He peeled of a twenty and handed it over to the woman. “All right, then. You’re hungry? Go buy us all some food.”

  “With just twenty?”

  “Don’t wanna break the bank, girl.”

  She pursed her lips and held out her open hand. He rolled his eyes and gave me a ‘Can you believe this chick?’ grin, and then placed another twenty on her palm.

  She smiled and blew him a kiss. “That’s better. You want the usual?”

  “You know what I like. And what about your friends here?”

  She turned to me. “Do you know what you’d like?”

  I shrugged. “I guess I’ll have whatever he’s having.”

  “General Tso’s it is.”

  “Mel,” I suggested, “why don’t you go with her?”

  Melissa studied my face a moment, as if trying to get a read on what I had in mind, but after a moment she gave up the attempt and followed the Asian chick out of the building.

  For which I was grateful. Truth is, I didn’t know what I had in mind. What I did know was two things. One, that I was sitting in the presence of a drug dealer, borrowing money from him, in fact. And two, that I despised drug lords. Almost as much as I despised pedophiles.

  In retrospect, I suppose that’s why I was so willing to take out Mel’s old boyfriend, Gill. The man was scum through and through. But could Vic here really be all that better? Selling poison to kids who’d willingly turn tricks just so they could buy their next high?

  “So you’re Gerrold, huh?” Vic asked. “Not Jerry?”

  I frowned.

  “I mean, that’s what she called you earlier. And I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say your last name isn’t McHale, either, is it?”

  I realized then that he had my fake ID in his palm and was reading from it.

  “You wanna give that back?”

  “Think I’ll hold on to it. Just till you pay me back.” He sucked his teeth. “Still, if McHale’s not your real name, it’s got me wondering what is. Such an odd name to choose, too. McHale doesn’t even make the top thousand most common names. Now most people, when they put together a fake ID, they go for something innocuous and reasonably common. Like Johnson. Williams. Or Smith. But I suppose a name like Jerry Smith would be just a little too close to home. Wouldn’t it, Gerrold?”

  I shifted in my seat, putting my weight over the balls of my feet, ready to spring.

  “Still, even Gerrold Smith is a fairly common name. Famous, too. But then, you’d know that. Seems a guy up in New York got himself into a bit of trouble ‘bout five years back. Bombed a school. Torched a courthouse. Killed some people. You ever get up to New York, there, Gerrold? Oh wait. How stupid of me.” He held up the license. “You’re from New York. But then, this license is a fake, so I suppose you could be from anywhere. Hell of a coincidence, though, wouldn’t you say? Ah, but what am I saying? Gerrold Smith the domestic terrorist is dead, isn’t he? Burned to a crisp during a strange, drug-induced bad trip that struck the whole prison where he’d been incarcerated.”

  “You sure do know a lot about him,” I muttered.

  “Well, yeah. I do like to follow the news. I also like to know who’s been staying under my roof. Gotta make sure we haven’t got any cops coming in undercover, know what I’m saying, chief? That’s why I always do a careful investigation. But then, you’re definitely not a cop. Which I guess, brings me to my point. What’s a dead guy like you doing in a nice place like this?”

  I heaved a breath. “I suppose I’m just trying to get back on my feet.”

  “Is that a fact?”

  I nodded. “I didn’t come here of my own volition.”

  “No, but you kinda came back that way. I guess that’s why I’m curious about your intentions. I don’t mind supplying a room to somebody who’s gotta recover from a bad trip. Sorta like the ancient laws of hospitality, know what I’m saying?”

  “And I appreciate that.”

  He nodded. “Good. That’s… real comforting.”

  “I imagine it is.”

  “Tell me about this pay day you’re expecting.”

  I chewed my lip, wondering whether or not I should let him in on it. He knew so much already. I didn’t particularly want him for an ally. And if he chose to make himself an enemy, I wouldn’t have a problem with that, either. I was confident I could take him out without much fuss, and the wad of cash he was sitting on could keep me from having to get the crap beat out of me later—or from having to kill a guy who’s only interest was in fighting for a pay day.

  On the other hand, there might be a way to kill two birds with one stone.

  “I’m gonna do a fight.”

  “Banger’s place?” his eyes lit up. “You’re gonna get your ass kicked.”

  “I doubt it.”

  “You’d best not be planning to throw that fight. Banger don’t pay if you lose, and he won’t let someone in your corner bet against you.”

  “So he explained.”

  “So you think you can win?”

  “I think I have to.”

  “‘kay. How you gonna do that?”

  “Let me ask you a question. Let’s say that I am this domestic terrorist who’s supposed to be dead. Only I ain’t dead—because that would just be weird. This guy held an entire city hostage—took out the cops, the judge who was sentencing him, the bailiff who was enforcing her will, and pretty much held that city for ransom. He survived all of that, and a pretty severe fire, and while he was at it, managed to take out the heads of a major child sex trafficking ring who’d been operating with the full knowledge and acquiescence of the local authorities. If I’m that guy, and now I faked my own death and escaped from a maximum security prison, what do you think my odds are of surviving a tiny little cage match with some young thug jumped up on steroids and not talented enough to make it as a professional fighter?”

  He studied the ceiling a moment, stroking his chin. “Well, I might just be willing to consider putting down a bet on a man like that. Theoretically speaking, of course. Still, that didn’t quite answer my question.”

  “That’s a shame. It’s bound to be the only answer you’re gonna get.”

  “Hmm. You’re not planning on cheating, are ya?”

  I shook my head.

  “Banger know your ribs is busted up?”

  “Not that I know of. But then again, he may be asking around about me, seeing as how I busted up his face a bit.”

  Vic frowned. “You been banging on Banger? Not saying he doesn’t deserve it, but damn. He’ll pull out all the stops to be sure he wins.”

  I nodded. “And the odds against me winning will be astronomical.”

  “So a bigger pay day if you win.”

  “That’s right.”

  “And your girl’s okay with that?”

  “Not remotely.”

  He laughed and threw his head back against the chair. “You do tell it like it is. I like you, Jerry McHale. I just might have to come see this fight tonight. I think I could even stand to wager a couple of bucks on the outcome. I tell you what: you win tonight, dinner’s on me.”

  “Fair enough.”

  Just then, the girls returned with the food. “Well, well,” he said. “Bon appétit!”

  Chapter 17

  Mel wasn’t too happy when I explained that Vic and his girl would be accompanying us to the fight. Even less so when I told her he knew who I was.

  “Ger, we can’t stay ‘round here. We gotta get scarce.”

  “Yeah? Well how’re we gonna do that without any dough? Look, I agree with you. And I want to get out of here just as quickly and as desperately as you do. But we’ve got to do this first. We need the money. Plain and simple.” I took a bite of the chicken, struggling to get it to my lips with the chopsticks. The Asian chick, whose name, Mel informed me, was Candi, of all things, appeared to be an expert with them, and took turns placing pieces of chicken in Vic’s mouth and her own. Futilely, I skewered another piece.

  “So Vic,” I said between bites, “think you can do something for me?”

  He snorted. “You mean besides feed you? House you?”

  A grin tugged at my mouth. “I need a rumor started. The kind of thing that’ll spread like wildfire through the fight tonight. After it starts. That’s critical.”

  He furrowed his brow. “What’s that?”

  “Nothing much. Just the truth.”

  Mel stopped eating mid-bite.

  Vic broke into a confused grin. “Okay. What truth is that?”

  “The truth,” I skewered another piece of chicken, “that Banger has put his best fighter into a ring with a cold-blooded convicted murderer, an escaped convict with nothing to lose. Think you can do that?”

  “Ger?” Mel found her voice. I touched her hand and kept my eyes fixed on Vic.

  After a moment, he nodded. “Sure. What are you playing at?”

  “Insurance.”

  Mel put her chicken down, rose, and left the room. I finished chewing, thanked Vic for the chicken, and followed.

  She’d gone out to the front porch. The air out here still swam with humidity and trapped heat. Lights had come on outside, but the sky was still that mixture of vanilla and blue—the crest of the shadow as day turned to darkness. She stood with her arms wrapped around her chest, staring over the street.

  I came up behind her and put my hands on her shoulders. I felt her stiffen beneath my touch. I bent forward and kissed her cheek.

  “I forgot,” she mumbled.

  I kissed her neck. “Forgot what?”

  “How much you scare me.”

  “I scare you?”

  “You’re like those bombs that you set. So random. Chaotic. Uncontrollable.”

  Uncontrollable, I mused. Is that what’s eating you, Mel? “Bombs aren’t as chaotic as you think. True, they unleash a lot of force, and if you’re not careful you can get hurt. But if you know the power, the strength, the brisance, the shape of the charge, and the stress points of whatever structure you’re destroying, you can reasonably predict what will happen with a given explosion.”

  She shrugged. “Guess I don’t know much about explosives.”

  “But you do know me.”

  “Do I?”

  “You do.”

  We stayed that way for a long time.

  ***

  The fight began just after sundown. We met Dodge with Vic and Candi in tow. Not surprisingly, they all seemed to know each other. Soon we joined a furtive sea of humanity filing into the warehouse from every direction. The people wandering in looked like a cross-section of the city’s dark underbelly. The Hispanic oaths of Puerto Ricans and Filipinos mingled with huskier Russian and Serbian accents, Arabic dialects, and the lilt of African American hip hop. I listened to the voices as we wove through the crowd, following Dodge as he led us to the corner where I’d enter the ring.

  Above our heads, brilliant lights glared down on the worn concrete, glinting off the chain link mesh of the cage where the fighters would duke it out. A shirtless Chicano with a cigarette dangling out of his mouth and a clipboard in his paws shouted instructions. “Challengers to the right. Defenders to the left. Yo, sort it out, y’all.”

  He nodded at Dodge, took one look at me and said, “You the Human Torch?”

  Dodge swore. “What you talking about? The Human Torch was part of the Fantastic Four. He look like a comic book to you?”

  “Looks a bit like Freddy Krueger if you ask me.”

  “Freddy? What? Look, yo, this here’s the Torch.”

  “Just Torch,” Mel said. I raised an eye in her direction.

  Dodge corrected, “Just Torch. You got that? You writing that down?”

  “Torch. Right. Yeah, I got it. To the left.”

  I followed his directions to the left and took my place in line. Dodge said, “‘Kay. S’here’s the thing: challengers and defenders come out one at a time, and fight till someone loses. KO or tap out. There ain’t no weapons allowed, but after that there ain’t no rules, neither. People been known to lose an eye or worse in that cage. You win, you get to be a defender next time out.”

  “Defenders ever fight each other?”

  “Sure. That’s in the second round. Newly crowned defenders become the challengers, along with the newest of the rest—just so that we wind up with an even number of matches, see?”

  “Sure. That makes sense. How long does this go on for?”

  Dodge glanced up and down the line. “Don’t know. Looks like maybe nine opening matches. That’s bad. Odd number, see. Nine winners’ll match up. They’ll have to bring out somebody else for the tenth. Then there’ll be five winners, making three matches. Winners of those three will enter a sudden death round.”

  “Sudden death round?” said Mel, concern rising in her voice.

  “Yeah. Three fighters against each other. Last one standing wins.”

  I breathed out an expletive and gripped Mel’s hand. “No worries, babe. I just gotta win the first round, and then we’re out of here.”

  Dodge gave me a nervous grin. “Not exactly.”

  “What do you mean, ‘not exactly’?”

  “It’s—ah—kind of an unwritten rule. Once you enter the cage, you don’t come out until you’re the last man standing. You’re expected to roll your winnings from one bout into the pot for the next. Makes for a bigger payout at the end for whoever wins.”

  “But it’s not required, right?” Mel asked.

  Dodge scratched his chin. “Like I said, it’s kind of an unwritten rule.”

  “Look,” I told her, “you bet like I’ve told you, and we won’t need to keep going.”

  “I wouldn’t advise throwing the fight,” Dodge cautioned.

  “Wouldn’t think of it.”

  I took my place in line, and moved to a bench in front of the cage. Across the floor, the defenders took their respective seats as well. Then the house lights dimmed, and a single cone of light was left glowing over the center of the cage. The crowd grew silent, tense, like a predator waiting to spring. I found my eyes drawn to the man seated directly across from me. He was big. Bigger than me. Solidly built. Didn’t look like he had an ounce of fat on him. He was giving me a thousand yard stare. I knew it was meant to intimidate, to warn me that he was a threat. I’d seen it many times before, especially in the fresh fish that came into the prison. They all assumed it was about the pecking order, proving how tough you were. Those of us who’d been through it ourselves knew none of that crap mattered. I met his eyes with a bored expression. Which was true. I didn’t care what sort of street fighting skills or Kung Pow Chicken he thought he knew. There was still a world of difference between fighting to beat someone up and win a match, and killing a man, and I was fully prepared to do what I had to do.

  Banger took center stage, raising his arms to tepid applause, before putting a wireless mic to his lips. “Gonna have ourselves a good fight tonight, y’all. We got nine matches to start, and a special guest coming out of retirement just for the second round so we keep it all nice and even like. May I draw your attention to his greatness, the undefeated master of the cage, Hans Brueger!”

  A roar went up from the crowd, and I glanced upward at a human mountain with a bald head, cauliflower ears, and an expression as bored as mine on his face. I wondered if he’d still insist on fighting once I quit after the first round and walked away. He didn’t look like he cared one way or another.

  Banger kept talking, but that’s when it hit me: Brueger was his ace in the hole—the one he intended me to fight, to teach me a lesson. But first, he wanted to see how I moved, let Hans get a look at me before he stepped into the cage with me. Pity he’d never get the chance.

  The first two fighters entered the cage and began their match while I took a seat on the bench. They started by touching fists, and then quickly danced away from each other. What followed looked like something out of a standard MMA bout, with each man feinting punches and hurling kicks out at the other until one man surged in on the other and tackled him to the floor. From there, it began a slow moving grappling contest as both men sweated and grunted their way toward a submission hold on the other. The man on the bottom managed to slip the man on top into a Kimura, and applied pressure until the other tapped out.

  Next came a pair of boxers duking it out until both were black and blue and bloody with swollen eyes. One connected with a hard uppercut, and the other went down. Stupidly, the fighter danced back and waited till the downed man got to his feet. Why he didn’t finish him off then and there mystified me. The second man shook it off, and when the boxer came at him again, stepped in and cold-cocked him with a forearm to the face. When this guy went down, the other showed no mercy and pummeled him into oblivion.

  Then it was my turn. As my opponent stepped into the ring, I took off my shirt. A sudden hush fell over the crowd when they saw my bandages, and I could hear the murmurs of surprise at the wrappings. I slid a finger beneath the tape and removed it, unwinding the bandage till it fell away, and the dark, ugly bruise of my broken rib showed glaringly in the stark light of the overhead fluorescents.

  I stepped into the cage. The fighter I was to meet shook his head, his ‘thousand yard stare’ and carefully constructed demeanor all but gone.

  “Man, what are you doing?” he asked.

  “Paying the mortgage. You?”

  “Damn baby. You shouldn’t be here.”

  “Let’s find out. And don’t call me baby.”

  I glanced around, and spotted Mel placing our money on me. The odds against me winning had to have been stratospheric at this point. I found Vic and raised an eyebrow toward him when he caught my eye. He gave me a quick thumbs-up. Hopefully, that meant he’d started the rumor about who and what I was.

  My opponent came forward with his fist extended. I smiled, nodded, and stepped quickly inside his reach. Before he could blink I hit him hard in the throat, stomped on his knee, and grabbed his chin and the back of his head as he went down, ready to snap his neck.

  Mel screamed, “No!”

  I caught her eye, and froze for only a second. I could feel the fighter clawing at my hands.