Those were the kinds of things Frankie Rollins liked to think about when walking through a place for the first time.
He walked over to the tables, the blackjack and Caribbean poker, and saw that the felt was fuzzy. No matted places where the schmucks sat, no burn marks or blemishes from spilled drinks. That could be bad or good—either they didn’t have much card action on these cruises, or Sefelis Industries took the time and expense to replace the felt when it got natty. He hoped it didn’t mean the card tables had just been added to the venue, which might mean inexperienced dealers and lots of headaches. Not that he gave a shit about the take, not on this level, but Moore was right about one thing: Be it ships or casinos, when things went to shit, the moneymen started headhunting.
The far wall was lined with flat-screens for the sports book. The Sox played later tonight; Frankie would have to remember to come up and see what the line was, maybe drop a twenty. He hadn’t been in Boston long, but it was strange how little things could open you up to the right people. Little doorways, like becoming a Sox fan, usually led nowhere. Sometimes, though, a comment about the wisdom of the starting rotation, or why the manager was or was not a douche bag, led to a conversation. And once in a while that conversation became interesting.
He moved closer to the bank of screens. CNN was playing an aerial video of a rescue operation off the coast of Nova Scotia. A few people had washed up onto a bleak escarpment of brown rock, little yellow penguins waving at the chopper. The scrolling tagline underneath read:
ROGUE WAVES CONTINUE TO PLAGUE NORTHEAST COAST. SURVIVOR SAYS THE BOAT FELT LIKE IT “BROKE IN HALF” UNDERNEATH HIM. TWELVE STILL MISSING.
Frankie waved at a nearby bartender, a young black guy who was wiping out wineglasses. “You wanna turn the station, friend?”
The bartender looked up, saw what was on the screen, and flipped the channel to a soap opera without saying a word. Frankie had seen the soap before; even the names were familiar. He watched for a second, seeing if anybody’d got their shit together in the past decade. No, same problems. He moved on, taking a moment to drop a twenty in the empty wineglass next to the bar’s register. He glanced back as he opened the door to the lower levels, in time to see the bartender fold the twenty into the pocket of his white oxford shirt. He grinned at Frankie and Frankie nodded back, knowing he had made his first friend on the
Nokomis.
* * *
The next level down, C, was lodging. Frankie strolled through the busy hallway, nodding and smiling to people who didn’t seem to notice him. The air smelled of people, sweat and cologne and perfume, and under it was the constant saline odor of the harbor. There were smaller rooms near the bow and Rollins saw those were crammed with younger men and women, partiers, smuggled booze bottles already perched in places of honor on top of the faux teak dressers.
He turned the corner of the hallway and went down the port side of C-deck, where the small rooms gave way to onboard facilities. There was a small medical room, currently unstaffed, and next to it a large room labeled
DAYCARE
. There was a small deli-slash-pharmacy in the center of C-level, with a bloated, goateed man behind the counter. An attractive blonde was trying to find something to eat for the brat hanging on her leg, while studiously ignoring the eye-fucking Mr. Goatee was giving her.
“You want a sandwich?” the blonde said. The kid shook her head. “You’ve got to eat something. How about an apple?”
“Uh-uh.”
Frankie could’ve told her, no kid who just boarded a big ship wants to eat a damned apple.
“M&M’s,” he said. “With vanilla ice cream. Ship special.”
The woman glared at Frankie, and he waved an apology as he walked past, the kid now babbling about ice cream. He turned the corner in the hallway, feeling the woman’s eyes burning into the back of his head. He didn’t get it. All these parents, they spent a couple grand to get away, brought the source of their tiredness with them, didn’t relax, couldn’t take a joke. He wondered if it was guilt or love. If there was even a difference.
At the far corner of the port side was Room C85, and Frankie withdrew the key card from his wallet and passed it through the lock. He stepped inside, giving the door an extra little shove to get it to latch behind him. It was a newly constructed room, built around an existing stairwell, and it had the feel of a rushed job. Hell, the entire ship’s construction seemed lightweight, shoddy, a bad vibe for a gambling venue. In Vegas, in AC, there was a distinct feeling of substance in the infrastructure, a connection. You started to lose your ass at the table, you could lean down, grab hold of it, feel yourself secured to seven, eight feet of concrete. Anchor yourself, even as your money was flying away. Out here, you started losing money, the waves and the bird’s-nest construction would probably send you straight to your room, make you tuck your credit cards under the mattress.
“Who is this?”
There were two men in the room, a large man who looked maybe Samoan and an even larger Scandinavian-looking guy with his long blond hair tied in the back. Great big slabs for arms, his face flushed red. It was the white guy who had spoken, in a clipped Nordic accent.
Hue is tiss?
Frankie looked at the Samoan. The guy in the chair—always talk to the guy who was sitting down.
“Frankie Rollins. You guys with Prower or Latham?”
“You got the wrong room, little Frank,” the Scandinavian said, taking a step forward. “Nobody’s here but me and Adrian.”
“They’re expecting me,” Frankie said, nodding at the door in the back of the room. “I got business downstairs.”
“Is dead-end room,” the man said. “Our room.”
“Shit,” Frankie said. “Here I thought I was going to go talk to my clients, and what I did was”—he looked directly at the big Swede, or Dane, or whatever the hell he was—“I went and barged into your love nest before you could assume the position. You’re the submissive one, Thor?”
“Funny,” Thor said, and placed a hand on Frankie’s shoulder. “Outside, little guy. Before you get in an accident.”
Frankie considered his options. It was a small room, and Thor’s massive hand was clamped firmly on his shoulder. “Frankie Rollins,” he said again, looking around Thor’s mass to Adrian. “Check with them, friend. I had the key card to get into this room, didn’t I?”
Adrian didn’t move. The hand shifted from Frankie’s shoulder to the back of his neck, and then he was being propelled back toward the door. His feet touched the floor only two out of every three steps.
Well, shit. He couldn’t let it start out like this.
He lunged forward, out of Thor’s grip, and dropped to the floor. The big man was on him quick and Frankie rolled away, pulling the five-inch Buck knife from the scabbard on his hip, swiveling low and fast. Thor’s arm passed over him, grazing his back, and Frankie brought the knife down. The blade entered between Thor’s metatarsal bones and passed all the way through the white sneaker, quivering to a stop deep in the wood floor.
Thor bellowed and Frankie rolled away again, the big fist slamming into the floorboards where he’d been a second earlier. Adrian was watching them, frowning, and Frankie saw he’d made a mistake. Adrian wasn’t in charge; hell, Adrian’s lightbulb wasn’t even screwed all the way into the socket. No, if there was a boss in this room, he’d just stabbed him in the foot.
Frankie shook his head at Adrian, who was just now reaching under his jacket. “Nope,” he said, showing him the 9mm Glock he already held in his hand. “Better go downstairs and tell them what happened. You remember my name?”
“Yeah,” Adrian said. “I remember it.”
“Go on, then,” Frankie said, pointing to the door with the muzzle of his gun. “I’ll take care of your buddy.”
* * *
After Adrian went out the back door to D-level, Frankie moved closer to Thor, who was half-bent, not quite touching the hilt of the knife. His back heaving like a bellows.
Frankie had seen a documentary once, where this trapper up in Maine had caught a fisher, this big mean-ass weasel sort of thing. It was caught by the front paw in a leghold trap and there was a catch-circle around it, a black patch of frozen topsoil torn into the snowy ground. The trapper had stepped inside the circle to release it—fisher season wasn’t open yet, the narrator said in a dry voice—and just like that the fisher had darted forward and ripped away a chunk of the guy’s jeans, and a piece of the guy’s calf, faster than you could blink. Blood spraying onto the frozen dirt, the guy hopping backwards, the fisher maybe not going to be so gently released now. Rollins had played the attack in slow motion a bunch of times, lying slouched on the recliner in his apartment with his bourbon-rocks resting on his belly, thinking there was some kind of lesson there. Not getting too close to a dangerous animal being first and foremost, especially if you had good intentions.
Bad intentions, that was okay, just knock it on the head.
“I understand you were doing your job,” Frankie said. “You got responsibilities, yeah, nobody gets through to D-deck. Assholes should’ve let you know I was coming.”
Thor breathed in deeply, his head turning slightly, looking at Frankie out of the corner of his eye. Frankie looked down the massive leg to the knife and sneaker now perfectly motionless. He had only started carrying a blade after the incident in the desert, a knife at first and then, because a blade seemed silly, almost archaic, he bought the Glock. At first the pistol felt strangely heavy when he slid it into the shoulder holster, too dense, like he was carrying some mercury-filled secret with him. Affected his mood, made him less friendly, and he wasn’t full up in the friendly department to begin with. He got used to it, in time. He’d gotten used to lots of stuff.
Blood began to leak out the side of Thor’s sneaker.
“That’s gotta hurt.”
“Is starting to,” Thor said. “I’ve never been stabbed before this.”
“I would have preferred we shake hands,” Frankie said. “Listen, you’re gonna be working for me on this show. I already cleared that with both the guys, Latham and Prower, both their lieutenants know the drill. Hornydog and the Russian.”
“Hornaday,” Thor said. “Hornaday and Kharkov.”
“Sure,” Frankie said. “They might act like they’re in charge, but I’m boss.”
“Yes, is fine.” No doubt Thor was feeling it now, the building pain fraying the edge of his voice. “You pull this knife out,
chef
?”
“I’m not a cook, you big fucking dork.”
“Is Swedish,” Thor said, then groaned. “Means ‘man in charge.’”
Frankie could hear voices below them, at the base of the stairwell, and saw Adrian had left the door slightly ajar. The gap between the door and the doorframe wasn’t quite square. Surprise, surprise.
The voices grew louder, and now Frankie could hear somebody moving at the base of the stairs. In a few moments they would be up here, looking for the guy who was supposed to run the show, keep things smooth. Come up and find a wounded giant bleeding all over the floor, and Frankie backed into a corner.
“I’m going to get that knife out of your foot,” Frankie said. “No reason we got to wait, right? But remember two things, Thor.”
The big man took another deep breath. “Yes?”
“There is only one
chef
,” Frankie said, kneeling forward and placing his hand around the hilt of the knife. Thor hissed at the pain and Frankie let him feel it for a second, wondering if the big man was going to reach down and turn him into a pretzel. “And if he has to stab you again, it ain’t gonna be in the foot.”
He pulled the knife up and out in one clean jerk, wiped the blade on the cuff of Thor’s pants, and slid it back into his sheath. He looked up, held Thor’s gaze for a second, then reached down and unlaced his bloody sneaker. He felt the giant shift his mass above him, the floorboards groaning, and pulled the shoe free.
“Jesus,” Frankie said. “I bet there’s goddamn mushrooms inside this thing. You heard of Dr. Scholl’s?”
He tossed the shoe aside and scrolled Thor’s sock down over a large, hairless ankle, and used the dry upper portion of the sock to wipe the blood off Thor’s foot. After the blood was sopped up it didn’t look like much of a wound, a tiny red mouth in a big foot. He grabbed a towel from the bathroom, wrapped it around Thor’s foot, and helped him to a chair.
“It’s starting to hurt.”
Frankie nodded. “Couple minutes, we’ll go find a doc. I’ll get you on light duty the rest of the cruise, full paycheck. But no more misunderstandings between me and you. Got it, Thor?”
The massive head nodded. “My name is Christopher.”
Frankie placed the heel of his shoe on top of Christopher’s swaddled foot and pressed down. “I’ll say it one more time,” he said. “Won’t be no more misunderstandings. Between me and you, between me and anybody. There is, you get off your light duty and clear it up. I got more important things to do than play knife games. Understand?”
Thor’s upper lip quivered. “I understand,
chef
.”
“That’s good,” Frankie said, removing his heel. “We’re going to get along fine, Thor.”
Underneath them the ship shuddered, and Frankie put a hand against the wall as the directional props pushed the ship away from the dock.
* * *
The door creaked open. Frankie looked up to see a pale face staring at him from the darkness of the stairwell. A compact, powerfully built man moved into the light, his head and face covered with short bristles of hair, bloodshot eyes centered by pale irises. The man’s eyes shifted from Frankie to Thor, and then back to Frankie. He took another step forward, his black leather boots silent on the floorboards. Not so much stepping as gliding.
Frankie’s hand tightened on the Glock, and he made a conscious effort to put the gun back in its shoulder holster.
“You Latham’s man?”