Page 20 of Hard to Kill

Jimmy is bound to what he’s sure is one of his kitchen chairs. Before he even knows she’s on him, the woman hits him with what has to be a full wind-up slap across his face, nearly knocking the chair he’s bound to over on its side.

“Do we have your attention now?” the guy asks.

“What,” Jimmy says, “you got tired of sending texts and came here for a more hands-on approach?”

“Do you want a little more?” the woman asks.

“Not tonight, dear. I have a headache.”

The guy chuckles. “I told you he’s a funny bastard. Didn’t I tell you this guy is a funny bastard?”

“Is there a purpose to this visit?”

“Now that you mention it,” the guy says.

Jimmy thinks he even sounds a little like Champi. Older voice. Raspy. Some New York in it. Almost like he could have come out of Jimmy’s old neighborhood.

“I want you and your friend, when she gets back from Switzerland, to stop looking into things you don’t need to be looking into. We like things we fix to stay fixed.”

“You know about Switzerland?”

“Want to know which seat she sat in on the flight over?”

Jimmy feels his fingers losing circulation. Knocked out and tied up in his own home. First time for everything. If there were just one, Jimmy could try to bull-rush him, even with his hands tied behind him. But there’s two of them. And there are guys Jimmy was in the ring with who couldn’t hit as hard as this woman.

“You want to waste your time defending that asshole again, have at it. I kept telling Joe he wasn’t worth it, but Joe just didn’t want the gravy train to end. Either way, Jacobson’s going down this time.”

“You sound pretty sure of that.”

“He did it. I thought Joe told you that.”

“So what’s in this for you?”

“My business, not yours. Let the trial play out. Then you and the cancer patient go on and live happy lives. Hers will be shorter, of course. Just stay away from Eddie McKenzie, starting now.”

“Did McKenzie call you after I put him against the wall?”

Now the guy laughs hard enough that he starts coughing.

“You got no idea what you’re into. No wonder you busted out of the cops. You still don’t know what you don’t know.”

“I know you could have killed me tonight if you wanted,” Jimmy says.

“I need you around, to get her tocomearound.”

“And if she doesn’t?”

“Then she unfortunately dies of something other than cancer,” the guy says. “While you watch.”

He shoves Jimmy hard enough that the chair goes over and he ends up on his back. The guy laughs again and they leave him there.

SIXTEEN

AS SOON AS I’M awake at the Meier Clinic, every morning, first thing, I check my hair.

My nose is nearly pressed against the bathroom mirror after I’ve made what I consider to be a full forensic examination of my pillows, making sure I haven’t backslid, hairwise, overnight.

It doesn’t mean I’m getting better, necessarily. But still having a full head of hair makes me feel better.

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