Cristobal Rodriguez ♦ Coyote (coyoti) wrote in paxletalelogs, @ 2017-06-27 09:26:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | charon, coyote |
but what if I could ask you only one thing
Who: Carver & Chris.
What: Obed's right hand man investigates one of his friend's newfound business ventures.
Where: 3-Thirty-3 Bar.
When: Backdated to June 7, evening.
Chris waited by the bar, having arrived early (as usual) to both scope out the location suggested and to find a comfortable, enclosed spot to sit where he could watch traffic coming and going. His hand was wrapped around a scotch; it was early to be drinking, but he was in a bar, and such things were customary in such places.
Now he was merely waiting for the man Obed had suggested he meet with, in order to make sure everyone was comfortable with how things were proceeding. As expected, there'd been a little pushback from the sale of his real estate; current tenants were refusing to be evicted, instead trashing properties with graffiti and damage. Of course, the fact that said tenants were drug dealers went unsaid.
Chris' fingers ringed the top of his glass, encircling it, twirling the container around its contents. He glanced away from the doorway for a moment, which, inevitably, seemed to coax his guest through its entrance.
The man looked something of a mismatch - his jaw was unshaven and his hair, though swept back from his face, was too long to be entirely businesslike and slightly mussed, but his suit was good quality and pristine. He looked around the bar, first passing over Chris entirely before returning to him. He frowned faintly, as if recalling something, and then put on a broad smile, tugging the front of his suit jacket straight as he made his way over. “Chris Rodriguez, I hope?”
Chris turned back, eyes catching hold of someone he didn't quite expect. He kept that reaction from his face, though; he was in the business of needing to be able to turn on a dime, so something like this wasn't going to cause him to do something stupid. He bobbed his head.
"Ray Carver?" He waved at the seat next to him, inviting the other man to sit.
“You got it.” Carver extended a hand. Chris took it in his own firm grip, pumping Carver's hand twice before releasing it. “You want to stay here or grab a table in the corner?”
"Corner," Chris replied with a nod, waving for Carver to walk first and make his own selection. It was also an attempt to hide his limp, lest the man pre-judge him for something he had little control over.
“Works for me.” Carver briefly let his attention drift from Chris to catch the bartender’s attention, order and receive a pint of the local seasonal beer on tap. Carrying the beer, he indicated the smaller table in the corner by the front of the bar, then led the way there. The two men shuffled in that direction quietly, Chris managing to slip into a chair nearly synonymously with Carver, his drink bobbing only slightly in its glass before him. “So the boss says you’re looking to possibly move some property?”
Chris bobbed his head, sliding his drink between both hands. "A few things, just to get some money in pocket. He said you'd be verifying what I have to offer in return?"
Carver frowned briefly. He looked like he wanted to say something, and then just sighed before nodding. He took a long drink of beer, and then said, “Much as I can.”
One brow arching, Chris nodded and from within his dress jacket withdrew a manila folder. It held all of the information regarding the source he'd described to Obed, the man they'd be able to deal with and thus remove a good portion of the drug dealing from within some of Obed's lesser properties. Of course, the copy would not be walking out with Carver; it was merely a show of good faith, to prove that Chris was here to work with them and get things done. As he slid it across the table, he sipped from his glass, somewhat anxiously watching and waiting to see how the other man might react.
Carver thumbed through the file, glancing at and then flipping the photos over quickly, taking longer to skim the profile and movement record of the man. After several minutes, he nodded slightly. “If all this is true, his arrest would certainly clean up a couple of the neighborhoods the boss is concerned about. That said… I don’t think I’d hand this off to the boss without double checking it, no offense. I don’t know you well enough to know you wouldn’t frame someone you didn’t like. Or how you might come by this kind of information.”
Chris shrugged. "I'd think you were an idiot if you did. But I can't let you have the whole envelope; you can take the guy's name, see what you find. That's about as much as I can put on offer right now. I guarantee you won't find anything as neat as what I've put together right there for you, but I think you could see enough dirt to find out that he's the one you want.
"We start moving on my properties," he continued, leaning back in his seat and casually extending an arm over the backrest of the chair next to him, "and we can talk about handing over the rest. Maybe do a nice little 50/50 deal?"
“Fair enough,” Carver said, nodding, “long as I don’t turn up anything unpleasant about you when I run this guy’s name. I’m assuming you wouldn’t be that stupid, of course, so it’s probably a moot point, but the boss doesn’t need more trouble after that pure and utter bullshit that TMZ chick cooked up. You understand, right?”
Chris held up his hands, palms out flat. "I don't truck with that kind of crap. I saw that, by the way; hard to believe your boss didn't just sue for libel. It seemed like an open and shut case." He picked up his drink, swirling it for a moment before sipping. He turned a critical eye on Carver.
"So how's someone like you end up working for someone like Mr. Brandt? You handle a lot of this sort of thing for him?"
“He didn’t think it was worth the legal fees, especially when they tripped all over their feet to take it down once he had his lawyer let ‘em know how much he didn’t want to pay those legal fees.” Carver shrugged. “And yeah, I sort out shit for him when he needs. It’s not my favorite thing to do, but he’s got bigger things to handle.” He shrugged again. “He and I have been friends a long time. Worked up the ranks together. But I owe him; he got me back on the straight and narrow after years of wandering, and I’ll always appreciate that.” He dragged his fingertips down the side of his pint glass, cutting tracks through the condensation there. “And you? What’s your story? All that property and no need to work for a living? I didn’t see any rich uncles leaving you millions in your financial history.”
A smile flitted over Chris' face. "I've got friends in high places, which I'm sure you'd understand. Not quite the same story as you, but a similar path. Less...getting out of things and more into.
"So, what else did you dig up on me? I figured that would end up happening, but I'm always curious what people are able to find out. I like to think I keep myself pretty quiet." He covered his mouth with another sip from the glass, finishing it. Setting the empty down on the table, he let one hand spread over the tabletop, eyes focused on the man across from him.
Carver’s mouth curved, dimples flashing. “Standard practice when the boss is looking to invest in somebody or something, of course. Let’s see…” His gaze darted upwards, eyes squinting slightly as he summoned the relevant information. “You got in a bit of trouble as a kid - records sealed, of course, but assuming it wasn’t too bad - and after highschool you seemed to say ‘fuck it’ to a formal education. But whatever you’ve been doing since, you haven’t left much of a paper trail, other than the odd job here and there, and yet you’ve acquired a good chunk of property to your name. So your friends in high places are certainly good friends.” He shifted slightly on the barstool. “Either you’ve got a talent for inspiring loyalty, or you do some kind of work off the books. Professional gigolo, or some kind of a con artist, or hell. Your rich uncle owns a chain of restaurants you manage but he pays you under the table.” He smiled again, but one hand drew restless patterns on the side of his pint glass. “I’ll be honest, I’m not entirely comfortable with that fact, but the boss says you’re not up to anything I need to worry about, and I’m trusting him on this. If it were up to me, I’d have my guy look a little deeper.”
"Professional gigolo," Chris echoed back, just barely keeping from rolling his eyes. "Haven't heard that one before, but maybe it takes one to know one? Anyway, all of that sounds about right. I don't know if I should apologize that my apparently dull life story isn't enough to inspire some trust, but I guess it's good I'm doing business with your boss and not you." He held out a hand for the folder he'd offered Carver a moment before. "But unless you've got more questions, I've got more appointments, so... What do you say about wrapping this up?"
Carver made a low “hmmm” in the back of his throat, clearly amused at Chris’s abrupt request to end their conversation. “In a--” he started to say, and then abruptly stopped, his gaze focusing on something faraway. His fingers went limp against his glass, and then his hand slid off the table entirely. The lights in the bar created the unsettling illusion that his irises were luminous and gold. “I think your heart is set on the right road,” he said softly, and his voice had become both deeper and grimmer. “But… the secrets you’re hiding… You’re just making the way more difficult for yourself. You might still come out all right in the end, I can’t see that far….” His eyes narrowed slightly, like he was studying something. “Better that you come clean to him. Things will be much easier for you.”
Then, just as abruptly, Carver refocused, said, “--to leave, are we?”, picked up his beer, and drank cheerfully. He chuckled.
A blank stare followed Carver's motions; there had been a lot of weird things happening lately, so what was one more? But a man sitting across from him going into some sort of trance, only to break out of it as though nothing had happened, was more than he was prepared for in the moment. Especially this far outside of the apartment complex, which seemed to be the epicenter for all the weirdness.
"Hold up," he said, his hand moving down to grasp his own empty glass, sliding it forward as he leaned over the table. "What the fuck was that? What the fuck do you know?"
Carver frowned, clearly confused. “I think I just laid out everything I know…and didn’t know? To be honest, I was hoping you’d willingly fill me in on some of that shit, if you were as decent as the boss says, but… I guess everyone’s got shit to hide.”
"No, no," Chris squeezed his eyes closed as though that would help him mentally reorder and thus understand what he'd just seen. He just barely kept himself from pinching the bridge of his nose in the universal gesture of 'I can't believe this is happening'. "What you just said. Come clean to who about what?"
Carver gave Chris a look like he’d grown another head. “I think you must have misheard me. Hell, maybe you ought to get your ears checked. It isn’t that loud in here, yet. All I said was you seemed eager to leave.” He laughed.
The expression on Chris' face said clearly that he thought the other man was insane. That, in itself, presented a whole new facet to this interaction.
"No, that's not everything you said, and now I think you're just fucking with me, which... Is this a fucking test, or something? Because you're not making me feel better about the deal I made with your boss." He reached across the table and slapped his hand down on the envelope, its contents still somewhat spread about, drawing the information back toward himself. "Cut the shit, man, I don't need some loco assistant trying to scare me. I'm here to do a legitimate deal."
Carver amused smile gave way to open puzzlement, his brow furrowing and mouth spreading into a crooked line.
“Hey, buddy, so am I, and I'm not sure I want to recommend the boss do business with someone who can't hear shit, makes up what he can't hear and then gives me a hard time for it. If you want to keep playing at that, we can walk away from this deal right now.”
Chris grimaced, slightly, doing his best to hold warring emotions within. He took a deep breath, and let it out.
"OK, look. You were making your little joke about me trying to get out of here, and then... You did this trance thing. Like you were here, but not. And then you said something about being honest with someone. That my, uh, heart," here he winced, but kept his voice low, "was in the right place. But that I'm just making stuff harder for myself. Who'd you mean? Your boss?
"You got, I don't know, some kind of condition?" He watched Carver warily, his question asked as nicely as he could given their mutual lack of knowledge of each other and their situation, trying to keep their tentative negotiations intact. He needed this to work out, and badly. He could only hope that the other man seated across the table would be willing to figure out whatever was going on; people spouting what sounded like prophecy were not an obstacle he had anticipated.
Carver’s confusion deepened. “Trance thing?” His eyes unfocused slightly, like he was recalling the past exchanges. He shook his head again, but now there was doubt in his face. “Look, I really don’t have a clue what you’re talking about--”
And just as abruptly as before, the confusion in his face gave way to an unfocused distance. The light took up in his eyes again, and this time, Chris couldn’t be sure it was a reflection. “You know who I mean. The man of the house. Don’t lie to yourself. You know you must come clean, or walk the harder road.”
The spell faded again, but this time, Carver sagged forward, gasping, when he came back to himself. He looked at Chris, bewildered, before he went suddenly boneless, collapsing forward onto the table between them. It was an almost funny thing, to watch such a fit, sturdy man suddenly faint like a lady in a fairy tale.
"Shit," Chris muttered, glancing around to see if anyone was watching this bizarre exchange. No one seemed to have noticed Carver's peculiar responses. Chris leaned forward, his voice low.
"You need water or something? Jesu cristo, don't make me call a fucking ambulance to this place. This was supposed to be a low key meeting." His words were a half-hearted joke, the offer of a drink definitely more grounded. Carver's words left no room for interpretation; Chris knew exactly who and what he was talking about, and how he knew, Chris had no idea.
Carver roused at Chris’s words, shaking his head like a dazed animal. His words were slurred. “Water. Yeah… nah. I--” He slid off the barstool, somewhat finding his feet, stumbling a little. He shook his head again. “‘M gonna go. Nice t’ talk t’ ya.”
Chris rose with the other man, still concerned. "You...gonna make it all right?" He lingered by the table, uncertain if he should follow.
Gratefulness flickered over Carver’s face, and then he waved Chris off. “‘l'll be good…” he mumbled, and before Chris could argue, he tottered off into the bar crowd, beelining for the exit.
Chris remained standing, watching the other man go. Once he was clear of the doorway, Chris sank back into his seat, mulling over what had just happened. He turned back to the envelope still on the table and tucked it into his suit jacket; then he made his own exit, too perturbed to remain in the nearly empty restaurant.