Savage code, p.14
Savage Code, page 14
part #4 of The Porter Series
“That’s exactly what I want to do.” Porter pointed Rivera’s pistol at the ceiling and fired three times. The rounds shot up past the second floor and the walkway, into the structure of the roof.
The blasts were the universal signal to “Get the hell out.”
A stampede started: people from upstairs trying to cram their way down, people from the ground level pushing their way out in droves. The security guards who had been attentive to Osito were now pushed and jostled, lost in the scrum of fight-watchers who were trying to flee the gunfire.
Porter lost Harsh in the crowd, his opponent swallowed up by the wave of humanity.
“Get Camelot,” Porter said over his shoulder.
Rivera motioned to the man, who was sitting on his chair, bewildered.
Porter pulled Osito backward, away from the frenzied crowd “Where’s the back door?”
“I’m not telling—”
Porter jabbed the still-warm muzzle of Rivera’s Glock into Osito’s head. “Nothing would make me happier than to put a bullet in you right now. Wanna test me?”
Osito shook his head—at least, as much as Porter’s forearm would allow it to move. “It’s behind the damn ring. Be careful with that thing.”
“I got him,” Rivera said, pulling Camelot by the suit coat.
“You see a door behind the ring?”
Rivera wheeled around, Osito’s revolver in her hands. “I got one.”
“You lead,” Porter said. “I’ll bring up the rear.”
The small group moved, bumping and dodging and muscling their way past the crowd, until Porter heard, “It’s right here.”
He looked over his shoulder just enough to see Camelot push his way through a door, and Rivera holding it open for him to enter.
Dragging Osito with him as he went, Porter looked back at the crowd.
Two security guards materialized as if from nowhere, guns pointed at the pair.
“Don’t shoot, you idiots! Don’t shoot.”
“Yeah, idiots,” Porter said, “don’t shoot.”
With that, he made his way through the door.
He pushed Osito toward Rivera, who stepped back and leveled the man’s own revolver at him.
Porter looked around. Stainless steel appliances and counters, stacks of plantain boxes, giant shaker seasoning bottles of Sazón—all the trappings of a Puerto Rican kitchen.
He got behind the nearest refrigerator, the glass door revealing an entire stock of rum bottles, and shoved it in front of the door, blocking the entrance. Then, Porter opened it and grabbed one by the neck.
The blood was warm on his cheek and his face felt tight, the swelling soon to come.
“You need a drink right now?” Rivera said.
“Take a look at my face, what do you think?”
He stuffed Rivera’s pistol in his waistband and grabbed Osito again. “Which way is the exit?”
Osito laughed.
“What’s so funny?” Rivera said.
“There’s no exit. The only way in is that door we just came through.”
There was thumping on the door as Osito’s men tried to bang their way in after their boss.
“Bullshit,” Porter said. “Kitchen’s gotta have an exit.”
Camelot came back from a hallway he’d gone down. “That’s all bricked up.”
Rivera rubbed her wrists. “You serious?”
“Bit—” Camelot started to say, before he stopped himself. “Yeah, I’m sure.”
“Okay, so we go out the way we came in,” Rivera said, and pulled her hair into a ponytail. “We still have the boss, no way they shoot us.”
Osito laughed again, his hoarse voice grating on Porter’s ears. “No way they let you take me out of here. Now that my boys have had time to set up, you’re all dead.”
The banging on the door intensified, accompanied by muted voices on the other side, yelling something unintelligible.
Rivera raised the revolver again. “Yeah? We can at least shoot you first. How’s that sound?”
“Go ahead. Just another nail in your coffin.”
Porter wasn’t paying attention to the conversation. Instead, he was looking up, walking around, past the flat griddle stove, until he found what he was looking for: a roof access ladder. “You weren’t gonna mention this, huh?”
Osito didn't say anything.
He nodded at Rivera. “See if you can get that thing open.”
She climbed up the ladder, kicking her heels off as she went. Porter grabbed Osito by the front of his shirt. “Tell me what you did with Royce Michelson.”
“Who?”
“Don’t play with me. Where’d you take him?”
“No entiendo,” Osito said with a smile. “Solamente español.”
“My ass you don’t understand,” Porter said.
Rivera called from the small shaft that led to the roof, “It’s open, I got it.”
Camelot clambered up the ladder after her.
“Last chance,” Porter said. “Tell me, or your men will find you with a bullet in your face.”
Osito’s smile was gone, replaced by a hard look. “All you need to know is that you’re a dead man. I’ll chase you all the way to hell if I have to.”
“I believe that’s the first truthful thing you’ve said to me all night,” Porter said. “So it’s probably best if I don’t let you chase me at all.”
Osito had a confused look on his face.
Then Porter shot him in the knee cap. No mercy, no hesitation; he blew out the entire hinge joint, crumpling the man to the floor.
“Dios mio, Dios,” Osito said, clutching at the bloody hole where his knee used to be.
“You still wanna chase me?”
Osito writhed and wiggled on the ground, his blood covering the industrial floor.
Porter leaned over the man and said, “I’ll see you again. Bet on it.” With that, he took the rum bottle and brought it crashing down on Osito’s head, disconnecting him from consciousness.
“Hey!” Rivera had climbed back down the ladder and was stopped midway. “We need to go.”
With the advent of gunfire, the banging on the barricaded door was growing more insistent. Porter looked at it, then to Rivera. “I’m right behind you.”
He stuffed her pistol in his pocket, and ran over to the ladder.
“You’re really bringing that?”
Porter held the bottle of booze as he started his climb. “I’m gonna need a drink.”
Twenty-Eight
Porter followed Rivera up the ladder, careful not to get caught looking up her dress, which she’d hiked up for ease of movement. The last thing he wanted was for her to see him staring as they made their exit. He’d rather let Osito’s guys catch him standing over the top of Osito’s mutilated, unconscious body than piss her off.
The hatch was small, and Porter had to squeeze his shoulders through to make them fit. He pulled his way through the opening, and stood on the roof of the building.
In the distance, the lights of the city lit up the night skyline like a constellation in space. The bite in the air grabbed Porter, and he exhaled sharply.
“Now what?” Rivera said.
“We get the hell down off this roof,” Porter said.
“How?” Camelot was moving slow, right arm laid across his stomach.
“It’s only two stories. Jump.”
“Are you crazy?” Rivera said.
“You’d rather want to wait for every thug in the Bronx to come busting through the floor over there?”
Porter looked off the roof, down at the front of the casino. There were still dozens of people milling around. The night had ended too suddenly, and no one seemed to have a firm grip on where they were going next.
Turning away from the front, Porter ran to the back of the building. There was a small strip of grass, then a tall chain-link fence topped with barbed wire, then the Westchester River. He motioned for Rivera and Camelot, who were looking off different sides of the roof. “Come on.”
The pair joined him at the roof’s edge.
“Are you nuts? This ain't no normal two stories, this is warehouse height,” Camelot said.
“I don’t want to be here anymore, and this is my way out. If you want to come with me, then you’re leaving, too.”
“He’s right,” Rivera said to Camelot. “We have to go.”
“Damn, man. You got my ass beat, now you want me to jump off a building?”
“Scared? I’ll help you out.” With that, Porter grabbed Camelot by the wrist and shouldered into the man. The pimp lost his balance and stepped over the side.
Porter held fast to his wrist. Thankfully, Camelot wasn’t a heavy man, and even with his broken hand, Porter could hold him easily enough.
Beneath him, Camelot writhed and wiggled. “Oh, God, let me go. Let me go.”
“You keep moving around like that and I will,” Porter said through gritted teeth.
As Camelot calmed down, Porter bent over, then went to a knee. Finally, he lay on his stomach and extended his arm as far as he could over the side of the building. Camelot couldn’t have been much more than ten feet off the ground at that point.
So Porter let go.
Camelot fell the rest of the way. He hit the ground hard and rolled over to his stomach. A groan came up from the ground, like the wind had been knocked out of him.
“Unh,” he said, before coughing and swearing.
“Shut up,” Rivera hissed.
“Your turn,” Porter said.
Rivera looked at him, then looked at the big revolver in her hand and dropped it over the side. She reached out and took Porter’s hand with a surprising level of firmness.
Porter gently lowered her down as far as he could, then held tight while she dangled. “Try to tuck and roll.”
“I know how to fall; just drop me.”
“You sure you're ready?”
“Don’t make me tell you again.”
With that, Porter released Rivera. True to her word, she knew how to fall. She landed much better than Camelot, dropping into a crouch and then rolling. Porter watched in amazement as she sprang to her bare feet and grabbed Osito’s revolver.
Now it was his turn. He grabbed his rum bottle and stuffed it in his back pocket. He got on his belly, and shimmied out with his feet over the edge, then his legs and most of the rest of him. He gripped the side of the roof and lowered himself as far as he could. As he prepared to drop, a jolt of pain from his broken hand tore through his entire arm, and he let go sooner than he’d wanted.
Regardless, he stuck a respectable landing and stood stiffly, leaning against the brick façade of the back of the club.
Rivera and Camelot huddled with him, and he spoke first. “We have to get to the cars.”
“How? We don’t have a way to get there without going past the front.”
Porter looked around the small grass strip. There was nothing in the back that could help him, nowhere he could hide. Because of the high fence, the only options were to try to chew his way through the fence—only to end up in the frigid river water—or walk past the front. “Front it is.”
“You’re serious?” Camelot said. “Them niggas is up there and they ain’t gonna be happy to see none of us.”
Porter shrugged. “I’m going that way. I’ll bet my friend here is with me. If you want to go somewhere else, that’s on you.”
Camelot opened his mouth to speak, then shut it just as quickly.
“Just walk past the front?” Rivera said. “Just like that?”
“Yep. And the longer we wait, the worse it’s gonna be. Right now, security is probably trying to figure out how to stop Osito from bleeding to death. Let’s go while they’re still distracted.”
“Yeah. My life was a lot better when I didn't know how you did things. Definitely a lot better,” Rivera said.
Porter laughed, and walked along the edge of the wall until he came to the side of the warehouse. He stopped and peeked around the side. It was an empty lane, warehouse on the left-hand side, chain-link fence and river on the right. The grass ran the length of the warehouse, and ended at the street and the sidewalk that led to the front door. He nodded to the group behind him and stepped out on the grass.
The rum bottle in his pocket sloshed around as he jogged close to the wall, trying to cover the distance to the front of the building as quickly as he could. As he got closer, he heard talking and yelling, the sounds of a group of people carousing.
Porter slowed as he neared the street and looked over his shoulder, toward Rivera and Camelot. “You guys good?”
“Hell no, I ain't good. I think my ribs are broke. Every time I breathe in, it’s like I’m getting stabbed.”
“Quit whining,” Porter said.
“I’m good. Let’s go,” Rivera said.
Porter stepped out, no longer concealed behind the wall. The sidewalk that ran past the front door was packed, and he shouldered his way through the crowd, slipping in and out, creating enough of a wake for Rivera to follow.
He trusted that Camelot was keeping up.
Porter made it through the last of the crowd; now he was in the street, with its smattering of cars driving by, or picking up groups of people in front of the club. Once he reached the opposite sidewalk, Porter risked a brief stop, looking back at the front of the club.
There were so many people, it was impossible to see who was coming or going through the front. In the distance, the wail of a siren grew closer and closer.
The crowd in front of the club parted, and several of the security guards appeared, carrying Osito upright by his arms and legs, like he was royalty in a flying throne. He yelled and swore the entire way.
“Come on,” Rivera said, pulling on Porter’s arm. “Let’s go before they pay attention to us.”
Porter lingered for another moment, angry at himself that the evening had gone so far sideways. Not only had he failed to find out who Osito had given Royce Michelson to, he’d nearly gotten himself and Rivera killed.
For the briefest of moments, out of sheer frustration, Porter wondered if there was a way he could get to the casino boss then and there, out in the open, but he quickly realized that was futile—a suicide mission.
Their conversation would have to wait for another time.
He turned to see Rivera and Camelot halfway up the block, and he jogged after them.
Several tense minutes later, with Porter checking his back nearly the entire time, the group made it back to the library parking lot, safely at their vehicles.
Rivera opened the sedan, and Porter dropped her pistol and the rum bottle on the passenger seat.
Porter turned to Camelot. “You know it was your boy Antonio that set us up, right?”
“I figured that much. I never trusted his soft ass.”
“Well, you have a funny way of picking help,” Rivera said.
“Yeah, well, I never make the same mistake twice.”
“What are you gonna do?” she asked.
“Antonio ain’t the only muscle I have around town. I’ll make sure he never opens his mouth again, that’s for sure.”
Rivera looked at Porter, who nodded in the glow of the parking lot light. “He deserves it.”
She didn’t say anything, instead dropping Osito’s revolver on the driver’s seat.
“Yeah, I got somethin’ for Antonio. I’ll handle that myself. In fact, y’all don’t need to worry about me no more at all. You don’t know me; lose my number. I ain’t never helping you two again,” Camelot said. “Don’t ever call me no more. I don’t care what you say about the cops. You want to turn me in, turn me in. I’d rather be in jail than end up in one of Osito’s barrels.”
“The feeling’s mutual. I don’t ever want to even see you again,” Porter said.
“Why would you? I’m just going to mind my own business, do me for a while.”
“Does your business include going back to work?”
“Of course. A nigga’s gotta eat.”
“Then that’s what you’re not understanding,” Porter said.
He leaned against the trunk, while Rivera hopped up and sat next to him.
Porter crossed his arms. “Just because you’d rather go to jail doesn’t mean I don’t have anything to hold over your head. Half the girls you run are probably kids, and you know it.”
“You can’t prove that.”
“I don’t need to; this isn’t court. I’m not a judge. But if I catch one whiff of a girl working for you again, I will be your executioner. You feel me?”
“You’re gonna push me out, just like that?”
“Just like that,” Porter said. “If you think I’m joking, just put another girl underneath some guy again, and find out.”
“What the hell am I supposed to do for money?”
“I’m sure Subway is hiring,” Rivera said.
“You’re not kidding,” Camelot said. His shoulders slumped.
“Nope. Honestly, I’d just as soon stuff you in your own trunk over there, but I’m feeling charitable because you helped me out tonight. I think the cracked ribs are enough. For now.”
“This is some bullshit.”
“It is what it is,” Porter said. He pushed away from the trunk suddenly, and Camelot flinched. “Relax. I just want to give you my card.”
“Man, I already got one.”
“Take another. I want you to see this and remember what we talked about. I own you now.”
Camelot looked at Porter and Rivera, then turned and walked away. He got into his car without another word, and drove slowly out of the parking lot.
Porter watched him go, wondering if he’d made a decision he’d regret by letting the man go. Then he was pushed from his own thoughts by Rivera’s voice.
“What now?”
Porter walked around to the passenger’s seat and reached in, picking up the rum bottle and giving it a shake. “I think it’s time for a drink.”
Twenty-Nine
“So how did you know they weren’t going to kill us?”
Rivera reached over the open pizza box, dabbing at the cut on the side of Porter’s head with an iodine solution.
