So the union Club was formed, and we’ve been butting heads with the bosses and their minions to keep them off the honest workers that are left. If they won’t allow union s to protect the workers in an official way, we’ll protect them outside the law.
But my past with the Bratva has been a liability more often than I like to admit. It wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest if someone got a connection from Washington to come investigate me. I can see the headlines now, “Mobster in hiding exposed, affiliated with former corrupt union !” They’ll do anything to smear common folk in this town.
“I wouldn’t put it past them,” I finally answer Genn, “so I want to know who she is, sooner rather than later.”
“What’s she look like?”
“Hard to miss,” I say, and it was true that she’d made a hell of an impression. “Flaming red hair you could spot a mile away. Full lips, high cheekbones, and and a nose that turns up a little at the tip. Blue eyes, bluest eyes I’ve seen in a long time, bright and keen. Whoever she is, I can tell she’s a few notches sharper than most of the cops I’ve seen. But she didn’t identify herself, either — what the fuck kind of game’s she playing?” I shake my head. “Anyway, she was dressed like most of the plain-clothed feds are. Trenchcoat and jeans.”
The bearded man smiles with a chuckle. “Sounds like you were paying attention, Prez.”
I roll my eyes. “Fuck off, Genn.” But even as I say it, I can’t help but realize he’s right. She was fucking hot. I’ve always been a sucker for a woman who can move like that. And there’s something about her that I can’t quite place, nagging at the back of my mind like an old dream, but it doesn’t come to mind.
Genn nods, understanding, and he turns over to a couple of keen-eyed members wearing the club jackets and playing pool in the corner. “Anya, Vasily! The two of you were patrolling out by the I-78 this morning, you see anyone that sounds like what Prez is looking for?”
Vasily blinks in confusion, but Anya had been listening in on the conversation. The two of them were truck drivers for the docks before the union got busted and the bosses decided they could pay immigrant workers a third of their wages.
“Yeah,” said Anya, “I remember someone like that stopping by the same gas station Dmitiri and I were refueling at on her way in. I remember her chatting up the old cashier like they’ve known each other for years.”
“What, are you kiddin’ me?” came Rodya’s voice from behind the bar, looking over at all of us with a look of disbelief. Rodya’s an older guy with a good heart who’s lived through the best and worst times, and he’ll do just about anything for the club, but he’s too laid back to want to earn a kutte. “I’d recognize a gal like that anywhere.”
“Got something to say, Rod?” I ask with an arched eyebrow, and Rod laughs at having the upper hand on local intel for once. It’s always been a friendly rivalry between the two of us, seeing who can keep the better ear out for the locals: the bartender or the club president.
“W-well yeah! I mean, I’d think you recognize her, wouldn’t you?”
I stare at him a moment, then gesture for him to keep talking.
“Shit, Prez,” he goes on, “there’s only one gal who knows anyone in town who looks like that. You’re telling me you really don’t remember Cherry?”
The beer can in my hand nearly falls to the ground, and Genn’s eyes widen as he slowly looks to me. Hell, half the bar does.
“Cherry,” I repeat in disbelief, “Cherry LaBeau.”
Out of all I’ve left behind from my old life, that woman is the one thing I wish I could have back.
“Come on,” Rod says with cheerful reminiscence in his voice, “you think I forget anyone who’s tried to buy a drink from me underaged? When you and her were teens, I remember you strutting in here all tough, trying to order her a whisky sour. You’re the only ones I ever did that for anyway, too, you put on such a good show of it.”
Genn bites back a grin, but I chuckle and give him an elbow in the side nonetheless. Cherry had been someone I knew when I was a teenager around here, it was true. But last I’d heard of Cherry, she’d gone up into the city for bigger and brighter things. Fancy college degree, maybe even a career and a metropolitan apartment. She’d always been the type to want to chase after that.
“Cherry LaBeau,” I repeat again, dumbfounded. “Shit, she didn’t recognize me either. Have we really changed that much?”