As he waited, a junkie who had been watching him from across the street since he'd arrived staggered up to his GMC Jimmy. "Hey, buddy, you got a quarter?"
"Yeah," Gus smiled. "Got a couple of them. Fuck off."
The door to the apartment building opened and Kathleen appeared on the front steps looking as if she hadn't gotten much sleep. Gus jumped from the car and bolted around to the passenger-side door so he could open it for her.
"Hi, babe," he said, kissing her on the cheek.
She climbed into the Jimmy and lit a cigarette. "What the hell was so important that you had to see me so fucking early?"
"Come on, hon, watch the language, that's no way for a nice girl to talk."
She stared at him, bleary-eyed. "Are you fucking kidding me? Tell me you're fucking kidding me. What are you, a retard?"
Gus got back behind the wheel and headed for the highway. Frank and Vincent had left for Pennsylvania the night before and he knew that until nine o'clock, when the secretary and two telemarketing salespeople working under him showed up, he'd have the office to himself. "I thought you might like to see where I work."
"I know what an office looks like, Gus."
"After I show you around I thought we'd go get some breakfast. Sound good?"
"Sure," she moaned. "Whatever."
"I decided to skip this tour. I'll probably check in on things from time to time just to make sure nobody's slacking off, but I'm too damn busy running the business to go on the road. Besides, after what happened the last time I've got to be real careful. After the show in Connecticut me and the boys stopped to get a bite to eat and ran into a load of trouble."
"Yeah?" She yawned.
"Five rednecks decided to give us some shit." He shook his head in disgust and tried his best to recall the details of the story Vincent had told him about the incident in the diner. "Naturally, everybody looked to me to handle it, being the muscle and all. Anyway, took one guy's knee out with a thrust kick, broke another guy's jaw with a spinning back-fist. That was enough to convince the other three guys that they'd picked the wrong dude to fuck with."
They arrived at the office a few minutes later and Gus proudly gave her the grand tour, leaving his work area for last. He insisted Kathleen sit in his leather swivel and put her feet up on his desk.
"Feels good, doesn't it?" he said.
She forced a smile. "Sure."
"Anyway, this is the place. My place."
"And those guys you talk about all the time - Frank and Vin - they're your partners?"
Gus sat on the corner of his desk. "Yeah, we're partners, but I'm still the boss."
"I admit it." Kathleen glanced around the office. "I'm impressed."
"There's still time before anybody else shows up," Gus said, moving closer. "Ever done it in an office?"
Kathleen leaned back in the chair, away from his advances. "You're gonna have to help me out with a little something." He frowned, stared at her with confusion. "I thought you said you wanted me to be your girl?"
He nodded. "I do."
"You wanted me to try not to work as much, remember?" Gus nodded again. "I got bills. I got to pay half the rent and half the utilities. Tiffany needs new clothes, and I - "
Gus pulled out his wallet. "Here's fifty - "
"Fifty?"
" - and another thirty."
"I can make that sucking cock on the street in less than an hour."
"Jesus, why do you have to say shit like - just don't say things like that."
"Eighty bucks ain't gonna cut it, Gus."
"That's all I've got."
Kathleen dropped the cash on the desk as if it were diseased and folded her arms across her chest. "This isn't gonna work out, Gus. Maybe you should just take me home."
"Take it easy, babe," he said through a nervous laugh. "I can go to the ATM - no problem. Jesus, lighten up."
She pushed out her lower lip and pouted. "I'm sorry. It's just that I thought you were different from all the others."
He crouched next to her. "I am."
"Then why won't you help me? Why won't you take care of me? You know I got bills, Gus. I got a daughter and she needs things, you understand? Kids are expensive. I wanna be with you, you know that."
"I'll make it right," he muttered, his mind racing.
"I really care about you," she said, "and I thought you felt the same way about me."
Gus stood up, lit a cigarette and began to pace in front of his desk. Things had to change soon. Frank was going to have to sit Vincent down and explain to him that it was time for the business to be split three ways. He'd worked hard and done everything asked of him for more than a year. He'd earned the right to be a full partner, and for the first time in his life Gus feared this might be his last shot at real happiness. There could be no more delays. He needed to move up and he needed to do it now. He assured himself he would speak to Frank the moment he returned from Indiana.
"Don't you care about me at all?" Kathleen asked softly.
He hesitated, looked her in the eye. "I love you."
Her mouth fell open. "You do?"
"I've never told a woman that before." He'd never meant it before, at least that much was true. "I'm about to make some moves that'll make me a very powerful man, babe. When that happens, I want us to be together."
Kathleen slid the money into her purse and moved around to the front of the desk. "Let's stop at the ATM," she smiled, snaking her arms around his neck, "then go back to your place and have breakfast in bed."
***
The first leg of the tour, four shots spread out over six nights in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, went off without a hitch. They played mostly rural, depressed areas, but the stands were packed, the sponsors made money, and in all but one case return dates for the following year were secured.
There were two more stops, followed by a shot in Youngstown, Ohio, before they crossed the border into Indiana. It was an exhausting tour with a lot of downtime between shots spent partying in a string of motels that all looked the same, and several boring hours logged in a caravan of cars. David Delvecchio, as strung out as ever, pulled up the rear in his battered Ford Bronco, the disassembled ring in tow.
With one exception, the talent remained the same throughout the tour. Nick Strong was a headliner who had worked the major federations for decades and had only recently made his services available to the independent circuit. Because one could never be sure how some of the bigger stars were to work with, Charlie seldom booked wrestlers he hadn't used before, but in order to close the deal, Frank had promised Strong in the main event.
The move turned out to be something of a coup. In booking Strong the ECPWL became the first independent promotion to do so, and with the drawing power his name still generated, the shot - a fund-raiser financed by a group of businessmen and scheduled to be held outdoors on a high school football field - had sold over five thousand tickets after only a month of promotion.
Arrangements had been made to fly Strong in from his home in Atlanta to Indianapolis International Airport. Frank would pick him up at his hotel and drive him to the event in Singleton, a town about thirty minutes away.
Frank got to the hotel just before five and asked a woman at the front desk to call Strong's room and notify him that his ride had arrived.
The woman promptly made the call. "Of course, sir," she said, returning the phone to its cradle. "Mr. Strong said to tell you he's not quite ready, and he asked you to join him in his room."
Following the directions she'd given him, Frank rode the elevator to the second floor. Nick Strong had always been one of his favorites, and Frank couldn't wait to meet him.
A former Olympic boxer in the light heavyweight division, Strong (then known by his real name, Nicholas Strazinski) had come within one match of winning a bronze metal in 1968 in Mexico City at the age of twenty. With much fanfare he turned professional in 1969 and had a respectable though less-than-dazzling career as a heavyweight, being dubbed one in a string of many great white hopes for a time. But his biggest claim to fame came in defeat in 1973 when he was viciously knocked out by another contender on national television on an under-card featuring then heavyweight champion and boxing legend "Smokin'" Joe Frazier. Strong retired not long after, and, to the horror of many boxing purists, decided to embark on a career as a professional wrestler.
Ironically, it was as a wrestler that Nick Strong found fame and fortune. Working as a baby headliner in the United States, Europe, Japan, and even the Middle East, he became an international star adored by millions of wrestling fans. But at forty-two, the glory days were drawing to a close for Strong, and his descent to the ranks of the independents was only the beginning.
Frank hesitated at the door then knocked lightly. It swung open almost immediately to reveal a man well over six feet tall with bright blue eyes and a mane of bleached-blond hair nearly to his shoulders. Dressed in a satin robe and slippers, he was a bit older and his body wasn't quite as impressive as the one he'd displayed in his prime, but there was no mistaking who he was.
"Mr. Strong - "
"Nick."
"Nick." Frank smiled and they shook hands. "I'm Charlie Rain's partner, Frank Ponte."
"Great!" he said enthusiastically. "I'm running a little late, come on in for a minute."
The big man moved out of the way and Frank entered the room. Sitting directly in front of him at the foot of the bed was a girl not yet in her teens. Her hair was long and blonde; she wore heavy makeup, and had light, sleepy eyes.
"Hi." Her wide smiled exposed a mouth full of braces.
Frank hadn't expected anyone else in the room and tried to mask his surprise. "Hello."
"Sweetie," Strong said abruptly, "do me a favor and go make a tinkle or something, okay?"
The girl got up without response and strolled into the bathroom, closing the door behind her.
"Your daughter?" Frank asked.
Strong gave him a playful elbow to the ribs. "Better not be."
Frank looked at him, uncertain. "I don't get it."
"I've known her mother for years." Strong moved to the bureau and pulled a joint out of a large gym bag and lit it. "Shit, I've known the kid since she was five or six. I've been working Indianapolis since Christ was a corporal. I used to fuck the mother but she ain't what she used to be. But see, the beauty part is, to these fucking hicks I'm like a big deal - a god, almost, you know? - big fucking celebrity. Being with me, near me - whatever - is like the closest any of them every get to the big time themselves, understand? So now, whenever I'm in town these days I have her drop the kid off for me. Like mother like daughter. She's a hot little piece, huh?"
Frank couldn't believe what he was hearing. "We're talking about a little girl, for Christ's sake."
"Just turned twelve." He chuckled and took a hard hit on the joint. "Hey, old enough to bleed, old enough to breed, baby."
"Are you serious?"
Strong looked confused. "What's the problem, Frank? What… you want some too?"
"You stay the hell away from her," Frank said, moving toward the bathroom. Before he reached the door, it opened and the girl poked her head out. "Honey, come on with me. I'll take you down to the lobby and we can call somebody."
She looked at Strong. "What the fuck's his problem?"
Stunned, Frank froze in mid-step. Strong flashed her an angry look and she disappeared back behind the bathroom door.
"You're not gonna touch that kid," Frank told him.
"Oh really?" Strong laughed. "Who the hell do you think you're talking to?"
It was a good question. Frank studied him without bothering to hide the disgust. "What the hell is wrong with you?"
"I don't have to take this shit." Strong stabbed a finger at the air between them. "I'm gonna talk to Charlie about this."
"Go right ahead. Charlie works for me."
"That's not how I heard it."
"Then you heard it wrong."
"Here's what's gonna happen, slick." Strong butted the joint in an ashtray and put his hands on his hips, puffing his chest out like Frank had seen him do on television dozens of times. "You either shut the fuck up, mind your business and go wait for me in the car, or you can pay me my money and cart my ass back to the airport right now."
Frank saw himself peeling off the cash from the roll in his pocket, throwing it at the bastard and telling him to drive himself.
In reality, all he did was stand and stare.
"I heard the shot's a sell out. What you got - fifty, fifty-five grand in gate receipts? How much of that goes in your pocket?" Strong smiled. "You wanna go tell five thousand screaming fans why the guy they came to see - the guy they paid to see - ain't there? Face it, without me you got a card that couldn't draw flies, asshole."
Their eyes remained locked for what seemed an eternity.
"I'll be in the bar," Frank heard himself say, wishing it was someone else's voice instead of his own. "Hurry up."
***
Despite the two drinks he'd had at the hotel, Frank still couldn't relax, and the drive to the venue turned out to be the longest thirty minutes of his life. Frank tried to distract himself by concentrating on the seemingly endless expanse of utterly flat land that surrounded them, but the foreign surroundings only served to heighten his discomfort.