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“Yeah, ten million would’ve been one helluva payoff,” dad agreed, musing in response. “Sit down, Mike, and I’ll explain why I turned him down.” I sat waiting to hear what possible reason he had to turn down the key to the bank.
He hesitated. “Mike, I’ve dealt with guys like that my whole life. You, on the other hand, you’re still a teenager and you’ve got a whole lot of growing up to do when you get out there in the world. You’re going to find a Bill every time you turn around.
“He’s either going to be smarter, richer, or better looking than you, and he’ll never let you forget it. Now, there are two ways to deal with a Bill. You can meekly agree that he’s better than you, or you can stand eye to eye with him and let him know that you’re just as good as him.
“That guy,” he nodded to the door, “came in here expecting to lord it over everybody. Ordering $100 dollars a shot Scotch and boutique bourbons and expecting me to grovel and apologize for not being able to fulfill his requests.
“When I told him that he’d have to settle for Johnny Walker or Jack Daniels, or otherwise take it down the road, he took that as me telling him ‘fuck you,’ so he settled in trying to find some way to assert his superiority. While he was doing that, he got a surprise and realized he was actually enjoying himself.
“Just sitting there, drinking and dancing with his friends, talking and enjoying himself for a rare change, but he still had to get that one last shot at showing me how big his cock was, figuratively, and he made his offer.
“Now, I could’ve immediately accepted and thanked him profusely, comped all his drinks and shook his hand until his hand was bleeding, but that was what he was wanting and expecting. I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction, and I turned him down.”This content belongs to Nô/velDra/ma.Org .
“That was me letting him know that my cock was just as big as his, and he didn’t faze me a bit. So, he upped his offer, and again I turned him down. He raised it again, hoping that I’d agree, because now he was locked into a contest of will.
“I could see that Bill was trapped and he had no way out. You see, son, a guy like Bill needs a bar like I need a third nipple. He’s smart and made a shitload of money and he didn’t do that by making many mistakes. There’s no way he could ever justify paying that kind of money for a place like this.
“I could’ve continued turning him down until the offer would’ve been ridiculously noticeable to his friends, but I decided to cut him some slack and gave him his out by telling him to come by tomorrow and talk to Jack, Kate, and your Mom, and convince them.
“But, he won’t come back. Chances are, we will never see him again. He’ll go on making obscene amounts of money and we’ll continue to work here, and I’m okay with that. I make a good living and provide for you and your mom. I’m beholden to no man, and I’m good with that.”
For some reason, his comment gave him pause and he blurted out, “There’s only been one time I’ve ever been on my knees to another man, and that will never happen again.”
The cold steel determination on his face frightened me. He must’ve picked up on it as he morphed back into character. “So, he left with his pride intact, and I’m sitting here with my pride intact and you’re sitting here at a table that needs to be cleaned so some paying customers can sit down.”
I had to say it. “But what if he’s shows up tomorrow with a ten million dollar check?” Dad replied, “If he does that, I’ll scramble and get Jack, Kate, and your mom to sign so fast that it will make your head spin. I ain’t that stupid, son!”
Bill didn’t show the next day.
*******************
Fuck!!! Another goddamn Sixty’s favorite started blaring out of the jukebox. My uncle noticed my grimace and he winked at me in response. Frigging Allman Brother’s “Mountain Jam” started cranking up.
Don’t get me wrong. Hearing guitar gods like Duane Allman and Dickie Betts trading licks for 33 minutes is amazing, but, try hearing it night after night in the bar, and coupled with the mood I was in, the pleasure factor was hovering around zero.
Yeah, and now you’re about to remind me that a jukebox only plays 45 singles, so there’s no way the antique could play long versions of rock and roll songs. Well, thanks to my dad cutting some slack on a computer hacker he arrested, the guy converted the mechanism to play multiple CD’s instead of records, as a way of showing his appreciation not to be heading to jail.
C’mon, my dad is a cop, not a saint. Rules and laws were made to be bent when common sense dictated. The hacker wouldn’t have lasted a day in jail, and dad got the kid a legitimate job. So what if the kid wanted to return the favor?
Taking legal shortcuts to provide a common sense solution was a specialty of my dad and Uncle Jack. Take the time two rocket scientists decided to hold up the bar at happy hour.
I suppose the two thugs first got a clue after they drawing their weapons and announcing a holdup, when twenty off duty cops enjoying a drink drew down on them and covered them from every angle. Somehow, they kept from pissing in their pants as their weapons were collected and their wallets were inspected.
Now, the misguided youths expected the usual routine: get arrested, go to jail, get bonded out, show up for plea and arraignment, get assigned a public defender, have a court date set near the speedy trial deadline, have a mental evaluation ordered, plea bargain a deal with an overworked prosecutor, and be back on the street robbing someone who wouldn’t defend themselves.
What happened was, my Dad had a simple solution. The thugs’ money was “liberated” from their wallets, along with their weapons, and their getaway car, and their clothes. They were pushed out in the street to be laughed at by gawkers, and videoed upstream to the internet before being arrested for public indecency by a police unit that “just happened” to be patrolling by.
Word got out on the street what had happened to the two, and they were a laughingstock. Interesting enough, an anonymous contribution to the Victim’s Reparation Fund was donated in the exact amount provided by their money, clothes, weapons, and car (after a visit to a chop shop) brought. The two would-be gangsters, having lost all street cred, finally left town to avoid the embarrassment. Nobody ever tried anything in Genero’s after that. Moral of the story: Don’t pull any shit in a cop bar.
I took another look at my beer. The icy glaze had melted off and I hadn’t even taken the first sip. Not that I was really in the mood for drinking, if I started there was no telling when I’d stop, given the mood I was in. How the fuck did I ever get myself in this situation?
The previous night was supposed to be the best night of my life, and it was. Until it wasn’t. Now I’m sitting there trying to figure out what to do, and I’m scared. Scared that I was going to make the wrong decision. Scared that I’d let the wrong person in my life. Scared that I might wind up losing her. Scared that I might not. Nothing made any sense anymore.
Christ, less than 24 hours before, we left the reception and we were all over each other in the limo. Kissing and groping and clutching at each other in a frenzy, heat boiling and percolating, held back by a thin strand of propriety as we exited the limo, managed to collect our key to the suite, riding in the elevator, oblivious to bemused onlookers, pausing at the door and finally negotiating the locking mechanism while she rubbed the crotch of my trousers. Swooping down and collecting her and carrying her over the threshold. The door swinging shut as I carried her through the suite, kissing her the entire time until I gently placed her on the bed.
I had an entire plan of slow seduction for the entire night, and it went right out the window. She broke away from me, adorned in her virginal white lacey finery and fixed me with a lusty gaze. She slowly began dancing to an unheard song as I sat on the bed, darting near me and then moving just out of reach before I could grab her, pivoting her luscious body clockwise and dipping low as she made her direction counter-clockwise to an unknown tempo. Rubbing her hands against her torso, she whipped her long brown hair across her face, sliding her arms down, lower and lower, the palms of her hands joining at the juncture of her legs while she looked at me in a plea to satisfy her and groaned softly.
Turning away from me, swiveling her tight buttocks and giving me a teasing look across her shoulder as she bent down she was at a ninety degree angle. Slowly, she rose up, as once again she twisted until she faced me, a huge smile on her face as she knew she had me mesmerized.
Then teasingly, she fiddled with the collar button of her Victorian gown, slowly drawing out the drama of unbuttoning it and then pretending she wouldn’t. Back and forth it went, as she ramped up the suspense of when it would finally happen.
A flourish, as her neckline was exposed. A view of her throat I had seen countless times, yet now appeared as a forbidden treat. I continued to stare at her as she danced joyfully across the room, celebrating holding me in thrall.