Free as a Jailbird

Chapter 46

Mercy pulls up out the front of a building I recognize as the old downtown strip club where one of the biggest drug busts this city has ever seen took place around eighteen months ago. Ridden with bomb blasts and bullet holes, the place was torn apart and deserted. Mercy parks his bike on the curb and opens the back door to the building.

"Coming?" he asks with a smirk.

The inside of the club is lit with blinking, fluorescent lights. The stench of stale booze and crumbling concrete makes clean oxygen hard to breathe in. I crunch over broken glass and marvel at how comfortable Mercy is. He strolls into the near darkness as though he owns the joint.

"Are you squatting here Merc?" I ask with a sideways smirk.

"Actually ... yes. Well, more the apartment building next door. I'm using the club to start up my new business."

"What's that?"

"A center."

I freeze as Mercy turns around to observe my shocked face.

He starts laughing. "Fuck, I love the look on people's faces when I tell them that."

"Are you serious?" I ask. "So you brought me here to... become your first patient?"

"Course not," he says and walks behind the bar. "I brought you here to present to you a business proposal."

I cross my arms, waiting for the punch line.

"I've been around for a very long time," says Mercy. "I've met a lot of crew members too and I've been making myself a little list. You've been on that list since the day I met you. You're probably thinking I'm crazy, but ... come on, we can't do this forever. Sooner or later we have to get realistic. I'm thirty nine. I'll be forty next year."

"Merc," I say. "I get where you're coming from, but ... counselling and soup kitchens aren't really my thing. Unless I'm on the receiving end of some quality minestrone."

Mercy points a finger at me and sets his deep, dark eyes on mine. "You are obviously perfect for nurturing young people who don't have a home because you've lived it."

"Sure," I say. I agree with him. I once thought about starting up something like this, but that was back when I wasn't going to prison for assassinating a mob boss and doting father. "But I might not make it out of this Mafia gig alive let alone to start up a shelter."

"Look–" Mercy raises his hands and places them on the bar. "All I'm asking is that you think about it. Know that I believe in you. I wouldn't have brought you here if I didn't. I have a dream to clean up these streets and the only way to do that is to get rid of violence and start giving back to those people who really need help."

I've never seen this side of Mercy and I wish I had earlier. He acted like a father to me back in the day when he led the Southbend Bikers, but I always considered him to be a tough man inside and out. Now I see that the name 'Mercy' really is genuine.

I start asking him more questions and I'm halfway through my list when there is a distant crash from somewhere in the building. By the look on Mercy's face, the sound was not expected.

"Wait here." He crunches through the rubble to the back of the bar where there is a double door leading to the outside entrance.

I listen, nervously tapping my foot until I hear Mercy open the back door. There is silence for a moment, then the sound of a door swinging shut. I relax as soon as I see him trudging back into sight.

"Probably just a–"

Gunfire litters the bar. 

I am so shocked that for a second, I don't move an inch. Then I feel the backlash of broken glass and I dive behind the bar, looking for shelter.