Nightlife Read Free

Rao began to walk. Hugo followed for about two hundred feet, and stopped. Steve Rao noticed, so he stopped too, and spoke. “I’ve been around for a while now. You know that?”
    “I’ve noticed you for about five years,” said Hugo Poole.
    “I haven’t been lying around all that time.”
    “I’ve noticed that too.”
    “I’ve been busy. I’ve been talking to people, making deals, making friends.”
    “No flies on you,” said Hugo Poole.
    “It’s worked out. I’ve gotten big.” It was a strange thing for a man Hugo Poole judged was about five feet five to say. “It’s time to make a deal with you too.” He glared at Hugo Poole. “I’ve put it off for longer than I should have.”
    “I’m listening.”
    “I want ten thousand a month from you.”
    “In exchange for what?”
    “For being able to do whatever you want. For not having to worry. You can go on forever, just like you have been, and nobody will bother you.”
    “Nobody bothers me now.”
    Steve Rao stopped and pointed back at the Hummer, where the two off-duty cops were sitting. “See those guys?”
    Hugo Poole gave his second sigh of the evening. “Steve, how old are you?”
    “Twenty-four.”
    “When you’re a young guy, just starting out, you have to consider the possibility that the people who were here before you were born aren’t all dumb.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “You should look around and say, ‘What are people already doing that works? What are people not doing, even though it’s an obvious thing to do? And why aren’t they?’ ”
    Steve Rao glared at him again, then resumed walking. “A lot of people are doing this. People have sold protection for a hundred years.”
    “Street gangs. They shake down a few Korean grocery stores, a couple of small liquor stores. They ask for just enough so the payoff is cheaper than buying a new front window. The game lasts a few months, until all the gang boys are in jail for something else or dead. Grown-ups don’t do this in L.A. And they don’t use off-duty cops for bodyguards.”
    “Why are you saying this shit?” Steve was quickly beginning to feel the heat around his neck cooking into anger. “It’s all shit! Half the rock stars in town have hired cops with them wherever they go.”
    “I’m telling you this because I want to do you a big favor,” said Hugo Poole. “That works great for musicians. Cops have to carry guns off-duty, so nobody has to make any guesses.”
    “That’s right,” said Steve Rao. “So don’t even think about trying to get out of this. I might as well be made out of steel. Anybody opens up anywhere near me, my cops will drill his ass for him. They got my back. Nobody can do anything to me.”
    “That’s probably true,” said Hugo Poole. “But what can you do to anybody else?”
    “Anything,” said Steve Rao, but he sounded uncertain.
    Hugo Poole said, “Off-duty cops will keep people from killing you if they can, just like they do for rock stars. But they won’t let even the biggest rock stars grease somebody else.”
    “We have an understanding.”
    “They understand you better than you understand them.”
    “They’re mine. I bought them.”
    “You’re paying cops money to stay a few feet from you. They can see you make deals, they can hear what you say. When they’ve seen and heard enough, they’re going to arrest you and all of the people who do business with you.”
    “You’re full of shit.”
    “Steve, these guys know the system. They know that if they get in trouble, you won’t be able to do them any good. The only people who can help them are other cops.” He paused. “You aren’t going to collect any money from anybody, Steve, because you can’t hurt anybody in front of two cops. You just put yourself out of business.”
    “Hugo, I always heard you were supposed to be the smartest man in L.A. But this is pitiful,” said Steve Rao. He took a small semiautomatic pistol from his jacket. He didn’t point it