"No."

"Because they don't catch it in time."

"Did they with you?"

Rubashkin coughed hard, sending him back into the couch until he could finally regain his balance and push himself back upright. "Not so lucky, I'm afraid."

"Is this a social call? If so, I'd like to wait until the sun's up at least. I didn't get much sleep yet tonight."

"I'm sorry to hear that. But I'm afraid it isn't. I've been looking for you, Wes. For years. Why is it that you've been so hard to find?"

Wes didn't have an answer to that.

"Because I'm not so special?"

The soft chuckle turned into more racking coughs. "Spread to my lungs. You can't imagine. You know, I never smoked? All my brothers. They all smoked like chimneys. I swore to myself, I never smoke, because it killed my Papa. Well, I guess they're having the last laugh aren't they?"

"I'm sorry to hear about that."

"I have to think, you know, there are all sorts of the wrong people looking into my business and my affairs, and now everything starts to become clearer. Where was little Wes Park gone to? 'He's been so hard to get in touch with. I can't even send him a Christmas card, to thank him for taking the fall for my boy!'"

"If you're going to shoot me, just do it."

"You're working for the Feds, aren't you?"

"Feds? They didn't even bother to talk to me. They apparently don't believe I've ever met you before."

"I'm sorry, Wesley, but I don't believe you."

"Then just do it. I'm too tired for this s.h.i.t."

Rubashkin had trouble with that kind of s.h.i.t, Wes dimly remembered. If someone begged him, then it was a sign they were guilty. He knew, he always knew. But if they were up-front about not really giving him answers at all...

Then, he's not sure.

It hadn't been a tactic, not really. Wes was tired. He wanted to sleep more than he wanted anything else. More than he wanted to live. But now that had worked in his favor. Rubashkin set the gun down on the table.

"You don't want to sit and talk about the good old times?"

"In the morning."

"'In the morning,' 'in the morning,' you're like a parrot, you know."

The old Russian coughed again. He was many things, Rubashkin. Wes didn't know him well, but he knew enough about the man to know what kind of person he was. He ran one of the biggest gangs in New York, which said something by itself. But in person, he'd never been much but petty. Constant complaints about things that under normal circ.u.mstances, to normal people, wouldn't have been worth commenting. In other words, petty.

"Look, if you're not going to kill me, I have a fight tonight, I need to sleep. Please."

"Fine. Then we'll talk about your sister in the morning."

The mention of his sister raised the hair on the back of Wesley's neck. Now, in spite of how bad he wanted to sleep, even as he heard Rubashkin walk out of the apartment, he couldn't.

Wes pushed himself up off the mattress on the floor and padded his way across the apartment to the door. The gun was still on the table, as if Rubashkin had decided to leave it there as a gift, or as a curse.

He pushed the door open. Rubashkin was limping away, slow. He moved heavy on his left leg. "Wait."

"Oh, that got your attention, did it, Malchik?"

"What did you come here for?"

"No; the moment is pa.s.sed. Sorry."

"I don't have time for these games, old man. If you want to go die of your pancreatic-lung cancer, be my guest, but don't bulls.h.i.t me. What did you come here to say to me?"

"You're interested in talking, then?"

"Fine. But come back, so I can change out of this G.o.d d.a.m.ned monkey suit, and then we're going out for coffee. You're buying."

"It's the least I can do, for an old friend."

Wes left the door open for him as he went back to pull a tee-shirt and jeans out of the dresser, forcing them back on as Rubashkin limped back into the room. Wes waited until he closed the door to add, "And take your gun. I don't want it around."

"Oh, Wesley. You never could deal with these toys."

"Don't be a jacka.s.s, Anton Yurievich."

Rubashkin put the weapon back into the holster he kept carefully concealed. Getting caught with the thing here wouldn't be nearly as dangerous as New York, but that didn't mean they were friendly.

Thirty-Five.

Minami Minami crossed her legs in bed and tried desperately to read the magazine she'd asked Majima to pick up for her from the store. There had been plenty to interest her in theory, but her eyes just looked right through it, like the words weren't even there on the page in front of her.

She couldn't taste her food. She couldn't calm herself enough to read.

"What was I supposed to have done?" she said out loud, only halfway to herself. Part of her wished that someone would tell her, give her some answer that would have saved Wes's life without throwing him away, throwing away her last life line out of the Yakuza life.

But it was too late for that, and too late for her to change her mind. Those were the provisions of the agreement she'd made with Father, and she'd made it. If she broke her word, what other sort of h.e.l.l would it bring down on her head? On Wesley's?

Her mother peeked her head in. "Minami, did you say something?"

Seeing Mother's full head of blonde hair served as a strange reminder of what had happened the night before. She darted inside and drew Minami up in her arms when she saw her lip start quivering.

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong." Minami tried to sound in control. She wasn't going to let herself start crying over any of this. She was a grown woman, and she didn't need to cry. It was her own fault, anyways, that she'd gotten anyone into this mess, so- The tears started flowing, hot streaks flowing down her cheeks, and once the floodgates were open, she couldn't stop it no matter how hard she tried. So Mother held her close as Minami softly cried, not daring to try to ask, and Minami unwilling or unable to explain through the veil of tears.

"It's okay, sweetheart."

Minami took a minute to collect herself, her face numb from crying so hard, and tried to take a breath. "I'm sorry, Mother."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

Minami hiccuped and swallowed and tried not to start crying again, even as she dangled precariously over the edge of tears a second time.

"No."

"Are you sure?"

Minami tried to find the right words, but they all came out sounding like it was all her fault, and she knew it was. If she'd been smarter, been more convincing, tried harder, then she wouldn't be in this predicament.

The words that came out of her mouth weren't the ones she expected to be saying. "Mom, I'm pregnant."

Minami's mother closed her eyes and took in a deep breath. "And the father?"

"Father was going to kill him."

"Because you're pregnant?"

"He doesn't know."

"You might be surprised, your father knows a lot he doesn't let on."

"He asked to marry me."

"Okay." Minami could see from her mother's expression that as much as she might be aware of day-to-day Yakuza business, and might know quite a bit about all of it, she wasn't exactly following.

"So I had to talk Father into letting him live. So, I offered to walk away from him, and take his stupid marriage meetings more seriously."

Mother's mouth tightened, and then she nodded slowly. "Ah, okay. I'm seeing now."

"I don't want to, but I couldn't let him die. Mom, I don't want to be part of this-stuff. I don't want to be a gangster's wife."

Minami's mother made a face and nodded conspiratorially. "I know how you feel. Some people aren't really cut out for it. You're a gentle girl, Minami. I could tell you some nonsense about how you'd be a gentling force on your husband, you'd make him a better person. Well, not likely."

Minami's face screwed up in confusion.

"I married your father, knowing full well what I'd be getting myself into. No arranged nothing. Your father loved your mother-your actual mother-but when she died, he wasn't going through another arranged marriage. Your father can't be persuaded by giving in to him. I'll tell you that right now. I gentled him, sure. But I did it by telling him he was wrong to his face. Not in front of the men, but..."

"So you'll talk to him?"

"I'm not going to talk to him about anything. He got the dry cleaning done, he got the laundry done, we've got nothing to talk about. But it sounds like you need to talk to him, Minami, and you need to have a conversation about what you want for your future. I can come with you, if you like, but I'm not going to fight your battles for you, either."

Minami sucked in a breath and tried to calm herself down.

"You promise you'll come with me?"

"Of course, baby."

"And he won't hate me?"

"I don't think he could ever hate you. And, um... one thing. That man has been talking about grand kids since I met him. You were one year old. Use that information how you will."

Thirty-Six.

Wes Wes sipped his tenth cup of coffee. Rubashkin liked to talk, and then he'd get into a coughing fit and start talking again, as if the previous conversation hadn't even occurred.

Stories about how his boy was doing. 'All thanks to you,' he a.s.sured Wes.

Then it would be about business.

The one thing that he didn't talk about, and the only thing that made Wesley quite certain that there was more to this than an old man's ramblings, was that they didn't talk about Wes's sister one bit.

The one reason he'd come, and now it was "wait a few minutes, can't you?"

Well, he could wait a few minutes, even as a few minutes turned into an hour, even as the waitresses changed shifts, Rubashkin tipping the first one more than she deserved (and, Wesley thought, she deserved quite a bit) because her b.r.e.a.s.t.s were large and prominent.

Wes found himself getting too tired to argue as Rubashkin talked. He wasn't awake enough yet to let the fatigue slip into the background, even after all that coffee. If the day had been active, if he'd been training or fighting or even going out to pick up laundry, he might be able to wake up a little more.

Instead, they sat in a little dimly-lit 24-hour diner and Wes watched the sun come up, watched the hours tick down until he was supposed to go fight, and he went to the slaughter.

Finally he stirred from his reverie, cut Rubashkin off in the middle of a sentence-not one he'd been listening to, but something about different brands of whiskey.

"When are we going to seriously talk, old man? I have a long time, but I haven't got all day."

"Haven't we been talking?"

There he was, back to his usual self. The Rubashkin who would give anyone s.h.i.t for even the mildest of misstatements. Cancer hadn't changed who he was, just how hard he could hit you.

"I will walk right out that door, if you don't cut this s.h.i.t out. I'm not your errand boy any more, Anton Yurievich, so why don't you stop acting like I'm on your time?"

"Well," Rubashkin pouted, his face twisting into an exaggeration of disappointment.

"I didn't realize I was causing you such an inconvenience."