Never Going Back Again: Chapter Thirty-five
sorry for the long gap in updating. I've put up a nice long installment in mitigation. But things are starting to get rather dark for Deeks right now. he's been forced to go somewhere he really doesn't want to go...
They hit another couple of scummy bars without any noticeable success – it seemed as if all Max Gentry's former acquaintances were either behind bars, dead or playing possum. By this stage Deeks felt that just the smell of another shot of cheap whiskey would make him throw up. This one was particularly bad, and seemed to attract the dregs of humanity. He and DiNozzo were just about the only customers who were not sporting facial tattoos and/or piercings.
"I've had it." He kicked the bar stool, adding another dent to its already scarred battle-history and loosening one of the legs. "I'm out of here." Sometimes it was a relief to be Max – if you didn't like something, then you didn't have to even bother pretending – you could just lash out, kick the shit out of something or someone and nobody blinked an eye – unless you'd gouged it out.. There was none of this delicate dancing around, having to be careful of other people's feelings – you just said what you thought, and if they didn't like it well that was your problem. It was liberating, not to have to bother with the normal rules of society – for all of ten minutes. Max ruled by fear and fear alone. He was powerful because people were scared of him. But there would come a time when the tide began to turn against Max, as it always did. For himself, Deeks just hoped that he could start running away from Max when the tide started to swoop in towards him and that he didn't get stuck, right up to his neck in things. The brief moments of joy and freedom he experienced as Max were counterbalanced by the deep shame he felt. And as long as he kept feeling that disgust at himself, then maybe he'd be alright, maybe he wouldn't sell his soul. Then again, it was easy to get dragged down. Each of the people in here had once been a wide-eyed baby, full of hope and promise – and look where it had lead them. Everyone started off fresh and clean – they just became soiled with life and could never wash themselves clean.
DiNozzo knocked back the remainder of his drink as Deeks stormed off, pushing a junkie out of the way and nearly sending him flying in the process, and eyeballed the woman behind the bar. She might once have been presentable – but that was a long time ago. Now she was looked like she could take on the arm wrestlers over in the corner without blinking an eye, and probably beat them without breaking sweat. "We were never here," he said, with a feral leer.
"Who are you exactly?" She was gutsy, he had to give her that much.
"Me – I'm nobody. But he's Max Gentry. Mad Max, you know?"
"He sure ain't no Mel Gibson, sugar." She cackled delightedly at her own ready wit and DiNozzo gave it up as bad job and trailed out into the street, where Deeks sat revving the motorbike impatiently.
"You coming?" He threw the older man a challenging look.
"Where else would I possible want to go?" Throwing one leg over the back of the bike, DiNozzo settled himself behind Deeks and pulled on a helmet. Apart from just about anywhere, other than the seedy dive you've no doubt got lined up for us to crash in tonight. Max doesn't look like he'd be bothered about where he'd lay his head, but I guess I'll have to go along with it. Just as long as there aren't any cockroaches, 'cos I definitely draw the line there. Or rats. Can't stand them either. This is another fine mess you've got me into, boss.
The moment the bike roared off, another call was placed. "Max is back. And he's looking awful mean."
"Did he say anything?"
"No. Just sat for a while and drank some. Got some new mate with him – older guy."
"Is he still there?"
"Just drove off on his bike."
"Let me know if you see him again. Call me at once." Nicole closed the phone and hugged herself triumphantly. Her plan was coming together beautifully. All those years with Ray, they hadn't been such a complete waste of time after all, because she'd made some really useful contacts. His old network of hangers on, associates – call them what you will – had turned against Ray the moment he broke the unwritten code and testified. Ray was a snitch, pure and simple and he'd made himself fair game. All bets were off the moment he turned against his own. But Nicole – she was the betrayed wife, dumped for another woman. Nicole was accepted and when she asked for help in her quest for revenge, Ray's old friends were only too happy help. And now Max was getting closer, she could feel it. And when he saw her, she knew he would never leave her again. She'd make sure of that. Nicole had been planning this a long time.
"What the hell did that guy Max ever do to you?" The barkeeper couldn't help overhearing the conversation. She was new here, and the name Max Gentry meant nothing to her. Ten years in solitary tended to distance you from the world.
"Max? He never done nothing to me. I'm just doing Nicole a favour."
"Her? She's as nutty as a bag of squirrels. What does she want with him?"
The man smirked. "She just wants him, pure and simple. No, scratch the pure. Aint nothing pure about what Nicole wants with Max – more like down and dirty."
"What if this Max isn't interested?"
"Not interested in staying alive? Nicole's not exactly firing on all cylinders at the moment – not since Max left the last time and then Ray cheated on her. Once she gets Max, she's not going to let him go." He took a long pull of beer. "You ever see that film Psycho?"
"Who hasn't? You reckon she'll stab him in the shower then?"
"Naw, that'd just be stupid. Do you have any idea how much mess that makes? No, my reckoning is that if he makes one wrong move, then in about ten years' time they'll find Maxie-boy's skeleton sitting in a rocking chair in Nicole's basement. If she can't have him, she won't want anybody else have him either."
Just then, a fight broke out and by the time the barkeeper had knocked a few head together , chucked the debris chucked out into the alley and mopped up the worst of the blood, Max Gentry, Nicole Martindale and their squalid reputations were completely forgotten.
"It could be worse. I suppose. We could be in the Gaza Strip." DiNozzo looked around the small apartment disdainfully and tried not to wrinkle his nose up when he inspected the bathroom.
"Wait till night," Deeks advised. "This neighbourhood can make Helmand Province look tame." He bounced on the bed experimentally. "I've stayed in worse places." He flopped back and stared up at the ceiling, complete with old water stains. At least the leak appeared to have been mended.
"You were a cop, weren't you?" DiNozzo recognised the resignation – that got drummed into you pretty damned quickly on the job: somethings you can't change, you just accept them, or you'll go crazy.
"Still am. Kind of. Sort of permanent loan to NCIS."
"You ever think of going back?" DiNozzo sat down on the settee and found that while it wasn't quite as uncomfortable as it looked, that wasn't saying much.
"Sometimes," Deeks admitted. "When things are particularly shitty."
"Like now?"
"Pretty much." He let one arm fall across his eyes. "But if I resign from LAPD, it's like admitting I was wrong."
"And if you don't join NCIS - it's the same? Catch Twenty Two."
"Yeah. Good book, bad film. You were a cop too?"
"Baltimore PD. I don't quite fit the mould Vance was trying to promote – I'm not ex-service and I don't have a fancy degree in computing. It's like I'm out on a limb right now."
"I never could have hacked it in the military. The marine buzz cut is a serious problem for a start."
"Try telling my boss that is the worst haircut in the world, bar none and he'll just give you that fish-eye stare."
Deeks sighed. "I guess I've got a bit of a problem with authority and people telling me what to do." He'd heard a lot of stories about DiNozzo, but none of them had prepared him for actually liking the man.
"Exactly. All that "hoo rah" and "semper fi – do or die" leaves me cold." DiNozzo studied the ceiling for a moment, but quickly became bored. "If we're stuck here tonight, what do you say to beer and pizza?"
Deeks sat up and grinned at him. "I'd say how about a movie to go with it."
His interest picqued, DiNozzo looked at him curiously. "Which movie?" He'd always maintained you tell a lot about a man by the films he chose, and while he'd never asked Gibbs, he kind of suspected the guy would chose The Green Berets. Whereas everyone with an ounce of artistic sensibility knew the Duke's finest hour was in The Searchers.
"How about Apocalypse Now? Or maybe The Godfather?"
A broad smile crept across DiNozzo's face. "I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship," he said slyly, wondering if Deeks would get the reference.
"Casablanca. Good choice – but maybe not tonight." No, definitely not tonight. Not till this whole mess is over and I'm back home with Kensi.
"Only one thing for it then." This was the clincher, DiNozzo thought. The final test. So far, Deeks was doing pretty well, but it all depended on this last answer. "Your fall-back film – when all is lost?"
Deeks swung his feet off the bed. "Simple. Animal House it is then?"
It was like a light had appeared in the skies, DiNozzo thought, a heavenly light. Now, if only they could pick up a couple of dates, his night would be complete. So what if there was only one bed – they were grown-ups. They were liberal and tolerant and they'd manage just fine.
"You scared, Marty?" The movie was over and the girls had never materialised, but there were still a few bottles of beer left. They lay side by side in the bed, two men stripped down to boxer shorts and t-shirts in an apartment that was too low-rent to even have a ceiling fan the move the sticky night air. It seemed natural that they'd progressed to first names.
"I'm absolutely bricking it." The beer was making him feel pleasantly mellow, and he tried to focus on the tv as Tony relentlessly channel-hopped. "Never been so scared. How about you?"
Tony paused to savour a raunchy moment from a re-run of Sex and the City. For an old broad, Samantha was pretty fit. "Couple of times maybe. Once when I had the plague."
"You had the plague? Shit."
"That's exactly how I felt. And then when Kate got shot. She was my partner. I heard the bullet, you know? Heard it as it went past me and felt the rush of air. And he was a good shot, a really good shot, because he hit her dead centre in the middle of the forehead, like she was nothing more than target practice." Tony had never talked about this before and it wasn't easy. "Her blood splattered over my face, in that second before she dropped down. It was warm, that's what I remember most – how warm her blood was. And how shit scared I was. Never quite got over that. Don't think I ever will. Seeing Kate die and knowing it could have been me." And I've never quite got over Kate either. She really was the one who got away.
Marty reached down and pulled another bottle of beer out of the cooler and handed it across. "Remind me again why we're doing this?" He popped the cap of his own bottle and held it out.
"Fucked if I know, Marty." Tony clinked his beer against the other bottle and they both drank in silence, staring aimlessly at the tv screen.