Night Work (16 page)

    Larry grabbed the man by the back of his neck and pushed him toward his friends. He staggered across the floor but was caught by one of the others before he fell.

    "Anybody else?" Vincent asked, watching the other men, an arrogant smile spreading across his face. "How about you? You wanna hang out with your buddy down there on the floor?"

    "Just get the hell out of here!" one of the men shouted.

    Very slowly, Vincent backed out of the diner. In minutes, he and the others were all piled into their rented Nissan Pathfinder, barreling down the state highway, headed for the relative safety of a motel in Connecticut.

    Jose high-fived Vincent. "Jesus, that dude's knee was wrecked. You don't play, brother."

    "He was a big guy," Vincent laughed. "I wasn't taking any chances."

    "I hope they didn't get our plate," Charlie sighed from behind the driver's wheel.

    Al Sawyer, a referee in his middle forties, sat quietly in the back seat staring out the window. He was a tall, lanky man with a comb-over that began just above his right ear and ended somewhere on the other side of his balding head. He still lived at home with his mother in New Hampshire, and in addition to his career as a referee, worked full-time as an assistant supermarket manager.

    "You all right, Al?" Frank asked.

    "Yeah," he said, face pale. "I guess so."

    "Maybe we can grab something to eat once we get into Connecticut?" Larry said.

    Charlie shook his head. "Are you kidding? They roll up the sidewalks at seven."

    "Another night, another vending machine," Luther sighed.

    Still under the control of an adrenaline rush, Vincent took several deep breaths and did his best to calm down. "I knew those guys were pussies," he said, looking around for further vindication. "You wanna bet that fat fuck walks with a limp even after the doctors patch him up?"

    Vincent's eyes found Frank in the relative darkness. He met his gaze with a quick wink but said nothing.

    Charlie pushed a cigarette between his lips and lit it. "I'm way too old for this shit."

    "You're never too old to run for the car," Luther laughed. "You guys see him haul ass back there? Not bad for an old white man."

    "Eat shit."

    Exhausted, Frank closed his eyes and let his head rest against the back of the seat. He heard someone say, "It's a glamorous life, ain't it?" amidst laughter and moans as Luther began reciting one of his epic stories from tours past.

    

    

    The following morning, Gus joined the troupe in New London. He and Frank had breakfast in a cheap restaurant across the street from the motel and then returned to Frank's room for a scheduled meeting with Vincent and Charlie. Instead of going directly to bed, as he should have the night before, Frank had stayed up swapping stories and drinking vodka with Benny Dunn until dawn, and was already feeling the effects of three hours of fitful sleep.

    Charlie staggered in first, sipping a cup of fizzing water he swore cured even the most debilitating symptoms caused by excessive drinking, and collapsed into a chair in the corner. Through eyes that more closely resembled slits, he managed to find Gus sitting on the edge of the bed smoking a cigarette.

    "You look like shit," Gus told him. "Only worse."

    Charlie nonchalantly raised a buttock and squeezed out a thunderous fart. "That's for you."

    "Lovely." Frank frowned and fanned the air with his hand.

    "My classic breeding is only exceeded by my boyish good looks," Charlie cracked. What began as a hearty laugh soon became an uncontrollable cough emanating from deep within his chest.

    Gus held out his pack of cigarettes. "Have a smoke, you wheezing bastard."

    He hawked a ball of phlegm into a small plastic wastebasket next to the desk and to everyone's surprise, actually took one of the cigarettes and lit it. "Nothing a little nicotine can't fix."

    Vincent knocked and entered the room looking rather drawn but none the worse for wear. "Good morning."

    "That's debatable," Frank said.

    "What's up?"

    "We've got a problem."

    "So what else is new?"

    "A serious problem," Gus announced.

    Vincent made it a point to look directly at Frank. "I'm listening."

    "I just found out over breakfast," Frank said. "Go ahead and fill them in, Gus."

    Gus crossed his legs and attempted a relaxed posture. "This week I started contacting former clients from last year in the hopes of organizing the first leg of our New England tour for September," he began uncomfortably, "and I found a disturbing pattern. The GCWA has already signed three of them away from us for shots this fall."

    "Global Championship Wrestling Alliance," Charlie groaned. "That's John Turano's group. I knew this was coming."

    "They're following the exact route of our tour from last season," Gus told them. "They've already contacted six of our clients in the last month or so, and from what I can tell they don't plan on stopping any time soon."

    "Which ones did we lose?"

    "Fall River, Dedham, and Lowell."

    Vincent drew a slow, deep breath. "Sonofabitch."

    "The GCWA is basically a three-man operation," Charlie said. "Turano, his brother Marvin, and his cousin Joey Loomis."

    "But everybody knows Turano's a piece of shit," Vincent said. "Most marks outside the business who talk to him or his people directly are turned off in the first five minutes."

    Charlie nodded. "All three of them are buffoons. They've got a few independent bookers scattered around from here to Florida, but nobody major. They write all of their business on cost. They're established - been in the business for almost twenty years. The only reason they never became major players is because they're hit-and-run artists. They used to work a lot of dates in New York and Jersey, but they ripped off so many people it got to the point that their reputation made it impossible for them to conduct business. That's why they relocated to Philadelphia and tried to monopolize that state. They still do shots up and down the East Coast when they can get them, but they're mainly a TV federation now. Granted, the only thing worse than their live shots is that TV show - and it only runs on the smaller cable outlets - but it generates a shit-load of house shows for the pricks. It's Turano's bread and butter. He packages thirteen-week runs, sells advertising, produces the show, and gives it to the goddamn stations. He makes his coin on the shots generated by the TV show and from the advertisers and sponsors directly. He's been running TV shots for more than ten years from here to Pennsylvania, and it pays off. He just sits there in Philly and takes the shots as they come to him. It's the only way they could survive once the business cleaned itself up and started involving real sales pros. Turano knew he and his boys couldn't compete with competent, articulate salespeople, so he went the TV route instead."

    Vincent turned to Gus. "Specifically, how is he stealing our dates?"

    "He's offering them TV tapings," Gus explained. "He comes to their school with a TV crew, his regular under-card workers, and as many stars on the independent circuit he can get his hands on. They start the shot about noon, and it runs until nine or ten o'clock at night. Fans come and go throughout the course of the day, but they manage to keep it packed because they sell the tickets real cheap - two, three dollars for a ringside seat and a buck for everything else. The fans not only get to see a ton of matches they get to see a lot of the boys wrestle over and over again. The stars come out and do two or three squash matches - where they beat the shit out of some no-name - to top-of-the-card main event bouts. By the time they wrap up a shot, Turano's got thirteen weeks in the can."

    Frank was beginning to feel claustrophobic. He moved to the window and opened the blinds enough to let in a bit of light. "And because he's already got all of his advertising sold he can deliver the show to the client for free."

    Gus looked to Vincent for support. "And just how the hell am I supposed to compete with that? I asked our client in Fall River if they were happy with us last season - they made money, we delivered everything we promised - and the client says if they sign with Turano there's no risk. Zero. If he lets the Turano's use his gym for a day, he lets him sell as many tickets as he wants and he gets to keep the whole nut. Bottom line, fellas, I'm stuck trying to sell a product this motherfucker's giving away."

    "Why risk five or six thousand to make ten or twelve," Charlie sighed, "when Turano can offer you three-to-five with no chance of losing dime one?"

    Vincent began to pace. "Why fuck with us?"

    "I've never seen him make a move like this," Charlie said. "He's always kept pretty much to himself."

    "With all due respect, Charlie," Frank said, stepping forward, "until we entered the picture the ECPWL wasn't much of a threat to somebody like Turano. With the number of shows we're doing now, particularly those in and around his home base state, we must be hurting him worse than we thought."

    Everyone in the room was familiar with the six independent promoters conducting business from Maine to Florida, but it was also common knowledge that only three could be considered federations capable of wielding any significant power. The ECPWL was one; a promotion based in Miami (and considered at that point to be friendly), was another. The third and arguably strongest of the lot belonged to John Turano. In a little more than a year the ECPWL had become recognized throughout the wrestling business as the fastest-rising independent organization in the country. Their rapid success had now made them a target.

    "Maybe we should've tried to meet with Turano before we started booking shots in Pennsylvania and the neighboring states," Gus said quietly.

    Charlie shook his head. "You don't understand. You don't talk to John Turano. He's such an asshole it's impossible to have a reasonable conversation with the guy. Believe me, I've tried. That's why he's an outcast in the business."

    "None of us are exactly close," Frank said.

    "True, but at least if we need to talk to say, Ralphie Logan down in Miami, or Murray Weiss in New York, or even Pete Bracco in Trenton, we can get them on the phone and work things out. Turano considers everybody the enemy."

    "Maybe he's right," Vincent said.

    "Yeah," Charlie answered, "but we all know there's certain things you just don't do, and following somebody else's dates is one of them. It shows a complete lack of respect. It's like a slap in the face, Vin."

    Gus said, "The New England states were his territory first. He could make the argument that we did the same shit to him. Turano had free reign there for so long he probably thought he could just - "

    "I don't give a shit what he thought," Frank snapped. "Give me the actual damages."

    "Using sales figures from last year, the loss of those three shots will end up costing us more than ten grand in profits."

    Frank slammed a fist on the bureau. "But Jesus Christ, can we get a break from this bullshit?"

    "We can't afford another hit like that," Gus said after a hard swallow. "It'd set us back a year, maybe more."

    Frank exchanged glances with Vincent before he spoke. "At some point Turano will have enough TV tapings ahead of him. How much longer do you think he'll keep this stunt going? Can we just ride it out?"

    "Remember," Vincent warned, "he's got more money than we do at this point. The question is how much longer can he afford to keep it going?"

    With a horrible grimace, Charlie gulped down the remainder of his drink. "Long enough to run us into the ground."

    Frank lit a cigarette, pulled the smoke deep into his lungs and held it there. "What do we do about it?"

    "Okay," Vincent said, "let's cut to the chase. We've got three options."

    "That's two more than I can think of," Charlie said wearily.

    Vincent removed his suit jacket and slung it over the back of the desk chair. "One, we wait it out, step up our own sales efforts - particularly in this sack of shit's backyard - and wait to see what he does next. Two, we set up a meeting with him and his people and try to negotiate some sort of deal where nobody has to take the pipe. Three, we make a move on Turano that shows the entire wrestling world that we are the last guys on the planet anybody wants to be fucking with."

    "Charlie," Frank said, pacing slowly near the door, "you're the only one who knows this guy - "

    "I've met him," Charlie corrected him. "I don't know him any better than you do, brother."

    "But you don't think he can be negotiated with."

    "Not at all. The guy's a dick. Ask your friend, Paulie Caruso, he knows Turano. Ask Luther. He worked for him for a few months a couple years back. Any of the boys that work for the guy will tell you the same thing, Frank. The only way he gets talent to work for him in the first place is because he promises TV exposure and guarantees a certain number of shots a year."

    Frank thought a moment. "Has he ever been pushed?"

    "Luther told me a story once about a feud Turano had back in the seventies with a guy by the name of Dave Remy. He was a real small-timer, worked mostly Massachusetts and Rhode Island doing little popcorn shows - you know, a few hundred bucks in his pocket a night with a card of unknown talent, a small room and cheap ticket prices. One of the guys who worked for Turano at that time was Jimmy Shaw. He had a hell of a gimmick - they'd carry him out in a cage and drag him into the ring in chains like a nut. He worked as The Neanderthal Man. They billed him as a guy a bunch of scientists had found out in some jungle someplace - you know the routine - I'm sure you guys remember seeing him on TV and in all the magazines back then. He was a major headliner for a while. Anyway, in those days, the big promotions only offered a handful of exclusive contracts, so there was a lot more movement between the major federations and the independent circuit, even by the big stars. Shaw ended up going to work for Turano, but they had a falling out over money and Shaw split. Somewhere along the line, he met up with this Remy guy and they decided to do a shot together. Shaw wanted to get back at Turano for stiffing him so he gave Remy the name of one of the Turano's biggest clients and told him to put it together. Well, with The Neanderthal Man as the main event draw even a stiff like Remy could sell the deal. Word got back to Turano and I guess he went fucking ballistic, but it was too late. The contract had already been signed."