Free Fiction Friday: Kick It

Here we go, a little short for Blaze Tuesday. Because, I love him.  

A kind of silly aside in the story timeline, kind of a fan fiction f my own work because, why not?

Be warned: Blaze cusses. If you don't like it, I suggest you turn back, now.

Otherwise, enjoy.

-Kai Kiriyama

Kick it, Tuesday.

It was already shaping up to be a worse day than the day before.

Hell, it was shaping up to be a terrible week overall. It was the kind of week that made you seriously reconsider the life choices you'd made up until that very point in your life. It was the kind of week that made you want to crawl back into your bed and never get up. Or drown yourself in the bottom of a whiskey bottle, if that was your thing.

It was raining. Again.

And I was stuck outside, sopping wet and miserable. I was just happy that I wasn't actually wearing a good suit. Jackson would have been ruined by the rain. I was just cranky. 

I felt like kicking myself for taking this case; I hadn't wanted to go out, but we needed to pay the bills somehow. We were just starting up and with New York being chock full of coffee and doughnut P.I's wanting to make their name int he biz, I had to fight tooth and claw to make sure that my name got put out there. I was the best in town and with Jacks by my side, I was unstoppable. I just needed the public to know that.

Jackson had taken a case alone. Nothing terribly important, nothing that was even really something we should have been doing in the first place, but who am I to deny my partner a nice cushy indoor job that allowed him to sort through ancient books and settle a blood-feud over some dead broad's fortune? At least, I knew that the take would be relatively good for us.

I, on the other hand, was outside. In the rain. Chasing ghosts more or less. It wasn't even a decent murder. I was busily tailing a guy who was suspected of cheatin' on his wife. Not really my strong suit, and cases of infidelity weren't something I liked to think about. Been there, done that. There was a reason why I never did get married, and that reason happened to be infidelity.

Heh, I'd almost gotten arrested for takin' the boots to that sonuvabitch, but my partner at the time had managed to talk everyone out of it while I had my knuckles cleaned  and my eyebrow stitched up in the precinct's basement morgue.

And now here I was, playing wannabe spy on a dude who was cheatin' on his wife. I kinda wanted to shoot myself in the alley I'd found myself standing in, waiting. Or shoot him for not bein' able to keep it in his pants.

Either way, I was pissed off and the pouring rain wasn't helping.

The entire week had been like this. Cold cases comin' through the front door of my little practice, cases that I had no hope in hell of being able to complete and being forced to turn away. Offers to do illegal things for copious amounts of cash. The blue breathing down my neck because I'd done a great job of pissing them off and now the dirty cops who I used to drink from the same bottle with were constantly trying to find a way to pick me up, lock me away or otherwise humiliate me and ruin my career.

Not that it was doin' them much good. I was clean a whistle, sharp as a tack and I'd just bought myself a building with apartment space above the offices. No one got in or out without my knowledge, despite having an open door kinda policy for the offices where I would conduct my business. No assassin would bother tryin' to get in. It would be too much hassle and not worth the contract price. I wasn't worth it now, anyway. Better to see me humiliated than dead. 

Dead means I won. Dead means I was right.

Humiliated, well, that was something that I was used to and I'm pretty sure that my reputation had been through worse than just a few dirty cops tryin' to pick up a retired cop turned private eye on some bogus charge. I'd never paid for sex, and it was suggested more than once that I liked men. I didn't do drugs, didn't even smoke. My vices were caffeine in unhealthy amounts and booze in slightly less amounts than my coffee.

And when I got blackout drunk, I made sure to do it at home, with the doors locked so that I could pass out in my apartment and keep what little dignity there was to be found in drinking yourself unconscious intact.

Tonight was shaping up to be one of those "drink until I pass out" kind of nights. 

The guy I was tailing walked right past the alley I was standing in, just like I'd predicted. Idiot. I had had enough of the bullshit. I'd been following the guy for a week and it was pretty damned obvious he was cheatin' on his wife. I had photographic evidence to prove it. I needed my own brand of justice though.

My arm shot out of the shadows and grabbed the guy by the collar of his jacket and I dragged him into the alley. I slammed him up against the wall with a wet thud, water from both our jackets spattered to the ground, unnoticed in the rest of the pattering rain. I drew my gun from my under the arm holster I kept her in.

"This here is Nadia." I drawled angrily. "She doesn't like it when guys cheat on their wives."

"Oh God, please don't kill me!" The guy begged. 

I snorted in contempt. "I'm a good guy." I assured him. "I don't kill."

He breathed a sigh of relief and I shook him, pressing my forearm harder into his chest. "Hey asshole." I growled. "Just 'cause I'm a good guy doesn't mean you get off Scot-free." I sorely wanted to pistol-whip him. 

"What do you want from me?"

I shrugged. "I want you to stop cheatin' on your wife to start." I suggested, pointing Nadia at his forehead. "I want you to break it off with your little 'mistress' right now. I want you to go home with flowers and candy and other lovely gifts for your wife. I want you to do whatever she says, goddammit. And, if you're lucky, she won't divorce you and take everything you're worth while she's at it." I wrinkled my nose in disgust. "Because believe me, I can make that happen."

The guy nodded, his eyes fixed on Nadia. 

"Get the hell outta my sight." I growled, pulling him away from the wall and shoving back towards the street. "You have twenty minutes to get back home with gifts, and if I so much as hear of you sneaking away to be with your little trollop, you won't be so lucky next time. Nadia doesn't forget."

He let out a little whimper and scurried away. I snorted derisively and tucked Nadia back in her holster. I was paid for another three days; I'd be following the bastard around to make sure that he did as I was told. 

For now, though, I was calling it a win and I was going home. There was a lot of drinking to do and I wanted to get a head start on it.