Page 1 of The Damage Man

Evan Smoak, aka Orphan X, aka the Nowhere Man, is pissed off about vodka.

This can happen, even to the finest assassin of this or any generation.

Early this morning, a shitty liquor store at the edge of not-so-glamorous Hollywood posted a bottle of Kauffman Vintage vodka on its website. Evan’s web crawler picked up on it immediately, sending him an alert.

Standing now inside the optimistically named Tinsel Town Tipples examining said bottle, he sees that the seal is already broken. A quick sniff confirms that the zaftig bottle has been emptied and refilled with an inferior spirit.

He hands the bottle back to the clerk, a bald, stocky man of indeterminate Eastern European provenance. “This isn’t Kauffman.”

The clerk pauses from probing at his molars with a dental pick. His lack of hair makes his head’s perfect roundness all the more pronounced. “Eez Kauffman! Say right here. Fuck you.”

Evan says, “Right.”

He walks out, tilts his face to the midday Los Angeles sun. Car exhaust is plentiful here, along with prostitutes and baggies of crank.

Deep breath. Hold. Exhale.

Onward to his Ford F-150.

At first he thinks the man he spots quivering by the dumpster is another meth-head. But then he sees the guy’s clean pants and button-up shirt, hears the note of fear in his voice.

“I can’t,” he says, to someone out of sight. “If I had it I would, believe me.” His hands fan up, showing his palms. “Give me another week. Please. He’s just a kid.”

A gravelly voice floats from around the corner. “He’s twenty-four. What’s owed is owed.”

Evan’s jaw has clenched, nearly imperceptibly. He relaxes it.

He shouldn’t get involved. Never make it personal.

But he’s blown through the Fourth Commandment enough times now to consider it a yellow light.

“One week,” the first man pleads. “I’ll figure something out.”

“Your son’s had two months. You can’t cover him, you shouldn’t’ve asked for a meet.”

Evan changes course, heads to the scene by the alley.

The man being threatened is older than Evan thought at first glance, closing in on fifty. Creases at the edges of his eyes, threads of gray at the temples, his face burnished from working in the sun. The button-up shirt isn’t dress but blue-collar, a name patch announcing him as RUSSELL.

The man threatening Russell is a decade and change younger. He wields no weapon, but his posture conveys menace and a willingness to fight. The asphalt of the alley glitters with glass from shattered bottles.

As he sees Evan approach, he bounces his shoulders like a boxer. “Keep it moving, Chad. Not your business.”

Chad.

Evan has found thug dialogue unimaginative of late.

He keeps on, nearing the alley.

The man’s hand dips to the pocket of his brown canvas camp jacket. There is a bulge in the fabric but not a significant one. Knife, probably, or perhaps a crappy little .22. “The hell do you want?”

Evan considers. “Kauffman Vintage vodka.”

The man’s grimace shows off a gold incisor that was likely an inspired fashion choice in his youth. He blinks twice. “What?”

“I know, a long shot here, but in sterquiliniis invenitur and all that.”

“Huh?”