Cigarette smoke stained the alley, the stench competing with ripe garbage from a dumpster. It was almost enough to make him retch again.
But he wouldn't give Hoodie the satisfaction.
Cal wiped the corner of his mouth and stared down the younger thug.
Hoodie had a day's worth of dark stubble, and his signature hood was down, revealing a buzzed haircut and a prematurely receding hairline. He was handsome like those 1990s heroin-chic models, all sunken cheeks and full lips. He smiled like a man begging to be hit.
A trio of young women, skinny and barely clothed, huddled around the perimeter of the puke zone, puffing on cigarettes and chiding Cal in French for his drunkenness. Hoodie blew a dragon's stream of hot smoke into Cal's face, making the women laugh.
Cal stifled a cough and blinked his eyes clean.
Goggles popped into view and wrapped an arm around his larger friend's shoulder, smoking a cigarette of his own. Goggles was shorter and stockier; his eyes magnified behind their lenses. They smiled widely and spat insults or threats, toying with Cal or trying to egg him on.
Cal tried to think. He was larger than either man, but he was much older, outnumbered, and his head spun with too much alcohol.
On balance, he was fucked, and Frank was again nowhere to be found.
"Cal MacIntyre," Hoodie said and Cal thought his name sounded almost foreign with the man's thick accent. "You puked on my shoes."
"You tried to throw me over a cliff," Cal said. "We're almost even."
"Zelenko stopped us last time," Hoodie said almost absently. "But he isn't here now . . . " The words hung like a threat.
Zelenko? Now Cal had a name for Zebra, and a quick scan of the alley confirmed the big man was absent, thank God, but it was still two-on-one.
Until it wasn't.
The club door swung open and released a torrent of pounding music.
"Well, well, well," Frank said, stepping to Cal's side. "If it isn't my two favorite French fucks. Look at you." His voice was slurred. "Still alive."
Hoodie stared at him hard. "And you are?"
The question surprised Cal. They knew his full name but didn't recognize Frank at all—not from their first encounter on the tram, not from their weeks of surveillance, and not from whatever Frank had been up to the previous night. Then again, Frank was no longer wearing his mustache.
It fucking worked.
Frank smiled. "Let's find out."
Frank caught Cal's eye and gave a subtle nod. They'd been there before, shoulder to shoulder facing down assholes running their mouths: in the hallway of Heartland High, the parking lot of the old bowling alley, and once outside a club in Ybor.
The four of them in the alley were a dark reflection of each other, with Frank and Hoodie squaring off and about the same size, and Goggles and Cal opposites in every way. The stare down only lasted a moment, before Hoodie stepped back and made a dismissive hand gesture, which Goggles copied like a shadow.
They were backing down and Cal let out a held breath.
Then Hoodie smiled like he had an idea. He made an exaggerated show of checking his wrist for a watch that wasn't there.
"I think it's late, but I forgot my watch." He leered at Cal. "Maybe you have the time?"
Molly's watch.
The alley was still for only a second before Cal launched himself forward.
"You son of a bitch!"
He pushed Hoodie hard in the chest and sent him wheeling backwards, barely keeping his feet. Goggles raised a fist, but his head snapped back as Frank hit him in the nose. The women in the background shrieked in unison and clattered down the alley on their high heels, cigarettes still burning.
Hoodie found his feet and charged into Cal, but Cal had fifty pounds on him and absorbed the charge without retreating. His ribs flared in pain, though, as he took several quick punches under his guard. Cal responded with a quick elbow that connected with Hoodie's ear, and they separated again to size each other up for another clash.
Pain sobered him. Cal sucked in quick breaths and shuffled towards Hoodie in a boxer's stance—
—but Frank interrupted with a HI-YAH! and a kick.
Hoodie stumbled sideways and clutched at his side, obviously in pain, and Frank dropped back into a karate stance with his hands straight as blades.
Goggles came back into the fight, his nose bloody from Frank's initial punch. His short body crouched into a martial arts stance of his own, with his fingers curled forward into claws—some sort of ridiculous tiger style. He yelled and launched himself at Frank with his hands clawing through the air—
—but Cal intercepted him with a clothesline to the neck and the little man collapsed under his own momentum. Cal reached down and ripped the eyeglasses off Goggles's head, raising them with a triumphant roar.
Tiger style was no match for old-fashioned American brawling.
Cal glanced sideways at his fellow outlaw and best friend, and Frank met his gaze with a nod.
The alley was silent except for heavy breaths and the muffled music from inside. Cal rolled his shoulders in his boxer's stance while Frank chopped the air with whatever karate shit he was doing, both of them daring the Frenchies to make a move. Goggles searched blindly for his glasses, turned the wrong way, but Hoodie was focused, his sneer set in stone.
There was a sudden snikt and a shiny blade appeared in Hoodie's hand.
Frank dropped out of his karate stance and backed away slowly with his hands up peacefully. Cal copied him.
"Woah, now," Frank said.
But Hoodie followed with slow, menacing steps.
"Frank," warned Cal.
"Just get out of here," Frank answered, not taking his eyes off the blade.
Cal shook his head.
Hoodie backed them up against the brick wall. The club door was behind him.
"I should have done this last time," Hoodie sneered at Cal and coiled back with his knife like a snake ready to strike—
—but not before a green bottle exploded against his skull as Nikolas (or Dorian) smashed him from behind.
The switchblade clattered to the ground and Frank immediately kicked its handle and sent it skittering into the shadows. Hoodie stayed on his feet, doubled over and clutched his bleeding scalp, but their other Swiss friend sent him to the ground with a kick behind his knee.
Cal hadn't noticed the club door opening, the details lost in the commotion of the fight, and—apparently—Hoodie hadn't noticed either. Both of their Swiss friends had slipped into the alley and now they all exchanged wide-eyed glances before one of them yelled, "Let's go!"
They bolted out of the alley, all four of them, but not before Frank kicked Goggles in the stomach as they passed.
It wasn't clear who started laughing, but Cal joined in as they ran, the sound bouncing off the alley walls as they spilled into the Niçoise night.