Bad Apple (11 page)

Stanley started to move around the counter, stalking Mr. Blake. The old guy still didn't say anything, but the wet gleam of fear suddenly showed in his eyes.

Tozzi wet his lips. He had to do something.

Except he wasn't carrying a weapon, he couldn't depend on Freshy to help him out, and Bells just might go ballistic if he tried to interfere with “business.” He touched the beeper clipped to his belt. Gibbons hadn't seen him getting into Bells's car back in Bayonne. If he had, he and Dougherty would've followed them in the surveillance van, and they'd be hearing all this right now. They'd have plenty of backups with them, who'd barge in and save Mr. Blake. But Gibbons hadn't seen him getting into the car, so no one was listening now. Shit.

Stanley was behind the counter, closing in on his prey, and Bells was moving on the the balls of his feet, stepping in a box pattern with a look of glee on his face. Tozzi wondered if this was some kind of tribal dance he was doing. Or just something he did when he was enjoying himself.

The Tazmanian Devil was smoothing the leather on the backs of his hands, moving in for the kill.

Bells was doing his little witch-doctor dance. It could've been the fluorescent lights in there, but Tozzi swore the bastard's eyes were glowing.

Tozzi had to do something quick, but what? He was gonna have to reveal himself, say he was an FBI agent, and hope they'd back off. He was gonna have to blow his cover.

Mr. Blake was backing around the counter, but there was no getting away from Stanley, and he knew it.

Tozzi's heart was thumping. Maybe there was another way. He looked at the floor, looked all around him, not knowing what the hell he thought he'd find that could help Mr. Blake now. Then something caught his eye. A purple sparkle in the glass case behind Bells.

He walked over and quickly pointed to it, a silver bracelet with tiny dangling purple gems cut like tear drops. The silver was dark and antique-looking, and the settings were like little silver petunias. A chain of glittering little eggplants jammed into petunia horns. The color of the stones reminded him of the color of Gina's glasses.

“Stanley, excuse me,” Tozzi said. “Before you do anything, I'd just like to ask Mr. Blake something.” Tozzi was making this up as he went along. “Mr. Blake, how much for the bracelet with the purple stones? This one, right here.” Tozzi pointed through the glass.

Bells stared down at the bracelet in the case. He looked a little baffled, but more amused. “Whatever it costs, it won't be enough to begin to cover what he owes me.” He shifted his gaze to Mr. Blake. “Go 'head. Show Mikey what he wants to see.” He leaned over the counter then and whispered to the old man, “Hey, maybe you can make bundle off this guy, and everybody'll end up happy. See, I'm a very fair person. I never believe in interfering with a man's business. Especially a man who owes me money.”

Mr. Blake kept his eye on Stanley as he moved around the counter to the bracelet with the purple stones. He unlocked the case and pulled it out, handing it to Tozzi. His hand was shaking. “They're amethysts,” he said, but he seemed reluctant to name a price. Obviously he must've owed Bells a lot more than the
bracelet was worth. Naming a ridiculous price to save his ass would be playing Bells's game, and Mr. Blake had too much self-respect for that. But with the Tazmanian Devil hovering over his shoulder, he also knew he had run out of alternatives.

“How much, Mr. Blake? Go 'head. Give him a price.” Bells was eating this up.

Tozzi held the bracelet up to the light. “Hey, Freshy, you think she'd like this?”

Bells's head snapped around. “Who you talking about?”

Freshy looked like he was gonna piss his pants. “I, ah, I . . .”

Tozzi kept his eyes on the glittering stones. “She really loves purple. I think she'd like this. What do you think, Fresh?” Tozzi didn't look at Bells, and he didn't mention Gina's name. It was a gamble, but Bells was too clever to be led by the nose. He had to fill in the blanks for himself.

“So how much you want?” Tozzi asked Mr. Blake.

The bracelet was suddenly snatched out of Tozzi's hand. Bells held it up, tilting his head back to examine it. Then he furrowed his brow at Tozzi. “Forget it. It's sold,” he said.

“What?”

“
I
want it,” he said, and slipped it into his pants pocket.

“But you just said—”

“Tough shit. It's mine.”

Tozzi shrugged and turned to Mr. Blake. “You got another one like that? This girl would
really
love that bracelet.”

The old man shook his head. “It's handmade. One of a kind.”

“Too bad, Mikey-boy.” Bells was grinning like a skull.

Tozzi shrugged, then turned to Freshy. “Too bad. She would've liked it. If you decide you don't want it, Bells, lemme know. I'll buy it off you.”

The skull's grin dissolved. He didn't answer. Bells went into another trance, staring into one of the glass cases, thinking hard.
Suddenly he checked his watch, then waved Stanley out from behind the counter. The Tazmanian Devil looked very disappointed.

Bells regained his composure. “Tell you what, Mr. Blake. This is what I'm gonna do for you.” He held up his index finger. “One week. That's what I'm gonna give you because I'm a nice guy, and I got someplace to go right now. One week. Next Wednesday I'll be back, and I want the money, up to date, everything you owe so far. If not, we'll pick up right where we left off today.”

Stanley was taking off his gloves, but he smiled when he heard that.

Bells backstepped toward the door. “C'mon. Let's go.” He seemed to be in a hurry all of a sudden.

“What about the bracelet?” Mr. Blake asked.

“You're giving it to me. For my trouble.”

“But—”

“You want to argue about it?”

Mr. Blake shut up.

Bells was at the door, holding it open. “C'mon. Let's go, I said.” He looked at his watch again.

Freshy was paler than usual. “You gonna take us home now?”

“Nope. Gotta make a stop in the city. C'mon now. Hurry up.”

As they filed out of the store, Tozzi caught Bells staring at him. There was mischief in his eyes. Or malice. Tozzi wasn't sure which.

“So where is she?” Bells hovered over the edge of the desk, polite but insistent.

Gina's secretary shrugged, the phone cradled on her shoulder as she called around the department store looking for her boss. She was a black girl in her twenties with one of those Buckwheat hairdos. She had an attitude when they first walked in, but the presence of four grown men with bad grammar and no place else to be in the middle of a weekday was making her a little uneasy. She was having a hard time looking Bells in the eye.

The top floor of Macy's humongous flagship store on Thirty-fourth Street in Manhattan didn't look like the rest of the store. It was full of offices and pretty drab ones at that, just like a regular old office building. Gina shared an office with another buyer, but neither of them was in right now. The secretary's desk was out in the hallway.

Tozzi, Freshy, and Stanley hung back as Bells did the talking. He stood there with his hands clasped behind his back, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, staring down at the secretary, always moving.

The secretary dialed yet another extension and asked if Gina was there. She kept her eyes down, staring at her blotter, playing with her hair. Bells watched her like a cruel headmaster. He
knew he was making her nervous, and Tozzi could tell from his face that he was enjoying it.

“Is Ms. DeFresco down there?” she asked one more time. She glanced up at Bells, shook her head, and looked down again. “Have you seen her? . . . No? . . . Okay, thanks.”

“No luck?” Bells tucked his chin in and puckered his lips.

She spoke fast, not wanting to disappoint the creep. “No one's seen her. Maybe she left for Hoboken already.”

“Hoboken?”

“Yeah. That's where they make the floats for the parade. The Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade? You know, with all those big balloons? The cartoon characters? The store has a big warehouse somewhere over in Hoboken.”

Bells kept shifting his weight, back and forth. “Why would she be going over there?”

“Well, she wasn't supposed to leave until after lunch, but she's got all these kids with her. They're going to be in the parade tomorrow, on Santa's float. Gina is supposed to take them over and show them what they're supposed to do.”

“So who are these kids?”

She lowered her voice and rolled her eyes. “The bosses' kids. Getting your kids on Santa's float is one of the big perks around here.”

“But if Gina isn't supposed to go over to see the floats until after lunch, where the hell could she be with all these kids?”

“Wherever they want to be. They're the bosses' kids.” She looked at her watch. “It's almost lunchtime. Gina could be feeding them, either upstairs in the cafeteria or down in the Cellar. Or they could be somewhere on five in kids' clothes. Or toys on eight. Maybe electronics on seven. I dunno. It's a big store. And these kids get whatever the hell they want when they're here.”

“No kidding.” Bells's voice softened. He sounded genuinely concerned about the young woman's grievance.

“Santa's treat.” she said with a smirk. “Like they don't have enough.” She didn't seem so intimidated now that he was listening to her complaints.

Bells crinkled his eyes and nodded at the phone. “Make a few more calls, would'ja? I'll bet they're still here.”

The secretary shrugged. “All right.” But she didn't sound hopeful. She pounded out another extension and asked if Gina was there.

Tozzi noticed that Bells kept his hand in his jacket pocket. He was jingling that bracelet he took from Mr. Blake, the jeweler. Tozzi got the impression from the way he kept playing with it that he was anxious to give it to Gina. Tozzi hadn't even been sure Bells had something going with Gina when he made believe he wanted to buy it for someone who loved purple, but now it seemed that he was right on the money about them. From what Tozzi could see, Bells had it pretty bad for Gina, and that was really pissing him off. Bells's voice on her answering machine kept replaying through his head. He wondered if Gina felt as strongly for Bells, though. Maybe it was just a one-way thing. But maybe all that stuff she'd told Tozzi about not wanting anything to do with her brother's wiseguy friends was a load. Maybe it was just her way of giving him the brush-off because she was already taken.

The secretary nodded, said thanks, and hung up the phone. “Gina was in kids' shoes on five about ten minutes ago, but she's not there now. The kids are with her. You want me to have her paged? Is this an emergency or something?”

Bells shook his head. “No, no, don't have her paged. I don't want to get her upset.” He glanced over his shoulder at Freshy. “Maybe she'll think someone died.” He laughed, but no one
joined in. That didn't bother him. He turned back to the secretary and smiled at her. “If she's in the store, we'll find her. Thanks for your help.”

Bells turned and spread his arms like a big bird of prey, ushering them all back down to the end of the hall to the bank of elevators. An oil portrait of old man Macy was on the opposite wall to greet people as they got off the elevator.

Stanley looked at his watch. “Whatta'ya wanna do, Bells?”

“We'll split up and look for her. She's in the store. She should be easy to spot if she's baby-sitting a bunch of kids.”

Tozzi and Freshy shrugged and said okay. They didn't have much choice. It wasn't like he was asking them to break some deadbeat's leg. But in this instance, Tozzi might've rather done that than help Bells give Gina a gift that he had picked out because he'd genuinely thought she might like it.

“What is it, a little after noon?” Bells asked.

Stanley looked at his watch again. “Yup.”

“Okay. Stanley, you come with me. We'll start on the top floor and work down. Mikey, you and Freshy go down to the basement and work up. We'll meet back here in what? Half an hour, forty-five minutes?”

They all shrugged and nodded. Tozzi planned to get to a phone and call in to the field office as soon as he could. Maybe they could take Bells down in the store.

Bells grinned at Tozzi. “Now, if you guys find her first, you just tell her I got a surprise for her and bring her back here, okay?”

“Sure.” Tozzi nodded. Bells was really busting his balls now, but Tozzi didn't want to give him the satisfaction of letting him think he was jealous. Even though he was.

Bells pressed the down-button for the elevator. He was still
grinning at Tozzi. “And don't tell her what it is. Gina likes surprises.”

Tozzi held his tongue and just nodded. How about you, Bells? he thought. You like surprises?

“See? I told you she'd be here. She eats here all the time.” Freshy bounced as he cut through the circular racks of dresses and blouses on the fourth floor. Tucked away in a corner, there was a little snack bar done up like an ice cream parlor from the fifties. The girl who worked the counter wore a pink and black poodle skirt, and her blond hair was tied back in a high, tight ponytail. Gina was sitting in a booth with a bunch of kids—nine-and ten-year-olds, Tozzi guessed. They took up the only two booths in the snack bar.

Tozzi followed Freshy through the racks. “If you knew your sister would be here, why didn't you tell Bells?”

Freshy gave him a look. “Would you want that friggin' freak hanging around
your
sister?”

The answer was obvious, but Tozzi pondered Freshy's statement. Was Freshy implying that Bells had been hanging around with Gina? As in the past?

Tozzi stopped and watched Gina and the kids from behind a rack of iridescent green parkas. They were flipping through the selections on the jukebox in the booth, arguing over what they wanted to hear. He didn't like what he saw. He'd just made a quick call in to the field office and told them that Bells was in Macy's and that he'd try to keep him here until an arrest team could get there. But if Bells found Gina and these kids, making an arrest would be too risky. Bells had to be isolated somehow. As Tozzi walked over toward the snack bar, he wondered how the hell he could do that. He'd have to go off and search the
store for Bells. But he didn't want to leave Gina and the kids alone.