Cold Service (8 page)

The Rowes Wharf condos were part of a big handsome complex on the waterfront that included a huge archway and the Boston Harbor Hotel. In the lobby of Rimbaud's building was a security guy in a blue blazer and striped tie. Hawk asked him for the Rimbauds.

"May I say who is calling?"

"Say we from Mr. Marcus," Hawk said.

The guard dialed the phone and spoke into it and hung up.

"Through that door," he said, "down the steps, turn right, second condo."

We went. The door led outside. We were on a boat slip. To our right, a promenade led past the big archway, to the hotel. In good weather, people sat outside on the promenade and drank flavored martinis and ate light meals and listened to live music. In the cold rain, the promenade was empty except for one guy in a fashionable yellow slicker, trying to hold an umbrella over a miserable little white dog whose hairdo was being seriously compromised as they walked toward the archway. We walked up the two steps at the Rimbaud condo and rang the bell. The door opened and it was Brock himself. He looked like the cover of a romance novel. Shoulder-length blond hair, pale blue eyes, chiseled features, pouty lips, his flowered shirt unbuttoned halfway down his manly upper body. He stood so that his right hand was concealed behind the door.

Hawk said, "My name's Hawk. This is Spenser. We need to talk."

"Tony send you?" Brock said.

" 'Course he did," Hawk said. "It's raining."

"I don't give a fuck what it's doing," Brock said. "You come in when I know why you want to."

A good-looking young woman with coffee-colored skin appeared behind Rimbaud. Her hair was in an elaborate pattern of tight cornrows. Ethnic as hell.

"Who is it, Brock?" she said, and pressed her considerable boobs against his left arm.

"Couple dudes say they from your old man," Rimbaud said.

Jolene was barefoot and a little big for her clothes. She looked to be a size six. Her jeans appeared to be a size two. They ended well below her navel. Her cropped tank top ended well above. She had a nice, flat stomach, and her arms and shoulders looked strong.

"I don't know them," she said.

"Well, my heavens," Hawk said. "Look at how you've grown, girl. I knew Veronica and Tony when you was born, child. And look what you turned out to be."

I looked at Hawk. He was thrilled to see her. He was folksy. I felt a little nauseous.

"You know my mom, too?" Jolene said.

"Huh-unh."

"Oh, Brock, let them in," Jolene said. "They seem nice."

Brock nodded us in. Anything the little lady wants. As we came in he put the gun he'd been concealing behind the door into his belt. He saw me see him do it, and he met my look.

"My line of work," he said. "Pays to be careful."

Jolene went across the living room to the couch. It was less than a flounce but certainly more than a walk. On the low table in front of the couch there was a bottle of Riesling in an ice bucket, and two glasses, half empty. Or half full. There was some kind of fusion jazz playing on the stereo. I hated fusion jazz. Brock went and stood near Jolene. I stood near the door. Hawk sat on a big, red, tasseled hassock in front of them. Nobody offered us a drink. Nobody turned down the fusion. Through the big picture window, I could see the rain dappling the gray water of the harbor.

"Tell us about you and Boots Podolak," Hawk said to Jolene.

"What kind of a fucking question is that," Brock said.

"Who's Boots Podolak?" Jolene said.

"Shut up, Jolene," Brock said.

"Who you telling to shut up?" Jolene said.

"There some other fucking Jolene in here," Brock said. "I don't want you talking to these bozos."

"Bozos?" I said to Hawk.

Hawk shrugged. Brock took the gun out of his waistband.

"Don't you go pointing no gun in my house, you motherfucker," Jolene said.

"Get out," Brock said, "right now, or I'll blow your mother-fucking heads off."

"What's goin' on," Jolene said.

"Keep fucking quiet," Brock said.

"You the one gonna get your mother-fucking head blown off," Jolene said, "my daddy hear you talk to me like that."

The gun was a nine-millimeter. He had thumbed the hammer back.

"Shut up, bitch," he said, and raised the gun.

Hawk stood.

"Don't mean to start up no domestic dispute," he said.

I opened the door. Hawk smiled at them.

Hawk said, "We'll be seeing you all again real soon, I hope."

"Fuck you," Jolene said.

We went out and closed the door. They were screaming at each other behind us.

"Look at how you've grown, girl," I said.

"Got us in there, didn't it?" Hawk said.

"Not for long," I said. "And as we left, I believe I heard a fuck you."

"I believe she talking to you," Hawk said.

"No doubt," I said. "Well, we learned there's something up with Boots."

"And Jolene don't know what."

"And Brock thinks he's tough."

"And we was right," Hawk said. "I don't think Brock a brother."

"By God, you're right," I said. "Mission accomplished."

"The weather sucks," Tony said. "This better be worth it."

"I give you two words," Hawk said. "Jolene Marcus."

Tony showed no reaction.

"What about her?" he said.

"She married outside the faith," Hawk said.

"What about her," Tony said again.

"Whassup," Hawk said, "with her husband and Boots Podolak?"

I was wearing my black nylon raincoat with the cool zipper front. I had my hands in my pockets. In the right pocket was my Browning nine-millimeter. I kept my hand on the butt, my thumb on the hammer. I could cock it before it cleared my pocket. I'd practiced. There were people hurrying through the gardens on their way home from work, and some of them came across the bridge. But there were no casual walkers in the mean weather.

Tony looked at Hawk as if he were appraising him for auction. Hawk waited. I watched Ty Bop. Ty Bop was the shooter. Junior probably would have an Uzi, maybe a Bull Pup, under his coat. But it wasn't second nature to him the way it was with Ty Bop. Leonard would have a handgun, and he'd be good with it. But for Ty Bop, shooting was a part of his viscera. It was who he was. Ty Bop was the one to kill first.

"Whadya know?" Tony finally said in a soft voice.

"I know she your daughter with Veronica," Hawk said. "I know she married to a horse's ass."

"You seen them?" Tony said.

His voice was even softer.

"Yes."

"Where?"

"Rowes Wharf," Hawk said.

"You went to her house?"

I hunched my shoulders slightly.

"I did," Hawk said.

I could hear Tony breathe deeply through his nose.

"What did she say?"

I could feel the tightness begin to loosen in my trapezius.

"She don't seem to know nothing 'bout Boots," Hawk said.

"Brock?"

"He did," Hawk said. "Pulled a gun. Told us to, ah believe, get the fuck out."

"He pulled a gun on you," Tony said.

"Un-huh."

"You let it slide?"

"Un-huh. They started shoutin' at each other and me and my trusted companion here dee-parted."

Tony was silent. He glanced down the bridge toward Ty Bop and Junior. He looked the other way at Leonard. He raised his voice slightly.

"Go wait in the car," he said.

Junior and Leonard looked pleased. Ty Bop seemed disappointed. When they were gone, Tony took his hands out of his pockets and leaned his forearms on the bridge railing and looked down at the empty lake bottom.

"Her mother's no good, never was. I wasn't married to her. Just fucked her some. Knocked her up. When the kid was born, I took her. Jolene's twenty. I sent her to fucking Hampshire College. She's had two abortions."

He paused. I wondered if there was a connection between Hampshire and abortions. Hawk didn't say anything. The sleety rain drizzled down, not very hard and not very fast, but steady.

"Thirty thousand a year," Tony said, "and she's the old joke. Only fucked for friends, didn't have an enemy in the world."

It was hard language. If you told it tough, maybe it was less painful. Tony kept staring down, nodding his head softly, as if to himself.

"Then this honkie jerk-off comes along and she decide he the one. First time I see him I know what he is. But he what she wants. So she marries him. I set him up with a nice little book in the South End, easy living, no deadbeats. But he can't hack it. Refuses to pay off on a bet, smacks the customer around when the customer complains. Customer complains to the cops. We got to shut down the book for a while. I set him up someplace else… same long story. Asshole can't make a living. But she loves him. Somebody else, I have Ty Bop kill him, but…"

"So what about Boots," Hawk said.

It was dark now. The lights on Boylston Street were amorphous in the drizzle.

"Dumbass kid decides he's going to acquire new territory for us."

"You and him?" Hawk said.

"Yeah. Show me the kind of fucking criminal genius he is. So he decides to set us up in Marshport. Says it's a black population run by a few fucking Bohunks. Says they'll welcome us in, we get a foothold."

"And what did he think the Bohunks be doing," Hawk said, "while he getting this foothold?"

"He don't think, Hawk. He a fucking airhead. He think pumping iron and carrying a gun make him a tough guy."

"You weren't able to explain that it didn't," Hawk said.

"Jolene say I don't want him to succeed, that I, ah, repressing him. I told you she been to college."

"You let him use some soldiers," Hawk said.

"Sure, but I don't want no big war with Boots Podolak," Tony said. "For Marshport? What kind of business plan is that?"

Tony shook his head.

"So?" Hawk said.

"So I make a deal with Boots," Tony said. "He lets the kid grab a little piece of Marshport so Jolene can think he got a dick."

"And you let Boots grab a little piece of your enterprise," Hawk said.

Looking down at the empty pond bed, Tony nodded yes.

"And," Hawk said, "maybe you and Boots can designate who gets the short straw in your neighborhoods."

Tony nodded again.

"And Luther Gillespie gets aced."

Tony nodded again. We were all quiet.

After a time, Hawk said, "Known you a long time, Tony."

"Yeah."

"Don't want to give you more trouble than you got."

Tony nodded.

"But I got to even up for Luther Gillespie and his family, you understand that."

"And I got to look out for my daughter," Tony said.

"I got no interest in hurting her," Hawk said.

"She wants something, I do what I gotta do to get it for her," Tony said. "Right now she wants her husband to be a player in Marshport."

"I can work around you on this," Hawk said, "I will."

"I'll do the same," Tony said.

"If I can't…" Hawk said.

"You can't," Tony said.

"So we know," Hawk said.

"We know," Tony said.

"So how do you want to do this?" I said.

"Gonna go right at the Ukes," Hawk said. "Leave Rimbaud to do whatever he gonna do."

"Ukes probably don't make fine distinctions," I said. "They have trouble on their end, they'll make trouble at Brock's end."

"Which means maybe we have trouble with Tony," Hawk said.

"I don't think Clauswicz was in favor of fighting a two-front war," I said.

"Got no choice," Hawk said.

The whisky was warm and pleasant in my throat. The rain came steady against the office window.

"You think Brock's going to settle for the little piece of Marshport that Boots will give him?"

"Too stupid," Hawk said.

"You bet," I said.

"So he'll keep taking more from Boots," Hawk said. "And Boots be taking more from Tony."

"Which isn't going to work in the long run."

"No."

"So sooner or later there will be a war," I said. "With us or without us."

"Less we take out the Ukes," Hawk said.

"Then the kid gets Marshport," I said.

"Not for long," Hawk said.

"No," I said. "He's too stupid."

"And he don't know it," Hawk said. "And he ain't tough. And he don't know that, either."

"Deadly combination," I said.

"Tony's only hope would be to take it away from him," Hawk said.

"Or hope the daughter gets over him."

"Be easy to do," Hawk said.

"Maybe not for her," I said.

"Gonna have a lot of people mad at us," Hawk said.

"We'll get over it," I said.

"Ain't really your fight," Hawk said.

We each drank another swallow of whisky. The rain came steady on the black window.

"Yeah," I said. "It is."

Hawk was quiet for a time, then he nodded his head slowly.

"Yeah," he said. "It is."

I got up and looked out my window. Berkeley Street was dark and shiny wet and empty. A few cars went by on Boylston Street. And once in a while there was somebody walking, bent forward, hunched against the rain, hands in pockets. Genderless in the dark weather.

"Can't let it go," Hawk said.

"I know."

"Gonna be a bad mess any way it plays," Hawk said.

"Certainly will," I said.

"So, I guess we may as well do what we gonna do and not think too much 'bout what everybody else gonna do," Hawk said.

"Isn't that what we always do?" I said.

"It is," Hawk said.