Hard Case Crime: Fifty to One (12 page)

Tricia ran to her. “My god, Stella, what happened to you?”

“I was in a fight,” Stella said. “It’s why the gloves, and trunks, and all.”

“No, I mean your face. What is that?” She bent to look at the welts: a low, wide ‘Z’ next to an ‘N.’ In fact, it wasn’t even two letters, it was the same letter twice, just turned sideways. And her blood ran cold as she realized the significance of those particular letters. ZN.
Zio Nicolazzo.

“It should’ve been you, Trixie. Not me. You. You’re the one knows who wrote the book.”

“Nicolazzo did this to you?”

She turned to her trainer. “Could you leave us alone for a minute?”

“You sure you’re okay?” he said.

“Yeah, I’m sure. Go on. I’m fine.” He left reluctantly, watching from the door for a moment before letting it close. “Listen, kid,” Stella said. “You need to know this. I gave you up. I didn’t want to give the bastard anything, but...” She touched the padded tip of one glove to her cheek.

“You know how he did it?” she said. “He’s got a ring with his initial on it, this big goddamn ring, and he held it over the flame from a cigarette lighter, a fancy gold Zippo, and he said, ‘You tell me which of my men betrayed me or you’ll never work as a model again.’ I told him I have no idea. They roughed me up a little, but Jesus, I’ve taken worse than that in my fights, and they knew it. So the ring. He said back in Italy, you’d use it to seal a letter, press it in hot wax. Leave your mark.”

“Oh, god, Stella, I’m so sorry,” Tricia said.

“Well, I’m just telling you, I talked. I told him everything I knew and some things I didn’t. Anything to make him stop.” Stella started biting at her laces again, finally got them loose, stripped off her gloves. Her hands were taped up underneath and the tape was dark with sweat.

“What exactly did you tell him?” Erin said.

“I told him I’d seen Trixie working on the book, that I’d read bits of it before it came out.”

“That’s it?”

“No.” She turned to Trixie. “I said you were sleeping with the guy. That you told me you’d planned the robbery together.”

“What?”
Tricia exploded. “Why would you say that?”

“I had to say something. To make him stop.”

“Did he?”

“Eventually.”

“You shouldn’t have lied,” Tricia said.

“You try it sometime, having hot metal pressed into your face, and then tell me what I should or shouldn’t have done.”

“Why’d he even come after you? Why did he think you’d know anything about the robbery?”

“He had his men get copies of all of Charley’s books, and they recognized me on some of the covers. I’ve been fighting here for a while, so they knew where to find me. And then, of course, they found the book in my locker.”

“Yeah,” Erin said, “we found it, too. You think maybe you’d want to get rid of it?”

“I wish I’d never seen it,” Stella said. “I wish I’d never met any of you.”

“Why’d you leave, Stella?” Tricia said. “A month ago. Right around the time of the robbery. Why’d you pick that time to move out?”

“What—
you
think I had something to do with it? Jesus Christ, after I took this because of you?” She was on her feet suddenly, aiming one taped hand at her scarred face. Tricia saw her fist clench and stepped back, out of range. Stella dropped her hands, disgusted. “Get out of here. Both of you.”

“Not till you answer my question,” Tricia said, trembling but hoping it didn’t show. “We went through a lot to find you. We’re not leaving without an answer.”

“Why’d I move out? Look at me. This is what I look like after a fight—when I win. It’s worse when I lose. Used to be I’d get a fight once a month, once every six weeks. Then about a month ago they offered me a regular gig, this whole ‘Houston Hurricane,’ ‘Colorado Kid’ thing. Good money, good hours, it’s maybe a stepping stone to a stage gig what with all the Broadway types in the audience—but how many modeling jobs am I going to get with bruises like this? Or a split lip, or maybe a broken nose? It was either or. I had to make a choice.”

“Did it occur to you,” Erin said, “that maybe they gave you this regular gig because they wanted to keep closer tabs on you?”

“Not until last night,” Stella said. “While they were doing this.”

“This just happened last night?” Tricia said. “Why’d they wait that long?”

“What, you think they should’ve done it sooner?” Stella growled.

“I don’t mean that, it’s just...why didn’t they?”

“Maybe Nicolazzo wasn’t back in the city yet,” Erin said. “Or maybe they’re getting desperate because no other leads have panned out. They must be pretty desperate to have sent those two goons to Charley’s office.”

“They got Charley?” Stella said.

“No, we chased them off.”

“You got lucky, then. Nicolazzo’s boys are awful mean. Charley’d crumble soon as they laid a finger on him. You, too,” Stella said to Tricia. “They’d break you in two. Not sure about you, Erin. You might last a while.”

“Thanks,” Erin said. “I think.”

“One more question,” Tricia said, “then we’ll go. Who else saw the book before it was published? Or did you tell anyone about it?”

“All the girls saw it. You left it lying around, for Christ’s sake.”

“Anyone else?”

“Well, Colleen—I told her. Don’t ask me why. I just thought she might get a kick out of it. This was back before we got the regular gig.”

“Who’s Colleen?”

“Colleen King, the Colorado Kid. You might see her on the way out—she’ll be the one coming to in the ring. She was one of Nicolazzo’s taxi dancers before he put her in the fight game.”

“Does Nicolazzo know you told her about the book?”

“Nicolazzo knows everything,” Stella said. “Everything. I’m no pushover—but we’ve all got limits. I’ll take it on my face if I have to, but when he started moving that ring south I sang like Mahalia Jackson.”

Tricia nodded. What could you say to that? She walked to the door, Erin close behind. Stella watched them go.

“I’m sorry this happened,” Tricia said, her hand on the knob. “I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt. I—” She stopped abruptly.

“What?” Stella said.

Tricia felt the knob turning under her hand.
Oh, no,
she said to herself.
Let it be the trainer coming back. Or Colleen King, coming in to peel her gloves off and change. Or Squinty, with his broom.

But it wasn’t.

“O-ho,” said the smaller one, “look who’s here.” The larger one ground his knuckles together like a kid warming himself in front of a fire.

“We were just leaving,” Erin said.

“I’m sure you were. You’re not anymore, but I’m sure you were.”

The big one reached inside his coat and brought out something wrapped in brown burlap.

“You can’t keep us here,” Tricia said.

“Who said anything about keeping you here?”

“You did,” Tricia said. “You just said we’re not leaving.”

“What are you, a lawyer? I meant you’re not leaving us.” He snapped his fingers at his partner, who was untangling the burlap. “Bruno, come on, the boss is waiting.”

Bruno finished pulling apart the wad of fabric, but there was nothing inside it—it was just burlap, all the way through. He walked up to Tricia, handed her a piece, then gave another to Erin and crammed the rest back in his deep coat pocket. “Put them on,” he said in his gravel pit voice and mimed pulling something over his head.

Tricia saw the drawstring then, sticking out at the bottom, and realized it was a sack, the sort potatoes come in.

“I’m not putting a bag over my head,” Erin said.

“If she doesn’t,” the other one said, “put it on her.”

“What are you going to do to them?” Stella said.

“What business is it of yours?” the smaller man said. “You didn’t have enough last night?”

Stella said nothing.

“That’s better.”

“People will be looking for us,” Erin said.

“You mean your boss, Borden? You’ll be seeing him soon enough.”

So they’d gotten Charley after all. Tricia’s heart sank.

“I mean the cops,” Erin said. “We’re wanted for assault. After you left, a cop named O’Malley tried to take her in—” she nodded toward Tricia “—and we knocked him out, tied him up. They’re going to be looking for both of us. I don’t know that you want to be seen in our company.”

“Then it’s a good thing you’re going to have bags over your heads, isn’t it? Now, quit talking and put ‘em on.” And he whipped out a revolver to emphasize his point. Reluctantly, Tricia opened her bag. She saw Erin doing the same.

The bag smelled musty and earthy as she pulled it over her head, as though it actually had held potatoes sometime recently. Through its coarse weave she could only see a hint of light. She felt a rough hand at her elbow, steering her toward the door.

“You really knocked out a cop?” she heard the smaller man say.

“Yeah,” Erin said. Her voice was muffled. “We really did.”

“With what?”

“Desk lamp.”

“That brass one?” the man said. “Good for you.”

He didn’t say any more till they were in the car. “All right, now you’re going to go in and up two flights of stairs. You’re going to keep the bag on till I tell you to take it off, understand?”

They’d been driving for the better part of an hour, making enough turns along the way that Tricia had no idea where they were. Which, presumably, was the point.

Something hard poked her in the side. “Understand?”

Tricia hadn’t realized he was waiting for an answer from her. “Yes, I understand. Two flights of stairs, keep the bag on.”

“Until what?”

“Until you say so.”

“Good. Now, you.”

Apparently he’d poked Erin, since she said, “Cut it out. I understand.”

“No, for you the rules are different. You’re going downstairs, to the cellar, where Bruno will keep an eye on you. You do whatever he tells you to. Understand?”

“Do I have a choice?”

“No.”

“Well, then,” Erin said.

“Hey, Mitch,” came a low voice from the front seat, “where does he want them, out front or in the back?”

Tricia felt the leg pressed against hers in the back seat tense. Apparently Mitch didn’t much mind them knowing Bruno’s name but hadn’t meant for them to know his.

“In the back,” Mitch barked. “And keep your mouth shut from now on.”

“What?” Bruno said. “Why?”

“You know what,” Mitch said. “And you know why.”

“I don’t, Mitch—”

Tricia felt the man next to her lean forward, heard a slap of metal against flesh. The car swerved a little. Bruno kept his mouth shut from then on.

When the car drew to a stop, she was led out by the elbow, across a stretch of what felt like gravel underfoot, and through a door that could’ve used a bit of oil on its hinges. On the way up the stairs inside, Tricia counted 37, 38, 39 steps and she was suddenly reminded of a movie she’d seen when she was a kid, at the local picture palace in Aberdeen. It was an old one, made before she was born, but she’d enjoyed it, people chasing each other around with guns, all sorts of peril and adventure. It had all seemed like so much fun then, when all she had to do was sit in the dark and watch it happen to people up on the screen. She’d never thought someday she’d be marched up a flight of stairs at gunpoint herself.

“Stop.” Mitch walked around in front of her and she heard a door opening. “Okay.” A hand at her shoulder pushed her forward. After she’d taken a few steps—onto a thick carpet, it felt like—he said, “You can take the bag off.”

Tricia didn’t wait to be told twice. She dropped the sack on the ground and took in big gulps of air as she looked around the room they were in. It was a sort of a library, with bookshelves running from the floor to the ceiling all the way around. The spines of the books were mostly dark leather with gold lettering, though a few looked newer, with paper dust jackets, and on one table she saw a disorderly stack of familiar-looking paperbacks. The one on top was
I Robbed the Mob!
and she winced when she saw its condition. The cover was bent back, several pages folded down or torn. Next to it she saw Stella staring up at her from the front of
The Crimson Cravat
by Bill Grewer. Someone had circled Stella’s face in red ink.

“Young lady,” a man’s voice said, and Tricia hunted about for its source. She found it finally in a doorway off to one side, where a fat man stood wiping his hands on a towel. He was wearing a scarlet vest, a watch chain stretched across it like the equator on a globe. His shirt looked like silk, his hair like the sleek black coat of a wet seal. He tossed the hand towel onto a chair and came forward.

“Young lady,” he said again, “I hope you don’t think me rude, but let me tell you I am very disappointed in you. Very disappointed.”

Tricia recognized him from the newspaper photos she’d seen, but only barely. The scar was there, the heavy brows—but his body had ballooned from years of luxurious shipboard living and his already swarthy skin was baked a deep, nut brown. He had on a medallion on a gold chain, glittering under his open shirt, and he had rings on three of his fingers. He looked like a portly pirate captain, she thought, lacking only the beard and eyepatch to complete the picture.

“Mr. Nicolazzo,” Tricia said, “I’m sorry you—”

“Nick,” he said. “Uncle Nick.”

“Nick,” she said.

“Uncle Nick,” he said. “It’s what everyone calls me.”

“Okay, Uncle Nick. I’m sorry you—”

“Don’t apologize. It makes you sound weak, like a little girl. Stand up for yourself. You’re going to steal from powerful men like me, you’ve got to face the music like a grown-up.”

“I didn’t steal from you,” Tricia said.

“Ah, that’s even worse than apologizing. Lying, and so poorly too. Come, now, child, do you think your Uncle Nick is a fool? Is that what you’re telling me?”

“No, sir. Not at all.”

“Stand up straight.”

She straightened, a sense of annoyance and embarrassment mingling with fear. She could see, as he waved his hands about, the backwards letter N protruding from the ring on his right index finger.