Killing The Rat (An Organized Crime Thriller) (9 page)

And that’s when Vincenzo Romano had called. Jack’s ordinary fee was a hundred grand. But because of the rush job, he’d asked for two-fifty. Romano had agreed. Instantly.

Two hundred and fifty grand. Minus Betty’s share of fifty thousand. That left two hundred grand, or nearly twenty-two thousand shares of High Speed Access. If the stock doubled, or even tripled, Jack might sell, retire, and play golf in some backwater course in Jamaica for the rest of his life.

***

Jack turned into the used bookstore two blocks away from the Prescott Hotel in Ann Arbor.  It was a student’s bookstore, replete with plenty of used textbooks and the faint aroma of marijuana. Jack’s eyes roved the shelves as he walked, picking out his favorite authors: Julian Barnes, Binnie Kirshenbaum and fellow Michigander, Steve Hamilton.

He walked through the fiction aisle, past history until he got to the biography section. There, he turned and walked to the middle of the aisle, where he found Betty perusing a thick tome on Eisenhower.

“I like Ike,” Jack said.

“All you military types stick together.”

Jack took Betty in: she was wearing a chic Armani business suit with a camel-hair overcoat. Black leather shoe boots. A sleek Coach briefcase was slung over her shoulder. Tasteful diamond earrings. The very picture of a successful businesswoman.

A dramatic difference from the scared sixteen year-old he’d found in the apartment of a man who’d dared to steal from Vincenzo Romano. Jack, of course, killed him, and then helped the young girl who the man had been holding hostage both physically and psychologically.

Betty slid the Eisenhower bio back on the shelf. “What’s the game plan, Jack?”

Jack’s eyes roamed the biographies. It had been awhile since he’d read a good biography. The last one was, what? Lee Iacocca? He couldn’t remember.

He turned and faced Betty.

“Have you ever done improv?”

21.

“Come in, come in.”

Loreli watched as the man’s eyes ran up and down her body.

“What’s your name?” he asked, shutting the door behind her.

“Loreli,” she said. “Did Rhonda tell you how this works?”

The man said to her. “Look, I’ve done this a few times before. I know how it works.” He reached into the inside pocket of his suit coat and pulled out a slim black wallet. From it, he counted out fifteen one hundred dollar bills.

Loreli took the money and put it in her purse. “Okay,” she said.

There was an art form to detaching. Sometimes Loreli used different images to accomplish the task. In the past, she pictured a big switch in her brain. It was an on/off switch. Usually, when the john was either undressing himself or undressing her, that was when she mentally reached up and turned the switch to off. In those cases, she didn’t imagine a happy place. She didn’t whisk herself away on the wings of her imagination. She just turned it off. Her mind, her being, her body, became the spiritual equivalent of beige. If there was an EKG machine hooked up, the needles would be flatlined. The graph would go from the normal spikes into just one long impulse-less being.

Loreli did that now. The big Italian was on top of her. She closed her mind, then opened her body.

It didn’t take very long.

Loreli was so far away that she almost didn’t notice when he finished. She had turned everything off, except for that small part of her that automatically made the right noises and the right body movements. But that was it. They were on auto-pilot and she almost forgot to shift gears to the next part of it. The Italian flopped onto the bed next to her and looked into her face.

“That was great,” she said. She was gambling, too much flattery and some get suspicious. But her instinct told her that he wasn’t the type. She was working for a tip.

The Italian stood up, crossed the room, and when he came out, he had on a bathrobe and was carrying the small ice bucket.

“When I come back, I want you to blow me, okay?”

“Okay,” Loreli said. “But that will be extra.”

“No problem, babe,” he answered. “Today’s your lucky day.”

He left for a minute or two. He came back in, put the ice bucket in the bathroom, and returned, sans the bathrobe. His member was stiff, hanging out in front of him like a divining rid.

Loreli looked at it. Had he toweled himself off? It didn’t look right.

He stood before her. She moved to the edge of the bed, sat in front of him.

She reached out and stroked him.

Loreli looked up at the big Italian’s face.

He looked the same. Same hair. Same big lips. Same dumb eyes. No, the eyes were different. They were the same, yes. But now that little gleam was gone. That little verminous glint to them.

What had happened here?

She didn’t know.

The Italian groaned.

And then the sounds in the next room started. Someone had started having sex. Loud, violent sex.

“Wha...?” the Italian said. There was a loud crashing sound from next door.

“Shut up!” the Italian yelled. His face was now flushed, frustrated.

The reply was muffled, but Loreli clearly heard a fair amount of anger in it.

A look of rage passed over the Italian’s face. From next door, the sound of sex continued. Loreli watched as her john called the front desk. Moments later, she heard the phone ring next door. The sound stopped. Then, moments later, it started again.

“Goddamnit,” the Italian said. He pounded on the wall. “Shut the goddamn hell up!” he yelled.

The reply had another “fuck” in it, but she also heard the word “mother.” This time, the Italian’s face became beet red. He went to the closet, cursing under his breath, and reached into his suit. Loreli sat up. Her breath went out of her.

There was a gun in his hand. He stalked from the room.

Loreli quickly got dressed, then went to the closet where her shirt was hanging. She slipped it on, was buttoning it up when she spied the suitcase at the bottom of the closet. This was a bad situation, she told herself, no point in making it any worse. The nutjob had a gun. No amount of money was going to make her stay in the room now. She was no good to Liam dead.

She buttoned the last button of the shirt and reached for her purse. But then, for reasons unbeknownst to even her, she ripped open the zipper of the suitcase.

For the second time, her breath went out of her.

22.

The man threw the woman against the wall.

A few feet away above a stained wingchair, a painting of a pheasant taking flight crashed to the floor. The glass spiderwebbed. A few small shards dropped onto the spotted beige carpet.

The woman, momentarily stunned, stared blankly at the man. She had large almond eyes, full lips, and a narrow face with a sharp nose. Though her skin was chocolate brown, there were dark circles visible beneath her eyes. She raised a hand to her mouth. Began to smile. Her hand fell away as she bent forward. Her mouth hung open in a crazy, crooked grin.

And then she burst out laughing.

Her body shook as her laughter began to crescendo. It was a deep, throaty sound. She gasped for air. Her legs quivered. The veins in her neck jutted out. She pointed a finger at the man.

The man was tall and white. At least an inch or two over six feet. He had a strong face, with a heavy jaw and sandy brown hair. He was shirtless, with a patch of light hair in the middle of his stark white chest. He was thin, but with a kind of ropy musculature. He wore a pair of glasses with tinted lenses. In the harsh lights of the hotel room, they had a burgundy tint.

He watched the woman, a lopsided grin on his face. He reached out to the night table beside the bed where a bottle of Absolut vodka sat. He picked it up, held it to his mouth, took a long pull. As the woman’s hysterical laughter continued, the smile left his face. He lowered the bottle, reared back, and threw it at the woman. She ducked, just as the bottle crashed into the wall over her head. Her mouth formed a silent “O” and then she was consumed with another wave of convulsive laughter. She put her hands on the edge of the small desk next to the wingchair.

From the room next door came a coarse shout and someone pounded on the wall. Neither the man nor the woman seemed to notice.

The man opened the drawer to the night table and took out a Bible. He threw it at the woman. It missed her by three feet, crashed into the wall. “I’m throwin’ the book at you,” he said. The woman sank to her knees with laughter.

From the other side of the wall came another pounding noise. A muffled voice shouted, “Shut up!” and then the phone rang.

The man answered the phone with a “Yes?” He listened patiently, nodded. “We certainly will,” he said.

He hung the phone up and walked back to the woman. “Front desk,” he said. The woman nodded as the man threw her against the wall. She crashed into it and a small dent appeared in the thin drywall.

“Shut the hell up!” the voice from the other room yelled.

The man with the burgundy glasses laughed. “I can’t help it if your Mom’s a screamer!” he yelled at the wall.

The sound of a door being thrown open echoed in the hallway. The man with the glasses looked at the door as a fist pounded.

“I’m kinda busy here!” he called out.

A voice responded. “Open the goddamned door!”

The woman looked back at the man and he gestured with his head and she moved quickly to the door. She grabbed the handle, looked back at the man. He stood in the middle of the room, facing the door squarely. He nodded to her.

She opened the door and stepped back. A heavyset man stood in the doorway. He had dark hair, olive skin and dark eyes. His face was thick and fleshy with big lips and a bulbous nose. His hair was slicked back, his wide mouth slightly agape.

He wore a bathrobe. It was open at the collar, revealing thick black hair.His right hand was down, pressed against his right leg. He slowly raised it. The gun in his hand was nickel-plated. He raised it and pressed the muzzle against the black woman’s forehead.

“Move back,” he said. His words came slow and thick, as if he wasn’t used to talking, let alone being in charge of a room.

She walked backwards into the room. The man in the bathrobe stepped into the room, pulling the door shut behind him.

“Oh, shit,” the man with the glasses said. His face had gone pale.

The man with the glasses tried unsuccessfully to stop his hands from shaking. “Look,” he said. “I was just partying. I had a great day at the casinos and was...splurging. I didn’t mean to—”

“Say that about my mother?” the dark-haired man said. “Did you think that was funny?”

The man’s lips began to quiver. “I’m drunk. She’s not my wife. She’s a whore I picked up.” His voice had risen. Become almost squeaky. “Please,” he said. “This has just gotten out of hand. Let me go. Just let me go.”

The man in the bathrobe smirked. “Oh, you want me to let you go, huh?” His smile was wide. “You must think I’m pretty stupid.”

“I’m sorry,” the man in the glasses started to say. “Please don’t tell my wife.”

The man in the bathrobe laughed. Imitated the man in the glasses, his voice singsongy with sarcasm. “Don’t tell my wife.” He laughed, a deep, baritone. The smile quickly fell from his face. His eyes glowered beneath thick eyebrows. He shook his head sadly. “Thinking you’re a big man.” He pressed the muzzle of the gun hard enough against the black woman’s head to make it snap back. “She’s a…a whore. Probably does ten guys a day.”

“Yeah,” the woman said. “But I’m good at it.” She backed away from the man in the bathrobe who responded by pulling back the hammer on his automatic.

“Where are you going-” he started to ask.

The black woman slowly raised her arms over her head. She began to move her hips. Slowly, sensuously. The cocoa skin was firm and taut. She smiled. Her teeth were a dazzling white.

“You better stop,” the dark-haired man said. His voice sounded husky. Suddenly it had a rasp to it, but not an ounce of conviction.

The man in glasses had stopped blubbering and now watched the black woman as well.

“Stop,” the man in the bathrobe said. His voice was nearly inaudible. His eyes bore into the black woman’s body.

She looked back at the dark-haired man. “Why don’t you come here and do me right now?” she said. “He was lousy. But you...” She let her eyes linger on the big man’s crotch. “You look like a man who knows what to do.”

The dark-haired man licked his lips. Sweat had broken out along his forehead.

“Come over here.” Her voice was sultry, jagged. “Do it. I want it. Now.”

The man in the bathrobe took in the sight before him. His mouth had opened even farther, his face seemed to sag. Slowly, he lowered his gun. His nostrils flared as he watched the black woman.

The man in the bathrobe took a step toward the black woman. Casually, as if he was doing something completely mundane, the man in the glasses brought up his own gun. It was a smooth, effortless motion. He pointed it at the big man in the bathrobe.

“Good-bye Mr. Abrocci,” the man in the glasses said.

He fired twice.

The man in the bathrobe looked down at his chest where two neat holes appeared directly over his heart. He could see the holes in the soft white terrycloth. And looking down, he could see the blood streaming against the white softness below. He looked stupidly toward the man in the glasses. Noted the gun. A small one with a large silencer at the end. A professional’s gun. He watched the man with the glasses raise the gun again. He saw the man’s finger tighten around the trigger.

Jack Cleveland picked a spot on the center of the Italian’s forehead.

And then Abrocci was dead.

23.

Loreli heard voices in the next room. She was frozen. There were stacks and stacks of money in the suitcase. She thought for a moment that it might be fake money. Like the Italian liked to travel with a suitcase full of Monopoly money. She grabbed one of the little packets and held it up to her face. No, it was real. It was a twenty. Used.

There was low talking in the room next door. Loreli peeled the top twenty off and studied it. Was it a fake? She had no way of knowing. But it had clearly been used. She knew that they could make fake money looked aged, but this seemed real.