Pagan Babies (15 page)

"You have to admit, Mary Pat knows how to cook."

"Casseroles," Debbie said, "are easy. Throw a lot of stuff together and shove it in the oven."

"How was the food inside?"

"For lunch, macaroni and cheese, cole slaw, rice pudding and three slices of plain bread. Everything looked alike." She said, "You didn't eat insects, anything like that, did you?"

"You only ate the ones flew in your mouth," Terry said. "Listen, I'm gonna call Johnny, see if he wants to go with us tomorrow."

Debbie said, "Why?" because there was no obvious reason to have him along.

All Terry said was, "I think he'd enjoy it."

Chapter
15.

RANDY BECAME A GANGSTER ABOUT
two months after opening the restaurant, still into a Pierce Brosnan phase, custom-tailored dark suits and a hint of Brit nonchalance in his speech. His response to problems, a minor fire in the kitchen: "Oh really? Why don't you see Carlo about that?" Carlo his manager--maitre d' with thirty years in the business and a small percentage of the restaurant profit as incentive. Randy loved being Randy's, always ready with car talk visiting tables, business trends he got out of Automotive News, motoring fun and gear ratios from Automobile. That part, for a world-class schemer, was easy. Being on his feet most of the day was the killer, but worth it. Randy's had opened big and was the place to be.

Hour Detroit magazine said: "Filling the gap left by the old London Chop House--still mourned by those who feel fine dining should allow fine diners to be seen to their best advantage--Randy's is clubby, polished and features a floor plan that encourages seating elitism. Booth No. One is back downtown and, not incidentally, in a place unrivaled for fabulous food, pricey booze and a wine list that's the Yellow Pages."

Randy had the review framed on the wall near the entrance. The rest of the walls were gathering caricatures of Detroit celebrities, most of them famous names who'd died or left town: Joe Louis, Gordie Howe, Lily Tomlin, Tom Selleck, Henry Ford II, Jeff Daniels, Iggy Pop . . . Carlo was responsible for refinements. The cigar room with its own bar. The personal lockers with nameplates for cognac and expensive whiskeys purchased by the bottle. Godiva mints in the dish by the entrance. Ice in the men's room urinals, newspaper pages from the business and sports sections taped to the wall above each one. "So they can read while they piss," Carlo said. "These are busy men dine here."

Randy said, "But not in the women's?"

"Women don't read on the toilet," Carlo said. "They have hair-spray on the sink and a colored woman helps them pin things that come undone."

Randy's change from sophisticated Brit to cool gangster began to take place on a Monday night about ten. (They were closed Sundays.) Randy was talking to his little maitre d' at the end of the bar near the entrance. Carlo glanced up and seemed momentarily startled, then looked aside as he said to Randy, "Be careful of this guy. Be nice to him." Now Carlo raised his brow in pleasant expectation and stepped past Randy saying, "Mr. Moraco, is so good of you to come in. I believe only your first time, no? Shame on you."

There were two of them. To Randy, a couple of guys off the street. But if he had to be careful--Carlo's warnings always to be trusted--let's see what we have here. A couple of mob guys? Quite possibly. The older one with sleepy eyes, dark suit and shirt, no tie but buttoned up all the way, steel-gray hair cut very short, this would be Mr. Moraco. Randy saw him as a dedicated soldier, but lacking the polish of an officer, more like a thirty-year noncom, though not a mob soldier, Moraco would be at least a capo. Betcha. The other guy was the soldier, about five eight, maybe thirty, one of those street tough guys in a bomber jacket and Banlon shirt, open. He could be a fighter, a pro boxer Moraco had brought along. The guy, though, did not look at all Italian.

Moraco said something as he came past Carlo looking straight ahead--thin nose, not a bad-looking guy, mid-fifties--and Randy stuck out his hand.

"Mr. Moraco--"

He took hold of Randy's fingers, squeezed and let go, saying, "Mr. Agley, how you doing? I'm Vincent Moraco," and stopped there, turning to look over the room. "Not bad for a Monday. I thought you had a trio."

"Thursday through Saturday," Randy said.

Vincent Moraco was nodding. "Good bar business. You have any girls come in?"

"Young ladies? Yes, of course. But it's not a pickup bar, if that's what you mean. We get quite a nice crowd every night, fortunate to have General Motors only a couple of blocks away, in the RenCen."

"What I'm gonna do," Vincent Moraco said, "is line you up with some high-class girls, dress nice, fit right in. They come in ten o'clock on, every night. Saturday guys're here with their wives or girlfriends, so maybe only one will come in, make the guys from out-of-town happy. The girls have a drink at the bar, they're seen and they leave. But not with a guy. Any guy comes up to them, they're waiting for somebody, their husband. The guy keeps trying, becomes a problem"--Moraco half turned, his sleepy eyes moving to the soldier--"the Mutt here tells the guy in a nice way to get lost. The guy gets tough about it, the Mutt takes him outside."

"The Mutt," Randy said, "and you go by Vincent or is it Vinnie?"

"Stay with Vincent you'll be okay. The Mutt's also your bodyguard, so you pay him."

"How much?"

"Five a week, cash."

"I'm not sure I need a bodyguard."

"You not sure 'cause you never know, that's why you need one. What you do, let your good customers with house accounts know the girls are here. Maybe three or four will come in, but not at the same time, so it don't look like a whorehouse."

Randy glanced over to see Carlo watching, Carlo nodding toward Number One, called a booth but actually a banquette, and Randy said, "Why don't we sit down and have a drink?" His first step in becoming a mob guy.

Moving to the booth, Vincent Moraco motioned to the Mutt to join them. The waitress, in her tux, was there before they were all seated. "At Randy's," Randy said, "every waiter in the place is yours. Cindy here is my star. Cindy only takes care of this booth, Number One. She needs help she's got it."

Cindy took their orders and left.

Watching her go the Mutt spoke his first words, saying with a country accent that turned Randy's head to look at him, "Man, she could sell pussy 'long with the others, you know it?"

Randy had to ask him, "Where you from?"

"Indiana," the Mutt said. "You know where Bedford's at? On U.S. Fifty?"

Randy made a decision. He said, "Mutt, I don't need a Hoosier hotshot fucking with my staff. You got it?"

The guy seemed surprised. Vincent Moraco said, "He knows his place."

And Randy's role was established. He was accepting the arrangement--since he didn't see that he had a choice--but would remain the boss here. It was Randy's second step approaching gangland.

"The way it works," Vincent said, stirring his Canadian Club and Coke, "your good customers from GM, Ford's, Compuware, call you over to the table. 'Say, Randy, you happen to know that redhead sitting at the bar?' You look over. 'Oh, you mean Ginger? You like to meet her? She staying at the hotel 'round the corner.' Then you say, 'We have a special arrangement, you want to party over there with Ginger, I can put it on your tab, here.' After that they know they don't have to carry extra cash with them, it's house-account pussy. The wife sees the bill, 'Jesus Christ, you buying drinks for the fuckin house?' What she don't accuse the guy of is getting laid."

"How much a trick?"

"Five."

"They're all the same?"

"Stand 'em on their heads . . . Yeah, all're five a trick."

"What about all night?"

"A grand, anything over an hour. The girls with baby-sitters get another two bills from the guy, over and above the tip."

"What if the customer, after he's down for one--"

"Wants to go again? The girl calls you and you put it on the guy's account."

"What's the girl get?"

"Three bills. There's a table of guys, out-of-towners here for a convention at Cobo, like the Society of Automotive Engineers, and they all want a piece of the action? The girl stays there at the hotel. You get the relay team going it makes it easier."

"The girl does everything the guy wants?"

"As long as it don't leave marks. The guy wants her to piss on him, or take a dump on a glass-top coffee table while he's underneath looking up?" Moraco shrugged. "If she has to go, no problem. She don't, I don't know. Maybe the guy calls down for some prune juice."

Randy looked off at Cindy in her tux to get the picture out of his mind. He said to Vincent, "What's your take?"

"So you don't have to keep books, a flat eight thousand a week."

"Based on what?"

"An average night. Say four girls turning two tricks each, then times five nights, Monday to Friday, what's that?"

"Twenty thousand."

"They make twelve, we take eight. You pay every Saturday, keep anything over eight for yourself."

"What about slow nights?"

"It's up to you to bring in the business."

"What if all the girls don't show up?"

"It can happen, say illness in the family."

"But you get your eight grand even if the girls don't make the nut."

Vincent said, "You have a problem with that?"

"I want to be sure I have it straight," Randy said, a sleepy look coming into his eyes as the image of Pierce Brosnan faded out and Lucky Luciano, without the pockmarks, faded in to take his place. "What you're telling me," Randy said, "the girls could all quit and become stockbrokers, you still get your eight a week."

Vincent was nodding. "As your partners."

* * *

By the end of April, nine months into the arrangement, Randy's mob connection had cost him $116,200 out-of-pocket. He still saw himself as a wiseguy, but no longer on the level of a Luciano. Christ, Luciano would've had Moraco whacked by now and taken over the girls.

Carlo was threatening to quit, not happy about some of the clientele, these goombas who'd show up, no reservation, and squeeze into Booth Number One without asking. The linen service, owned by Moraco's boss, cost twice what it should. And the Mutt, the Mutt was five bills a week down a rathole. What did he do? The girls, the ones who showed up, didn't need protection.

Randy had never been curious about the Mutt until one Saturday, just before Vincent Moraco arrived for his free lunch and the eight grand, he had a talk with him, standing at the end of the bar.

"Tell me," Randy said, "what you do exactly."

It brought a frown. "My job? I keep an eye on you."

"For Vincent?"

"He don't talk to me either. I watch out for you 'cause I'm your bodyguard. But what you could say I do is no more 'n fuck the dog, 'cause you don't gimme any jobs to do."

Randy said, "Like what?"

"Like throwing the drunks out, the ones get loud and cause a commotion."

"Most of them are friends. What else?"

"What bodyguards do. Some guy's bothering you, I teach him a lesson."

"Well, I do have someone bothering me."

"Gimme his name, I'll tell him to leave you alone."

"Vincent Moraco."

That might've been too blunt, or too much all of a sudden for the Mutt to think about. He nodded, staring off, but after a moment said, "Mr. Moraco, huh?"

"I want you to be at the meeting," Randy said. "Listen to what I tell Vincent, keeping in mind who pays you."

Signed celebrity photos--not the caricatures--looked out from the walls of Randy's office, done in browns, recessed lighting and a lot of chrome. Vincent Moraco was seated across the desk from him, the Mutt over to one side, beneath a black-and-white photo of Soupy Sales.

"First of all," Randy said, "you realize that what my customers are paying to get laid appears on the books as profit, restaurant income."

Vincent said, "Yeah . . . ?"

"It means I'm paying taxes on income that isn't income, over three hundred grand in fuck money I can't write off."

Vincent said, "You look at it like you laundering the money."

"Yeah, but people who do that are paid a fee, they get something for the service, the risk they take."

"You need a bookkeeper know what he's doing."

"That's only half the problem."

"Yeah . . . ?"

"You base your cut on four girls a night, but only two show up, once in a while three. And there aren't that many relay teams or all-nighters."

"You have to understand," Vincent said, "you don't get this class of girl off the street. You know who some of the best ones are? College girls. They work hard to pay for school and make something of themselves."

"But two, at the most three girls," Randy said, "even with Ph.D.'s and working their asses off, won't come close to making the nut."

"Why? You having trouble bringing people in? Business falling off?"

"Leveling off. Carlo said you have to expect that. No matter how well you open, after a while it's bound to settle down. We do okay all week and still go crazy weekends."