Tom Piccirilli - The Last Kind Words

She hadn’t softened while we’d talked. A ribbon of hair had fallen across her face and she brushed it away and it fell back again. She raised the gun. I took a step back and a mean titter spilled from her mouth. “You think I was kidding about using this thing? I hope someone does try something. I hope you come back and try something. Next time I won’t chat. And I was lying about shooting you in the leg or the nuts. If I ever pull the trigger, it’ll be a head shot.”

Jack “Fingers” Brown worked out of a bowling alley in Huntington Station. He held court on the last lane and never kept any hardware on the premises. If you wanted a clean, untraceable piece, you came to Fingers. Sometimes the serial numbers were filed off and sometimes they weren’t. It didn’t matter. They either were ripped off from a gun shop, had fallen off an army truck, or were police-academy-cadet fresh.

Collie had used a clean S &W.38 on his mad-dog outing. There were a couple of other guys on the island who might’ve been able to supply a piece like that, but I figured Collie would’ve gone to Fingers first. I wanted to know when Collie had decided to pick up a pistol. Had it been right after he’d left the Elbow Room or right before? Or had he nabbed it weeks in advance, preparing for his decline into the underneath?

Fingers was about fifty, with a smarmy leer, a snow tire around his middle, and a mountain of oiled hair that he kept swept to one side so it looked like he might topple over at any second. He’d been a gunrunner for twenty years or more and got picked up at least once a month by the cops, but they could never hold him for more than a day. He was smart and well connected, and word was he’d ace anyone who even looked like they might rat on him. His public persona of a bowling geek wasn’t a persona. Fingers really did spend several hours a day knocking pins down. I looked around at the signs on the front door as I walked in. They’d been there forever. Senior citizens bowled free on Tuesday nights. Fridays the high school kids got in for half price. Special prices for parties of more than twenty. Ask about discounts.

My family had bowled here when I was a kid. Grey was a natural who regularly broke 250. My mother was damn good too. She had a deceptively soft way of throwing the ball. It would drop from her hand and seem to barely have enough power to make it all the way down the lane, but once it got to the pins they practically exploded. Mal couldn’t break 100 to save his life, and I wasn’t much better. Collie had always been competitive but never with himself. Only with me. So lonstice be T g as he beat me by even a pin, he was happy. My old man would just sit and watch the rest of us and laugh while Gramp hung around in the bar and snatched enough pocket change to pay for his beer.

It was twelve-thirty. Fingers never came in before noon. He was working a four-six split in the fifth frame when I stepped up and sat behind his entourage. His right-hand man was an ex-con leg breaker named Higgins who stood six-three, weighed 230 of mostly muscle, and wore sunglasses day and night so you could never tell when he had a bead on you. It wasn’t a bad guess to figure he was always watching. Word was he used a beaver-tail sap. I kept my hands on my knees.

Two young women were chattering, clapping, and urging Fingers on. They might have been twins or were just affecting the look. Short blond hair feathered across their eyes, lots of neck jewelry, both in muted summer dresses. The bowling shoes actually looked good on them. They each turned and gave me a beaming smile. I grinned back. Higgins kept his body angled toward me. If I made a fast move he’d find the sweet spot of my skull with that blackjack in no time flat.

Fingers had good form, a nice extension as he threw the ball, a solid curve that hooked the edge of the gutter and held on, breaking only at the last moment. He picked up the spare handily and the women clapped and woo-hooed.

He noticed me immediately but chose to ignore me until he and his lady friends had finished their game. Afterward, he gave each of them a juicy kiss that made me think this crew was a little kinkier than at first appeared to be the case. Maybe the bowling shoes should have been a giveaway. The women retired to the bar. Higgins kept focused on me the entire time.

Fingers finally turned his chin and waved me over. I got up and so did Higgins, who shadowed my every move. I stood before Fingers while he cleaned his ball with an oil-stained chamois rag.

“I know you?” he asked.

“We’ve never met,” I said. “My name’s Terry Rand.”

He nodded. “Family’s got a good rep, except for that one black mark on it.”

“Right. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”

“I’m entertaining some friends right now.”

“This will only take a minute.”

“Not here.” He stuck his ball in a bag. Higgins kept eyeing me. Whatever intimidation the sunglasses got him would eventually cost him. He’d be rough to take under these bright lights, but in a parking lot at night he’d go pretty easy. “Make an appointment with my partner here. Maybe we can set something up in a few days. Maybe next week.”

“It can’t wait.”

“I told you. I don’t do business here.”

“From what I hear, Fingers, this is the only place you do business. No chance of the feds bugging you with all these pins flying.”

“Like I said, I’m entertaining some close friends right now-”

“Yeah, I saw. They really twins or do they just like to play dress-up and pretend?”

It made him reassess me. He held his bowling bag on his lap and wet his lips.

“What do you need?”

“I don’t need anything. I want to ask you a few questions.”

“I don’t answer questions.”

“How do you get through life without answering questions?”

“I just do.”

I put a little ice in my voice. “See that, Fingers. You just fucking answered one.”

He checked over his shoulder at Higgins, to make sure he was still close by. “You don’t want to be troublesome now, kid.”

“You’re right, I don’t. But like I said, this can’t wait. I think you know why.”

“We’re through here,” Fingers said.

Higgins drifted nearer and began to brace me. He stuck his chest in my face and backed me up a step. Like most big bruisers, he underestimated anyone who wasn’t as tall and thick as himself. He got in closer and angled a hip at me so he could yank his sap quickly. His right hand dipped into his pocket. He said nothing. What little of his face I could see held no expression. He started to draw the beaver-tail blackjack.

I grabbed the bowling bag out of Fingers’s lap and hurled it down as hard as I could on Higgins’s left foot. There was a crunch like a box of matchsticks snapping. He let out the first note of a yowl and bent over to grab at his mashed toes. I snapped a knee up into his chin. I couldn’t see his eyes but they had to be rolling. He took one step backward and fought for balance. I knocked his other leg out from under him and he fell flat on his back.

While he was down, I kicked him twice in the face. His glasses cracked and sailed off.

The bowlers in the other lanes kept right on playing. I had to hand it to these folks. They certainly had dedication and passion. Jesus, were they focused.

Fingers didn’t even try to take a swing at me. He just sat with a resigned air, sucking his teeth and shaking his head, probably already plotting how he’d snuff me.

“Did you sell a piece to my brother?” I asked.

“You’re finished, you know. I can’t let this go. Even if I wanted to, I can’t.”

“We’ll cover that later. But for right now, focus. Tell me about my brother.”