George Pelecanos - Shame the Devil

“You don’t need that,” she said. “Right?”

He did need it. He loved her but, God, he needed it. It was stronger than her or anyone else.

“Right,” he said, pushing the bottle away with the back of his hand.

She leaned over the bar and kissed him on the lips.

Thomas Wilson ordered a cognac at the bar of an African club up on Georgia and Missouri, near the old Ibex. Wilson couldn’t pronounce the name of the place, but he liked it all right. Once you listened to their music for a while, it got way under your skin, too. Those Africans talked real loud, standing around the bar. Sometimes you couldn’t tell if they were arguing with each other or just being friends. But they pretty much left him alone.

Way he looked now, cut in the face and with a fucked-up eye, wasn’t no one gonna try to talk to him, anyway.

Yeah, Dimitri had really worked him over. Afterward, even with the pain, it was funny how different he’d felt. Not good, exactly, or happy. More like clean.

Now that he’d done it, he wished Bernie had been there as well. He looked forward to seeing Bernie again. He wanted to tell him like he’d told Dimitri, and take it from Bernie like he’d taken it from Dimitri, if that’s how it had to be. He wanted to feel clean with Bernie, and with Stephanie, too.

First he’d have to do this thing with Dimitri. Step up and be a man for Dimitri and Bernie and Stephanie. And for Charles. He could do that. He felt that he could.

Someone bumped him from behind. Wilson looked over his shoulder, not hard or anything like that, but in a curious way. The man who had bumped him started shouting something at him in a foreign tongue. Wilson ignored him, but the man kept shouting. One of the man’s friends came over, and he could hear them laughing behind his back.

Wilson fired down his cognac. He got off his stool and left money on the bar. He was careful not to look at anyone as he walked from the club.

Dimitri Karras drove north on Connecticut Avenue, downshifting at the start of a long grade. The old BMW had lost its juice; Jap cars and domestics passed him on either side. The Beamer’s paint job had faded and its engine was weak, but he’d decided to hang onto it. Cars meant nothing to him anymore. The only time he’d get stoked by a ride was when he’d see a restored Karmann Ghia on the street. It reminded him of his old Ghia, that decade, those times. Yeah, the seventies had been a glorious ride.

Karras turned off Connecticut and parked along the curb.

He’d had a quiet day at work. Nick Stefanos had asked him a couple of questions and he’d answered him shortly or not at all. He didn’t like to be unkind to Stefanos, but Stefanos was out. He was sorry he had talked so freely with him the night before. He shouldn’t have gotten so drunk.

He got out of his car and took the sidewalk back to Connecticut. He walked to an apartment house on the corner, stood at the glass doors, waved to the woman at the desk, and was buzzed in.

After work, he’d met Thomas Wilson at his place. Thomas had told him the plan. It was a very simple plan and as good as any plan, he supposed. If he kept his nerve, and Thomas kept his nerve, it could work.

He took the elevator up to the sixth floor and walked down a carpeted hall. He knocked on a door and he heard muffled steps.

Stephanie Maroulis opened the door.

“Dimitri.”

“It is me. Why so surprised?”

“It’s not Tuesday,” she said.

“I know it,” said Karras.

They looked into each other’s eyes.

“You’re breaking our arrangement,” she said. “You do this and everything changes.”

“I’m ready for it to change,” he said.

Stephanie stepped aside. He walked through the open door.

This will be the last day of my life.

It was the first thought that came to Thomas Wilson when he woke on Friday morning. He turned onto his side in the bed and shut his eyes. His stomach flipped, and he thought he could be sick.

Please don’t let me be a coward, God. Please.

The phone rang, and Wilson reached across the bed and picked it up.

“Thomas, it’s Nick Stefanos.”

“Nick.”

“I was with Dimitri on Wednesday night. I know you told him everything. I know what you guys are planning to do.”

Wilson had promised Dimitri that from here on in he’d keep his mouth shut. He did want Stefanos’s help. He welcomed it. But he wouldn’t betray Dimitri, not again.

“There is no plan,” said Wilson.

“Bullshit,” said Stefanos. “You guys have got something happening and you think you can pull it off yourselves. I told Dimitri and I’m telling you: You try this thing and you will die. You understand me, Thomas?”

“I gotta run,” said Wilson. “My uncle’s waitin’ on me, man, and I got to get myself into work.”

“You still have my card?”

“I got it.”

“You call me, Thomas. You give me a call, hear?”

“I hear you, Nick.”

“Thomas -”

Wilson killed the connection and sat up on the edge of his bed. He stood and dressed for work.

Friday’s lunch, like every Friday lunch, was the most hectic two hours of the week at the Spot. Dimitri Karras, Maria Juarez, and James Posten had little time for idle conversation as they struggled to stay ahead of the orders flowing into the kitchen. Nick Stefanos and Anna Wang were in the weeds in the dining and bar area from noon to two. Ramon and Darnell had both broken full body sweat by the time the rush was through.

At two o’clock, Maria put her Tito Puente tape into the box. James grabbed his spatula, and he and Maria began to dance. Karras walked over to Darnell, who was wiping down his slick arms with a rag, his backside against the sink.

“How’d that catfish go today?” said Darnell.

“Went good, buddy. Looked good, too. In fact, I called eighty-six on it to Anna even though we had one order left. That one’s for me.”

“You earned it, Dimitri. Nice work today.”

“Thanks.” Karras drew a card from his wallet. “Here you go, man. This is the number for that friend I been telling you about. Marcus wants to hook up with you, show you how easy it can be to do this thing, if that’s what you want to do. Got all sorts of options he wants to lay out for you, Darnell. Says he’d like to meet with you next week.”

“That’s cool. But I thought you were gonna come with me.”

“Yeah, sure,” said Karras, smiling sadly at Darnell. “If you still want me to.”

“Damn right I want you to, Dimitri.”

“Then I’ll be there,” said Karras, and he shook Darnell’s hand.

Karras hugged Maria and James and thanked them for the good job they had done that day. He untied his apron, dropped it in the laundry hamper by the door, and left without another word. He sat at a deuce and ate the catfish special, avoiding conversation with Stefanos, and when he was done he told Anna and Ramon to have a good weekend, said good bye to Stefanos, and left the bar.

Stefanos caught up with him out on 8th.

“Dimitri!”

Karras turned. Stefanos walked to him in his shirtsleeves and met him by the alley. He put a hand on Karras’s arm.

“Where you off to, man?” said Stefanos.

Karras shrugged. “Goin’ home.”

“Don’t just walk out of here without telling me, Dimitri.”

“Telling you what?”

“When and where. I’ve got a right to know.”

Karras looked around the street. He waited for a man to pass them on the sidewalk. When the man was out of earshot, Karras found Stefanos’s eyes.

“Listen,” said Karras. “I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, Nick. You hooking me up with this job, it put me back in the world. I’m almost at that place where I can see myself having some kind of normal life. But there’s one thing left to do, and you can’t be a part of that. You’re out of it, Nick. It’s not your affair. So forget it.”