Elmore Leonard - Mr. Paradise

Delsa said, "Val, you want to call the old man's son?"

"That's one I won't mind doing," Val said. "I imagine you want the bodies out of here first."

"We'd appreciate it," Delsa said.

Val handed over the plastic cards. He said, "I'll have the removal service come in," and walked away.

Now Delsa looked at the two license photos close to the dead girl's face. The eyes closed, she could be either one.

Harris came along leading their boss like they were on a tour of the scene: Inspector Wendell Robinson, his trench coat hanging open over a sweater, and wearing his beige Kangol. Most of the time the man wore a good-looking suit and tie, a Kangol to match, their dude leader, cool mustache, tall, slim, Richard Harris' idol. Every detective at 1300 called him Wendell.

"Frank, you see Val Trabucci?"

"He was just here."

"He tell you who did it?"

"Said Montez Taylor's in it one way or another."

"Write it down. Val came to me from the Bomb Squad fifteen years ago, I was lieutenant of Seven. I never saw a homicide investigator trust his gut as much as Val did. Like you, Frank, only you're quieter about it, put it all together in your head first. Val burned himself out. I told him, go on over to the M.E.'s office, be a death investigator and take it easy. Like being on the job only the hours are better, you have more time to read the paper. You know why he quit the Bomb Squad? His girlfriend was afraid he'd get his hands blown off he's taking some device apart, and she'd have to tend to him he goes to the toilet. I had another guy quit the Bomb Squad for the same reason."

Wendell Robinson turned to the victims.

"Frank, did you flip this girl's skirt up?"

"Somebody did, before any of us got here."

"You think she's been poked?"

"We'll have to wait and see."

"It's sure eye-catching, exposed like that. Richard's been filling me in," Wendell said. "So who did it? Come on, Frank, you must've been here an hour by now."

Delsa handed him the two plastic cards.

"I want to know who's dead first."

Wendell took his time looking from the photos to the dead girl. "I thought she was Kelly Barr?"

"According to Montez. But which one do you say she is, from the photos?"

"I could go either way."

"That's what Val said."

"What about the houseman, Uncle Ben?"

"He goes along with Montez."

"Why would he say it's Kelly if it's Chloe? You got the other girl upstairs. Didn't she tell you she's Chloe?"

"If you're supposed to believe this one's Kelly, you assume the other one's Chloe."

"Frank, I didn't think you assume anything."

"I said, 'Miss Robinette?' She didn't say no, I'm Kelly. I asked if they were prostitutes. She says no, but without acting insulted. I asked if she was one of Paradiso's girlfriends. No."

"Wait now," Harris said. "Lloyd the houseman says Chloe's the regular girlfriend. Kelly, he's not sure he's seen her before tonight. They been other cheerleaders come with Chloe. I put it to Montez, 'These two come here much?' Says whenever Mr. Paradise wants their company. Then how come Lloyd isn't sure about Kelly? Montez says he's old, can't remember shit. Or Lloyd goes to bed before they get here."

"You need to sit this Montez down," Wendell said. "Find out what he gets out of this man being dead. Montez is your focus, and it sounds like he's telling you anything he wants. Says both girls are hookers. The one upstairs says they aren't." Wendell turned to the chair. "If this one didn't sell it, she was sure a fun-loving little girl, huh? You ever see a bush like that wasn't in a garden?" He turned to Delsa. "The one upstairs have her drawers on?"

"Panties and bra," Delsa said. "Montez says she's in shock. Dermot Cleary, first on the scene, thinks so too. Jackie Michaels was with her a few minutes, says she never was in shock. She might've put it on for Dermot so she wouldn't have to talk to him."

Wendell lifted his beige cap and placed it on his head again, loose, low in front. "She act straight with you?"

"Montez fixed her a bong, he said to settle her down. And she's got a buzz on from drinking."

"She a mess?"

"She knows she's half in the bag, talkative, so she's trying to hold herself down. Jackie thought she was a little goofy. I think she's scared to death and using the buzz to cover it up. Like trying to be funny with her friend dead, right downstairs. She knows how it happened or has a pretty good idea, or saw something that ties in Montez Taylor, this guy with fuckin egg all over his face. I think he got to her, warned her to keep her mouth shut."

Wendell was nodding.

"Because if she didn't know anything," Delsa said, "she'd still be scared, but she'd be telling us what it was like seeing her friend dead, how it affected her and go on about that. This girl's watching her step."

"Being threatened could be enough," Wendell said. "You gonna house Montez tonight?"

"I'd rather ask him to stop by in the morning," Delsa said. "Let him stroll in thinking he's a friendly witness, then jump him."

"It's your case," Wendell said.

"The other thing," Delsa said. "I don't want this girl identified in our statement. Not till the one upstairs tells me who she is."

The uniform, leaning against the wall opposite the open bedroom door, straightened as Delsa came along the hall. Her coat was open and she hooked her thumbs in her gunbelt.

Delsa stopped. "You think the girl in there could be a hooker?"

"What, you mean by looking at her? I'll say yeah, she could, without ever seeing any like her in the Seventh."

"What about the girl downstairs?"

"Well, yeah, the way somebody left her, but you still can't tell for sure. Good girls fuck, too, don't they?"

Delsa sent the uniform downstairs and stepped in the bedroom to see the one who was supposed to be Chloe sitting on the side of the bed smoking a cigarette, light from the bathroom in her hair, soft-looking, no longer spiked, her face in lamplight, the mask of makeup gone, a different girl looking up at him, but with eyes he recognized.

"More questions, Frank?"

He believed he could get used to that.

He shook his head.

"I'm taking you home."

The way it worked, a contract would fall into Avern Cohn's lap and he'd put Carl Fontana and Art Krupa on it.

Avern was one of those Clinton Street lawyers who hung out at the Frank Murphy and picked up criminal cases assigned by the court-where he first met Fontana and Krupa on separate homicide arraignments. Avern called himself their agent and took 20 percent off the top of fifty thousand, the minimum he charged for a professional hit. The people who wanted somebody taken out could afford it, all of them in the drug business. Fifty grand was what, the wholesale price of two and a half keys to get rid of competition or pay somebody back.

At one of the early meetings when they discussed the deal, having drinks at the Caucus Club, Fontana said, "I thought agents only got ten percent."

Avern said, "What we'll be doing isn't exactly show business. You walk in where I tell you the guy will be, shoot him or throw him out a window and collect the balance, your twenty grand each. What I have to do for half that much is find you the job. I can't advertise, can I? Like I'm one of those personal injury fuckheads. I can't appeal to the little housewife whose husband beats her up every time he gets drunk. And she can't run an ad in the Help Wanted. So I have to deal with people who shoot each other."

It answered Art Krupa's question, why Avern didn't get jobs from ordinary people who wanted somebody whacked. Art said, "But they're out there. Carl knows one."

"Yeah, my wife Connie," Fontana said. "She happens to come to you, turn her the fuck down."