William Lashner - Bitter Truth

A peculiar sound erupted from Cressi’s stomach. “I must have eaten something,” said Cressi with a weak smile.

“It’s hot down there,” said Calvi, and I thought for a moment he was referring to Cressi’s stomach but he was off on a tangent of his own. “Hot as hell but hotter. And muggy, so there’s nothing to do but sweat. What did that snake think I was going to do, learn canasta? What am I, an old lady? You know when they eat dinner down there? Four o’clock. Christ, up here I was finishing lunch at Tosca’s around four o’clock and waiting for the night to begin. At four o’clock down there they’re lining up for the early birds. They’re serving early birds till as late as six, but they line up at four. And lime green jackets. Explain to me, Vic, sweating in a restaurant line in lime green jackets.”

“I understand Phoenix has a dry heat,” I said.

“White belts, white shoes, what the hell am I supposed to do down there? Golf? I tried golf, bought a set of clubs. Pings. I liked the sound of it. Ping. Went to the course, swung, the ball went sideways. Sideways. I almost killed a priest. What the hell am I doing playing golf? I went fishing once, one of them big boats. Threw up the whole way out and the whole way back. The only thing I caught was a guy on the deck behind me when a burst of wind sent the puke right into his face. That was good for a laugh, sure, but that was it for fishing. You know, I been in this business all my life. Started as a kid running errands for Bruno when he was still an underboss. You stay alive in this business, you do a few stints in the shack, your hair turns gray, you’re entitled. Up here I was respected. I was feared. Down there I was a kid again, surrounded by old men with colostomy bags on their hips and old ladies looking to get laid. I was getting high school ass up here, down there ladies ten years older than me, nothing more than bags of bones held together by tumors, they’re eyeing me like I’m a side of venison. They got walkers and the itch and they want to cook for me. Pasta? Sauce Bolognese? Good Italian blood sausage? Shit no. Kreplach and kishke and brust. You ever have something called gefilte fish?”

“Sure,” I said.

“What’s with that fish jelly that jiggles on the plate? Whatever it is, it ain’t blood sausage. I hate it down there. It’s hell all right, hot and steamy and the sinners they wear lime green jackets and white belts and eat pompano every night at four o’clock and play canasta and talk about hurricanes and bet on the dogs. ‘Welcome to Florida,’ the sign says, but it should say ‘Abandon hope all of yous who fly down here.’ What the hell made Raffaello think he could send me there to sweat and die?”

“So that’s why you came back?” I said.

“That’s right,” said Calvi. “That and the money. You sure you don’t want a cigar?”

I shook my head.

“Never understood why you’d drop a fin for a cigar when you could buy a perfectly good smoke for thirty-five cents.”

“You got me,” I said.

“I’ll be right back,” said Calvi, placing the cigar on the table so the end with the ash hung over the edge. He stood and hitched up his pants. “I gotta pinch a loaf.”

He ambled through the living room mess and into the bathroom. The cat followed, sneaking between his legs just as Calvi shut the door on himself. As soon as we heard the first of his loud moans, the bell to my apartment rang.

“That must be them,” said Cressi. “Can I just buzz them up?”

“No,” I said. “You have to go down the stairs and open the vestibule door.”

“What kind of shithole is this you live in, Vic?” said Cressi as he stood up and slipped the long barrel of his gun into his pants, buttoning his jacket to hide, though not very convincingly, the bulge. “And you a lawyer and all. You expecting anyone?”

“I don’t think so,” I said, though I wondered if maybe Morris or Beth had come by to check on me.

“Let’s hope not for their sakes,” said Cressi, as he started around the table and toward the door, the pistol in his pants turning his walk into a sort of waddle. He stopped for a moment and turned to us.

“Don’t either of yous move or you’ll piss the hell out of me.”

Then he turned again and disappeared around the bend of the living room.

“WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING?”asked a frantic Caroline as soon as we were alone.

I turned to her and put my finger on her mouth and whispered. “You came to me because of my connections with the mob. Well, there’s a battle going on for control of the organization and, somehow, I’m in the middle of it.”

“Who are they?” she asked, whispering back. “Those two men?”

“They’re the men who killed your sister and brother.”

“Oh, Jesus Jesus Jesus. I’m scared. Let’s get away, please.”

I took hold of her and stroked her hair. “Shhhh. I’m scared, too,” I said, “but it will be all right. I took care of some things.”

“They knew who I was. What do they want with me?”

“I don’t know,” I said, lying, because I was pretty certain that what they wanted with her was for her to be dead.

“Why did he want the stuff in my grandmother’s box?”

“I don’t know, except maybe it’s not your grandmother’s box after all.”

“I thought about what you said, in the car.”

“That’s good, Caroline, but we have a more immediate problem. We have to get you out of here.”

“I know I need to change things, but it’s harder than you think. You don’t reorganize your life’s story like you reorganize your closets. You need something to reorganize it around. What is there for me but the horrors of our past?”

I took her face in my hands and I looked at her and saw the struggle playing out on her features, but then the toilet flushed and a terror washed the struggle away with a consuming bland fear. I jumped from my chair and went to a kitchen drawer, slid it open with a jangle of stainless steel, pulled out a small paring knife. As I slammed the drawer shut I dropped the paring knife, point first, into my pants pocket. Then I went back to the table, took hold of her shoulders, and leaned over her.

“You’ll have a chance to get away,” I whispered. “Sometime. Keep your eyes open. Keep alert. I’ll give you the sign. When I do, run. All right?”

She was staring at me, her eyes darting with panic. The water started running in the bathroom sink as Calvi washed his hands.

“All right?” I asked again.

She nodded her head.

“Now pretend to smile and be brave.”

I let go of her and turned to sit on the tabletop. I was sitting casually, an arm draped over the pocket to hide the outline of the knife, when Calvi came out of the bathroom, shaking his hands. The cat ran out of the doorway ahead of him and jumped onto a cushion. Calvi looked around with suspicion. “Where’s Peter?”

“My bell rang,” I said. “He went to answer it.”

Calvi went back to the table, sat in his seat, picked up his cigar from the edge where he had left it. He sucked deep. “Good,” he said, exhaling. “They’re here.”

Cressi came back, not leading Morris or Beth by gunpoint, as I had feared, but with three men, apparently allies. Two I had never seen before, they wore dark pants with bulges at the ankles and silk shirts and had sharp handsome faces and slicked hair. The third I recognized for sure. The long face, the wide ears, the crumbling teeth and bottle cap glasses and black porkpie hat. It was Anton Schmidt, the human computer, who had kept Jimmy Vig’s records in his head.

Anton Schmidt, his hands in his pockets and his mouth pursed open to show his rotting teeth, stopped still when he saw me. “I didn’t know you were with us, Victor.”