Lullaby Town

by Robert Crais

  We were half a block from the meat plant when a brown Nissan Sentra nosed out of the parking lot and into the street. Two guys I hadn't seen before were in the front seat and Ric was in the back with Dani and Peter. Peter's head was sort of lolling to the side.

  Pike said, "We get the chance, we take them in traffic.'' He took out his Python and held it in his lap.

  I let the Sentra make its first corner, then I jerked the Taurus around and caught up to them going east on Canal to climb the Manhattan Bridge across the East River to Brooklyn.

  The bridge was electric with late-afternoon congestion as thousands of cars raced for home before the bridge gridlocked. If the bridge was locked now, what we were trying to do would be easy, but the bridge wasn't locked. Traffic coursed and bumper-to-bumper cars weaved from lane to lane, cutting each other off, hitting their brakes and making it hard to keep the Sentra in sight. Pike rolled down the passenger window and climbed out to sit on the door, but it didn't help. Eight cars ahead of us and two lanes over, the Sentra took the second exit ramp over the Brooklyn shore and that's where we lost it.

  Pike said, "Off-ramp."

  I blew the horn and cut in and out between three cars and knocked the bumper off a green Dodge station wagon, but I kept going.

  We jumped across the two right lanes and hit the off-ramp in a skid and followed it down in a great looping arc over factories and waterfront and chain-link fences and bridge supports, Pike standing as tall as he could in the window, trying to spot the Sentra, finally yelling, "Got it."

  The Sentra was below us in a U-Stor-It yard under one of the on-ramps leading back to Manhattan. The two guys were out of the Sentra's front seat and Ric and Peter and Dani were getting out of the back. One of the guys from the front was wearing a red leather jacket with very wide shoulders. The other had a gun out. Revolver.

  We came off the ramp at the rear of the storage yard on the wrong side of a ten-foot chain-link fence. I said, "Faster to go over it."

  We went up and over and came out between two corrugated-metal storage sheds eighty yards away as Ric took out the stainless-steel ten, pointed it at Peter, and said something to the guy with the revolver. Peter was standing with his hands up the way he'd had actors stand in his movies. Eighty yards away, you could see that his face was white and his eyes looked scooped out behind the thick glasses. Dani was maybe a half step in front of him. Peter said something to Ric and put out his hands, maybe saying please don't shoot, and Ric raised his gun to eye level and Dani went for him. I yelled, but it didn't do any good. Ric's gun popped once and the right back quarter of Dani's head blew off. Then I had the Dan Wesson out and Pike had his .357 and we were firing at them, eighty yards away, me screaming at Peter to get down, but Peter standing there, still with his hands up.

  The guy with the revolver went down.

  Ric ran toward the Sentra, firing as he went, and the guy in the red jacket pulled out a black automatic. Bullets slapped into the little corrugated sheds around us with the sound of hammers hitting garbage cans and left silver streaks on the tarmac where they hit and bounced into a concrete bridge support. The guy in the red jacket fired fast, bapbapbap, and then he went for the Sentra, too. I shot him in the back. He fell in through the Sentra's front passenger window as Ric roared away, fishtailing into storage sheds and a boat trailer, and then through the far gate.

  When the Sentra was gone, the storage yard was still.

  We got to Dani as fast as we could, but there wasn't anything to do.

  Peter said, "He told that guy Ric to kill me." He was talking fast and there was a knot below his left eye, like maybe someone had hit him there. His hands were still in the air. "Just like that, he said kill'm. I said I'm Peter Alan Nelsen. I said you can't kill me. He said, you wanna bet? And then these guys were bringing us out here and they were gonna kill me." Me. Me and I.

  I stood up. "Dani."

  He was hopping from foot to foot, confused and squinting at me. "What?"

  "They killed Dani." I said it carefully, each word distinct.

  He gave me more of the confused and said, "What?" Pike was squatting next to her body and I was standing over her, and Peter and I were talking about her, but he hadn't looked at her and he hadn't said anything about her. He said, "I told'm you can't do this to me. I'm Peter Alan Nelsen."

  I went over to him and said, "Put down your hands."

  He put down his hands.

  I punched him in the chest with my right hand. He fell backward and landed hard on his butt and said, "Hey, what did you hit me for?" Surprised.

  I grabbed him by the hair and lifted him as high as I could and I hit him in the face. His nose popped with a little spray of blood and I hit him again. He started to cry. I said, "Who's lying right there? What's her name?"

  "Dani." He still wouldn't look at her.

  "Look at her."

  "No." Blubbering now.

  I knotted his hair between my fingers and turned his face toward the body and pointed at her. "Look at her."

  He clenched his eyes tight. "No!"

  I slapped him hard on the left side of his face two times and then I dug my fingers at his eyes, prying them open. I said, "Look at her, you sonofabitch. Dani's lying there and not you. They killed Dani. Do you see her? They didn't kill you." Peter covered his face, peering out from between his fingers at what was left of the woman who picked up his candy wrappers. I said, "Do you see her, Peter?"

  He coughed out a great whooping sob. "Dani."

  I let go of him.

  He rocked forward and crawled toward her body. "It's my fault," he said. "Oh God, it's my fault."

  I didn't say anything. I was breathing hard and something sharp throbbed behind my right eye.

  Peter sat on his knees next to her, and touched her muscular arm, and cried all the harder. It made me feel ashamed.

  Pike came up behind me. "Ric will go to DeLuca. Things will happen fast now."

  "Yes." I took a deep breath and let it out. "Peter?"

  "What?" He didn't look at me.

  "Did you tell Charlie that we were on to the Jamaicans?"

  He nodded, still not looking at me.

  "Did you tell him we knew about the secret accounts?"

  Another nod.

  It felt cold and damp and ready to snow. Above us, the roadway vibrated with cars and trucks and thousands of people. Around us was a city of millions. We'd fired maybe fifteen high-velocity pistol rounds, yet no one came.

  Pike said, "Charlie will panic. He'll do the first thing he thinks of and that means he'll come for us and for Karen and the boy. He won't want anyone around who knows about the accounts or the Jamaicans."

  I looked down at Dani. "We'll have to leave her."

  Pike said, "Yes."

  I lifted Peter Alan Nelsen to his feet. He didn't look at me or at Pike and he didn't resist; he stared at Dani's body.

  I said, "Did you hear? Did you understand?"

  Peter nodded.

  "All right."

  Pike took Peter by the arm and led him back to the car.

  I took off my G-2 jacket, ripped my name out of the inside collar, and put it over Dani's head. Then I followed after them.

  CHAPTER THIRTY THREE

  I stopped at the Texaco station in Chelam and used the pay phone to call Karen Lloyd at the bank. I had to pull off the shoulder rig and the Dan Wesson and leave them in the car. No jacket. The old guy in the hunting cap was still sitting in the hard chair and the old retriever was still lying on his piece of cardboard. The retriever wagged his tail when he saw me.

  I told Karen that something had gone wrong and that she should pick up Toby from school and go home. She wanted to know what. I told her that I was at the Texaco station and would tell her when she got home. I said, "Are the printouts of the DeLuca transactions at your house or at the bank?"

  "The bank."

  "Bring them."

  At ten minutes of four we parked in Karen Lloyd's drive and went into the house
. Karen was in the living room, looking nervous, and Toby was with her. Peter was sort of slack-jawed and distant and walked as if his knees were stiff. They stared at him. Karen said, "What's wrong?"

  "Plans have changed."

  Peter said, "They killed Dani."

  "What?"

  Peter went to the couch and Joe Pike went past them down the hall to Karen's study.

  I said, "You guys are going to have to go away for tonight. Maybe a couple of nights. Throw whatever you need into a bag."

  Karen started to ask another question, then looked at Toby. "Toby. Do what he says. Go pack an overnighter."

  Toby took a couple of steps back along the hall, then stopped.

  Joe Pike came back with his duffel bag and took out a 12-gauge Winchester autoloader and a box of Remington Long Range Express shotgun shells. Number 4 buck. The autoloader had an illegal 14-inch barrel and a pistol grip in place of a stock. When Karen saw the shotgun, she said, "Oh my God. What is happening here?"

  Pike took a Browning .32 automatic in an ankle holster out of the bag and showed it to me. "You want the backup?"

  "Yes."

  He handed it to me and I put it on. I made sure the safety was off.

  "Tell me what happened!"

  I told her. I told her that at about the time Pike and I had been in her office, explaining what we had found out and what we were going to do with it, Peter and Dani had gone to see DeLuca and that now Dani was lying beneath an on-ramp to the Manhattan Bridge in Brooklyn. When I said the part about Dani, Karen's face went gray and she said, "You stupid sonofabitch."

  Peter looked at the floor.

  I pulled my pants leg down to cover the Browning and Karen said, "What are we going to do?"

  "It's not just Charlie anymore, but there's still maybe a way to do this without the cops. Before, we had it contained and we could have worked it so that we were dealing only with Charlie, but now that's different. We shot two DeLuca soldiers. One of them is dead and the other might be. Charlie's going to have to explain where the dead guys are and how they got dead."

  "So what will he do?"

  "He'll hit us. He'd rather lose the laundering setup than risk the other capos or the Gambozas finding out what he's been doing."

  Karen said, "Maybe we can talk to him. Maybe we should call him."

  "It's past that."

  "What can we do?"

  Pike said, "Sal."

  Karen looked at Pike, then me.

  I nodded. "Sal's our only way out. Charlie's thinking he's got to end it. He's got to get all of us before we send up the flare. So we go to Sal and we lay it out for him just like we were going to lay it out for Charlie. Sal won't want the Gambozas or the other families to find out what Charlie has been doing any more than Charlie."

  Karen nodded, maybe looking hopeful. Toby had worked his way back to the living room and she had her arm around him. He was staring at Peter.

  "Did you bring the account records?"

  She got them out of her purse in the dining room and gave them to me.

  I said, "Joe will stay with you. Does Charlie know about May Erdich's place?"

  Karen shook her head. "I don't think so."

  "Go there. If they come here looking for you tonight and don't find you, they might get the idea to look around. They'll check the Ho Jo, so don't go there. Get a room with May Erdich. If it goes okay, I'll come to May's when it's done."

  "All right."

  Maybe Peter could feel the weight of Toby's eyes. He looked up and he said, "I got her killed. I'd make it better if I could, but this is what I've done."

  Toby turned and ran down the hall.

  Peter Alan Nelsen, the King of Adventure, put his face in his hands and sobbed like a baby.

  I borrowed Pike's coat and pulled it on. It was a little big, but it fit well enough. I folded the account records and put them in the right outside pocket.

  Karen said, "Peter."

  Peter's shoulders shook and what you could see of his face looked red and splotched.

  Karen said, "Goddamnit, Peter, we don't need to listen to this."

  Peter cried harder.

  Karen crossed her arms and looked out the window, and then she walked over to Peter Alan Nelsen and put her hand on his back. Peter gulped air and made a deep, racking sob and hugged her around the hips and cried into her skirt. Karen Lloyd stared at the ceiling and patted his back.

  I walked out of the house and climbed into the Taurus and drove hard through the falling darkness all the way down to Manhattan and Sal DeLuca's.

  CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR

  Sal "The Rock" DeLuca had three adjoining brown-stones just east of Central Park on 62nd Street

  . One block in from the park a homeless woman with two children was building a little hut out of cardboard against somebody's front gate while a wino staggered by and offered her a drink. The wino didn't look where he was going, tripped over something, stumbled around in a wide orbit with a lot of hand waving, then fell onto the cardboard and threw up. The homeless woman kicked him in the balls. Anywhere else in America, East 62nd Street

  was a place you'd avoid after the sun went down, but not in New York. In New York, people paid millions to live on East 62nd Street

  . There were trees on East 62nd. The French Embassy was around the corner.

  Charlie DeLuca's black Lincoln Town Car wasn't around, but a couple of guys in a maroon Mercedes were. If Sal knew what Charlie was up to with the Jamaicans, I figured that Charlie would come to Sal first for damage control. If Sal didn't know, then Charlie would charge straight out to Chelam and try to end it before Sal found out. The black Town Car not being around was a good sign, but maybe Charlie had come with somebody else. He even might've taken a cab.

  I made the block twice, then parked on Fifth and walked back, trying to figure a way to see Sal without getting killed. The two guys in the Mercedes watched me as I walked past.

  The homeless woman and her children were huddled in their little cardboard house and the wino was sitting with his back against the building, holding his crotch with one hand and his bottle with the other. I made a big deal out of weaving as I walked and stopped a couple of times as if I had to steady myself and then I sat down next to the wino and studied the block. There were no fire escapes to creep up and no alleys to slip within and no second-story landings to leap to in a single bound. There were only the two guys in the Mercedes and another guy hanging around on Sal the Rock's top step. Phoning for an appointment probably wouldn't work.

  The wino burped softly and gingerly fingered his crotch.

  I said, "Pretty nasty shot she gave you."

  He nodded ruefully. "Women have been my ruination."

  "Is there any wine left in your bottle?"

  The wino lifted the bottle and looked at it forlornly. "Alas. Non." Our breaths were fogging in the cold night air.

  "May I have it?"

  He placed the bottle carefully on the sidewalk. "My world is yours to share."

  I picked up the bottle and wobbled across the street.

  The two guys in the Mercedes and the guy standing on the top step watched me, but it was the guys in the Mercedes I was worried about.

  I leaned against one of the trees for a while and pretended to drink, then continued along the sidewalk until I came to Sal DeLuca's. When I got to Sal's, I sat on the bottom step.

  The guy on the top step said, "Beat it, rummy." He was a little guy with a squinty face.

  I mumbled something and hugged the bottle.

  "Hey, asshole, I said beat it." He pounded down the steps and grabbed me by the back of the jacket and tried to lift me. When he lifted, he pulled me to him and I pushed the Dan Wesson into the soft flesh beneath his ribs. I said, "If you give it away, you die first."

  He stopped moving and stared directly into my eyes.

  I said, "Take me up the steps. Walk like you're helping me. We're going inside. Do you understand?"

  "Yes."

  "
Is Sal DeLuca in there?"

  "Yes."

  "Is Charlie DeLuca in there?"

  "No."

  "Who else is in there?"

  "The old man. Vito and Angie. The staff." I didn't know who Vito and Angie were, but it didn't seem to matter.

  "Let's go."

  We went up the steps, walking close so that the gun was hidden between us.

  Halfway up, the passenger side of the Mercedes opened and one of the guys got out. "Hey, Freddie."

  I dug the gun into Freddie's side a little harder. "Tell'm you're getting me something to eat."

  Freddie told him.

  The guy at the Mercedes laughed and called Freddie an asshole.

  We went up the rest of the way and Freddie let us into a long marble entry with a high ceiling and ornate stairs. The house was quiet. I said, "Take me to Sal."

  "You gotta be crazy."

  "If I was crazy, I'd have said take me to your leader." I gave him another prod.

  We went down the long entry, then through a living room that looked like it was maybe a hundred years old and then into a wood-paneled den with a fireplace. Sal DeLuca was sitting with a couple of well-dressed guys close to his age, the two guys on one couch and Sal on another, facing each other across a little table. Vito and Angie. They had hard, lined faces, and one of them had a gray mustache, and both of them looked at me with the sort of mild curiosity you reserve for a strange dog with a skin rash. Capos. Mafia executive material.

  Sal looked surprised. "What do you want?"

  Then Sal saw the gun.

  Sal DeLuca was in his early sixties and maybe five ten but he was very wide, with the sort of muscular density that allows great strength. He would've been very strong when he was younger, and he was probably very strong now. They don't call you Sal the Rock because you're wuzzy. He had a round face and protruding eyes and a wide mouth and fleshy lips, sort of like a frog's. He was wearing a deep blue smoking jacket. The last guy I'd seen in a smoking jacket was Elmer Fudd, but I didn't tell him that. Instead I said, "Two of your soldiers were killed today in Brooklyn. I'm the guy who killed them. Charlie DeLuca is partnered with a Jamaican gangster named Jesus Santiago. No one knows it yet, but they're stealing dope from the Gamboza brothers."