“What happened?” she demanded. “Who were those guys?”
I peered up at her and realized I was seeing her with only one eye. There was something wet and sticky in my left one. I wiped at it with my hand, but that only made it worse.
“Oh, Jesus, you’re bleeding,” she said. “Are you all right?”
“Did they-did they hurt you?” I asked.
“No,” she said, “they just pushed me aside and ran out of here. I guess I scared ’em.”
“Help me up, Dori.”
She got her arm under my shoulder and helped me to my feet. Myknee screamed at me, my ribs ached, so did my back, and the wet, sticky stuff-my blood, I assumed-kept running down my face.
“Where to?” she asked.
“The sofa.”
“You might bleed on it.”
Just like a woman to worry about the furniture.
“I’ll risk it.”
With her help I limped to the sofa and dropped down onto it.
“Let me get something for your head,” she said.
While she was gone I took inventory. Everything seemed to hurt, but nothing was broken. I swiped at the blood in my eye, smearing it all over my hand and face without clearing my vision. Dori returned with a wet washcloth and a couple of towels.
“Since you weren’t worried about the sofa, I figured the same went for your towels,” she said.
Gently she began washing blood from my face. At one point I took over so she wouldn’t poke out my eyes trying to clean it. Once I could see I set the cloth aside and used a towel to wipe up the rest of the blood.
“Can you tell me what happened, now?” she asked.
“No,” I said.
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t know what happened,” I said. “I walked in, I got hit, two guys started working me over and then you showed up. End of fuckin’ story.”
“Did they rob you. Did they get your wallet?”
“It should be on the floor over there somewhere.”
She looked around, retrieved it for me and brought it over.
“Everything there?” she asked.
“Looks like it.” I set the wallet aside.
“Did they say anything?”
“They argued a bit.”
“Did they say anything to you?”
I thought a moment, then said, “Just shut up.”
“That’s odd,” she said.
“Yeah, it is odd. Did they speak to you?”
“Well, yes,” she said, “as they pushed me aside one of them said ‘Tell your boyfriend to mind his own business.’ What did he mean by that? Whose business have you been minding?”
“My own,” I said, “and I don’t usually have to be told to do it.” I touched my knee and found it swollen, stretched it out to try and ease the pain. There didn’t seem to be anything I could do for my back or my ribs.
“Your forehead is still bleeding,” she said, pressing the second towel to it.
I reached up and put my hand on it so she could let go.
“I better call the police,” she said.
“No-wait!”
She turned away from the phone and frowned at me. Dori was tall and statuesque, the way the casinos preferred their showgirls to be, and when she was all made up to go on stage she became beautiful. Freshly scrubbed the way she was now, though, she was simply achingly pretty.
“Why?”
“I need a minute to think.”
I was still feeling disoriented from being attacked. Did I want the police called in? What could I tell them? I couldn’t even describe the men.
“Would you be able to identify those two if you saw them again?” I asked.
“What? No, I don’t think so. They went by me so fast, and shoved me out of the way …”
“Then I don’t think it would do any good to call the police,” I said. I was starting to think more clearly. What of this was connected to the threats on Dean Martin? After all, that was the only thing happening in my life that was out of the ordinary.
“Are you sleeping with somebody’s wife, Eddie? Is that what this is about?”
Lately, we’d been having some problems and I’d started to think about ending our little arrangement-or what she had begun calling our “relationship.”
“No, I haven’t slept with anyone’s wife, lately.” Danny had askedme the same thing. When did I get that fuckin’ reputation? “To tell you the truth, I don’t know what this was all about, but they really seemed intent on hurting me.”
“Maybe I should take you to the hospital?”
I leaned forward and reached behind me to rub my back. The blow had not landed on either of my kidneys, so I doubted I’d be pissing blood like a fighter after a bout. I probed my ribs, which didn’t seem to be cracked. I’d had cracked ribs once before, so I knew from experience that it hurt like a bitch just to breathe. The worst problem seemed to be my knee, which had swelled up to about twice its size.
“I think some ice on my knee would be the best thing,” I said. “How does my head look?”
I removed the towel so she could take a look. She took hold of my face and leaned me toward the light.
“One of the girls fell one night and hit her head. The doctor said scalp wounds bleed a lot, but aren’t that serious. It doesn’t look like you’re going to need stitches.”
“Okay, then,” I said, “no cops and no doctors.”
“But Eddie-”
She was wearing jeans and a man’s shirt knotted below her large breasts. There was a considerable expanse of tummy showing, and I put my hand on her warm skin.
“I just think I need some tender loving care,” I said.
“From me?” she asked, with a smile.
“You’re the one who’s here,” I said, and then realized that may have been the wrong way to put it. “After all, you probably saved my life tonight. In some countries that makes you responsible for me.”
“Eddie,” she said, leaning forward so that her head came in contact with mine.
“Ow!” I said, and started bleeding again.
Thirteen
I woke the next morning stiff and sore-but I was grateful to wake up, at all. If Dori hadn’t come to the door, I might have been dead.
Dori stayed the night. She checked my eyes to make sure my pupils contracted in the light-she’d seen a doctor do this to the girl that had fallen onstage-and pronounced me concussion free.
We went to bed but didn’t have sex. Not that I didn’t want to. Dori’s all woman, and having her next to me gave me a raging hard-on all night, but my aches and pains just wouldn’t allow it. Believe me, we tried. The second time she whacked my sore knee with one of hers and we gave it up.
However, when we woke the next morning I was still hard, and she had pity on me.
Then she sprang a surprise on me while she was getting dressed.
“I think you should consider that a goodbye blowjob, Eddie.”
“What?” I’d been distracted watching her move about the room naked, enjoying the play of her dancer’s muscles beneath her smooth, pale skin.
“You’ve gotten yourself into something funny,” she said, “and I don’t mean ‘ha ha’ funny.”
“Well,” I said, “you’re right about that.” I watched as she fit her showgirl tits into her bra, then pulled on her top.
“Those men scared the shit out of me last night,” she said, pulling on her panties and hip-huggers at the same time, “so now that I know you’re all right I don’t think I want to be around if and when they come back.”
I couldn’t blame her for that. They’d pretty much scared the shit out of me, too-which, according to one of them, had been their job. Hurting me, that just seemed to be something the first guy wanted to do because he liked it.
She put on her shoes, grabbed her purse and came over to the bed to kiss me goodbye.
“Give me a call when you’ve got it all sorted out,” she said, then added, “then we’ll se
e.”
After she was gone I realized she’d been feeling the same thing I had, that maybe we’d run our course. We’d probably bump into each other around town-I’d even go to see her show-but we both knew that anything more than that was no longer an option.
In other words, we were done.
Being from Brooklyn I had seen a lot of street fights in my life. Hell, I had even done my time as a kid in a street gang, but had outgrown that stage very quickly. My point is I’m not really all that brave, but getting beat up didn’t send me running right to the cops, either. In the light of day I decided not to bring them into it-at least, not until I talked to Dean, again.
I took a shower when I got up and then checked myself out in the mirror. None of my injuries were visible except for a bruised knee-and no one would see that once I got dressed. The wound on my scalp was covered by my hairline, at first glance no one could tell I’d been attacked. Probably the only explaining I’d have to do was about the slight limp. Good thing Dori and I had iced the knee the night before, or it would have been much worse come morning. It was still somewhat swollen, but not so bad I couldn’t get my pants on. As far as thelimp went, I was hoping that it would get stronger and start to handle all my weight as the day progressed.
I made myself some coffee and tried not to rub my knee while I drank it. There was nothing else going on in my life that would cause two men to break into my house, wait for me, and then try to hurt me. And “break” was not even the right word. There was no damage to my door, or to any of my windows. Those guys had gotten in slick as you please, which meant they were pros-and that meant they had probably been paid to do what they did-only they hadn’t gotten the job done. Did that mean they’d be back? And wasn’t that a good enough reason to call the police?
I was still going over the one hand and the other hand when the phone rang.
“Is this Eddie Gianelli?” a man’s harsh voice asked. I didn’t recognize it, but got a chill down my spine anyway. I had a feeling I knew why he was calling.
“That’s right. What can I do for you?”
“Stay healthy, Eddie,” the man said. “I can always send my friends back around.’
“Who is this?”
“That don’t matter.”
“Then what the fuck do you want?”
“Stick to what you know best,” he said. “Don’t be tryin’ to branch out.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“I’m talkin’ about stickin’ your nose where it don’t belong,” the man said. “I’m talkin’ about doin’ favors for people and gettin’ hurt.”
“You’re talking about vague threats,” I said, starting to get angry. “How am I supposed to know what you’re warning me off of if you don’t tell me?”
“Names don’t matter,” he said. “You got a job, do it. Just don’t be freelancing, Eddie. It ain’t healthy.”
“For Chrissake,” I yelled, “this isn’t a Bogart movie, you stupid sonofa-”
But he was gone. I hung up, feeling totally frustrated. He had tobe talking about me helping Frank and Dean, but why wouldn’t he say it?
I picked up the phone and dialed.
“Bardini investigations,” a girl’s voice said.
“Is he there, Penny?” I asked. “It’s Eddie.”
“Hey, Eddie, how’s it goin’? Yeah, he’s here. Hold on.”
She put me through to Danny.
“Lookin’ for results already?” he asked. “You’re a harsh taskmaster, buddy.”
“I think I may have already gotten more results than I bargained for, Danny,” I said. “I need to talk to you. I’m coming to your office. I can be there in about twenty minutes.”
“Bring coffee,” he said, and hung up.
Fourteen
The offices of Bardini Investigations were at 150 Fremont Street, between the Fremont Street Casino and Binion’s Horseshoe Club, above a gift shop. When I opened the door Penny O’Grady looked up at me from her desk. I walked over and put a container down in front of her. She switched off her portable radio, cutting off the howling of what sounded like Buddy Holly. Dean Martin he ain’t.
“Coffee or tea?” she asked.
“Tea,” I said. “It doesn’t take me long to learn.”
“I’ve only been working for Danny for five years,” she said. “It’s taken me that long to get his files in shape, and for you to learn I drink tea.”
Penny had come to Danny right out of college and convinced him to hire her. At the time he’d been running his office alone. Now she was twenty-seven and pushing him to make her a partner. She had freckles, long legs and red hair and the only thing that kept her from being a knockout was a snub nose she was saving to have fixed. In my opinion she was smart enough to be a partner, but Danny liked the idea of a one-man shop-with secretary. Neither of them had ever bothered to satisfy my curiosity about whether or not they were sleeping or had ever slept together.
“Go on in,” she said. “He’s not doing anything important.”
“Thanks.”
I went past her and through the door to Danny’s office without knocking.
“What happened to you?” he asked, immediately.
“Does it show?”
“You’re limping,” he said, “and walking hunched over. And what happened to your head?”
I put my hand up to my scalp. I’d gotten past Penny, but not old eagle-eye Danny.
“I didn’t think it showed.”
“I’m a detective, remember?” he asked. “Speaking of which, I deduce that’s coffee in your hand. Fork it over here.”
I limped to his desk, sat across from him and handed him his coffee. He opened it, inhaled it, tasted it and then sat back and closed his eyes with a sigh. He liked it with four sugars, so I was always surprised his teeth didn’t just drop out of his mouth.
“I swear I’m gonna fire that girl if she doesn’t start makin’ coffee.” He opened his eyes and looked at me. “Okay, now give.”
I told him the story, starting from when I entered my house without using the key and ending with Dori leaving the next morning.
“Not having to use your key to get in should have been your first clue,” he commented when I was done.
“I came here so you could tell me something I don’t know, Danny.” My tone was a bit testy.
“Okay, okay,” Danny said, “calm down. No damage to doors or windows, you said?”
“That’s right.”
“Then you were dealin’ with pros,” he said. “If you can describe them I can identify them for you.”
“I got hit as soon as I walked in,” I said. “I’m afraid I couldn’t focus.”
“Well,” Danny said, “toss in the phone call you got this morning and it’s obvious this is all because of this … Rat Pack thing you’re involved in.”
“Why didn’t he just say so on the phone?”
“Maybe he thought your phone would be tapped.”
“Why would someone tap my phone?”
“Maybe,” Danny said, “he knows his own phone is tapped.”
“You’re saying he was with the mob?” I asked.
“Who else would have their phones tapped?”
“So that’s why he didn’t want to say Frank or Dean’s name.”
“Especially Sinatra’s,” Danny said. “And the guys they sent were real pro leg-breakers, not hit men, or you’d be dead.”
“One of them told the other one to hold me so he could hurt me.”
“Figures.” Danny took time to sip his coffee and eye me over the rim. “There’s nothing else you can tell me about them?”
“Well,” I said, “they bitched at each other like an old married couple.”
He laughed. “Why didn’t you tell me that in the first place?”
“Why?”
“Because now I know who they are.”
“Who?”
“Lenny Davis and Buzz Ravisi.”
“Are they workin’ f
or the mob?”
“They’re pros,” he said, “but not top of the line. They freelance as leg-breakers for the books, so I’m sure they’ve done some work for the mob at one time or another, but not for the big boys.”
“So what’s this mean for me?”
“It means that whoever’s skin you’ve gotten under, he’s not connected high up.”
I thought about that for a moment.
“Or he doesn’t want you to think he is.”
“That’s a big help.”
“You want a gun?” he asked. “I can give you one, or get you one.”
“What would I do with a gun?” I asked. “No, no gun.” Not yet, anyway. Besides, I hadn’t handled one since Korea. I’d shoot myself in the foot.
“This Dori,” he said, then, “she the one with the big knockers from the Sahara?”
Fifteen
Before leaving Danny’s office I verified for him that yes, Dori was the one with the big boobs from the Sahara, and he told me not to worry about Lenny and Buzz, that he’d check them out for me.
“I’m sure they did what they did just for the money,” he said, “and nothing personal. If I pay them enough they might roll over on whoever they’re working for.”
“How much is enough?”
“I don’t know,” Danny said. “Don’t worry, I’ll handle it and let you know.”
He hadn’t picked up any word on the street about who might want to threaten Dean Martin, but he’d only been working on it since yesterday. I knew he had the word out, so I wasn’t worried about that.
“You want to see a doctor?” he asked, before I left.
“I’m trying to be discreet, Danny.”
“I got a guy who won’t ask any questions,” he said. He opened his drawer and gave me a card. “I’ll call ahead and tell him you’re comin’.”
It wasn’t a bad idea, so I said okay.
“I don’t see any cracked ribs on the X-ray,” Doctor Gregory Edstrom said. He was holding my X-ray up to the light to show me. I didn’t know what I was looking at, but I nodded.
“That’s good.”
“You’ve got a deep-tissue bruise on your back,” he said, putting the X-ray down. “Take a few hot baths over the next few days, let the heat soak in. You got a heating pad?”
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