House of the Rising Sun

by Charlie Hustmyre

  Ray steeled his resolve. “What if I say no?”

  Charlie’s face got hard. “Then you’ll be a problem.”

  They had another round. This time Ray paid.

  As they were leaving the bar, Charlie slipped a napkin into Ray’s hand. “My number’s on it. You need help, give me a call. I’ll see what I can do.”

  “You think that asshole is going to do it?” Tony asked, leaning against the wall next to one of the big windows in Vinnie Messina’s fourth-floor office.

  Vinnie, his ass sunk into the sofa, munched on peanuts from a jar. He nodded as he dropped another handful into his mouth. “He’ll do it.”

  Tony eyed the empty chair behind Vinnie’s desk. Pushing away from the wall, he strolled over and sat down, listening with satisfaction as the rich leather creaked under his weight. The casters rolled easily on the hardwood floor as he slid up to the desk and propped his elbows on the lacquered top. “You didn’t see him with that cop downstairs. I don’t think he’s bullshitting when he says he ain’t got no friends on the department anymore.”

  Vinnie upended the jar, pouring the last of the peanuts directly into his mouth. When he finished crunching them, he said, “My brother’s gonna think it’s funny if I don’t put Shane on the job.”

  Tony knew that Vinnie lived in his older brother’s shadow. He also knew Vinnie didn’t like it, but there was nothing Vinnie could do about it. He wasn’t tough enough to really stand up to his brother. Old Man Carlos put up with a certain amount of posturing from his kid brother, but that was it. Vinnie wasn’t his own man. He certainly would never be able to replace his brother. Someone else would have to do that. “Then why did you let that prick Charlie Rabbit talk you out of it?” Tony said.

  Vinnie set the empty peanut jar down on the end table. “He didn’t talk me out of it. I agreed that Shane could think about it until tomorrow.”

  “Since when do we let our guys think about whether or not they’re going to do what we tell them?”

  “We don’t tell anybody anything,” Vinnie snapped. “I tell them what to do. And they’re not our guys. They’re my guys.”

  Now wasn’t the time to argue. Patience, Tony told himself. He had to have patience. “That’s what I meant.”

  “I know you got a beef with him over that broad downstairs, but-”

  “I don’t give a shit about her,” Tony snapped. “She’s just a piece of tail, like half a dozen others.”

  Vinnie stared at him. “When you let things get personal, that’s when you lose control.”

  Tony Z. waved a hand at him. “I just don’t like the guy.”

  “I like him, and my brother likes him. He did five years for us.”

  “It wasn’t five years,” Tony said, tired of hearing about how tough Ray Shane was supposed to be. Everything he had seen of Shane lately just convinced him even more of what a scared little prick he was.

  “Close enough to five,” Vinnie said. “But the important thing, at least as far as my brother is concerned, is the guy didn’t rat.”

  “He knows what we do to rats.”

  Vinnie struggled to his feet. “Point I’m making, Carlos appreciates Shane’s loyalty. And so do I. Shane is an ex-cop. He’s perfect for this job.”

  Tony watched Vinnie, wondering if the fat man was going to want his chair back. But Vinnie lurched to the nearest window. Gazing out at the filthy streets of the French Quarter, Vinnie said, “The one thing my brother admires most in people is loyalty.”

  Tony swiveled the chair toward the window, looking at Vinnie’s back. “How does doing a few years in the joint make him so loyal? I say it shows how stupid he is for letting the FBI get him on tape.”

  Without turning, Vinnie asked, “You know why Charlie Rabbit was here?”

  “He said he was here to help, whatever that means.”

  “More than that,” Vinnie said. “My brother values Charlie’s opinion over anyone else’s. If he doesn’t like what Charlie tells him about how we handle this situation… Well, a lot of people might end up paying for what happened last night.”

  Tony leaned back in the big chair, getting comfortable. “I don’t trust Shane.”

  Vinnie turned away from the window, fixing Tony with a stare. Surprisingly, the gaze of the man he considered little more than a fool suddenly made Tony uncomfortable. Vinnie’s eyes had something burning in them that Tony had never before seen in the blubbery fool’s expression. Menace. “Carlos is watching us, so you make sure Shane does what I want him to do.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Ray stepped out of the Hog’s Breath Saloon and into a torrential downpour. As he ran across the street to the Rising Sun, he held a newspaper he had swiped from the bar over his head as a shield. At the House, he stood under the awning waiting for the rain to let up so he could make a dash for his car, which sat two blocks away on Decatur Street.

  But after ten minutes of smoking and waiting, the rain was still coming down in a windswept torrent, so Ray tossed his cigarette into the street, raised the sopping wet newspaper over his head again, and ran. When he reached the parking lot, he was sure he was dying. His lungs burned, and the stitch in his side felt like a knife wound. A small booth stood at the entrance to the parking lot, set between two lift gates, one for entry and one for exit.

  Ray ducked into the booth and squeezed the attendant against the wall. “Sorry, Shorty,” Ray panted. “I just got to catch my breath.”

  Shorty was an old black man, no more than five foot two, bald and pudgy. He had been the parking lot attendant for as long as Ray could remember.

  “That’s all right, Mr. Ray,” Shorty said. “Take your time, you don’t look too good.”

  As Ray sucked in a lungful of damp air, he choked down a cough. Still, he wondered if there was enough room in this sardine can for him to reach his cigarettes. “You wouldn’t know it now,” he wheezed to Shorty, “but I used to run five miles a day, rain or shine.”

  “Oh, I believe it, Mr. Ray. You still look in pretty good shape, but listen here. I know it ain’t none of my business what you folks do, but…”

  Ray twisted to look at Shorty. “Yeah?”

  “There was two men by here a little while ago asking ’bout you.”

  The pain in Ray’s side, his burning lungs, both faded to nothing. “Who was it?”

  Shorty looked away. “Ain’t really none of my bus-”

  “Who?”

  “Was Mr. Tony, and that other… that big fella. I can’t recall his name.”

  “Rocco?”

  Shorty nodded.

  “What did they want?”

  “Didn’t say, just wanted to know which car was yours.”

  Ray glanced to the back of the lot and saw his Mustang. It was still there, same spot he always parked in. Backed up against the wall on the left side, ground level. Shorty’s parking lot was wedged between a pair of eighteenth-century brick buildings. Hydraulic lifts lined both sides of the lot so Shorty could double stack cars against the walls. Half the cars on the lot were Rising Sun employees.

  “What’d you tell them?”

  “I didn’t tell them nothing.”

  “Shorty, I’m not blaming you for anything,” Ray said, meaning it. The old man was a friend. “I just need to know what you said.”

  “I… I… had to show ’em.”

  The booth’s windows had started to fog up. Ray wiped a hand over the glass. He scanned the entire lot. The rain was still coming down hard. There was nobody in sight. “Where’d they go?”

  “I think they left.”

  “You’re not sure?”

  “No, sir,” Shorty said. “I had a car come in right about that time, and I didn’t see where they went. Time I turned around they was gone.”

  Screwed into one wall was an inch-thick, two-foot-by-two-foot piece of plywood, painted black and laid out with a grid of numbered hooks, half of which had keys dangling from them. Shorty kept the keys to all the cars parked on his lot so he co
uld shuffle them around and drive them on and off the hydraulic lifts. Rising Sun cars stayed on the ground just in case they were needed for a quick getaway. Ray pulled his keys down from one of the hooks, then slipped five bucks into Shorty’s hand as he patted the old-timer on the shoulder. “Thanks,” he said. Then he stepped out of the booth and loped across the lot to his car.

  The newspaper was a wet gob by the time Ray reached his Mustang. He tossed it onto the hood of the Lincoln parked next to him. Then he unlocked his door and slid behind the wheel. As he hunched forward, aiming the key at the ignition switch and tugging on the door handle, Ray felt the door jerked out of his hand.

  He turned and saw Rocco peering at him through the open doorway. In his huge right fist he gripped a big black pistol, a Glock. 45 by the look of it.

  Rocco grinned. “Say good-bye, Raymond.” Then the. 45 dropped out of sight, and Rocco’s left hand came up holding a small black gun, one Ray didn’t recognize.

  Everything slowed down. Rocco’s finger tightened on the trigger. Squeezed it back. There was no chance to get away. Not even time enough to duck. No possibility of Rocco missing. Ray had a flash realization: it’s over. Everything. No worries. No guilt. No nothing. He almost welcomed it. Then he realized that Rocco’s stupid, grinning face was going to be the last thing he ever saw. He opened his mouth to curse his cruel fate.

  Something shot out of the end of the barrel, but it wasn’t a bullet. It was a stream of liquid that filled Ray’s open mouth, splashed into his eyes, and squirted up his nose. He gagged on it and almost vomited. Instinctively, Ray shut his eyes, but it was too late to protect them from the burning liquid, and although he couldn’t see, he could still smell, and he recognized the acrid stench for what it was-urine.

  A squirt gun filled with piss.

  Ray’s hands jumped to his face and wiped frantically as he tried to clear his vision. He kicked out with his left foot but only managed to bang his shin on the door. A voice, a voice he recognized, said, “How’s it taste, Raymond? I didn’t know you were into golden showers.” That name again, Raymond. God, how he hated that name.

  By the time Ray managed to force his eyes back open, Rocco had taken a step back and had the Glock. 45 up again, pointing it at Ray’s head. Behind Rocco, Tony Z. stepped out from the front passenger seat of the Lincoln and popped open an umbrella to shield him from the driving rain.

  The two of them stood staring at Ray. At Rocco’s feet lay the black plastic squirt gun. Tony held the umbrella over his head but wasn’t sharing any of it with his sidekick. Rocco, the big dummy, just stood in the rain getting soaked. Ray waited, both hands on the steering wheel, griping it tight, his knuckles feeling like they were going to explode.

  “Did you like our little joke?” Tony said.

  Rocco chuckled.

  Ray said nothing.

  Tony grinned. “I wanted to get your attention, Raymond.”

  “My name is Ray.”

  Tony shrugged. “Whatever.”

  “You got my attention. What do you want?”

  “When Mr. Messina asks you to do something, you don’t think about it, you just do it.”

  Ray felt a drop of urine run down his cheek. He grabbed a hand towel he kept wedged between the console and the driver’s seat and wiped his face. “I thought that’s what he had guys like you for?”

  “He wants you to handle it.”

  Ray tossed the towel onto the passenger seat, then looked at Rocco, at the rain soaking his clothes, the big fat drops splashing off the Glock. 45 in his hand. Turning to Tony, Ray asked, “Why me?”

  Despite the rain, Tony was still managing to look cool, the umbrella protecting his gel-slick hair and silk suit. “Since it’s your mess, it’s only fair that you have to clean it up.”

  “I’m not the dumbass who left three hundred grand up there.”

  “You let four assholes with guns come into our-”

  “With guns is right, Tony. What the hell was I supposed to do? Stick my finger in my pocket, tell ’em to freeze?”

  Tony jabbed a finger in Ray’s face. “I’m not here to argue. I’m here to relay a message. You either find these assholes or you die in their place.”

  Rocco chuckled again.

  “We’re not talking about four douche bags who were looking for a Seven-Eleven to knock off,” Ray said. “They knew exactly what they were doing, and they’re not going to stick around afterward. That crew is long gone by now.”

  “You better hope not.”

  “What makes you think I can find them any better than you can?”

  Tony shook his head. “I don’t.”

  “Then why-”

  “I told you, this is what Mr. Messina wants.”

  Ray stared at Tony, his slicked hair, his Italian suit, his Bruno Magli loafers.

  Why do these wiseguys need a broken-down ex-cop and ex-con doing their dirty work for them. Unless…

  “You screwed up, didn’t you, Tony? It was you who left all that money in the counting room. What happened? Were you upstairs knocking off a piece of ass when you should have been taking care of-”

  “Shut up!” Tony snapped. He shot a glance at Rocco, then nodded at Ray. Rocco stepped in quick, lowering the pistol as he swung his left fist at Ray’s face. Seeing it coming, Ray threw his hands up and leaned back. He got one hand in the way, taking some of the power off Rocco’s punch, but not enough as the goon’s brick-size fist caught him in the mouth.

  Ray rolled back across the console and tucked his knees up into his belly in case Rocco came in after him, but he didn’t. Instead, the big man bent down and picked up the water pistol. He aimed it at Ray and pumped the trigger three times, laughing as the stream of urine hit Ray in the face and head. On the fourth pump, just a dribble came out and Rocco threw the empty plastic gun on top of Ray, then slammed the Mustang’s door shut.

  Tony pressed his face against the closed window and yelled, “Somebody’s got to pay, Raymond. It’s either going to be you or them.” Then he disappeared into the passenger door of the Lincoln and closed his umbrella. Like a faithful dog, Rocco trotted around the big car and squeezed in behind the wheel. The motor cranked. Then the Lincoln tore out of the parking lot, its tires spinning on the wet pavement.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Ray called three times and left three messages. Jimmy didn’t call him back. Ray decided to go in person.

  The New Orleans Police Department headquarters building is an ugly, 1960s-era, five-story block of cement and smoked glass that stands between the jail and municipal court. As Ray crossed the open plaza in front of the dilapidated building, he passed the dry, weed-choked memorial fountain and tried not to look at the memorial wall.

  Set in a corner of Sirgo Plaza, the fallen-officers memorial was the only modern edifice in the entire jail-court-police complex. The memorial wall was a seven-foot-tall pane of thick glass, surrounded by a rectangular concrete frame. Etched into the glass were the names of all of the New Orleans police officers who had been killed in the line of duty. When he was a rookie cop, Ray used to stop and stare at the glass wall. He would get choked up thinking about the fallen heroes whose names were inscribed there. This time he raced past it, too ashamed to look.

  Just inside the main door to headquarters, angled off to the left, was a security desk, almost always manned by a cop who was on light duty, usually one recovering from an injury. Two rope lines and a red carpet guided people to the security desk, but Ray slipped to the right as soon as he got inside. The officer on duty was busy with a couple of visitors and didn’t notice as Ray passed the elevator and glided toward the back stairs.

  On the third floor, Ray opened the door marked CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION BUREAU. A window made of bullet-resistant glass was set in the wall of the tiny waiting room. There was a small circular talking device mounted in the window. It looked like some sort of aluminum speaker. No one was behind the window, so Ray rang the old-fashioned metal bell that sat on the ledge in front of the gl
ass.

  Several seconds later, a fat female civilian support officer strolled up to the window. She stared at Ray for a second, giving him that bored civil-service look, then said, “Yeah?”

  “Is Detective LaGrange here?” Ray asked.

  She smacked a wad of gum a couple times while she looked him over. “Hold on,” she said as she turned and walked away.

  While he waited, Ray looked at the artwork on the waiting room walls. Cheap frames around police public awareness pictures. One was a stark black-and-white photo of a chalk outline drawn on the street where a body had fallen. A superimposed image in the lower right-hand corner showed a close-up shot of a young hand holding two rocks of crack cocaine. At the bottom of the poster, in big block letters, was the legend CRACK KILLS.

  Another framed picture showed kids on a playground. Printed at the bottom of the picture were the words CHILDREN SHOULD BE SEEN NOT HEARD , but a red line ran through the word heard, and printed over it in red letters, in what was supposed to look like handwritten graffiti, was the word shot. The detective office was a cheerful place to hang out.

  An electric solenoid buzzed. Ray turned to the window and saw the fat civil servant pointing to the door. He pushed it open just before the buzzing stopped and stepped inside the Detective Bureau. Detective Jimmy LaGrange was walking toward him. In his early forties, LaGrange was thicker around the middle and thinner on top than the last time Ray had seen him. He wore a shirt and tie and was slipping into a sport coat.

  “Hey, Jimmy,” Ray said, and stuck out his hand.

  The detective brushed past him without taking it. “I figured it was you.” He pointed toward the door. “Outside.”

  The door hadn’t even closed behind Ray before LaGrange was through it. Ray turned and followed him out into the hall. As he caught up to the cop at the elevator, Ray asked, “What’s wrong, Jimmy? You don’t have time for an old friend?”

  The detective looked up and down the hall. They were alone. “What are you doing here?” he said in a loud whisper.

  The elevator door opened. Inside stood a uniformed lieutenant and a sergeant. Ray followed LaGrange as he stepped into the elevator. Neither of them spoke. On the first floor Ray followed LaGrange out the front door. They turned left. They crossed the street that ran between headquarters and the sheriff’s building, finally stopping near a Dumpster.