Yeah, he knew all about Mikey-boy making a big play for Gina. What Freshy hadn’t told him, he’d pretty much pieced together himself. It wasn’t hard to figure. Santoro was trying to use all his Mr. Clean charms to sweep Gina right off her feet and right into his bed. See, he thinks he’s better than everybody else. He thinks just like her. She thinks she’s better than her upbringing. But in her case, that was okay. He liked the fact that she had a backbone, that she told people to go to hell all the time, and that she said she wanted nothing to do with wiseguys. That was okay.
But on Santoro, this attitude wasn’t so becoming. It just showed him up for what he really was, a snot-nosed shitass. He needed to be taken down a few pegs, and Bells was just the guy to do it. That’s what he gets for messing around with Gina. That was the only reason he’d gone head to head with Buddha over getting these two mamelukes their loan. Sure, they were gonna get their money, and he was gonna encourage them to use it on their business right away, all of it. He was gonna lead them down the garden path because he wanted them to fuck up. And they would fuck up, he’d make sure of that. And when they did, they’d have to deal with their good ole shy, who was gonna be right there to wipe that smile off Santoro’s face. First off, Bells was gonna have to take over their porn business and run it himself to satisfy the loan. He’d keep Freshy around to run the day-to-day stuff, out of the goodness of his heart, of course. But Mikey-boy would have to go. And Gina, if she was brought up right, which Bells knew she basically was, would thank him from the bottom of her heart for saving her little fuck-up brother’s ass. In fact, he knew she would thank him, even though she might not make a big show of it, because he knew she was devoted to the little jerkoff and worried all the time about Freshy getting his head blown off or being sent to jail or something. She’d told him.
The two black guys were moving slow toward the door, the one with the dirty face still holding the fin in his fingers like a retard who didn’t know enough to put it in his pocket. Then the boss showed up. Finally.
“Hey, Bells, Stanley, what’s happening?”
Randy Slipowitz was a skinny guy with black black hair, thick eyebrows, and a honker like a sailboat sticking out of his face. He sort of looked like that guy on M*A*S*H who was always wearing women’s clothes to get himself booted out of the army. Slipowitz smoked like a chimney and always wore dress shirts and dark dress pants, which were always covered with hair. He had this problem. A sickness, really. He had this nutty thing for animals. His house was full of strays he’d picked up here and there. Two dozen dogs and who knows how many cats. It wasn’t unusual for him to have a couple in the car with him, and right this minute he was holding this little cat, a sleepy little orange tabby, bigger than a kitten but not quite a teenage cat. Slipowitz scratched its head with a lit cigarette between his fingers even though the thing was already sacked out in the crook of his elbow with its little head upside down and its paws up in the air.
But Randy Slipowitz’s animal problem went beyond stray cats and dogs. He had a thing for the ponies, too. Without fail, he’d spend every afternoon at the track, winning some, losing more, just like every other schmuck who lives for the ponies. He’d borrowed a hundred and seventy-five grand from Buddha to buy this Maxximum Muffler franchise, but he wasn’t here enough to make the place work for him. He must’ve thought the place would run itself, that it would somehow turn into some kind of magic money machine. But that wasn’t how you ran a business. You didn’t leave the help in charge day after day on a regular basis. Bells could see disaster coming down the road. Slipowitz hadn’t fallen behind in his payments—not yet—but Bells knew the signs, and it was definitely coming. The franchise itself was worth shit as far as he could tell. If the Slip defaulted, Buddha didn’t want the shop and neither did Bells. So that was why Bells was here today. To give ole Randy a little financial advice and get him back on track before he got off track.
Slipowitz sucked on his cigarette. “What’s up, Bells?” His eyes darted from Bells to Freshy to Mikey-boy and then back again. He avoided looking at Stanley. He didn’t even want to acknowledge that Stanley was there. No one liked seeing Stanley.
Bells walked up to him with a smile and scratched the little cat’s lazy head. “This is a cute one, Randy. What’s his name?”
“I call him Pancho. ’Cause it’s always siesta time with this one.” Slipowitz took a long drag off his cigarette, his eyes still darting all over the place.
Bells took the cat from him and cradled it in one arm. He explored the fur on its belly with his fingers. “Hey, Randy, this cat has teats. How can it be Pancho? It’s a girl.”
“I know, I know. It’s just that she looks like a Pancho to me. You know what I mean?”
Bells smiled. “Yeah. I do.”
“So what brings you around here, Bells? Need a new muffler?”
Bells shook his head and scratched the little cat under the chin. She squeezed her eyes shut and stretched, lounging in the lap of luxury.
“So, ah . . . so what’s up, Bells?”
Tozzi noticed that Slipowitz’s hand was shaking. The guy was scared shitless, and he kept flicking ashes on the floor with his thumb even after there were no more ashes to flick.
Bells looked down at the little cat as he scratched its chin. “So how’re the ponies running these days, Randy? You making out?”
Slipowitz shrugged. “I dunno. You know how it is, Bells. You got good days—and you got not-so-good days, too . . . sometimes. You know?”
Tozzi couldn’t tell if little Pancho was all the way asleep or not, but she sure looked it.
Bells kept scratching her chin. “Tell me something, Randy. How’s business?”
“Business?”
“Yeah. How many mufflers you sell in an average day? About.”
“Whole mufflers?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, see, you don’t sell a whole system all that often. Usually it’s just pieces that people need. Pipes, condensers, the actual muffler itself, that kind of thing. Very unusual for someone to need a complete exhaust system replaced.”
“Interesting. So how many cars you work on a day? About.”
Slipowitz glanced out the Plexiglas panels in the garage door. Except for Bells’s BMW and his own Pontiac, there were no other cars out front in the lot, which meant they didn’t have a whole lot of business today. He held the cigarette butt carefully as he took the very last drag, then dropped it on the floor and stepped on it. “Well, that all depends, Bells. Every day is different. See, it’s a little slow now, but that’s to be expected this time of year. Once it snows and the weather gets shitty, this place’ll be hopping. You know the way they salt the roads around here. That really speeds up metal corrosion. Then there’s the slush that builds up in the wheel wells and freezes. You’re driving along and this big chunk of frozen slush breaks off—it can get caught on the muffler. Maybe you drag it for a couple hundred feet. You don’t realize how much damage that can do.”
Bells was grinning down at the cat, so calm and contented. “Frozen slush, huh? Is this what they taught you out at Maxximum Muffler School? Where was it? Kansas?”
“No, Omaha.”
Bells stared at Slipowitz and nodded. “So when did you open up this place? Last April, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah, April.”
“So you haven’t actually been through a winter in the muffler business yet, have you?”
“Well, no, but—”
“And how long did you go to that muffler school down there?”
“Five days.”
Bells nodded. “And not counting what you did down there, how many mufflers have you personally put in, Randy?”
“Oh, I done quite a few, Bells. One of the guys calls in sick, I fill in. Oh, yeah. I do.”
“How many mufflers, Randy?” Bells kept staring at him.
Slipowitz couldn’t look at him. “Gee, Bells, offhand? I dunno. If you want a number, I’d have to look it up.”
&nbs
p; “Ah-huh.”
Tozzi didn’t like the way this was going. He didn’t know what the story was with Slipowitz, but it seemed like Bells was here to collect on a late payment. Stanley was standing between Slipowitz and the door, his big head tilted back on a bull neck, eyes half-closed with attitude.
The lazy little tabby was nearly comatose, laid out across Bells’s forearm like a fur pelt. Bells walked it like he was walking a baby, jiggling it, stroking its chin, cooing to it. As he walked around in circles, he found his way under the Celica up on the lift. He stopped and stared up at the underside of the car as if he were gazing up at the stars.
“Randy,” he said, “lemme tell you something you should know. A team is only as good as its coach. An army is only as good as its general. And a business is the same thing. It’s only as good as its boss.”
“I agree with you, Bells.”
Bells looked over his shoulder at Freshy and Tozzi and raised his eyebrows. “Listen to this, you two. This applies to you guys, too.” He went back to gazing up at the rusty underside of the car. “Now you said you agreed with me, right, Randy?”
“Absolutely.”
“Then I guess you don’t practice what you preach.”
“Wha-wha-whatta’ya mean, Bells?” Slipowitz had an unlit cigarette wedged between his lips.
“What I mean is, we both know that you don’t pay a whole lot of hands-on attention to this place, Randy, and I consider that a breach of contract.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Bells. I been paying you on time. I haven’t made you wait once.”
“That’s not the point, Randy. The point is, you have other things on your mind that interfere with your muffler business here. Things like playing the ponies and picking up strays, like little Pancho Villa here, and worrying about all the mangy mutts and cats you got living at your house.”
“You don’t understand, Bells—”
Bells shook his head, and Slipowitz shut right up. “No, you don’t understand, Randy. When I lent you the money you needed to buy the franchise, I became like your partner in this place. If this place goes under, I’m affected, too, right? So that’s why I’m here, to give you a little business advice before it’s too late. Sort of like as an extra service that I offer. You know what I mean?”
“Yeah. I guess. I dunno.”
Bells looked over his shoulder and stared at Tozzi.
Tozzi stared back but didn’t say a thing. This was all for his benefit, his and Freshy’s. Bells wanted them to see what it was like doing business with him.
Bells stepped out from under the car, still stroking the lethargic cat. He looked down and found the metal lever on the floor that controlled the lift. With his toe, he flipped the lever out of the lock position and activated the release. The car started to descend, a slow loud hiss emanating from the greasy metal column that held the car up.
Tozzi’s gut clenched. He watched Slipowitz, who was shaking like a chihuahua.
“You see, Randy, it’s like this.” Bells hunkered down next to one of the depressions in the floor where the car’s back wheels would settle. “I could yell and scream and make all kinds of threats against you and your family and all your pets, but that’s not me. I’m not like that. I’d rather help you out now, before you have a problem. ’Cause no one likes problems. Right, Mikey?”
“Sure. Right.”
“What’sa matter, Mikey? You look worried.”
“Me? Why should I be worried?”
“I dunno, but your face is as tight as a fist. Relax.”
“I said I’m not worried.”
“Oh. Good.” Bells was grinning at him.
Tozzi wanted to kick the bastard’s head off.
The red Celica was about three feet off the floor now. Bells stroked the cat and grinned up at Slipowitz.
“What I want, Randy, is for you to take a little more personal interest in this place. Those two black guys you got may be excellent muffler technicians or whatever the hell you call them, but they are not management material. I want you to spend less time at the track and more time here. Otherwise . . .”
Bells leaned forward and gently laid the sleeping tabby in the tire gully. The Celica was less than two feet from the ground.
Tozzi’s heart started to pound.
The cigarette fell out of Slipowitz’s mouth. “Don’t, Bells, please. Don’t.” He stepped forward to rescue the cat, but the Tazmanian Devil stepped in front of him, and he backed right off. No one wanted to get too close to Stanley.
Slipowitz pleaded from a distance. “C’mon, Bells. Please. Don’t.”
Bells had to peer around the descending tire to see him. He stroked the little cat’s head until it realized that it was in danger. It tried to turn over and move, but the son of a bitch already had his hand around its neck, pinning it down. It struggled and fought, scratching like crazy with its back paws, but the pain apparently didn’t bother Bells. Tozzi couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Buddha was right: Bells was a freak. He tilted his head and smiled down benevolently at the frantic little cat in his bloody hand, then he looked up at Tozzi.
“What’sa matter, Mikey? You look upset. Don’t worry. Scratches heal.”
Tozzi shrugged. “It’s your hand, Bells.” You goddamn freak you.
Bells turned back to Slipowitz. “From now on, Randy, what I’d like to see is you coming in every morning before the help, taking some pride in this place, wearing the Maxximum Muffler coveralls, the whole bit. I want you to make this place really take off.”
The poor little cat was howling. The tire was right on top of it. Bells carefully slid his hand out just in time, so that he still had it by the neck as the tire pinned its body to the floor. Tozzi had to force himself to stay put.
Randy tried to get to the cat again, but Stanley blocked his way. “Okay, Bells, okay. Whatever you say. Anything. I’ll even wear the overalls. Anything.”
“Don’t bullshit me, Randy.”
The cat screamed.
Tozzi wanted to save the poor animal, but he couldn’t risk blowing his cover for a cat. Mike Santoro wouldn’t dare get in Bells’s way, not now, not with a big loan pending.
Slipowitz was in a real state, practically on the verge of tears. “I swear, Bells! Whatever you want.”
“Really?”
“Really! I swear! I promise!”
“Fine.”
Bells yanked the cat out just as it was about to be crushed. The tire spun for a few rotations, then squeaked to a stop as it touched ground. He swung the cat by the scruff of the neck, but instead of letting it go, he forced it back into his arms, cradling it, stroking it, shushing it, scratching its head with his scratched bloody hand until the cat finally settled down and relaxed, tipping its head back and accepting the attention just the way it had before. It wasn’t long before the little tabby was nearly comatose again, stretched out and totally limp.
The black guy from Haiti dropped his cup of coffee, and it splattered in a sunburst on the grimy floor. He and his buddy had been watching quietly from the doorway between the office and the garage. “Mon Dieu,” he breathed, staring with big yellowish eyes at the sleepy little cat.
“Did you see that?” Freshy whispered to Tozzi.
“I saw.”
“Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!”
Bells cradled the cat and laughed out loud. He opened his eyes wide and stared back at the guy from Haiti. “It’s voodoo, baby.”
Freshy’s mouth hung open. He looked just like the guy from Haiti.
“What’sa matter, Mikey? You still look all upset over there.”
“I’m not upset, Bells. I told you.”
“Oh, yeah, right. You did tell me.” Bells was still laughing.
Tozzi just looked at him. This son of a bitch wasn’t just a freak. He was a freak and a half.
EIGHT
10:50 A.M.
From the backseat of the BMW, Tozzi watched Stanley as he carried a big white paper bag and a small
brown paper bag back to the car. Tozzi was still brooding over what had happened back at the muffler shop. He kept thinking: What if it had been Randy Slipowitz’s head under that tire? In that case, Tozzi couldn’t have just stood around and watched. He would have had to do something to stop it, and that would’ve blown his cover. Then what? Bells and Stanley might’ve tried to flatten his head under the car, that’s what. Bells was that crazy. Tozzi wished he could stop thinking like this, but Bells had really gotten under his skin, and this fixation wasn’t healthy. It was too close to fear, and once you showed fear, forget about it. But Tozzi knew he would never admit to himself that he was ever afraid, and that worried him, too. Too much ego clouds your judgment, and for a guy working undercover, that could be fatal. He stared at the back of Bells’s head as the freak calmly read his newspaper up front in the passenger seat. Asshole.
Stanley got into the car and handed the brown bag to Bells, then reached into the white one and pulled out what everyone else had ordered. Tozzi got the large coffee—milk, no sugar. Freshy got the light and sweet coffee and the buttered roll. Stanley got a coffee and a cheese Danish for himself. Bells opened his bag and pulled out a white cardboard container, a foam cup, and a pair of wooden chopsticks. He was having shrimp fried rice and tea. From the backseat, Tozzi watched him break the chopsticks apart and pry the lid off the cup of tea.
They were parked in the lot of a strip mall somewhere off Route 46, past Paterson, that had a discount baby furniture store, a cosmetics outlet, a luncheonette, a Chinese take-out place, a cheap women’s shoe store, and a jewelry store. Bells turned and sat sideways in his seat as he started to shovel fried rice into his mouth, holding the carton close to his face. He seemed to be ravenous.
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