by Don Donovan
"Hi, honey," she said. "How'd it go?"
I took the book out of her hands and sat facing her.
"Not good," I told her. "Trey Whitney's dead."
Her body shot to a bolt-upright position and her eyebrows reached for the ceiling. "What? Trey —"
"I was there to collect from Sharma and Trey showed up. He interfered and put up a fight. I shoved him away. Hard. He hit his head on a concrete light pole."
Dorothy gasped out loud for a few seconds. Then she said, "You mean he just died? Right on the spot?"
I nodded. "Before I even knew he hit the pavement."
She blew out a strong exhale. "Tell me everything that happened."
I ran it down for her, every painful detail, emphasizing how I was lucky as shit no one came along while I was there, either before, during, or after the scuffle with Trey. By the time I got done, she had calmed herself considerably.
"So the stripper is the only one who can put you there? You didn't go in the club? No one else saw you?"
"No. No one."
"Can she be counted on to keep her mouth shut?"
"I think so."
"But you're not sure?"
I said, "She knows what'll happen to her if she squeals."
"You realize what it means if word gets out."
I said, "I know. It's probably a murder charge. Manslaughter at the very least."
My body was covered in sweat. The odor disgusted me. I peeled off my T-shirt, slipped out of my pants, and jumped into a cool shower. I wanted to not only scrub off the sweat, but to also cleanse away all the events of the night, although I knew a shower wouldn't do it.
Afterward, I wanted to feel her body up against mine. Then, at that very moment. I just wanted everything to be different. Despite the way everything went down, accidental and all, I still felt as if I had turned into an honest-to-God killer. Trey didn't deserve to die. I didn't have to shove him so damned hard. Sure, he was drunk, only being his usual asshole self, trying to defend Sharma and look like a hot shot. But then I took his life. Snuffed him when he didn't have it coming.
Dorothy opened her arms to me as I climbed in next to her.
"My God," I said, "I can't believe what I've done." I buried my face in her soft breasts.
She slowly ran her hand through my hair. "Why'd you have to get so rough with him? Maybe you could've eased up on him a little."
"I didn't get rough with him. I just gave him a little shove is all. At least I thought it was just a little shove. But he hit that lamppost so hard!"
"You think you could've talked him down?" she said.
"Maybe, but I didn't. And he's dead. Shit, his wife is probably getting the word right now."
"And so is Win Whitney."
I jumped up from the bed and padded into the kitchen. I reached into the cabinet and my hand came out with a bottle of whiskey. A stiff belt into a rocks glass and down the hatch. Pour another one for the road. I sipped at it and returned to the bedroom.
I sat next to her on the bed. "Baby," I said, "I think I'm gonna be in very deep shit over this."
"Not if the stripper keeps her mouth shut, right?"
Another sip. I could feel the calm sluicing over me.
"I guess not. But Trey's just as dead."
Dorothy ran a hand through my hair and smoothed out her voice. "Shh-h-h. Don't think about it right now."
"B-but —"
"Shh." Her arms tightened around me and her substantial body ground softly into mine, ready to yield. Her voice lowered to a whisper. "Leave it alone for now. Just come to me. Come to me, my love."
≈ ≈ ≈
I got up before Dorothy, awakening from a tight troubling sleep, and not at all refreshed. It was a little before noon. A glance through the window showing me a nice day, the summer heat leaking hard into our apartment. I ticked the AC up a notch.
As I made coffee, the events of the night before still poisoned my thoughts. I didn't know what to do at this point. Whether I should pretend nothing happened and expect my life to continue uninterrupted, or maybe I should sit around and mentally prepare for the inevitable shit to hit the waiting fan.
The knock came on my second sip of coffee.
I opened the door. Chuck from upstairs stood in the hall, glaring at me.
"What's up, Chuck?"
"Logan, can you ask your wife to please not hang her underwear out on your rear balcony? It's unsightly. We've got a laundry room for that kind of thing."
"What? Underwear? On the balcony?"
He made a gesture, kind of a cocky wrist flip, which pretended to straighten out his wrinkled khaki shirt. No doubt showing me he meant business. Meanwhile, his voice remained even. "Don't pretend you don't know what I'm talking about. There are a couple of items of ladies' underwear out there right now."
To be honest, I never noticed that kind of stuff. If Dorothy hung a few things over the balcony rail, it slid right on past me.
"Listen, Chuck," I said. "First of all, her name is Dorothy and she's not my wife. Second of all, I don't know what you're talking about. If there's anything hanging over our balcony, I'm not aware of it. But finally, if there is anything out there, it's none of your fucking business."
"It's everybody's business," he said. "You can see it from the interior courtyard. Underwear hanging out in plain sight. It looks trashy."
My fists ground together and my lips tightened around a hardening jawline. It was all I could do to keep from sending this shitbird to meet Trey Whitney in the great beyond. But right now, I didn't need to bring any more bad juju into my life. I summoned all my patience to still my gut and to restrain my hands from clutching him around his long fucking gooseneck.
"I'll take care of it," I said. Then I chilled my eyes and my voice as cold as they could get. "And don't ever call us trash again. You understand me?"
He nodded once as an outward sign of understanding, but he didn't really have to. The sudden flicker of fear in his eyes told me he got it.
29
Mambo
Sunday, July 17, 2011
2:10 PM
A NINE-BALL GAME HAD JUST ENDED with a once-in-a-lifetime shot, sinking both the eight and the nine in spectacular fashion. Mambo the Third watched from the sidelines and joined in the raucous applause that followed. The winner grinned in appreciation and scooped up the money from the rail. Around the table, money changed hands as people paid off their losing bets.
Mambo turned back to the bar and the bartender waved at him for attention.
"Your grandfather's on the phone, Mambo," he said.
"I'll take it in the office."
Back in the office, he picked up the phone and pressed the appropriate line button. "Hola, Abuelo," he said.
"I just got off the phone with Win Whitney. Did you hear about Trey?" The Original Mambo's voice was drained of any niceties.
"Trey? No. What happened?"
"He's dead."
Mambo the Third lurched forward in his chair. "Dead? How?"
"Killed outside the Wild Thing. That stripper of his was there. She says it was an accident."
"Accident? Wha — what the hell happened?"
"Seems Trey was drunk and started groping her on the street after she got off work. She says she tried to pull away from him and he lost his balance. Hit his head against a lamppost as he fell."
Mambo was still having a difficult time digesting this. "So he's dead? Just like that?"
"Just like that. I don't like it, though."
"Why not?"
"I don't know. Something … I don't know, it just doesn't smell right to me."
"Well, you think she killed him? Did it deliberately?"
"I don't know. We'll see. But this is going to slow down our North Roosevelt project. Slow it way down. Trey was playing a big part in it, and Win is damn sure going to want a real resolution of his son's death before we move ahead."
"I — I guess so," young Mambo said. "I can see where he would want that
."
"He might even think we had something to do with it."
"Us? Why the hell would he think that? We wouldn't have any reason for —"
"Tell me, mi nieto, did you tell Trey his debt was forgiven? That he no longer owed us that money?"
"Of course! Just like you said! He thanked me and that was that."
"Well," The Original Mambo said, "this still doesn't smell right to me. Or to Win either. He told me as much on the phone just now. Right now, he's leaning toward the stripper hitting Trey with something, or otherwise causing his death."
"Jesus! That's a fucking stretch, isn't it?"
"Not if you think about it. She simply might have had enough of Trey and his bullshit. You don't know what goes on in the minds of those stripper sluts. The cops, though, they're believing her for now. I hear Ortega's got the case."
Mambo said, "Ortega? Shit, if he can't get to the bottom of it, no one can. How long does Win want to postpone the redevelopment deal?"
"As long as it takes. Till he gets an answer for his son's death. I've got to go now. And by the way, no dinner tonight."
"Sí, Abuelo."
Mambo the Third hung up and absorbed this information for two or three minutes. Then he punched in another number on his cell.
"Logan," he said. "You hear about Trey?"
"Trey?" Logan said. "No. What about him?"
"They found him on the street outside the Wild Thing early this morning with his skull opened up."
"What? You mean he's —"
"Dead as a pair of deuces against a straight flush."
"Holy shit! What happened?" Logan sounded natural.
"His stripper girlfriend was involved. She says he was drunk and he grabbed her tits right there on the street. She moved away from him and he lost his balance. Slipped and fell, hit his head on a light pole."
"That's it? You mean he just fell down drunk and cracked his head open? Right outside the Wild Thing alley?"
Mambo said, "Well, that's what the stripper says."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean it doesn't sound right. Think about it. Why would she want to get away from Trey? From what I heard, he was showering money down on her pretty steadily."
"I don't know, maybe she just had a rough night at work. You said Trey was loaded. And you know how he can be when he gets like that. Real fucking annoying. Maybe she didn't feel like getting pawed out on the sidewalk."
A quick head shake on Mambo's end of the phone. "She doesn't mind it all night long in the Wild Thing. Why would she make a big deal out of Trey doing it? Especially since he pays her for the privilege."
"Oh, man, you know how these strippers are," Logan said. "Inside those joints, they're for sale to everyone with a hard dick and a few bucks. But once they walk out the door, they think they're fucking Mother Teresa."
"Maybe, but it just doesn't …" Mambo's mind ventured off again, trying to piece it together.
"How's his family taking it?"
"Winston's pretty upset, as you can imagine. From what I heard, he doesn't believe a word of it, either. He thinks maybe the bitch got rough with Trey and hit him with something."
"Well, you know how Win feels. He thinks Trey could do no wrong. Innocent choirboy and all."
"Yeah, he does think that." He really does, thought Mambo. He never could see straight when it came to that asshole son of his.
"How about the cops?" Logan said. "What do they think?"
"From what I hear, they're buying the stripper's story. For now. Ortega's got the case. He hasn't found any other evidence so far."
"So far?"
He said, "I don't have to tell you about Ortega. Nothing's ever easy when he's involved. He'll turn everything inside out and upside down before he closes this case. Especially when the victim is named Whitney."
Mambo knew Ortega, all right. An old veteran. One sharp cop. Couldn't be bought, couldn't be pushed around. Could read a crime scene better than anyone. He'd been onto Mambo's operations for years, trying to put him away for one thing or another. Mambo always took care to cover his tracks, though, so Ortega never could pin him down on anything, never could make anything stick, even though his bar was full of outlaws every night of the week.
"Well," Logan said, "if Trey did fall, like the girl said, then there's nothing to prove. Not even Win Whitney can turn an accident into a crime."
Mambo sighed. "I guess not," he said and swiped the call off his cell phone.
30
Logan
Sunday, July 17, 2011
2:25 PM
"IS THE STRIPPER'S STORY HOLDING UP?" Dorothy asked, putting down the iron.
"For now. But Win Whitney thinks she killed Trey. And Ortega's on it like gravy on rice."
"Oh, shit. Ortega."
"I know," I said. "The last thing we need."
"What's Mambo's take?"
"He's not completely sold on it, either."
She said, "The stripper won't be able to stand up to Ortega. No goddamn way. He'll lean on her hard and I'm telling you, she'll fold like a wet fucking tent."
I didn't want to hear this. I knew it was possible, but I didn't want to hear it. I didn't want to think about Sharma leaking the truth out under Ortega's hard questioning. Definitely didn't want to think about what would happen after that.
Dorothy led me to the couch and sat me down.
"You know what this means," she said. "Don't you?"
My head hung between my hands. She walked over and stood in front of me and repeated, "Don't you?"
"I-I really don't think she'll talk. If she sticks to her story, they'll have to believe it." I looked up at her.
She said, "We're gonna have to do something about it."
"No, we got to step away from this, honey. I don't want to get too deep into it. We may not be able to turn back."
"Shit, open your eyes! You're in up to your fucking neck already."
"Well …" I thought for a second. "How about we hustle her out of town? Back to Hialeah. Or maybe Tampa. They'll never find her there. Give her a few grand to hold her over a while."
"Nix," she said. "If she splits town, Win Whitney's gonna think she was for sure responsible for Trey's death. He'll stop at nothing to find her. His arms are long. Ver-rrry long."
I was sure where she was going with this, but I pretended I wasn't. "So … what, then?" I asked.
"So this," she said and grabbed me by the hair, jerking my mouth to hers. After the hard, desperate kiss, she pulled my head away to look straight into my eyes. It jerked me a little and I bumped into the ironing board, sending the iron crashing to the floor. Reluctantly, she turned loose of me so I could bend down and pick it up.
Taking my head in her hands once more, she put on her dead-serious face. At times like this, her overbite showed the most. The sun blasting in through the undraped window turned her complexion pasty, gray, like she needed a shower. This being Sunday, and with her having no plans to go out, she hadn't bothered to fix her hair, so it hung limply, messy around her face. None of this really bothered me too much, but on some level, I knew I didn't care for this look. Or more precisely, what it stood for at this very moment.
Her brow furrowing, she gripped my head tighter. "We're going to have to kill her," she said.
"Kill her? Kill Sharma?" Heat rushed to my face. We moved over to the couch and sat.
"What other choice do we have?"
I said, "Wait a minute, now. Trey was an accident. Even though you could say I killed him, I didn't mean to. It was still an accident! I just wanted to push him away from me. But you're talking about murdering Sharma. Cold-blooded murder."
"Damn right I am."
"Honey, we can't do that. We're not killers here. You know that."
A layer of cold steel spread itself over her voice and hardened right away. "What I know is that when Ortega and Winston Whitney put serious heat on her ass, she's gonna roll over on you in a fucking eyeblink."
"She'll stand u
p. Don't worry about her."
"I'm plenty fucking worried about her. Nobody's buying her story. Not Ortega, not Winston Whitney, not even Mambo the Third. You just now admitted it. She gives you up, nobody's gonna believe your story about it being an accident. You'd be looking at a minimum of manslaughter for Trey's death. What's that, twenty-five to life? We can't take the chance. I won't let you."
"But they can't prove something that didn't happen. Besides, you really think a jury would believe her? A stripper?"
Dorothy's agitation showed itself. Blood entered her face. "Get a grip, for Chrissakes. All she's gotta do is show up in court with a high-necked frilly blouse and understated makeup. She's gonna start off by saying you were extorting money out of her, money that she worked hard to earn."
"Bullshit! She's a fucking stripper! She gives lap dances and sucks dick every night!"
"Yeah, but in that courtroom, she's gonna be a hard-working young woman, forced to work an unpleasant job just to support herself. That's how she's gonna come off. Then, once she starts singing about how you had all this hostility toward Trey — who, by the way, is from the finest family in town — and about how he tried to protect her and you beat the shit out of him, it's gonna be all over. Throw in a tear or two and you're fucking toast."
I took her hand in mine, very gently. I didn't want to aggravate her more. My voice calmed.
"Look, honey, I'll be honest with you. I have killed people before. But in every single case, they had it coming. Usually self-defense. I'm not a stone-cold killer. And neither are you. Especially not you."
She took my hand and squeezed it harder than I would've expected. Her eyes were colder than I'd ever known them to be.
"You don't think this is self-defense? You don't think that whore'd rat you out? This is self-defense of the highest fucking order. We take her out, we save your ass. Simple as that."
