Bad Reputation: The Complete Collection

by Matt Hader

  He stood there and stared at the opened boxes of his father’s belongings. The skanky woman had scattered some of their contents about and the letter and registered mail envelope from Maggie Lopresta were now face up on the living room floor.

  He took a step over and lifted it into view. Enright reread every word once more and wondered if it was total bullshit. But he still needed to stop Maggie from printing any more information about his grandfather even if it wasn’t true.

  When he had first found the letter, Maggie’s name seemed familiar and he wondered if he had met her at church. Enright attended near-weekly services at a new nondenominational church located inside the husk of a closed Circuit City on Dempster Street in Skokie.

  Enright didn’t go to the services for the inspiring messages and warm-hearted camaraderie. He attended the church to scope out some of the lonely single women in his Dali-esque dreams. There were such easy pickings at his church, especially among the homelier women.

  Most times when he attended his chosen house of worship, he would park himself in a back corner of the room, tuck in his iPhone earbuds, crank some Milli Vanilli, and try to visually separate a weaker female from the rest of the herd. It was a very easy task to accomplish. All he had to do was look for a woman, a lonely soul, who didn’t interact with anyone else in the church. Enright’s heart had definitely grown darker and murkier over the years.

  Another thought flashed through his mind – that of maybe improving his quality in women by hiring a few of the “Bar Girls” to come home with him now that he’d have the bankroll to pay them.

  His exhausted mind promptly dismissed the thought of meeting Maggie Lopresta in the past because the envelope had obviously come from inside the box with his father’s belongings.

  Enright had already read Maggie’s latest article on his phone at the bar where he picked up the skanky woman the night before. In it she stated that she had tracked Enright’s father down because she believed he would help her in the quest to clear her own grandfather of any crimes he committed. Enright reasoned that her entire line of supposition was bullshit, and he chuckled at the visual of Maggie trying to communicate with his dementia-ridden dad.

  Besides the envelope from Maggie, some Wisconsin Dells-themed thimbles, and other bric-a-brac, there were two small, framed photos in the top box. Photos of the mother he never really knew.

  The drab color film processing and the clothes worn by the subjects in the snapshots indicated that they were taken in the late 1960s. That and he knew his mother had left Enright and his father in 1969 to find a life more worth living. She was a stylishly attractive woman and Enright always wondered how she wound up with a schmuck like his old man in the first place.

  Enright was partial to wallow and take comfort in the belief that he wasn’t responsible for his own life going down the shitter. He knew for damned sure that it was entirely the fault of his forebears: partially his grandmother and mother for abandoning their respective families once their spouses’ drinking became unbearable, but mainly his father, and mostly his grandfather, the one responsible for the bulk of his actual upbringing.

  The knowledge that he wasn’t truly responsible for his life’s choices took some of the pressure off of Enright and allowed him to screw people over every chance he could without any remorse. He figured that it wasn’t his fault that he was such an asshole.

  As it turned out, the flighty Enright women were the smartest of the bunch. Each of them had bolted once their spouse’s degenerations got underway. Enright’s grandmother and mother left their unhappy abodes around the same time and he didn’t remember all that much about either of them. His father and grandfather never spoke of them, and Enright grew to be just fine with that.

  As he shoved his dad’s belongings back into the boxes, Enright made a mental note to take the stuff down to his dank basement storage unit. There, it would cozy up to the few other boxes and things that belonged to his grandfather.

  Enright wasn’t saving the stuff from his family’s past out of sentimentality, no. He was an avid Pawn Stars viewer and he hoped that something in the boxes would be of value someday.

  “Shit,” he said aloud as the idea of meeting Vasily to discuss Maggie Lopresta crashed down on him.

  ***

  “Get steak with yaytsa, yes? It’s specialty,” said Vasily with his clipped Russian accent through a beautifully maintained insincere smile.

  Enright stood with his arms spread eagle as Vasily’s bodyguard -- a man with all the warmth of a black leather coat-wearing, rough-cut 275-pound hunk of granite -- searched him for weapons and wires. Enright was used to this treatment each time he met Vasily, even before Maggie’s articles began to be published.

  “Clyde, get my friend steak with egg. My treat,” said Vasily. He motioned with his coffee cup for Enright to take a seat next to him at the 10-seat diner counter.

  Clyde, the only other occupant of the building, and the frightened owner of the dive located across the street from the Kennedy Expressway, did as instructed. Vasily had taken over Clyde’s business as his private headquarters, but had paid him a handsome weekly stipend for the honor.

  Vasily was a pleasant-looking, gray-haired man who seemed as if he could easily fit into any number of comfortable suburban communities around the Chicago-area. The only thing that betrayed him was the edgy and dangerous glint in his eyes. He didn’t have the body mass for extended close-up combat; his ‘muscle’ came in his ability to make millions and millions of dollars through various schemes for him and his Eastern European soldiers.

  The hunk of granite finished searching Enright, and the private detective took his seat. Vasily, with just the hint of a grin, sat there and studied Enright for a moment.

  “The man from Tulsa was quite generous,” said Vasily. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a small stack of $100 bills. “That was wonderful start for us,” he said as he slid the cash over the pitted diner counter toward Enright.

  Enright didn’t pick up the money just yet. He was doing his best to cover for his nervousness. He just sat there and waited for the Maggie Lopresta shoe to drop.

  Vasily knew Enright was waiting for him to talk first, so he obliged. “Okay, so lady now writes that her grandfather was politsiya with your grandfather. She digs and digs into this family secret. I find all so, how you say, awesome. Where I come from all sorts of people work for two masters. Gets complicated, yes? The psychology of someone who do such work? Fascinating. Just fascinating.”

  “My grandfather was a prick, that’s all I know,” said Enright. “It wasn’t fascinating at all being around him. Look, this lady and her shitty column are not a problem. I can keep any heat off of me-”

  “How’s search for baby face robber person going? You make progress, no?” said Vasily, his eyes locked tightly on Enright. “See, we’re team. I give you opportunity to make handsome living with my girls, you give me piece of what you find with baby face man, yes? It’s only fair.”

  Enright was trapped. Did Vasily not care about Maggie Lopresta? He obviously wanted to get a piece of the “Baby Face Robber” money. There was no doubt now. But how did he know that Enright was even investigating the robber?

  The hunk of granite took a step in Enright’s direction. “Sure. That’s fair,” Enright lied. “I’m not that far along in locating him, but I was going to let you in on it once it solidified.”

  “How generous of you, Enright. Thank you,” said Vasily. “And don’t worry about articles. Articles are not problem.”

  Enright caught Vasily’s eyes darting quickly to the leather coat-wearing slab of granite and then back to him. A wave of stomach acid sloshed in his gut.

  Clyde delivered Enright a greasy plate of steak and eggs. Vasily nodded for Enright to dig in, “Yehst! Enjoy. Eat.”

  ***

  The
only customer, an old man, sat at the lunch counter of the dingy diner on Lee Street in Des Plaines. He shoved his empty breakfast plate forward, tossed money on the counter and left the building.

  Enright figured that as long as he was nearby meeting with Vasily, he’d make a stop here before he continued with his day. The museum wouldn’t even open for another two hours. He sat in his car, counted to ten, got out and walked into the business just as the fifty-year old male owner, a man with all the muscle tone of a wire coat hanger, cleared the exiting customer’s plate.

  “Hey, how you doing? Coffee?” asked the owner.

  “That’ll work just fine,” said Enright, as he leaned over the counter and popped the owner once in the nose with a quick right jab.

  The owner dropped the plate and bent over as blood gushed from his nose. He tried to catch his breath, “I don’t have any money, man. My wife already took the deposit to the bank.” He righted himself and wiped blood from his nose with the back of his hand as Enright stepped around the counter.

  “Don’t need your money. Well, maybe indirectly, I do,” said Enright. He grabbed the owner by the shirt collar, roughly tugged him into the back room, and out of view. “I need to speak with you about the asshole in the baby face mask who was here a while back.”

  A few moments later, Enright emerged from the diner. He left the unconscious owner in the back room, and no further along in his “Baby Face Robber” investigation. The owner didn’t know anything more than what he had told the police, Enright was sure of it. No one could lie under the physically demanding circumstances he had placed the owner under. No one.

  As he got into his car, he caught sight of a dark-haired, pretty, olive-skinned woman loitering across the street outside of a beauty salon. She acted as inconspicuously as she could, but was doing a horrible job of it. He’d seen her before when he investigated the “Baby Face Robber” in the town of Balmoral three days ago.

  She was in her late-thirties, and had the same skin-tone as Tyler Dimos, the seventeen-year old kid who had initially hired Enright to find the “Baby Face Robber.” Tyler Dimos employed Enright shortly after the robber struck his father’s restaurant in Arlington Heights.

  He’d seen the pretty woman twice within a few days’ time and knew that it was no coincidence. Enright never believed coincidences. Although she was very easy on the eye, he’d deal with the pretty, olive-skinned woman at another time. He needed to be on his way to the Lincoln Park area and the Chicago History Museum to retrieve a copy of the file he saw at Maggie Lopresta’s home.

  As he drove away, Enright spotted the leather coat-wearing hunk of granite following him in a dark colored BMW.

  “Son of a bitch…”

  ***

  On the ride to downtown Chicago from Des Plaines, Enright was able to slyly exit and reenter the Kennedy Expressway three times so he could elude Vasily’s man. Later, as he drove north on the surface streets of the Loop, he could no longer see the BMW in his rear view mirror. Enright’s prowess behind the wheel had paid off.

  He parked his car in the lot of a large drug store on North Avenue and made his way on foot around the block to the Chicago Historical Museum. He strolled past the massive curving blocks of glass on the exterior of the building, stepped through the front doors, and immediately located the archival library and reading room. There he approached the woman at the information desk.

  “Hey, how are you doing today?” Enright asked, his charm dial turned all the way to eleven.

  The woman never even looked up from her computer and said, “What can I help you with, sir?”

  “I understand that I can view documents relating to a former Chicago police officer named Sean Enright here. I was wondering how I go about doing that.”

  “Sean Enright,” she said as she tapped at the keys on her computer keyboard. Her eyes froze for just a flash, and a bit of fright displayed on her face. It was not lost on Enright.

  “Everything okay?” he asked.

  “Please have a seat and I’ll retrieve the documents, sir,” she said. She got up and opened a door behind her counter and quietly spoke to someone inside.

  A moment after Enright took a seat in a line of chairs along the hallway wall, a tall and stern-looking woman burst out of the door behind the counter and marched directly toward him. She held a thin file folder tightly in her hand. “What is your name? I need your name. Now,” said the stern woman. “Mary, call the police,” she continued as she turned toward the other woman.

  “Whoa. Settle down, lady. What’s going on? I’m not here for any trouble,” said Enright, as he stood with his palms held out.

  Mary, the woman behind the counter, picked up the phone but didn’t dial when she saw Enright’s sincere reaction. “Bev, I think you may be overreacting,” said Mary.

  Enright turned to Mary and said, “Mary, please don’t call the police. I’m just here doing some genealogy work.” Enright’s eyes slid toward the stern woman and he continued, “Bev. Bev, my name is Jack Enright. I’m a former police officer and I’m looking into completing a survey on my grandfather, Sean. He was a Chicago police officer back in the 40s. Here.” He carefully took his wallet from his pocket and displayed his driver’s license.

  The moment she saw that he was legitimate, she relaxed and shook her head at Mary. Mary lowered the phone and sat down.

  “I’m sorry. We had a woman here a few weeks back. She said her name was Enright and she wanted to look at the same file. She took the file to the reading room but never returned it,” said the stern woman. “Is she someone you know? Because if she is, we need our property back post haste.” She opened the file in her hand and showed Enright a surveillance photo of Maggie Lopresta standing at the library counter. “This woman.”

  Enright pretended to study the photo. “No. Never seen her before,” he lied.

  “It was our only copy of the file,” said the stern woman. “We’re heartbroken. Most of these documents are one-of-a-kind and quite rare.”

  Enright’s own heart sank. He thought, ‘Shit, I need to break into Maggie’s house again.’ He also surrendered to the reality that he would finally have to confront Maggie Lopresta sooner rather than later over this whole fiasco. He wanted as much information as he could get a hold of before he started to turn the screws on her, though. The surest way of knowing that someone was lying was to be armed with as much information as you could find. That was interrogation 101. He was going to have to go after her with a different, albeit for Maggie Lopresta, less enjoyable approach.

  Enright temporarily bucked up his acting chops and said, “You’ve got to be kidding me! That’s horrible!” He also knew that by their lack of recognition of Maggie, the two museum ladies had not been reading her newspaper articles. The paper was distributed in the far northwest area of the city and the closer ring of northwest suburbs. The staff at the downtown museum obviously didn’t operate in the paper’s distribution area or have any interest, yet, in reading her work online.

  A minute after politely bowing out of the museum, Enright sprinted back to his parked vehicle and sped back to Ozanam Avenue in Niles.

  ***

  “You must be Mike Enright’s absent son. The ex-cop,” said Maggie Lopresta, as she stepped into the living room of her tiny Cape Cod home. She leveled a .38 revolver at Jack Enright’s chest. He stood upright and stepped back from the antique sideboard - the thick file in his hand.

  Despite her Italian last name, Maggie sported flaming red hair and crystal blue eyes over her freckled high cheekbones. She would easily fit in as a Dublin, Ireland native. Her late mother Katherine McManus had just a little something to do with that.

  “You going to put that away?”

  “Look, I don’t like this any more than you do, but at least your relative was on the right side of history,” she said.

&nb
sp; “Your columns are moving more towards someone getting hurt, lady,” said Enright.

  “That’s why you’ve broken into my house, to make me stop. I have to assume that I’ll be the one getting hurt.”

  When Enright sidestepped toward the front door, Lopresta extended the gun and aimed at his face.

  “I had to air my dirty laundry to make the mortgage payment. There was no choice in the matter.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” said Enright, with blatant sarcasm.

  “Your family has been shown in a good light. Sean Enright was a trailblazer. A hero, really. Not sure why it’s so important to you that I stop.”

  She took a seat and motioned with the gun for Enright to put the file back and to do the same.

  “Right, let’s make this a social visit,” said Enright.

  “I have the six shots,” said Maggie, as she aimed the pistol with more purpose. “And maybe I’m curious. It’s part of the job.”

  Enright tossed the file into the open drawer and took a seat near the window.

  “Can I be up front with you, Mr. Enright?”

  He laughed.

  “You’re kind of a prick,” Maggie said. “You should’ve called me. We could’ve worked this all out without you tearing up my house. The cloak and dagger shit is so destructive.”

  “I get that a lot,” he said with a chuckle. “So you didn’t call the cops about me breaking in before? I know that the ladies at the museum would love to meet you.”

  Maggie shrugged.

  Enright lost his grin and said, “My gramps was running with your gramps. That I get. But not this other hero bullshit you’re pedaling. I need you to stop. Today.”

  She considered his threat for a moment and then continued, “If your relative was something, or someone you didn’t even understand, wouldn’t that bother you?”