by JB Lynn
“I have to get it off!” I whimpered through chattering teeth, raising my face into the stream of water. I wasn’t sure if I was shivering because I was cold or upset.
“I know, Sweetheart. I know.”
“This is all your fault!”
I felt every muscle in his body tighten, but he didn’t argue. “How do you figure that?”
“Goddamn Life Lesson Two. Dead is dead. I listened for his heartbeat. That’s how I got his blood on me.”
“Good girl. Nice to know you were paying attention.” Reaching around me, he snatched up my bottle of shampoo and squirted some on top of my head.
“Hey!” I spluttered as soap got in my eye. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
“Washing your hair.”
You know all those movies where a man is washing a woman’s hair and it looks like one of the sexiest things ever? They’re all a lie. Trust me, there is nothing remotely sexy about having a man standing behind you, rubbing your scalp like he’s scrubbing a stain in the kitchen sink.
The water warmed as we stood there, soaking into our clothes. Suds flowed down into my eyes. It stung, but I didn’t cry. I couldn’t.
“You’re going to blind me,” I muttered. “Just let me do it myself.”
Squeezing my eyes tightly shut, I raised my hands to my hair and began methodically rinsing the lather away. I was barely aware of Patrick stepping out of the shower and leaving the bathroom.
The only thing I could hear over the roar of the pounding water was God singing. In Italian.
I wondered whether it would be difficult to drown a lizard.
Chapter Twenty-Two
“YOU LACK EMPATHY.”
I glared at Harry while I counted to ten to keep from telling him that he lacked hair, a personality, and the basics of dental hygiene.
He was unaware that I was giving him a look that could kill. He was too busy studying his copy of the printed-out report he’d given me.
I was having a crappy day, even by my standards, which, let’s face it, aren’t set all that high. First I’d killed Alfonso Cifelli and gotten his blood smeared all over me, then the damn lizard harangued me mercilessly and Patrick practically gave me a heart attack. Now, to make my misery complete, I’d been called into my boss’s office for my quarterly review. It wasn’t even lunchtime yet.
“Yes, you definitely lack empathy.” Harry clucked like a disapproving schoolmarm. “There will be no way I’m going to be able to approve you for a raise on your hire anniversary if you don’t improve those empathy scores.”
I really wished Patrick hadn’t taken the gun I’d used to kill Alfonso. It would have come in handy right about now. I knew damn well that Life Lesson One was: Don’t get caught, but eradicating Harry might be worth it.
“Do you understand what I’m telling you?”
“But my other numbers are off the charts,” I argued. “My call volume. My accuracy. My problem-solving.”
Harry shook his head sadly. “But we can’t tolerate employees of Insuring the Future being heartless.”
“I’m not heartless!” Sure I hadn’t shed a tear for Theresa or Katie, and I hadn’t felt much of anything when I’d pulled the trigger and ended Cifelli, but that didn’t mean I was a cold-hearted bitch. Did it?
“All you have to do is stick with the script, and your scores will go up.” Standing, Harry walked around from behind his desk to sit in the chair beside me. “And if you could refrain from calling people stupid . . .”
“People are stupid. If you’re talking about that call last week with the guy who left his keys in the ignition of his car while he ran into the sporting goods store to buy a new nine iron . . . he is stupid.”
“But it’s not our place to tell the customers that.”
“His kid was strapped into the carseat in the back seat! He left him and the key in the car so he could get a new golf club, and then he has the nerve to complain that the jackass who stole his car . . . and his kid, let’s not forget the kid was in there too . . . the jackass smashed the front fender when the police chased him down.”
“Our job is to take the claim. It’s not our place to judge.”
“If you ask me, somebody should have taken the nine iron to the guy’s skull!”
“That’s not my concern. All I’m worried about is the fact that you called him stupid. According to the transcript of that call, Mr. Balch said, ‘Isn’t that awful?’ And you replied, ‘Awful? No. Stupid? Yes.’ You can’t go around saying that kind of stuff to customers. If you do, I’ll have no choice but to let you go.”
Harry let what he perceived to be a threat hang in the air. Personally, I thought getting let go from this hellhole would be a blessing.
Leaning in close, Harry laid a hand on my knee. I eyed the stapler on his desk. I was pretty sure I could use it to both shatter his creeping fingers and bash in his head.
“I know you’ve been through a lot, Maggie.” Sitting this close, his pepperoni breath threatened to trigger my gag reflex. “That’s why I’m willing to overlook this.”
He squeezed my knee.
I envisioned grabbing the stapler and swinging it through the air. I closed my eyes as I imagined the satisfying thunk it would make as it bounced off my boss’s skull. It made me smile.
“I’m glad you appreciate that I’m looking out for you.”
Jolted out of my pleasant daydream, my eyes snapped open.
“Just try to remember when someone tells you that something has happened that was upsetting to them, you’re supposed to say, ‘I’m so sorry to hear that.’ Let me hear you say it.”
I stared at him.
“Go ahead. Say it.”
“I’m so sorry to hear that.” My delivery was flatter than a pancake.
“Okay. Okay. Needs a little work, but you’ve got the general idea. Let’s practice a couple of scenarios. I’ll be the customer.”
“Do we have to?” I was thinking another root canal would be preferable to role-playing with Harry.
“You’re my responsibility, Maggie. I want you to be the best that you can be.”
I’d have been willing to bet he’d learned this lousy pep talk at one of his manager-training meetings.
“Oh,” he said in a falsetto that would have given Mickey Mouse a run for his money. “I’m so upset. My car was rear ended.”
“Really?”
“No! You’re not supposed to say really. You’re supposed to say . . .” He waited for me to fill in the blank.
Desperate to get away from him, I did my best to sound sympathetic. “I’m so sorry to hear that.”
“Better. Much better! Let’s try another.” He looked at me expectantly, like he was waiting for me to indicate that I was into this stupid game we were playing.
“Okay.”
“I had a little too much to drink, and I crashed my car into my house.”
This time I didn’t miss a beat. “I’m so sorry to hear that.”
The vermin actually clapped his hands. “Now, for good measure, you could always add, Are you ok? Let’s try one more.”
“If you insist.” It wasn’t like I had any choice in the matter. If it was up to me, he’d be lying on the floor of this office with his mouth stapled shut.
“I ran a red light and mowed down an old lady trying to cross the street.”
I swallowed convulsively. Sadly, I’d had a call just like that a couple of weeks earlier. I knew for certain I’d offered no empathy to that driver. This one was the ultimate test. Forcing myself to smile, I said, “I’m so sorry to hear that. Are you okay?”
“Excellent! Now just remember that when you’re back on the phones.” He patted my knee.
I stood and walked out before I made a grab for the stapler.
—#—
At lunch Armani offered to help me perfect my bullshitting skills. “Pretend it’s a game,” she encouraged, pushing a peanut butter and jelly sandwich across the table toward me. “Imagine you’re an actress, givi
ng the performance of your life.”
I looked from her to the sandwich, unsure of which made less sense.
“Try it,” she urged.
I picked up the sandwich.
“Not that! Try the line.”
“Why?”
“Why? Cuz I’m not going to let you get your Chiquita-lite ass fired. I’d miss your swollen face.”
“Sullen.”
“What?”
“Not swollen. You’d miss my sullen face.”
“Damn right I would!”
“Is that why you brought me the sandwich, to sweeten my disposition?”
“Naah . . . that there is a bribe.”
“A bribe for what?” I asked even though I knew I wasn’t going to like the answer. I tried not to think about what it meant that my friend thought I could be bribed with a sandwich.
“I need you to go shopping with me.”
“For what?” The last time we’d done the retail thing she’d taken me to a sex shop where she insisted on . . . sampling everything, much to the amusement of the clerk and my humiliation.
“Bibs and clothes. Baby shit.”
“You’re pregnant?” I gasped.
Armani threw back her head and laughed. “I’m as likely to get pregnant as you are to get laid any time soon.”
I BARELY MADE IT through the work day, and all I really wanted to do once I was done was to go home and sleep. Instead I drove to the hospital. While there under the pretense of visiting my beloved niece Katie, I would talk to the mob boss Tony/Anthony Delveccio. I couldn’t wait to tell him I’d done the dirty deed and he had no reason to worry about his ne’er-do-well son-in-law ever again, and every reason to hand over a hundred grand.
Of course, my life being the clusterfuck that it is, things didn’t exactly turn out that way.
Before I even passed through the doors of the hospital, I heard a familiar voice calling my name.
“Maggie, oh, Maggie, Darling!”
Hoping that this was just another of my ill-timed hallucinations, I turned around slowly.
Nope, not a hallucination, just a nightmare come true. Aunt Loretta came tottering toward me on her five-inch stilettos.
“I’m so glad you’re here!”
That made one of us.
“A terrible thing happened, just terrible.” As she grew closer, I could see that her mascara had run down her face. She’d been crying.
Something had happened to Katie.
Something terrible.
The world around me tilted and swirled. Overcome by sudden vertigo, it was a struggle to remain standing.
Katie.
A shadow fell over everything, and I was suddenly cold.
Not Katie.
My sisters were gone and now my niece.
I’d never in my life fainted, but I was pretty sure I was going to. Maybe if I was lucky I’d hit my head as I fell and would die too.
“It’s poor Templeton!”
I swayed unsteadily as I tried to make sense of what she was saying.
“So much blood. So very much blood!”
She charged into me, almost knocking us both to the ground. “I’m so glad you’re here, Maggie,” she gasped on a hiccupped sob.
“What?” I had no idea what she was trying to tell me. I’d thought she’d meant something had happened to Katie, but now I wasn’t so sure.
“Templeton’s hurt!” Loretta wailed.
“What happened?” Now that I knew for sure that Katie was okay, well, as okay as someone in a persistent vegetative state can be, I had to sort out why Aunt Loretta was so upset. And she was upset. This wasn’t her being overly dramatic for attention. Her whole body was shaking. Hugging her tightly, I led her to a bench beside the hospital doors. “Take your time, Aunt Loretta. Just tell me what happened.”
“We were . . . getting frisky,” she sniffled. “And I was on top and—”
Ewww. The image scarred me more than that of Alfonso Cifelli keeling over in front of me. I hurriedly interrupted her before she could give me any more details about her lovers’ tryst. “You said something about blood?”
“The portrait above my bed, the one in that heavy oak frame, you know the one.”
I nodded. I’d never known anyone else who kept an oil painting of themselves hanging in their bedroom.
“It fell and broke Templeton’s nose!” She cried. “So much blood!”
I almost started to laugh hysterically. Here I’d been thinking Katie was dead, and all that had happened was the rat had gotten his snout dented. I didn’t think Aunt Loretta would take kindly to my being amused by her boyfriend’s fate, so I fell back on my professional training.
“I’m so sorry to hear that. Are you okay?” There was no way my aunt could say I wasn’t empathetic.
Chapter Twenty-Three
I SAT WITH AUNT Loretta for almost thirty minutes. That was when my ration of sympathy pretty much ran out. Then we went inside and found Templeton waiting to leave. He’d been patched up and had his discharge papers signed. Even I felt a twinge of sympathy for him, when I saw the size of the bandage they’d used on him.
“That must hurt.” Sometimes my brilliant observations amaze even me.
“My pride’s the thing that took a beating.” He sounded as though he had the world’s worst head cold.
“He hadn’t finished getting dressed when the paramedics arrived,” Loretta confided. “All he was wearing were his hot pink LOVE MACHINE boxer shorts.”
“Too much information, Aunt Loretta. It does answer the age old boxers-or-briefs question, though.”
Templeton chuckled. At least I think that’s what the noise—like a pig snuffling out wild truffles—was supposed to be.
It’s hard not to like someone who deals with a painful and embarrassing situation with humor. I found myself wondering if my instant dislike of the man had been misguided. Maybe he wasn’t all that bad.
Finally, once the two love birds were safely on their way home, I went looking for Delveccio. He wasn’t in his grandson’s room, or the waiting area, so I took a chance he was in the cafeteria and headed that way. Okay, okay, I was hedging my bet. Even if he wasn’t there, I’d probably find some chocolate pudding. A treat I richly deserved after the day I’d had.
Delveccio was there. Sitting at a table in the back, studying what appeared to be the sports section of the newspaper. I tried to remember whether he’d been charged with illegal gambling as I headed toward him.
“Mind if I join you?”
He glanced up and blinked, as though he was surprised to see me. “It’s a free country.”
I slid into the seat opposite him, noticing for once he wasn’t wearing his ubiquitous pinky ring. “How’s your grandson?”
“No change.” He folded up the paper and placed it on the table between us.
“Well, at least you’ll be relieved to know that you won’t have to worry about any . . . outside interference with his recovery.” I’d never realized how much work it was for criminals to talk in euphemisms.
“I know.”
“You do?” That caught me off guard.
“Of course. He told me.”
“Of course.” Patrick must have told him. “So when do I get paid?”
“You?” He squinted at me disbelievingly.
“Who else?”
“Are you trying to tell me that you took care of that particular problem?”
I really didn’t understand why everyone seemed to be talking in riddles. “Yes. I fulfilled my end of the contract. When do I get paid?”
Leaning back in his chair, he considered me thoughtfully.
I gulped. It probably wasn’t the best of ideas to shake down the head of a crime syndicate for money, but I was desperate. I needed that cash for Katie.
“Where’d you do it?”
“Washington Park.”
“How?”
I glanced around nervously to make sure no one was within earshot. Leaning as close as I could
, I whispered. “I shot him. Twice.”
“The body hasn’t been found.”
“That’s because I pushed him off a cliff.”
“Why’d you do something like that?”
“For the sake of my alibi.”
“Somebody’s lying to me. I don’t like to be lied to. It makes me angry. You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry.”
For a split second I imagined the mob boss morphing into the Incredible Hulk. It was not an attractive picture. “I’m not lying to you, Mr. Delveccio.”
“Maybe, maybe not.”
“Are you trying to welch on our deal?” I asked. I couldn’t believe this. I’d killed a man, and I wasn’t even going to get paid for my trouble? This was officially the crappiest day ever.
“Keep your voice down.”
I fought for control. I couldn’t afford to let my emotions get the best of me. Feelings led to screw-ups. I imagined my internal submarine hatches slamming shut, closing off my anger, my desperation. “Why are you doing this to me?”
“I’m a businessman, Miss Lee.”
“Then why won’t you honor our deal?”
“Because someone else has already claimed credit for the job.”
Patrick. It had to be. “Son-of-a-bitch! I’ll kill him!”
Delveccio tilted his head to the side. “You do that and you’ll collect the fee for the first job.”
“You mean that?”
“It’s a deal.” He extended his hand.
I shook it, but I wasn’t happy about it. I’d made a deal with this particular devil before, and he’d screwed me. Besides, I wasn’t so sure I could kill Patrick Mulligan even if he had stolen my money. Alfonso Cifelli was a monster. Killing him had been a service to society, but for the most part the redhead seemed to be a pretty decent guy.
“But either way,” Delveccio said, “you’re still on the hook for our mutual friend’s cut.”
I stared at him, trying to make sense of what he was saying. Our only mutual acquaintance was Patrick. If he was getting paid for killing Alfonso, why the hell would he need a cut?
“You can’t expect me to cover your expenses,” he said. “It would be bad business.”
“What expenses? What cut?”
