He blinked at the final two words.
“Just testing to see if you were listening.”
“What did he find out?”
“Nothing less than a bombshell.”
We climbed elbow to elbow, taking the stairs like an afternoon stroll in the park while I wove a story of greed and corruption gleaned from the accounts of Digby Tate, Nick Testa, the clerk at the Recorder of Deeds, Sam Grado, past newspaper accounts, and other snippets picked up from sources and snitches. The pieces of how the city and the mob worked hand-in-hand to make the O’Hare deal come together fit like a jigsaw puzzle. Starr had already figured out most of it but was unaware of some of the key players. Labor unions, investors, the governor, certain state assemblymen, bankers, the previous mayor, the current mayor, and handpicked civil servants all working in concert to pull off the biggest heist ever, where every interested party lined their pockets, but taxpayers were left holding the bag.
“It’s a bomb ready to explode. Everybody from the top down has a stake in keeping it under wraps. If Byrnes’s dossier ever goes public, powerbrokers can look forward to exchanging silk suits for prison-issued stripes.”
“Byrnes’s dossier?” he asked innocently, as if the whole town hadn’t been buzzing about it.
“The dossier Kirk infiltrated the Big Dive for. The dossier Arezzo wouldn’t mind committing murder for. The dossier the killer probably killed for. The dossier Pennyroyal wants to exchange a captaincy for. The dossier an unknown party, most probably the mayor, paid Richard C. Starr, Esquire, a retainer for.”
The briefest smile touched his lips before skirting once more behind the P.I. mask of impenetrability. His eyes calmly glanced upstairs and just as calmly glanced downstairs. With composure, he relieved me of my carryout and set both bags on the landing.
“Oh. Oh, no,” I said just before he gathered me up like his imaginary hothouse tomato, squeezed me for ripeness, took a juicy taste, and descended for a satisfying bite. Poetry seeped into my bones in non-rhyming verse. Heat filled my cheeks. It wasn’t like that tepid kiss downstairs. This one was for real.
“If there is a secret dossier,” he said before applying another kiss, “and I’m not saying there is ...” The world went away. I became putty in his hands. He could do with me as he wished. Right here. Right now. Even if it meant being arrested for public indecency. He tugged his lips away. “... it won’t implicate this mayor.”
“Where politics are concerned, there’s always more than enough dirt to go around.” Despite strongly held beliefs that a woman must exert self-control when faced with sexual perversity in the big city, I wriggled my fingers along his lapels and folded my arms around the nape of his neck. We smooched until our moans interlaced like a song. Coming up for air, I said, “In that file cabinet of yours, I didn’t see a folder under the letter B.”
“For Bogart? Or Byrnes?” He smothered my lips with his. An el train passed overhead. The staircase swayed and vibrated. Our bodies jiggled in harmony. He whimpered. I sighed. Pinwheels and sparklers ignited. His fedora flipped end over end down the staircase.
“Take your pick,” I said, breathless.
He ran his tongue along my throat and buried his face between my breasts, taking advantage of my weak knees and dire position. I was dizzy with passion. He was lost in lust. But he still had the presence of mind to say, “You’ll never find a file folder for either man.”
A car horn honked. We awoke to the city spinning around us. “Guess I’ll just have to break into your apartment.”
“I’ll give you the key, but you won’t find anything there, either.”
I tried to tame my hair after his hands had hopelessly snarled it. “You’re very careful, aren’t you?” Twilight settled around us, hiding the worst of our transgressions.
“Only if I want to stay alive.” He let go and whipped me into an upright position. After all those torrid kisses, I had to grip the handhold to steady myself. He skipped downstairs, retrieved his fedora, zipped back, and swept up the takeout bags with the grace of Fred Astaire tripping the light fantastic.
We ascended to the intermediate platform, where two sets of stairs split off toward opposite sides of the train tracks. He removed his suit jacket, draped it across the lower steps of one of the staircases, twirled me around, and set me upon the makeshift bench. Sinking beside me, he unpacked the bags.
“Are we dining al fresco this evening?”
Wordlessly he handed me a stack of paper napkins.
“If I’d known we were going to eat by candlelight, would’ve changed into basic black.” I shucked off my shoes and nestled against the stair railing. Overhead, a northbound train crawled along. The entire structure strained under its weight. While the wheels squealed at high pitch, we divvied up the food. From the opposite direction, a southbound train pulled into the platform. Brakes ground to a halt and doors flapped open. Footsteps pounded the boards. Seconds later, passengers descended our stairway and squeezed past.
“Dickheads!” one of them barked.
“Only one of us, lady.”
She flung a disdainful glare back at Starr and stumbled across the landing.
We ate in silence. Night descended like a woolen blanket. The sun was setting in a splash of crimson and purple.
“Kirk’s on the lam,” I said to Starr. “No one’s seen since the gondola wars, not his wife, his bookie, or the hatcheck girl at the Chez Paree.”
“If you were a marked man,” Starr said, “you’d be incommunicado, too.”
“Then what’s the point of staking out the el? He’s not about to walk into a trap just for the hell of it.”
“Three reasons. He’s corrupt, he’s greedy, and he doesn’t want to take the fall for something he didn’t do.”
“If he didn’t kill Byrnes, who did?” I munched a French fry. He took a wolf-sized bite of his hamburger. “Don’t hold back on me now, Starr.”
He reached for one of my fries. “If I knew, sure as hell wouldn’t be here.”
“Where would you be?”
“Gee. Can’t imagine.” From the droll look on his face, he was thinking about last night. I was, too.
“I hear you have a thing going with Kirk’s secretary.”
Starr stopped chewing mid-chomp. “Who told you that?”
“She tipped you off, didn’t she?”
“And not Moore’s secretary?”
“Shirley Wickham wouldn’t tell a fireman where to connect his hose if her house was burning down.”
Night descended. The city lit up. The glow from hundreds of office windows flickered like candle flames.
High-heel shoes click-click-clicked up the lower staircase. A picture hat appeared before the form and figure of Monica Seagraves arrived like a goddess rising from the sea. “Whaddaya know. Iris Grenadine and Richard Starr.” She sniffed out the burgers and helped herself. “Why don’t we wait together and see what develops, shall we.”
“Pennyroyal tipped her off,” I said to Starr over her head.
“Did not,” she said.
“Because she’s in bed with him, and I don’t mean figuratively.”
She snidely rocked her head back and forth while moving her mouth in mimicry.
“Find your kitty cat?” I asked.
She shook her head in the negative. “And I’m really broken up about it, too.”
We became alert to an off-key crooner hammering up the stairway. Clad in a crumpled suit, polka dot tie, and food-stained shirt, Tom Stacy announced his arrival in a hullabaloo of flamboyance.
“What is this ... Union Station?”
“And a hardy hello to you too, Grenadine.” When his eyes swiveled over to Monica Seagraves, they clicked on like light bulbs. “See you found the place.”
“The idea of a stakeout, Stacy,” I said, “is to blend in with the background.”
“Wow, never heard that before.” He sniffed out the fast food bags and helped himself to the last remaining burger.
St
arr leaned back, braced his elbows on an upper step, and crossed his legs at the ankles. “Be my guest.”
“Don’t mind if I do.” Stacy climbed between us and took a seat above ours. His smile was all teeth and lips but no eyes. Only habitual liars wore perpetual grins and vague upturned eyes. “Anybody show up yet?”
“If they had,” Starr said, “wouldn’t have found us waiting around for you.”
“Richard Starr, right?” He leaned forward and shook hands. “Heard the mayor hired you to cover his ass.”
As looks went, Tom Stacy was a traffic stopper, but his personality needed shellacking. He was known as a man of few words and fewer niceties. He lived in high digs, partied in low places, and stayed up until the wee hours, usually with a blonde babe in tow. No one knew how he got his leads.
Two sets of heavy feet tramped upstairs from street level. Twin fedoras rose like umbrellas from the lower staircase. The brims were attached to two wise guys: the first swarthy and striking and the second pale as an albino. They wore double-breasted suits, shiny gabardine shirts, silk handkerchiefs, and Italian wingtip shoes. I didn’t have to search hard to make out handguns wedged underneath their suit coats. They squeezed past us and climbed purposefully, their heels pounding the stairs in sync.
Starr looked at me. I looked back at him. And together we bolted upstairs.
Chapter 33
STACY CHASED AFTER us in a rush of heavy shoes and heavier breathing, Monica taking up the rear. “What’s going on?”
Starr called back. “Try to stay out of the way.”
Stacy saluted. “Will do.”
We rushed toward the turnstile. Thinking the coast was clear, the station attendant had just raised his eyes to lookout level. When he saw us, he ducked under the counter and hit the floor. We dribbled coins through the pay window and stampeded onto the platform.
Aligned like Doric columns with fists folded over crotches and feet spaced a yard apart, the wise guys inspected us with casual interest. A train chuffed into view. Starr and I meandered down the line as if searching for the perfect boarding spot. Stacy found a discarded Post-News and unfolded the broadsheet just below eyelevel. Monica made the blunder of openly appraising the wise guys.
The albino slithered his eyes sideways. “Got a problem?”
“Your suits,” she said. “Italian stitched?”
“What’s it to you?”
Stacy tore his eyes away from the cartoon section. “The lady was just admiring the weave.”
The wise guy reached under his coat. “Take a hike, pal.”
“Anything you say.” Stacy saluted and moved along.
The wise guys took a second gander at me, this time with keen interest, eyes sunshiny and mouths drooling. Starr moved in as my knight in shining armor and wrapped me up like a birthday present. When I eked out an audible protest, he muzzled me with a forceful lip lock. I clawed to get loose. He twisted my body like a licorice stick and awarded himself with an unobstructed view of the wise guys. The buttons on his waistcoat dug into my breastbone. He blinked down the track, his eyes darkening with intrigue. I whined maledictions. He dragged me along, his clutch unbreakable. We capered across the platform, Starr charging forward on worn soles and me treading backwards on high heels. The small of my back met up with a steel pillar.
The el train rumbled into the station. The platform shuddered and pitched. A wind tunnel upended my hair. The suction between us ruptured. We came up for air. Starr was full of himself. He winked, scooped up his fedora, and dusted it off while I unhitched a spasm in my neck. Making believe we hadn’t taken a side trip to Mars, we split up. The doors of the el train clattered open. Passengers disembarked. Just before the doors clapped shut, a rotund silhouette emerged from the rear-most car. The dark shadow plodded methodically toward the exit. The train pulled out of the station, picking up speed. Its interior lights pulsated, switching the fat man on and off like an old-time movie reel.
As the el train pulled out of view, Johnny Kirk met up with the wise guys. They exchanged a few words. The words became heated. He spit out his Havana. Revolvers appeared. A volley of bullets punctured fiery holes into the night. The wise guys took cover. Monica screamed and scampered downstairs, hands slapped over ears. A gunshot ricocheted off steel. Kirk held his ground. Spent cartridges trickled onto the platform. Explosive gunfire rocked the night. When the smoke cleared, Kirk hobbled downstairs.
The albino whipped out a Colt .45 and took aim at the fat man’s back. I two-fisted the strap of my shoulder bag and let it fly. The pocketbook whacked him in the shoulder. The pistol sprang from his grasp, rebounded off the platform, and tumbled onto the tracks. Torn between retrieving the lost Colt or escaping further abuse, the wise guy cut and ran. Starr took off after him, rappelling down the staircase. Stacy chased after everyone else, yodeling like Tarzan.
The swarthy wise guy lobbed a toothy grin in my direction before contemplating the el tracks. Lodged against the third rail, the Colt conducted electricity. Deciding to go for it, he used his hands as springboards and jumped down. He held onto his hat, prissily stepping over ironwork. A train bore down on the southbound track. The conductor blasted warning whistles. The wise guy leapt out of the way, tripped, dove for safety, and landed between the rails of the empty northbound tracks.
The train streaked by, wheels hammering out a monotonous beat.
The wise guy sat up and redirected a probing eye at the revolver. He extended a timid arm. Nightlight glinted off the gun grip, just out of reach of his buffed fingernails. Another train rounded the bend, this one riding the northbound tracks. He made a second attempt, his fingertips straining. Seconds separated him from immortality. He played chicken and hiked himself to a sitting position, his joints limber and his muscles primed for flight. Exhilaration etched his face. On a count of three, he scrambled to his feet and hurtled onto the platform, arriving with the gun in tow. Gleeful with success, he checked out the cylinder, took pleasure in the solid heft, and tucked it into his waistband. Undaunted by his encounter with near-death, he brushed off his suit and staggered toward the exit, arms swinging.
Down at street level, several sirens complained. He tuned into dissonant caterwauling coming from multiple directions. Engines roared. Tires braked. I pushed my luck, beat him to the head of the staircase, and blocked his way. He grabbed me, one arm for each fist. My flesh smarted. A string of Sicilian swearwords detonated from his bottle mouth. I returned the gunfire with a compilation of my own, also in Italian, my accent flawless. His eyes bulged with wonder. In Italian, he said, “Will you marry me?”
I answered back, also in Italian, “The pope is a fag.”
Pleased with my grasp of his native tongue, he guffawed and formally introduced himself. “Armand Centanni,” he said, doffing his fedora.
Translating the meaning of his name, I said, “A hundred years.”
“That is why I fear nothing. Trains. Bullets. Sirens. Women.” He raised his arms in an invitation to dance.
“I never dance with strangers.”
“We can fuck instead.”
“Try it, and you’ll have to answer to Arezzo.”
His mouth rounded into an O of surprise. “You? Know Arezzo? I don’t believe.”
“I’ve often admired his black onyx bathtub.”
He wagged his eyebrows. “Do you want to know what I’d like to do to you in his black onyx bathtub?”
“Make sure your gun is loaded, because if it isn’t, mine will be.”
“Oh, lady, talk dirty some more.”
“Screw you.”
“Just for that, I will kiss the hem of your skirt. I will crawl on my hands and knees. Just say, Sì, and I am yours forever.”
Car doors slammed. Feet scampered. Shouting splintered the night.
“Up yours,” I said.
“With every word, I fall more madly in love. I am sinking at the deep end of the ocean. I am floating on cloud nine.”
“Kiss off.”
A
northbound train pulled into the station. Centanni was torn between ravishing me or making his escape. “I will do your bidding,” he said. “Reluctantly. ’Til next time, arrivederci, il mio amore.” He hopped onboard. As the train pulled out of the station, he threw a kiss through the grimy windows.
I spun on a heel and trudged downstairs.
Up until this moment, I had been playacting like an actress on a stage, spitting out dialog, emoting for the audience, and flinging arms in diaphanous splendor. Now that the backdrop had been lifted away, only stark reality remained. I couldn’t stop trembling.
In those few seconds when gunfire lit up the night, my life flashed before my eyes. Starting with the cold, dark moment when I arrived in this world, the perfect mixture of my father’s intelligence and my mother’s beauty. Fast-forwarding through memorable scenes: the day my mother walked out; the first day of kindergarten; the date, hour, and minute I realized my father was a hood; the night I lost my virginity; finally ending when everything came to a screeching halt with a stray bullet. I could see it. Visualize it. Witness the aftermath. Daddy weeping inconsolably at my funeral. Lilith frozen with grief. Rose and Violet telling everybody what a wonderful sister I was. Friends and colleagues extolling my virtues.
After giving over to a few tears, I shook away the jitters and pulled my posture straight. Then I descended the last few steps with sluggish care, preparing to enter through the curtain stage left and fake my way through the improvisational scene to follow.
Pulsating emergency lights drenched everything the color of blood. A battalion of black-and-whites had braked to chaotic stops, doors ajar. High beams converged on a single point of focus. Armed police officers formed a semicircle around the hub. Poised in shooting stances, they cocked service revolvers and aligned sights on Iris Grenadine, reporter for the Daily Standard, who had a nose for news and a talent for bad timing.
I pumped my hands skyward. “I give up.”
With his non-regulation Colt Python aimed at my heart, Pennyroyal cut a path through his men. Floodlights turned his face into a full moon. His skin was papery white, his eyes coal black, and his lower lip cherry red. The pistol swiveled around his trigger finger and pointed harmlessly at the sidewalk.
The Green-Eyed Dick Page 22
