The Winter of Frankie Machine

by Don Winslow

  Troy holds up his umbrella.

  There are maybe three people in San Diego who own an umbrella.

  Anyway, it’s not raining hard, and the umbrella stands up to the wind. Troy walks three blocks down to a little lunch place on Broadway, at the edge of the Gaslamp District. He finds a stool at the counter and sits down.

  “What’s the soup of the day?” he asks the guy behind the counter.

  “Vegetable bean.”

  Troy orders the soup and half-sandwich special and unfolds his newspaper. He removes the sports section, sets it down on the stool beside him, and starts to read the main section.

  A minute later, the guy two stools over gets up, slides his check off the counter, picks up the sports section, and goes up to the register. The man pays his check and walks out into the rain.

  Troy cautions himself to ignore the man walking out. He makes himself sit and finish his sandwich and his cup of vegetable bean soup.

  Which, he thinks, is not exactly haute cuisine, but good on a cold, rainy day.

  30

  The fishermen were trying to bag a four-hundred-pound marlin, but they hooked a four-hundred-pound bouncer instead.

  Grisly catch.

  Dave Hansen gets the call that morning and goes down to the docks to meet the boat. He isn’t very worried about the forensics getting screwed up on a body that’s been in the water for two days.

  Still and all, it isn’t hard to ID Tony Palumbo.

  A few hours later, Dave gets confirmation that Palumbo was shot with the same gun that killed Vince Vena.

  Hypothesis: Vena had come out from Detroit to get rid of Tony Palumbo, and someone had killed them both.

  So someone was trying to clean up G-Sting from the top down. And to do it, they contracted with the most efficient hit man in California.

  Dave puts a warrant out for Frank Machianno.

  31

  Frank takes a left on Nautilus Street and pulls off the road at Windansea.

  Sherm’s single word, Run, let him know that The Nickel is hot.

  On a normal day, he’d relish the chance to come to Windansea, the legendary surf spot. Especially on a day when the break is going off and some of the world’s best surfers will be out. But this isn’t a normal day. This is a day when somebody is waiting to kill him.

  Let them wait, Frank thinks.

  He flirts briefly with the idea of driving into La Jolla anyway and just letting the chips fall.

  They don’t know what car you’re driving, and, better, they don’t know that you know that they’re there. On the downside, you don’t know who they are, or how many, or where they are. All you know is that they—whoever “they” are—will be hanging close to Sherm’s office. And besides, what do you gain even if you “win” a shoot-out in the crowded shopping district on La Jolla Boulevard?

  Life without parole.

  So don’t be stupid, he tells himself.

  He pulls out of the parking lot and heads east on Nautilus, then south on La Jolla Scenic Drive, then east on Soledad Mountain Road out to the 5. Then he drives north to the 78 and heads east.

  32

  Jimmy the Kid Giacamone sits in a car and thinks about balls.

  Balls is what Frankie Machine’s got. Big, clanging brass clappers.

  First he snatches Mouse Junior and rides him right into his daddy’s place of business, next he pulls John Heaney into a Dumpster, and then he strolls into Migliore’s bar, beats half the guys senseless, and roughs up Teddy himself.

  The guy’s got balls.

  Good, Jimmy thinks, because that’s the kind of trophy you want hanging on your wall. Not his balls, of course, not literally—but any hunter worth his salt wants the big old bull elephant, the one that, you fuck up, is going to kill you.

  Otherwise, what’s the point?

  Jimmy’s in California with his whole crew.

  “The Wrecking Crew,” they’re glossed, because they work out of a car-salvage place out in Deerborn. Jimmy likes the tag—the Wrecking Crew—it says it all.

  They didn’t come in together, of course. That would’ve been stupid. They came in on separate flights, and none of them into San Diego, either. Jimmy came into Orange County, Paulie and Joey into L.A., Carlo into Burbank, Tony into Palm Springs, Jackie into Long Beach.

  Mouse’s guys met them and hooked them up with hardware.

  That’s all Jimmy asked from those West Coast mooks. “Get us some hardware, clean, untraceable. You guys think you can handle that?”

  Maybe yes, maybe no. Frankie M. had come right into their driveway, for Chrissakes, and they let him skate. Way he heard it, Frankie had shot up the kid’s Hummer and stolen Joey Fiella’s car in the process.

  Too fucking funny.

  But the Mouseketeers had come through with the arsenal he’d requested, so his crew was strapped and ready to rock and roll, Motor City–style.

  Eight Mile–style.

  Jimmy starts to sing:

  “You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to blow

  This opportunity comes once in a lifetime, yo…”

  No shit, you ain’t gonna blow this opportunity. Take care of business here, go back and jump the old man for the spot on the council. Like, king me, Dad. First step in taking the family back from the Tominellos and getting it home where it belongs, to the Giacamones.

  Something Dad never had the stones to do.

  But I do, Jimmy thinks.

  Me and Frankie M., we got balls.

  I just gotta blow Frankie’s off.

  So he sits in the car and waits.

  Frankie Machine is going to show up sooner or later.

  33

  Two hours later, Frank’s in the desert.

  It’s raining there.

  Raining in the damn desert, Frank thinks. It just figures. It goes with all the other weird stuff that’s going down.

  Borrego Springs is an oasis in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, 770,000 acres of some of the wildest terrain in the country. The town’s founders thought it was going to be the next Palm Springs, but that never happened, mostly because there are only two roads into town, both of them bad, both of them winding through miles and miles of tough, inhospitable desert. A dozen or so mojados die every year trying to cross the desert from the Mexican side, and the Border Patrol has taken to burying water beneath thirty foot red-flagged poles to try to save lives.

  So the town never really flourished, and now it’s mostly a small retirement community for snowbirds, along with a couple of thousand hardy souls who live there year-round, even in the summer, when the temps can reach 130.

  Frank drives in from Route 22, which snakes in seemingly endless switchbacks down from the mountains onto the vast desert floor and becomes Borrego’s main street, which sports a couple of motels, a few restaurants and shops, and a bank.

  The bank is what has brought Frank here.

  It’s a “tame” bank, one of the many places that Sherm launders money, and the prearranged pickup spot for Frank to get cash in case of an emergency. He drives past it, though, looking for cars or people who look out of place.

  He doesn’t see anything.

  He parks the car outside Albierto’s, a little Mexican joint where he’s eaten before. The food is good, and cheap, and you get a lot of it, because Albierto’s caters to the local Mexicans, who work damn hard and want a good meal for their money.

  Frank stops outside, gets a Borrego Sun from the newspaper machine, walks up to the counter and orders two chicken enchiladas with black beans and rice and an iced tea, then sits down in a booth and waits for them to call his name.

  Not a lot happens in Borrego Springs. There’s an article about a new archaeological dig, another one about renovations to the high school gym, but the lead story is about the San Diego city council scandal and the grand jury indicting another councilman.

  Frank skips over the article and finds Tom Gorton’s column. Gorton is the editor and an old-time newspaper guy, and a hel
l of a good writer. Frank reads his column every time he sees a Sun somewhere. This time, Gorton’s writing about all the rain they’ve had this winter, and how it will bring a wonderful spring bloom.

  I’d like to see that, Frank thinks.

  It’s been years since there’s been a big desert bloom, the valley floor carpeted with a panoply (puzzle word) of wildflowers. Frank’s always found it moving, a miracle, when the sere desert becomes a sea of color and blooms with life. It’s an affirmation of life, Frank thinks. It’s proof that redemption is possible, when flowers blossom from the desert.

  I hope I get to see it.

  I’ll bring Donna out here, maybe Jill, too. Maybe it’s a trip that the three of us can do together.

  Yeah, right, he thinks. That’s going to happen, those two in the same car together.

  “Bob.”

  Frank lifts a finger, then walks over to the counter and gets his tray. The food smells great. He goes to another counter, picks two different salsas—a verde and a fresca—and some spiced carrots.

  The food is as good as it smells, the enchiladas smothered in a rich mole sauce, and the rice and beans done perfectly. Frank notices that they have fish tacos on the menu and wonders who supplies their seafood. He thinks briefly about making a pitch, then does the math and decides that the drive out here and then having to deadhead back would more than eat up any profit.

  He finishes his meal, tosses the plastic plate into the trash can, and walks outside. The rain is gentle, more of a mist, but the streets are quiet, as if the residents are hiding in their houses, waiting for the sun to come out again.

  Frank goes into the bank, walks up to the nice lady teller, and asks for the manager, Mr. Osborne.

  “May I say who’s calling?” the teller asks.

  “Scott Davis,” Frank says with a smile.

  “One moment, Mr. Davis.”

  Osborne looks nervous when he comes out from the office. He has a big Adam’s apple, anyway, on a skinny neck, but it’s bobbing up and down a little more than Frank would like.

  Don’t get hinky, Frank tells himself. This is just an otherwise-law-abiding citizen a little stressed about committing an illegal act.

  Osborne sticks his hand out. His palm is moist, sweaty.

  “Mr. Davis,” he says, loudly enough for the teller to hear. “Come into my office; let’s see if we can do some business about your loan.”

  Frank follows him back into the office. Osborne opens a safe closet, then the safe, then takes out a canvas bank bag and hands it to Frank.

  “Twenty thousand,” he says.

  “Minus your three points,” Frank says. He puts the bag in his jacket.

  “Aren’t you going to count it?” Osborne asks.

  “Should I?”

  “It’s all there.”

  “I just assumed it would be,” Frank says.

  Osborne is looking over Frank’s shoulder, out the window that faces onto the street. Frank pulls the .38 and sticks it in the banker’s face. “Tell me.”

  “These men,” Osborne says, his voice shaking, “they came to my house this morning. They said to give you the money. Please don’t kill me. I have a wife and two children. Becky is eight, and Maureen is—”

  “Shut up,” Frank says. “Nobody’s killing anybody.”

  Maybe.

  Osborne starts to cry. “My career…my family…prison…”

  “You’re not going to prison,” Frank says. “All you need to do is keep your mouth shut, capisce?”

  “Keep my mouth shut,” Osborne repeats, like he’s trying to remember directions somebody’s giving him over the phone: Turn left on Jackson, second right on La Playa, keep my mouth shut.

  “Is there a back door?” Frank asks.

  Osborne looks at him. Frank repeats the question.

  “You told me to keep my mouth shut,” Osborne says.

  “Not now,” Frank says. “Is there a back way out?”

  “I’ll have to unlock it.”

  “What are you waiting for?”

  The door is triple-locked and has a security bar across it. It takes a good minute for Osborne to get the door unlocked.

  “Don’t open it,” Frank says.

  What are you thinking? he asks himself. Any decent crew will have a guy or two out back. And they’ll have heard the door unlatching. You step out that door, you walk into a hail of bullets.

  Then again, you walk out the front door, you step into the same.

  You’re trapped.

  34

  That’s certainly what Jimmy the Kid thinks.

  Frankie M. is totally fucked.

  Jimmy’s sitting in the car across the street. He’s in the passenger seat, rifle in his lap, waiting for the kill shot.

  “You’re sure he went in?” Jimmy asks.

  “I watched him,” Carlo says.

  Carlo placed himself in the ice cream store across the road. He watched Frankie Machine drive by, then have lunch, then go into the bank. He could have taken the man out himself, except he had strict orders from Jimmy, who’d said, “You see him, you call me.” So Carlo called him, then got himself another ice cream—butter brickle this time.

  Now Jimmy sits in the car, his foot tapping like a bass drummer in a heavy-metal band.

  “Paulie, Jackie, and Joey are in back?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You sure?”

  “You can call them, you want.”

  Jimmy thinks about it, then decides against it. It would be just like Paulie to shout into the phone and tip off Frankie M. No, we want Frankie nice and confident. Let him come strolling through that door with his money in hand and happy thoughts in his head.

  Then blam.

  You only get one shot, do not miss your chance to blow…

  “What’s taking so fucking long?” Jimmy asks.

  Carlo doesn’t have time to answer, because, just then, sirens start wailing.

  Police sirens.

  Coming this way.

  Carlo doesn’t wait for Jimmy to tell him to get in gear and get the fuck out of there.

  It’s the obvious call.

  35

  Frank goes out the back as soon as he hears the sirens.

  Osborne had hit the silent alarm, just like he’d told him to. Hopefully, the banker will follow the rest of his instructions.

  “Tell the state troopers a man came in and tried to rob you, then got nervous and ran out. Give the cops the description of one of the guys who approached you this morning,” he’d told Osborne.

  “Why don’t I tell them the robber got twenty grand?” Osborne asked.

  “Are you supposed to have an extra twenty K in the bank?” Frank said.

  “No.”

  “Well?”

  “Oh, right.”

  “Just hit the alarm, okay?”

  Frank doesn’t run out the back alley, though. He finds the ladder that leads to the roof and climbs up. By the time he reaches the top, his heart is hammering and he’s gasping for breath.

  Jill was right about the red meat and the desserts, he thinks. I have to cut down. He crawls along the rooftop on his stomach, then climbs down the ladder on the other side just as the troopers’ cars screech to the front of the bank. Frank walks back to his car, calmly backs out, drives across the street to a gas station, and starts to fill his tank.

  “What’s going on?” he asks the attendant, who’s come out to see what all the excitement’s about.

  “I don’t know,” the kid says. “Something with the bank.”

  “Jeez, no kidding?” Frank says. “That’s wild.”

  He watches as Osborne comes out of the bank with one of the troopers and a citizen runs across from the ice cream parlor and starts pointing west, with one of those emphatic “They went thataway” gesticulations.

  One of the troopers rushes back to his car and races west.

  Frank fills up his tank.

  “I hope they get the guys,” he says, and then pulls out
and drives east, doing the speed limit.

  You’re an idiot, he tells himself. Or else you’re just getting tired, worn down.

  It was the guy in the ice cream shop, across the street. You know him, just can’t place him.

  Damn getting old.

  Come on, think, think, think.

  It’s flirting with him, skirting the edge of his memory.

  Carlo Moretti.

  A Detroit guy, a hitter for Vince Vena.

  36

  It was 1981.

  Frank and Patty were already having a tough time in their marriage. They’d been trying and trying to have a baby, to no avail. They’d been to doctor after doctor, but the word was always the same: Frank had a low sperm count, nothing they could do. They talked adoption, but Patty just wasn’t into it.

  She said she didn’t blame him—that would be irrational and unfair, she said—but he knew that part of her, deep down, harbored a resentment. She blamed his schedule, the pressure he put on himself with not just the fish business but the linen business now, too, and he would answer that if they ever did have a baby, he wanted to be able to provide for the kid, offer his child a future.

  So it was tough times, their love life had turned into an anxiety-ridden chore, and it was just on one of those days when she was most likely to get pregnant that he got the call from Chicago to go to Vegas and take care of this little problem.

  Truth was, Frank was glad to get away for a few days.

  You need the money, he told himself, and he did, but the truth was that home was turning into a painful place and he was looking for excuses to get away. That was part of the reason for the long hours at work, part of the reason for taking the job in Las Vegas.

  He and Patty argued over it.

  “You’re going off to Vegas with your buddies?” she said. “Now?”

  Now, Frank thought, when I’m supposed to be dutifully, joylessly performing an act of love. “It’s work.”

  “Work,” she scoffed. “Gambling away our money, screwing hookers, some kind of work.”

  “I don’t gamble, I don’t screw hookers.”

  “So what do you do in Vegas?” she asked. “Go to shows?”