Headstone City

TWENTY-FOUR

At dawn, Dane stopped by Phil Guerra's house and stole the Cadillac again.

He stopped over at his grandmother's house to check on her. She was up watching infomercials, sitting in her cotton nightgown with two crocheted blankets over her knees. Her lips were smeared black from eating licorice out of the candy dish. She said, “You think you can stop over at La Famiglia and pick me up some sfogliatelle and cannoli?”

“Sure, but they won't be open for another hour. What are you doing up this early? Trying to form a strategy to combat Mabel Guerra's psychological bingo attacks?”

“I had to pee and couldn't get back to sleep. That one, she sneaks gin and tonic in a coffee Thermos. They're going to ban her soon.”

She glanced up at him with an expression like she wanted to say something else, but she held it back. All this holding back, it was driving them all pazzo. He knew she was having bad dreams again.

“So what happens to me?” he asked. “In your nightmares. Do I get chased out of the village?”

“No, you take it over.”

It made him tuck his chin in. “What's that mean?”

“I don't know, but it worries me.”

“Why?”

“Don't ask such questions. We do our best to understand these things even the priests won't help us with. We feel our way through the dark.”

“Okay.”

“Whatever you start today you need to finish.”

Dane wanted to sit beside his grandma and hug her, but she shifted on the couch and pulled the blankets higher. He said, “I will.”

“Go, then. You be careful.”

He drove over to Williamsburg, down Bedford Avenue past the new ultrahip cafés, vintage clothing stores, and restaurants, heading to the projects. The neighborhood quickly gave way to abandoned buildings and burned-out blocks. He remembered his parents bringing him here to celebrate La Festa del Giglio, the Feast of the Lily, and Dane would watch the people carrying a fifty-foot-high obelisk covered in flowers topped with a statue of St. Paulinus down the streets. It seemed weird even by Catholic standards.

He found the address he was looking for and pulled over about a block away, behind a pile of garbage and rubble three feet high.

It took Dane about four hours to see how the setup worked. There were the lookouts, the dealers, the muscle, and the boss and his crew. The lookouts were perched on the corners and rooftops, keeping their eyes to the street, watching for police and potential buyers. Dane had been made immediately; but they knew he wasn't a cop, so they waited while he sat behind the Caddy's wheel.

The street action moved with well-oiled efficiency, honed by repetition. The crew used walkie-talkies, not cell phones where anybody could be listening. The scouts corralled addicts and sold to them within the safety of their secured alleys, the muscle protecting the exchange of money and making sure nobody hit the dealers. Every two hours a bag man would be sent up the block into an apartment with the take so far, retrieve more drugs, and get right back to selling. So far as Dane could tell, there were at least six dealers in this general area. Bag men farther out from the home base probably only made two drops a day.

Fredric Wilson appeared to be an all-around wing man. He sold some crack, dropped off a wad of cash, and spent a lot of time gabbing on the walkie-talkies. So far as Dane could tell, Fredric didn't fit easily into any particular slot of the crew. That was good, it would make things easier.

Dane took off his jacket, left his.38 in the Caddy's glove box, and strutted up the street, all the scouts watching him. Three approached him at once and didn't bother to hawk their wares since they knew he wasn't a buyer. They couldn't figure him out, which was also good. They remained silent until one of the thugs moved from a doorway and stepped up.

“I want to talk to Fredric Wilson,” Dane said.

“Why?”

“We have business.”

“Wait here.”

It got more activity going, cars pulling out of alleys, doors opening and slamming. A few more faces peered at him through windows and from the fire escapes. The walkie-talkies squawked all over the fucking place.

Dane stood there on the corner with three kids not even in their twenties yet staring him down. They were nothing compared to his drill sergeant, and he let his face go placid. At the curb up ahead sat a silver Lexus, buffed out and the hubcaps shining so bright you couldn't stare at them for long. The toughs moved to the driver's door. It opened and Fredric popped out. He strutted up with a long-legged swagger.

He had on a fashionable silk-and-wool suit, posh, with a wide lapel and a lime-green tie knotted tightly. Dane wondered what Glory would've thought of that. There were diamond rings on six of his fingers, and a bump under his jacket that looked about the size of a SIG Mauser. He was one of those cats who liked to dare people to make a grab for what he had, hoping he'd appear so ready for it that nobody would make the move.

Dane permitted himself to feel the wind flowing around his shirt collar. This was gonna be all right.

Grabbing the knot of his tie to make sure it was still straight, Fredric approached Dane, his face clenched into an expression of contempt, but his eyes bright with the idea of easy cash. “What do you want?”

Dane slid into the guy's personal space, three inches away. “To talk to you.”

“You a cop?”

It got Dane smiling like a mental patient. He had to put the brakes on his laughter before it became real. “You act like asking that question is going to keep you safe from the courts. Like a cop never lied on the stand. ‘Your Honor, I told him I was a police officer, but he sold me the cocaine anyway.' Don't you know how lame it sounds when you ask somebody if he's a cop?”

“Who the hell are you, man?”

“I blew my horn at you once.”

“What?”

“Outside your building in Bed-Stuy, the one with the red awning. You were there with your girlfriend Taneesha Welles two years ago.”

“I haven't seen Taneesha in a while. You have business with her?”

“I have business with you, Fredric. Besides, Taneesha's dead.”

That got the prick for about a half second. Fredric had known she was dead, but he'd forgotten. “Well, ain't that sad.”

“It is. She died just like a friend of mine. Because you were selling bad shit.”

Dane liked this crew. About ten guys were ringing him and Fredric now, killers to the core, but hardened and smartened by the life. None of them got in the way. They listened and watched, clever enough to wait and make up their own minds.

“The fuck you say, man?” Squaring himself, leaning in like the posturing would be enough.

“You heard me. You want me to repeat myself in front of your crew? You sold bad flake. You poisoned at least two people. Taneesha and a girl named Angelina Monticelli. I'm here to see you kick up for that.”

Chewing his lips, trying to give the malocchio, the death gaze, but just not staunch enough to do it right. “You talk like we know each other, man, but I ain't never met you.”

“You never budged from the house, that's why. Even when a teenager was dying on your stoop. Maybe you don't remember me jamming on my horn, but you should.”

“You crazy, fuckah.” Fredric dropped out of his high-class attitude and got back to sounding like a gangbanger, with the moves now, arms akimbo, jumping like some giant rooster. “You want me to put one in yo head?”

“Pull that SIG Mauser and I'll have to stuff it in your ear. You and I have had this meeting coming for too long. We need to get past it.”

“You talkin' like a guinea wiseguy now! That what you is!” Leaping back and forth, like a dance, swinging to his own rhythm.

“That's because I pretty much am one.” It was time to put the fear in him. “All those diamond rings flashing. You get put down, how long do you think it'll be before somebody comes out with a bolt cutter and starts taking your fingers?”

“What?”

“You're just daring them to try, aren't you? You think everybody is a punk ass bitch except you. I bet you flash those rocks in everybody's face all day long. You tempt a man long enough and he's going to make a grab. You're gonna look funny trying to pick your nose with a stump.”

There it was. The dark swirl of terror starting in his eyes. “These are my men. This is my crew.”

“And if you get iced, who takes over?”

Fredric quit moving around so much and tried to keep his face impassive. But the only thing that ever really rattled fuckers like this was the fact that there was always somebody else willing to step into their shoes. Fredric wouldn't be missed for a goddamn minute, no more than Taneesha Welles.

“I'm going to take you out of action, Fredric.”

“Stop sayin' my name like that, man.”

“I'm going to weaken you so much that your spot gets filled in a split goddamn second.”

“Fuck you!”

“Nature abhors a vacuum, Fredric. You're going to the curb and no one is going to help you. Look at you. I been pissing on you for five minutes and you haven't made a move yet. You're going to lose those fingers of yours.”

It was finally enough to get him reaching for his gun, proving to the others that he didn't have the guts to go hand to hand with an unarmed guy.

Dane pushed out with the flat of his palm and pressed Fredric Wilson's wrist tightly to his chest so he couldn't finish pulling the pistol. With his other fist he repeatedly cracked Fredric hard across the nose until blood spurted all over. Wanting to make the lesson last, Dane danced out of the way, driven by his frustration the day Angie died, but disconnected from it in a way, so it wouldn't impede him.

But Fredric wasn't a slouch. He was wiry and had good footwork, shaking off his pain and doggedly moving forward. He tried two quick jabs that Dane easily avoided, the silence around them thick and unnatural. In the army, during the training sessions, the squad used to yell and applaud and groan while watching somebody else take a beatdown, but Dane liked this a lot better. Everybody quiet and keeping to himself.

Fredric went for his back pocket, going for a switchblade. His face was filled with murder, the blood flowing from both nostrils and streaming against his teeth as he grinned and snapped the knife open. Dane quit dancing and settled back on the balls of his feet, hands at his sides, staring straight on.

The blade flashed out and Dane stepped in, chopping at Fredric's wrist twice in quick succession, feeling the bone snap on the second blow. Fredric let loose with a girlish squeal that hit a sweet note. Dane stooped and picked up the blade and handed it to the guy closest to him, who took the knife with a muted chuckle.

All right, so Dane could've ended it right then, but he wanted to prolong the moment, draw the scene out for more drama. Usually that would be a sign of weakness, but not now. It was important at this moment to show Fredric Wilson the folly of selling bad drugs to teen girls. Two haunted years needed to be paid for.

Tucking his broken hand behind him, Fredric moved in again, but his eyes were wildly searching for a way out. He wanted to race back to the car, but he realized there was no safety in making a run for it. Showing such fear and weakness was chum in the water. He scanned left and right, looking at the faces of the chicks on the stoops anxiously watching him.

“Her name was Angelina Monticelli, Fredric.” Dane rushed forward, grabbed the prick's good arm at the elbow, and gave it a vicious twist. The snap was loud but not loud enough, so Dane yanked it again and felt the bone splinter up through the flesh. Fredric pulled a scream out from deep down under his balls, but Dane didn't want to hear it. He slapped a hand over Fredric's mouth and said, “Shh. Say her name.”

Crying, Fredric dropped to his knees and vomited on the sidewalk. Dane grabbed him by the collar and pulled him to the curb and told him, “Say it. C'mon. Angelina Monticelli. Say it.”

But Fredric Wilson had already passed out facedown in the gutter, blood and bile soaking into his green tie.

Dane turned to the muscle standing beside him. “Who do I contact to do some serious business?”

“My name's Cutter Bunk. You ever want to talk real money, you come to me.”

Dane walked back to the Caddy and got in, pulled out, and swung around the corner heading back toward Bedford Avenue.

Forever fifteen years old and seething with a dark attitude. Smiling but with the annoying glint of superiority in her gray eyes shining through even more clearly now. That was okay, he was getting used to it. Angie's oversized black sweater and midnight-blue jeans made it difficult for him to see the subtle lines of her body. Black hair fell straight back over her ears, showing the slightest curl of bangs up front, moved by her breath although she didn't breathe.

JoJo Tormino sat in the backseat with her, staring at the side of her face like he didn't recognize her anymore. Or thought she was someone else.

Angelina leaned forward and said in Dane's ear, “Thank you.”

“Sure.”

“But you should have killed him.”

“Maybe some other time.”

“Will they really take his fingers?”

“I don't know. It might be a point of pride now, since I put the idea in their heads.”

“I hope they do.”

She climbed forward into the passenger seat, curling against him without touching. That familiar heat flooded into his guts and got him sweating, worse than usual because his heart was still hammering.

Could any woman alive ever do for him the things the dead could do? He started breathing heavily, nervous in the way that guns could never make him. Her bangs wafted again, brushing against his throat.

“You told me that my mother wanted to say something to me.”

“She does.”

“What is it?”

“How should I know?”

JoJo Tormino stared out the window. Unwilling or unable to speak. Funny how some of them had so much to say, and others so little. JoJo turned his gaze forward and caught Dane's eye in the rearview. He was going to start that whole prodding in the side thing again, Dane could tell. It was time to go give her the ring.

“Where's Maria now, Angie? In Hollywood?”

“Hell no, she's never been west of Jersey.”

“But I thought Vinny was setting up her career?”

“He hasn't done a thing for her yet.”

“So where is she?”

Angie smiled, like she knew what was coming next. “At our sister Carmella's house out on Begoyan Street. She's married to a podiatrist.”

Dane didn't know Carmella all that well. She was older, the daughter of the Don's longtime goomar, a girlfriend he started hanging around with back in the late fifties. She didn't have much to do with the family, and Dane had only met her a couple of times at Monticelli functions a long time ago.

“Why's she there?”

“Berto is keeping watch over her.”

“For what?”

“He thinks the Ventimiglia family might be taking a run at her.”

Dane tried to track it but couldn't. With a touch of frustration he realized he still didn't see things the way the goombas did. After all these years it should be second nature, understanding their impractical moves, but he just couldn't ever get it into focus. “Why would they do that?”

“Because of JoJo Tormino.”

“The Ventis think he died because of her?”

“Well, he did, pretty much.”

“But she had nothing to do with it. The Ventimiglias work like that? Send a crew against a family member in payback? They've got to know JoJo loved her, right? So now they're gonna whack her?”

“They're the only rough family left,” Angie said, her lips just under his ear. The Caddy veered a little over the double yellow and Dane had to yank it back. “I always hated those guys. Vito Grimaldi was constantly trying to paw me whenever there was some kind of get-together. Barbecues. Baptisms. Even at funerals.”

“He a capo?”

“Yeah.”

JoJo still had his bullet holes: the left elbow, left thigh, jagged melted graze along his jaw, and high in the chest. The sucking wound above his heart hissed and gurgled. How long could a dead man bleed? It got worrisome, having JoJo back there just watching, waiting, his spiritual peace all hinged on Dane facing a woman he'd wanted his entire life.

If only you could throw a corpse out of the car. It would make life so much easier.

“By the way,” Angie said. “What did Mr. Fielding want with you? He no longer cries in his grave.”

Dane told her, “He had a confession to make.”

“Oh,” she said. So beautiful, so much like Maria, that Dane had to rub his palms along his pant legs to dry them. “Oh, I know what that's like.”

“Yeah, me too.”