Inside Out

82

New Orleans, Louisiana

The slipstream caught the cigarette that Johnny Russo flicked out of the Lincoln. He lit another before he closed the window.

A mile after leaving the interstate, Spiro turned right at the crossroads. He drove another fifty yards, then steered the Lincoln onto Sam's property. The gatekeeper opened the front gate while a guard gazed out of the window of the small building. Russo watched the gatekeeper pull the lever on the wall. Even though he had seen the guard disarm the device designed to protect Sam from unwelcome guests, he reminded Spiro to slow as he approached the bridge erected over the man-made gully a hundred yards beyond the gate.

As the Lincoln passed between the hills that guarded Sam's privacy from both sight-seers and surveillance teams, Russo saw two of Sam's bodyguards sitting in a golf cart parked beside the driveway. The pair returned Johnny's wave as Spiro drove past. Sam's guard consisted of serious-minded professionals, who in the way of well-trained attack dogs, were expected to respond only to their master's commands. Sam had recently imported seven young Sicilians-all blood relatives of his bodyguards-which put the number of men he had protecting him at fourteen-by far the largest number ever. He had always been satisfied before with a driver and two others who trailed him in a second car. His caution was indicative of the change in Sam since Dylan Devlin prompted his arrest.

Johnny's mission was tricky because the old man could always sniff out deceit. Sam based life-and-death decisions on a man's facial tic, a shifting eye, or the moisture of a hand he was shaking.

Spiro parked in front of the house beside Sam's Cadillac. Three of the new guards stared at the newcomers as though they had never seen them before.

“Damn Zips,” Spiro said distastefully.

“Wait with the car,” Johnny told him. “Make nice with the boys. It's important you develop a relationship with them, since you're going to be working with them from now on.”

“How, with sign language? They shouldn't come here if they can't talk English.”

“Whose fault is it you never learned to speak Italian? Maybe I'll get you some foreign language tapes for Christmas.”

Inside the house, Johnny found Sam standing at his expensive gas range overcooking sausages in a big cast-iron skillet. Two of his recently imported young guards sat on stools at the counter waiting like patient hounds.

“Johnny!” Sam said. “You hungry? Grab a plate.”

“Nah, Sam,” Johnny said. “I passed by my house and ate with the kids a little while ago.” The idea of putting anything Sam cooked into his stomach was only slightly less frightening than having a crackhead holding a cocked pistol to his temple. “I wanted to get a shower and change.”

“It's nice to keep close with your kids. Where's Spiro?”

“With the car.” Understanding why Sam had asked, he added, “He ate already, too.”

Sam reached over and turned the radio up before he spoke to Johnny in a low voice. “They don't understand English,” he said, meaning the young men seated at the counter. “So, what you got up your sleeve?”

Be calm, Johnny. “Sean called me.”

Sam burned Johnny with his gaze. Smoke was seconds from billowing from the black skins of the sizzling meat. He pulled the skillet off the flame. “So when was it she called you?”

“This morning.” He spoke with a nonchalance he didn't feel. In his mind he pictured morning as actually being late at night. “She wouldn't say where she was, just said she saw you on TV, and that it wasn't her fault about-”

“Where is she?”

“She wouldn't tell me. I asked her and said I'd send somebody to get her. I even offered to go myself. She wasn't interested.”

“You came straight here?” Sam asked.

“Sure.”

Sam smiled at him warmly. “After you passed by your house to eat a little bite with the family and wash up?”

“It was one thing after the other all night, last night. I stank. I had to shower so I wouldn't draw flies,” Johnny said, trying to lighten Sam's mood.

Sam's now-clouded eyes were impossible to read; the smile had turned into a sneer. “You wanted to shower and eat before you brought me this word I been crazy out of my head to get?”

Johnny tried to picture Sam as an old man more dead than alive. With Sam standing there, the image wouldn't take shape because Sam looked as invincible as he had when Johnny was a child. That cancer sure had its work cut out for it.

“You get in touch with Herman yet?” Sam asked, changing the subject.

“His number is disconnected,” Johnny said, bracing himself for a storm. Herman Hoffman's contact number did indeed have a message saying it was no longer in service. Only the last time Johnny had called it, one of Herman's men had called him back within seconds. The cutout's message had been that despite appearances, everything was under control. Johnny had no choice but to believe him.

“We need to talk,” Sam said. “Go on downstairs and wait for me. I'll be right there soon's I feed the boys.”

The guards were eager as Sam speared the sausages and put them on their plates beside the nests of linguini, which looked seriously undercooked. Johnny suspected that as soon as Sam left, the men would dump the inedible feast down the garbage disposal.

Downstairs, outside the steam room, Russo changed out of his clothes and wrapped a towel around his waist. He was pissed that Sam thought he had nothing better to do than look for that bitch, but he had no choice-for the time being.

He comforted himself with something he had read in a book of World War II battles. The greatest generals in history had the ability to turn their weaknesses into strengths.

Johnny Russo saw himself as a general who had proved time after time that he could improvise with the best of them.