Lassiter

35 The Fairy Godfather

Twenty-four hours after Amy shot out my tires and disappeared, I was sitting on the coral rock wall along Ocean Drive, near my office, wearing a bandage on my forehead.

Amy hadn’t shown up at Ziegler’s office. Or her old motel. Or my office. I tried calling her cell a dozen times. Nothing but voicemail.

An hour earlier, Alex Castiel had called with the non-news that police couldn’t find Amy. He wanted to charge her with reckless display and discharge of a firearm. Would I cooperate? No, I would not. I wanted to get her into a therapist’s office, not a jail cell.

I was eating my lunch. My jaw ached with each bite, and for once, I couldn’t blame the stale bread Havana Banana used for its Cuban sandwiches. Ray Decker’s boot prints were tattooed on my back. My ribs felt brittle as crystal stemware, and it hurt to swallow. A patch of skin from my forehead had been left on the pavement. I’d been blindsided by tight ends before, but this was more like a head-on with a sixteen-wheeler.

The beach was behind me, The Scene in front. The air smelled of coconut oil and car exhaust. Ocean Drive was wall-to-wall outdoor cafes where wannabe actors served tables with an air of boredom with their work and superiority to their clientele. The tourists arrived sunburned, the pasta arrived al dente, the margaritas arrived watery. Models zipped by on Rollerblades. Bodybuilders with shaved, lubed chests paraded shirtless. A flock of green parrots streaked overhead, squawking-or maybe laughing-at what they saw below.

“Ay, bubee, you should see a doctor. You look like drek.”

I swung stiffly toward the voice, feeling like Frankenstein. Max Perlow waddled toward me, his cane clicking the concrete. He wore a gray silk guayabera with twirled piping and fancy buttons that looked like ivory. A skinny-brimmed green fedora sat on his head. His pencil mustache looked freshly trimmed and waxed.

“Thanks, but I feel great,” I lied.

He looked across Ocean Drive toward the bustling cafes and shops. “I love this neighborhood. Such life it’s got! Wouldn’t Meyer have loved to see the changes?” Perlow gestured with his cane toward the canyons along Collins Avenue. “Meyer lived just north of the Eden Roc. Modest little condo. I used to keep him company while he walked his dog.” Perlow grinned at the memory. “Yappy little bastard he called ‘Bruzzer.’ ”

I didn’t invite him, but Perlow sat down next to me on the coral wall, doffing his fedora in a polite, outdated way. The hat had a jaunty orange feather, and I wondered if a nearsighted heron might try to mate with it.

“Alex tells me you’re gonna ask the Attorney General to open an investigation.”

“His relationship with Ziegler compromises his impartiality,” I said. “So, yeah, I’m gonna rattle some cages in Tallahassee, see if I can get a team of FDLE agents down here. Turn over some rocks, maybe find some scorpions underneath.”

“Innuendos about Alex would be damaging to his career.”

“Not my concern.”

He gave me a look through those drooping eyelids, but the eyes themselves burned hot.

“Walk with me, Mr. Lassiter. I need the exercise.”

I followed him, tossing the rest of the sandwich into a trash can. In the street, a creamy white Bentley crept alongside us.

Perlow waved at the driver, a Hispanic man who filled a considerable portion of the front seat. “Go on, Nestor. Leave us.” The car pulled away, quiet as diamonds dropping on velvet.

“Your bodyguard?”

“Feh! Why would I need protection? I’m an honest businessman.” He gave me a little smile. “Of course, Nestor is excellent with a handgun. As good as Lucky Luciano’s boys, and they could shoot.”

A BMW convertible drove by, top down, C.D. player cranked up, as if the entire neighborhood was dying to listen to Bob Marley admit he’d shot the sheriff but spared the deputy.

“Where’s your client?” Perlow asked.

“I don’t know, and if I did, I wouldn’t tell you.”

“Are you not concerned, Mr. Lassiter? A neurotic woman threatened you with a gun.”

“And you care because …?”

“She also threatened my partner. That makes it my business.”

“I’ll find her, and I’ll deal with her. I don’t want you or your pistol-packing driver anywhere near her.”

“If she comes after Charlie, you can’t protect her. Do you take my meaning?”

“I take it as a threat.”

“It’s simple advice. I’ve spoken to Alejandro. He won’t charge her for that incident at the gun range if you can get her to leave town.”

I shook my head and laughed.

“What?” he said.

“From walking Meyer Lansky’s dog to delivering messages for the State Attorney. I can’t figure out if you’ve come up or down in the world.”

“Such a smart mouth you have.”

We’d walked less than a block when Perlow stopped and said, “I’m bushed. Let’s sit.”

I followed him through a gate in the coral rock wall, and we found a bench in the shade of a palm on the beach, the fronds swaying in the ocean breeze. Thirty yards away, a shirtless, leathery-skinned man of maybe ninety worked a metal detector across the sand.

“I have no wife, Mr. Lassiter,” Perlow said, somberly. “No children or grandchildren or blood relatives I give a shit about. Alex means everything to me.”

“I know. His old man gave you a job at the casino. You stood in for him the day they snipped Alex’s foreskin.”

“Alex is the son I never had,” Perlow said. “I would do anything for him.”

I believed him. The godfather was a real Godfather.

“Years ago, when Charlie Ziegler was schtupping that underage girl, I told Alex to stay away from him.”

“But Alex didn’t listen.”

“He was young. He couldn’t see Ziegler for what he was. A weak man. A man of the flesh.”

I thought of one of Granny’s old cracker expressions. If you lie down with dogs, you’re gonna get fleas. Or at Ziegler’s house, chlamydia.

“If the Attorney General investigates,” Perlow said, “there’ll be a flood of publicity. Even though he’s done nothing wrong, Alex will be linked to a man who seduced underage girls.”

“Like I said before, not my concern.”

“You’re an intelligent man, Mr. Lassiter. Surely it is not necessary for me to underscore how precarious your position is.”

“I think I got the point when you mentioned how good a shot your pistolero is.”

Perlow used a knuckle to scratch at his Errol Flynn mustache. “So, why so damned stubborn?”

“Because I don’t like being pushed around. When I am, I push back. So, no, I’m not gonna abandon my plans. In fact, I’ll expand them. If Castiel is involved in a cover-up, the feds ought to be interested, too. I’ll ask the Justice Department to take a look at all three of you. I’ll bet there are files on you going back so far, J. Edgar Hoover hadn’t started wearing dresses.”

The old man shook his head and sighed. On the beach, two copper-toned young women were playing Frisbee. They wore micro-thongs and nothing on top. I didn’t pay attention to their Frisbee skills.

“How’s your knowledge of history, Mr. Lassiter?”

“I know who bombed Pearl Harbor.”

“Do you know about Meyer Lansky ordering the hit on Ben Siegel?”

“I saw the movie Bugsy, if that counts.”

“They’d grown up together, and Meyer loved Ben like a brother. But Ben was stealing, and after a warning, Meyer felt he had no choice. Do you take my meaning, Mr. Lassiter?”

“Lansky had Bugsy killed, even though he didn’t want to.”

“Think how it pained Meyer. And consider that I have no feelings whatsoever toward you.”

Perlow nudged the fedora back on his head, got to his feet, and waved his cane in the air. It must have been a magic cane, because the Bentley immediately appeared, easing up to the curb.

Nestor, the husky driver and crack shot, came out and held the door open. Tats up and down both arms, a five-pointed crown on the back of his shaved head. Latin Kings gangbanger.

“Will you answer a question, Perlow?” I said.

“What?”

“That party that Krista Larkin didn’t go to …”

“What about it?” Perlow ducked into the car.

“Were you there?”

“Of course, Mr. Lassiter” came the voice from the darkened backseat. “Everyone was there.”