Shakedown

Chapter Twenty-seven

Grisnik took the Fifth Street exit off I-70, a street that runs through the heart of Strawberry Hill. At the south end of Fifth, just after we came off the highway, there was a low-slung bar wearing a faded coat of red paint. Narrow windows offered a peek into a dimly lit interior while a dyspeptic neon sign over the door irregularly blinked its gospel of FREE BEER TOMORROW. Cars were parked at the curb, probably belonging to faithful customers who were hoping that today was the day. A sign bolted to the roof said it was Pete’s Place.

Next to the bar was a restaurant, painted from the same can, a companion sign on its roof reading Pete’s Other Place, the neon promise over its door pledging Good Eats. A barrel barbeque cooker sat on the sidewalk, the tangy smell of smoked sausage mixing with rising smoke. Grisnik slowed and rolled his window down, breathing deep. I followed his lead, the enticing smell convincing me that this was one promise Pete kept.

“In the early days, the whole area was covered with strawberry fields. That’s where the name comes from. But I’ll take the sausage any day. It’s Pete’s secret recipe. Kind of a Croatian kielbasa.”

Post-World War II brick and stone houses with well-kept front porches; tidy, narrow yards; and single-car garages lined the steep hills that explained the other half of the name. Grisnik waved to a white-haired couple, the husband relaxing in a rocking chair on his porch, the wife tugging at weeds peeking through the concrete walk. They waved back, calling him by name.

“Petar and Maja Andrija, my godparents. They own the bar and the restaurant,” he explained. “Their daughter, Tanja, runs the bar and their son, Nick, makes the sausage and the povitica.”

“Sausage, I understand. What’s povitica?”

“Croatian cake bread. Lots of different?avors, like chocolate, walnut-anything you can think of. Can’t have a holiday or a party around here without it.”

Farther north at the intersection of Fifth and Ann, a Catholic church framed in limestone stood on the corner, its steeple aimed at heaven, its painted-glass windows catching the fire of the early afternoon sun. A small herd of young children, dressed in parochial blue and white, chased a soccer ball across the fenced, paved playground affixed to the hip of the church.

“Let me guess,” I said. “Your alma mater?”

Grisnik laughed. “My neighborhood, my people.”

“What’s next? The drive-in theater where you lost your virginity?”

“Nope. That would be the back room of the bar.”

“The daughter?”

He grinned. “She had a way of looking at you that made you forget everything holy.”

“But you didn’t marry her.”

Grisnik shook his head, the grin receding. “Oh, I asked Tanja enough times, starting when I was fifteen. She kept saying no, said she was moving to New York as soon as we graduated high school. I heard she got married, after that, nothing. Eventually I got married too, had a couple of kids, and got divorced. A few years ago, she shows up out of the blue, divorced, too. Went back to her maiden name. We tried it again, but it was nothing but memories for her. I guess she outgrew me.”

“Sounds like you didn’t outgrow her.”

He didn’t answer, looked at his watch, then back down the hill. I checked mine. It was almost one o’clock.

“You got time for the best sausage sandwich in the world?” Grisnik asked.

“I’ve got nothing but time.”

We parked in front of Pete’s Other Place. There were eight square wrought-iron tables with matching chairs, all of them empty, and a deli case filled with cold meats, salads, and loaves of povitica. A row of sausages hung above the counter like a curtain in front of a blackboard menu advertising stew, pasta, fish, salads, and sausage.

“Hey, Nicky,” Grisnik said to the man behind the counter.

Nick Andrija stepped out to greet us. He was a slab of hard muscle with a shaved head, bulging arms, and pile-driver legs. I pegged him at five-eight, an easy one-ninety, none of it wasted. He gave Grisnik an easy grin, sharing it with me. They shook hands, clapping each other on the shoulder.

“Marty! How goes it, baby? Who’s your friend?”

“Jack Davis, shake hands with Nicky Andrija, sausage master of Strawberry Hill.”

“Hey, Nick,” I said. “The sausage taste as good as it smells?”

“Better.”

“Give us a couple with everything,” Grisnik said.

“Two with peppers, onions, potatoes, and sauce coming at you,” he said, leaving the counter for the grill on the sidewalk.

A double-wide doorway connected the bar and the restaurant. We took a table that gave us a straight-shot view to the other side. The two buildings were twins on the outside and the inside. The bar was positioned identically to the deli counter, a row of bar stools the only difference.

Nick returned with our sandwiches, which lived up to Pete’s promise of good eats and Grisnik’s claim that they were the world’s greatest. We washed them down with cold soda.

Grisnik wiped his mouth and belched his satisfaction with our meal. “I gotta hit the head.”

I glanced at the counter. Nick had disappeared somewhere in the back. I scraped the crumbs from my plate and drained the last of my soda, watching the traffic at the bar.

There was only one customer, his back to me and his head down as he leaned in close to the bartender, a shapely blonde. Her fingers toyed with his, their laughter drifting my way. The guy moved in to kiss her and she spun away, both of them laughing again at a familiar game. The guy shrugged, swiveled around, and slipped off his chair, looking up and directly at me. It was Colby Hudson.

It was one of those frozen moments. We were both running a thousand computations through our heads. If he was on the job, he couldn’t acknowledge me without risking blowing his cover. I couldn’t recall any references to Tanja, Nick, or their restaurant and bar in any of Colby’s reports. It was possible, but unlikely, that a lead had developed in the last few days that brought him here, but his relationship with Tanja, whatever it was, was too intimate to be recent.

The situation was clear to me. Colby wasn’t worried that I’d blow his cover. He was worried that I would tell Wendy he was cheating on her.

Colby made the call, smiling broadly at me, turning to the bartender, signaling me to join him at the bar. Tanja stepped around the bar, standing close to Colby. She was as Grisnik had promised. Calling her good looking, saying that she had a good figure, missed the point. Her allure was in the way she walked, like a lioness casually stalking prey, and the way she looked at you with her crystal blue eyes made you want to be caught.

There was a picture of her behind the bar outside a restaurant, the sign reading Mancero’s. She was maybe ten years younger in the picture. The photograph wasn’t a close-up, the focus more on the restaurant. Now in her late thirties, maybe early forties, she was a woman who’d gotten better, not older. She would attract younger guys like Colby or older guys like me just by breathing.

“Tanja, say hello to a friend of mine, Jack Davis.”

I stood, taking the hand she offered me. It was warm and soft. She held my eyes with the politician’s gift of making me feel like I was the only person in the room.

“Your brother makes a helluva sausage.”

“It’s all in the skin,” she said, letting her hand slide reluctantly from mine. “That’s what holds all the?avor together.”

Colby said, “You can’t beat their food.”

“Looks that way,” I said.

“A buddy of mine told me about this place,” Colby said to me. “How’d you find it? It’s not exactly in the Zagat guide.”

He was smooth, treating our encounter like the most natural thing, admitting that we knew each other without acknowledging how. His purposeful ambiguity suggested that Tanja didn’t know what he did for a living. That made sense. When you cheat, you keep a lot of secrets.

“Same as you-a friend of mine,” I said.

“Well, I’ve got to get going,” Colby said. “Catch you later.”

Now there were two people in the bar, Tanja and me. I pointed to the photograph.

“I don’t recognize the restaurant. Where is it?”

“New York. I used to be married to the owner.”

“So you divorced him but kept the picture.”

“Reminds me of the good times.”

“You have a picture of Colby for when you’re finished with him?”

Tanja laughed. “You’re not shy, are you?”

“Doesn’t pay. So, how long have you two been together?”

She shrugged, smiled again. “It’s not like that. He drops by once a week, sometimes more often, sometimes less. He’s a good guy. He makes me laugh.”

“And you make his balls turn blue.”

Her face hardened, her eyes grew?inty. “I don’t think I like you.”

“You wouldn’t be the first.”

Grisnik returned from the bathroom before either of us could draw blood.

“Tanja, honey,” he said, one arm squeezing her around her waist. “I see you met Jack.”

“You’re the one who brought him in here?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Don’t bring him back,” she said, turning her back on both of us and retreating to the bar.

Grisnik stared at me. “What the hell was that about?”

“I’m not her type.”

Grisnik’s cell phone rang, ending the discussion. His expression turned cold as he listened and then asked the cop’s automatic questions of who, what, when, where, and how. He hung up and snapped the phone into the cradle on his belt.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Javy Ordonez is dead.”