by Karl Tutt
Chapter 13
The apartment was empty when we got back. The smell was stale, but there was a hint of something in the air . . . not a food odor, more like cheap cologne. I knew it wasn’t Eleisha. She wouldn’t wear anything short of Channel. I couldn’t see anything amiss. It was all the same as when we had left. I shook it off and credited it to my overactive imagination. Elesiha unpacked the overnight bag while I rummaged through the fridge. She had left a little salad fixings. She’d be okay, but I’ll be damned if all of my pizza hadn’t gone AWOL, or at least MIA. Maybe this would all end when I died of malnutrition.
I said a few choice words under my breath. All Eleisha heard was, “I’m going down to the Deli. I’m out of pizza.” She let out a disgusted sigh and mumbled, “Watch yourself.”
Down the steps and a turn to the right. My head down, I was debating self-rising crust. It’s usually a little heavy for me, but my Dad always said, “Variety is the spice of life.” He was a wise man. I jingled a handful of change in my pocket and patted my wallet. Sometimes a big decision like this is hard to make. Suddenly the sound of my hated nickname.
“Hey Spook, talk to ya for a sec?”
I turned.
I really wasn’t in the mood for chitchat, but the small pistol in the speaker’s hand convinced me otherwise. He wasn’t that tall, but he was pretty big in his own way. I’d learned a long time ago, it was these guys you’d better watch out for. He looked like a squat boulder, grinning through yellow teeth and motioning me towards an alley on my right. His hair was slicked back black on his head . . . axel grease, I figured. The scent from the apartment. His buddy was redwood sized, with hands like Hulk Hogan. These guys were often a bit slow. I was damned sure hoping. He wore a garish green shirt with tropical designs. It must have been made by Omar, the tent maker. Maybe a Wal-Mart clearance special. He wasn’t smiling at all.
“You, my dear Spook, have pissed a lot of people off. It’s a bad thing to do when you got friends like me and Murray.” He pointed to the giant. The giant grunted like a bull ox.
“We’re going to have to mess you up . . . and after we do you gotta convince me and Murray that you and that she-devil are gonna dedicate yourselves to a new project. Stay away from Beacon Hill and concentrate on those suckers you like to fleece. Otherwise, I guess we’ll just have to kill ya.”
I was afraid that was their first choice. I was out numbered, out gunned, and out muscled. I needed some time.
“Listen guys, I can feel my memory fading as we speak. You tell your people they don’t have to do anything drastic. No need to worry about the Spook. Breathing is actually one of my favorite hobbies.”
“I like your attitude, smart guy, but we still got to earn our keep. We’ll try to keep ya out of the ER and you can tell your bitch to find some dirty palms to read.”
The Hulk lumbered toward me, his fist clenched like a block of granite.
Suddenly a howl pierced my eardrums. The dark force came like a whirlwind. She locked herself on the Hulk’s back and drove her nails into his cheeks. The blood appeared instantly. He yowled and clawed at his face as she went for the eyes. The boulder glanced to his left. I charged and buried my head in his belly. It was softer than it looked. A shot went off, but it was high and wide. He hit the ground with a thud and I stomped on his knee. The sound was like an axe splitting wood, solid and sickening. He dropped the gun and grabbed for the bad leg. I kicked him in the face and went for the Hulk. Eleisha was still riding his bull back like a rodeo cowboy. He was screaming as I put a deft chop into his Adam’s Apple. He began to gasp for breath and hit the dirty concrete like a sack of wet cement. The two of them writhed on the ground like a couple of hogs about to be slaughtered.
“You okay?” I asked Eleisha.
She raised her hands and the blood ran from beneath her nails. She nodded.
I bent down over the boulder.
“You want to tell me who set this up?”
He clutched his knee and groaned. I raised my foot and gave it another stomp.
“Okay,” he screamed, “it was a phone call . . . a woman, sexy voice, mentioned a couple of names. She didn’t say who she was, but she mentioned Lute. Wanted us to finish his job. She left half the money in a garbage bag near Long Wharf. We get the rest when the job is done.”
“Yeah . . . well the job is done. Give me your phone, asshole. I’ll call 911. You can tell them you tripped on the steps.”
Eleisha and I hurried back to apartment. She ran into the bathroom and began to scrub her hands. I checked all of the locks and pulled my old Taurus .38 from the shoebox in the closet and spun the cylinder to make sure it was loaded. I took boulder’s phone out of my pocket and laid it on the kitchen table next to the .38. I looked around the apartment again, pulled the shades, and checked for any unlocked windows. Maybe we were safe. I didn’t know.
What I did know was there was no pizza. I found a couple of Hebrew Nationals just begging to be browned in the pan. I melted a pat of butter and waited for it to sizzle. Eleisha fixed a salad. She looked a little shaken, but I was probably the only one who could tell. The lady was tough.
“I owe you for that one,” I said.
“Yeah . . . you do, but something wasn’t right. I knew it when we got back from Hull. It was the smell. I don’t wear that drugstore shit. I’m just glad I got off my butt to check on you. You do give me a pain in the ass sometimes, but I’m not ready for your funeral . . . at least not yet.”
She tried to laugh, but it came out more like a gurgle.
“We’re closer than we think. Even the mob doesn’t like to leave extra bodies laying around unless it’s absolutely necessary. It’s just too damned messy.”
“So why don’t you call Billy?”
“Good question, but no good answer. We don’t have anything. It could go down as a simple mugging. Neither of us hurt. But I guess I ought to let him know. I did take the thug’s cell phone. Maybe something there. I could pick either one of them out of a lineup, but maybe we sent the right message.”
“Yeah . . . dream on, sucker. That’s a message that could get us killed.”
“Well, there is that.”