“No, he’s not Mr. Guzman. This is my buddy, Ralph.”
She nodded once. “Remember, Joey, Saturday night. It’s your last chance.”
Ralph and I watched her walk through the door then he turned, put the beer bottles on the bar and grinned.
“Who was that?”
“Agent Viola of the IRS.”
“The IRS? What’s she doing here?”
That’s when the idea hit me. I took a swig of a beer Ralph had put down on the bar.
“She’s going to help me talk Grassman into letting me use the bar for another gig. She just doesn’t know it yet.”
Chapter 50
No sooner had Agent Viola sauntered out than Toughie came in. They must have passed each other on the sidewalk. Toughie glanced over her shoulder at the closed door and turned to me.
“Who’s the bimbo?”
“Agent Viola of the IRS.”
“What’s the IRS doing here?”
Ralph reached across the bar and tugged on my sleeve. I ignored him. “Agent Viola’s going to help me secure the venue for Delilah’s gig.”
“Yeah, I’ll just best she is. I thought the show was going to be here.”
“It is.”
Toughie shook her head. “Spare Parts, I don’t know what’s the greater mystery, what happened to Amelia Earhart or how you stay alive.”
She crossed the bar to the counter. From the corner of my eye I saw Ralph straighten up. He appeared to be glaring at me, like I’d forgotten to pack the ammo for the Battle of the Bulge. I ignored him. He cleared his throat. Loud. Toughie turned and seemed to notice him for the first time.
“Hi, I’m Ralph,” he said. He smiled, tried to suck in his ample stomach, and held out his hand.
“I’m Toughie.” She shook his hand.
“I know. I recognized you the moment you walked in. I was always a huge fan.”
“You liked Roller Derby?” Her eyes sparkled. She was still holding his hand.
“Yeah, it was okay. Mostly I just liked to watch you move around in those tight shorts and those tights, oh my, it was … heavenly. I could have watched you go around that track for hours.”
“I usually did,” she said and rested her right hand on a cocked hip. She tossed her head and her short hair bounced like a handful of bratwurst.
“I know,” Ralph said. “Counterclockwise had always been my favorite direction. It’s so, I don’t know, just so graceful.”
“I always thought of it more as art than athletics,” she said.
“Me too.”
I cut Ralph with my eyes. He looked at me and shrugged. What?
Roller derby graceful? Counterclockwise his favorite direction? For a second I wondered if someone had slipped a few pharmaceuticals into my coffee or spiked my muffin. Then I remembered that I hadn’t eaten breakfast. I looked from Ralph to Toughie and back. Their eyes were locked. They didn’t know I existed. Rhinos in love.
I cleared my throat. “Ah, excuse me.”
Toughie dropped Ralph’s hand and turned to me. I swear she was blushing, but it was hard to be sure. With Toughie, it was a little like watching Stonehenge blush.
“Oh, yeah, Spare Parts. Vincent the Hammer wants to know how it’s going.”
“Great. Just great, but I’ve got to run an errand. I’m nailing down the band and need to talk to a lady.”
“Keep in touch.” Toughie was only half listening, already turning back to Ralph who was trying not to drool.
“The thing is, I need a ride. I don’t have wheels.”
“My truck’s in Vegas. I had to take a cab here,” Toughie said.
“I was thinking maybe Ralph could drive me.”
“I’ll drive,” Ralph said. He was still looking at Toughie. “You’ve got to come too, right? Keep an eye on Joey?”
“That’s why Vincent the Hammer sent me over.”
I envisioned the three of us in the cab of Ralph’s van with me sitting atop a bag of year-old beef jerky squeezed between Toughie and Ralph.
“I’ll ride shotgun,” I said trying to lay claim to my spot. But if either one heard me, they didn’t give a sign, both of them deaf as a bag of Doritos.
Chapter 51
The back of Ralph’s van smelled like burnt oil and well-used embalming fluid. Sure, I’d called shotgun, but when Ralph swept open the passenger door for Toughie I’d gone ahead and climbed in the back without protest. Who was I to stand in the way of true love?
I looked for a place to sit and spotted a big rolled up carpet near the back door – a shag the color of a Cracker Jack box – and I started to sit on it but caught myself. Maybe it was just some carpet Ralph was hauling around. But maybe there was prize inside. I didn’t want to know. I knelt behind Ralph’s seat.
“Where to?” Ralph said.
“Westwood, up by UCLA,” I said and tried to breathe through my mouth.
Ralph fired the engine and the van slowly came to life with little shivers and groans, like a giant waking up with a hangover.
Up front Ralph reached under the seat and pulled out a bag of beef jerky and held it out to Toughie. “Snack?”
Toughie reached over and pinched the bag with her finger tips but didn’t take it. “Oh, I really shouldn’t. I’m watching my weight,” she said and giggled like a school girl. Sometimes life catches you off guard. Like learning Al Capone slept with a teddy bear.
They were both still holding the damned bag full of jerky that was old before Buffalo Bill was born. I glared at Ralph then Toughie then Ralph again. Maybe Ralph finally got the hint.
“I understand,” he said. “You’re perfect the way you are.” He lowered the bag.
To this day I don’t know if I gagged because of the conversation or the smell. I closed my eyes and gripped Ralph’s seat hard to keep everything under control. Maybe it was my struggling for air that reminded him that I was there.
He craned his neck around. “So who you seeing in Westwood?”
“Letty Latte.”
“Great,” Toughie chimed in. “I just lover her ice blendeds. I haven’t had one in years. They’re the best.”
“Well, you know Letty’s motto, ‘no one matches my cups.’ ”
I’d met Letty Latte, the owner of a funky Westwood coffee shop frequented by U.C.L.A. students, a few years earlier. It was on the last day of my very brief career as a process server. I was supposed to hand Letty a subpoena and mumble those magic words ‘You’re served.’ But I knew I was going to be fired at the end of the day anyway, so I lacked motivation. Instead I’d told her who I was, advised her to take a short vacation, then tossed the subpoena in a trash can on the corner.
When we got to Westwood, Ralph and Toughie stayed in the van and I headed to the coffee shop.
Letty was short with flaming red hair and a tattoo of a milk bone dog biscuit on her forearm with the initials MAD. That way, she said, she’d never forget that ‘Men Are Dogs.’ I’d been told that her love life lacked a little something – men mostly.
She was behind the counter and smiled when I walked in. “Ah, Joey, good to see you. How about a latte on the house?”
“Maybe when I go. First, though, I need a favor.”
“Sure, sure, whatever you need,” she said and gestured to an empty table near the front window.
There were about a dozen students in the shop, every last one of them staring at a smart phone or a laptop with the concentration of a vampire eyeing a fresh neck. I worked my way past them unnoticed to the table and waited for Letty.
She finished serving a customer and joined me a few moments later. “So what do you need?”
“I’m thinking of bombing the student union. For homecoming. You want in?” I glanced around. All the vampires were wired for sound, their ear plugs firmly in place. Not a one paid attention. I leaned across the table and whispered to Letty.
“I need a high SAT score.”
“You thinking of going to college, trying to make something of yourself?”
“It’s not for me.”
“Good decision.”
“Who do you know that can take a test?”
“I know a lot of people. What do you need?”
I described the situation briefly – giving very specific information about Hakim. It wouldn’t work if a Nordic Amazon showed up and claimed to be a boy named Hakim.
“Yeah, I’d got a kid. Ramon. He’s Mexican but can pass for just about anything, except maybe white. How high a score you need?”
“High enough to get into Stanford or Harvard, but not high enough to draw suspicion.”
“He can do that. What about ID?”
“Ralph will get you everything you need – driver’s license, school ID, everything. I’ll just need a couple of photos of Ramon.”
“Ralph? Haven’t seen him in a while. How is he?”
“He’s in love.”
“Miss Piggy?”
“Not exactly but … .” I shrugged.
“Well, say hello for me.” She glanced at a couple of vampires at the next table and back to me. “I gotta tell you, this isn’t going to be cheap.”
“I was thinking we’d call it even for the subpoena.”
Letty stared into space for a moment, then nodded. “Deal. So how about that latte?”
I thought of Ralph and Toughie in the van. “Nah, but I’ll take a couple of ice blended mochas to go.”
Chapter 52
The Roo brothers were waiting on the sidewalk outside the bar when we got back from Westwood.
Ralph shut the van down and it shook, coughed and sputtered, not that anyone else seemed to notice. I climbed out and glanced back at Toughie and Ralph. They were clutching that damned beef jerky bag again, the ends of their fingers touching, and staring into each other’s eyes.
I started to say something, but figured there wasn’t much point — they’d forgotten I was even in the van, let alone noticed that I’d gotten out. I turned to the Roo boys.
“Vincent the Hammer wants a report,” Jimmy said and pointed to the Continental at the curb.
I climbed into the back seat as compliant as a corpse in a hearse. We’d covered a couple of blocks when I leaned forward, my head between Jimmy and James, a garbanzo bean between a couple of cantaloupes.
“Hey, we have time to make a quick detour?” I asked.
They stared straight ahead, silent as sarcophagi.
“It’s for my grandmother. Hector the bail bondsman won’t guarantee her bail unless he knows I’m back in L.A.”
Silence.
“Come on, guys, you don’t want Ethel spending a night in jail because of my, ah, spotty record with Hector, right?”
“We already talked to Hector,” Jimmy said.
“Told him you weren’t leaving L.A. again,” James said.
“Without Vincent the Hammer’s permission,” Jimmy said.
“Oh great, thanks,” I said. I probably should have been happy that they’d taken care of Ethel’s bail problem, but at that moment I had trouble working up much enthusiasm — sort of like learning that you’re being transferred from a super max prison to a minimum security joint a hundred miles north of Nome. In January. On paper minimum security looks like a better deal, but, as the saying goes, the devil’s in the details.
We rode in silence the rest of the way to Vincent the Hammer’s house. They made me take my shoes off again and I crossed that white shag carpet to Vincent’s desk. He was wearing a long-sleeved silver lamé shirt open at the collar and a gold link chain necklace. The necklace and the shirt didn’t match but at least he wasn’t wearing that jacket that looked like an albino Irish setter.
He had the show tunes playing — Man of Le Mancha, this time.
“Sit,” Vincent said and pointed to the folding metal chair across from his polished plywood desk.
I sat.
“Joey, Joey, Joey, you’ve certainly caused me a lot of trouble lately.”
That’s when I noticed the well-worn catalogue for garden implements on his desk. It was open to a page featuring an industrial strength wood chipper. “No job too tough. It’ll even grind up old oak stumps.”
He must have caught me eyeing the catalogue. “I like to garden. You?”
“I tried to raise some pot plants under a grow light once.” I shrugged indicating it hadn’t really worked. Sure, I’d gotten a couple of plants but they were pretty lame, didn’t pack enough punch to get a hedgehog high.
Vincent nodded as if he understood. “It’s all in the fertilizer. You’ve got to make sure there are lots of nutrients. I favor fresh bone meal myself.”
Now what do you say to that? I thought to tell him that I’d had rickets as a kid, but didn’t figure it would give me much of an edge.
“So Delilah says you’re going to make it work this time,” Vincent the Hammer said.
“I’ve got it under control.”
“Band?”
“A group of great musicians.”
“Like that group you tried to pass off last time? Who was it again, Dumbass and Dipshit?”
“These guys are different. Everyone of them is really talented.” I said a silent prayer that Hakim would deliver.
“And she’s going to get great reviews, right?”
I remembered Davey the semi-illiterate music critic who hated everything. Another complication, but I was sure I could come up with something to motivate him, or some way to make sure he missed the performance all together. I’d have to be careful, though. Another bout of projectile vomiting could ruin the whole thing. At a minimum, I’d need some fresh pretzels.
“I know the reviewer. He’s going to love Delilah,” I said.
Vincent the Hammer nodded. “You owe me. You know that, right?”
“Oh absolutely. But I’m also doing this because I really think Delilah can sing.”
Vincent raised his hand, turned his head, and smiled as he listened to the lyrics coming from those iPod speakers, The Impossible Dream — ‘That my heart will lie will lie peaceful and calm, when I’m laid to my rest.’
“Great lyrics, no?” Vincent the Hammer said and smiled.
I wasn’t quite sure how to respond. Was there a message there? It was tough to tell. After all, when you’re dealing with a man nicknamed “The Hammer” there’s a tendency to dismiss subtly and irony as communication styles.
I eyed the wood chipper in the catalogue again and opted for silence, choosing to just nod in agreement. Besides, I knew if I tried to speak my voice would probably come out sounding like Minnie Mouse with a snoot full of helium.
“On top of everything else I had to save you from Royal Rob. Disrupted my whole Vegas operation.”
“Delilah didn’t like him very much.”
“True enough. But she wouldn’t have been in Vegas if you hadn’t screwed up in the first place.”
I could see why he was such a successful mob boss. Vincent the Hammer had a way of cutting through all the BS and getting right to the point. That and he probably had a garage full of very intimidating garden implements.
“Saturday,” I said. “One gig and Delilah is on her way. She’s going to be a star.”
“Guaranteed?”
“Would I lie to you?” Okay, so it was probably the wrong thing to say considering I’d gotten into this mess by trying to sell him a fake John Lennon guitar.
“Joey, you’d lie to a ham sandwich if you thought you could steal the pickle.”
“But I don’t like pickles.”
Vincent glanced at the catalogue and back at me.
“Toughie told me you weren’t as dumb as you look,” he said.
“I try.”
“She said you were dumber. Beats me what Delilah sees in you.”
He found a pair of scissors somewhere, opened and closed them a couple of times then rose up in his seat a little and peered over the edge of the table. He focused on my jeans. I focused on the scissors. I crossed my legs.
Still, I smiled. I couldn’t help my
self. He’d said Delilah sees something in me. Sure, it wasn’t much. But, when your immediate future includes becoming best friends forever with an industrial strength wood chipper, you’ll grasp at anything.
“Saturday night. You’re going to love the show,” I said.
Chapter 53
We were about a block away from Vincent the Hammer’s house when I started thinking again about that wood chipper. I was slumped in the backseat as usual with Jimmy driving the Continental and James riding shotgun.
I leaned forward and tried my best smile. “So you guys ever see Vincent the Hammer actually use a wood chipper?”
“Yes,” they said in unison. It wasn’t the ‘yes’ that bothered me so much as the lack of hesitation before the response. Like well-timed cymbals in a symphony, not even a quarter beat off.
Oh well, what’s the old saying? If you don’t want to know the answer, don’t ask the question.
“Okay then, just checking,” I said and sprawled across the backseat and for the first time in years thought of an old friend named Philip Fillup. Philip had been a Communist in college but became a capitalist soon after graduation. He’d explained his conversion like this. “Joey, being a Communist is just too hard. You gotta move to some place like North Korea or Cuba. But being a capitalist is easy. You only need to know one thing – when in trouble, expand.”
I always thought that was a line of BS, then I met a banker.
So I was thinking about Communists, bankers, and wood chippers when I decided Philip was right. I needed to expand. When your immediate future is a choice between an instrument that can grind up oak stumps and a synthetic wool blend, what have you got to lose?
“I need to go see someone. How about a detour?” I said and leaned forward between the seats.
“Who?”
“A PR guy. He’s going to help me make Delilah famous.”
Jimmy and James stared straight ahead, as always their eyes hidden behind their black sunglasses. Sometimes talking to them was like getting your mail delivered on a rural route by a drunken postman. There was always a delay and you were never quite sure the outgoing mail ever really made it through.
Chuck Freadhoff - Free Booze Tonight Page 15