by Paula Cox
I stare back, and we continue on like this for a minute or two like total idiots. Then Theo’s door opens; a sickly, hunched-over kid totters out like he’s just gotten out of the hospital, and a green and blue streak of feathers goes flying overhead, squawking ‘pussy, pussy.’
I get a snapshot of the interior. Black and white tiled floors, big oaken desk, a couple of what look like Corinthian pillars behind it, some strains from an opera, a squeal—
The door slams shut. It’s just us again, plus the kid and this parrot. He’s easily the biggest and the most beautiful parrot I’ve ever seen - red like blood, green like spring, grass, blue like water, and yellow like the sun. I sound like a goddam poet just describing the thing. Part of me wants to know how much the old boss paid for the creature, while the other part says don’t bother: even if you worked for the Brothers full-time there ain’t a chance you’d see anywhere near that money in your lifetime.
The Brothers. Sometimes it’s the Family. If you wanna get fancy, it’s the Fratelli, but if you’re like the rest of us you just call it the mob. That’s Theo’s crew. Old Sicilian mob types. They came here about two hundred years ago right around the time of the Irish, and the two fought like devils in New York. Then they came a little bit more north and became friends, though by “friends” I mean in the sense when the other person isn’t constantly trying to put a jagged hunk of steel in your belly, or strap a bomb to the underside of your Mercedes.
All things considered, it’s still pretty crazy to think of the changes these guys have made recently. Take that guy who just walked out of Theo’s office - wormy, thin, and pale with so many freckles on his cheeks they look like a swarm of fire ants. Irish through and through.
Fifty years ago, if he’d been spotted a mile from this place, you could bet these Russians would have been there in seconds pounding his ass into the daisies. Now here he is trying to bum a cigarette.
“J—just one, man,” the kid stutters. Jesus. He looks like he’s about to cry. What the hell did Theo do to him?
The guy belches and turns towards me with the Russian’s tobacco pouch, and I see the bags under his eyes and start to think that it’s probably not a coke addiction—he hasn’t touched his nose once—so he’s probably just drunk.
Sure enough, he stumbles across the tiles and plants his elbow right in the nick of time on the balustrade, knocking off my tie. “Sorry, b—brother.”
He extracts a sheet of rolling paper, dumps on a pinch of tobacco, rolls most of it off the paper and onto the tiles, licks the end of the paper and sticks the shabbiest excuse for a cigarette I’ve ever seen in the tiny crevice in the corner of his mouth. “You g-got,” he stumbles over the word, once, twice like he’s playing jump rope with it. “G-g-otta light?”
“Pussy!”
The kid glares up at the bird as he tries to light the end of his paper with my Zippo. The parrot responds by dropping a long, wet shit on the tiles. The Russians both give identical dry chuckles. One says something into the gadget coming out of his ear, and a second later, an old Mexican woman with a mop and bucket appears from somewhere in the back of the mansion and scrubs the tiles back to glittering. The kid was still trying to light his cigarette.
It’s been awhile since I’ve been in a situation as strange as this. But it’s been awhile since anyone has made me an offer as good as what Theo Butler offered on the phone.
Tailgating—his word. Just to make sure his daughter doesn’t run into trouble.
Trouble. Now that’s a difficult word. There’s my definition of trouble, which is when you got rival Crewmembers with two-by-fours out for your blood. Then there’s a mob boss’s trouble, which if I’ve understood the Godfather right, could mean fifty shots from a submachine gun while waiting for your car to fill. Which one did you have in mind? I had asked him.
I swear I could hear the old man’s cheekbones pulling up into a smile at the question. We’re not expecting anything quite that exciting, he said. She’s a respectable young woman. Come on down to the mansion, and we’ll discuss all the fine points to your heart’s content.
I wipe more sweat from my hairline and take my Zippo back from the kid. I still like keeping it in my pocket even if I gave up cigs a long time ago. He tries to say thank you but the words come out as something much different, and I ignore it. Then he stumbles over to the big wooden door on the far side of the room, which the butler opens, and he disappears into the light of the day, trailed by another cry from the parrot. The Russians laugh again.
I’ve got a feeling it’s about my time, so I straighten up and make my fingers into a comb and loop my already-tied tie around my neck. My buddy who was gonna get married is the one who tied it for me—four of five years ago, I’ve forgotten now. Never learned how to do the thing myself.
“Scoose me.” It’s a girl’s voice—a Barbie’s voice, and she actually says it like that, so it sounds like the word ‘loose.’ I get up and push myself back against the banister.
Five feet of fluff and fur and a crown of Shirley-temple curls come bounding down the stairs, past the Russians, and into Theo’s office. Then, a second later, someone calls, “Quinn Tolliver,” and I take the last few seconds to re-comb my hair before entering the lair.
Respectable young woman, my ass. That’s not a woman. That’s a stick of bubblegum, a rugrat.
A problem.
That’s when the door slams shut behind me.
Chapter 3
“Mr. Tolliver. A pleasure to finally meet you in person.”
“Same.”
The old guy offers me a chair facing his desk, and I take it. The seat is an old wooden thing that has this rickrack, jerry-rigged feel to it—like someone scrapped a few pieces of cheap lumber together and called it a day. The thing sits a few inches lower than the desk, but I’m tall enough that Theo and I sit more or less at eye level.
It’s just as hot if not hotter in his study, the difference between inside and outdoors being that now I’m stuck wearing this goddam tie. Theo Butler, on the other hand, has got on this pinstriped double-breasted coat, buttoned all the way up like he was afraid something would slip out. His white hair looks like a ski slope, and as I would see later, when he wheeled himself to the door to see me out, he’s got a blanket on his lap.
The rugrat is nowhere in sight. She must’ve slipped through the back door. I look through the room’s only window and see a tangle of green garden.
“I must apologize if the heat has inconvenienced you. A necessary evil. Even the summers are enough to freeze me now.”
“Maine isn’t exactly known for its aggressive summers.”
Theo lights what’s probably a thousand-dollar cigar, exchanging it for his beaker of scotch. The bottle’s on the table, and the label reads Lagavulin, which I know is mid to high tier. With a guy like Theo, I half-expected the bottle to be made out of diamonds.
Theo drinks slowly but with care, smacks his old lips and sticks in the wedge of his cigar. He blows two pillars of smoke before saying anything to me.
“Do you smoke, Mr. Tolliver?”
“I quit,” I say.
“A shame. But perhaps I could convince you to share in a small celebration with me over your recent contract? Call it tradition.”
“You could try.”
Then the old man starts sizing me up with those tiny, brown eyes of his and part of me thinks I’m in trouble for talking short with a mob boss, but only a small part. Truth be told, most of me is wondering why the hell he’s got so many exotic birds in his office. I hadn’t noticed them at first because all my attention was trained on the big fellow and also because the cages are sort of nestled here and there amongst all the bric-a-brac, but honest to God they’re everywhere. Cockatoos, parakeets, other, smaller parrots, pigeons, and some others I can’t name. All of them silent as the grave.
Theo catches me looking around at the cages. “My little friends,” he says proudly, “spent six months with trainers before I took them into my o
ffice. If you were wondering why they were so quiet.”
“I was. Why do you keep them here?”
“Colors, Mr. Tolliver. Everything else is so dark—I’m a man who spends his time in suites, offices, and cars and all of them are dark.”
“Buy a painting.”
“Never cared for art. Too much of it in the old country. Birds are better. More exciting. And I don’t mind the smell—don’t even notice it anymore. Cheaper, too.”
“For a man like you is that really a concern?”
“No man likes knowing that he’s been cheated.”
“What about your parrot?”
“Michelangelo?” Theo’s eyes flash like coals. “My pride and joy. We fought the Peruvian government three years before we were allowed to purchase him. They thought they’d be putting one of their endangered Amazonians in jeopardy if they sold him to a mob boss. Now the Amazon’s cut down and the country’s gone to hell and Michelangelo has got six square meals a day and his own aviary. Governments don’t know a thing about their countries, Mr. Tolliver.”
“I’d expect as much,” I say, “from a mob boss.”
There’s a second of quiet and Theo gazes for a long time at his scotch. I’m wondering if maybe the joke was in bad taste, but it’s too late now to correct anything, so I just stand there waiting for him to finish. He brought me here to talk about his daughter, after all. Not some goddamned birds.
“Absolutely right,” he says when he puts his drink down again. “And absolutely true. Governments don’t know a thing about protecting our property. Let’s hope that you do better.”
So now we’re getting down to it. The old man takes out one of these big manila envelopes from his desk and gives it a quick flip-through before tossing it on his desk for me to flip through.
“Some light reading material for those nights when you can’t sleep.”
“What is it?”
“Addresses. Friends. Numbers. Places of interest. Preferred shopping malls.”
I take a quick look and find a big picture of a bald guy staring back at me, his name: DAVID GILLESPIE marked in caps underneath his photo. I also find his date of birth, job history, speeding ticket record and a blank list of ‘Interesting Persons in Relation to…’
“If you’ve already got a private investigator tailing your daughter then why do you need me?” I shut the manila envelope.
“Insurance.”
“That’s what you’ve got lawyers for.”
“Did you know, Mr. Tolliver-” Theo blows a smoke ring over the bronze statuette on his desk. “You’re the only man I’ve ever known to ask what exactly the money he’s getting paid is for? Everyone else just says okay and signs the form.”
“I’d like to know what I’ll be doing, Mr. Butler. Especially if you’re paying me two-and-a-half thousand dollars a day to do it.”
“At the end of the day, Mr. Tolliver, you’ll be keeping my daughter safe. The Family has its reputation pretty well taken care of in this part of Maine. We’re respected, and feared when we need to be. No one’s been hit in years. Old enemies have become friends. Do you know the Ceallaighs? They spend their time near the docks—old Irish, those types. We were the worst of enemies, and now we’re practically brothers. These are peaceful times.”
“If you believed any of that then you wouldn’t be giving me a job.”
“It’s because I do believe it and you don’t that you have the job, Mr. Tolliver. If I want to keep my daughter safe, then I’m going to choose the man who always expects danger rather than the man who assumes there is none.”
I can’t argue with that, and Theo knows it. One of the parakeets gives a squawk that we both ignore.
“It’s not a hard job. Not by any stretch. My daughter’s fond of shopping, friends, and parties—the same as any young person I suppose. All expenses paid of course, and a room in the local Astoria. Keys for the limo and your hotel card are in the folder.”
He slid out a clipboard with a few pieces of paper attached. I breeze through them and sign.
“You may consider yourself a glorified taxi driver, Mr. Tolliver. Or a bodyguard, if you find that more romantic.”
“I don’t care if it’s romantic. If you’re offering two-and-a-half grand a day to make sure your daughter comes home safe, then that’s what I’m going to do.”
The old man gives me this tight little smile and then wheels over to shake me by the hand, which is when I notice his blanket and just how big those hands are. He might be old now, but at one point there was some power in him.
“There’s just one question I’d like to ask before I begin.”
“Anything at all, Mr. Tolliver.”
“Who was the man who was in here before me?”
Something crosses the old man’s eyes like a tiny searchlight. I try to focus in on it, but it disappears a second later. His wrinkly cheeks make a smile.
“I’ll assume you’re referring to young Kit Holcomb. Some of my men have taken to calling him ‘Kitty.’ Others have taken up Michelangelo’s term, I’m afraid.”
“Does he work for you?”
“Are you asking me that because he’s a Ceallaigh?”
“I didn’t know he was a Ceallaigh.”
“But you guessed accurately enough.”
He goes back behind the desk. “The answer you’re looking for is a simple ‘no,’ but I’m afraid that’s not the whole story. You might have heard that the Ceallaighs and the Family have opened up for business lately. Brothers, as I’ve said. I’ve taken it upon myself to see that young Kit is properly integrated.”
“He looks half crazy if you were to ask me.”
Theo smiles. I don’t like one false curve about it. I know those kinds of smiles, dished out like counterfeit fifties to people who don’t know the difference.
“Kirill’t get carried away, Mr. Tolliver. You’ve been hired to look after Maya. Let me take care of myself.”
Chapter 4
Flash forward. Here we are again making our way like devils out from the mall. Anthony Gerard—the guy whose arm I probably would’ve broken if I hadn’t seen his glittery birthday card—turns out to be one of these guys who’s neck-deep in Maya’s pack. He’s all smiles and ‘no harm done’ and waits with his hands in his peacoat rotating from his heels to the flats of his feet up until security arrives. The sales clerk appears again from the back room and tries to smile. I get the idea that Maya doesn’t want me standing side-by-side, so I sit on the bench facing the store and try to wipe my smile away.
Security doesn’t need much talking to. Theo’s got his understandings with every policeman or woman from Portsmouth to New York City. Maya throws them a couple laughs and drops her last name casually like a used napkin and the next thing you know it these guys are practically scraping the ground bowing to Her Majesty. She slips them both what look like hundred-dollar bills and then we’re out of there.
We walk back to the car in silence. I dump the five bags into the trunk and open Maya’s door, and she slides in coolly.
She waits until I’ve pulled out of the parking lot before laying into me.
“You gonna tell me what the hell you were doing back there?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Kirill’t you damn well ask me that, not after I saw you twist Anthony’s arm like that. You ought to be thanking your lucky stars that it didn’t break.”
“Lucky stars don’t have a thing to do with it. If you’re that excited your friend’s okay, thank a solid radius and coordinated distribution of strength.”
“Are you trying to be funny?”
Maya hasn’t told me where I’m supposed to be going. We’re drifting on the service road right now, and I’m switching over to the highway when Maya’s hand makes a grab for the steering wheel, tugging us sharply back. I can hear the sound of squealing tires as the eighteen-wheeler behind us pumps its breaks. The horn sends off a groan, and I see in the rearview mirror the guy flipping me the bird.
“Jesus. You trying to kill us or something?”
“I asked you, are you trying to be fucking funny? Is this some fucking joke to you?”
Maya still hasn’t let go of the wheel. We’re doing sixty with a pissed-off trucker trailing behind us by a hundred feet or so, and I’m beginning to wonder whether or not I should fear for my life. Theo didn’t mention any suicidal tendencies, but now that I’m thinking about it I get to wondering if what I’ve seen so far of Maya Butler is just the good side of potential bipolar.
“Keep the gas on,” she hisses. “We’re not pulling over. I want you to get something straight.”