The Usher

by Will Pettijohn

  He pulled up to the circle drive lined by live oak trees in front of the large house and looked carefully to both sides. He couldn’t see anyone, and the Lincoln parked in front of the house was in clear sight. His mind was put at ease a little more when he saw the car there. Gamboni didn’t like going anywhere without taking the Lincoln. Its bulletproof glass and steel-reinforced doors provided him with a little more security than a regular car. Gamboni sacrificed speed for security, and his car was his primary security blanket.

  Colt knew that even if the car was there, Gamboni may not know what was going on. He made his way up the circle drive and parked on the driver’s side of the Lincoln, in case bullets began flying. He looked around again as he slowly stepped out of the car. Still no one was to be found. He placed his pistol in his jacket pocket and made his way to the door. He cautiously pressed the doorbell button and waited. He turned a little, placing his right side to the door. This would give him a chance to pull his gun in the event that Berto tried something stupid.

  The door opened. Berto was wearing a white cooking apron over his black slacks and black silk shirt. Berto was a big man, but Colt was still much larger than he was. Berto smiled as he greeted Colt and shoved his hand out to shake Colt’s. Colt looked into Berto’s eyes and noticed that he was nervous. He forced a smile, shook hands, and asked, “Where’s he at?”

  “He’s showering now and will get dressed afterward. I told him you were on your way, and he told me to cook an extra piece of veal for you to join us for dinner.”

  “Okay, sounds great!” Colt said and entered the house after Berto had moved from in front of the door. Colt couldn’t see anyone else in the front part of the house, but his guard was still up, and would be until he saw Gamboni. He followed Berto into the living area and then into the sitting room. Berto turned and said, “Wait here and I’ll go and see if he’s ready.”

  Colt’s hands were down by his side as he looked around and then watched Berto walk into the other room. He sat on a Brazilian, first-cut leather chair in the corner of the room so that he could see every entrance. After a few moments he heard Berto call to him, “Hey, Colt!”

  “Yeah … What’s up?”

  “Come on in here for a bit while we are waiting. … I don’t want the veal to burn.”

  “Okay,” he said, and walked toward the door. He knew what veal smelled like when it was being cooked, and he didn’t smell anything cooking. The feeling in his gut told him that this was it … He stopped just shy of the door and pulled his gun from his jacket. The feeling that came over him wasn’t new to him. He felt it each time he had to do a job. This was going to turn very bad … real fast. Colt placed his head to the door and heard nothing. He moved his head away from the door and cautiously placed his body to the right of it. He pushed the door open with his left hand. …

  A shot rang out, and wooden shrapnel from the oak barrier began flying in all directions. It was followed immediately by another shot, until the total was four. Colt moved away from the door and looked at the pattern on it. It had been made by scatter pellets from a shotgun. Berto had planned to shoot him when he walked through the door, and it would have been messy.

  Colt thought about how Berto would explain the mess to Gamboni. He was listening for anything, but couldn’t hear a sound. He decided to taunt Berto and make him reveal his position to him. “Berto, you got a lot of nerve shooting at me, boy.” But Berto didn’t make a sound.

  “Why did you do that, Berto?” he continued in a sarcastic voice.

  After a moment Berto answered. “I am just removing another wall that’s in my way, Colt!” he shouted from the other end of the kitchen.

  “What does that mean, Berto?” he asked to pinpoint his location. Colt knew the kitchen well.

  “You have to be removed from my path, Colt. I can’t do what I need to do unless you are gone. That’s just the way things have to be, old friend.”

  “What is it that you’re trying to do here, Berto? And I am not your fucking friend. I’ve never liked you or the way that you suck the old man’s dick to get what you want. You’re his little pet rat, and I’m going to exterminate you.”

  Berto paused for a moment and then answered, “I have orders to kill you, and then I will take your place.”

  “Oh yeah … You following orders from Gamboni?”

  “Oh no … not Gamboni. I’m following orders from my new boss.”

  “Who’s your new boss, Berto?”

  “You don’t need to worry about that, Colt. Just die and then I can fix the mistake I made.” Berto followed with another blast from the shotgun.

  After the splinters had stopped, Colt continued to probe. “What mistake, Berto?”

  “Remember the time when you were tried for a murder last year? That was—” The sentence was halted as mumbles were heard in the back of the kitchen and then three shots rang out, one after another. It was quiet, and then the rustling of footsteps could be heard. Tony’s voice thundered through the kitchen and into Colt’s waiting ears. “Colt? You okay, primo?”

  Colt was relieved to hear a friendly voice. “Hell, yeah, I’m okay, Tony. He either doesn’t like doors very much or his aim sucks. Hee hee.”

  “You need to see this, Colt,” Tony said after he opened the door slowly and looked at him. The two walked through the shot-up door to see Berto lying in a pool of blood. His face was destroyed, and he looked like freshly ground hamburger meat. There were two other large holes in his torso from the shotgun that Tony still held in his hand.

  Just then, the front door was kicked open and three of Tony’s goons entered at high speed. Guns drawn and a hunger for killing in their eyes, they searched the front rooms. Tony looked at Colt. “Over there by the china hutch,” he said, pointing. Colt walked around Berto’s dead body and looked to see what it was. And there lying on the floor … was the cold, dead, lifeless body of the crime boss Don Michael Gamboni.

  Berto had killed Gamboni, just as he had planned to kill Colt. Colt knelt down by the body and checked for any sign of life. But there was nothing left in the mob boss. Berto had murdered him sometime before he knew Colt would arrive and then left him there. Colt was devastated by what had happened. Gamboni was hard to get along with sometimes, yes. But in many ways, Gamboni had been like a father to him. He had been obligated to him since he was nineteen years old. Gamboni was more of a father to him than even his own father was.

  Colt placed his hand over the dead boss’s eyes and began to cry for his own loss. Tony placed a hand on Colt’s shoulder and gently patted him in understanding. So many memories of the past years flooded back into Colt’s mind as he knelt down beside his old friend and wept. Colt gathered a look of hate upon his face as he wiped the tears from his eyes, cleared his throat, and stood quickly. He stomped the four steps back to Berto’s dead body and began shooting him in the head in anger. His gun held nine shots, and they all found their mark.

  After it was empty and the slide stayed back, Colt continued to pull the trigger with no results. Tony walked over and slowly raised his hand to place it on Colt’s silent gun. He gently pushed Colt’s hand down and then stepped back. “I know, primo … and we all thought a lot of Big Mike.”

  “I don’t know why Berto did this, Tony. But I will find out and settle the score with the fucking piece of shit he was working for.”

  “Colt … I think you should know that on the way over here, one of my guys asked me a stupid question. He asked me if we were gonna kill Berto.”

  “So why is that a stupid question?”

  “Because I didn’t tell him where we were going. He was in my office when you called and heard the conversation, but I never said anything other than load up, we’re leaving. I noticed him getting anxious when we were turning down the drive here. He asked me the question, and I told Daniel to grab him.”

  “I gue
ss I don’t understand, Tony.”

  “He knew where we were going when we got close to the house. I never said we were coming here. So he had to have been working with Berto.”

  “What the fuck?”

  “I figured you’d want to know what the hell was going on, so I have him in the trunk now if ya wanna talk to him.”

  “Hell, yeah, I want to talk to him.”

  Tony turned to one of his guys and said, “Bring him in.” Colt pulled the empty clip out of his pistol and reloaded it with a full one from his jacket. Tony said nothing as he watched him load and then put the gun away.

  Colt stood with his wrists crossed at his waist and waited for the men to finish dragging the man through the house. Colt picked up a chair from the cook’s table in the kitchen and placed it in the middle of the room. “How many guys you got here, Tony?” Colt asked.

  “I have three plus this son of a bitch … Why?”

  “I just want to make sure we don’t have any other unexpected guests.”

  “We have the place covered, Colt. You do your thing and I’ll watch you this time. Maybe I’ll learn something about getting information. Just don’t drug him before you talk to him. It makes for a slow conversation.” Tony smiled. But the frown never left Colt’s face as he looked at Tony. He was focused now and wanted to know the answers to his questions.

  The man was dragged into the kitchen and placed into the chair. Colt looked around and found a roll of duct tape and removed it from under the counter. He tossed it to one of the men and watched them tape his hands and feet to the chair. Colt asked them to place each arm on the armrests of the chair, and they complied. After the man was secured to the chair, Colt walked around him slowly. He circled him twice before stopping on his right side.

  He pulled the rag out of his mouth that had been placed there before he was thrown into the trunk and said, “You have a decision to make. You can give me the information and I’ll let Tony deal with you. Or you cannot give me the information and make me angry. If you make me ask you twice for the information, then … I don’t think you’ll like that option.” The man’s mouth never moved. He peered into the distance.

  Colt looked at the set of Cutco knives in a wooden holder on the countertop. He pulled the short peeling knife from the wooden block, and then walked over to the man and asked, “Do you think this will hurt when it cuts?”

  Again the man didn’t say anything. He watched as Colt came closer and then looked up into his eyes. Colt raised the man’s little finger on his left hand and placed the knife on the first bend. He watched the man now looking at the knife. Colt moved the knife to the end of the finger, placed the blade under the man’s fingernail, and shoved it deep into the tissue. The man suddenly screamed from the pain, and his body began to jerk violently.

  “Will you talk to me now?” Colt asked in a dangerously calm voice. Tony grimaced from the scene of so much blood dripping from such a small part of the body. The fingernail was nearly removed now as it rose ominously above the nail bed.

  “I’ll tell you … what I know!” the man answered in a cracked voice, with tears in his eyes and his body shaking from the intense pain.

  “How did you know you were coming over here?”

  “I overheard Tony talking on the phone, and when he hung up, I called Berto and told him I thought you had called. I was told a few days ago to keep my ears open and let him know if I heard anything,” the man whined.

  “So why would Berto ask you to let him know if you heard anything?” Colt asked in the same strange voice.

  “I don’t know.”

  Colt closed his eyes, shook his head, and then reached down to get to the wounded hand again. He took the man’s ring finger into his and shoved the knife deep under that nail as well. The man flailed around, jerking on the duct tape, and thrashed his head back and forth from the pain. He began screaming unrecognizable words at the top of his lungs from the anguish that his new wound caused.

  “I’ll ask you again. Why did he ask you to let him know?”

  The man regained himself for a moment and answered, “Because he’s had me doing some stuff for him lately. Berto said there was something going down soon … something big. I told him you were at the garage yesterday, and he told me to watch Tony and see if you guys kept talking. That’s it, man. I swear.”

  “So what kind of stuff have you been doing for him?”

  “He had me rig a couple of sea containers at the dry docks with explosives for him. He had me find him a couple of thugs to work for him too.”

  “Why would Berto need thugs to work for him?”

  The man’s wounds continued to pour blood. “He told me that he was gonna kill you and that he was gonna kill Gamboni. But I didn’t think he’d do it, man. He’s always talked about stupid shit … but I never thought he’d really do it.”

  “Why didn’t you think he’d do it? Did you know Berto very well?”

  “Yeah … I knew him real well. He’s my cousin.”

  “So you’re cousins with Berto and Squeaky?”

  “Yeah, we have a big family and most of us are close. Berto told me he was gonna take you out a few weeks ago. I asked him what happened when I saw you, and he said his new boss wasn’t able to help him do it. So he’d have to figure it out on his own.”

  “Who was Berto working for?”

  “I don’t know, man, some FBI guy that hired him a while back.”

  “Hmm, so Berto was working for an FBI agent?”

  “Yeah, that’s what he told me. He said the FBI guy hated you as much as he did and that they were going to take you out. Then the FBI guy was gonna let Berto take out Gamboni so Berto could take over where Gamboni left off.”

  “How the fuck did he think he was gonna just take over the Gamboni family?”

  “He said he knew all of the business and who to contact for everything. He said Gamboni was slipping and that he had to pick up the slack. He said that he told Gamboni that if the cops found anything at the dry docks, they’d be all over, and that wasn’t good for business.” The man squirmed from the pain and spoke quickly.

  “So you knew about the shipments? Because of Berto asking you to work for him? Didn’t you think of what would happen if Gamboni caught you?”

  “Berto told me to wire a couple of sea containers with booby traps so that the cops would get blown up when they opened them. I did it, but I never thought anything would ever happen. Berto was always full of shit.”

  “Why did Berto want to draw attention on the docks?”

  “He told me about a dirty cop who was working for Gamboni. He said he’d be around when the cops opened them and he couldn’t let that cop run his mouth after Gamboni was dead. He said he would kill Gamboni after the cop was dead … and then he’d kill you.”

  “So let me make sure that I have this all down. Berto planned to kill the cop, so he made you plant the bombs and then told you to let him know if anything was up. And then he planned on killing me too. Does that about cover it?”

  “Yeah, that’s right. Berto had to get things ready for his boss so that when he came back around, Berto would be set up to take over the business. When the FBI wanted you dead and Berto caught wind of it, he made contact with them. They know all about Gamboni’s business and you too.”

  “They do, huh? I’m still confused about how Berto thought he would take over the business. Gamboni has a son, and a lot of other people are in line before Berto would ever be able to step in.”

  “He said that as long as he took out the main people he needed to, everyone else would leave him alone. The FBI guy was going to take down all the other key players and let Berto run the business. Then he’d take a cut of the profit and become rich, with Berto running the family business.”

  “Why did you help him?”

  �
��’Cause he’s my cousin, and if he’s on top, that don’t put me far from the top,” the man explained, and he cringed from the pain again.

  Colt looked at Tony and said, “I think that answers a lot of my questions.”

  Tony walked to the back door and then looked at Colt. Colt followed, and the two stepped outside the doorway to the kitchen. Tony looked at Colt, scratched his chin, and asked, “So … Berto was working for an FBI agent?”

  “I think it’s the guy who tried to frame me for those murders of my old attorney’s family. He told me he’d get me no matter what. The last time I saw him, he was pretty angry because I beat the case.”

  “So this guy’s got a lot of stroke, huh?”

  “He’s in jail. The news said he’s being held in federal custody.”

  “So even from prison he was able to have Gamboni whacked and almost kill you? I ain’t buying it, Colt.”

  “I guess the guy does have a lot of stroke. Berto must have known that he couldn’t pull this off. I mean … Berto couldn’t take out enough people for him to be able to be the boss. He’s like at least fifteenth in line for that. Besides, he’s not even that kind of guy. He hasn’t ever killed anyone, as far as I know. Well … until now, that is.”

  “Well, Gamboni may have been his first, but why practice fishing when you have a whale living with you?”

  “I see what ya mean. I still can’t believe Berto thought of all of this. I mean … I know the FBI guy had a plan. But for Berto to put it all into action, after the brains has gone to prison, just doesn’t seem right. Berto probably can’t even spell his name right. This takes some real thinking, and I believe he had more help than this guy is saying or maybe even knows about.”

  “So let’s go back in and ask him some more questions.”

  “I’ll watch you this time. Like you said, you need the practice.” Colt handed him the knife and giggled. Tony took the knife and smiled big before turning and walking back.