by Joe Corso
“Who the fuck do you think you are coming into my town and taking my money?” Bull’s disarming smile confused the little man. These two men should be quaking in their shoes, Carlos thought, not smiling at him. “What’s so funny, Mister? Mister? Say, what is your name?”
“Bull. Call me Bull, Carlos; everyone does. And here’s your money. We didn’t come here to steal your money; we came to Bonner Springs so one of my men could visit his sister. But dumdum here,” Bull said, pointing to O’Rourke, “abused my friend’s sister and that made him very angry, so he leaned on Brian and he kind of got carried away. Now that you have your money back and you know that we’re just passing through, we’ll be on our way.”
Carlos jumped up from behind his desk and stepped in front of Bull. “Not so fast. No one leaves here until I give the word. Understand?”
Bull’s temper was beginning to rise. He was never one to shy away from a fight, especially with a little turd like the one standing in front of him. Bull squinted his eyes and gave Carlos a look that could fry a potato.
“Leave it, Carlos. You don’t want to start anything with us.”
Carlos sneered. “Oh? And why not?”
“Because you’d be a dead man and we’d be running your little operation here. That’s why. Now if there’s nothing else you want to talk about, we’re leaving.”
Carlos’s other men in the room looked at their leader, waiting for him to do something, but Carlos was simmering with a rage that was about to boil over, and Bull and Joey both sensed it.
“Look, there’s no need for you to get excited. We’re not here to cause you any problems. We came here to return your money and to introduce ourselves; that’s all. We’re part of an outfit from Queens on our way to Nevada to look after our business interests there. Our boss is a very powerful man and, trust me when I tell you, you don’t want him visiting you here in Mayberry, USA. Now, are we finished?”
Instead of seeing the logic to what Bull was telling him, Carlos went into a hysterical rage and, without thinking, he pointed at his men and screamed, “Hector, Max, Julio, kill them; kill them now. I want them dead.”
It wasn’t very smart of Carlos not to have had the foresight to have had his men pat the two strangers down to see if they were armed before ordering them killed. Frankie kept watching the body language of Carlos’s men. He waited for Bull to make a move because he knew that Bull would react to the threat. Bull his hand around the gun in his jacket pocket, tilted up his finger, squeezed the trigger, and the shot hit Carlos once in the head, killing him instantly. Frankie had expected it, so he let go with his gun and then pandemonium set in as both men whirled around, shooting at Carlos’s men, with bullets flying everywhere. When the smoke cleared in the little room, Carlos and all of his men were dead, including O’Rourke.
Unfortunately, Frankie the Nose had taken one in the gut. The gunfight lasted about thirty heartbeats, but Bull hadn’t seen Frankie get shot. He had seen him fall back against the wall. He rushed over to him, catching him before he slid down the wall. Bull half carried and half walked him to Carlos’s plush leather chair and sat him gently down in it.
“Wait here. I’m going to get Joey and Richie. I’ll be right back.”
But Bull didn’t have to take more than a few steps from the room, because both Joey and Richie, having heard the gunshots, ran into the building, but being unfamiliar with the layout of the building, they spent some precious moments trying to determine where the gunshots came from. A door opened and both men pulled their guns, but lowered them when they saw that it was Joey and Richie.
“We heard gunshots. Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m okay, but Frankie is hurt bad. We’ve got to get him to a doctor. I’ve got to make a call to Red and have him check with Civella to see if he knows of any doctors near here that we could use.”
Bull called Red and Red told him to give him the number and he’d call him back in two minutes. He wrote down the number and rushed across the street to the mechanic’s shop to use his phone.
“Red, we tried to be reasonable, we really did. But the stupid fuck ordered his men to open up and kill us. We killed all of them, but Frankie was shot badly in the shootout.”
“Where is he hit?” Red asked.
“In the gut and it don’t look good.”
“Shit! Don’t go to any doctors. Fix Frankie up the best you can and I’ll see what I can do for you. I have the number you’re calling from and I’ll call you back in a few minutes.”
Red took out his little black book, the ones containing the names, telephone numbers, and addresses of his special friends and associates. He scanned the S’s and stopped at Scalia. Dr. Ben Scalia. Scalia was the doctor who had lost his license after working on a gunshot wound one of Red’s men received in a shootout. Ben wound up working at a pharmacy on the corner of Roosevelt Avenue and 111th Street. When federal agents blew up the Starlight Club and shot Red five times, almost killing him, Moose was with Red and he managed to drag him out of the wreckage. He brought him to the Corona Gentlemen’s Club and hid him in the secret room. Moose got back in his car and raced to the pharmacy. He pulled the former doctor aside and told him that Red was dying from a gunshot wound. “He’s barely hanging on,” he told Scalia.
The doctor got there in time to effectively save Red’s life and, from that moment, Moose stayed beside Red, administering to his needs until he recovered from his wounds. When Red learned that Ben Scalia had saved his life, he promised him that as soon as he recovered, he would use his money and influence to get his medical license restored to him.
Dr. Ben Scalia had a room full of patients. Every Tuesday evening, his medical services were free because he treated his elderly patients at no cost on that night. He took being a doctor seriously, and if his patients didn’t have insurance and couldn’t afford the medical care they needed, they would appear at his office on Tuesday nights and he’d treat them for nothing. The door opened and his receptionist informed the doctor that a Red Fortunato was holding on line 1 for him. Ben excused himself and picked up the phone.
“Ben, this is Big Red. One of my men has been terribly injured and I need to see you right away, so drop whatever you’re doing and get over here.”
Dr. Scalia told his patients that an emergency had arisen and he had to cancel all of his appointments. Fifteen minutes later, he was in Red’s office at the Starlight Club. Red got up from behind his desk and walked over to Scalia. He handed him an envelope and then he leaned close and whispered in the doctor’s ear just in case a bug had been placed in his office.
“There’s a plane leaving Kennedy in an hour and a half for Kansas City. I want you on it. Frankie the Nose has been shot and Bull told me that he’s got a bullet in his gut and he’s in bad shape. Bull will meet you at the airport and take you to see Frankie. Fix him up and give the men instructions on what to do after you leave. Then one of the guys will take you back to the airport and you’ll be back in Queens tonight. Do this for me and, after you fix up Frankie, when you get back, a substantial bonus will be waiting for you.”
Scalia looked at the plane tickets and then he put the envelope into his breast pocket. “I have to go home and pack some clothes.”
Red shook his head. “No you don’t. I told you; you’ll just be there a few hours, so there’s no need for any clothes.” Red opened his desk drawer and took an envelope out. “Here; take this. It’s a little traveling money.” Scalia opened the envelope and counted ten one-hundred-dollar bills.
“Christ, this is a lot of money, Red.”
“It’s for you so put it in your pocket. You never know; something may happen and you may need it. Come on now; you don’t want to miss your plane. Vinnie is waiting to drive you to the airport.”
As soon as the two men left the Starlight Club, Red called Bull.
“Red, did you call your friend?”
“No, I have another friend who is better qualified to help you with your problem and he’ll be ther
e in a few hours. His name is Ben and either you or one of the boys will meet him at Kansas City International Airport at eleven p.m. and take him to Joey’s sister’s house. Look for the flight from Idlewild to Kansas City due in at eleven p.m. Do I make myself clear?”
Bull knew Dr. Ben Scalia was the perfect choice to help Frankie the Nose, that was, if Frankie was still alive when the good doctor got there.
Chapter Seven
After leaving the Starlight Club, Doctor Ben asked Vinnie to stop by the pharmacy on the way to the airport, explaining that he wanted to pick up some medical instruments in case he needed to perform surgery. Less than five minutes after walking into the pharmacy in Corona, Ben walked out with the items he needed in his black leather doctor’s bag, and he was back in the car, rushing to the Idlewild Airport. Instead of pulling over to the curb in front of the terminal to drop off Dr. Scalia, Vinnie pulled into the garage and parked the car instead. Scalia tilted his head and looked at Vinnie.
“Why didn’t you just drop me off in front of the terminal instead of parking the car here?”
Vinnie smiled. “Because I’m coming with you.”
Ben looked confused. “Why would Red want you to come with me?” Ben asked.
“Red wanted someone to be with you in case there was some trouble.”
“Trouble?” Ben asked. “You mean, there still could be trouble? I thought that was all taken care of.”
“It was. I’m just a precaution in case we run into some residual problems, because you never know.”
As soon as Bull hung up the phone, he told Richie to pull the car into the warehouse and then close the bay door behind him.
“Red is sending a doctor here to take care of Frankie. Our job is to get Frankie out of here and get him to Joey’s sister’s house. I’ll pick up the doctor at the airport and bring him to the house. Joey, find something to put over the back seat. If the cops happen to stumble onto us, it’s best if they don’t find blood in the car. Meanwhile, wrap a towel tightly around Frankie’s waist to try to stop him from losing any more blood. We have to get out of here now. I don’t know if Carlos had any more men, but it stands to reason that if he had a fairly large organization, then he couldn’t have managed it with just the men we took care of tonight. He must have more men and you can make book on it that one of them will want to take over the territory. We better be long gone when they discover what happened here tonight. Joey?”
“Yeah, Bull.”
“You and Richie search the office. Look for a safe. Carlos wouldn’t have put anything of value in another room. He’d want it where it would be safe and he could get to it in a hurry. I’m thinking that he put it right here in his office. Check the filing cabinets and let’s see if they have anything of value stashed here.”
Richie Fingers pointed to a picture. “Bull, look at what I found on the side of the filing cabinet.”
The picture Richie was pointing to was of a 1963 Mustang Convertible with a smiling Carlos standing by the driver’s door. Richie pulled the picture and it swung to the side on cleverly concealed hinges, revealing a safe hidden behind it. Richie smiled, rubbing together the thumb and forefinger of both hands.
“This safe is like picking cherries. Anyone want to bet me that I can open this baby in less than five minutes?”
Both men shook their heads. Richie was the best pickpocket and safecracker in the business and they knew he could open the safe in no time at all. Three minutes later, the safe was open and Richie had the safe’s contents on Carlos’s desk.
“Let’s see what we have here,” Bull said. In one of the envelopes, they found three deeds to buildings that Carlos owned. One was for the warehouse they were in. The other two were commercial buildings in the business district. Another envelope contained twenty-five thousand dollars in large bills. The last envelope had a key to a safe deposit box in it, along with the title to the Mustang. Bull put the envelope containing the key and the car’s title in his side pocket and the envelope with the money in his jacket’s inside pocket.
As they carried Frankie across the cavernous warehouse to the Cadillac, Bull told the men, “Red said to give the doctor fifteen grand from the sixty Brian had stashed in the house for coming here to help Frankie. Tomorrow, I want to check out the safe deposit box. Who knows what we’ll find in it. We still have the sixty grand we took from Brian and the twenty-five from the safe and since this is not family business, it looks like we’re gonna have a nice chunk of cash to split between us. It’s too bad the Mustang is hot. I would have liked to take that baby with us to Vegas. I’ll call Red and tell him what we’ve done.”
“You gonna tell him about the money, Bull?” Richie asked, wondering if he’d really get a piece of that action.
“Sure, I’m gonna tell him, but since we found this money, I’m gonna ask him if we can keep it.” That brought a smile to Richie’s face.
Frankie was in great pain and the men eased him into the back seat of the Caddy, but with Frankie taking up the whole back seat, the three remaining men would have to sit in the front seat. The big Cadillac had the room, but Bull had a thought. “Richie, I noticed the keys to the Mustang in the desk drawer. Run back to the office and get them. Joey, go with him and call your sister and tell her to close the lights in the house and pull her car out of the garage and park it in the street. Tell her to leave the garage door open.”
“Why, Bull?”
“I’m gonna put the Mustang in the garage. Who knows, maybe we could work something out where we can take it with us. In the meanwhile, no one will see it in the garage with the door closed and I want the house dark when we carry Frankie in.”
Joey drove the Mustang, with Bull following in the Caddy. When they got to the house, Joey drove the Ford into the garage and closed the garage door behind him as he stepped out of the garage. He looked around to see if anyone had witnessed him pulling the car into the garage, but he could see no one. He hoped that was the case, that no one was there. Bull pulled the Caddy up the driveway and stepped out of the car, taking a casual glance around to see if the coast was clear to carry Frankie into the house. The street was dark and most people were either having dinner or watching television, too tired from a long day’s work to bother with anything that was happening outside.
The men eased Frankie out of the car and carried him carefully into the dark house and laid him in the bed in the guest bedroom, making him as comfortable as possible, considering how much pain he was in. JoAnne watched the men carry their friend in and she knew that something horrible had happened.
“Where’s Brian? Why isn’t he here?”
Joey took his sister aside and held her at arm’s length. “Sis, your boyfriend was involved with some crazy sons of bitches. After Bull gave them their money, we tried talking to them, but instead, they tried to kill us. We had to defend ourselves and we were lucky to escape with our lives. Brian and Frankie weren’t as lucky. Brian is dead and Frankie is near death.”
JoAnne put her hand to her lips. “My God, what are we going to do?”
“Everything is going to be all right. We have a doctor coming to the house later to patch Frankie up. Bull is going to the airport to pick him up. He should be here about midnight. Now why don’t you go make us a large pot of coffee? We’re gonna need it before this night is over. We’ll probably have to stay here for a week or so, or at least until Frankie recovers.” Or dies, he thought.
Bull looked at his watch. Ten o’clock. Still time to call Red, he said to himself. He picked up the phone and made the call. Red picked up the phone and listened to all that Bull had to tell him. He didn’t like the part about giving up the Mustang.
“Let it go. It’s too hot to fool with,” Red told him.
When he hung up, Red called Civella, who called him back at the mechanic’s shed from a pay phone. Now Red could tell Civella exactly what happened without having to worry about their phones being tapped. Red brought Civella up to date on everything that happened at the w
arehouse including the shootout that resulted in Frankie being badly shot and Carlos and his men being killed.
“I’m flying a doctor in to look after my man, but aside from that, it looks like your problem may go away. My men took care of Carlos and five of his men and my guys think there’s a possibility that one of Carlos’s other men might want to take over the mob, but if you send a few of your men to Bonner Springs right away, you could step in and keep the Bonner Springs action for yourself. You’ll also be getting the deeds to three properties my men found in Carlos’s safe. Bull, my guy in charge, said that one of the properties is the warehouse the gang had been working out of. It appears from the deeds to the properties are free and clear, so if you agree, I’ll arrange a meeting and at the meeting, my man will hand you the deeds.”
It was Civella’s nature to be suspicious and he was suspicious now. In his mind, he couldn’t understand why anyone would hand over the deeds to three properties when he could have kept them himself and not want something in return. This was something he would never do, because what Civella took, Civella kept.
“So you’re just gonna hand over the deeds, eh? Okay, I’m standing here waiting for the trapdoor to open, wondering what the catch is. You’re not doing this from the goodness of your heart. What is it you want from me in return?”
Red was smiling on the other end of the phone. “Well, for starters, my men could use a little help cleaning up the mess they left at the warehouse. I’m guessing the cleanup should happen now. I may be wrong and maybe no one will show up in the morning — but I think you should get this done and over with tonight, just in case someone does show up.”
Civella was quiet for a moment. “Yeah, I see what you mean.” But he was still suspicious. “And that’s all you want from me?”
“Well, there is something else.”
“I knew it. I just knew it. Okay, what else do you want from me?”
“My guys had to use Carlos’s pretty Mustang convertible and they parked it in one of my men’s sister’s garage. My man wanted the car, but I squashed that deal. That car is going nowhere. Carlos’s men would know it was missing and wonder where it was. They might try to track it through the title or registration or the plates. And it’s that unusual of a car that if it were driven locally, they’d spot it in a heartbeat Look, Nick. I want you to have one of your men drop the car off somewhere and forget about it. As far as anything else goes, I have no interest in getting involved in your Kansas City business. That’s your territory and what’s yours is yours. My men are just passing through. I have properties out west that they need to manage for me. That’s why I told them to hand you the deeds when they meet you tomorrow. ”