Kill City USA
Page 6
A bunch of gay male heads had turned as she entered, as they obviously knew a good thing when they saw it. She walked over to me behind a welcoming smile and dark green satiny eyes. I traded her my neon smile, this being an Art Deco town.
We introduced ourselves by a loose handshake and were shown by a hovering waiter to a circular table at the rear corner, where Cza took the seat facing the front of the restaurant, as Dooley had done earlier. It was either a Cuban dining custom or she probably preferred to be facing the door if she felt her dinner companion was about to be shot.
‘Hi I’m Zane, and I’ll be serving you tonight. A cocktail to start?’ said a fawning waiter, addressing Cza while ignoring me. He’d meant to say that he’s a tip-hungry whore and a bottom-feeder like me had better come up with at least twenty-five per cent, then he might make nice to me next time.
Cza swivelled to face him. ‘Sure. A Tanqueray pink gin.’
‘Pink gin?’
‘Pink gin,’ said Cza. ‘If your Tanqueray ain’t in the freezer then stir the gin with ice. Don’t shake it. That dilutes the alcohol. Then coat a martini glass with Angostura bitters. Tip out the excess. Add the well-iced Tanqueray – not some other brand – it comes in a dark green bottle. And leave out the garbage.’
‘The garbage?’
‘Olives, twists, whatever.’ She pondered. ‘No. I’ll have a couple of black olives on the side. I’ll stir ‘em in and eat ‘em. That’s it. Thanks.’
I ordered the same, it seeming boorish not to, as Cza left the table to say hello to a friend sitting nearby, and the waiter left to consult The Bartender’s Bible.
She returned and said, ‘Xavier’s told me a lot about you.’ I wasn’t used to using Dooley’s first name. ‘You introduced yourself as Milo. He told me your first name is Joe. So what shall I call you?’
‘Whatever you like. Friends call me Milo.’
‘Name suits you.’
Zane waltzed back with the drinks. Black olives on the side like the lady likes. ‘Kalamata olives,’ he said, waiting for applause. None came so he pivoted his hips away.
She raised her glass. ‘OK. Here’s looking at you, Milo.’
‘Cheers.’
Cza sipped her drink and chewed one of her olives after drowning it at the end of a toothpick.
‘What he didn’t tell me about you, I looked up for myself.’
‘You’re the second person this week who’s said they know all about me. Some special all-you-need-to-know-about-Milo-but-were-afraid-to-ask offer on I should know about?’
‘I didn’t say I knew all and my offer was courtesy of Uncle Sam’s database. But I hope you’re going to fill in some blanks. A lot of your life, like when you were in the British Special Services, is classified. What were you doing those years?’
‘What I was told to do,’ I said.
‘You don’t look the sort of person who does what he’s told.’
Cza was eyeballing me in that unnerving way that trained investigators have been taught, to make you think your pupils will contract if you lie.
‘Dooley told me you had some misfortune at college and being a romantic, you went and enlisted in the French Foreign Legion as you thought it was the right thing to do. I thought that only took place in silent movies. What happened?’
We’d finished our drinks so I ordered another two, Cza assenting by not saying no. I told no people about my past. Not even Jonah. Because he never asked. But, for a girl who ordered a drink like she did, I’d make an exception.
‘I was in the middle of my degree when my girlfriend told me she was pregnant.’
‘At Oxford, I believe.’
I didn’t blush. ‘She had this Roman Catholic thing about wanting to have the baby and after a while, I did too. We were on our way to tell her parents when our car was hit by a drunken driver. I survived. She didn’t. A couple of days after the funeral I found the prick and beat the shit out of him. They thought he was going to die and were looking for me. I went to Dover, caught a ferry to Calais, a train to Marseilles, and signed up.’
‘That it?’
‘They gave me a new identity, I did my training, got my képi, did my five years, and then went back to the UK. I didn’t know what to do next. Charges against me had been dropped on some manna from heaven technicality. In my perverse way I’d enjoyed my time with the Legion. And I’d been good at what I’d done, so I was accepted for training into the SAS. I passed their induction, and I did my thing there for a while, but quit after the Gulf War. I’d had enough of killing for the sake of politicians’ egos.’
‘Did your thing there for a while. After that?’
‘I came to the US and worked on security matters for a big corporation. That didn’t work out.’
She laughed. ‘I gather your employers thought that you showed too much originality in problem solving. Going above and beyond the guidelines laid out in the corporate manuals.’
‘Something like that. I was fired. So I set up business with Dooley.’
‘Where did you meet him?’
‘On a joint US/UK exercise. He was seconded from the SEALS to US naval intelligence, and we were on an operation together in West Africa. We became buddies.’
‘He said that he owes his life to you.’
‘We’ve done a lot for each other over the years.’
‘You don’t like talking about yourself, do you,’ she said. ‘You seem very uncomfortable.’
‘Er – you’re right. I don’t. It’s – inelegant.’
Our food arrived. Cza had ordered the Mongolian lamb salad, a house speciality. I had this theory that if a woman on a dinner date ordered something light like a salad for a main course, then it was odds on that she would want us to sleep together. If she ordered something heavy plus a desert, then no chance. I wasn’t sure how a salad with lamb counted in the light/heavy scale. So I ordered a seared tuna salad in case Cza had a similar theory.
I also ordered Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc. Zane ingratiatingly complimented her on my choice. Uriah Heep grovelled less.
I said, ‘How do you know Dooley?’
‘I went to college with Gloria and met Xavier, Tomas and Jennifer through her. We’re like family. I’ve also worked with him and trust him like a brother. He’s told me I could do the same with you.’
I pondered Dooley’s instructions concerning my bloodstream. ‘He told me likewise about you.’ I took a sip of my drink. ‘So. You’re with one of the US government acronym agencies.’
‘That’s right, so anything we say tonight or any other time is off the record. I’m sticking my neck out here, but I know Tomas has big problems and they’re connected with Quaranto. I’ll help where I can but I have to be very careful and discreet. So do you.’
‘Of course. What’s your connection with these characters?’
‘I’m with the FBI’s Criminal Investigation Division, or the CID. And presently seconded from the OC, the Organised Crime and Drugs section, to the white-collar crime division, partly because I once trained as an accountant,’ she said. ‘And I’ve come across Quaranto under both hats.’
In the interest of keeping initials going, I said, ‘You don’t look like a glorified CPA.’
She was pissed. ‘I’ll ignore that.’
I changed the subject. ‘Doesn’t Quaranto mean forty in Italian?’
‘Almost. You’re thinking of quaranta. Although he liked to put it around that he’d hit forty guys before he was made in Naples as a young man. His urban myth. He obviously did nothing to dispel it.’
‘What’s his form?’
‘Old-school type mobster trying to make out he’s morphed into a sensitive new-age wise guy. He rose to be an underboss in one of the New York families. Before that he was a capo for Paul Castellano.’
‘The guy that John Gotti hit in Manhattan?’
‘Yeah. Gotti hated Castellano and his sidekicks. After Gambino died, Gotti wanted his compare Dellacroce as boss, but Castellano got the puffs of whi
te smoke instead, and became Pope. He stayed remote in his ivory mansion, ruling his kingdom while demanding more than his share of profits. He was a greedy bastard, even for a mobster. Plus he had side interests which he didn’t declare to the other families. One of these sidelines just happened to be in Florida where he had a nice little shipping scam going. I was involved in the investigation a long time later.’
‘A shipping scam?’
‘Castellano would set up dummy companies and supply goods to overseas companies against international banker’s letters of credit. They’re irrevocable payment instruments. Like unbounceable cheques for paying for goods moved around the world. They would firstly do a small legit deal where the buyer received his goods. Then he’d sucker the same buyer with a special offer of say, containers full of cut-price liquor. He’d then ship empty containers, and cash the letter of credit before the goods were received by the buyer. Once this happened his company disappeared without trace. A nice little earner. Which he didn’t share around.’
‘Didn’t the mob find out?’ ‘Only when everyone started spilling their guts to save their miserable asses after Sammy Gravano took witness protection. It became a matter of record when some FBI surveillance tapes were in the public domain. Two days after Castellano was hit, a two million buck letter of credit in favour of one of his companies had been cashed in Miami, and the money disappeared. Just before Christmas in ‘85. When they found out about the deal, the New York families then put out a two fifty grand bounty for its recovery.’
‘Anyone take them up on it?’
‘We felt like cracking it for them and putting in a claim. At the time we’d suspected Quaranto or one of his crew who subsequently disappeared. Quaranto was convicted on other counts and sent to the federal pen at Marion in Illinois. He got a get-out-of-jail-free card when his conviction was overturned on a five-hundred-bucks-lawyer-an-hour bullshit technicality after he’d done a couple of years. Didn’t even do parole. He was tarred with the Castellano brush but his number one enemy John Gotti was now behind bars, also in Marion. But Paul Q hadn’t talked to save his sorry skin like everyone else so he was allowed by the mob to slip quietly down here. To a life of warmer crime in the moral twilight of his years.’
‘Cashed in his pension plan and retired?’
‘No way. The mob’s like the priesthood. You don’t become a lapsed mobster. You can always be called upon to send some soul to damnation just like the Catholic church. You swear to enter La Cosa Nostra alive and leave it dead. You’ve made a deal with the devil and it’s no hope. No Jesus. No Madonna. No redemption.’
‘Like signing a sort of irredeemable IOU?’
‘You got it,’ she said. ‘You join the mob. You sign a note with them. Every day you just push the settlement date closer to infinity.’
‘What’s he up to now?’
‘Same as what a lot of the mob are up to. We kept hitting their military wing so they turned to financial crime. That requires a different kind of muscle. He’s got a couple of bars and clubs, he keeps his hand into shylocking, internet porn, investment fraud, boiler rooms, where they pump and dump worthless stock. Plus – get this. He’s got a share in a funeral home and crematory in Coral Gables. Paul Quaranto, mob mortician. A one-stop service.’ She shook her head wryly and laughed.
‘Seems a natural extension of their business. Less messy than digging six foot under in the dead of night then realising you’d forgotten to bring the sack of lime.’
Cza said, ‘It’s a nice macabre touch. Kafka and fuck you Feds, all in one.’
‘Tell me about Quaranto’s goons, Bezzant and Moresco?’
Cza smiled. She was on a roll. ‘Ricky the Anvil and Ernie the Hammer. Two wackos who were made men in Quaranto’s crew. When they’re not being dipshits, they watch gangster movies and read comics.’
‘Hammer and Anvil?’
‘The freelance thugs in The Incredible Hulk comics.’
‘What’s their form?’
‘Moresco’s rap sheet would paper an aircraft hangar. The prison psychiatrists described him as a constitutional psychopath and Bezzant a congenital sociopath. They both did federal time with their boss and were released on the same bullshit loophole, despite being serial felons. Again, no parole, no probation officer.’
‘How come they’re still free?’
‘Don’t worry, we’re working on it – trying to get a bug into their human rat lab. We’ve got a sniff of them in some hard drugs business, which I don’t think their boss Mr Q knows about. Plus we’ve finally got someone in witness protection who we hope might be able to testify against the bastards.’
She took a long pull of her wine. ‘You will not believe this story.’ I didn’t raise my eyebrows because I knew I would. ‘This guy, we’ll call him Mr X, was sitting by Bezzant’s pool one afternoon. He’d picked up his daughter’s pet poodle from the vet and it was in his car. Moresco let it out and started teasing it with snacks. Next thing the dog’s humping Moresco’s leg and everyone’s laughing except him. So he goes inside and returns with a piece of steak and he teases the dog with it. The same humping routine, and Moresco joins in the laughter this time. Then he calmly pulls out a .22 and shoots the dog between the eyes, calling it a fucking anti-American French homo-mongrel. Mr X freaks. Moresco tells him he can just about cope with Miami being Faggot Central, but not when it comes to French cheese-eating surrender-monkey poodles. Then he goes on about France not supporting the US in Iraq. Go home and explain that to your nine-year-old.’
‘So that convinced him to go into the program.’
‘That was just for starters. We found out by surveillance they were about to whack him, so we played the aforesaid Mr X the tape. The law says we have to advise the intended vic of such threats, so we thought we’d let him hear it for himself. That same day his kid daughter received a FedEx package. It was an hourglass filled with what she thought was grey sand. It wasn’t. It was the ashes of her dog. The glass had its red ribbon tied around it. So he became CW.’
‘CW?’ I said.
‘A co-operating witness. He’s in Witness Protection Program now. Blowing in the wind out there. Just another day under the big top in Miami. The big sideshow. A place beyond parody. It’s Ripley’s Believe It Or Not down here. More not than it.’
I said, ‘Some message. More effective than a gorilla singing a telegram.’
‘With the mob, everything’s a message. This was just one of their subtle ones.’
‘Told by an idiot. Full of sound and fury, signifying something.’
She smiled, as if she’d enjoyed it as much as I had, in that irritating smartass way of mine. ‘Nice apt Macbeth misquote, Milo.’
‘You keep an eye on the funeral home?’
‘We’ve recently started to take an interest. It’s run by an odd-ball woman called Maria Viscione. In her sixties, maybe. We’ve nothing on her. Just her social security number. No parking tickets, just sweet FA. Has some firewall between herself and the villainy. She seems pretty tight with Quaranto. And the fuckwit twins hang out there.’
‘What’s oddball about her?’
‘Dresses like a bit player in The Addams Family. Uses embalming fluid as foundation cream.’
‘Bitchy, bitchy.’
Cza laughed. She had a contagious laugh. The sort you didn’t mind catching. I sat and contemplated it for a while. We’d finished our meal and Cza didn’t want dessert. A sign, maybe, I thought, despite Dooley’s warning. We ordered coffee and she left the table for the bathroom to polish her badge, or strip her gun, or whatever FBI women do. ‘Let’s talk about something else,’ she said, when she sat back down. ‘This conversation’s giving me moral indigestion.’
‘What’s Cza short for? Doesn’t sound Cuban.’
‘Czarina. It’s not. My parents’ weird humour wanted something un-socialist. They thought a Russian empress fitted the anti-totalitarian bill, particularly when Cuba was Soviet-influenced.
‘Where did you meet Dool
ey?’
‘I went to college with Gloria. We both did classics and English lit. I then did a business course and lasted a couple of months in some crap office job. Then I enrolled with the FBI and did my training at Quantico. Eventually I ended up in Miami, hooked up with Gloria again, and met Dooley.’
‘You’re Cuban by birth?’
‘Yeah. Like my parents. I was raised here but they’re Cuban through and through. They live in Little Havana with the Miami Cubans and lots of untangled conspiracies and forty-five-year-old political frustrations. I just keep out of that side of things. But I have to go as I’ve an early start tomorrow.’
‘To catch insomniac felons?’ I motioned for the check.
‘Something like that,’ she said. ‘So where you going to start, Mr English private investigator?’
‘The crematory is probably as good a place as anywhere. Shake an urn or two.’
‘Sure. Let them know you’re here. The more that you can find out about these crims the better,’ she said.
‘Yeah. Knowledge is power as someone once said.’
‘Nam et ipsa scientia potestas est,’ she said. ‘For also knowledge itself is power.’ She cocked her head to one side looking a bit too pleased with herself.
‘You must create fear and havoc with those classicist crims.’
‘Milo. Don’t look so alarmed. I just happen to have written a paper on Francis Bacon for my masters. That quote somehow stuck with me all these years, just waiting for a Milo-moment like now. Sort of makes my whole expensive college education seem worthwhile.’
I paid the bill and we walked to Washington Avenue, where I hailed one of the cruising cabs for Cza. She loosely held my arms and said, ‘Let’s have a dinner sometime soon with no business.’
I went to kiss her on the cheek. She moved her head and gave me a butterfly kiss on the lips instead.
‘Hasta luego,’ I said.
‘You take good care out there, Milo.’
‘Don’t worry about me. I’m indestructible.’