Well, she thought, I’m just going to have to resort to Craigslist. Going online to find some cheap apartment was the absolute last thing that Darlene wanted to do, but it was either that or continue to wake up being harassed by the homeless outside her car. She started to wonder if even they were more secure in the City of Angels than she was.
*****
It was Pete’s turn to host poker night because last time Tony Rollonio’s blood and teeth stained Mario’s new carpet. Pete didn’t mind that the boys wanted to go to his new place for poker night—hell, it was actually a compliment to his character. If Victor Lumino was willing to play poker at your house, that meant you were practically made for life.
Victor had recently promoted Pete “The Piper” Zanelli from soldier to caporegime. Being one of Vic’s Capos was an honor Pete had desired for most of his adult life. He’d started as a runner for Vic when Vic was only an underboss. That was way back when his uncle, Micky Lumino, still ran the Los Angeles crime family. Pete was one of the few people who knew that Vic had killed his uncle in order to move up. In fact, Vic asked Pete personally to help him in the murder. It was a guaranteed promotion, and Vic promised Pete that if he stuck with him then he’d be taken care of.
And so far Pete had been taken care of pretty good. As one of Vic’s new Capos, Vic made sure to stock Pete’s wardrobe with new name brand suits, bought him a BMW, and even let him manage his restaurant, Lumino’s. Of course the management position was a front for what he really did for Vic. The restaurant itself only served as a way for Vic to claim and launder money from “alternative” sources.
Poker night, however, was not something Vic usually entrusted to the soldiers, but as a Capo his name was in the running to host. The previous month Tony Rollonio drank a few too many glasses of vino and ended up spilling his guts about money he owed all over town for gambling.
“If you owe money for gambling, playing cards with us is the last thing you want be doing, Tony,” Mario said. Pete kept his mouth shut. He didn’t have anything but a pair of fours anyway.
“But if I win with you guys then I can pay the other guys back,” Tony said.
“If you lose tonight, Tony, then Mario is knocking your teeth out,” Vic said.
“That ain’t very funny, Vic,” Tony said.
“It ain’t meant to be funny,” Vic said, swigging his McAllan 12. When he set his glass back down on the card table all the guys knew to roar with laughter, even Tony.
“I can’t argue with the boss,” Mario said.
They played the rest of the hand as they would any other, except Pete could see from behind his cards that Tony was sweating. If Pete was right about which cards had already been played from the deck, which he usually was, Tony couldn’t have had more than three of a kind. Pete might not have been able to win the hand, but he was also sure that the odds were not in Tony’s favor.
Pete had folded quickly into the hand, but Tony kept upping the ante. Pete knew that Tony was trying to bluff a good hand, but the sweat on his brow gave the poor guy away. Pete scratched his left eyebrow, signaling to Vic that Tony couldn’t possibly have squat. Vic lifted his glass and took another sip of scotch. This was his signal to Pete that his hand couldn’t be beat.
“Well, boys,” Pete said, standing up and finishing off his Stella Artois, “I’m going to go out for more booze.” Tony looked up from his cards, familiar with the lingo coming out of Pete’s mouth. Tony knew not to stand up as Pete went to the doorway, blocking its entire frame with his body. The doorframe in the kitchen was the only way to exit the house, and unless Tony was prepared to break through Pete then he was stuck to finish the hand.
“Alright, let’s see what we got,” Vic said. His glass of scotch had been empty for a whole minute. Vic laid his cards out on the table, revealing a royal flush. Everybody else at the table felt stupid laying their own hands down because they would obviously be incomparable to Vic’s undefeatable hand.
Mario laid down a straight. Pete and Sammy had both folded. Dom revealed a flush, which was an admirable attempt. Pete watched as Tony tried to stand up. His failure to stay in his seat made Pete think that he had something worse than a losing hand, something Pete’s card counting skills couldn’t have predicted.
“What you got, Tony?” Vic asked. The boss picked up the bottle of McAllan and poured the remainder of the amber liquid into his glass.
“I’d rather not say,” Tony whispered. Pete could tell that the poor guy just wanted to get out of there. With sweat pouring down his fat face, Tony kept his cards literally to his chest.
“Show us what you got,” Mario repeated after Vic. Pete didn’t want to watch what would happen next.
Tony laid down a five of a kind, four aces and a wild joker. The hand is very rare, and Pete had considered it but never thought such a rare hand would fall into Tony’s mitts.
“You cheating piece of shit,” Vic laughed. He had no more McAcllan in his bottle, so his anger waned on the brink of rage. Pete kept his post in the doorway, watching Vic’s veins popping from his forehead and neck. The last thing Pete ever wanted to do was be on Vic’s bad side. Pete had known Tony for years. They were Soldiers together, although Tony’s methods had always been too unorthodox for Pete, even considering the fact that they were in the mafia.
Mario stood up from his seat, his fist already balled into the palm of his other hand. “This isn’t going to be fun, Tony,” Mario said, “But it is going to teaching you a fucking lesson.”
Tony’s eyelids sucked back into his face. Pete couldn’t remember seeing anyone so scared to take a beating. Vic stood up from his chair to give Mario enough space. Before too long Tony couldn’t help but getting up from his own chair, foolishly holding a bottle of liquor as if he could use it as a weapon. Deep down they all knew that none of them could mess with Victor Lumino, especially during a poker game with his closest comrades.
“Please, Vic, this hand is legit! You seriously think I was cheating? That’s impossible!”
“All I know is that you’re a lying rat,” Vic said. He looked over to Pete with a smile. He wanted Pete to enjoy in the pain that Tony was about to take in.
Does he want me to see what will happen to me if I ever double cross him? Pete wondered.
Mario snatched the bottle from Tony’s hand. “You think this is going to help you, you little cocksucker?” Mario laughed. His high-pitched voice echoed in the smoke-filled room. During his maniacal laughter, Mario smashed the liquor bottle against the card table and held the jagged edge to Tony’s throat as if the glass were the blade of a sword.
Tony took a swing at Mario, catching him in the temple. This bought Tony a second to get his back away from the wall, but Mario got his balance faster than Mario could dodge. The glass weapon cut Tony in his stomach, and Pete’s mouth fell open while the blood spilled from his belly to the floor.
Tony let out a wail of agony, his saliva and blood mixing as it spat from his mouth. “Sorry, Tony,” Mario said, withdrawing the glass dagger from Tony’s stomach.
“Don’t be sorry, Mario,” Vic said. “This rat owes money all over town that he won’t pay back. You did Los Angeles a favor. Ain’t that right, Pete?”
Pete didn’t know what to say. He knew enough not to contradict Vic. If he did, he’d be as good as Tony, both of them most likely buried in Pete’s new back yard.
“Get this piece of trash out of my fucking den,” Pete said. His smile was forced but he knew that it would be the sole gesture to save his life.
“Will do, Pete,” Mario said, picking Tony up by his greasy hair.
“He ain’t leaving this house,” Vic said.
“What do you mean?” Pete asked. Was Vic going to sadistically force Pete to be Tony’s stay at home nurse?
“I mean once we whack this rat, his body ain’t leaving this apartment.” Vic’s demeanor told the entire room that he meant business. He lifted his lip above his two front teeth and dented his eyebrows while reaching into his
jacket pocket for a cigar.
“Please, Vic, I’ll do anything,” Tony mumbled through a mouth full of blood.
“You already did enough, you little piss ant,” Vic laughed while lighting up his stogie. “You might as well keep your mouth shut and keep your pleas to your prayers. They’ll do better with God than they will with me.”
At that point Tony knew that it was futile to beg for his life. Once Vic made up his mind, that was that. You were either alive or dead with Vic. There were no two ways about it. Pete learned that early on. He would never be stupid enough to get into debt like Tony, though. Pete knew that working for Vic was a blessing that you didn’t want to ruin.
If Pete shut his eyes, he knew that Vic would notice and think that he couldn’t take watching a man getting whacked. One day Vic might want Pete to do the whacking, even though everyone knew Pete was pretty much a money guy. Mario, on the other hand—Mario was the type of guy you didn’t want to double cross. Pete had seen Mario once kill a man with a hockey puck and a dry erase marker. He still had nightmares about the scene.
With Tony bleeding to death, Mario must not have thought he was dying fast enough because he pulled out his knife and slashed Tony’s throat. The blood poured out, and Tony cried out weakly, then went limp.
“Well, that’s that,” Vic laughed. “Sammy, clean up the blood. Dom, get rid of all the shit. All the evidence. Mario, Pete—you two find a place to stash this guy somewhere in this apartment.”
“In my apartment?” Pete asked. He already wished he hadn’t opened his mouth.
“Your apartment?” Vic repeated. “Did you forget who set you up with all this property in the first place? Did you forget who helped you start getting rental income? No, you know what, kid. This ain’t your place no more.”
“What do you mean this ain’t my place no more?” Pete didn’t know what to do. Tony was lying dead on the parlor floor and everyone was staring at Pete.
“I mean it’s time you rent it out and start pulling more weight,” Vic said. “Stash this son of a bitch in the floors or the walls or the damn garbage disposal for all I care, and first thing tomorrow put this place on the market.”
“Where the hell am I going to stay?” Pete asked.
“I didn’t give you this place to live in, Petie,” Vic laughed. “I gave it to you so you could help me with business. Tony Two-Phones over here’s body is now part of business. You bringing in money and giving me my share on the property—that’s business. Nobody told you to move out of your girlfriend’s place and start staying here, Petie. Sorry, but we all told you that Monique was a cheating whore. You either go back with her or crash on Sammy’s couch for a week.”
“Why’s it gotta be my couch?” Sammy asked, his hands covered in Tony’s blood.
“Because you’re the only other one here who ain’t got a wife,” Vic said. The rest of the men laughed, and Pete felt glad the Vic had taken some of the attention off him and put a little on Sammy.
Vic patted Pete on the shoulder, cocked his head, and walked out the front door laughing. The rest of the guys stayed behind, not saying a word, ready to do the tasks their boss set for them.
*****
Darlene felt stupid begging the librarian to sign her up for a library card with no proof of residence in Los Angeles County.
“Please, I need the library so that I can use the Internet so that I can find a place to live so that I can provide proof of residence to the library.”
At first Darlene was afraid that her dry, Midwestern sense of humor wouldn’t work on the middle-aged, Hispanic librarian. She thought she might have to reduce to batting her eyes at him, but luckily he cracked a smile.
“Tell you what,” he said. “I’ll let you log in for a couple hours, and if you haven’t found anything after that we’ll negotiate. I might need you to shelve a few books if you’re going to need more than that.”
He was joking with her, too. “That should be plenty of time,” Darlene said. It felt nice to actually receive some sympathy for a change. The librarian walked Darlene over to one of the computers in the center of the room, logged in her, and pulled up the browser for her.
“Good luck.”
“Thank you.”
Suddenly Darlene felt like she was back in college, trying to figure out the confusing campus computers again. She started with the first place she could think of, even though her instincts told her not to—Craigslist.
The first hour of Darlene’s free Internet time resulted in more Google maps searches than apartment listings because she was so unfamiliar with the area. Thankfully the librarian was able to offer his opinion on how the various areas of the sprawling metropolis compared to others.
After a long daunting conversation of which areas were affordable but sketchy, which areas were pricey but you live in a room the size of a cubicle, and which areas were mid-range ones like the Robertson area, where it was only a little sketchy, moderately priced, and you got two cubicles and a parking spot.
“I’m from Detroit,” she told the guy. “I may have very well seen the worst of the worst.”
The librarian laughed.
“You ain’t seen nothing. This city can really surprise you.”
With the advice he gave her, she decided to look in the Robertson area. She found a listing for a one-bedroom apartment for $1,000 a month, and that was the cheapest one she could find in the area. Back home a two-bedroom apartment would only cost $850. For some reason she was afraid of getting ripped off, although she knew the cost of living was higher in Los Angeles than a lot of cities in the world.
The apartment she looked at did in fact come with a parking spot, a kitchenette, a parlor, a bedroom, and a bathroom. She thought it was odd that they even needed to list that there was a bathroom in the apartment. Do some apartments not have bathrooms in Los Angeles? she wondered. The listing stated that the renter would have to pay for the first month’s rent, last month’s rent, deposit, and down payment.
Maybe she could talk the landlord down. The price seemed astronomical, even for Los Angeles. Why would you need to put so much down for renting such a small unit? She skimmed the rest of the Craigslists ads, but it seemed liked this one unit in particular was the best she could do for her price range and quality of life.
When she pulled up to the complex, Darlene’s first thought was that she was not impressed. It’s not that the complex was dingy or dirty looking, she just couldn’t understand why it cost $1000 a month. Something the same quality in the Midwest wouldn’t even compare. She would be living large back home for $1000 a month.
Regardless, she wasn’t going to miss the opportunity. The ad had stated that the apartment would be open, and just to walk in. At first it sounded like something out of a serial killer movie, but the librarian had assured her that it was pretty common in Los Angeles. Readying herself to walk into the place, she tried to return her friendly demeanor to her face so she could do some smooth talking if she had to. Would the landlord even be there? The librarian had told her that usually they just leave applications sitting on a counter; you take one, fill it out, and talk to the landlord later.
She walked to unit #105. The door was ajar. Her worst fear was that she’d walk in and someone would jump out from a closet and kidnap her. Don’t be stupid, Darlene thought. Then again, it really wasn’t stupid. That kind of thing wasn’t unheard of in her father’s line of work back home.
As soon as she was inside, she was surprised to see that the entire apartment was furnished. There was even some food in the kitchen. Was someone still living in the apartment? Was she in the right place? Her heart started to beat so hard she thought it would echo in the quiet apartment.
“Hello?” she called out. “Is anyone here?”
“Well hello,” a voice said in a smooth, sexy demeanor. It almost sounded like a joke. “Sorry,” the voice continued. It was coming from down the hall. In a moment the voice revealed itself to be owned by a handsome young Italian man in an e
xcellent suit, a genuine Armani by the looks of it. “I didn’t mean to startle you. Sorry if the joke didn’t land. Hi, my name is Pete. Pete Zanelli. Are you here about the apartment?”
“Is this the apartment listed on Craigslist for $1000?” she asked.
“You’ve come to the right place,” he smiled. “Feel free to take a look around.”
“Does someone live here now or does the place come furnished, or what? How much extra will that cost?”
“The place comes furnished, and for a cute face like yours, no extra cost.” Who is this guy? she thought.
“That’s a hell of a pick-up line if I’ve ever heard one,” Darlene said. She reached her hand out to shake his. “My name is Darlene. Darlene Tanner.”
“Pleasure to meet you, Darlene,” Pete said. His eyes were dark, like his curly hair. The stubble on his face against his tan complexion made her think of how a real Italian man might look. Back home, Italians weren’t very tan. The fact is that it just wasn’t very sunny in Detroit. That didn’t make the mob less active, though.
“I think I’ll take a look around,” Darlene said. He was flirting with her, but she didn’t want to get hooked in to any dangerous charm.
“Please do,” he said with a smile.
She finally took a step away from his gaze and meandered down the hallway where he’d come from. The place was quaint. Nothing special about it. The bedroom was nice, and the bathroom at least had a big tub, but there wasn’t really a view out the window. What she really wanted to see was the parlor. That part of the ad intrigued her most.
Turning the corner across from the bathroom, she entered the room that smelled vaguely of cigar smoke. This must be the parlor, she thought. There was a card table in the middle of the room, but the carpet had been ripped out.
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