by Graham Guy
Franco spat out his reply. “You’re fucking full of it, Gina…”
“Enrico gets pissed, Franco. He doesn’t say much, but I can add up. You know what they say about loose lips? In fact if anyone had’ve been game enough to speak up, he’d already be inside for what he did to that woman.”
“What woman?”
“Close your mind to it if you like, but you know as well as everybody else in the joint that he’s the one who fucked her. Now the poor bitch is in a wheelchair.”
Franco’s eyes dropped. Gina knew she’d hit the mark.
“But don’t worry, sweetheart, no-one’s gonna spill their guts.”
“So what’s the story?”
“Do you trust me?”
“I don’t trust any bastard!”
“Wrong answer. Let me try again. Do you trust me?”
“If you’re asking me if I would trust a woman, the answer is no.”
Gina glared at him. “Not just any woman. After seeing me for two years, do you trust me?”
“I would never trust a woman,” he told her coldly.
Gina flew into a rage.
“Get the fuck out of here! Get the fuck out of here! Do you hear me, you arsehole! Go! Get! Go on, Get out! I knew this wouldn’t work. And as you’re leaving, ask yourself if there was twenty million bucks on the end of it, would you trust a woman then? Now piss off, you sonofabitch.”
Gina grabbed Franco by the arm and hustled him to the door. Normally Franco would have stood his ground and delivered a backhander. But this time it was Gina who held the trump card and she knew it.
“Come on, babe…, ” he protested.
“Go… out!”
She reefed open the door, shoved him outside then slammed it shut. Regaining her composure, she lit a cigarette and sat down. “If that prick doesn’t ring me back within the hour, I’m done.” She knew she had to play the heavy hand to win Franco’s respect. By seeing him off from her room, she now had to wait to see if the bait was big enough to lure him in to returning. She knew if he did, it would have to be on her terms. Gina knew the stakes were high. But this was a high-stakes game she was playing. She couldn’t be a player without Franco. She hoped he didn’t realise that. She also hoped her Italian friend was sufficiently motivated by greed to call her back.
Forty minutes later the phone rang. “Gina?”
“So?”
“So what the fuck got into you?”
“I asked you a question and you lay that sort of shit on me? Jesus Christ, Franco, we’ve been balling each other for two years… and you tell me you would never trust a woman?”
“OK. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for it to include you.”
Gina smiled to herself, knowingly. Franco knew as well as she did what he had said, but he’d obviously gone away and thought about the twenty million bucks. The power of greed was just too strong.
I’d hoped it would be. Thank god, I was right.
She knew, too, that from now on he’d be amiable and easy-going with the money his sole motivation. She also knew that come time to divide it up he’d show his true colours and if she wasn’t careful, he’d either kill her or leave her out in the cold. Twenty million dollars was a lot of money.
“Let me ask you again. Do you trust me?”
“Do I trust you? Of course I trust you. With my life, for Christ sakes!” he told her.
Lying bastard! she said to herself.
“Come back up.”
As she opened her door to Franco, he smiled. “Hi babe,” he smiled. “Take two?”
She put her arms around him. Within moments, the two were locked together, pushing each other to exhaustion.
“Don’t fight with me,” Franco pleaded, as he sat on the side of the bed lighting two cigarettes. Gina accepted one.
“Then don’t fuck with me!” she told him, with no hint of emotion.
“You’ve really got a plan, haven’t you?”
“I have. You in or out?”
“Tell me the plan.”
Gina produced a folder and laid its contents on the floor. “What you’re looking at is a villa and its interior. It belongs to Bruno Formicella.”
Franco’s eyes opened widely. “Bloody hell! People actually ‘live’ like that?”
“This little turkey does.”
“So who the hell is this guy?”
“The House of Bruno in Milan. Fashion guru extraordinaire.”
Gina went on to tell Franco everything she knew about the man police and governments regarded as untouchable.
“So how did you get on to this?”
“That’s why I asked you if you trusted me,” she began. “It was a work function dinner and I happened to sit next to a man with a real big job…”
“Did you fuck him?”
Gina’s temper flared. “Jesus, Franco! How come everything comes down to that with you?” hoping her outburst would cover her guilt.
“Did you?”
“And if I did?”
“If I found out you did, I’d kill you,” he replied unemotionally.
“As it turns out, no I didn’t. Jesus Christ, Franco. Do you fuck anyone else besides me?”
“Need to know… you don’t need to know.”
She flashed her eyes at him. “I bloody well do need to know. If you are, I’ll kill you!”
“Piss off, Gina!”
“How do you like it? Not much fun having someone say shit like that to you is it?”
“Who’s the guy?”
“Need to know. You don’t need to know,” she told him curtly, turning his words back onto him.
“Get on with it.”
“In five months’ time, little Bruno, his darling wife and their children will be away from the villa for two days and two nights. It’s the only time of the year the place is unoccupied. My source assures me there will be around twenty million bucks in his safe. There’s no security and that’s because no-one’s game to touch him.”
“So he goes off and leaves twenty mill in a safe with no security? Bullshit!”
“True story. But there’s one catch.”
“Which is?”
“The safe door weighs a tonne.”
She could tell Franco’s mind was already in overdrive. “Not a problem. And you want me to go and knock it off? Whereabouts is the place?”
“Portofino, on the Italian Riviera.”
Franco laughed. “And just how the hell do I get there, clean the joint out and get home again with twenty million bucks in my back pocket?”
“In $1000 bills US, two bags is all you’ll need to hold twenty mill.”
“OK, how am I supposed to pull off this little miracle?”
“Would you be prepared to?”
“If I say yes?”
“There’ll need to be a shit-load of planning. You’ll need your brothers to help. We’d need to buy a plane, find a pilot, a deserted landing strip in the Northern Territory, the right weather conditions and about four hundred grand to fund it…”
“Four hundred grand…?”
“It’s on the other side of the world. We’ll need fuel, black money, a vehicle to meet us at the plane on our return. You think it’s too big?”
Franco paced the floor. He began to chuckle. “Got to hand it to you, babe. You don’t do things by half measures. How good’s your information?”
“Good enough to say I want to come with you…”
“Pig’s arse!”
“If I can’t come with you, then I’ll call it off right now,” she told him firmly.
“You want to be part of all the shit? Christ, you could get shot! The bloody plane might crash. Flying under radar, we might even get shot at…”
“I might also be very handy to have by your side in Italy. I am fluent, you know.”
“So we just go out and buy a fucking aeroplane, hire a pilot and take off. What about flight plans, fuel stops, landing rights. Christ, Gina, what are you thinking about?”
“
Twenty million dollars,” she replied determinedly.
“All right, when?”
“Five months from now. If we do it, we do it five months from today. That’s when our little turkey nicks off for a couple of days.”
Silence fell between them for a considerable length of time. Franco smoked two cigarettes before he spoke. “How much do you get out of it?”
“Five mill each.”
“You reckon there’s twenty in the safe?”
“More or less.”
“Come on, Gina. Twenty or not?”
“Could be less. Could be more. Christ, I can hardly ring and ask him!”
“No security?”
“That’s what I’m assured.”
“How much are we paying your snitch?”
“Don’t give up, do you? He doesn’t even realise the implications of what he said over dinner at the function. Once he mentioned the magic figure, several of us hit on him for detail. All the others were doing it out of sheer curiosity. Not me. But all I’m prepared to tell you is the guy telling the story was a high-ranking officer with the government. His source was the Italian government. OK? It’s a risk. It might be bullshit. The bloody safe may be empty when we open it. I know all that. If it turns out that way, we’ll pinch the bastard’s steak knives so we don’t leave empty-handed.”
“How long?”
“We’ll all need to lose a week out of our lives.”
“Four hundred grand! Where the hell am I gonna get that sort of dough?”
Gina smiled. “Cut up some Mercs,” she told him, handing him her phone. “You want to call your brothers and ask them to come up?”
Franco shot his glance at Gina. She gave a half-way grin as he dialled Luigi’s number. “Luigi? It’s me. Enrico with you?”
“Yeah, he’s here.”
“Listen to me. Tell Enrico to put his dick back in his pants and both of you get in here now… to the Hilton. Room 797. Don’t be long.”
“You OK?”
“I’m fine. Just get in here.”
Franco turned off the phone and handed it back to Gina and sat down. “You might have convinced me, but I’m fucking you, they’re not. Convince them, and we’ll do it.”
* * *
Ten minutes later came a knock on the door. The reaction of Luigi and Enrico was similar to that of their brother’s when they saw Gina. They too had to look twice to convince themselves it was really her.
“I’ll explain all that to you later,” Franco began. “Sit down.” Then to Gina, “Gina, four coffees.”
“So what’s the story?” Luigi asked.
“Gina will tell you in a moment.”
A minute later Gina handed each of the three brothers a coffee. “Milk and sugar’s on the table if you want it.” Then she began to tell them her plan.
After an hour of explanation and intensive questioning, silence fell amongst the group.
“Could be a pig in a poke Franco?” Luigi said.
“Could be a shitload, could be nothing. She told you that. Somehow I don’t think it will be nothing,” he answered thoughtfully, gesturing towards the computer printouts of the villa. “Not in a joint like that.”
“And the safe door weighs a tonne?” Enrico put in, glancing at Gina.
“That’s what I’m told.”
Enrico grinned. “And we’ve got just the gadget to fix that bastard,” he sneered.
They smiled in agreement and Luigi began to pace. He rubbed his chin, speaking his thoughts out loud. “Five mill each? I say five and half for us, three and a half for Gina. Any extras, she pays for them.”
“Piss off,” Gina interjected. “An even split or it’s not on. Jesus, Luigi, you’re fucking unreal! Franco, tell him!”
Luigi looked at his brother.
“Any room for negotiation, Gina?”
She was suddenly filled with anger. Deliberately calming herself, she gave a gritty and determined reply. “There is no room to negotiate.”
“Even split, then.” Franco turned to his brothers. “Any expenses go four ways. Anyone got a problem with that?”
All agreed.
“OK. So what’s your answer. Do we do this thing, or don’t we?”
“Gina,” Luigi began, “so how do you plan to launder the stuff back here?”
Franco laughed. “Carefully! Let’s just get it first and we’ll worry about that later. But I don’t see it being a problem.”
“When do you need to know, Gina?” Enrico asked.
“Now. If you guys say yes, there’s a truckload of detail to be worked out and we’ve only got twenty weeks. In that time we have to find a pilot and buy a plane. Over to you.”
Luigi rolled his bottom lip under his top front teeth. “How do we know we’re not being sold a pup?”
It was Gina who spoke. “If we’ve been sold a pup, then I go down with you, because I will be coming along. Is that guarantee enough?”
Her reply seemed to ease his concerns. “I’d say it’s worth a shot,” he said.
“Yeah, me too,” Enrico agreed. “Franco?”
Franco nodded.
“OK, where do we go from here?” Enrico wanted to know.
Gina took over and rolled out a map of Italy on a table. She pointed to Portofino, and stressed the first priority of hiring a pilot and purchasing the right type of aeroplane.
“Enrico, tell Gina about the time you took a trip through north Queensland. What was that town you went to? You know, the place that’s full of blokes escaping wives, maintenance, the law and Christ knows what?”
“You mean Karumba?”
“That’s it! Cairns sits on one side of the gulf. Karumba sits on the other, almost directly opposite.”
“Tell me about it?” she asked.
“It was a fair while ago. If you head out that way, first you go to Normanton and the thing that hits you about that place is the really weird paint job on the ‘local’. That’s called The Purple Pub. Not much there. Couple of shops. A post office. Camel trains used to run up to the Cloncurry copper mines. Seventy kilometres away on the coast is Karumba.” Enrico laughed. “The bloody joint is so remote, even the paper’s two days old when you get it. You’ll get plenty of Grunter, king salmon and blue salmon up there. It’s also the home of the barramundi and the centre for the Gulf prawning industry.
“There was a time when they were going to establish a telegraph connection with Asia, but somewhere along the line that died in the arse. Not a lot of Aborigines. They tend to shun the joint pretty well. Apparently there was a huge shitfight with the whites at one time. Many Aborigines died, so they give the place a wide berth. Mind you, down the road a bit is an all-black roadhouse. If you’re white, you don’t go near the place. But the local is called The Animal Bar. Enter at your own risk. I reckon it would have to be the roughest pub in the country. To the extent that a couple of tourists had the audacity to take a photo of the place. They had their heads kicked in, their camera smashed and their car totalled.
“In fact I don’t reckon you’d find a more diverse group of blokes. Anyone and everyone from crooked lawyers to bent coppers to druggies to the straight out mean sons of bitches.”
“Would it be a good place to find a pilot?” Gina asked.
“Probably as good a place as any… especially one who might be a bit of a shonk.”
“Could you go there?”
Enrico looked at Franco. “Bloody long way to go on a maybe!”
“Yeah, well we can’t run an ad in the paper either.”
“Luigi?”
“Don’t you think we should get the dough together first, then look?”
“How long will that take?” Gina wanted to know.
“Eight weeks, if we start now,” Franco told her.
“So in eight weeks, can one of you go to Karumba?”
“One of us will go,” Luigi told her.
* * *
From that moment on the weekly meetings at the Lay Lady Lay took on a differe
nt genre. Instead of all the laughing and carryings-on, mostly all four sat in deep conversation and away from the rest of the patrons. Sometimes the mood would lighten, but now there was a different and more compelling motivation behind the weekly get togethers at their favourite haunt.
Gina was pressuring the brothers to raise the funding. The brothers kept pressuring Gina for more details. It was a juggling act for Gina, keeping Franco happy and always being there for Sebastian McAlister. She kept up the subtle pressure on her political friend, constantly reassuring him she was doing it ‘for them’. Franco still wanted to know the source of her information. Gina continued her wall of silence. After several weeks of keeping to themselves at Lay Lady Lay, Marcella, a casual acquaintance of Gina, cornered her in the washroom.
“What the hell is it with you guys? You used to be the life of the party. Now you just sit in a huddle all the time?”
Gina tried to dismiss the question. “Oh you know what guys are like. Sometimes they just want to talk.”
“That’s crap, Gina! I fucked Enrico the other night when he was half-pissed and he said there’s something big going down.”
Gina laughed. “Oh Jesus Christ, you believe that? Marcella, he’s a bloody dickhead and full of shit!”
Inside, Gina was fuming. That bloody useless, big-mouthed sonofabitch. He may have blown it. Then came the words which ripped into her gut.
“He even told me the date,” Marcella added in a knowing tone.
Gina wanted to explode. Somehow she kept it together. She looked at Marcella. “The date… what date?”
“For whatever the fuck it is you lot are planning.”
“Oh, Christ, Marcella, you mean that extravaganza in three or four months’ time?” she answered rapidly, collecting her scrambled thoughts to create a convincing lie.
“Uh-huh.”
“Sweetheart, he’s having a lend of you. It’s just a surprise party for Franco… here, too… forget about it. Enrico just loves mouthing off to impress.”
“Oh shit, Gina! I was thinking you guys must have been planning a fucking heist or something,” she replied, disappointedly.
Gina hoped she’d successfully extinguished the words from Enrico’s loose lips, hoping Marcella wasn’t foxing her. She went back inside the club, content somewhat that she’d prevented any damage. She just hoped that Enrico’s loose tongue wouldn’t jeopardize the futures of all of them.