3 The Case of Tiffany's Epiphany

by Jim Stevens

  I think you should know there’s a great disconnect between the distributors in the middle and the chieftains at the top. The exclusive few who import the dope and supply it to the distributors seldom get busted because they keep their distance from the down and dirty aspects of the trade. For them it’s quite simple. If anything goes wrong they merely walk away, go back to the massive labor pool at their disposal, and start over.

  These kingpins are just like a lot of America’s respected corporate CEO’s who sit in their ivory towers, sip 12-year-old scotch, and order their MBA generals to use cheap, foreign, sweatshop labor to reduce costs. So what if a fire breaks out in a Bangladesh factory making battery acid and hundreds of workers are killed. They simply blame it on the locals in charge and move the operation to some other factory in Katmandu.

  It works the same way in the drug business. In order to keep their distance, the big bosses establish phony corporations and rent abandoned buildings to use as retail “outlets.” It works out great because it’s easy to keep watch on the operations at a safe distance, maintain quality control of the products, supervise the employees, offer an easy access to the product for their customers, and most importantly, it allows them to totally control the enormous amount of the cash generated by the transactions. If one of these “outlets” gets busted, the supplier merely picks up, moves to another building and sets up shop there.

  Transporting the cash from the “outlets” to the “bank” works in almost the same way it does in the “legitimate” business world—only with a great deal more caution. Under the cover of night and when the coast is clear, somebody drives up to the “outlet,” picks up the money, and drives off.

  The last thing a major drug supplier wants is to be in any way involved when a turf war breaks out, where kids are shooting each other at will, and innocent people are getting caught in the crossfire. He wants complete deniability. And he often says with a straight face, “Hey, they’re independent contractors. It isn’t our fault.” If you look at the business from the top, it’s a moneymaking machine. If you look at it from the bottom, it’s a nightmare on any level—business or otherwise.

  I pull up in my Toyota and wait with the engine running. The building is similar to the one where the felt fedora Thug took one in his Kevlar vest. Less than a minute later, a kid not much older than sixteen comes up to my open window. “Yo,” he greets me.

  I show him the ten bills “Wait” Jack Wayt gave me to use and say, “Blow.”

  The kid takes my money, runs inside the building, and two minutes later runs back out to my car. He drops a baggie of white powder in my lap, and walks away. He doesn’t even bother to say “Thanks.” And people wonder why customers have so little retail loyalty.

  I drive directly to the precinct station in Cabrini-Green, where “Wait” Jack Wayt is waiting.

  “Wait, he says.

  “What?”

  “The toe on my other foot is hurting.”

  “Did you loosen that shoe?” I ask.

  He doesn’t answer. I hand him the recently purchased baggie and pull out what’s left of the wad he gave me in Bruno’s apartment.

  “Will you let me know where the trace ends up?” I ask.

  “If it ends up anywhere,” he tells me.

  I hold out the cash for him to take.

  “Keep it.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Don’t mention it,” He’s not merely being polite, but merely playing the game. In reality, this is a small price to pay for the services I rendered.

  “Don’t worry,” I assure him. “I won’t.”

  Jack knows that I know the unwritten rules of this game.

  I feel the thickness of the stack of bills, try not to smile, but in my head all I hear is … Cha-ching, cha-ching, cha-ching.

  ---

  I’m home. The kids are asleep. Personal shopping can be exhausting, although I wouldn’t know since I do so little of it. I pull the wad of money out of my pocket and add it to the bills Mr. Rogers gave me. The total is $1,700. This is more cash in hand than I’ve had since my divorce two years ago. Feeling those bills between my fingers, seeing how green, and how comforting they are; it's a feeling I haven’t had in a long, long time. It’ll buy me a new muffler, new winter boots and new jeans, and a full refrigerator. It’ll also pay off my credit card debt. No more pink statements in my mailbox. Hallelujah!

  I fold the bills in half, wrap two rubber bands around them, and place them in the bottom of a small tin recipe box I keep in the upper kitchen cupboard. The money from Mr. D’Wayne DeWitt is already there. Now the total is well over $2,500.

  While I’m at it, I take out a stack of blank 3x5 recipe cards, find a pen that works, and retire to the living room, which doubles as my bedroom when the kids are with me. I fix the couch up with a sheet and blanket. I do a couple of back exercises before lying down. I feel pretty good. I have one last thought of the stack of money safely tucked away in my kitchen cupboard and fall asleep with a grin on my face.

  ---

  The Original Carlo, a particularly bad painting I bought years ago at an outdoor art sale for eight dollars, hangs on my living room’s biggest wall. It’s a rendition of a dilapidated barn with four red mailboxes in front of it, all set against a lemon yellow background or maybe it’s a lemon yellow sky. Why the sky is yellow, or why a barn would ever need one, much less four, mailboxes, only adds to its artistic allure. I consider the work so bad, it’s good.

  When I’m on a case, The Original Carlo serves another purpose. It becomes a bulletin board for my handwritten index cards. It helps me to keep everything I know about a case in one convenient place and see it at a glance. I add row upon row of easily movable 3x5 cards which I stick on the picture with push pins. It’s easy to add, subtract, mix and match, whatever. Hardly high tech, in no way artistic, and the process makes The Original Carlo look like it has shingles. But hey, it works for me.

  Sunday morning, a little after nine, the kids are snoring away, and I go to work. I start scribbling away on the recipe cards. I write one item on each card—a thought, a fact, a suspicion, an instance, a happening, a question, or a conclusion. When I have prepared about fifty cards, I begin push pinning them into The Original Carlo. All with the purpose to make some sense of the case at hand.

  Tiffany is at the top of my first column. Beneath her name, I have the when, where, how, and what concerning her drug induced state. I have a card for each person either around her or close to the situation when she took a header off the barstool at the Zanadu—Alix, Bruno, Monroe, and the blocker. I left the “C” word off so my impressionable daughters won’t see it and ask me any embarrassing questions.

  My next column is headed Gibby Fearn. Beneath his name is a card for the Behemoth, his comic book-reading comrade-in-arms. I have cards listing what Gibby does and what he doesn’t do. I also list the times of his inside and outside money pick-ups and drops. I’m not sure why I do this, but for some reason it seems to make sense.

  The third column is headed D’Wayne DeWitt. I list his rap sheet, his two girls, his job, and his digs at the Zanadu on separate cards. I also have a number of cards for what I don’t know about him—where he lives, his finances, his hangouts, his friends, and his business associates. There's also a card with the amount of money I have received from him so far, $1,900. I usually don’t use The Original Carlo as a spread sheet, but the money is coming in so fast and furious it’s kinda fun to have it up there to see my finances flourishing for once.

  I make two more columns. One for Bruno Buttaras, which lists everything I know about him and his murder. His is the longest list by far. The second is for Mr. Rogers, the shortest of the listings. I have very little to report on my latest client except for the $1,000 he gave me.

  Lastly, I put up random cards on which I’ve written aspects of the case for which I have no clue where they fit in. These include my two kidnappings, the Non-Brink’s Brinks truck, the Brink’s truck and each of thei
r destinations; Monroe’s CEI company, the shooting at the first retail dope location, the blood on that floor, the gang/turf war currently in progress, Neula “No-No” Noonan’s suspicion of a male murderer, “Wait” Jack Wayt’s steroid find, and the baggie of blow I picked up for him in that crummy neighborhood off Madison Street on the Westside.

  I consider adding a final column that will chart the relationship status of “Wait” Jack Wayt and Neula “No-No” Noonan, but I decide against mixing business info with personal info.

  I sit for about an hour staring at the partially covered painting before me. What I have is Tiffany getting roofied, a murder, money being laundered through the Zanadu, a shooting, a drug buy, a potential murder scene, two new employers who pay me in advance, the Behemoth, a Thug who used to wear a fedora, Mr. Ponytail, the absence of a Mr. Capellino, and Bobo Bling’s horrible MF rap CD. I know in some way, shape, or form it’s all connected, but there’s not yet a thread stitched between any two. I don’t get far in figuring any of it out because I’m interrupted by a just risen Care.

  “Good morning.”

  “What are you doing, Dad?”

  “Trying to make some sense of nonsense.

  “Why?”

  “Because that’s my job.”

  “Care wipes the sleep from her eyes, looks up at the first column on The Original Carlo. “Are you going to find out who did that to Tiffany?”

  “I certainly hope so.”

  Care takes another long look, “You know something, Dad?” She pauses dramatically and I await the bombshell. “You have really horrible handwriting.”

  I sigh. “Thanks for the compliment.”

  Kelly emerges from the bedroom and plops down on the couch; she’s still half-asleep. “Aren’t you going to say ‘Good morning,’ Kelly?” I ask.

  “I wasn’t planning on it,” she answers.

  “Do you know what I think would be a great idea?” I say with a zing in my tone.

  “Nope,” Kelly says negating any of my zing with her droll response.

  “Why don’t we all get dressed up and take in a service at one of the neighborhood churches?”

  Care turns her nose up at the idea. Kelly is vocal, “Bad idea,” she says.

  “I think it’s a great idea. It would do you girls good to listen to a good sermon.”

  “You go, Dad,” Kelly says. “And bring home some loaves and fishes.”

  “Sermons aren’t like take-out, Kelly,” I inform her. “You have to be there to experience it.”

  “Then why are so many sermons on TV?” Kelly asks.

  “Those shows are for people who are shut-ins and can’t attend a regular church service in person.”

  “We’re shut in right now,” Care says.

  “I’ll TiVo one and watch it later,” Kelly promises.

  “I can’t afford TiVo,” I tell them what they already know.

  “Mom has TiVo,” Kelly says, knowing it makes me crazy when she plays the “Mom has that at her house” card.

  “I’ll tell you what, Dad,” Care assures me. “I’ll tape one at Mom’s and make sure Kelly watches it with me.”

  “Yeah, I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

  “Why don’t we go out and spend some more of your money?” Kelly suggests.

  “I let you do that yesterday or have you already forgotten?”

  “No,” Kelly says. “I’m considering yesterday was a practice day and today you’d give us some more money so we could go out and put to use what we learned about shopping yesterday.”

  “As I said before, Kelly, ‘Yeah, I don’t think that’s going to happen.’”

  My phone rings. Care picks it up and punches the screen. “Care, don’t answer my phone.”

  “Hello,” she says.

  “Well, Dad,” Kelly says, “if we can’t go shopping maybe we can use the time to put some new ringtones on your phone?”

  “Don’t you dare.”

  “It’s Tiffany,” Care says, handing me my phone.”

  It’s Sunday, long before noon. If Tiffany is calling, something isn’t right. “Hello.”

  Her message is clear. I hang up. “Get showered and dressed, girls. Tiffany is taking us to brunch.”

  ---

  The Ritz, the Four Seasons, the Park Hyatt, and the Drake all have Sunday Brunch Bacchanalias. This is where they open up their ballrooms, pull out their best dinner china and silverware, and spread out enough food to feed a refugee camp on tables that circle the room. Their breakfast fare has everything gastronomically imaginable—and even unimaginable: fruit, cereal, toast, pancakes, scones, bagels, bacon, sausages of all sizes and varieties, white eggs, brown eggs, even green eggs and ham. You can order custom-made omelets in more flavors than Baskin-Robbins and Ben & Jerry’s combined. If you can stomach looking into the glassy eyes of a just caught salmon, you can scoop out some of its smoked flesh and enjoy devouring it. There’s French toast made from every type of bread including French. There’s biscuits and gravy for those from the heartland, grits for the Southern folk, enough shrimp to satisfy Moby Dick’s cravings, and a pastry display that would be the envy of that cupcake chef on TV who Care watches all the time. It’s enough to make anyone run for an antacid. And I won’t even go into the libations available, but the bar provides everything from Bloody Marys to Virgin Moonshine. Sunday Brunch is America’s answer to a Roman Orgy; all that’s missing is the adjacent barfatorium.

  Here’s the kicker, these exorbitant smorgasbords come with a hefty price tag that usually starts at around fifty bucks a head. So a family of three will spend more on a Sunday Brunch than I will spend at the Jewel-Osco in a month. Ridiculous.

  “Hi, little dudettes.” Tiffany spots us in the lobby of the Four Seasons Hotel.

  “Tiffany,” I say as the girls ceremoniously group hug, “why don’t we just go to some local breakfast place. We don’t need all this food.”

  Tiffany, who is dressed in tweed skirt and a yellow cashmere sweater, the standard fall attire for the fashion conscious girl of Chicago, says, “Nobody can really see you in a one of those overcrowded breakfast nooks, Mr. Sherlock. And if they did see me there, I’d be horrified.”

  “Whatever.”

  There’s something not quite right about Tiffany. Maybe her Sword of Damocles is poking her in the rear. I can’t tell what the problem is by looking at her, but I’m a bit surprised that she called me instead of her new life coach, Dr. R. Bosley Radcliff. Maybe the doctor doesn’t give advice on Sundays.

  We are led by the Maitre d’ to one of the better tables. The waiter arrives the moment our butts touch down. Tiffany orders a mimosa. I order three orange juices. Kelly and Care are straining their necks at the epicurean potpourri surrounding us like a wagon train of food trucks. I tell my girls, “Here’s what you do. Walk around the entire room, see all the stuff they have to eat, and then decide where you want to start. Pick and choose carefully. Don’t get filled up on one thing. You can go back as many times as you want, so make variety the spice of your breakfast life.”

  The kids get up and make a dash for the breakfast dessert table. Nobody listens to me.

  I turn to Tiffany who is gulping the mimosa. “What’s the matter?”

  Tiffany downs half of the drink before answering. “Something happened to me last night that’s never happened to me before.”

  “What?”

  “It’s kinda hard to talk about.”

  “What is it?”

  “Do you promise you’ll never repeat this, post it on Facebook, or tweet it to anyone?” She’s serious, very, very serious.

  “Yes.”

  She hesitates.

  “Want me to cut my finger and swear to you in my own blood?” I ask to reassure her.

  “Maybe later.”

  “Okay, tell me.”

  “Mr. Sherlock, I got shut down last night,” she whispers, as if she’s confessing that she once committed a horrendous crim
e against humanity.

  “What?”

  “This probably happens to you and maybe everybody else all the time, but it's never, ever happened to me.” She puts her head into her hands to hide her shame.

  “What?”

  “I got shut down.” Tiffany’s wrist goes to her forehead. She rubs her temples to ease the pain. She sniffles as if she’s about to break into tears.

  I still have no clue what she is referring to.

  Tiffany lifts one hand from her face and whispers to me. “I wanted to do it and he didn’t.”

  “Do what?”

  Tiffany drops both hands and gives me her no one can be this stupid look. “It, Mr. Sherlock,” she cries out. “IT.”

  The explanation dawns on me like a fireplace poker to my skull. “Monroe?”

  Tiffany nods and returns to the whispering mode. “After our date, I invited him up to my penthouse. I made it very clear what was going to happen next, and when I get his clothes off, do you know what he does?”

  Even though I have a real good idea, I say, “No.”

  “He starts posing and flexing.”

  “Posing and flexing what?” I have to ask.

  “His muscles.

  “How many?”

  “Mr. Sherlock. I’m standing there in nothing but my best lace chemise and a smile, and he’s there going through this Arnold Schwarzenegger, flex-a-thon routine in front of my mirrors. It was nauseating. And he’s oiled up enough to be in the Gay Pride Parade.”

  “You think Monroe’s gay?”

  “No,” Tiffany says. “I know for a fact he’s not gay.”

  I don’t ask for an explanation.

  “It was like he was more interested in looking at himself in the mirror than looking at me. Can you believe that?”

  “No, Tiffany, I can’t.” I pause for a moment. “What did you do?”

  “Well, I just stood there and watched him go from one pose to another, from one mirror to another …”