by Dani Amore
He pulled up in front of a small house in the middle of a block that looked like every other block within two square miles. The only difference was, this house had a lawn ornament. A birdfeeder with one of those big balls on top that looked like a purple bowling ball. This was it.
Tommy parked the car on the street to make it just a little bit more difficult for the neighbors to see the license plate, just in case things got a little messy.
He walked up the brick-paved sidewalk and knocked on the door. While he waited, Tommy breathed deeply, taking in the scent from the shrubs hugging the house’s foundation. A squirrel peeked around the corner of the house and looked at Tommy.
“Piss off,” Tommy said. The squirrel disappeared.
“Good morning,” a voice said.
Tommy turned, smiled easily at the woman whose face was smiling tentatively at him. She had watery blue eyes and sagging cheeks. Deep lines creased her neck and forehead. Even her chin sagged slightly.
“I’ve come back for seconds.”
She laughed and undid the chain. “Tommy, right?”
“Guilty as charged.”
“Come on in. You want something to drink?”
“No thanks.”
Tommy followed her into the house. She closed the door behind him and walked toward the kitchen. Tommy checked out the place. The living room was small with blue carpeting. The couch and armchair had matching floral upholstery. A bookshelf with mirrors held hundreds of tiny figurines. A grandfather clock stood silently in the corner, its pendulum swinging gently back-and-forth. It reminded Tommy of his grandmother’s house. He shook that thought from his mind.
Rhonda walked into the kitchen and gestured for Tommy to sit at the small table. It had a wood top with a natural finish, but the legs were painted white. Tommy noted that there was no dining room.
“You don’t want something to drink,” she said. “What do you want?”
Any thoughts of his grandmother left Tommy as he studied Rhonda’s face. It wasn’t a grandmother’s face. The teeth were slightly stained. The mouth cold and hard. Her hands were meaty, products of a sausage factory. The house didn’t smell like his grandmother’s. It didn’t even smell like a woman’s house. It had a guy smell.
“I want Loreli. Again.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to sample the variety of my product line? Unlike Baskin-Robbins, I’ve got a lot more than 33 flavors.” She smiled at him which meant her mouth moved, but her eyes showed not a flicker of warmth.
“You know, when you find something you really like, you hate to take a chance on something else.”
“Spoken like a truly satisfied customer,” she said.
“Well, let me see what else you’ve got. Just for kicks.”
Rhonda retrieved a leatherbound scrapbook from the kitchen counter. She set it on the table in front of Tommy. She poured herself a cup of coffee as Tommy flipped through the pages in the book. The plastic sleeves crinkled with each turn of the page.
“Yeah, baby. There she is.” Rhonda crossed the kitchen, stood behind Tommy, and looked over his shoulder.
He was tapping a picture of Loreli standing in front of a bed. She had on high heels and a black mesh tank top. She was in profile, looking back at the camera, bent over slightly as if to pick something up. Her ass was round and smooth, the dividing line warm and inviting.
“Man, she was good.”
“Loreli does not disappoint,” Rhonda said.
“Tell me more about her,” Tommy said.
Rhonda gestured with her coffee cup. “Her vital statistics are right there underneath her picture. See?”
Tommy nodded, then looked at the picture again. This was the bitch that killed his stupid brother. He still couldn’t believe it. And he couldn’t believe that he was getting hard just looking at her picture. Rhonda was right. Loreli does not disappoint.
“After seeing this picture, I definitely want her again. She’s just too damn good to pass up.”
“Okay,” Rhonda said. “You know how it works. Cash or credit card. You did cash, right?”
“Right.”
“I’ll set up a time and place, and she’ll be there, okay?”
“You know,” Tommy said. “I was thinking. If I paid a little more, could I pick her up? You know, make it a little more like a date. Kind of like, what do they call that, role-playing?”
“Sure,” Rhonda said. She crossed her thick arms over her midsection, sipped from her cup of coffee. “I’ve done that before. She’ll be at a hotel bar, you pretend to be a stranger. It’s fun. A nice touch. More romantic that way, too.”
“Very romantic,” Tommy said, struggling to keep his voice even. Smooth. “I like that. But you know what I was thinking? What if I picked her up somewhere a little more natural? Does she live around here?”
“No, that’s against policy.” Rhonda drained the rest of her coffee in one big gulp and set the cup on the counter. “You understand. Most of these girls like to keep work separate from home. You know, leave it at the office.”
“Oh, sure,” Tommy said. “I’ve been there. But would it make a difference to you or to her if I pay a little extra? You know, with a few hundred, maybe she would make an exception in this case. And I think it would be a lot of fun, make the whole play-acting thing a little more real.”
“Sorry, I can’t do that,” Rhonda said. Tommy heard the iron in her voice. This woman was not going to be tricked or swayed. “Besides,” she said, “I don’t give out—”
Tommy lowered his right knee to the floor, twisted from his chair, and threw a left hook with everything he had. His fist flashed out, sunk into Rhonda’s ample stomach. Her breathed whooshed out of her body.
Rhonda reached out toward the table to steady herself, but Tommy got to his feet and swung again. His right fist connected with Rhonda’s chin and she crashed to the floor in a heap. Tommy stood over her. The effort from the two punches, from the adrenaline coursing through his body, left him slightly out of breath.
“Listen. You tell me where Loreli lives or this is just going to be the start, do you understand?”
Rhonda vomited onto the faded linoleum floor. Watery brown liquid shot from her mouth and splattered onto Tommy’s shoes. He jumped back, looked in disgust at the vomit on the hem of his pants.
When he was sure she was done, Tommy stepped around Rhonda and planted a foot on her head.
“We can do this the easy way, or we can do it the very, very, very hard way. Either way, you’re going to tell me where the bitch lives, got it? Now, if you want me to turn your fat ass into a pile of bloody hamburger, I can do it. In fact, I’ve got a shitload of frustration I wouldn’t mind working out on someone right now, understand? So tell me where she is.” He lifted his left leg and kicked her in the ribs with the point of his toe. “Now.”
Instead, Rhonda lunged upward, her head wedged between Tommy’s legs. She lifted, her thick legs pushing up beneath her, her big veiny hands grabbing each of his ankles. Tommy, incredulous, felt himself being lifted up, up and up. She lifted him on her back, a loud grunting sound escaping her lips, and then she flipped him backwards over her. He crashed to the kitchen floor in a heap.
Tommy felt shooting pains in his shoulder. He rolled to his knees, got his hands beneath him and began to stand up. He looked up just in time to see Rhonda, her arm pulled back behind her and then the coffee pot was coming at his head. He tried to duck, but was too slow. Lights exploded in his head and he felt scalding hot coffee cascade down his face. He let out a roar as the searing pain drove white hot needles into his skin. His hands flew to his face, tried to wipe the heat from his face. His mouth was open. He was screaming. Somewhere, in the distant realm of his conscious mind, he heard the sound of cast iron scraping. He knew that sound. It was the same sound his grandmother’s heavy frying pan made when she lifted it off the stove—
He lunged to his feet, bellowing like a wounded buffalo. He managed to get one eye open which afforded him th
e view of Rhonda stepping forward. He watched in disbelief as she swung the frying pan with all the grace and power of a young Ted Williams. The heavy pan caught Tommy on the bridge of the nose, and the cartilage squashed beneath the blow. He felt something give in his face. His mouth filled with blood and he sank to his knees. He saw black and fell to the floor.
The linoleum cooled one side of Tommy’s face and his vision returned. He rolled over onto his back, instinctively raising his arms to protect his face. Rhonda swung the pan again and it crashed into his arm, then slid down his elbow and triceps until it banged against his torso. Tommy clamped down on the pan, catching Rhonda’s hands beneath his arm. She was off balance, leaning over him when he rotated and threw a high left hook that caught Rhonda flush on the jaw. She staggered. Tommy let go of the pan. Before she could regain her balance, he brought his knees to his chest and drove his feet directly into Rhonda’s face.
She flew backward, landed on the floor with a thud. Her head smashed into the kitchen cabinet’s base. Blood streamed from her mouth. Two of her stained teeth fell to the floor. She retched again.
“You,” Tommy said as he stomped down on her ankle. They both heard something snap. “Will,” Tommy said, and stomped down on her knee. “Tell,” he said, and kicked her in the solar plexus. He moved around her. “Me.” A kick in the back. Right on her spine. “Where.” He knelt down beside her. “She.” Rhonda felt a kitchen knife pressed against her throat.
“Lives.”
Tommy pressed the point of the knife against the sagging folds of flesh around Big Fat Rhonda’s neck.
“Right now. Or I’m going to slit your stupid throat. Got it?”
The blade sunk deeper into Rhonda’s throat but Tommy could she was already losing consciousness.
It was hard for her to speak.
Somehow, she managed.
30.
Loreli took a deep breath, tried to calm herself down. She had to focus. It was like when she was typing a deposition for the attorney. She had to put everything out of her mind and concentrate. She breathed deeply, her head cleared and the off-kilter feeling of dizziness subsided.
She was in the middle lane of I-696, surrounded by cars on all sides. The Camry was doing its best to keep up. Loreli glanced at the speedometer. Seventy-five. She could feel the little car’s body shudder as the three-lane highway curved. Her stomach tightened until the road straightened out.
Her mind buzzed with ricochet thoughts. Her hands were still sweaty on the wheel. Every time she looked in the rearview mirror, her stomach bunched up and pushed its way toward the back of her throat.
But the Taurus was gone.
Loreli wanted to take an exit. She wanted to pull the car over and just sit. A place where none of this would have happened. Where she could just wake up in the morning and not call Rhonda. Not go to the hotel in Ann Arbor.
But that would’ve meant not being able to pay off Ted’s drug dealer. And that would’ve put Liam at risk.
She did take an exit and pull over, but it wasn’t to contemplate. It wasn’t to wallow in self-pity.
When she finished her task, she got back behind the wheel, gritting her teeth.
Loreli was through with blaming herself. She’d made her decisions, made her mistakes, and hopefully, she could live with them.
Hopefully, they’d let her live with them.
Loreli drove east, all the way on 696 until she hit I-94. She took that down to 10 mile, then exited, and pointed the Camry east toward St. Claire Shores. Loreli hadn’t been to Detroit’s east side in a long time. The area seemed foreign to her.
She took 10 mile to Jefferson, then Jefferson south to Barkley. From there, she followed the house numbers until she found the one she was looking for. Loreli had to double check, because it didn’t look like the neighborhood of a drug dealer. The yards were big, the houses bigger. The driveways expansive, the cars expensive.
This was the kind of place her boss, Carl Ryson, could afford to live. Not the tailpipe-sucking drug dealer of her old deadbeat boyfriend.
Loreli put the Camry in park and gazed at the gold numerals on the dark brown archway over the solid wooden door.
Ted should be doing this, she thought. That piece of dogshit should be here, doing the dirty work. For a brief moment, Loreli felt like the old Loreli, the one without any self-esteem who basically did what Ted told her to do. She thought of how she’d let him drive her car into the ground, spend her money, and when she did try to stand up to him, how she’d let him sweet talk her into a state of complete supplication.
God, she’d been so weak back then, it made her want to puke.
So what was different now? Here she was doing his dirty work.
This was different, she thought. Liam was at stake. And she wasn’t doing this for Ted. She didn’t trust him. Giving him the money to take to this Dexter guy would be an even bigger mistake.
It was time for her to handle things herself.
She’d pay this guy, then figure out what to do with the rest of the money. She could give the rest of it back and promise to pay it back. She didn’t know to whom she could give the money, but she would figure that out later.
It was time to get Liam off the hook.
Loreli walked to the house and rang the bell. Her heart was beating fast, but strong. She flexed her hands and fingers. Strength surged through her body and muscles. She looked at the big, thick wooden door and felt like she could rip it off its hinges. A breeze stirred her hair and the leaves on the large Dutch Elm on the boulevard rustled at the intrusion.
The door swung open and Dexter Brussels stood before her. He had his shirt off, and his muscular chest and arms were glistening. She could smell food cooking, beer on his breath. His eyes were clear, his smile innocent and boyish.
“I don’t want no Girl Scout cookies,” he said. He leaned against the doorjamb, his arms folded across his chest.
Loreli handed him the five thousand dollars.
He kept his arms where they were. The grin widened.
“All right, sugar mama,” he said.
She thrust the money at him, pushed it into his chest. He grabbed it before it fell to the floor.
“I don’t ever want to see you again. Ted and I are through. If I ever see you near me or Liam, I’ll kill you, and then I’ll call the cops. Not the other way around. Understand?”
He was busy counting the money.
She turned and walked back to the Camry. Dexter called after her. “Look, the tough girl act ain’t workin’, but I like the way you came up with this money.”
Loreli sat down in the driver’s seat. She was about to pull the door shut behind her when she heard:
“Is there more where this came from?”
31.
Tommy Abrocci had been arrested for shoplifting when he was sixteen years old. He stole a box of rubbers. He had no intention of using them, he was just curious, that’s all. Because he was a minor, he was not fingerprinted. When he was seventeen, he was charged with assault for slapping a fifteen year old girl. Again, he was not fingerprinted. However, when Tommy Abrocci pulled a gun on an Indonesian shopkeeper and it was caught on a surveillance tape, he was arrested, and it being two days after his eighteenth birthday, fingerprinted.
A copy of that fingerprint, magnified approximately fifteen times, appeared on a computer monitor under the watchful gaze of FBI Special Agent Theo Bradley. Bradley worked in the Criminal Identification Department as a senior analyst.
Bradley called up the fingerprint taken from the dead man in Room 912 of the Prescott Hotel. The new image was laid over the first one and the computer worked soundlessly for several seconds, looking for points of similarity as well as difference.
A moment later a rectangular red box appeared telling Agent Bradley that the two fingerprints were most definitely not a match.
Bradley hadn’t been expecting this result, namely because his supervisors hadn’t been expecting this result. He pondered what he should
do. Agent Theo Bradley was careful by nature. He wasn’t a coward, he simply preferred to avoid a fight if possible. So rather than just call up his supervisor, SAC Amanda Rierdon, he thought he should at least present the problem: a) the dead man is not who you think he is, with the solution: b) who he really is.
Bradley closed the image of Tommy Abrocci’s fingerprint, and centered the dead man’s from Room 912. He then asked the computer to search not only the FBI’s database, but the entire network of criminal detection, as well as Interpol.
Bradley hit the ENTER button and settled back in his chair. This search could take anywhere from thirty seconds to fifteen minutes. He leafed through a Sports Illustrated on his desk until the computer beeped.
Bradley dropped the SI and looked at the screen. One positive match. He scanned the info: Dominic R. Abrocci of 125 Harley Lane, Philadelphia, PA. One arrest for indecent exposure in 1981. He’d pleaded guilty and was released on a mental outpatient basis.
Bradley picked up the phone, dialed Rierdon’s extension.
***
Amanda Rierdon was not a mystic. She didn’t believe in chakras and New Age bullshit. She did, however, believe in the basic tenet of karma. What goes around comes around.
Screw somebody, somebody screws you.
And, get a promotion, albeit deserved, and your job suddenly becomes a hundred times harder.
Case in point: Tommy Abrocci.
Could she say she’d been expecting a call from Theo Bradley, telling him that the corpse in the Prescott Hotel’s Room 914 that looked exactly like her prized informant was in fact not her informant, but rather his twin brother? No. But, on some level, she knew this is what happens. You get a promotion, and your ass is on the line x 100.