by Paul Levine
"I was trying to draw a bad throw. If the pitcher puts it in the dugout, I score and we tie it up."
"You put the whole team at risk so you could be the hero. Now you're doing the same thing with Herb." Luber rocked forward in the chair and got to his feet. He brushed off his pants, as if he'd just hopped off a particularly dusty horse instead of a relatively clean, secondhand chair. "I gotta get going. Ponies are running at Calder."
Luber had always seemed short, but now, aged and a tad stooped, he was truly pint-size.
Luber started for the door, stopped, and turned. "Getting picked off. There's a lesson in that you never learned. You can't depend on umpires. Same for judges. Same for the whole damn system. That's why it's better to resolve matters informally. Between people."
Steve put the head of the bat on the floor, leaned on the handle. "What are you getting at?"
"That cockamamie suit you filed to get Herb's license back. You drop it, I could give you some help."
"What kind of help?"
Pinky's cheeks crinkled with a chubby smile. "Let's say you had a murder case that's got you stumped."
That caught Steve by surprise. "What do you know about it?"
"C'mon, Stevie. I got friends who say Hal Griffin's been pulling some pretty cute permits down in Monroe County. New docks, hydrofoil service, liquor license for a gulfside terminal. Then a guy from Washington gets whacked on his boat. If I were defending Griffin, I'd be asking myself one mighty big question."
"What's that? Who could you bribe to get the case dropped?"
"The one the ancient Romans asked, wise guy. Cui bono? Who stands to gain?"
"Already doing that. Looking for who profits if Griffin takes a fall."
"So let me help you. I know people. I hear things."
"So whadaya know? Whadaya hear?"
"Oy! I should give it away, you gonif?" Pinky Luber sniggered and waddled toward the door. "Got another Roman expression for you. Quid pro quo." He opened the door to the reception room and slipped the bowler onto his head. "Without some quid, kid, there ain't no quo."
Fifteen
IN PRAISE OF INANIMATE
WOMEN
"Pinky Luber tried to bribe you?" Victoria sounded skeptical.
"I don't know if you'd call it a bribe," Steve said, "but he implied he'd help us in Griffin's case if I'd drop Dad's Bar petition."
Victoria wanted to ask more, but it was awkward, with all the people staring at them. "This is so embarrassing."
"What's the problem?" Steve said.
They were hurrying along Flagler Street, a woman in a thong bikini slung over Steve's shoulder. The woman's breasts, full spheroids, overflowed her bikini top. Her hair, a blond avalanche—Farrah Fawcett circa 1976—tickled Steve's neck.
"Everyone's looking at us," Victoria said.
True. Patrons at the café Cubano stands, clerks from the discount camera shops sneaking smokes on the sidewalk, Latin-American tourists rolling luggage carts . . . everyone was gaping, pointing, laughing. Probably because the woman in the bikini was a hundred-pound, custom-made, silicone "love doll," anatomically correct right down to every digit and orifice.
"We should have parked right across the street from the courthouse," Victoria said.
"And pay fifteen bucks? No way."
Steve had parked his old Caddy at a meter around the corner on Miami Avenue. They had three minutes to get to the hearing. Motion for summary judgment in the case of Pullone vs. Adult Enterprises, Ltd., dba The Beav. Long before Steve hooked up with Victoria— professionally and personally—he had represented The Beav, the strip club in Surfside. The cases were usually mundane consumer-fraud actions: selling sparkling cider as champagne for twenty bucks a glass or running multiple credit card charges every time the song changed during a lap dance. There was also the occasional personal-injury suit, including today's case. Clayton Pullone, a middle-aged, married CPA, claimed to have suffered a dislocated hip while wrestling Susie Slamazon, The Beav's famed bikini grappler, in a vat of lime Jell-O. Although the blonde on Steve's shoulder was not Susie, her specs were as close as he was likely to find. Her name was Tami, according to the instruction manual, which also included helpful hints about washing various parts with warm, sudsy water.
"Cuánto cuesta la rubia?" a man in a guayabera shouted as they passed Castillo Joyeria, a cut-rate jewelry store. Inquiring into the price of the blonde.
"You can't afford her," Steve called back.
In fact, Tami cost six thousand dollars. Custom-made to the buyer's specifications. Skin tone: tan. Hair: honey blond. Nails: French manicure. Pubic hair: lightly trimmed. Breasts: 38DD and jiggly. Articulated hands that can grip. Mouth, vagina, and anal cavity, well . . . in working order. Lubed and suction ready, if you were into that sort of thing. Tami was on loan from Harvey Leinoff, The Beav's owner, who after dating the hired help for years had recently turned to inanimate sex objects for his personal needs. No back talk, no dressing room catfights, no overtime pay.
The three of them—Steve, Victoria, and Tami— headed up the granite steps to the courthouse, Steve beginning to wish they had parked closer. Tami was damn heavy, and as her weight shifted, a perky silicone nipple lodged—like a pencil eraser—in his ear.
Victoria tried to ignore the carnival going on next to her. "So how could Luber help us in Uncle Grif's case?"
"He let on that he knew who stuck Stubbs with that spear. Or could find out. It wasn't clear which."
"Do you trust Luber?"
Steve struggled up the last step. "About as far as I can throw Tami."
They were at the front doors, waiting to go through the metal detector, the guards stifling laughs.
"This is crazy," Victoria said. "There's no way you can force the plaintiff to roll around on the courtroom floor with your rubber doll."
"Don't need the plaintiff. I'm gonna wrestle Tami."
"Oh, please . . ."
"I'm gonna strip down to my briefs—"
"Not the leopard-spotted ones!"
"Of course not. That would be tacky. I'm wearing my Florida Marlins silk boxers. Which you'd know if you'd slept over last night."
Waiting for an overweight bail bondsman to go through the security check, Victoria whispered: "Please try not to get us held in contempt."
"Vic, a lawyer who's afraid of jail—"
"Is like a surgeon who's afraid of blood," she finished. "I know. I know."
They'd reached the front of the line, where Omar Torres, a portly courthouse security guard, was manning the walk-through metal detector.
"Omar, we're late for a hearing," Steve said. "Could you speed it up a bit?"
"No way, Steve," Torres said. "Yesterday, some santero sneaked in here with a human skull, cast a spell right in Judge Gridley's courtroom."
Victoria placed her purse on the conveyor belt for the X-ray machine.
"Gonna have to pat you down, honey," Torres said.
"In your dreams," Victoria said.
"Not you, Ms. Lord." Torres pointed at Tami the Love Doll, now standing shakily on her feet—painted toenails and all—leaning on Steve. "Her. Gotta check all her body cavities."
"No need, Omar," Steve replied. "I already did last night."
Victoria tried to analyze what Steve had told her, but it didn't compute. "Why would Pinky Luber care about your father's case?"
"Obviously, he's afraid of something."
They were sitting on a black wooden bench that resembled a church pew in the corridor outside Judge Alvin Schwartz's chambers. Steve had moved Tami between them after two guys in suits walked by and pinched the doll's boobs. Plaintiff's P.I. lawyers, Victoria figured. The insurance guys would never be so bold.
Steve had checked in with the bailiff, an officious young man who would be unemployed if not related to Judge Schwartz through marriage, if not bloodlines.
The bailiff carried a clipboard and demanded to know the names of every lawyer and witness who would be appearing in his great
-uncle's chambers. Steve dutifully gave their names, choosing "Tami Stepford" for his witness. They settled down to wait. Judge Schwartz was running late, a legalism for reading the morning paper while having his coffee with a bagel and a schmear.
"What's Luber afraid of?" Victoria asked. "He's served his time. There's nothing more the state can do to him."
"Unless something new came out in the Bar case."
"Anything now would be too late under the statute of limitations."
Steve shrugged, and Tami's head slid down his shoulder. "All I know, Pinky's scared shitless about my lawsuit."
"Did you tell your father about his visit?"
"Yep. Dad said Pinky was a wind-belly from way back. And if I got mixed up with him, I'd be hitched to a dead mule that was ass-deep in molasses. Or maybe it was manure, I can't remember which."
"Herb still wants you to drop the Bar case, right?"
"Said if I didn't, he'd write me out of his will."
"Strong words."
"Yeah, I'd lose a leaky houseboat and a collection of empty Bacardi bottles."
"So what are you going to do?"
"I'm not going to be intimidated by Dad or bribed by Pinky. Full speed ahead on the Bar case and to hell with Pinky Luber."
"But if Luber really can help us . . ."
"Forget it. I won't sell out my father."
"Herb doesn't want his license back. Maybe you should listen to him."
"This is what I've been talking about, Vic. You're too close to the Griffins. You can't be objective."
"Me? You won't accept help in Uncle Grif's case because you need to prove something to your father."
"Prove what?"
"That you're just as good a lawyer as he was."
"This isn't about me."
"Yes it is. If you were objective, you'd see it."
After that, no one said a thing, not even Tami.
The bailiff called three other cases, whose deep-carpet lawyers customarily gave him cash at Christmas, Halloween, and Bribe-Your-Public-Servant Day. So the partners of Solomon & Lord were still sitting on the hard, wooden pew at ten a.m., Victoria wondering what to tell Steve about her late-night phone call.
Then she just blurted it out. "The Queen called last night."
"Zurich or Johannesburg?"
"Katmandu. She's getting injections of pituitary glands from mountain goats. Supposed to rejuvenate the skin."
"You tell her about the case?"
Victoria nodded. "She was shocked. First time in years either of us mention Uncle Grif's name, and I have to tell her he's being charged with murder."
"She ask about Junior?"
"Only a hundred questions. 'How's he look? What's he doing? Is he married?' "
"She still think he's a dreamboat?"
"And 'terrif.' She said Junior was a terrif kid, so she's not surprised how he turned out."
"And how did he turn out? I mean, what exactly did you tell her?"
"Nothing much." Which was basically true, she thought. She didn't share her conflicted feelings with The Queen.
"Her Highness hates me, doesn't she?" Steve pried.
"She barely knows you."
"She thinks I'm not good enough for you."
"All parents think that about their children."
"Not my old man."
"You want to make a better impression on The Queen, stop wearing that stupid T-shirt every time you see her."
"What shirt?"
"Don't play dumb. The one that says: " 'If It's Not One Thing, It's Your Mother.' "
"I've tried being nice. She didn't like the watch I gave her."
"If it had been a real Cartier and not a knockoff, she would have loved it."
"If it had been a real Cartier, I couldn't have bought it from the valet parker at jai alai."
"The Queen doesn't hate you, Steve. She just always imagined me with someone . . ." How could she put this? ". . . different."
"A Princeton WASP whose Daddy owned an investment bank. Summer in Southampton, winter in Aspen."
"Actually, she always thought I'd marry Junior."
Steve made an "ow" sound and wrapped an arm around Tami. "I'm beginning to see the benefits of inanimate partners. No mothers-in-law."
Victoria had never told Steve some of her mother's pithier comments about him:
"For the life of me, Princess, I don't know what you see in that ambulance chaser."
And just now Victoria decided not to tell Steve something else, too. Her mother's odd reaction last night to the news about Uncle Grif. The Queen never asked about the case. Victoria would have expected her to wonder—Who's dead? Did Grif do it? How badly hurt is he?—but she didn't ask any of those questions. Her first response: "What did Grif say about me, dear?"
On second thought, maybe that was to be expected. After all, The Queen's egocentricity was as much a trademark as her couture dresses and salon coiffures. But the question wasn't: "Did he ask about me?" More of a concern, an alarm, about what was said. And then there was: "Did Grif mention your father?"
Again, it wasn't the question so much as the tone, Victoria reflected. Was there just a hint of fear? It seemed as if The Queen didn't want her talking about the family with Uncle Grif. After all these years of silence, what was she afraid of?
Victoria wondered about the secrets parents keep. Both Steve's father and her mother were hiding things. Was it to protect themselves, or their children? But don't all of us keep secrets from our loved ones? After all, she didn't come clean with Steve about just how shaky their relationship was.
What am I afraid of?
There was fear all around, it seemed to her.
The Queen had ended the phone call with another odd note Victoria was still processing.
"Grif was always envious of your father," Irene Lord had said.
"I thought they were best friends," Victoria replied.
"They were. But Nelson had such . . . je ne sais quoi . . . elegance, such class. Grif always knew he'd be nothing more than . . ."
Victoria could picture her mother, in her suite at the Shangri-la Hotel, making a dismissive European gesture, to be followed by a French expression.
"Another nouveau riche builder," The Queen concluded.
Victoria kept herself from pointing out that, after her father's death, she and her mother were nouveau pauvre. "I don't get it, Mother. Why are you criticizing Uncle Grif?"
"I'm not, dear. I'm only saying, don't take everything he says at face value. Now, I must ring off, darling. I'm late for my mud bath."
Victoria imagined her mother, the phone pressed between shoulder and ear, delicate fingers removing a three-carat diamond stud from the other ear, placing it carefully in her black-lacquer traveling jewelry box. There was so much more Victoria wanted to ask. Why had The Queen never told her about Grif's offers of financial support? And why had she refused all his help? Why shut Uncle Grif out of their lives when they needed him the most?
She decided not to share any of this with Steve, at least not until she could figure out some of it. She glanced at him stuffing Tami's overflowing breasts back into place. Wondering if he was taking longer than absolutely necessary to complete the task.
She thought of her father, remembering a handsome man in an old-fashioned, three-piece suit, a barrel-chested man with a deep voice and a mane of salt-andpepper hair. He had seemed so strong. So invincible. But damn him, he'd been weak. He took the coward's way out, abandoning his family. Not even a note, she thought for the thousandth time. How hard would it have been to write of his love for his only child?
Damn him! Damn him for the pain he left in his wake.
A memory came back to her, just a glimpse of her father, scooping her up and swinging her around, her legs nearly parallel to the ground as she shrieked with delight. A merry-go-round of a father. She remembered him as a tall man, but years later, she saw photos of Nelson and Irene Lord together. They were about the same height, and Irene was five-eight. The tri
cks the mind plays, she thought. What else was distorted in her memory? And what other secrets did her mother keep locked in her black-lacquer jewelry box?
Sixteen
THIS YEAR'S BIGBY
In the span of seven minutes, Judge Alvin Schwartz— eighty-one years old, nearsighted, absentminded, and cantankerous as a hemorrhoid—threatened Steve with contempt, ordered him to put his pants back on, reserved ruling on his motion for summary judgment, tossed all lawyers out of his chambers, but commanded Ms. Tami Stepford and all her silicone charms to remain behind, while His Honor considered the weighty legal precedents concerning injuries suffered while wrestling bikini-clad women in vats of Jell-O.
On the way out of the courthouse, Steve felt elated. Victoria had made the legal arguments, and he'd handled the single-leg takedown and crotch-and-a-half pinning move. Surely Victoria must realize they were a terrific team. "We're gonna win," he predicted cheerfully.
"Great," Victoria said, without enthusiasm. "We'll get more work from . . ." She couldn't bring herself to say it. Even the name sounded dirty. "That place."
"Hey, The Beav pays the bills."
"Not just in lap dance coupons?"
"C'mon, Vic. You know I don't mess around with The Beav Brigade." Referring to the pole climbers, lap dancers, and bar-top booty shakers.
It was technically true, thanks to his use of the present-tense verb "don't." It would have been completely true if he'd added "anymore."
From the day he first kissed Victoria—actually, she kissed him on the dock of a yacht club while her fiancé was having avocado vichyssoise inside—he had not been with another woman. Had not even lusted after another woman. In the time they'd been together, he had often told Victoria that he loved her—usually amidst various whoops and snorts while her legs were wrapped around his hips—but even so, he figured he meant it.
"So, how 'bout Nemo for dinner?" he asked. "My treat. You're crazy about their pan-seared yellowtail."
"Ah. Uhh. Ah," Victoria said.
She was either buying time or was in desperate need of a Heimlich maneuver, Steve thought.