All business now, in his one suit, clean shirt, and a pair of cracked brogans, the .38 tucked snug and comfortable in his waistband, Kevin took a cab to the Tenth Street Baths.
He sat on the highest bench in the steam room, where it was hottest. Below him, shriveled old Ukrainian men, retired Jewish gangsters, a few spiky-haired punks on the nod sweated silently, occasionally pouring buckets of icy water over their heads, which they refilled from a rusty spigot. Kevin lay there on the worn, wooden bench a long time, his white skin turning pink in the atrocious heat, oozing out months of accumulated poisons. After an hour, he could take no more. He heaved himself out the door, trotted gingerly the few steps to the black and uninviting pool, and flopped into the water with a loud splash. The temperature punched the air right out of his lungs. It was cold; so cold he didn't know whether he could make it the few feet to the ladder before he went into shock and sank like a stone. He just made it, clambering up the metal rungs, his skin burning.
A wizened Uzbek with a broom of soapy oak leaves rubbed him down with mentholated lather, Kevin thinking about the job the whole time. He wouldn't take any shit this time, he resolved. If he had to go out to Jersey for this one, or up to Providence again, they were gonna pay expenses.
He had a half-hour massage from a bored-looking blond woman with a Mohawk and a nose ring. She asked him his astrological sign, and he had to say he didn't know, irritated with her for disturbing his thoughts. He was worried about his hands. They shook a little from lack of alcohol. It had been four hours since his last drink. He'd have a short one just before the meeting. Just in case he had to use the gun. Just in case they gave him any shit. He felt no loyalty to these greaseballs. This was a money job, no more. He'd ask for ten, no, twelve thousand dollars this time. Not a nickel less. He wasn't some street punk looking to make a reputation for himself. He had experience. He'd killed twenty-four men. He'd have one drink, no more. Then it was stricly maintenance until the job was over, and how long could that be?
When he went into the ancient, white-tiled shower room, only one other person was there, a tall, Nordic-looking man with one of those pumped-up bodies you got working out eight hours a day. Kevin had seen a lot of that in prison, guys who lifted weights until their bodies were so inflated they could barely touch their sides. Useless muscleheads, in love with the mirror.
"You should try the new machines," said the man.
"What?" said Kevin, annoyed that a stranger, especially a naked stranger, would talk to him.
"The machines . . . the weight machines," the man said, making lifting motions with both arms to demonstrate what he meant, and to show off an upper body he was clearly proud of. "They put in a weight room. They got everything. StairMaster, Exercycle, everything. Good for that stomach."
Kevin stepped out an inch from under the showerhead and stared stone faced at the chiseled giant.
"You should lose that belly," the man said, oblivious to Kevin's increasing irritation. He looked up and down at the older man, appraising his physique. "The rest of you is good, for your age, very good. The arms, legs . . . excellent. Pecs are good. Wasn't for that gut, you'd be in tremendous shape."
The man smiled at him, so filled with self-love he didn't see the loathing in Kevin's eyes, missed the rage and resentment that Kevin felt rushing up into his head like an electric charge. The giant Teuton moved closer, smiling idiotically, a hand extended, as if expecting to be asked for an autograph. It occurred to Kevin that maybe he should know this steroid-juiced moron, maybe he'd seen his picture somewhere, modeling underwear on a billboard, on television, wrestling maybe. He didn't know. Didn't care either. The man had pissed him off, as good as challenged him with his witless babble.
Kevin extended his hand now too. Without changing his expression, he reached down, grabbed the man's testicles, and twisted, hard. The man made a funny, sucking noise through his teeth, and Kevin brought his head forward and crashed his temple into the bridge of the muscle man's nose. As he doubled over in pain, Kevin brought his knee up to catch his head on the way down. There was a loud crack, like a bat knocking fungoes into an outfield. Then there was a wet thud as the man collapsed in a heap on the tile floor, blood running freely across his face from a flattened nose. He lay there, naked and wheezing, while Kevin looked around to see if anybody was watching. Then he looked down over his belly at the man and pissed on his head.
13
Idon't see why we gotta hire a fuckin' mick," said Paulie Brown. "It don't seem right." He brought the big, gray Seville to a halt to avoid a taxi that had pulled over to pick up a fare.
"Go around him," said Richie Tic from the passenger seat. "Fuckin' rag head!" he yelled through the closed window.
"It don't seem right," repeated Paulie as he pulled back out into Second Avenue traffic, "lettin' a fuckin' mick whack a boss. It don't seem respectful. Even if the guy's a rat, it don't seem right. It sets a bad . . . a bad . . . whaddyacallit, a president. I mean, you let that happen once, and everybody's gonna feel free to take liberties . . . you gonna have every fuckin' eggplant, every porta ricken the fuckin' city thinkin' it's fine they take a shot atta boss every time they got a beef."
"Precedent? That the word you want?" said Richie. "Lemme tell you about precedent. You worried about settin' a precedent? That's what's worryin' you? Listen, somebody doesn't shut this guy's mouth an' we're all goin' . . . the whole fuckin' borghata's goin' away. Howzat for fuckin' precedent? Lemme tell you what's bad precedent: Jimmy gettin' locked down twenny-three outta twenty-four hours a day, no phone calls, nothin' - that's bad precedent. I don't care we gotta hire fuckin' Martians do the job, so long it gets done."
Paulie sat silently for a while, thinking things over. "An' this guy Rico?" he wondered out loud, chewing at his lower lip. "All I hear lately is this guy Rico says this, Rico says that . . . What is this Rico guy sayin' that's so bad?"
"RICO's a fuckin' statute, a law, numb-nuts. It's the law they gonna use put you, me, an' Jimmy an' just about everybody you ever talked to inna can. Marrone! Maybe you noticed a lotta fellas from the other families been goin' away lately? Maybe you noticed they ain't maybe never comin' back? That's what RICO is. It means like you got pinched doin' only one little thing, and the prosecutor, he puts your case in with a buncha things maybe you didn't do, some other things that maybe some other guys done, then both you and the other guys and everybody else gets to go away for it. You understand that? That penetrate in there, Paulie? You see what I'm sayin' to you?"
"I got it. I'm not fuckin' stupid, Richie." Paulie fumed silently for a few more blocks. "I still don't like usin' that mick. You see that guy last night? He looks like a fuckin' lush."
"You wanna do it, Paulie? You wanna go down there the islands? They got a whole buncha federal marshals down there just waitin' for some big guinea get off the plane from New York. You wanna like walk right over Charlie's crib an' put a couple in his head just like that? Yeah . . . why not? That'll be great. That'll look real good. Jimmy, Jimmy gets to explain to the nice prosecutor on the stand what his former close personal associate Mr Brown, that's former, notice, 'cause you'll be dead by then, he gets to tell the man what his good friend Paulie is doin' down there the Caribbean tryin' to clip a protected fuckin' witness in his case. You still wanna go?"
"I don't wanna go," said Paulie. "My wife would kill me I come back with a tan. I tell her I been gone on business all I want, she ain't gonna believe it."
"He's sendin' Petey down there anyways," said Richie.
"Petey? Which Petey you talkin' about? Big or Little?"
"Little. He's sendin' Little Petey."
"He's wit' Jerry Dogs."
"Yeah . . . that's the beauty part. Jerry's like sympathetic, and he's got a casino hotel down there, he's wired up pretty good. It was his people that heard about Charlie first, so he's like sendin' Little Petey down to supervise."
"So . . . so at least it's a friend of ours who's going down with him, right?"
"
Right. So shut the fuck up about the Irishman," said Richie. "He's gonna do fine, this guy. He's a real fuckin' hoodlum, don't worry. This guy, this guy, you can cut his fuckin' arm off an' he'll pick it right up an' beat you to death with it. This guy is good. This ain't the first time out for him by a fuckin' long shot, okay? Don't worry. This guy likes his work - " Richie slammed his palm into his forehead. "Fuck!"
"What is it?" said Paulie, alarmed.
"Turn it around. I forgot something."
"What?"
"Turn it around. Go up Madison. We gotta go back uptown. I forgot somethin' we gotta get for Jimmy."
"Where we goin'? What do we gotta get?" asked Paulie, swinging the Caddy across two lanes of traffic to take a right on Thirty-fourth.
"Gotta go to Lane Bryant," said Richie. "He saw somethin' he wants inna catalog."
"Jeez," said Paulie. "I hate this. Why don't he just order from the catalog?"
"'Cause the FBI reads his fuckin' mail. He don't want people to know . . . I mean, fuck if I know. He's the skipper, okay? He wants something, I do it."
"I ain't the one goin' in this time," said Paulie.
"Why the fuck not?" said Richie. "Pretend like you're gettin' somethin' for the wife. Nobody's gonna think it's for you . . . what, you think somebody's gonna think it's for you?"
"I don't want nobody thinkin' my wife's that heavy," said Paulie. "It's embarrassin'."
14
The car arrived to take him to the airport at nine, just like Brian said, and, just like Brian said, Bobby Flannigan was at the wheel.
"You can do me a wee favor on your way to the airport," Brian had said. "As you're goin' out there anyway . . ."
It was a gray, drizzly morning, and Kevin, dressed for the tropics, was feeling shaky and cold in the front passenger seat. Bobby, a gravelly-voiced geezer, was making bitter observations on the state of the world as they crossed 125th Street to pick up the Long Island Expressway. Bobby had been around forever, and Kevin had to wonder if he sounded like that - bitter, old, his brain shriveled by alcohol.
"Look at these animals," said Bobby, moving his chin to indicate a group of young black men hanging out in front of a grocery store. "Monkeys . . . they look like fuckin' monkeys. Breed like them too . . . dirty little bastards. They're gonna be runnin' everything one a' these days, you watch. Mark my words, Kev . . . you come back you might be workin' fer niggers."
Kevin wasn't listening. He was running over his Things to Do list in his mind.
When they got to the American Airlines terminal, Kevin directed Bobby to a parking space in the last row, explaining he had to meet somebody before he got on the plane. Bobby pulled the clapped-out Oldsmobile into the space, next to a lemon yellow Camaro.
"We gotta wait here? What time's your flight?" asked Bobby.
"Quarter of," replied Kevin, reaching in his jacket pocket.
"Don't wanna miss yer plane . . . all that fun in the sun."
"Here he comes," said Kevin, indicating a moon-faced young man in a ski parka, approaching the car from the driver's side.
"That's Timmy Moon," said Bobby, smiling. "Know his dad."
Kevin put the barrel of the Colt up against Bobby's head and fired twice. Bobby fell over the wheel, his hair on fire, a momentary spume of red painting the dash. "Thanks for the ride, Bobby," said Kevin, under his breath. He got out of the car and handed the revolver to Timmy, who put it immediately under his coat. "You got everything?" said Timmy, reminding Kevin of his bag. Kevin reached in the back seat to retrieve it.
"You touch anything?" asked Timmy.
"No," said Kevin, "just the door handle."
"I'll get it," said Timmy. "Have a nice trip."
15
Henry took Tommy over to Sandy Ground and they came away with a nearly new gas-powered generator for the amazing price of seventy-five bucks. It purred happily away beneath the palmettos, a respectable distance from the bar, bringing light and refrigeration. Cheryl bought some novelty Christmas lights in the shape of chili peppers in Philipsburg and strung them around the roof. The two hopeful entrepreneurs even set up a small stereo system, playing the Bob Marley and Peter Tosh that tourists expected on vacation.
A few wanderers from Dawn Beach did come over now and then, checking to see if there were any naked tits on Tommy and Cheryl's end of the beach. They'd have a burger and maybe a beer - // Frances or Cheryl was sunbathing nearby - before returning to their air-conditioned bunkers and their wives and kids on the other end. A few locals would stop by occasionally, for a single soda or a milk stout, but they never came in numbers.
Henry and Frances remained Tommy's Tropical's best customers - good for lunch every day, dinner at least twice a week, and about a half case of beer and a bottle of tequila a day. They insisted on paying - in cash - and dragged a few friends over from the marina, Captain Toby and his wife, a few heavy-drinking Aussies and South Africans. They even organized a few late evening lobster-diving parties, when the bar filled up and stayed filled for hours, Tommy and Cheryl rushing to keep up with the furious pace of two-fisted, career alcoholics. But none of them returned on their own.
Tommy's Tropical did not become the culinary mecca that Tommy had so fervently hoped for, and he was grateful for the distractions of their sailing trips with the older couple, their bar crawls to little Dominican whorehouses, French cafes, and waterfront lolos. He came to anticipate and even expect the gooey, high-grade dope that Henry and Frances always seemed to have in abundance.
Standing at the helm of a sleek, fifty-one-foot sailboat, a good breeze going, Tommy was thinking life in the tropics was, in spite of any business disappointments, not half bad. Cheryl, grinning ear to ear, the way she had been all morning, stood next to him holding a Heineken, squealing with delight every time a wave crashed over the rails, spraying them with seawater.
"How'm I doin'?" asked Tommy, apprehensively. The sea was rough today. In their previous trips it had been nothing like this twelve-foot swells, the deck at a steep angle, pots and pans rattling around in the cabin below, spindrift from the wave tops filling Tommy's eyes with salty mist.
"You're doing fine," said Henry from his seat. "Just keep the bow in line with that rock over there. You're doing great. Natural born sailor."
Pleased with himself, Tommy muscled the big boat up the side of another wave and surfed it down the other side into a deep trough. The next wave broke over his head, almost tearing him from the wheel and washing him overboard, thrilling him.
"Yeee-haaa!" yelled Henry.
Another wave, this one right over the bow, washed across the deck, worrying Tommy. He gave Henry an expectant look, thinking he'd want to take over, but Henry ignored him, draining his third beer since leaving port, his feet braced casually against the fold-down table in the center of the aft deck, looking dreamily over at Frances at the winches.
Isle Forchue and its surrounding rocks grew closer, and Tommy, more than a little drunk himself at ten in the morning, didn't like the way the dark sea boiled white around the projections of brown coral jutting out of the water a few hundred yards off.
"Isn't that . . . like, a reef or something?" he asked worriedly. "I don't . . . I really don't wanna rack this thing up."
"Don't worry," said Henry. "I'll take over when you get close. You're doing great. Few more times, you can sail around the world without help. Want another beer?"
Tommy shrugged, frightened and exhilarated. In a moment, Henry was pressing another cold, green bottle into his hand. This was fun. This was really fun. He was having the best goddamn time he could remember.
Cheryl clambered around behind him and held on to his waist. Saint Martin was ten miles or so behind them, a faraway mountain range surrounded by dark blue. When Tommy kissed Cheryl on the neck, he tasted salt.
Henry finally hopped to his feet and took the helm, swinging the boat around and through a narrow cut in the reef, using sail power the whole way. There was a towering black rock to the starboard side, and as
they passed by it, into a previously unseen horseshoe-shaped lagoon, the wind died suddenly, the sails emptied and fell slack, and they drifted noiselessly over turquoise and green water, their view of Saint Martin obstructed now by Isle Forchue's outcroppings of rock and scrub-covered bluffs. Henry cranked in the main sheet, and Frances ran forward to drop anchor.
The island was deserted. Not a soul, not a house, not a boat, not a single structure of human design in sight. There was only a barren strip of white sand beach curving around the lagoon, some coconut palms, and, beyond the tree line, a hilly expanse of brown grass and low bushes. In the distance, Tommy could see sheep grazing.
"Cool," said Cheryl. "I feel like a pirate."
"The British used to keep French prisoners here," said Henry, squinting into the sun. "Held them for ransom until the local governor paid up."
Without warning, Frances peeled off her wet, olive drab jump vest, kicked off her shorts, and dove stark naked into the water. Tommy caught an enticing glimpse of mahogany brown ass and a flash of pubic hair before she disappeared beneath the surface. Cheryl unhesitatingly followed her example, leaving her maillot in a wet pile on the deck, leaping feet first into the lagoon. Another crash from the aft deck and Tommy saw that Henry too had dispensed with his clothes and gone cannonballing over the side.
He felt momentarily at a loss. Uncomfortable in any case with displaying himself in the nude, he was made even more uncomfortable by the fact that his quick look at Frances's rock-hard butt and that dark patch between her legs had left him with a hard-on, a noticeable semi, and the spectacle of both Frances and Cheryl, frolicking like naked mermaids a few feet away, threatened to make his condition even more apparent. The two girls began chanting from the water, "Tomm-y! Tooomm-y!" and he saw he had no choice. Before his penis popped out of the top of his bathing suit like a hand puppet, he belly flopped into the water.
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