Frank Sinatra in a Blender (14 page)

Sid shook his head, said he didn’t know. He was looking through the windshield when a Chevy van pulled out of the Indigo that said Naramore Locksmith Co. on the side.

He squinted to get a better look at the driver, then looked over at No Nuts.

“You see that van, Johnny?”

“Yeah, the locksmith guy? What about it? Think we just got robbed by a locksmith?”

Sid checked his rear-view mirror and slapped the shifter into reverse. “I dunno, Johnny, but I got a funny feelin’. Maybe it’s nothin’, but let’s look into it.”

Sid thought about that elevator ride. There was somethin’ about that guy in the coveralls. Sid knew him but he couldn’t remember from where. Just something about him—thieves’ intuition.

Sid slid out of the parking lot with his iPhone in his right hand, searching with his thumb. “What’d that van say, Johnny? Naramore Locksmith Company?”

“Yeah, somethin’ like that.” No Nuts turned around to make sure there was no traffic coming up behind them while Sid was on his phone. “Clear,” he said. Sid got over.

“Well, well, what do you make of this? There’s no bloody Naramore Locksmith I can find.” He turned the screen toward No Nuts.

“What’s this mean, Sid?”

“I’m not sure what it means yet but I think I might’ve just seen this cocksucker in the elevator.”

“This guy in the van?”

“Maybe. Whoever I saw was sweatin’ his ass off. He looked nervous.” Sid remembered the bulging fanny pack around Doyle’s waist, could’ve been anything in there.

“Sid, the light!”

Sid was lost in thought. He blazed through a red light, got hit hard in the back passenger side by a ¾ ton GMC. It spun the car around four times. Sid slammed into a few trashcans and sent them out into the street. The front of the Lexus knocked down a wooden privacy fence and one of the boards broke free and shattered the windshield.

“Bloody fuck!” Sid said. Everything happened fast. He looked down to find the car still running. He put it in reverse and it made a horrible sound, but it went. Sid cut the wheel hard to the left, shoved it up into drive and hammered the accelerator, throwing snow all over the young couple who stopped to help. No one climbed out of the GMC, the front windshield spiderwebbed.

No Nuts moved slowly. He’d been out cold for a minute, maybe two. Sid asked him if he was all right.

“My head’s killin’ me, Sid.”

Sid took a look at him. “You’ll be fine Johnny.”

The Lexus was fucked, but Sid didn’t care anymore. All he cared about was the stolen money and the cocksucker who’d re-stolen it from them. As hard as he tried, he could only make a single connection. The credit union manager, the one Bruiser and Telly took care of.

“My fuckin’ heads killin’ me Sid.”

“Toughen up, Johnny. Would ya look at my bloody Lexus fer fuck’s sake?”

No Nuts rubbed the knot on the side of his head and told Sid fuck his Lexus.

“What should we do about Parker, Johnny? We call him, tell him he’s been robbed, or let him find out on his own? We could just tell him we grabbed the paper off the table and we don’t say shit about the robbery. He ain’t gonna know when he got hit anyway.”

No Nuts said that was a great idea.

“Fuck it, we’re not tellin’ him them then. Far as we know, if he asks us we don’t know what he’s talking about.”

Sid lost track of the van and the Lexus was making unhealthy noises. He pulled over into the parking lot of a grocery store to call Parker. He’d tell him they had the paper, but there’d been a slight fender-bender. They’d be there soon as they could.

“What about that locksmith?”

Sid smiled devilishly, said he shouldn’t be too hard to find. He was pretty sure he’d seen him around over at Cowboy Roy’s Fantasyland.

•••••

Big Tony sat in his favorite booth at Cowboy Roy’s
and sipped expensive cognac while he dreamed of a woman he could never have. She moved slowly, with purpose. More in love with herself than she could ever love anyone else. But that was okay with him. He wanted to watch her dance. Watch her body speak to him as he sipped Remy Martin. The good shit.

When she finished touching herself and grinding on the pole, the crowd of losers gathered around her pulled crumpled dollar bills from their shallow pockets and tossed them down on the stage. Big Tony thought that was unacceptable.

He walked up to the stage like a hot shot and threw her a handful of stiff twenties. It was a bold move but he was now a high roller. He was about to make an extravagant score; he was feeling flush. He’d lure her in, ensnare her with the Jackson’s and get her out to the Lincoln. He’d break out the Columbian nasal therapy and he was guaranteed a blowjob. Or at least a quick tug.

He took his seat and waited for her to come and thank him, but she snatched the money off the stage and disappeared behind the curtains. The brief fantasy that flashed through his head suddenly flamed up and disappeared into ashes. Not to mention the sixty bucks.

He slammed the rest of his Remy and dropped the empty glass on the table.
Fuck it.
The clock was winding down. It was almost time to roll, but he left Cowboy Roy’s one pissed off son-of-a-bitch and vowed never to return. He should’ve known better than to go on a Wednesday afternoon, when the place was packed with losers.

•••••

My phone rang
and woke me from a power nap.
It was Big Tony. He said there was a lot going on and we should talk. I told him I could meet him at the club in an hour but he said that was a no-go. We had to meet someplace different. He gave me the address. Said he had to go, better keep the line clear. He thought Doyle might’ve just tried to call him.

I walked into the bathroom and splashed water in my face. I looked at my reflection in the mirror and flexed. My abdominals were getting soft but they still hardened on command. My shoulders were round and hard enough.

I looked back across the room at my heavy bag and my weight bench. It sat with two 45’s on each side, all of it collecting dust. When I turned to the side and flexed my triceps, I was impressed to still see the outline of a nice horseshoe shape in the muscle, considering my failure to work out with any regularity.

“What do you think, Frank?” I struck a front double bicep pose but he didn’t look impressed.

“Hungry, pal?” Frank dropped low and barked. I walked over to my desk and he went crazy when I pulled open the food drawer. He danced and jumped and peeled out.

I dumped the very last beer can full of dog food on the floor. I’d need to restock while I was out. I couldn’t find his water bowl and could see it wasn’t in the usual corner where he liked to drag it. The water from the bathroom faucet was starting to smell funny anyway, so I dumped half a Corona in the coffee pot I no longer used, then I left for the meeting with my associates.

On my way to the Tilted Kilt I had a glass of vodka mixed with cranberry juice and a dash of peach schnapps. The snow continued to fall; I saw a handful of cars nestled in the the ditches by the time I made it to the interstate. I wanted to find out what Doyle and Big Tony’d dug up. I’d spent my whole day with Amish Ron waiting for him to let his guard down long enough so I could steal something. I realized Detective Ron Beachy wasn’t the type of guy to make mistakes. He wasn’t going to tell me anything I didn’t need to know. He didn’t trust me.

I sucked a mouthful of liquid strength up my straw and changed lanes. I smashed the pedal to the floor for a second and let that Crown Victoria speak to me. I’d pounded a handful of So Co’s back at my place and I was now working the bottom end of my second Styrofoam cup, driving the orange plastic straw into the little crevices to locate every last drop of Stoli.

As I greeted the initial feelings of intoxication with open arms, I began to notice my thoughts becoming more lucid with every drink I mixed. Like a lighting bolt from above, I realized the core truth of my life—drinking more made me a better detective.

I was putting things together and filling in the blanks. One day, the world would marvel at my detective genius. And although the legacy I would leave behind would be littered with empty beer cans, at least I was leaving a wake of some kind.

After exhausting the contents of the cup, I set it where it fit tight between the seats and the 12-gauge. I slipped the lid off, poured a little Stoli on whatever ice cubes were left, and I did a good job of holding the Vic on the road considering the circumstances. Only an experienced drunk could mix a drink with one hand while navigating his way through a snowstorm at high speeds with the other.

When I slid the Vic sideways into the parking lot, I saw Big Tony’s Lincoln parked in the far corner with him still behind the wheel, probably doing cocaine. I took a big swig from the cup and parked beside him. He motioned for me to get in.

“It’s fucking cold outside.” I sat down.

Big Tony looked at me. “Ain’t that the truth?”

He had the mirror resting on his leg and I saw it was broken. I watched him stare off into space; he was still holding the straw between his thumb and his finger.

I pointed to the mirror but he shook his head. Said, “Don’t ask.”

He played with the straw in his hand.

“Y’know,” I said, “it’s better to use a bill.”

“Huh?” Big Tony squinted at me.

“It’s better to use a bill to do lines. If a cop pulls you over, there’s just a bill. Maybe it’s got residue on it, maybe it doesn’t. But either way, you’re gonna say you just got it from the clerk at the last gas station you stopped at. You can always blame somebody else. If you get pulled over with a straw in your pocket that’s only two inches long. . .”

“They’re gonna think you was doin’ coke.” Big Tony got my drift.

“Well, I’ll go out on a limb here and say it’ll raise their level of suspicion.”

I took another drink from my cup and hoped he would spare me a return lecture about driving drunk in a snowstorm. At this stage in my career I was much better suited to give advice than to receive it.

“Here’s Doyle.”

We watched him walk across the parking lot, rubbing his hands in front of him. Doyle dove into the backseat and ordered Big Tony to turn the fucking heat up quick.