Grinder (12 page)

The keys were in the car as promised. I took the Volvo out of the restaurant parking lot without stopping to retrieve the electronics I hid in the trunk. I left the restaurant and watched each street sign fly past the windshield as I tried to get an idea of where I was. At an intersection, I saw that I was on Duke Street. A sight that made a bell ring in my head. I pulled out the sheet of paper that contained Paolo's information and looked at the addresses. Luca Perino worked out of a place on James Street — which was less than a minute away. I couldn't believe it. I was right where I needed to be.

Paolo's info put Luca Perino inside Ave Maria — a little shop that sold Catholic religious items. A huge portion of the city was Italian Catholic, and religious stores were a common sight throughout Hamilton. The colossal statue of the Virgin Mary I saw in the window of Ave Maria as I drove by told me the shop blended in just fine in the city. The shop would repel most people. Almost everyone preferred stores that catered to their vices rather than their spirituality. Those that did venture in off the concrete would either know about the shop's dual identity and not mind — seeing it as commonplace in the community — or the customers would be so pious they would not even think to notice the blasphemy taking place behind the counter.

I drove slow in the right lane eyeing the rows of cars on both sides of the street. I was looking for one vehicle in particular, according to Paolo's intel — a white Cadillac Escalade. The Escalade had been a mob staple since its inception. It was a sort of moving billboard broadcasting the fruits of criminal success to the community. A white Escalade was a bit different than the standard mob black, but I figured an up-and-comer would want to be part of the trend and at the same time identify himself as special.

The car wasn't on either side of the busy street, so I used Main Street to circle around to Hughson, which ran behind the shop. I drove slowly up the less busy street and stopped in the parking lot behind Ave Maria. There was no Escalade, only a rusted Dodge Shadow parked in an employees-only space along the side of the building. There were two other employee spots vacant, something that didn't sit well with me. A shop this small and this specific would never have more than one employee working at a time, two tops. Of the prospective employees, there was no way that they all were drivers. Stores like this would not offer enough cash to pay for a car, and the deeply religious women who typically worked behind the counter were usually unmarried or widowed, making them lower-income wage earners and thus frequent bus passengers. One of the two vacant parking spaces was much bigger than the other. The hand-painted lines were a bit wavy, but they were clearly designed to contain two cars of different sizes. No one painted parking spots behind stores like this — it was too much trouble. Someone had gone a long way to ensure that a really big car got a permanent spot. I was sure I could figure out what kind of car fit inside the painted lines.

I reversed the Volvo and backed into a spot that offered a view of the parking lot from a safe distance. No one in the parking lot I was watching would be able to see me inside the dark interior of the car. From Ave Maria, the Volvo would look like just another car taking up a free space on a side road. I unfolded the paper Paolo had given me and took the time to really look at the information on Luca Perino. Perino was in charge of his little world around James Street. His number two was a man named Marco Monaco. The paper gave me the address of the shop, physical descriptions of everyone involved with the business, and a phone number. With the car stopped and no one in sight, I decided to call the number and see what happened.

I eased myself out of the car, being careful not to twist my ribs more than I had to. I opened the trunk and pulled back the fabric covering on the floor. Underneath a spot of blood left by my face while I travelled in the dark was everything I left. I took everything in the trunk and got back into the front seat. I powered up Johnny's phone and dialled the number.

“Ave Maria,” a pleasant female voice answered. She sounded older than her twenties but younger than her fifties. Beneath her words rose the sounds of hymns from a sound system in the store.

I decided to take a shot at it. “Ah, yes, hello. My name is John Clark, and I work for the city of Hamilton.”

“How can I help you, Mr. Clark?”

“Well, you see, this is one of the rare calls I make that I enjoy. One of the calls I make where I can actually help you. You see, the city reassessed your area last year, and somehow in the shuffle we neglected to adjust your property taxes. As a result, we owe you some money.”

“Well, that is a first. The city paying money to the people instead of the other way round.” Her voice sounded very chipper. She was genuinely happy about my lie.

“I need to come in and have some papers signed before I can make out the cheque. Let me check my computer . . . I would need the signature of a Mr. Monaco. I have him listed here as the owner.”

“Mr. Monaco's not the owner, Mr. Per —” She trailed off into a quiet murmur as her mind caught up with her mouth.

“Hello? Miss?” I sighed, knowing she was still on the line. “Darn phone. Hey, Jerry, my line went dead again. Can I use your —”

“No, it didn't. I'm here. I'm sorry, I just got confused. You're right, Marco is the owner.”

“Is that Mr. Monaco?”

“Yes, he is.” Her voice was chipper again. She had decided that although Luca Perino was in charge, his name was probably off the official books. After all, he was a big wheel in the mob. The woman on the other end of the phone wasn't one of those ignorant religious patrons of the store — she knew the score.

“Is he there now? I would love to get this taken care of right away.”

“I'm sorry, he's not usually in until six o'clock.”

The dashboard clock read 4:00. Julian had held me up, but not enough.

“I will have someone walk over the papers then. I'm off at five,” I said.

“I'll let him know you're coming. He'll be so pleased. It's not every day that someone gets money back from the city.”

“No, it's not,” I agreed. “Thank you so much for your help.”

“God bless you, Mr. Clark,” the woman said, and then she hung up.

I closed the phone and shifted to put it away in my pocket. As I arched my ass off the seat to get at my pockets, I felt nothing but a searing pain through my torso. Every part of me burned, and although I was sure there were no broken bones, the pain made me question the health of my organs. I got the phone in my pocket without screaming. I kept my body off the seat so that I could stash the digital recorder in my pants too.

Once I was back in the seat with a new coat of cold sweat on my brow, I leaned over to the glove box and pulled out the cord that came with the digital recorder. I spent a minute testing the cord in each hole in the device before finally managing to fit the cord into its corresponding hole. I had at least two hours before Marco Monaco, Luca Perino's number two, would pull into his small parking space. There was no way I was going to spend two hours with my rapidly cramping body inside my car. I needed to move and loosen up. I got out of the car, taking everything except the rubber bone with me. I checked the parking sign on Hughson, making sure the car wouldn't be towed or ticketed where it was, and walked away.

I walked down Hughson until I hit King Street. King was second only to Main in its possession of legitimate businesses. The stores that lined the roadway were, for the most part, legitimate, successful retailers. The places that worked under the radar and off the books were all on the veins that led into the major arteries of commerce like Main and King. I walked the street in between the numerous bodies of pierced kids and unwashed adults. I passed a strip club and several pizza places, while I scanned the street for an Internet café. I found one on a side street just off King. I walked into the deserted café and paid up front for thirty minutes.

I opened the web browser and pulled up a free e-mail account I kept. I plugged the digital recorder into the computer and listened to the chime of hardware recognition. I clicked the Attach icon and pulled the file off the digital recorder. Once the transfer was complete, I addressed the e-mail to myself and sent it off. The e-mail was in my inbox by the time I had the recorder back in my pocket. I cleared the web browser three times and shut the computer down before I got up to leave.

I walked out of the café without another word to the employee behind the counter and followed my nose onto King Street towards a pizza place I passed on my way to the Internet café.

The pizza place sign just read “pizza” in big, bold, neon letters. The walls of the tiny restaurant had a repeating phone number stencilled all over them with the words “Two for One” added in anywhere they would fit. There was a counter directly open to the street that everyone had to wait in front of for their food. I didn't like being exposed to the entire street, but rusting in the car like the tin man was not an option. I waited patiently and used the constant flow of young women in slutty clothing as an excuse to scan the crowds around me. I was not a man hunting the mob; I was a hungry pervert, like the rest of the men in line.

I ordered two slices of pepperoni pizza and a Coke and waited under a minute for the lukewarm Italian food to get to my hands. I took the food with me across the street to Gore Park.

Gore Park is a small patch of grass in the heart of the city core. It could be walked around in under three minutes, but no one ever did it. The park was like a safari of human suffering. Homeless kids, derelicts, and people on the verge of becoming either were in constant supply. No one stared into the park when they were at the red light on King Street — it just seemed like an invitation for disaster. Seeing everyone look away from the park made it almost magnetic to me. It was a rare find in the city. A place where a person could be invisible while being completely visible.

I walked past the homeless until I found a vacant rock. The pizza bag offered little resistance as I tore through the grease-soaked paper. The right side of my face, on the other hand, put up the fight of its life. I had lost teeth from the side of my jaw, making chewing difficult. I spent half an hour using my tongue to mash the pizza against the left side of my mouth before I swallowed. The Coke's acidity burned the empty sockets in my jaw, so I didn't drink often.

I ate to the point of physical exhaustion. The food felt good in my stomach and it was quickly taking the edge off the pain I felt. I tore the last of the food into bits and fed it a piece at a time to the gulls that had slowly been surrounding me while I ate. The gulls made me think of the island. They made me remember what it was like away from the city. The island wanted me back, but nothing could pull me away. Paolo had anchored me here, tied me to the city I tried to leave behind. I looked at my hand as I threw the last piece of pizza to the birds. My hands were no longer good for tying off knots and setting lures. I was back to what I had been. My hands were gnarled mitts again — useful for beating and stealing. Each uncomfortable breath made the island seem more like a fantasy and the city a painful reality. Suddenly, the greasy pizza felt like a stone in my stomach, and all I wanted was to be moving.

By the time I slid back behind the wheel, it was 5:15 p.m. I looked through the windshield and noticed that the little space was full. A black, two-door Mercedes was in the lot beside the beat-up Dodge Shadow. Marco was early for work.

I didn't want to go in and repeat what had happened at the cleaning-supply store. There wouldn't be any bleach here, and I wasn't interested in beating up a female employee of a religious store unless I had to. I knew I wasn't going to heaven, but I wasn't so far gone that I was going to start doing the devil any favours. I needed to get Marco out of the store without raising suspicions, so that I could deal with him alone.

My body stayed still in the car as my mind raced over the possible ways to handle the situation I was in. I no longer felt pushed to act right away. I didn't feel apprehension or anger. I searched my mind for the feelings, but they weren't there anymore. The sickness from the pizza had evaporated, and I was left in the car. I was focused without connection. I was my uncle's nephew again.

After two minutes of thought, I arched off the seat and endured the pain of retrieving my cell phone. I dialled Paolo, who answered on the fourth ring.

“I need something,” I said before he could even finish his greeting of, “What?”

“I told you not to call unless you had good news. I told you I would get you some incentive if you needed it. Is that why you're calling? To test me? I can make a call right —”

“It wasn't Bombedieri,” I said.

“How do you know?”

“I asked the right people the right questions the hard way.”

“And you think they'd tell you anything? You have gone soft.”

“I asked real hard. I know I'm right, and you know it too.”

“How do I know?” he asked.

“You brought me back into this because you know what I am. I'm a grinder, I'll find out everything. Bombedieri is only concerned with his turf and bikers.”

“What did you do? This can't come back on me.” Paolo sounded mildly panicked. He instantly knew I had done what I said because I mentioned the bikers. Bombedieri's move against the bikers must have been a real hush-hush job.

“It won't. Now, I've given you your good news. It's your turn to give me something.”

“Give you — give you — You work for me, remember?”

“I'm out of the loop, and things are going to have to start moving faster.”

“Why?”

“Never mind why. It's nothing,” I lied — deciding to leave Paolo in the dark about Julian's misfit crew. Julian would send them after me again. He'd have to; his pride would accept nothing less than me dead in a painful way. He had known I would go after Bombedieri; he would figure out Perino, too, once he was conscious and lucid again. I had to settle up before he was back on me. Knowing I had dealt with Julian and that he was already informed about why I was in the city would put Paolo into damage control. He would have to erase all evidence of everything he had me do. That would include erasing me. He would correct his mistake by killing me, and he'd use Steve and Sandra as bait to get the job done.