High Stakes (14 page)

Chapter Thirty-three

Moe Kellman had finished his morning workout, showered, shaved, and was putting on his business clothes when Doyle hurried into their corner of the Fit City locker room.

“Jack. Where've you been? You haven't missed a Wednesday here in months.”

Doyle said, “I took a run this morning instead. Sometimes I think better zipping along the lakefront than grunting and groaning in here with you.”

“What are thinking about? I know you're going to tell me. Make it quick. I'm due to have breakfast with one of the mayor's cousins in about twenty minutes.”

It didn't take Doyle long to describe Ralph Tenuta's recent travails involving his loyal Wisconsin clients and Wendell Pilling, the threatening Internet mogul who was refusing to be denied in his quest to buy Mr. Rhinelander.

Moe finished tying his silk tie without looking in the mirror. “Last time when Tenuta was being troubled, we talked to Fifi and he kept his hands off. Told
you
to handle the situation. Which you did. Why would you need Feef's help now?”

“This is different. Me scaring that little Berwyn lunatic who was trying to blackmail Ralph, that was one thing. I don't know if I could pull the same thing with this big shot Pilling. Remember, your pal Fifi Bonadio knew who Ralph was. Their grandfathers came over here from Sicily about the same time. He was kind of sympathetic. That's why I'm bringing him up now. Asking if he could help. He has,” Doyle smiled,“certain resources I don't.”

Moe put on his tailored tan suit jacket over his beige shirt and adjusted the tan tie and stooped to flick a dust rag across his black Italian-made shoes.

“Jack, you'll have to go see Feef about this. I'll call him for you. I can't go today. One of my five-star spenders is flying in to look at the fall fur lineup. Needs a holiday present for wife number four. Tells me he'd like to keep his total down to a quartet.”

Doyle said, “All right. Does Bonadio still live in that luxury stockade in River Forest?”

Moe sighed. “Yes, he does. But I wouldn't be denigrating something belonging to a guy you want a favor from.”

Doyle silently agreed, the guy in question being Moe's friend from childhood, Fifi Bonadio, longtime head of the Chicago Outfit.

“He'll know I'm coming, right?”

“I will have paved the way,” Moe said.”Just try to be respectful.
Bono fortuna
.”

***

Doyle pointed his Accord westward on the Eisenhower Expressway. The early afternoon traffic was not bad, nothing like it would be in a few hours when the rush began for the city's western suburbs. He knew the way, having previously visited Bonadio after traveling with Moe in Kellman's big Lincoln limousine, retired Chicago Police detective Pete Dunleavy at the wheel. Doyle always felt at ease in the friendly yet somehow fearsome presence of Dunleavy, Kellman's full-time driver and security man. Kind of wished he had Dunleavy along with him today.

He got off at the exit for River Forest and headed north. Two miles later up a quiet street lined with tall oak trees, past expensive looking houses, then nearing what he thought of as Estateville, he turned into the driveway at Bonadio's address. Waited in front of the thick, wide iron gates for someone to emerge from the guard booth on the left side of the driveway.

Within seconds, a young man wearing a security firm uniform and a hip holster displaying a large hand gun hurried to Doyle's lowered window. Before Jack could say anything, the man said, “Go ahead, Mr. Doyle. Vito will meet you at the door.” He clicked a remote device on his belt. The gates swung open.

Jack drove slowly the fifty yards or so before parking on the red-bricked driveway fronting the house. There wasn't another vehicle in sight. As he got out of his, the huge mansion's front door opened. “In here, Doyle,” waved an old man from the entry. He was wearing a musty-looking black suit and a scowl. Maybe his mid-day nap had been interrupted, Doyle thought. “Should I lock my car in this neighborhood?”

“Very comical,” the old man rasped. “In here. He's waiting.”

Doyle was led from the front door directly to the rear of the mansion, which he'd read had eighteen rooms, seven bathrooms, a basement bowling alley, an indoor
bocce
court, and, as Doyle was about to see, an Olympic-size outdoor swimming pool. After the long walk down the darkened corridor, lit only by shallow lights illuminating what Doyle thought he recognized as a number of extremely valuable works of art, the old man pushed open doors to the patio. He waved Doyle forward and, without a word, shuffled away back inside.

Emerging from that darkness into the mid-afternoon summer sunlight, Jack paused at the edge of the vast, flower-bordered green lawn that led to another high stone wall at the end of the property. A squadron of Hispanic gardeners was busy on two sides of the yard. Two men dressed in security uniforms patrolled the rear.

“Here, over here,” came a gravelly, commanding voice. Doyle turned to his left. Sitting up on a chaise lounge was the Outfit chieftain. Bonadio was wearing a black Speedo swimsuit and dark glasses. His lean, tanned body glistened with sun lotion, drops of which were visible atop the layer of gray hair on his muscular chest. His strong facial features reminded Doyle of the Italian actor Rossano Brazzi, one of his mother's non-secret crushes. Fifi Bonadio was a handsome man, even now in his seventies, even deep in luxury's lap made possible by his iron-fisted control of a profit-producing criminal enterprise.

Bonadio got to his feet and motioned Doyle to join him at the umbrella-shaded glass table close to the pool. He led the way. Doyle slowly followed, eyes riveted on the prone form of the other person present. Her long legs extended from an orange-thonged, marvelously curved butt. She lay facedown. Her dark blond hair in a long ponytail was pulled to the side of her tanned, naked back. Doyle saw there were no loosened top straps, especially when she suddenly turned over, raising her sunglasses to take a brief look at him. Then she lowered the glasses and lay still, arms at her sides, on the lounge. Bonadio smiled watching Doyle attempting not to gawk at this striking sight.

“Doyle, is that a classic set of tits or what?” he heard Bonadio say as his host pulled out a chair from under the round glass table that sat beneath the broad blue umbrella. For a moment Doyle thought that he wished he knew how to say in Italian “How right you are.” Bonadio smiled. “That's my young friend Sylvia. If you're wondering,” Bonadio said, nodding toward the supine beauty, “those gorgeous bazooms are as real as the air you're breathing.”

Doyle sat down across from Bonadio, who punched a remote control device in his right hand. “Guido, bring me a Moretti. Doyle, what do you want?”

“Moretti's good.” He sat back in his chair, attempting to look relaxed. Doyle said, “If you don't mind me asking, what happened to those beautiful twins, the Greco sisters, who worked for you on your yacht when I last saw you?”

“They were prime, weren't they?” Bonadio sighed. “Beautiful. Not too bright. And obedient. Everything a man could ask for in a woman. But, I had to let them go.”

“Why?”

The Outfit chieftain leaned forward to confide, “I've got a method I use with women. None of this, by the way, has anything to do with my wife, who spends most of her time each year back with her relatives in Calabria.” He paused to drain half of the bottle of Moretti. “I have found, over the years, that my good fortune in gambling somehow is tied to the women at my side. This started when Moe Kellman and I were kids betting quarters on Sportsman's Park horse races with a corner bookie on Taylor Street. We were on a real hot streak, when I was going with Rosena Imbo. That was for a couple of weeks. Then, I started losing. After four or five days, I took up with Rosena's younger sister Teresa. Like
that,
my luck changed. I could see there was a pattern there. Every time I've done that over the years since, my luck has gone from bad to good like that,” he said, snapping his fingers.

Even beneath the blue umbrella, Doyle was beginning to sweat. His occasional glance toward the nearby Sylvia didn't help him cool off. Every time she shifted positions, he could not avoid noticing. When he did, out of the corner of his eye, he could see Bonadio observing him with amusement. Bonadio snapped his fingers. A waiter scurried tableside carrying another pair of Morettis.

“Let me get this straight,” Doyle said, now concentrating on his host instead of the current concubine in residence. “So, that pattern from when you were a kid, changing girls or women in an attempt to change your luck, that's what you've carried forward?”

Bonadio looked away from Doyle and Sylvia toward the rear of the property. He pointed first to the rosebush array on the right side, the two-story greenhouse opposite it across the vast lawn, then toward the grove of native apple and imported olive trees lining the left side. Then he gestured nonchalantly over his shoulder to the mansion looming behind him.

“That method's worked ever since I was a boy on Taylor Street,” Bonadio said. “Why change?”

Doyle took a deep breath. He was tempted to suggest to this rich, arrogant prick that decades' worth of corrupt workings by the Outfit he controlled must have contributed as much to Bonadio's wealth as his system of replacing women in his bed for the sake of better luck. He refrained, wondering to himself if the resplendent Sylvia's tenure would exceed that of the Greco twins.

Doyle said, “You're probably wondering why I've asked myself here. It's about some people from Wisconsin who own horses trained by your cousin Ralph Tenuta.”

Bonadio sat back and sighed. “Didn't we go through some crap with Ralph Tenuta a year or so ago, Doyle? Some mook was threatening Ralph. You came to me because Moe told you Tenuta's family knew mine. Both our fathers came over from Sicily. And I said I'd help out, even though if I ever saw him I wouldn't know Ralph Tenuta from, who's the guy with the pony on his shirts, Ralph Lauren? And then, as it turned out, that problem went away because Ralph was lucky and that lunatic blew himself up.”

“That was then,” Doyle said. “This is a different problem.”

“So, what do you need from me on this beautiful afternoon?” Bonadio reached into the cigar canister on the table next to him. Extracted what appeared to be a small brown baton. Didn't offer one to Doyle. Took his time clipping the end. Sylvia suddenly sat up on the nearby chaise. “You want I should light for you, Mr. Feef?” she said as she reached for matches. “Naw, sit back, honey. You're gonna give Doyle a heart attack. Or a hard on. Or both. It's okay.”

How I despise this guy
, Doyle thought.
But I need his help
. “You might counsel Sylvia to adjust that thong. Seems to be sliding up her left thigh,” Doyle said.

Bonadio scowled. One of the nearby gardeners seeing this change in his employer's expression hurriedly turned away as Doyle began to describe the worrisome situation involving Tenuta's Wisconsin clients and the demanding Wendell Pilling. Bonadio listened in silence, smoking. Finally, he said, “Only because Moe asked me to help you again,” Bonadio sighed, “will I take care of this for you. Within the next two, three days.

“You don't have to mention this to Ralph Tenuta. He probably wouldn't want to know about any favor I do for him. I understand he's straight as they come. He's had a good career and he's got a good reputation to defend. I don't mind helping him out even if he doesn't know about it.” Bonadio puffed on the Cuban cigar and sat back, watching the smoke trail upward in the summer breeze. “This will be taken care of.”

Bonadio swiveled to the side of the lounge and was on his feet in a second. Doyle watched, impressed, at this swarthy septuagenarian in such nimble action. Figuring their meeting was over, Jack drained his Moretti, look a last, lingering glance at Sylvia, and stood up.

He turned back when he felt Bonadio's right forefinger tapping his shoulder, the Outfit chief's face suddenly right next to his. “I will send some people to talk to this Pilling. That will conclude any and all dealings I have with you, Jack Doyle.
Capice?”

“Understood. And, well, thanks.”

Bonadio nodded his dismissal.

Three strides down the walkway to the mansion's rear entrance, Doyle stopped. Pointing at Sylvia, he said to Bonadio, “I think that left cheek of hers is taking some burn. Better keep an eye on it. Or a hand.” Then he hurried out.

Chapter Thirty-four

Crump Towers' arguably richest resident parked his gleaming black Bentley in the building garage's two-vehicle space he owned. He inserted his identification card in the slot at the basement elevator and pressed the button for the ninety-fourth floor. The ultra-quiet car zoomed upward. He smiled to himself as he often did when he thought of the wonderful security system and conveniences this building provided, cost be damned. With his money what did he care?

At his penthouse door, Wendell Pilling stopped, startled. The door was ajar. That had never happened before. First thought that came to his mind was that the daily maid service had carelessly failed to close it after work that morning. He snorted. He'd raise some hell about
that
with management. He pushed the door open and entered the dark foyer. When he hit the light switch next to the door, nothing happened. “What the fuck!”

Wendell stumbled slightly as he moved forward toward the entrance to the huge living room with its deep beige carpet, quartet of brown leather chairs facing the long brown leather sofa, all centered away from the lengthy mahogany dining table with its dozen chairs. Expensive, recently acquired modern paintings adorned the walls. When he flicked the switch for the room's lighting, again nothing happened. “What the fuck?”

Out of the darkness came a measured, low-pitched voice. “Stop repeating yourself, Pilling.” A bright beam from the man's large flashlight caused Pilling to cover his eyes. “Who are you?” he yelped. “What's going on here?”

“Follow the moving light” came the voice from the darkness. “Sit down on that big leather couch. Good.” The flashlight went off and the room's lights simultaneously came on. In his right hand, the swarthy man facing Pilling motioned with a Ruger LC9 pistol equipped with a suppressor.

Wendell lowered himself slowly and sat, motionless, stunned, attempting to process this unprecedented intrusion. Lino Lucarelli's long, lean face creased in a sardonic smile. “Your building's security system, Wendell? It's
merde
.” He glanced at his watch. “You have any idea why I'm here?”

“
What?
What? No, of course I don't,” Pilling said, trying to recover from his shock, attempting to work his way up to one of his familiar bluster modes. “This, here, mister,” Pilling said loudly, “whatever is going on, is not acceptable.” He started to shift forward off the couch. “I'll have the building manager's head for this. I want you out of here
right now
. Why,” he sneered, “you weren't even smart enough to wear a mask.”

“A mask,” Lucarelli laughed. “Like I don't
want
you to remember me, you dumb fuck?”

There was a barely audible pop from his Ruger. The shot plowed into the back cushion of the brown leather couch two inches from Pilling's left arm. Wendell slumped sideways, mouth open, gripping his arm as if he'd been hit by the bullet, his head swiveling as if answers were somewhere in the room back of where this terrifying, authoritative man sat with his legs crossed, relaxed, the coat of his dark-blue suit unbuttoned, light-blue shirt collar open, his weapon still pointed at Wendell. Dark glasses remained propped atop his head of thick, short, graying hair. He smiled, looking at this moment to the shaken multi-millionaire to be kind of a middle-aged but frightening version of the singer Tony Bennett. Pilling shuddered.

“Pay attention, Wendell.”

Lucarelli turned around in his chair and said, “DuJuan.”

The glass door to the penthouse balcony was yanked open admitting DuJuan Coleman, a man just about Pilling's height, six foot three, and close to his weight. But, unlike Pilling, this very ominous looking African-American was carrying a great deal of that amount in muscle mass. DuJuan on this downtown Chicago Gold Coast assignment was an example of the once tremendously ethnically exclusive Chicago Outfit's need to change tactics and outsource certain assignments. Chicago's notable street gang structure produced many candidates eligible for careers in well paid violence. DuJuan, a former high-ranking officer of Chicago's notorious Blackstone Rangers gang, was toting the large, limp form of Big Boy, which he easily raised up a couple of feet before ceremoniously depositing the dog with a thud in the middle of Pilling's large dining room table.

Wendell screeched, “What have you done to him? Is my dog dead? Oh, you bastards…” He lowered his face into his hands and began to shake as he sobbed loudly. Lucarelli and Coleman grinned at each other.

Lucarelli got up from his chair, placed his weapon in the shoulder holster inside his suit coat. He shook his head as he looked at the blubbering bully wannabe in front of him. “What a sorry sack of shit you are, Pilling.” He reached down and slapped Wendell aside the head. “Shut the fuck up. And listen.”

To Pilling's relief, he was then advised that Big Boy was not currently a corpse. The dog had been tranquilized with a syringe by DuJuan Coleman after the penthouse entrance had been broached. “Of course,” Lucarelli said, “DuJuan was forced to smash his big right fist onto Big Boy's brow in order to begin prep work. That animal will be sleeping for awhile,” Lucarelli said. “Actually, DuJuan likes dogs.”

Lucarelli gave Pilling another head slap. “If you ever make one more fucking attempt to threaten the owners of that horse, Mr. Rhinelander, if you ever even
call
them again, we'll be back, Wendell. Me and DuJuan, maybe DuJuan's big brother DeLeon. He's the certified bad ass in that family. He
hates
dogs.

“We can walk past any security system that's here,” Lucarelli continued. “The people who install security protection here get their own protection—from
my
people. Understand? We can make a visit to you, Wendell, night or day,
any
fucking time we want. So, if you don't completely back off trying to buy that horse, this will happen.”

He nodded to DuJuan. Pilling gasped as he saw the powerful black man scoop up the still comatose Big Boy and carry him back out onto the balcony. “Get up,” Lucarelli ordered Pilling. “I want you to see, and remember, this.”

Out on the balcony, where far below streams of car beams on nearby Lakeshore Drive lit up the Chicago night. Lucarelli signaled DuJuan, who, muscular arms extended, positioned Big Boy three feet outside the patio ledge.

“
No
,” Pilling screamed and moved forward. He was banged on the right side of his big head by Lucarelli's pistol. Momentarily stunned, he heard Lucarelli say harshly, “Want to see the doggy drop from here into dog heaven? What say, Wendell?”

Pilling's eyes were riveted on DuJuan, who was extending his canine package slightly farther out over the balcony edge. Even DuJuan's powerful arms were beginning to visibly tremble with the burden he was holding out into the Chicago night.

“
Don't, don't
,” Pilling blurted, “please don't. I'll do what you want.” Large tears began to mingle with the sweat sheen on his face.

DuJuan briefly extended the somnolent canine another six inches over the balcony edge, eliciting a final Pilling scream. Then, at a signal from Lucarelli, DuJuan brought the dog back in and plopped him onto the patio floor.

“I'll do what you want,” Pilling bleated. “I'll do what you want.”

Lucarelli gently tapped Pilling on the head with his pistol.

“You fuckin' well better, Wendell. You don't want to see that animal show up in a dead doggie bag. And you deposited right down there on top of him.”