Revenge of the Cootie Girls (21 page)

And when we held Billy/Frankie at Cafe Buñuel, we gave Johnny Chiesa a chance to use the pay phone by the john, call his cohorts to come get Frankie the Fish.

God, we were lucky we didn't get offed along with Johnny Nostrils. The mob was bad, but they did have a code of honor that precluded the murder of innocent bystanders. Partly this was because innocent bystanders brought the swift wrath of the cops and the media, especially when said innocent bystanders are dead tourist girls. Only after most of the Mafia was broken did sloppier, more ruthless gangs move in and kids and other innocents get killed from stray bullets in gang crossfires and drive-bys.

After that excerpt was a story about Godmother G., mother of the dead don G., who was said to be the brains behind the family until a head injury resulting from a fall in 1989 left her daft. Before the head injury, she had been the meanest woman in the Mafia, believed to be responsible for the mysterious disappearance and presumed murder of two women with whom her husband had long affairs. As soon as her ailing husband slipped into a coma, the mistresses vanished.

Godmother G.'s son Don G. had four daughters, the eldest married to the man, J., who took over the family after the Godfather died.

Shit. I looked over at Granny. She looked so sweet and harmless now. You could hardly even tell she was a murderess.

Where was Claire? I wondered if I should call the feds. What if the room phone was tapped or something? What if the feds showed up before I got Kathy and Tamayo back? How would the Perrugia sisters call me now that my cell phone was dead? I looked for the room phone. There was none. Someone had removed it.

Granny was snoring loudly away. In between snores, I heard pounding at the door. Quietly, I crept to the peephole, looked out, and saw someone in one of those cheap, over-the-head skeleton costumes.

“Who are you?” I said. “Show your face.”

Two delicate hands rose, with identical movements, and pulled the front of the costume up over the top of her head.

It was Mary MacCosham, and did she looked pissed. More than pissed. She was wild-eyed, like she was manic, or on something. Evidently, Mary had gone off the deep end.

“Open this damn door,” she said. “Or I'll shoot it open.”

17

I
N THE MOMENT
before I opened the door, there was, like, an atomic explosion in my head.

Mary's middle name was Anne. Her mother's maiden name was something like Winston. Anne Winston. I don't know why I didn't think of it before. I guess I was thinking in a different groove.

Mary was involved with charity. Mary had tried to buy her way up through society with charity fund-raising work. She seemed the type to have tasteful Park Avenue decor. Hell, she was a Park Avenue trophy wife, in a small-time way, until her divorce.

Not only that, but she'd come back to New York with Julie—she no doubt knew a lot about our itinerary. Had she and Julie hooked up with George when they were here? Maybe that photo of Julie and George was taken during their trip. Maybe they'd gone to some of the same places.

Shit, yes! The handwritten note from Julie that was included with the cootie catcher I was given at Joy II was dated August 7, 1979, after our falling out. Apparently, it was a note to Mary MacCosham.

That explained the lame alias.

But why was she fucking with me? Was this part of her motherfucker of a midlife crisis? Some settling of old scores?

So—where was Julie? Hell. I'd been chasing her all night, and she was probably a happily remarried housewife in New Mexico, asleep in her bed tonight, ignorant of all this.

Boy, I had to give Mary credit. Mary was a little cleverer than I had imagined, not as clever as Julie, but pretty clever.

I didn't have any weaponry with me. I tried to pick up the lamp on the bedside table, but it was bolted down. There was nothing, so I just opened the door, and, going purely on instinct, popped Mary right in the nose, three times, very quickly.

“This one is for me, this one is for Julie, and this one is for making Mabel eat her own Barbie,” I said. This was the rare instance where a punch in the nose was better than a sturdy Anglo-Saxon word.

Mary MacCosham dropped to the floor.

Somewhere, doors were opening.

I pulled Mary's body into the room and slammed the door.

She was out, but not dead. Thank God. The last thing I needed now was a dead crazy socialite mob moll on my hands. At her side was a gun, but a toy, not a real one. Quickly, I dumped her purse out. Among the contents were expensive cosmetics, a bottle of Midol, a handkerchief, which I placed over Mary's bleeding nose, a brown envelope folded in half and containing what looked like a lot of money, a vial of what looked like coke, and a typed letter.

It was the second page of a note—or made up to look that way, with the number 2 up in the corner—that read:

photos. As you know, these photos could ruin your chance to regain custody of your kids. If you want them back, go to the Hotel Vincent, and wait for the redhead in 721. Bring $10,000 in unmarked bills. Go to the cops and it's over for you.

It was signed “Putli Bai.”

That fucking Julie had set us both up. Julie tricked me with those Mary MacCosham clues. Or had I just jumped to the wrong conclusion, because of her nice furniture, when I saw Mary at the door? Or all of the above? Julie must have faked the note dated after our falling out, then thrown in the photo with the September date, and the lame alias to lead me astray. If only Rubik had known Julie.

There were no photos for Mary among the things Julie had left here, so I assumed Julie had totally faked Mary out with that bit. Maybe she knew something about Mary, maybe she didn't. Knowing Mary's weak points, she could have pushed her buttons very easily by bluffing.

I filled a paper cup with water from the tap and dumped it on Mary. She moaned a little, but didn't come to. I shook her slightly and her eyes opened.

“Aieaie … ooooh,” she moaned.

“Long time no see, Mary,” I said.

She tried to get up but couldn't.

“Sorry I had to bean you. I misunderstood.”

“Do you have the photos?”

“As far as I know, there are no photos.”

“No … but … Who are you? You look vaguely familiar.”

“Robin, Robin Hudson.”

“Robin?”

“Yeah, Mary.”

She held the handkerchief over her bleeding nose and said, weakly, “Who's the old woman?”

“It's a long story. Julie Goomey set us up,” I said, and I gave her the capsule version while I flushed her coke. I was expecting Claire any minute, possibly with cops, and I didn't want Mary getting busted on a possession rap. I had a feeling she'd been through enough.

When I was finished, all Mary could say was, “Why? What did I ever do to her?”

“Whatever,” I said. “Listen, are you okay now? Can you get up? Because I need you to help me.”

I held my hand out to her and she grabbed it, hoisting herself to her knees. When she'd stabilized, she pulled herself to her feet.

I gave her Special Agent Jeff Walter's card. “Call this guy. Tell him where I am. Tell him—this is very important, let me write it down.” I wrote a short note, explaining that the Perrugia sisters were holding my intern and my friend hostage, that I had their granny and I needed to effect an exchange discreetly so nothing would happen to Kathy and Tamayo. I put down my room number.

“After you make this call, go to the front desk and tell them the phone is missing in this room and I need a phone immediately.”

“I don't know,” Mary said. She was looking at me with deep suspicion. “How do I know this isn't one of your jokes?”

“Why would I do that?”

“Why did you send the Dumpster salesmen to my house? Or write the letters at Camp Hapalot? Or send me on all those wild-goose chases?”

“I didn't. Okay, I sent the Dumpster salesmen to your house—that was my idea—but those other things were Julie's ideas, not mine.”

“Really? Because a long time ago Julie told me … she blamed you …”

She was still groggy.

“Just call this guy, please,” I said. “He probably knows a lot of stuff I don't know and he can explain it better. Just do it. Lives are at stake. No shit.”

After she picked up her purse, with none of the urgency I wanted her to display, she turned to me, and said, “Why did you flush my coke?”

“Please call this guy.”

Mary just looked at me. Then she left. I hoped I could trust her.

I sat down. The voices in my head were all clamoring for attention. I held my head between my hands, thinking maybe, if I just steadied my head, the right voice would squeeze through. Somehow, I had to make contact with the Groucho women. Before I could figure out how, there was another knock at the door. I looked out the peephole and saw a big dog-face staring back at me.

“Good timing!” I said, quickly unlocking the door so she could slip in without whoever else seeing her. “Claire, jeez, what took ya. You will never believe …”

Immediately I realized what was wrong. But immediately was too late. There was a gun in my chest. Jojo the Health and Safety Dog backed me into the room and the door slammed behind us.

The dog head came off. Underneath was a pretty, dark-haired woman with a very unpleasant expression on her face. She put down a drawstring bag, which fell open to reveal a green wig, Groucho-nose glasses, and what looked like a mask of some kind. I couldn't tell what it was, but I guessed that she had changed masks at some point, or gone unmasked, to avoid detection while following me.

“Expecting me? Sorry for the delay. I ran into a big dog,” she said. I recognized her voice. It was the head wig-wearing woman. “Give me your purse.”

I did. She opened it, saw nothing of value, and threw it into the far corner, out of my reach.

After glancing at the documents Julie had left, she scooped them up into her bag.

“Sit down over there,” she said, walking backwards towards the old woman.

She poked the old woman. “Granny, wake up.”

The woman just snorted and fell back to sleep.

“She's out. She was given something,” I said. “There's a note on the dresser.”

“Uh-huh,” she said. She picked it up and handed it to me.

“Read it to me,” she said.

I did.

“Where's Julie?” she said.

“I don't know. Rio, probably. But you have your granny and you have those documents. I think I've lived up to my end of the bargain.”

“Yeah, whatever,” the woman said. She pulled out a cell phone and dialed carefully, pushing a number, looking up at me, pushing another one, looking up at me again.

“Hello? It's me. I've got them, Granny, the redhead, and a whole pile of spread sheets.”

A beat.

“No, she's not here. I don't know if we'll get the money back. Well, what did you expect? At least we have Granny and the documents. Maybe we can recover some of the money.”

Pause.

“I'd rather not kill anyone here unless I have to. I had to ask the clerk for the room number, so I've been seen. You want me to leave a body here? Besides, this isn't a very good silencer.”

Kill anyone? Jeez. She was talking about me. Where were the fucking feds?

“Get Granny's van and then get right over here. It's the Hotel Vincent. We'll take them out together. How long will it take you? Okay. We'll be down in front in fifteen minutes. Don't make me wait too long. And send the boys to pick up a blonde in the utility closet on the seventh floor. I knocked her out.”

That had to be Mary. Knocked out twice in one night. Damn. Now she wouldn't be able to call Special Agent Jeff Walter.

A pause.

“She's fast asleep but otherwise she seems okay. Julie had the decency to hire a nurse to look after her until midnight. Okay. Right. Okay.”

She hung up.

“Where's Claire?” I asked.

“Which one is that?”

“The black woman?”

“We got her outside the hotel. One of my sisters took her. You think we didn't see you with her? We got the Chinese girl outside Neon Hand.… We grabbed the bald woman there too. And now we have your blond friend. That's what you get for being mixed up with Julie Goomey.”

“They weren't mixed up with her. They don't even know her. And I didn't want to be mixed up with her,” I said. “I haven't seen the woman in almost two decades.”

“Tough titty,” she said.

Okay, I was thinking, she's a woman. Maybe I can access that empathy thing, meet her on that nurturing, sisterhood plane that women are supposed to have biologically. She loves her granny, how bad can she be? I was willing to bet she even laughed at quality fart jokes and had a few legendary Girls' Nights Out under her belt.

“You know, I'm an innocent bystander. I don't wish you or yours any harm, I just want me and my friends to get out of this alive,” I said.

“You know too much, princess,” she said.

“I'm not a princess.”

“Oh, come on. I know girls like you and Julie. Country clubs, trust funds, college, think your shit doesn't stink.”

“I did go to college, but otherwise you are way off.”

“Well, I went to college too,” she said, defensively.

“I didn't come from money and I had a crappy childhood, no country clubs, my dad died when I was ten.…”

Now I was trying a strategy my Southern friend Carol calls “Don't kick the cripple,” to make her feel guilty for picking on me. It was something I'd seen Solange do.

“Cry me a river,” she said. “You try being the eldest of four sisters living in a fucking compound in New Jersey. Every inch of your life is controlled.”

“I'm sorry,” I said, trying to express some genuine empathy. It was a bad move.

“Don't you feel sorry for me, princess,” she said, gesticulating with the gun. “Feel sorry for yourself.”