Sons of the City (28 page)

“And you don’t think that’s going to worry her even more? This is why I didn’t want to say anything to you.”

Michelle turned to me. “And I can’t believe you’re conspiring with him against me, Eddie.”

“We’re not against you,” said her father. “We had to let you know about this
Post
story.”

“What
Post
story?”

“Didn’t a reporter come into your shop?” he asked.

Michelle stared at her father. “That was Holly Troutman. She’s going to write a story?”

“It’s going to be in Jay Bender’s gossip column,” her father said.

Michelle shook her head in anger. “I can’t believe they’re going to write something.” “Is it definite?” I asked.

“I’m afraid so,” the Commissioner said. “I got the editor on the phone, he was a real jerk. I told him that if the story ran, my daughter’s life would be in danger. You know what he said? He said this was about the tenth time I’d tried to get a story killed, and each time I used the same ‘excuse'— he called it an ‘excuse'—that someone’s life would be in danger.”

“Is that true?” Michelle asked her father.

“No, it’s absolute bullshit. I’ve called that editor about stories no more than four times in, what, the two years I’ve been Commissioner? Did I tell him cops’ lives were in danger? Of course—if you don’t say something like that, they don’t give a shit, they just put whatever they want in the paper.”

“So now he doesn’t believe you this time,” Michelle said.

“No. He was a real jerk about it.” “So when’s it going to run?” I asked.

“Tomorrow.”

We were all silent, thinking. Michelle nodded, like she was making up her mind, then said, “I’ll be all right.”

“What do you mean, all right?” her father said. “Once they find out who you are …”

“You don’t have to worry, I know what I’m doing.”

“Really?” I asked. “You want to tell your father about how you’re getting married to Mickey Bravelli?”

“What?” the Commissioner yelled.

Michelle’s eyes narrowed at me. “You can’t keep your mouth shut for five minutes?”

“I’ve heard enough,” the Commissioner said. “We’re going home, now.”

Michelle looked at her father for a moment, then walked up and hugged him.

“Daddy, I’m glad you’re OK. I was really worried.” She kissed her father on the cheek, and then reached for her purse. I figured she was going to get a Kleenex, but she took a couple of quick steps and was at the door.

“But the next time you’re sick,” she said to her father, pointing like a schoolmaster, “you better damn well be sick.”

She took one last look at me and just shook her head, and then before either of us could move, she was out the door.

“Michelle!” the Commissioner called, and he burst out the door after her. I was right behind, and together we watched Michelle slip into the elevator and quickly press the button. We were still ten feet away when the doors gently slid closed.

T
hat was it. That was our last shot. Michelle wasn’t going to listen to me. She wasn’t going to listen to her father. And if that story appeared in the
Post,
she’d never survive.

There were no more options to explore, no more possibilities to exhaust. I left the hospital and went straight to my house, and then straight to the closet, and pulled down the box of Christmas tree ornaments. And then I had Junior Vicente’s gun in my hand.

I got a bottle of beer from the refrigerator, and sat down at the kitchen table to look at the gun. It had a purpose now. It had a reason for being so precisely designed, so carefully made.

I had figured that if I ever reached this point. I’d be consumed with self-doubt, maybe too paralyzed to move. But it turned out to be just the opposite. I actually felt freer than ever. Bravelli was just a bug that needed squashing.

The phone rang, it was the Commissioner.

“I’m going to have a plainclothes detail watch Michelle twenty-four hours a day.” he said. “I want you to tell me where she’s staying.”

“If anyone sees them …”

“You think I’m going to let that happen?” he almost yelled. “This is my daughter we’re talking about.”

I knew he was right, Michelle was going to need protection.

“The apartment’s at 7728 Locust,” I said. “Third floor. Make sure they never let her out of their sight.”

“Let me worry about that, OK, Sergeant?” He hung up.

Ten minutes later, he called back.

“She’s not there,” he said. “If she came by after the hospital, she’s already gone. Where else would she be?”

“How about her old apartment up on Rhawn?”

“I’ve got a car there now. Theresa says she hasn’t seen Michelle all week.”

“I don’t know where else to look.”

“Let me know if you get any ideas. I’m going to have people watch both apartments, just in case.”

“Not a bad idea.”

“I don’t know what I was thinking,” he said. “I should have had someone keep an eye on her from the moment she left the hospital.” I thought he was going to say something else, but he stayed quiet for a few moments, then hung up again.

I knew I could solve the whole problem once I found Bravelli. I paged Doc. Maybe he would know where the asshole was.

He called me back a minute later.

“What are you doin’ at home?” Doc asked. “You sick?”

“No, got the night off. I’m looking for Bravelli. Any ideas?”

“Yeah. Sagiliano’s. That’s where I am, watching the alley.”

“Bravelli’s out there?”

“No, but his white Lexus is,” Doc drawled.

T
wenty-eight minutes later, I was standing next to Doc, looking out the alley window of the insurance office. The Lexus was still there. Lanier was inside the bar, too, Doc said. Doc’s walkie-talkie, picking up the sounds of the alley from the hidden microphone, was set up on a filing cabinet next to us.

I had Junior Vicente’s gun in my side waistband holster. It was the only gun I had with me, it was the only gun I would need. The last time I stood at the window, I wouldn’t have been ready to use it. Things change.

Not that I was going to put a bullet in Bravelli’s head with Doc watching. I had no desire to spend the rest of my life sharing prison showers with musclebound apes who hated cops. But once Bravelli left Sagiliano’s, I could follow him, see where he went. I could wait for the right moment.

As I looked out the window, I tried to calculate how long it would take to run downstairs, jump in my Blazer, and get to within sight of the alley entrance. Too long, I decided. It’d be better to wait in my truck near the entrance to the alley.

“See ya, Doc,” I said.

He turned to me in surprise. “Where you goin'? You just got here.”

“I think I’m a little too tired for a stakeout. I had to work pretty late after what happened to Jeff.”

“Suit yourself. What’d you want with Bravelli, anyway?”

“Nothing, forget it.”

Great, I thought. What’s Doc going to think when Bravelli turns up dead an hour from now? Murder was turning out to be a lot harder than I thought.

“I don’t know, I guess I just wanted to make sure we were keeping an eye on him. And obviously you are.”

I was heading down the hall toward the secretaries’ desks when Doc called me back.

“Wait, Eddie,” he said.

When I rejoined Doc at the window, Lanier was standing in the alley next to the Lexus. He had on blue jeans, a maroon polo shirt, and sneakers, and if he was trying not to look like a cop, he wasn’t doing a very good job.

“He just came out,” Doc told me. “We’ll see what happens next.”

We didn’t have long to wait. The back door of Sagiliano’s opened, and Michelle emerged, wearing a short black dress and heels. She was clearly surprised to see Lanier.

“You’re Michelle Ryder, aren’t you?” Lanier asked.

My heart froze.

“Who?” Michelle asked.

“What are you doing here, Michelle?”

“You’re mistaking me for someone else,” we heard her say. Their voices were tinny, but clear. “I don’t know who you are.”

“No, we’ve met. You remember me, don’t you? Captain Lanier?”

Doc glanced at me. “Bravelli’s going to be coming out any minute.”

What was I going to do, shoot Bravelli
and
Lanier?

“I think you’ve got the wrong person,” Michelle said, reaching for the door handle to go back in.

“Michelle, does your father know you’re dating Mickey Bravelli?”

She pulled the door open. “You’ve made a mistake. My name’s Lisa.” And she went back inside.

Lanier looked at the closed door for a moment, then turned away.

“You think he’s going to tell Bravelli?” Doc asked.

“He better not.”

Lanier walked over to the Lexus and leaned against it, and we watched him light a cigarette. The back door of Sagiliano’s opened again, and this time, Mickey Bravelli came out.

“Yo, watch the car,” he said. Lanier stood upright and said something we couldn’t make out.

Bravelli was close to the microphone, and we didn’t have any problem hearing him respond. “Well, keep somebody else’s car warm.”

“Finally, I’m seein’ them together,” said Doc, jubilant. “I knew if I came here often enough, sooner or later …”

Bravelli seemed in a hurry. “They said you wanted to talk to me.”

“That’s right,” said Lanier, walking up to him. “You know who I am.”

“Yeah, so? You been coming around here all the time. Ain’t there no bars around where you live?”

“You know that my job is to put you in jail.”

“So?”

“Maybe it doesn’t have to be like that.” “What are you talkin’ about?”

“Maybe we can work out a deal. You know, you help me, [help you.”

Bravelli looked at Lanier for a long moment.

“What do you think I am, stupid?” he finally said. “No. All I’m saying is—”

“You probably got this whole place wired up, you probably got people listening to everything we’re sayin'.”

“There’s nobody listening.”

“Either arrest me or get the fuck out of here.”

“That’s the point, I don’t want to arrest you. I think we can work together.”

Bravelli looked around, then spoke to the large, unseen audience he imagined was in the alley. “I’m a law-abiding citizen. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He turned back to go into the bar.

“Wait,” said Lanier, trying to figure out what else he could say.

“I ain’t gonna wait,” said Bravelli. “And there ain’t no reason for you to drink beer here no more. That bartender, he don’t like cops. You don’t want him spittin’ in your beer, do you?”

Bravelli opened the door and walked back inside Sagiliano’s, leaving Lanier alone in the alley. He stood looking at the door, you could tell he was deciding whether to go in after Bravelli. He decided against it, though, and walked out of the alley.

“What the hell was that all about?” Doc asked.

“Don’t ask me,” I said. “I’m just glad he didn’t mention Michelle.”

“It’s amazing,” Doc said. “I come here every other night for two weeks, nothing happens. Then I see two things in one night. ‘Course, I don’t understand either one of them …”

Again Sagiliano’s door opened. Michelle and Bravelli were coming out.

“So, which ones are we going to?” Michelle asked him.

“Why don’t we start at the Taj Mahal?” Bravelli said. “Then maybe we’ll hit Caesars and Trump Plaza.”

“Fine.”

“And guess what? I want to buy you a really nice dinner, Leez, with candlelight and everything. You can have whatever you want.”

“That sounds lovely, Mickey.”

They continued talking as they moved toward the car, though they were soon out of range of the microphone. It didn’t matter, I knew where they were going—Atlantic City.

Which meant I didn’t have to rush out of here in front of Doc. And he wasn’t going to make the connection once Bravelli was found dead.

After all, what was one more mob hit in South Jersey?

T
raffic on the Atlantic City expressway was light, and I sped past the darkened blueberry fields and through the New Jersey Pine Barrens. There was plenty of time to work out how I’d kill Bravelli: once I found them in the casino, I’d wait for them to leave, then follow them to the parking garage. I’d come up behind Bravelli with Junior Vincente’s gun, two shots, pop-pop, one to take him down, the second to make sure. Michelle would be upset, but that couldn’t be helped.

She was deluding herself. Bravelli would never forgive her betrayal once Bender’s story hit the street. There was probably even a chapter on that in the Official Mob Handbook. Rule 235: Someone betrays you, kill ‘em. If it’s your grandmother, just make sure you’re in the will first.

Near the end of the expressway, I could see the brightly lit casino-hotels, all lined up along the ocean like they were intentionally trying to block everyone’s view. There was no doubt which casino was which—on each was its name in giant red letters you could see miles away: Caesars, Trump Plaza, Tropicana. It was like
The New York Times
Large Type Edition of casinos.

My first stop was the Taj Mahal. It was the gaudiest, ugliest, most pretentious casino in Atlantic City—just Bravelli’s speed. I parked my Blazer in the Taj’s monstrous garage, and headed for the casino floor.

I cruised through the cluster of craps tables, then past the long line of blackjack dealers, then onto roulette and baccarat and the other games. The casino wasn’t crowded yet, so it was pretty easy to get a look at everyone there. No sign of Michelle or Bravelli. The slot machines were in four major areas, and it didn’t take long to glide through each. Not bad, I thought—I’d covered the whole floor in twenty minutes.

I made quick tours of Caesars and Trump Plaza as well. But by the time I got back to the Taj to begin my second round, it was far more crowded than before. Atlantic City was kicking into high gear for the night, and the casinos were becoming swirling streams of gamblers. By my third trip through the Taj, just after midnight, faces were blurring together. All I saw were row after row of flashing, clanging slot machines, and craps tables surrounded by shouting men, and endless blackjack games, each half hidden in a thick cloud of cigarette smoke.