Big Money (Austin Carr Mystery) (3 page)

SIX

Bluefish’s black Chevy Suburban crunches gravel in Luis’s parking lot, then rolls quietly across the sidewalk into light traffic. Red dash lights cast a hellish glow on Bluefish and his doublewide driver, Max, who had big trouble squeezing inside the SUV. Max would have trouble squeezing inside a bus.

Luis and I are tucked in the Suburban’s middle row behind Max and Bluefish. From the jump seat behind us, Bluefish’s two pals in business suits hold their semi-automatics directly behind our cerebellums.

“Here’s the deal,” Bluefish says. “Tom Ragsdale is a degenerate gambler. No one will take his action. But then your asshole boss
Vic tells me he’ll guarantee his son-in-law’s bets. Okay, I know Vic a long time. I take his word. But a few months go by, and now this hump Ragsdale is into me for eighty-nine gees.”

“Rags and
Vic’s daughter are getting divorced,” I say.

“So?”

“I’m just saying. But no matter what, why is this my problem?”

Bluefish’s head turns back to the windshield. “Everybody tells me
Vic’s coming back by the end of summer. Maybe he does, maybe he doesn’t. In the meantime, I’m holding Shore as collateral, meaning you and your big mouth friend Poncho here are going to do me a couple of favors.”

The Suburban turns off Broad
Street at Newman Springs Road and heads toward the Garden State Parkway. Every other building is a gas station or a liquor store. The good people of Branchtown like to fuel up before any long ride.

“Carr, you’re going to open an account for me at Shore Securities, help manage my money.”

Luis raps his window with soft knuckles, listening at the glass. He silently tests the door handle. Locked. The driver must have switched on his override. Is my favorite bartender considering a bailout?

“Sounds painless,” I say to Bluefish, “but a few months from now you’ll want Shore to accept bags of cash or stolen negotiable securities. I know how this crap works. It’s why Mr.
Vic never opened an account for you all the time he’s known you.”

Luis’s hand tests the door handle again. Hope to hell he doesn’t leave me. That driver Max gives me the creeps. His head’s the size of a jack-o-lantern, his back and shoulders like a rhino’s.

“What favor do you ask of
me
?” Luis says.

“Liquor distribution. I got a firm in Philly would like to supply your restaurant.”

“No,” Luis says.

Bluefish’s chin drops to his chest. Very expressive, this bookie. I should introduce him to Walter. “Th
is ain’t a negotiation, Poncho...you and me going back and forth. Do what you’re fucking told or I’ll bury both of you in the pine barrens.”

He nods out the window. We’re on the Parkway headed sout
h now. Manicured lines of white pine, oak, and maple trees border both north and south lanes. Another twenty-five, thirty miles, the forest turns wilder. Nothing but scrub pine.

“Perhaps there is a third choice,” Luis says. “A contest. Myself against your driver.”

Bluefish grunts. “You want a piece of Max? That’s your solution?” Bluefish shakes his head. “You come across as smart, too, although maybe I was fooled ’cause you don’t talk much. But no, I see no benefit to me in that. I’ve got what I want right now.”

“Perhaps
if I include a one-half interest in the restaurant itself—in addition to my liquor business?” Luis says.

My
man is feeling confident. Is Luis in possession of material facts of which I am unaware? Maybe something to do with that door handle?

“
I’m impressed,” Bluefish says. “How about you, Carr? You’re not going along with this dumb idea, are you?”

I’ve never gone wrong trusting Luis yet.
El Hombre
. He’s got a mean plan, I know it.

“Sure I’m going along,” I say. “Here’s my offer: Max wins, you get your new account at Shore, plus I’ll agree to launder cash for you, say
one hundred grand a month.”

Bluefish scratches his narrow chin. “You’re actually making this tempting.” He sighs. “Max? What do you think?”

A bus going the same way zooms by in the fast lane, a big steel box loaded with senior citizens and their rolls of slot change headed for Atlantic City. Max the Creeper shrugs. Like maybe the Suburban went over a bump.

“Max will stomp him,” Max says. Speaking in the third person like a half-wit.
Unlike Mama Bones’ thick Italian accent, I suspect Max is not cultivating misconceptions.

Bluefish says, “
So what’s the rules, Poncho?”

“
Bare hands, no weapons,” Luis says. “The fight continues until only one man is able.”

“You want to fight Max bare handed? S
ounds like a waste of time,” Bluefish says. “Max?”

The driver’s huge head bounces up and down maybe an inch. My p
ulse ticks much higher. This duel is going to happen. Luis versus Max the Creeper. A pint of sour milk boils inside my stomach.

“Max stomp him quick,” Max says.

Bluefish stares out the car window. “Well, why the hell not?”

“If I win, you forget about these favors?” Luis says.

Bluefish shrugs. “If
you
win? Right. You know where to turn off, Max. I can’t notice a five hundred dollar bill on the sidewalk, not pick it up.”

SEVEN

The Suburban’s headlights slice through the inky air like white lasers, searching the blacktop gliding toward us. Pine and oak trees border both sides of the confined two-lane road, a thick, black wall of forest. Above the treetops, a narrow strip of sky shimmers with stars. Bluefish’s window is down, and inside the rush of wind, a night bird makes lonely calls.

I’m definitely getting nervous. The only thing keeping my heart rate below two
hundred sits calmly beside me. I’m pretty sure Luis—
mi amigo—
can handle anything.

The Suburban’s red
glow dash lights fire up the angled edges of Max the Creeper’s profile. Almost inhuman, really. Cartoonish. Trick imaging, yes, but I can’t shake the feeling he’s a monster driving me and Luis down some highway to hell.

Bluefish saying, “
So, Max, tell the guys about your first job. The one you had when you were thirteen.”

Bluefish thinks this is funny. He covers his mouth with his fingers. Call it a silly hunch, but I’m going out on a limb and predict this revelation about creepy Max’s teenage past is going to make me worry even more about Luis’s future.

“Max work with circus,” the Creeper says. Talking about himself in the third person again, his voice a crackling whisper. Broken glass thrown on sandpaper.

“No, tell them what you did for the circus,” Bluefish says.

“Max wrestle bears.”

Bluefish fakes a cough. “Notice he said ‘bears,’ guys. Not ‘bear.’”

The Suburban swings into a private driveway. Six-foot lengths of treated logs bridge the roadside ditch where water trickles through tall grass. A battered mailbox, shaped like a black squirrel, stands sentry. How cute, except the critter’s head has been shot off.

Seventy-five feet off the blacktop, the forest
opens into a grassy clearing with a mulched playground for kids, slides, a jungle gym, and parking for two dozen cars. Three brick barbecues line one side of the parking area. Probably where Bluefish holds his company picnics. Buries his wives and girlfriends.

The Suburban rolls to a stop against the parking lot’s log boundary. Luis’s hand is locked onto the door handle, his gaze pinned on Creeper. Luis’s body language reminds
me of a house cat. Watching like Max is a mouse.

Trouble is Creeper is
more like the Giant Rat of Sumatra.

Bluefish saying, “Do I even need to get out of the car, Max? I mean, how long could this take?”

I hear Max the Creeper click a switch. All the Suburban’s doors pop free, and Luis is outside before I smell fresh air. I saw his hand move this quickly once, when some
pachuko
hoisted Luis by the collar and my favorite bartender went for a switchblade in his back pocket. But Luis’s whole body is a blur this time. Like that house cat, making his move.

Poking my head outside, watching
Luis over the SUV’s roof, Luis stands loose and ready beside the Suburban’s flank while Max is still squeezing out from behind the wheel like some ugly gob of toothpaste.

When Luis kicks Max’s door, stomping on the hinged steel like he’s breaking down a locked
vault, Luis times his explosion precisely as Creeper’s noggin rises between the top of the Suburban’s door and the frame. The chunky sound of steel on Creeper’s head—like someone dropped a stick of butter on the floor—makes me wince. Max staggers to one knee, blood oozing from his temple. His shoulders weave, and he tumbles face first onto the parking lot’s shredded bark. The earth shakes like somebody dropped a piano.

My heart’s drumming, hard rain on a cardboard roof. The two guys in suits
have scrambled out of the Suburban’s rear seat, slowly at first to watch the fight, then knocking me down, pushing past, as Max goes down. They want Luis. One rushes around the grill, the other goes for the rear bumper to trap him. My lungs want more oxygen.

Luis stoops out of my view
from the top, then reappears like magic photography back inside the Suburban, sitting in the driver’s seat. One hand extends a gun toward Bluefish’s head. Luis must have taken the weapon from Max. A tear of sweat rolls down my right flank.

I see Luis’s end game, at last, and jump back inside the Suburban. Same seat I had before, behind Bluefish. Luis hits the override
button as soon as my door shuts, raising all the windows and locking the three of us inside. Luis grins as he hands me the gun. What an
hombre
. “Watch carefully Bluefish’s hands. If you lose sight of them, shoot.”

It would be my pleasure, I think. I’m no killer, but if Bluefish has another gun on him, and I don’t shoot whe
n he goes for his weapon, Luis and/or I could suffer serious and permanent injury.

Bluefish is no risk taker, however.
He shows me the back of his hands, one poised by each ear. How sweet. He’s wearing his missing wife’s wedding band. Gold, and not perfectly round, the circle squared with tiny corners.

I line up the muzzle with the back of Bluefish’s demented
brain, although I am seriously starting to worry about the two guys in suits. Locked out, they are hammering the windows and yanking on the doors and now firing weapons.

I duck.
Cracks appear on the window beside Luis’s head, but the bullets don’t penetrate. Bulletproof glass? I’m not only impressed with Bluefish’s expensive and professional defenses, but also the fact Luis must have figured this out earlier. I remember him tapping the glass with his knuckles.

Luis throttles the Suburban into a bark
spewing K-turn.

Bluefish says
, “You humps are as good as dead.”

EIGHT

Plenty of parking at the Mexican Grill when Luis bounces us back into his gravel lot. With no bartender to mix drinks for over an hour, Luis’s thirsty customers obviously sought refreshment elsewhere. In Branchtown, drinking loyalties have limits.

I’m breathing like a normal
running Labrador again as Luis flips off the engine. My heart-rate’s taken a dive, too. Probably down to a smooth one-eighty. Don’t think I was meant to aim guns at people. Or maybe it’s the dead-ass blank stare Bluefish just gave me. Looking at this guy gives me the idea I might be out of my league.

Luis swings his shoulders to confront Bluefish, holds up the car keys like a prize. “You will
keep your word, forget about the favors you asked?”

Good thing I’ve got Luis,
El Hombre
. The man is in a league of his own.

Bluefish nods, reaches for the keys. “Sure.”

Don’t know about Luis, but Bluefish’s tone and manner do not sate me with confidence. In fact, it’s impossible to even hope he’s telling the truth. Or maybe I’m just the skeptical type. Being a stockbroker and all.

But I am not the only one.
Bluefish’s fingers snatch air as Luis yanks the keys back. Luis says, “I would be a fool to let you leave if you only plan to kill us.”

Glad
Luis agreed with my zero reading of Bluefish’s Sincerity Meter. Bluefish better be careful what he says next, too. I know for a fact Luis has the stomach to kill.

“I’ll keep the bargain,” Bluefish says. “I’m pissed off, yeah, so maybe it don’t sound right. But I’ll forget about the favors,
leave Shore alone and the restaurant alone. Ragsdale’s debt can wait for Vic to come back.”

Bluefish
tried
that time. I have a small hope he might live up to his word. No confidence. Just hope. And actually, “forget about the favors” isn’t exactly “I won’t have someone shoot you in the head” either.

Luis gives him the keys to the Suburban.

Inside an empty Luis’s Mexican Grill, I cover a stool at the horseshoe bar, right under Luis’s collection of authentic caballista sombreros. My favorite bartender sends Umberto home, flips off the television and begins to toss trash, wipe glasses and towel the counter.

When the bar’s clean and ready for tomorrow’s setup, Luis pours us each a shot of Herradura Gold. A nightcap of warriors. Actually, I was more of a foil. Maybe a prop or the comic relief—like the real Poncho to Luis’s Cisco Kid.

We salute and drink.

Luis says,
“Have you given thought to what happened tonight?”

“I’m trying to block it out.”

“Do not,” Luis says. “This is a serious matter. Bluefish will almost certainly try to kill us. Perhaps not right away. He would be wise to wait, perhaps put us off our guard by letting us think he kept his word.”

“Sounds sneaky enough for Bluefish. Did you get a good look at that
pumpkin-faced creep Max who was driving...before you changed the shape of his head, I mean?”

Luis ignores me.
“We must make plans, take special care. Before this is over, we may decide killing Bluefish first is our only protection.”

I pull my wallet, find the yellow scrap of paper Mr.
Vic gave me that Friday night. I show Luis Tony’s name and telephone number.

“Who is Tony?” Luis
asks.

“My boss said I should call him in case of trouble with his daughter. I did, and he took care of it.
Rags is gone. Maybe he could take care of Bluefish, too.”

Luis switches off the beer signs. “Is this Tony a lawyer? Or a thug like Bluefish?”

“I don’t know.”

“It is of litt
le consequence, I think. Most likely this matter must be settled between ourselves and Bluefish.”

Luis is ready to close the restaurant
. I’m not sure, but I think he may have himself a steady girlfriend these days. I slide off the barstool. “You mean you and Bluefish will settle it, Luis. I’m not much of a fighter.”

Luis shakes his head. “This is not true,
amigo.
Myself, I am experienced with many weapons. My favorite is the knife, and I handle even the large ones with skill. Yet your words can be more cutting than my biggest knife. Austin Carr fights with his brain and his mouth. And he fights very well.”

Now that’s an interesting take on my Gift for Gab. I always saw my verbal proficiency as a shield, not a weapon. But who am I to argue with a Toltec warrior
?