Gang of Lovers (3 page)

“That depends on how things turn out,” Rossini retorted menacingly. “In this kind of situation, it's never a good idea to count your chickens before they hatch.”

The uncle turned pale and concentrated on the butter he was spreading on his baguette. “If you had just let my niece take care of things, we'd be done by now,” he grumbled unhappily. “A few drops of poison, a silk noose around her neck. Quick and clean.”

“We don't hire hit men,” Beniamino interrupted.

“That's an offensive term in any language,” the offended Serbian protested, shoring up his own self-respect.

“We're leaving tomorrow,” I announced, changing the subject. “We're going to leave you locked up in the cellar, with plenty of food and water, and when the time comes we'll tell Bojana to come set you free.”

“But that way I don't have any guarantee that you'll keep your side of the bargain.”

“Don't tell me you're afraid, ‘commandant'?” I asked with a smile.

The Serbian pointed at Rossini furtively. “Yes, I am—of him.”

Lazar really was a poor idiot. He was afraid of Beniamino's vengeance because his criminal culture couldn't conceive of the notion of respect. Respect for one's word, for prisoners, for women and children.

The old bandit took him by the arm. “It's time for you to go beddy-bye, Lazar GaraÅ¡anin. You're no longer welcome here.”

 

The trip to Lyon took more than five hours. In a brasserie on the outskirts of town we met Luc and Christine. They both looked different than the last time I'd seen them. Evidently they'd made a withdrawal since then, and changing your look was essential in the world of armed robbery.

Luc had shaved his mustache, and Christine had dyed her hair a faded red. Both of them wore coveralls that bore the logo of a janitorial company.

“We found a safe house in Vienne,” Luc informed us. “The lady that rented to us is the widow of a straight-up guy I met in prison.”

“It's more than thirty kilometers outside of town,” his wife added. “But these days the city isn't safe. The cops are hunting for a couple of fugitives and they're checking everybody and everything.”

Rossini shrugged. “We'll be fast and discreet. Like always.”

Max and I boarded a bus and headed for the center of town, where we planned to scope out the places Natalija Dini´c was a regular. It was nice to stroll through the streets of that beautiful city, both ancient and prosperous, but our minds were on other things. On the one hand, we were relieved at the thought that this whole thing might soon be over once and for all. On the other, we were filled with a kind of dread completely divorced from rational thought. Even though we knew it was the right thing to do and that there were no feasible alternatives, planning a murder that required a betrayal to work just didn't fit with the lives we'd led up till then.

“That whore ruined our lives and yet an inexplicable sense of remorse will color our experience of her death,” said the fat man, between slurps of beer.

“It's a burden we're going to have to share with Beniamino. He's the one who's going to be pulling the trigger.”

We had slipped into a bar on rue de la Martinière, where Natalija's dentist had his office, almost right across the street from the Académie de Billard. You had to walk through a small front garden to get into the building. Though we hadn't yet checked the other addresses, we both knew that this was where it was going to happen. It was a sort of no-man's land surrounded by hedges, with a couple of trees that seemed to have been planted with an ambush in mind.

As always, the real problem would be our escape route, but we could leave that detail to the old bandit and the couple from Marseille.

We boarded a taxi and headed to the station. The train was packed with exhausted commuters; some talked on their cell phones, while the rest listened resignedly to bits and pieces of other people's lives.

“I feel like having a smoke and a drink,” I confided to Max. “And to think I only quit half an hour ago.”

“I hear you. And I'm hungry, too. We just need to fill in the holes in our lives.”

I snickered. “You've dated too many shrinks. They've left their mark on you.”

“Only the Lacanians. Two Lacanian psychoanalysts, to tell the truth, are plenty.”

“If you ask me, you'll fall for a third the first chance you get.”

“You can bet on it. Before long I'll climb a tree and start shouting:
I want a woman!
Like the crazy uncle in Fellini's
Amarcord
.”

“Life during gang wars.” I'd meant it as a cynical wisecrack but it came out sounding gloomier than I'd intended.

“I think you ought to give the idea of a girlfriend who's a shrink some thought,” the fat man observed. “If you go on like this, every woman you meet will give you the heave-ho the way that cute bartender in La Trinité did.”

“You're a pal.” In the past few weeks I'd been doing my best to forget about the latest pathetic attempt I'd made at picking up a woman I liked. It was the end of July, a rainy day that was anything but warm. I'd stopped to fill up my tank and the sign across the street had caught my eye: Tip Top Bar.

I decided that a quick shot of something wouldn't hurt and the next thing I knew I was standing in a bar that was practically deserted except for a couple of retirees, regular customers, each nursing a pastis he meant to make last until evening, and a female bartender who was giving me a level look: arms crossed and a cigarette dangling from her lip.

Forty years old, a cascade of dark curls, a pretty face, made up as if she was waiting her turn to walk the runway for an exclusive Parisian designer. Tits and neckline that you couldn't miss.

“With someone like you behind the bar, this place ought to be packed with horny men,” I said after ordering a beer and an anisette.

“They show up after sunset,” she replied. “That's when I'm at my best.”

“Then maybe I'll wait around for the show to start.”

I took the little shot glass of liqueur and dropped it into the mug of beer. By the time it hit bottom, the anisette was nicely mixed in with the beer. “Just perfect as a thirst-quencher,” I explained.

She paid no attention to me. She'd already filed me away as just another customer. I started staring at her insistently. She got annoyed almost immediately.

“Something wrong?” she huffed.

“I want to strike up a conversation but I can't figure out the best gambit to attract your attention. I don't want to get my first move wrong.”

“Oh, you're a slick one with the girls, aren't you,” she said in a mocking tone of voice, before walking over to the radio to change the station.

I took advantage of the opportunity to get up on my tiptoes so I could catch a good look at her butt and her legs. I caught her wry glance as she watched me in the mirror behind the bar. “Everything meet with your approval?” she asked.

“Yes,” I sighed.

She tuned the radio to a station that was playing
Coeur de Chewing Gum
. Brigitte sang:

 

Si j'avais le coeur dur comme de la pierre

j'embrassarais tous le garçons de la terre

mais moi j'ai le coeur comme du chewing gum

tu me goûtes e je te colle . . .

 

“Is your heart all gummy too?” I asked her.

The woman gestured for me to pay attention to the lyrics.

 

Irrésistiblement amoureuse c'est emmerdant

Irrésistiblement emmerdeuse c'est amusant.

 

“So now do you get it?” she asked.

“Yep, you're having some fun at my expense.”

“That's exactly right.”

“And I deserve it, don't I?”

“Your question about my heart was strictly for beginners.”

Just then I felt my cell phone buzz in my shirt pocket. It was Beniamino. He was calling to find out whether I'd crossed the border and when he should expect me in Nice. Staring the bartender right in the eye, I told him that I wasn't far away, but that I would most likely get there a couple of days late because I'd just met the most beautiful woman on earth. My friend asked no questions, it was enough for him to know that I was well and on my way. She, on the other hand, burst out laughing.

“You understand Italian,” I said, stunned.

“Enough. Like everyone here, we're just a stone's throw from the border.”

“And I made you laugh.”

“Am I really the most beautiful woman on earth?”

“Absolutely no doubt about it.”

She stuck out her hand. “The name's Ninon.”

That was her first name: her surname was Colin. I learned that when I rang her doorbell the following day. The night at the Tip Top Bar had been challenging, both in terms of consuming alcohol and in terms of controlling my anger. A ridiculous number of contenders for her attention whom I'd gladly have gotten rid of by waving a sawn-off shotgun. The lovely bartender had invited me over for lunch, but there was nothing on the kitchen table but a paper sack with two ham sandwiches.

“Wine or beer?” she asked.

“Beer,” I answered, absentmindedly. All my attention had been drawn to a poster that showed Ninon, practically naked, feverishly clutching at some man.

“I worked in porn until two years ago,” she explained. “And that big handsome hunk is my ex-husband. He's no longer acting either, now he's a producer in Slovakia.”

“Will you give me a complete set of all your movies?” I asked, perfectly serious.

“No,” she replied, and then she kissed me.

Ninon was beautiful. I'd have stayed in her bed for the rest of my life but there was no room for me in her life. I was just a foreigner passing through, a good way to break up the monotony of a town where all the men were after her but none really wanted her. She accepted the situation because the Tip Top Bar had been in her family for as long as anyone could remember and she wouldn't have abandoned it for any reason on earth.

Two days later I was completely head over heels in love with her. When it dawned on me that my time was up, I walked into the bar and asked her to run away with me. Right then and there.

Ninon lit two cigarettes and stuck one between my lips. “Please, don't be ridiculous. Don't leave me with such a depressing memory of you.”

But I just kept making things worse. Luckily she got sick of it quickly and kept me from sinking all the way to rock bottom.

“Beat it, handsome!” she hissed, cold as ice. I turned on my heel and headed straight for the door.

As I walked past the table with the two retirees, I heard one comment to the other: “Another day, another asshole, eh, Louis?”

He was right, and everything about what had happened kept on making me feel shitty. Ninon didn't deserve to be treated like that. This was collateral damage in the war that would only come to an end, perhaps, with an inevitable execution.

 

At the Vienne train station, we found Luc waiting for us with a small delivery van. The safe house was just another farmhouse way the hell out in the countryside. It hadn't been lived in for years, and there was dust everywhere. Plus it was freezing. The heaters were going full blast, but the place wasn't even going to begin to warm up until the next day.

Max went to help Christine get the kitchen into working shape. I went in search of Beniamino to bring him up-to-date on our scouting trip in Lyon.

The first thing I told him about was the little front garden. He asked me about a couple of details, but only to be polite; it was clear he had other things on his mind.

“You've talked to Sylvie,” I guessed.

“Right. I told her that we've been forced to give up on the idea of hitting Natalija Dini´c 's business interests and she didn't take that well at all. She insulted me. Every day that passes, she seems to have a crueler tongue.”­

I pulled a small flask of Calvados out of my jacket pocket. I'd been carrying it around with me for the past two days and I had yet to taste a drop. I unscrewed the cap and handed it to my friend.

He took a substantial gulp. “At this point, everything about this thing hurts. It's just sick.”

I agreed, and I sat there listening to his sad, weary thoughts. He despaired over the woman he loved, who could no longer find anything to care about in her life.

“The only thing about me that she loves is the violence I can unleash on her enemies.”

“They're your enemies too. And ours.”

“But Sylvie has forgotten that part.”

We were interrupted by Luc, who came to announce that dinner was ready. A giant onion frittata that Max praised to the high heavens, though with pedantic asides on just how he would have cooked it differently. Christine paid him no mind. And neither did we. The next day Natalija had an appointment with her hairdresser and all we cared about was making sure we arranged for the best possible surveillance.

“It's important that all of us be there,” Beniamino hammered home. “We need to figure out whether or not the GaraÅ¡anins intend to hold up their end of the deal.”

“I'd be amazed if they didn't,” I retorted. “We're holding their Uncle Lazar hostage and they are completely determined to get their hands on all of Dini´c's businesses.”

Rossini finished chewing a mouthful of food. “Never trust a bunch of Serbian gangsters, especially if you're not Serbian yourself,” he pronounced. “For all we know, at this very moment, they're negotiating with Natalija because they've decided that an alliance would be more useful and don't care if Lazar does wind up in an unmarked grave.”

I nodded but Beniamino clearly didn't think we were done with our discussion. “I don't understand why you trust Bojana.”

That wasn't entirely true. Still, I'd taken the value of the hostage for granted. “I made a mistake,” I admitted easily.