Naked Moon (5 page)

The warehouse had been under investigation before. In the end, these investigations always faltered, but this one was being headed up by a woman from SI, a Chinese cop by the name of Leanora Chin. Dante knew her from his time on the force.

The Lady in Blue, so called.

This was how her fellow cops referred to her, on account, no matter the occasion, she always had the look of someone in uniform. She always wore the same blunt cut. Her clothes, it seemed, were always blue.

“I didn't start this mess,” Gary said. “I inherited it.”

Inside the living room, smooth surfaces were everywhere, hard and sleek, Italian furniture, glass and gold leaf, all contemporary, expensive, colors bright and simple. There was a carton upturned on the glass table. A shattered bottle of wine. A broken vase on the floor.

“Viola had one of her fits,” he said.

Dante knew about Viola's fits. He had seen her once sweep a shelf of imported crystal from the display. He'd seen her go after Gary and rip his shirtfront with her long nails. He'd seen her inflamed, and he'd heard her wail. In the dining nook, a china plate lay shattered, a designer piece, some rococo nonsense, and there was a great red smear on the wall. Tomato sauce.

Viola was a wild one, but Gary was no prince.

“Where is she?”

“Tahoe …” He pointed. “I'm not cleaning it up. It's her mess.”

“Is she coming back?”

“She always comes back,” he said ruefully.

It was true: Viola always came back. Or she always had in the past. She liked the house with its big windows and her closet full of clothes and the jet-black Jaguar in the garage. Nonetheless, she was the third wife, and she had her reasons to explode. A slew of stepkids in and out. Gary mooning over his first wife, fighting with the second. Sleeping with Lola down at the warehouse, bending her over the big metal desk. Not to mention the money problems now, the whole thing a house of cards. With the Feds standing outside, ready to blow it all over.

“She's talking to lawyers. She's going to testify against me if I don't give her everything I own.”

“She'll calm down.”

“She's jealous. She thinks there's another woman.”

“Another one?”

“It was business, I tried to explain. With the woman—and her husband.” Gary smirked despite himself, forever proud of his dalliances, though his eyes held a self-conscious glimmer that Dante had seen often enough, along with a hint of fear. It could be difficult to tell when his cousin was lying.

“What kind of business?”

“This is your fault, too,” Gary said.

“I don't have anything to do with the warehouse.”

“No, of course not. You're too good for that.”

By stipulation of the will, Dante remained half owner. He had given the day-to-day operations over to his cousin years ago, in return for a percentage. In actuality, the business had not turned a profit in years, at least not on paper, and the property was mortgaged beyond its value. Dante had put a second mortgage on the place out on Fresno, to help his cousin out, but that, too, was sliding toward arrears.

“You always thought you deserved it all,” Gary said. “But the truth is, you don't deserve anything. I am not even blood. I never wanted it. They came over to Italy and dragged me here. They dressed me up.”

Gary spread his arms wide in a beseeching gesture. Dante had seen the gesture before and he had heard the argument, too. His adopted cousin had used the argument ever since he was a kid, every time he got in over his head. If Salvatore and Regina Mancuso had left him in the orphanage, if they had not adopted him, none of this would ever have happened.

“Do you think I wanted this life?”

“It doesn't matter. You've got it.”

“I didn't want this.”

But his cousin had wanted it. Or he had wanted the stuff, anyway. He liked his sports car and his glass tile bathroom and his ten-jet Jacuzzi. He loved his house that looked out over the whole world and his video-monitoring system that let him see every bug crawling up the walk. He loved it even now, angry as he was. Loved catching sight of himself in the big gilt mirror, here in the living room, hands on his hips,
staring back at himself in his silk shirt, his white slacks and his loafers with the tassels, his gold Rolex.

But it wasn't enough.

Dante's uncle had given Gary everything he could, but now the old ones were dead and Gary had run up against the wall.

Because it wasn't Gary who ran the warehouse anymore. It was the Wus. He was their front, their shill. He was really nothing more than a paid fall guy—one who wasn't particularly discreet—and it was a wonder they hadn't gotten rid of him a long time ago.

All Gary'd had to do was close his eyes and take the money, but his cousin had bungled the laundering operations. He'd also gotten himself into debt.

“The Wus are tied in with the CIA, you know. They can do any goddamn thing they want.”

His cousin looked at him pointedly. It was a common rumor, containing a degree of truth. Dante didn't argue.

“This guy Dominick Greene. Who is he?”

“No one. Just some two-bit. I drank with him a couple of times, that's all.”

“What does he want?”

“He works for a fabric wholesaler. Merchandise—needs expedited delivery.”

“You should be careful.”

“This isn't about him.” His cousin's jaw tightened, and then the eyes went dark, woeful. “I need your help.”

“I don't have money,” Dante said.

“It's not cash,” Gary said, irritated, though Dante knew his cousin was perennially short of money. “I talked to some people…. If you help them, if you cooperate,” he said, “they'll help me. They have insider contacts. They'll kill the investigation.”

Dante thought of Greene again. He thought of the call he himself had received, the insect down there in its den.

“Someone's pulling your leg,” he said.

“This isn't just for me. I've got two ex-wives … kids … responsibilities.” Gary hung his head. “This cop, Chin—with Special Investigations—she's been after the Wus for years. Meantime, she's got me in a bind.”

Dante knew his cousin's dilemma. Leanora Chin wanted the Wu operation and would use his cousin to get it. Other investigators had gone after the Wus before, cops tougher on the surface, but these others had either been bought off or disappeared. Meanwhile Chin had threatened to get the IRS on his cousin if he didn't reveal the inner operations. She had offered him immunity if he cooperated, but if Gary took her offer, the Wus would come after him. His cousin's only way out, if he wanted to avoid jail time on one side and the Wus on the other, was to join Witness Protection. Gary didn't want to do that. He didn't want to leave everything behind.

“What makes you think I can do anything?” asked Dante.

“I got a call, a visit … from some people….”

“What people?”

“All you have to do, is give them what they want.”

His looks curled in an expression Dante remembered from their boyhood. When his cousin was desperate, he did foolish things. He grabbed at straws. He looked around for someone to blame, to pull down with him. Nevertheless, his cousin knew a lot, from his years at the trade—about the Wus, about this and that—and as Dante studied his cousin's face, he wondered if his cousin had stumbled upon something else.

“What were you doing at Rossi's?”

“Just paying my respects.”

“That's not what I heard.”

“People exaggerate.”

“There was a scene.”

“Big friend of the family, that one. Mayor for twelve years. I asked him to use his influence, that's all. To get this cop off my back. But fuck me, that's his attitude. Fuck me.”

“He's not mayor anymore.”

“I wouldn't have gone out there if you'd answered my goddamn calls.”

“What do you expect me to do?”

“You can help. That's what I was told.”

“Who told you that?”

His cousin shook his head. “I was told in confidence.”

“Greene?”

His cousin turned away. Gary was weak—and if he went after him, if he pushed him hard enough, his cousin might tell him—but Dante felt the same hesitation he'd felt with the girl from Gino's, who'd led him to the hotel room. It
was sometimes better to let the messenger be, to let the pony go. Force Gary to talk, drag him in too far, there might be repercussions he could not see. He thought of Marilyn. He'd lingered in town too long, the company knew his every vulnerability, and now it was too late to leave.

“It was a friendly visit. Like I said, if you help them,” he said, “they'll help us. We can save the business.”

“I don't know what you're talking about.”

“You're lying.”

“No.” Dante dropped his voice, looking his cousin in the eye. They'd been raised like brothers, two kids on the block, and he saw his cousin hesitating under his glance, guilty, sheepish. But his cousin was right: Dante was not telling him everything.

“You're supposed to be the good one,” said Gary. “The cop … but it turns out, you're the one with all the nasty friends.”

His cousin sat on the couch, shoulders bent, hands clasped between his knees. He had dark brown eyes, curly hair, boyish. The women had always liked him, even those who saw through him. You could see the softness in him, something about to relent, the desire to be good—but in the end, he was always looking for another way. He got up now, smiling that kid smile, and went to the bookcase. There were pictures up there. Dante's own father and mother. Himself and his cousin on the stoop.

“Remember?” his cousin asked.

“Yeah.”

“There's more pictures.”

“I know.”

“The old days.”

More pictures, the two of them together. Of Uncle Salvatore and Aunt Regina. More cousins, more family. Old fishermen on the dock. His cousin gave him the soft look. “I miss them.”

“Yeah.”

“It seems like just a minute ago, they were all here. In another minute, us, too, we'll be gone also.”

“Time passes.”

“There's no such thing as time—remember. That's what the priest used to say, the nuns. It's just one moment. The big forever.”

“I remember.”

“So you think about it—we're already dead.”

“Not quite.”

“This is your fault, too. If you had come into the business,” he said. “If you had done what your father wanted, things wouldn't be this way.”

It was a perverse logic, typical of his cousin, but there was an element of truth. If he had gone into the business, if he had taken charge—if he had married Marilyn, years ago—if he'd never gone to New Orleans, then his friends at the company would never have paid his cousin a visit, in whatever outfit, whatever guise, promising to pull the strings that would kill the investigation and make everything right.

His cousin looked at him now, his eyes soft and earnest, the little boy on the street, on the stoop, in the foreign country, in over his head.

“Just give them what they want,” Gary said.

PART THREE

A
chicken could not cluck in Portsmouth Square, a fish could not whisper, without the sound carrying into the chambers of Love Wu, atop the Empress Building. Or this was the saying of the old men playing mah-jongg on the stone benches in the square.

The Empress was not on the square itself, but on the rise, a block back, and the sound carried to the upper stories. The building was not in itself impressive, seven stories high, built with brick, then covered with deteriorating stucco on the upper layers. At the top it had been corniced in the fashion of a pagoda, though this facade, too, was in partial disrepair.

On the street level, the building housed the ubiquitous vegetable parlors and junk palaces of Chinatown, stalls crammed with cheap luggage and cheaper produce. Above that stood the offices of the Wu Benevolent Association—and
on the top floor, or so it was said, the chambers of Love Wu himself.