She Walks in Beauty (43 page)

*

“I’m so sorry,” said Vic, the captain who always took care of Michelangelo. “I hate to disturb you, but there is this man outside who insists that he has an appointment. I’m sure he doesn’t, Mr. Amato.” Vic rolled his eyes. “But before we send him away, I thought you ought to know—”

Ma was dining alone today. He’d just finished a plate of spedini, one of his favorites. Italian bread with melted mozzarella smothered in a light anchovy sauce. It wasn’t good for his arteries, but it was good for his soul. That, with a glass of dolcetto, slightly chilled. Then a green salad with a small bottle of San Pellegrino. A little espresso.

The good food took his mind off his problems. Sometimes Michelangelo felt that the weight of the whole world rested on his shoulders. Well,
his
world, anyway.

The boys who worked lookout said his mom was out of the house every day. He knew there was something going on they were afraid to tell him. And he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

Then there was Lana, a real pain in the butt if there ever was one. Who’d she think she was, Vito Corleone, ordering hits left and right?
Those girls took my dress; do ’em.
On the other hand, she was Big John’s niece, and under Ma’s protection. It was hard to know where the boundaries might lie in Big John’s eyes.

One thing he’d decided, Miss DeLucca getting on his nerves, the hell with a fix. There was no money changing hands on the pageant anyway, so it wasn’t like he was going to make anything except some goodwill with Big John. For that there were other avenues that were less complicated.

But the next thing he knows, Angelo Pizza calls him up and says not to worry, he’s heard Ma wants the girl to win, he’s got it wired.

What the hell did that mean? Angelo was a good man, but Ma would rather he didn’t branch out on his own. Ange hadn’t served all that time in Danbury for having New Jersey’s most creative criminal mind, even when he was young. And what with Ma’s recently expanded bookmaking business, the heavy investments in IBM equipment and several telecommunications concerns, he wasn’t interested in bringing any unnecessary attention to himself. ,In the feds’ eyes where there was smoke there was fire,. And now,
now,
there’s strangers tracking him to his club. A man couldn’t enjoy a quiet meal without some jerkoff interrupting him.

“Bring him in,” said Ma. Maybe this was the time to make an example. Show what respect demanded. Word would get out on the street, and at least he could eat a lunch in peace.

*

Lana was standing right in front of the wine cellar door. The little woman, whoever she was, with the multicolored hair piled up on top of her head was breathing right down her neck.

“Lana!” she screamed, practically in her ear. “Lana, wait!”

Wait, her ass. Lana leaned over, pressed her chest right up against the lock, fiddled with the key—the chain she was wearing it on around her neck was just long enough—click, got it, great, jerked open the door.

“Wait! Wait! There’s something I’ve got to tell you!”

Lana put one foot in the door, turned, and grabbed at what was closest, anything to get this broad off her tail, reached up and snatched off her long blond wig and tossed it at the woman’s face.

“Ouch!” Darleen yelped. For Lana had grabbed the key too. The chain broke, and the key popped Darleen right in the mouth.

Lana slammed the door shut. Whew! Safe at last. Maybe there
was
a point to the chaperones after all. At least they kept the crazies off.

*

“So you see,” Wayne had settled himself down at the table in Ma’s private dining room as if he’d been invited, “I’ll make the tape of your girl like she’s taking her victory walk down the runway, and then I’ll implant it in the judges’ heads, and your Miss New Jersey will win.”

“Really?” Ma used his warm voice. He wanted to keep this bugger talking until Willie, who was out in the car, could answer the beeper. Besides, this was pretty interesting info—from a nut case.

“Yeah, and it works, all this stuff works. It’s just like, well, you know, you use a lot of electronic stuff in your business. Isn’t it great what you can do these days?”

That
stopped Ma cold. What did this freak show know about
his
business?

“Yeah, you know, I was talking with a guy one day who said all the bookmaking in town was high tech. I didn’t believe him, so I tried to tap into it, and I have to give it to you, man. That call-forwarding from the dummy offices to your central office, wow! And the volume you handle on that mainframe is terrific.”

“You don’t say.”

“Hey, I’m impressed. And listen, I brought you something that just popped up. Kind of a surprise, you know. This thing I stumbled into, it’s like this pageant business could be a spy novel, you know what I mean? They’ve got people all over the place doing tricks, planting stuff, I don’t know what all they’re up to. And, of course, it’s hard to get ’em to talk, but I thought that might be more up your alley.”

“What do you mean?”

Wayne rubbed his hands together. He was standing off and watching himself, in a way. It was just like in the movies. “You’re gonna love this! I caught this broad trying to sneak into your Miss New Jersey’s room, so I nabbed her. I’ve got her outside.”

“Where outside?”

“In the trunk of my Mustang. You want to come out and see?”

*

Well, screw it, Darleen Carroll thought, fingering her cut lip. It wasn’t worth a cracked front tooth to apologize to a silly little whore who was doing your husband.

She hoped
all
Miss New Jersey’s hair fell out and her boobs sagged and her butt dropped. Overnight.

Shoeless and sweaty in her turquoise silk shirt and black capri pants, Darleen retraced her steps back into the Monopoly’s lobby.

Or almost.

Just before that last turn of the hallway, there was a big Phoenix palm in a blue ceramic Chinese pot decorated with white golden-eyed swans. Darleen the decorator was wondering if the pot had come from mainland China and how much it would cost her in volume, when a hand reached out from behind the palm and grabbed her.

*

Inside the wine cellar, Lana stripped off her pink sweater, white slacks, and bra and slipped into her evening gown. There were those who would say that her dress was too racy for Miss America, but Lana wasn’t one of them. The front didn’t show a thing. It was cut high, and there were
lots
of beads and sequins over her boobs. Of course, in this cold cellar, her nipples were a problem, but tonight she’d do the old Band-Aid number. The back of the dress was something, dipping to below those two cute little dimples just above her butt.

But the point was, it was almost an exact copy of the dress Marilyn had worn when she sang the same song in
Some Like It Hot.
Lana was
doing
Marilyn, so it was okay. Right? What was really super was how close this dress was to the original. Her lucky original. The one that was ripped off.

Just thinking about that made Lana mad all over again, that someone would have the nerve! Her eyes went out of focus, seeing the faces of Magic and Connors. She’d get them for this. Oh, yes, she’d get them. But then she saw what she’d been staring at. Stacked in the mahogany shelves above the orange pop were cases of nothing but the best. She ran her fingers across a few bottles, then pulled out a Veuve Cliquot. No glasses, but what the heck? One of the nice things about champagne was you didn’t need a corkscrew.

*

“Tell you what,” Ma said, folding his napkin. “Your car’s out front? Why don’t you drive it through the alleyway to the side of the club around to the back? There’s a private parking lot behind the back door. I’ll meet you there.”

“Fine and dandy.” Wayne was feeling good, sounding more like Mr. You Know Who all the time. Letting those slick phrases he’d learned from him just roll right off his tongue. “Speaking of alleys, this’ll be right up yours. You’re gonna love it, I guarandamntee you.”

“I’m sure.” Ma nodded at Willie, who’d just stepped to the dining room door.

*

Rashad was all over the place in the living room of Sam and Harry’s suite, arranging chairs, plumping pillows, slipping the tape into the VCR. “Hey, did you bring any popcorn?” Harry asked.

“Oh, my God.” Rashad slapped himself in the forehead. “I forgot it. I can call room service.”

“He’s teasing,” said Sam. “Calm down, Rashad. Now tell us what this is about.” Then she leaned over and whispered to Harry, “This better not take long. I want to get moving on this Wayne Ward thing.”

“Well. Harrumph.” Rashad cleared his throat and looked over at Junior, who gave him the high sign. Rashad was wearing full formal dress this morning, down to the gray spats. Junior was more informally attired, but cool.

Whatever they lacked in filmmaking skills they more than compensated for in style, thought Harry. These two would land buttered side up.

Rashad began to explain about the film’s subject, Bette Cooper, Miss Bertram Island, New Jersey, who’d decided in the middle of the night, after being crowned Miss America 1937, that she’d just as soon pass. And Lou Off, the Atlantic City socialite, who’d helped her make her grand escape.

Junior added, “That part’s true. What we’ve done, though, is tie it in with a fictional gangster story that takes place in the Pine Barrens. You know, kind of a film noir. The beautiful versus the bad. Innocence played against evil.”

Rashad stared at his normally silent partner, then said, “Why don’t we just roll it for you?”

And so they did.

On the TV screen Rachel Rose shimmied down a fire escape and landed in a convertible. Junior, playing Lou Off, drove her, as Bette, still sniveling with a terrible head cold, down
along a beach road. He was telling her how he was sure she was doing the right thing. The Miss America business was just too gauche. He headed toward Margate and a fishing boat he had docked there. As the sun rose on Sunday morning and the Steel Pier where the Miss America festivities were about to be thrown into turmoil by the disappearance of its Cinderella, the fishing boat headed north toward that same pier, where it would dock.

“Neat!” Harry exclaimed. “Did this really happen?”

“Every jot,” Rashad replied.

*

Darleen awoke to total darkness. At first, she thought she’d gone blind.

Then she realized that she was in a storeroom of some kind. It smelled of cheese.

“Let me out of here,” she shouted and kicked the door with her bare foot.

“Hold your horses!”

The door opened slowly, and Darleen blinked. At first she couldn’t make out a thing in the bright light. But then she focused.

It was the old guy with the windbreaker and the limp who’d been following her.

“So, how much,” he said in a gravelly voice, “do you think your husband Billy loves you, Mrs. Carroll?”

Oh shit. If
that
was the scam, she was a goner.

51

Inside the wine cellar, Lana had finished practicing the boop-boop-a-doop routine she’d perform tonight. She was good. She was
sure
she’d be one of the ten finalists. Then she’d changed back into her pink sweater and white pants and taken a little nap.

Now she was rested and relaxed and ready to go back upstairs and face her chaperone, who would be mad as hell, but so what?

Lana stood and stretched like a kitty, grabbed her dress, and reached for the door.

But it was locked.

She tried turning the knob to the right, to the left. Nothing.

That was because the dead bolt had to be unlocked from the inside, and Lana didn’t have the key.

She’d smacked Darleen Carroll in the mouth with it and then slammed the door.

*

“Okay, open it up,” said Michelangelo. Willie was looking over his shoulder, though there was no one else in Va Bene’s parking lot. The Lincoln was pulled up right beside the red Mustang.

Wayne licked his lips. Oh, this was going to be so good. Michelangelo was going to be so pleased. He could just tell by the look in the man’s eyes. He wanted to make this last as long as possible.

“Now,” said Michelangelo.

Okay, okay. For an Italian, the man sure didn’t have much of a sense of drama. Wayne unlocked the trunk and paused with the lid still down. “She says she doesn’t know anything.”

“Open it!” Michelangelo growled.

And his manners weren’t nearly as good as Mr. You Know Who’s. But Wayne could adjust. Wayne could get used to his style. It was just a matter of time.

Wayne flipped up the lid. There was the tall redheaded woman, bound and gagged. But she wasn’t moving at all.

*

“This is great stuff!” Harry exclaimed at the video. “You guys are really good!”

Junior and Rashad beamed with pride in the darkened hotel room. The show was on hold.