Tommy Gabrini 4: Dapper Tom Begin Again (20 page)

By
the time he made it down the corridor, she had stopped.
 
Her arms had given out.
 
“Get out of my house and get out now, you
pervert!” she yelled.

And
he kept going.
 
He ran like the coward he
truly was.
 
But he ran down the stairs
too fast.
 
He tripped, stumbled, and then
fell.
 
He fell down stair after stair
after stair.
 
Liz ran to the railing,
watching him fall.
 
He landed at the
bottom.
 

By
the time Liz ran down there, her bat still in her hand just in case it was act,
she realized there was no more game in him.
 
He was too lifeless for games.

Dana
handed Tommy another document to sign.
 
“How many more?” he asked.

She
smiled.
 
“Lots, I’m afraid,” she
said.
 
“ About twenty or thirty
more.
 
And since you read every word
before you sign, this could take the whole trip.”

Dana
was Tommy’s assistant.
 
One of a handful
he was taking with him to Denmark.
 
Of
all of them, she was the most senior.
 
“Were you able to get in touch with the Copenhagen office last night?”
he asked her.

“Finally,
yes, sir.
 
They keep some early hours
there, sir.”

“How
did they respond?”

“They
were royally pissed, sir. In their own proper way.
  
But they know you’re the boss. There’s
nothing they can do about it.”

Tommy’s
decision to stay overnight in Chicago delayed them in more ways than one.
 
The crew and the small army of assistants he
had traveling with him to Denmark had to sleep overnight on the plane, and
every one of the meetings once they arrived in Copenhagen had to be
rescheduled.
 
Gabrini Denmark had pulled
out the stops to welcome the boss, and rescheduling wasn’t as easy as changing
a time.
 
It required layers upon layers
of notifications and cancelations and revamps.
 
But Tommy inwardly smiled.
 
He
loved being with Liz.
 
It was worth every
headache.

He
was so into his night with Liz that Dana was shocked when he signed the
document in front of him without reading it first.
 
He handed it back to her.

“I
don’t believe it,” she said.
 
“You didn’t
read it first, sir.”

When
Tommy realized his error, he smiled.
 
But
took it back from her, and began reading every word.
 

“That’s
more like it,” Dana said, as she smiled.

She
was seated across from him, on his luxury jet, and they were preparing for
takeoff.
 

Not
that she was complaining.
 
As the senior
aide on the plane, she slept in Tommy’s bed last night. The silk sheets and his
sweet cologne smell all over the pillows made it one of the best sleeps she’d
ever had.
 
She’d sleep on that plane any
day of the week!

Tommy’s
cell phone rang as he read.
 
Dana picked
it up from beside him and looked at the Caller ID.
 
“It’s says Liz Logan, sir,” she said.

Tommy
immediately stopped writing and took it.
 
Dana was surprised. He usually shook his head
no
when she told him it was some female calling.
 
But this Liz Logan?
 
Was she the reason for this layover?
 
It was unlikely that a man like Tommy would
allow some random lady to interfere with his business plans, but this decision
to come to Chicago in the first place, and then to stay overnight, was odd in
the extreme for him too.
 
She wasn’t
laying bets against any of it.

“Step
out for a minute, Dana,” he said before he answered the phone.

Dana quickly
stood and left the cabin.
 
Then Tommy
answered.
 
“Liz?”

“Where
are you?” she asked.

“I’m
on the plane.”

“Are
you still in Chicago?”

“Yes.
 
Why?”
 
He detected strain in her voice.
 
“Liz, what’s wrong?”

“After
you left, Matthew came over.”

“Matthew?”

“Matthew
Tennyson.
 
This creep I used to
know.
 
The one who was leaving me those
voice mail messages.”

“Matthew
Tennyson”
 
But isn’t he the mayor of
Chicago?”

Liz
paused.
 
“Yes.”

“You
were dating the mayor of Chicago?”

“I
wasn’t dating him.
 
It never got that
far.
 
But he came over today, and thought
I was going to let him have his way with me.
 
When I wouldn’t, and things got crazy, he fell.”

Tommy
frowned.
 
“He fell?
 
What do you mean he fell?”

“He
tried to rape me, Tommy.
 
I beat the crap
out of him.
 
When he was getting away
from me, he fell down the stairs.”

Tommy
was already standing up.
 
“He tried to
rape you?”

“Yes.

“Is
he still alive?”

“I
think so.
 
I called an ambulance.
 
They’re on the way. I’m sure the cops are
too.
 
But he fell down those stairs,
Tommy.
 
I didn’t push him.”

“I
believe you,” Tommy said bluntly and grabbed his suitcoat.
 
“Do not give any statements until I get
there.”

“I
won’t.”

“Have
you contacted your attorney?”

“I’m
calling her next.”

“Good.
 
I’m on my way.”

“Tommy?”

“Yes?”

“Drive
carefully, but hurry.”

Tommy
let out a harsh exhale.
 
For Liz to want
him that badly meant she needed him even worse.
 
“I will,” he said, and got in a hurry.

The ambulance
swerved out of the driveway and headed down the street just as Tommy’s Maserati
turned onto the street.
 
What surprised
him wasn’t the fact that an ambulance was rushing away from Liz’s house.
 
What surprised him was that it was rushing
away with no sirens blaring.
  
Which made
it all the more clearer to Tommy that they had a special patient onboard that
they didn’t want everybody to know they had, and that Liz Logan, by virtue of
the man the silent ambulance carried, was a player in the big leagues.

Police
cars were already on the property when Tommy arrived.
 
He parked within the circle, got out, and
made his way to the front door.

Inside
the house, Liz was sitting on the sofa with a police captain hovering over
her.
 
The police officer pulling door
duty yelled across the room.
 
“Cap’n,” he
said, “guy here to see Miss Logan.”

“Who?”

“Tommy
Garini.”

“Tommy?”
Liz asked, and stood up.

“Back
down,” the captain said as if Liz was a dog.
 
Liz remained standing.
 
“Sit back
down,” the captain said.
 
Liz sat down
then.
 
“Who’s Tommy Garini?”

“Gabrini,”
Liz said.
 
“He’s my boyfriend.”

The
captain looked at his subordinate.
 
“Send
him in,” he ordered.

Liz
felt relief wash over her when Tommy entered her home.
 
And he looked so cool, as if scenes like
these were no big deal to him.

“Mr.
Gabrini?” The captain said and extended his hand.

Tommy
shook it.

“I
understand you’re Miss Logan’s boyfriend?”

Tommy
looked at her.
 
“You okay?”

She
nodded.
 

“Have
a seat if you like,” the captain said.

Tommy
sat down beside her.
  
“Where’s Annie?”

“On
her way,” Liz said.

“Have
you given a statement?”

“No,”
the captain said.
 
“That’s the
problem.
 
She either tell me what
happened here, or she’ll be going downtown to tell me what happened.”

Tommy
looked at him. “She has a right to remain silent.”

“If
she’s under arrest she does.
 
Who said
anything about arresting her?
 
I just
need to know the facts.
 
Now the victim
fell down the stairs.”

“He
was no victim,” Liz said.

“What
was he then?”

Liz
ignored him.

“So
she’s not under arrest?” Tommy asked the cop.

“Not
yet,” Liz said. “We’re waiting on Matt’s handler: the police commissioner.”

“Not
funny,” the captain said.
 
“Did you push
the mayor down those stairs, lady?”

“No,”
Liz said with confidence.

“Then
how did he get from up there, to down here?
 
What happened?
 
And how did he get
all of those fresh bruises on his body?”

Fresh
bruises?
 
Tommy looked at Liz.
 
He remembered she said she beat the crap out
of him.

“What
happened, lady?” the captain asked.
 
“If
you don’t want to get hauled downtown, I strongly suggest you answer my
question.”

“He
fell down the stairs,” Liz said.

“Yeah,
you told me that,” the captain said.
 
“And the bruises?
 
How did that
happen to him?
 
Stairs didn’t beat him
up.”

“I
beat his ass with a bat when he tried to rape me,” Liz finally said.
 
Enough with the lawyering up.
 
“The falling down the stairs part was all on
him.”

There
was more commotion at the front door as it opened again, and a man Liz knew to
be the police commissioner entered her home.

“Good
morning, sir,” the captain said as the commissioner approached them.

“Good
morning.”
 
Then he looked at Liz.
 
“Hello Liz.”

“Mike,”
Liz said.

“Nice
seeing you again.”

Liz
didn’t return the compliment.

“And
this gentleman is?”

“The boyfriend,”
the captain said.

“Oh
yeah?
 
I didn’t know you were dating
somebody, Liz.
 
Other than Matt I mean.”

“I
wasn’t dating Matt.”

“Okay,
to make a long story short, this is the deal,” the commissioner said as if Liz
was wasting his time.
 
“Nothing happened
here.
 
Got it?
 
The mayor was visiting friends and slipped
and fell.
 
An ankle twist, nothing
more.
 
No bats, no bruises, no
stairs.
 
A broken ankle.
 
Got it?”
 

“No
rape attempt?” Liz asked.

The
commissioner frowned.
 
“You’d better be
glad I didn’t have my men arrest your arrogant ass!”

But
Liz fired back.
 
“He better be glad I
didn’t pull out my gun and shoot his rapist ass!” she said.
 
She was about to say more, but Tommy stopped
her.

“If
she’s not under arrest,” Tommy said, “she’s not giving any more statements.”

The
commissioner stared at her.
 
“Nothing
happened here,” he said.
 
“Is that clear,
Miss Logan?”

Liz
stared at him.
 
Then she looked at
Tommy.
 
Tommy nodded his head.
 

“It’s
clear,” Liz said.

The
commissioner smiled as if he and Liz were suddenly on great terms again.
 
“Good,” he said.
 
“And have a good day folks,” he added, and
quickly left.
 
The captain and his men
left shortly thereafter.

When
they were gone, Tommy leaned back.
 
Liz
looked at him.
 
Then she jumped into his
arms crying.

Tommy
pulled her onto his lap, and held her tightly.

Three
days later.
 
It seemed like an eternity
ago.
 
The elevator door opened inside the
penthouse apartment and Matthew Tennyson stepped off and headed for his
kitchen.
 
He walked gingerly, with a cane,
as the damage to his ligaments from the fall, and Liz’s beating, had him in
near constant pain.
 
But the only thing
the citizens knew was that their mayor had fallen at a friend’s house and
broken his ankle.
 
Full stop period.
 
That was the reason for the cane.
 
That was the reason for his agony.
 
Talk of bats and rapes and stairs never came
up.

He
walked over to the refrigerator, pulled out a carton of milk, and began
drinking it straight from the carton.
 
The privilege, he felt, of living alone.
 
Then he stood there, taking in the cool of the open door, and exhaled.

“For
your ulcer?” a voice asked, and Matthew dropped the milk carton where he stood.

Tommy
entered the kitchen, from the living room area of the apartment, and stood at
the center island.

“Who
the hell are you?” Matthew asked him.

Tommy
walked up to the mayor.
 
The mayor began
to back up.
 
“I asked you a question,” he
said.

“But
that’s the thing,” Tommy was saying as he walked the mayor further and further
back until the mayor was pinned against the wall.
 
“You didn’t ask Liz.
 
Did you?
 
You just thought you’d take what was hers to give.
 
You didn’t ask her the question.
 
But you want to ask me a question?”

Tommy
could hear the mayor’s heartbeat.
 
He was
a punk just like Tommy had pegged him.
 
A
punk who loved to intimidate women, but cowered around any man.
 
“But since I’m not you,” Tommy continued,
“I’ll answer it.
  
What am I doing here,
you asked?” Tommy punched him in the gut so hard that Matthew immediately bent
over.
 
“I’m here to fuck you up the way
you tried to fuck up Liz!”

And
Tommy did exactly that.
 
He beat him
until he had beaten him down.
 
Once the
mayor, pleading for his life, was on the floor, Tommy began kicking his balls
and penis without mercy.
 
The more he
thought about what this man tried to do to Liz, and would have done to Liz had
she not been as resourceful as she had been, he kicked the mayor harder.
 
The mayor curled into a ball, a fetal
position, as the kicks wouldn’t cease.

“A broken
ankle?” Tommy asked as he kicked.
 
“How
about broken balls?
 
Explain that to your
constituents.
 
Explain how you’re never
get it up again!
 
Explain that
motherfucker!”

When
Tommy stopped kicking, he stood above the mayor.
 
Then he gave him one last stomp on his
distressed balls that caused blood to suddenly appear outside of the mayor’s
trousers.
  
The mayor cried in
agony.
 
Tommy continued to stand over
him.
 
“If you want to live,” he said,
“stay away from Liz Logan.
 
You, that
crooked-ass police commissioner of yours, and any other flunky you have under
your command.
 
Stay away from Liz.”

Then
Tommy began to leave.
 
He turned to the
anguished mayor.
 
“Your security detail
is lousy.
 
You should get that checked.”

Tommy
looked at the mayor one last time, and then he left for good.