Mr. Paradise Part 28

Delsa had told her their names, Carl Fontana and Art Krupa, but she didn't know which was which. They stared at her not saying anything. She wanted to run out the front door. She should've run out that night and not worried about leaving her bag. They kept staring at her.

She heard voices coming from the den, a TV commercial about acid reflux she recognized, looked over and saw Lloyd standing in the doorway. He nodded to her. Now a young black guy appeared next to him.

Montez said, "Come on," took her by the arm and they started up the stairway.

Lloyd said, "Miss, can I get you anything?"

She had stopped at the Rattlesnake with a girl from the show and they'd each had a couple of drinks. Now she said to Lloyd, "How about an alexander?"

Going back to the kitchen Art said to Carl, "The f.u.c.k's an alexander?"

"It's a drink, a c.o.c.ktail."

"What's in it?"

"I don't know, it's kind of a tan drink."

They went in the kitchen to the table by the window, a lamp on, and sat down. Carl said, "We haven't been in any room in this whole f.u.c.kin house except the f.u.c.kin kitchen."

"I'm home, I always sit in the f.u.c.kin kitchen."

"Not when I stay with you."

"'Cause Ginny's in there. We go out."

"You don't worry about her knowing what you do."

"I said to her, you tell anybody I'll shoot you, and I know I can do it."

Carl said, "Art, how do the cops know about us? This girl tells what we look like, they draw pictures of us and say, 's.h.i.+t, why that's Art and Carl'?"

"Unless," Art said, "where we got the guns-they'd been used before and that a.s.shole told us they're cherry."

"That's been bothering me," Carl said. "Should we have trusted that kid? I can't even think of his name. But that could be it." Carl poured Club in his gla.s.s, ice melted in the bottom. He pushed the bottle to Art, saying to him, "You notice how much the two girls look alike?"

"Going by her picture in the paper. Otherwise you wouldn't know it was the same one in the chair. Yeah, they could almost be twins." He said, "I'm glad we didn't talk to her. You gonna talk to the one upstairs?"

"I'm not having nothing to do with her," Carl said. "I'm not gonna talk to her and I'm sure as h.e.l.l not gonna shoot her. How about you?"

"The smoke wants it done," Art said, "he's gonna have to do it."

"Would you let him?"

"What you're asking now," Art said, "would I shoot him before he puts a plastic bag over her head. I don't see any difference in whacking him or the f.u.c.kin dopers. See, but I don't know he has the nerve to do it."

"You don't worry about her saying it was us?"

"Did you see her the other night? I didn't. Where was she when she saw us, upstairs? She couldn't of seen us good."

"The thing is she's seen us now," Carl said. "She can tell herself yeah, those're the guys. You know what I mean? But I don't think the cops need her."

"You think it's the guns," Art said.

Carl was nodding. "I think we f.u.c.ked ourselves buying those guns."

There was a silence as Art picked up the bottle of Canadian Club and then paused.

"How come Avern hasn't been on us to get rid of 'em?"

The bong was no longer on the dresser. "Confiscated," Montez said. He rolled a joint and lit and handed it to Kelly, saying, "For your pleasure."

She shrugged and took a hit. Like the other time.

Lloyd came with an alexander in a lowball gla.s.s, the crystal, he handed to Kelly in the chair and looked at Montez sitting on the other side of the bed, the lamp on, reading about Del Rio Power. Lloyd said to Kelly, "You need anything else?"

She said, "Tell me what I'm doing here."

"That's his bidness," Lloyd said, looking at Montez. "I jes work here."

"You have a cigarette?"

"I'll find you some," Lloyd said and walked out.

Montez came around to sit on the side of the bed facing Kelly, in the chair where she had tried to hide in her cinnamon coat that night. Today she wore dark Donna Karan head to toe, sweater, pants and heels.

"What I have here," Montez said, "is the paper that transfers the stock to Chloe, filled out, signed by Mr. Paradise. Where you sign it is down here."

"Even if the stock was good," Kelly said, "I'm not gonna commit fraud."

Montez said, "Those two white menaces downstairs, they brought you here while they decide how to dispose of you. Understand? They ain't letting you send them to prison."

Kelly said, "But if I sign this, what? You'll get me out of here?"

"I didn't know you have this on you. Since you do, I want you to cash it in for me."

"But before you found it," Kelly said, "you agreed with the two guys, I had to be put away?"

"You lucky you brought it, huh?"

"And now I'm supposed to trust you?" Kelly said. "Chloe's picture was in the paper. She's the news, and she's dead."

"We wait a while, n.o.body remembers her name. They look at you and the picture on Chloe's license-you still have it, the driver's license?"

"In my bag. And by the time we get around to doing it," Kelly said, "Del Rio is out of business and there's no stock to sell."

Montez said, "Why couldn't the stock go up instead of down? Del Rio Power, man, it's a giant corporation."

Kelly sipped her drink.

She looked at Montez and for a moment or so felt sorry for him. She said, "Why don't you go hold up a liquor store? You do all this plotting ... for what? I'll bet you anything the best way to make money in crime is armed robbery. You've been f.u.c.king around with this idea, make a killing off the old man for how long, ten years? Don't you know those two-what did you call them, white menaces?-are going to name you to make a deal with the prosecutor? You know they'll be arrested. Frank Delsa said, 'Those two go around like they're wearing signs.' I think you ought to come to some agreement with the two guys that you won't tell on each other."

Kelly sipped her drink.

"Listen, and make sure they know I didn't see them the other night. I didn't, really. Not well enough to swear they're the same guys who were here."

She sipped her drink and again thought of sitting in this chair the other night in her coat, half in the bag, thinking, Are you nuts Are you nuts? Even considering what Montez wanted her to do, a houseful of cops on the scene? Are you f.u.c.king nuts Are you f.u.c.king nuts? She was easing into that mood now, reminding herself she had to be smarter than these guys, and to keep her eyes open and watch for a way to get out of here. She thought of Delsa and tried to remember details he'd told her about the case. She thought of him and wondered if he'd made the show and where he was now and what he was doing. She did that whenever they were apart.

She said to Montez, "Is there anyone else involved in this besides the two guys? I mean who you ought to talk to?"

Montez laid the stock information on the bed, didn't say a word to her and walked out. Kelly finished her drink and set the gla.s.s on the floor. She looked up to see the young black guy standing in the doorway, the room dim with only the lamp on.

He said, "I have these cigarettes for you Lloyd give me."

Kelly said, "Thank Lloyd for me, okay?" and he came in the room to hand her the pack of Slims and a book of matches. She said, "You see the ashtray anywhere?"

Jerome pointed. "Right there, the end of the bed."

"Where I left it the other night," Kelly said. "I didn't see it. You can turn the light on if you want."

"Don't matter to me."

She opened the pack and popped out a cigarette.

"You're related to Lloyd?"

"I come with the two white dudes."

"You work for them?"

"We looking for a dude has twenty thousand reward on him, but I don't work for them or ever would. I'm a C.I."

"What's a C.I.?"

"Confidential Informant."

Kelly struck a match.

"I work for a man with the Homicide police name of Frank Delsa."

Kelly was lighting the cigarette. She blew out the match and said to this guy in the dark red do-rag, "Why don't you hand me the ashtray and sit down for a minute? I know Frank."

Montez was at the round table now in the kitchen with Carl and Art. He said, "Y'all still drinking, huh?"

He saw Art look at Carl while Carl kept looking this way, staring at him.

"b.i.t.c.h say to me upstairs she can't pick you out. Is she s.h.i.+ttin' me? But then I wonder about it. I'm thinking, she's on the second floor as you run out. She look down from up there, she looking at the top of your heads. Understand what I'm saying? She can't see your faces, you got your Tiger hats on. What I'm saying, she can't put either one of you at the scene."

Carl turned to Art. "What he's saying is he don't want to shoot her, or put a bag over her head. He's changed his mind."

"There's no cause to mess with her," Montez said. "No, I think the one we ought to get over here and have a talk with is your agent, Avern Cohn."

29.

AT ELEVEN-FIFTEEN LAST NIGHT DELSA DROVE TO the loft and saw Kelly's black Volkswagen in the lot and phoned her from outside the building. Her voice said to leave a message. Okay, she didn't drive. Someone picked her up, one of the other models, and they stopped off or ran into friends and went to a party after the show. He had to remind himself she had a life he didn't know much about. the loft and saw Kelly's black Volkswagen in the lot and phoned her from outside the building. Her voice said to leave a message. Okay, she didn't drive. Someone picked her up, one of the other models, and they stopped off or ran into friends and went to a party after the show. He had to remind himself she had a life he didn't know much about.

This morning, Sunday, he phoned from the squad room, putting it off until ten in case she was sleeping in, and got no response. He drove to her place again, three miles from 1300, and saw her VW still in the lot. This time he got the manager to let him into the loft. The manager stood inside the door while he listened to phone messages, all from women in the fas.h.i.+on business, all related to the runway show last night. No calls from Montez.

But yesterday on the phone she told him the last thing Montez had said to her when he called the night before, "You think you done with me?" and she hung up on him.

It was time to see Montez.

Last night Kelly asked Jerome how he knew Frank Delsa. Jerome was self-conscious and didn't look at her directly telling about the shooting at Yakity Yak's he'd witnessed and how he became Delsa's C.I. and how he ran into the two hit men at the house Orlando tried to burn down account of the three bodies in the bas.e.m.e.nt, one of 'em cut up into six pieces. Kelly said, "Six?" Jerome said the arms and the legs were four, the head five and body was six. He said people forgot to count the body.

Kelly said, "If you work for Frank Delsa and the two hit men are here, why don't you slip out? Tell Delsa the ones who killed Mr. Paradiso and my friend Chloe are here?" Jerome said Lloyd told him it wasn't none of his bidness. He said he had to go and left, closing the door. Kelly got up and locked it. She didn't know what she was supposed to do. After a while she stretched out on the bed in her Donna Karan sweater and pants, and a little later heard the faint sound of voices in the hall. Someone rattled the doork.n.o.b. At 2 A.M. she opened it and looked down the hall toward the staircase. She saw Jerome down there in an easy chair he'd got from one of the rooms. She walked toward him, got close enough to see he was asleep, but he woke up as she started down the stairs and told her she was supposed to stay in her room.

In the morning the chair was still there but Jerome was gone. This time she got to the bottom of the stairs and was startled to see Carl sitting in the foyer in one of the upholstered straight chairs. Carl said, "Go on in the kitchen you want some breakfast. Lloyd's in there." He said, "I'm gonna talk to you later on."

She said, "About what?"

He said, "The situation."

Montez was at the round table in the alcove with a cup of coffee. She said to him, "Would you mind telling me what's going on?"

Montez said, "We gonna have a sit-down here and get things straightened out."

"When?"

"We got to get somebody first. You want some coffee? Lloyd brewed a pot."

"Where's Jerome?"

"The g.a.n.g.b.a.n.ger? I guess he's sleeping."