Bad Luck (16 page)

Under the shade of the trees there was a blond guy huddled over a camera, cursing to himself. He was wearing jeans, a tan corduroy sport jacket, and running shoes—photographer chic. “Excuse me,” he said as Tozzi approached the Mercury. “Could you give me a hand over here? Film's jammed and I need an extra finger.”

“Sure.” Tozzi walked into the shade to see what he could do for the guy. “What do you need?”

The blond guy showed him the open back of a 35mm with an elaborate flash attachment. “Here. See right here?” He suddenly whipped the camera up and bashed Tozzi over the nose with it.

Instinctively Tozzi grabbed his face. Blind anger told him to rip the guy's throat out, but before he could make a move he felt something in his back. Hard and small, dead center on his spine. A hand from behind grabbed the material on his shoulder and yanked him back, digging the gun barrel deeper into his flesh. Tozzi glanced over his shoulder and saw the gunman. He was wearing a cheap herringbone-tweed jacket, still crisp and new from the store, and the kind of designer jeans that aren't quite the right color. The hand on his shoulder had a heavy gold bracelet and a big gaudy ring with two rows of diamonds on it. Tozzi caught the guy's reflection in the window of the car parked in front of him. The gunman's dark hair was slicked straight back. A greaser in sheep's clothing.

The blond guy's hair was shaved close around his ears, long and wavy on top. He kept scratching behind his ear, like a dog, as he paced back and forth in front of Tozzi. He kept clenching his jaw and showing his teeth. Must've had a nervous tic or something. Maybe rabies.

Tozzi glanced at him as the pain of the blow to his nose gathered around his eyes. His head and his heart started pounding in competition. The gunman must've felt the
vibrations. Tozzi was waiting for Blondie to say it:
You're a fucking fed, and we're gonna blow your fucking head off.
That's what he's gonna say. Immordino did know. Oh, shit . . .

Blondie kept walking back and forth, back and forth, clenching his jaw and making all kinds of faces. Tozzi couldn't stand it anymore. “What do you want with me?”

“Don't . . . say . . . a word. You . . . just . . . listen.” The blond guy enunciated every word, but he didn't stop pacing. The greaser jammed the gun into Tozzi's spine for emphasis, as if he needed it. “This is from Sal Immordino. Okay? He says you're not a good boy. He says you don't know how to mind your own . . . fucking . . . business.”

Maybe they don't know, Tozzi thought. Maybe Sal's just jealous, because of Sydney. It's possible. Maybe this isn't a hit, maybe just a warning. They would've done it by now if this was a hit. Hit and run, that's how they usually do it. Gotta stay in character, then. “Yeah, well, fuck you and Sal Imm—”

Blondie swung the camera backhanded and smashed the side of Tozzi's head. Slivers of glass from the shattered flash fell into the dead pine needles on the ground. Tozzi shook his head. Fucking asshole. He wondered if he was bleeding.

“Now don't be such a wiseass, Tomasso.” Blondie clenched his jaw again. “Just shut up and listen.”

Tozzi wanted to kill the bastard, but with the greaser back there . . . His gun was in his ankle holster. No way he could get to that. He tried to get a better look at the greaser's face in the car window, wondering just how trigger-happy this guy might be. If he was a kid, maybe he was new to this kind of shit. Tozzi considered turning on him quickly and wrestling him for the gun. Of course, Blondie probably had a weapon of his own, besides the Nikon. Shit. He suddenly had a bad feeling then. Maybe Immordino did know. Maybe Blondie had been instructed to tell him
something before they kill him. That's what was holding things up. Shit . . .

Then Tozzi suddenly remembered something, a move he'd practiced in aikido class a long time ago, what to do if someone is holding a pistol in your back. He didn't remember it exactly, and the hand on the shoulder was a variation they hadn't practiced. He tried to visualize how his
sensei
had done it. Roll to the gunhand side until you're shoulder-to-shoulder with the attacker. Grab the wrist of the gun-hand . . . Yeah, that sounds right. Bend the wrist back, point his fingers to the ground, and throw him down with a
kote gaeshi.
Yeah, that would work, but what about the hand on his shoulder? How do you start the technique with that other hand holding you in place? Well, what if you turn to the other side, away from the gunhand? Can't do
kote gaeshi
from that side, but how about a
kokyu nage
, a big throw? Yeah, but what about the gun? Gotta get control of the gun. Can't do anything before you take care of the gun. How the hell do you do that? Shit . . .

“What'sa matta?” Blondie said. He kept pacing up and down, three steps this way, three steps back, clenching his jaw with every turn. “This too much for you to figure out? It's not hard. We're gonna make it short and sweet for you, Tomasso.”

Fucker. Next time he turns away I'm gonna try it, the
kote gaeshi.
The greaser's not holding on that tight now. I'll make it work. Go ahead, Blondie, turn around, turn away from me. I'll throw the greaser down on his back, take his gun, and put a hole in your stupid fucking head with it. Come on, Blondie, come on. Turn around, turn around . . . Good.
Now!

But just as Tozzi started to make his move on the greaser, he glanced into that car window and saw the reflection of another head rising up behind the greaser, a head in a gray fedora. Holy shit! What the fuck was she trying to prove? He glanced quickly at Blondie, whose back was still turned. Just get out of the way, Val.

Tozzi was about to turn on the greaser when he caught
Valerie's reflection in the glass, slapping the greaser's ears with the palms of her hands. The greaser wailed as his eardrums burst, and as he went to grab his head, Valerie took the gun right out of his hand, just like that. She jammed the muzzle into the greaser's pimply neck and told him not to move or she'd blow his fucking head off.

Well, fuck me. Tozzi couldn't believe this.

“The other one,” Val shouted then, nodding toward the open parking lot.

Blondie was making tracks, hightailing it across the lot. Tozzi got down on one knee, pulled the .22 out of his ankle holster, and took off after him. He was just about to yell,
Stop! FBI!
when he caught himself. “Get back here, you fuck!”

He caught up with Blondie just as he was about to jump into his car, but the guy was wiry and he turned on Tozzi unexpectedly, shouldering him in the gut. They both hit the dirt, Blondie trying to strangle Tozzi's gunhand like a snake, beating it on the ground. Tozzi punched him in the kidney—once, twice, once more—but the guy didn't let up. He slapped his free hand over Blondie's nose and hooked his thumb on the pressure point where the jaw met the ear. Tozzi pressed, then kept pressing, searching for the right spot, but he wasn't hitting it because the guy didn't seem to be affected. Fucking wiseguys aren't even human.

Tozzi noticed the tire of Blondie's car right in front of his face. Who knows? Maybe it'll do something. Tozzi struggled to bend his wrist and aim, then he fired a shot into the tire, closing his eyes as he pulled the trigger. He felt the whoosh of escaping air and flying dirt in his face.

Blondie groaned and rolled away, rubbing his eyes. “Shit! There's shit in my eyes!”

“There's shit in your head.” Tozzi hauled him up by the lapels and slammed him against the car. He frisked him, then dragged him back across the lot to Val and the greaser. “Watch this one,” he said to Val as he frisked the greaser and found a small automatic in the pocket of his
jacket. Tozzi heaved it into the woods, then took the greaser's 9mm from Val and threw that into the woods too. He grabbed the greaser by the shirtfront and threw him down on the ground, then pushed his buddy, who was still complaining about his eyes, on top of him. “Get on your bellies with your hands behind your heads. Now!”

The greaser complied right away. Blondie took his time about it, bitching about his eyes the whole time.

“Hey, Blondie, make sure you tell your boss he can go fuck himself. You got that?”

He turned to Val. “Come on, let's go.” He gave her the car keys and kept his gun on them. She got into the Mercury and started the engine as he went around to the passenger side, keeping his gun on them over the roof of the car. “Let's go,” he said as he got in. “Fast.” She kicked up dirt as he slammed his door closed. He got on his knees on the seat and peered out the back window at the two wiseguys on the ground.

“You okay?” he asked her.

“Fine.”

She did seem fine. She drove fast but in control. She took the big car out to the county road and maintained a nice steady speed. When she tipped her fedora back and showed some forehead, Tozzi thought of Gibbons. He always did the exact same thing with his hat in these situations.

“Who were your friends back there?” she asked.

“No friends of mine. Not even acquaintances.”

“Didn't think so.” She braked at a stop sign, then pulled out onto a two-lane highway. She picked up speed and cruised at sixty-five, fast but not too fast. She was a good driver.

Tozzi rolled up his pant leg and put his gun back in the holster. “Where'd you learn how to do that?”

“Do what?”

“Burst that guy's eardrums like that.”

“I took a self-defense course once. You know, one of
those courses for women who're scared shitless of being raped.”

“Where'd you learn how to handle a gun?”

She looked over at him and grinned. “I've never held a gun in my life.”

“Bullshit.”

“Swear to God. I used to take acting lessons, though.”

“You're full of it, Val.”

“No, just centered.”

“Huh?”

“Centered. Calm for the fight. I practice this Chinese martial art called t'ai chi. It's something we work on.” She kept her eye on the road.

“T'ai chi, huh?”
Chi
in Chinese is the same as
ki
in Japanese. As in ai
kido
. They called it being “centered” in his martial art too. Calm for the fight? Same thing in aikido. Tozzi stared at her holding the wheel. He was trying very hard not to be steamed because she'd stolen his thunder back there.

They drove in silence for a while. She turned on the radio and played with the dial until she picked up one of the Philly stations. Bruce was singing about the tunnel of love.

“So,” she finally said, “am I taking
you
to the casbah, or are you taking me?” She looked over at him with that little lopsided grin of hers, waiting for an answer.

Tozzi shook his head and laughed. She was great. He couldn't stay mad at her even when he wanted to.

There was just one thing that bothered him. Would Sal Immordino let him live long enough to find out just how great she was? The smile turned brittle on his face.

he air was clear and cold, and the moon was bright enough to read by. Joseph's face looked a little purple in the moonlight—lavender actually. Sal wished the hell his brother'd loosen up. Joseph stood there by the door with his hands jammed into the pockets of that big overcoat of his, collar up, hat brim pulled down. William Powell as the Thin Man. Except Joseph wasn't thin.