Crime Always Pays (30 page)

          'Karen's sticking around?'

          'What she says. Karen, you probably noticed, she doesn't take kindly to orders. And she reckons it's perfect out here for Anna.'

          Ray lit a cigarette. 'Where'll I find this guy?'

          'He's coming in at noon, the hi-speed from Santorini. He owns a club up in the village, the Blue Orange, you'll need to hit him before he gets there. Get tight in the crowd, stick the gun in his ribs.'

          'Whoa. I'll have a look at it, see if it can be done. If it looks okay, then maybe.'

          'Karen's nose isn't maybe busted, Ray. It's busted.'

          Ray thought about that. 'This guy's moron enough to walk off the ferry with no muscle around, you won't need me. He's smart enough to bring muscle, they're tooled, there's fuck-all I can do.'

          'I'm telling you, man, he's expecting acid-fried hippies. He won't be packing.'

          'Says the acid-fried hippy.'

          'What's that supposed to mean?'

          'I'm not hearing you volunteer for back-up, Pyle. Not even volunteering George, anyone else looks like they might be useful.'

          'We get seen, man, the guy'll know something's rotten in Denmark.'

          Ray thought it over finishing his smoke. 'What I'm feeling,' he said, crushing the butt dead in the reddish dust, 'is there's way too many variables. But I'll have a look, see this guy off the ferry. You keep Karen on at the ESY after she gets her x-rays, I need to drop around there anyway. You don't see me by twelve-thirty, it means it was do-able, he's taken.'

          'Sweet.'

          'But it probably won't be. And it might be better, this guy's coming in for a sit-down anyway, to hold off, do him somewhere you can scope out first, cut down on the what-ifs.'

          'Uh-huh.'

          'Meanwhile,' Ray said, 'you might want to start drumming up a few volunteers. Starting with you.'

          Pyle didn't like the insinuation. 'What d'you think this is for?' he said, holding up the .38. 'An ornament?'

          'We've all got balls,' Ray said. 'Using them, that's a different matter.'

          'I've been to 'Nam, Ray. Where you been?'

          ''Nam, huh?'

          'Damn straight.'

          'Drafted, right?'

          'Straight outta school.'

          'This is what I'm saying,' Ray said, 'about volunteering. Making a choice, not letting the choice make you.'

Melody

'Say some guys owed you ten grand,' Mel said to the skinny waitress as she placed a latte on the table, 'and you had a chance to get it back. Would you take it?'

          'What would I have to do?' the waitress said. Jade, by her name-tag.

          'Meet with a friend of theirs who says he'll honour the debt.'

          'And that's it?'

          'That's it.'

          'You're sure?'

          'That's what this guy says.'

          'Then I'd meet him. Ten grand is ten grand.'

          'It is, isn't it?'

          'Absolutely. Can I get you something to eat with that?'

          'That's fine, thanks. I'm being taken to lunch.'

          'Lucky you.'

          Melody watching the hi-speed ferry make a long turn around the headland and roar in towards the near dock, foam churning as it slowed. She took a twenty out of her purse, held it up, then tucked it under the latte.

'Um, Jade? Mind if I ask you a favour?'

Rossi

'The guy doesn't give me what you might call an itinerary,' Roger said. 'Maybe the hi-speed was late, how would I know?'

          'It's unprofessional,' Rossi said, 'is what it is.'

          'It can get choppy when there's a wind. And the hi-speed doesn't sail in what they call adverse weather conditions.'

          'A wind?' Rossi, wondering if black was really the way to go in the island, loosened the knot in his tie, opened the silk shirt a couple of buttons. He compared Roger's baggy shorts and sandals with his own suit and shoes, Rossi's bare toes swimming in sweat just sitting on a cane-weave chair at a three-legged metal table in the alleyway outside the Blue Orange, sipping a tall iced tea. Roger sweeping out and picking up litter. The air dead, stifling. 'There hasn't been a puff a breeze,' Rossi said, 'in three whole days. And you're talking about adverse fuckin conditions?'

          Roger shrugged. 'No point giving me grief. All I do is --'

          The tinny sound of 
We Are The Champions
 came muffled from Rossi's breast pocket. He dug out the cell phone. 'Sleeps? You see him?'

          'Yeah. He just got off the boat.'

          ''Bout time. Okay, stick tight, see if he heads for Ali fuckin --'

          'Rossi? He might be a while yet.'

          'What's doing?'

          'He's taking Mel to lunch.'

          Rossi went cross-eyed trying to picture it. 'Mel's with Johnny P?'

          'And, it looks like, some Greek-looking guy met Johnny off the ferry. The guy in from Crete, I'm guessing.'

          'Christ. The girl can't help herself, can she? What're they saying?'

          'I'm in a phone-box, Rossi. Because you wouldn't splash out for two cell phones.'

          'Fuck. Okay, hold on there, I'm on my way down.'

          Rossi hung up and said, 'Johnny's playing a dangerous game.'

          Roger leaned on his broom. 'What's that, Naked Twister?'

Rossi rose above the sarcasm. 'First rule of business,' he said, 'is you take care your staff, your staff'll take care of you. And Johnny, it looks like, is taking care of staff, they're not even on the payroll.'

'You want to put a complaint in writing? Meet the union rep, maybe?'

'I don't get my ten grand,' Rossi said, 'just like that it goes up to twenty. What they call the double-bubble. You tell Johnny that. He wants to haggle, he knows where to find me.'

'Where's that?'

'The name escapes me right this second,' Rossi said with no little dignity. 'But it's the place his guy already found me.'

'Right you are.'

'You tell Johnny,' Rossi said, 'he's thinking of fuckin me around, I got a package with his mitts all over it.'

'And you've been carrying this package around,' Roger said, intrigued, 'coming from Amsterdam, using gloves all the way. Is that right?'

'Anything happens me,' Rossi went on, 'Johnny goes rogue, then my man's got strict instructions to take the package to the cops.'

Roger raised an eyebrow. 'So your guy'll go to the cops with a package that'll get Johnny in the shit. Putting himself,' he said, 'in the shit alongside Johnny.'

'Lemme ask you this one question, Roger.' Rossi drained the iced tea, stood up. 'How probable is it you'd take a hit, do time, for Johnny?'

'I couldn't say for certain,' Roger said, considering. 'Is there such a thing as a negative value for probable?'

'See,' Rossi said, 'what I got, what Johnny don't, is my guy'll do time for me. Guy's already put himself in the frame.'

'Your man 
wants
 to do time?'

'Perxactly.' He forked his fingers at Roger's eyes. 'You tell Johnny, he's dealing with Sicilians now.'

Madge

'Maybe,' Terry said, shading his eyes looking up at the sign, Ali Baba's, 'we should try saying ala-kazaam, some shit like that.'

          'Now isn't the time for facetious,' Madge said.

'I asked the guy,' Terry said, 'the name of a restaurant, somewhere out of the way where it's good to eat. Presuming, okay, maybe I shouldn't, but presuming your average restaurant on a tourist island would be open for lunch. Who could've known?'

'Maybe you should have given him that tip you promised.'

'He jumped to the wrong conclusion. It's my fault he's greedy?'

          Madge uncapped her water bottle and had a sip. 'What if Rossi was already here,' she said, 'found the place locked up and believed he was being taken for a ride?'

          'The good news there,' Terry said, 'is it was an anonymous note. So he won't think it was you stringing him along.'

          'What time is it now?'

          'Ten past.'

          'He might still arrive.'

          'He's the smart type, Madge. He'd have got here early, casing the place. Making sure it was all kosher.'

          'So what do we do now?'

          'I'm thinking lunch, a siesta, another note at reception. This time signing it, so there's no confusion about who's admiring him from a distance.'

          'And this time backing it up with an actual tip.'

          Terry smiled at three tanned teens sashaying by in flip-flops, denim mini-skirts, all three combined wearing less than Madge. 'You want my advice?' he said, gazing after the trio, head bobbing in time to the rise and fall of their pert little butts. 'Put a number in the note. Mention this inheritance, three-quarters of a mill. Guy'll break your door down.'

          'I don't want to make it sound like I'm trying to buy his love,' Madge said.

          'I thought that was the plan.'

          'Well, sure. I just don't want it to sound that way.'

          'He starts to quibble, hears anything other than ker-ching,' Terry said with a wistful note as the trio disappeared around the corner, 'I'll round it up to the full mill myself.' He seemed to shake himself as he turned back to Madge. 'So what d'you fancy for lunch, sea-food? I hear the fresh stuff, it's God's own Viagra.'

Karen

What woke Karen up was she rolled over in bed and there was nothing to stop her rolling, no Ray. Then she came fully awake, remembering there was no Ray anymore. She chugged some water, wondering where Anna was, and then her nose began to throb, a sharp pulsing that caused her to squint, her eyes to water. She went for the pain-killers on the beside locker and then realised she was more worried about getting pills down her neck than asking where Anna was.

          Karen, the idea filtering through slow, started to wonder if she hadn't spent the last twelve hours or so doped, Pyle for some reason keeping her knocked out.

A cold shower blasted her out of sluggish mode. She dressed and began banging on the locked door, then got up on the bed beside the window to karate-kick the shutters. 

          Feet scraped up the steps onto her porch. 'Cut that shit out 
now
.'

          'I'm starving,' Karen called. 'I haven't eaten since yesterday.'

          'Okay, relax. I'll bring you a sandwich.'

          'And coffee. Black, no sugar.'

          'No problem. Just take it easy, okay?'

          The feet scraped away down the steps. Karen, eyes watering again at the thought of it, glad she was still semi-doped, went in the bathroom and found the toilet-roll, put it in her mouth and bit down hard. Bent over the sink, grabbing a good hold of each side. Then, on three, she bounced her nose off the rim.

Ten minutes later the feet scraped back up onto the porch. 'Move away from the door.'

          'I'm on the bed,' Karen shouted.

          A key grated in the lock and the door pushed open. A stocky guy peered in, the crew-cut composing the ballet for trees, a tray in his hands. Then, seeing Karen on the bed, her face like badly pulped jam, the front of her t-shirt a sticky red mess, he swore and hurried across the room. Karen held off until he bent down to place the tray on the bedside locker, then twisted and scissor-kicked from the hip, booting the tray into his face.

Sandwich and coffee flew, mostly into the guy's face. He reared back, leaving himself wide open, allowing Karen to re-scissor and put her heel deep in his crotch. He groaned staggering backwards, then went down on one knee like someone about to leave church, genuflecting. Karen rolled off the bed, ducking down a little to jam the heel of her hand up into his nose. A dull crunch, the guy's head rocking.  Karen took a half-step back and then booted him in the groin like she was kicking a field-goal from two counties over. He folded like he was hinged at the hips, emitting a keening whimper as he toppled onto his side.