Ugly As Sin (17 page)

Nick leaned in close to Leon. “Say we gotta talk?”

“Get ready to be happy.” Leon took a drag on his cigarette, blew smoke rings in the air. He gestured for Nick to follow him, and they left Claudette behind for now. “You tapped out? Any cash left on ya?”

“Depends on what we need it for.”

“Claudette recognizes the man in the picture. Says she’ll talk to us, but only in private.”

“Great,” said Nick. “What time does she get off?”

“Last call’s at two a.m.”

“I can’t wait that long.”

Leon shot a glance the bouncer’s way. The guy had reclaimed his position between the two doorways with the velvet curtains. “You thinkin’ what I’m thinkin’, boss-man?”

“I believe I am.”

“Problem is, we gotta get by Blondie.”

“Why don’t you leave that up to me.” Nick pulled out his wallet. “How much?”

“Fifty bucks rents the room for half an hour. Claudette’s another sixty.”

Nick gave him two hundred. “For her trouble. You go in first, I’ll catch up.”

†

The room was small, dimly lit. To the left of the curtained doorway hung a neon clock urging customers to “ENJOY COORS LIGHT.” On the club’s P.A. system: the opening chords of “You Shook Me All Night Long.”

Claudette straddled Leon on a leather loveseat. Her breasts lay heavy on his bony chest. His forehead was shiny with sweat.

Her long blond hair hung in his face as she whispered in his ear, “So, you and that man with the messed-up face, you were asking about the guy in the picture...”

“Umm, yeah.” Leon looked over her shoulder, trying to stall. “Could you hold that thought for a minute, hon?”

The bouncer stood inside the doorway, watching their every move. “It’s your dime, bro,” he said, “but the clock’s still ticking.”

Then Nick entered the room behind him, and the bouncer wasn’t saying anything else.

The former wrestler’s huge right arm wrapped around the younger man’s neck in an old-fashioned sleeper hold. It was a move the Widowmaker had used on a thousand opponents back in the day. Except this time it was real.

The bouncer struggled. Not for long. His knees buckled. Nick maintained the hold for a few more seconds, restricting blood flow to the brain to keep him out for a little while longer. Then he gently eased the bouncer to the floor.

“Diondre!” Claudette squealed.

“He’ll be fine,” said Nick. “He’s just gonna take a little nap while the grown-ups talk.”

†

Leon and Claudette sat beside one another on the loveseat. Nick stood over them. He had removed his hoodie, given it to Claudette. It swallowed the dancer whole. As for Leon, he looked like he’d lost a dear friend when she zipped it up over her breasts.

“Tell us about the man in the photo,” said Nick.

She glanced at the bouncer on the floor. “I don’t want to know what this is about, do I? You two are gonna get me in so much trouble.”

“Please,” said Nick. “Help us.” He knelt down on one knee in front of her. “It might save a girl’s life.”

“Anyone I know?”

Nick just stared at her with sad eyes, waiting.

She sighed, swung her legs up into Leon’s lap. “I don’t know his name. And he don’t come in here all the time. But I’ve seen him. In my profession, you notice guys like him. They stand out.”

“How do you mean?”

“He’s loaded, that’s what I mean. You can tell by looking at him. He wears suits that probably cost more than I bring home in a month. Always smells like he took a bath in the kind of cologne that goes for a hundred bucks a bottle.”

Nick felt a chill as he recalled his showdown at the Sunrise Motor Lodge, against a gunman wearing too much cologne.

“He don’t throw his money around like a lot of guys, though. He sits at the same table in the corner every time. He orders a couple beers, eye-fucks the girls, but he never stays too long.”

“Tell him what you heard that one night,” Leon said. “Dude, wait till you get a load of this.”

“There was this conversation I overheard between him and another guy,” said Claudette.

“When was this?”

“A little over a month ago. I remember ’cause my son’s birthday was that weekend. I asked for the night off, but I had to work ’cause one of the other girls was a no-show.”

“Who was the other guy? Anyone you know?”

“This guy Eddie who comes in here sometimes.”

Leon shot Nick a look, but the big man’s disfigured face betrayed nothing. As for Claudette, apparently she didn’t know that Eddie had been murdered; she spoke of him in the present tense.

“It was almost closing time. The place had started to clear out. Like I said, the guy in your picture, he usually keeps to himself, but this time Eddie was sitting with him. I walked by their table, and they were arguing. I heard Eddie say something like, ‘It ain’t right. I made a mistake. I shoulda got that nigger his money some other way.’ The other dude stuck his finger in Eddie’s face. He said, ‘You were the one who came crying to Daddy after that dumb cooze of yours got you in hot water. Now you gotta uphold your end of the bargain!’ ”

Nick’s perfect poker face faltered now. His head hurt as he tried to make sense of everything Claudette had told him.

“Daddy”...there was that weird name again, made even weirder by the fact that it had been spoken by a grown man. Who was he? Some sort of local crime boss? A loan shark with strong paternal tendencies?

What had Eddie promised this man, but then reneged upon? And who was the “dumb cooze” responsible for landing him in “hot water”?

Nick tasted whiskey-laced bile in the back of his throat. He remembered the stuff Sophie had posted online about how Eddie taught her how to fire a gun a few weeks before she went missing.

Was it possible that the piece of shit had
sold
his girlfriend’s fourteen-year-old daughter, experienced a change of heart after the fact, but the buyer collected anyway?

“You okay?” Leon asked his hero.

“No,” said Nick. “I’m not.”

Behind Nick, the bouncer moaned. He babbled something into the carpet that sounded like “jalapeno won’t stop nothing.”

Nick stepped over him, pinched a nerve in his neck to keep him out for a little longer. He didn’t take his eyes off Claudette. “What did Eddie do after that?”

“He just stood up, walked off in a daze. Bumped into me, and it was like he didn’t even know I was there. I remember thinking he looked like a guy on his way to the electric chair. Somebody who knows his luck’s run out.”

“Claudette,” said Nick, “have you told anybody besides Leon and me what you heard that night?”

“No,” she replied. “It felt like a conversation I ought to keep to myself, you know? None of my business. I’ve probably said too much already. I’ve got a little boy at home to think about.”

“Joey?” Nick nodded toward the tattoo on her wrist.

She smiled sadly, looked down at the cursive letters under her skin and started rubbing at them. “My baby. He just turned three. He’s the only thing that keeps me going, sometimes. Whatever happens, you guys will keep my name out of this, right? You didn’t hear nothing from me?”

“You have our word,” said Nick.

Leon made a
cross my heart
gesture.

Nick stood, threw a thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the bouncer. “He won’t remember much. He’ll have a bastard of a headache, but he’ll be fine. Tell him you noticed he was looking pale, he complained of a hot flash, a second later he went down. Scared you half to death. You thought about calling 911, but he was only out for a minute.”

“Gotcha,” said Claudette.

“You’re the one who’s gonna need 911, girl,” said a voice behind Nick then. “What in the blue fuck do you think you’re doing?”

“Oh, God...Russo...”

Nick turned to see the bartender stepping over the bouncer.

“What did you tell them?”

Claudette shot to her feet. “I didn’t tell them anything! We were just talking.”

“You don’t get paid to talk. You get paid to shake them big titties of yours. You think our customers would appreciate you blabbing to other customers about them?”

“What’s it to you, Russo? You ain’t my boss. Why don’t you mind your own business?”

“I’m making it my business, whore.”

Nick decided he’d had enough of this bastard.

He took two steps across the room, put his fist in Russo’s face.

The bartender flew backward as if he had been head-butted by a rhino. He crashed into the clock on the wall, joined the bouncer on the floor.

Nick stood over him. By some miracle, the guy was still conscious.

“Ought to give you some more, for lying to me. You got off easy. I’ll be checking in with Claudette. If I hear she’s broken a
nail
, I’ll be back for you. Understand?”

The bartender made a sound like air escaping from a punctured tire, closed his eyes.

Leon grabbed one of Nick’s huge arms with both hands. “We, uh, might wanna go now.”

“Probably a good idea.”

Claudette unzipped her borrowed hoodie.

“Keep it,” said Nick.

They headed for the exit.

†

“Holy shit, that was the coolest thing I’ve ever seen!” Leon said once they were back in the Bronco. He pantomimed his hero taking a swing at the bartender. “BAM! Motherfucker went
down!
That’s what you get when you mess with the Widowmaker!”

Nick started up the vehicle, made for the highway. Narrowly avoided flattening a man who staggered out of the club and into his path. The guy didn’t even look up. He adjusted himself through his overalls before climbing into a pick-up with a faded ROMNEY/RYAN 2012 sticker on the back window.

The Bronco’s tires screamed like someone being murdered as Nick sped out of the lot.

Leon held on for dear life. He waited till they had merged onto the interstate before asking, “So...Claudette gave us some good stuff, yeah? Something we can use? Did I do good?”

Nick said, “You did real good...partner.”

Leon beamed as if he’d just won a lifetime supply of free drugs.

Nick meant every word. He had underestimated the little speed-freak. Expected to walk out of the Skin Den with nothing to show for the trip besides a lighter wallet, a headache from the too-loud music, and maybe a case of blue balls. But his friend had come through for him. He’d had a plan all along. Which was more than even Nick could say.

“What happens next?” asked Leon. “Where do we go from here?”

“I wanna see if this ‘Daddy’ rings a bell with the sheriff. Maybe he knows somebody who goes by that alias? There’s no question he’s got Sophie. Only thing left is figuring out who he is.
Where
he is. We’re closer than ever, Leon. I’m gonna bring that young lady home to her mama if it kills me...”

“Somethin’ else, too,” said Leon. “Eddie mentioned a colored fella?”

“He said he wished he’d ‘paid him back some other way.’ I can’t help thinking that ties in with Eddie getting busted earlier this year.”

“You lost me.”

Nick shook his head. “It’s something that keeps picking at the back of my brain. I’m not ready to discuss it yet. And I hope I’m wrong.”

Leon frowned, shrugged. Lit a cigarette. The lighter’s flame was reflected in his glasses, as if the skinny meth-head’s skull had been hollowed out, and his eyes replaced by flickering firelight.

†

The rest of the trip home was mostly silent. Nick didn’t mind. It enabled him to mull over everything he had learned.

But as he ascended the exit ramp that would lead them back to Midnight, Leon lit another cigarette and said, “I was thinkin’ about somethin’ earlier, dude.”

“What’s that?”

“When all o’ this is over, I’ll bet you could sell your life story, get them Hollywood suits to make a movie about you.”

“You think so?”

“Hell, yeah!” Leon grinned from ear to ear. “Maybe they’d even give me a small part.”

Nick glanced over at him. “You wanna be a movie star, do you?”

“Nah. I’m just sayin’. It’d be kinda cool.”

“I did make a movie, years ago. You of all people should know that. Once was enough for me, though.”

“
Night of the Berserker!
Jason, Freddy, Michael Myers—none o’ them pussies had anything on the Berserker! He coulda kicked all their asses with one hand tied behind his back!” Leon exhaled smoke rings as he reminisced: “I remember I was watchin’
Berserker
the first time I got my willy touched. It was at the Lansdale Drive-In. I took Betty Lynn Brubaker to see your movie on openin’ night. She had more hair on her arms than me, and she always smelled like sauerkraut, but she was a sweet girl. Anyway...when you busted outta the woods with your meat cleaver and started choppin’ up them cheerleaders, Betty-Lynn reached over, put her hand on my crotch, and that was all she wrote.”

Nick said, “That, my friend, was too much information. And I’m not quite sure how I feel about it.”

“I musta watched my old VHS copy a billion times back in high school.
Berserker
was the fuckin’ bomb, I don’t care what anybody says.”

“It was a bomb, all right,” said Nick. “It was a pile of shit.”

“I freakin’ loved it, man.”

“There’s no accounting for taste.”

At the crest of the hill, Nick rolled to a stop. His fingers drummed upon the steering wheel as he waited for a fleet of rumbling Harley Davidsons to pass so he could turn left.

Leon reached down, turned on the stereo.

“You was born to die,”
Blind Willie McTell warned the men from the Bronco’s ancient speakers. It had always been one of his favorite songs, but Nick killed the music right away. For some reason, the hairs on his arms and the back of his neck suddenly stood to attention.

In his rearview mirror, he saw another vehicle ascending the exit ramp. Coming up fast behind the Bronco.

The approaching car flashed its bluish headlights—from dim to bright, dim to bright—a dozen times or more.

The vehicle veered to the left at the last second, swerving around the Bronco without stopping.