The Dead Bat
Blood and bone and ceiling tiles. A jagged hole thirty feet up. A shaft of hard rain pummeling three lifeless faces on the warehouse floor. Death, foul play, mystery, and Lieutenant Play yanked from her breakfast of bacon with eggs-over-easy and orange juice freshly squeezed.
The lieutenant contemplated the crime-scene, the ends of her dyed-red locks running parallel with the angle of her jawbone. A sharp, delicate jawbone that could cut paper and mince words. Her dark-gray jacket mostly hid the blue blouse that had been hastily tucked into her pants. Her eyes scanned the scene like the wand of light sliding across the inside of a copy machine. Three wrecked bodies sprawled near the toes of her scuffed black boots. Two males, one female.
One man was olive-complected and greasy, exquisitely dressed, thin, with a trimmed black moustache. The other man young, prematurely balding, with a blue bruise on the side of his face. A cheap suit covered him like curdled cream. He had the build and coloring of a Doberman Pincher.
The woman. On the wrong side of forty. Pale skin, dark hair. Atrociously beautiful.
And in the middle of the mess, a satchel. Brown leather, waterlogged, stuffed with shredded paper. A few hundred-dollar bills around its rim, with several more floating atop the pinkish pool of watered-down blood.
The gun. Half-submerged in the thin pink gelatin. A flat black Guerning Thirty-Five, a retro six shooter. A collector’s item and real hole puncher. Drops of fat rain falling from the gouged-out hole above popped off its gold-plated side where there was an inscription written in the curvaceous, interconnected lettering of the old-style lettering.
And, of course, the bat. Brown, small. Wrinkled face. Dead.
The bat appeared to be the only victim who had been shot.
And it had been shot four times.
“Thanks fo’ the call, Lieutenant.”
Mister Wucka stood beside Play, his hands in his trenchcoat. He was a short man with a menacing look, rounded in the middle, bald head, expensive suit. A cannonball wrapped in silk.
“That’s the deal, Mister Wucka. But that’s as far as it goes.”
Mister Wucka trucked his fine Italian shoes around the edge of the bloody puddle.
“How ya got it figga’d?”
“Drug deal. Abandoned warehouse roof, middle of no-where. A weak spot in the roof snuck up behind them. Freefall for one long second. And thirty feet later…” Play smacked the butts of her slender hands together. Mister Wucka’s rounded shoulders jumped. “Wham. So much human jelly and gristle. Not to mention a breakfast sitting cold for me at home.”
“If it was a dwug deal, wheeah awe the dwugs?”
“The ol’ double double-cross. There were never any drugs. See that satchel? Last time I checked, shredded paper didn’t have the backing of any country’s full faith and credit. Both sides were trying to screw down the other.”
“And the giwl?”
“She played the lady. Left with the fella she came with.”
“Which was?”
“Your man. Primero.”
“You wecognize him?”
“The inscription on the gun helped. For Primero—My Number One. A real Hallmark moment.”
Wucka looked at the partially submerged gun.
“I neveh seen that gun befo’ in my life.”
“Of course you haven’t, Mister Wucka.”
“What about the bat?”
“Caught in the double-cross fire.”
“Wapped up pwetty fast, eh Lieutenant? All it needs now is a bow.”
“I ain’t gonna waste taxpayer money wringing my hands over which punk crossed which punk. You people have your little gang war. Kill off every two-bit hood in the city for all I care. We’d be better off for it. Just don’t let it happen again on my day off.”
“What if youw weading of the situation is wong, Lieutantent Play? What if theiw’s mo’ heew than meets the eye?”
“You know what I do when this kind of mess meets my eye, Mister Wucka? I shrug. The city shrugs. Two crooks and a no-class broad met their end. Big deal. The D.N.A. guy’ll be here soon, and he’ll confirm who they are, and they’ll all have records a mile long, and we’ll log the bodies in for cremation and go home.”
“I see. Well, youw men will be by layta to see me, I suppose.”
“It is your company’s jetty parked on the roof. But don’t worry. I’m sure you’ve already reported it stolen.”
“Indeed… Well, lieutenant, thanks again fo’ the call.”
“That’s the deal, Mister Wucka. But that’s as far as it goes.”
*** *** ***
The previous night…
Sitting on the hotel bed sipping his sweetened espresso drink, the room service cart against the robin’s-egg-colored wall, Giuseppe “Primero” Fibonacci smoothed down his black, meticulously trimmed moustache with thumb and forefinger and waited for the knock at the door.
When the knock came, three light raps, he stood, straightened his red tie, and slipped on his suit jacket. At the door, he turned to look through the bathroom doorway and into the mirror above the sink. He pushed his slick black hair away from his tall forehead, then sprayed some breath freshener into his mouth. When he was satisfied with his look in the mirror, he opened the door.
And lost his pepperminty breath.
His dream image of the eternal feminine floated just across the threshold. The whole storybook. Red dress. Rose petal lips. Blue diamond eyes. Waves of soft blond hair.
He stepped back – or rather, fell back and caught himself with his foot. He motioned her inside.
“Drink?” he managed to ask.
“Whatever you’re having,” came the honeyed response.
“I’m having a fantasy.”
“In that case, make it a double.”
Primero opened the bottle of wine setting on the cart and watched her as she sat down on the edge of the bed and crossed her shapely legs.
“Mind if I smoke?” she asked.
“When you’re as hot as you are, honey, you probably can’t help it.”
She lit up as he handed her the ashtray.
He filled the flutes with burgundy.
Red lips gently gripped the cigarette and blew a kiss of white smoke. “Talk to me, Primero.”
Primero handed her a glass and nestled-in beside her on the bed as close as he dared. “I hear you want to be made.”
“You’re a man who hears a lot.”
“What’s Mister Wucka think?”
“Damien doesn’t tell me what he thinks.”
They drank their wine. Both sensed a point of no return in the near distance.
“I think I understand you, Dish.”
“No one’s more suicidal than a man who thinks he understands a woman.”
“I might have a job for you.”
“Why not give it to one of the boys?”
“There’s a traitor in the Organization. I need someone outside the loop. Someone I can trust.”
“I didn’t think you trusted anyone.”
“I don’t trust people at all. But I do trust motivations.”
Dish drew on her cigarette. “You think you know mine?”
“You’re an open book with one sentence, Dish. You want to be the first moll in modern history to become a made man.”
“What’s the job?”
“Ah. Just like your old man was. Cut to the chase.”
“Leave him out of this.”
“It’s a swap.”
Dish took another drag from her cigarette and read over Primero’s somewhat greasy face. “Missus Feldman?”
Primero nodded. “Tonight.”
“Where’s the rendezvous?”
“I’ll give you the coordinates after you’ve accepted the terms.”
“I’ll take the going rate.” Dish made her demand nonchalantly, ashing her cigarette in the tray.
“It’s not your take that we’re negotiating.”
“No? What then?”
“Mine.” A greasy smile spread like a stain beneath the thin moustache.
“Alright.” Dish stamped out her cigarette. “What’s the deal?”
“You give me what I want…” He put a hand on Dish’s knee. “I give you what you want.”
Dish looked down at the trespassing paw and then up at Primero. Her large blue eyes turned icy. “You’re not afraid of Damien?”
“What the Boss don’t know won’t hurt him.” He rubbed his thumb back and forth across her thigh.
“What’s my guarantee that you’ll hold up your end of the bargain?”
“I’m messing with the Boss’s moll. You could have me snuffed me with a word.”
“Assume we do this. I’ll be made?”
“The final word will be Mister Wucka’s, of course. But there is no scenario that doesn’t include that, Dish. I can tell you that this is a big job. If you’re successful, you’ll deserve to be made as much as anyone. I’ll make the recommendation myself.”
“And what will he think about you giving me a job in the first place? He might clean the gutters with your face.”
“I’ll take that risk. He knows there’s a rat aboard ship. I’ll explain I couldn’t take any chances on this one. You were my best option, the Organization’s best option.”
“You’re taking an awfully big chance for a little action on the side. Damien really would kill you if he found out.”
“I’d die a happy man.”
Dish finished her wine and set the empty glass down on the nightstand. She stood. Primero could smell her sweet perfume. His eyes flowed over the curves of her.
“Undress me,” she said.
*** *** ***
Heels clicked hard on the corridor floor, the echoes snapping back from the bare block walls. Hips swayed quickly beneath a black dress. Blond hair bounced on pale shoulders. Dish neared her life’s greatest opportunity with a unity of purpose from gorgeous head to dainty foot.
Primero played a rough game, the slimy scoundrel. But sometimes, rough was okay. Especially the first time. The overpowering desire of the man for the woman crashing down like a wave. Grunts and moans and scratches and bites and bent limbs and tight clasps. The bestial burden growing, swelling, overpowering, disgorging. The intensity of a jungle kill. Dish moistened her rosy lips.
She turned the corner. The Organization’s Keep was dead ahead. She saw Flinch seated on a hard chair straining to hold him, one leg crossed atop the other, his big muttonchop hands wrapped around a tablet-reader in his lap. A tie hung from his wide neck, not much fabric leftover to run down his massive chest. A dark jacket stretched over the rockslide of his neck and shoulders.
He stood as soon as he saw Dish, the reader tossed onto the chair. He glanced at her and then expectantly behind her, his wide-set brown eyes scurrying from one side of his broad face to the other like a couple of nervous chipmunks.
What a big block of a man you turned out to be, thought Dish. Everything about him oversized. Forehead, nose, chin, shoulders, hipbones. The kind of guy it was difficult to share a grocery store aisle with.
“Oh hi ya, Dish. Boss not widja?” Flinch’s voice was an incongruous high alto, the sweet voice of a prepubescent angel. Of death.
“I chewed through my leash.”
“Oh. Huh?”
“Open the door, Flinch. I’m taking that bulldog bitch out for a walk of her own.”
“Yeah?”
Dish was forced to check her forward movement or risk breaking her collarbone against Flinch’s large, hard gut. She attempted to stare him down with the hardest look her blue diamond eyes could muster, but it was like trying to intimidate a wall.
“Who says?”
“Who says what, Flinch?”
“Who says Missus Feldman goes for a walk?”
“Flinchy…”
Dish reached up and tenderly stroked Flinch’s short tie. Her knuckles rubbed against his massive chest. He jerked back with a burp of a squeal.
“Sorry, Dish,” Flinch squeaked. “Ya know I hate it when people touch me.”
Dish lowered her small hand. She was well aware of Flinch’s psychological condition when it came to human connection. But she forgot when it came to herself sometimes.
“Then get out of the way,” she said.
“Who says ya comin’ in?”
“I says.”
“Me and you go back a long ways, Dish. But dere’s only two sezzes dat get dis door open on my shift.” Flinch’s high voice had risen even higher in his excitement. “And yours ain’t one of ‘em. Sorry.”
“How ‘bout Primero’s say?”
“You got Primero’s say?”
“I couldn’t make the swap tonight without the dame, now could I Flinch?”
Flinch’s dark eyes tried to ferret out the meaning in Dish’s words. Then his expression softened and his black eyebrows raised. “Dish! Ya gotta a job?”
“I didn’t come here for the clever conversation.”
“Oh Dish!” came the falsetto exclamation. “My friend Dish… Gonna be a made man—I mean woman—at last.”
Flinch smiled down at Dish, fat puddles standing on the lower rims of his eyes. Dish saw for a moment the big, goofy kid with the strange manner and girly voice who had protected her from the boys in the neighborhood since before she’d grown boobs.
“Yeah, yeah, Flinchy. Save the waterworks. Open the door, will you?”
“Sure. Sure thing, Dish.” Flinch rummaged through his pants pocket for the key. “Where’s the swap going down?”
“You know the rule. Job open, mouth closed.”
Flinch pulled out the keycard, so small in his hand that it looked like a stick of gum. “Let me come widja, Dish.”
“No can do. Primero said I was to do the swap alone.”
Flinch turned toward the door, the mountain of his shoulders taking on a dejected angle. He ran the keycard through the slot, and the light near the handle changed from red to green. Flinch opened the door.
“Comin’ in, Missus Feldman!” he bellowed into the Keep in his ear-piercing alto. He stepped through the doorway and looked the place over.
Dish knew he was taking extra precautions for her safety. In his own clumsy way, he had always done whatever he could to keep her safe. Lord knew she hadn’t made that job an easy one. He motioned for her to follow him in.
Except for being windowless and dank, the basement apartment that the Organization used for storing its higher-class inventory wasn’t bad digs. A linoleum-floored kitchenette was tucked into the corner. A brown sofa-bed sat across from an extravagant entertainment center in the main room. Framed mirrors and artwork covered the walls.
An attractive, middle-aged woman rose from the couch, rubbing her nose and sniffing loudly. Her brown hair was short and expertly cut and styled. She wore a long, dark blue dress that displayed her slender figure to good effect. As she stood, the apartment’s lights glinted off the jewelry at her neck, earlobes, wrists, and fingers.
“Slut!” hissed the woman at Dish.
“Good to see you again, too, Suzanne.” Dish found it difficult to believe that this woman had ever been a mother-figure to her back in the day. She looked down at the powder-covered mirror and razorblade on the coffeetable. “I see they’re keeping you well-fed.”
The dust Suzanne had just inhaled gave her brown eyes a feral look. She looked Dish over contemptuously. “I’m not the one with the cornpone hips.”
Dish saw that, though Suzanne was acting boldly, she was nervously twisting one of her rings around her finger. The two molls had crossed paths on many occasions in the long, intermingling histories of their two gangland harems. Among other grudges held, Suzanne had never forgiven Dish for being the younger.
“For crying out loud, Suzanne,” said Dish, “You look like a clown. Wash that snort off your face. We’re going out.”
Suzanne came at Dish, but Flinch, who had just finished putting on his black leather gloves, stepped between them. Dish wondered if Suzanne knew the exponentially increased risk of physical harm signified by the donning of Flinch’s smooth black gloves.
“Can the soap opera antics,” said Dish. “Your husband’s posted your bail. God knows why. Grab whatever you need to keep warm. We’re going for a ride.”
“Like Hell.”
“With you as a passenger, I’m sure it will be.”
Flinch gave Suzanne a gentle shove with one gloved mitt, almost planting her on her pretty face. She went to the nearest mirror to wipe her face and began putting on her coat. Dish wondered if having Flinch come along might not be such a bad idea.
*** *** ***
The towering black night set heavy on the windshield. Dish had both hands on the controls. Flinch was beside her in the passenger seat.
“Don’t screw this up for me tonight, Flinch.”
“Whaaat?”
“Just stay focused. That’s all I’m saying. Not like that time Damien sent you to represent at that funeral.”
“What? I brung flowers to a funeral. So sue me.”
“It wasn’t the flowers, Flinch, and you know it. It was what was in the flowers.”
“How was I spost to know dhere was a bee in da boekett?”
“It’s bouquet, Dufus. And your little uninvited guest stung the widow on the eyelid.”
“Yeah. Dat was tough luck.”
“She was allergic to bees.”
“Duh. Like dat’s not obvious in hindsight.”
“You’re lucky to be alive after that stunt. I know Damien pretty well and—”
“Yeah. I’d say ya do.”
Dish grabbed Flinch by the shirt. Flinch yelped like a pup.
“Che- chest hair,” he gasped nearly voicelessly.
“Don’t go there, Flinch. You know better’n that.” Dish tightened her grip.
“Aye!”
“Would you two shut up?” Suzanne leaned forward between the two front seats.
Without turning around, Dish let go of Flinch, palmed Suzanne’s face, shoved her back into the cramped area behind the two front seats, then returned both hands to the controls.
“Dat hurt,” said Flinch.
“Do I talk about your personal life, Flinch?”
“You know I don’t like to be touched.”
“Do I?”
“No. But ya didn’t need to resort to violence.” Flinch was beginning to sulk. He rubbed small circles on his big barrel chest with one of his huge hands.
“Alright then,” said Dish. “We’re here.”
She brought the jetty to a sudden halt, tossing the two passengers forward. Dish again palmed Suzanne’s face and returned her unceremoniously to the backseat.
“Bitch!” said Suzanne.
“You have no idea,” returned Dish, and punched-in the descent request.
Within a few moments, the jetty had received descent clearance, and Dish was gently bringing the bird down onto a corner of the flat-roofed, abandoned warehouse where the swap was to take place.
“I’m not going back to that man,” Suzanne said after Dish had powered down the jetty. “You can’t make me.”
“Wanna bet, sweetheart?”
“I hate him, Dish. With all my heart, I hate him. I’d rather die than go back to him. You ever hate anyone that much?”
“Well, I’ve never been married.”
“That’s the smartest thing you never did.”
The jetty grew quiet as Dish watched the radar and Flinch put back on his gloves. The dashboard display signaled the approach of a jetty from the east. Dish looked up. A few floating lights. One of them must be Mister Feldman’s crew.
“You think my husband allowed me to be kidnapped by accident?” Suzanne said, her tone melancholic. “By you people? Please. He’s not that stupid.”
Dish kept her eyes on the radar. “He married you, didn’t he?” She pressed a button that popped open Flinch’s door. “Get her out, Flinch.”
As Flinch pulled Suzanne out of the jetty, Dish got out and pulled her short black dress down over the curves of her hips and began putting on her shoes by kicking one comely leg up behind her at a time, securing each shoe while staring up at the approaching light she assumed to be Feldman’s people. Dish had chosen practical shoes for the evening, heels short and wide, and she was proud of herself for thinking ahead about the proper footwear for a swap.
Her shoes on, she pulled out a palm-sized, silver case with an internal light that came on when she opened it. She looked at herself in its mirror. I’m nearly thirty, she thought. She could only trade on her looks so long. A girl needs a career of her own. She wished her father was around to give her some advice about the business.
“You’re the only gangster in the world who takes out a compact in the middle of a job,” said Suzanne from in front of the jetty. Flinch was holding her by the elbow, his gloved hand covering half her arm.
Dish snapped the case closed. “I’m the only one it would do any good.” She tossed her compact into her purse next to the gun that she had surreptitiously swiped from Primero’s small, traveling collection.
“Hey, don’t lean in so close, lady.”
“You really don’t like to be touched do you, big guy?” said Suzanne without leaning away. “At least by the girls. Am I right?”
“You jus’ behave, Missus Feldman. You’ll be reunited widjur husband very soon.”
“Don’t remind me.”
Dish paced around the roof as they waited for the other jetty to arrive. The night was dark and the seeing difficult. No moon. Clouds rolling in like smoke. She walked to a structure shaped like a large metal refrigerator. The roof was uneven beneath her heels, buckling in some places, rutted in others. As she got closer to the structure, she thought she could make out the frame of a door.
Her heel sunk down into the roof, and she stumbled, frightening a bat from its resting place.
Bat-bat-bat-bat, sputtered the dark wings, the bat jerkily flying around in a way that irritated Dish. It circled her head once then vanished into the shadows and was quiet.
“You okay, Dish?” called Flinch.
“Yeah. Damn roof’s like wet cardboard here in the middle.”
Dish unstuck her heel and went to the refrigerator-like structure and turned the door handle and gave it a tug. She looked inside, then shut the door and made her way back over to the jetty.
“I thought bats were supposed to be out feeding at night,” she complained to Flinch. “Why doesn’t anyone do what they’re supposed to do?”
“What wuz over in dat closet-thing?” Flinch asked.
Dish shrugged. “Stairs.”
Suzanne was twisting one of her rings around her finger and looking up at the jetty hovering overhead.
“Here they come, Flinchy,” said Dish. “It’s showtime.”
She began walking toward the spot where the jetty was descending. Flinch followed, tugging Suzanne behind him.
Dish heard something tinkle on the roof.
“My ring!”
“I think I heard where it went, Missus Feldman.”
Dish turned to see Flinch bent down, holding Suzanne behind him with one hand, shuffling forward over the roof, squinting in the dark to find the gleam of the ring.
Suzanne spun so that she was in front of Flinch and planted a sloppy kiss on his wide lips. He reacted at the touch as an arachnophobe might react after walking into a spiderweb, pulling himself away and stumbling backwards, arms flailing. Suzanne immediately darted across the rooftop toward the stair access Dish had discovered.
Dish pulled Primero’s gun from her purse. “Hold it right there, Suzanne!” She raised the gun into the air to fire, remembered the jetty above, and lowered her aim, firing over the head of Suzanne.
Suzanne kept running.
A dead bat fell from the sky.
“Damn,” muttered Dish.
A strange crackling sound filled the roof, just audible above the growing sounds of the jetty descending behind Dish. Dish watched helplessly as the silhouette of Suzanne’s slender figure dropped from view. She and Flinch looked at each other, then sprinted forward.
“Careful!” Flinch twitted as they arrived at the spot.
Dish looked down at the roof. She lowered her gun, and her shoulders slumped.
“She fell tru da roof!” gasped Flinch in a high-pitched whisper.
Dish dropped to her knees and looked into the hole. Pitch blackness. “Suzanne? Suzanne, are you alive?”
Nothing.
She stood. “Damn! Damn damn damn!”
As she stomped in anger, she happened to brush a heel against the bat she had shot, and it began flopping around. Bam-bam-bam! Dish shot the unfortunate night creature three more times before giving it a kick. It slid across the roof’s dark surface, hung halfway over the jagged hole Suzanne had just made, then tipped over and disappeared from view.
Looking through the blond waves of hair hanging in her face, Dish saw a second jetty landing on the roof. She stretched to her full height and tossed her hair behind her shoulders and took a deep breath. She straightened her dress and began walking toward the jetty, gun still in hand.
“Dish?” peeped Flinch.
“Don’t say a word, Flinch,” Dish growled over her shoulder. She stopped and turned slightly, her perfect profile outlined against the lights of the landing jetty: “Take out your gun, Flinch.”
Flinch fumbled with his gun until it was free from his shoulder holster and caught up to Dish just as Feldman’s crew was exiting their jetty.
Though the running lights of the jetty behind them made their faces difficult to see, Dish could tell that the three figures approaching her were all male. She could not be sure that no one was left in the jetty, but she doubted it. It was a small, sporty number, and the expected addition of Suzanne would make four. A fifth person would have been almost impossible.
“Was that gunfire, Dish?”
Dish recognized the voice. She squinted into the lights.
“Primero?”
Primero glanced at Flinch. “I thought I told you not to bring anyone, Dish.”
“Who? Flinchy? He’s just my guardian angel.”
Primero smiled his greasy little smile beneath his pencil-thin moustache. Beside him stood Suzanne’s husband, Robert Feldman. Feldman wore thinly framed glasses and was sharply dressed. On the other side of Feldman was a younger man with a receding hairline, flat nose, and muscular build. He wore a frown and a cheap suit and held a satchel in one hand, while keeping the other worrisomely tucked inside his jacket.
“Cute, Dish,” said Primero, ” But I expressly—”
Feldman silenced Primero by putting a hand on his forearm. “Where’s my wife?” he asked Dish.
With a nod of her head, Dish motioned toward the jetty that she, Flinch, and the recently departed Suzanne had arrived in. “She’s close,” she said. She heard Flinch shifting his large feet on the roof. He better keep his big yap shut, she thought.
“Put away the guns, Dish. You’re insulting us,” said Primero.
“So you’re the traitor,” said Dish. She raised her gun and aimed it at the middle of his chest. “I should’ve known.”
“Wait a minute there, Missy,” said Feldman. “Let’s not make this personal. It’s just business. Timmy, give the lady what she’s due, and let’s be done with this.”
“Sure thing, boss,” said Timmy.
Dish realized from the sound of his voice that he was little more than a boy, in spite of his male pattern baldness.
He began walking toward Dish. She kept her gun trained on Primero.
So, Primero’s the traitor, she thought. She hadn’t seen that one coming. Damien’s trusted right-hand man for years. She wondered how this was going to play-out for her now.
She didn’t like the way Timmy was approaching her. Something about his manner pulled the tripwire of her intuition. Her body clocked over into a state of alarm. Was this how she was supposed to feel? Was this how it always was during a job? The adrenaline, the uncertainty, the fear. Or was she truly sensing something wrong? She didn’t trust herself.
“Nothing personal,” said Timmy, frowning as he struck her hard across the face with the satchel in his hands. The force of the blow knocked her to the ground. In a flash, Timmy was down beside her, his pistol pressed against her cheek, one foot planted on her gun arm. Dish could see that Primero had drawn a gun, also, and had it trained on Flinch. She groaned, hurting all over.
“Tell your guardian angel to drop his harp, Dish,” ordered Primero.
“I got on my bulletproof, Dish,” said Flinch. “I can take at least one out wid me.”
“Maybe you could and maybe you couldn’t, Mister Flinch,” said Primero. “But I guarantee that Timmy Boy’ll shoot that pretty face right off Dish’s lovely neck before he goes down. Do you really want to live with that for eternity? Over a bag of money?”
Dish heard Flinch’s gun clank against the rooftop a few seconds later. Good decision, she thought. Don’t bring things to a head before we have to. Stall for time. Give luck some elbow room.
“Sorry, Dish,” Flinch said.
Primero retrieved the pistol. “Big gun for a big fella,” he said, bouncing the gun in his hand. “What the Hell am I supposed to do with this bazooka?” Primero put the gun back down on the roof and gave it kick that sent it sliding toward the jetty that he and Feldman and Timmy hand flown in on. “I always told the Boss you were a complete moron, Flinch.” He looked at Dish lying on the grimy rooftop. “Timmy,” he called. “Get her gun.”
Timmy ground the bottom of his shoe on Dish’s forearm, and her gun slipped from her hand. He grabbed it.
Primero walked over and took it from him. It’s gold inscription caught his eye.
“What’s the big idea, Dish? You five-fingered my gun from the room?”
“I thought I might need some protection,” responded Dish. “Guess I didn’t know how right I was.”
“Dames!” said Primero, glancing back with a shrug at Feldman. He pocketed the matte-black gun he had brought with him and kept the gold-plated one in his hand. “Get her up, Timmy,” he said.
Timmy took his gun’s barrel out of Dish’s face and stepped off her arm and jerked her up. He pushed her toward Flinch, who caught her with his gloved hands and steadied her. Her face was hurting from the smack with the satchel and the pistol jammed into her cheek, and her arm felt broken.
“I don’t get it, Primero,” said Dish. “Why get me involved?”
“I needed someone to take the blame for Suzanne’s escape.”
“You knew I’d keep my trap shut until the job was done,” Dish reasoned aloud. “That I’d be too afraid Damien would put the kibosh on it if he got wind.”
“Yeah. That, and I really did want to get on top of you. I’d waited two years for that. Tonight was my last opportunity. And I must say…” He smoothed down his greasy moustache. “I think made the most of it.”
“That was your most, huh?” replied Dish.
Primero gave her a hard look but said nothing. She felt Flinch staring side-eyed at her, and her face grew hot.
“Is the jetty open, sweetheart?” asked Feldman.
“It’s open. Uh, Suzanne’s tied-up inside.”
“Timmy. Go get my wife. We’ll do all three of them at once.”
Timmy began toward the jetty, still carrying the satchel.
“You are a bastard,” said Dish. “You’re gonna kill your own wife?”
“Wife? What kind of wife would testify against her own husband? I just wish I had put her down sooner. Think of all the money I’da saved.”
Feldman elbowed Primero, who had moved back to his side, and they both laughed.
“Alright, Flinch. Turn around,” said Primero.
Flinch didn’t move.
Primero slapped him across the wide jaw with the barrel of his golden gun.
Blood trickled down Flinch’s cheek, but it was the only outward sign given of the blow he had received.
“I said turn around!” yelled Primero.
Flinch cast a sad and helpless look down at Dish and turned slowly.
“Now, down on your knees.”
Flinch remained standing.
Primero came down hard with butt of the gun on the base of Flinch’s neck.
Dish gave a sympathetic yelp.
Flinch fell to his knees, swaying back and forth.
Timmy called something across the roof from the other jetty, but the wind carried away his words.
“What? What’s he saying?” asked Feldman irritably.
“There’s… one here!” came some of Timmy’s words across the roof.
With Primero and Feldman concentrating on trying to decipher Timmy’s wind-tossed message, Dish bolted across the roof toward the stairway door, her purse bouncing on her hip.
She heard Primero barking her name and then the firing of a gun and then the whizzing a bullet just past her ear. She tripped and fell as another bullet whizzed over her. When she stood and began running again, Primero was practically breathing down her neck. From the corner of her eye, she saw Timmy also running toward her.
She ran madly, blindly through the dark night. She could practically feel the mouth of the gun’s barrel pointing between her shoulderblades and expected at any second to feel the terrible, tearing pain of the bullet that would end her life.
It was too dark to see the hole in front of the stair access, but Dish remembered it just in time and closed her eyes and leapt as far as she could. She landed on hands and knees and tumbled and came to rest with her back against the stairway access.
Primero slowed to take careful aim with his gold-plated gun, striding toward Dish with the confident smile of a victor who had never doubted winning.
“You were some piece of pie,” he said. “I’m sorry it had to end this way.”
Primero dropped like a stone.
“I’m not,” Dish said.
Dish was scrambling to her feet just as Timmy arrived.
“Like I said, lady,” he said through his frown. “Nothing personal.”
Dish closed her eyes as the young, prematurely balding man began to press down on the trigger of his gun—
Flinch leapt forward with all the power in his tree trunk legs. He landed just behind Timmy, the roof caving in beneath his bulk. But as he fell, he managed to fling out one of his big ham hands just enough to make contact with Timmy’s hip, causing the young tough to stumble forward and his shot at Dish to go wide.
Timmy teetered on the edge of the hole that had already claimed Suzanne and Primero, the satchel held behind him as a counterbalance. He stepped back from the hole’s crumbling rim and breathed a sigh of relief.
Dish walloped him across the side of the head with her purse. He spun around and fell frowning into the abyss.
“Nothing personal,” said Dish.
She heard a strange, high-pitched growling behind her and turned to see Flinch’s head sticking out from the roof. His big shoulders had wedged in the hole his landing had made in the roof, and he was trying to raise himself. Dish helped pull him up as best she could, which wasn’t much. Finally they were both stretched out and panting on the rooftop.
“Well, well…” came the voice of Feldman.
Dish and Flinch sprang to their feet. Feldman was shining a light from his phone down into the hole and peering over the rim of his nearly invisible glasses. “You don’t see that every day.” He turned off the phone’s light and pocketed it, then turned toward Dish and Flinch. “Oh. I believe this is yours, Mister Flinch.” He handed Flinch the large gun Primero had kicked away moments ago. “I guess we better get you two out of here before the authorities arrive.”
“I don’t understand,” said Dish.
“You’ve solved both our problems, young lady. My traitorous bitch of a wife is dead, and so is your organization’s traitorous Number One.” Feldman began walking wearily toward his jetty. “Take anything from the jetty or rooftop that might identify you. My jetty’s copjammed. We were never here and never intended to come.”
Dish and Flinch, both dazed, fell in behind Feldman.
“Shame about Timmy, though,” continued Feldman. “Just a kid. This racket is full of heartache. Don’t you agree?”
A few moments later, the threesome were flying back toward the city. On the way, Dish told and retold Flinch their cover story until she was sure he had it. Feldman agreed that it was a good story, and swore he’d never contradict it. All Flinch had to remember was that it was Primero—Primero, Flinch!—who had come to the Keep and taken Suzanne away in one of the Organization’s jetties.
Feldman dropped off Dish and Flinch halfway between their apartment buildings—but not before Dish could promise Feldman that the next time she saw him, she’d blow his goddam head off, which he accepted with aplomb.
Dish and Flinch walked down a backstreet together until they came to the road where they had to part.
“Thanks for your help tonight, Flinch. You’ve always been there for me. Since we were kids.”
“Well…”
“Sorry about almost getting you killed.”
“Sorry ‘bout Primero playin’ ya, Dish.”
Dish shrugged. “I’m a big girl.”
“Guess ya won’t get made now.”
Dish smiled. “I seriously doubt it, Flinchy.”
She shuddered. A cold rain had begun to drizzle.
“Hey Dish,” said Flinch, looking uncomfortable as he reached inside a trouser pocket. “Why don’t you have this?”
Dish looked down at what Flinch was offering her. It was Suzanne’s ring.
“Well, look at that,” she said, reaching for it and then holding it up to the light of the nearest streetlamp. “You know, they say diamonds are a girl’s best friend.” She put her arms through Flinch’s, which he accepted with minimal recoil. “But, of course, I’ve already got a best friend.”
Flinch smiled his wide smile.
“Lean down here a moment,” said Dish.
Flinch complied.
Raising one fabulously formed calf behind her, Dish leaned up and gently, ever so gently, kissed Flinch on the cheek.
Flinch grinned haltingly and leaned up rubbing his cheek.
Dish removed her arm from beneath his and began walking toward her digs. She held up the ring. It sparkled beneath a streetlamp.
“But who says you can’t have two best friends?” she said, putting the ring on her finger.
*** *** ***
Later, while Flinch was washing his cheek and hands with an antiseptic treatment, he thought how lucky he was to have a best friend like Dish.
Zephyr Dorsey 