A plum blush rises in young Loreal’s cheeks, and he huffily challenges me to fisticuffs in the nearest alley. The rest of us stare at him pitilessly.
“Someday you might be a star,” I say to Cleo, “but so far you’ve had exactly one hit single for a rinky-dink label. Whatever money you made is already spent on dope and wardrobe. Beyond the fact you’re not worth blackmailing, it’s significant to note that I’ve got nothing to blackmail you with. I can’t write a story alleging you stole your husband’s song without somebody else saying so. The paper wouldn’t print it—please tell me you’re not too fried to understand.”
The widow paws absently at her bangs. She seems cordially immune to insult. “Suppose you burn another copy of Jimmy’s solo version—that’d queer things up for me, it ever got out on the Net. What’s to stop you from shakin’ me down six months from now? Or a year?”
“Nothing,” I say, “except an intense distaste for cliches.”
Cleo puffs her cheeks and snorts. “Bottom line, all you want is the chick?”
“Correct.”
“What’s her name again?”
“Emma. And I want my portable computer, too.” I grab one of Jerry’s earlobe hoops and pull his grimacing mug close to mine. “The laptop doesn’t belong to me, Jer. It belongs to the Maggad-Feist Publishing Group, a publicly held company that is fiercely accountable to its shareholders.”
Loreal says, “Jesus, knock it off. We’ll buy you a brand-fucking-new Powerbook.”
Now the DJ has returned to the podium, and I feel the mother of all headaches taking hold. I release the bodyguard’s ear and lean my face across the table into a cloud of Cleo’s cigarette smoke. “Let’s get this over with.”
“I gotta pee.” And off she goes.
“So, when can we do it?” I ask Jerry.
“Not tonight,” he says. “That’s for damn sure.”
“Then when?”
He cuffs me sharply on the side of the head and says, “We’ll call you tomorrow, asswipe.”
“Yeah, we’ll be in touch,” says Loreal.
As I rise from the table the speakers in the rafters start pounding—a hideous house-mix version of “MacArthur Park.”
“You two should cut loose,” I advise Cleo’s boys. “Don’t wait for something slow and romantic. Just let it happen.”
27
Knock-knock. Emma opened the door. They snatched her.
Smooth and easy, it appears. The apartment is unlocked. Her purse is on the bed; on the kitchen table, car keys and a cold cup of espresso. For breakfast she had toast and a bowl of Special K.
Two in the morning, this isn’t the best place to be. If I stay much longer I’ll put a fist through the wall. Emma is gone and it’s my fault.
But somebody’s got to feed the cat, which cries and turns figure eights on the tile. I lift her into my arms, saying, “It’s all right, Debbie. She’ll be home soon.”
Staring at the damn telephone, just like in the old days.
I remember once waiting seven hours for a source of mine to call—Walter Dubb, the bus-fleet supplier who was helping me nail Commissioner Orrin Van Gelder for bribery.
Walter’s wife had gotten on his ass about making waves, so he was experiencing a crisis of faith. And so was I, because without Walter’s cooperation the feds had no case and I had no story. The day before the dinner at which Orrin Van Gelder was to be arrested by the undercover FBI man, Walter went deer hunting and failed to return in time for evening mass. His wife called up to rant. She said he must’ve got depressed and killed himself, and it was all because of me. She said he should’ve paid off the commissioner and kept his damn fool mouth shut.
Seized with dread, I sat glued to my desk from four that afternoon until eleven at night. My bladder was the size of Arkansas by the time Walter Dubb finally called. He’d killed a buck and skinned it out and then the pickup broke down in the woods and then a bear showed up and made off with the deer meat before Walter could get his rifle out of the rack—this was the tale he laid upon Mrs. Dubb, anyway. Whatever really happened that evening had put Walter in a highly contented frame of mind, and that’s all that mattered to me. I whooped and danced all the way to the John.