Jezebel (38 page)

Shane reached up and gripped
his coach’s forearm. “Thanks for everything, old man.”

Overcome
with emotion, Ollie’s head dipped and his shoulders shook. “I’m
so damn proud of you, kid. You proved all of em wrong.”

“
Come on, Ollie, don’t
cry,” Shane sniffed, blinking back tears. He would have been
made of stone not to react. “You should be celebrating, not
crying like an old woman.”

Ollie stepped back, wiping
away tears with a sleeve. “These are tears of happiness,”
he sniffed. He even attempted a smile.

“
That’s
better. Now get out of here.” He jerked his head toward the
door. “I wanna be alone with my wife.”

Shane
yanked her into his side and kissed a hot path along her jaw and down
her throat.

“
We’re not going
to do this here are we?” Celeste tilted her head back, giving
him a better vantage point as he buried his head in her cleavage.

“
I’m
the champ. And I can do whatever I want,” he murmured, while
drawing aside the ruffle covering the swell of her breasts.

“
The champ!”

Irritated by the
interruption, Shane growled. “No one is allowed in…”
Shane pushed away from the table. “Mr. Ferruci.”

Ferruci stepped forward hand
outstretched. “I gotta tell you, kid, you gave me a real
fright out there.”

“
It was close.”
Shane laughed nervously as he shook the other man’s hand. He
hoped Ferruci would have enough tact not to discuss business in front
of mixed company.

As if reading his mind, the
promoter’s gaze alighted on Celeste. “Well, well, well
long time no see.”

Shane looked from Ferruci to
Celeste and then back again. “You two know each other,”
he bit out, unable to keep his jealousy at bay.

“
We met before.”
That was all Ferruci would supply. The bastard even had the nerve to
tweak his tie.

Luckily for him, Celeste
filled in the holes. “We met at the weigh-in yesterday.”

“
Yeah,
I kept her company while she was waiting for you,” Ferruci
recalled, as if suddenly regaining his memory. With a sly grin, he
wagged his finger at Celeste. “Why didn’t you tell me it
was Brennan you were waiting on?”

“
Would it have
prevented you from flirting with me?” Celeste murmured.

A muscle in Shane’s
jaw worked frantically and he clenched his fists. Testosterone warred
with common sense. The only thing that prevented him from flattening
Ferruci was the fact that Celeste had obviously rebuffed him.

“
Well, that bout was
too close for comfort,” Ferruci said, changing the subject.

Shane shrugged the tension
from his shoulder. “I upheld my side of things. I got the
title.”

“
Indeed you did.”
Ferruci chuckled. “That’s why I wanted to offer you a
lift.”

“
That won’t be
necessary.” Celeste spoke up before Shane could do the honors.
“We can grab a cab.”

“
The
new, light heavyweight champion of the world taking a cab after his
own title fight,” Ferruci balked. “It just isn’t
heard of. Come on, I insist you let me drop you two off anywhere you
want to go.”

This time it wasn’t a
request. For some reason, Ferruci wasn’t ready to cut ties.

“
Okay,” Shane
acquiesced, but then felt like a jerk when Celeste stiffened. Before
she could pull away, he kissed her cheek as a way to make amends.

Ferruci clapped his hands
together as if sealing some kind of deal. Shane bit the inside of
his lip. The sooner he washed his hands of him, this world, this
business, New York City the better.

“
I’ll wait for
you outside so you can clean up.” Ferruci held out his arm to
Celeste. “Want to come with? I’d hate for Sugar Shane to
corrupt your sensibilities.”

“
Too
late for that, but I’ll come just the same,” Shane said
while taking his time relinquishing his wife to the other man.

“
She’s in safe
hands,” Ferruci reassured him. “Now that I know to whom
she belongs.”

Not trusting Ferruci as far
as he could throw him, Shane showered and changed in record time. He
gathered up his belongings and met Ferruci and Celeste in the tunnel.
In the process of rolling a cigarette, Ferruci pointed toward the
exit.

“
I have a few cars out
back,” he mumbled as he licked and rolled. “After I drop
you two off, me and the boys plan to celebrate.”

Then why delay the party
with a chauffeur service? Shane wondered.

Not liking what they were
walking into, Shane grabbed Celeste’s hand. If anything went
down he’d protect her ‘til his dying breath.

Ferruci rolled in style.
Three late model Cadillac sedans, with their motors still running,
lined the alleyway.

“
I’m in the
middle one.”

Shane escorted her around

“
There
he is that Judas.” Abraham Gould stepped out of the shadows,
the usual two goons in tow. “I got a beef with you, Shane
Brennan.

“
Abraham,”
Ferruci drawled, his tongue lingering on ‘ham’, “Funny
you should show up. You and I need to talk.”

“
A-about what?”
Gould licked his lips and Shane could sense the other man’s
fear. He couldn’t blame him. Ferruci had connections in the
Syndicate, one of the biggest organized crime operations in the
tri-city area.

While Gould looked ready to
soil his pants, Ferruci was cool as a cucumber, as he pulled out a
lighter and lit his cigarette. “You enjoy the fight?”

“
Ruined me.”
Gould sneered.

“
That’s what
happens when we get too greedy.”

Gould’s gaze narrowed
and his cheeks turned bright red. Shane could practically see the
wheels turning in his head, putting two and two together. “What’s
this? You two in bed together?”

“
I hear that you tried
to fix my card. Is it true?” Ferruci asked, completely ignoring
Gould’s accusations.

“
I–I–I
have no idea what you’re talking about, Mr. Ferruci.”

“
Oh,
I think you do.” Ferruci dragged on his cigarette and then
exhaled. “At first I didn’t think you had enough balls
to get the jump
on me, but then I had a run in with an ole friend of mine, Burt
Lowenstein. You know him don’t you? He runs the numbers down
at the Lox N’ Bagel off Canal. Great cream cheese by the way.”
Ferruci took another drag. “Well ole Burt said you put fifty
thousand on tonight’s fight. That’s pretty big bait for a
minnow like you.”

“
Lowenstein can barely
count change.”

Ferruci yanked the cigarette
out of his mouth and threw it on the ground. “Did you try to
undercut me in my own house?” he bellowed.

Gould wasn’t the only
one who jumped. Worried, Shane pulled Celeste against him. She
immediately wrapped her arms around his waist.

“
Let’s get out
of here,” she whispered. Even in the dim light cast by a sole
light fixture above the back entrance he could see tear swimming in
her dark eyes.

“
We can’t, not
yet.” Following through with the terms of their agreement,
Ferruci had set this all up for show so there would be no doubts as
to if and when they’d been met.

“
It wasn’t like
that…I–I swear.”

As if on cue, the Cadillac
doors popped open. Four men from each car stepped out then drifted
toward their party. “What are you going to do?” Gould and
his men found themselves surrounded by Ferruci’s men.

“
Put you out of
business.”

“
Out of the boxing
business?”

Ferruci
didn’t answer him. He snapped his fingers, and his men jumped
to, surrounding Gould and his cohorts.

“
What are you going to
do to him?” Celeste asked.

Ferruci
glanced over his shoulder. His expression chilled her to the bone.
“We’re just going to talk, sweetie. Convince him to leave
town…permanently.”

Hearing
the promoter’s intentions, Gould struggled with Ferruci’s
men and failed. They dragged him and his goons like paper dolls up to
the lead car.

In a last ditch effort, he
slammed his feet against the car’s running board, and then
twisted around.

“
Schmucks!
The lot of you,” Gould yelled, spit flying in all directions.

His gaze locked on Celeste
and he smiled. “He ain’t clean, Toots. Did lover boy tell
you he was there…did he tell you he was there when I popped
your old man, the good Reverend?”

“
Get him in the
fucking car!” Ferruci commanded.

But the damage had been
done. Shane allowed her to pull away from him. She staggered a few
steps, her shoulder pressed against the brick wall for support.

Feeling his entire world
slipping away from him, Shane followed. “Celeste, please let me
explain.” he implored.

Shoulders
slumped, she turned toward the wall “You can try, she said, her
voice trembling as she pressed her forehead against the bricks.
Shane’s heart constricted so painfully he thought it would
burst.

“
I-I used to hang at
your father’s place at night. Helped him close shop more times
than not. I was in the back alley throwing out the trash when Gould
and his goons came in. There was a commotion and then I heard a
gunshot.”

Burdened
with guilt, Shane leaned against the wall. “I came out to
investigate. “T-they threatened to blow my head off, but then
one of them recognized who I was and they forced me into tonight’s
fight. I was supposed to take a fall. They end up with a windfall.
Everything was planned.”

“
Why did he do it?”

“
According to Gould,
your father refused to play by his rules. The Reverend refused his
protection and it snowballed to the rest of the merchants on the
block.”

“
S–s–so
all this time you knew what happened to my father. And you didn’t
report it or tell me.” With each syllable, her voice swelled
and grew an octave

Shane reached for her. She
spun away at the last minute, eluding him. “Don’t touch
me,” she snarled. Her expression as she looked from his hand to
his face made him flinch. He dropped his hand.

“
Don’t ever
touch me again.” She pulled at the gold band encircling her
finger and his chest grew tight like someone fisted his heart.

“
Don’t do this.
I was only making things right.”

“
More like making
things better for you. You got a title and my father a headstone. Oh
and you got a little ass thrown in as well.”

She punted his ring at him.
It bounced off his chest, dribbled between his feet and then fell
flat. Heavy hearted, he squatted to pick it up before it could become
tarnished. When he straightened, she was gone.

Shane blinked at the band of
gold in his palm. Could things get any worse?

“
Ensign Shane
McAllister.”

Shane
turned around. He eyed the master-at-arm badges attached to their
Navy uniforms.

He’d spoken to soon.

CHAPTER
TWENTY NINE

Portsmouth
Naval Prison
July
1942

“
Brennan,
the doc’s ready to process you.”

Shane set the letter he was
drafting aside, while the guard unlocked his cell.

“
Break a leg.”

Shane smiled at his cell
mate, Gustaf Petersson. Assigned to the top bunk, the Gunner’s
mate was curled up with an issue of Readers Digest in his hands.
Despite a three year stint in the can for burglary, the man was the
most well-read man Shane had ever met.

“
I need all the luck
you can send my way. I’m itching to get out of here and get my
hands on some Nazis.”

Shane left his cell behind
and followed the guard upstairs to the medics. By the end of the
week, he would kiss the brig goodbye. And none too soon. After
serving twenty four months for desertion, the place made him feel
like a caged animal.

“
Writing another
letter?” the guard asked. He straightened one arm in the air,
“return to sender,” he said as if reading it from a
theatre marquee. “Why do you keep sending that dame letters?”

“
It’s my way of
keeping up with her.”

The guard stopped and looked
at him as if he’d grown horns. “How can you keep up with
someone if she keeps sending ‘em back? Most foolish thing I’ve
ever heard.”

“
Every time she moves,
she has her letters forwarded to her new address,” Shane
explained.

“
After I survive this
war, I’m going after her.”

The guard crossed his arms.
“Oh yeah, where are you going to start looking?”