Authors: Jane Price
She picked out her new furniture, television, sound system, the works. Rachel stayed within what she thought was reasonable and even on one occasion the man told her to go for the more expensive television because it was something that Jimmy would definitely approve. She looked at the price and saw that it was nearly $10,000. That was the kind of money that she had only seen in movies, but never in real life.
Everything after that went by in a blur for Rachel. Her apartment was remodeled the next day while she was at the gym and she noticed that everywhere she went she was followed by at least one man dressed in a suit. She couldn’t tell if it was Jimmy’s man or Steven’s, but the fact was she felt safe. Every night Jimmy would come over and he would bring with him dinner. It was always take-out from an expensive restaurant that Rachel didn’t know did take-out and they would lay together and talk.
At first Rachel was timid to pry too far into anything, but as the days progressed and they ran out of the mundane topics to talk about, she began to venture into his work and the things that Steven had been clear to try to find out about. Steven had the suspicion that Jimmy was funneling drugs into the city which was against the truce that Steven had heard about between the different gangs in town. He needed to know what he was working with to see if he had legal recourse to take Jimmy down or if another gang would do the job for him.
So, as Jimmy fed Rachel grapes, she decided to ask: “So, what is it you do, Jimmy?” Jimmy didn’t answer right away, but rather seemed to take his time with his answer. He hummed to himself as he thought and clicked his tongue. Rachel just stared at him in silence, waiting.
“The truth or what I tell others?” Jimmy looked at Rachel with a smile and laughed. Rachel laughed as well and went to answer, but Jimmy held up his finger to her lips. “You are my lady, you know you’ll always get the truth with me.” Jimmy removed his hand and stood up. He was wearing a white undershirt under his dress shirt and he undid the buttons on the shirt as he spoke. “I smuggle drugs. I work for a man by the name of Salvatore Alesso. You may have heard of him.” Jimmy began to pace the room as he undressed.
“You see, we were losing steam and we were losing control of some areas of the city. We decided to introduce drugs to get a little bit of our control back. However, once Sal saw the dangers of the drugs he wanted to stop. But they were already addicted and I already had the connections, so I’ve been doing it behind his back.” Jimmy pulled his undershirt off and revealed a crisscross of scars that lined his back.
“Sal found out and went to town on me, made me promise to quit.” Rachel gasped at the deep gashes. She now realized why he had been so insistent to keep his shirt on the first night they were together. Jimmy then held up his hand, revealing the partially missing thumb. “This was so that I wouldn’t forget the mistake that I had made.” He began to put his shirt back on and sat back down onto the bed with Rachel.
“So, now, I have other people run the drugs for me, but I make sure that I get a cut. He never said I couldn’t put the right people in connection with each other.” Rachel reached into the bag of fruit and grabbed out a few grapes and began feeding them to Jimmy who had laid back onto the bed, resting his head in her lap.
“I don’t regret a single thing that I’ve done. Because, in a weird way, this path set me up to meet you. That fateful day behind Scaletti’s bar. Crazy, huh?” Jimmy took the grapes from Rachel and began to feed himself. Just like that, the fear of that night came rushing back to her and she knew that her time with Jimmy was running short.
******
Rachel went through the rest of her week and played it cool the whole time. She appreciated Jimmy for what he did for her, she honestly did, but she was terrified with the kind of man that she had found herself intertwined with. So, when the day arrived, Rachel made her way to a small diner that Steven had given her directions to on the first day they met. She walked in the front door and found Steven right away.
His stubble had grown into a short beard by this point and there were circles under his eyes. He appeared to be working the candle on both ends and she was glad that she had some good news for him. She had not spent long with him, but she was quite taken in the short amount of time, she had to admit. Rachel knew that she was the kind of woman that fell in love fast and hard and this was no exception. She sat down in the booth across from him as Steven watched the door intently.
“Did you follow the directions like I asked?” Steven seemed pretty anxious and Rachel was happy that she could put his mind at ease. She reached out and placed her hand on his. He didn’t immediately pull away and she watched as tension obviously melted away slightly from his face.
“Yes, I followed them down to the letter.” She pulled her hand back and picked up the menu that was sitting on the table as the waitress came over to take their order. Rachel ordered herself a B.L.T. and Steven just ordered coffee. She was worried about him, but she knew that she had no place to tell him what to do. “So, I have some news for you. It’s just like you expected. He’s funneling drugs into the city, but he’s just getting the kickbacks from it, he doesn’t have any real position within the operation now.” Steven sat back in his seat as the waitress poured him a cup of coffee.
“Is this what he told you or is this what you saw?” Rachel thought about what he was implying and she answered truthfully, saying that it was only something she had been told and not actually had seen. “Interesting, well that’s good to know. I need you to follow up on it and see just how truthful he is being. People like Spagna will do and say anything to protect themselves.” Rachel nodded thoughtfully and the meal progressed with the two of them discussing where they had gone to college, where they grew up, and their hobbies. Rachel noticed that it was like a date, except for the fact that Steven continuously was looking around, searching for a familiar face that would compromise the whole operation.
Rachel was true to her word though and months passed where she slowly ingratiated herself into Jimmy’s operation. What had once just been him coming over to her apartment late at night quickly turned into dinners out on the town and meeting with other famous families. She was always ushered out of the rooms, but after a month or two of convincing Jimmy allowed her to sit in on a few meetings, both official and unofficial. The official meetings were nothing like she would have imagined. She grew up on crime dramas and gangster movies, but nowadays the gangs are more about social outreach than anything else. They had a secretary at each meeting that took notes and sent out the minutes to those that couldn’t go. It was all fairly pedestrian.
However, one night after going out for drinks, Rachel found herself in the passenger seat of an unofficial meeting where Jimmy was discussing drugs. She was no prude and had done a few drugs while in college, but nothing like the kind of thing Jimmy was pushing. In the one meeting alone Jimmy discussed heroin, cocaine, and three other kinds of illicit drugs. She was slightly tipsy at this point, but as soon as the conversation started her mind was crystal clear.
“Look, the cost doesn’t matter. Do it like they used to do back in the 80s.” Jimmy took a sip from his drink and looked around the room to make sure no one was listening in on their conversation. “Allow one of the new guys to get caught carrying a bit. The cops will think they’re doing their jobs and the family will see that it isn’t one of our guys doing the lifting.” The man across the table from the two of them leaned in.
“Alright, Jimmy, but he’ll have to get caught with some quality stuff, it’s not gonna be cheap.” Jimmy’s hand flew across the table and smacked the man. A few people turned to look, but Jimmy just laughed it out and continued to speak.
“What part of ‘the cost doesn’t matter’ don’t you understand?” He picked up his drink and handed it to the man who was holding his cheek tenderly. “Make it happen or I’ll handle it myself like last time, understand?” Rachel’s ears perked up at this. “Now go have some fun.” The man took the drink that was offered to him and he stood up from the table. Jimmy then raised his hand to flag down the passing waitress as Rachel turned to ask him a few questions.
“Babe, when was ‘last time,’ I thought you didn’t mess with that stuff anymore?” Jimmy coughed a few times awkwardly and laughed, patting Rachel on the shoulder.
“Don’t worry, doll. It wasn’t long ago but I was safe.” The waitress brought back his regular drink and sat it down in front of Jimmy. Instead of picking it up though he leaned towards Rachel and whispered in her ear. “And don’t ask so many questions. It’s not attractive.”
******
As soon as Rachel got home she ran to the corner of the room where her new desk and office were located and pulled out the phone that had been given to her by Steven. It was a similar situation to the one with Jimmy. Steven had made sure to give her a phone that he knew was clean and wouldn’t have been tampered with. Pulling out the phone she dialed his number, her hands shook the whole time. She held the phone up to her ear and listened to the ringing.
“Hey, what’s up? I was asleep.” The groggy voice of Steven greeted her, but she was too anxious to apologize for being late.
“He handled the drugs. Like, a week ago.” Rachel could hear Steven shifting and she could hear blankets and other things moving around in the background of the phone call. Steven coughed a few times to clear his throat.
“What did he say? Exactly. I need the details.” Rachel wracked her brain to remember what he had said exactly. She had been so eager to get home and tell him that she hadn’t really thought about being specific.
“I-I don’t remember exactly.” She shook her head, trying to remember, “he was talking to Edgar. He’s a part of the organization. Jimmy wanted him to let a few new guys get caught with drugs so that people looked the other direction.” Rachel could hear a pen scratching away in the background. She waited for Steven to say something, but almost immediately, her phone for Jimmy began to ring.
“What’s that ringing?” Steven asked. The scratching of the pen had stopped.
“It’s Jimmy. He never calls after he drops me off. I told him I was going right to bed.” Rachel reached over and picked up the phone off the desk. “Should I answer?” Steven told her to put it on speaker and to answer. So, placing both phones on speaker, she rested them on the desk. Before she could even say hello, Jimmy started speaking.
“Rachel. I thought you were going to sleep.” Rachel looked around the room, almost expecting to see him there waiting. “Who are you talking to, darling?” His voice was cold and unfeeling. She was so used to his voice being full of life.
“What are you talking abou-” she didn’t have to finish her thought before Jimmy broke through.
“Don’t you fucking dare lie to me, bitch. I made you. And I swear to god I will destroy you.” Jimmy’s voice echoed for a moment and the line clicked out. Rachel looked down at the phone and whispered into Steven’s phone.
“Help me. Please.”
******
Rachel wanted to run, but she didn’t know where to go. Everyone knew that she was Jimmy’s girl and she had no doubt that by this point people had already spread the word. Rachel was a rat trying to take Jimmy down. And if Jimmy went down there’s no saying he wouldn’t pull down everyone else too. There was too much on the line. So, she hunkered down in her room and waited for whoever could get to her first.
It felt like forever before she heard the knock on her door. The fact that there was a knock was a good sign. Jimmy had a key and he was a man on a mission, Steven was still polite through everything. She crawled towards the door and opened it slowly, peaking through the peephole to double check her guess was right. Steven opened the door the rest of the way and closed it behind him, fastening the deadbolt and looking through the peephole.
“I have agents stationed at the door to your apartment and a few men along the halls. We should be safe and we should be able to take him down before he even gets this far.” Steven walked around the house, pulling the blinds closed. He had his Colt .45 in one hand and ushered Rachel to the back of the room where he sat her down. “You’ll be safe, I promise.” Rachel couldn’t stop shaking but something about the confidence in his voice was comforting. She leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek.
“Thank you for coming. I don’t know what I would do without you, Steven.” Steven blushed slightly when a call came through over his walkie talkie.
“We’re in position, sir. ETA?” Steven listened intently and held down the talk button on his receiver.