The Big Scam (33 page)

“Hopefully.”

Kenyon offered his hand. “Nick, what Howard said…me, too.”

As the two men shook hands, Vanko looked up and saw Sheila talking to Abby, but watching him. She was wearing the green silk dress she had on the night at the hotel. He went over to her.

“Hi.”

Abby said, “This is where I wander away nonchalantly.” She walked over and sat down next to Jack Straker, who put his arm around her, and while he laughed at something Snow was saying, pulled her closer.

Without a word, Sheila took Vanko's hand. Hers was trembling slightly and she squeezed his to try to stop. “Why didn't you tell me why you had to leave last night?”

“You had enough going on. Which, rumor has it, turned out well.”

“Not that good. It hasn't been on the news yet, but there was a third victim. I spent most of the night with her parents. It's so sad.”

He squeezed her hand now. “How's the Lopez girl?”

“You can never be sure what's buried underneath, but all the signs were positive. She was unbelievably calm and focused, extremely strong-willed. He hadn't done anything to her.”

“Yet
…thanks to you. And how are you doing now?”

She thought back to Tolenka's cruel remark similar to those she had endured many times before. Maybe that's why she had zeroed in on him during the volunteer search. Maybe that's what she had recognized—his need to terrorize. “Better.”

“I'm sorry.”

“For what?”

“For thinking I knew what was best for you.” He stepped closer to her, his lips barely touching the side of her face. “I was just worried about you.”

She pulled her head back to look at him. Some mischief had returned to her eyes. “If that's a sincere apology, really sincere, you'll dance with me.”

“It's not that sincere.”

“Please.”

“It's been a long,
long
time.”

“For both of us. You're not going to try and tell me you've forgotten how?”

“Well, I am Greek. We do have two extra genes, one for tragedy and the other for dancing. Hopefully my feet won't get them confused.”

He led the way to the small dance floor. “Before you hear it from the front office,” she said, “I wanted to let you know I'm going back to the task force.”

He carefully put his arm around her. “A media star like you, I'm not surprised.”

“It is tough keeping a good obsessive-compulsive down.”

“Are you going back to your old apartment?”

“Yes I am, and you're going to help me move. How else can I be certain you'll know exactly where I live?”

“I know what you're trying to do, but it's Bureau policy that once someone is reevaluated as sane, I have to stop delivering pizzas.”

She put her cheek against his. “That's all right, I think I've found something else to be crazy about.”

He dug his fingers into her waist and gently pulled her closer.

 

Mike Parisi stared lazily through the thick shafts of afternoon sunlight slanting across Anthony Carrera's den, trying to avoid any immediate decision about the future. The easy money and respect of organized crime would be difficult for him to give up, but its bounty would always be complicated by men like Danny DeMiglia. Then there was the FBI to consider. Once they locked on to a target, their ingenuity seemed especially ominous to him. That they had eliminated someone like DeMiglia—a man far better built for the scheming demands of that life than he—presented a strong argument for Parisi's retirement. But in all likelihood, the worst of it was over, and everyone, with reassuring indifference, would now be able to get back to profiting from the venial sins of mankind.

The old don came in, and Parisi couldn't help but marvel at his resilience. The cane hardly seemed necessary, his veined hand balanced lightly on its ebony crook. He had put some weight back on, eliminating the spectral profile that just a week earlier had seemed so tentative. “You look terrific, Uncle Tony.”

“I feel good. You should feel good, too, no? You could have had a much worse week.” Even his speech was quicker and more enunciated.

“You're right, I have to consider my blessings. I could be in a cell with DeMiglia.”

“That particular cell is reserved for murderers.”

“I know, but still, I can't help thinking my luck with these other things of ours might be running out.”

“Of course you feel that way, you were in jail. It'll pass.”

“I don't know. The FBI ran circles around us. I can't help but feel that as soon as I come up on their list, I'll be gone.”

“You may be overestimating them. They tried to get to you through Manny, and it didn't happen. What they did with DeMiglia was impressive, but they would never have been able to do it without your involvement. Their success was possible only because you made DeMiglia vulnerable while protecting this family from him.”

“I was just trying to do what I could to help.”

“You did what had to be done, even though it was against your nature. That's who you are. That's the kind of person I need as an underboss.”

“Me? I appreciate your confidence, but if I've learned one thing from all of this, it's that there's too much of this business I don't understand.”

“That may have been true when this started, but you have learned a great deal. I am not a sentimental old man, I would not offer you this position strictly out of gratitude.”

“I am honored, but I came here to ask your blessing to leave the family. And now you offer me this.”

“Do you know why your regime is successful, even though you have men who are not the most talented? You maintain. DeMiglia murdered and look where that got us. But somehow through all the turmoil, you maintained. If you can bring that to the rest of our people, I think the FBI will find better ways to spend their time.” There was something playful in Carrera's tone that hinted he knew more about the motivations of the government agency than he was revealing. As Parisi tried to figure out what it was, Carrera said, “This is a lot. Go home, kiss my niece, and think about it. I don't need an answer today. You come Sunday for dinner, we'll talk some more then. In the meantime, I have a small gift for you to remember this little training exercise.” Carrera handed him a wrapped present.

“Training exercise” seemed an odd choice of words, but it brought a glint of amusement to Carrera's eyes. Once before he had referred to the problems with DeMiglia as instructional. Parisi opened the flat package with careful curiosity. It was a picture frame. Inside was the Dutch Schultz map.

“How? This was sent to the FBI lab just this morning.”

The don's only response was a sly smile.

Parisi tilted the frame against the strong sunlight. “There's no seam. This is a whole map. Where did you—” Carrera's smile remained patiently in place. “You planted it in the safe deposit box?”

“Sometimes tests have to be untraditional.”

“This was all a test?”

“Maybe not all.”

“Wait a minute. Half of the map we used was found by that agent in the FBI files.”

The old don shrugged modestly. “This is a funny business. Sometimes you have to make friends with the most unlikely people.”

Paul Lindsay was born in Chicago. After graduating from MacMurray College in 1968, he served a tour of duty in Vietnam as a Marine Corps infantry officer. He later joined the FBI and worked in the Detroit office for twenty years. He is the author of five other novels—
Freedom to Kill, Code Name: Gentkill, Witness to the Truth, The Führer's Reserve,
and
Traps.
He lives in Rye, New Hampshire.