The Good Guys Read online

  They played the game, telling him what he already knew. Then they asked him if he knew Anthony Cosentino. Anthony? They sounded like a talking newspaper story. Mr. Anthony Cosentino. He couldn’t help but smile. “You know how it is, maybe I met him once or twice to shake hands. Seems like a nice enough guy. We got some friends in common, that’s all.” This was total bullshit and he knew it and they knew it. So he asked them, “What game we playing here?”

  O’Brien made a joke out of it, responding, “Clue, it looks like to me. You know, Uncle Tony’s in the basement with a hammer.”

  A regular fucking comedian, Bobby thought. Don fucking Rickles. Then the agent asked if he knew Skinny Al. Alphonse D’Angelo. Bobby decided to throw him a bone. “Sure, who didn’t know him?” he lied. “Everybody knew that fat slob. Even the mayor, Koch, he knew him from when he was a councilman, I’ll bet.” That’ll get them running to the grand jury. Mayor Koch friendly with a wiseguy? Whoa, stop the presses. Bobby chuckled to himself. This whole thing was actually sort of amusing. On a day like today he needed it.

  The girl agent was talking now. He looked her over again. Okay, he noticed, that Simon was right, she was nice-looking. She had some style too. She was wearing just the right amount of makeup; when you looked at her, you didn’t notice right away that she was wearing makeup. Perfect.

  And then her words ripped through him. “What do you know about the murder of Pamela Fox?”

  Jesus fucking Christ. Keep walking, he ordered himself, just keep moving. Don’t stop. Don’t let them know nothing. Prick bastards. How the fuck did they find out about it so quickly? Keep walking, don’t look at them. That Gradinsky bullshit, it wasn’t about that at all.

  And then, suddenly, he decided to confront them. They didn’t have the right to come to him about this. This wasn’t their fucking business. He stopped and whirled to face them. “Fuck you,” he spit at them. “Who the fuck do you think you are, talking to me like that?” His anger was growing. He balled his hands into fists, digging his fingernails into his palms, his old way of making sure he didn’t hit the wrong person. Maintaining control. A couple of people walking past stopped, then got out of there as fast as they could. Bobby pointed a warning finger at O’Brien, then practically screamed, “I don’t care who the fuck you are. Come near me again, I swear to God you’re gonna be real unhappy. Now, you got any more questions, you call my fucking lawyer.”

  Then he walked right between them, right between the two of them, like a defensive lineman going through the line after the quarterback, practically shoving both of them off to the side. Who the fuck did they think they were?

  What the fuck was he doing talking to them in the first place? That was the mistake. That was what happens when you try to be a nice guy. They fuck you over. The fucking agent was yelling something at his back. A Russian name, Vasily someshit. At that moment Bobby didn’t give a flying fuck about anything the FBI had to say to him. Only when he heard the agent call the guy “a real lady killer” did he get the message.

  That was a lot more information than necessary to ask that question. Bobby stopped and spun halfway around. “What’d you say?” They couldn’t intentionally be telling him what they were telling him. Not the Fucking Bunch of Idiots.

  The guy was blabbing. “I asked if you knew this Russian guy, Vasily Kuznetzov. Maybe I can refresh your memory. He runs this bootleg fuel business out of a gas station on Brighton Beach Boulevard—1405, I think it is.” They walked toward him. The guy had a real shit-eating grin on his face. He was talking to his partner but looking directly at Bobby. “That’s it, right, partner—1405 Brighton Beach Boulevard?”

  That was the right address, she said. Bobby just stood there, stunned into silence. They were actually giving up Pam’s killer to him. He didn’t have the slightest doubt about that. Holy fucking shit, this was an amazing thing. The FBI giving up a killer to the family. Somebody dig up Ripley, ’cause no one was gonna believe this one. 1405 Brighton Beach Boulevard. A gas station. Easy to remember. “There’s a room hidden in the back. You have to go through the men’s room to get there? Doesn’t ring any bells, huh?”

  They were giving him the road map. Telling him everything. Who would have figured? The FBI asking for help from him. Basically asking him to do the heavyweight work. He couldn’t help smiling at that thought. The world gets pretty strange sometimes.

  The guy continued talking, pretending he was talking to the girl but looking right at Bobby. “And doesn’t he have this psycho partner works there too, Russo? Ivan something?”

  The meaning of that was pretty obvious. They were warning him to watch out for the little fucker. The broad-shouldered guy. Even at the funeral the guy looked like a walking problem.

  There was no question about what these feds were doing; the real question was, why were they doing it? The female agent, Russo, was still talking about the crazy guy, Chernanko. Shit, they were all crazy, those Russians; that one was just a little crazier than the rest of them. “. . . always fighting with Skinny Al at the meetings between Tony Cosentino and the Russians,” she was saying. “The one who swore he was going to kill him someday?”

  Kill him? Holy Mother. Bobby relaxed his fists. For just an instant his mind flashed back on the funeral. It was like he was standing right there again, a few feet away, watching the two Russians kissing Tony Cosentino. And the Hammer, the motherfucking Hammer, was laughing along with them. So they were the producers, he thought. They had made the funeral possible—by killing the featured guest. These thoughts were racing through his head at lightning-bolt speed. And then he settled on the one that mattered: Did Cosentino know?

  Jesus.

  He looked at the girl and saw the cold determination in her eyes. She knew exactly what she was doing. She was pushing him to kill the Russians. Both of them, her and her partner, they were putting the gun in his hand. Why? What was in it for them? If they had all this information, they probably had enough to make their bones in the bureau. This was stuff for the front page of the Daily News. The bureau loved this stuff as much as the reporters, they loved the publicity. And this situation? Pretty much your average Joe Citizen liked the Mafia, but there was nobody who liked the Russian mob. Not even the Russians. They were the enemy, the commies. So why didn’t the bureau take them down themselves? Pam maybe? Getting even for Pam? Was it possible the FBI had a heart? That they wanted to do the right thing? That thought made him smile. Not in this lifetime. But nothing else made sense.

  The guy came a few steps closer and said, “I think that’s what Professor Gradinsky said when we spoke to him last night. Remember? Was that before or after he told us that they were meeting there tonight?”

  The professor? They had the professor? If they expected that to have an impact on him, they were going to be real disappointed. At that moment the professor was maybe the last person in the world that he cared about. He was going to find Gradinsky for Cosentino? That story was very old news.

  The fact that the big meeting was being held that night wasn’t much of a surprise either. It was pretty obvious that was the reason Cosentino was pushing so hard to find him. He needed him before this meeting. It was almost funny. None of that mattered anymore, none of it. Finding the professor, the million-dollar deals, none of it. By the time he got done tonight, it would all be a sad memory.

  He had all the information he needed. Whatever their reasons, the FBI had given him the name of Pam’s killer and told him where to find him. Game over. Dealing with these agents was complicated. He owed them big-time. Maybe he should be thankful: Without their assistance he wouldn’t be walking into a potential bloodbath. He wouldn’t be putting his own life up for grabs. Fine, he thought, I’ll buy them a table at the annual Mafia Dinner Dance.

  It had been a long time since he’d slept. Seemed like a couple of years, at least. He took off his hat and brushed back his hair. He closed his eyes and for a split second he almost fell asleep on his feet. His head dropped forward but he quick
ly jerked it back. Then he put his hat back on, adjusted it to a jaunty angle, and walked away.

  Fuck ’em, he thought.

  A fender bender on the Belt Parkway had cost them a few minutes, but Bobby wasn’t in a big hurry. There was no possible way the meeting with Cosentino was going to start before ten o’clock and probably it was going to be much later than that. Dinner first, always. He used the time on the road to explain the situation to Little Eddie. When he started telling him about Pam, he couldn’t help it, his eyes teared up. As he had anticipated, Eddie didn’t say too much in response, mostly a few “bastards” and “motherfuckers.”

  Eddie ignored Bobby’s tears. They never happened. Talking about personal problems always made him uncomfortable. He much preferred situations that could be handled with a baseball bat, or in the extreme, with Myrtle and her friends. He was curious, though, wondering what they had done to Bobby’s girl. He figured Bobby probably wanted to know too, almost as much as he didn’t want to know.

  Bobby drove past the gas station three times to check it out. The first time he went by the place Eddie said in surprise, “Gees, look at that, willya?”

  Bobby glanced at the gas station but saw nothing unusual. “What? What?”

  “High-test’s only a dollar five. That’s pretty fucking cheap.”

  Bobby ignored him. After the third drive-by he turned the corner and parked as far as possible from the streetlights. They were too far from the station to be noticed but close enough to watch the place. They sat there and they watched. It was impossible to see what was going on inside, but out in front a steady stream of customers took advantage of the low price. Bobby counted two attendants. A little after eight o’clock the outside lights were turned off. A couple of minutes later most of the lights in the office also went out. And a few minutes after that one of the attendants, an old-looking guy, came out of the office, got in a beat-up Chevy, and drove away. “He didn’t lock it,” Eddie noted.

  “The other guy’s still inside,” Bobby pointed out. While they waited, Bobby checked out the entire area, watching for guards, cops, cameras, surveillance, or security of any kind. If it was there, he couldn’t find it.

  “How long?” Eddie asked. He affectionately patted his stomach. “You know, I gotta feed this thing every few hours.”

  Bobby couldn’t help laughing. Little Eddie definitely had his priorities in order: friendship, food, then killing. In that order. Friendship first, always. Bobby didn’t like to eat when he was in this kind of waiting situation. If he ate, he wanted something to drink. If he had something to drink, he was going to have to take a piss. If he had to take a piss, he either went into a soda bottle or had to get out of the car. If he took a piss in a bottle, he had to carry it away with him or leave it at the scene for the cops. Since he didn’t like pissing in a bottle and he didn’t want to get out of the car and give up his stakeout, he didn’t eat.

  Eddie was different. Eddie had cast-iron kidneys. He could drink a six-pack and pee next week. He was amazing. So Bobby was about to suggest that Eddie walk over to a deli they’d passed about a block away when the charcoal Firebird stopped at a traffic light almost directly in front of them. “Look at that,” he said urgently, “look, look.”

  It was impossible to see who was in the car. The light changed and the Firebird went about thirty yards, then made a right turn into the gas station. It disappeared around the back. Bobby and Eddie watched and waited, but whoever was inside never reappeared. Bobby assumed whoever it was went through the bathroom into the secret hidden special room.

  They waited in the car until Eddie’s stomach growled. “Hey, don’t blame me,” he said, holding up his hands. “It speaks for itself.”

  “All right,” Bobby said. He reached across the front seat and opened the glove compartment. Eddie had to push back in the passenger seat to give him stomach clearance. Bobby shoveled everything out of the box and onto the floor, then pulled open the false back. He took hold of the gun that was hidden there, then checked it to make certain it was loaded. “Ready?”

  Little Eddie nodded toward the gun. “You got a silencer for that?”

  Most people don’t know it, but it’s considerably more difficult to get a silencer for a gun than to get the gun. A lot of people improvise. If you know what you’re doing, for example, it’s possible to make a functional silencer from a plastic soda bottle. Or a cushion or a pillow. Bobby shook his head. “I didn’t have enough time.” He thought about it. “Maybe there’s something in the trunk.”

  Once again he reached across the seat, this time pressing a button and popping open the trunk. As Eddie checked Myrtle, Bobby dug into the trunk. He was smiling when he got back in the car.

  “What the fuck is that?” Eddie asked.

  “What’s it look like?” Bobby said. “It’s the last one of those Cabbage Patch Kids I had, ’member?” He read the name on the “birth certificate.” “This is Penny Nichols.” He held up the doll. “Penny, say hello to your Uncle Eddie.”

  “Great,” Eddie said, “fucking Looney Tunes. Now, what are you gonna do with that thing? Ask them to babysit?”

  “Watch.” Bobby carried a penknife on his key chain. He stuck the knife into the doll between its legs and cut it open. Then he reached in and pulled out some of the rag stuffing. Almost immediately the strong scent of turpentine filled the car.

  “Open the fucking window,” Eddie ordered. “That stuff stinks.”

  Bobby opened his window. “These is counterfeit, I guess.” He tossed the rags out the window. Then he took his gun and twisted its barrel into the hole he’d dug. He waved the gun through the air and the Cabbage Patch Kid appeared to dance on it. “This’ll work,” he said, pleased.

  Little Eddie started getting out of the car. “Yeah, the smell alone’ll kill them.”

  Bobby took the ignition key off his key chain and put it on the floor, under the mat. If they had to get out of there quickly, he didn’t want to waste time fumbling with his keys trying to find it. For the same reason, he didn’t lock the car.

  The gas station was in the middle of the block. The stores on either side of it were closed. Bobby and Eddie stayed on the far side of the street and walked down the entire block. Bobby’s gun was in his coat pocket, the doll stuck headfirst into the other pocket, its legs sticking up in the air. Myrtle was concealed under Eddie’s unzipped jacket. There was some traffic on that portion of Brighton Beach Boulevard, but few pedestrians. They passed a woman walking two dogs and a young couple holding hands and giggling. They looked across the street at the gas station. They didn’t see anybody moving around at all.

  At the far end of the block they crossed the street and turned right, walking back toward the gas station. The men’s room was on its left, the side closest to them as they approached.

  “Let’s do it,” Bobby said, and they walked purposefully, side by side, toward the station. They ducked behind the pumps, where they could not be seen from the office. Once they were safely in the shadows, Bobby took out his gun and Penny Nichols, then twisted the barrel of the gun between the doll’s legs. Eddie took out Myrtle, checking to make sure the safety was off. And then the two men went to work.

  Bobby led the way toward the office. At times like this you never know what to expect, so you expect everything. All of your senses are primed; you hear every sound, see the slightest movement; some people claim you can even smell your adrenaline pumping. The important thing is not to hesitate. To move with confidence. To keep going forward.

  The office was empty. The room was dimly lit by a low-wattage bulb in a gooseneck lamp on the desk. They didn’t bother trying the door, assuming there was some kind of bell or buzzer system. They moved past the garage doors. Somewhat surprisingly, all of the single-pane rectangular windows were covered with sheets of white paper. Somebody obviously did not want people to know what was going on inside the garage. Scribbled in black marker on one of these white sheets was the notice “Lifts Broken. No Repairs.”


  But as they moved past the last window, Bobby saw that the paper covering it had flopped back. It was being held in place by a piece of tape on the bottom corner, allowing him to see inside. The lights were on. It was a typically drab auto mechanics work area. There were two old-fashioned hydraulic lifts, the type with two parallel long metal skids to support a car. The two ramps of the lift on the left were lying flat on the cement floor, but the lift on the right was holding a car about four feet in the air. Chest-high. It did not appear to be broken, just shut down for the night with the car left raised in position. Although Bobby’s field of vision was limited, he scanned as much of the garage as possible. And that’s when it caught his attention.

  There was a wooden workbench against the back wall. Scattered on the bench top were well-used tools, grease-covered auto parts, filthy rags, and a telephone. Stored on the lower shelf were more tools, more parts, and more filthy rags. And one other thing. Bundled into a ball, just another rag, and shoved into a corner was something bright powder blue. Whatever it was, its color stood out against the drab work materials like carousel horses in the desert. The color was unmistakable: It was the corporate blue used by Pan Am, as recognizable as Coca-Cola’s red or Camel’s camel. In fact, it was the precise color of a stewardess’s uniform.

  Bobby put a restraining hand on Eddie’s stomach and whispered, “I gotta check something.” He backtracked to the office door. Very slowly he pushed it open a few inches, waiting to hear an alarm. Nothing. He pushed it open a few more inches, then slipped inside. Holding the door still, he reached up and grasped the cluster of bells hanging on the back of the door. The alarm system. Holding them tightly in his hand, he opened the door and let Eddie inside. A large, noisy space heater warmed the office, indicating the attendant would be returning. Bobby pointed to the door, silently telling Eddie to stand guard. Eddie nodded. He stepped into the protection of the shadows and stood there, Myrtle warm against his chest.