tragically awry, and so on. It could get fairly exotic.
Anyway, actual mob hits by any of Broker’s string rarely represented one Gotti going after another; that kind of action was kept in-house, soldier to soldier. When a guy like me was called in for a mob job, it was more likely one of those superficially straight business types getting removed. For non-payment, or tying off a crooked loose end, or whatever.
“Like this guy we’re here to do,” Jerry said. Way in the bag now. His speech was only slightly slurry, but his movements were strictly slow-motion. “He’s no mob guy. You know what he is? He’s a film director!”
“No kidding.”
“Yeah-they’re making some kind of Billy Jack rip-off. Some kind of biker movie where a good guy biker kills the shit out of bad guy bikers. This Boot Heel, it’s famous for bikers, you know.”
“I heard. But that was last month.”
“Yeah, but this isn’t real bikers, though they hired a few to do security on the set.” Jerry shrugged elaborately; it took some work. “So what does a movie director do to piss off the mob? But it must figure in somehow. Who knows?”
Mob money funded a lot of movies. And a low-budget biker flick could either be a cash cow, if it were successful, or a money laundry, if it flopped.
“So when does it go down?”
Hitting the director, I meant.
Jerry understood. “Not sure. Soon. But Nick, he doesn’t work like you, you know. He’s a real artist, and I don’t mean to put you down in any way, Quarry, you could take care of business just fine, it’s just…Nick doesn’t do straight, you know…” He made a pointing gun gesture, fairly steady for as blasted as he was.
“What does Nick do?”
He makes the kills look accidental.
“He makes accidents happen. Not vehicular, either, which is, you gotta say, relatively easy shit to pull off. No, I mean, he’s an artist…” Jerry leaned over and his bleary blue eyes widened behind the smudgy granny lenses, and he whispered, as if what we’d been discussing hadn’t already been taboo. “…he sets fires… he fixes balconies to give way…he packs overdoses into ’scription meds…he sends guys down icy stairways…he makes people drown… he even fed a farmer to a fuckin’ wheat thresher.”
“He is an artist. How’s the movie director gonna buy it? I hear film stock catches fire easy.”
Jerry shrugged. “Not my department. Nick and me, we’ll talk, later on-Nick takes a certain pride. Likes to share with his partner. But always after the fact.”
“Sounds like a sweetheart.”
“Great guy. Great guy. Don’t get me wrong, Quarry, I think you and me made a great team, too. Or woulda, if Broker had given us half a chance. But we didn’t have a chance to grow, to get to know each other, really.”
I knew Jerry, all right. He was a drunk and a talker. And it was a wonder he and Nick had lasted this long. As a team. And on Mother Earth. Nick would need to be an artist to survive working with this jackass.
“So is Nick staying here?” I asked, indicating our surroundings, knowing he wasn’t-he was at the Spur Motel.
“No,” he said. He laughed, for some unknown reason, and flecks of spit touched my cheek. I didn’t brush it away till he was focused on his next sip of Scotch. “Nick’s at the same motel as the mark. Handy, if you’re in the accident game.”
I shook my head slowly. “Man, I don’t think I’d have the stones. What are you doing at the Four Jacks? You aren’t staying here, right?”
His face fell. “Right. Nick…Nick’s got a rule.”
“Yeah?”
“He won’t let me stay any place that has a bar. He thinks I have a drinking problem.”
“I think you hold it just fine.”
“Thank you! Thank you!” His expression turned melancholy, the bleary eyes tearing up. “I mean, I have had to hear this shit forever. Every goddamn one of my wives, ’cept the new one, Wanda, has ragged and nagged and fragged me about my drinking. Can’t a guy fuckin’ relax in his own goddamn fuckin’ home?”
“Women can be such bitches.”
“Yes! Yes! And Nick can be such a bitch, too, for a man, let me tell you. Oh, I love the guy. Don’t misunderstand me. But never once, in all these years, has drinking caused me any trouble on the job. You know, I hardly drink at all on the job.”
“Well…aren’t you on the job right now?”
“Naw. I’m not even meeting up with Nick.”
“How do you mean?”
Jerry pawed the air. “He doesn’t want back-up out of me-just surveillance. Background stuff. Mark’s pattern and all. I write it all up. It was waiting for him in a manila folder in his mailbox at the motel when he checked in. That’s how we work it.”
I told you I got lucky.
“So that’s why you’re letting your hair down a little,” I said.
“Yeah. Damn straight. I thought I’d gamble some, maybe have a nice meal, maybe take in Jerry Vale and laugh my ass off at that square shit.”
That wouldn’t attract any attention.
“But now, Quarry…” He put a hand on his plump stomach and rubbed it, like he was trying to summon a genie. “…I don’t know…”
“Change of plans, Jerry?”
“Yeah-I think I better crash. I maybe put away a few too many of these…” He tapped his empty Scotch glass. “Tell you what-why don’t you drive me to my motel, and I’ll have a little nap, and we can get together later? Maybe around…ten-ish? There’s a blues club where the local girls go-they’re not USDA prime, maybe, but they know how to make a guy’s dick go boy howdy.”
“Sounds like a blast. Give me your keys and lead me to your car. What motel are you staying at again?”
Dusk had doused the little casino town purple, a nice shade for neon to glow against. Something cool was blowing in off the desert, but for a guy used to the Midwest, this lack of humidity was flat-out strange. Heat that didn’t feel hot. Nevada was another planet.
His car was a late-model red Mustang-what a brilliant surveillance guy this Jerry was. Who would ever spot a red Mustang? He and Nick had done forty jobs and lived this long? Unreal.
Anyway, the car was in the lot behind the Four Jacks, and Jerry fell asleep in the rider’s seat probably thirty seconds after he managed to fasten his seat belt. Driving north toward Vegas would have put us in Clark County and that meant big city cops maybe taking an interest. Jerry had half a tank of gas, so I drove south a good thirty miles, with the last gorgeous gasps of an orange desert sunset glowing off to my right, like a fire far away. Jerry was snoring.
By the time I pulled off the highway and took the dirt road to nowhere, darkness had fallen. Christ knew what kind of evil critters were out here. Lizards, snakes, coyotes. I decided not to take Jerry off exploring, risking the Mustang on sand, and instead to stay on the dirt strip. I stopped five miles or so off the highway. No lights of houses were visible, just stars and scrubby silhouettes of yucca and cactus against darkness diminished by a fingernail trimming of moon.
I hauled the slumbering Jerry out of the car and dragged him onto the dirt road and let him sleep there. I did crouch to take his wallet from his back jeans pocket and the wad of cash from in front. Otherwise, I didn’t disturb him. He lay sprawled, ripping the night with the z’s he was cutting, blissfully unaware of his circumstances, even the Mustang’s headlights not disturbing him.
When I drove the front right wheel over his head, vehicle barely moving, the crunch made an unsettling sound in the stillness. The back right wheel rolling over him made only the slightest bump and no discernible sound at all. The bad part was I had nowhere to turn around, and had to back up the whole five miles. Had somebody swung down that road, I might have had a problem.
But like I said, I got lucky.
