Choice of Evil

side as she and Strega faced each other.

“So this is the girl who’s helping you, huh?” Strega said to me.

“This is the girl I told you about,” I said, not asking for her judgment, just telling her I’d delivered the goods, kept my promises.

“What’s your name?” Strega asked her.

“Nadine.”

“I’m Jina. And he’s mine,” she said, pointing at me like I was an unlicensed dog she was claiming from the pound.

“You’re welcome to him,” Nadine said. “I’m only here because—”

“Oh!” Strega said suddenly. “I see. You’re not into men at all, huh?”

“I’m a lesbian,” Nadine said proudly, folding her arms under her breasts.

Strega walked around Nadine like the bigger woman was a statue, not saying anything for a long minute. “Sit down,” she finally said, pointing at a chair.

Nadine sat back, crossed her legs, waiting. Strega perched herself on the ottoman that matched the chair, imitated the other woman’s gesture.

“Yours?” Strega asked her, holding the leather mask.

“Yes,” Nadine replied, eyes and voice steady.

“Oh, you like to spank, huh? What do you think?” she said, getting up. “You like to spank me?”

“I don’t know you,” Nadine said, like she was answering questions at a job interview.

“Ahhh. . . and I thought I had such a tempting ass too,” Strega said, bending forward and making a kissing sound at Nadine. “Get up,” she said suddenly.

Nadine did it, standing still and calm, taller than Strega.

“Take a better look, maybe you’ll change your mind,” Strega told her, turning her back on Nadine and walking away. Nadine followed her into the darkness.

They were gone long enough for me to smoke through a pair of cigarettes. Not chain-smoke either—plenty of time in between. I went somewhere else then, closing my eyes.

“You asleep, baby?”

Strega’s voice. I opened my eyes. She was alone.

“No,” I told her. “Where’s—?”

“Oh, she’s nice and safe. But she has to stay there. It’s not her business what you want to know, right?”

“Right.”

“I have to whisper,” she said, turning her back and dropping into my lap.

I didn’t say anything, waiting. When she finally settled herself, her voice was calm, like she was giving me the recipe for something.

“Gutterball ordered it, all right. You know how he got his name? He was a bowler, a pro bowler, when he was younger. Like calling some fat guy Tiny, I guess. Anyway, Corky was angling, and Gutterball wanted him off the count. Corky wasn’t made, so Gutterball didn’t need the okay, but he—Corky, I mean—he was with some Irish guys. Some bad Irish guys, you understand what I’m saying? So it had to look good.”

She slipped her hand inside my pants. Said, “Oh, not interested, huh?” then chuckled at her own pun before she went on: “You know what was the real slick part? Corky, he thought he was gonna do someone. I mean, that’s why he was there. At that gay rally. What they told him was, the mark’s gonna come strolling by. Behind him, like, understand? So Corky, he knows there’s gonna be a car there. The way I got it, they made a few passes, let Corky see them and everything. How it was supposed to go, Corky stands at the very back of the crowd, close to the sidewalk, get it? Then, when the mark comes down the sidewalk, the guys in the car, they tap the horn three times, real quick. Corky turns around, blasts him, and just keeps running into the car and off they go. The cover fire was supposed to protect Corky. A real slick plan.”

“You saying Gutterball wanted them all gone?”

“I don’t know. They weren’t his honchos or anything, but they were in his crew. The way I heard it, Wesley told him he was gonna get Corky, but. . .”

“Wesley?”

“Wesley,” she said softly. “Gutterball talked to him himself. Made the whole deal on the phone. You know how Wesley works.”

“Yeah. But how could Gutterball be sure it was—?”

“That’s what he said himself. You know what Wesley told him? New deal. Nothing up front. COD. How could Gutterball lose behind that?”

“But how would Wesley know Gutterball wanted—?”

“I don’t know. Gutterball didn’t know. He thought he was being set up. So he met with him and—”

“He met with Wesley?”

“That’s what he said. Oh, he didn’t see him—just a man, in the shadows. But whoever it was, he knew Gutterball’s business, knew what Corky was up to. . . everything.”

“Jesus.”

“Wesley—”

“It wasn’t Wesley.”

“Okay, baby. Sssshh. Whoever it was, all right? He said he was back in town, and he knew some people wouldn’t believe him. That’s why he was changing the deal. He didn’t ask for it all up front, like you’d expect. . . especially since that whole war started back then, when they wouldn’t pay him, remember? He said he’d prove who he was.”

“It stinks,” I said. “How’d Gutterball know he wasn’t talking to the law, for chrissakes?”

“He said he could tell. I don’t know what else to say. You’ve been around Wesley. No cop could ever. . . Wesley has his own. . . I don’t know what you’d call it. But it wasn’t a cop. And there damn sure was a killing.”

“More than one.”

“I know. Gutterball, he paid fast, I promise you. It’s Wesley’s style, right down to the end. No witnesses, right?”

“Yeah. But anyone could’ve—”

“Sure, honey. Whatever you say.”

“The other ones who died. . . the ones in the crowd. It was all for. . . nothing.”

“That’s Wesley too, baby boy.”

“He’d—”

“—do it just like that, and you know it. Wesley’d burn a building down to get one of the tenants. He did it before. And he couldn’t have known your girlfriend would be. . .”

“Gutterball, you think he’d talk to me?”

“Not in life. He’s not gonna talk, period. Even if they drop him for this, he’s never saying a word. You can always juice a jury or scam the parole board. But Wesley. . . Gutterball wouldn’t be safe, no matter where they put him. Anyway, it doesn’t look like that’s gonna happen. Gutterball, he’s golden now. Word is, Wesley’s working for him. You know what that means.”

“Sure. It means they’re a pack of retards.”

“Whatever you say. But they’re a scared pack of retards, that’s the truth.”

“It wasn’t Wesley,” I told her.

“Burke, I wasn’t there, okay?”

“I know. Thank you.”

“You know how to thank me.”

“Strega, not now. I. . .”

“Sssshhh,” she hissed.

“Where is she?” I asked her later.

“You ready to go? Is that what you’re saying?”