Rum Punch

“This’s the look,” Jackie said, “fluid and swingy.”

  “It’s okay on you. How much?”

  “Five fifty for the jacket . . .”

  “Christ.”

  “Two sixty-eight for the skirt.”

  “I guess you can afford it,” Melanie said, handing Jackie her shopping bag. “We could’ve worked this. You know that, don’t you? You would’ve made out a lot better than you’re going to, believe me.”

  Jackie pushed open the louvered door to a dressing room, went in with Melanie’s shopping bag, and came out with her own.

  “That’s the same one,” Melanie said, “the same towel? Are you putting me on or what?”

  Jackie’s hand went inside the bag, dug beneath the towels, and came out with a packet of hundred-dollar bills she held in Melanie’s face, letting her stare for a moment before shoving the money down in the bag again. Jackie didn’t say a word.

  Neither did Melanie. She took the bag and left.

  In the dressing room again with the door closed, Jackie transferred the five hundred thousand from her flight bag to the shopping bag Melanie had brought. Packed her uniform in the flight bag. Put on the nifty black silk. . . . She’d have to pass on the Zang Toi with the off-center slit; no time to try it on. Pay for the suit and the Isani separates, which she’d take with her. But ask to leave her flight bag at the cashier’s counter, pick it up later.

  Okay, then as she’s walking out say to Frieda, “Oh. Someone left a shopping bag in there. Looks like beach towels.” She exits. A minute or so later Max enters, he’s looking for a shopping bag his wife thinks she left in a dressing room. Beach towels in it.

  Once she was out on the floor in plain sight she would have to appear anxious, helpless, and run off looking for Nicolet, someone, to tell what happened. How Melanie, just a minute ago, barged into the fitting room, grabbed the money, and took off. Melanie, the one who shot the guy—Jackie sounding a little frantic by then. Nicolet would go into action, do whatever they did, and when he got back to her with or without Melanie there would be questions, all kinds, but none, Jackie believed, she couldn’t handle. The only real problem she saw down the road was Max.

  Melanie had come out of the fitting room and moved through racks of clothes heading for the aisle. She caught a glimpse of Louis still at the Michi Moon display. He saw her and she saw him cutting across the floor now past Dana Buchman to head her off. They met in the aisle at Donna Karan New York.

  “What’re you doing?”

  He said it with kind of a strung-out, spacy look that scared her for a moment.

  “I’m getting out of here. What do you think?”

  “Lemme have the bag.”

  “Fuck you. I can carry it.”

  She tried to push past him and he caught her by the arm to pull her around.

  “Goddamn it, gimme the bag.”

  “What’re you gonna do, hit me?”

  “If I have to.”

  He was ready, his fist cocked close to his shoulder. He grabbed the open edge of the bag and when she tried to pull it away, holding on to the loop handles, the bag started to tear open at the seam—not much, but enough that she let go saying, “Okay, okay, take it, Jesus, what’s wrong with you?”

  He said, “I’m carrying it.”

  She said, “All right. You’ve got it. What’d you think I was gonna do, run off with it?”

  He said, “If you had half a chance,” holding the bag in his arm now, all that money crushed against his cheap sport coat. He turned and walked off. She followed him down the down escalator staring at his hair, at his scalp beginning to show through at the crown; followed him off on the main floor past girls offering perfume samples and out into the mall. Louis stopped.

  Melanie said, “Remember where we came in?”

  He looked up at palm trees, at turquoise structural beams and the skylight ceiling way up there. He started off in the direction of Sears.

  Melanie said, “The other way, Louis,” and he stopped. “We came in through Burdine’s, remember? Where you do your shopping?”

  Louis didn’t say anything. He wasn’t strung out; maybe hung over. Definitely scared, Melanie decided, out of his element, the ex-con in a crowd of civilians he didn’t know or trust, holding the shopping bag against his body.

  She said, “Let’s try to act like we’re just plain folks, Louis. What do you say? Turn around. That’s it, now put one foot in front of the other and we’ll stroll down to Burdine’s. Pick up a snappy straw hat to go with your snappy jacket. Would you like that?”

  Max watched the fitting room from the Anne Klein display. He saw a woman who had to be Melanie, a lot of hair and a big can, duck in and come out again, gone, as he concentrated on the fitting room. The salesclerk went in, stayed a few minutes, and came out to the cashier’s counter with clothes over her arm. No sign of Jackie yet. The clerk was ringing up the sale now, folding the clothes in boxes, two of them, and slipping the boxes into a shopping bag. There she was, finally. Jackie in a neat, short-sleeved black suit. With her flight bag. She placed it on the floor behind the counter, came up, and began looking around then, going into her act: agitated, distracted as she spoke to the clerk, paid for the clothes with cash and took the shopping bag from the counter. Max had spotted a young woman earlier who seemed to be hanging around and could be working surveillance, but didn’t see her now; and none of the women shoppers poking through the racks would qualify for law enforcement. Jackie was walking away now, still looking around, anxious, the clerk saying something after her. Jackie kept going. Max watched her until she was out of sight down the aisle, heading for the mall. He waited. No one followed her. The salesclerk was alone now by the cashier’s counter.

  It was Max’s turn.

  Nineteen years dealing with people who took incredible risks. If he walked over to that counter he’d find out what it was like.

  After, he was to go home and wait for Jackie’s call. She’d come to the house or he’d meet her somewhere. Or he might not hear from her right away. Nicolet could be into it and she’d have to face him, tell her story, and stick to it. She said, “If you come through, I can handle it.” And after that they would sort of drift away, disappear.

  Apart or together. She didn’t say and he didn’t ask. And then what? She said, “Let’s see what happens.”

  The one thing Max was sure of, standing by Anne Klein designs, he was in love with her and wanted to be with her, and if he had to suspend his judgment to do it, he would, with his eyes wide open. If he saw she was using him . . . He didn’t think so, but if she was . . . Well, he would have to handle that, wouldn’t he?

  At the moment, walking away from Anne Klein toward the salesclerk at the cashier’s counter, he was changing his life for good.

  “You don’t want a snappy straw? Hey, a pair of jams. Or what about a Hawaiian shirt? Louis, look.”

  Driving him nuts.

  Melanie right behind him all the way through Burdine’s poking at his arm, telling him to look at hats, shirts, bathing suits. He pushed through the door and was outside, for a few moments with a sense of relief, facing the aisles of empty cars in late sunlight. Shit, but then he couldn’t remember where they’d parked. Melanie would pick up on it any second now. It wasn’t this aisle right in front of the entrance, it was two or three over, he was pretty sure. To the left. When they came in the mall Louis was thinking of why they were here, not memorizing where they’d parked. Come out the wrong door you were in trouble. People lost their cars at malls all the time. It was why they had security guys driving around in those white utility cars, GMC Jimmys, to help you out. He could wait for Melanie to walk off.

  But she didn’t, she was waiting for him. She said, “You have no idea where we parked, do you? Jesus, but if you two aren’t the biggest fuckups I’ve ever met in my life . . . How did you ever rob a bank? You come out and have to look for your car? You better give me the bag, Louis, before you lose it.”

  He didn’t say anything. r />
  “I’ll hold it and you go get the car.” She said, “No, that won’t work. You don’t know where it is.”

  He thought of hitting her.

  “Or I get the car,” Melanie said, running the words together, “we drive off, split the money, and each go our separate way. Fuck Ordell.”

  Punch her right in the mouth.

  She said, “Okay, come on. It’s this way, Lou-is. Here, give me your hand.”

  She stuck hers out, waiting. When he didn’t take it she walked off and he followed after her, over to the second aisle and then cut between cars to the next one. She walked along the parked cars a little way and stopped.

  “Is it in this aisle?”

  “Yeah, down the end.”

  “You sure?”

  He started off that way.

  She said, “Lou-is,” turned, and cut between cars to the next aisle.

  He followed her. Sometimes when he was living in South Beach and drinking a lot he’d forget where he parked and have to roam up and down the streets. He’d had a few pops this afternoon before he picked her up. Melanie stopped.

  She said, “Louis, I feel sorry for you, I really do.” She said, “You need somebody to take care of you,” and walked off swinging her can at him in that tight white tube skirt. She stopped, about to cut between the cars again, and turned to look at him.

  “Is it this aisle or the next one over?”

  He said, “This one,” not caring if it was or not. He wasn’t taking any more of this.

  She said, “You sure?”

  He said, “Don’t say anything else, okay? I’m telling you, keep your mouth shut.”

  She seemed surprised, but then got her smirky look back, was about to speak, and Louis put his hand up, quick.

  “I mean it. Don’t say one fucking word.”

  Melanie said, “Okay, Lou-is . . .”

  And told him he’d be walking around here all night looking for his car—got to say all that while he was reaching inside his jacket for the Beretta Ordell had given him. Once she saw it she shut up. Her face went blank. But then, Christ, she started talking again. Louis didn’t hear what she said because right then he shot her. Bam. And saw her bounce off one of the cars. Bam. Shot her again to make sure and because it felt good. And that was that. He went down the aisle to his Toyota, where he’d said it was, got in with the shopping bag, and drove back this way. Coming to Melanie’s tan legs sticking out from between the cars, Louis rolled his window down. He said to her, “Hey, look, I found it,” and got out of there. One of those white Jimmys was coming up the next aisle.

  Jackie hurried along the mall’s upper level, breathless for the benefit of surveillance. (In actual fact anxious to put it on Melanie. That change in the plan, Melanie for Simone, was working out better than she’d expected.) Jackie headed straight for Barnie’s Coffee & Tea Company on the edge of the café area, where Nicolet had hung out the time before.

  He wasn’t there.

  She came out and two mall security guys in their green blazers almost ran her down, both with hand radios, dodged around her, and kept going. Coming away from Macy’s she had noticed another security guy running toward Burdine’s.

  Jackie imagined Nicolet and his people, in contact by radio, were passing her along, telling one another: Standing in front of Barnie’s looking around. Moving into the table area now, she’s all yours. Ten four, over and out. Or whatever they said on police radios. Jackie still had her concerned look in place, a puzzled frown, when her gaze came to Sheronda with a tray from Stuff ’N Turkey and stopped.

  Sheronda’s eyes, above a large-size Coca Cola, watched as Jackie came over to the table and sat down, shoving her Macy’s bag underneath.

  “How’re you doing?”

  Sheronda put her Coke down and sat up straight, saying she was just fine. Jackie lit a cigarette.

  She said, “The last time we exchanged gifts, a woman came by after I left and you swapped with her?”

  “Simone,” Sheronda said. “Nice lady, say she was Ordell’s aunty. Yeah, she took the bag you put here and gave me the one she had.”

  “You know why we’re doing this?”

  “He say is like a game, you get surprises. Like the other time was nice underwear.”

  “The potholders are great,” Jackie said.

  “I didn’t know what to get.”

  “I needed them—thanks.”

  “Ordell say this time we all bringing the same thing?”

  “Towels,” Jackie said.

  Sheronda nodded. She smiled at Jackie watching her and lowered her eyes, innocent, no idea she was being used.

  “But, you might be surprised,” Jackie said and stubbed out her cigarette. “I have to go.”

  “Simone coming this time?”

  “I don’t know,” Jackie said, “maybe. Take your time. Have something else if you want, there’s no hurry.” She took Sheronda’s shopping bag from under the table and left.

  Max came out of Macy’s lower level to the mall’s center-court pools and palm trees and headed off toward Sears, where he was parked outside. He passed the entrance to Bloomingdale’s and came to the Gallery Renee.

  There she was, standing by the table with the busboy, Da-veed showing her something in a magazine. The busboy looked up, saw Max, and paused. He said something to Renee and she was looking this way now. Max shifted the Macy’s bag holding a half-million dollars to his right hand, away from the showroom window, and gave them a friendly wave as he passed. The busboy raised his hand, no finger, just a fist: a tough kid making out. Renee turned away.

  The woman had no imagination.

  A living mannequin stood posed in front of a ladies’ apparel shop: a young woman with blond hair in gray jeans, a sequined cowboy shirt, and white fringed boots. She seemed poised to run. Or the way her hands were raised, to fend off something coming at her; though she would never see it with that blank stare, head cocked slightly to one side. A little girl stopped to touch the mannequin’s fingers, touched, and pulled her hand back and ran to catch up to her mother.

  Jackie, coming away from the café area, had paused to watch, waiting for the living mannequin to move. There was something familiar about the girl. Jackie, with her shopping bag, walked up to her and said, “How long do you have to do this?”

  The girl didn’t answer, her gaze leveled at Jackie’s shoulder without expression, unblinking. For several moments Jackie stared at her with the feeling she was looking at herself. Blond hair and green eyes in a much younger version, but there she was, poised, ready to run or somehow defend herself. The one big difference, Jackie’s eyes were focused. She saw rough times ahead she would have to feel and talk her way through. Face Nicolet, there was no chance of avoiding that. Maybe see Ordell again, it was possible. And finally come to a decision about Max.

  That would be a tough one, because they were alike, she felt good with him and knew he was doing this for her, not the money. She saw it in his eyes when she brought him along with her own eyes and could tell he knew she was playing with him, so it was okay. And yet he was his own person, a very decent guy, even if he was a bail bondsman—and had to smile thinking that, wondering if she sounded like his arty little wife. He was tender and he was rough too, in a good way that left her sore after. She said to him, “I don’t think I can walk,” and he said, “Then come back to bed.” She would have to decide in the next day or so and she hadn’t been that good at picking guys. When she told him, “Let’s see what happens,” she meant it. She liked him a lot. Maybe loved him. But didn’t want to run off with him and learn too late it was a mistake. But how else did you find out? She needed to have the money in her hands to make an honest decision. And at the moment Max had it. She hoped.

  The living mannequin changed her pose: came around to stand with her back to Jackie, fringed boots planted wide, fists on her hips, head cocked to stare dull-eyed over her shoulder, defiant. Without moving her mouth she said, “Will you get out of here?”


  The poor girl trying to make a living. There were all kinds of ways. Jackie said, “You can do better than this,” and walked away.

  She didn’t get far.

  A guy with a hand radio was coming along the concourse toward her, noticeable in his suit among vacation outfits, casual wear. Jackie saw two more suits now and a young woman in a skirt and jacket carrying a shoulder bag, the suits spreading out as they approached, and now she saw Nicolet coming with a radio. Jackie waited.

  When he was close enough she said, “Try to find a cop when you need one,” and got ready for a rough time.

  23

  All Ordell wanted to know was, “Did you get it?”

  No, Louis had to tell him how he’s driving up to the apartment and sees two guys sitting in a car on Atlantic he’s sure are watching the building and thinks they saw him go by. So he kept going around the block and now he was at Casey’s, calling from there.

  Ordell believed having a few pops, too, for his nerves. He tried to be patient with the man, saying, “I felt they was watching me, Louis; that’s why I said to check. Now did you get it or didn’t you?”

  “I got it,” Louis said. “Listen, there’s something else I have to tell you.”

  “After I see the money,” Ordell said, and told Louis how they’d work it. He’d get in his Mercedes like he was going out for cigarettes or a six-pack, just in his shirt-sleeves, an old pair of pants. Drive up to Ocean Mall with the two guys following him. Park in back. Walk through Casey’s and Louis would be waiting in his car, in front. They’d go someplace. . . . Ordell said he’d think of where and let him know. He asked Louis, “You count the money?”

  Louis said he hadn’t even looked at it yet; it was still in the shopping bag.

  Ordell said, “Melanie must be dying to see it.”

  There was a silence on the line.

  Ordell said, “Louis?”

  “That’s what I want to talk to you about,” Louis said. “Melanie was giving me a hard time . . .”

  “Not now,” Ordell said. “I’ll meet you in five minutes. Have your motor running.”