She said he wasn’t there. Delsa asked if she knew where he was and Connie said, “Who knows where that shitbird is. What’d he do now?”
“We’d like to come in if it’s okay,” Jackie said, pushing the door, forcing Connie to step back, Delsa and Harris following as Jackie said, “Thank you,” to Connie and kept going, through the living room—past Dr. Phil on TV saying, “Does that make you feel good? Talking to your sister that way?”—and down a narrow hall to the kitchen. Delsa could see her unlocking the back door and Manny and Violent Crimes coming in, three of them, wearing vests under their jackets. They came through to the stairway with Glocks and a shotgun. Delsa nodded and they went up the stairs.
“Jesus Christ,” Connie said, “what in the world did he do? He got in another fight, didn’t he?”
Dr. Phil was saying, “You mean this whole thing is about her nose?”
As Connie was saying, “It’s his buddy gets in the fights with his ugly mouth. He’s an ugly man, his whole disposition. He’s always looking to be insulted. Carl tries to stop the fight and he gets in it. He’s short, but, boy, is he scrappy. It’s been a while—I’m surprised he’s fighting again.”
Delsa was trying to follow Connie and Dr. Phil at the same time. It seemed the girl with their dad’s nose, it was a honker, was jealous of her sister who had their mother’s cute nose. He said to Connie, “It’s not about a fight. What’s his friend’s name?”
“Gene Krupa.”
“Wasn’t he a drummer?”
“I mean Art Krupa. He thinks he’s hot shit ‘cause he use to be with the Detroit Mafia.”
“They hang out together?”
“Carl spends more time over there, at Art’s, than he does here. I told him, you don’t come home, I ain’t cooking for you no more.”
The TV audience was applauding Dr. Phil as the Violent Crimes guys came down the stairs, Manny shaking his head, and went out the front.
Delsa said to Connie, “Can you tell me where this Art Krupa lives?”
“Hamtramck. I think on Yemans.”
“What’s Carl do for a living?”
“Lays bricks. Does pretty good, too.”
“This time of year?”
“He started before it turned cold and snowed.”
“When’s the last time you saw him?”
“Yesterday he come by, brought me a fifth of vodka, real expensive stuff. I said Jesus Christ, you could’ve bought me two gallons of Popov for what you paid for it.”
Delsa looked past Connie to see Jackie coming out of the hall. She held an empty Christiania bottle by one finger in the neck. Now Connie glanced around. She said, “What’re you doing with that?” her voice rising. “There was still some in there.”
The poor woman sounding desperate.
“No, I put it in a glass,” Jackie said. “I saw this beautiful bottle—you mind if I take it?”
Delsa said, “She collects bottles, ones with unusual designs on them.” He handed Connie one of his cards. “If you hear from Carl, would you mind giving me a call? I’d appreciate it.” He put his hand on hers as she took the card and looked down to read it. “I’m Frank Delsa.”
“She could’ve asked me first,” Connie said.
Delsa patted her hand and said it was nice talking to her.
Manny was outside by the cars.
Walking up to him Delsa said, “Anything good?”
“Here,” Manny said, handing Delsa a leather-bound address book, a small one. “Guy lives like a fuckin monk.”
“He’s never there,” Delsa said, skimming through the book, stopping now and then.
“No guns, but a box of forty caliber.”
“Here’s Art Krupa’s number, and address.”
“I’ll call the Fourth,” Manny said. “Get the precinct to watch the house till we put a crew on it.”
“And Avern Cohn’s number,” Delsa said.
•
They parked down the street from where Art Krupa was living on Yemans in a neat little two-story house on a thirty-foot lot, no driveway, green and white metal awnings over the windows, a statue of the Virgin Mary holding a dish, a birdbath, in the front yard.
“This Art Krupa,” Jackie said, “what’s he, a religious hit man?”
She called Communications and had the address checked. It was listed in the name of a Virginia Novak. Jackie called the house and asked for Art. She was told he wasn’t home.
“Is this Virginia?”
The woman said, “Yes, it is,” in a tiny voice.
“Can you help me out, Virginia? Tell me where I can get in touch with Art?”
“Who is this calling, please?”
“I’m in his lawyer’s office,” Jackie said. “Will Art be back soon?”
“I have no way of knowing,” Virginia said. “I’m sorry.”
Jackie told her she’d try again later and said to Harris, behind the wheel of the Lumina, and Delsa in back, “The Blessed Virgin must belong to her. She sounds like a timid little thing.”
“Live with a man shoots people,” Harris said, “I would be, too.” He turned his head toward Delsa. “How long you want to wait?”
“We’re here,” Delsa said, “we might as well hang for a while.”
“Art could be in the house,” Jackie said. “Carl, too.”
“Let’s wait and see if anything happens,” Delsa said. He got out his cell to call Kelly, anxious to hear her voice.
She said, “I’ve been trying to get you.”
“I felt my phone vibrate, but couldn’t answer. We’re on a stakeout, looking for the shooters.”
“You know who they are?”
“We’re pretty sure. How’d you do?”
He didn’t care if Jackie and Harris listened.
“I told you it was a fitting? At Saks. They’ve already shown the collection a few times, so they have to make adjustments, make sure they have all the buttons and the zippers work. We have to try on shoes and boots—they bring dozens of eights, nines and tens. I’m usually a nine.” Kelly talking fast. “A rep for the collection was there, and thirty girls for twenty spots, all from Detroit. Sometimes, if the rep wants a certain type, like a predominant hair color, he might bring a girl or two from New York. It’s Chanel’s Fall Collection. They decide who wears what for about eighty different looks coming down the runway—and that’s in just twenty-five minutes—so most of the girls will have four changes. I’ll have five tomorrow.”
Delsa said, “Yeah?”
“You know why?”
“Why?”
“I look great in Chanel.”
“Is that right?”
“My favorite that I wear in the show, I think of as kind of a biker look, a nubby burgundy suit that barely covers my butt, silver chains around my neck and my hips and these cool velvety boots. My Harley look, I think it’ll stop the show. They’ll start with suits and dresses, get the audience sitting up, and then swing into activewear, ski and apres-ski this year. They’ll show little black dresses for the cocktail look, and finish big with evening wear, opulent dresses. That’s four or five segments, with different lighting and music for different moods.”
“Do you walk funny?”
“Do the crossover? That keeps you walking straight, but I just walk. I hear the beat and I’m on it, I just try to act natural. If you’re in the audience I’ll find you and give you a smile. People will look around at you, wondering who you are, if you’re my lover.”
He said, “Yeah, right.”
And heard Jackie say to Harris, “You hear him, the conversationalist?”
“I’ll call you later.”
She said, “I’m going out tonight.”
It stopped him. He didn’t know what to say.
“I’ve got a date. But if your pants vibrate, Frank, pick up. I might have to call you.”
For the next ten or fifteen minutes he wondered what she meant—she might have to call him. He had always pictured her alone. He had to stop and rea
lize she knew people, she had friends, a life he knew very little about. He wondered if she meant she had a real date, some guy had called her, asked her to go out. Not the guy she’d called a mama’s boy who left his clothes lying around. He wondered if she had lived with him. He could ask her if she was a prostitute, but not if she had lived with the guy who left his clothes lying around. Why would she need him if she was on a date with someone she knew? No, what she said was, “I might have to call you.”
His phone rang. It was Jerome.
“I’m waiting to be picked up. We going to Pontiac, gonna check out a place Tenisha’s mom told us he might be at. I get close enough and see Orlando’s there, I’ll call you. I been trying two hours to get hold of you, man.”
Delsa said, “Who’s we?”
“I didn’t tell you? Shit, I got two policemen working with me case it gets rough on the street. They say they been away, on vacation. Come back, they waiting to be put to work. Couple of middle-aged detectives, out of shape.”
“They show you their badges?”
“Didn’t have to. They got cop written all over ‘em. Know what I’m saying? The way they dress, the way they talk. But, man, they ask a question they get an answer. The one puts his piece in Jo-Jo’s face?”
Delsa stopped him. “These guys are armed? What kind of guns?”
“Nines, like Berettas. The one ask this dude Jo-Jo where’s Orlando at? The dude say he don’t know and the one busts a cap next to the dude’s ear, bam, the dude screams but can’t hear hisself.”
“They’re not cops,” Delsa said. “Jerome, these guys’re gonna get you in trouble. Get away from them.”
“Jo-Jo say he thinks Orlando went to Mississippi, someplace down there. Was Tenisha’s mama gave us the dude. The woman is hot for her age, man, going on to be forty. I feel myself starting to crave her panties.”
“Jerome,” Delsa said, “they’re not cops, they sound like bounty hunters, using you to get next to the reward.”
Jerome said, “I know that. I wondered did you.”
“Give me their names,” Delsa said, “what they look like, what kind of car they drive and I’ll have them picked up … Jerome?”
He was gone.
22
SO FAR THIS BOY THREE-J WASN’T DOING THEM much good. He took them out to Pontiac, way past the GMC Truck plant to an old rundown property where they used to have pit bull fights and all they did was shoot a dog.
Art did. The man holding it on a leash. Art pointed his gun at the pit bull and asked the old colored man with gray hair, was Orlando hiding out here? The man said, “Don’t shoot my dog.” And Art shot it. The dog’s name was Sonny. Art said, “I shot him ‘cause you didn’t answer my question.” Carl said, “Couldn’t you think of a better name for a vicious fighting dog?” The man said that was its name.
The old man turned out to be Orlando’s granddaddy. Art asked him where Orlando was. Art said he’d count to three and the old man said, “He’s staying in Detroit on Pingree, 700 Pingree between Second and Third. Now get outta here.”
Art said he almost blew him away to teach him a lesson.
Three-J didn’t say much. Carl was sure he didn’t believe they were cops and didn’t care. Art told him their names. It meant Art would shoot him before they were through and they’d put in for the reward. It didn’t bother Carl, he didn’t see Three-J as much of an asset. Three-J liked Tenisha’s mama and she wasn’t bad. Carl asked Art, surprised he hadn’t asked him before, if he’d ever fucked a colored girl. Art said, “Sure, haven’t you? Don’t tell me you never had any colored poon.” So they talked about different colored girls they’d had until Jerome said wait, was these regular bitches or ho’s? It turned out they were whores. Three-J asked what was a ho like, since he never had one. Carl saw the boy thinking he was smarter than they were. If he didn’t care they weren’t cops but carried guns, he knew they’d try to get rid of him once they found Orlando. He didn’t say much, no, but the colored boy was ready, keeping his eyes open, wasn’t he?
They were coming back now in the Tahoe, on Woodward out in Oakland County, twenty miles from downtown Detroit.
Art said, “There’s an OPEN HOUSE sign. Carl? The next right.”
•
These two white guys were cuckoo.
They turned down a street of fairly new homes, big ones with lawns and young trees, down to a house that was open for inspection. Art took the OPEN sign hanging from the regular FOR SALE sign in the yard and brought it inside with them and handed it to the real estate man in his suit and tie grinning at them, the man saying, “Well, thank you. How did you know I was just about to close?”
“You see us come along,” Carl said, “you’d be closing if you just opened.”
It was going on seven, becoming dusky out.
Carl put his hand on Jerome’s shoulder saying to the real estate man, “This boy wants to buy a house out here. You got anything against selling to coloreds?”
The real estate man frowned like he’s never heard of such a thing, telling them no, of course not. He said the house was listed at a million one-ninety-nine. Carl asked what he would take and the real estate man said well, the people were in Florida, anxious to sell, he believed they might go as low as nine-fifty.
Art said, “You got any tape?”
The real estate man said, “I think I saw some in the kitchen,” went out there and came back with a roll of silver duct tape saying, “Can I ask what you need it for?”
Art said, “To tape your mouth shut.”
Jerome watched them sit the real estate man in a dining room chair and tape his arms to the arms and legs to the legs of the chair, the man not saying shit, but his eyes open wide watching them. As Art was about to tape his mouth shut, the man said, “Please be careful you don’t cover my nose, too, okay?”
He should never’ve said it.
Art covered his nose and Jerome could see the man couldn’t breathe, his face turning red as he pulled against the tape holding him to the chair.
Jerome watched Carl shake his head. Carl said, “Goddamn it, Art, the man can’t fuckin breathe.” Taking his time, cool about it.
Art said, “Fuck him.”
Carl pulled the tape off the man’s nose and mouth, let him suck in air a few times and put the tape back on over his mouth.
“Look around,” Carl said to Jerome, “see if there’s anything you like.”
The two went upstairs.
Jerome went to the kitchen and looked in the fridge and took out a can of beer and sat down to drink it with a good-size roach he had on him and lit with a kitchen match, Jerome pretty sure these guys were crazy. They didn’t care who saw them or who might come to the house. They were cool, though. Walk in a house and take it over. Jerome wondered why he hadn’t heard of doing this. Drive around looking for OPEN signs.
Jerome took out his cell and phoned Frank Delsa.
“Hey, man, how you doing?”
“Where are you?”
“Out in the suburbs. Orlando wasn’t in Pontiac. His granddaddy say he’s in Detroit and told us where, but I don’t believe him. Would you? His granddaddy saying it?”
Delsa said, “You still with the two guys?”
“On and off. They cuckoo. Next time I see you I’ll tell you what we doing at this house the real estate man say he’s gonna sell for a million one-ninety-nine—give you an idea where we at. I never been in a house cost this much, even when I was busting into places. I see you I’ll tell you about it.”
“You know their names?”
“I ain’t telling you. You might know these motherfuckers, man, they outrageous. I don’t know why you don’t have ‘em locked up somewhere. The granddaddy goes, ‘Don’t shoot my dog.’ The one shoots his dog. You know why? ‘Cause the old man say don’t do it. They been to Jackson. One of ‘em mentioned something about when they was there about the noise in the cell block. Bunch of retards in there making noise. Frank, these guys want the money.”
&
nbsp; “I told you that,” Delsa said. “And they’ll kill you for it.”
“I know. It’s why we do see Orlando—go in someplace and there he is? I say it ain’t him.”
“He won’t look like his picture.”
“Or somebody could point him out to me? I say no, that ain’t Orlando. Then soon as I get away from these motherfuckers I give you a call.”
“Where are they?”
“Looking around upstairs.”
“You said before they’re middle-aged—”
“They coming down. I got to go,” Jerome said. He put away his cell and picked up his beer.
They came in the kitchen with men’s and women’s watches, some jewelry, and laid them on the counter where Jerome was sitting. Art got beers from the fridge saying he thought Virginia would go for that Lady Bulova. Carl got a fifth of Canadian Club from the liquor cabinet and poured a couple, not asking Jerome if he wanted one. It was okay, he’d rather watch these two than get high. He said, “What would you do if the people that live here walked in the door?”
“It’s like a home invasion then,” Art said. “What you do is strip ‘em and tie ‘em up.” He sniffed the air, looked at Jerome and said, “Somebody’s smoking a joint,” sounding eager.
Jerome offered the roach.
Art seemed about to take it, but said, “Shit, not after you nigger-lipped it.”
Jerome let it pass for the time being. He said, “How come you guys never get caught? You don’t seem to care who sees you. You leave tracks every place you go. How come you don’t get picked up?”
“We could get caught,” Carl said, “but we don’t.”
“We work under contract,” Art said. “So far we’ve whacked six people.”
“Eight,” Carl said, “the two before we teamed up.”
“You count those?”
“Why not?”
“How many’s that?”
“I just told you, eight.”
“You count the bodyguard?”
“No, I didn’t. That’s nine.”
“Nine we’ve whacked,” Art said, “without getting caught.”
“Except the first two,” Carl said.
Jerome watched them throw down their shots of Club and make faces.