Next night, things with me all arranged, she comes back to the bar and Blue puts her in touch with Hector. Blue got some mad blues playing on the system and I’m watching them from a stool down the other end, sipping drinks while Blue’s driver goes on about how Blue got some big-ass moves in the works. I want to see how Katrina plays it with Hector, see if last night’s jag was for me alone or if she do that with just anybody.
Katrina start doing the flirt thing with Hector and he’s real funny, man. He’s like drooling at hello, and right away she know he so totally into her she don’t even need to toss him a tumble like she did me. She just shoot him some hot looks, and tease him with a little dirty dance in the middle of the floor. Seems like the dance leaves him half-unconscious with desire. And that is that. Deal is sealed. She tells me later in her room that Hector even buys her excuse why they can’t go somewhere and do it tonight, so I figure Katrina really plays that macho muchacho hands down, bitch is something else.
After that, though, when Katrina tells me Hector’s the goddamned uncle we gotta take care of, you could push me over with a fingertip. I would never make that guy as an undercover cop. She tells me they find out he the one sours a whole bunch of gigs they got going on while I’m in the joint, tells me it’s Hector put some of Blue’s key guys in jail, and now they gotta put an end to it. That’s when I’m thinking maybe Hector allows Katrina to play him that way in the bar that night, cuz cops ain’t supposed to get it on with the women they working to put away.
Probably both are true — Katrina is truly hot enough to get Hector thinking with the little head, but also Hector made it easy for her to seal the deal without having to seduce him cuz he a goddamn cop. Hell, this crazy game’s all good to me. One way or another don’t change a thing. Just pay me and point the way and I am there.
But like I say, once Katrina lets me in on the job details, one question keeps nagging at me, all night: What’s going on with Hector’s ghost? These uncle guys almost never work undercover without some other cop keep an eye on them from the shadows. Some cop watching me do away with his partner puts me in mind that this job could toss me in the deepest of shit in a freakin’ heartbeat. And nobody do short or easy time off a cop murder, cuz they make sure every single minute you do inside is a living hell.
Katrina quick. She see my concern, tries to calm my nerves by telling how she and Blue have this sweet arrangement with Hector’s ghost, this old cop Eddie.
“Eddie?” I say, that name perking me right up. “Eddie McClusky?”
“Yeah, you know him?” she say.
“Bad-ass mother,” I say. “Eddie’s an Unknown Chicago Legend.”
“What d’ya mean, unknown?” she say.
“To the public,” I say. “But not to half the population of Joliet. I even hear about Bad-ass Eddie Mac when I’m on the street before I do my stretch. How you so sure Eddie ain’t playing y’all?”
“Don’t you worry,” she say. “Me and Blue don’t do this if it ain’t all in place.”
“Do me favor,” I say. “Lay it out for me and I decide if I should worry or not.”
I see she pissed at my question, but I guess she decides it’s fair to ask, so she gives me the respect I deserve and answers me. “First off, Eddie played ball with Blue plenty in the past.”
“Wait a sec, you saying Eddie Mac ain’t righteous?” I say. “That ain’t the word I hear. How about all them arrests he bring down?”
“When it suits Eddie to play straight, he bring arrests down,” she say. “When it don’t, he don’t. That big Irish gang bust over in Bridgeport? Believe me, Blue helped Eddie out with that. It don’t happen if Blue don’t come through big.”
I’m laughing now. “You saying Blue helping Eddie Mac lock up the bad guys?”
“Blue and Eddie only do deals when they both get something out of it. If they don’t, they enemies again.”
“Okay, so what’s Eddie getting out of knocking off this uncle Hector?” I say.
“Hector knows Eddie play both sides of the street, Eddie don’t trust him to be cool. We do this for Eddie, Eddie do something else for Blue,” she say. “But I don’t know what, cuz that’s ‘tween Blue and Eddie, and it don’t matter to me.”
I see it do matter to Katrina, but I leave it right there, cuz I can also see she knows Eddie’ll be cool when it all goes down and that’s what really matters to me.
“Heavy duty, baby,” I say, smiling again. “That’s the real deal.”
She puts her hand flat on my chest, all sincere and tender.
“We gonna have to lay real low after the job, though,” she say. “Think maybe you and me go somewhere and enjoy the quiet life for a little bit?”
“Sounds good,” I say, cuz it do sound good.
“I got a place in Costa Rica.”
“Gotta get around my parole thing here, baby, but you singing my song.”
“Good, Zane,” she say. “You gonna like it down there.”
I want to ask her about how she first get involved with Blue’s business, but I leave that for some other time. Maybe when we in Costa Rica. And I’m wondering how I got this lucky all of a sudden, money in my pocket, beautiful woman all into me. All this shit going through my brain as me and Hector are digging the hole toward head-deep, like Katrina orders us to do, and I keep on thinking and thinking and thinking like this. Wondering what I know.
I know what Katrina say about Eddie, about Blue and Eddie, that’s what. And I know Blue owe me. And knowing Blue and Katrina got my back is good enough for me, or I wouldn’t be here. But I still can’t help coming back around to Eddie Mac, Hector’s ghost, lurking out there in the dark watching his partner dig his own grave. I know I should be scared out of my skin over this job, but now that Katrina and Blue lay it out for me, I’m cool. Except for the sweat soaking through my dark green coveralls, about ten percent fear sweat and the rest shoveling sweat, even in the chilly night air.
All this digging is boring now, and I’m sneaking peeks at Katrina checking her watch. We been working this pit a good while, breathing heavy, and my eyes are level with her toes. Hector’s head don’t even reach up to the grass, he being one short Puerto Rican. Got dirt in my coveralls, dirt on my face, dirt soiling my brand new White Sox cap, dirt in my boots, blisters on my hands, but from this angle I ain’t thinking of none a that, cuz I can see right up under that miniskirt, right to Katrina’s white thong against her smooth coffee skin, and what a heavenly sight that is. I want to just pull her down and get us both really dirty right here in this black soil.
But she surprise me.
“Good enough,” she say. “Zane, use your shovel to get out first.”
Show Time is at hand. I prop the shovel against the end of the grave, spade end down on a rock, and use it as a step to boost myself up. My heart’s racing now cuz I been thinking about everything else but the big moment.
Katrina back off a step or two as I climb out. Like me and Katrina plan, I hold my hand down to Hector and say, “Don’t leave it behind,” and he hands me his shovel.
Then he looks down to step on my spade end, his hands grabbing at the sod above, ready to boost himself out of the grave. He still looking down as his head comes up, and I take a full swing with his shovel right down hard on his head. Only it don’t hit quite square and the edge of the shovel scoop off a hunk of Hector’s scalp and skull bone, which goes flipping onto the grass at Katrina’s feet like a bloody tea saucer.
You could even see some of Hector’s brain sitting in it like some freaky Fear Factor stunt. Sight gross me out, man, don’t know why cuz I seen that before. Lying back in that grave, Hector give out this puny little cry and his body start in on some serious shaking.