“You really don’t remember?” she asked later, over coffee.
“I’m sorry,” I said, “but a lot of last night is missing.”
“That’s not something a girl likes to hear, Eddie.”
“Hey,” I said, “I was thoroughly conscious this morning.”
“Yes,” she said, “I did notice an improvement in your performance over last night.”
“That’s not somethin’ a guy likes to hear, Judy,” I complained.
She laughed and said, “Forget it. I’m, just kiddin’ you. We were both so tired and drunk last night that we went right to bed-to sleep.”
“Okay,” I said, “but what I’m wonderin’ is … how did you come to be with me?”
“If I remember correctly,” she said, “you invited me home.”
“Yeah, but … you were with Frank and Kennedy.”
“Frank doesn’t care who I fuck,” she said, “as long as he gets to fuck me when he wants.”
“And Kennedy?”
“Well, there were some sparks,” she said, “but nothing’s happened yet. It will, though.”
“And us?”
“Us?” She laughed again, but this time I had the feeling it was at me. “Eddie, this was just for fun. One night. No strings.”
“Oh,” I said, “suits me.”
She reached across the table and put her hand on mine. She was wearing a white shirt she’d taken from my closet. I’ve always thought a woman wearin’ a man’s shirt like that is sexy as hell. Judith Campbell wearin’ a man’s shirt like that was even sexier.
“You don’t seem as happy to hear that as most men would.”
“Well, face it, Judy,” I said. “You’re gorgeous. What man wouldn’t want you?”
“A lot of men want me,” she said, “just not for very long.”
“Why is that, do you think?”
She shrugged.
“I’m a party girl, Eddie,” she said. “I’m not ready to settle down with one man, so it doesn’t concern me.”
“You sure know who you are and exactly what you want,” I said. “I’ve got to admire that.”
She reached out with both hands now, grabbing mine, and said, “Right now I want you to do more than admire me.”
I squeezed her hands and asked, “What happened to just one night?”
“This is morning,” she said, “an extension of the night before. Don’t tell me you don’t want to lay me one more time? For old time’s sake?”
My answer was to drag her into the bedroom.
I called a cab for Judith and she went back to the Sands, to a room Frank had arranged for her. I’d been with a lot of women before JudithCampbell, but never with anyone quite like her. I hoped she’d get what she wanted when the time came.
Once she was gone I showered, got dressed and had some more coffee. Then I made a few phone calls. Penny told me Danny had already gone to the Sands to pick up the list. She didn’t mention his date to take Marcia to the Rat Pack show that night, so I didn’t either.
Next, I called Jack Entratter.
“Where are you?” he demanded.
“Home. I just woke up a while ago.”
“Well, you did good last night, kid,” he said. “I heard Kennedy never left the hotel, and I haven’t heard about any trouble on his floor. I guess you kept the lid on for me.”
“I guess I did, Jack. What about Jerry?”
“He’s out,” Jack said, “back here at the Sands. His gun didn’t match. They were pretty much able to tell that right away. They kept at him all night, though, and he gave them nothin’. Never mentioned your name, or any anyone else.”
“A stand-up guy.” Frank had said that about me, but it applied more to Jerry.
“Any cops lookin’ for me?” I asked.
“Not here,” he said. “I don’t know about anywhere else.”
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll be around in a while. Tell Jerry not to go anywhere without me.”
“He won’t leave until you get here. I upgraded him to a suite. Kind of like a reward.”
“Good,” I said. “He deserves it.”
I hung up, couldn’t think of anymore calls to make. Frank and Dean were probably still asleep in their rooms. If everything I’d heard about Frank was true, he had two broads with him.
I decided to go for breakfast, then head for the Sands. My car was out front, so I must have driven it home. As I turned the key to start the engine I realized I’d forgotten my wallet. I got out, left the car running, and started for the house. A moment later I felt something lift me into the air and toss me across the lawn. I didn’t hear the blast until later ….
Fifty-two
That should have been it for me.
Okay, I got beat up. Okay, if not for Jerry I might have gotten shot by Buzz Ravisi in that flophouse. But now somebody had tried to blow me up. Someone had seriously tried to kill me. That had never happened to me before and it wasn’t the kind of new experience I was interested in having.
Pieces of my car were lying all around me, some of them burning, while the remainder of the car was ablaze at the curb. When I turned and looked at my house I could see that the front windows had been blown out. Some of my neighbors-the ones I didn’t hate and who didn’t hate me-came running out to see what happened, then came over to see if I was all right. The ones who did hate me came out to bitch about the noise or about their windows. They were talking to me but I couldn’t hear a thing except a kind of dull hum in my head. Finally, someone called an ambulance, which arrived in tandem with a Sheriff’s Department car. They put me in the ambulance and took me to the nearest hospital. I think I blacked out once on the way, because when I woke again I was in the emergency room. Still couldn’t hear, so the doctors and nurses asking me questions were an annoyance. I just kept shaking my head and shrugging. They finally gave uptrying to find out where it hurt-or whatever the hell they’d been asking me-and gave me a complete once-over.
Yeah, that should have been it for me. Why go on when somebody obviously wanted me dead this bad? And for what? For what?
Well … I didn’t know, and maybe that’s why it wasn’t it for me. My curiosity wouldn’t let it rest. What did I know, or what was I doing, that made somebody want me out of the way this bad? This … well, permanently?
So, that should have been it for me, but it wasn’t. The first thing I should have done when my hearing came back-if it came back-was march right up to Jack Entratter, Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin and say, “Sorry guys, I’m out.”
But I wasn’t going to do that.
You know why? It was more than just my curiosity.
For the first time since I’d started this whole thing I wasn’t afraid, or puzzled or confused.
Now I was mad.
Fifty-three
By the time they put me in a hospital bed, my hearing had started to return. However, when Detectives Hargrove and Smith entered the room I had a miraculous relapse.
“Can you hear me, Mr. Gianelli?” Hargrove asked.
I heard him, but it sounded as if he was standing at one end of a tunnel, and I was at the other. But I just stared at him and shook my head.
“Your doctor tells us your hearing loss is temporary,” he went on.
That was good to know, but I didn’t let on that I’d understood him.
“I think he’s fakin’,” Smith said, glaring at me.
“The guy got blown up, Willie,” Hargrove said. “Somebody put a freakin’ bomb in his car. The doctor said he’s deaf.”
“Temporary,” Smith said, “the doctor said it was temporary. What if he already has his hearing back and he’s scammin’ us?”
Hargrove looked at me. I tried to stare back at him with a look of total innocence on my face.
“You wouldn’t do that to us, Eddie, would you?” he asked.
“I’m sorry guys,” I said, and shrugged.
At that moment the doctor walked in.
“Come on, doc,” Detective Smith said. “Can he hear or can’t he?”
“We’ll know when he tells us,” the doctor said. “Right now I need for you gents to leave.”
“Okay,” Hargrove said, “but we’ll be back. After all, we have to find out who tried to kill him.”