I remember sitting at my desk, pouring a couple of drinks (no more than a third of a bottle), and trying to clear my head. All the time with the poor bastard right there, blubbering for help. God knows what he must have thought of me.
When I did notice him it shocked me. I can blame my gray hair on that. How was I going to explain this? And then I realized how the shooting had to turn out. The way it was going to become, for if he was dead, why wouldn’t it be that way?
I got up and blew the top of his head off.
I was lucky. No one heard the first shot, the one to the belly. Otherwise the police would have been called long before I called them, and well, you know how all this turned out.
So you see why I couldn’t afford to let Mary meet with Rose. She might just end up guessing the truth and I couldn’t take that chance. Even if it was only a one in a thousand chance, how could I risk it?
Anyway, I couldn’t shake the feeling that Mary would figure out what happened. Maybe she would have her doubts at first, but as soon as she saw me, she would know the truth. She’d see right into me. It somehow didn’t seem right to have to live dreading a thing like that. I just didn’t see how I could.
* * * * *
I sat back and gave the matter some thought. When I was through thinking, I called Jerry Bry and told him where to meet me.
Chapter 10
Jerry Bry was a real sweetheart of a guy, the type who’d give you a nickel for a dollar any day of the week. That’s what I liked about him- the size of his heart, which was a shade smaller than an ice cube.
Over the years I have had quite a few dealings with Bry. Well, to be more specific, I have always been hired by his wife, but Bry and I somehow always ended up doing business.
* * * * *
He was waiting at a back table in Goldie’s Bar. It had been almost two years since I’d seen him last and from what I could tell, he hadn’t changed much. Maybe a little grayer around the eyes and maybe his hairline had receded another inch. And he still had that soft whining look that always made me want to erase it with my fists.
I gave him a nod. He acknowledged me with a dull stare before dropping his eyes to the beer he was nursing. I sat across from him.
Keeping his eyes on his drink, he muttered, “I have to hand it to her, Joyce had me fooled this time. I had no idea she suspected anything.”
“Is that so?”
“Yeah, that’s so. Just hand them over to me, okay?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He shook his head slowly. “A real clown. Just hand me your goddamned pictures and let me pay you and get the hell out of here. Your stench is beginning to get to me.”
“I hate to disappoint you,” I said, “but I don’t have any pictures.”
He gave me a blank stare for a moment before his face sagged into an expression of bewilderment. “What the hell are you trying to pull?”
His mouth had dropped open, and he fell back into his chair. Looking at him, with his eyes just about popping out of his head, I couldn’t keep from grinning.
“What the fuck do you want?”
“Just a favor,” I said.
“You can take your favor and shove it!” He started to get out of his chair, and as he did so I leaned forward and shoved him hard back into it. He went down hard enough for the force to drive the chair’s front legs off the ground, leaving him frantically flapping his arms to keep from toppling backwards. Just like Humpty Dumpty, except Bry avoided the great fall. He got his balance back and forced the chair forward.
For a good ten-count he couldn’t speak. He was breathing hard, his face purpling with rage. It was funny how he felt he could treat me with contempt. Maybe he thought it was just business, that it was something he paid for. And maybe I did always laugh it off, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t keeping score.
Finally he caught his breath and clamped down hard enough on his teeth that I thought they were going to break. “I’d give anything to get you alone for five minutes.”
“No reason we couldn’t step out back,” I said, trying to be agreeable.
I wished he’d take me up on it, but I knew he wouldn’t. He was a big man, probably outweighed me by fifty pounds-and I weigh a solid one hundred and ninety. When he was younger he was a hotshot for his college football team and probably still thought he was something. But even at his peak, I would have taken him apart. The way he was now, the time it took him to hit the pavement would have been all I needed.
He didn’t say anything. We both sat and stared at each other. “Is this any way to act after all I’ve done for you?” I asked after a while.
“All you’ve done for me?” His laugh caught in his sinuses and came out more as a snort.
“That’s right.” I nodded. “Kept your marriage together best I could and-”
“Yeah? I always thought you were just blackmailing me like the cheap punk you are.”
“That’s where you’re showing your ignorance,” I said. “Whenever Joyce hires me and I catch you banging away without her, deciding what to do with the pictures is always a struggle. If I thought she’d use them to divorce you, I’d give them to her gladly. But I don’t suppose that’s what she’d do.”
I waited for him to say something, but he just breathed hard and ground his teeth.
“If Joyce were to see them,” I continued, “there’s no doubt in my mind she’d kill you first chance she got.”
Whenever his wife had hired me, she would act casual about it. But it was a poor act. The skin around her mouth would be pulled so tight you’d think it was going to rip. And when she laughed, it was edged with a shrill hysteria. Kind of like nails on a blackboard. I never took her jokes about how she would cut his balls off and use them as a car ornament if he really cheated on her as anything but what she truly intended.
“Now I’m not saying this world wouldn’t be a better place without you,” I said. “Probably would be, but it just doesn’t seem fair if your wife ended up going to jail for a thing like that.”
“So that’s how you justify blackmailing me,” he said.
I looked at him sadly. He still didn’t get it. I was only trying to do what was best for my client. If I thought showing him the pictures would make him stop, I’d never have asked for money. But he wouldn’t have stopped. And what his wife was paying for, deep inside, was to make him stop.
“Now,” I said, trying to make him understand. And what the hell was so hard to understand? “That’s not how I see it. I’m just trying to teach you a lesson. Get you back on the straight and narrow. But it seems I’ve been failing you, cause no matter how hard I try you keep straying. Maybe if it hurt a little more, you’d straighten out.”
“You son of a bitch. If only this city knew that the great Johnny Lane was nothing more than a cheap blackmailing punk.”
I ignored him. “To be honest,” I said, “I never understood why your wife cares a damn about you. With that cute little figure she’s got and with all that emotion she puts out in the sack, she should be able to get herself something that stands on two legs. At least something with brains enough not to risk losing a gal who can moan the way she can.”
Of course, I was lying. Not about her having a nice figure, because she certainly had that. The one time Joyce and I ended up horizontally, she was deader than a stick of wood. I think she gave me a splinter. I could understand why he was always sniffing around. But then again, he was probably the one who had made her that way.
He was livid. For a second I thought he was going to lunge at me and maybe that was what I was after. Usually, I didn’t twist the knife that deep into him, but this time I was getting my hands all bloody. Maybe I was after some payback, which was crazy, since I needed him now and would have all the time in the world for that later.
Luke, who was working the bar, sauntered over, carrying a beer bottle. He asked if everything was okay.