“We’ve discussed all this before,” interrupted Billie decisively, “and I’m with you. Well, my idea is to give Catanesi the dope about the pay-roll truck. He’ll try this particular game just as soon as he finds out about it, anyway. So why shouldn’t we gain by it? We’ll have our men there to hi-jack the Killer. In the meantime I’ll take care of the boss himself.”
“There’s a lot in what you say, Billie,” admitted Regan, “but I don’t like the idea of your going to Catanesi. You’d be running a terrible risk. Suppose he suspects you?”
“I’m going upstairs,” replied the girl, ignoring the man’s last remarks. “When I come back, I want a detailed lay-out of tonight’s plans that I can take along with me.”
“But how’ll I know that you’ve put it over on the Killer?” said Regan, allowing himself to be persuaded by the girl’s determined manner.
“You’ll know all right,” Billie told him. “You’ll get a signal from me that you can’t mistake. And I won’t tell you what it is. She turned and ran up the stairs while the racketeer crossed over to a concealed safe in the wall to get her the information she had requested.”
A little later a completely transformed Billie entered the room. A bright red tam o’shanter was pulled rakishly down over one ear above a mass of flaming red hair. A black and white checked jacket covered her blue sweater, while a tight skirt of the same material revealed a pair of perfect legs which terminated in black shoes with high scarlet heels. The exquisite girl Mike Regan knew had been changed into a tough, hard-boiled gangster’s moll.
Regan stared hard. “What a makeup!” he exclaimed admiringly. “It’s just what’ll appeal to that tough wop from Chicago.”
“There’ll be plenty of lead flying around tonight, or I miss my guess,” remarked Billie with affected toughness as she knotted a bright blue and red silk scarf around her neck. “So long, Mike. I’ll kid that low-life wop into thinking he’s the only guy on earth. I’ll tell him this hold-up’s a pipe and that he and his new moll between ’em will finish up Mike Regan’s outfit.”
“I’ll tell Red Conners to get the gang together in our hide-out near the river front. That’s where I’ll expect your signal.”
“Listen, Mike,” said Billie, leaning against the door. “You see how I look, now. And remember how you used to look — feel... hunted! All this” — she pointed to her make-up — “is behind us. Our life has been so peaceful until lately—”
Mike was puzzled. “What do you mean, Billie? You want to—”
“Yes, Mike.” She looked at him steadily.
Mike frowned thoughtfully.
“The idea isn’t exactly a surprise, Billie. I’ve suspected you wanted to... to—”
“Quit — go straight!” She shot out the words defiantly. “I’m no coward, you know that, Mike. For that reason I insist on getting rid of Catanesi! But after that—”
Mike drew her to him.
The long, passionate kiss of farewell between the two showed their understanding.
Regan looked at the closed door, listened for a moment to the rapid footsteps dying away down the corridor. Then, instantly, he became all action. Here was the dearest thing in the world to him, gambling her life on a desperate venture. And no one knew better than she how desperate that venture was.
Meanwhile Billie Ross was being whirled rapidly in a taxi to the Killer’s headquarters at the other end of the city. At the door of the big house where Catanesi lived in almost royal state, she stepped out, slim, provocative and alluring.
Four burly gunmen accosted her in the hall, demanded to know her business while their expert hands patted her clothing for a hidden rod. But she had anticipated this and had come unarmed.
“I want to see Joe Catanesi,” she told the men coolly. “And you’II get one hell of a bawling out if you don’t take me up to him right away.”
Her words had their effect. Two more men, lounging in the spacious hallway, came up to inspect the newcomer. In one of them she recognized a deserter from Regan’s gang, one of the few who had known her in the early days. Since their rise to fortune she never saw any of the gang except the most important of Regan’s lieutenants. Here was luck! “Tell these guys who I am, Charlie.”
The man looked at her in amazement. “If it isn’t Billie Ross!” he said, staring at her. “You haven’t changed much. Why, it must be years, since—” He broke off to eye her doubtfully. “But what about Mike Regan?”
The girl extended her hand, thumb downward in a significant gesture. The Killer’s rods looked at each other. So Regan’s moll was giving him the gate!
Without more delay the girl was rapidly escorted up a broad winding staircase and along a lofty corridor. Before a massive, oaken door her guard halted and knocked.
“Come in,” growled a hoarse voice. The door was flung open and Billie found herself in an enormous room whose walls were lined with books from floor to ceiling. Her feet sank into the thick luxurious carpet, making no sound.
“So you’re Mike Regan’s moll, huh?” A massive bullet head in which two small, blood-shot eyes glinted evilly under black, bushy eyebrows, raised itself slowly at her entrance from the papers on the carved walnut desk at the far end of the room. The thick, cruel lips parted to reveal irregular yellow fangs in a smile which was plainly intended to be one of welcome.
The girl could scarcely repress a shudder. Here before her, if she had ever set eyes on them, were lust, treachery and brutality. But she summoned an easy smile to her lips, ripped off her tam, gave her head an impertinent toss and crossed over to the table.
“I was Regan’s moll,” she corrected him, seating herself on the edge of the table and swinging one slender, silk-clad leg provocatively. “But I ditched him. The big mick hasn’t got the guts of a louse in ail that big body of his. I like a man!” she went on, letting her gaze travel admiringly over the burly hulk of the man before her.
The girl’s trim figure and alluring beauty plainly had their effect on the Killer. Her instinct told her that she had been right to disguise herself. Her toughness and her appearance would have a far more telling effect than if she had come in her ordinary clothes.
Catanesi grinned and shifted a little in his chair to obtain a better view. “How do I know Regan ain’t sent you here himself?” he asked, suspicion lowering in his small eyes. He reached for the house phone on his desk while Billie continued to smile at him with calm insolence. “Send Charlie up here,” he ordered.
“I haven’t come empty handed, Joe,” she retorted meaningly, drawing a slip of paper from her pocket and handing it over to the Killer. “Regan’s desperately hard up and he’s planning to hold up this pay-roll truck tomorrow night.”
The wop’s big head nodded slowly as he took in the rough sketch on the paper, noted the minute description of the truck and the accuracy with which its progress from the bank to the factory had been timed.
“You’re new to this town, Joe,” Billie told him, “and with me to tip you off on stunts like this, you ought to clean up!”
The Killer grinned and, with a clumsy effort at gallantry, stretched out one hairy paw to the gay silk scarf encircling the girl’s white throat.
“Red for blood and blue for hope,” she said with a laugh, letting him pull it off. She could tell that he still mistrusted her, but she must play a bold game. Leaning forward, so that the seductive perfume of her body enveloped his senses like wine, she said with flaming eyes: “I thought you had guts, Joe! Haven’t you got this town where you want it? Why is it called the city of bullets?”