"What kind of events?"
"Like you used to do," Alphonse said, "but on a much larger scale."
There was subtlety to Rinaldo's description. I was surprised that he remembered how my life had shifted from being a crook to trying to make amends in some way. My life seemed like such a small thing compared to the world in which he traveled. For my circumstances to fall under his purview seemed… improbable-like a mountain claiming to feel the passage of a caterpillar.
"So you think Lord might be, um, leveraging Tara?"
Rinaldo sucked in his lips and then tried to cover the faux pas with his left hand.
"I don't know," he said. "It makes sense that if he was going after me he might approach her. I suppose he could decide to kill her, but I can't think why. At any rate, it's nothing personal. He's working for someone else. I need to find out who that is."
"I take it that you can't do something so delicate through Strange or Latour," I speculated.
"No."
"What about Tara?"
"What about her?"
"What does she have to do with you?"
Alphonse Rinaldo winced, if only slightly. He shuddered and looked away. In those few gestures he conveyed to me that this subject, the central purpose of our business, was off limits.
"Then tell me what you know about Lord," I said.
"There was once a congressman," Rinaldo began, on confident footing.
"Here's yer eggs and ham," the nut-brown cook said. He set down the food and coffee and left.
"There was once a congressman…" I said, to restart the story.
"… who was looking into the pricing practices of the oil companies. He was a brash midwesterner who didn't understand the protocols necessary in taking such an action. The process of bringing to light these practices… was protracted. Terry Lord was hired to follow it from inside a shadow.
"Her name was Alana Ash, and she was everything a happily married man could want in a prostitute. The arrangement went on for eleven months. Just before the congressman was to bring the case of the oil companies to his fellows, Alana moved to Virginia, not far from downtown D.C. One day the congressman sent his car for her. The FBI had him in custody for interstate sex trafficking before the sweat had dried."
It was a simple scenario, one that I might have arranged myself, on a slightly smaller scale.
"So he's got a lot of clout, huh?" I said.
"He could crush you without a second thought, Leonid."
A smile I could not suppress slid across my mouth and I said, "No one is safe from anyone else in this world."
"Is there anything else you need from me?" he asked.
"What do you know about an ADA named Broderick Tinely?"
"I know the name. Why?"
"He's pressing the investigation of Soa's murder, going above and beyond."
"I'll look into it."
"There's a guy named Grant. He was looking into Angie's whereabouts when Wanda Soa was murdered."
"Forget him. He was working for me through Sam Strange."
"What about Lamont Jennings? He represented Soa at one time."
"Same thing. Anything else?"
"No, not that I can think of."
"Will you continue the investigation?" Rinaldo asked.
"Right after I eat these eggs."
48
The Big Man paid the bill in cash, then left me to my protein and caffeine.
My phone made the sound of mission bells. It was Aura calling me. I feared that if I spoke with her I might be thrown off my game again and trampled by one of the many enemies I was accruing.
I decided to let her leave a message.
The eggs were crumbly and the tough ham was shot through with the harsh taste of preservatives. The coffee was strong enough, but the hour was too early.
After scarfing down this breakfast, I took a cab to Wilma Spyres's apartment building.
SHE ANSWERED THE DOOR quickly, didn't even ask who it was. Her tattered robe was partly open. Upon seeing me she closed the fabric gap and produced a perfect sneer with her small mouth.
"What do you want?" she asked
"What all men want," I said.
This statement sparked interest in the former beauty's muddled eyes. Then a wave of suspicion washed away the momentary vulnerability.
"What's that?" she asked.
"Truth."
"I don't have time for this," she said.
"Unless you want to be doing time you better find a few minutes for me."
"Fuck you."
She stepped back and moved to close the door.
"You shut me out and I go right to Joe Fleming," I said.
That stayed her slam hand.
"What are you talking about?"
"Let me in or I go to Joe."
"Ron's not here," she said. I didn't know what she meant by it. Maybe it was a stab at old-fashioned respectability-you couldn't enter a man's domicile with his woman if he was not present.
"I know that."
"Come on, then," she said, turning her back, leaving me to close the door behind us.
Wilma sat on the dark-blue sofa and I returned to the relative safety of the folding chair.
"What?" she asked. Even the potential for beauty disappeared behind her wall of anger, this buttressed by a lifetime of fear.
"I have a very simple job, Ms. Spyres," I said. "I have to keep Ron out of trouble. I don't care about you, your habits, or your friends. Tomorrow they could crown you queen of England or lay you in your grave-it's all the same to me."
These words sobered her rampant emotions a bit.
"What do you want?"
"The truth."
"What truth?"
"Tell me something," I said. "If I were to have put a sealed envelope with Ron's name on it under your door instead of knocking, would you just put it down there next to that bong and wait for him to come home?"
I took no pleasure in seeing the fear that flooded the junkie's girlfriend's eyes.
"It was Joe Fleming," she said, stammering over every other word.
"No."
"It was Joe set Ronnie up," she pleaded.
"No."
Wilma jumped to her feet.
"Sit down," I said, with no particular emphasis to my voice.
She obeyed and muttered something that I didn't understand.
"What?"
She looked away, biting back the tears.
"What did you say?" I asked.
"He made me do it," she said loudly and clearly, her tone somehow underscoring the cliched phrase.
"Who?"
"He…" she stopped after the syllable and took a breath. "He told me that we could, could get together. All I had to do was make the deal with Ron. Once the car was picked up, me and him would go away to Atlantic City to this time-share he got down there. It used to belong to his auntie, but she died and left it to him."
"His name."
"But the cops busted Ron and now it's all shit. You know, if I could just get away from the losers around here for just a mont' I know I could get straight." With one hand Wilma scratched her face and with the other she pulled at her hair. "I was gonna leave Ron with this place. He could'a stayed here until the rent ran out. I didn't mean for him to go to jail. Now what am I gonna do?"
"His name," I said.
"What am I gonna do?" she asked again.
"Who gave you the money?"
"Cary Bottoms. They call him 'Scary' a lot, but he can be real sweet."
"What does this, uh, Cary do?"
Wilma looked at me, bringing her hands away from her face.
"He's killed people before," she said. "But that's just because he doesn't know how to get away from here, either. If we, if we could'a got that money from them guns we could'a moved out to Atlantic City."