He stood near his car in the parking lot, outside the perimeter of light around the flamboyant entrance, with his hands stuffed in his pockets, protecting them against the frigid night wind that had chased away the rain. Winter emerged a few minutes later and joined him, the wind rippling through tight curls on his head. He held his jacket closed with one hand.
‘Hi, Cowboy,’ he said to Papa.
‘How’s it going, Leo?’ Papa said.
‘Right now I’m freezing my ass off. This gonna take long?’
‘Depends on you.’
‘Uh oh. I got some trouble I don’t know about?’
Papa shook his head. ‘Information.’
Leo’s attitude changed. His body tightened and seemed to grow an inch. He stood with one shoulder towards Papa, staring into the dark parking lot.
Papa said, ‘I’m gonna tell you something and you’re gonna forget it as soon as I tell you. Then I’m gonna ask you something. Then we’ll go from there.’
Leo continued to look into the darkness.
‘First off, you know a fancy pros calls herself Domino?’ Leo thought about the question, then said, ‘Is this a freebie or can we do a little trading?’
‘Leo, I got this big problem. I’m runnin’ outa time and I ain’t even got started good yet. Can we talk about Domino or not?’
Leo rubbed his shoulder with his free hand then shrugged. ‘I’ve seen her here and there.’
‘You know her pimp?’
‘You mean, do I know him or are we asshole buddies?
‘I mean, do you know him? That’s what I mean.’
‘I know him. We’re not thick.’
‘I got Neil. I need the rest of the name and an address.’ Leo looked down at his foot, tapping his toe gently against the car tyre. ‘This Neil, is he in trouble?’
‘Maybe.’
‘Bad trouble?’
‘If he’s in trouble, it’s bad trouble.’
‘You’re a regular encyclopaedia of facts there, Papa.’
‘If you ain’t wrap-around pals, what’s the difference?’
‘Yeah, I suppose there’s something to that. Okay, his name’s Dantzler. He lives out on Peachtree in The Courtyard.’
The name struck a bell. Papa’s mind dug back as he kept talking.
‘The apartments?’
‘Dantzler lives in a condo.’
‘How about Tiffany? What do you know about her?
‘You’re really fishin’, ain’t you, Papa. From here i’d say you don’t know shit for sure.’
‘If I did, would I be here?’
‘You got a point.’
‘So?’
‘So, Tiffany’s Dantzler’s old lady. She lives in the apartment complex out there, but mostly she uses her pad for tricks. Whenever Dantzler snaps his fingers, she’s up at his
place with her legs spread.’ -
Now Papa remembered why Dantzler’s address had ticked off his memory bank. It was the same complex as Tiffany’s. ‘You mean this Dantzler pimps for his own girlfriend?’
‘You got it. Real sweetheart, right?’
‘Okay, gimme the package on this shmuck.’
‘Dantzler’s a scam artist. Rich kid. His old man took a bath in real estate about ten years ago, got in the shower, and emptied his brains out with a .45. All Dantzler had goin’ for him was a shaky pedigree and a smooth mouth. A pretty boy, y’know? He played off his country club connections and worked some fast deals but he got in trouble with the state over some pyramid scheme he had goin’ and he dropped outa sight for awhile, When he came back up, he has this Tiffany in tow, and she’s a real piece, not just your everyday low-class honey, know what I mean?
‘And he was pimping for her?’
‘More than that. Dantzler’s living with her and pimping too, and she’s turning three, four-hundred a night tricks with his uptown friends and the fat-wallet out-of-towners. But she doesn’t quite have it, okay? Then a couple of years ago Dantzler pops Domino outa the closet. She was like a super version of Tiffany. More of everything and a class act, to boot. At first she was kind of shy and Tiffany got the soreass, but then this Domino sprouts wings, man, a real angel, and she kinda has a soft spot for Tiffany, so they end up tighter than a fat couple in a single bed. Domino won’t have anything to do with any of the other street people — didn’t want to and didn’t. But all of a sudden you see her everywhere, dressed like she come off a magazine cover. Let me tell ya, Papa — this lady, when she walks in a room even the clock stops tellin’ time. A very selective lady and smart as a kick in the ass. The way it comes to me, she doesn’t like the trade, she packs it in and goes home. Left more than one big spender with his thumb in his ear.’
‘But Dantzler was pimping for her?’
‘Sure. He’s got the connections. He’s got the ins.’
‘And Domino is independent?’
‘You know it. A no-shit lady. Even starts shaping up Tiffany. Tn fact, the way I get it, Tiffany’s got another old man on the side and this Domino covers for her all the time. J mean, shit, man, how long could anybody put up with that little mama’s boy?’
‘But Domino gives Dantzler a hard time, right?’
‘Hey, c’mon Papa, between the two chicks Dantzler must be knockin’ down fifteen, sixteen a week after the split and no tax. Does that sound like hard times to you?’ He paused for a minute, then said, ‘I thought you were gonna give me something I got to forget.’
‘Okay, here it is. Somebody put this Domino on ice about four hours ago.’
‘Hunhi’
‘Right in the doorway of her apartment. And from my end of the street it wasn’t no amateur hit.’
Leo looked hard at Papa and a scowl crossed his face. ‘Are you tellin’ me there was paper out on her? You tellin’ me that?’
‘I’m tellin’ you somebody staked out her apartment for several hours and then punched her out with a sawed-off shotgun. Does that sound like amateur night to you?’
Leo whistled softly through his teeth, then shook his head. ‘Bad news.’
‘If this goes any further there, Leo, I’ll be back out and step all over those pretty Mary Janes of yours.’
‘Did I tell you it stops with me? Did I tell you that or not?’
‘Just so it’s clear.’
‘You put me in a funny kinda box, Papa.’
‘How’s that?’
‘Let’s just say this was a local contract, okay? And it wasn’t run past me first. Then I would be very unhappy with some people. Like if a local shooter took this on, I would want to know it’s comin’ down. And if there was any hotshot freelancers around, I would know that, too. Now I’m not saying I’d have anything to dc with that kind of action, okay. What I’m saying is, there are courtesies and out of courtesy it would come to me and I would say no, or maybe I would say it ain’t any of my bi.asiness.’
‘What you’re saying is the shooter is an out-of-towner.’
‘What I’m saying is if the shooter isn’t an out-of-towner, it’s going to hit the fan. I mean there’s going to be a shit storm that’ll make Hurricane Alice lo.ok like somebody sneezed.’
‘Could you gimme a guess why it happened?’
‘Papa, I never got closer than ten feet to the lady. Couple of months ago I came up a heavy winner in a poker game and Dantzler lost his ass. I took his marker for five bills. I offered to trade it out for a night with Domino and she nixed it, not him. Maybe, you know, she thumbed her nose at the wrong guy.’
‘You hear anything about Dantzler and Tiffany juicing some tourist recently?’
Leo began to laugh. ‘Jesus, you sure want a lot for your nickel, don’t ya?’
‘Leo, how long we known. each other?’
‘Too long.’
‘Did I ever stand short on you?’
‘No, I can’t say that.’
‘So when I tell you time is short, I mean time is short. We do my problem, then we do yours. Now tell me about this shakedown.’