“Anything else, boss?” Little Pete asked, heaving his huge body forward, nabbing the empty bourbon bottle off the makeup table, and then huffing his way back to the door.
“A pack of weeds and a bucket of ice,” Corona said, still squinting at Abby and me, sizing us up as if we were horses (or slaves) on the auction block. “And two more glasses,” he added as an afterthought.
“You got it,” Little Pete grunted, turning to leave.
“Hold on a minute,” Corona said. “What’s the scene out in the hall? Anybody waiting to see me?”
“Sure, boss. Lotsa people, like always.”
“Any big shots?”
“Nah, just Georgie Gobel and some TV actress. The rest ain’t nothin’ to honk about.”
“What about Hogarth?”
“He’s still up in the mezz with the wife. They’re havin’ dinner. Said he’d see ya later.”
“Then you can tell everybody else to scram,” Corona grumbled, swinging his leg off the arm of the chair, leaning forward, and raking his fingers through his hair. “I’m not in the mood for visitors and ass-kissers. Tell ’em I’m not feelin’ too good and I gotta rest up for the next show.”
“Okay, boss.” Little Pete nodded and reached for the door-knob.
“One more thing,” Corona said, looking toward the ceiling and rubbing the back of his neck. “Did that dick come back tonight? The rat who’s been sittin’ lookout at the bar all week? He thinks he’s undercover, but he’s not. The bartender made him right off. Said his name is Street and he’s a hotshot in Homicide.”
Little Pete let out a booming laugh. “Yeah, I know the rat you mean. Buys one rye and ginger and don’t even drink it. What a tip-off. Don’t he know any better’n that?”
Corona didn’t laugh or even smile. He jumped to his feet and started pacing, like a caged animal, around the tiny room. “So what’s the story?” he growled. “Is Street out there again tonight? Because if he is, I want you to get rid of him. Once and for all. I’m sick of looking at his ugly mug.”
“No, boss, he ain’t here yet. He usually don’t show up till after the second show.”
“Well, if he does come in, lemme know right away.” Corona continued his feverish pacing, not looking at Abby or me, but brushing so close to us I could feel the heat coming off his body.
“Sure thing,” Little Pete said. “You want that bottle of bourbon now?”
Corona came to a sudden standstill, ripped off his loosened bow tie, and tossed it on top of his rumpled jacket. “Yeah,” he said, unbuttoning his shirt all the way down to his black satin cummerbund, “and don’t forget the ice.”
Chapter 29
I DIDN’T THROW UP, BUT I ALMOST PASSED OUT. A hurricane was howling in my head. Corona and his boys knew all about Dan! And about his stakeout at the Copa! And that meant the city’s most powerful crime boss and the secret owner of the Copa, Frank Costello, knew all about Dan, too! And since Costello was now under investigation in the city’s big crackdown on organized crime, there was a damn good chance that Dan’s identity and recent surveillance activities had also been brought to the attention of District Attorney Sam Hogarth.
Oh, my God! What the holy hell is going on? Could it be that-?
My screaming thoughts were interrupted by Corona ’s silky yet surly voice. “Glad to see you could make it,” he scoffed, walking up to me and screwing his mouth into an ugly sneer. “Which one are you? Gina or Cherry?” He was standing so close I could see every detail engraved on the gold St. Christopher medal visible through the gap in his wide-open shirt.
“Cherry,” I said, without hesitation. (My near-virginal state had prompted Abby to pin that alias on me, and-though I hadn’t appreciated her derisive snorts and giggles at the time- I was now grateful for the name. At least I could remember it.)
“Cherry, huh?” Corona said, changing his sneer to a lusty smirk. “Does that mean you’ve still got a cherry to pop? Because if you do, you’ve come to the right place, honey. Poppin’ cherries is my favorite sport.”
I knew this was my cue to start flirting with the man-to make nice and bat my lashes and shower him with suggestive come-ons-but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I was consumed with worry about Dan. He was in danger, and I had to do something about it! I needed to drop the nauseating call girl act and get back to playing detective-now.
“I hate the name Cherry!” I snapped, face flaming. “It has nothing to do with me or my precious maidenhead. Sabrina just wants me to use it because she thinks it sounds sexy. I wanted to take the name Melody, but Sabrina said it belonged to another girl… a girl who was-”
Before I could say the word murdered, Abby shoved me aside and planted her own cleavage in front of Corona. “What about my name, Tony?” she said to him, pouting and striking a voluptuous pose. “Doesn’t it turn you on? I borrowed it from Gina Lollobrigida. She and I have a lot in common, you see. We’re both busty brunettes, and we both just luuuuuvvv to ride Italian stallions.” Abby was pulling out all the stops, doing her best to distract Corona from my ill-advised (okay, incredibly stupid) outburst.
It worked.
Corona ’s eyes grew wide as quarters, and his lean, hard face (think Frank Sinatra with a touch of Victor Mature) turned a little pink around the edges. He stopped breathing and started panting. “I hear what you’re sayin’, doll,” he snorted, “and I like what I see. But I want to see more. Step out in the middle of the floor and turn around real slow, so I can get a better look.”
“Whatever you say, Tony,” Abby murmured, smiling like the girl in the Colgate toothpaste ads. Then she took a deep breath, puffed up her nearly naked breasts, and-writhing her shoulders and hips like a professional stripper-did as she was told. (Look, I understood what she was doing, okay? She was making a sexual spectacle of herself so Corona would get all hot and bothered, and forget about my uncooperative conduct, and let us both stick around long enough to observe his behavior and fish for clues to the murder. But here’s what I didn’t understand: Did she really have to have so much fun doing it?)
As Abby was making her third or fourth slow, sensual (and annoyingly cheerful) turn around the floor, there was a loud knock on the door. “I got the booze, boss,” Little Pete called out, opening the door about an inch. “You want I should bring it in now?”
“Yeah,” Corona said, motioning for Abby to stop twirling and move out of the way. “Come in and put it on the table. You got the other stuff, too?”
“Sure thing, boss.” Grasping an ice bucket in one hand and a bottle of bourbon in the other, Little Pete lumbered across the room and set down the items as directed. A waiter carrying a tray topped with three glasses and a pack of Chesterfields followed close behind him. After everything was deposited on the makeup table, they both returned to the door. “That all, boss?” Little Pete asked. “Got what you need?”
“Yeah, scram. Shut the door on your way out.”
The waiter left the room in a hurry, but Little Pete hung back, belly hovering like a blimp in the doorway. “Street just came in, boss,” he said in a lowered voice. “He parked his ass at the bar. Want me to do somethin’ about it?”
“Sure,” Corona snarled. “I want the bastard put down. I want his goddamn head on a platter. But I gotta talk to Frank first. Is he here?”
“Yeah,” Little Pete said. “At his reg’lar table up in the mezz.”
“Okay, I’ll catch him later, after the girls leave.” The anxious look on Corona ’s face suggested our departure would be sooner rather than later-which was just hunky-dory with me.