While I picked up the phone to call the psychiatric ward of the nearest hospital, I looked at the bottom shelves, and there I saw a tape that bore my name, made, no doubt, while I’d slept last night, a guest in his house.
Copyright ©2006 by Louis Sanders. First published in French by Nouvel Observateur.
Stone Cold Christmas
by Doug Allyn
Doug Allyn has written mainly series stories for EQMM over the past several years. This time out he introduces an entirely new set of characters, and a plot complete with financial shenanigans, an investigation of union politics by the F.B.I., and a family’s complicated loyalties. He’s EQMM’s all-time Readers Award favorite: Since 1992, eight of this stories have taken first place.
The limousine looked half a block long. A GM Hummer, an army assault vehicle with its sheet metal stretched to limo length. Coal-mine black with opaque windows. Bulletproof. Crude as a coffin on wheels and totally out of place rolling silently down a street where working-class folks drove pickups or econo-cars.
As the limo eased to the curb, two bodyguards scrambled out. Big men, one white, one black. Both burly, in leather car coats. No weapons showing, but they kept their hands in their pockets as they scanned the streets for trouble.
They didn’t spot any. The neighborhood looked cordial as a Christmas card, Norman Rockwell-style. Two-story suburban saltboxes decked out in their holiday best, evergreen wreaths on front doors, colored lights winking in the windows, plastic snowmen smiling on frosty lawns.
Sean crouched in the shadow of the shrouded porch swing until the two goons were satisfied the street was clear. Then one nodded to the driver, the limo’s rear door popped open, and Iron Mike O’Donnell climbed out. Looked as rough as his reputation. Two hundred forty pounds of beef on a six-foot frame. Played center on the Northridge high-school football team, a long time back.
Twenty years older now, forty pounds heavier, Iron Mike looked like what he was, union boss of the Refuse Haulers Local 106, a radical splinter of the Teamsters. “The most dangerous labor leader since Jimmy Hoffa,” according to Newsweek.
Surprise was his best chance, so Sean kept utterly still, waiting for Iron Mike to cross the sidewalk. As the boss’s brogan touched the first step, Sean launched.
Charging out of the shadows, he vaulted the porch railing, tackling Mike chest-high, wrestling him to the ground, the two men sprawling on the lawn as they scuffled for an advantage.
For a frozen instant the bodyguards were too stunned to react, then they seized Sean, pulling him off, pinning his arms so Iron Mike could work him over.
“You moron!” Mike said, dusting himself off. “Are you trying to get yourself killed?”
“Just wondering if you’re as tough as your press releases claim.”
“Too tough for you. You still tackle like a girl,” Mike snorted, tousling the younger man’s hair, wrapping him in a bear hug as the bodyguards exchanged puzzled glances. “It’s okay, guys, it’s just my half-wit brother. Been awhile, Sean.”
“Not long enough. Once a year under the same roof is all my career can handle.”
“Career,” Mike snorted. “Sean’s a banker, guys. A freakin’ capitalist lackey.”
“Guilty as charged,” Sean admitted. “How was jail?”
“Lousy. Is that real food I smell? What’s Mom cookin’?”
“Everything.” Sean grinned. “Every damn thing you ever heard of. Welcome home.”
Arms over each other’s shoulders, the brothers led the way into the house, where their tiny silver-haired mom, in her flowered apron, with a dab of flour on the tip of her nose, greeted Mike with squeals of delight. Even their chocolate Labrador barked a hello before returning to his corner of the kitchen, patiently hoping for a handout.
After hugging her boys hello and welcoming Mike’s bodyguards, Mrs. O’Donnell shooed the men into the dining room to the long oaken table beneath a wagon-wheel chandelier.
Iron Mike served up mugs of Irish coffee all around, then took his seat at the head of the table. And relaxed just a little. Home and free. At last.
“So, what’s new, little brother?”
“You are,” Sean said. “All over TV and the national press. That article in Newsweek said you were a Communist. I didn’t even know you could spell Communist.”
“I can’t. I hire computer nerds like you to spell it.”
“But what’s the point?” Sean pressed. “Communism flopped twenty years ago, or hadn’t you heard?”
“I know.” Mike grinned. “Know what being a Commie amounts to these days?”
Sean shook his head.
“That’s the beauty of it, laddie. Neither does anyone else. But it sounds dangerous, and in my business, making businessmen nervous is our stock in trade.”
“So you’re not really a Commie? Just a labor thug?”
“And you’re a capitalist pig.”
“Enough name-calling, boys,” Mother Meg yelled from the kitchen. “No more politics at my table, I declare a truce for the holidays. Do you hear?”
“Yes, Ma,” the brothers answered together.
“Are you two brothers, really?” Joe Briggs, the black bodyguard, asked, leaning back in his chair. “You don’t even look alike.”
True. Barrel-chested with a bullet head, Iron Mike was Black Irish, dark eyes, darker outlook. Sean was as tall as his brother but slender as a whip, fair-haired, with his mother’s green eyes. Dressed preppie: fashionably faded jeans, button-down Pendleton shirt, deck shoes, no socks.
“Different fathers,” Mike explained. “My dad was killed on the road when I was six. His eighteen-wheeler hit a train. After he’d been driving forty hours straight. And people wonder why I’m a Commie.”
“My dad met Ma at a USO dance,” Sean offered. “A soldier. Bought it in Vietnam.”
“Actually, they’re both adopted,” their mother said, delivering steaming bowls of bean soup to the table. “Bought one from a circus, the other belongs to the milkman. I can never remember which.”
“We never had a milkman, Ma,” Mike said.
“The plumber, then,” she said. “I’ve got corned-beef sandwiches coming, boys, but save some space for dessert. Tomorrow’s a big day.”
“Nothing for me, Ma,” Sean said, rising. “I’ll take Bowser for a run before dinner. If my girlfriend calls, tell her I’ll be back in an hour. And for God’s sake don’t let these knuckleheads talk to her.”
“You invited a girlfriend for Christmas?” Mike said, surprised. “That’s a first. Anything serious?”
“Might be,” Sean said. “Assuming she doesn’t run for her life as soon as she sees you and your goons.”
“Does she play poker?”
“No, but her brother does. He’s coming, too.”
“Doesn’t trust you two alone, huh?” Mike eyed his brother. “Don’t blame him. Do I know these people?”
“No, they’re business acquaintances,” Sean said quickly, lacing up his running shoes and grabbing a jacket off the hook. “Back in a bit. Come on, Bowser.”
The big black Lab bounded up and beat Sean out the door.
“What’s little brother’s new girl like, Mom?” Mike asked.
“I haven’t met her yet, but I’m sure she’s very nice.”
“Yeah,” he said thoughtfully. “If he’s bringing her for Christmas, she must be.”
Outside, Sean set a steady pace, enjoying the nip of the winter wind, jogging down the sidewalk as the afternoon faded and the streetlights winked on. Bowser covered twice as much ground, charging happily over lawns, pausing to water every tree, racing to catch up.