Three cigarettes and a couple glasses of champagne later, he heard the key in the lock and watched the door open.
Leo came in wearing a sporty little plaid hat cocked on the side of his head. Leo still playing the high roller, not even dragging after all day at the
GET SHORTY 165
track, not looking over this way either, going straight for the Chivas on the desk and having one out of the bottle, ahhh, before pulling a fat wad of cash out of his jacket, tossing it on the desk like it was change from the cab fare and then taking the jacket off, the shirt too, it was coming off, Leo getting down to his undershirt hanging on bony shoulders, but not touching the hat, the sporty hat stayed, Leo thinking he must look good in it or the hat brought him luck, Leo in his four-bills-a-day hotel suite having another swig from the bottle.
“You got no class.”
The poor guy didn’t move.
Not till Chili said, “Look at me, Leo.”
Watching him now reminded Chili of the time in Vegas, Leo pinned to the roulette table, no escape, and finally coming around to say, “How much you want?” Leo the loser, no matter how much he won. Leo came around this time with the same hopeless look, but didn’t say anything. He was taking in the scene. Chili in his pinstripe, on the sofa. The champagne on the coffee table. But what caught Leo’s eye and held his attention was sitting next to the champagne. His briefcase. The same one the bodyguard had carried for him in Vegas.
“I wouldn’t think you’re that dumb,” Chili said, “leave over three hunnerd grand in the closet, underneath the extra blanket, but I guess you are.”
For a second there Leo looked surprised. “I did-n’t know where else to keep it. Where would you?”
The guy was serious.
“You’re here a while, what’s wrong with a bank?”
“They report it to the IRS.”
“You don’t open an account, Leo, you put it in a deposit box. Dip in whenever you want.”
He watched Leo nodding in his sporty hat and undershirt, thinking it over, what to do the next time he scammed an airline. Jesus, he was dumb.
“You been losing, huh?”
“I’m up twelve grand today.”
“From when? You left Vegas with four-fifty.”
“Who told you that?”
“Now you’re down to three-ten in the briefcase. You must’ve cooled off quite a bit in Reno.”
“Who says I was in Reno?”
The poor guy kept trying.
“Your friend Annette,” Chili said.
Leo narrowed his eyes and stared, trying hard to fake who he was: He raised his preshaped plaid hat and recocked it, see if that would help. No, there was nothing dumber than a dumb guy who thought he was a hotshot. You did have to feel a little sorry for him . . .
Till he said, “It was Fay, wasn’t it, told you about Annette. She tell you my whole life history, for Christ sake?”
“I wouldn’t let her if she tried,” Chili said. “Why I’m here, Leo, basically, is to save your ass.”
“How? By taking my money?”
“You can keep what you won today. That’s yours.”
“It’s all mine,” Leo said. “You don’t have any right to it.” Starting to whine. “You’re some friend.”
“No, I’m not your friend, Leo.”
“I’ll say you aren’t. Come in and ruin my life. Why are you doing this to me? I paid you what I owed.”
“Sit down, Leo.”
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Leo had to think about it, but he did. Went to the deep chair facing the coffee table, sat down and stared at his briefcase.
Chili said, “I don’t know how you stayed in business, Leo, you’re so fuckin dumb. Or how you ever got this far. But now you’re through. I’m gonna explain to you why and I hope you’re not too dumb you don’t understand what I’m saying. Okay?”
So Chili laid it out, told how Ray Bones was now in the picture and the kind of guy Bones was, the reason Leo and Annette would have to disappear or else risk serious injury. That seemed simple enough, a no-option kind of situation.
Leo thought about it a minute and said, “Well, I’m not going home.”
Look how his mind worked.
“I don’t care where you go, Leo.”
“I mean back to Fay.”
“That’s up to you.”
“After what she did to me?”
“You aren’t only dumb, Leo, you’re crazy.”
Leo thought about it another minute and said, “I don’t see any difference who takes the money, you or this other guy. Either way I’m cleaned out.”
“Yeah, but there different ways of getting cleaned out,” Chili said. “Ray Bones’ll take everything you have—”
“What—you ,won’t?”
“Leo, listen to me. When I say everything, I mean even that sporty hat if he wants it. Your watch, that pinkie you have on . . . and then he’ll hit you with some kind of heavy object if he doesn’t shoot you, so you won’t tell on him. I won’t do that,” Chili said, “take your jewelry or hurt you. You have three-ten in the case, right? I’m gonna take the three hundred you scammed off the airline, but the rest of it, the ten grand? I’m gonna borrow that and pay you back sometime.”
He knew Leo wouldn’t understand what he meant, Leo squinting at him now.
“You take all my money, but you’re borrowing part of it?”
“At eighteen percent, okay? And don’t ask me no more questions, I’m leaving,” Chili said.
He picked up the briefcase as he rose from the sofa and Leo came up out of his chair.
“You’re saying you want me to loan you the ten grand?”
“I’m not asking you, Leo. What I’m saying is I’m gonna pay you back.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You don’t have to. Let’s leave it at that.”
“Yeah, but how’re you gonna pay me?”
Chili was moving toward the door. “Don’t worry about it.”
“I mean you won’t know where I am. I don’t even know where I’ll be.”
“I’ll find you, Leo. You leave a trail like a fuckin caterpillar.” Chili reached the door and opened it.
Leo saying now, “Wait a minute. What’s this eighteen-percent-a-year shit? You want to borrow ten, the vig’s three bills a week. You hear me?” Chili crossing the hall toward the stairway, shaking his head, Leo yelling after him, “Fifteen for the vig plus the ten, that’s twenty-five big ones you go a whole year, buddy! You hear me?”
Chili stopped. He turned around. As he started back he saw Leo’s scared look just before he slammed the door shut. Jesus, he was dumb.
17 
He thought Raji’s would be a cocktail lounge with entertainment, a Hollywood nightspot. It turned out to be a bar with pinball machines and video games making a racket, also a counter where you could buy Raji’s T-shirts, in case you wanted to show you had actually come in here. Sometimes it was hard to keep an open mind. Chili, in his pinstripe suit, nice tie, wondered if any regular people came here or just these kids trying to look like heroin addicts. He said to one of them, “How come there’s no sign out in front?”