He turned to face her. His breath reeked. “I hope those offshore account numbers were of some use to you.”
She nodded.
He leaned over to speak more intimately. “Mallory, have you ever thought of getting into another line of work?”
“No. I like being a cop. I’m good at it.”
“You take after Markowitz.” He reached out one gnarly hand to touch hers. She balled her hand into a fist to warn him off. He did pull back, but he also smiled, as if he found her gesture of violence exquisitely charming.
“I suppose you learned a lot from your father.”
She nodded again. “So the sooner you retire, old man, the better.”
His cracked lips spread wide over the yellow teeth, and his frail body shook when he laughed. The laughter turned into a barking cough. He reached out to the bar recessed into the back seat of the limo. Where the booze should be, there was a water pitcher and a portable pharmacy of medication. He fiddled with a plastic mask attached to a small bottle of oxygen. He clasped it over his face and inhaled deeply.
Enjoying the good life, old man?
Mallory glanced at her watch while she waited out the dregs of the coughing spasm. “I haven’t got all day,” she said. “What do you want?”
He removed the mask. “I came to warn you.” His every breath was a ragged piece of work. He held up one hand to call for a time-out. In another minute, he was himself again. “Blakely tried to hire one of my boys to whack you. I put a stop on that.”
“How comforting.” She touched the glass partition that separated the driver from his employer. “Bulletproof glass?”
“Yes, and soundproof-very private. I conduct all my business in this car, so my driver checks it for bugging devices every morning.”
She could only see the dark hair of the man behind the wheel. He stared straight ahead. “And who checks the driver?”
“He’s family-my nephew’s youngest boy. Satisfied? Now listen to me, Mallory. Don’t underestimate Blakely. He’s scared now-not thinking straight. Next, he’ll lean on one of his own people to do the job. He’s gone underground. It may take me awhile to find him. But I can give you a good bodyguard-”
“I don’t want your bodyguard. And you don’t touch Blakely-you got that? You can’t kill all your mistakes, old man. Blakely is being threatened with tax evasion, not mob connections. There won’t be any investigation. I keep my bargains-you better keep yours.”
The driver’s head turned slightly to find her reflection in his rearview mirror. He looked away quickly, as though she had caught him at something.
Now what was that about?
“I want you to take the bodyguard.” The old don’s voice was insistent, but not so confident anymore. “I’m going to give you a man I would trust with my own life.”
“So you’re still worried that it’s all going to come back on you.” And if she didn’t live through the night, it would. Buying Blakely had been a bad mistake, and the payoff trail to a senator had left the old Mafia don vulnerable. It was only a matter of time before his own people realized what a liability he was.
She caught the eyes of the young driver in the rearview mirror. Was this man suddenly worried too?
“Cops don’t need bodyguards.” Her eyes traveled over the car’s lush appointments, looking for the thing that didn’t belong here.
“Cops don’t usually have gunmen after them,” said the don, as though explaining elementary facts of life to a small child.
“Yeah, they do-every time they hit the street.” Her eyes were fixed on an irregular upholstery stud near the glass partition. She leaned closer. The black stud was not leather but plastic, and it had three machine-made holes. She pulled it from the plush leather. It came out easily, only anchored by a pin. She blew a shrill whistle into the small plastic transmitter.
On the other side of the glass wall, the driver put one hand to the ear where the receiver must be hidden. There was real pain in the mirror reflection of his eyes.
The old man looked from the driver to the eavesdropping device in Mallory’s hand. Eyes rounded with shock, he knew he had been betrayed, yet he tried to deny it with the slow shake of his head.
Mallory knew everything in the don’s mind: This could not be happening, not to him, not at the hands of his own family.
“Soundproof? Bugproof? Don’t you wonder who your driver reports to?” Mallory touched the button to lower the glass partition. “Let’s ask him.”
The man at the wheel was turning around, one hand fumbling in his coat where the holster would be. She was already pointing her revolver at the driver’s face-and the bulletproof glass was sliding down.
The driver left the car at a dead run. Across the street, Frank the doorman was averting his eyes from the running man with the gun in his hand. Frank was a good New Yorker. What he did not see, he could not witness to in court at the cost of a day’s pay.
When the running gunman was out of sight, Mallory holstered her revolver and turned back to the old don. “Was that one of your hotshot bodyguards?”
Angry now, the don reached for the car phone. “That punk is a dead man.”
Mallory grabbed his wrist. It took very little effort to restrain him. “Who are you going to call? Another bodyguard? One of your nephew’s kids?” She sat quietly for all the time it took him to grasp this simple thing-he was the dead man.
She opened the door and stepped out of the car. “Might be smarter to call a cab and head for the airport.” She closed the door slowly, saying, “Don’t light in any one place for too long. You know the drill, old man.”
Mallory crossed the street to the condominium. Frank the doorman was smiling as he held the door open. “Two cops came by, miss.” He followed her into the lobby. “They showed me their badges and told me to let them into your apartment.” He pushed the button to fetch her an elevator. “But they didn’t have a warrant, so I told them to go screw themselves into the ground. I hope I did the right thing.”
She put two twenty-dollar bills into his coat pocket to tell him he had done exactly the right thing.
The elevator doors opened, and she looked up to the mirror mounted high on the back wall. It gave her a compressed view of an empty interior. When she stepped off the elevator at her floor, she had her revolver out of the holster. The gun preceded her into the apartment. After checking all the rooms and closets, she sat down on the couch and rifled her tote bag for the cellular phone.
It was gone. But where-
She checked her watch again. Now she reached over to the standard telephone on the end table and dialed Father Brenner’s number.
Where is the damn cellular?
While she talked to the priest, she searched the drawer of the table-a futile activity. Mrs. Ortega, world’s foremost cleaning woman, had put the apartment back in order after the robbery. So what were the odds that a single item would be out of place? Where had she lost the damn cellular phone?
She finished her instructions to Father Brenner. “I want you to say a mass for her.”
“Consider it done, Kathy. What was your mother’s name?”
“You don’t need her name. When you talk about her, just say she was a woman who was brutally murdered. And leave me out of it.”
She glanced at the messages accumulated on her answering machine.
“Kathy?”
“That’s all you get. It’s enough, isn’t it?”
“Yes. I’ll say the mass tomorrow.”
“No, do it tonight, I need it tonight.”
“All right, tonight it is. So you’re not looking for spiritual comfort for yourself?”
“No. You can save that routine for the believers, the suckers.”