“Shut up.”
Giancana sneered. “Then shoot, Saint.” Shrugged.
“Didn’t I always say, ‘Live by the sword, die by the sword’? So my string ran out, finally. It was a good ride. I fucked men over and fucked women silly — who could ask for more?”
Michael’s finger began to tighten on the trigger.
Giancana braced himself...
...but the diminutive don had said it before: Why wasn’t Michael shooting?
“Or maybe,” Giancana said, smiling just a little, the sideways slitted eyes narrowing even further, deep creases in the forehead signaling thought, “maybe you know that when you kill me, certain questions go unanswered — maybe forever. Questions like — how did I know you were in Arizona? Tucson? In Paradise the fuck Estates?”
Michael’s eyes tightened. “How did you know, Momo?”
A smile blossomed on the stubbly, wrinkled face; he looked very small, chest sunken, even frail. Of course, the man was in his late sixties, and recovering from gallbladder surgery.
Mooney’s voice was soothing now, almost charming. “Saint, why don’t we talk...”
The gangster gestured past the adjacent dining area through the open doorway into the den, where the large, rectangular dark oak table and ten high-backed chairs had been home to many an inner-circle Outfit meeting, back when Giancana was boss.
Michael knew he should just shoot this son of a bitch; but Giancana was right: when Mooney died, information would die with him.
“You first, Momo.”
Slowly, hands half-raised, Giancana led Michael into a spacious light-oak-paneled room cluttered with armchairs, a sofa, and endless bric-a-brac: porcelain ashtrays, beer steins, sterling silver pieces, glassware and bowls, some filling a Gothic hutch, others decorating tables; oil paintings, lighted from beneath, ran to Sicilian landscapes, and from a low-slung stereo cabinet, Sinatra was singing “Talk to Me, Baby” next to a fully stocked liquor cabinet.
One area of the den was devoted to golf, including a golf-bag wastebasket and a framed golfing clown print. Half the pipes in Chicago were displayed on a rack, and on a Louis XV desk a cigar humidor was initialed G.
But the vast conference table was dominant, and Giancana and Michael sat across from each other at the near end, closer to the scent of sizzling sausage.
Michael of course had checked for hidden weapons, alarm buttons, and patted down the scrawny gangster, who seemed vaguely amused. But the shark’s eyes had a glimmer Michael recognized: fear.
“Let me tell you why you shouldn’t kill me, Saint,” Giancana said, hands flat on the tabletop.
“Why don’t you.”
“You’re a smart man. You recognize power when you see it. You see the possibilities.” Another shrug. “Aiuppa doesn’t have the brains to run an organization like ours, with its national and international interests. And Accardo is an old man who just wants to retire and clip coupons. You know, I spent the afternoon talking with Butch Blasi and Chuckie English. Planning.”
“Don’t they work for Aiuppa now?”
Giancana snorted a laugh. “Aiuppa thinks they do. They go back with me, for... for fuckin’ ever. I got friends in the Outfit, from the old days, who remember what it was like having a real leader. The new turks, they heard of me, they heard the stories, the legend. Whispers about Jack Kennedy and Marilyn and Bobby. And how I fucking killed all three.”
“This is quite an argument you’re making.”
He raised a withered palm. “Just providing a... whaddyacallit, context for all of this. First thing you need to know is, I didn’t authorize what happened at your house. In Arizona.”
“Really.”
“I ain’t gonna tell you I was not in favor of shutting you up, permanent. We both know the kind of things you could yak about on the witness stand.”
“That’s funny, Momo. Lot of people feel the same about you.”
Giancana paused. “I did not tell Inoglia and them guys to do that terrible thing to your family. I would not do that. I got kids, too. I lost a wife who I still love to this day... Don’t look at me like that. It’s the truth.”
“Who did tell them to do it?”
“Thing is...” He twitched a nervous smile. “...I don’t know exactly. I only know what went down in your place ’cause... well. You probably heard I picked up, over the years, certain... contacts in government. These contacts are concerned about, you know... what you said. Me testifying.”
“CIA. I heard the rumors. But you don’t remind me at all of James Bond, Momo.”
His slash of mouth tightened. “I am not shitting you, Saint. I was dealing with a voice on the phone. This voice said, don’t give us up to the committee... Senate committee, you know... and we’ll protect you. We’ll give you Michael Satariano.”
“I’m not a fool, Momo...”
“Hell, I know you aren’t! But think about it, Mike — think! How could I know you headed back to Tahoe, to pick up that prom queen daughter of yours? How could I know that?”
His gloved hand tight on the pistol grip, Michael said, “Anna and her boyfriend kept in touch.”
“How?”
“By phone.”
“Who taps phones, Mike? Do I tap phones? Does the Outfit tap fucking phones? Who the hell does that sound like — the fuckin’ G, and that don’t-the-fuck stand for Giancana, does it?”
The truth of it sizzled inside Michael’s brain like that damn sausage on the stove.
“A leak,” Michael said. “In WITSEC.”
“Has to be,” Giancana said, and pounded the table in emphasis. “Has to be — working with the spooks, one government agency leaning on another.”
“Who?”
He threw his hands up. “Hey, you got me by the balls.” His hands came down and folded, prayerfully, respectfully. “But you come over to my side, Mike, you be my right-hand man... like you were Frank Nitti’s? And when I retire—”
“All this will be mine?” Michael grunted a mirthless laugh. “I’m not into ashtrays and beer steins, Momo.”
Giancana swallowed, sat forward, urgency in his voice. “You take my off er, you ride back to the top with me, Mike, and I promise you, I will play those government cocksuckers like a ten-cent kazoo, and we will find out who ratted you out! We’ll find the WITSEC leak and you will plug the bastard. Personally!”
Michael stared at the little shell of the once powerful mob boss, in whom desperation had replaced charisma.
“Inoglia, Nappi, Caruso — they were your men, Momo, before I sent them to hell.”
“Who said they weren’t?”
“You say what happened in Paradise Estates wasn’t your doing. That some faceless voice on the phone, representing the CIA skeletons in your closet, gave me up to you as a favor...”
“Yeah! What don’t you get, Saint? I let it be known I was unhappy about my ‘company’ pals not protecting me from those fuckin’ Mexicans! I had tens of goddamn millions in the bank down there... and Uncle Sam can’t do anything about it? And now I gotta testify, and make Accardo and every paranoid asshole in the Outfit think I might spill the secrets, like that prick Valachi?”