Vince wasn’t sure if it was meant for him or not, so he pulled into the spot as he’d meant to, turned off the car but waited to see what the cops would do. What they did was move up next to the back of his car, leave their red light flashing, and get out. One moved to the sidewalk, slowly walked up to the rear passenger-side window, and stood there. The other came up to Vince’s side and motioned him to roll down the window. He blinded Vince with a flashlight, then moved the beam down and around, over Vince, onto the seats of the car, before bringing it back up into his eyes.
“You got a taillight out.”
That was a relief. It was a bother, but what cop’s gonna give him too much grief over that? Still, fucking George. Vince hoped he didn’t move his hand in time.
“Yeah? Okay. Sure, I’ll get it fixed. Can you get that light out of my eyes? It’s working too well.”
The cop didn’t like that. “You got a mouth. And you look a little familiar. I seen you somewhere before? Somewhere I shouldn’t?”
Vince wasn’t unknown to the local station house. They knew who he worked for. He’d had his share of scrapes, nothing too serious but enough that when something ugly was going down they’d pick him up sometimes to see if they could sweat something, anything out of him. He knew he was small potatoes, but rousting guys like him was one way the cops could squeeze his bosses for more money, favors, or just to let them know who was really in charge without having to get tripped up in the mess of tangling with the big guys head-on.
“Get out of the car. Hands on the roof, back to the street.” The other cop moved up to the front window, his hand resting on his holster.
A whole lot of things Vince wanted to say ran through his head, but even with the whites and coffee still percolating his blood, he knew better than to say any of them. Keeping his hands in sight he slowly opened the door, got out of the car, and did as he was told.
He could hear the music spilling out the door of the Downbeat. The club was owned by that Jew in Hollywood, the well-dressed one, Cohen. Above Earl, above the Lucca brothers, he was Vince’s real boss. The band sounded crazy. Hopheads most likely. The bass rattled the windows. What was their name? Some of Vince’s friends were nuts over them, said they were the future. He sure as shit hoped not. Stars of Swing, that was it. Some guy named Charlie was the dope fiend on the bass. The girls were crazy over him. No explaining that.
The cop turned him just enough to run the light over Vince’s face, collar, and the front of his shirt. He took a step back and put his hand on his holster. “What’s this? Looks like blood.”
Shit, fucking George again. Vince should have checked himself over after pounding on him. “Cut myself shaving. Guess I was in a hurry to get out and didn’t notice to change shirts.”
The cop just nodded and told his partner to check out the car. The other cop opened the passenger door and got in, ran his flashlight around the bottom of the seats, then opened the glove box. He pulled out the pink slip and looked it over. “This your car? When’d you buy it?”
The slip was typed out to George but signed over to Vince. He didn’t know what George was going to do, maybe go to the cops, maybe his wife’d make him do it, maybe someone would find him. Better not to put himself and George in the same place tonight. “A few days ago. It’s a piece of shit but it runs. Sorry I didn’t notice the taillight.”
The cop shined his light back into the box and came out with a folded piece of paper. He carefully unfolded it, shined his light on it, and held it up so that the cop next to Vince could see. “What’ve we got here?”
The cop shoved Vince hard up against the car and pushed into the back of one of his knees with his knee. “Put your hands behind your back.”
Vince did and was cuffed, quick and tight. “What the fuck? What’d I do? Told you I’d get the light fixed.”
The cop moved him to the open driver’s window, pushed his head down to it so he could look inside and see what the other cop was holding. Shit, George, fucking George, what the hell? Vince hated that shit. It was for losers.
The other cop started tossing the car, looking it all over as the cop with Vince steered him toward the prowl car. “You know reefer’s illegal, pal, even just a little, a felony rap, even on the Avenue.”
Vince snorted. Mary Jane? Two reefers. That was all. There wouldn’t be more. George didn’t have the money or the connections. And it was all over the Avenue, all the time, and for the most part no one gave a shit, not so long as it was a white guy caught holding.
“Okay, fellas, you got me. It ain’t much of nothin’. You let trouble like this slide all the time. You know who I work for, right? I’ll get the light fixed, you can take the reefer, I don’t smoke that shit anyhow. And I’ll make sure you get taken care of soon as I get a little ahead.”
He was looking into the eyes of the cop when he said it and missed seeing the knee coming up toward his groin. He could still hear the cop, though, once he was on the ground breathing hard to try to get through it.
“That’s resisting arrest and attempted bribery, shitbag.”
The reek of vomit and piss in the tank wasn’t helping Vince’s pains. His crotch had settled into a slow dull throb, but his hips, stomach, and shoulders ached hard where he had “fallen” onto the booking cop’s billy while he was being processed. The whites and coffee still working their way through his veins weren’t helping either. Where was a real drink when he needed one?
And what was it with so many guys in the holding tank? He saw someone he knew a little across the cell and slowly picked his way over. “Hey, Tom, what’d they nab you for?”
“Hey, Vince. A bullshit B&E. The ex’s place, trying to get my radio back. Used to be my place. Cops knew it too. You?”
“A little reefer, on the back of a busted taillight. What’s going on? Why the crowd?”
“I hear it’s come down from on high. Clean up the Avenue. Some radio preacher’s got his hooks into the deputy mayor’s wife and now we’re paying for it. And it’s not like the locals mind. They’re just going to hop on board figuring they can use it to raise the going rates on leaving things be.”
Another guy had moved into Vince’s seat on the bench and he wasn’t up to the rumble it would take to clear him out. He found a spot on the concrete to try to mull over the possibilities.
They weren’t good. Normally Earl would have him out in no time. And he’d stay out. The whole ruckus would disappear. But it would cost him. Palms would be greased, strings pulled, favors called in, and Vince’d be in deeper hock to Earl and the Luccas than the schmos he regularly had to brace on their behalf. Though it wouldn’t be anything he couldn’t work off in a few good months.
But this might be different. Vince was small fry, he knew that. And so long as the little guys didn’t cost too much, didn’t rock the boat, didn’t stir up shit for the bigger fish, and brought in more than they took out, all was right with the world. A little trouble every so often, taken care of easily with something the Luccas could scrape out of his cut of things, no problem. It was like any company, just business.
Vince understood the politicians and the high-ranking cops and even the cops on the beat weren’t earning their keep by being stupid. The way to lean on the Luccas was to raise their cost of doing business. They weren’t ever going to shut down, everyone knew that. They didn’t even want to. The “legit” guys were like everybody else, they wanted to gamble, they wanted dope, they wanted women, and they wanted their slice, a fat slice, of the money being made from that.
And the soft part of the Luccas’ business was guys like Vince. Give enough grief to the little guys and it was one of the very rare times that shit could defy gravity and roll uphill. This was going to be expensive, a lot more expensive than usual. And by the time the internal ball of shit rolled back down from the Luccas to Earl and got to Vince, it would gain a whole lot of weight and pick up a mighty head of steam. He’d be theirs, forever, for whatever the fuck they wanted him for. And there were some things he didn’t want to do, wasn’t sure he could do if it came down to it. And if the Luccas owned a guy, “no” was a very dangerous word.