By Christopher Leeson
Chapter 2
The Narrative of D.C. Callahan
Morning came too early and too bright. The sun cutting through the gaps in the hotel curtains felt like a personal insult. I woke in Val's room with the previous night's work written into my every muscle. My back was in full complaint mode about the constant movement, my arms were protesting against the heavy trays I'd carried, and my calves were in full rebellion against the long hours on my feet.
But my feet themselves? They were fine. Sheila had fortunately worn stilettos before I was stuffed into her body by those miserable space invaders. D.C. Callahan had been used to sensible, thick-soled oxfords. Without the resilience of Sheila Coffin's ankles, I'd be in agony about now. It was a relief to find out that at least two or three of the crazy things women subject themselves to came with a legit payoff.
Val's bed was empty; she was already up. She was doing stretches on the floor, her body folding with a flexibility that made my own joints ache just watching. Dancers were a type of acrobat, and I could respect that. She had on yoga pants and a sports bra, which wasn't an impressive outfit on a girl as attractive as she was.
"You okay?" she asked, noticing the audible creak in my knees as I sat up.
"Just sore. It's been a while since I've done barroom service." I didn't add that the 'last time' I worked in a bar I was a two-hundred-pound man hauling kegs in from the alley, not a slip of a girl balancing martinis on a silver tray.
She smiled—a genuine, sympathetic look—and slid a bottle of ibuprofen across the nightstand along with a glass of lukewarm water. "I've done floor work, too. Take three with breakfast. Trust me. The second night is always the hardest because the adrenaline from the first night has worn off."
I took them gratefully with a plastic cup of water. The pills felt chalky and dry in my throat.
"You really love the work, don't you? The dancing?" I asked, watching her expression. Talking to a stripper about stripping was still a turn-on for me.
Val paused, her leg pulled up behind her head in a way that looked physically impossible. Her eyes went distant as she considered the question. "Yeah, I do. Most people think strippers are stupid or trashy. They put us only one notch above whores. It kills me that society wants what we offer them, but still despises us when we give it to them. The best part of the strip gig is that on that stage, I'm the one in control. I'm the one they're looking at, and I'm the only one who's important in the entire room."
As I watched her movement, the detective in me went quiet. As D.C. Callahan, I'd spent decades on the other side of that stage. I thought I'd been showing the strippers respect because I didn't hoot or holler. Before this, I'd talked to a few strippers, but none of them spoke honestly to me, not like Val was doing. She was letting me know about the "life." It took sweat and sheer raw discipline to bring off what she did so well. To be honest, that was also true about cocktail waitressing. There was more to the job than wearing a short dress. My body wouldn't have ached so much if I had only needed to stand around looking great.
A sharp, rhythmic rapping at the door broke the quiet of the morning. Both of us went still.
"It's Martin," my roomie said, checking the peephole.
Martin came in carrying a cardboard carrier of coffee with a grease-stained bag of breakfast sandwiches tucked under his arm. His dark stubble told me he hadn't shaved. Well, the old Callahan wouldn't have shaved either. He'd be too eager to get over to a stripper's hotel room before the window of opportunity closed. Martin set the food on the small laminate table and started taking maps and handwritten notes from his pack.
"The Morettis aren't going away," he said without preamble. "Big Leo's guys spotted two 'scouts' idling in a sedan outside the club at closing time. They're circling, waiting for an opening."
"Well, you've been busy," I said. "I'm impressed."
He looked across at me in that special way of his. "I aim to please," he said with that smile I love so much. It's a nuisance being a girl, but when the lights are out, it has aspects that aren't so bad.
I took a sip of the coffee—black, bitter, and hot. "They're smart," I said in the breathy alto I'd inherited from Sheila. "They won't hit her inside the club. Too many witnesses, too much security. They'll wait for the transition—the walk to the car, the ride back here."
Martin's eyes narrowed as he looked up and studied me.
"Yeah," I quipped. "Just don't tell me I look like a pro."
"Not in those dowdy PJs, you don't. But I've seen you dressed like a bad girl before and loved it."
"You would! You're a randy son of a bitch who can't keep his lip buttoned."
He shrugged. "Yeah, if you say so. But I know how much you like being complimented. You gotta have it even when you're wearing your grumpiness like an old lady's shawl."
#
The crowd tonight differed from the one on my opening night. This time, it was heavily weighted with regulars who tipped well and caused less disturbance than the tourists in town to see the Lincoln Memorial. These were the customers that Dom, the boss, cultivated: affluent people with expense accounts and enough sense not to get handsy with the talent.
On stage, the dancer named Lacy was performing a routine I'd seen her rehearse earlier. She moved like water, every gesture deliberate and controlled. There was something magical about a striptease dancer, at least the pretty ones. I couldn't get enough of them. Though I couldn't have explained it, even after becoming as a girl myself, I still couldn't.
When someone tapped me on the shoulder, I jumped. "You look tense, Sheila." Val was standing behind me. "Trouble?"
"No, it's nothing. A guy propositioned me. He took me by surprise. What makes me tense is keeping lookout for killers."
"I don't know about killers, but I know about the lounge crowd. You just learn to endure their lewd comments, sigh, and move on."
It was Val who moved on just then, but I wasn't left on my own for over ten seconds. "Scarlett!" Mercedes's hard voice came at me like the swipe of a buzz saw. "Table nine in your section is waiting for drinks. Are you planning to deliver them this century?"
I snapped back into motion, heat rising in my cheeks. "Sorry, I was distracted by another customer."
"That's no excuse!" With a snort, the floor manager passed on.
"Damn it!" I thought in her wake. How did college-age women stand working in such a demanding place?
More time passed, and then, around eleven o'clock, the atmosphere shifted.
A man in his fifties slinked in like a prowling alley cat and sat down at a corner table. He didn't order a drink immediately. The newcomer was wearing a charcoal suit that cost more than my first three cars combined. He had on understated and expensive duds and moved with a stillness that would have put any savvy observer on guard. I saw the way his eyes were fixed on Val, who was just then on the floor doing hostess duty for extra tips.
I stepped into his line of sight. "Sorry, honey, Val's booked solid tonight."
I was taking care to use my "waitress voice"—light, polite, but firm.
The man glanced up, with eyes resembling two pieces of flint. They didn't help make his smile look authentic. "You're new. What's your name, honeybuns?"
"Scarlett."
"Nice gams. You ought to try dancing yourself." He let the compliment hang in the air like a buzzng hornet. "I don't have time to hang around here," he finished. "Tell Val I'll be seeing her soon—very soon. My name's Anthony Gallo. Tell her that."
He stood up, adjusted his cuffs, and left the lounge without looking back.
The Narrative of D.C. Callahan, continued
The name Anthony Gallo hit me like a bucket of ice water. The talk on the street called Gallo the "Architect." He was more than a commonplace hit man. Breaking legs wasn't his game; his specialty was disappearances. If the Morettis had sent their top consigliere into a strip club just to say "hello," it meant the clock wasn't just ticking. It was about five seconds from midnight.
My heart was hammering against my ribs. With time running out, what was I supposed to do? Some plans I'd had! Here I was, wearing a cocktail dress and holding a rattling tray of empty glasses in my mitts when I should have been fingering a deadly weapon.
Val fast-stepped toward me, losing her smile now that she had he back to the customers. "How are things looking?" she asked in a whisper.
If I told her the truth, we'd probably have a screaming Mimi on our hands. That wouldn't do anybody any good.
"No news is good news," I told her. "It's best if you act like you don't have a care in the world."
She forced a smile, as if sensing the surrounding menace. But, saying nothing, the dancer nodded, sighed, and returned to her hosting gig. I winced as my glams followed after her. It was like I was seeing clouds of doom gathering over her head.
Just then, Dom, the club boss, materialized beside me. "I saw the guy. I know who he is. You okay, Scarlett?"
"Gallo told me to tell Val that he's going to see her soon," I muttered.
Dom's jaws tightened. "Gallo doesn't make social calls. If he came to deliver a message, it means they're getting ready to move. Tonight, tomorrow—it doesn't matter. The clock's ticking."
Concerned, I searched the room for Val. I saw her trying hard to chat pleasantly with a regular. She looked tense, aware of the surrounding danger. I knew she'd panic if I told her that her executioner had just walked through the door and measured her for a coffin.
"Keep her in sight," Dom said quietly. "This is trouble beyond my league. What can you and your buddy do to keep the worst from happening?"
I grimaced and must have looked pretty clueless.
The club manager squeezed my shoulder then—a gesture that was probably meant to be reassuring but felt more like a warning. "Let me know whether you detectives can think of something. I'll tip off the bouncers to help you out if they can. I'll do what I can, too, short of getting myself killed." Then he drifted back toward his observation point near the stage door, his mouth grim and his eyes darting about.
To my relief, I saw Martin coming out of the crowd, returning to his place at the bar. Intense and jittery, I moved fast, the clicks my heels made reminding me of gunfire. I glanced over to the exit that Gallo had used, feeling like I was standing in the path of a breaking dam.
When my shadow touched Martin, he glanced up. I said nothing, but my eyes gave him a message to meet me away from listening ears. I made for the backstage area. My pard waited in place for just half a minute before stepping after me, maybe trying to look like he was going to the john.
When the pair of us met under a web of hanging ropes, it took me only one breathless sentence to fill him in on the whole sordid story.
He shook his head. "So there really are gangsters chasing Val. But if Anthony Gallo has a personal interest in her, that's about as bad as things could get."
"Tell me something I don't know," I fired back at him.
"It's a dark night, but maybe not the eleventh hour yet," Martin answered back. "Gallo came to deliver a warning. Why try to scare her? Why not just ambush her?"
I had a pretty good idea why, and none of the reasons were good. "He probably thinks Val is alone and unprotected. He'd like to shock her into making a run for it. Then the gang will be able to grab her someplace away from witnesses."
Martin nodded. "They'll probably stake out her car. You didn't say anything to Val about the danger, did you?"
"No! I'm not that dumb!"
"Good. It's best if she carries on naturally until closing time, doing nothing that might excite the bad guys. Have you got your gun?"
"No! Where the deuce could I hide a gat while wearing this outfit? I feel naked."
He briefly looked like he would make a jibe, but his features fell. He wasn't in the mood for it.
"You'll need to figure out the how and where yourself! But get on the move! Armed yourself and then head back to the floor. I'll stay as close to Val as I can, while you keep watch on the flanks. After her shift, we'll bring the car around and take her home. Like I said, her own car might be a danger spot."
"We could take her home, but they probably know where she's staying!" I reminded him.
Martin paused a beat. "You're right. Fortunately, I still keep a room of my own. We'll stash her there and stand guard. There's no way the apes could know about my place yet."
I shook my head. "Even if Val gets through the night alive, what about tomorrow?"
Martin took a deep breath. "I think—"
"What are you doing here, Scarlett?" a hard female
voice broke in. It was Mercedes, the wicked witch of Washington. "I
know this hunk is your boyfriend, but you're distractions are unprofessional. You won't get another warning. You look good, and we'd like to
keep you on board but pretty girls who need jobs are a dime a
dozen."
"I'm sorry," I said. "It won't happen again!"
"Your 'sorries' are inflated currency, Pouty Lips. If I have to tell you that you're screwing up again, it will be the last time."
She wheeled away, leaving me steaming. To her, I was just a spot of dust in need of sweeping. I gritted my teeth. Having to look like a girl 24-7 was bad enough, but being treated like a useless twit from four to midnight really made me sour.
#
Closing time came, and we took Val outside through the most obscure exit the club had. Martin had already positioned his Honda there, engine running. Getting Val out of the club without incident took careful choreography. Big Leo, the bouncer, helped us walk Val out first, his considerable frame shielding her from any potential sniper angles. I followed close behind, my hand in my purse, gripping my Rossi.
We were in an alley, not a parking lot, but there were many shadows, many angles where shooters could hide. I scanned the roof lines, the piles of trash, the dark spaces between the glaring lights.
Martin pushed the passenger door open. "Get in," he said sharply.
Val dove in next to him, and I took the back seat, my pistol now out. I'd be the tail-gunner. Martin vavoomed out of the alley with a heavy foot, but not recklessly—doing nothing that would draw unwanted attention.
For the first few blocks, nobody spoke. Martin took random turns, doubled back twice, and used every trick he knew to dodge a tail. I watched through the rear window, my pulse racing faster than the car.
"Are we being followed?" Val whispered.
"Not that I can see," Martin answered. His knuckles were white on the steering wheel. "Anything, Sheila?"
"Not that I can tell!" I said from backseat.
We took the long way to Martin's single room, adding twenty minutes to the drive. By the time we pulled into the underground garage, my shirt was damp with sweat under my jacket.
"We made it," Val breathed.
"For now," I said.
The Narrative of D.C. Callahan, continued
We hurried inside and climbed the stairs. I pushed open the door to the single room that Martin still maintained as his own space. I knew full well that every man needs to have a hidey-hole to call his own. Sniffing the air, I could barely detect the scent of Martin's cheap cigarettes in his seldom-occupied crash zone.
Val was behind us. We shuffled out of the way, and she hurried into the room, her phone clutched in a shakey grip. "I'm scared," she said. "Should I call the police?"
Martin shook his head. "They won't be ready to take you yet," he said. "You'll be lucky if they're ready to hide you as early as they told you they would. That's how this town works." He looked back at me. "I hope all the evasive driving I did pays off. The two of us are both armed, and we'll stand guard, sleeping in shifts. Val can have the bed. We'll make do on the chair or the floor."
"I'm sorry," I apologized to our client. "That's about all a pair of dicks can do when up against a criminal outfit of the Morettis' size."
Martin crossed to the window ledge and sat down. He was wearing his "danger face," with the piercing, analytical gaze of a man who makes his living noticing things that are out of place.
Val, shivering more from fear than cold, struggled under the covers fully clothed. I took possession of the only chair available and gave the small room a good perusal. Until now, I'd thought it silly for my cash-strapped partner to shell out good dough for cramped cubbyhole he hardly needed. But tonight, I was damned glad to have access to an out-of-the-way hiding place.
I assumed the first watch, too keyed up to sleep. The dark hours after midnight seemed endless, but who could be bored when you had a gang of thugs on your heels? I was still awake when Martin's wristwatch alarm went off. He heaved up from the floor and relieved me. I took his place on the old carpet, under the large towel he'd been using for a blanket, still warm from his body heat. I didn't expect to get any sleep at all, but I miraculously dropped off within minutes. When Martin shook me awake, the sun was beaming in through the window. Val was up, too, sitting on the bed's edge, biting her lower lip.
Martin yawned and returned to the windowsill. "Now that we've
gotten some rest," he said, "we ought to take breakfast some public place, maybe
at a mall when it opens. If the gang can somehow track us down here, it won't
a good place to defend."
"I don't care for us walking around like three clay pipes in a shooting gallery," I said. "Maybe we ought to take Val to our office later. We'll burrow in behind the "closed" sign until it's time for her to go back to work. But before we head that way, we have to pack in some groceries. Otherwise, Val and I are going to faint from hunger working at the club tonight."
I stepped up to the window overlook to take look outside over the top of Martin's head. It was a shabby neighborhood, full of illegal emigrants. After thinking quietly for a moment, I had to admit, "I've got a bad feeling about tonight."
To be continued in Chapter 3
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