Bad Business (36 page)

“Could you please stop with that?” Lorraine gave him that annoyed squint of hers.

Gibbons drained his beer.
What the hell was she defending
him
for?

“Let me tell you something, Lorraine. If it weren't for me, McCleery would've been facing charges along with his boss right now. Taking pictures on Grand Street in order to
frame Tozzi? That would've made him an accomplice. Am I right, Toz?”

“You're right.”

“But,” Gibbons continued, “out of the goodness of my heart, I made him chase down Augustine and arrest him. I
gave
him the collar, made him look like the big hero. And that's what saved his ass from being indicted. I don't even like the friggin' guy and I helped him out. You see? I'm a real humanitarian. So don't go making faces at me, Lorraine, until you know the facts.”

She made that face at him again. Why? Was she getting fed up with him? Was she dreaming about that bum McCleery and his fucking Irish poetry?

The crowd noise was swelling on television. Dick Clark was holding his headphones, yelling into his microphone as the camera panned past him to the throngs of idiots getting crushed in Times Square. The camera switched to the big red apple on the pole, and the countdown started.
“Ten, nine, eight”
—Lesley quickly filled the champagne glasses for everyone—
”seven, six, five, four”
—Lorraine took the beer bottle out of Gibbons's hand and gave him a glass—
“three, two, one, Happy New Year!”

They all clinked glasses and drank to the New Year, then all of a sudden Tozzi and Lesley were in a hot and heavy clinch. Gibbons put his arm around his wife, but she gave him that squinty look again before she let him kiss her. It wasn't much of a kiss, a wifey kind of a kiss. She was thinking about McCleery, he knew it. What a fucking depressing way to start the year.

“Hey, happy New Year, Gib.” Tozzi had his hand out.

Gibbons gripped it. “Happy New Year, goombah.”

Lorraine and Lesley were hugging over Tozzi's back. Gibbons wondered what he was supposed to do with Lesley. Shake her hand or what?

Lesley got up then and came around the couch toward him. She sat on the edge next to him and gave him a little
half-smile, like she knew just what he was thinking, then she put her arm around his shoulder and gave him a hug. “Happy New Year, tough guy.”

“Same to you, counselor.” He returned the hug, and his hand practically covered her entire back, she was so small. But she was all right.

“Excuse me for a minute,” she said then. “I just want to go look in on Patricia.”

When she was out of the room, Tozzi leaned into Gibbons's ear. “She's still real nervous about the kidnapping. I don't think she's let the kid go to the bathroom alone since it happened.”

“Can you blame her?” Lorraine made the squint face at Tozzi.

“Of course not. That's why I've been hanging around. You know, just to make her feel more secure.”

Now Gibbons gave him the squint face. Who the hell did he think he was bullshitting?

Lorraine set down her champagne glass, stood up, and stretched.

“Time to shove off?” Gibbons asked her.

She nodded. “I think so. I'm pretty tired.”

Gibbons watched her collect the empty beer bottles and glasses from the coffee table and bring them out to the kitchen.

Tired, huh? Does that mean what I think it means? Not even for auld lang syne?

“You need a ride home?” he asked Tozzi.

“No, that's okay. I'm staying here tonight.”

Gibbons shook his head. “I knew it would come down to this sooner or later. With you, it always does.”

Lucky bastard
.

“You know something, Gibbons? You've turned into a filthy-minded old man. I told you. Lesley's still a little nervous about staying alone, and I'm trying to help her out, you
know, make her realize that wiseguy junkies won't be coming through her windows every night.”

“Yeah, tell me another one.”

“I swear to Christ on my uncle's grave. I've been sleeping on the couch.”

“And where's she been sleeping?”

Tozzi couldn't hold back the shit-eating grin.

Gibbons smirked and shook his head.

Lesley came back in with Lorraine, reporting that the kid was all right. She looked so happy and relieved when she said it, Gibbons figured Tozzi must've been right. She
was
worried about wiseguys coming through the windows.

Gibbons and Tozzi got up off the couch, and they all started moving toward the door the way people do when it's time to go home, in slow motion, dragging it out. Lesley got their coats, and all of a sudden she and Lorraine had a lot to say to each other. It was one of those mysterious female things Gibbons would never understand. If they had so much to say, why didn't they say it before? They'd only had—what?—five hours to get around to it. Jesus.

They finished saying their good-byes, and the door finally closed. He and Lorraine were alone in the hallway.

“That was nice,” she said as they headed for the elevator.

“Yeah, it was.”

He pressed the down button, watching her face out of the corner of his eye. He was thinking about Tozzi and Lesley on the couch.

“What's the matter?” she suddenly said.

“Huh? Nothing.”

“What're you looking at me like that for?”

“Like what?”

She had that squint look again. She looked like a goddamn wife.

He turned and looked her in the eye, reconsidered for a second, then decided what the hell. “Shamrocks are green/ Guinness is brown./ I love you/ More than anyone around.”

“What?”

“That's Irish poetry. You said you liked Irish poetry.”

“Are you drunk?”

“No. You said you liked it when Jimmy McCleery recited Irish poetry to you. So I wrote you an Irish poem. You don't like it?”

“You think I'm carrying the torch for Jimmy, don't you?”

“Well, no . . . not really. But you did say you liked him . . . or you used to like him, something like that.”

A teary grin appeared on her face. “Gibbons,” she said with a sigh.

“It's not that I'm jealous or anything. It's just that you seem to be a little sweet on him. And I thought maybe I could use a little sweetening. You know, maybe you think I'm a little too rough. Maybe.”

She sighed again. “You're right. I do think Jimmy McCleery is sweet.” Her hands found their way around his waist. “But who wants sweet, when you've already got substance?”

He gave her a squinty look, then suddenly wiped it off, wondering if he looked like an old pain-in-the-ass husband to her.

“Happy New Year, you big pain in the ass.” She drew him close and kissed him, really kissed him.

Lesley's apartment door opened then. “Hey, Gib?” Tozzi's head was sticking out the door.

Gibbons pulled away from Lorraine's lips and bared his teeth. “Hey, what?”

“Oh . . . never mind. It's not important.”

The door closed. Gibbons put his hands under Lorraine's coat and hugged her closer, picking up where they'd left off. The elevator came and waited for them, but they let it go. They were too busy. Gibbons smiled like a crocodile under that kiss, running his hands over the back of that slinky dress, feeling her substance, thinking how much nicer it was to hug a tall woman.

BAD BUSINESS

All Rights Reserved © 1991, 2008 by Anthony Bruno

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Originally published by Delacorte Press

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ISBN: 978-0-786-75341-3

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