Double Espresso (A Loretta Kovacs thriller) Page 10

  “Yeah,” Jerry snapped. “It’s obvious to us.” His eyes started blinking out of control, and Loretta’s eyes blinked back as if his blinks were gunshots.

  “You think you’re better’n us,” Jerry snarled. “Admit it. You do.”

  “No. I never said that. I never thought it.”

  “Admit it,” Jerry insisted, digging the gun into her neck.

  “Yeah, say it,” Larry said. “Say it!”

  Loretta winced. “I—”

  “Hey!” Another man’s voice sailed over the bookcases. “Where are you two? We’re leaving.”

  Larry looked at Jerry, and all of a sudden their anger was gone.

  “Gotta go,” Larry whispered to his brother. “Yeah.” Jerry nodded.

  They put their guns away, stood up, and walked off as if Loretta weren’t even there. They acted as if nothing had happened.

  “We’re coming, Taf,” Larry called out over the bookshelves.

  “We’re coming,” Jerry echoed as they rushed out of the Travel section.

  Loretta sat up, her heart still beating wildly. She was dumbfounded, but she was furious, too. She’d sworn that she’d never let anything like that ever happen to her again. She never ever wanted to be at anyone else’s mercy. She squeezed her eyes shut and took deep, measured breaths. All of a sudden she felt nauseous, as if she were spinning around in that clothes drier again.

  12

  Loretta and Marvelli were back at the Grind, sitting at the varnished maple counter that ran along one of the brick walls, rehashing their blunder at the bookstore, trying to come up with a new plan to catch Sammy. They were the only customers in the place except for a big gawky-looking guy who was hunched over one of the computers, mainlining iced caffè lattes. They stopped talking about Sammy as soon as Jennifer came over with their order.

  “Here you go, Frankie,” Jennifer said as she put a jumbo cappuccino and a plate of hazelnut biscotti in front of her brother-in-law.

  The cup was as big as a soup bowl. Loretta looked at it with a mixture of horror and envy. She felt incredibly awful—woozy, headachy, fatigued—and she couldn’t stop thinking about Larry and Jerry and their guns. She’d let it happen again, she thought. Just like that time with Brenda Hemingway. She blamed herself for not taking control of the situation.

  Jennifer set down a cup of green tea in front of Loretta. “You sure you don’t want some honey for that?” Jennifer asked.

  Loretta shook her head. She was only drinking it because her doctor had told her that green tea was a healthy substitute for coffee. She stared down into her cup, sniffed the steamy bitter brew, and made a face. What she really wanted was coffee.

  “Why don’t you order a decaf?” Marvelli suggested.

  “What?”

  “I can see you’re miserable. You won’t get the jolt, but at least it tastes like coffee.”

  “If I taste coffee, I’m gonna want coffee—real coffee—and in no time I’ll be back to square one. I’ve come this far; I don’t want to have to start all over again.”

  Jennifer was nodding, holding the brown plastic tray to her chest like a stack of schoolbooks. “She’s right, Frankie. I’ve seen some of our regulars here try to quit. Decaf just prolongs the agony. It’s cold turkey or nothing.” She moved a strand of her long blond hair to the side of her eye so that it caressed her face along with the rest of her hair.

  Everything Jennifer did was sexy, Loretta thought. She was sexy without even trying to be. Loretta watched Marvelli out of the side of her eye. She wanted to know if Marvelli thought she was sexy.

  “Lemme know if you need anything,” Jennifer said as she headed back behind the counter. She was wearing khaki shorts and yellow rubber clogs. Her calves alone constituted a felony.

  “So what were we talking about?” Marvelli said after he took a sip of cappuccino. When he put the cup down, he had a steamed-milk mustache.

  “Finding Sammy,” she said.

  “Oh, yeah.” He took another sip. “So what was I saying?”

  “That we’re screwed. We’re never gonna find this guy.”

  “Right, right. I’m sure he spotted me at that bookstore. How else would Taffy Demaggio know who I was? Sammy’s gonna do a magic act and disappear now that he knows I’m looking for him.”

  “So what do we do? Go home?”

  Actually that wasn’t such a bad idea, she thought. At least it would get Marvelli away from Jennifer.

  “I don’t think we should give up,” Marvelli said, taking another sip. He picked up one of his long biscotti, dunked it in the cappuccino, and bit off a piece. “I was thinking maybe we should approach this from the other end.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “If we can’t catch the killer,” he said with his mouth full, “then we should protect the target.”

  “What’re you saying? That we should find Rispoli and guard him?”

  “Yeah, something like that.” He crunched loudly into the undunked portion of his biscotti.

  “And how are we supposed to do that? Break into My Blue Heaven?” Loretta would have laughed if she’d had the energy. She picked up her tea to take a sip, but the smell drove her off before she could get it to her lips.

  “There has to be a way to find that place,” Marvelli said. “It must be fairly big, so a lot of people must work there. They have to have support staff, people bringing in food and stuff. All we have to do is find some blabbermouth who’s been there.”

  “The place is supposed to be airtight,” Loretta said. “That’s what your friend Tarantella said.”

  Marvelli gave her a skeptical look over the rim of his coffee cup. “It’s run by the feds, Loretta. There’s got to be something wrong with it.”

  “Forget about it,” she said. “Even if we could find My Blue Heaven, what would we do when we got there? Ring the doorbell and ask if Rispoli can come out and play? Be real.”

  “Hey, you be real,” Marvelli shot back, his expression suddenly serious. “Do you realize what it’ll mean if Sammy gets to Rispoli? Take that dirtbag Taffy Demaggio and multiply him by about three dozen. That’s how many mob creeps like him are gonna walk because Rispoli won’t be around to testify against them. Demaggio by himself is endangering the lives of thousands of people with his crappy medical supplies. These other crumb-buns are into scams that are just as bad, so if each one of them is hurting that many people, just do the math.”

  “But we warned the feds. We told them about Sammy. We gave it our best shot.”

  Marvelli was shaking his head. “That’s not good enough. We are the only ones taking Sammy seriously. That means we are the only ones who can prevent Sammy from killing Rispoli.”

  “Don’t you think you’re exaggerating this just a bit? I mean, Rispoli is under Witness Protection.”

  “I keep telling you—you don’t know Sammy. Rispoli should be under Sammy Protection.”

  Loretta shrugged and finally took a sip of her tea. It tasted as bad as it smelled. It did need honey. She picked up her cup and went over to the counter where Jennifer was stacking clean coffee mugs. “I think I’ll take that honey after all,” Loretta said.

  “Great. What kind?”

  Loretta shrugged. “I dunno. What do you have?” “We have orange blossom, buckwheat, wildflower, clover, Tupelo—”

  “Wildflower,” Loretta said to keep her from going on. Honey was getting like coffee and tea—too many choices.

  Jennifer slid a little brown pot with a wooden dipper toward Loretta.

  Everything’s so natural out here, Loretta thought as she drizzled some honey into her tea. She wondered if that included Jennifer’s perfectly perky breasts.

  As Loretta stirred her tea, she noticed that Marvelli had taken his cappuccino over to the gawky nerd working the computer. The guy seemed like the shy, introverted type, but Marvelli was getting him to talk. Marvelli, of course, could make conversation with a clam.

  “Loretta,” Marvelli called to her, “Come ’e
re. I want you to meet someone.”

  Loretta picked up her cup and went over to them.

  “This is Alan Winslow,” Marvelli said. “He says he can help us out.”

  Alan stood up and bashfully offered his hand to Loretta. She shook it, marveling at his incredible height. He was tall enough to play pro basketball. Unfortunately there was nothing remotely athletic about him. He had pathetic puppy-dog eyes, but he was having a hard time maintaining eye contact with her. She imagined him as the biggest kid in his class, the one who grew up too fast and all the other kids picked on. She could picture him in gym class, forced to play center on a basketball team with all the jock kids dribbling around him like hornets, taunting him for not playing up to his size. Loretta knew how cruel kids could be. She’d always been the “fat girl” in school.

  “Nice to meet you, Alan,” Loretta said, trying to be friendly.

  Marvelli hoisted his humongous cup. “Alan says he can find My Blue Heaven.”

  Loretta’s eyes shot open as she glanced around the room to see if anyone else had come in. “Why don’t you get a bullhorn, for God’s sake?”

  “Sorry.” Marvelli lowered his voice. “Alan says he might be able to get us an address on-line. Pretty good, huh?”

  “I used to work for Microsoft,” Alan said to justify himself.

  “I hear it’s a good place to work,” Loretta said. “Why don’t you work there anymore?”

  “I got fired.”

  Loretta gazed up at Alan, who obviously sensed her displeasure, then glared at Marvelli, who obviously didn’t. “Excuse us for a minute, Alan,” she said, taking Marvelli by the elbow and leading him away. “What the hell’s wrong with you?” she hissed. “You’re asking that man to do something illegal.”

  “Not specifically,” Marvelli said.

  “Yes specifically. You’re asking him to hack his way into government files.”

  “We can’t just sit on our hands with this, Loretta.”

  “We can’t break the law either.”

  “We’re not going to be using the information for illegal purposes.”

  “But what if Alan sells the information to someone else? Like Taffy Demaggio, for instance.”

  Marvelli turned around and grinned up at the tall hulking man. “Look at that face. Does he look like he’d do something like that?”

  Loretta studied Alan’s face. His puppy-dog eyes were melting all over her like chocolate kisses. Oh, no, she thought. Never pet a stray.

  Marvelli whispered in her ear. “Look, we don’t have many options here. Let’s just let him see what he can do.”

  Loretta didn’t like that gooey look on Alan’s face, not when it was aimed at her. Unless, of course, it was somebody she wanted to get gooey over her. She glanced at Marvelli and quickly looked away.

  “I don’t know about this,” she said, shaking her head. She noticed that Jennifer was looking at Marvelli, who was smiling reassuringly at Alan, who was staring at Loretta. Oh, God, she thought.

  “Maybe I’ll just get started,” Alan said, starting to sit down. He stopped and stood up again. “Unless you don’t want me to.”

  “No, no, no, get started,” Marvelli said, holding the back of the chair for him.

  “Marvelli!” Loretta warned.

  “Frankie, you want a refill?” Jennifer called out from behind the counter.

  “Frank!” This voice came from the front door, and it sounded like the screech of a mother pterodactyl. A stern-looking silver-haired woman in her late sixties/early seventies was standing on the threshold. She was holding a valise and a garment bag, and she was glaring at Marvelli.

  13

  Marvelli just stared at the pterodactyl woman for a moment, waiting for his brain to process her unexpected arrival. Annette? he thought. Here in Seattle? It didn’t make any sense. His mother-in-law was supposed to be back in Jersey, taking care of his daughter Nina.

  Suddenly his gut bottomed out. Nina!

  “Annette,” he said, rushing up to her, “where’s Nina? What’s wrong?”

  Annette pressed the heel of her hand against his forehead. “Stunad’!” she said. “Nina’s fine. She’s in New Hampshire at summer camp. Don’t you remember anything?”

  “Of course, I remember. So why are you here?”

  The woman bunched her fingers and shook her hand at him. “Whattaya mean, why am I here? I’m here to visit my daughter. Is there something wrong with that?” She looked to Loretta for support. “Whatta stunad’.”

  Loretta just smiled politely, and Marvelli wondered if she secretly agreed with Annette.

  Annette closed one eye and pointed at Loretta. “Lorinda, right?”

  “Loretta,” she corrected. “Close enough.”

  “Hi, Mom.” Jennifer came over and took the valise out of her mother’s hand, kissing her on both cheeks.

  Annette then sandwiched Jennifer’s face between her palms. “Madonn’, you’re so skinny. Why don’t you eat?”

  Jennifer rolled her eyes. “I eat, Mom. I eat plenty.”

  “No, you don’t. Look at yourself. I’m gonna cook for you. We’ll freeze stuff so you can eat good till I come back the next time.”

  Marvelli could tell that Jennifer was biting her tongue. Everyone in the family knew that it was always best to just agree with Annette. He stood back and took in the two women, amazed that one had come out of the other. Jennifer was long and slender with delicate features. Annette was thick and squat with a broad nose and squinty eyes behind oversized bifocals. She always wore polyester stretch pants when she went out, housedresses at home—neither of which were very flattering. Her hair was the standard-issue gray lacquered-for-endurance battle-ax ’do. And despite her quick temper and whiplash tongue, Marvelli thought the world of her because she’d stuck by his wife all through her illness, moving in with them and taking care of both Rene and Nina while he was at work. In his book the woman was a saint. Bossy, but a saint.

  Marvelli pictured his wife—before the cancer had struck—and he let out a silent, bittersweet sigh. Rene was nothing like her mother either. She was more like Jennifer but not exactly. She was … Rene.

  “So are we gonna just stand here?” Annette blurted. “Jennifer, you’re not gonna offer your own mother a cup of coffee?”

  “Sure, Mom. What do you want? We have all kinds of coffee.”

  Annette threw her garment bag over a chair and took a seat. “I want an espresso with a little sambuca in it. Not too much.”

  “We don’t have a liquor license, Mom.”

  “You mean, you don’t keep a bottle under the counter for special customers? What’s the matter with you? You have to have sambuca with espresso. Tell her, Frank.”

  “What?” Marvelli had been distracted, watching Alan Winslow at the computer. The guy was working away, typing and mousing like crazy. But was he finding out anything about My Blue Heaven? That’s what Marvelli wanted to know.

  “Frank!” Annette repeated. “Tell her, why don’t you? Espresso without sambuca is like spaghetti without gravy. Am I right or what? Frank!”

  “Annette, it’s two o’clock in the afternoon. It’s too early to be drinking.”

  “It’s two o’clock for you,” she shot back. “It’s five o’clock my time. And believe me, I could use a shot of something after that flight. I thought I was gonna die.”

  “Why? What happened?” Loretta asked.

  Annette’s frown was so deep the tip of her nose almost touched her chin. “Don’t ask. I don’t even want to talk about it.”

  This was classic Annette, Marvelli thought. The world was created just to aggravate her because it consistently refused to operate the way she’d decided it should. The way she saw it, when God had created the universe, He should have consulted with her first.

  “Mom, I’m gonna fix you something nice,” Jennifer said as she backstepped toward the counter. “You’ll like this.”

  “Don’t bring me any cake or anything like that,” she called
after her daughter. “I’m on a diet.”

  Marvelli and Jennifer exchanged knowing glances. Annette had been on a diet for as long as they’d both known her and probably a lot longer than that. Her dieting was based on her own unique concepts of science and nutrition. Basically, if she cooked it, it wasn’t fattening. If someone else cooked it, but it was Italian food, it was just a little fattening. If it wasn’t Italian at all, then it was highly suspect and most likely toxic, cholesterol filled, and generally life threatening.

  “Frank, whattaya standing there for? Sit down,” Annette ordered. “You too, Lor …”

  “ ’retta,” Loretta finished.

  “I knew that,” Annette said.

  Loretta set her tea down on the table and took a seat, but Marvelli hesitated. He was dying to know what Alan was up to.

  Marvelli raised one finger. “One second, Annette. I just gotta check on this one thing.” He started walking toward Alan, and Loretta glowered at him. She didn’t want to be left alone with his mother-in-law. He couldn’t blame her.

  As he turned away, he could hear Annette asking Loretta, “So how’ve you been? You married yet?”

  Marvelli cringed. He didn’t dare look back.

  A smile was plastered across Loretta’s face. She knew better than to say what she was thinking. “Nope,” she said. “Not married yet.”

  “Don’t worry, honey. You’re gonna find the right guy. And pretty soon. You can trust me on that.”

  Loretta shot a quick glance at Marvelli, then looked away. No, she thought, it’ll never happen.

  Annette leaned in closer to Loretta. “You wanna know the truth?” she whispered. “I came out here for a reason. When my little girl called and told me that good-for-nothing bum Sammy Teitelbaum was bothering her again, I told myself I had to do something. I don’t know what Jennifer sees in him, but it’s like she’s under hypnosis whenever she’s around him. He always manages to win her back. But not this time, he won’t. Not if I can help it.”

  “But how can you stop her?” Loretta said. “She’s a grown woman. She’ll do what she wants.”

  “Not if I can get her married. To someone else, I mean.” Annette was nodding confidently.