Mick Abruzzo Read online

  ISBN: 9781483533490

  Against his better judgment, Mick Abruzzo agreed to meet his idiot brother at a noisy South Philadelphia college hangout where Little Frankie swore they’d blend in. But when Mick showed up, Frankie was wearing a pinky ring straight out of The Sopranos and flashing a wad of cash the size of a baseball. He had staked out a pair of stools right in front of the March Madness opener on the big screen. A swarm of girls hung around the nearby pool table. One of them had a finger stuck in her mouth as she lifted her sweater to show Frankie a rose tattoo on the soft baby fat of her belly. Frankie finally gave her some cash and she trotted off to the jukebox.

  Frankie drained his glass and turned companionably to Mick. “I hear you need money, and it just so happens I know where to get some.”

  Even though the bar noise was enough to keep their conversation private, Mick waited until the bartender set down his draft and eased away. Then he said, “You couldn’t have made yourself more obvious in this place?”

  “What? You mean, with the chick?”

  “You gonna help her with her algebra homework later? That girl is jailbait.”

  Frankie grinned. “Lucky me.”

  The older Little Frankie got, the more he took to pretending he was Big Frankie—talking like he owned most of the rackets in Jersey. He tried to imitate Big Frankie’s half-friendly, half-threatening smile, too, which on Little Frankie ended up looking like the big, loose grin of a patsy who’d buy another round without too much convincing. Little Frankie still hadn’t grasped the fundamentals.

  But Little Frankie wasn’t stupid. He was a lazy crocodile—floating around in the swampy river until a thirsty gazelle came down for a drink. Then all of a sudden he was the smart one, scoring with hardly any effort.

  Mick had the uncomfortable feeling he had just been pegged for a gazelle.

  Frankie said, “Since when did you get to be such an old man when it comes to jailbait? Since you shacked up with the redhead I’ve heard so much about? Pop says she’s the swanky type. You have to buy her jewelry to get her to put out? What does a diamond necklace get you in the sack, bro? Or maybe now you’re broke, you’re not getting any good action?”

  Punching his brother in the mouth always felt like a good idea. Growing up, they had fought like wolverines. Even with Frankie satisfyingly bleeding from his nose and mouth, though, Mick had usually been the one who ended up in handcuffs. The first night Mick had successfully stopped himself from trying to beat the crap out of his brother, he’d slammed out of the house and stolen a motorcycle to get far away from the whole damn family. A day later he’d been picked up by a particularly vigilant cop, and his years of hard time began.

  So maybe he had learned to hold back when it came to Frankie. But holding back had its consequences, too.

  Now, though, Little Frankie only seemed to call when he was in trouble. Trouble that could spread to the rest of the family if Mick didn’t throw water on whatever fire Little Frankie had lit a match to.

  “What’s the matter?” Frankie asked while Mick considered the situation. “You worried about busting your parole to make some money? Or do you want to hear the particulars?”

  “Whatever it is, as long as it’s coming from you, I don’t want anything to do with it.”

  “Suit yourself.” Frankie put his elbows on the bar, both hands around his beer. He pretended to watch the game for a minute before leaning over again. “I just thought I could do you a favor, Mick, get you out of the jam you’re in. I heard about the accountant stealing all your dough while you were inside. Tough break. But that’s what happens when you start trusting geeks instead of family, am I right? A couple of years ago, you’d have buried most of the accountant in a ditch and spread the rest of him along the Jersey turnpike.”

  Mick ground his teeth and didn’t answer. Maybe it was good that Frankie believed he was capable of taking care of business the family way. Maybe it wasn’t so far from the truth.

  He sipped his beer. To be honest, he hated that he’d been ripped off. Months after it happened, he still itched to inflict serious retribution. Sure, some of the guys in his old crew had found the accountant and scared the shit out of him, but that hadn’t gotten Mick’s money back.

  These days, Mick was scraping to keep his legit businesses open. At home, Nora appeared to be cool with the fact that they couldn’t afford the pay the electric bill on that derelict house of hers. But to her, being poor was some kind of romantic notion. She cuddled up in bed to stay warm, which had its advantages, but Mick had been cold before and knew how much work it took to get the heat turned back on again. And accomplishing that while sticking to a code of good behavior he didn’t quite have a grasp on yet—that was harder than he’d figured.

  Now here was Frankie offering a way out.

  With a warning going off in his head, Mick set his glass back down on the bar. “Who’s the mark?”

  Frankie’s face broadened into a grin. “Mexican dude. Does business under the name Damian Sanchez.”

  “Drugs?”

  “Nope. Washing coin.”

  “Laundering money for drug dealers.”

  “What does it matter? Cash is cash.”

  That was Frankie. A walking Darwin Award.

  “Sanchez is low on the food chain, no bodyguards, so he’s easy pickings,” Frankie said. “Here’s the beautiful part. He has a regular, like, routine. He collects money all week, then parks his car on the street while he visits his girlfriend. After the fun and games, he drives over the bridge to Camden where he hands over the cash to his boss—a bad dude you’d want to avoid. So I figure you steal the car while Sanchez is doing the girl. We split the money.”

  “That’s all you get? Half?”

  As if the answer was obvious, Frankie said, “I want the car, too.”

  Mick’s radar kicked in. “Why?”

  “It’s a vintage Jag. A 1972 E-Type, twelve cylinders. British racing green, but I can have it re-painted. I want that ride, bro. It’s a chick magnet for sure.”

  What a bonehead. “You’d get picked up ten minutes after you turn the key in a car like that. Better to ship it overseas.”

  “Hell, no, I want it. I want to drive it around after we do the deed. It’s a trophy car.”

  A trophy for having bested a bad dude.

  Looking up at the TV screen, Frankie said, “It’s not just the car. I could use the dough, too.”

  Mick waited.

  Frankie drank some beer and said, “I’ve got some debts. Nothing big. But, you know, I need to settle up.”

  “What kind of debts?”

  Frankie shook his head. “Just a little trouble I need to take care of. I want to get in on the Final Four action, but I can’t unless—you know, until I’ve made good on some bad bets.”

  Mick felt a throb start behind his eyes. Here was the real story. “Hell, Frank, we own the fucking rackets. You’re betting against the family?”

  “No, no, just private stuff.”

  Private stuff. Not a casino, but maybe side bets with a small time betting parlor in the back of a barber shop or some suburbanite’s man cave. In the area, there were half a dozen low-level bookies who ran gambling operations so small it wasn’t worth the effort of putting them out of business. One of them must have hooked Frankie like a trout.

  Frankie was talking about the job again. “It’ll be easy. Nobody can boost a car like you, Mick. You’re like a ghost. A magician. The best. Am I right? You can get the car, no problem.”

  “Save the snow job,” Mick said. “I don’t do felonies anymore.”

  “A felony? Sanchez is so bad at his job, it’d be like, you know, vocational training to show him the error of his ways.”

  Vocational training for Frankie, too. Bu
t Mick found himself saying, “How much are we talking?”

  “The money? That’s the other good part. Half a mil, for sure. Maybe more.”

  It was kinda cute, Frankie thinking half a million dollars was worth going to jail for. It was probably enough to get him out of trouble with his bookie friend, though.

  And it would pay the electric bill at Blackbird Farm. Help make the payroll at the gas stations Mick was trying to get back off the ground, too. The gig was starting to feel irresistible, a notion he could squelch down if he worked at it. But there was instinct at play, too. Frankie wasn’t the only crocodile in the family.

  Mick asked, “If this gig is so easy, why aren’t you doing it yourself? Taking the car and the cash both?”

  “I don’t have your skills. Besides, there’s a thing,” Frankie said. “Not a problem, but—let’s call it an issue I thought maybe you should know about. This is kind of a brotherly heads-up.”

  “You think you’re doing me a favor?”

  “Maybe. Sanchez’s girlfriend? The one he visits every Saturday? It’s Liz.”

  “Liz? Liz Trillo?”

  “Yeah. Your ex-girlfriend. And you know where her place is. And how she is. Plus maybe she’d soften up if you were in on the deal. It’s a two-man job for sure. So I figured I’d cut you in, Mick. Do you a favor. Family’s family. It’ll be easy.”

  Easy until the bad dude in Camden came looking for his money, and they’d both end up dead. But Frankie hadn’t thought that far ahead. Chances were, he’d have a bullet in his head before he got the Jag re-painted. But there was no explaining anything to Frankie. Already, the girl with the tattooed belly was back, and Frankie was turning to her.

  The smiling girl looked past Frankie’s shoulder and met Mick’s gaze. In a second, her expression went blank, and she took a step back as if she’d just encountered a bear on a hiking trail.

  Mick decided not to drop his last twenty on the bar. Frankie had called the meeting, he could buy the beer. Mick left.

  Sure, Frankie was a dumb mook who probably deserved to catch whatever itch college girls passed around these days. Piling up a gambling debt—that was just plain stupid, too. But Frankie had charm, which meant he always gathered good intel. He massaged his contacts better than most. Mick figured Frankie probably had the details of the car and the cash right. Sanchez and the bad dude in Camden—that was probably solid, too.

  Liz involved? That was strange.

  Mick hadn’t thought about Liz in a long time. Why bother when there was Nora to go home to every night?

  But Liz had been good medicine for him in that first year on the outside. She was a higher class of girl than he first hooked up with. She’d made him work for it—not just the sex, but a lot of things. She had a wicked laugh and a quick mind. Made him act like a person, think before he spoke, remember to open doors, initiate a real conversation now and then. She had a hardness that was a turn-on at the beginning, but made things easy when it came time to split up. She was the first woman who made him think about the advantages of being with somebody who had brains as well as a body.

  Her heart was the questionable part. She got off on bad boys. Mick figured whatever she had going with a drug dealer’s errand boy was probably not what it looked to Little Frankie. Liz didn’t go for idiots.

  For a couple of days after meeting his brother, Mick thought about Liz—maybe too much. Early one morning—still half asleep—he was already slipping between Nora’s yielding thighs before he realized she wasn’t Liz. Fortunately, Nora woke up and climbed on top with an enthusiasm that prevented her from noticing, but it was a bad moment.

  He decided his subconscious was telling him he’d better gather a little intel himself. Not about Little Frankie’s gambling trouble. About Liz. After Mass on Sunday and before heading over to the office he’d set up on the second floor of one of the gas stations—more of a war room than an office, really--he paid a call on old Nicky Severino.

  Nicky had gone to PS 9 with Big Frankie and hung just on the edge of the Abruzzo family ever since. These days he ran a chop shop in Philly.

  Mick waited, sitting across the grimy street in his own car until an unmarked panel truck pulled out of Nicky’s place and rumbled away, probably full of used car parts collected on Saturday night and now headed for specialty garages across state lines. Mick phoned from his car to give Nicky a heads-up.

  Nicky opened the side door with a shitty grin, half his teeth still missing from his days boxing for a legendary trainer in Fairless Hills. The trainer had been famous for molding angry teenagers into athletes. A welterweight with fast combinations but no instinct for keeping his face out of the way, Nicky hadn’t lasted in the sport. But he walked away from the gym with a work ethic. He was small—almost childlike in his later years, but still wiry. He was cleaning grease off his hands with a rag. “Hey, Mick. You shoulda come a few hours ago. I coulda used your help.”

  Mick shook the old man’s clean hand. “I’m too rusty.”

  “Aw, it’s like riding a bike. You never forget how to use a torch.”

  Cutting up stolen cars wasn’t exactly a skill that translated into better things. A while back Mick had decided it was a dead end when it came to his soul, too. But he said, “Good to see you, Nicky. Can I buy you a cup of coffee?”

  “What, pay Starbucks for what I can brew right here? C’mon in. I’ll make a fresh pot.”

  Nicky finished washing up at a big sink in the corner, giving Mick a minute to look around. The windowless garage was immaculate under the glare of intense fluorescent lights. Tools were neatly stowed in drawers. Floor was swept. The place was so clean it might have been the maintenance garage at Hertz. And there was no sign anything unlawful had taken place overnight.

  A few vehicles sat off at the other end of the space—a tow truck, a couple of black SUVs, a Mercedes C-class and two generic BMWs. One of the BMWs had a smashed windshield, the other a crumpled front end.

  “You need a new car?” Nicky asked, seeing where Mick’s gaze had traveled. “I bought those at auction, titles and everything. Thought I’d fix ‘em up and sell ‘em.”

  “You going straight, Nicky?”

  “I’m getting old, Mick. Too old to serve time. Besides, I got a new lady friend, and this business gives her a nervous stomach.” He waved his hand at the chop shop set-up. “She wants me to retire, maybe move to Ocean City. So I thought why not try selling used cars?”

  “It’s a good business. I’ve done it myself.”

  “Yeah, I heard you were trying to clean up your act. What’s that about, son? Turning your back on Big Frankie? That’s throwing away an operation that took a lot of time to build. Not to mention, it’s a waste of your outstanding talent.”

  “You know how it is.” Mick smiled. “Love’s complicated.”

  “Love, huh?” Nicky let out a cackle. “You gonna move to Ocean City, too? Do some fishing? Maybe get a cat?”

  “No cats,” Mick said. “I’m selling gasoline.”

  “Is that a clean business? Legit, that is?”

  “Pretty much. There are assholes everywhere, though. You know.”

  “Yeah, I do. It’s a lotta indoor work, though, right? I mean, an office, fancy phones that play tunes? College boy stuff? That your thing now?” Nicky squinted. “Do you wear a tie?”

  Mick laughed. “When I put on a tie, everybody thinks I’m going to court.”

  Nicky was still puzzled. “Takes up a lotta time, though, your office?”

  “Most days it takes up more time than I have. I just wish it would start paying off.” Some days, Gas ‘n Grub still looked like a colossal failure. It would be so much easier if he could cut a few corners, make a deal or two under the table.

  “But you like a challenge.” Nicky nodded, full of certainty. “Always did. And you work at something till you get it right. You’d have made a hell of a fighter, Mick.”

  “I don’t like getting my face beat up any more than it is already.”


  Nicky laughed. Together, they strolled across the garage floor and stopped beside a shiny black Escalade. Mick popped open the driver’s side door. It felt heavy in his hand—heavier than normal. Inside? Custom leather seats, full package of extras, GPS, the works.

  “You like it?” Nicky asked. “It was a special order for the governor. Except on delivery, the sticker price was too much for the budget office. Governor figured he has enough problems getting re-elected without the taxpayers thinking he’s got a taste for expensive wheels, so he turned it down. Nobody else wanted it, so I won the bid. Bullet-proof glass, reinforced doors.”

  “You could drive this thing through a war zone and come out the other side.”

  “That’s the idea. All the modern safety features for a politician to survive a terrorist attack. You got any kids yet?” Nicky patted the heavy door. “This one’s real safe. Just what the doctor ordered.”

  Mick controlled a mental wince. That had been the plan—having kids with Nora. But things weren’t working out. Nora had gotten quiet about it, but Mick knew she ached for children of her own. Hell, he wanted that, too, now that he’d figured out not all families fought like animals. But fate was holding back. And it was looking as if an ex-con couldn’t provide for a family the way normal people did anyway, so maybe it was for the best they couldn’t have children.

  He slammed the door on the Escalade.

  They went into Nicky’s office where Nicky poured away some black sludge and fussed over brewing another pot of coffee. Over his head on the wall was a faded poster for a Fast & Furious movie.

  The rest of room was cluttered with secondhand metal office furniture and a cot with a dirty pillow and a rumpled blanket. On the computer, a bunch of security screens rotated through the cameras that were mounted outside. From halfway down the block, Mick had seen the cameras and motion sensor alarms rigged on the building. Nicky was smart and didn’t leave much to chance. He probably had an escape route, too—out an attic door and across the roof--or maybe a spider hole to hide in if the cops showed up. Whether the old man was quick enough to outrun the law these days—that was another question. He was probably right to move to Ocean City with his girlfriend. It would be a real life, not like hiding from the cops by sleeping in a rat hole.