Doppelgangster - Laura Resnick [7]
Lopez said, “Look, I know this is only our third date—sort of—but I don’t want you working there. It’s not safe.”
“Oh, come on,” I said. “Nobody there is going to kill me. I’m just an actress. Er, waitress.”
“When somebody sprays a sawed-off shotgun across the room, the bullets don’t go out of their way to avoid law-abiding citizens,” he pointed out.
“No innocent bystander—or waitress—has ever been harmed at Stella’s.” I’m no fool, I had checked before the first time I started working there.
“Not yet,” he said. “That would be bad for business, and if there’s one things wiseguys love, it’s making money. They’ve been careful at Stella’s so far. But sooner or later, it’ll happen. A waiter or tourist will get killed in the cross fire.”
Since his expression implored me to take him seriously, I did. “I read up on those hits,” I said. “There was no spraying of shotguns.”
“No,” he agreed, “Handsome Joey Gambello was whacked five years ago with a twenty-two caliber, two shots straight into the head. Very professional. Then two years ago, Frankie Mastiglione got shivved while gorging on pasta al forno, and no one realized he was dead until he fell facedown into his dinner after the hitter had already left.”
So Lopez had evidently read up on the murders at Stella’s, too.
“Cops know all sorts of interesting things,” I said.
He continued, “But all it takes is one bullet, Esther. Or one hitter who thinks you may remember his face.”
“I suppose so,” I admitted. “But, then, all it takes is one cab that runs a red light or one lunatic on the subway, right?” Or one sorcerer’s apprentice run amok.
“Spending all your nights at Bella Stella raises the odds of dying young,” Lopez insisted. “The Gambellos have been at war on-and-off with the Corvino family for decades. Things are quiet between them these days, but it wouldn’t take much to trigger another war. And that could make Stella’s a dangerous place to work.”
“How do you know so much about this?” Before he could answer, I said, “Never mind, I get it. You’re a cop, and they’re criminals. Of course you know.”
“Actually—”
“Look, as day jobs go, this is a good one for me. Wiseguys tip well. I make better money at Stella’s than anywhere else, and that’s important.”
“And I want you to live long enough to spend whatever you make.”
“Plus, since we’re all, you know, singing waiters—” This was a special feature of Stella’s; the waiters and waitresses performed on request. “—Stella treats us like actors. She makes it easy for me to get time off for an audition or a quick job, like one day of filming on a soap opera. Most restaurants make that sort of thing a real headache for me. I even got fired from two other places because of it.”
“My point is—”
“I understand your point,” I said. “I do. But working at Bella Stella is a good between-jobs gig for me. And I can start earning right away, too. So I’m not going to give it up.”
“Esther . . .” Lopez let his breath out, sagged back against the couch cushions, and looked at the ceiling. “I just had to get interested in a starving actress.” He glanced at me and added, “One with no sense of self-preservation.”
I protested, “I have plenty of—”
“Still hanging out with Max?” he asked abruptly.
Another awkward subject. “Sometimes.”
Apart from enduring Golly Gee’s sour temper at work, I hadn’t encountered much Evil since we had eliminated Hieronymus, but I had become fond of Max. So I’d seen him a few times since then. Since Max was nearly 350 years old (though he didn’t look a day over 70), he was certainly not a rival for Lopez. But Lopez thought he was crazy and probably dangerous, and he didn’t like me having anything to do with him.
“Well,” Lopez