Doppelgangster - Laura Resnick [94]
“This is a nightmare,” I muttered.
There might be a Mafia contract on my head now! And all because Chubby Charlie Chiccante had died right in front of me. I was suddenly incensed at the fat, vulgar, rude, overdressed mobster. Why did he come to Bella Stella’s that day if he knew he was marked for death? And why sit in my section?
I was so angry now, if Charlie weren’t already dead, I would kill him myself for getting me involved in this madness.
And why had I involved Max? What was I thinking? After surviving for some three hundred fifty years, which couldn’t have been easy even with the help of a mysterious elixir, he might soon be sleeping with the fishes because of me!
Wait a minute. I remembered why I had dragged Max into this. Because Lucky had convinced me I might be in danger from the killer, since Detective Napoli’s interest in me was making it look like I knew something. And because Lucky had taken Charlie’s talk of a “double” and the evil eye so seriously.
So this was all Lucky’s fault! And Napoli’s. Ah-hah!
It was good to have someone to blame.
I heard the cellar door open and close. Max’s footsteps, accompanied by some metallic scraping and rattling, crossed the floor of the bookshop, moving toward me. As he came around a row of bookcases and I saw what was causing the noise, I rose to my feet and stared in surprise.
“Here we are!” he said a little breathlessly.
He was carrying two swords and a large, ornate ax.
He said, “Er, can you help me with . . .”
“Huh? Oh! Sure.” I gingerly reached for the ax—which was even heavier than it looked and fell to the floor with a thud. I jumped in time to prevent it from taking off half my foot.
“Max! What are you doing with these things?” I demanded.
“As per our earlier discussion,” he said, depositing the swords on the table, “we need to keep tools handy for the decapitation of doppelgangsters.”
“My God.” I looked at the items on the table while Max stooped down to pick up the ax. He gave a little grunt as he heaved it up, then set it on the table with a heavy thud, alongside the other menacing objects.
I tried to picture decapitating Johnny Be Good in the crypt of St. Monica’s with one of these bladed weapons. I had found him repulsive even before knowing he was a doppelgangster. Knowing what I knew now, could I behead him?
After a long moment, I let out my breath in a rush. “I can’t cut off their heads. They’re too lifelike. I just can’t do it, Max.”
He patted my hand. “That’s quite all right, my dear. Lucky is no doubt correct when he says it’s not a proper task for a young lady.”
I lifted my gaze from the weapons on the table and said, “Max, I think you and I may be in danger.”
“While Evil is afoot in New York,” he said with heroic serenity, “we’re always in danger, Esther.”
“No, I mean a more, um, mundane kind of danger. Lucky says that the Corvino crime family—”
The chiming of the doorbells interrupted me as someone entered the shop. It was after ten o’clock now—too late, surely, for the newcomer to be a book shopper. I froze, caught in a moment of debilitating terror. I recalled the brief, anonymous phone call a few hours ago. Had that been the Corvinos, hunting us down?
As footsteps approached us, a hot rush of survival instinct flooded every capillary in my body. I snatched a sword from the table and turned to face the mortal danger bearing down on me.
Lopez came around the corner of the bookcase.
My jaw dropped as I gaped at him.
“Detective Lopez?” Max said. “What a pleasant surprise! How nice to see you again.”
Lopez and I stared at each other. He didn’t look at all surprised to see me here. In fact, he looked as if my presence confirmed his worst expectations, and his expression was grim and resigned.
Max looked at the weapon in my hand, then leaned closer to me to whisper, “Er, are you angry at him?”
“What? Oh.” I put the sword back down on the table, uncomfortably aware