Straits of Fortune - Anthony Gagliano [26]
Nick stripped off his backpack as though it were on fire and threw it on the floor at Vivian’s feet.
“Do you have any idea how hard it is to get fifty thousand dollars in cash at this time of night?” he demanded furiously, turning first to me, then Vivian.
“Relax, Nick,” I said. “It’s for a good cause. You want a beer?”
He looked at me as though I had offered him a turd. “No, you idiot, I do not want a beer. I don’t suppose you have any white wine. That would be too much to expect.” He looked around the apartment. “How can you live like this?” he asked.
“I keep my eyes closed,” I said.
I picked up the backpack and opened it. There was a lot of money inside. I closed the bag and held it in the palm of my hand. It was heavy. “That seems about the right weight. You done good, Nick,” I said. “Real good. I’m proud of you.”
I carried the bag into the kitchen and put it in the cabinet under the sink, burying it beneath a hoard of plastic bags from the supermarket. Then I went into the fridge and found half a bottle of white wine. It took me a while, but I managed to dig up a mismatched pair of wineglasses with a layer of dust on them. I knew Nick wouldn’t appreciate that, so I rinsed them off in the sink. I went back into the living room and poured each of my guests a glass. Nick took a very suspicious sip, held the glass away from him, then set it down.
“I hope you like it,” I said. “It cost three bucks.”
I watched him take another cautious sip.
“You were overcharged,” he said.
Vivian drank her wine down in one gulp. “Nick,” she said. “Maybe you should go now. I’ll meet you back at the house.”
“Why can’t you go with me?” her half brother asked. “I’m not about to leave you here. Look at this place!”
“I want to talk to Jack.”
“You don’t need to talk to him. Talk to him when he gets back.”
“Finish your wine, Whitey,” I said. “I’m getting tired of your attitude. Tell your dad I’ll be in touch.”
“Who the hell are you to give me orders?”
“You know who I am, Nicky. I’m the one who’s pulling your family’s collective ass out of the fire, remember? You could do it yourself, of course, but I know that would be beneath your dignity. You might get your hands dirty, and we couldn’t have that, could we? Now, get up and get out.”
Nick glared at me, but his heat vision failed to melt my head, so he tried it on his sister. “I’ll see you back at the house,” she said.
Nick stood up. He looked around the room. “You and your men,” he said. “You’ll drag us all down before this is over.”
He bumped the edge of the coffee table as he went by. His wineglass teetered, then spilled over. I didn’t move. The glass hit the floor but didn’t shatter. A moment later the door shut. I got up and put the chain on. Vivian sat watching me. I went into the kitchen to get some paper towels to wipe up the wine Nick had spilled. When I came back from the kitchen again, Vivian was on her feet.
“How much time do we have?” she asked.
“Not much,” I said. I knew what she was thinking.
She turned her back on me. I don’t remember moving, but suddenly I was standing right behind her.
“Unzip me,” she said.
“Is this my going-away present?”
“It’s whatever you want it to be.”
I pulled the zipper down slowly and watched as the two halves of the leather dress came apart. Vivian pulled her arms free of the straps, and the garment, unsupported now, collapsed about her waist. Her back was brown. I ran my index finger from the nape of her neck down the trail of her spine, feeling the knob of each vertebra until I reached the bottom. Her skin was feverishly hot, as though the leather had sealed in her body’s heat that was now being released. She arched her lower back toward me. Then I put my tongue on all the places where