flinching.
I hesitated and slowly pulled my hand back from the fire. “I’ll have some later.”
Lisa’s head bobbed. “Good idea.”
Having some later was my way of telling that crazed partier inside me that I wasn’t going to totally deprive her of getting completely shitfaced. I was simply putting it off until some future time, which I thoroughly believed and planned for . . . someday.
“How long ago did you say Jimmy left?” I asked.
“A couple minutes at most. If we hurry, we can probably catch him.”
We left through the side door just as Uncle Benny straightened his gray tie, and lifted his shoulders in pure gangster fashion. A sure sign the room was getting too small for both he and Giuseppe to occupy at the same time.
FOURTEEN
Ring-a-ding-ding
We caught up to Jimmy in the parking lot next to my mom’s house. He was just about to take off in his black BMW Roadster. The man always had great taste in cars.
I grabbed his attention through the windshield, and he rolled down the window.
“Yeah?” he asked, looking all pissy. “What’s up?”
“What’s up with you?” I said, trying to sound concerned.
Lisa and I walked up to his window and for a moment I caught the sent of sweet berries. The same berry scent that I’d smelled on Dickey. I took a step closer to the open window and inhaled, but the scent was gone, overpowered by the stale scent of cigarettes. Jimmy was a pack-a-day smoker.
Light poured into the car from the fixture above the barn door. He seemed more agitated up close. His hands rested on the steering wheel while his thumbs tapped out the rhythm of some imaginary tune.
“Nothin’. Just in a hurry to get the hell outta here.”
“This will only take a few minutes.”
“If it’s about Dickey, you can forget it. I got nothin’ to say.”
His thumbs tapped harder.
“Actually, it’s about that new dude, Giuseppe,” Lisa said. “You know anything about him?”
Jimmy gave her the once over, as if he was trying to get a make on her. The way I saw it, he never quite got over her. I could see it all over his face, or maybe he was simply having some sort of sexual fantasy about her underwear. I couldn’t tell which.
“Not much. Just that he’s still hot. Still connected. Gotta be careful what a person says in front of somebody like that. He could cause us a lotta trouble. Hey,” he leaned out of the window to get closer to Lisa. “You want to come over to my place and sign some of your books? I’m your biggest fan, sweet cheeks.”
She ignored him. “What kind of trouble?”
“Your loss, sweetheart.” He moved back inside the car. “The kind that ain’t too good for seeing your next birthday. He’s not somebody you girls should be asking questions about. Just watch your own backyard and everything will be okay. You get what I’m saying?”
His face went all serious, complete with nostrils flaring and forehead wrinkling.
“Yeah, we get what you’re saying,” I said, “but we also know that sometime tomorrow the cops are going to start hunting for one missing Dickey Spia. Got any ideas what they might find?”
“No. Do you?”
I thought I’d take a chance. “Did you know his killer tried to set up my mom?”
The color drained from his face, and he stared out the front window for a moment. Then he turned back to me.
“No, and that’s low, way low, but this matter ain’t your concern. You got no business sticking your nose where it don’t belong. You too, Lisa. This won’t end good if you two keep digging around. Like the saying goes, forget about it. Now I gotta book on outta here. I got somebody waiting for me in the city.”
He turned the key in the ignition and his car roared to life.
“One more question,” Lisa said, leaning in closer. “Got any idea who might have hired Giuseppe to burn Dickey?”
He smiled. “A guy like that? A lotta people. Dickey’s got a long history of double-crossin’ people. And don’t forget the guy grew up in Calabria. Probably made some important enemies who want their own piece of him. Probably somebody in Italy put Giuseppe up to it, like he said, or maybe somebody here. I don’t know, but I can’t talk about this no more. You girls need to stay clear of this one or you’ll get more than just a little car chase that Lisa here can handle with her eyes closed. The person behind