“Okay, who’s next?” Gio asked.
Vic Croce flipped over the top page of his spiral-bound steno notepad and tapped his ballpoint pen on the second to last name not yet crossed out. “Ying’s.” He flicked his gaze ahead of them, to where a distant traffic light blinked yellow. “Where are we now, Huston Street? Easiest way to get there from here is to hang a right at the light and drive two blocks,” he said. “It’ll be on the corner.”
Scratch-scratch went the pen, grating on Gio’s nerves. “You know about these newfangled contraptions called cell phones, right? You can tap out notes right on the screen”—quietly—“so you don’t have to tear through sheets and sheets of paper and kill all the trees.”
Vic stabbed the pen’s tip on the notepad again, for emphasis. The move left a thick blue smudge next to Ying’s name. “Hey, I don’t need every search engine and tweety site listening to me through those so-called apps,” he said. “Pen and paper keep your secrets.”
Gio snorted. “Until somebody finds a carelessly discarded note.”
“What?” Vic flashed the small pad. “It’s a list of local restaurants. People’ll think I’m a food critic. Fuckin’ drive already, G.”
Joseph “Gio” Spatafora huffed out a mirthless laugh and gripped the wheel of his black sedan. He checked the rearview mirror for approaching traffic. Amber-colored eyes, tired yet intense, set underneath a pair of bushy black brows urged him on to the next stop. He almost spoke up on seeing them, to warn Vic he wasn’t looking like himself lately. Who was this bum in the reflection, staring back with such exhaustion?
Gio was twenty-eight years old and an associate for the San Gaetanos, whose boss controlled the sprawling west side of the city from downtown to the river. Having worked for the family since elementary school, he hoped to soon move on to more substantial work beyond these tedious bagman runs. Preferably in the daytime, leaving his nights free. Nothing against Vic, his partner for this route—he liked the man’s company—but he was capable of working alone.
“Gio?” Vic slapped the notepad on the dash, snapping Gio out of his reverie.
“Right,” Gio said, and pulled away from the curb. It was close to six, and Ying’s delivered until midnight. That he and Vic would have the bag packed before suppertime spoke of their efficiency, considering their growing ‘client list.’ Between the restaurants, bodegas, services and miscellaneous retail shops, Gio figured he’d collected from just over a hundred entrepreneurs over the past few days…with added muscle from Vic, of course.
He didn’t bother with his seatbelt on the short drive, and lucked out on a free stretch of curb outside the storefront. Checking under the flap of his green and white varsity jacket for his gun, tucked into his belt, he joined Vic on the sidewalk.
“You want to pick up something to go while we’re here?” Vic asked.
“No. Get what you want if you’re not hanging around.” Friday at their capo’s house meant saltimbocca, and the capo’s wife cooked not only well but in volume. Every dinner was like Christmas Eve and Gio, who survived on canned ravioli and single-serving noodle cups, was always glad of a home-cooked meal. Vic, who still lived with his mother, clearly took that benefit for granted if he craved over-salted Chinese food.
The setup of Ying’s discouraged lingering diners. Blinding lights from exposed fluorescent tubes, two drinks coolers taking up space on the other side of the counter, and only two four-top tables with three chairs apiece. Two children occupied the one farthest from the door, textbooks and binders spread over the surface among opened soda cans. Gio spoke curtly to the older one in halting Mandarin.
“Get your father. Now.”
The boy grabbed his sister and pulled her through the red embroidered curtains separating the service counter from the busy kitchen. Gio watched the movement through the slit, of bodies hunched over grills and stock pots. A face, eyes wide with worry, glanced in his direction briefly before disappearing to one side.
When the old man emerged, he held two white paper pint containers with reedy metal handles. He nodded silently and showed them to Gio before placing them in a brown paper bag. Mr. Ying addressed Gio by his last name, his accent thick. “One moo goo gai pan, one pork lo mein,” he announced loudly, and shoved a fistful of sauce packets and napkins on top.
Vic stepped forward, irritated. “Excuse me, old man?” he barked, and reached for the lower flap of his windbreaker. “You out of your fu—”
Gio slapping his hand on Vic’s shoulder cut short the tirade. He countered Vic’s venomous glare with a crook of his head behind them. A young couple had walked in, the man with his wallet out, presumably to pick up their order. Vic got the message quickly and stood down.
As muscle, Vic served well, but he had much to learn before the San Gaetanos allowed him to make these rounds on his own. With potential witnesses in their airspace, Gio wasn’t keen on hanging around for additional orders. He took the bag from Ying and gave a sharp bow.
“Xièxiè,” he said. “See you next time.”
Ying returned the gesture, silent.
Back in the car, Gio chastised his partner. “You had to have known the old man was speaking in code.”
“No, because everybody else handed us envelopes, not ‘takeout.’” Vic turned in his seat to face Gio head-on. “Where’d you learn to speak fucking Chinese?”
“I read books. You should try it,” Gio said. “I pick up enough to show these people some common courtesy. These transactions occur more smoothly when you relate to them.” To that effect, Gio also spoke enough Spanish, Portuguese, and Russian to deal with their marks, in addition to his fluency in Italian. It worked, too. He got the sense shopkeepers felt less threatened by a collector who greeted them in their native tongues.
“For the record,” Gio added, “I was speaking Mandarin, a dialect of the Chinese language.”
“A dia-who?” Vic shook his head. “You sure go through a lot of trouble for a pickup job.”
“Yes, and you saw how easily Ying paid up. No arguments, in Mandarin or English.” Gio grunted and dropped the bag in Vic’s lap. “Count it. Make sure it’s all there.”
Vic opened one of the pint boxes to a thick roll of cash. Gio watched the block for signs of police activity and curious window peepers. The latter could be discouraged with a dirty look, Gio surmised, but cops were tricky. Don San Gaetano kept a few officers in his pocket, but they all looked alike to Gio. Big risk to bribe the wrong one if he came up to the car tapping on the windshield.
“It’s all here. Mostly ones and fives, but he’s not short,” Vic said. He stacked the bills from both containers together and put them with the rest of the day’s take. With a sad expression, he glanced at one empty pint box. “Sure wish this was filled with lo mein. Ying didn’t even give us any fortune cookies.”
“You wanna go back in there?” As Gio said this, two more people entered the takeout space. “Tell him we’ve upped the cost of protection to include a half-dozen cookies?”
When Vic flashed him a sheepish smile, Gio laughed and turned over the engine.
“To be honest, I’d rather have fish and chips. It is Friday, after all,” he said. Tap-tap-tap with the ballpoint pen on the pad. “Last up is Lonnegan’s. It’s a block from the capo’s.” Tap-tap-tap with the ballpoint pen on his right temple. “You see how I arranged the pickup route? We ain’t wasting time driving all over creation.”
“Nice going, Vic. You ought to give tours.” Gio side-eyed his acquaintance, unable to see if the man had a blue ink blotch near his forehead. The coast clear, he pulled away and turned at the next light, heading toward their capo’s place.
Three miles later, made all the longer by uncooperative traffic lights, they came to the street on which the pub resided. On the westside’s dwindling Irish neighborhood, encroached upon over the decades by other ethnicities, the establishment maintained an authentic façade with its dark exterior paneling and gilded Celtic font on the signage. That the pub was sandwiched between a Catholic church and its rectory inspired Gio’s quiet laughter. He imagined a stream of parishioners on a Sunday morning emptying one place and filling the other.
What unsettled him, though, was the lack of activity. Not even an Irish flag hanging by the door. On a Friday night, the place ought to be packed with people named McDude and O’Something ready to kick off the weekend. Gio killed the car’s engine near the curb and ignored the meter when he got out to look.
He tried the door. Locked. He cupped his hands over the nearest window and peered inside, finding upturned barstools, the glowing distant exit signs providing the only illumination. Lonnegan’s wasn’t his type of hangout, but he drove down this street often and swore the place had been open earlier in the week.
Vic ambled up beside him. “Sign says they should have opened at three.”
“Brilliant detective work,” Gio said, his voice rough. He reached into his pocket. “See this?” He waved his phone. “This will provide more info than an unreliable sign.”
“If I had a phone now, I’d find nothing but ads for Chinese food, the way we were talking about lo mein.” Vic kicked at an uneven patch of sidewalk near the café seating area. “So, what sayeth the mighty cellphone?”
As much as the sign, Gio determined from the pub’s stale social accounts. The most recent post was timestamped shortly after Easter, and they were well into June now. Gio looked for comments from patrons and came up empty. “Well, fuck.”
Vic shrugged. “Hey, if they’re closed, they’re closed. It means we don’t collect from them, right?”
“Not today,” Gio said. He normally worked different parts of the westside, but their capo kept full records on steady accounts and delinquents. He hated going to Aldo Bertinelli with a light bag, and more than likely the man had a few home addresses for them to check. So much for spending his evening in more pleasurable pursuits.
He nudged Vic. “Get the bag. We’ll leave the car here and walk. There’s a plate of saltimbocca with my name on it.”
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