10

It was past eleven in the morning when Houston and O’Leary arrived at Del Vecchio’s apartment building, a paint-deprived triple-decker on a narrow street. Houston studied the less-than-impressive neighborhood for several seconds and said, “Looks like the economy is affecting the prostitution business, too.”

O’Leary snickered. “Del Vecchio ain’t exactly an astute businessman, that’s for certain.”

They entered the building through a pair of warped doors. To the right stood a bank of mail boxes; Houston studied the names and quickly found Del Vecchio’s. He lived on the third floor. They climbed the dark stairs, staying off to one side to lessen the creaking of the aged wood. Del Vecchio’s apartment was on the left at the top landing. Houston knocked on the door.

Nobody answered.

He knocked harder—pimps work nights and usually went to sleep after the sun came up. O’Leary reached over Houston’s shoulder and banged on the door so hard it rattled.

Houston heard a door behind them creak. He turned and saw an old woman peeping out through a partially opened door. She said, “Jesus, you trying to knock the door down or what?”

A cigarette hung from her mouth, and at least an inch of ash dangled from the burning end. Through the narrow opening, Houston saw that she wore a tattered chenille robe and worn pink slippers, on which the fuzz had turned to snarls. “Do you know if Mr. Del Vecchio is at home?” he asked.

“Mr. Del Vecchio!” She laughed. Air passing through her rheumy, phlegm-coated windpipe made a popping sound. “You mean Mel? He’s most likely sleeping. He works nights.”

O’Leary banged on the door again, this time using the palm of his hand. Inside the apartment, someone started cursing.

“You a bill collector?” the old crone asked.

“Nope.”

“Cop?”

O’Leary turned away from Del Vecchio’s door, stepped across the narrow hall and pushed his face close to her ear. He whispered, “Mafia.”

Her eyes widened, and she darted inside the apartment like a hermit crab fleeing a gull’s beak. When she slammed her door, the loud bang echoed through the building. They turned back to the pimp’s apartment, and O’Leary hammered on the door again.

“Who’s there?”

“Mel Del Vecchio?” Houston asked.

“Who’s asking?”

“My name is Mike Houston.”

“That supposed to mean something to me?”

“I need to ask you some questions.”

“You a cop?”

“Nope.”

“Del Vecchio, it’s Jimmy O. If you don’t open this fucking door, I’m going to bust it down and then kick your ass so hard you’ll be strangled by your own asshole!”

“Jesus, Jimmy, why didn’t you say it was you?”

As soon as the door opened, O’Leary bulled his way in, shoved Del Vecchio aside, and pulled out a pistol.

Houston followed and studied Del Vecchio. What he saw was radically different from the man in the picture Betty Guerette had given him. Either Del Vecchio had hit on hard times, or he was a lot older than he looked in that picture. His oily hair hung down over his ears exposing a growing bald spot, which he probably hid with a comb-over when in public. He was missing a couple of his front teeth: an upper and a lower. He wore a dirty sleeveless undershirt, the type Houston and his friends called “guinea tuxedos” when they were kids. The shirt barely covered his bulging gut, and gray hair protruded above its plunging neckline. He wore a pair of wrinkled boxer shorts—once white but now beige from too much wear and not enough washing.

Houston turned his eye to the room. It looked like a bomb had gone off. The sink could have used sideboards to contain the dirty dishes piled in it. The tabletop was invisible through the empty beer cans that covered it. Ants and some type of larger insect scrambled across its surface seeking the sticky, sweet treasures that coated it. He concealed his contempt for Del Vecchio’s housekeeping skills and, without waiting for an invitation, entered the living room. When he was a cop, he had learned when someone lets you in, you go all the way in.

The living room was no more sanitary than the kitchen. The whole place smelled sour—a nasty combination of stale alcohol, cigarette smoke, and unwashed bodies. Overall, Houston thought it smelled as if someone had fried roadkill. Across the room, he saw the door of the apartment’s single bedroom open, and a naked woman appeared in the threshold. She stood with one arm against the doorjamb and glared at the intruders. She was obviously one of Del Vecchio’s stable; her face was young, but her eyes were old, and her body already showed signs of wear. It was the way a woman aged when she had seen too much and done even more in too short a time.

Del Vecchio walked into the room. He seemed to have recovered from the shock of having two men barge past him into his home. He saw the nude woman and said, “Ronnie, either put some fucking clothes on, or go into the bedroom and shut the door.” He faced Houston. “You got some kind of nerve, buddy.”

Ronnie ignored Del Vecchio’s order to dress or close the door and walked further into the room. She flopped down in a chair and crossed her legs like a man, resting her left ankle on her right knee. Houston could not help but notice that she’d groomed her pubic hair, shaving it into the shape of a heart. A mocking smile spread across her face. Houston looked her in the eye, refusing to rise to her bait. She lit a cigarette and raised an eyebrow, daring him to look away. They remained like that for several seconds, engaged in a perverse version of a Mexican standoff.

“Jesus Christ, woman!” Del Vecchio stomped into the bedroom and, in seconds, returned with a bedspread. He threw it at her and said, “Cover your ass, will you?”

“It ain’t my ass that’s showing.” Ronnie gave him a scathing look and covered her gaunt frame with the worn bed cover.

“Cheryl Guerette’s family asked me to find her,” Houston said.

Ronnie’s actions seemed to irritate Del Vecchio, and he turned his wrath on Houston. “Mister, you got bigger balls than King Kong to come in here like this.”

“Who the hell are you?” Ronnie challenged.

O’Leary walked into the room, and as soon as she recognized the mobster, the attitude left her, replaced by visible fear. “Oh shit,” she said.

“Someone who wants to talk to Mel,” O’Leary said.

Ronnie rebounded quickly, and when she realized neither of the men were paying attention to her lack of attire, her attitude morphed yet again. She became aggressive. “What’s wrong?” she challenged. “Don’t like what you see?”

Del Vecchio was as pallid as a newly laundered sheet. “Ronnie, watch your mouth.”

O’Leary walked to the window and looked outside. “You should listen to Mel. Is it Ronnie? Ain’t that a man’s name?”

“It’s short for Veronica.” Her indignation at his obvious insult turned to anger. “What are you, queer? A couple of gay boys?”

“Just selective,” O’Leary said. “I got this thing about hitting women. I think it’s something only cowards do. But if you don’t shut your fucking mouth, I’ll make you an exception to the rule.”

She started to retort but thought better of it and sat with her mouth open.

Houston added, “You can go back into the bedroom—unless you know something about Cheryl Guerette. You probably know her as Cheri.”

Ronnie’s eyes narrowed. “That snotty bitch, I thought she was gone.”

“She is. That’s why we’re here.”

“Sit down and shut up,” O’Leary said. “You two answer a few questions, and we’ll be out of your hair. Play games, and we’ll be here all afternoon—we got lots of time.”

Houston looked for a clean chair to sit in. He decided to stand.

Del Vecchio sat on the arm of Ronnie’s chair in an obvious attempt to keep her under control.

“All right,” Houston said. “Let’s start with Cheryl.” He directed his first question to Ronnie. “I get the impression you know her personally.”

“Oh, I know her all right. She’s a snotty bitch from the right side of the tracks who thinks she’s better than the rest of us.”

“Really? And just who are the rest of us?”

“The rest of the girls.”

“The girls?” Houston asked. “What do you girls do? Were you in the same sorority? You work together? What could you and Cheryl Guerette have in common?”

Ronnie laughed, “The only fucking sorority she was in was I Amma Whore or Getta Lotta Bangin’, the same one I’m in. In spite of her uppity ways, she was just another hooker.”

Houston turned to Del Vecchio. “What you got to add?”

“Get to the point, Mel,” O’Leary said. “I’m more than a little tired of playing sixty-four questions with a whore.”

“When I met her, she was out of money and screwing pimple-faced college boys for nose-candy money. Before long, she was on H. She had just started working the streets full time. I tried to pull her in, give her some protection. The street can be a bad place for a freelancer. Ain’t that right, babe?”

Ronnie nodded.

“Did she let you protect her?”

“What?” Del Vecchio asked.

O’Leary walked over and clenched his fist with the middle knuckle slightly extended. With a quick snapping action, he popped Del Vecchio on the top of his head.

“Holy Jay-sus,” Del Vecchio said as he rubbed the painful knot on his skull.

“Just answer the goddamned questions,” O’Leary said.

“Did she let you take her under your so-called wing?” Houston repeated.

“Oh. Yeah, but she was something else.” Del Vecchio looked at O’Leary while he rubbed his head in a circular motion. “That fucking hurt.”

O’Leary smiled. “Just answer our questions, or you’ll see just how much I can hurt you.”

“How so?” Houston asked.

Del Vecchio stared at him as if he did not understand the question.

“What, you got ADD or some shit?” O’Leary asked. “How was she something else?”

“That’s one headstrong kid. She wanted to choose who she’d go with, shit like that. Once she gave up the cocaine and began mainlining scag, she became a handful. You can’t trust them once they start shooting heroin.”

“So you had to show her the error of her ways?”

Del Vecchio looked at Houston, his head rolled a bit to the side. After a few seconds, he figured out what Houston meant. “Hey! It wasn’t like that. No way! I don’t beat on my girls. Do I, baby?”

“Naw,” Ronnie said. “Mel’s the salt of the fucking earth. Hell, he loves his fellow man so much he registered Democrat.”

Houston glared at the two of them. “Yeah, I’ll just bet he takes real good care of you girls, and all he asks is for you to turn over eighty percent of your take.” Ronnie’s smile told him he was close to the truth if not right on the money.

“So where is she?”

“Beats the fuck out of me,” Del Vecchio said. “She might have gone to New York.”

Ronnie nodded her head.

“Did she talk about New York a lot?” Houston asked her.

“All the goddamned time. It was her favorite subject,” Ronnie said. “She was going to be a big-time actress or model—some stupid shit like that. She said from now on the only people she was going to spread for would have endorsement contracts on their desks.”

“You have no idea where she went?” Houston turned his attention back to Melvin.

“Not a goddamned clue. After all I done for her. She never said a fucking word to me about leaving or anything—just took off owing me a bundle. Her habit got to the point where her earnings couldn’t cover her daily overhead, you know what I mean?”

The comment amazed Houston. What did he expect her to do, give him two weeks’ notice?

Del Vecchio looked uncomfortable. “Hey, I got to take a leak, okay?”

“Go for it.”

When he bolted from the room at a half-run, Houston thought, Old age is tough on the bladder.

“He ain’t bullshitting you,” Ronnie said.

“Oh?”

“Yeah, Mel has his faults, but he don’t make a girl work if she wants out—which is probably why he ain’t so successful. He acts tough, but,” she patted her chest, “in here, where it counts, he’s soft as shit.”

A toilet flushed, and Del Vecchio walked back into the room too soon to have washed his hands. Houston thought that although Del Vecchio might be a feeling, twenty-first century pimp, he had the hygiene of a pig. Houston retracted the thought. He knew a hog farmer in Maine; comparing his animals to Del Vecchio did a grave disservice to the pigs.

Del Vecchio returned to his seat on the arm of the chair. “What else you want to know? We ain’t had much sleep.”

“We heard she worked the Combat Zone. There isn’t much left of the Zone.”

“There are still parts of it around. My girls work the Public Garden. Occasionally in cold weather, they’ll work some of the strip joints in Chelsea and Revere or up north on the New Hampshire border but mostly we operate right here in the city.”

“Did she mention any names—maybe someone in New York, a friend or a business acquaintance?”

“Nope, she never mentioned anything to me. She ever say anything to you, Ronnie?”

“Nah, she and I didn’t talk much. We didn’t hit it off—must have been one of them personality conflicts.”

Houston believed her. He had only known Ronnie for fifteen minutes, and he disliked her.

“Who was Cheryl close to?” Houston asked.

“Shit, that bitch wasn’t close to anyone,” Ronnie answered. “But she would talk to Candy.”

“Candy?”

“She ain’t one of mine,” Melvin said.

“She ain’t nobody’s. A real crazy bitch,” Ronnie said. “She’s a walking epidemic. She’s loaded, got HIV, probably gonorrhea and syphilis, too. She says some john gave the shit to her, and she’s going to pass it on to as many horny bastards as she can before she dies. She calls herself the Toxic Avenger like she’s some kind of a fucking superhero, can you believe it?”

“And Cheryl was close to her?”

“No, Cheryl was too damned high and mighty to get close to anyone. I said she talked with Candy.”

“Did she talk with anyone else?”

“Yeah,” Del Vecchio said, “Patty, but she doesn’t do tricks. She thinks that she can be a manager—you know, like a madam. I tried to talk her into getting out of this business while she could. The kid didn’t listen. She has some crazy fucking idea that sex can be a real business. She’s going to get herself and some others killed.”

“What makes you say that?” Houston asked.

“She keeps talking about them starting their own service—no more pimps to pay. They’ll share the expenses and the profits. She ain’t had any luck though. Everyone she’s talked to knows their pimps would fucking kill them if they got wind of it.”

Houston wrote Candy’s and Patty’s names in his notebook. “These names real or are they street names?”

“You got me.”

“Do they work Arlington Street, too?”

“Usually,” Del Vecchio answered. “Sometimes they hang out on Traveler Street by the Herald building.”

Ronnie spoke up, as if she had just remembered something. “There’s one other person you should talk to.”

Del Vecchio turned to her and gave her a dirty look, as if she were telling tales out of school.

Houston did not want him to cut her off, so he asked, “Who’s that?”

“Lisa Enright.”

“Who’s Lisa Enright?”

“A reporter for one of them newspapers that the yuppies in the city read—I think it’s called the Progressive. She was doing a series of articles on the trade.”

Del Vecchio scowled at the mention of the reporter’s name. “Nosy bitch,” he said. “She thinks that the business should be legalized and run by the government. Can you imagine that? Fucking people can’t run Medicare and Social Security, but they think they can run a private industry? As if the streets aren’t bad enough, she expects a bunch of crooked politicians to clean it up.”

Houston was familiar with the Progressive. It was very popular with young left-leaning intellectuals. As liberal as the Globe was, the Progressive made it look right wing. However, if Lisa Enright had been talking with the women who worked the streets, she was definitely someone to whom Houston wanted to talk. He added her name to his notes.

“You going to be around if I need any more help?” Houston asked Del Vecchio.

“Sure. I want to know that she’s okay, too.”

Houston thought Cheryl Guerette had been anything but okay since the minute Del Vecchio had latched onto her.

“You have a current address for her?”

“Hell, she’s missing. As far as I know, she ain’t got no address.”

“Mel,” O’Leary said, “if you don’t give me the fucking address of the last place you know of her living, I’m going to pound the shit out of you.”

Del Vecchio opened a drawer of a small table that stood beside Ronnie’s chair. He removed a pad and pencil and wrote something. He tore off the page and handed it to Houston. “This is where she was staying. I hope . . .” He looked worried.

“You hope what?” Houston asked.

“I hope you don’t find her dead of an overdose.”

Del Vecchio peered at Houston and then O’Leary, looking for reassurance. His voice was subdued when he said, “Really guys, I care for my girls. Cheryl was a pain in the ass, but she wouldn’t have taken off without a word. I think something’s happened to her.”

“Mel, you may a pimp with a heart of gold,” O’Leary said, “but if I find out you’re stringing us along, I’m going to come back here and break both your arms and both your legs—then I’m going to hurt you.”