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“Sure. Sure. Now get outta here before those pissy sons-a-bitches inside hold this against me.”
Navy pier.
1:12 a.m. I rented a car for this occasion. Some four-door sedan job: silver, tinted, nothing fancy. Looks like every other car on the road, which is why I picked it. I’m sure they’ll be pissed I’m chain-smoking inside of it but oh well. I’ve smoked half a pack waiting for this jack off.
My hand
lifts to the gear shift. I’m leaving and then in my rearview Paulie Torreno comes walking towards me from some shadow. He pauses ten feet back and huddles his face in front of his hands. A few orange flickers and he’s dragging off his own cigarette. He starts walking again.
He comes to the driver side window and my .44 Magnum is in my lap, pointed his direction. He gets to the window, looks in and sees the iron.
“I been set up?” he says, blowing smoke in my face.
“No. I just don’t trust you.”
“Well, you wanted to see me, Dick. What’s on your mind?”
“Sit down inside.”
“I like the cold.”
“See, that’s strange. I hear you like heat.”
“People say things. I like the cold.”
“I didn’t ask what you like. I said sit down. We need to talk business.”
Torreno drags deep off the smoke and his aging eyes turn to slits. He lowers the cigarette and gives me a hard stare before suddenly smiling bright.
“Oh, what the hell,” he says, cheery. “I ain’t got nothing to worry about from old Dick Buckner anymore. You can’t even write me a parking ticket these days.”
He walks around the hood and comes to the door. Swings it open. Plops down into the seat.
Paulie Torreno is one of the main firebugs who had his heyday working for the mob years back. In the ’70s, if a building burnt down, Paulie did it. The mob liked Paulie because he had a knack for being thorough and for getting away with it. He’s too old for constant work now. He spends his days doing whatever retired mob guys do. How he ever came into my sights is forever lost but his name used to get circulated a lot in the PD. Somehow he never went down for a torch job. Not even the jobs where there were people inside.
Seemed to be a lot of those by the end.
Whoever did the houses connected to Delilah Boothe, if it was a pro, Torreno will know something. Torreno is an animal. He’s a serial killer with a Bic lighter. This is a long shot but I cover my bases.
“What’s so important, Dick?” Torreno says. His arrogance fills the car like a bad stink. He’s old now. Older than me. He moves slow. Slower than me. He might be five-foot-eight, one-fifty. His snug wool hat with its slight brim makes him look Irish. He smells like fire and brimstone.
“Did you see the torch jobs on the news?”
“I mighta, yeah.”
“Somebody pass that gig around? Looking for a man to do them?”
“Why would you ask me?”
“You know why.”
“I sold shoes, hats and coats my whole life. Swear on Mother Mary. You know this.”
“I know you set fires. Personally I think that job is past you now. But all three of those jobs were done by one man. And if someone was looking for a pro, you would have heard. So spill it.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Dick.”
“I told you a long time ago, don’t call me Dick.”
