Dopplegangster Read Free Page B

Whenever things are at their lowest, she calls me. And within minutes, she manages to make me feel even worse.”
    “I see.”
    “It’s her gift.”
    “Maybe you should get a phone with caller ID.”
    “I can’t buy a new phone, I’m out of work.” I’m an actress, my budget is tight. My current phone would remain in use until it died. “I should never have given my home number to my mother!”
    I knew even from our short acquaintance that Lopez was much closer to his parents than I was to mine. However, since his mother pestered him often by phone, perhaps he sympathized with my problem.
    “Here, I’ll answer it,” he said. “If it’s your mom, I’ll tell her you’re in the shower.”
    “You can’t do that!” I clung to the cordless receiver when he reached for it. “I’ll have to explain what a strange man was doing in my apartment while I was showering!”
    “I’m not that strange,” he said. “Besides, she must realize you date. I mean, if my mom realizes that I date, then surely—”
    “Dating and being naked in the next room are not synonymous in my family. Anyhow, then she’d fight with me about dating someone who’s not Jewish.”
    “How would she know I’m not Jewish on the phone? ”
    There are things that Gentiles just don’t understand about Jewish mothers.
    Realizing that any caller who was not my mother would give up in another ring or two, I girded my loins and answered the ringing phone. “Hello?”
    “Esther! Esther Diamond! Sweetie! It’s Stella,” boomed a robust female voice in a strong Queens accent.
    “Oh, Stella,” I said with relief. “Thanks for returning my call so soon.”
    I met Lopez’s eyes and smiled. He took the ice cream carton from my lap and ate another spoonful.
    “Are you kidding?” Stella said. “I called back as soon as I got your message. Of course we can use you around here! A good voice, sturdy feet, and a strong back? There’s always a place for you at Stella’s, sweetie. You wanna start this week?”
    “I’ll be there tomorrow.” We made arrangements, and then I said, “Thanks, Stella.”
    “No problem, sweetie.”
    When I hung up, Lopez noted my relief and asked, “An audition? A job?”
    “Well, I won’t starve or lose the apartment. I got my old day job back. The one I had right before Sorcerer! Waiting tables. Though ‘day job’ isn’t quite accurate. I usually get off work around two o’clock in the morning at Stella’s.”
    “Stella’s?”
    “It’s a restaurant called Bella Stella in Little Italy.”
    He frowned. “On Mulberry Street.”
    “You know it?” That didn’t surprise me. It was a pretty famous place.
    “Of course I know it, Esther. There’ve been two mob hits there in the past five years, and Stella Butera launders money for the Gambello crime family.”
    Okay, so it was notorious as well as famous.
    Bella Stella was a Mafia hangout, particularly popular with the Gambellos. This notoriety, of course, also made it a hot tourist spot, as well as a stomping ground for certain celebrities. Stella perpetually claimed to be thirty-nine, which was probably a dozen years younger than her true age. The restaurant had been given to her long ago by Handsome Joey Gambello, who’d been her lover for more than twenty years—right up until the night he was assassinated in the restaurant’s bathroom five years ago.
    Lopez said, “Look, I know this is only our third date—sort of—but I don’t want you working there. It’s not safe.”
    “Oh, come on,” I said. “Nobody there is going to kill me . I’m just an actress. Er, waitress.”
    “When somebody sprays a sawed-off shotgun across the room, the bullets don’t go out of their way to avoid law-abiding citizens,” he pointed out.
    “No innocent bystander—or waitress—has ever been harmed at Stella’s.” I’m no fool, I had checked before the first time I started working there.
    “Not yet,” he said. “That would be bad for business, and if