Hate is Thicker Than Blood Read Free Page A

genuinely surprised, then laughed a hard, rasping laugh. “My wife don’t got no other jewels.
Didn’t
have no other jewels,” he corrected himself.
    “You’re sure?”
    Nuzzzo’s left eyelid again began to flutter rapidly. “You callin’ me a liar?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “I’m tellin’ ya, I don’t believe in crap like that for women. The only reason she had the necklace was she inherited it from
     her grandmother. The rest was from the dimestore.”
    “Your wife had a policy for her jewelry.”
    “Right. That’s the claim I put in. Five thousand dollars.”
    “That was another one. She had a second one in her name for sixty thousand.”
    Nuzzo stared at Lockwood. The concept seemed to be too tough for him. “What you mean?”
    “Just that. Your wife seems to have owned another sixty thousand dollars’ worth of jewels. Sixty thousand that you seem not
     to have known about.”
    Nuzzo’s lip curled, and Lockwood caught a flash of his crooked teeth. “That bitch!” He exploded out of his chair, then stopped.
     “Naah, it ain’t possible. I know her stuff. All she had was costume jewelry, aside from that necklace.”
    Lockwood nodded. “Costume jewelry. May I see it?”
    Nuzzo’s features contorted angrily, but then he shrugged. “Sure. Waddo I care? Come on.”
    The Hook followed the gangster into a bedroom that was overfurnished in the height of contemporary fashion—if you shopped
     at Woolworth’s. Gewgaws abounded, garish, loud draperies and bedspread accented an air of sensual, if ill-conceived, decor.
     Nuzzo opened a huge genuine imitation leather jewelry case. “Here,” he said with disinterest, his hand casually taking up
     a few baubles. “This is all she had. I know it.”
    The Hook took an offered necklace and slowly scrutinized it. Next, he plucked a ring from the box and strode over to a window,
     where sunlight was flooding in. He reached into his jacket pocket and withdrew a jeweler’s loupe, then fixed it in his eye.
    “Now you know. Shit, right?” Nuzzo smiled, a little uncertainly.
    Lockwood said nothing, then turned from studying the ring to the necklace he’d retained.
    “Come on, I’m busy,” Nuzzo snapped, edgily.
    After a moment, Lockwood dropped his hand, removed the loupe, and returned it to his pocket. “My guess is this stuff’s the
     real thing.”
    “I don’t believe you.”
    Lockwood handed him a sheaf of papers. “Here’s a copy of your wife’s policy. This necklace is listed in it along with this
     ring. So, probably, is everything in this jewelry box. I’m no expert, but from what I see, this stuff’s far from paste.”
    Again, Nuzzo seemed to have trouble comprehending.
    “Everything listed in this policy is genuine. Our company wouldn’t insure something like this without checking it over first.
     My looking over these two—” and he dropped them back into the box, “is enough to convince me that all of this is the real
     stuff.”
    Nuzzo sat down on the bed, stunned. “It don’t make no sense.”
    “Come on, Nuzzo. You’re no kid. You know lots of wives don’t tell everything to their husbands.”
    “She couldn’t have bought that stuff. She didn’t have that kind of money.” Nuzzo ran a hand through his inky black, oily hair.
     “It don’t make no sense. Where could she get that kind of dough?”
    Lockwood shrugged, and began moving from the bedroom. Immediately, Nuzzo followed him, looking now like a Doberman Pinscher
     about to pounce. “Get outta here!” he yelled at the detective. “Get your filthy self outta here!”
    “Not quite yet, Frankie. I think it’s best I tell you all you need to know before I leave.”
    Nuzzo’s taut cheekbones were working. “What you mean?”
    “Withdraw your claims.”
    “What?”
    “Withdraw your claims. Both of them.”
    Nuzzo’s expression was pure menace. “Who you think you are tellin’ me what to do?”
    “Better listen to me, Nuzzo. I’m not a cop. I don’t put