Hopper House (The Jenkins Cycle Book 3) Read Free

so?”
    Lenny's eyes seemed to dance. “What happened when that movie producer didn’t let Tom finish his dinner?”
    “Vito sent—”
    “Wrong!” Lenny said, pounding the table. “Tom handled everything. Bosses don’t have time to micromanage like that. It was Tom who had that horse’s head cut off. Now listen, lemme ask you—who really had that police chief and Sollozzo whacked?”
    I smiled. “Tom Hagen?”
    “Right!” Lenny said, and pounded the table again. “Tom gets picked up, Sollozzo tells him his foster dad, or what the fuck, is dead. Then, when Sonny wants to murder everyone, Tom’s suddenly Mahatma-fuckin’-Gandhi—until Michael says he wants to whack them. Then Tom seems to give in, and that sets everything in motion. Fucking German-Irish, I tell you. Hitler on one side, leprechauns and IRA on the other. Unpredictable. That’s why you make good killers.”
    I wondered if I should scowl like a mean killer or grin like a crazy one, but in the end I just waited.
    “So back to Ricky,” he said. “I want him to go with you on that thing I mentioned.” He held his hands up as if forestalling me. “Now listen—I know about your code, but hear me out.”
    I nodded.
    “All you trigger men,” he said, “with your codes these days. I got a guy won’t burn down houses ’less they got no animals in them. This other guy thinks he’s a wild Indian, only uses a knife. And you, with the women and children … I mean, I get that. But Ricky—he’s my nephew, see? He’s got limitations, but he’s willing to do things I can’t ask you.”
    Lenny opened a drawer, pulled out a photograph, and tossed it on the desk. It was a picture of a very beautiful woman, standing on the steps of a courthouse looking powerful in front of a sea of reporters.
    “Pretty, ain’t she?” he said.
    “Nicest picture I’ve seen all day.”
    “She’s also a pain in the ass. Easy to find out about her, but take it from me: the less you know the better, same as usual. She needs to go, but with you and your code…”
    I smiled. “And Ricky with no code…”
    “See how it is? I want him to go with you. She’s in Savannah-fucking-Georgia, going to some conference. It’s on the back of the picture.”
    I turned the photo over and found an address for a hotel with a date beneath it. Three days from now, if the receipt from the transfer station had been correct.
    “I want you to get Ricky in place,” he said. “She’ll be there in two days. Here—I splurged on the tickets.” He handed me an airline envelope.
    I opened the paper sleeve and looked. My flight was tomorrow morning, 9:20 a.m.
    “Business class all right?” he said.
    “Sure.”
    “Ricky wanted first class, you believe it? But we ain’t the government.” He reached in the drawer and took out a thicker envelope. “That’s the money for that asshole you wiped. And a little more.”
    “Thanks,” I said and took it.
    Lenny's smile faded into a look of concern. “We were all sorry about your wife, Andre. She was a good woman. You should stay down there a few extra days. Soak it up. You know better than most life’s too short.” He eased back in his chair. “Send Ricky in when you leave.”
    A dismissal. And a lot to think about.
----
    T hings were definitely looking up for me. Not for the first time in my strange afterlife, I was rolling in blood money. Over the years, I’d come back as a member of countless violent gangs, all of which were involved in guns, killing, and drugs. Andre appeared to be a cut above that lot.
    I wondered what happened to his wife. Terminal disease? Car accident? Something more sinister?
    After the Jolly Green Goombah gave me back my gun, I returned to the dining area and struggled with the mesmerizing, delicious, intoxicating smell of—
    “I wanna know what you and Lenny talked about,” Ricky said, getting too close and sticking his finger an inch from my face.
    He wasn’t a pipsqueak or a little guy, but he was