Chapter 6

I look over at Tina in the bed.

She's sleeping on top of the covers now. It's summer and fucking hot. All she's got on is a little black thong, and she's laying on her stomach, giving me a heart wrenching view of her body. Well, okay, my heart isn't the only thing getting wrenched.

I pet her hair as she sleeps.

Teresa comes in carrying a tray, with a coffee pot and cups and cream and sugar. I smile at her.

We had sex last night, the three of us. Teresa is able to enjoy women again, but even her old pal Jack makes her a little nervous.

Hey, I fantasize about rape. I think most guys do and some women. It's just that the reality is pretty fucking ugly.

Teresa makes three cups of coffee, mine with lots of cream and sugar. My old stomach needs that first thing in the morning.

She gives me my cup and kisses me gently.

"Thanks for giving me time," she says. "Last night was nice."

Teresa is a hell of a girl. She didn't deserve what Brisco and his buddies did to her.

Teresa's scarred from it, but hopefully the ones that don't show will heal in time.

Teresa goes over and wakes up Tina by sliding her fingers down over Tina's pussy and touching her until Tina begins to move, moaning in pleasure.

"That's a hell of an alarm clock," I tell her. "I want one like it."

Teresa chortles and Tina giggles.

"I don't thing you want the same model," Tina says. "You want the one for guys."

"No, he doesn't," Teresa chuckles. "The one for guys just sits at the end of the bed and yells, "GET UP, ASSHOLE! WHAT DID YOU EXPECT? A BLOW JOB?"

"Give a guy a blow job, and he just goes back off to sleep," Tina giggles. "It's nature's snooze alarm."

"Jesus Christ," I complain as I swing my legs out of the bed. "Damned man-bashing Lesbians."

I get up and head into the bathroom to try to scrub the leftover taste of last night out of my mouth.

I can hear them giggling out in the other room.

I have to smile. Guys just don't have friendships like this. You have buddies, but theres always a real distance, by mutual agreement.

Get too close and, heaven forbid, something queer might happen.

Of course, that's bullshit. I have close guy friends and some of them are gay too. I never get an urge to hop in the sack with any of them. But I think that's the way it plays in a lot of guy's friendships.

That's why most of my close friends are females with close female friends. Something happens, everyone doesn't get all homophobic and weird on you.

I hear there's a rumor I'm gay floating around, since I frequent gay bars and have male gay friends. Yeah, right. I'm scoring more pussy than at any other time in my entire life. Sure, I must be gay.

Tina comes pushing past me.

"I gotta pee! I gotta pee!" she's giggles.

I shake my head, trying to look peeved or bored by this, but I love the fact Tina is such fun. She can make a day in the office just great, just by being there.

Teresa looks in and smiles.

"Lila wants to see you, Murray," she says. "She's in her bedroom."

Yeah, we're at Lila's. I have my own private rooms and bathroom now. Lila likes the company.

So does Tina. Hell, it's a great house: Pool, hot tub, gym, card room, big screen Tvs everywhere and hot babes visiting at all hours.

It's like the Lesbian version of the Playboy Mansion.

I throw on a robe and head downstairs.

Lila's bedroom is on the main floor. I knock and hear her voice from inside.

"Come in," she says.

I open the door and step into her room. It's huge, with a four poster bed in the middle. Lila's laying in it. She's not alone.

"You wanted to see me?" I ask.

Lila motions at et girl laying beside her. She's Italian looking, dark and very pretty.

"This is Gina," Lila says. "She has a problem. I thought you could help."

Yeah, this is how I get cases. I can't tell you how many times I've snagged good cases at Bad Dolly's, the Lesbian bar I frequent. Everyone in the gay community knows Murray Antoinette, the straight PI who's an alright guy. And my partner is a Lesbian babe, so she snags a lot of cases too.

No, gays aren't any more likely to have problems where a PI could help. But they aren't any less likely either. Anywhere you got people, you got cheating, thieving, lying, conniving and even murdering.

It's a human problem. It doesn't have a lot to do with whether you're being cheated on or thieved on by a man or another woman. Or another man, for that matter.

They're all human, and that means they fuck up or fuck around or fuck you over. Gay, straight, white, black, American or whatever.

Yeah, it's a dark view of the world, but it's how things really are. It's kept me making a living for a lot of years, so I ain't complaining.

"What's the problem?" I ask.

Gina sits up in the bed, and the sheet slips off her breasts. She has small, nicely shaped tits, with quarter sized aureoles and cute little pink nipples. She seems unaware or uncaring that she's giving me a little show.

"It's my brother," she says. "He got involved in something, something heavy. Now he thinks people may be trying to kill him."

I nod. Yeah, a lot of people think you're crazy if you think people are out to get you. I think you're crazy if you don't think that. There are people out there who'd kill you for your socks, or for three bucks, or just because you look at them funny.

People are always trying to kill you, every time you take a drive in your car. And don't think your spouse or loved ones or family members haven't, at least once or twice, thought about offing you. What, you never think about killing some asshole, whether it's your spouse or your boss? Just a nice vicious little daydream?

Yeah, I didn't think so.

People kill people. Once you learn that one little truth of life, you're much better off.

"Why?" I ask. That's the big question. Could be anything from drugs to a lover's quarrel. The 'why' is always the important question.

"He knows too much," she says. "The Feds have been talking to him."

My ears perk up, even as my heart drops. If this is big enough to attract Feds, this guy is really in trouble. They probably want to put him in prison unless he turns over on guys who'd want to put him in a hole. It's a lose lose situation, any way you look at it.

"What's he been doing?" I ask, walking over and sitting on the bed. Gina looks even better up close: Olive skin, classic features, full black hair framing her face, almost black eyes, small, inviting lips. I figure her for maybe twenty, though it could go either way a couple of years.

She sighs and looks down at her lap. She sighs again, then looks up, pulling up the sheet as if she just noticed it had slipped.

"Narcotics," she says. "And maybe murder."

Yeah, I want to get up and walk away. Drugs aren't my thing. Too much money, too many people using their own product, too many guns and too many people willing to use them. It's a dangerous business, and a dirty one.

If her brother is deep in the business, he's in deep trouble in the first place.

"What did he do?" I ask. Might as well get the whole story, at least as much of the story that she knows. He's probably lying his ass off to her: That's pretty much a given. At the very least, he's putting a good face on a bad situation.

At worst, he's signed his own death warrant and put his sister in danger as well.

"He stole a million dollars worth of heroin from the Mob," she says softly.

I let out a low whistle. Hell, the guy could be full of shit. For her sake, I hope he is. Because if it's true, he's a dead man, no way around it.

"Why?" I ask again.

"He has a buyer," she says. "They'll pay a half million cash."

Well, that's just great if any of this is true. There could be a buyer, who'd rather pop a cap in her brother's skull than pay some skel a half mil. The heroin could be a fiction, trying to get the half million close enough her brother can steal it.

Or her brother could be a junkie, making all this up to get a few bucks for his next fix.

Or he could have the million in heroin and have the Mob, the Feds and half the dope world breathing down his neck.

"Where is he now?" I ask.

She shrugs.

"In a hotel somewhere," she says. "He calls on my cell phone. The Feds are trying to get him to give himself up and give them the drugs. They want him to rat out the people he stole them from."

I shake my head. This is way too much at nine o'clock in the morning.

"What do you want me to do?" I ask.

"Help him," she says. "He's a good guy, trying to make it. He's fucked up some, but he's really trying. He needs to get out of this, without ending up dead or in prison."

Her eyes are big and sad and filled with pain. She loves her brother. That's plain.

But the way it sounds, dead or in prison may be the only choices her brother has left himself.

"It'll cost," I tell her. She looks at me and lets the sheet slip from her breasts again. She looks me right in the eyes provocatively.

"I don't have the cash," she says, "but I'll work it off, however you want me to."

Shit. Like I don't get enough pussy and want to do a girl who's just fucking me to help out her brother. Yeah, in traditional detective stories, the guy makes it with her and they probably fall in love. She's a sweet girl in a bad situation.

But the sad reality is pussy doesn't buy a lot. And it's way overpriced for what you usually end up with.

Besides; almost invariably, the girl decides you somehow coerced her into having sex with her, so she ends up bitter and pissed off at you.

I'd rather work for free than work for pussy.

And I hate working for free.

I shake my head.

"Sorry. I really am. But either your brother is rattling your chain and is full of shit, or he's telling the truth."

I look at the chick to let that settle in, then follow it with the slap of reality.

"If he's telling the truth, he's dead," I tell her. "You don't want to get anywhere near him or you could get dead too. Run away from him as fast as you can, or he'll take you down with him. That's my advice, for whatever it's worth."

I turn and walk out of the room.

Kim smiles over at me. Kim is my little Oriental friend and her reaction to the problem at Dolly's is the exception that proves the rule. Her rape excited her, and she went fuck mad after, laying every guy she could. Hey, I'm not saying it was right, I'm just reporting the facts here.

Oh, shit. The facts. Okay, there was a small mistake in the last story. Yeah, there are probably literary types out there saying, "Hey, he's breaking the fourth wall here! He's talking directly to his audience. Where's the suspension of disbelief?"

Fuck disbelief. Fact is, I did the Feebee equivalent of saying Special Agent Al Allbright has a little prick.

She DOES NOT carry a Beretta. Hey, a Beretta is a nice little pistol, 9mm.

But that's the problem. Al carries a 1911, the big Colt.45 semiauto design manufactured by Springfield Armory. A.45 is a larger round than a Nine, with more knock down power.

Why you looking at me that way? Yeah, it's a bullshit thing, but all the Feds are going around acting like I just cut two inches off their dicks!

They carry 1911's, which are bigger and longer and rounder and superior in all ways to those underpowered, under-hung nine millimeters.

Me, I figure they just worry about their little dicks, so they carry big guns to cover for it.

Anyway, I promised Al I'd clear up the problem. So there it it: All FBI agents carry big guns in a pathetic attempt to bolster their egos, damaged by their lack of better sexual equipment.

Hey, I said I'd clear it up. I didn't say I'd be nice about it.

Anyway, I didn't even think about Gina's problem that day. Hey, I got a life too.

And when I got back to my room, a big part of that life slid into my arms.

Jesus. Tina has on this long white robe, with this very short nightgown underneath. The nightgown is sheer, and her fantastic body is just set off by it.

She kisses me hotly.

"I missed you, Murray," she says. "Did Jack miss me?"

She has her hand down the front of my pants and Jack is jumping at my pants like a puppy wanting to be petted. Yeah, Jack has a real hard-on for Tina as well.

I slide my hands over that hot, youthful body. Damn, it's like a drug and I'm totally addicted.

I kiss Tina and pull her to me tightly. She moans and starts wrapping body parts around me. Jesus, she can make you feel like you're wearing her, and it's one hell of an outfit.

We fall back on my bed, kissing and touching and feeling each other. I get her nightgown pushed up, revealing her perfect and inviting flesh.

I get a handful of one breast and a mouthful of the other. She's already starting to breath heavy and make little moans of pleasure.

I slide down and take her pussy in my mouth. It's full and fantastic, and so nice to lick. And Tina just starts moaning more and having little spasms of pleasure. Her tits are standing and her body has a sheen of sweat on it now: She's getting real turned on.

"Can Jack go for a walk?" she asks softly. "Can Jack come play with my pussy?"

Well, Jack's ready, so I get down my pants and let him go. He burrows deep in Tina's hot cunt, all wet and excited to see him. They both do a dance, getting each other real worked up. Tina and I are pretty worked up too. We're kissing and groping and just getting off on each other.

Tina still fucks like a semi-pro. She loves the game and always gives a hundred and ten percent. I swear softly as I feel myself getting ready to come.

"Oh, yes, Murray," she says. "Let Jack get off in me. Make him go long and give us both a touchdown."

Hey, cut the smirking out there. At the time, it was real sexy. Tina makes these professional cheerleaders look like tired old sluts, so until you have one of your own, don't go getting all superior on me.

I come off, hard and great.

We were laying together afterward, Tina's hot, lush body all pressed up against me, when she starts causing trouble.

"Murray, did you talk to Gina?"

I cringe. Yeah, Lila has a lot of guests, but it's a smallish group. And everyone tends to know every else's business.

"Yeah," I say.

"Can you help her?" she asks.

I sigh. Shit. Tina wants me to help her. I can tell that.

I turn towards Tina and look into her soft blue eyes.

"Her brother's bought himself a ton of shit and is about to take a shower in it. Not much I can do," I tell her.

"Gina's really concerned about him," Tina says. "He's her little brother and their parents are dead."

Shit. I don't need this. Orphan girl and her poor little brother.

"How their parents die?" I ask.

"Someone bombed their car in Vegas," Tina says. "Her dad was a mobster."

"She mention the family?" I ask. Yeah, I'm asking, but I'm not getting involved. The more I hear, the faster I want to run away.

"The Andolinis," she says.

Well, that tears it. I know old Marco Andolini. He's an asshole, but an honorable one. If he says he'll kill you, he always remains true to his word.

If Gina's brothers stole Andolini heroin, he's living on borrowed time.

"What the fuck was he thinking?" I ask, not really expecting an answer.

"He had a buyer, offered him half the value," Tina says. "Five hundred thousand dollars is a hell of a lot of money, tax free."

Yeah, it is. That's what those assholes on the outside don't understand. They look down on some black kid who's selling drugs to help support his family, expecting he should get a 'real' job. Hell, he can work at MacDonald's for six bucks an hour if he's lucky, and see a third of that or more taken in taxes. Or he can make a hundred times more dealing drugs, tax free.

So who's the smart one? The kid at MacDonalds or the one on the street corner?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. "But it's illegal!" So was bootlegging when old Joe Kennedy made the family fortune. "Behind every great fortune is a great crime." Some old guy said that, and boy was he right.

No, I'm not saying you should go out and rob a bank and make a fortune. But hell. One big take and you're set for life.

Gina's brother probably thought the same thing.

Tina leans over and kisses me, softly but insistently.

"Gina's a nice girl," she says. "She already said she'd be grateful. So would I."

Shit. Yeah, I'm getting to know the true meaning of pussy- whipped.

Tina doesn't use it like a torture device, but like a reward. But the end result is the same. You end up doing something you wouldn't normally do on a bet.

"I'll look into it," I tell her.

Gina comes into the office the next day. Damn, this girl is tasty. She's dressed well, like a CEO's wet-dream of a secretary type. The type who uses your prick to give dictation to. That's spelled Dick Tation. I think I saw the movie.

Anyway, she comes in my office and sits down. Her grey skirt is short anyway, and she's not shy about letting me know what's underneath.

"I really appreciate you doing this, Murray," she says. "You won't regret it."

She's wrong. I already am. I'm getting between the Feds and the Mob. Neither group pulls any punches, and I'm playing referee. I feel like Mills Lane getting between two heavyweights and trying to pull them apart. Yeah, I know him. Nice guy.

Anyway, I sit back and enjoy the view. Her dark hose and light panties are a nice contrast, and her panties are lace, with pussy hair plainly visible through them. She has nice little tits, now in an under-wire bra, proffering them up for my inspection.

And she's made up to bring the best out of her already good looks.

I sigh.

"What's your brother's name?" I ask.

"Michael. Michael Ferretti."

"Your father was Frankie Ferretti?" I ask. Frank "Frankie Six Fingers" Ferretti was a notorious hit man in the Andolini family for years. I'd heard he got blown up a couple of years back in Vegas.

I didn't make the connection.

Gina nods.

"Yeah, that was Pops," she says. "He wasn't like they said."

I nod. I knew Frankie Six Fingers. Yeah he had six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot. The Feds made him out like your average mad dog killer, but Frankie was a craftsman. If you wanted someone dead, no muss, no fuss, no innocent bystanders getting killed too, you got Frankie.

I knew him when I was a cop. Yeah, I busted his balls and he busted mine, but he knew I wasn't going to try to manufacture evidence on him and I knew he was being square with me.

In fact, I owe him. Donnie Brisco went to him when my Vice work was hurting his businesses. Brisco wanted me dead.

Frankie refused. And he warned me. When the amateurs Brisco hired came for me, they got wheeled out in body bags.

I guess I really owe Frankie my life.

"I knew your dad," I tell her. "He was good people."

"My brother is too," she said. "After Dad died, he was on his own. You know the Mob today. He did what he could, but Brisco ran the rackets around here and Brisco hated Italians."

I nod. It's bullshit, but the Mob still breaks along racial lines.

The Italians, the Irish, now the Russians and Chinese too.

"So he stole a shipment of heroin," I say.

Gina shrugs and nods. Damn, she does look nice.

"It was brought in over the Great Lakes to Chicago. The Andolinis were transporting it to be stepped on and packaged. My brother was asked to drive the car."

She looks at me and smiles sadly.

"I guess he kind of got lost," she added softly.

"What was he thinking?" I asked.

"He was thinking he could make his score and get out," Gina said sadly. "The old Mob, my dad's Mob, is dead. Everyone is in it for the big money and figures if they get caught, they pull a Sammy the Bull and disappear into the Witness Protection Program. My brother was sick of the bullshit. He figured this was his chance."

"He use?" I ask.

I see a flash of anger in her dark eyes.

"My father didn't raise stupid kids," Gina says tightly. "You sell the shit. You don't use it yourself."

I nod. Yeah, Frankie was smart. He understood becoming your own best customer was the quickest way to a shallow grave somewhere.

"What do the Feds have on him?" I ask.

Gina shrugged.

"They been talking him for a couple of years. Little meetings, offers of assistance, asking for help. He plays along, but nothing more.

They want a big fish, and figure because of his dad's connections, he might know some."

Yeah, that's how the Feds work. Turn a little guy on a bigger guy, and go on up the food chain until you get something worth eating. And Frankie was a pretty big fish who swam with some big sharks.

"Why was your dad killed?" I ask. Frankie killed a lot of people, but a bombing in Vegas usually means permission from the higher ups. Vegas is still kind of off limits for warfare.

Gina sighed and shook her head.

"Someone started a rumor he was talking to the Feds," she said. "He wasn't, but people got nervous. He ended up getting blown up, just in case."

I nod. Yeah, it's a risk of the profession. You might trust this guy absolutely, but then you see people like Henry Hill and Sammy the Bull getting sweetheart deals and taking down everyone around them.

And suddenly anything seems possible. So you kill the guy, just in case.

"Just in Case" could be the epitaph on a lot of Mob guy's tombstones.

"I'm sorry," I tell her. "I liked Frankie."

"Can you help me?" she asks. She leans across the desk. This time it's not provocative or flirting.

She's dead serious.

"You help my brother Michaal and I will do anything you want," she says. "Lila figures sex, but my dad taught me a lot.

I'm saying you help my brother, you tell me what you want and, if there is any way I can, I will do it for you."

Shit. I could be sitting across from her old man. That ice cold look, that soft voice, that total and complete threat without saying anything threatening.

Gina's telling me that I help her brother, and if I ever want someone dead, it happens. Simple as that. No muss, no fuss, no bother.

Gina has her old man's eyes and her old man's balls.

I look at her oddly wide hands. Yeah, she has her old man's fingers too, all six of them.

I nod.

"I'll see what I can do," I tell her.

I look out the window of the plane to Vegas, wondering what the hell I'm doing here.

Andolini is "retired" to Vegas now. Andolini is about as retired as I am gay, but the Feds don't know that.

Muscles was pissed off I left her behind. I told her to run the office and not worry about me. I also didn't tell her anything about what I'm doing.

She'll find out soon enough. She has contacts up to her twat, and she'll figure out I'm doing this for Gina soon enough. Hopefully, by the time she figures out the danger I'm putting myself in, I'll be back safe and sound.

Yeah, it's dangerous. The Mob is pissed off, with good reason.

Michael Ferretti and the million in drugs is nowhere to be found. The Feds see this as their ticket to find out who Andolini left his business interests too.

Hell, I'm kind of curious myself.

But I'm the middle guy here and, if it gets suddenly hot, I'm gonna get it from all sides.

I sigh. Damn Agent Al anyway. I always carry my Dog, my 44 snubby. But she gave me an Springfield HRT 1911 semi-auto, the.45 ACP that all the bullshit was over. It's a hell of a nice pistol. I immediately took it to the range and put a hundred and fifty rounds through it without a single jam.

So now I have it in a shoulder holster, in my luggage in the hold. I'll still be packing my Dog, but I'll have Dusty along as well.

Yeah, Dusty Springfield. So I name my prick and my guns. What's your problem, asshole?

I look around the plane. Most of the passengers are families, heading to the new Family Las Vegas.

Hell, I remember the old Family Las Vegas. With the Families who broke your fingers or your head if they caught you cheating.

Problem is, the corporations came in and the Mob got kicked out. Corporations make the Mob look like kids when it comes to hardball.

The Mob just couldn't stand up to the real evil of Corporate America.

Hey, before people start writing and complaining, it's only a comment. I like corporations. I think they're a great idea.

Because if I don't say that, I know what could happen. I'm brave, but I'm not stupid.

Anyway, I'm checking out this hot babe two rows back. Probably six-two, statuesque as all hell, long blonde hair and big knockers and great legs and dressed to show them off.

She's made up really hot, and looks fantastic.

She sees me looking and smiles. Yeah, I've seen that smile before. Once a guy hits about thirty, the 'possibly interested" smile fades from babe's and the "nice old fart" smile kicks in.

This was definitely her "nice old fart" smile.

I turn back in my seat. Yeah, she's great, but she'll be making it with a hot guy that goes with her hot looks. I don't blame her. Hell, if I were young and hot, I certainly wouldn't be dating fat old women.

At least I'm in a little better shape now. Muscles and I hit the gym pretty regularly, and I'm down a few pounds and carrying a little more muscle.

We land in Las Vegas. I hate to date myself, but I remember going down the boarding ramp at Vegas and walking across the tarmac to the terminal. But we walk through the tube, feeling like the sperms in that stupid Woody Allen movie. Whenever I walk down one of those penis-like boarding things, I always feel like a fucking sperm.

Blondie is just ahead of me, her hot ass clad in a skin tight pair of leather pants. She has on real high heels.

Hell, I enjoy the view. She's showing it off and I'm enjoying looking. So's Jack.

The terminal's busy, and I walk down and get my luggage off the beltway system.

I see a pretty young Black girl looking for a bag. She sees it just as it goes past, but can't quite get to it because of the crowd around her.

I wait till it comes to my side and cadge it. I look over at her lift the suitcase and smile. She smiles back and starts around.

We meet and I hand her the luggage.

"Thank you, sir," she says.

"You're welcome," I say.

Giant Blonde Woman walks up. Shit, this babe must be six- two or better. Add the heels and she towers over us.

"Is this guy bothering you?" she asks the black girl. The girl shakes her head.

"No, he just got my luggage for me," she says.

Giant Blonde Woman looks down at me. Shit, that's one beanstalk that would be real fun to climb. I grin up at her, but I also wish I had my guns on me, just in case. She one big babe.

"I can get that," she says, taking the luggage away from the Black girl who it is increasingly obvious is Giant Blonde Woman's girlfriend.

The girl smiles real nice at me, despite Giant Blonde Woman's frown.

"I'm Brandy," she says. "Thanks for the help.

"Murray," I say. "You're welcome."

I watch them leave.

Shit. I thought I was doing good. But, well, that's life.

I take the Limo to the Casino. It's not a Limo at all, but a small bus. Lots of visitors are on it, all chattering excitedly.

I get my room, and go down and play a few bucks in the Casino. My luck's not good, so as soon as I'm down twenty bucks, I quit and go to the show I was comped as part of my room package.

There's Giant Blonde Woman, right up on the stage. She starts out in a dress, dancing with a bunch of gay guys (No, it's not advertised, but it's obvious) and stripping down to just a little tiny G-string.

Damn, this woman is built. And surrounded by mostly naked babes, one of which is Brandy.

So I check out the breasts and butts and drink my three drink minimum. They're good drinks. Casino's ain't stupid. They get you a little tipsy, you lose more at the tables. Established scientific fact.

Afterwards I go out and sit at the bar. I don't want to feed the fucking machines and the tables are crowded. Smart thing about Casinos: They got good restaurants and great shows, but there ain't nothing else to do, so you end up gambling.

And, with the house edge, you lose.

They don't build these huge, glitzy palaces off the winners, folks. These are monuments to losers, to the eternal hope that never quite emerges as a reality.

Yeah, Vegas depresses me. It's the real world in microcosm. All full of lights and glitz and desperation. A fantasy world that runs on the harsh reality of the bottom line: You can't win in the long run.

Nobody does.

Vegas is reality. Very pretty, dressed up nice, but a real whore underneath, out for your money and nothing else.