Page 3 of Maid of Dishonor
Ever the gambler, Maitland hides what he’s really feeling—fear—behind a confident smile—the poker face he’s honed over the years. Too bad he never improved his ability to walk away from the poker tables without leaving all his money behind.
“If I could just talk to Gio,” he says, his voice wavering a bit.
I shake my head. “The time for talking is over. We’ve come for the money you owe him, and we aren’t leaving until we do.”
“I’ve got the money,” he says.
“Great. Where is it?”
Maitland shakes his head. “I don’t have it here.”
“That’s too bad for you,” Frankie says, while Lorenzo pushes to his feet and cracks his neck like he’s preparing to do the same to many of the bones in Maitland’s body.
“Hang on, please.” Maitland holds up his hands towards Lorenzo to stop him as he takes a menacing step toward him. “I can get you the money tonight. Every cent.”
Lorenzo stops and looks to Frankie and me for some guidance on if he should continue or not. I give him the slightest head shake. Maybe I can buy some time to get the message to my people and provide them with enough time to get this place cleared out.
“Every cent?” I ask.
Hope lights up in Maitland’s eyes as he says, “Every cent I owe to Gio.”
“You have three hours,” I tell him, knowing that if I give him anything more, then Frankie and Lorenzo may act on their own.
Maitland lets out the deep breath he’d been holding, and I hope for his sake that he isn’t bluffing.
The three of us head out of the office and make our way through the crowd of unsuspecting people just here for a good time. Especially the woman standing on one of the tables and dancing, looking like she's had one too many tequila shots.
Once we are outside, Frankie’s meaty hand lands on my shoulder and spins me around to face him.
“What the hell were you thinking, giving that guy three hours to come up with the money?”
“Use your head.” I shrug his hand off my shoulder. “We don’t need any unwanted attention on us. And if waiting three hours saves us from getting our hands dirty with an arson charge, then I'm willing to wait and see what he comes up with. Either way, we get what we came for.”
Just behind Frankie and Lorenzo, I see the redhead from earlier. She's still arguing with the same tall blonde I saw on the security cameras, but now they've moved their fight out onto the sidewalk. The club music is still loud, even outside, but I catch a few words of what she’s saying.
“When are you going to wake up?” The redhead yells.
The blonde points to her phone, but the club door opens, and her response is drowned out by the music.
“I’m going to call Gio to let him know you’ve changed the plan,” Frankie says, drawing my attention back to him. From his tone, I can tell that he’s trying to test me and see if I’m going to back down.
“Do it,” I tell him, meeting his stare head-on. I can't lose any ground with either of them, so I need to sound confident in my plan. "You were in that room too. You could have spoken up when I made the offer. Do you think Gio is going to be happy with you when he finds out?”
There’s a moment of hesitation in Frankie's eyes, but I know I haven't convinced him. Lorenzo may get a pass from Gio because his job is literally just to be the muscle. But Frankie moved from just being muscle to making calls in the field. If I go down, he could go down too.
The flash of red and blue lights from a cop car pulling to a stop at the curb interrupts our conversation. The two uniformed officers step out but don't seem concerned with our presence, Frankie and Lorenzo relax, but I need to get the unis attention if I’m going to pass along the information to my lieutenant without blowing my cover. I need to act now or risk the lives of hundreds of people.
The redhead storms off from her friend and heads my way—I get an idea. An idea that will likely get the attention of the uniformed officers and shake some of Frankie and Lorenzo’s suspicions off me.
