But Nobody Wants To Die Read online

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  BIG EARS

  A lphonso, “Big Ears,” Vietri once believed that being a modern day Don Corleone would be like being the CEO of any major corporation, except with more perks and of course, more money, and granted more risk, after all, how many CEO’s worry about being found dead in the blood stained trunk of a Cadillac? In actuality it was like being the ringmaster of a crazed three ring circus with the acts going berserk - the lions escaping their cages, the clowns running amuck, the elephants trampling the spectators.

  Alphonso was not listed as the CEO in the media guide, nor on the Global Entertainment website, in fact, you would have to dig to finally find him listed merely as the Director of Marketing. Don Jameson is the public face of Global Entertainment, the person representing the Casino at golf tournaments, press conferences present and in the newspapers. The guy whose face is plastered on the cover of the Las Vegas Visitor’s Guide and the throughout the Annual Report to stockholders. But Don is just a figurehead with no real decision making authority, someone paid big money to sit in a huge office, shuffle papers, and pretend he is the CEO.

  Alphonso picked up the phone and called Sam, the kid he’d put through Med School and after apologizing for disturbing him, asked if he could do him a favor. Sam said he could. Alphonso explained the situation and then said he’d send him, ‘a little something,’ for his trouble. Sam said that was not necessary, that he was glad to help out. Alphonso gave him the room number at the Camelback Inn and asked him if he still lived in that same condo on Orange Grove Road? Sam said he did. Alphonso thanked him, made a note to send him some cash, and hung up. Alphonso wanted to tie up a few loose ends. He pressed the intercom and waited for Gino to come in and motioned for him to close the door.

  “You remember that conversation we had about Melinda D?” Alphonso said.

  “Sure I do,” Gino said.

  “I want that little slut dead, but make it look like an accident,” Alphonso said.

  “Okay boss,” Gino said.

  She has a printed copy of an e-mail that I want. She’ll know what I’m talking about. Tell her that if she gives you the e-mail, you’ll let her go. When you get it I want you to shove enough pure grade cocaine up her nose to stop a train,” Alphonso said.

  “Sure thing boss,” Gino said. He was gone almost as quickly as he came in.

  Alphonso waited for the door to shut completely. Then he called Fagamo.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  WHERE TIME STANDS STILL

  I t was a long drive up to Scottsdale from Tucson and it gave Sam time to think about his future. Almost three years out of med school and he wondered how much longer he would have to be on the hook to the Mob. The old story so familiar now, it sounded like part fairy tale, part ancient legend.

  How his mom, a show girl at Global Entertainment was walking through the lobby, telling her friend Fay about her little boy, Sam. Going on about how he was the smartest boy in school and although he’s only in the fifth grade, he’s already letting everybody know he wanted to be a doctor.

  His mom telling Fay there was no way she could afford to send Sam to medical school all while Big Ears Alphonso is walking behind her, and naturally, with a name like that, hearing every word. He stops her, and during the requisite small talk finds out her maiden name was Luciano, that she is originally from Queens and what a small world after all. He asks her to come up to his office on Friday evening after work so they can talk some more.

  The PG-13 version of the story, the one he believed for years, is that when Mom comes to his office on Friday, Big Ears invites her in, asks her to sit down, and tells her that he’s talked to Sam’s teachers, and discovered he actually is the smartest kid in school. They say he has a natural aptitude for science and they would love to see him go to med school. Precocious is the word they use and his mom has to look it up when she gets home.

  Besides learning a new word she also learns Big Ears wants to pay her son’s college tuition, and set up a $200,000 trust fund, laddered bonds that mature during his six years of med school, internship, and residency.

  “Would that be okay?” he asks.

  Sam’s mom is glad she’s sitting down because maybe otherwise she’d fall down but even in her joyful state she’s smart enough to wonder what’s the catch and asks Big Ears if there is a condition attached to this unexpectedly generous offer? After all his mom is a 29-year-old single mom and a good Catholic girl and since she’s a show girl, obviously quite attractive, but a woman can’t be too careful, right?

  And Big Ears says, “Actually there are two: first, if Sam does not go to Med School for whatever reason; the trust proceeds revert to the Global Hotel and Casino. Second, no one, besides her and Sam, when he is old enough, is to know where this money came from. Does she agree to these conditions?”

  For years Sam imagined it took his mom a New York minute to agree, not that he ever blamed her and not that he would have done anything differently if he was in her shoes. After all, how do you say no to the boss, especially if he is giving your son the opportunity of a lifetime?

  But one night when Sam is in his last year of Residency, he comes home for the weekend and after dinner his mom has a couple glasses of wine and she starts talking about that bastard Alphonso, what a low life he is, and Sam has to ask what is this all about?

  And through her tears, his Mom tells him that the true story is that when Alphonso invited her to his office late that night, there weren’t just two conditions, but three. The last one being that they have sex in order to, “seal the deal,” and when she refused and tried to leave, he grabbed her, and slapped her and then called her an ‘ungrateful bitch,’ before he tore off her clothes and raped her. Which meant that his college tuition and the laddered bonds that paid for med school are hush money, a reward for her keeping her mouth shut. Big Ears tells her before he has Gino drive her home that if she ever goes to the cops, breathes a word of this to anyone, they’ll find her body out in the desert.

  And Sam holds her while she sobs uncontrollably, thinking that his mom had to live with this all these years, pretending that Alphonso was their benefactor when in reality, he was her worst nightmare.

  She tells Sam she’s sorry, that she never should have bragged about him, that it’s all her fault and could he ever forgive her? She tells him that she kept it a secret all these years and just couldn’t do it for a minute longer.

  Sam tries to console her, tells her it wasn’t her fault. He tells her that there was nothing she could have done, and that there is nothing to forgive. He tells her that every Mom has the right to be proud of her son, just like he is proud of her.

  So your son the doctor, the one you hold in such high regard, the one in the picture of the two of you the day he graduated from med school that holds the place of honor in the living room, works for the mob. Oh, he has a regular job, works at a prestigious clinic on the north side of town, is held in esteem by his peers, and is respected by his patients. But whenever there is the potential for the unwelcome combination of spilled blood and bad publicity, whether it’s a gunshot wound, or a stabbing, or even a rock to the head, Sam is the one they call. But no one knows that the real reason he works for the mob is because he thinks it is the best way to keep his mom safe.

  But Sam is smart, he’s a doctor after all, and keeps good notes, notes he’s been saving for the FBI’s Special Agent in the Las Vegas office. So maybe, if things go right, and if there really is such a thing as an air tight Federal Government’s Witness Protection Program, one night Alfonso is going to call Sam but he won’t answer. He’ll be gone. And his mother will be gone with him, and the FBI will have enough to put Alphonso away for a very long time.

  The J.W. Marriott Camelback Inn, nestled amidst the backdrop of Mummy Mountain with the words, “Where Time Stands Still,” inscribed above the lobby entrance was a beautiful place. The sun was just coming up as Sam wandered the winding pathways through the lush landscaping until he found R
oom 214 and knocked on the door.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  MEANWHILE BACK AT THE RANCH

  L ouie Fagamo didn’t get all the details, just enough to know that Mikey had screwed up again. Big Ears Alfonso calling to tell him he needed to get down to Phoenix right away. There would be a plane to catch at Henderson Executive. The pilot, who Louie knew on sight, would be waiting for him just outside the Pilot Lounge. Jimmy would meet the two of them there and there would be a car and driver standing by in Phoenix. He gave him the address where Mikey was staying and asked him to repeat it back to him. Louie wrote it down as he confirmed the address with Alfonso. They were to fly back on the same plane once Mikey’s medical condition was stabilized.

  “Medical condition?” Louie said, incredulous.

  “Yeah, some bitch busted his head with a rock, can you believe it? You remember Sam, right, the kid we put through medical school, lives down in Tucson? I’m sending him to Scottsdale to sew up Mikey. Make sure he’s patched up and bring him back before he can step on his dick again. Have Jimmy get rid of the car and make sure nothing can be traced back to us,” Alphonso said.

  “Sure thing Alphonso, I’m on my way,” Fagamo said.

  Cleaning up Mikey’s messes was nothing new, but Mikey was what, twenty-eight-years-old now and if he was anybody beside the Mouse’s kid, he’d be lucky if he had a job at Newark Sanitation picking up garbage cans.

  Louie was a walking contradiction, a big guy with fingers the size of rolls of quarters, a grip that could crush walnuts, with shoulders as wide as a two car garage, who cried at sad movies, weddings, funerals and anything sung by Enya. Louie liked to think that if it hadn’t been for adversity, he never would have amounted to anything, and if there was one thing he knew intimately, it was adversity. But he was older now, sadder, wiser, and the weight of every one of those fifty-two long years, as heavy as the hundreds of wheelbarrows full of cement he pushed starting when he was just thirteen.

  Right now, heaving garbage cans seemed like a nice quiet occupation. A job with much less aggravation than he would have to deal with in Phoenix. He quickly changed his clothes, packed his overnight bag, and headed out the door. On his way to the airport he decided his luck had changed. It was worse.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CARLOS SIGNS UP

  T o say college hadn’t gone well, was just the powdered sugar coating on the Polvorones, one of the Mexican cookies Carlos made at the bakery. Carlos knew up front he needed to go all in to succeed, but he’d hedged his bets, told himself he’d give it a try, see how it went. It was obvious now, looking at the tattered landscape of his report card, littered with ‘D’s and ‘F’s, that he spent far too much time hanging out at the Student Union, watching the girls go by, and too little time studying. So school had been a waste of time and money, at least without the proper motivation.

  Carlos knew if he wanted to see any of the world he needed to make the break now. If he waited any longer he would be stuck in the bakery forever and life would pass him by while he continued to make Empanadas and Pan Dulce, and all too soon his hair would be as white as the flour that dusted his clothes night after night.

  The only way Carlos could afford to see the world was to enlist. Ever since 9/11, Carlos always thought that if push came to shove, he would join the Marines. The recruiting station was in a strip mall, with a Vietnamese restaurant on one side and a Subway on the other. The office didn’t look like much, but the smell of bread baking at the Subway reminded Carlos that if he didn’t want to smell bread every day for the rest of his life here was his chance. When he got there, the Navy recruiter said that the Marine Corps recruiter was out to lunch. The Navy recruiter looked like he frequented both restaurants on a regular basis, but he was friendly and more than willing to talk to him while he waited.

  Once he found out Carlos was a two time state champion swimmer he asked him if he wanted to watch a short video, just to kill some time. The video turned out to be about the Navy SEALS. It described the training and outlined the minimum physical and mental requirements just to be considered for admission into the selective program.

  After watching the video, Carlos knew he could swim 500 yards sidestroke under the time allotted and could run one and a half miles in well under ten minutes. The minimums for pushups and sit-ups, fifty in two minutes, was doable, but in reality, the recruiter said, fifty wouldn’t get you in the door. The number they were really looking for was eighty. Eighty pushups in two minutes, followed by eighty sit-ups in two minutes? That was crazy and would require some serious training.

  “Why become a Marine, when you could be a Marine with a cape, you could be a SEAL,” the recruiter said. “Look,” he said, “the Marines like to call themselves the few, the proud. But there have been millions of Marines. Kick over any rock anywhere, and you’re likely to find one. But those who have been awarded the Trident worn by Navy SEALS are numbered in the thousands. They are the real elite. You said you swam the 100 and 200 meter freestyle and were the anchor leg on the 400 meter freestyle relay right?”

  “Yes,” said Carlos.

  “Well,” said the recruiter,” lots of hot shot swimmers have washed out of BUD/S, so there is no guarantee, but having a background in competitive swimming is a big plus. If you’re interested I’ll draw up the paperwork.”

  “Yes,” said Carlos, “I’m interested.”

  If Carlos ever needed motivation here was the opportunity to back up the truck and load all he wanted. When the recruiter laid the paperwork in front of him Carlos reached for the pen and signed on the proverbial dotted line. No sooner had he put the pen down than the Marine Recruiter walked through the door.

  The Navy recruiter wasted no time putting the knife between the Marine’s ribs. “This young man came here to talk to you, but I was able to convince him of the error of his ways. He’s going to be a SEAL,” he said. Carlos knew by the intensity of the stare emanating from the Marine sergeant that this was not a friendly rivalry, and that there was no love lost between these two.

  The Marine was tall and broad shouldered with sharply creased dress blue trousers and a khaki shirt full of ribbons. He possessed what Carlos later learned was described as ‘military bearing,’ but to Carlos it simply looked like he ate barb wire for breakfast. Carlos wondered if he made a mistake. His greatest fear was that if he washed out, if he couldn’t become a SEAL, the Navy would make him a cook, or worse yet, a baker.

  The Marine recruiter glanced at Carlos and then glared back at the overweight sailor. “When pigs freaking fly,” he said. Carlos thought of that brief exchange many times during BUD/S and used it as motivation to endure the unendurable.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  TRUE CONFESSIONS

  O kay so maybe it wasn’t the Holiday Inn, but at least it wasn’t a Motel 6. Close, but even cheapskate Dad didn’t want to spend the next month, week, or even just a few days at a Motel 6 if he didn’t have to.

  According to Dad 101, Motel 6 was the last refuge of pimps, prostitutes, drug dealers and those unfortunate few down to the final page of food stamps; the last step before being thrown out on the street. Not fair to all the travelers just trying to save a buck, but Dad was never worried about being labeled as prejudiced. I imagined he was more worried about those fancy chrome rims on his new Dodge Challenger. I wasn’t sure what the difference was between Howard Johnson’s and Motel 6, maybe a few more palm trees and a few less cigarette butts in the parking lot, but Dad seemed to think that it was an upgrade.

  “Well Dad,” I said, as we finished moving our hastily gathered possessions from the trunk of the car, “I think your car will be safe here.”

  He shook his head, “It’s not the car I’m worried about. I’m worried about you. Look, I’m sorry I drug you into this mess. Big Ears Alphonso stepped way over the line in including you in his personal vendetta against me. It’s my fault you got hurt,” he said, his words trailing away.

  “So why do you think it’s per
sonal?” I said.

  “It’s a long story, let’s just say it involves a pregnant showgirl who refused to have an abortion and save the rest for later,” he said.

  “Okay, that’s fine. But no matter what the reason is, it’s not your fault. There’s nothing you could have done,” I said.

  “I should have seen it coming,” Dad said, “here I was so worried about you getting hurt in the ring. I should have been more worried about you getting hurt outside it. I didn’t do my job.”

  I knew that my anger over the way I was raised is what caused the rift between us to develop in the first place. Boxing only deepened the chasm, widening the gulf between us. We drifted farther apart because Dad didn’t approve of how I was living my life. My feelings were hurt when the approval I wanted more than anything was no longer there. Brick by brick I built a wall between us.

  “I’m so sorry,” Dad said.

  “I’m sorry too,” I said.

  And suddenly we were in each other’s arms, and it felt so good to hold him. I wanted so badly to be a family again. I held him tight, wishing that the hurt I felt these past few years would melt away. But as much as I wanted the pain to go away, I wasn’t ready to let it go.

  “I love you so much,” Dad said in my ear.

  “I love you so much too,” I said.

  “Johnson and Johnson?” Dad asked.

  “Johnson and Johnson,” I replied. Our old joke, resurrected now at a time when we needed it most. I only wished that I really meant it.