Speak Easy (Speak Easy 1)

She smiled, which always changed her face from plain to pretty. “No, you can have some. Do you want some cold meat for a sandwich? Joey brought some ham from Eastern Market.”

I shook my head and polished off the first slice. “I saw him downstairs. I thought he moved to Chicago.”

She set Charlie on the yellow linoleum floor and sliced a piece of bread for him. “He did, but his mother took ill, and he’s worried about her. Wants to stay closer to home for a while. I know he’s not your favorite, but try to be nice. He’s family.”

“He’s not my family.”

“He’s a good guy.”

“He’s a pain in the ass.”

She pursed her lips as she handed Charlie the bread, and I decided to switch topics.

“Look at this.” I licked my fingers and pulled the fifty-dollar bill from my pocket.

Bridget wiped her hands on her stained apron and took the bill. “Jaypers cripes! Where’d you get that?”

“From Mr. Henshaw, as a tip.” I picked up my second slice of bread and sank my teeth in. “But don’t tell Daddy.”

Our eyes met, and I knew she understood. Bridget kept my tips for me, stashing them in a big yellow envelope underneath her mattress. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust Daddy, but I felt safer with my tips out of the house. “Want me to put it with the rest?”

I hesitated, the image of myself in a beaded dress and satin shoes vanishing in a puff of smoke. “I guess so.” Slumping into a chair at the round kitchen table, I dropped my forehead to the wood. “But boy, I wish I could be spending some of that money on something else. Like a new dress. Or shoes. Or rent.”

She patted my shoulder before going into her bedroom, which was off the kitchen. “Is Daddy giving you a rough time?” she asked when she returned.

I sat up and shrugged. “I’m twenty years old. I’m just tired of living with my father and having two little sisters underfoot all the time.”

Bridget went to the stove and stirred something in a large copper pot. “You’ve got your own bedroom. That’s more than I had when I lived at home.”

“So what? The only thing I do in it is read and sleep. And I can hardly even do that without one of the girls barging in on me.” I sat up straight and mimicked our sisters’ high-pitched voices. “Tiny, can you mend this blouse? Will you make my lunch? Can I wear your blue sweater? She’s bothering me! She’s following me! She hit me!”

“Well, cheer up.” Bridget clacked the spoon on the edge of the pot and set it aside. “Molly will be done with school in three years, and by then Mary Grace will be old enough to look after herself. You’ll be free to do as you please.” She turned and waggled her brows at me. “Inside your bedroom and out.”

“But that’s years away! I want a little excitement in my life now.” I thumped the table for emphasis.

“Take it from me—a little excitement goes a long way,” said Bridget, gesturing toward the front room, where I could hear her two older boys playing. “You don’t want to do what I did.”

That was true. Bridget had gotten pregnant before her wedding and Daddy had been furious. But still. “For cripes sake, Bridget, when would I have the opportunity? I haven’t even kissed anyone in months!”

“So kiss somebody.” Bridget grinned and dropped into the chair across from me. “Then give me all the saucy details.”

“It’s more than that,” I went on. “In the morning I want to get up and go to work without cleaning up a big mess after breakfast. At night, instead of washing all the dinner dishes and making sure everyone has clean clothes for the next day, I want to go dancing and drink champagne. I want to wear a short dress and red lipstick without my father scolding me. I want to hit the best nightclubs with a dashing swain at my side to light my cigarettes. Like the Arrow Shirt man,” I said wistfully. “Or the sheik.”

Bridget laughed. “The sheik?”

“That guy who comes in for the Fatimas. He was in again today looking for Daddy.” I touched my buttery mouth, picturing the sheik’s lips on his cigarette.

The light in Bridget’s eyes went out. “Oh.”

“Any idea who he is?”

She jumped up, grabbed the broom from the corner and swept the floor with angry strokes, shooing Charlie into the front room. “No. But I don’t like the looks of him.”

“Since when? The other day we were both swooning over him like he was Valentino.”

“Something about the way he keeps showing up gives me a bad feeling.” She swept harder, not meeting my eyes. “He reminds me of those guys who used to come around for Vince.”

My twitchy feeling returned. I knew the kind of men she was talking about. The day Vince was murdered two years ago, he was picking up a mobster named Big Leo Scarfone from the police station. He’d been shot right there on the sidewalk. Twenty-one times.