Speak Easy (Speak Easy 1)

“Oh?” I glanced at his hand near my shoulder. “I didn’t know that.”

“Yes. Although in the construction business, you do just as much demolition as you do building.”

My breath caught. Oh, no.

“In fact, we demolished a few old houses last week to make way for a new apartment building. And we happened to have some extra explosives, but wouldn’t you know, we ran out of storage space.”

Chills broke out over my entire body. “Enzo. Don’t.”

“So I arranged to store some explosives beneath this building right here,” he said, pointing toward the store.

“Please,” I begged, turning to him. “Why are you doing this?”

He grabbed the back of my head again, forcing my face closer to his. “You wanted to fuck me last night? Well, you did.”

“I don’t understand.”

“The hearses, Tiny. The fucking hearses. I saw them in the garage that night. I know they belong to your father. Then the next time I hear about them, they’re full of booze that belongs to me, being driven by the men who stole it.”

Those fucking hearses. I hated them! Why hadn’t I thought about that when I gave them to Sam? “Those hearses could belong to anyone. Daddy sells them to bootleggers all the time.”

“They were yours, Tiny. Now who was it? Sam Scarfone? Is he working for you? Are you fucking him too?” With the last sentence, he tightened his grip on my hair.

I winced. “No! Goddammit, Enzo, you’re hurting me! Let me go.”

“Why should I? So you can run to Sam and tell him everything?” But he let go of my hair, and I rubbed my scalp as tears began to drip down my cheeks. “Well, here’s something you might not know. My father was going to give me the club,” he went on, looking straight ahead. “And turn the bootlegging over to me. So I arrange this big shipment from the east coast, fifteen thousand dollars worth of rum, packed in cases with hidden compartments, in which is stored forty thousand dollars worth of opium. And then it’s fucking hijacked.” He hit the wheel with the heel of his hand. “Now my father is furious and thinks I’m goddamn incompetent. We’re out more than fifty grand, I’m in the middle of another whisky deal with a distillery in Kentucky that I can no longer fucking afford, and I’m left here with my dick in my hand while your boys enjoy the spoils.” He looked over at me. “So where is it?”

His eyes had a savage look in them I’d only seen once before, when he was nearly uncontrollable with lust in the office. But it wasn’t lust now; it was rage. And if I wasn’t careful, he was going to direct it not only at me, but at my family too. “I don’t know,” I said weakly. “I didn’t steal it, please believe me. And I had no idea about the opium.”

“Goddammit, Tiny!” He thumped the steering wheel again. “I’ve been up front with you.”

“No, you haven’t!” I yelled, forgetting about being careful. “What about going behind my back to Al Murphy? Asking whom I supplied and then stealing his business from under me! You knew I needed it to get the ransom money.”

Enzo looked out the front window again. “When my father saw the ledgers, he wanted Murphy’s business, so I arranged it. And that’s fucking peanuts compared to my shipment.”

“Oh, poor you! Well, I don’t have it.”

Suddenly he put the car into reverse and backed up, the tires spitting gravel. When he turned onto Jefferson, I knew where we were headed.

“It’s not there,” I told him. Please, please, God, let them not have anything stored in the boathouse. Let them have taken it all to Chicago.

“Then you have nothing to worry about.”

Worry wasn’t the word for what was going on inside me. I was sweating as if I’d run ten miles, my heart hammering against my chest like it might split my body wide open. As the Cadillac bumped along the dirt road leading down to the water, I grabbed onto the dash to steady myself. Enzo turned off the engine and got out; reluctantly, I opened the passenger door and trailed him to the boathouse door.

“Open it,” demanded Enzo.

My fingers fumbled with the padlock, and I recalled how he’d snuck in before. “You don’t need me to open this. Why did you drag me here?”

“Maybe I like your company.”

I froze and looked at him, but his face still betrayed no emotion. Once I had the padlock in my hands, Enzo pushed the door open.

“After you.”

I stepped into the cool, damp space and looked into every shadowy corner, my body shuddering with relief—nothing but the forty bottles of whisky I’d left on Tuesday. “I told you it wasn’t here. That whisky’s mine.”

Enzo examined the cases and faced me. “I’m going to ask you some questions, Tiny. And you’re going to answer them. Do you understand?”