Chapter 4 #3
“I don’t understand—Mr. Black, tell me what’s happening.” Fern lifted her voice to compete with the singer’s, whose mild humming had trailed into a crooning wail.
“Don’t call me that,” he said in her ear again. “I told the boys you’re with us, and that means you’re on the up and up.”
She wrenched her arm free. “I don’t know what that means!”
A scream, and then a loud crash, erupted behind them. Fern whirled to find the girl who’d been dancing on the tabletop on her rump on the floor, the table turned on its side. She was now sobbing instead of laughing, tears streaking her mascara down her cheeks.
Mr. Black jerked Fern back toward him, peeling her attention from the delirious girl and forcing it onto him. His eyes brimmed with a warning that needed no words.
“What do I call you then?” she whispered.
“Cal,” he supplied. “You call me Cal.”
“But I thought your name was George.”
An infinitesimal grin began to soften his black glare but then fled. “You really don’t know who I am, then?”
“Should I?”
His eyes narrowed, as if he wasn’t sure of something.
Abruptly, he turned away and, after exchanging a nod with the guard at the curtains, pulled Fern through them and into another hallway.
This one was lit with red candescent bulbs in place of white, and there were doors to the right, left, and one at the very end of the short hallway.
All of them were closed, and the hallway was empty.
“Shit,” Cal whispered. He glanced back over her head toward the black drapes. They parted, and Francis and Vinny appeared.
“What took you a decade? You were supposed to let him know we were here, Vin,” Cal said.
From the way he spoke to them, it was clear that he was in charge or at least had some authority over Vinny and Francis. Fern didn’t know how far that authority stretched, but something told her it was only to the end of this hallway.
Vinny and Francis hurried past them toward the last door.
“Sorry, Cal, I got caught up with Natalie. You know how she is, all arms and legs and lips. Wrapped me up like a goddamned Christmas present,” Vinny called, jabbing Francis in the ribs with his elbow. “Right? You know it, right?”
Cal wasn’t amused. The muscles along his jaw jumped and tightened.
Vinny stifled his good humor long enough to rap once on the door. He stood aside, and Francis opened it—and a vulgar scene burned its way onto Fern’s retinas.
“Jesus, do the two of you ever fuckin’ knock?” a man shouted. He was leaning over a desk, his bare hips cradled between the thighs of a half-naked girl perched on the edge of his ink blotter.
Vinny and Francis swore, apologies tumbling from their mouths in between profanities.
Cal’s tall frame and broad shoulders slid in front of Fern, mercifully blocking her view.
He peered down at her wordlessly, his expression unaffected, as if waiting for her scandalized reaction.
He’d been calling her “princess” all night, and in a way, she was.
She’d certainly never been exposed to anything as sordid as that.
Her jaw hung loose at the shock, but she quickly hinged it again and fought the urge to visibly squirm.
Cal peered over his shoulder to see if it was safe to move, then resumed his position at Fern’s side.
Looking into the office again, the man was now tucking his shirt into his pants and sliding his suspenders up over each shoulder.
“Now that you’ve interrupted, get the hell in here,” he hollered, and Vinny and Francis leaped inside the office.
Cal moved at a less rushed pace, as if the man’s anger didn’t apply to him.
The woman was still half naked, though she’d slipped on a black, fur-trimmed, sheer negligee robe.
She stood behind the man, fiddling with the miniscule amounts of lace and silk.
She peeked over the man’s shoulder to eye Fern, who angled her head to hide the scarred half of her face.
This man had to be the Rodney they’d been speaking about. A flicker of recognition stroked Fern’s panicked mind, but she couldn’t settle on it for more than a few seconds. He lit a cigarette as he perused her face. His eyes, a pair of hard, black stones, slid coldly down the length of her body.
“Nicely done, big brother. Or should I start calling you Casanova?”
Vinny and Francis snickered and whistled. Cal sent them a dark glare, and they stiffened up again. Brother? Cal and Rodney were brothers? With his slim, lanky build, Rodney appeared at least five or so years the younger. Again, awareness teased her brain.
“I placed my bet on it taking at least a couple of shindigs before you convinced her,” Rodney went on, expelling a cloud of smoke around his head. “Must be that Rosetti charm.”
Fern’s fingers loosened their clutch on Cal’s arm.
Rosetti. A torrent of ice slid down her back as, at last, her mind found what it had been searching for.
One of last week’s suitors, Mr. Halbert, and her brother, had spoken that name.
The Rosettis are cracked, Buchanan had said.
He and Mr. Halbert had been discussing Al Capone and the gangs in Chicago.
The black stares at dinner, her father’s unusual nervousness, Buchanan’s temper … it all made perfect sense. Cal wasn’t just some low-life, inconsequential bootlegger. He headed up a gang.
Fern tried to let go of Cal’s arm, but he pinned it in place, refusing her.
The girl in the sheer negligee draped herself over Rodney’s shoulder, but he rolled it back, throwing her off.
“Beat it, Bessy.”
She pouted at the brush-off but didn’t argue. She patted her dark hair, tied the little ribbon around the waist of her robe, and gave him a peck on the cheek. He slapped her rear end as she walked away, and she swatted at his hand, giggling.
Bessy carved her way between Vinny and Francis, both of whom were eyeing her swaying hips and jiggling breasts with frank appreciation.
She approached Fern and Cal at the door, bringing with her a sultry scent of musk and rose.
She held the feathered collar of her robe tight to her neck and appraised Fern with a feline gaze under a penciled brow.
Up close, her makeup failed to fully conceal a bruise on her cinnamon-hued skin, just under her left eye.
“Nice dress,” she drawled. Fern glanced down at the red silk gown. It was far too elegant and chaste for a place like this.
“I said, ‘Beat it,’” Rodney barked, and as if his voice was a fist, Bessy bolted into the hallway.
Cal shut the door, and the small, windowless room shrank another size. It fit the five of them closely. Fern wondered where it was in relation to the houses above. Underneath a next-door neighbor’s kitchen? Their living room?
Rodney stepped away from his desk, and Vinny and Francis shuffled awkwardly to get out of his way. They hadn’t moved for Bessy, though they likely hadn’t minded her brushing up against them as she left.
Rodney kept one hand in his pants pocket. The other made a swirling gesture toward Fern, creating a spiral of cigarette smoke.
“You want a drink?” He stopped an arm’s length away. “Vinny, go get her a drink. Some fruity potion. And ring up Stanny while you’re at it. Tell him we’re on.”
“I don’t want a drink,” she managed to whisper, her mind swirling about who Stanny might be and what exactly was “on.”
“Trust me, china doll, you want a drink,” Rodney laughed.
“She doesn’t need a drink, Rod. Listen. Things happened. That’s why you sent me and not one of these nimrods,” Cal said.
Rodney snorted. “I wouldn’t send those two to the corner store to buy me a quart of milk.”
Vinny threw up his hands. “That ain’t fair. You sent us last week to get the milk.”
“Stuff it, Vin,” Francis muttered, kicking him in the back of the leg. “Rod gave you an order. Scram.”
Vinny left, wearing a hangdog frown. Rodney rolled his eyes and took another drag on his cigarette.
“What things?” he asked Cal, again staring openly at Fern’s scars.
She clenched her jaw and shifted her eyes to the pair of leather club chairs in the corner, a yellow-tasseled lamp on the spindle-legged table between them.
She hated the oil-slick sensation of caring what other people thought of her face.
So many times, too many to count, she’d promised herself that she’d stop.
Be stronger. More confident. She’d vowed to leave her house more often and hold her head high.
“The pictures are a bad idea, Rod. She’s with us,” Cal said. “Like Aunt Helen always said: We’ll catch more flies with honey.”
A burst of prickly heat fired along the back of Fern’s neck.
Pictures of what? Of her? She hadn’t allowed anyone to take a picture of her in years.
Not since that awful portrait taker who had promised her mother that he could reduce the appearance of her scars on film.
The finished photographs had never been framed or hung anywhere in the house, leading Fern to believe her mother hadn’t been satisfied with the results.
“Fuck Aunt Helen, and fuck the flies,” Rodney snapped. The lighting in the room hadn’t changed, but his whole face now darkened.
He came closer, his scrutiny searing Fern’s face now. “Question is, why would a china doll like yourself come down off the shelf to help out the likes of us?”
Her mouth went dry, and her tongue seemed to swell. Go along with everything I say. Cal’s earlier, urgent whisper gave her mouth a kick.
“I…I suppose because I…” She grappled for something, some good reason. A reason Rodney would believe.
Cal’s fingers dug into her elbow, and with the pressure came the memory of what Buchanan had told her the week before, when she’d confronted him in his room.
“I’m a ghost to them,” she continued. “My family. I live with them, but I’m not a part of them. They…they don’t want me. No one does.”
The sting of tears was unexpected. She’d only meant to say the first part. That she was a ghost in her own house, and yet the rest had come pouring out. The room fell quiet, except for the muted heartbeat of the high hat out on the stage. Cal’s grip eased.
Rodney sniffed and cocked his head. “So, you’re willing to do the pictures, doll?”
Again, with the pictures. What did he mean? She couldn’t say yes, not blindly. Pictures were permanent. Besides, what would they be used for?
Cal finally let go of her arm and shucked his trench coat. “Francis, get me a drink. And make sure Natalie didn’t jump Vin on the way to the bar.”
Francis shuffled out, and the moment the door closed, the tension melted out of Rodney’s posture. He slouched and sat on the edge of the desk.
“Don’t give me any more shit about this, Cal.”
“I’m thinking about the lasting effects,” he said, dropping into one of the club chairs and crossing an ankle over his opposite knee. “You do the pictures, the judge jumps in your pocket, and he’s pissed for as long as he stays there.”
The judge?
Father.
Fern inched back toward the wall and stood with her arms wrapped around her middle.
Of course, this had to do with her father.
He was who Cal had come to see in the first place.
And yet, the others here hadn’t been awfully surprised to see Fern.
They hadn’t expected her to join them so willingly, but she had been part of some plan.
“Who gives a shit if he’s pissed?” Rodney retorted, ignoring her presence entirely. Cal took out his cigarette case, and Rodney moved to hold out his own lighter.
Fern felt as insignificant as a fly on the wall and, for once, appreciated that. She flicked a look toward the door and considered asking for directions to the bathroom. She could pretend to be sick, maybe escape before anyone discovered she’d left. It was crowded enough out there.
“We make an alliance of another kind, and we keep him closer, longer, with less antagonism,” Cal suggested. “We don’t need the theatrics, especially with Capone looking for reasons to consolidate even further.”
Rodney snapped the cover on his lighter closed. “Fuck Capone too. I still want the pictures.”
Cal straightened in the chair and lifted his chin. “Rod, don’t be—”
Vinny and Francis barged back into the office, each of them carrying a drink.
Francis handed Cal a short tumbler filled with whiskey and crushed ice, and Vinny held out a tall glass of pink fizzy liquid.
A cocktail stick, speared with three maraschino cherries, had been dunked in.
Fern eyed it but kept her hands fisted, her arms crossed over her stomach.
“You’ll want this,” Vinny said, snickering a laugh so high-pitched it climbed the back of Fern’s neck.
“Take the drink, dollface.” Cal’s voice was the polar opposite of Vinny’s, all dark skies and disappointment.
The pet name—dollface—brought Fern off the wall she’d wanted to melt into. It sounded wrong on Cal’s lips. Forced. He stared at her with the same intensity as before, when they’d been speaking on South Woodlawn.
Home. She just wanted to go home.
Fern took the drink from Vinny. The glass was clammy and cold. Just holding it made her thirsty. She put it to her lips. Sharp, sweet cherry exploded on her tongue, but when she swallowed the sip, something bitter clung to the roof of her mouth.
Cal stood up from the chair and walked toward her. She stifled a yelp as he palmed her waist and tugged her against him. She put her hands against his chest to push him away and spilled her drink onto his dinner jacket.
The pictures… Fern had the sinking feeling they wouldn’t be anything like the portraits Mother had ordered.
“Like I said,” Cal murmured, his breath caressing her ear. “She’s with us.”