Killing Them Softly (Cogan's Trade Movie Tie-in Edition) by George V. Higgins Read Free Book Online

night guys were there and that’s how these guys find out about it. ‘They’re good customers,’ Markie said, ‘good customers’re the same as good friends, my book.’ So I got an idea, there’s more dough there onna Friday’n there is onna Wednesday. So the question is, when’re we gonna do it? And I think, I still think, a Wednesday. Friday that place’s different. During the week it’s pretty quiet, but on Fridays and Saturdays they got a lot of people coming and going, getting laid and all, and that’s just another fuckin’ thing you got to think about, parties going on and everything. And I think, I dunno, I kind of think maybe there’s some guys in there, Fridays, don’t come Wednesdays, the kind of guys I don’t want to get pissed off. I didn’t see nobody there Wednesdays, had any muscle. I think it’s better.”
    â€œHow’re we cutting this?” Frankie said.
    â€œA third,” Amato said. “I get a third.”
    â€œThat’s high, John,” Frankie said.
    â€œNot for this,” Amato said. “I know where it is and I know what it is. A third’s right. You, I don’t care what you do. You can get that wild man or somebody, do it for five, get him. Fine with me.”
    â€œThe guy who goes in with me gets the same’s I do,” Frankie said.
    â€œUp to you,” Amato said.
    â€œYou’re not going in,” Frankie said.
    â€œUh uh,” Amato said. “They’d burn me the minute I came inna door. I’m gonna be a long ways away from that place that night and I’m gonna have a lot of people around me, saw me there. See, that’s what, that’s why I think of you. All I can really do is show somebody where the thing is. I can’t go near it, and I need a guy I can trust, somebody that isn’t gonna tell me, they come up with thirty, it’s really fifty and they’re fucking me and there’s no way I can check. I gotta just be the guy that does the brainwork on this. What I need’s two guys to do the job the way I tell them.”
    â€œAll right,” Frankie said, “I’m in. Now, what about Russell?”
    â€œWhat about him?” Amato said.
    â€œI’m still thinking, he’s gonna be the other guy,” Frankie said. “You get used to that?”
    â€œI don’t give a rat’s ass,” Amato said. “You can go in with Tarzan in his fuckin’ spotted jockstrap if you can get him to do it, don’t matter to me. I just want, get somebody who’s gonna do it right. There’s only two things a guy’s gotta have, right? He’s gotta have balls, which you say the guy’s got, and he can’t be nobody my padrones know.”
    â€œWell, Jesus,” Frankie said, “China Tanzi knows me, for Christ sake.”
    â€œChina don’t count,” Amato said. “China’s in Lewisburg and he’s gonna be in Lewisburg for a long time. Making furniture for the government or something, and theres a lot of guys’re not too happy with China anyway right now. They think he probably should’ve got fifteen or twenty in Atlanta like everybody else that was in that thing, instead of just the five. Shit, he hadda record worse’n anybody else’s that was in it, and he gets the five and he’s not inna same place and, I mean, that’s got to make guys wonder, you know? How come? It was going around for a while, China’s not even in Lewisburg. They got him on ice somewhere, they’re feeding him steaks and bringing his family around and talking to him. Well, somebody says it’s not true. I dunno. But nobody’s listening to China much any more. I already thought of that.”
    â€œWell,” Frankie said, “I’m gonna ask Russell, then. I don’t think he knows anybody.”
    â€œWhat’d he go in for?” Amato said.
    â€œIt was kind of