Kill Me, Darling Read online

  She poured her own champagne this round and drank half a glass of the swill before she looked right back at me, eyes half-lidded in a combination of shrewdness and intoxication. “That’s a nice name, Mike. I like it. You look like you might be nice.”

  “No ‘might’ about it, baby. I’m a sweetheart.”

  “Miranda.”

  “Huh?”

  “I prefer Miranda. That’s what my girl friends call me. Might be nice to hear a man say it. But I like the name Randi fine for, you know, a stage name. It’s sexy. And Storm, well that says something.”

  Right. It said she was trying to steal Tempest Storm’s thunder.

  She gestured with her sloshing champagne glass. “You look like a rough apple, Mike, but I can feel it. That you’re a nice guy. I’m good about such things. Sensing stuff. Judge of character is what I am. Good judge. Of character.”

  She finished the glass and was getting herself another when I held her wrist.

  “Let’s back off on that stuff,” I said, “till we’ve talked this out.”

  “Talked what out?”

  “You tell me.”

  She leaned close and raised a wavery finger to her lips. “Gonna cost you.”

  “I can give you a hundred right now, doll. A nice crisp C-note.”

  She shook her head. “No, I need real money, Mike. This is big. This’ll make big, big ripples for Nolly, if it gets out. A guy in his racket can get killed for something like this. A girl can get killed for telling it.”

  “What kind of money are we talking, Miranda?”

  “I want ten grand.”

  I reared back as if somebody had fired a shot my way. “That’s a lot of money, honey.”

  “I need ten grand to get out of this town and start over somewhere. I might even go home, Mike. There was a guy back there, big football star, high school football star. But he was too damn dumb to get a scholarship to college. He’s running his daddy’s furniture store now. Well, his daddy’s still running it, but he’s the manager, so-called. And I thought it was small potatoes. Just small little potatoes. I wanted to be in show business, I was pretty and I could dance, and wouldn’t you know it won two beauty contests, and I went to New York but wound up here in Miami, and I’m starting to think I took a wrong turn, Mike. A really wrong turn.”

  “Going back to Minnesota sounds like a good move.”

  She snorted a laugh. “Somebody at the Herald really gave you a bunch of stuff on me, didn’t they? But never mind me, Mike. Here’s the thing. Nolly’s got a secret. A big secret. If it gets out, those gangsters he does business with will kill him dead. Deader than a doornail dead.”

  I hated to break it to her, but I said, “Baby, I already know Nolly’s secret.”

  “Do you now, Mike? Then what is it?”

  “He’s queer.”

  She shook her head. “No. That’s not it.”

  I blinked away the surprise of that response, saying, “I think it is. He never had sex with you, did he? Or any of those women he paraded around on his arm like a Rolex watch? He gave you a song and dance about being on penicillin for the clap, or wanting to wait till the honeymoon. Right?”

  The stripper was shaking her head, smiling just a little, amused. “Wrong. I had sex with Nolly plenty of times, Mike. So did Dotty Flynn, who was my roommate, when she was with him. We both agreed that he stunk in the sack, like a lot of too-handsome Romeos. But if you think he didn’t have sex with girls, you are missing the boat.” She emphasized every syllable with a nod: “Miss-ing the gol-durn boat.”

  I let her pour herself another glass of the cheap champagne. My head was swirling worse than hers had to be. If Nolly wasn’t gay, then what the hell was his secret? What did Miranda alias Randi know about the bastard that I didn’t? That wasn’t common knowledge?

  “Miranda, do you think your friend Dotty was murdered?”

  She nodded emphatically. “Yes. Oh yes, yes, yes. Cut herself in the tub? Never. No way never.”

  “Did she know this… this secret of Nolly’s?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did it have to do with his business?”

  “Yes.”

  Is it bigger than a bread box?

  “Goddamnit, woman, what is his damn secret? Is it the identity of his two silent partners? That’s it, isn’t it? Do you know which of the five Mafia families in New York is planning to do business with him on this Cuban thing?”

  That at least got her attention. “You have been digging, haven’t you, Mike?”

  “Is that it? Is that what you have to sell?”

  She opened her palm and she tapped a red-nailed finger in it. “Right here. Cross Madame Miranda’s palm with ten thousand clams and she will tell all.”

  The waitress came over and asked, “More champagne?”

  “No!” I snapped.

  And the waitress moved away quickly, looking hurt.

  Miss Storm was pouring herself the last half of a glass the bottle held. She probably wouldn’t have hit the bubbly this hard if she hadn’t already danced her last set. Or maybe the subject matter of Nolly Quinn gave her a thirst.

  I thought about it. Ten grand was not something I could lay hands on easily, especially down here, and who could say that what she knew was worth the asking price?

  But I could feel it, the answer to everything was sitting across from me, inside a babe with a great body and beautiful face and eyes working to stay open.

  “I think I can get you that ten gees,” I said.

  Her eyelids rolled back like startled window shades. “You can? Goodie!”

  “You’re done here for the night, right?”

  She nodded.

  “Then go back to your dressing room and get your street clothes on. I have to make a phone call. Meet me up front.”

  “I knew you’d come through for me, handsome.” She waved like a little kid. “Bye bye!”

  Then she hip-swayed across the room, weaving between tables and heading through the diaphanous curtain of cigarette smoke to the stage door at the back. A lot of male eyes followed her. Even drunk she was something to behold.

  There was a pay phone on the wall by the men’s room up near the hatcheck window. I used the phone number Alberto Bonetti gave me, hoping he’d be in. It was only ten-thirty but maybe these middle-aged types went to bed early, even mob boss ones.

  The Betsy Ross Hotel switchboard put me through to his room. A rough male voice answered, a bodyguard probably, but soon Bonetti was on the line.

  I said, “Do you think you could arrange a ten-thousand dollar pay-off for a source with key information about Nolly Quinn?”

  He was gruff but businesslike. “What kind of information, Mr. Hammer?”

  “I think this source knows who Nolly’s silent partners are. One could be his contact with a rival family back home. The other is probably a local politician or maybe somebody on the Cuba end.”

  “That would be worth ten grand.”

  “A bargain for you fellas, considering I walked away from one-hundred-thousand.”

  He chuckled. “Still thinking about that, Mr. Hammer? Dreaming about the long green you turned your nose up at?”

  “I don’t give a damn about your money, Bonetti. I’d pay this source myself but I don’t have the cash. This is your call.”

  He didn’t hesitate: “Make the deal. I can have the cash for you yet tonight if need be.”

  “That might help. My source is a little on the sloshed side right now, and at a later, more sober moment might decide either to ask for more or not talk at all.”

  “Take the source to your hotel room and call me from there when you’re in. I’ll messenger the cash over.”

  “Okay,” I said, and we hung up.

  I waited another ten minutes for her, and almost didn’t recognize her when she walked up to me in the vestibule with all that honey hair up and no make-up. She was in a sleeveless sundress as red as a stop light, but her figure alone would halt traffic.


  “You look pretty,” I said.

  “Thanks. What now, Mike?”

  “Now we go to my hotel room.”

  Only vaguely tipsy, she said, “This is a little sudden, isn’t it?”

  I grinned at her. “Honey, I just arranged to get you ten grand for what you know. You can decide how to best express your gratitude later.”

  “All right,” she said, and she leaned close to me. She smelled good, some kind of Parisian perfume probably, and the champagne hadn’t screwed up her breath. “But, Mike—you don’t get to know what I know, till I get the cash. Hate to be mercenary, but a girl’s gotta look after herself in this cold old world.”

  I just smiled and shook my head, and held the door open for her. She was still in front of me, just beyond the overhang, when the black Cadillac slowed and from the rear driver’s side window came the hand with a silenced automatic in it that coughed twice, spitting orange flame.

  I was half-way to the cement, no time even to pull my .45, tugging her down with me, when the car roared off and people were yelling and screaming and then I was cradling the girl from Minnesota in my arms at the entry to the chapel-like nightclub. The bullets had punctured her breasts, one each, two small puckers only slightly darker red than the sundress, but the back of her was torn and ragged and draining blood fast.

  She looked so goddamn young and fresh and not at all drunk when she gazed up at me with the damnedest glazed smile and said, “Mike… bye… bye…”

  “Goodbye, Miranda,” I said, but she was already gone.

  * * *

  One uniformed cop took my basic information while the other one held back any bystanders. The plainclothes guys from the Miami Beach P.D. got there maybe ten minutes after the shooting. They went inside and took names and released all the patrons as well as the entertainers and the staff, asking only the manager to stick around.

  I was detained of course. So were two men who’d been about to enter the Five O’Clock Club and a honeymooning couple who’d just exited. Nobody caught the license number, because the plate wore a mud smear like a mask.

  The ambulance guys arrived, established the girl was dead in their brilliance and cooled their heels till the lab boys and photographers showed.

  I kept my story simple and factual, as far as it went. I was down from New York, with proper licensing credentials, looking into the Miami end of a cop killing. Nolly Quinn was suspected to have been behind it and I was talking to known associates of his, including the late Randi Storm, who was an ex-Quinn girl friend. Miss Storm and I were leaving the strip club to seek quieter surroundings to talk. A shooter in a back seat window of a black Caddie had leaned out and fired twice with a silenced gun. I didn’t see anything really but a hand with an automatic. A .22, I believed.

  I knew this would take a while. Figured I would probably have to go to their station house and repeat my story ad infinitum till dawn anyway. But when I mentioned Captain Barney Pell had arranged my temporary local P.I. license and gun permit, they called him.

  He showed in twenty minutes, took the lead detective aside and talked to him like a priest, gesturing toward me occasionally.

  The night was humid and warm and Pell was sweating, the white shirt under his suit coat sopping. That didn’t stop him from smoking a cigar. He had a supply, after all. The ambulance boys were loading the wicker basket with the dead girl in it when Pell slipped an arm around my shoulder and walked me back into the club.

  We stood just inside the door.

  His blue eyes were hooded and his smile was lopsided, but the effect of his bulb-nosed, lightly freckled face was somehow reassuring. He put a hand on my shoulder. Friendly not threatening.

  “You really know how to have a good time in a vacation spot, don’t you, Mike?”

  Did he know about the Sea Breeze Motel?

  “I have a ball everywhere I go, Barney. So—boy or girl?”

  He beamed. “Boy! Bernard Jr. Man, Connie is over the moon about this thing. I mean, she had a rough ride, one of the longest damn labors in the history of that hospital. But she can’t get the smile off her face, lookin’ at the little one in her arms.”

  “I’m happy for you, Barney.”

  “You should try it. Haul that honey of yours home and keep her barefoot and pregnant.”

  Somehow that didn’t sound a lot like Velda.

  Grinning, he patted his suit coat where I keep my .45. “Sure you don’t want a cigar?”

  “No. I stopped smoking.”

  “And you stopped drinking. You did stop, Mike, didn’t you?”

  “I did, Barney. Nothing but a few beers a day.”

  He gave me a once-over glance. “You do look better. For a guy who just ducked some bullets, anyway. So what’s the straight story here?”

  I shrugged. “What I told the Miami Beach boys. This girl was an ex of Quinn’s, who lived with him a while. And she was good friends with the Flynn girl who slit her wrists. And I wanted to talk to her about all that. I got interrupted.”

  Pell’s face grew somber and a little disgusted. “It’s looking like Mr. Quinn is collecting a lot of dead girl friends lately. Some hobby.”

  “I’m close to nailing him, Barney, if this thing tonight doesn’t slow me down.”

  He stuck his cigar back in his face and thought about it. “I’ll talk to the Miami Beach boys. See if I can get you a pass on this. But you can’t leave town. You still at that motel?”

  Damn!

  “No, Barney, I was just there for that first night. Couldn’t see staying out in the sticks when the investigation centered here in Miami Beach. Moved to the Raleigh.” I gestured in the hotel’s direction.

  He nodded, apparently accepting that.

  “Let me see what I can do,” he said. Then he reached in his inside suit coat pocket and got out a cellophane-wrapped “It’s-a-boy!” cigar and dangled it in front of me. “Sure you don’t want one? You don’t have to inhale.”

  I took it. “I’ll take one home to Pat Chambers for you.”

  That widened his grin. “You do that.”

  Then he went out to talk to his counterpart on the Miami Beach department.

  I didn’t remind him that one of Nolly Quinn’s two cars was a black Cadillac.

  * * *

  In my hotel room, I put a long-distance call through to Pat Chambers. I tried his apartment first and got him there.

  “You sound sober enough,” he said.

  “I am sober. And if I’d been drunk, what happened tonight would have sobered me up.”

  I filled him in on the shooting at the Five O’Clock Club.

  Pat said, “Nice that Barney could vouch for you with the Miami Beach P.D.”

  “Nice doesn’t cover it. I was afraid your pal Barney would ask me some embarrassing questions about certain other things.”

  “Such as?”

  “Yeah, like I’m going to tell you. Let’s just say I was glad all he can talk about at the moment is that new baby of his. And his proud missus.”

  “Tell me about it,” Pat chuckled. “At the police convention, he was passing out premature cigars all around the Waldorf ballroom.”

  “Well, he gave me another one for you.” I shifted gears. “Getting anywhere on the guy seen talking to Manley the night he was killed?”

  Frustration hung on his voice like wet laundry. “I handled that myself, Mike, like I said I would, with help from some of my top people. I’d like to say we got something, but it’s really so much air.”

  “Nobody got a good look at the guy?”

  “They noticed him, that’s all. We talked to sailors and hookers and dockworkers and truckers and barflies. They all say the same thing—big guy, but not too big. Heavy guy, but not fat. Dark hair, but not too dark. In his thirties maybe. Or his forties. Or maybe fifties. We brought the three most credible types in for the sketch artist. We got three drawings that looked nothing like each other of somebody that could have been anybody.”

  “Hell. It’s the
eye-witness curse—‘He was medium.’”

  “The only thing close to a lead that came of it is the guy was wearing a suit, tie and hat.”

  “Well, that narrows it down to four or five million.”

  “Including you and me, Mike. But it is suggestive. Think about it.”

  I did. “You mean, the patrons at Dirty Dick’s are not exactly the suit-and-tie type.”

  “No. Whoever Wade Manley was talking with was not your usual patron of a waterfront dive.”

  “It’s something, anyway. Where do you take it from here?”

  He sighed. “Widening the canvass area. Wading through Manley’s files for arrests of individuals who might hold a grudge. Pretty damn standard stuff. You think you’ve got anything?”

  “I thought I did.” I told him my theory that Nolly Quinn was a closeted homosexual using beautiful women as beards to protect himself from the disgusted wrath of his criminal cronies. And told Pat, too, how the dead stripper had shot that theory down, talking of some other secret of Nolly Quinn’s.

  “I figure she had the identities of Quinn’s silent partners,” I said.

  “Makes sense. You may not have this one solved yet, but it sounds like the perfect Mike Hammer case.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Chasing down all the clues at strip joints. But you know, if Nolly were gay, your stripper tour would make sense. It’s like he was trolling those clubs for beautiful women to cast as make-believe girl friends.”

  “I didn’t know her long, Pat, but that stripper Randi Storm… Miranda Storsky… was a nice enough kid. She just got mixed up with the wrong people.”

  “Sounds greedy to me.”

  “She wanted enough money to get out and start over. Who can fault her for that? Damnit, Pat, it’s making me sick, this wholesale killing.”

  “It always does, when you aren’t doing it.”

  But that wasn’t funny, not to me.

  We talked a while more, and he was relieved to learn that Velda had been on an undercover assignment for Manley all along.

  “We really are working two ends of the same case,” he said. “But, Mike—you have to pull her out of there. This Quinn character is bad news all the way. You can’t let Velda be his next dead girl friend—fake or not.”