Live by Night

Joe was still trying to piece it together when Irv saw what he’d been waiting for and took two one-legged hops onto the road and into the path of a coal truck.

The driver hit Irv and then he hit his brakes, but all that did was cause him to skid on the red brick and Irv went under the tires and the truck bounced when it crushed his bones and rolled over him.

Joe turned away from the road, heard the driver still skidding and he looked at the hole in his raincoat and realized the bullet had passed through from behind. Passed through clean, missed his hip by who knew how few or how many inches. The flap would have been swaying in the air at that point as he covered his family. As he…

He looked over the car and he saw Graciela trying to stand and the blood that poured out of her waist, out of her entire midsection. He dove over the hood of the car and landed on his hands and knees in front of her.

She said, “Joseph?”

He could hear the fear in her voice. He could hear the knowledge in her voice. He tore off his coat. He found the wound just above her groin and he pressed the wadded-up coat to her midsection and he said, “No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.”

She wasn’t trying to move anymore. She probably couldn’t.

A young woman dared to stick her head out of the terminal door and Joe screamed, “Call a doctor! A doctor!”

The woman went back inside and Joe saw Tomas staring at him, his mouth open but no sound coming out.

“I love you,” Graciela said. “I always loved you.”

“No,” Joe said and pressed his forehead to hers. He pressed the coat as hard as he could against the wound. “No, no, no. You’re my… you’re my… No.”

She said, “Shhh.”

He pulled his head back from hers as she drifted off and kept drifting.

“World,” he said.

Chapter twenty-nine A Man in His Profession

He remained a great friend of Ybor, though few knew him. None, certainly, knew him the way he’d been known when she was alive. Then, he’d been pleasant and surprisingly open for a man in his profession. Now he was pleasant.

He grew old very fast, some said. He walked with hesitancy, as if he limped, though he didn’t.

Sometimes he took the boy fishing. This was usually at sunset when the snook and redfish were most likely to bite. They’d sit on the seawall where he’d taught the boy how to tie his line, and every now and then he’d put his arm around the boy, speak softly into his ear, and point toward Cuba.

Acknowledgments

My immense gratitude to:

Tom Bernardo, Mike Eigen, Mal Ellenburg, Michael Koryta, Gerry Lehane, Theresa Milewski, and Sterling Watson for the early reads and feedback.

The folks at the Henry B. Plant Museum and the Don Vicente De Ybor Inn in Tampa.

Dominic Amenta of the Regan Communications Group for answering my questions about the Hotel Statler in Boston.

And a particular thanks to Scott Deitche for giving me the Cigar City Mafia tour of Ybor City.