chapter 179

word count: 1169

nick ‘the salami’ solumbrino found a nice dark, desolate place to pull over beside the big bear river in weston..  he made a u-turn so that he could just roll the body of his former compadre onto the lift,, and then push him off into the roaring falls.. that way the body would roll down the falls and move swiftly north.. the farther away from new albany they found him, the better was his thought on that matter.. 

getting the over-stuffed body of  ‘the puck’ off the truck had been a whole hell of a lot easier than getting him in there.. within 5 minutes,, ‘the salami’ was back on the road and headed into part two of his plan..

he drove directly to the main bus depot,, where he bought a diet coke,, slugged half of it down,, dropped the diamond in the remainder if the soda and purchased a small locker into which he placed the diamond laden diet coke,, locking it securely behind him..

once back in the van he had only to hide the key..  having the digestive track of a goat, after years of eating anything and everything that crossed his path definitely  made his decision to swallow the key all that much easier.. that way there was no possible way anyone could happen across it,, and by the time he passed it,, the family would be suffering the aftermath of the virtual slaughter of the big guy,, tracking ‘the puck’,, and the reformation of the hierarchy of the family,, so therefore he would have the opportunity then to decide upon a safe place to keep the key..

just a few blocks down the road, he swung the van into a handicapped parking spot at the new albany international airport,, and placed a groggy call to the couple a guidos that were holding the tsung family,, and should by now have tiffany yoo under wraps as well..

“it’s ‘the salami’, " he panted into the phone.. “something has gone terribly wrong.. the china man took out the big guy,, and guido.. me and ‘the puck’ got him before he could get away.. but as soon as we were sure we had him, ‘the puck’ stuck me,  and everything went black..”

“wadda ya mean everything went black?” one of the guido’s , rudy,  barked back into the phone..

“wadda ya mean what do i mean? black is fucking black.. i woke up in the back of the van at the airport,, that’s what i mean you meat head!!!”

“so then wadda we do?”

“you do what you gotta do.. i gotta straighten my head up enough to get back to the house.. meet me there when you’re finished there. we gotta lot of business to take care of,, a lotta calls to make.”  ‘the salami’ said as he clicked off the call.

“do it.” rudy said to his partner, ray,  as he slipped his cell back into his suit pocket and fired the first shot. within a matter of minutes they were back in the car,, and on their way to the compound.. 

with the wheels set in motion,, “the salami” made his way to the terminal.. he was already disheveled from all the hard work he had put in getting the body of ‘the puck” in and out of the van,, so he staggered a bit,, as when he was picked up on the security cameras (and he was depending on the fact that those tapes would be reviewed in order to strengthen his story) it would look as if he was in fact trying to shake off whatever it was ‘the puck’ had done to him to cause him to black out..

he grabbed a large coffee in the terminal,  and headed back to the van.. he took his time sipping the steaming, hot coffee,, and nearly finished it off before he backed out the van, and headed toward the compound.. he wanted the guidos to get there first.. to see the devastation.. the spent hypodermic laying on the driveway.. the empty briefcase.. let them put two and two together.. the more they figured out for themselves,, the less he had to pad the story..

***

as soon as algie heard the crack of wood shattering coming from the bedroom,, he knew exactly what had happened,, but before he could assume any responsibility for trudy’s actions,, buzz was on his feet and running toward the bedroom..

“oh winnie,”  algie whispered across the table,, “i’m wondering if i hadn’t of  just left well enough  alone..”

before winnie could answer,, they heard buzz yell out, “what the hell’s goin’ on?” as he entered the bedroom, and saw not only the deep crack of splintered wood on his dresser,, but a quite bewildered trudy standing there holding her arm as if she was in pain..

instead of answering trudy broke into tears, and slipped limply onto the bed.. buzz left off thinking about the dresser long enough to go try and comfort trudy.. he sat beside her on the bed,, and  wrapped his arm around her.. she buried her face in his neck and sobbed uncontrollably,, as buzz inspected her now swollen hand and arm,, feeling up and down the phalanges in her hand and then her ulna and radius searching for evidence of a broken bones..

“i think i can answer that for her,” interjected a rather meek algie, from the doorway of the bedroom..

“when i took her to pick up a few of her things earlier this evening,, i offered her and alternate outlet for her rage,, by introducing her to the basic elements of karate.. i’m afraid this is essentially all my fault..” he continued apologetically..

buzz cradled the still sobbing trudy in his arms.. “none of that is important right now,, i think she has done some damage to this hand,, it’s hard to tell with all the swelling.. algie,, could you bring the car around?? i am afraid we are gonna have to take her in for some x-rays..” 

“at your service!!” algie turned heel and headed out to the drive to warm up the edsel.. 

within moments buzz cradled a bedspread covered trudy in his arms and led her down the walkway from the house to algies waiting car..  the two of them got into the back seat,, and without further direction algie headed out of the driveway,, and back to new albany medical center.. over the course of the last week or so he had spent enough time there to know exactly where to go..  he pulled the edsel up outside the emergency entrance,, and allowed buzz and trudy to get out there at the door before he searched out an open spot in the very full emergency room parking lot.

before exiting the car, he put in a call to winnie,, who had remained back at the house..

“full house here tonight, i’m afraid.. you may as well get some sleep,, i am thinking we are going to be a while…”