“Uh, duh? Good thing I’m not as stupid as you are ugly!” Rowena bit back. “For fuck’s sake! If Roddy did it, good! I’m glad! Marco was a raping piece of shit! They shouldn’t be arresting Roddy, they should be thanking him!”
“He could have a case for a crime of passion, voluntary manslaughter, depending on the circumstances,” Jimmy offered. “Without knowing what evidence they have, it’s hard to say.”
Rowena drowned a few curses with another shot.
“Are you okay?” Jimmy asked her, his brow furrowing in concern. The last time Rowena was drinking like this was because she’d killed Dickie White.
“I’m just peachy,” Rowena said with forced sweetness. She took Jimmy’s hand and squeezed it hard. “What about you? Are you okay, sweetie?”
Struggling to find the right words, Jimmy sighed heavily. “I don’t know what I am right now. Scared. Worried. I know Rod is smart, but...”
“But this is a huge fucking mess,” Rowena finished his thought for him.
“How did they find the body?” Jimmy asked, glancing warily at Jules and Jerry. “If he was killed, in theory, around the time Don Luchesi was murdered, that would have been nineteen years ago.”
Jules said nothing while Jerry found a spot on the floor very interesting.
“Ha!” Rowena bared her teeth. “It’s all because of the stupid construction! The mayor’s bullshit plan to fix up the city!”
Jimmy’s heart sank.
“They had to do something with the pipes across the street and oops, found a body down in the damn foundation!”
“Across the street from here? The old deli?”
“Yup.”
“Holy shit,” Jimmy mumbled. It couldn’t have been a coincidence that Cold had stashed a body so close to one of his own properties. He’d want it somewhere that he could keep an eye on it.
“It’s all over the news,” Rowena said with a miserable sneer. “They’re saying they found it a few months ago, but they were waiting on like, dental records or something to identify the body.”
“Ugh.” Jimmy grimaced. “Well, wait. If the body is that badly decomposed, how did they link it to Cold?”
“You two need to quit yappin’,” Jules warned. “Cold’s already got it all planned out. It’s gonna be fuckin’ fine.”
Jimmy really wanted to believe him.
“Hey!” Theodore Pym, another of Cold’s Gentlemen, came rushing in from the back of the club near the stage. He was carrying a garment bag with him. “There’s fuckin’ press everywhere! I almost got jumped by some douche with a camera back there!”
“You all right?” Jules asked. “You didn’t fuck him up, did you? We gotta keep our shit together. No more fuckin’ arrests!”
“Nah! Just broke his camera,” Pym scoffed, fumbling to adjust his glasses. “Stupid fuck.” He looked to Jimmy, saying, “I got word from Face Fucker. She wants Jimmy to go with her to see Cold.”
“Has he even been processed by now?” Jimmy blinked.
“I don’t fuckin’ know!” Pym threw his hands up. “I’m just the messenger!”
“I’m going, too!” Rowena declared, already stepping out from behind the bar. “I’m gonna give my brother a freakin’ piece of my mind—”
“No can do,” Pym cut in. “It’s a meeting for counsel only.”
“Counsel?” Jimmy stared, protesting, “But I’m not a lawyer!”
“Congrats!” Pym snorted, pushing the garment bag into Jimmy’s arms. “You just got an internship with Face Fucker’s law firm.”
“Beccali and Beccali?” Jimmy couldn’t help how his jaw dropped. Beccali and Beccali was the most powerful law firm in all of Strassen Springs, and Christine Beccali in particular was known for being a very fierce attorney.
Her unusual nickname came from an encounter in court where she’d threatened to fuck the prosecutor’s face with a concrete dildo for badgering her witness. She was reprimanded and never again used such language in front of a judge, but the name had stuck.
