Over dinner that night in L. A. Pamela laid out parts of her plan to Leo, including the two players she was looking to bring on.
"Sounds good, but what about the long con? You haven't told me about that."
"One step at a time," she answered, fingering a wine glass, her gaze wondering around the swanky dinning room automatically searching for potential marks.
Take a breath, find a chump. She flicked her dyed-red hair out of her face and made momentary eye contact with a guy three tables down. This jerk had been ogling and overtly signaling Pamela in her little black dress for the last hour while his humiliated date sat silently fuming. Now he slowly licked his lips and winked at her.
Uh-uh, you couldn't even come close to handling it. Leo interrupted this thought. "Look, Pamela, I'm not going to screw you. Hell, I came all this way."
"Right, you came all this way on my dime."
"We're partners, you can tell me. It goes no further."
Her gaze drifted over him as she finished her Cabernet. "Leo, don't bother. Even you're not that good of a liar."
A waiter came by and handed her a card. "From the gentleman over there," he said, pointing to the man who'd been ogling her.
Pamela took the card. It said that the man was a talent agent. He'd also helpfully written on the back of the card a specific sex act he'd like to perform on her.
Okay, Mr. talent Agent. You asked for it.
On the way out she stopped at a table with five stout guys in pinstripe suits. She said something and they all laughed. She gave one of them a pat on the head and another, a man of about forty with grey temples and thick shoulders, a peck on the cheek. They all laughed at something else Pamela said. Then she sat down and talked with them for a few minutes. Leo looked at her curiously as Pamela left the table and walked past him towards the exit.
As she passed the talent agent's table, he said, "Hey, baby, call me. I mean it. You are so hot, I'm on fire!"
Pamela swiped a glass of water off the tray of a passing waiter and said, "Well, then let's cool you off, stud." She dumped the water in the guy's lap. he jumped up.
"Damn it! You're gonna pay for that, you crazy bitch."
His date covered her mouth to hide her laughter. Before the man could reach out to grab her, Pamela shot out a hand and clutched his wrist. "You see those boys over there?" She nodded at the five suits that sat starring at the man hostilely. One of them cracked his knuckles. Another slid hid hand inside his suit jacket and kept it there.
Pamela said smoothly, "I'm sure you saw me talking to them, since you've been staring at me all night. They're the Moscarelli family and the one of the end there is my ex, Joey Junior. Now, even though I'm no longer technically in the family, you never really leave the Moscarelli clan."
"Moscarelli?" the man said defiantly. "Who the hell are they?"
"They were the number three organised crime family in Vegas before the FBI ran them and everybody else out. Now they've gone back to doing what they do best: controlling the garbage unions in the Big Apple and Newark." She squeezed his arm. "So if you have a problem with your wet pants, I'm sure Joey will take care of it."
"You think I'm buying that crap?" the guy shot back.
"Well, if you don't believe me, go over there and talk to him about it."
The man looked over at the table again. Josey Junior was holding a steak knife in his beefy hand while one of the other men was attempting to keep him in his seat.
Pamela gripped the man's arm tighter, "Or do you want me to have Joey come over here with some his friends? Don't worry; he's out on parole right now, so he can't bust you up really bad without ticking off the feds."
"No, No!" the alarmed man said as he tore his gaze from murderous Joey Junior and his steak knife. he added quietly, "I mean, it's no big deal. Just a little water." he sat back down and dabbed at his soaked crotch with a napkin.
Pamela turned to his date. The woman was trying and failing to hold back her giggles. "You think it's funny, sweetie?" Pamela said. "This is a case of where we're all laughing at you, not with you. So why don't you try finding some self respect, or little shits like him are the only slime you'll be walking up next to until you're so old nobody will give a crap anymore. Including you."
The lady stopped laughing.
On the way out of the restaurant Leo said, "Wow, and here I was wasting my time reading Dale Carnegie when all I needed to do was hang around you."
"Give it a rest, Leo."
"Okay, Okay, but the Moscarelli family? Come on. Who were they really?"
"Five accountants from Cincinnati probably looking to get laid tonight."
"You're lucky they seemed pretty tough."
"It wasn't luck. I said I was practicing a scene from a movie with a friend of mine in public. I told them it happens all the time in L. A. I asked them to help out, that they were to look like the mob; you know, to give us the right atmosphere to deliver our lines. I told them if they did well enough, they might even get a part in the film. It's probably the most excitement they've ever had."
"Yeah, but how'd you know that jerk would collar you on the way out?"
"Oh, I don't know, Leo, maybe it was that tent pole in his pants. Or did you think I just threw the water in his crotch for the hell of it?"
The next day Pamela and Leo cruised down Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills in a rented dark blue Lincoln. Leo intently eyed the shops they were passing. "How'd you get a lead on him?"
"Usual sources. he's young and doesn't have much street experience, but his specialty is why I'm here."
Pamela pulled into a parking place and pointed to a storefront up ahead. "Okay, that's where gadget bot screws the retail consumer."
"What's he like?"
"very metrosexual."
Leo looked at her quizzically. "Metrosexual? What the hell's that? New kind of gay freak?"
"You really need to get out more, Leo, and work on your PC skills."
A minute later Pamela led Leo into a high end clothing boutique. Inside the store, they were greeted by a lean, good looking young man dressed all in chic black with clicked back blond hair and a day's worth of fashionable stubble on his face.
"You here all by yourself today?" she asked him, looking around at the other well heeled customers in the store. They'd have to be wealthy, she knew, since the shoes here started at a thousand bucks a pair, entitling the lucky owner to stumble around on four inch golf tees until her Achilles snapped.
He nodded. "But I enjoy working the store. I'm very service oriented."
"I'm sure you are," Pamela said under her breath.
After waiting until the other customers had left the shop, Pamela put the Closed sign on the front door. Leo brought a woman's blouse to the cash register while Pamela wandered around behind the check out area. Leo handed over his credit card, but it slipped out of the clerk's hand and the man bent down to retrieve it. When he straightened up, he found Pamela standing right behind him.
"That's a really neat toy you have there," she said, eyeing the tiny machine the clerk had just swiped Leo's card through.
"Ma'am, you're not allowed behind the counter," he said, frowning.
Pamela ignored this comment. "Did yo built it yourself?"
The clerk said firmly, "It's an anti fraud machine. it confirms that the card is valid. It checks encryption code embedded in the plastic. We've had a lot of stolen credit cards come in here, so the owner instructed us to start using it. I try to do it as unobtrusively as possible so no one gets embarrassed. I'm sure you can understand."
