The System - A Detroit Story - by John Silver

spent three months in a Saigon hospital, then six months in a hospital stateside. On discharge he went back to Detroit and went to work at ACE, focusing on running the business, forgetting about Nam and learning to live with his disability.
    Nobody gave a shit about returning Vietnam vets. They were considered the enemy also, right along with Johnson and Nixon. Eddie hid in the inner office at ACE, thinking about Nam and women. Never got laid at home. Not by an all-American girl. Sure, he fooled around with some girls in high school, but never the full thing.
    On leave he went with Vinnie to a whorehouse in Saigon a couple of times, but GIs were suspicious and wary of hookers. Funny how they said "You like boom-boom? I boom-boom you real good." Most were VC and everyone heard the legends about GIs getting fatal doses of clap and the hookers who stuck razor blades up their snatches.
    Eddie looked up at Chris, smoking the cigarette. "Gimme one of those."
    "I thought you quit," said Chris.
    "New Year's Resolution," said Eddie. "Start smoking again and drink more."
    Chris pulled the pack from his pocket, tapped out a smoke and handed it to Eddie.
    "Light?" said Eddie.
    "Jesus," said Chris. "Smoke it for you too?" He pulled out his old Zippo, flicked it and held it to the cigarette. Eddie lit up.
    "You know," said Chris. "The Escalade driver can ID me. What if Vinnie won't let this go? We're fucked, big time."
    "That ship has sailed. Vinnie's got bigger fish to fry. We do this Marriot boost and we're gold."
    Chris took a drag off his cigarette. "What about this Paulie asshole? You know that's why Vinnie stuck him with you. He doesn't trust you." Chris flicked the cigarette ash on the shop floor. "Where you gonna put this guy, anyway? No way he's with me."
    Eddie thought a moment. "I'll put him with Zippy, maybe Clarence."
    "Clarence'll kill him," said Chris.
    "You're right," said Eddie. "Zippy it is."
     
    *   *
     
    Vinnie drove out of Detroit and took the Square Lake exit toward Bloomfield Hills. He turned on Telegraph Road and passed by where the old Red Fox restaurant once stood. One day was fixed in his mind, July 30, 1975. The day he made his bones. The mark really did look like a bulldog. Scheduled to meet Tony Jack and Tony Pro, have lunch, square things.
    Didn't happen.
    Instead of meeting Tony Jack and Tony Pro, Vinnie met him with two guys from New York. Told him the big guys didn't want to meet in public, and said they were here to take him to a house in Bloomfield Hills to meet with them. The mark didn't like it and was suspicious, of course, but what could he do? This was the last chance to make things right before everything turned to shit. The mark got in the car, sitting between the two guys from New York. Vinnie drove.
    They went to an isolated house near Stony Craft golf course, got out, went inside and one of the New York guys did him right there, in the foyer. Two shots, back of the head with a 38. Vinnie was on cleanup detail, mopping up the blood as fast as possible and bleaching it down while the New York guys wrapped the body in a blanket. Clean, well placed shots. A little brains and blood in a side table, but none on the walls. These guys were good.
    They waited until dark. Just so happened they were pouring the foundation for the new Matilda Wilson wing of the Detroit zoo's aviary that night and next day. They just poured one slab a little early, which was no big deal since Vinnie's boss was hooked up with one of the contractors. They took the body to the zoo in a work van, drove to the construction site and put the body and the blanket in the excavation. The mixer was already rolling. They covered the body with concrete and smoothed the slab, the first poured for the new wing.
    Now, when families ooh and aah at the exotic birds cruising around the aviary, the have no clue they're walking over Jimmy Hoffa.

Chapter 15
     
    Vlad Visits Jerzy
     
    Jerzy Vogodian was stunned when he looked through the