Chapter 22: A taste of Old Chicago.

It was snowing again, Jamie saw in the light of the streetlamps. It was a light, almost invisible snow... the kind that lightly dusts the hair. It would be cold for her, but she shoved it out of her mind as she slipped into her heels and made sure they would not slip off.
“You have everything you need?” Tanya turned around in the driver’s seat of Michael’s loaner car and glanced over Jamie, finally nodding her approval.
“Yes. I’m worried about Michael. He should be here sending me off.”
“He said his part is just as important as yours. He’s going to meet up with us at the hotel, so just focus on the moment here and remember what I taught you.”
“I’m scared.”
“You’ll be fine. I believe in you.” She flashed a warm smile and Jamie leaned forward in the backseat to wrap her arms around the woman, giving her a friendly hug. 
“Thanks. That means a lot to me.” Tanya’s cell-phone rang once with Michael’s call-tone and went silent again.
“It’s time.”
“Wish me luck.”

The door of the small Italian restaurant/club opened and everyone looked up at the late-evening stranger as she closed the door behind her. She made her way to the small bar, her heels clicking on the tile floor, the guitar case in her hand swinging gently with each graceful step she took. The woman looked around casually at the patrons, smiling softly at a pair of families with children on her right and a group of larger men in suits that were seated in a pair of booths to her left. 
The bartender returned her smile as she settled the case on a stool beside her and pulled off her overcoat. A whistle went up from one of the booths as the material revealed luscious skin on a body to die for, all wrapped in a white cocktail dress whose length showed as much leg as any on the Vegas strip. The owner of the body settled onto the stool and tossed her blonde hair off of her shoulder.
“What can I get you, Miss?”
“I’ll have a soda-pop, please.” 
The question had been in Italian, but the response was given in the plainest mid-western America English that anyone there had heard.
“Certainly.” He was happy to show off his own mastery of the English language and chatted her up as he poured her a Coca-Cola on the rocks. “Just come from a wedding?”
“Wedding?” She gave a confused look as her seductive lips sipped the drink and wrapped around a chunk of ice.
“The white dress.” 
“Oh, no.” She laughed and smiled at him again. “My boss sent me here on business.”
“Your boss?” The bartender wiped at a glass and laughed at the ridiculous nature of the answer.
“Yes. You might have heard of him: Antonio Santorini.”
The bartender went pale and the woman caught movement in the corner of the room where the suits were.
“And what business do you have here?” His tone was cautious, unsure as to what was happening, but fairly certain he was not going to like it.
“There was a misunderstanding a few weeks back and my employer feels terrible about it. I was told I could find Ricci’s men here and to, entertain them, as a gesture of faith that we can sort the misunderstanding out.” She spoke loud enough to be heard in the corner, though not every word. She turned and smiled at the men in the corner who had their full attention focused on her. “Is that them over there?”
“Er...yes.”
“Mmmm... I can see it’s going to be a long night.” She giggled seductively and slipped off of the stool, the long legs carrying her with a grace that angels could envy. She was tall, and the heels made her presence impossible to miss, her eyes glancing over the men in the two booths as her lips caressed the rim of the glass she held.
“Evening, boys. Don Santorini sent me over as a gift of good faith. I trust you’ll see that the thoughtfulness is not lost on you.”
“Damn.” 
The men could not help but stare at the virtual goddess before them.
“He sent you to entertain us?”
“That’s right.”
“And, uh, what kind of entertainment are you good at?” This one needed to wipe the drool from his face.
“Oh! I sing, I dance. I’m especially good with my hands.” She draped an arm over the guy who seemed like he was the boss of the others and her other hand used a napkin to wipe some pasta sauce from the corner of his mouth. His free hand slipped around her and traced the curve of her body.
“Is that all?”
“Hmm... Well, we can see where things go from there, I guess. My opening act is fairly family friendly, but I’m afraid the later bits can be a bit too vivid for younger audiences. I guess you’ll have to sit this one out, junior.” She waved a finger at the youngest of the group, a man who looked to be only twenty, making the others erupt in laughter at his embarrassment.
“You’re all-right, Miss.” The boss sat her down on his leg and stroked her thigh as the conversation continued on in more excited tones among the men. Another round of drinks was ordered and the girl sipped her coke as she observed the others in the group, getting a read of the capabilities of them, realizing that there was really no reason not to continue.
The fat man laughed and his greasy hands roamed around her body excitedly. It was all she could do to keep smiling and laughing at the jokes being told among the group, the level of relaxation increasing as time went by.
“What’s your name, Miss?”
“Anna. I’m from Chicago.”
“Really? Tony loves his American girls, huh?”
She laughed. “Yeah, well, you seem to be enjoying yourself now, aren’t you?”
“Well, yeah.”
“Good. Tonight is a night that we’re all going to get something out of, I just know it.” She could see his mind was already on pleasure and figured it was time to move on to the next phase. She leaned over and kissed him, the taste of cigarettes, whiskey, and pasta, overwhelmed by the garlic was a revolting combination. “Before things get to be too busy, I have a clause in my contract that says I get to sing a song for you guys.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah...” She flashed the disarming smile again and slipped off of his lap. “I’m really good, I think you’ll like it.” 
She quickly retrieved her case from the bar and set it down on the floor near the booths, popping the latches and opening it up.
“What song are you going to sing?”
“It’s one from Chicago, my hometown.” Her hands dove into the case out of the sight of the men, her body shielding the case from view from behind. The hands moved fast to keep from spoiling the surprise. 
Her voice changed to one that was almost robotic, the brilliant-blue eyes changing to cold-hard slits. Only one of the men noticed the change on her face, but he was against the wall in the booth, unable to move fast enough to do anything about it. She had them.
“It’s called ‘Typewriter’.” 
There was a loud click and the unmistakable sound of an action being racked, freezing the men in their places with the same thought of feeling like idiots. ‘Anna’ stood and leveled a full-length Thompson sub-machinegun with a drum magazine at them, pausing only long enough to smile wickedly. “Here we go.”
The sound was deafening in the small restaurant, drowning out the sounds of the other patrons screaming as they sought cover under their tables, but she hardly heard through her target fixation, watching as the bullets leapt from the barrel and into the men at the tables. Her senses were so keyed up that she could virtually count the hot, empty casings as they were ejected in a hailstorm to her right, spreading out and rolling everywhere on the floor. 
The muzzle swept across the men and they jerked with every bullet that ripped through them, their faces masks of surprise and pain. The ones that missed tore gaping holes in the wall and upholstery, spraying fragments of wood and brick everywhere. Glasses and bottles on the table shattered and added to the mess, the red wine darker than the blood that was suddenly spilling out onto the tablecloth. The men slumped into the seats or onto the floor, their bodies riddled with holes. Her orders were to use the whole magazine, and so she continued well after the life had left the bodies, the smile never leaving her face.
Finally the action locked open on the empty magazine, the sudden silence even more overwhelming than the noise had been. A thick, evil haze had formed from the gun’s firing, the scent of death hanging in the air. A child’s crying shattered the silence and it was quickly muffled by a frightened parent looking to avoid drawing attention, but the sound pulled ‘Anna’ from her fixation on the carnage she had just unleashed. 
The gun fell from her hands into the guitar case and she bent over, pulling a Kimber 1911 pistol from it, and straightened back up, gently tugging the dress back down from where it had ridden up. The legs carried the incarnation of Death over to the booths and the light fell on her face again, one that was devoid of any emotion at all. The hammer of the pistol was thumbed back and the arm stretched out, taking aim at the skull of the twenty year old that had not stopped breathing yet. His eyes blinked and focused on his killer in a desperate search for understanding, of where it had gone wrong. The blank look on her face explained nothing and he could only feel anger at how he had been taken down so young.
“Bit-“ His coughed last word was silenced by the forty-five caliber round piercing his skull. She went to each one and fired a single round into their heads to make sure they were finished, the ruthless measure of efficiency and total lack of emotion seared into the minds of those who would survive to tell the tale. The adults cowering under the tables with their children would watch the angel of death slowly release the locked-open slide of the pistol and gently place it into the guitar case alongside the Thompson, lock the case closed, and slowly stand. 
The heels clicked like gunshots as she approached the bar again, pulled on her overcoat, and glared at the cowering barkeep, who had been either too stupid or too scared to do anything but stand there and wet his pants as the events had unfolded. The woman’s hand went into a pocket of her coat and the barkeep flinched, fearing that she was going to pull out another gun with which she would finish him off. 
The hand came out and dropped a hundred-Euro note on the bar, which she weighted down with a glass. When she spoke, it was the emotionless voice that had suddenly appeared before brutally slaying eight men.
“You tell Christobal Ricci that Antonio Santorini will be seeing him soon.” She spun and walked to the door, all eyes on her again but certainly in a different light than when she had walked in. She paused at the door after she had opened it, the cold winter air spilling into the room and adding to the chill that was already there. “Oh, and keep the change.”
The door closed behind her but no one dared take a breath of relief.