Round Robin (33 page)

Bianca weighed scarcely seventy pounds, but she had leaped with all her might, and with Robin already in motion, the child sent the much larger woman staggering backward.

Impaling her on the knife that Tone held fast in his hand. The blade plunged deeply into Robin’s back. Tone looked on in horror. The knife was still in his hand. The blade ran red with Robin’s blood.

He had his revenge at last.

Chapter 33

Tone released the knife, but otherwise froze.

Everyone around him, however, moved with incredible speed. Already heading in her direction, Manfred vaulted his 300–plus pounds over the counter and caught Robin before she crumpled to the floor. Mimi was on the phone dialing 911 at the same time. She dropped the phone when she saw Stan Prozanski walk through the door. He was quickly turned around.

Stan, Bianca and Mimi piled into the front of the sergeant’s patrol unit. Robin, with the knife sticking out of her back, lay across Manfred’s legs in the rear. Lights flashing and sirens howling, they headed for nearby Northwestern Memorial Hospital. Stan radioed ahead for help.

Robin was still conscious.

“Mimi,” she gasped.

“Yes, sweetie?” Mimi asked, doing her best not to go into hysterics.

“I quit.”

“Get it out,” Robin growled.

She lay on a table in the emergency room. The ER physician and nurse tried to calm her. Instead of removing the knife, they’d built a dressing around it. A second nurse was putting an IV line into Robin.

“The sedative will help you with the pain,” the doctor said. “We’ve got to do this the right way.”

“Get it out, get it out, get it out!” Robin yelled.

“We’ve called for the trauma team. There’s a surgeon on his way right now.”

Manfred, Bianca, Mimi and Stan watched, not six feet away. The ER staff had tried to shoo them away, but, clearly, this group would not to be budged. And they were looking increasingly unfriendly.

“Get it out!” Robin shrieked, but this time she seemed to be losing steam.

Manfred caught the physician’s wrist. “You will remove the knife or I will.”

“Sir, that knife has likely collapsed the lady’s right lung. Air and blood are where they don’t belong inside her chest cavity. There may be damage to her diaphragm and even her liver. We’re trying to — Hey, come back here!”

But Bianca had slipped past the physician and the nurse. Using two hands and one mighty yank, she pulled the knife out of Robin’s back. The trauma team, and a crowd of patrons from the deli, arrived just in time to see this.

Knife in hand, Bianca addressed the assembled medical personnel.

“You will fix her! You will fix her
now!”

And just to let them know she was serious, she repeated herself in German.

“Hurry,” Robin added, before she lapsed into unconsciousness.

Epilogue

Athens, Summer, 2004

Robin shifted in her seat at Olympic Stadium, trying to find a position that didn’t press uncomfortably against the scar on her back.

“Any minute now,” Bianca said excitedly as they watched the parade of nations at the Opening Ceremony of the Athens Olympic Games.

Robin nodded, looking at the beautiful young woman sitting in the seat next to her and loving her with all her heart.

Robin had spent nine hours in surgery. Pneumohemothorax and lacerations of the diaphragm and liver were serious business. At one point, she went into shock and her heart stopped. The surgical team was genuinely afraid they were going to lose her. But they didn’t.

Later, her survival would be attributed simply to the will to live.

This woman had not yet finished with her life.

The first person Robin saw when she regained consciousness was her father. He sat in a wheelchair next to her bed. As ever, when Robin needed him, he put aside his own troubles and was there for her. Right next to him was her mother. And the sight of them together brought Robin a comfort she thought she’d never know again.

Nancy and Charlie and their boys came.

Mimi and Stan visited daily.

David Solomonovich came and held her hand and kissed her — on the cheek.

Manfred and Bianca became fixtures in the room. A cot was set up for Bianca, and Manfred slept in a chair. The only times they left were when Robin asked for privacy as her doctors attended to her needs.

The last night in the hospital, as Bianca slept, Robin held Manfred’s hand and told him simply, “I’m healed.”

They both knew what she meant.

Dan and Patti Phinney were remarried by Monsignor Wrightman, whose angina pectoris was being controlled with medication. Robin and Nancy served as co-matrons of honor. Manfred was Dan’s best man. Bianca was the ring bearer. Dan and Patti moved to Lahaina, Maui, where Patti got a terrific deal on a darling condo. These days, they watch whales and Hawaiian sunsets and neither of them goes anywhere without the other.

David Solomonovich forsook science for art, which partially explains why room-temperature-superconductivity still hasn’t been achieved. The muse that had found its way into David’s heart through Bianca’s erotic tales refused to yield to any other use of his time. In typical fashion, David had to carry things out as far as he could, and he became not an illustrator or a painter but a sculptor. He quickly gained a reputation for doing the most romantic and classical nudes since Rodin, works of which even his parents were proud. He now works out of both a loft in Chicago and his farm-studio in Galena. There have, of course, been rumors of affairs between the artist and his models, but those who know better understand that David is waiting for a certain young woman to finish medical school at which time her formidable father will allow her to marry.

Tone Morello suffered another career setback that day at Mimi’s. His job with the network affiliate disappeared when he was found to be in violation of the public morals clause of his contract. He did beat the rap on the assault with a deadly weapon charge when Robin refused to file a complaint. In due time, Tone regained his place in the scheme of things when he became the sports–scandal reporter for a national tabloid. There was no shortage of material for him to exploit, and he had a flunky who did all of the actual writing. Tone had been scheduled to cover the Athens Games — the Olympics always being a fertile field for sports shenanigans — but the preceding winter while vacationing in the Caribbean he went fishing with a group of Canadian businessmen and fell overboard. His body was never recovered.

Phil Leeds scurried back to the margins of society where he was most comfortable, taking with him that day at Mimi’s the wallet he picked from the pocket of the stunned Tone Morello.

For a while, Iggy Gross regained his popularity as a radio loudmouth. He even got a brief bump in his ratings when someone started a rumor — Iggy swore it wasn’t him — that what had happened to Robin was an example of what people got if they messed with him. Iggy lost his life when he literally could no longer stomach himself. His digestive system turned on him and refused to absorb any of the food he gave it. Everything he ate slipped right through without providing any nutrition. Some observers felt this was a sure sign that everything Iggy touched turned to shit.

Warner Lisle slipped into the seat next to Robin. She was amazed at how the ex-spy hadn’t seemed to age at all. He was still easy to look at, easy to forget, and could still blend into any crowd at will. But Warner’s spying days were well behind him. He was a Hollywood special effects legend now. His company was even doing consulting for the laser shows and pyrotechnics being used at the Athens Games.

“Haven’t missed anything, have I?” he asked.

Robin smiled and shook her head.

“Any second now,” Bianca said, quivering with excitement. “Any second.”

“You leave your place in good hands?” he asked Robin.

“The best. Nancy’s.”

Screaming Mimi’s Deli had closed forever the day Robin was stabbed. Mimi never set foot in the place again. She, too, considered herself guilty for what had happened, running a business where people were encouraged to scream at one another. She and Stanley retired to Florida, where he finally made an honest woman of her. She sold her place to Robin as planned, Robin completing the purchase with Manfred’s help. The new establishment was reopened as the Continental Cafe, the place with the best baked goods and friendliest service in town. Nancy had changed jobs to manage the cafe’s business — and she constantly battled to keep her weight down, having become addicted to Manfred’s baking.

Bianca jumped to her feet.

“I see it! I see the flag!”

Robin and Warner rose to their feet, as did the sizable contingent of other Americans in the stadium. Many of them began to chant, “U-S-A, U-S-A...”

The American team stepped proudly from the shadow of the tunnel and into the bright light of the track. At their head, holding the Stars and Stripes, was an enormous man.

The press had been telling his story for days now. Denied the chance to compete for the East German team at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics because of the Soviet boycott — and his political imprisonment — he now carried the American flag as the honorary team captain, a tribute to the fact that five members of the American weightlifting squad, three wrestlers, a shot–putter, and the power-forward on the basketball team had all been coached by this man in high school.

The crowd roared as Manfred Welk stepped into the stadium.

From the stands, Robin Welk beamed at her husband.

Bianca threw her arms around Robin.

“Oh, Mom,” she cried. “I’m so proud, I’m so happy.”

Robin nodded as tears ran down her face.

“So am I,” she said. “ So am I.”

About the Author

Joseph Flynn is a Chicagoan, born and raised, currently living in central Illinois with his wife and daughter. He is the author of
The Concrete Inquisition, Digger, The Next President, Hot Type, Farewell Performance, Gasoline Texas, The President’s Henchman, The Hangman’s Companion
and more titles to appear in the near future.

You can read free excerpts of Joe’s books by visiting his website at:
www.josephflynn.com
.

Pointy Teeth,
a free e-book, is available at
smashwords.com
.

Notes

My apology to Dawn Staley — basketball player, three-time Olympian and women’s head basketball coach at the University of South Carolina — who was the actual U.S. flag bearer at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens.