“Officer DiNoffrio,” Finn replied.
He noted Finn’s casual attire. “You going to the Sox game today?”
“Yeah.”
“Lucky bastard.”
“Yeah. I’d offer you one of my other tickets, but…” Finn shrugged.
“Bullshit.”
“Yeah. It’s the thought that counts, though, right?”
DiNoffrio shook his head. “Not even close. Who are you here to see?”
“ Devon Malley.”
“Shit. You serious?”
“I guess.”
“You might as well give me your ticket. By the time he finishes trying to explain this, it’ll be the bottom of the ninth.”
“I charge by the hour.”
“Still…” DiNoffrio swiveled in his chair, facing back out toward the cell block. He grabbed the microphone that extended up from the control board at the center of the guard station, flicked the power switch on. “ Devon Malley. Visitor.” His amplified, mechanized voice echoed off the smooth cement surfaces of the cell block. It didn’t sound like him; it sounded like God. For those living on the block, it might as well have been. He looked back at Finn and nodded toward another steel door off to the side of the guard station. He pressed a button and the door unlocked. “He’ll be in in a minute.”
“Thanks.” Finn walked over and stood in front of the door. He looked up at a clock in the guard station. Nine forty-five a.m. The first pitch was at eleven oh-five. Devon better talk quickly. He took a deep breath and walked through the door.
The room was small-smaller even than the single cells in which the inmates were kept for most of the day. Two plastic chairs were the only furnishings. No table. The lock on the door behind him buzzed shut, and Finn took quick, shallow breaths, trying to keep the stink of inmate sweat and vinegar-based disinfectant from reaching too deeply into his lungs. It was useless, he knew from experience. The odor would stay with him for the rest of the day.
The buzzer on the door that led directly into the jail’s common area sounded, the door swung open, and Devon Malley stepped into the room. He was dressed in the standard-issue faded blue smock and drawstring pants. The two men looked at each other without saying anything.
Devon looked more or less the same as he had the last time Finn had seen him a few years before. He was around five years older than Finn-late forties-and just over six feet tall. He had dark hair, cut short and streaked with gray, and a round face with well-defined features. His eyes had a guileless look to them incongruous with his chosen profession.
Finn had known Devon since the old days, when Finn was still running with his gang in the Charlestown projects. He wasn’t part of Finn’s crew-he was from Southie-but they hung around some of the same people. Devon was the sort of guy people usually took little notice of. He wasn’t bright enough to be a leader, but he was pliable, and he could round out a decent crew. He wasn’t a complete psychopath, which was refreshing. Many of the people Finn knew from back then would kill without thought or provocation. That was never a worry with Devon. Finn didn’t think he had killing in him. Finn liked him for that.
Neither of them said anything for a moment, and the silence was awkward in so small a room. Devon finally stepped forward, extending his hand. Finn shook it.
“It’s good to see ya, Finn,” Devon said. His heavy South Boston accent brought Finn back to his youth. “R”s came out as “aah”s and the gerund form “-ing” had been lost forever. Curses replaced all punctuation. Finn had worked hard to lose that dialect.
“You too,” Finn replied.
“It’s good of ya to do this. Showin’ up on a fuckin’ holiday and all.” Devon let Finn’s hand go and stepped back, pulling one of the chairs over and sitting down.
“Anything for an old friend.”
“Anything for an old friend who’ll pay your fuckin’ fees, you mean,” Devon corrected him.
“That, too.” Finn pulled over the other chair and sat in front of his client. “You can pay my fees, right?”
Devon smiled, but avoided eye contact. “We never change, do we?”
“Not in any way that matters,” Finn agreed.
“Jesus, what’s it been, five years? Ten? How you been?”
“Okay.”
“From what I hear, you been better than okay,” Devon said. “You’re gettin’ a fuckin’ reputation for yourself. ‘Miracle worker,’ that’s what I heard you called.” He rocked back and forth as he spoke.
“Really? That’s a good one. I’ll have to put it on my business cards.”
“No fuckin’ need. You do right by the right people and you don’t need to advertise no more.” He sounded like he was trying to convince himself of something. “You must be making a pretty fuckin’ penny, too, huh?”
“Right. That brings me back to my fees.”
He nodded, still not looking directly at Finn. “I’ll pay ’em. I need a miracle worker.”
“Apparently. You want to tell me what happened?”
Devon shrugged. “I don’t fuckin’ know. My night didn’t go like I planned it.”
Finn looked around the tiny room. “So it would seem.” He went silent for a moment. “You want to tell me about the lingerie?”
Devon put his head down. “That’s all anyone’s gonna fuckin’ talk about, isn’t it. Fuck.”
“You’ve got to admit that when a guy gets caught with an armful of women’s underwear it paints a picture that’s hard to forget.”
“It wasn’t just underwear,” Devon said. “It was dresses, too.”
“Right,” Finn said. “Dresses, too. Does that make it sound better?” He watched his client get up and pace in the tiny room like a tiger at the zoo. “The cops are calling you the G-String Bandit.”
“Fuck ’em. They ain’t got nothin’ better to do with their lives but fuck with me? I got enough to worry about, right?”
“It was apparently a toss-up between that and the Panty Raider. Personally, I like the Panty Raider, but that’s probably because I went to college at night, so I feel like I missed out.”
Devon stopped pacing and looked at Finn. “This is fuckin’ funny?”
“Maybe a little,” Finn replied. Then he turned serious. “Tell me what happened.”
Devon sat down, leaned back in the little chair, and took a deep breath. “It shoulda been the easiest night of my fuckin’ life. You know Gilberacci’s on Newberry Street? High-end fashion place?” Finn nodded. “They just got in the new shipments for summer. The place was stocked.”
“A little smash-and-grab?” Finn asked. “The notion of you getting pinched fondling a bunch of silk bras is a little hard to swallow.”
“You’re not listening,” Devon said. “This wasn’t no fuckin’ smash-and-grab. I had over fifty designer dresses, up to six thousand retail for each one. Plus some jewelry and-yeah-very expensive panties and bras and shit like that. All in all, close to half a million dollars in the store, low six figures on the street.”
Finn whistled. “That’s expensive underwear.”
“That’s what I’m sayin’. Plus, it shoulda been easy. Johnny Gilberacci’s one of the owners, and he’s got a serious fuckin’ gambling problem.”
“Johnny Gilberacci? He’s the guy who’s always in the society pages with his little dog with the pink collar, right?”
“That’s the guy.”
“A little weak in the wrists, isn’t he?”
“He’s queer as a fuckin’ ballerina, but he’s still got a gambling problem.”
“Really? What does he bet on?”
“How the fuck should I know? Whatever it is, he’s no fuckin’ good at it. He loses a fortune, and he’s been paying off Vinny by stealing the shit outta the stuff in his store. This was gonna even everyone up. He’s got insurance on the place for twice the inventory that’s actually there. I had the keys and access to the loading dock in back. No risk, and no one could get hurt.”
“And yet here you are.”
Devon nodded. “Yeah, here I am.” He looked around the small room. “There was no fuckin’ warning. Everything was goin’ fine. I had most of the shit loaded up already, and I’d just gone back in to grab a few more things. All of a sudden I look up and there are these two fuckin’ cops looking back at me, these big, wide, shit-eating grins on their faces.”