It was nearly eleven-thirty when a part-time home health aide parked Don Ellis’s Dodge minivan in front of the building and scurried around to help him to the front door. When I walked into the second-floor cafeteria, Don was waiting at a table near a row of vending machines, sipping Dr Pepper through a straw. “I’m glad you called. Since you came to the house I ain’t thought about nothing else. You left the picture of that kid at my house.” He shrugged. “I’m a coward these days, Charlie. I lost what little nerve I had.”
I felt sorry for him, but that didn’t stop me from asking questions. I’m still enough of a cop that it rarely does.
“We hauled lots of stuff,” he said. “Don’t ask me what it was because I don’t know other than there were vats and barrels of it, and it came in from everywhere. Even I could tell the logs and inspections were phony, but no one seemed to ask any questions.”
“How long?”
“For me, five years off and on.” He slurped his Dr Pepper, stared at a point somewhere past my head. “They’ve been dumping down there since the early seventies, I think, but that’s just a guess.”
“Why was Giacomeli with you?”
“It was just one of those things. He was at the industrial park on some kind of business. I don’t ask questions. I just drive trucks. Anyways, his Mazda broke down. I offered to take a look, but it was late and he said forget it, he’d just catch a ride back with me. Then the truck started acting up. The last thing I remember him saying was ‘Jesus Christ, two engines in one night, maybe I’m frigging cursed.’ Then those kids came from nowhere and...” His voice trailed off, and he chased his straw around with the tip of his tongue, finally gave up and licked his lips instead. “After the fire started, someone must have made a phone call, because when I woke up everyone was saying I was alone. A guy visited me in the ICU, told me that’s the way it happened and I didn’t want to complicate matters by saying any different.”
“Listen, Don,” I said. “I still got a few friends on the force.”
“Forget it,” he said, his voice loud enough to turn heads in our direction. “I’m telling you this ‘cause it’s been on my mind a lot and you knew about it anyway, but I’m not talking to anyone else. Ever.”
“Don, something needs to be done.”
“Listen to me, Charlie. The thing I thought about while I was in the hospital was that maybe I had this coming, that maybe I deserved to die. But I got my boys and my ex-wife to think about.” He licked his lips again. “I said what I got to say. And I’m never going to say it again.”
I was furious. I wanted to tell him that he was right: He had become a coward. Maybe I even opened my mouth to do it, but the sight of him struggling to stand, his ruined face straining from the effort, left me wordless and ashamed.
Two hours later, I lay on the asphalt outside my apartment building and stared up at the flushed and bloated face of the man who’d dented the back of my head with a pool cue and cracked a couple of my ribs with the toe of his snake-skinned cowboy boot. He looked familiar, but my mind was reeling from shock and pain, and I couldn’t quite get a handle on his name or who he was or why he seemed intent on killing me.
“Look here, Charlie. Moan a lot, thrash around like you’re really hurting and this will go a lot quicker,” he said in a voice that sounded as if he started each day by gargling broken glass. “I tried to beg off this one, but you know how it is.” He stomped my left hand, ground the bones under his heel, grinned down at me. “You don’t recognize me, do you?”
If I’d had the strength to do anything except whimper and cringe and try to remember the words of the Lord’s Prayer, I would have told him that I didn’t really give a damn who he was. He could have been Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, or the frigging Easter Bunny, for all I cared. I just didn’t want him to hurt me anymore.
“It’s me, Frankie Giageos,” he said. “I guess I put on a few pounds, huh?”
I blinked cold sweat from my eyes, squinted up at his face, and saw a guy I used to know buried beneath a fresh fifty pounds of fat. Frankie Gee. The last I’d heard, he was in federal prison for conspiracy to commit mail fraud.
“You got out,” I said.
“Couple of months ago.”
Then he kicked me again, left side this time, and I felt a rib crack. Say what you wanted about Frankie Gee, he was a professional. Another kick to the solar plexus and then he took a step back and stood looking down at me, breathing hard, the air whistling through his nose and rattling in his chest.
“I’m getting too old for this crap,” he said, gasping for air.
“Me too,” I said
“That’s pretty good, Charlie.” He wiped his face on his coat sleeve and pulled a pack of Camels from his inside pocket. “I got a message for you.”
I coughed hard, nearly passed out from the pain but felt a little better when I saw that I’d spat out a mouthful of phlegm instead of blood. “Let me guess. Stay away from Parrish Industrial Park.”
He lit a cigarette with a gold Zippo. “You know this stuff already, why am I here?”
He glanced over his shoulder at a silver Lexus parked in a handicapped space. A heavyset man with gray curly hair was sitting behind the wheel, sipping from a Styrofoam cup while he watched us. I recognized him as the man who’d been driving the SUV when Terrell Cheatham was murdered. Seeing him here with Frankie Gee brought his name back to me. Jackie Marconi, a bottom- feeder who’d been doing grunt work for the mob since he was sixteen. It looked as if he’d taken a giant leap up the ladder.
“Jackie Macaroni sits in the car while you’re out...”
” ‘Jackie Macaroni.’ That’s good,” Frankie said. “Since Tony retired and Vinnie’s been so screwed up over his kid, God rest his little soul, things ain’t the way they used to be. Between you and me, they ain’t right at all.”
“Cardo’s calling the shots,” I said.
“And Jackie there is the king turd in the toilet bowl.” He flicked his cigarette away, grunted as he stooped to retrieve the sawed-off pool cue. “Cardo’s serious about this one, Charlie. Next time I’ll have to put a bullet in your head. Only reason you got a pass this time is because even though Tony ain’t the boss no more, his opinion carries weight.” He took another quick glance back at the Lexus. “If he were to make a direct request on your behalf, people would be inclined to listen. You hear what I’m saying?”
“I hear you, Frankie.”
“You listening?”
“I hear you.”
“Same old Charlie R,” he said.
I wasn’t expecting the kick in the crotch. It caught me off guard, sent stars shooting behind my eyes and the bacon, egg, and cheese biscuit I’d gobbled for breakfast spewing onto the pavement. He hadn’t pulled the kick or tried to soften the blow. Like I said, Frankie Gee was a professional.
“When you talk to Tony, give him my best wishes,” he said.
I wiped the vomit from my mouth. “What makes you think I’m going to talk to Tony?”
“You’re stubborn, Charlie. Not stupid.”
When the Lexus pulled out of the lot, I curled up into a ball and lay on the asphalt, taking deep breaths of cold air until my stomach settled. A few curtains ruffled in the apartments across the way, but no one bothered to come out to help or took the trouble to call 911. Five minutes later, I crawled to my car and drove myself to the emergency room.