Smoke, page 11
Beyond them, a massive marble dining table was set for a sit-down dinner.
He introduced himself as Tommy, reticent to divulge more, unaware of what the guests may or may not already know. Rafaella left him in the company of Augusto and Felice, a familiar-looking couple from Dumbo, though she didn’t stray far, her gaze always tending in his direction.
“Please, call me Gus. Only Rafaella dares call me Augusto, something she’s done since she was an insufferable five-year-old.” He held out his hand, the nails trimmed and buffed to a shine, his skin soft as Smoke took it and pumped it twice.
Smoke motioned toward himself. “Apologies for my state. It’s been a rough couple of days and I didn’t expect Rafaella to have guests this evening.”
“Oh, I’m sure.” Gus glanced at Felice before returning his attention to Smoke. “I think we’ve met before. Maybe at a club down near Christopher Street, or here in Hell’s Kitchen?”
“The Eagle?” Felice asked.
“That’s certainly possible,” Smoke said. “But we also chatted for several minutes at the Boathouse wedding reception last week. You were both a bottle or two of champagne ahead of me.”
“Of course,” Felice said. “You wore that tuxedo well.”
“You wear this well,” Gus added, reaching out to tap Smoke’s shoulder.
Others joined them, with Smoke committing the mostly Italian sounding names to memory with each introduction.
It wasn’t long before the name Jameson De Vries surfaced in the conversation. Not Italian. Smoke assumed Frisian. Dutch.
“I don’t understand why they’ve done an about-face and designated it a murder,” he heard someone say. “Jameson has been so despondent since Aunt Giulia died. And from the vague descriptions of the crime scene, it seems he chose his own demise—whether intentional or by accident.”
A server offered a platter of fried arancini balls to the group amid the conversation. Palle! Palle! Palle! Smoke thought, selecting one and biting into it, content to listen to the conversation without disrupting its flow.
“Perhaps because it happened so soon after the Stuyvesants. Handsome Daan always was a cheeky bastard and definitely hot-headed, but I didn’t see that one coming.”
“Have the authorities provided any details on why they’ve kept that investigation open? And how it’s linked to Jameson’s death?”
“Apparently they identified the DNA of a single, unknown male at both scenes.”
“What kind of DNA?”
Gus shrugged. “Angi and Daan were open, both with their relationship and the types they appreciated sharing it with.” He took in Smoke’s bulk beside him. “Perhaps it could’ve been a threesome gone wrong, but from what I’ve read, there were no defensive wounds. No sign of a struggle. From either Daan or Angi.”
“Same with Jameson. He was going under pretty quick at the Boathouse bar earlier that evening. Perhaps the wedding was too much for him.”
“But again, there’s the DNA linking both scenes. Sure, Jameson was related to Angi and Daan by marriage. But he barely, if ever, ran in the same circles. I don’t recall ever seeing them in conversation.”
Smoke recalled the hours spent with Jameson at The Townhouse, then lounging on his sofa, then sprawled across the rug of the Tudor City penthouse. A gentleman in every way. The taste of whiskey and cigars on his lips. Their tender moments. Talking through the night, mostly about Giulia. A man desperate for company. Not unlike Elgan who seemed, in their short time together, to crave nothing more than the gentle touch of another human being.
“And who were the others supposedly killed by the same culprit?” Gus asked.
“Some Welsh guy, and a young woman from downtown.”
Smoke washed down the arancini with a sip of water. “Elgan Glyndwr and Liz Bayer. Didn’t you know them?” he said.
Gus shrugged, his face as blank as the others.
Over Gus’s shoulder, Smoke saw Moretti standing on the far side of the room near the terrace doors. His attention was tight on Smoke, shaking his head and mouthing the word “No.”
“At least that’s what I heard on the news,” Smoke said.
“They added two more to the body count this morning. Some fracas at Chelsea Piers, but they haven’t released the names. Man, if the NYPD is right that this is all on one guy, he sure has been busy. It all seems pretty random to me.”
Moretti motioned for Smoke to join him out on the terrace.
Smoke excused himself.
“Che cazzo!” Moretti said. “Are you trying to get yourself killed?” His voice was barely a whisper, the movement of his jaw almost undetectable. A swollen, garish purple bruise extended from his right temple down his face and beneath his collar. The underside of his jawline was puffy and black.
“Afraid I’ll put you out of a job?” Smoke said.
Moretti sighed, then winced in pain. He closed his eyes, his features motionless as he slowly breathed through pursed lips.
“Tommaso. I wasn’t assigned to kill you. I was assigned to protect you and Gabrielle. Unfortunately, the intel sourced by my handler was confusing and missing reliable facts. I had to board a flight to New York without any briefing of what I was heading into. By the time I landed at JFK, Gabrielle had already taken a bullet and you were nowhere to be found.”
Smoke contemplated Moretti’s words. And his face.
“Then why the charade in front of Rafaella?”
“The less aware she is, the better.”
Smoke nodded, without fully grasping Moretti’s meaning.
A server approached with a tray of wine glasses.
“Do you have anything harder?” Smoke asked.
“Yes sir, full bar.”
“Good. Two Grey Goose martinis. Straight up. Twist.”
Smoke flipped the cigarette pack from his sleeve and tapped out the weed and papers. Several Gauloises were left, but still he scrunched up the packet and threw it onto a nearby table. He licked a paper and rolled a joint.
“This will help,” he said when the server returned with the martinis. Moretti sipped his, relief on his face as he carefully swallowed the chilled liquor. Moreso when Smoke lit and handed him the joint.
“I guess I should apologize about the jaw.”
Moretti waved his hand. “You could have left me to drown in the river, but I’m told you dragged me ashore. I’ll just be grateful for that.”
They leaned against the travertine balustrade, passing the joint back and forth in silence, a breeze drifting off the Hudson. Both sides of the great river were littered with light, but it was the vast wattage of Times Square and Midtown that dominated their panorama.
“Who said I pulled you from the river?” Smoke sucked in a lungful of the pungency, then handed the joint back to Moretti, his head buzzing and the ache beginning to leave his body.
“You ask the wrong questions, Tommaso.”
“What are the right ones?”
“The ones that’ll help us to work out what the hell is going on without getting us both killed.” Simone suppressed a chuckle before gently pressing his hand to his jaw. “I’ll need your contact number and the address where you’re staying while your condo is being surveilled.”
“Unfortunately, I’m homeless,” Smoke said. “Plenty of funds, but no ID to secure a hotel room. I was planning on spending the night in Bryant Park.” He turned his back on the view and immediately locked on Rafaella at the far end of the living room. “Yeah, I think it safer to sleep in the park.” It surprised him when he realized he was smiling, but he quickly attributed it to the weed. Rafaella smiled back, the fullness of her lips reminding him of Eleonora. And Angi.
“Senza senso!” Moretti said. “I’ll book an adjoining suite at my hotel until we work out something better to suit.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
He was finally clean, his blonde curls wet from the vitamin-enhanced shower at the New York Palace Hotel. Sitting on the edge of the bed in a pair of loose slacks, he rearranged a backpack containing several sets of new clothes and shoes. He balanced a Bloomingdale’s gift box on his lap as he wrote a note for Hugh. He hoped the meager explanation would suffice until their promised brunch at Elmo’s.
Moretti entered from the adjoining room without knocking. “Do you still have the boys’ cell phones?” he asked.
Smoke leaned over the side of the bed and reached into the pocket of Hugh’s crumpled jeans. He’d keep them. They were a good fit. “I don’t have the charge cords, so they might be low on battery. I’ve only accessed one a few times, for a couple of minutes at the most.”
Moretti sat beside him on the bed. He powered one on, switched it to airplane mode, and joined the hotel’s Wi-Fi network. Smoke followed suit with the second phone.
“What are we looking for?”
“We’ll know when we find it, mio amico.”
Smoke clicked on the Instagram app and started surfing the pictures. “What’s the deal with their multiple passports—in differing Italian and French names?”
“The boys are... were... Toscani, with their original home in Firenze. Upon emancipation and with the release of their trust funds, they established a base in Paris to distance themselves from the family. They wanted a fresh start, but without losing access to their hereditary wealth.”
“So, homes in Paris and Florence.”
“Undoubtedly, two of many in their portfolio.”
Smoke pulled on a fresh shirt from the backpack, buttoning it up to mid-chest before slipping on a lightweight black bomber jacket. “Did you meet them?”
“I crossed paths with them only once. A masquerade ball at Villa La Rotonda near Vicenza, for last year’s Venice Biennale. They seemed good natured enough, of course with a confidence bolstered by their financial circumstance.”
“What were you doing there?”
Moretti narrowed his eyes. “What were you doing on the George Washington Bridge on July seventeenth last year?”
Smoke side-eyed him, then returned his attention to the phone.
He was a few years deep in the Instagram timeline. The photos abruptly switched from Mediterranean old-world chic to the dichotomy of Manhattan’s chrome-plated grunge. One picture caught his attention, and he stopped scrolling. The twins were sitting on a sofa, their arms around a young woman between them. A window silhouetted them, showcasing a glimpsing view of the Brooklyn Bridge. He turned the screen toward Moretti.
“Who’s that?” Moretti asked.
“Liz Bayer.”
“One of your recent kills.”
“Yes, one the NYPD has somehow linked back to me.”
* * *
Wall Street.
Smoke and Moretti walked into a residential building in Lower Manhattan. Mass-produced modern Baroque pieces squatted throughout the common areas. High-density, high-gloss black plastic furniture emulating a false regal charm. Crystals dangled from plastic candelabras—decorative light fittings pervasive in both high-end galleries and low-end hardware stores with a price point to match. The difference in quality and value was obvious even to an untrained eye. This was a failed attempt at the trendy Dark Academia décor.
Liz’s apartment was on the twentieth floor.
“This is a pretty pedestrian rental building,” Moretti said. “Members of the Family might own it, but they certainly wouldn’t rent or live here. You don’t remain rich by throwing dead money into another landlord’s bank account.”
Smoke stopped, tentatively peering around the hallway corner toward apartment 20C. There was no police presence, but yellow crime scene tape crisscrossed the entrance to Liz’s home. He leaned against the door, then shifted his weight to throw his bulk against it.
Moretti slapped his hand against Smoke’s chest to stop him, reached into his pocket, and handed him a lock pick. “Tommaso, per favore...”
Smoke twisted the pick in the keyhole and clicked open the door. Morning sunlight drenched the apartment, a sliver of a Brooklyn Bridge view, all dramatic swooping cables and Gothic arches. Triple-glazed windows kept the sounds of the city at bay.
They stopped at the threshold.
Someone had slashed and overturned the sofa. Had ripped the kitchen cabinet doors from their frames and strewn their contents across the room. They’d pulled the refrigerator and oven from the wall and tipped them onto their sides. Holes had been sledgehammered into the plaster ceiling and walls. Through a shattered sliding glass wall, they could see the bedroom was also in disarray.
“The police wouldn’t do this,” Smoke said.
“No, they wouldn’t. But I know who would,” Moretti said. “If there was anything here to find, it is already gone.”
Smoke wasn’t so certain. He scanned the debris scattered throughout the apartment, recalling remnants of his moments with Liz.
“I wondered if it was you,” she’d said. “There was something about your manner. A sureness. More confidence than anyone Julianne and I had selected before. Not excitable like an out-of-towner. Not anxious, like a businessman who’d missed their train home to their family in Westchester or Greenwich. Nor cocky or slimy, like, you know, a lot of guys are. Just a gentle easiness. A confident tenderness.” She’d slid a pod of dark roast into the coffeemaker and turned on the sink faucet. “They warned me when I first accepted the portfolios, but I thought nothing of it. I thought it was just a conspiracy theory beyond the usual nondisclosure agreement to ensure I’d never dare break their trust. A joke, really, to keep me on my toes. But then I saw the incomprehensible values of their trust funds—both commercial and individual. And ever since, I’ve been second guessing their initial warning, and everyone who comes into my life.” She’d fallen silent.
“What makes you think it’s me, now?” he’d said.
She’d pressed her lips into a tight smile. “Thank you for a lovely evening.” She’d reached for a coffee cup, hesitating as her reach passed a New York Yankees baseball cap hanging by the cup shelf. She’d glanced over her shoulder at him. “There’s nothing I can do, is there?”
“No,” he’d said.
Smoke quickly perused the room for the Yankees cap and found it discarded on the floor beside the oven. He stepped tentatively over the broken crockery and glassware to retrieve it. The brim and seams were intact, with nothing unusual or bulky beneath the material. But the squatchee atop the cap was the wrong shade of blue. He dug his nails beneath the button and pulled, and the small circular flash drive popped into his palm.
He held it up. “Is this why I killed her?” he asked.
“You tell me, Tommaso,” Moretti said, his brow creasing.
The two men held each other’s gaze.
“I was doing my job. A job I thought was imperative. A job I trusted was valid and, I expect, still is.”
“Good,” Moretti said. He nodded and took the flash drive from him. “And something on this USB might explain the House’s reason for your assignment. And why you are now a target.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The death-stained carpet stretched across the high-gloss floorboards of Jameson’s Tudor City penthouse. Where Jameson had satiated himself and exhaled his last breath, forensics had cut sections from the expensive weave that were no doubt now secure in a crime scene evidence locker somewhere downtown.
It was late morning, the sun still slightly below the meridian, refracting through the multi-storied Gothic windows facing the East River and Long Island.
Moretti unlatched and knuckled open the terrace door to diminish the rotten stink hovering in the room. “How much of this condo have you seen?” he asked.
“Only the entry foyer and this reception room. Plus, the east-side terrace.”
Moretti glanced up at the ornate ceiling and around them at the furnishings and paintings. “This is how you know you’re in one of their homes. Despite how well we’re paid, you and I do not live like they do, Tommaso. Any one of these artworks,”—he motioned toward the walls—“would outpace a decade of our salaries combined.”
“And by ‘they’ you mean the Medici line of descendants.”
“Some indirect lines, but yes, following a gerrymandered course of familial blood and money. And their immediate matrimonial contracts.” Moretti pulled the flash drive from his pocket. “De Vries should have one of their customized laptops. The authorities might not have seized it, if it was in a different room from the crime scene.”
To one side of the great fireplace, a corridor led to a wing of bedrooms; to the opposite side, another led to a media room and then a den. The den was in keeping with the richness of the rest of the condominium. Hundreds of leather-bounds leaned against one another upon floor-to-ceiling shelves, well loved and read. At eye-level Smoke could see first editions from the nineteenth century interspersed with modern variations. An original trilogy of Frankenstein without author attribution. A first edition of Polidori’s Vampyre incorrectly accredited to Lord Byron. Alongside these stood twenty-first-century companions, expanding on the time-honored themes. Several signed baseballs and a team-autographed Louisville Slugger took pride of place on a shelf at waist height. Signatures that were several decades old and which Smoke couldn’t decipher.
A laptop slanted amongst the paraphernalia of a paper-littered desk. Smoke recognized it as the same unbranded design as Elgan’s. As the twins’. Setting it on the chrome-trimmed walnut desk, he dropped into the wingback and flipped open the display.
Moretti stood at his side. “They designed the first line of security protocol so only those with familial DNA can—”
The desktop flared on, three bright gold balls in a triangular configuration against a blue background.
“Palle, palle, palle,” Moretti whispered. He turned from the screen to scrutinize Smoke instead.
