Angel Face, page 7
She was in the middle of describing how she’d disabled the suspect vehicle when her phone rang. It was an unidentified number, which meant either nothing or everything. She pushed her chair back from her desk, which attracted Rolf’s attention. The Shepherd perked up. Then, seeing her raise the phone to her ear, he flopped his head back down with a sigh. He’d learned to distrust the little black boxes humans loved holding against their faces.
“O’Reilly,” Erin said.
“We need to talk,” said a male voice. It sounded familiar, but she couldn’t immediately place it.
“What about?” she asked.
“Business,” the man said. “It’ll be something you want to hear. Come to Little Italy, Lucia’s Bar.”
Erin was startled. “Why there?” she blurted out. She knew that place. It was where Mattie Madonna had been shot.
“I’ll be there for the next couple hours,” the man said, ignoring her question. Then he hung up.
Erin got to her feet. “I have to go,” she announced.
“What’s up?” Webb asked.
“I’m not sure,” Erin said. “Something with my other case, I think. I’ll be at Lucia’s Bar.”
“Hey,” Vic said. “Isn’t that the place where—”
“Yeah,” she said. “The meeting site is part of the message.”
“You want some backup?” He was already halfway to his feet.
“Better if I go alone.”
“I’m not happy about that,” Vic said.
“When’s the last time you were happy about anything?” Erin retorted.
“Russians don’t know how to be happy,” he said. “Are you at least taking the dog?”
“Of course I’m taking the dog. Rolf, komm.”
Rolf bounded up, wagging and ready.
“Do you know who you’re meeting?” Webb asked.
“I think I’ll recognize him. I knew the voice.”
“Take Neshenko.”
“Sir…” she began.
“Don’t bring him inside if you don’t want to. Park him on the street, but nearby. Just in case.”
“It’s nice to know you care, sir,” Erin said.
“I don’t,” Webb said. “Dry cleaning is expensive. I don’t want to have to get my dress blues done for a departmental funeral.”
“That’s more like the Lieutenant I know,” she said. “I’ll call you when I get out of the meeting.”
“We’re going to have to get you a secretary,” Vic said. “To keep track of all your social engagements.”
Chapter 8
Lucia’s Bar was a small, dingy joint in Little Italy. The air reeked of cigarette smoke, in blatant contradiction of the city’s no-smoking policy for bars. It was early afternoon, the booths populated by aging Italian men with nothing to do and nowhere to be. Vic was outside, stewing in the passenger seat of Erin’s Charger, hoping she’d get in a fight so he’d have an excuse to come storming through the door and start breaking heads.
Erin took a second in the doorway to let her eyes grow accustomed to the dim light. Rolf, at her side, sniffed the air and sneezed. A few heads turned to look at her, but since she was silhouetted against the daylight, it was doubtful anyone could make out her face. On the other hand, how many women walked into this place with a big German Shepherd?
The last time she’d been in this bar, it had been in the aftermath of a Mob shooting. She’d come in with the Street Narcotics Enforcement Unit to find a room full of blood and bodies. Only two men had survived the shootout; Lucarelli soldier Carlo Peralta and Alfie Madonna. Erin had tried to flip Carlo, but he’d chosen to stay loyal to the Lucarellis, even though Vinnie had tried to have him killed in the hospital to make sure he stayed silent. Carlo was now in the prison hospital at Riker’s Island and was probably still alive.
Erin waved a hand in front of her face to drive away the cloud of smoke and memories. She could still remember the feel of Mattie Madonna’s hand in hers as the ambulance tried to get him to the emergency room in time. He’d asked her to get Vinnie for him, and to look after his son. Erin was doing her best to do both those things, not because a dying mobster had said so, but because Vinnie had to be stopped, and Alfie might still be saved.
As her eyes grew acclimated, she took a look around. She still didn’t know who she was looking for, but she knew what she expected to see; three guys, probably. One would be a boss, the other two would be bodyguards. The guards wouldn’t be sitting with their guy. They’d be at the next table, maybe, far enough so they wouldn’t listen in on what was being said, but close enough to help if things got rough.
In the left back corner she saw what she’d hoped for. An older gentleman sat alone in a booth. Two younger guys, slightly less well-dressed, were at a table across the aisle. The older man was wearing a very expensive suit. And Erin had met him before.
“Mr. Vitelli,” she said, approaching the table. “Good to see you again.”
Valentino Vitelli was one of Vinnie the Oil Man’s lieutenants, an old-school Mafia don who was in charge of the Lucarelli heroin trade. He looked like a harmless old man, white-haired and meticulously dressed, but Erin knew he could be as ruthless as any professional killer.
He smiled at her and got slowly to his feet, his movements indicating the frailty of advancing age. He extended a hand, which she took. Instead of shaking, he raised her hand to his lips and kissed the back of it.
“Thank you for taking the time to see me, Miss O’Reilly,” he said. His accent was pure Brooklyn. “I see you’ve brought your loyal companion.”
“They say diamonds are a girl’s best friend,” Erin said. “But they only say that because they haven’t met Rolf.”
Vitelli smiled. “Please, have a seat,” he said.
Erin slid into the booth across from him. “Rolf, sitz,” she said.
The K-9 sat at the end of the table, the top half of his face showing over its edge. He could feel Erin’s tension, so he was alert, but she hadn’t told him to attack anybody. He kept a wary eye on the man, in case it became necessary to bite him.
“I know you’re a busy woman,” Vitelli said. “So I’m not going to waste your time. I understand you had some unpleasantness earlier today.”
“You could call it that,” Erin said. “Do you mean the guy who tried to kill me at the courthouse, or the two idiots who caused a pileup on Fifth Avenue and pulled a gun on me?”
“I apologize for all that,” Vitelli said. “None of it should’ve happened. What can I say? Young people got no respect for their betters these days. They think they know everything, so you can’t tell them nothing. You know how it is. My own boy, I try to raise him right, try to teach him respect, and he’s a good boy, he really is, but he don’t know how it is in the Life. He thinks it just means you do whatever you want. You and me, we know it don’t work that way.”
Erin nodded. “Rookie cops are the same,” she said. “They think they know the whole Patrol Guide. They don’t realize you have to learn from the streets.”
Vitelli snapped his fingers and wagged one of them at her. “Exactly!” he said. “That’s just what I’m trying to say. Fortunately, in addition to being morons, those guys who hassled you couldn’t shoot straight, neither, so no harm done. And I appreciate you not capping them right in their stupid faces, though God knows they deserved it.”
Erin blinked. She reminded herself that her reputation in the Lucarellis was that of “Junkyard” O’Reilly, Carlyle’s personal attack dog. She was a hardened cop with the street cred of a killer.
“Hell, you took out Mickey Connor. A couple young punks ain’t nothing for you,” Vitelli said. He chuckled dryly. “But you took them in instead. That’s a courtesy, so thank you.”
“I didn’t know they were yours at the time,” Erin said. “The first shooter was wearing an NYPD uniform, for Christ’s sake! You can’t have your people doing that, dressing like us. If you keep doing that, somebody’s going to get hurt.”
Neither of them remarked on the fact that the shooter had been attempting a hit. Somebody getting hurt had been precisely the point.
“And those other two idiots were plowing through traffic in downtown Manhattan!” she went on. “They were putting civilians at risk. No matter who they were, I had to stop them.”
Vitelli put up a hand. “I get it,” he said. “Nobody’s mad at you. But we’ve still got our little problem. And both times it could’ve been solved, you were in the way.”
“Maybe that’s because nobody bothered to tell me what was going on,” she said.
“It’s better you don’t know,” Vitelli said. “You know how this works. We don’t exactly spread news around. I asked you here because I’ve just got two questions for you.”
“Those being?”
He extended his index finger. “Do you know where this punk is right now?”
Erin noted Vitelli, for all his apparent candor, was choosing his words carefully. He wasn’t naming any names, nor was he going into specifics. She had to act similarly, dance around the truth. It was risky to lie to one of these guys. They hung around liars and con men all the time. A man like Vitelli was good at sniffing out the truth.
“You missed your shot,” she said, truthfully enough. “He’s under the protection of the US Marshals. WitSec. Your guys interrupted the handoff. The NYPD’s got nothing to do with his safety anymore. That responsibility now belongs to the Federal government.”
“Then that answers my second question, too,” Vitelli said. “You can’t get to him.”
“He’ll have a Marshal with him twenty-four-seven,” she said. “Maybe more than one.”
“Well, I guess that’s all there is to say about that,” Vitelli said. “It’s too bad. It used to be, you could trust a kid not to run to the Feds. I appreciate you telling me in person. You’re stand-up, Miss O’Reilly.”
“Forget about it, Mr. Vitelli,” she said, getting to her feet. “We’re all just trying to make a living.”
“Hey, before you go, I want you to meet somebody,” Vitelli said. He waved to the table at which the two youngsters were sitting, beckoning one of them over. The kid hurried to the booth.
Vitelli smiled broadly. “This is my boy, Gabriel,” he said. “Gabriel, this is Erin O’Reilly. You’ve heard of her.”
That was a high compliment in the underworld. Erin tried her best to look like a badass dirty cop, someone not to be trifled with. She nodded to the young man as casually as she could.
“Good to meet you,” she said. She offered a hand, which the kid looked at for just a second, then took. To her amusement, he kissed it just like Valentino had done. It seemed he’d absorbed his lessons in manners from his old man.
When he looked up, she caught her breath in surprise. In the dark room, she hadn’t gotten a clear view of his features until now. Gabriel Vitelli was extraordinarily good-looking; movie-star handsome. His complexion was smooth, unblemished olive. His black hair was thick and wavy, stylishly cut. His eyes were a dark brown that could best be described as “smoldering.” His lips were exquisitely curved, his cheekbones chiseled as if a Renaissance sculptor had carved them out of marble.
Erin wasn’t one to set much store by appearances, but even so, the close proximity of this man, surely the sexiest guy she’d ever met in person, made her heart flutter just a little. His grip on her hand was firm, his own fingers warm and confident.
Jesus, she thought. I’m probably old enough to be his mom! He can’t be a day over nineteen! Get a hold of yourself, O’Reilly. You’re not in high school anymore.
“I’ve heard a lot about you, ma’am,” Gabriel said. “Is all of it true?”
“Only the good stuff,” she said with a twinkle in her eye. “So, you’re learning the family business from your dad?”
“I try to help him out,” Gabriel said.
“He’s a good boy,” Valentino said with obvious affection. He lightly cuffed Gabriel’s cheek. “You don’t have kids, do you, Miss O’Reilly?”
“Not yet,” she said.
“Then you don’t understand,” he said. “I’d do anything for this boy. All right, Gabriel, go on back. We’re done here.”
Erin once more offered the old man her hand. This time, they shook.
“Don’t worry about the rat infestation,” Valentino said. “It ain’t your problem, and it don’t concern you no more. I promise you won’t be bothered again.”
“Thanks,” she said, wondering exactly what that meant.
“You should come to dinner with me,” he said. “My wife makes the best chicken parmesan you’ve ever had. Why don’t you come sometime?”
“To your house?”
“Why not? Bring your guy. He’s welcome too. We’re all friends here, you know?”
Erin wondered. The Lucarellis and the O’Malleys had officially made peace, but they’d been killing one another only weeks earlier, and might easily do so again. Still, he’d have to be crazy to try to whack Carlyle in the presence of a police detective.
“Thanks for the invitation,” she said. “I’ll have to check my calendar. But I’ll let you know. You have a good day, Mr. Vitelli.”
“You too, Miss O’Reilly.”
“All right,” Vic said as they got out of Erin’s Charger back in the Eightball’s garage. “I know you don’t like talking shady business in your car, because you think somebody might be listening. But now we’re safe, right? So tell me what’s going on.”
Erin shrugged. “The Lucarellis are trying to kill Alfie Madonna.”
“We knew that already.”
“They want me to set him up.”
Vic blinked. “They want what, now?”
“You heard me.”
“They asked a police detective to help whack a guy? Tell me you got a recording.”
“Of course I did.” Erin had a miniature recorder sewn into the underwire of her bra, courtesy of Phil Stachowski’s tech support. She’d started it running before going into Lucia’s. “But Vitelli’s smart. He didn’t name any names or say anything that proves anything.”
“So he doesn’t trust you?”
“He doesn’t trust anybody. Well, maybe his son. He made a point of introducing me to the kid.”
“How sweet,” Vic said. “Was it Take Your Kid to Work Day for the Mafia?”
“No, he’s an adult… barely. Looks like Old Man Vitelli has his son on his personal security detail, just like Mattie Madonna did. Probably because of what I just said; in the Mob, your own flesh and blood are the only guys you can really trust.”
“Why’d he want you to meet his brat?”
“Networking,” Erin explained. “You can’t just slide into the Mob. Somebody always has to vouch for you. Vitelli’s getting close to retirement age. He wants to make sure his boy knows the right people, so when Gabriel gets an important position, he’ll have the right connections.”
“One of which is you?”
“Apparently.”
“Are you complimented or insulted?”
Erin smiled. “A little of both, I think.”
“What’d you think of this Gabriel?”
“Prettiest gangster I ever met.”
“Oh, God.” Vic slapped his forehead. “Not again!”
Erin smacked him on the shoulder. “I didn’t mean it like that! Sheesh. I can keep my pants pulled up.”
“You know what the best predictor of future behavior is?” he asked with a nasty grin. “Past behavior.”
“I am so very done talking about this.”
“I’m just getting started.”
“So, have you and Zofia picked out baby names yet?”
“We were having so much fun,” Vic said. “Then you had to go and get personal on me.”
“We can keep talking about this. Or do you want to go upstairs and do some more police work?”
“Yeah, that’s a good idea.”
Webb greeted them with a sour smile. “Glad you’re back,” he said. “Anything I need to worry about?”
“No, sir,” Erin said.
“Good. I’ve got enough heartburn. Neshenko, if memory serves, you have some fingerprints to run.”
“Copy that,” Vic sighed. “I didn’t even get to punch any mobsters.”
“We’re all very sorry for you,” Webb said. “O’Reilly, I want you to go through our victim’s financials and phone records. While you were gone, I looked over her jacket.”
“Yeah, she was a wild child, right?”
“Nothing too major, but she’s no stranger to the legal system. All non-violent offenses.”
“Party girl,” was Vic’s opinion. “Harmless.”
Erin settled in at her desk. Rolf planted himself a little closer than usual, resting his snout on her foot.
“If I’d wanted to be an accountant, I’d have gone to business school,” she muttered under her breath. She was no good with numbers. The only member of their squad that had really known how to sift through financial records had been Kira Jones, and Kira had transferred out of Major Crimes after one gunfight too many. Now Kira was upstairs, riding a desk at Internal Affairs. They were still friends, or at least as friendly as a detective and an IAB investigator could be, but it left Erin floundering through the accounting swamp on her own.
By the end of her shift, Erin was sure of only two things; Isabella Romano had been getting a lot of money from someone other than her employer, and Erin herself could really use a double shot of good top-shelf whiskey. She logged off her computer and pushed her chair back.
Rolf was on his paws instantly, ready for adventure. When Erin didn’t immediately clip his leash to his collar, he picked it up in his mouth and wagged his tail. She knelt and took it from him with a smile, scratching the base of his ears.
“I’m out,” she told the room at large. “Only one thing popped for me. Our victim had some undeclared income.”
