A Scourge of Vipers (28 page)

VANDALS ATTACK DISPATCH NEWSROOM.

It was accompanied by a photo of Twisdale's office, where plastic fish bobbed in what looked like about six feet of water. According to the story, the damage was estimated at seven thousand dollars.

I slid the front page to Joseph. He glanced at it and laughed. Now that I'd sobered up, I didn't find our escapade all that funny.

“Think they suspect you?” he asked.

“Oh, sure,” I said, “along with the forty other people the company let go in the last year and everybody who's got a beef with anything they printed.”

“A lot of suspects, then?”

“Hundreds.”

I finished the paper and turned to the mail. A credit card bill, three offers for more credit cards I didn't want, and a little package. I didn't remember ordering anything. Puzzled, I tore it open and found a pale blue box with gold lettering. Inside were a gift card and a heavy sterling chain, each link in the shape of an old-fashioned typewriter. It looked expensive. I flipped the card open.

I'm sorry. I was wrong to doubt you. Please call me.—Yolanda.

I draped the chain over my head and let it settle on my neck. I liked the way it felt.

“Sweet,” Joseph said. “Is it from her?”

“It is.”

I snatched my cell from the table and placed a call.

“Good morning, beautiful.”

“Hi, Mulligan. Did you get my peace offering?”

“I did. Not sure it's appropriate, though.”

“What do you mean?”

“I'm not a writer anymore.”

“Baby, you'll always be a writer. Nobody can ever take that away from you.”

“Thanks for saying that.”

“How about coming over tonight and giving me a look at those infamous Bruins boxers? I'll cook for you.”

I hesitated. One glance in the mirror this morning told me that my lost weekend had done some damage.

“Can we make it Tuesday? I've got some things I need to do today.”

 

44

Tearing Jefferson's Achilles had cost me more than heartache. I'd lost fifty bucks betting he'd make the team. Then again, my winning wager on Benton was worth two bills, so Whoosh owed me a hundred and fifty dollars. Leaving Joseph behind in the apartment, I skipped down the stairs and fetched Secretariat.

I'd just cranked the ignition when it occurred to me that Mario Zerilli and Marco Alfano were out there somewhere and probably still nursing a grudge. I went back upstairs for my nine mil, stuck it in my waistband, and headed out again. Ten minutes later, I pulled up to Zerilli's Market and parked on the street a few car lengths in front of an unoccupied gray Honda Civic. Christ! The damned things were everywhere.

The store lights were burning; but the place was locked up tight, a “Closed” sign hanging on the front door. That was odd. I shaded my eyes with my right hand and peered through a gap in the beer and cigarette advertising posters plastered all over the front window.

At first, I saw only Doreen, the latest in a series of gum-chomping high-school dropouts Whoosh had hired to man the register. She was standing halfway down the center grocery aisle. She looked terrified. Then Whoosh appeared and beckoned her to follow him. They turned left at the end of the aisle, and I lost sight of them. I shifted to look through another gap in the window and spotted them climbing the short flight of stairs to Whoosh's private office. A tall, scrawny guy in jeans and a black T-shirt followed them up. He had a silver pistol in his hand.

I pulled the cell phone from my pocket and called 911.

Unless a patrol car was in the area, it was going to take the Providence cops at least ten minutes to get there. I sprinted around the building to the back door and tried the knob. It wouldn't turn, but the lockset looked cheap. I slid a credit card from my wallet, shoved it between the door and the frame, and felt the lock give. But if the dead bolt was thrown, I was sunk.

It wasn't. I pulled my gun, pushed the door open, and stepped into a storage room piled high with cartons of cheap beer and boxes of Doritos, Ding Dongs, and cigarettes. I tiptoed through it, found another door, nudged it open, and emerged just a few feet from the stairs to the office. At the top, the steel door stood slightly ajar. Angry voices floated down, but I couldn't make out the words. I put my foot on the first step and started up.

I was halfway there when I heard a grunt. Then, in quick succession, a thump, a growl, a shriek, and a single gunshot. A heartbeat later, a woman screamed. Leading with my gun, I burst through the door.

Doreen was standing beside the keyhole desk, her face contorted as if she were about to scream again. Whoosh was sprawled on the carpet, bleeding from a gash on his head. The man who'd held the gun was doubled over in pain, the weapon lying uselessly on the floor. Shortstop, his jaws locked on the man's gun arm, dug his back paws into the carpet and dragged the creep down.

Mario Zerilli's head made a cracking sound as it hit the thin carpet. I pointed my pistol at him and kicked him once in the ribs. Hard. When he didn't react, I knew he was out cold, embarked on an exciting new career as a canine chew toy. I looked closer and saw that he was also bleeding from what appeared to be a bullet wound in his right foot.

I squatted, grabbed the silver pistol, and slipped it in my back pocket. Then I went to Whoosh, helped him up, and deposited him in his desk chair.

“Are you okay?”

“I don't fuckin' know.”

“Want to call off your dog?”

“Why the hell should I?”

“He's gonna kill Mario if you don't.”

Whoosh took a couple of seconds to decide whether he gave a shit.

“Shortstop! Come here, boy.”

The big mutt unlocked his jaws from Mario's arm, loped over, and rested his bloody maw in his master's lap.

*   *   *

My first words to the homicide twins: “Believe me now?”

“Believe what?” Wargart said.

“That Mario's still alive.”

“Barely,” Freitas said. “He's got a hairline skull fracture, a painful gunshot wound, and a dog bite that nicked an artery. The punk lost a lot of blood.”

“He gonna make it?”

“The docs at Rhode Island Hospital say yeah.”

We were drinking coffee in that same interrogation room. By now, I was a regular, so they knew how I took it.

“Start at the beginning,” Wargart said, “and tell us what happened.”

“I don't know much,” I said. “By the time I got there, it was all over but the bleeding.”

*   *   *

It was midafternoon by the time they were done with me. A squad car gave me a lift back to my vehicle, which was still parked in front of Zerilli's Market. Just down the street, Patrolman Bobby Santo, one of the few Providence cops I remained on good terms with, was pawing through the trunk of that gray Honda Civic.

“Hey, Bobby.”

“Oh, hi, Mulligan. Nice work in there today.”

“Not really,” I said. “All I did was call 911.”

“And maybe saved two lives.”

“Not me. Shortstop did that.”

“Who's Shortstop?”

“Whoosh's dog.”

“His
dog
took the shooter down? I hadn't heard that. The dicks have been in and out of there all day, but they aren't telling me shit.”

“The mutt woulda killed him if Whoosh hadn't called him off.”

“Too bad he didn't let the pooch finish the job.”

“This Mario's car?”

“Not exactly. It was stolen from a Stop and Shop parking lot in Johnston last week.”

“Find anything interesting inside?”

“Dirty clothes, a dozen empty Pabst cans, and a bunch of fast food cartons. Judging by the stink, I think maybe he's been living in it.”

“No bundles of hundred-dollar bills stuffed under the seats?” I asked. “No briefcase with two hundred grand in it concealed in the trunk?”

“Two hundred grand? If I'd found that, I'd already be on my way to Brazil.”

I thanked him, saddled up Secretariat, and pointed him toward Rhode Island Hospital. Turning onto Olney Street, I spotted another gray Honda Civic. It trailed me for a couple of miles, but when I crept through the congestion in downtown Providence, it dropped off and backed into a parking space.

*   *   *

I told the hospital receptionist I was Dominic Zerilli's grandson, learned that he had been admitted, and rode the elevator to his room on the fourth floor. There, I peeked inside his door and saw him sitting up in bed, a fresh bandage covering the gash on his temple. His wife sat at his side, fingering her rosary beads.

“Stop being so stubborn,” she said. “Next time, you might get yourself killed. It ain't worth it anymore, honey. We got all the money we need. Why don't you just walk away?”

“I can't, sweetheart. You know Arena ain't gonna let me leave till I find somebody to take over.”

“Mulligan to the rescue,” I said as I stepped inside.

Whoosh looked up at me and managed a smile.

“That mean you're gonna take the job?”

“Sort of,” I said. “Unless the governor's bill passes and puts us out of business.”

“
Sort
of? What the hell's that mean?”

“It means you two lovebirds can move to Florida,” I said. “We'll hash out the details when you're feeling better. How's he doing, Maggie?”

“He's got a mild concussion,” she said. “If he was younger, they woulda sent him home already, but they want to keep an eye on the old coot for a coupla days.”

“Who you callin' an old coot?”

“You,” she said. “It's time you started actin' your age.”

Whoosh dismissed that with a wave of his hand.

“So what happened this morning?” I asked.

“Mario came into the store waving a pistol and demanding money. Said he needed at least fifty grand to start a new life out of state. I told him no fuckin' way. That the ten grand I already gave him was all he was gonna get. So he locked the front door, herded me and Doreen into the office, and ordered me to open the safe. I worked the combination and showed him there wasn't nothing in it but my Walther, my coded record book, and maybe twelve grand in cash.”

“Then what?”

“I gave him the twelve grand and closed the safe. He asked where I kept the rest of the money. ‘The Caymans,' I told him, and that's when the fucker pistol-whipped me.”

“Sweetie,” Maggie said, “you know I don't like that kind of language.”

“And when he hit you, Shortstop jumped him?” I asked.

“Yeah. Leaped through the air like he was Michael Fuckin' Jordan and chomped down like he was Mike Fuckin' Tyson.”

Maggie scowled and wagged her finger. I wasn't keen on Whoosh's choice of words either. Jordan
had
played a little baseball, but neither he nor Tyson had ever been a shortstop. I would have gone with “leaped like Ozzie Smith,” but I couldn't come up with a shortstop who'd ever bitten anybody. Ty Cobb was mean enough to have done it, but he'd played the outfield.

“And that's when the gun went off and shot Mario in the foot?” I asked.

“Served the cocksu—” Whoosh hesitated and glanced at Maggie. “Served him right.”

After I left them, I called the Providence cops and asked what Mario was being charged with. They wouldn't tell me anything.

 

45

I was stuffed, but I didn't know how to unsnap my jeans in a way that wasn't suggestive.

“Yolanda, that was the best soul food I ever tasted.”

“How many soul food meals have you had?”

“Counting tonight?” I asked.

“Counting tonight.”

“One. But damn, it was good.”

“The smothered chicken was my mama's recipe. It was the first thing I ever learned to cook.”

“If this keeps up, I'll need my own ZIP code.”

Her dining room table was scattered with china we'd scraped clean of the onions-and-gravy-lathered chicken, the fried okra, the collard greens, and the sweet potato pie. I helped her clear it and load the dishwasher.

“Go get comfy in the living room,” she said. “I'll be there in a sec.”

I sank into the sofa in a room that was all mint green and light, the setting sun burning gold through the open mullioned windows. Yolanda strode in, set a birdbath-size glass of white wine on the glass coffee table, and handed me a tumbler half filled with amber liquid.

“Gimme one more minute, baby,” she said, and turned back to the kitchen.

I rolled the drink around on my tongue and knew instantly that it was better than my brand of Irish whiskey. She returned with an open bottle of Locke's Single Malt and placed it on the table. Then she flopped down beside me, tucked those long legs under her, picked up her wineglass, and laid her head on my chest.

“Now that's what I'm talkin' about,” she said. “I definitely could get used to this.”

“I know I could.”

She dropped her hand to my thigh.

“Are you really wearing Bruins boxers?”

“No. I don't have any. That was just a joke.”

“Actually, I picture you in Blackhawks briefs. Maybe I'll get you some.”

“I've already got what I need,” I said. And then I kissed her.

“You know I'm breaking a rule here, right?” she said.

“The one about not dating white guys?”

“The one about not dating clients.”

“I'm a client?”

“You gave me a five-dollar retainer.”

“Give it back. I don't need a lawyer.”

“Oh, yes you do.”

‘What? Why?”

“Because I think you've got a solid wrongful termination case.”

“I never thought of that.”

“Let me ask you a couple of questions,” she said, her voice suddenly lawyerly. “Did
The Dispatch
give you an opportunity to explain before they fired you?”