Fourth Victim (5 page)

Joe knew several other owners who had, to no apparent effect, dropped dimes on Five Star to rat out Breen’s practices. It was a bit cowardly, but sort of SOP in the business whenever someone bent the rules, by which they all had to live. Though it was never talked about directly, everyone knew and understood. It was kind of like old time baseball, when there were unwritten laws about when pitchers could throw at batters. There was no hot dogging or home run trots in old time baseball. And in the COD oil business, people knew how far they could bend the rules.

Five Star’s office was a run down shack in a dirty, pitted yard. Next to the office, a burly hispanic guy in filthy coveralls was doing a rear brake job on ‘77 Mack with a dented tank, mismatched fenders, and balding tires. As Serpe approached him, the man slid his torso under the rear axle.

“Nice rig,” Joe said to the mechanic’s legs.

“You think so, jefe?” a voice echoed from under the truck. “I think you are blind or a liar, no?”

“Maybe both. Breen around?” “You his amigo?”

“If I was, I’d be the only one,” Serpe said.

The mechanic slid out from under the truck and stood up, wiping his stubbled face with a greasy blue rag. He wasn’t more than five foot nine, but he was big through the chest and shoulders. He had the telltale cold stare—both blank and threatening—of someone who’d survived a long bid. When he shoved back his sleeves and peeled off his blue latex gloves, the tats confirmed what Joe already guessed.

“What you want with Tommy?”

“To talk.”

“Talk to me first.” “You his secretary?” “You a comedian?” “You got a name?” “Yeah.” Silence.

“Me too.”

“You smell like five-o, so where’s your tin at?”

“And you stink like a shitbird, but I’m not a cop anymore and you’re not inside, so let’s start over. I’m Joe Serpe from Mayday Fuel.” Serpe stuck out his hand.

If the name meant something to the mechanic, he didn’t show it. “They call me Zeus.” He shook Serpe’s hand.

“Hands of steel,” Joe said, taking back his hand. “Is Tommy around?” “Out on his truck.”

“Did you know the driver that was killed?” “Dave? I knew him. Asshole. What about him?” “Nice way to talk about the dead.”

“I talk about him to his face worse when he was alive. Dying don’t get you no extra points. Besides, Dave’s no different from the rest of these fuckeeng drivers.” Zeus’ English got worse and his accent got more pronounced as he grew more agitated. “They can all get killed.” He spit for emphasis.

“What about Breen?”

Zeus stepped forward, the cold stare on his face replaced by an angry, more overtly threatening glare. “You shut your mouth about Tim. The man, he save my fuckeeng life.”

Before Zeus could take another step, Serpe stuck the muzzle end of his Glock under the mechanic’s chin.

“Listen to me, Zeus. I’m not a cop no more, but don’t for one fuckin’ second think I won’t blow your worthless brains through the top of your fuckin’ head. I’m not here to bust your boss’ balls or cause him grief. I just wanna talk to him. When I put this away,” Joe said, pressing the Glock a little harder into the fleshy area between Zeus’ chin and adam’s apple, “I’m gonna give you a card to give to him and I’m gonna give you a card to keep. Tell him to call me. You gimme me a call if you want extra work, because to keep these pieces of shit trucks on the road, you must be a magical fuckin’ mechanic. Shake your head yes and step back.”

The mechanic shook his head and stepped back. Serpe tucked the gun away and handed Zeus two refrigerator magnets shaped like oil trucks with Mayday’s name and phone numbers printed on the tank.

“These ain’t no cards.”

“I own an oil company, Zeus. What the fuck do I need business cards for?”

“I see your point.”

“Go finish your brake job and maybe the next time we meet, we can leave the macho bullshit out of it.”

The mechanic didn’t say anything. He stuffed the magnets in his pocket and walked back toward the jacked up Mack. Serpe watched him until his body disappeared under the truck.

S
kip Rodriguez wasn’t sitting where he was supposed to be nor was he anywhere to be found inside Cloudy Dan’s bar in Red Hook. Even after the new rules about rotating officers in and out of IAB were established in the 90s, it was uncomfortable for regular cops to hang with their IAB brothers and sisters. Cloudy Dan’s, once the exclusive hangout of the toughest, most crooked longshoremen on the planet, had become IAB’s ironic little joke. It was sort of their home away from home and away from other cops. And it was the place where Bob Healy and Skip Rodriguez used to meet to conduct their business away from prying eyes and curious ears.

Sitting in the red vinyl booth where he and Skip always met, was a rail thin, dark- skinned black chick, drinking a Diet Coke and trying to force down a bowlful of Cloudy Dan’s famously awful chili. Healy gave her a lot of credit for even trying. The joke was that the local rats fed the chili to their pet roaches under the table. Bob Healy sat at the bar, ordered a Jack and Coke, and sipped while he waited for Skip to show.

Twenty minutes later, when he was gnawing on ice cubes and had left messages on both Rodriguez’s cell and land line, he got up to leave. He was shaking his head in disgust and cursing under his breath as he stepped through Cloudy Dan’s front door and walked back out into the bright, but heatless, Brooklyn sun. He was so pissed off that he didn’t hear the footsteps coming up behind him. He started at the touch of an unexpected hand on his arm. Jumping back, he slid his hand under his coat for his old off-duty piece. When he recognized his potential attacker as the chili eating black chick from Cloudy Dan’s, he relaxed and flushed red with embarrassment.

“Detective Healy?” she asked, ignoring his red face.

“Who’s asking?”

She flipped open an ID case and showed him a shiny detective’s shield. “Raiza Hines, IAB.” “Razor, as in blade?”

“Raiza as in R-a-i-z-a, but you can call me Blades. Everybody else does.” She held her hand out to Healy. Her grip was firm. Her fingers were elegant, long, and tapered to perfectly done nails finished in a glossy blue. “Captain Rodriguez sent me to see you.”

“And what did Skip say about me?”

“That you were old school and the best.”

“Uh oh,” Healy said, letting go of her hand. “That’s trouble, Blades.”

“What is?”

“First, that Skip sent you instead of coming himself. Second, that he’s blowing smoke up both our asses.” She didn’t react to the language. Bob liked that. “Did he give you anything to bring to me.”

“A message and instructions that I was to help you anyway I could. He also says he’s cleared me for all the overtime and time away from the bureau I need to do what I gotta do on this. Is he trying to fuck me up?” she asked, frowning.

“Not that I would put it past Skip to try and get ahead by screwing up someone else’s career, but I don’t think so. He’s putting you on an island to test you. If nothing comes of your working with me, then there’s no fallout and he knows he can trust you. But if we come up with a score, then—”

“—he’ll take the credit.”

“Smart woman. I think we’re gonna get along. Come on back in the bar and give me that message.”

Armor Oil was located on Reddington Street in Bay Shore, very far south and west from Joe and Bob’s yard in Ronkonkoma and from the big terminal in Holtsville. They loaded their trucks at a smaller terminal operated by Mann Brothers, the largest privately owned, full service company on Long Island. Mann loaded COD company trucks for a four to six cent a gallon premium above the rack price at the Holtsville terminal. The outfits that loaded at Mann Brothers weighed speed and convenience against the added cost. There were no long lines at the smaller terminals and that allowed an owner to get his trucks in and out fast and to do many more stops. Armor’s location and their loading practices accounted for the fact that Joe had never run across Rusty Monaco during his years on the road. It also meant that Joe knew nothing about their operations.

Armor’s yard was paved with concrete and there was one late 90s GMC cab-over —their spare truck, Joe figured—parked in a far corner. Their office, like Mayday’s, was a trailer propped up on blocks. Joe went up the flimsy stairs, knocked, and went in without waiting for permission.

A heavyset man with sleepy eyes and a slackjaw was watching satellite porn on a wide screen TV mounted to the near wall. He sat with his boots up on a desk and leaned back in his chair as far as it would go. There was an open bottle of Corona in his hand and a half-smoked Camel turning itself to ash at the edge of the desk. It was gang bang central on the screen with so many intertwined arms and legs that it looked like a bowlful of spaghetti.

“What can I do for you?” the big man asked, eyes fixed on the screen.

“Is the owner around?”

“No soliciting. Go read the sign on the door.” “I’m not selling anything.” “Everybody’s selling something, bud.” “How profound.”

He ignored Joe’s wit. “I don’t know how the fuck they manage this shit with all them bodies. How do they do that?” “Computers.”

“Either grab yourself a beer and sit down or get the fuck out,” the big man pointed at the mini fridge under the window.

Joe grabbed a beer and sat just in time to hear five women fake orgasms in unison.

“So that’s what it sounds like. I’m used to hearing ‘em fake it one at a time,” he said, clicking off the TV and swivelling the chair around to face Joe. “I’m Bill Eiserman and I own this lovely establishment. What can I do for you?”

“I’m Joe Serpe from Mayday Fuel.”

“The guy that whacked the Russians, right? Good for them cock-suckers. This business is hard enough without organized crime getting involved. Am I right?” He clinked bottles with Serpe.

“You don’t seem very broken up about Rusty Monaco.”

Eiserman wiped the jolly look off his face, put his beer down on the desk, and rubbed his chin thoughtfully before speaking. “Look, I got a business to run. I’m paying for the guy’s funeral. What the fuck else do you want, that I should cry for him? I’m not happy he’s dead. I don’t wish it on anybody to die like that, alone in the cold and the rain, but he was a nasty pain in the balls. I mean, he wouldn’t do stops in black areas, for chrissakes. But he would trade stops with the other drivers and did all the ones they hated. Worked out, I guess. The thing of it is, he was leaving soon anyway.”

“Monaco?”

“That’s who we’re dicussing, right? He was headed to Florida. He bought a condo in Plantation City. Beautiful place. Showed me pictures. Nicer than the place I got for my folks in Boca.”

Finally something, Joe thought. He didn’t know what to make of it, but at least it was something.

“How’d he afford that?” Serpe asked.

“He bought moldy bread. How the hell should I know? He’s got a nice pension, right? He did okay here. I don’t ask my drivers about shit I wouldn’t want them to ask me about.”

“Fair enough.”

Serpe and Eiserman talked for another ten minutes, but nothing the big man had to say revealed anything of interest or meaning. Eiserman took Joe’s numbers and promised to call if he remembered any relevant information.

“Do me a favor,” he said, just as Serpe was leaving, “take these.” He handed Joe several index cards. “They’re longtime customers, but they’re so far east of my territory that it kills me to have to get to them. I’ll call them and tell them to use you from now on.”

“Why?”

“It’s good for you, it’s good for me. I know you’ll take care of them and I won’t have to schlep my trucks out of the way.” “You don’t know me at all.”

“I know you plenty, don’t worry. I know you’ll do the right thing.” “How?”

“Because if you’re worried about who killed a cocksucker like Rusty Monaco, I know you’ll treat people right.”

Serpe closed the office door behind him without saying another word. It was tough to dispute Eiserman’s street logic and Joe wasn’t going to try.

Raiza Hines sat back down in the unofficial official booth of NYPD IAB as Healy went to the bar to get their drinks. As he waited, he looked back at Raiza, taking her measure. She seemed a cool customer, determined, not crazy ambitious like Skip Rodriguez. Skip had gotten pretty far, but he liked Raiza’s chances of getting further up the food chain.

“Vodka rocks, lime,” he said putting her glass down on the table and then sat himself opposite her with his beer in hand. “So, what’s the message from your fearless leader?”

“The food in that Indian restaurant is too hot for takeout. You’re better off eating it there,” Raiza said, shaking her head at her boss’ childish code. “You know what he’s talking about?”

“Blades, I think the question is, do you?”

“Monaco, Russell T. Born Elmhurst General Hospital, September ninth, Nineteen-sixty. Graduated NYPD Academy Class nineteen-eighty. Retired September twenty-fourth, Two thousand and three. Rank, Detective third … Should I continue?”

“Very good. I take it that since he was a recent victim of violence that his jacket’s too hot to touch.”

For the first time since they met, Detective Hines smiled at Healy. “Before.”

“Before!” Healy coughed up a little beer. “That means someone was grousing around in his files before he was killed.”

“Indeed there was and now there’s an access block on almost all his files.”

“I take it it’s not IAB’s doing.”

“Please put that in the form of a question,” she tweaked. “Smart, pretty, a sense of humor. Skip better watch his back and cover his ass.” “No comment.”

“Rusty Monaco was a piece of shit, but he was two years retired. The brass must have breathed a big sigh of relief when he put in his papers. Why would they be rooting around now, I wonder?”

“I suspect that’s what my boss wants me to help you find out.”

“Skip’s always had a nose for a big score.”

Healy handed Blades a Mayday refrigerator magnet and a napkin with his cell and home numbers scrawled out.

“Classy stuff. I think the NYPD should start using magnets and napkins too.”

“Come on, finish your drink detective, we’ve got work to do.”

Turning right at the Smithtown Bull statue and off Main Street onto St. Johnland heading up into Kings Park, Serpe smiled, shaking his head in disbelief. Even now, as he recalled the unlikely set of circumstances surrounding the transformation of two bitter enemies into partners and friends, he couldn’t quite believe it.

It had been late in the afternoon last Valentine’s Day; a raw, miserable Saturday when Serpe got an urgent call from Frank Randazzo’s mom. She was the dispatcher back then and told Joe there was one more stop to be done, one that couldn’t be put off until Monday. It was already dark out, Joe remembered, but just as he pulled over to write up the delivery ticket, it began to snow like a bastard. Worse still, he had to about-face over the LIE and head all the way back north into Kings Park. Maybe that was why the name Healy made no impact on him as wrote the ticket.

Twenty minutes later, as he began to make the delivery, it hadn’t yet dawned on Joe that the man he was rescuing from a frozen weekend and a wall full of burst pipes was the same man who had meticulously built the cases against him and Ralphy Abruzzi. Only after Healy walked up behind Joe while he was pumping the last of the two hundred gallons and uttered a few words of thanks at his back, was Serpe’s memory sufficently shaken. But it wasn’t until Joe went to collect the money and saw the family pictures through the glass storm door that he knew for sure. “Motherfucker, it’s him,” Joe said. And when Healy came to the door he said, “Fuck if it isn’t Joe ‘the Snake’ Serpe.” Not exactly the stuff friendships are made of.

Who knows? Maybe if the hose monkey hadn’t been murdered that same night or if Healy—long guilt-ridden over evidence he had kept from Serpe about the case against him—hadn’t showed up at the kid’s funeral service to talk to Joe, they would have stayed enemies forever. In a weird way, Joe and Bob owed Tim Hoskins a thank you, because when the detective showed up at the funeral too, he made himself their common enemy. As the old proverb goes: The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Generally, Joe tried not to focus on the past. Loss had taught him to look ahead, but he guessed it was sort of inevitable that he should think about Healy as he drove into Kings Park, taking the same route he had on that miserable, snowy Valentine’s Day.

Serpe knew even less about Epsilon Energy than he had known about Armor Oil. He had seen their trucks on the road every now and again, but there were only a very few areas where Mayday and Epsilon territories overlapped. Epsilon rarely ventured south of the LIE to make stops nor did they deliver east of Setauket. Like Armor, Epsilon didn’t load at the big Holtsville terminal. They filled up their trucks at a tiny satellite terminal by the Long Island Railroad station in Kings Park. The one tank terminal was owned by a consortium of full service companies who used the location to refill their trucks that were too far north to drive back and forth to Holtsville. As Epsilon’s yard was located very near the terminal and Healy’s home, it was probably the one oil company in Suffolk County Bob was more familiar with than Joe. Oddly enough, Healy’s house was Mayday Fuel’s only remaining stop in King’s Park. In a push to maximize profits and limit costs, Joe and Bob had given up most of their North Shore stops west of St. James in order to develop their routes further south and east. Good thing for them Frank Randazzo hadn’t had that same idea the year before.

Epsilon Energy, it turned out, didn’t even have a yard of its own. The company parked its trucks in the back of a body shop across the road from the Kings Park Fire Department. When Joe went inside the shop to ask about where he could find Epsilon’s offices, he was greeted by a young woman who couldn’t have been more than a year or two out of her teens. She was cute, on the heavy side, but had a great smile.

“What can I do for you, mister?”

“I see Epsilon Energy parks their trucks here.”

That knocked the greatness right out of her smile and she began nervously combing back the right side of her long blond hair. Serpe couldn’t help but notice the splint on her index finger.