Killers (36 page)

I was looking for Ted McGee's column. The headline read, “The Scourge of Casinos.” It began:

“The simmering underworld war for control of the state's new casinos last night flared into a fiery crescendo of mobster mayhem not seen anywhere north of the Rio Grande since the St. Valentine's Day massacre.”

North of the Rio Grande? Who knew that Ted McGee was a foreign correspondent on top of everything else?

As we walked back out onto the sidewalk, I handed the paper to Sally and pointed at McGee's column. He read it quickly and handed it back.

“Total bullshit,” he said. “And by the way, if this was the St. Valentine's Day massacre, that makes you Al Capone.”

“That's not the point,” I said. We were walking back toward our cars now.

“When I see a headline like that,” Sally said, “I know it's time to fly to Florida for a month. You oughta get outta town too. And I don't mean Medford.”

“Not yet,” I said. “There's still loose ends. They're still trying to deep-six the casino bill by saying we're killing each other. We're just lucky they can't shoot their way out of a paper bag, or they would have.”

“So what? That's better for us, if they don't know what they're doing.”

“I'm just saying, there's been plenty of money spread around to get this casino bill passed, and now not passed. A couple of weeks from now, this blows over, the votes are back. The people shooting at us may make another run, just to close the deal.”

“That reminds me of something,” Sally said, “who is behind this whole thing? I ask you again, who are these people? We gotta get them next.”

“Too dangerous,” I said. “It's pols—I'm not even going to tell you who.”

“You don't have to tell me who. Just put a rocket in their pocket.”

“Sally, it ain't 1963 anymore.”

“You're talking too much to this private dick, is what I think. You're starting to sound like him, like some State House fuck that goes to law school nights and thinks he's a half-a-wiseguy.”

“Listen, Sally, I don't need Reilly or nobody else to figure this out. They have to make it quote-unquote underworld. The cops like me for these jobs but there's none of our guys dead. Maybe it was Beezo Watson.”

Sally snorted at that one.

“Don't laugh,” I said. “That'll be in tomorrow's paper, maybe on TV tonight. Beezo's fingerprints are all over those guns.”

Sally put up his hands. “I ain't even askin'…”

“I'm just telling you, Sally, these hacks may have one more run in them.”

Sally stopped again. “So how come we're standing here?”

“You're standing,” I said. “I'm walking.”

He picked up the pace. When he tried to walk fast, Sally waddled like The Penguin in Batman. He couldn't keep up the pace—any pace—for long. Lucky for him, our cars weren't far away.

“What's their next play?” he asked, breathing heavily.

“All I know is, we were listening in on them yesterday—don't ask me how. And they said they had somebody ‘inside.'”

“You mean, like Hobart?”

“C'mon, Sally. Have they been hitting my places? Not until the other night, and even then they went after places everybody knows I own. They've been going after your rackets, the barbooth game, the check-cashing front, things only someone inside would know you had a piece of.”

He pulled to a full stop right there on the sidewalk and grabbed me by the arm. His nostrils flared, his mouth contorted with rage. I knew what was coming next. He was going Sally.

“Listen up!” he bellowed. “When you see that kid of mine”—this was me he was talking about, not his own son—“you tell him he better find that no-good yellow rat, and then I want him dropped, right where he stands, I don't care if it's on the corner of Hanover and Commercial Streets in front of eight million fuckin' tourists. Ba-boop-ba-bing-ba-boo. Hit him in the head! You understand American? Too many fuckin' rats, we gotta Orkin-ize the whole outfit. You tell him I said that.”

Yes, Sally, I will. He closed his eyes and started breathing even more heavily. He was coming out of it. Thank God it was a short one, or one of the Mommy brigade here in Winchester would be calling 911 for sure. Finally, when he was calmed down, I tried to resume our conversation. Nothing I could do now anyway. I knew what my plans for the day were—lay low in my Medford pad until the senator arrived at B.B. Bennigan's to wet his whistle.

“I was you,” I said to Sally, “I'd keep under cover today. Have somebody with you. I should know something by evening.”

He nodded at George Graft. He was standing beside the Cadillac. George Graft clicked the key to unlock the door and they both climbed back into the car. I walked over to the passenger's side and tapped on the window. Sally hit the button and it went down.

“Do me a favor,” I said. “Don't hit Liz without telling me.”

He stared straight ahead and nodded without saying a word. He didn't like being spoken to this way.

“I mean it,” I said.

 

38

IRRECONCILABLE DIFFERENCES

I was lucky I had this casino piece of business because otherwise, I was rolling nothing but snake eyes. Sure, I was getting business from my regular customers, the long-time incumbents, the real hacks. A lot of them had primary opponents, but I'd noticed a disquieting trend. The people trying to take them out tended to be older, over sixty, sometimes closer to seventy. Historically, the kind of people who usually ran for the legislature against incumbent reps were younger. They were small businessmen, third-rate lawyers, town hacks, mamas' boys living at home, empty-nest housewives.

But those were the people pulling up stakes in Massachusetts and fleeing. When you get your future hacks calling it quits and heading south to Florida or Tennessee, one of those no-income-tax states, you know you've got a long-term problem, and the problem is you just can't make a living here anymore, period, unless you work for the government.

These political hacks I work for, they've really wrecked the state.

Which is a long way of saying I needed more jobs, and beggars can't be choosers.

Still, I had a bad feeling about this guy I was meeting. Not so much bad as despondent. I couldn't imagine he was a paying customer. I'd been referred to him by another of my former clients, a state rep from Norfolk County, which meant he used to live in Boston. He told me a guy he knew was getting a divorce, and needed some sneaky stuff done.

I met the guy in my office at J.J. Foley's and bought him a beer. Then I started in on my usual spiel about no-fault divorce, about how a guy is always screwed one way or the other. How if she catches you with a gal pal, you owe her a million bucks. And if you catch her with a boy toy, you owe her a million bucks.

Then I asked him if he knew why divorces were so expensive. He didn't.

“Because they're worth it,” I said.

He was better dressed than I'd expected. Sometimes, when guys are out of the house, they start to get sloppy. Collars fray, pants don't get pressed. The clothes don't fit as well. They put on weight, or lose it. Depends on how much they drink, which depends on how many nights they're out hitting on nineteen-year-olds, which depends on how much money the lawyers and the ex have or haven't sucked out of them yet.

This guy's name was Kevin.

“I want to get the bitch,” he said, and I tried to remind him that if she catches you with—but he waved me off.

“I wanna take her off the board,” he said.

“I don't do hits,” I said. “And if you want a little free advice, don't even talk to anybody else about shit like that.”

He shook his head. “I don't mean ‘hit' like that. I just want her to lose the kids. I could give a shit less about her. I just want my kids.”

I nodded. Guys never get the kids. Co-custody is as big a farce as no-fault. He had obviously figured that out.

“Here's what I want you to do,” he said. “I want you to plant cocaine in her car, and then call the cops.”

“No way,” I said. I didn't even have to think about it.

“I'll pay you a grand. For ten minutes' work. I'll even supply the coke.” He was reaching into his coat pocket before I shook my head and he stopped.

“Why don't you save yourself a grand and plant it yourself?” I asked him.

“What if I get caught?”

“You know, that was exactly the same question I was asking myself.”

“I heard you were good.”

“The key to being good is not doing stupid stuff, and this is as dumb as it gets.”

“I don't get it, I offer you good money for an easy job, and you're not interested.”

I sighed and looked him in the eye for a few seconds before I spoke again. “Let's say she gets busted, and she's all hysterical, and she calls you to bail her out, and one thing leads to another, and there's this great big reconciliation between the two of you, and don't tell me it can't happen. So eventually there's some, what did they used to call it, pillow talk, and you tell her what you did, that you had the coke planted on her.”

“Why the hell would I do that?”

“Why the hell wouldn't you? I don't know you, and you don't know me. So let's just operate on the assumption that you would eventually tell her what you'd done, and when you do, she says I can't believe you would hire somebody to do something like that to me, the mother of your children. And you tell her, you know, honey, you're right, I was way out of line doing this, and I'm going to get you out of this jam you're in, this coke-possession charge. And how do you suppose you'd do that, get her out of it, I mean?”

“Turn you in?”

“Bingo.” I didn't even mention the fact that he probably wanted me to plant the shit in some mall parking lot somewhere, one of those places that are totally covered by surveillance cameras now.

“You won't do it?” he asked.

“I won't do it,” I said.

“Do you know anybody who will?” he asked.

“Find yourself somebody who won't think it through, or can't.” I paused. “I'd suggest maybe a junkie.”

“A junkie?” he said. “You want me to give a bag of cocaine to a junkie?”

“You begin to see the problem with your plan now?” I said. “If I were you, I'd try to make up with her. Like I said, it's a lot cheaper.”

I stood up and walked back to my car. Inside, I dialed Bench McCarthy's number.

“I'm going back to that place this afternoon,” I said. “Any interest?”

“Can't make it,” he said. “Call me if you hear anything. Gotta run.”

“Want me to pick up your stuff if I can?” I asked.

“Don't take any chances,” Bench said. “I think we can surmise who has the other one there.”

“Good point, I think you should just take a write-off.”

“I think I will,” he said.

 

39

THE LOCAL CONSTABULARY

I couldn't talk to him, I was in the Alibi, and it was full of cops from Somerville and Boston. I'd gotten tired of lying on top of the bed in Medford, listening to the same stories over and over on the all-news radio station. I knew I had to talk to the cops eventually, so I just drove back to Somerville and waited for some apprentice rat in the neighborhood to drop a dime to 911. I always talk to the cops, at least the Somerville cops. I'm a local boy made good. Or is it bad?

The cops didn't want to be here, unless it was lunch hour and they were drinking free booze, or heading down into the basement for an on-the-arm shopping spree. But they had to be here—they had their own shooting to “investigate,” plus it was police protocol to accompany their fellow flatfeet from Boston. I personally didn't think I'd gone overboard last night, and neither did the cops, when you got right down to it. Those guys had been trying to kill me. No civilians got taken out. It was all very clean, both here and in Roxbury. But they had a warrant.

I was standing near the Alibi's front door, my arms crossed. A couple of the plainclothes Boston detectives were questioning me, and the uniform Somerville guys were prowling around in the back, and down in the cellar, in case I'd left any of the murder weapons in plain view.

“So you weren't here last night?” one of the Boston plainclothes cops asked me. His name was Evans. He had a bad comb-over and his clothes were threadbare and cheap, even by cop standards.

“For the third, maybe fourth time, no, I wasn't. I didn't feel so hot, so I went home early.”

“Where's home?”

“Last night, I think I spent the night on Sparhawk Street,” I lied. “In Brighton.”

“Boston?”

“Last time I checked it was. I send the property tax check to City Hall, if that's what you mean. Always check the box to give an extra dollar to the mayor's college scholarship fund too. He's a helluva guy, Mumbles. Sorry he's leaving. And I like to help the youth of America, even if they're not from America anymore, most of them.”

“What are you, a wise guy?” Evans said.

“I never thought so, but the papers say different.”

One of the Somerville guys, Captain McKenna, stepped between me and the Boston guy, Evans.

“C'mon, Evans, you got nothing on this guy and you know it.”

Evans shot him a withering glare. “I don't need you to tell me anything.”

“We're just here to assist,” McKenna said calmly.

“Thanks for the ‘assistance,'” Evans said, his voice thick with sarcasm. “Five people killed last night, in front of this guy's hangouts.”

“Businesses,” I corrected. “I'm a businessman.”

“Nice business you got here,” said Evans. “Same business as those dead guys. Between Somerville and Boston, we found two revolvers, three machine guns and four sawed-off shotguns and approximately two hundred rounds of ammunition in the two cars. What do you suppose they needed that much firepower for?”