The Book of 21 (14 page)

He climbed back into the brown unmarked car and figured the stakeout was now pointless. If anyone was thinking about entering the house, having the entire place lit up like a beacon a few minutes ago probably put an end to that thought. Even if someone came along later, oblivious to his earlier entry, Fanelli was not going back in there a third time; you never lit three cigarettes off the same match, and Fanelli had burned two.

A blare of static came across the radio, followed by the dispatcher’s voice barking, “Fanelli, pick up!”

“This is Fanelli,” he snapped into the handset.

“Where have you been, asleep? I’ve been trying you for ten minutes.”

“Go on,” Fanelli growled.

“There’s a squad car on its way, and once they get there, you can go home. Word came in from Homicide; you’re relieved.”

Fanelli wondered if the dispatcher had any idea how true those last two words were.

Chapter 15:
The Light of the Moon

The tall dark woman in front of John remained silent for a bit before continuing, “You may call me Mezzalura.”

“So what do you want?”

“The same thing that you want, Detective McDonough, for the Brethren of the Rocks to leave me alone. You have something that is making them extremely nervous. If you survive the night, I’ll be extremely impressed.”

“Unfortunately, I’m not a detective anymore,” he snarled, lifting his pant leg and revealing his empty ankle holster. “You can go try to manipulate someone else.”

“Well, then maybe they are done with you, but maybe now you’ve seen enough to listen.”

John watched the cars rolling past him on Race Street. He knew he had learned nothing about what led to the murders, but, apparently, everyone else thought he was much smarter than he actually was. He would let them keep that assumption.

“Cut the shit,” he snapped. “Are you here to make some kind of deal?”

“Unfortunately, I’m not even the person that you would need to make a deal with. I’m a Wiccan. Do you know what that is?”

He rolled his eyes and shot back, “So are you a good witch or a bad witch?”

“This is no time for jokes,” she growled. “You can’t just click your little slippers and go home.”

John glared at her.

“The group you are dealing with is extremely powerful,” she continued. “They came to Philadelphia for religious tolerance, but they proceeded to hunt down my fellow Wiccans. As the witch-hunters of Philadelphia, they worked in secret and found that working behind the scenes could benefit them in many ways.”

“So, are you saying they’re like the Masons?” John sighed.

“No, these people are not like the Masons.”

“Oh, so they are more like the Mansons?”

She turned and started to walk away.

John knew this was his best lead yet, and it would be wise to see what she had to say. Unfortunately, he no longer had the option of just arresting her.

“So, why did you come here?” he yelled.

She turned and angrily walked back to him. In a hushed breath, she said, “Keep your voice down, you idiot. I don’t have time to play games—
we
don’t. A friend of mine is risking his life to distract the man that was tailing you, and soon that man will get wise and come back here. Are you ready to talk, or not?”

“Go ahead, talk to me.”

“The group you are dealing with draw their power from a book,
The Book of 21
, that the church does not want exposed. Basically, they get a good sum of money blackmailing the church to keep the thing a secret.”

“What do you care?” he scoffed. “What business is it of yours?”

“As for me, I have family members that were killed by these people, and friends as well. A long time ago, our group tried to expose them. This conflict spans generations, Detective. Believe me, we’ve tried to let this go, but
their
fear keeps this going. As soon as we start to become successful, to gain some wealth and prosperity, a convenient mishap befalls us. They fear that we will threaten them again if we gain any influence, and that fear perpetuates this conflict.”

“So you want me to believe that they are committing some sort of genocide over the ages and no one’s noticed?”

“They save murder for those of us that are particularly troublesome. You don’t always have to kill someone to do away with them. Think about that. You can simply make them appear insane, depraved, or inept.” She motioned her head toward the Roundhouse and then toward his empty ankle holster. “Would you believe me now?”

John thought for a second, and then muttered, “Maybe.”

“We have watched them. We’ve watched them for years, waiting until they screwed up and exposed themselves. Today, we realized they have been watching you. You have something they want.”

“Well, I don’t. It’s all in forensics.”

“Did you tell your lieutenant that?”

“Yes.”

Her face twisted into a pained look. “In that case, I’m sure that whatever you found will be gone by morning. Is there any way you can get to it?”

“I’m sure it’s all locked down. Besides, I’m not a cop at the moment. They don’t let just anyone walk into the evidence room and take stuff out.” John raised an eyebrow, and said, “You seem to want it very badly.”

“I want these people to go away—to release their hold on my life. I want to stop being kicked down just because someone thinks I am climbing too high for their comfort. They just kicked you down. Right now, I would think we have a common interest to see that these people go away. If you have found the book, it would be best to expose it to the public right away. Take away their power, and they are done. Keep it in the dark, and they will continue their ways.”

John sighed, “Look, let’s go get a cup of coffee and talk about this.”

“Yes, but let’s take the bus. If your tail returns and sees your car is here, he may sit here and wait for you to come out.”

John noticed the large public bus turning onto Race Street. It was still a few blocks away and would probably have to sit at a red light or two. It could be a bit of time before it arrived at the bus shelter.

“OK,” he agreed.

“I don’t think you have the book,” she admitted. “I think you may know something from what you found. I think you know something that will lead you to it. That holds promise for both of us, and threatens the Brethren. I just want to get this thing out in the open so it stops.”

John turned the story over in his head, and it still made no sense. “If you are out to get them, why haven’t they done you in? They seem to know everything else. Why don’t they know about what you are trying to do?”

“I used to be a doctor, until I was conveniently exposed as a Wiccan to the hospital. Now I sell black candles, dried frogs feet, and incense to teens that will soon grow up and laugh at the faith that they once thought was cool. Like I said, there are more ways than one to dispose of someone. If you want dramatic, though, I can give you that. My friend, Cecilia Long, would not forgive them for what they did to me. She pressed to find the book and expose both the Brethren and the church, even though I begged her to stop. In the end, she died in what the police called an automotive accident.”

The bus pulled up to the last red light and stopped.

“Be ready for them,” she continued. “I have asked a few of my friends to watch you.”

“Sort of like your own little army?”

“No,” she sighed. She pulled up her hood as the bus arrived, and said, “They are just people willing to help. None of them is willing to be killed. Now, get on the bus.”

John walked up the stairs of the bus and turned as he said, “So what—” He stopped, realizing she was gone. He looked out on the street and onto the plaza in front of the Roundhouse. It appeared as if the woman had evaporated.

The bus doors closed, and it started to pull away.

He turned to the driver and barked, “Stop!”

“You just got on,” the driver replied.

John spun to see the driver looking at him, and growled, “Open the fucking door!”

The doors swung open, and John leapt onto the sidewalk. He dashed to the tree line and scanned the park for movement. He saw nothing; she was simply gone.

Chapter 16:
John Exits, Stage Left

John opened the door to his apartment and peered inside. With one hand on his holstered Beretta, he reached in and turned on the lights. Everything seemed in order.

Noticing movement in the hall to his left, he spun to see a little old lady in a gray overcoat holding a dog. The lady stared at his gun with wide eyes. John exhaled and covered the gun with his jacket.

“Hi, Mrs. Antonetti, you’re up awfully late.”

He stepped inside and closed the door, leaving the little old lady on the other side with her jaw agape.

He needed to calm down before he blew someone’s head off. He dumped out the swill left in his bourbon glass, poured himself a fresh dose, plopped himself on the couch, and rubbed his forehead.

Thinking about Mezzalura’s story, he laughed at the realization that it was irrelevant. With his file looking the way it did, his days as a cop were probably over. He would never work in law enforcement again; he could forget about it.

For a brief instant, he thought about selling candles with Mezzalura. “I’d rather blow my head off than wind up selling dried frogs feet,” he sighed.

He froze, and in his mind, he saw the lead-in to the nightly news—“Drunken, depressed cop takes own life; more at eleven.” He pondered how that would be a convenient story for anyone who wanted to end him.

Of course, he told himself, Mezzalura could be lying through her teeth.

She gave him one fact, and he wanted to see if it
was
a fact. He booted his computer and went to the Philadelphia Inquirer’s website. He ran a search for “Cecilia Long and accident.”

One result came back.

The article detailed a traffic accident on the Schuylkill Expressway the previous spring. There was one fatality, Cecilia Long of Manayunk.

A flood of thoughts raced through his mind. What if Mezzalura just looked up an auto accident and used the name in an elaborate lie? What if she actually knew Cecilia Long, but the accident was simply a misfortune for Cecilia? He thought again; what if Mezzalura was telling the truth?

A noise outside his door made him swing about and grab his Beretta. Listening carefully, he could hear Mrs. Antonetti talking to her puppy as she came back from her walk. Whether his worries were valid or not, they were getting to him. The day had encompassed receiving a punch in the face, learning about Murphy’s death, being set up to for dismissal, and hearing Mezzalura’s warning about surviving the night. Now, he was beginning to feel like he was sitting in the kill zone and waiting to be the next victim.

He made a few resolutions. He was going to go somewhere he could concentrate, make sense of what was going on, and turn the tables. He was going to get his life back; selling frogs feet or french fries was out of the question.

John went into his bedroom and opened his closet. He pulled out an overnight bag and tossed three days’ worth of clothes into it. He then changed into a clean charcoal gray suit.

In his dresser, he pushed aside a few sweaters to reveal a small plastic box, from which he removed Peluno’s old revolver. While most cops bought a gun that had more power or held more ammunition, Peluno stuck with the department-issued, snub-nosed, .38-caliber revolver. John once asked him why such a big man carried such a small gun, and even now, John could almost hear Peluno quip, “Because, some of us don’t have phallic inadequacies that we got to compensate for.”

“Frank, you son-of-a-bitch, I could sure use your help now.”

John slid Peluno’s revolver into his ankle holster to replace the gun he turned over to Sanford. Returning to his bureau, he found a spare fifteen-round clip for the Beretta. Altogether, that made thirty rounds for the Beretta and six in Peluno’s revolver. He figured thirty-six rounds of ammunition should last him a few days.

With protection out of the way, John thought about access; he could not flash his badge anymore to get back into Hallman’s apartment, or any other place. When he made detective, his cousin gave him a set of lock picks as a gift. At the time, they seemed rather useless; he would break the law if he used them, rendering anything he found through their use inadmissible in court. Now, however, he was thankful for cousins who had no idea how the law worked. He tucked the wallet-sized pouch of picks into his pocket.

Taking a deep breath, he thought over the day’s events. He had been responding to punches from an unseen source, and he was done with it. He would go into Center City, check into a good hotel where a killer would need more than twenty dollars to buy his room key from the front desk, and go through Hallman’s papers and files. He vowed to himself that he would figure out this mess tonight and come out swinging tomorrow.

At least, that was the plan.

Chapter 17:
Heading Home

Kim Wohlford’s thighs ached from the activity of the last few hours. The cool night air had not dried her scalp, which was still moist with sweat from dancing. She was ready to sleep. While her friends were on their way to their fourth club of the night in search of mates, Kim had opted out. The night had gone on long enough, and she did not need to pay for it tomorrow morning.

Kim opened the door to her apartment and stepped inside. It was a one-bedroom in an older building on Twenty-Second Street, northwest of Rittenhouse Square. It was close to work and affordable for a medical examiner. The furniture, the stove, the refrigerator, the sinks, the tub, and the toilet were white. Every wall was painted buttercream. Kim made no pretension of being an interior designer; according to her understanding of color and design, her apartment was well decorated.

She tapped the switch to the hallway light and made her way into the glowing corridor. As she passed the kitchen, she sat her purse inside the archway, on top of the kitchen counter. She then continued down the hallway, past the darkened living room.