Secondhand Smoke

by Karen E. Olson

  “Where was he?” I whispered.

  Dick pointed to the other side of the house, and I tried to look all around me as I circled the front porch. There was no one I could see anywhere.

  “You must have imagined it,” I said out loud, my voice startling both me and Dick, who jumped.

  “I know I saw him,” he insisted.

  I shook my head. “No, Dick, there’s no one here, and if he’d been here, we would’ve seen him leave as we crossed the park.”

  I turned, and from somewhere behind the house a loud noise echoed through the trees and made me freeze. Dick grabbed my arm. “What was that?” he whispered.

  It was most definitely a gunshot, although it sounded like a much bigger gun than the one this afternoon. I could have been wrong, though. I’m not an expert on guns. Obviously, Dick wasn’t, either.

  Another shot rang out, and I pulled on Dick’s sleeve until we were both in the neighbor’s driveway behind an old Dodge pickup. “Can you tell where that’s coming from?” I whispered.

  Dick’s head shook back and forth until I realized it wasn’t going to stop. I put my hand on the top of his head to steady it.

  “You’re going to have to stay with me here, Dick,” I said.

  He frowned. “Why would someone be shooting at us?”

  He really seemed to be curious about that, as though spying on someone and trespassing wouldn’t cause that same person to feel slightly threatened and try something a little over the top. While I didn’t like the position I was in, at least I could understand it.

  Lights had gone on in the house next to us, and I could see two faces at the window. The shooting had stopped. I forced myself to stop thinking and listen. Silence. Except, maybe, someone slushing through the snow in back of Mac’s house. Whoever it was was getting away, and I could hear sirens coming closer. I thought quickly about what was behind Mac and Sal’s house. Another house on the street parallel to this one. I straightened up.

  “I’m going through the back,” I whispered to Dick, who was crouched behind the truck bed. He might have been weeping.

  “You’re not leaving me alone here,” he said.

  “The cops are coming. Tell them where I went and where I think the guy with the gun went.”

  Dick pawed at my sleeve, and I tossed off his hand. “He’s gone, Dick, so get the fuck to the cops and tell them where he is.”

  “You’re crazy, you know that?” I heard him say as I went around the front of the truck and into the backyard behind the garage.

  I might have been crazy to go after someone with a gun, but if it was my father, I had to help him. He could just disappear into the night, and I could tell the cops I never saw anyone. It was simple.

  Like anything in my life is fucking simple.

  I saw the figure a few feet ahead of me as I came around the garage in the yard behind the one I’d just left.

  “Dad,” I whispered loudly. “Dad!”

  The figure stopped, not close enough to the streetlight for me to see his face, but the long coat swung around his body, and I could see the glint of metal in his hand.

  “Dad!” I said again, louder this time.

  I felt more than heard the next shot. Fortunately, he was not a good shot, and I fell to the ground as he turned again and ran down the street.

  I hadn’t gotten a good look at him, but I didn’t think my father would actually shoot at me.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Tom’s voice crashed into my head, and I looked up from the snowy mess I was lying in.

  I pointed to the street as I got up. “He went that way.” I felt like I was in a bad western.

  “The shooter?”

  I nodded. Tom shouted to a couple of uniforms to go down the street and called a car on his radio to reroute it in that direction. I was brushing snow off my coat as he turned back to face me. “What are you doing out here?” he asked harshly.

  “Dick thought it was my dad.”

  “What?”

  I told him how Dick had come to my apartment and what he’d said. I related the rest of the story without leaving anything out.

  “So you decided to follow a guy who was shooting at you? What the hell do you have, a death wish?”

  It still hadn’t sunk in what I’d done, but hearing him say that made me start shivering. And it wasn’t because the snow had soaked through my jeans. “I thought if it was my father . . .” My voice trailed off.

  “You could help him,” Tom finished. He sighed. “I can’t fault you for that. But I don’t think your father would shoot at you.” He paused. “I saw you less when we were dating.”

  Two figures were stomping through the snow back to us. By now the entire neighborhood had lit up like a goddamn Christmas tree, and I could see their faces, drawn and disappointed.

  “We’ll get him,” one of the officers said to me on their way back to their cruiser. Tom hadn’t moved yet, which indicated that maybe he wasn’t done with me, so I stood my ground.

  “I’m going to put someone outside your building,” Tom said finally. “You don’t seem to see that you’re in danger, and this way, maybe, we can keep you alive. Because if not, one of these times the bullet’s going to hit you.”

  I caught my breath.

  He was nodding. “This is real life, Annie. This isn’t make-believe. And I won’t let you die.”

  Death. There it was, out in the open. Something that always happened to someone else, something I just wrote about. I’d never really contemplated my own death before. I guess I was just too stupid to do that. It was easier to get through life if you didn’t think about it.

  He was talking. “I’ll walk you back, but then I need to find out where Mac and Pete are and why someone would be lurking around their house with a gun.”

  “Mac’s at my mother’s,” a familiar voice said behind us.

  We turned to see Vinny standing in the snow, his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket. “I don’t know where Pete is,” he added.

  Tom eyed Vinny for a second. “Can you walk her back to her place and make sure she locks the door?”

  “No problem.”

  They were talking as if I weren’t there, and I guess I wasn’t in some way. It was all sinking in way too fast, everything that had happened during the day.

  I let Vinny take my arm.

  “See ya,” I said to Tom, but he was already gone. “He’s going to have someone watch me,” I told Vinny.

  “Good idea.”

  I looked around for Dick and spotted him talking to a cop near Mac’s house. I walked over, with Vinny the Shadow right next to me.

  “You okay?” I asked Dick.

  His eyes were wide, and he was looking at me as if I were a stranger. “You’re really crazy,” he said again.

  Tell me something I don’t already know.

  “I’m going home,” I said. “Are you going to be okay?”

  He was shaking his head. “Just go already. I don’t need your shit.”

  Dick Whitfield swore at me. He was actually rude to me. I should write this date down for posterity. He was getting some balls. Go figure. I wanted to congratulate him, give him a high-five, for finally starting on the road to becoming a cynical reporter, but this wasn’t exactly the time for that. I’d have to catch him at the paper tomorrow.

  Vinny and I were quiet for a couple of minutes as we walked, but suddenly he stopped in the middle of the park. “Dick thought he saw your father?”

  “Yeah. Weird.”

  Vinny looked around quickly, then ran a hand through his hair. I wasn’t sure I was going to like what was coming.

  “Remember, your father isn’t the only one who came to town.”

  I frowned.

  “Your father’s tall, dark, Italian. Dick thought that’s who he saw—”

  “Jesus Christ,” I interrupted. “Who is it, Vinny?”

  He shook his head. “I’m not sure. All I know is, someone else is here. That’s all your father w
ould tell me. He asked me to keep an eye on you.”

  A thought dawned. The guy who jumped me. The one who told me to stop asking questions. I shivered under my puffy coat, and not because I was cold. “But why would this guy shoot at me? I thought they wouldn’t go after me like that; you said so.”

  Vinny rubbed his forehead. “I don’t know. It’s just speculation.”

  “Why would someone with a gun be at Mac’s?”

  “He’s looking for his money.” Vinny’s voice was flat.

  “It’s good Mac’s at your parents.” I looked back at the house behind us, the lights on the cop cars reflecting off the snow. “Where’s Pete?”

  Vinny shrugged. “Beats me.”

  “Maybe we should go talk to Mac. She probably knows where he is. Pete might not be safe with a guy running around with a gun.”

  But Vinny was one step ahead of me, and he’d already taken my arm and was walking me briskly across the park. “Do we have to worry about Mac’s restraining order against you?” he asked as we crossed Chapel and trotted over to Wooster Street.

  “There’s no restraining order. It was just a threat.”

  We made our way down Wooster Street. Vinny’s parents lived upstairs from their pizza place, which was down near Tre Scalini.

  We slipped into the back near the kitchen and to the door to the upstairs. Vinny let me step into the hallway first, and he closed the door after me. He hit a switch, and a dim light went on up near another door at the top of the stairs. We climbed up, slowly. The day’s events had taken a toll on both of us.

  The kitchen was warm, lit only by a light over the stove. Vinny moved ahead of me.

  “Hey, Mom,” he called out.

  Mrs. DeLucia and Mac were sitting in the living room, Mrs. DeLucia in a rocking chair and Mac on the flower-covered sofa.

  “Hi,” I said quietly.

  They glared at me.

  “Mom, before you say anything, Annie was just over at Mac’s house, and someone fired some shots at her over there, but he got away through the backyard. Do you know of any reason why someone would do that?”

  Mac’s face was blank, but I could see her eyes taking in Vinny’s words. Mrs. DeLucia waited for her.

  Surprisingly, Mac lifted her chin at me and patted the sofa next to her, as though she wanted me to sit down. So I did. She looked into my face. “Annie, I know you’ve been doing your job, but why don’t you just leave well enough alone?” Her voice was soft, calm. Not at all like someone who just found out about a man with a gun outside her house.

  Vinny noticed that, too. “Mac, you heard what I said, didn’t you?”

  “You’re mistaken, Vinny.” Mac looked at him now. “Pete is at the house.”

  “Well, you’re going to have a couple of cops over here in a few minutes asking you a lot of questions about this,” Vinny said. “Unless Pete is sleeping or sitting in the dark, he’s not home.”

  “Vinny, dear, Pete has been home all night.”

  Vinny looked at me and shrugged.

  Mrs. DeLucia got up. “Why don’t you two come into the kitchen and help me get some tea.” It wasn’t a question; it was definitely an order. We followed her.

  “Mac’s doctor was here just a little while ago, and he gave her something to calm her down. She’s been a wreck ever since the restaurant burned down, and then Sal and all . . .” Mrs. DeLucia’s eyes lingered on mine for a few seconds. “Anyway, she’s been staying with us the last two nights. Pete isn’t being much help, unfortunately. He’s been drinking a lot.”

  “We’re a little worried about Pete. Especially with that guy out there,” Vinny said.

  His mother was quiet for a couple of seconds, then she looked from Vinny to me and back to Vinny. I could see in her face that she knew why we were worried, but all she said was, “Pete’s a big boy. He knows what to do.”

  I stayed quiet. A very ugly thought was forming in my head, and I didn’t like it. I knew for sure that no one in this house would like it, either. Vinny seemed oblivious, and this was the first time I actually wanted him to read my mind. So we could get the hell out of there and figure out what we were going to do.

  “How close was Pete with LeeAnn?” I asked Mrs. DeLucia.

  “I don’t know about that,” she said, but she was playing with her cuticle and wouldn’t meet my eyes.

  I smiled, trying not to be condescending. “Mrs. DeLucia, of course you do. It could be important.”

  Her eyes moved up to my face. “That’s none of your business.”

  Vinny took my arm. “Okay, we have to get going. Sorry about this,” he said to his mother. But she pulled him back as we started down the hall.

  “What are you doing with her?” Mrs. DeLucia’s voice was a stage whisper; she wanted me to hear what she was saying.

  Vinny glanced back at me and then looked at his mother. “It’s just work, Ma.”

  “Bullshit.”

  I stared at a picture on the wall of two kids on ponies.

  “Okay, maybe it’s more than work,” Vinny was conceding. I bit my lip as I eavesdropped. “I have to talk to Rosie first. Then you’ll know what’s going on.” He leaned over and kissed her cheek and came back to me.

  We went back through the kitchen and down to the restaurant. I didn’t want to ask him about what he’d said; he’d tell me in his own time. “Who were the kids in the picture?” I asked instead.

  “Me and my brother, Rocco. He’s a writer, he’s in Europe right now.”

  I wanted to ask more about Rocco, but we had more pressing issues at the moment. I set the pace, and we hurried down the street and around to my building. At the door, I fumbled a second with my keys before fitting the right one in the lock.

  As I turned the doorknob, Vinny put his fingers under my chin and turned my face toward him.

  “What’s up?” he asked.

  I sighed. “I know who it is. I know who killed LeeAnn.”

  Chapter 26

  So what’s up, Sherlock Holmes?” Vinny asked as I pulled my face away from his hand and went into my building.

  He followed me all the way into my apartment, and it was killing him that I still hadn’t told him anything else. I pulled two beers out of the fridge. I was going to get drunk if I wasn’t careful, but I needed another one after getting shot at again.

  “So are you going to tell me, Nancy Drew?” Vinny asked after taking a long drink from his bottle. I wondered how many literary detectives he would go through before I said anything.

  “You’re not going to like it,” I warned.

  “So fucking tell me already.” He was getting pissed.

  “Think about it, Vinny. Think about everything.”

  He smiled weakly. “It’s been a long day, Annie, too long for riddles.”

  “No, really, Vinny, think about what your mother said.”

  He drank about half his beer in one swallow before answering, then put down the bottle and stared at me. “No, Annie. That’s ridiculous.”

  “Why?”

  “Because he wouldn’t do that. He isn’t like that.”

  “He can get violent. You know that.”

  Vinny’s face was drawn. “I’ve known him all my life.”

  “So have I.”

  “Why would Pete kill LeeAnn?” Vinny asked.

  “I’m not sure why, but I think they were having an affair.”

  Vinny shook his head. “She wasn’t having an affair with anyone. I told you that.”

  “Not last summer. But before that? And after? You said yourself that you stopped trailing her after the farmers’ market closed. And what about that kiss you saw him give her in Malone’s?”

  Vinny was quiet a second, then: “Do you think he killed Sal, too?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know, but he was too broken up about LeeAnn, too quick to condemn Mickey.”

  “What about Mickey? Say Pete and LeeAnn were having an affair. Mickey could’ve found out about the affair and killed her, like the co
ps think.” He was playing devil’s advocate, but he was right about that. Maybe I was making this too complicated. “And you forget there’s an unidentified party out there,” Vinny reminded me. “He could be the one who killed Sal, not Pete. And what about your theory that LeeAnn was killed because she was ripping off the Mob’s money?”

  “Maybe Pete found out, too. Maybe that was part of it. Maybe he didn’t like it that she was ripping off his father, too.”

  We both stared at each other for a few seconds, letting that sink in.

  Vinny stared at me a second before asking, “Where’s your computer?”

  My laptop was in the bedroom. He followed me as I went to get it. I grabbed it off the dresser, and we both turned to face the bed, which was unmade as usual. He hesitated for a second, grinning, before taking the laptop and going back into the living room with it. In minutes, he’d plugged it into the phone jack and was dialing up the Internet.

  “You should get a cable modem,” Vinny complained as we waited for the server to boot up.

  “Yeah, right. I don’t need that here, I’ve got it at work. I don’t make a lot of money, you know.” I sipped my beer as Vinny punched the keys. “Jesus, don’t pound on it. It’s new,” I said.

  “Don’t worry,” he said absently as he stared at the screen.

  I peered over his shoulder at the screen. Bank records for Prego. How the hell did he get in there?

  “When Sal was missing, Mac gave me access to some of their documents,” Vinny said. “I made sure I got passwords, just in case I might need them.”

  “Just in case,” I repeated. “And you committed them to memory. Just in case.”

  He looked up at me and smiled, that slow, sexy smile I’d come to know so well. “Yeah,” he drawled.

  He stared at the screen, hit a few more keys. “What the hell is this?” he muttered.

  “What?”

  “The money for those renovations went in and then it went right back out. Cash.”

  That confirmed what Tom had told me.

  “We know the Mob works with cash,” I reminded him. “Anything else there?”

  “I need to poke around a little more, and your computer’s just too slow.” Vinny glanced at his watch at the same time I looked at the clock on the wall. Eleven o’clock.