by Steve Hadden
“Maria, the aunt said no. I have to go to Houston Wednesday.”
Maria pushed back from the bar and took in everything going on in the restaurant. Then she smiled at Ike. “Tiga?”
Ike smiled back. “Tiga.” It was their code word. The word they came up with in therapy when Maria was ten. It meant “There I go again.” They both used it when their emotions about their parents’ death were hijacked and projected onto another situation. The word always de-escalated the situation and brought them closer to the mindfulness the therapist had taught them.
“You ready for dinner?” Maria asked Mac.
“Yes, ma’am.”
Maria nodded to the waitress at the end of the bar, who headed into the kitchen.
Mac grinned and finished his beer. “You know, he is a good kid.”
Maria threw the bar towel at Mac, and Ike just dropped his head and chuckled. But something was grinding in Ike’s gut. It was a feeling Mac had taught him to listen to. But this time he pushed it down and turned his attention back to the game. The Pirates were down two in the second. Damn.
CHAPTER 8
Ike watched three more Cubs cross the plate, heard the collective sighs of the remaining patrons, and gave up on the game. The Pirates were down 8–2 in the eighth and the cash registers began to clang out the final damages. But Jack’s plight still tugged at Ike’s attention.
He checked his watch and saw it was nine thirty p.m. He and Maria had an agreement: one of them always kept an eye on Mac. Without Doris, they were all he had left. He turned to Mac. “So much for optimism. You need a ride home?”
Mac shrugged and showed him his half-empty mug. “When this is done.” Mac took a gulp. “You going to check out that lead from Cassidy?”
Ike’s urge to punch something, like Cassidy’s face, returned. “Tomorrow morning. I’m heading to Homewood to check her out.”
“Cassidy’s an asshole, but don’t get your hopes too high. I heard she has Alzheimer’s.”
“I hear you. But this is the first and only lead in years. I gotta go.”
Ike watched Maria wiping down the far side of the bar. She deserved it. Closure. She’d deserved it since she was nine. So did he. He’d follow any lead anywhere. All it took was one.
Just beyond Maria, the front door opened and Ike’s urge to punch someone disappeared. It was Lauren Bottaro. She stopped the last customer headed for the door and they exchanged words. Then the customer pointed in Ike’s direction. The helplessness and guilt of a nineteen-year-old stirred somewhere in the basement of his soul.
She walked around the bar and Mac eyed her as she passed and acknowledged him with a nod. He tipped the bill of his Pirates cap and drank the last of his beer. She looked troubled. Who wouldn’t? She brushed back her dark hair with her fingers and looped it over her left ear. She presented her hand.
“Mr. Rossi.”
Ike shook her hand. “Mrs. Bottaro.”
“It’s Lauren, and Ms. I need to talk with you about my nephew.” She looked more determined than at the courthouse. The embarrassment was gone.
“He seems like a good kid,” Ike said guardedly.
“He is a good kid. That’s why I’m here. Mr. Rossi, what they’re doing to him is wrong. They’re trying to end his life.”
Ike shifted in the stool. “It’s a terrible situation. The DA does seem determined even though he claims his hands are tied by the law.”
“It’s not just the DA,” she said, raising one eyebrow. “There’s something else.”
Ike saw Mac, ever the detective, lean closer over her shoulder.
“Someone is coming for Jack, and probably me and anyone else that’s in the way.”
Ike took a tangent, testing where she was headed. “I’m sure it feels that way, with the public and the media coverage.”
Lauren’s eyes ignited and she stepped closer. “No, Mr. Rossi, someone is coming to kill Jack.”
Ike stiffened but resisted taking the bait. “Did you tell the authorities?”
“They don’t believe us.”
“Is there any evidence?”
Lauren’s expression faded from frustration to enlightenment. She set her purse on the bar. Maria worked herself closer and Ike introduced her.
Lauren continued. “Jack’s not the typical ten-year-old. You’ve seen him. He’s not as playful or outgoing and doesn’t have close friends. He’s crazy smart and deals with the world on a different plane than the rest of us. But there is one thing he’s never done—with me or my brother—and that’s lie. He tells the truth, regardless of the consequences.”
“I think I saw most of that at the courthouse,” Ike said. “But who’s trying to kill him?”
“I don’t know. But I know what he told me.”
Now Mac and Maria were in such proximity that they were part of the conversation. Lauren paused. Ike nodded toward them. “They’re good. They help me all the time.”
Lauren eyed Maria and then Mac, then returned her attention to Ike.
“First of all, he told me his father would never kill himself, and I agree with that. Tom was the happiest I’d seen him after that last court appearance against Brenda.” She glanced at Maria. “His crazy ex.”
“Why was that?” Ike said.
“He’d won. He stopped her from getting her hands on Jack again. Before they divorced, she’d gone off the deep end. Screaming fits in front of Jack, leaving the house at two thirty a.m. to ‘work out,’ which turned out to be an affair with a coke head. She started using and Tom had enough. He filed for sole custody and the judge temporarily agreed. That’s when it began.”
“What began?”
“The trashing of Tom. Joseph Falzone had disowned his daughter because of her antics. She was a blemish on the family’s image. He’d had enough, too. But then he suddenly got involved and hired an attorney for Brenda.”
“Tanner?” Mac said.
“Yes. Franklin Tanner. He called Tom’s partner and told him Tom was in trouble and he should make him clean this up before it destroyed the company’s image. Tom was livid and embarrassed. He loved his company almost as much as Jack. Tanner’s team created every lie you could think of: affairs, child neglect, even drug use by Tom. It did take its toll on him, but only because he knew he couldn’t stand to lose Jack. They’re the same. Two peas in a pod. They were very close and spent every minute they could together. Tom taught him things. Helped get him out of his shell.”
Ike eyed Maria, then Mac. They seemed to be on the same page. “That sounds terrible. But it sounds like an acrimonious divorce, not grounds for murder.” Out of respect, Ike stopped short of saying that maybe Tom was hurt more than she knew. Maybe he’d been hiding it.
Lauren’s dark eyes flashed again. “I know. But here’s the catch. Jack said his father told him he knew something very important. Something that some people may not like. Jack said those people were coming for them—and they killed his father.”
Lauren stopped, and the silence filled the bar. Maria and Mac waited for Ike’s response.
Ike asked the first question he always asked in a case. “What evidence exists to support that?” As soon as the words left his mouth, the voice that came from his darkest place railed against getting involved. Asking that question was just like dipping your toe in the pool—you intended to jump in.
Lauren’s determination faded. “None. Jenna’s detectives haven’t turned up a thing.”
Mac’s face soured.
“But that’s why we need you.”
“I’m sorry, Ms. Bottaro.”
“Lauren.”
“Lauren. I have two other cases I’m working on and I’m already committed. I’m leaving town Wednesday.”
“Jack doesn’t stand a chance against them. The DA, Falzone, and his lawyers.” Lauren looked away and tears welled in her eyes. “They’ll take his life away. After he’s already lost his father, they’ll destroy him.”
Maria handed Lauren a tissue from behind the b
ar. Lauren acknowledged the kindness and dried her eyes.
“You’re my last chance—his last chance.”
Ike spotted Maria grab another tissue and wipe her own eyes. Mac dropped his head. As much as he hated to, Ike readied to refuse again. “I just can’t—”
“I have this,” Lauren said, pulling a business card from her purse. She offered it to Ike as if it were the Holy Grail.
Ike took it and read it. Joseph Falzone, Chairman, CEO and Founder. Falzone’s business card. So what? He raised his head to reply, but before he could, Lauren said, “Turn it over.”
Ike flipped it over. $5,000,000. It was handwritten. Ike’s mind ignited with the possibilities. Did she write it? Did Falzone? A memo? An offer?
“That’s what Joseph Falzone offered for my nephew’s life.”
An offer. An offer like Lauren Bottaro had surely never dreamed of and would never see again.
Her face hardened and she leaned close enough for him to smell her sweet perfume. “And he said it was no good if I hired you,” she whispered.
The words rattled through every nerve ending in his body before consolidating into a determination he’d felt only once before. The voice inside raged louder and harder against helping. It was if he were about to jump into a pitch-black abyss.
“He said that to you?” Maria asked.
Mac asked with his eyes, What now, buddy?
Ike examined the card again and tapped it against the back of his other hand. He looked up at Lauren. “I need to think about it, maybe check a few things out. That’s not saying I’m in. Can I let you know tomorrow?”
Lauren grabbed her purse. “That’s more than what I came in with.” She fished a pen from her purse and grabbed a napkin from the stack at the edge of the bar. “Here’s my number. We only have five days, so please call as soon as you can.” She smiled at Maria and Mac. “Nice meeting you both.” Then she left the bar.
Maria spoke first. “Did you hear that? Five million. And Falzone said it’s off if she hires you. Sounds like a desperate man.”
“Sounds like a man afraid something would be found out,” Mac said.
“Hang on, you guys. We don’t even know this is legit. She could have written it herself. And before you two go signing me up, I have a job in Houston and I gave them my word I’d help.”
Mac just leaned back and folded his thick arms.
Ike’s iPhone vibrated and he pulled it out. It was an e-mail message.
“Holy shit,” Ike said.
There was no text, just a math expression: 3–53+8x2+19
“What’s up?” Mac said.
“I just got an e-mail from Tom Cole.”
CHAPTER 9
Ike held his phone in his hand and stared at the e-mail. He stood at the edge of the abyss and this was his invitation. Despite his best efforts to resist, it was pulling him in.
He was certain the kid felt as he had when his parents were killed. He needed to know. He needed the truth. He needed closure. But closure for Jack would come at a cost to Ike. Those nasty, sticky thoughts he kept locked in the darkest corner of his mind would be released again if he helped the kid. He’d spent his adult life wrestling them, trying to get his own closure. But it never came—just the guilt of his failure to uncover the truth for himself and for his sister. He didn’t want to face such failure again, especially where the price was the life of a ten-year-old boy.
He’d moved upstairs to his office above the bar. The building had been there for more than seventy years. Two stories with an attic. The second story had a storage room, a small office that looked more like a closet where the previous owners had managed the bar, and two small apartments. Ike had converted one of the two apartments on the floor to an office. He’d modeled the entry door after the district attorney’s office in the county courthouse, including the stenciled glass. It helped unlock his curious side, which was paramount in his line of business.
Mac tapped on the glass and entered. “Maria is closing up with the others. Said she’ll be up when they’re done.” He threw a nod at the phone. “Anything?”
“I called Lauren when I got up here. She was adamant she didn’t send it to get me involved. Said she deleted all of Tom’s personal e-mail accounts three months ago. His partner told her he’d keep his business e-mail open for a while to field any business follow-ups he might have missed, but she thinks he would have shut it down by now. She said no one would have access.”
Mac moved next to Ike and examined the e-mail. “Can your guy get the IP address? Nail down the location?”
“He’s working on it. I forwarded it to him. I should hear back soon.”
“The obvious answer is minus 15,” Mac said.
“Yeah. If you do the math that’s it. It means nothing to me.”
“Me neither.”
Ike pointed at his phone. “I thought it could be a way to disguise the numbers. Seven numbers. Could be a phone number—no area code. I used 918 and 724 and came up with nothing. And 353 is the area code for Ireland, but there’s not enough numbers for an international number.”
“Too many numbers for a street address,” Mac said.
“I thought it could be an alphabetic code, but 53 doesn’t work.” Ike kept scanning the expression, but nothing jumped out.
Mac grabbed a pen from Ike’s desk and scribbled the numbers on a pad. “Could be a four-number combination to a safe?”
Ike weighed Mac’s theory. “That’s a possibility.”
Ike grabbed the pen and just wrote the numbers with no spaces. “Could be a serial number. And it can’t be GPS coordinates.” Ike leaned back to get a broader perspective. It hit him immediately. He turned to Mac.
“The biggest issue here is I just got an e-mail from a dead guy. Now it’s either someone, like Falzone, screwing with me to waste my time or it’s someone else.”
“Who?”
Ike’s phone vibrated with a call. “I have no idea,” he said as he answered the call. His tech guy was on the other end. “What’d you find?”
“No traceable IP. Whoever sent it didn’t want to be found. They used TOR.”
“You got me there?”
“The Onion Router. You can subscribe through several services. It encrypts the VPN tunnels and bounces around the world. The NSA guys might have something, but I can’t trace it.”
“Okay. Thanks.”
Ike relayed the information to Mac as Maria walked in.
“You still working on that?” she said with a smile.
Ike knew his sister well. “I’m not signing on.”
The smile never left her face. “Oh. Okay.”
“I have to be in Houston. I’m committed. I’ve never stood up a client and I won’t start now.”
Still the smile. “I understand.”
Ike ignored her. His thoughts shifted to his own closure. “What did you think of Cassidy’s lead yesterday?” he asked Mac.
“Interesting. A call from out of nowhere directly referencing your parents’ case. Cassidy is sloppy. He doesn’t want the case to thaw. He thinks it’s a loser for him.”
“There’s something there. I can feel it. I’ll head to Homewood and check it out tomorrow. I’ll give her some time to wake up and get going—probably there around eleven in the morning.”
Mac nodded. He always let Ike run with his instincts. “Just don’t be disappointed. Alzheimer’s does terrible things to a person’s mind. Had one of the guys on the force who had it. Erased most everything.”
While Mac’s warning irritated Ike, he knew it was Mac’s way of looking out for him. He loved him for it.
Maria was still smiling, but Ike didn’t ignore it this time. “And I’m going to stop by Tom Cole’s office and talk to his partner.” He gave Maria his fatherly look. “But I’m not taking this case. Just in case you’re curious.”
Maria didn’t reply. She looked at Mac. “You ready to head home?”
Mac hugged Ike and followed Maria out of the office. Ike o
pened his e-mail again and looked at the numbers. Then he saw the case file from Houston on his desk. Something his father used to tell him came to mind. Your word is your character. Stand by it no matter what.
He closed the e-mail, opened the file, and began reading.
CHAPTER 10
Ike left his Mount Washington condo early Tuesday and beat the traffic out of the city. He’d opened all the windows on his deep blue Shelby Mustang and reveled in the unseasonably warm air swirling through the car. A decent night’s sleep had cleared his mind and his focus had returned.
He knew by taking this drive he was admitting that his curiosity regarding the e-mail, and his ego regarding Falzone’s warning, were getting the best of him. He’d get to Cole’s Seismic Services in Southpointe by seven and catch Cole’s partner before his day got going. He’d prove to himself that his participation in the kid’s case was fruitless and call the kid’s aunt and respectfully decline. But that wasn’t his prime mission today. He’d dispense with the kid’s case and head back into the city to the Homewood Nursing Home and talk to Miss Emma Sosso. It was the first live lead in his parents’ case in seven years—and Mac always said it only took one to break a case.
Ike turned into the parking lot from Town Center Boulevard. The five-story glass, steel, and brick building sparkled in the sunshine. A few golfers just down the hill were taking advantage of the warm September day. He walked into the entry and directly to the woman seated at the large check-in desk.
“Ike Rossi here to see Robert Scott.”
The young woman picked up the phone. “Ike Rossi is here for Mr. Scott.” The receptionist hesitated. After checking Scott’s calendar and not seeing an appointment, Scott’s assistant was checking with her boss.
