“I’m working out at the gym, building some muscles somewhere on this body.”
“Increase the weights. I want to see those gorgeous muscles when you come to my next pool party, of which this is not one.”
She was glaring across to the other side of the pool.
Stacie tugged at me. “Look over there,” she whispered while pointing to a second bar at the other side of the pool where Claudia had cast her eyes.
“The one chica that not only shows up in a swimming suit, but a thong bikini. That would be Taylor. The man she’s clinging to used to play for the Scorpions but he got dumped. A bad overall performance compounded with his testing positive for performance enhancing drugs.”
I observed the two and asked as Claudia moved their way, “And, he is welcome here?”
Stacie threw back her head and giggled. “Mother lets anyone in who comes with someone she knows although she prefers that someone comes with status in the community and money. Taylor’s date du jour fell from grace but he redeemed himself by funding three football fields on the south side where kids didn’t stand a chance of getting one.”
Seth had excused himself to check out the food bars. Hunter, oddly, turned around and offered us a drink. The drinks were free, but what the hell. At least he acknowledged our presence. Soon, he had swiveled back around to the bar with his eyes, ears, and fingers glued to his phone.
I looked back toward the other bar. There, standing beside a cathedral of cypress trees, was a familiar face and he locked his eyes on me.
Diverting my attention, Taylor yanked on her man, also nearly naked, and in seconds the two did cannonballs into the pool.
After the flying bodies disappeared into the water and the large splashes settled, I looked back toward the trees.
He wasn’t there. I scanned the crowd.
He wasn’t there.
While we had agreed never to meet again a chance encounter seemed inevitable.
But why was Anthony Bibbione, the premier Don of Tucson’s Mafioso, attending Claudia Childs’ party?
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
MURATORE STUMBLED BETWEEN his worlds. He still had a sense of his life. The good and the bad. Sometimes he would find a black tie loosened around his neck and he had no clue why he would need such a thing, let alone where he got it and what occasion required the neckwear.
Then there were the days when he looked like a street urchin. At least he could recognize that person with no regard to any history. This person simply existed.
He maintained a balance between these lives. So far.
Only mildly under the influence of alcohol, he drove across the border to Mexico, in search of some cheap mota. Marijuana. He found the bazuko first. A blend of marijuana and cocaine.
Not satisfied on his journey across the border, it took him all of twenty minutes to score some chocos, the pills.
Oh, how his command of the Mexican Spanish language had evolved.
He downed a couple of the chocos, then sat on the filthy concrete and leaned against a decaying wall of a vacant building with cracked windows and graffiti, and the stench of urine and vomit.
For him, it seemed a perfect evening. He fell asleep and no one bothered him.
The next morning things changed. He awakened to the sound of the Mexican officials’ vehicle sirens. Coming out his blackout, he knew what they had discovered. A person had been covered in a soiled sheet. The authorities were placing the body on a gurney.
One more Mexican word he knew. This was an encobijado. After a killing, this is the word for the discarded body left wrapped in a sheet.
Muratore gathered up his wits and pulled himself off of the street. He meandered to a street vendor offering coffee and fresh fruits.
After refueling his body, if there could be such a thing, he drove back across the border to his home.
AFTER THE FIESTA WITH Stacie I left as a call came in to inform me that another of my shadows was out with food poisoning. Or the flu. Or a knot in his shoelace that might get him off of the hook for a stakeout. Stacie told me her driver would take me back to my car at the office.
I agreed to take over for a few hours. This case involved child porn. I hated it. And I worked those cases twice as hard. Still, I had sat outside a dark house for three hours before my relief drove up behind me.
I SWEAR MY head had just hit the pillow, as usual, when the phone rang. I managed a weak answer, if only but a huff.
“It’s Stacie and I need you here at my house.”
“What is it?”
“I know it’s late, or early, or whatever time it is, I just got home from Mother’s party and my place has been burglarized. It’s ransacked, Cassidy.”
“You called the police?”
“Yes. They’re on the way, but I need you here.”
I jumped into clothes, grabbed my bag full of some of my tools, and headed over there. Depending on the cops at the scene, they may give me some wiggle-room to look around and do my thing.
Luck was not on my side. The new chief of police had her new recruitments manning the scene. I didn’t know them and they didn’t know me, so the best I could do was talk to Stacie, and use my zoom lens now and then.
Visibly shaken, I led Stacie out to her patio.
“Do you know what was taken?”
“I sure as hell do. Not my jewelry. Not my art and my extensive collection of Pre-Columbian artifacts on display for all to see, and untouched. They took my laptop and all of my paper files that filled a four-drawer lateral. And you can see, they made a mess of this house but all they wanted was in my den.”
I couldn’t get into the back bedrooms, but it was obvious this perp was out to tear the one room apart. But why not take other valuables?
“How about your important papers. Your insurance policies, Deed?
Titles?” I asked.
“All locked in a safety deposit box at my bank.”
We were free to stay in her kitchen and I took charge, finding the tea and the teapot and the cups with saucers. Chamomile seemed like the flavor of the moment, although I could have used a quad-shot of espresso.
After I had her seated at her kitchen bar I asked, “Stacie. Only you would know this. What files were stolen?
She shook her head and dropped it into her hands. “I had all of the trust papers in there, and that included six thick files that documented my siblings’ histories.
Why had she not shared those files with me?
She sipped at the tea as she cradled the cup with both hands, looking far away and toward nothing.
“It’s Renaissance vintage Italian, you know.”
I did my stupid turtle thing, shrugging my shoulders and sinking my head. I was clueless what she was talking about.
“The china. I spent a fortune on a small set in Rome and another fortune shipping them back stateside. I’m glad I still have them.”
“Stacie, I think you need to look into security.”
“I have my alarm system. Even though it did no good tonight,” she said.
“I think you need more. You can pay us for surveillance, but for the foreseeable future maybe you’ll allow me to beef up your protection with bodyguards. 24-7. I have the best. No one will ever know they’re there.”
She sat her cup down and I reached to touch her hand. I knew that we both felt it. Although, Stacie’s hands felt tingly. Little pin pricks. Nerves?
This was not a robbery of opportunity. Someone knew that Stacie would be away that evening, and they apparently knew how to gain access to the house without setting off the alarm. They were only after information. Not fine Italian china.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
A MONDAY, AND I HAD agreed to meet Anthony Bibbione outside of my office at noon. I excused myself from Stacie’s case files knowing she would be in good hands.
His driver arrived precisely at noon. The driver exited the car to open the back door for me. Where we were going and why, I had no idea, but I made sure Schlep
knew my phone’s GPS tracker was on and if I wasn’t back or didn’t call him in two hours he should ride in on his white horse.
“Nice change,” I said.
Bibbione furrowed his eyes. “What change?”
Getting your boys out of black suits in the heat of the summer. Khaki looks good.”
He uncrossed his legs. A sign of relaxation. Usually.
“So, I’m here at your request even though we had this agreement regarding no contact. Don’t you think it’s time you tell me where we’re going since I didn’t bring my passport?”
He tilted his head my way and reached for the already open bottle of Prosecco, pouring me a glass without asking.
I would never be one to turn down a DOCG Prosecco.
We were driving toward the south side. Not in my comfort zone. Drugs? Check. Trafficking? Check. Gangs? Check. Murders? Check. They had it all.
He saw me fidgeting.
“It’s okay. You can light up,” he said.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I know you have a love and hate relationship with cigarettes and this car is detailed every night. Here.”
He opened the side console and provided me with a pack of Italian DOC.
I lit up. What the hell. I clearly had been making poor choices and stinking up his fancy car seemed like a good one.
We drove long enough for me to consume the whole damn thing, and then the car came to a stop outside of a food cart.
“What is this?”
“This is the only place in all of Southern Arizona where you can buy authentic trapizzino. You will not be disappointed.”
The same driver that had opened my door emerged and engaged with the vendor to make a purchase, returning with two wrapped food items.
“And I trust this?” I said.
“It’s an Italian street bread pocket filled with meats, cheeses, and vegetables. I think you will very much trust it and me when it lands on your discerning taste buds.”
The aroma overwhelmed any disgusting scent of lingering cigarette smoke in the car and he had me at one bite.
“You like it?”
I had to smile in between gulps. “Amazing.”
“You have had your alcohol and your nicotine, and now your trapizzino. We have one more stop. You still trust me, no?”
I started to do my turtle thing but caught it before Bibbione could see my discomfort. I’m in a limo with the Don and his men and I’m drinking DOCG Prosecco and smoking and eating something like a dumb American would call a hot pocket pizza, albeit a delicious one.
The car moved at a slow pace, down windy roads I had never seen, and I’d been on the south side more than I cared to admit. We approached a shamble of a home. Large enough, but in need of shingles, paint, windows. Hell. It should be bulldozed but that I deduced the property would be worthless. No other cars were in sight. That slightly bothered me, I realized with the sweat building on the palms of my hands and my the stiffening of my back. Heading toward the door, I searched my instinctual being for some sign of what I might be getting myself into. Nothing.
Bibbione punched in a code at the door and opened it. Damn, the fancy keypad cost more than the door, I thought.
Dark. Tables and chairs. My eyes had trouble focusing. A bar in the distance. The smell of stale smoke overwhelmed me, the closet smoker.
“Why did you bring me here?”
“This place is closed on Mondays. I wanted you to see my competition and what you might be up against.”
“Wait. This isn’t your place? How did you know the code? Oh, screw that. Of course, you know it. Cameras? Security?”
“Temporarily disabled,” he said as he moved behind the bar. “Care for another?”
“No, thanks. I just need to know what I’m looking at.” And why.
“This piece of shit joint is one of Isidora Childs’ operations. She runs a lot of drugs out of here. Cocaine and meth are behind the counter in little foil packages that look like they belong displayed at the candy counter. The opiates are served right here at the bar like a shot of whiskey. Of course, the booze is free, as is the first sample of the premiums.”
I wanted to ask him how he knew this but realized it would be another stupid question.
“Isidora started cutting the opiates with fentanyl, but her profits aren’t as great as the madam insists. That’s when she hired out rip guys.”
“Definition,” I said.
“They are the big losers and they all will lose by playing her game. They’ve cut cocaine with as much as baby powder. This game of hers won’t last. Addicts aren’t functioning all the time but they catch on, and they get angry. Now, she turns to the new big boy in town to cut. This one is bad, my friend.”
“I’m aware of that new kid. Carfentanil. It’s costing her.”
“It’s costing lives. Big time. I do care, you know. I have my pulse on this.”
I postured myself with a straight back and a firm stare into his rich eyes. I then looked up to see the red light on in the corner of what was a motion detector.
Bibbione followed my gaze. “Disarmed, but we don’t have much time. I want to show you something else.”
I followed him to a back room. He had a key and switched on a light.
“This is her so-called money room. Incorrect rumors have it labeled as an S&M room. As you can see, it’s far more nefarious than any fifty shades of gray.
I looked around but my stomach couldn’t take much of it. Instead of the fumes of cigarette smoke I smelled vomit. The fresh blood had that edgy tang smell of metallic iron I had become all too familiar with my line of work.
Syringes filled a plastic waste basket, along with used rubber tourniquets. Barely squeezed into the small room was a cot. No pillow, but plenty of unidentifiable stains.
“She’s also cutting her heroin with crushed roxies.”
“You got me again, Bibbione. Why roxies?”
“Just another breed of opiates. Cheaper in some markets. You need to be aware of this, Cassidy. She’s doing it all. You also need to be very careful. Isidora’s son, Hunter Childs. He’s her best recruiter. Charm, money, and a mother’s love. He thinks he has it all, and that would include the Tucson Scorpions.
“Now, it’s time we leave. Immediately.”
On the ride home I agreed to a refill on the still-chilled bottle of Prosecco after turning down a martini. I was stirred, but not shaken.
“Did you bring me out here to enlist my help in eliminating your competition?”
“You have always been one of the gutsiest women I know, Ms. Clark, and I’ve met them all. Sharp, too. I’m not happy with the presence of Isidora. In fact, I think she is more evil than one can imagine. I took you on this tour to sample my favorite Italian street food and to open your eyes to your backyard.”
Another person watching my back. Sort of.
CHAPTER THIRTY
NEXT UP ON MY LIST was my return to Hunter Childs, maybe because he was so aloof at the fiesta.
Although Schlep had spoken with Taylor Childs, her relationship with this man that had been booted off the team intrigued me. I wanted information on him in case he held a grudge. I called for Schlep to do a background check on the failed and re-risen to grace football player.
Hunter would be hard to corral. That was apparent in his continuing refusal to meet with me face-to-face, and when he all but ignored me at the pool bar. He stopped taking my calls nor did he return them. Born a product of money and born or raised to be a narcissist, Hunter seemed to think he knew how to play the game. No. I did not like the man. I called him again, anyway, but this time I borrowed Breecie’s office phone to place the call. He answered on the first ring.
The man proved to be elusive on the phone and also within the massive information I was pulling up on him when researching my regular sources.
“This is my private number, Ms. Clark. How did you obtain it?”
I wanted to tell him that I had Anthony Bibbione’s pr
ivate number that he changed bi-weekly, but before I could respond he answered his own question. “Of course, step-sister, Stacie. Her approach to our family business is ridiculous and I feel like you are taking advantage of her.”
“You’d help me wrap up my work if you’d just meet with me. I can save you time and meet you at the stadium if you like, or another place of business,” I said.
“When I’m there I’m working.”
“Okay. Where are you now? I can meet you there.”
“I’m at home with the New York Times and my coffee and trying to enjoy both.”
“Since I have you on the phone, how about giving me five minutes?”
Through the pause I could hear that he wasn’t sipping his coffee. He was gulping it. I wasn’t sure it was coffee.
“You have five minutes, and that’s it. I don’t want you calling this number again,” he snapped.
“Great. Let’s start with what exactly your title is within the Tucson Scorpions.”
“I’ve worked my way up the ranks, not that I started off selling hotdogs and sodas. I came to the team with an MBA.”
I could almost see him smirking. “Impressive. I had no idea. I know that your deceased sibling, Manny, held an impressive MBA. I didn’t catch that about you. My bad. And what do you do now?”
“I’m in operations.”
“But what do you do?” I persisted.
“Look, I don’t have the time or the desire to educate you in the matter of how the NFL organizations work.”
Of course, he didn’t have to as I knew he was a tolerated peon with no title other than his last name. I had to wonder if that pissed the arrogant rug rat off just a bit.
“Then let me move on. How is your personal life? I ask because I didn’t see you with anyone the night of your mother’s fiesta party. Are you involved with anyone at the moment?”
I heard him spill something. It sounded as if his coveted coffee had met the floor.
“First, Claudia is not my mother. Let’s get that straight. And second, you called it what it is. My personal life. It’s off limits. I think we’re finished here.”
Lethal Trust Page 12
