House Reckoning: A Joe DeMarco Thriller

by Mike Lawson

  “I want to see them,” DeMarco said again.

  Mahoney shrugged and pushed an envelope toward him. “Don’t touch the negatives,” Mahoney said.

  DeMarco opened the envelope. There were three identical sets of eight-by-ten photographs in the envelope, each set consisting of ten photos. In a small, clear envelope were the negatives.

  The first photo showed Gino DeMarco walking down the aisle of what appeared to be a brightly lit warehouse, and standing behind Gino was a young Brian Quinn pointing a pistol with a silencer at Gino’s back. Both men were dressed almost identically in work clothes and hard hats. The next photo showed Quinn shooting his gun at Gino while Gino appeared to be spinning around, turning to face Quinn. The photo captured the gas or flame or whatever it was escaping from Quinn’s gun as it was fired.

  DeMarco figured that whoever had taken the photos had used one of those cameras that advanced the film really fast, because the next series of photos showed Gino firing at Quinn and Quinn firing back, then Quinn firing again as Gino just stood there. The last photo was Quinn standing over his father’s body.

  DeMarco had tears in his eyes when he looked back at Mahoney.

  He wiped the tears away with the back of his hand and said, “I want to confront Quinn with this before he’s arrested. I want to look him in the eye and tell him his life is over.”

  “I don’t think that’s smart,” Stephanie Hernandez said. “He might run after you talk to him. You know, flee the country.”

  DeMarco ignored Stephanie; so did Mahoney.

  “Yeah, okay,” Mahoney said. He understood that this was something DeMarco needed to do. To Stephanie, he said, “Quinn’s not going to run. He’s so damn arrogant that he’ll think he can beat the evidence.”

  “Do you know where Quinn is?” DeMarco asked Mahoney.

  “No. All I know is he’s running around town, glad-handing folks before the confirmation hearing starts. I’ll have Perry track him down. Somebody must have his schedule. Perry will call you.”

  DeMarco nodded. “Can I get my badge back—I mean temporarily—so I can get in and out of the buildings up here?” He meant so he could go to the various congressional office buildings on Capitol Hill if he needed to find Quinn.

  “Yeah,” Mahoney said. “Mavis has your badge.” Mahoney stood up. “Now, I have to get over to the White House so I can ruin the president’s day.” To Stephanie he said, “I’ll call you as soon as I’m done with the president and I’ll make an appointment for you with the guy you need to talk to at the FBI.”

  “I need a shower and a change of clothes,” Stephanie said. “I’ve been wearing this suit for the last twenty-four hours.” DeMarco figured Hernandez was thinking there might be a photo op in the near future and she wanted to look her best.

  “Talk to Mavis,” Mahoney said. “She’ll help you out.”

  To DeMarco, Mahoney said, “Don’t do anything stupid.”

  39

  When Oskar Pankov saw the small FOR SALE sign on the house—showings by appointment only—he looked skyward and said a silent Thank you. He hadn’t noticed the for-sale house at first because he’d focused primarily on the target’s house. Oskar was actually an atheist; nothing he’d seen or experienced in his lifetime gave him any reason to believe God existed. Nonetheless, he was grateful to whatever or whoever it was that had decided to grant him this good fortune.

  The for-sale house was vacant—he knew this because the drapes had been taken down and he could see the rooms were empty of furniture—and from two of its windows, he would be able to see the target’s front door and into some of his windows. He would break into the vacant house, knock a hole in a window so it wouldn’t interfere with the shot, and when the guy exposed himself, he’d shoot him. Nice and simple, nothing fancy.

  Or maybe he wouldn’t break into the house. The for-sale house could be alarmed and if it was, the alarm would sound and the cops would show up; he’d be able to get away before the cops arrived, but that would end any chance of him being able to use the vacant house for a shooting nest. So maybe the best thing would be to lie down in the rhododendron bushes on the east side of the vacant house and shoot from there. There were big rhodies all along the east side, and there was a space about two feet wide between the house and the bushes. The other good thing about the rhodies is that people in the house on the east side of the for-sale house wouldn’t be able to see him through the bushes. The only drawback with this plan, other than lying on the ground for hours, was that he’d have to wait until it was completely dark to take up his position in the bushes.

  He thought all that over and decided he would certainly be more comfortable and less likely to be seen if he could wait inside the vacant house until the man showed himself. And since they were selling the house, even if it had an alarm, the alarm most likely wouldn’t be set because then they’d have to give the security code to a whole bunch of real estate agents. He doubted real estate agents would be showing clients the house after dark.

  Nah, why take the chance? He could stand it, lying on the ground in the space between the bushes and the vacant house for a few hours. It got dark around 6 P.M. this time of the year, and if the guy went out during the day, most likely he’d be back before midnight. Oskar could take six or seven hours lying on the ground.

  He remembered once when he was in the army, this enormously fat man he’d been order to kill in Georgia—that was the country of Georgia, not the American state. He didn’t know who the fat man was or why he was killing him. All he’d been told was that the man would eventually come out of his house to feed his rabbits, and he was to shoot him then.

  The shot had been easy—three hundred yards looking through powerful scope at a target the size of the Goodyear blimp—but it had been ten degrees below zero. He kept his hands warm but almost lost four toes to frostbite. He’d been nineteen years old then—a lot younger and tougher than he was now—but he could certainly lie on the ground for a few hours when the temperature would be above forty degrees and it wasn’t raining.

  There was a problem, however. Although killing the guy would be easy—almost as easy as killing the blimp-sized man in Georgia—he was going to have a hard time getting away, even shooting at night as he planned. He couldn’t take the shot and then run out into the street in front of the vacant house and jump into his car, because the bodyguards might see him—and shoot him. To make matters worse, there was no alley behind the vacant house. Instead, it butted up against the backyard of another house, and the two backyards were separated by a six-foot redwood fence. He was still in good enough shape at the age of fifty-three that he could make it over the fence, but scaling the fence would waste vital seconds. Hmm.

  Okay, here’s what he would do. He’d go to a hardware store and buy one of those short stepladders that fold up and are about eighteen inches high. Yeah, that would work. He’d be able to place one foot on the stepladder and be over the fence in an instant.

  It was decided. Tonight, he would come back after dark, and the first thing he would do was place his stepladder near the backyard fence of the for-sale house. Then he’d lie down in the bushes on the east side of the house and wait for the target to either pass in front of a window or come outside. He’d take the shot—he’d only need one—drop the rifle, run for the backyard fence, step on the stepladder, go over the fence, run through the neighbor’s backyard, and then run to his car, which would be parked on the street in front of the neighbor’s house. If the neighbor came outside after he took the shot, well, then he just might have to shoot the neighbor with his pistol.

  Now that he had a plan, he would go back to his room at the Marriott, rest until nightfall, then come back. If he couldn’t get a shot tonight, he’d come back the following night. If an opportunity didn’t present itself either tonight or tomorrow night—if the blinds in the house were shut or if the guy didn’t come outside or pass in front of one of the windows—then he’d develop another plan. He wasn’t going to
rush the kill, no matter what Tony had said when he called.

  40

  Quinn had just taken a seat in Beecham’s office. The old senator was staring at him, looking confused, as if he didn’t know who Quinn was or why he was there. Quinn couldn’t help but think that there really should be a mandatory retirement age for politicians. He was about to remind Beecham why he was there, but before he could say anything, Beecham’s good-looking chief of staff, Amelia Sherman, walked into the room. She told Quinn that the president’s chief of staff was on the phone and needed to speak to him immediately.

  “You can use the phone in my office, Commissioner,” she said.

  She led him to her office. “He’s on line two,” she said and closed the door as she left the room. Quinn punched a blinking button on the phone and said, “This is Brian Quinn.”

  Without any sort of preamble, Horrigan, the president’s chief, said, “The president is withdrawing your nomination. The confirmation hearing has been canceled. Go back to New York.”

  “What?” Quinn said. “What the hell’s going on?”

  “Just what I told you, Commissioner. You are no longer the president’s choice for FBI director,” Horrigan said and hung up.

  Quinn sat there in the chair behind Amelia Sherman’s desk for a minute, so shocked he couldn’t move. He needed to understand what was going on. He checked his cell phone for Horrigan’s number and called him back. The son of a bitch owed him an explanation.

  “This is Brian Quinn,” he said when a woman answered the phone. “I need to speak to Horrigan again.”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Quinn, but Mr. Horrigan is not available,” the woman said and hung up.

  Son of a bitch! What the hell was going on?

  He was going to drive over to the damn White House and demand to see Horrigan or the president. They couldn’t pull this shit without telling him why. He opened the door to Sherman’s office and the first thing he saw was DeMarco talking to Amelia Sherman.

  DeMarco pointed a finger at him and said, “Go back inside the office. I’ve got something to say to you before you leave. If you try to leave before I talk to you, I’ll beat the hell out of you.”

  “Behave yourself, Mr. DeMarco,” Sherman said, but DeMarco ignored her and took a step toward Quinn.

  Quinn wished that Grimes and Hanley were there. He’d told them to wait outside the building while he talked to Beecham. He hadn’t thought that he’d need their protection inside a Senate office building with the U.S. Capitol Police all over the place. Before he could react, DeMarco was standing in front of him and then DeMarco shoved him hard in the chest, pushing him back into Sherman’s office. DeMarco heard Amelia Sherman let out a small cry of surprise as he shut the door.

  “What in the hell do you think you’re doing?” Quinn shouted. “I’ll have your dumb ass arrested for assault.”

  “Sit down,” DeMarco said, pointing to the chair behind Sherman’s desk. When Quinn just stood there, glaring at him, DeMarco said, “Sit down, or I swear to Christ, I’ll pound your face into hamburger.”

  Quinn reached for his gun—then realized he wasn’t carrying a gun.

  He took a breath, to center himself. He needed to remain calm. He didn’t understand what was going on. He didn’t know why the president had withdrawn his nomination, nor did he understand what DeMarco was doing here. He had to wonder if the two events could be connected, but he didn’t see how they could be. A nobody like DeMarco would have no influence over the president.

  “All right, DeMarco,” he said, taking a seat. “Tell me what you want. And make it quick.”

  It was amazing how Quinn was able to do that, DeMarco thought: instantly regain his composure and now act as if he owned the room and was the man in charge. He was pretty sure, however, that Quinn’s composure would be short-lived.

  DeMarco didn’t sit. He opened the manila envelope he’d been holding in his left hand, pulled out the single photo in the envelope, and dropped it on the center of the desk. It was a photo of a young Brian Quinn with a gun in his hand standing over the corpse of Gino DeMarco.

  DeMarco saw Quinn glance down at the photo, puzzled at first, and then he realized what he was looking at. He sat back in the chair and closed his eyes. DeMarco was sure Quinn had seen the photo before. At some point in time, probably right after Quinn killed his father, Carmine Taliaferro would have shown Quinn the series of photos of Quinn killing Gino DeMarco. He may have even given Quinn a set of the photos. When Quinn opened his eyes, he looked at DeMarco for a moment, then quietly said, “How did you get the picture?”

  It sounded to DeMarco as if he was simply curious.

  “John Mahoney forced the photos out of Taliaferro’s daughter. I figured out that she had something she was holding over your head, but I didn’t know what. Mahoney convinced Stephanie Hernandez that it was in her best interest to give up whatever she’d been using to blackmail you.”

  “I’ve always hated that woman,” Quinn muttered. In a louder voice, he said. “So now what, DeMarco?”

  “Right now Stephanie is talking to the acting director of the FBI, showing him all the photos. Then I imagine the Bureau, being the cautious folks they are, will mull all this over for a few days, have their experts confirm the photos are real, then they’ll talk to a bunch of lawyers to see what kind of case they can make against you. Then they’ll arrest your ass.”

  “I’ll fight this, you know,” Quinn said. “I don’t know how, yet, but I will. I was a cop and your father was a criminal. I killed him during the course of my duties.”

  “You tried to shoot him in the back. The photos show that.”

  “Those photos don’t show what transpired before I shot him. I’ll say I chased him into that warehouse and he fired at me before I shot him.”

  DeMarco barked out a humorless laugh. “Come on, Quinn. How are you going to explain why you didn’t report killing my dad if you killed him trying to make a legitimate arrest?”

  “I don’t know. Yet. But I’ll come up with something. I’ll beat this.”

  For just a moment, DeMarco almost believed that Quinn might be able to save himself—and he almost lost it. He started around the desk, intending to knock the smirk off Quinn’s face, and maybe just keep beating on him until he was dead. But he didn’t.

  “You’re through,” DeMarco said. “And I’m the guy who brought you down.” He didn’t bother to add: with a whole bunch of help from Emma and Mahoney.

  DeMarco had said what he’d come to say, and he’d gotten the satisfaction of seeing the look of defeat on Quinn’s face when he initially saw the photo. He picked up the photo and turned to leave the office, but before he reached the door, Quinn stood and shouted, “Your father was a hit man! He was a killer! I don’t deserve to go to jail for killing him. I’ve spent my entire life putting criminals like him in jail and protecting New York from terrorists. I don’t deserve this,” Quinn said again.

  DeMarco thought for a minute about telling Quinn everything his father had meant to him and how Quinn was no better than the criminals he bragged about incarcerating. But what would be the point? All he said was “He was my dad. And fuck what you deserve.”

  41

  Quinn walked out of the Dirksen Building, still stunned by what had happened. Hanley and Grimes were waiting for him on the steps, bullshitting with one of the Capitol cops. As soon as they saw Quinn, they walked over to him. Quinn figured that DeMarco must have left by a different exit; if Hanley and Grimes had seen him, they would have detained him.

  “Where to, boss?” Hanley said.

  “I don’t know,” Quinn said.

  “Are you all right, boss?”

  Quinn didn’t answer. He was wondering if he should call Tony Benedetto and tell him that he’d changed his mind about killing DeMarco. Now there was no point in killing DeMarco. Well, that wasn’t exactly true. Killing DeMarco would be very satisfying, but if DeMarco was killed now—and considering the photos Stephanie Hernandez was supposed
ly showing the FBI—he would be considered a suspect. Yes, it would probably be best to tell Tony to call off whomever he’d hired. He didn’t, however, want to call Tony from his cell phone.

  “Have you seen a pay phone around here?” he asked Hanley.

  “A pay phone? Do you want to use my cell phone, boss?”

  “No, I want . . . Never mind.”

  Quinn started walking, with Grimes and Hanley trailing behind. He didn’t have any idea where he was going; he just needed to walk. He needed to think. He’d find a pay phone someplace along the way and call Tony.

  Goddamn Tony. He hadn’t told Tony to kill DeMarco before the confirmation hearing, but he thought he’d made it clear that he wanted the job done quickly. He couldn’t help but think that if DeMarco had died a couple of days ago he wouldn’t be in the situation he was in now because it would have taken some time for DeMarco to force Stephanie Hernandez to turn against him. Maybe he should tell Tony to kill Stephanie instead of DeMarco.

  The person he really wished he’d killed, however, was Carmine Taliaferro. He should have killed that conniving old fuck right after he killed Gino DeMarco.

  Quinn could see Carmine, clear as a bell, when he met with him years ago, a few days after he’d killed Gino. He had gone back to see the doctor who had treated his gunshot wound, to make sure everything was healing okay, and Carmine had been sitting in the junkie doctor’s living room wearing a baggy brown suit and those big black glasses he wore.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” Quinn had said.

  “How’s the shoulder? You gonna be able to play tennis or whatever it is you play?”

  “What are you doing here?” Quinn said again. “I told you I didn’t ever want to see you again.”

  As if he hadn’t heard him, Carmine said, “Anyway, I hope you’re mending okay. Your health’s important to me. You’re important to me.”