by Steven Henry
“I know,” she said. “But I’m not going to break the law for Evan O’Malley, no matter how nicely he asks.”
“You weren’t breaking the law tonight,” he said.
“Yeah, but we traded favors,” she said. “It’s a slippery slope, you know that. Next time it’ll be something a little closer to the line. He’s going to keep maneuvering, keep pushing, trying to get me to cross over.”
“I agree,” Carlyle said.
“What’s the endgame here?” she asked. “This isn’t going to work forever.”
His hand moved down her wrist. He laced his fingers into hers.
“Nothing lasts forever,” he said. “But I’ll stand by you through this trouble, whatever happens.”
Erin saw the softness in his eyes and believed him. But she knew softness wasn’t enough to deal with what they had coming.
“I need to ask you something,” she said.
“Go on, darling.”
“If you have to choose, them or me, what’s it gonna be?”
He didn’t flinch or waver. “If it comes down to it, I’m with you.”
She knew she should lay it on the line, right then and there, challenge him. If there was a chance to pull him out of the Life, she should take it. Right there, in that moment, seeing nothing but love and trust in his face, she thought he’d do it if she asked him.
But she didn’t ask. Because if he tried to leave, they’d kill him. Seeing Mickey Connor face-to-face left her with no doubt whatsoever about that. She wouldn’t ask him to lay down his life for her. That wasn’t fair. And she wasn’t sure she could live with herself if something did happen to him.
“Okay,” was what she said. “That’s what I needed to hear.”
“Grand. Are you wanting a refill?”
She looked down at the whiskey glass and saw it was empty, though she didn’t remember drinking most of it. “Yeah, thanks. But I can’t get too drunk.”
“You’re off-duty, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, but I got invited to go out to a bar with some of the fellas from work. At six in the morning.”
Carlyle laughed. “My pub doesn’t serve alcohol at such an ungodly hour. It’s against the law, or so I’m told.”
“Apparently this place does,” she said. “It’s a cop bar, gets the guys just off the night shift.”
“Are you planning on staying up, or getting some sleep?”
“I’m too old to stay up all night, unless there’s a damn good reason.”
“Then I’ll not keep you long,” he said, getting up and pouring another drink from the bottle of Glen D.
“That’s not what I meant,” she said. “If you don’t mind, I could crash here for a few hours.”
“On the sofa?” he inquired, glancing at the piece of furniture she was sitting on.
She smiled. “I don’t think so.”
She hadn’t stayed over at his place before, and she hadn’t meant to suggest it now. It had just slipped out. “If you’ve got a spare toothbrush, that is.”
“You’re in luck,” Carlyle said. “I know a lad.” He set her drink on the coffee table, then leaned over and kissed her. She wrapped her hands around the back of his neck and pulled him toward her. There’d be plenty of time for bed. Right now, the couch suited her just fine.
Chapter 16
Erin hadn’t set an alarm, but she was used to waking up early. She opened her eyes and saw a ceiling that wasn’t hers. Then she remembered where she was. She rolled over and saw Carlyle, asleep beside her. She leaned on an elbow and studied his face. In sleep, the carefulness that was so much a part of his persona had dropped away. He looked younger, less worn and wary.
She wondered how he’d ended up on such an opposite path from her own, and how they’d wound up at the same destination in the end, lying on silk sheets upstairs from a pub. And she wondered how it was going to end. She’d been telling the truth the previous night. Their relationship wasn’t going to work forever, not the way it was. Sooner or later, someone in the NYPD would tumble to it. Sooner, if Lieutenant Keane from Internal Affairs came sniffing around. Then there’d be hell to pay.
The thing was, Erin was having a hard time caring about the future just then. She felt like she was exactly where she was supposed to be. Being with Carlyle felt right. He was the first man she’d dated who really understood her, understood the Job, and didn’t expect her to be anything but who she was. They could talk, really talk. Added to that was the crackling sexual chemistry. What woman wouldn’t jump at the chance?
That was what Michelle, her sister-in-law, would say. But then, Michelle had two grade-school kids, brought up on a steady diet of happily-ever-after cartoons. Some of that optimism had rubbed off on Shelley. Erin saw all the bad things people did to one another, and they did some of the worst things to people they claimed to love.
Still, she couldn’t deny she felt happier here than anywhere else she could’ve laid her head. She leaned over and very gently kissed Carlyle’s cheek. He shifted slightly, but didn’t wake up. She decided to let him sleep. Easing her way out from under the covers, she went looking for her clothes. Some of them hadn’t made it all the way into the bedroom. She picked up her blouse from the coffee table in the living room and brought it back, along with her other things. Getting dressed in yesterday’s clothes wasn’t something she particularly enjoyed, but she didn’t have a lot of choice. Going out in one of Carlyle’s shirts would attract more attention than a wrinkled pair of slacks.
As she pulled on her pants, she glanced up and saw Rolf in the doorway. He was watching her with an unreadable expression on his face. She was probably reading too much into it, but he looked a little judgmental. It was the sort of look her father might have given her.
Her father. God, what was she going to tell him?
“Nothing,” she muttered. “Not yet.”
It was a little before six. She could be at the Final Countdown in fifteen minutes if she hurried.
“Hard liquor before breakfast,” she said to Rolf. “Hey, who can say no to that?”
* * *
The Final Countdown was a little brick storefront. She found it just down the street from the Precinct 5 house. A CLOSED sign hung in the door, but as she peered in the window, she saw movement inside. A moment later, Piekarski opened the door.
“Hey, glad you made it,” she said. “C’mon in. We just got here.”
The SNEU team had a table in the middle of the room. A couple of other officers were at the bar. Logan stood up and raised a glass.
“Here she is! Woman of the hour!”
“Have a seat,” Janovich said. “And a drink.”
“I’m going on duty in less than two hours,” she said. “I can’t get hammered.”
“Just one, then. On Firelli.”
The Final Countdown didn’t have Glen D whiskey, of course; Erin didn’t know any bar but the Corner that carried it. She settled for Jameson.
“Still up, hey?” Piekarski said.
“What do you mean?” Erin asked. She took a sip. Whiskey before breakfast was not really what she wanted, but it was definitely an experience. Hard liquor on an empty stomach always was.
“Same outfit,” the other woman said, nodding toward her.
“Oh. Right. No, I haven’t been home yet.”
“Maybe I oughta be a detective,” Piekarski said.
“You’d hate it,” Janovich said. “Too much paperwork.”
“We got too much paperwork already,” Firelli said.
“You’re just sayin’ that ‘cause you’re illegitimate,” Janovich said.
There was an awkward pause.
“You know, illegitimate,” Janovich said. “You can’t read.”
“Jan,” Logan said, “there’s so much wrong with what you just said, I don’t even know where to start.”
“Seriously, O’Reilly,” Firelli said. “You should come work with us. Forget about that Major Crimes bullshit. SNEU is where the action’s at.�
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“It’s not bullshit,” Erin said. “Well, not all of it, at least. Hey, I stopped a major terrorist attack last fall.”
“Blah blah blah,” Piekarksi said, winking at Erin as she mimicked her. “Look at me, I stopped a terrorist attack last year. Ain’t I something? Bullshit. What’ve you done lately?”
“We take down hard felony collars every day,” Logan said. “Hell, after we processed the guys from our bust, we did a couple 10-75Vs and nailed two more pushers with a buy and bust. And that was a slow night for us.”
A 10-75V was a vertical patrol, which was when a police unit moved in the stairwells and hallways of an apartment building. A lot of the older apartments in the city had resident drug dealers. “Thanks for the invite,” she said. “But I think I’m good where I am.”
“How ‘bout your partner?” Piekarski asked, offering Rolf her hand. He sniffed it in a businesslike manner and permitted a brief scratch behind the ears.
“He’s not narcotics-trained,” Erin said. “Explosives, human detection, and standard Patrol work. And he stays with me. You can have my dog when you pry his leash out of my cold, dead fingers.”
“We could use a dog, Sarge,” Piekarski pressed. “How do we get one?”
“Paperwork,” Logan said with a wicked gleam in his eye.
Firelli and Janovich groaned.
“Maybe it’s just as well,” Firelli said. “If we got another Irish on the squad, it’d mess up Mickstat.”
“But seriously,” Logan said. “We owe you one, O’Reilly. It worked out to twelve kilos of heroin, ninety-six percent pure. That’s over a million wholesale. If they step on it and cut it down, we’re talking ten to fourteen mil, street price. Those two guys are going away for a good, long time. And a lot of junkies will be going cold turkey.”
“Does it do any good?” Erin asked.
“We still got job security, if that’s what you’re wondering,” Piekarski said.
“I need to bounce,” Erin said, standing up. “Thanks for the drink, fellas.”
“Keep the streets safe,” Firelli said.
“If you insist,” she said. “Turn around and put your hands on the bar. You have the right to remain silent…”
The rest of her Miranda warning to Firelli was drowned out by the laughter of the rest of the squad.
* * *
Erin didn’t have time for her usual morning run, so she took Rolf for a quick walk, grabbed a shower, and swung by the bakery on her way into work. Stereotypes aside, a police officer couldn’t go far wrong bringing a box of donuts with her to the office.
Vic and Webb were already there. Vic was finishing boxing up the last of the case files. Webb was at his computer, twirling an unlit cigarette in his hand while he worked on one of their reports.
“Morning,” Webb said. “Nice to have an early night for a change?”
Erin thought he was being sarcastic until she remembered he didn’t know about her excursion with SNEU. She briefly weighed telling him, and for complicated reasons decided not to.
“I had a good night,” she said instead. “I brought munchies.”
“You got the jelly-filled kind?” Vic asked, hurrying over and reaching for the box.
“I dunno. I just grabbed the usual box set.”
Vic popped the lid and examined the merchandise. “If I get one that’s filled with lemon, I swear, I’m gonna shoot the baker,” he said.
“Please don’t boost the murder stat,” Webb said.
“Not in the head,” Vic said. “I was thinking maybe the leg or something.”
“We all set with the Bianchi case?” Erin asked, picking out a donut for herself and going to the break room to get a cup of coffee.
“In your dreams, O’Reilly,” Webb said. “I sent you your part of the reports. There’s the arrest report on Nina, the rest of the paperwork on Paulie, all the DD-5s, of course…”
Erin thought about what the SNEU team had said about joining up with them. It was actually a tempting thought for a moment.
“Okay,” she said. “I guess it beats being shot at. So we’re closed, other than the paperwork?”
“Yeah,” Vic said. “They kept Paulie overnight, but they released him this morning, when the DA finalized the deal. He goes home free.”
“He didn’t kill anyone,” Erin reminded him, not liking his sulky tone. “All he did was small-time, incompetent drug deals.”
“He accidentally got Ridgeway killed,” Webb said.
“A lot of other people helped make that happen,” Erin said. “So Lorenzo finally got sick of his wife and decided to kill her. He poisoned a box of chocolate and left it out, knowing she had a sweet tooth. But by sheer bad luck, it was the same brand of candy Paulie and his Mafia buddies were using to hide their drugs. So Paulie gave the wrong box to his buddy Rocky, who actually did open it up later on, and found out it was exactly what the label said.”
“Can we arrest Rocky?” Vic interjected.
“For what?” Webb asked. “All he did was eat some candy and give the rest to his girlfriend.”
Vic shrugged. “He was supposed to get a box of drugs. I kinda feel like we should arrest him.”
“Later,” Webb said. “Guys like him always step in shit again. I’d bet a month’s alimony he’s behind bars before the end of the year.”
“Anyway,” Erin went on, “after Rocky snacked on some of the candy, he got the idea to give the rest of it to his girl. Unfortunately for Norman Ridgeway, he was screwing around with Rocky’s girl, and she decided to share Rocky’s candy with her other boyfriend.”
“Not cool,” Vic said.
“Of course, Ridgeway was also cheating on Hayward,” Erin added. “Not that that makes it okay. But the poisoned almond nougats finally found a home, and that was it for Ridgeway.”
“At least he died happy,” Vic said.
“I’m gonna put that on your tombstone,” Erin said.
“I said it before, I’ll say it again,” Vic said. “I love your optimism. You actually think you’re gonna outlive me.”
“I’ve seen your diet,” she said. “You’ll have diabetes before you’re forty.”
“But at least I’ll die happy,” he repeated, grinning.
“And that’s it for the case,” Webb said. “I expect the Narcs will want to keep an eye on Paulie and Rocky, hoping they’ll lead them to bigger fish, but that’s out of our court.”
“Too bad,” Vic said. “I was hoping we could bust that greasy Italian asshole.”
“Better officers than you have tried,” Webb said. “I’ve been reading up on our friend Vinnie. He’s a slick son of a bitch. They’ll collar him on RICO eventually, I expect, but that’ll be up to the Feds.”
“The Feebies couldn’t collar their own ass with both hands,” Vic muttered, giving the usual NYPD opinion of the FBI.
“But regardless…” Webb began. He was interrupted by the phone on his desk ringing. He pivoted his chair and picked up the receiver. “Webb here.”
Erin and Vic saw his face change. He looked disbelieving, then shocked, then tired, in rapid succession. “Copy that,” Webb said. “Yeah, I understand. Who called it in? Who? Okay. Yeah, I’ll send someone.” He hung up and sagged back in his chair. “God damn it.”
“Sir?” Erin asked.
“What the hell happened?” Vic asked.
“Paulie Bianchi went home,” Webb said. “When he went inside his family apartment, someone was waiting for him. They put two bullets in the back of his head.”
“He dead?” Vic asked.
Webb gave him a look. “You know many guys who live through two in the head? Of course he’s dead.”
“When did it happen?” Erin asked.
“Sometime in the last half hour,” Webb said. “You’ll never guess who called 911.”
They waited.
“Rocky Nicoletti,” Webb said. He went over to see his buddy, found the door open, Paulie on the floor with his brains, such as they were, spre
ad out around him.”
“I’m a little surprised Rocky called the cops,” Vic said.
“You think Rocky’s the one who shot him?” Erin asked.
“Could be,” Webb said. “But I don’t think even that kid’s dumb enough to shoot his buddy and then call us. We’ll check him for gunpowder residue to make sure.”
“You want me over there?” Erin asked.
“Nah, you stay put, O’Reilly,” Webb said. “I’ll go with Neshenko. He deserves to get out of the office every now and then. Besides, we’re not going to make an arrest.”
“How do you know?” Vic asked.
“This was a Mob hit,” Webb sighed. “The guy who did it is long gone, with an alibi already in place.”
“I don’t get it,” Vic said. “Why whack Paulie? He was nothing, just a small-time piece of shit.”
“Maybe someone thought he knew something,” Webb said. “Unfortunately, we can’t very well ask him.”
Erin stopped listening. Her mind was spinning as she realized what had happened. “Oh God,” she said.
“Erin?” Vic said. “You okay? Shit, Lieutenant, she’s gonna faint!”
“No, I’m not,” she said, but for a moment, she’d felt the donut and coffee trying to come back up. They’d arrested Paulie Bianchi on a drug charge. Then, just a few hours later, the NYPD had busted a significant heroin shipment meant for Bianchi’s people, and she’d told SNEU it was on a tip. Then, the following morning, who’d walked out of jail, free and clear? From a mobster’s perspective, it couldn’t have been clearer. Vinnie the Oil Man had interpreted events the only way he could, and arrived at the logical, if incorrect, conclusion. And he’d taken the action any good Mafia don would.
“You sure you’re okay?” Vic asked. “You looked like a goddamn ghost.”
“You sick, O’Reilly?” Webb asked, looking at her with concern.
“No, I’m fine,” she said. “It was Vinnie. He’s our guy.”
“No shit,” Vic said.
“Not that we’ll be able to prove it,” Webb added. “Damn, I hate these cases. Even when we know who had it done, we can’t nail them. Mob hits are the worst. Come on, Neshenko. Count yourself lucky, O’Reilly. We’re just going to go through the motions, I’m afraid.”
