Cruel Mercy

by David Mark

  McAvoy scratches at his beard. Gray dust spirals down like snow.

  “There was a fight,” says Alto. “An underground boxing match between Helden and Byki. High stakes, big purse.”

  McAvoy starts to shake his head, refusing to believe Brishen Ayres would allow his protégé to involve himself in the brutality of the underground circuit. Then he stops himself, knowing his own preconceptions to be self-erected barriers between himself and the truth.

  “It went the distance,” says Alto. “It wasn’t as open-and-shut as everybody expected. After fifteen rounds the crowd started getting bored. There were complaints. The organizers decided to spice things up. They told Ayres his man had to take the gloves off. It was going to be bare-knuckle. Ayres said no, but Helden didn’t want to let his coach down and he pulled the gloves off. Went after Byki like a madman. Some of the crowd started getting involved. That’s when Valentine stepped in.”

  McAvoy looks at the tabletop. The drips of spilled drink look at him like a melted face, ghoulish and dead-eyed.

  “Valentine laid out two of the Chechen boys in the crowd. The whole thing broke down. Ayres, Helden, and Valentine had to run for their fucking lives.”

  McAvoy can picture it. Can scent the whole damn scene, with its sweat and blood and smelling salts, its reek of male skin and beer.

  “Zav watched it all,” says Alto. “They’d enjoyed every moment of it, even if there was no clear winner. There were no plans to take out Ayres. Helden had fought well.”

  “Until . . . ?”

  Alto gives a halfhearted laugh. “Valentine came back a while later. Walked straight in, bold as you like. He was bleeding from the mouth. He was high on something. And he demanded the prize money.”

  McAvoy feels his heart beat faster, as though it is swelling in his chest. He can picture his brother-in-law so clearly. Wishes he could not.

  “One of the Russian captains told Valentine he admired him for having balls of solid rock, but warned him he had better fuck off. Valentine didn’t do as he was told. He pulled a gun.”

  “A gun? Where did he get a gun?”

  “Zav claims that he must have taken it from one of the Chechens during the bout. Either way, he put his gun to the head of one of the men present and threatened to blow his brains out if he wasn’t paid.”

  “Did they care?” asks McAvoy, shocked.

  “They wouldn’t have, but the guy he happened to be threatening was Chebworz Khamzateyev,” says Alto resignedly.

  McAvoy looks blank. “I’m sorry . . .”

  “His father is about as high up in the Obshchina as you can get.”

  “The what?”

  “The fucking Chechen Mafia,” says Alto testily. “He’s important, okay? He’s the son of an important man and he’s pretty ruthless himself. And Valentine put a gun to his head.”

  “Christ.”

  “Christ indeed. These fucking Irish! They’re just not scared.”

  “Ronnie, tell me the rest.”

  “Valentine must have realized he was onto something because the mobsters dropped their guns. Zav saw his captain throw an envelope of money at Valentine’s feet. But Chebworz wasn’t frightened of him. Called him an Irish pussy. Told him to shoot him if he had the balls. Valentine slapped him in the mouth with the gun. He picked up the money and ran.”

  McAvoy realizes he is bouncing on the balls of his feet beneath the table. He feels as though he is watching the whole thing unfold before him.

  “And?”

  “They went after him,” says Alto. “Chebworz in the lead, threatening all sorts of things. That’s when Brishen and Shay Helden arrived.”

  McAvoy puts his head in his hands.

  “Zav saw them shouting for Valentine to jump in the car. Chebworz shot him.”

  “Shot Val?”

  “Clipped him, Zav says. Valentine fell and Chebworz’s men grabbed him. So Brishen drove straight at them. Chebworz took the brunt of it. Helden jumped out, grabbed Chebworz, and threw him in the car. Valentine made a run for it, but then the bullets started flying and Brishen drove out of there like the tailpipe was on fire.”

  “With Chebworz in the car?”

  Alto nods. “It got messy very quickly. The Chechens picked up Valentine within the hour, limping and bleeding and still threatening them with all kinds of hell.”

  “And the others?”

  “The Chechens rallied the troops. They were all set to unleash unholy hell on the Irishmen. Then Brishen got in touch with his contact—the man who had set up the fight. He told him to get the message to the Chechens that they wanted Valentine returned unharmed and all the money he was owed.”

  “And what did the Chechens say?”

  “They said yes. Culturally, they admire that kind of thing, if you’ll forgive the generalization.”

  “So what happened?”

  “They arranged a meet that same night. Neutral place in the Village. The Chechens showed, the Irishmen didn’t.”

  “This was the evening of the shootings? The night Shay died?”

  “By the time they were due to meet the Chechens, we know for certain that Brishen and Shay were already miles upstate, being shot to pieces by whoever did this to them.”

  McAvoy is breathing heavily. He gives in to a fit of coughing as he aggravates his wounded throat.

  “Next morning, Chebworz phoned his father from a rest stop about eight miles from where all this shit went down. He’d got himself free. He demanded they come and pick him up. He’d been thrown in the trunk and driven upstate. Been gagged and tied. Next thing, he’s hearing curses and shots and the trunk is thrown open by a young Italian male who must have been Luca Savoca. From the way he tells it, the Italians had no fucking clue he was there. Only found him because they were looking for a tire iron. Luca dragged him out on some forest road. Blackness and snow and trees and two Italians pointing guns in his face. Brishen and Shay were on their knees, hands behind their backs, battered and bleeding. Brishen’s face was a mess—a hole where his nose should be. Chebworz saw it all. When they pulled the gag free, he started cursing the Italians—telling them he was important and that if this was a setup, there would be war. Luca just laughed. Started hitting him. Showed him the blade he had used on the bleeding Irishmen. It broke down. Shay ran. Chebworz ran, too. Shots were fired. They went after him. He got the upper hand and rammed Luca onto a tree. Left the other guy bleeding. Then he ran. Ran until he reached a rest stop and called his men.”

  “And the people he left behind?” asks McAvoy softly.

  “The older Italian must have tidied up as best he could,” says Alto.

  McAvoy takes a moment to digest it all. “So they still have him. Valentine.”

  “If they haven’t cut off his hands, face, and feet and dumped him in the river,” says Alto, who suddenly looks apologetic. “That’s their MO. That’s what they do.”

  “But they could still have him,” says McAvoy, hardly moving his jaw.

  “Zav says that as of last night, Valentine was still alive, but who knows what’s happened since then. It’s clear that whatever relationship was blossoming between the Chechens and the Italians, something has gone horribly wrong.”

  “How much can we trust what your witness is saying? Maybe the whole thing was a setup. If Brishen was short of money, they could have found a way to lure the Italians to the middle of nowhere and then Cheb could have killed them. Or Brishen took some money from the Italians to grab Chebworz. The Irishmen may just have been collateral damage.” He locks his jaw. “Why won’t people just stop lying?”

  Alto smiles contritely. “Either way, we no longer have an informant in the organization. The feds may have moles in the Italian Mob, but if they do, they’re not sharing that information with NYPD. This whole thing will be bundled up into an organized crime investigation and you and I w
ill have nothing more to do with it. If we raid Molony’s place, we may find nothing but a lot of dust and some name tags.”

  “And Valentine . . .” protests McAvoy.

  “Could be anywhere,” says Alto kindly. “Or nowhere. All we have is the word of one Chechen soldier who will do and say anything to save his own life.”

  McAvoy rocks in his chair, trying to find the words to express himself. His face flushes. “Where was the fight?” he asks, and his accent becomes more pronounced. He sounds like a Scottish chieftain wanting to know who raided his clan’s land. “Where does Chebworz hang out? All we have to do is put some pressure on him. They have no need for Valentine. If we could guarantee there would be no prosecution—”

  Alto gives a harsh laugh. “No prosecution? This is the Chechen Mob. They’re not scared of anything. There’s no benefit to them admitting they’ve got him. There’s nothing in it for them.”

  McAvoy looks long and hard at Alto.

  “You’ve already helped me a lot,” says McAvoy. “I can’t ask you for any more. So I won’t ask you to tell me where I should go to find Chebworz. I’ll just blunder around, asking people who look vaguely Russian, and eventually, somebody will tell somebody else and I’m sure they’ll come and find me. That way, your conscience will be clear.”

  Alto shakes his head. “Don’t be stupid.”

  “It’s not stupid. There are a dozen ways to get an address. My colleagues at home have a special relationship with some of your colleagues. So don’t trouble yourself.”

  Alto looks pained. “You can’t just go and ask them if they’ve killed him.”

  McAvoy finds himself smiling, even as his heart races and he feels fear wrap around his insides. “He’s my wife’s brother,” says McAvoy. “He’s why I’m here. Everything else is none of my business, however much I feel the urge to make it so. If there’s a chance of taking him home with me, I’ll take it.”

  “They’ll kill you,” says Alto flatly.

  “Why? I’m no threat. I don’t want to arrest anybody. I just want to clear up a misunderstanding.”

  Alto looks at his glass, clearly wishing it was full to the brim with something that would pitch him into a coma.

  “What about Molony?” says Alto. “Everything we saw there this afternoon. Valentine’s tooth. This is so much bigger than a fight gone wrong.”

  “Yes, it is,” says McAvoy. “And you can investigate all of it. I’ll help, if you want me to. But right now, Valentine is what matters. In fact, no, my wife is what matters. Valentine is an angry little rat without a redeeming feature, but bringing him home will make Roisin happy, and that’s all I bloody live for, so that’s what I’m going to try and do.”

  Alto takes a notebook from his pocket and scribbles an address. “Don’t do it,” he says, standing up and looking at McAvoy as if he is saying good-bye to a prisoner. “There are better ways.”

  McAvoy folds the paper and puts it in his pocket.

  “The apartment,” he says. “Molony’s. There’s enough to pick him up. Somebody shot Brishen and Shay. Whether any of it is to do with Molony is something I can’t answer, but I don’t think we’d be particularly good police officers if we didn’t ask questions about the names, the ashes, and his link to Brishen. My boss reckons you’re using me. I hope not. Either way, I can’t just wash my hands of all this blood and dirt. Neither can you.”

  Alto gives a curt nod. He leaves without another word. As the door bangs behind him, another flurry of shredded angel wings fills the bar.

  McAvoy unfolds the piece of paper. Gives the tiniest nod. He knows, for a fraction of a second, who he is and what he is for.

  A minute later, he leaves the warm embrace of the Pink Pug and steps into blackness and snow, yellow lights and swirling trash.

  He turns to face the gale, feeling the last of the ash and bone lift from his skin to tumble away upon the screeching wind.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Claudio stands by the large windows of Molony’s living room and looks out on the city. He is not a New Yorker by birth but it is a vista in which he feels an odd kind of pride. There is certainly a beauty to it. Claudio has always preferred paintings and photographs of natural scenes to anything man-made. He likes rolling fields and woodlands, moonlit lakes and flower meadows. But in this moment, the view beyond the glass seems to be an equally organic thing. This city has grown like mold. It is the vision of endless different planners, architects, politicians, and developers, the product of a billion warring desires. It has been fettered by bureaucracy and chiseled into unexpected shapes by artless hands. Its buildings have grown, forestlike, from tiny acorns of inspiration and then been felled by violence, poverty, and hate. And yet it is beautiful, viewed from afar. Up close, he knows the city to be different. Its inhabitants are ticks buried deep in the fetid skin of a half-rotten dog, growing fat on its blood until they risk bursting. He counts himself among their number. He wishes this view belonged to him, and not to the pitiful specimen who first wriggled into his life three decades ago, and with whom he has never exchanged a word.

  Claudio did not need to intimidate or charm the pleasant lady at the nearby bodega. He gained entry into Molony’s apartment building the old-fashioned way. He picked the lock on the subterranean garage and made his way to the ground floor along a gray, sloping hallway, holding his gun in his right hand and his shoes in his left. He did as McAvoy and Alto had done, checking the empty apartments and forming his own conclusions about the scam being perpetrated by the landlord. And then he reached the red door. He picked the lock in eight seconds. Allowed himself a whistle of appreciation at the luxurious living space enjoyed by the lawyer. Then he got to work. He has checked the entire apartment for surveillance equipment and hidden cameras, and been mildly gratified to discover motion sensors in the living room and kitchen. He idly wondered who was monitoring the alarm, and how long he had before it caused him difficulties. An hour later, he has begun to feel secure. Nobody is coming. Whoever Molony is paying for security should offer the schmuck his money back.

  He has surprised himself with his actions. When he was finished with the Chechen, he should have telephoned his employer and told him that the whole thing had been a clusterfuck. Wrong place, wrong time. Cheb might have killed Luca Savoca, but what was the poor bastard supposed to have done? There was no need to go to war. No need to disturb the peace. Instead, Claudio is indulging himself. It was the Chechen who told him what it was that the owner of this apartment had been doing for Pugliesca for so many years. He was soon going to be doing it for the Chechens, too, and in return, Pugliesca was going to get new territory and a new line of supply on his heroin business. In payment, they wanted his system for cleaning up their millions. Claudio is unsure how much of the information has been passed on to the other New York crime families. Nor does he know why it was that he was sent into the woods in the middle of the night to go and kill two Irishmen. A job for New York—that’s what he’d been told. That order could only have come from Pugliesca or Savoca. And Luca hadn’t mentioned his father as they plotted how to spring the trap. If Pugliesca wanted the Irishmen dead, he would need a good reason. Claudio knows the old man and knows that money and power are his favorite mistresses. Could the Irishmen be fucking with his lucrative new deal, perhaps? A deal to which Molony was central? The more Claudio considered it, the more he began to feel that Molony held the answers. He wants to poke around a little. Wants to burrow beneath the veneer and see how many answers would spill out if he were to split the lawyer open. He is following his initiative, even as he knows the risks. If this man is important to Pugliesca, Claudio’s presence here is a grave mistake. He just can’t seem to persuade himself to leave without knowing more.

  The venetian blinds protest a little as Claudio adjusts them. There is a tiny discoloration upon their surface, as though they have never been opened, and Claudio wonders what kind of man would live in a p
lace like this and not enjoy the view.

  As he watches the snow blow like so much ripped tissue across the rooftops of Manhattan, Claudio finds himself overcome by memory. He has felt this way all day. He is not a man who feels much in the way of regret. He thinks of guilt as an indulgence. He has made his confessions and pays a handsome contribution to his neighborhood church in Philly each year as recompense for any misdeed he felt uncomfortable about sharing with his confessor. He is not haunted by the faces of men he has killed. But were he to admit to feeling the presence of any of the men he has dispatched, Sal Pugliesca’s face would fill his mind.

  Claudio has a sudden memory of a basement room in Brooklyn. He and Sal, dressed to the nines in wing tips and gleaming suits. He remembers the tiny sting of the needle as it punctured his skin, the acrid smell as the picture of the saint curled to ash before him. Remembers the slaps to his back and the billfolds being stuffed in his pocket. They were two of the youngest men ever to be made by the Mob. Sure, Sal’s father had greased the wheels for his boy, but there was no arguing that he was a good earner. He was loyal and fearless. Claudio was there on merit, too. He already had three hits on his record and had done his brief stint in Rikers like a stand-up guy. He was a good earner and he respected the hierarchy. He was good at keeping his mouth shut. He deserved this. Deserved his moment in the sun. Even smiled through it as the older guys busted his balls for being a member of the Philly outfit. “A weak-ass crew,” they called it, and Claudio did not point out how much more money his “crew” was bringing to the table than the New York family to which they were affiliated.

  It was a damn awful winter, Claudio recalls. Snow in Miami, slush in Alaska, as if the world had turned on its head. The drifts were six feet deep in Buffalo. The Salvation Army had volunteers clambering over snowdrifts to bring groceries to people who couldn’t open their front doors for the ice around the frames. He and Sal spent the night in a pizzeria, crammed in with dozens of other New Yorkers who warmed themselves on the wood-fired ovens and ate free slices like they were refugees from a war. The Dummy was there, too, looking at Sal with those big baby eyes. He was like a dog that followed his master. Occasionally, Sal would turn and ask him if he was okay, or check if he was warm enough or wanted something else to eat. The Dummy would look down and shake his head, and it seemed like it was all Sal could do not to tickle him behind the ear. Claudio had been too embarrassed to acknowledge the presence of the pale-skinned mute who followed them from bar to bar as they celebrated their new status as made men. He just trudged behind them through the snow, uncomplaining, stepping in the footsteps left by the man who called him “brother.”