“To see if I’ll talk.”
“Talk about what?”
“About what I know.”
“Know about what?”
“See,” he said, stopping to collect his breath, “I might be inclined to tell you if every one of these conversations didn’t start out exactly the same way. So you better start dancing a little faster or you can get the fuck outta here and tell that sanctimonious hypocritical prick that his old pal still has his mouth clamped shut.”
After I finished telling Furlong the whole story of how I came to be sitting in his living room on the Sunday morning before Christmas, I said, “Was that dancing fast enough?”
“Yeah, Murphy, that was fast enough and I got a story to tell, but I don’t see how it’s gonna help you any.”
“Let’s hear it and we’ll see.”
“First thing to tell is that it was me who found the old guy on the St. Jean case, not Jimmy, but it was Jimmy who combed the girls that killed her out of the statements we got. He got all the press, all the recognition, not me.”
“But you got the bump and the commendation, just like he did.”
“Yeah, back then Jimmy was good that way. He told the brass that it was the both of us who worked the case. That it was both of us down the line, so that if he got the bump, I had to get it, too. But you see, he was already maneuvering, negotiating. I shoulda gotten the bump on my own merit, not because Jimmy Regan negotiated it for me. See what I mean? He made it so that I would owe him. He was good at that stuff. That’s Jimmy. He could see the angles in anything. He could see how to use it to climb the ladder. Me, I wasn’t interested in that and I didn’t have the blarney in me like him.”
I’d heard a lot of sour grapes in my life and this one-legged, barely breathing man had a lot to be bitter about, so I wasn’t buying Furlong’s story like it was gospel. I challenged him on it.
“So you’re saying that Jimmy Regan’s rep as a cop’s cop is bullshit.”
“No, Murphy, you’re missing the point. Jimmy was a great cop. I’ll never say different. All that stuff about him being the first through the door, it’s true. But Jimmy always had an eye out for how to turn things to his advantage, is all I’m saying.”
That rang true, but I needed more than this to make headway.
“Okay, Furlong, I get it. Jimmy stole some of your thunder and he had ambition, but you did get the bump.”
“Boy, there’s some stuff you don’t know about the great St. Jimmy, isn’t there?”
“That’s why I’m here. And before you go into it, I know he has a drinking problem.”
Furlong laughed again, but made certain to not lose it the way he had before. “A drinking problem! That’s like saying a fish kind of likes water, as if he could take it or leave it.” His face rearranged itself into an all-out sneer. “Hell, when we were on that task force together . . .” He paused purposely to see my reaction. He must’ve gotten the reaction he was looking for. “That’s right, Gus, Jimmy and me were on that task force together, but I bet you didn’t see his name mentioned anywhere in them reports you were reading, huh?”
“No.”
“Yeah, well, we were on that task force, partnered up together, too.” The sneer on his face vanished, replaced by something that was wistful and happily so. “We stepped in shit, the two of us. There were all the girls you could handle and drugs and drug money up the wazoo. And did I mention there were girls? Christ, now I can’t even get fat old Fernand to give me a second look. Ain’t I a catch?”
I ignored his riff of self-pity. “You’re telling me that Jimmy Regan took drug money.”
“No, not St. Jimmy. I’m not saying he wasn’t tempted, but he didn’t take it. He wouldn’t. No, it was me. I took the money,” he said without any hesitation. “But it wasn’t like Jimmy was bathing in holy fucking water, either. He was hooked up with one of the girls pretty steep.”
“With a pro?”
The sneer returned to his face as he nodded. “Jimmy was drinking heavy in those days. You can say what you want about him, but he had an eye for beauty, did Jimmy Regan. He fell hard for her. Hard with a big H. That wasn’t just about humping neither, that relationship. It was about true love, at least for him. I think Jimmy was drinking so much because he was actually thinking about leaving Kathleen and his girls for her.”
I repeated, “Was she a pro?”
“She was kind of the boss, the madam of a massage parlor in Wyandanch. Fucking gorgeous black chick with white features, kinda like Halie Berry’s younger, almost-as-good-looking sister. She ran the girls, but we knew she was connected to the drug trade. It was her who tried buying us off, and she didn’t make that kind of cash from having ten girls hooking and kicking up to her.”
“Okay, Furlong, I get that you resent Regan stealing your thunder on the St. Jean case. But I don’t see what the thing is with the task force. Guys hook up. They do stupid things when it comes to women, really stupid things, but it was you who took the money. It was you who pissed on the shield by warning people about raids, putting other cops in danger.”
He laughed again, but cruelly. “I’m not making excuses for what I did and I’ve paid for it plenty, but I wasn’t the only one who got jammed up. Jimmy got caught, too, not for taking money. His woman, a convicted felon, mind you, got pulled over by Highway Patrol in our car with a loaded gun under her seat, Jimmy’s gun. And there was a few grams of coke on her, too. Maybe it wasn’t as bad as what I did, but you don’t just walk away from that with your ass intact and become chief of the department.”
“Fuck.”
“That’s right, Gus. You seem like a smart man and a good cop. I think you can see where this is going.”
“He gave you up, didn’t he?”
Furlong nodded, tears streaming down his face. I let him cry and gave him a few minutes until he was ready to start talking again.
“He rolled on me. I deserved it. Like you said, I pissed on the shield, but Jimmy got away clean and look at him now. That ain’t right. I’m going to die soon and—”
“So why keep quiet for all these years?”
“Because part of the deal he made was to keep me out of jail. The DA confirmed it for me. She said that Jimmy insisted that jail time for me was a deal breaker. Imagine that, even in the middle of getting jammed up, that cocksucker found a way to come out looking like he was throwing himself on the sword for me. And I’ve kept it quiet because he’s been giving me money all these years. When you’re in the position I’m in, you take the money and shut your mouth.”
“Why tell me?”
“Because I needed to tell someone before I died. Someone else had to know. But here’s the thing,” he said, “I don’t see how this helps you. I got jammed up in late ’93, early ’94. Jimmy cut off his relationship with his woman after she got arrested. He went to the honor farm to dry out. When he got off the farm, he was assigned to the Fourth Precinct detective squad and then Homicide. As far as I know, he’s never strayed since. See, by the time he got off the farm, Kathleen, that’s his wife, had their third girl. His girls mean everything to Jimmy. He could be a tough motherfucker and a backstabbing son of a bitch, but he doted on his girls. They are his pride and joy. I think the idea that he once risked losing them has kept him in line all these years.”
I was curious. “How do you know so much about him?”
“He used to come see me a few times a year. We’d talk. Jimmy has his failings, but he has guilt, too. Haunts the ever-living shit out of him, what he did to me. I used to take some comfort in that, but not anymore. Death is too close for that.”
“You said he used to come visit. Not anymore? How long has it been?”
“A year. Maybe a year and a half, but the money’s still coming in.”
“Would it surprise you to know he’s drinking again?”
He shrugged. “O
nce a drunk . . . Still, what happened between us was twenty years ago. None of it has anything to do with your homicides.”
“What if someone was blackmailing him with this?” I said.
“Jimmy would quietly resign and the cops would deny it. Too many people have too much to lose to let themselves get all that egg on their faces. If those records even exist anymore, I bet they are sealed as sealed can be.”
“I guess you’re right, Furlong,” I admitted, but reluctantly.
We said a few more things to each other about the weather and the raccoons, about his proximity to the rez and about getting his siding fixed up. I stuck my head into the laundry room and said so long to Fernand. But on my way out, I went back in the living room.
“What was the girlfriend’s name?”
Furlong looked confused.
“The woman Jimmy was mixed up with back then in ’94?”
“Ilana. Ilana Little or something like that.” He shrugged and made a face. “I just called her Ilana. She was some piece of ass.”
Outside, the sun was brilliant and the glare off the snow hurt my eyes. I thought about taking a ride over to the rez and picking up some cigarettes for Bill. Then I thought better of it, not because I was a crusader against smoking. At Bill’s age, he wasn’t going to quit unless it was his idea. No, I didn’t buy him cigarettes because I had to figure out how to talk to Bill now that I knew some of Jimmy Regan’s secrets. Furlong was right. I couldn’t see how Jimmy’s secrets, as dirty as they might be, had anything to do with the Delcamino murders. Still, given the way he had acted last night, the way he had sought me out to plead his innocence, the way he had gotten four drinks down his belly in such short order, let me know Jimmy Regan was involved somehow. I couldn’t help but remember something Furlong has said. Jimmy has guilt.
52
(MONDAY MORNING)
I’d spent the remainder of my Sunday back at the Paragon, watching football games. I’d also spent a lot of time thinking things through. When Slava came in for his shift, we worked through a plan to give Milt Paxson a little payback for his putting Martino onto me. I wasn’t going to let his bullshit pass, but that wasn’t really the point. I didn’t believe Jimmy Regan for a second about how Paxson, an inept putz with a nasty streak, was the mastermind behind arranging my Friday night adventures. And say what you will about Pete McCann, he had even less respect for Paxson than I did. There was no way Pete would have taken part in any plan that Paxson cooked up. That’s how I knew Jimmy Regan was full of shit. While I didn’t believe Regan, I found it interesting that he was willing to let Paxson take the fall and that Paxson was willing to take it. That said to me that Paxson might know something, maybe something useful. Or not. But with Slava’s help, I meant to find out. There had to be a connection between Jimmy Regan and the Delcaminos. There had to be. I was hoping that Paxson could supply the link.
If there was any truth to what Regan had promised me on Saturday during his visit with Bill, I would no longer be persona non grata with the SCPD and I’d get cooperation when I asked for it. So the first thing I did after showering was to put Regan’s word to the test by calling Alvaro Peña.
“Peña.”
“It’s me, Alvaro, Mr. Radioactive.”
“Not anymore, jefe. I don’t know how you did it, but it seems like the Pope’s given you special dispensation or something like that. Word filtered down from on high yesterday that if you wanted your lily-white Irish ass to get kissed, I was to pucker up my sweet Dominican lips and do my duty.”
“I never much cared for ass kissers, Alvaro.”
“Good thing, because I would have put in my fucking papers. So what else can I do for you?”
“Ilana Little, that name mean anything to you?”
“Should it?” he asked, the sound of his fingers tapping at a keyboard came through the phone.
“Not necessarily.”
“How do you spell that?”
“Not sure,” I said. “I-l-a-n-a, I guess, and Little the way you spell ‘little.’”
“Sorry, my man. Nada. Any reason she should be in the system?”
“Convicted felon, so I’m told. She also ran a massage parlor in Wyandanch in the ’90s. Do me a solid and keep checking. Ask around. She was right in the middle of some trouble with a drug/vice task force in ’94. Try different spellings, okay? My source is good.”
“No problemo. I can do that. And, jefe . . .”
“Yeah?”
“Put in a good word with the Pope for me.”
“Next time I see him, Alvaro, I’ll make sure to kiss the ring once extra for you.”
“Can’t ask for more than that.”
“You ever hear of a dealer, a guy goes by the name of Lazy Eye or Lamar English?”
There was a sudden chill in the air and a frosty silence from Alvaro’s end of the phone. All of his happy cooperative chatter came to an abrupt stop.
“Uh-uh. No way, Gus,” Peña said at last, his voice all business. “We can’t be going there and you can’t be going anywhere near him.”
I tried to keep the mood light. “Why not? I thought word came down about how I was reborn a good guy, one you could talk to.”
“If I tell you why I can’t discuss this with you, my man, it will defeat the purpose of me not discussing it with you. You understand me now?”
“I believe I do,” I said. “Consider it off the table.”
“Done. Anything else?”
“No, Alvaro, thanks. That should do me.”
We wished each other a good day, but I could tell I’d walked into a minefield. A minefield I wasn’t supposed to step into or even know existed. I’d gotten good at spotting the signs. After John died, there were mines everywhere and you couldn’t breathe without setting one off. There wasn’t a safe subject or a word or facial expression or sigh that didn’t explode in all our faces. So I knew.
There were only two reasons Alvaro could have reacted the way he did. Either Lazy Eye was the target of an investigation, or he was working for the department. I still wasn’t sure that got me any closer to making sense of the jumble of facts, but it didn’t get me any further away. That was something. I was feeling pretty good about that until the phone rang in my hand.
“It’s not the gun,” a familiar voice blurted out before I could say hello. It was Roussis.
“What?”
“The gun we seized from Frankie Tacos’ desk.”
“Yeah.”
“It’s the same type of gun that killed Tommy Delcamino, but it’s not the gun. Bullets don’t match.”
“Shit!”
“You can say that again.”
“Shit. So,” I asked, “are you back to square one?”
“Pretty much.”
“Listen, Al, I think we need to talk in person again.”
“Oh yeah, why’s that? You gonna send me on another wild-goose chase, tell me maybe that it was Jimmy fucking Hoffa.”
“Funny you should use that term ‘goose chase.’”
“What’s so funny? Because I’m not laughing.”
“Meet me for lunch.”
“Where?”
“You pick,” I said. “It’s on me.”
“You know that Mexican place in the shopping center in Hauppauge near the diner and the library?”
“Mazatlan?”
“One o’clock?”
“One.”
I didn’t know what was going to come of what I was about to do, but I figured it was about time to shake things up a little and to see what happened.
53
(MONDAY AFTERNOON)
For a slim, athletic guy, Al Roussis could eat. He had a burrito the size of a football topped by a layer of melted cheese, sour cream, guacamole, and chipotle salsa with sides of black beans and rice. I got nauseous just listening to him o
rder. I had a chicken salad that I didn’t finish because I was too busy watching him inhale his food. I think I began the conversation just to distract myself.
“The other day,” I said, “when we met in Brady Park.”
He stopped chewing long enough to say, “What about it?”
“You talked to me about the Alison St. Jean murder case.”
His shoulders slumped, his expression sad. “Terrible.”
“Very, but I wanted you to know I got your message.”
He tilted his head at me as if he didn’t understand the words I was saying. “Message?”
“Yeah, the message.”
“What message?”
Christ, he was going to play dumb, I thought. I understood that he had to protect himself, that if Jimmy Regan could trace anything back to him, he would be screwed. But it was just the two of us alone at a table in an empty Mexican restaurant in Hauppauge. I think the closest English speakers were four stores over in the Four Sisters burger joint.
“Come on, Al. There’s no one here to hide from. No need to play dumb. I’m not gonna tell Regan.”
“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about, Gus. I met you over there because I was at the Fourth interviewing somebody on another case, and I talked about the case because it haunts me.”
“So you didn’t meet me there and talk about the St. Jean case to drop hints about Jimmy Regan and Neil Furlong?”
“Neil who?”
“You’re kidding, right?”
He shook his head, stood up. “You want more soda? I’m getting some.”
“No, thanks.”
As Al Roussis walked over to the soda machine, I thought I was losing my mind. He had to have meant for me to look into the St. Jean case. He had to.
“So what’s this crap about Chief Regan?” he asked, settling back down in his seat. “What’s Jimmy Regan and this Neil what’s his name got to do with Alison St. Jean?”
“Furlong. Neil Furlong.”
“Sorry, Gus, never heard of him.”
Where It Hurts Page 26
