Lloyd Corricelli - Ronan Marino 01 - Two Redheads & a Dead Blonde

by Lloyd Corricelli

  TWO REDHEADS &

  A DEAD BLONDE

  A Ronan Marino Mystery

  Lloyd L. Corricelli

  TWO REDHEADS & A DEAD BLONDE

  Sky Cop Studios, February 2014

  TWO REDHEADS & A DEAD BLONDE

  Copyright © 2006 Lloyd L. Corricelli

  ISBN-10: 149423694X

  ISBN-13: 978-1494236946

  Edited by Larry Arnold

  Cover and Interior Artwork by Alex Cormack – alexcormack.com

  Book Package Design by Don Mousseau - Digital Media Design

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book may not be reproduced in whole, or in part, by any means, without the written consent of the publisher.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination, or are fictitiously used. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Any trademarks referred to within this publication are the property of their respective trademark holders. None of these trademark holders are affiliated with Sky Cops Studios or our products.

  Sky Cop Studios is a subsidiary of Sons of Liberty Publishing, LLC

  Live well. It is the best revenge.

  Other books by

  Lloyd L. Corricelli

  Chasing Curves

  A Ronan Marino Mystery

  The Vicious Cycle

  A Ronan Marino Mystery

  Russians, Runaways

  & The Raven

  A Ronan Marino Mystery

  (Short story included in the compilation

  “River Muse: Tales of Lowell

  & The Merrimack Valley”)

  Three Chords & The Truth

  The Graphic Novel

  With artist Alex Cormack

  Coming Soon!

  ONE

  This wasn’t exactly how I pictured my unexpected early retirement…

  It was close to four in the morning, and the spring rains poured from the sky in buckets, obscuring my vision through the fogged windshield of my Jeep. The stormy conditions made it nearly impossible to see where I was going with my headlights turned off. I clicked the defroster on high and grabbed a Dunkin Donuts napkin from the passenger seat to quickly wipe away the haze. I’m an impatient bastard and didn’t want to wait for the defroster to do its job.

  If it weren’t for the glowing red taillights of the barely roadworthy Ford pickup I was following a hundred yards ahead, I might have wrapped myself around a tree. I made a mental note to look into buying a pair of night vision goggles; although in the heavy rain they probably wouldn’t have made a damn bit of difference.

  The same mental note had been made three weeks ago, but I kept forgetting it; distracted no doubt by all the truly meaningless pursuits in my life. I should make a note to get a better filing system, but I’d probably forget that too. At thirty-six, I was much too young to have all of these senior moments, as an old friend once called them. The forgetfulness couldn’t be due to my chronological age and it sometimes occurred to me the cause may have been from too many brain cells killed partying in my younger years.

  I’d been watching these guys for the past two weeks on a tip that, at the time, I thought I’d paid too much for. It turned out to be a hundred bucks well spent. What had first started with swastikas spray painted on local synagogues had turned into an arson that damaged the Greater Lowell Hebrew Center, nearly killing a group of kids enjoying a weekend sleepover. The local Jewish community was living in fear, afraid of what would be torched next.

  Lowell’s Chief of Detectives Gary Shea is an old friend and mentor and asked for some unofficial help. Overwhelmed with a backlog of cases and feeling the pressure from above, he hoped I’d be able to develop some suspects with the contacts I’d built throughout the Merrimack Valley. I was happy to lend a hand because cliché as it sounds; it’s one of the things I do best.

  So while the city cops, the FBI and Massachusetts State Police followed regulations and conducted their investigation by the book, I was able to break a few rules and identify likely suspects in under a week.

  After reluctantly paying one of my low-life snitches for that tip that I’d originally feared was going to be a waste of a good Ben Franklin, I was able to not only get three names but where they could be found most nights. My targets had allegedly bragged about their misdeeds and anti-Semitic views to the wrong person and finding them didn’t take much more than patience, the right source and a hundred measly bucks. I’d have to admit though that luck had also played a part but that’s how it often worked in my line of business.

  I planned to get up close and personal to see if these were indeed my guys and if I could find out where they planned to strike next if they were. Dressed in my best plaid flannel shirt, faded black AC/DC concert T-shirt, work boots, and worn out jeans, I met the trio at a dive called Bobbie V’s Sports Lounge down near Nuttings Lake in Billerica. I struck up a conversation about the Red Sox and eventually challenged them to a game of pool. None of them were any good at eight ball, but I let them take a couple of double sawbucks from me, which they promptly spent on a few grams of crystal from a dealer working the bar.

  Winning at pool and the meth seemed to loosen them up around me and I soon learned they had plans to burn down a temple over in Lowell. I pressed for more details, but they grew paranoid and turned on me like a pack of rabid dogs. I should have been more careful, but I have to admit, at times my mouth tends to work before my brain. It’s one of my less endearing character flaws, but certainly not the worst of the lot.

  I figured me against three stoned morons wasn’t much of a match, but when the rest of the tavern decided to join in just for the hell of it, I had to make a hasty retreat. Every good hero knows his limits, and I’d had my ass kicked too many times in my life to stand around and fight an entire bar.

  From that point on, the cops and I watched them from afar and waited for them to move into action so they could be rolled up. Surveillance work, as any good investigator will tell you, is the most boring part of the job, but the patience and perseverance it takes often pays handsome dividends.

  Earlier in the day, one of them had filled up four five gallon gas cans and after another night of drinking and probably doing more meth at Bobbie V’s, he and his co-conspirators appeared to have finally mustered the courage to put their plan into action. I hoped so, because I was damn tired of sitting in my Jeep listening to late night talk radio, and eating fast food.

  Since we didn’t know which temple they were going to hit, the task force had spread out across the city ready to respond and the job of following them fell to me with a second tail as insurance. In the inclement weather, the backup surveillance vehicle had taken a wrong turn and until they could catch up, I was on my own.

  I watched the pickup turn left, slow down then speed up and take another quick turn, possibly trying to shake a real or imagined tail. These punks were amateurs, and I doubted they could spot a first year criminal justice student in this weather. The battered truck suddenly sped up again and crossed the river at the University Ave. Bridge, turning right onto Pawtucket Street. Having grown up in this city, I knew its layout pretty well, and that turn made their probable destination the temple on Westford Street. The name escaped me, something like Monefury or close to that. I only knew it didn’t sound Jewish, at least to this Gentile boy.

  In my mind I ran through probable scenarios when the thought occurred to me that I might pass a police cruiser searching for a drunk leaving an after-hours bar. Driving wit
h my lights off would give them the perfect reason to do a traffic stop and make me recite the alphabet backwards. I doubted I could perform that test stone cold sober. Though I was working with the task force and they knew I was out here, an overzealous young patrolman might not take any chances and pull me over. I considered turning on my lights but worried about spooking my target. I wanted this over tonight, so I could get back to a normal sleep cycle with a nice warm body beside me.

  The pickup turned onto Wilder Street and my heart raced; it seemed I was right about their objective. I made a quick call to Shea to give him an update and told him to have the cavalry ready to move out as well as to update the second tail where we were. In the event they were a little slow getting there, I felt my waistband for my security blanket; a stainless steel Colt .45 Defender loaded with 230 grain hollow points.

  Most private investigators I knew only carried a snub nose .38 or at the most a 9mm, but experience had taught me there is nothing like a .45 for making sure whatever you shot stayed down. There was a time when I alternated hollow points with armor piercing rounds but the odds of having to take on a tank had rapidly diminished since I left the Air Force; not to mention that that type of round had long been illegal for civilians and there was no reason for me to cross that line.

  Ahead of me, the perps banged a hard right. The temple was about a block west, so I turned up the adjacent street, parked, and ran south on foot. If I was wrong then I’d have lost them, but I took comfort in knowing my instincts were usually right on. I’d learned recently in a very painful way to trust them absolutely.

  Taking the most direct route, I jumped over chain link fences and crossed through backyards. I set off a couple of motion detector floodlights and stirred a few barking dogs in the process. How did Batman always manage to hide in the shadows without creating such a ruckus? Maybe it was his cape. This inspired yet another mental note, one that probably should be forgotten.

  I came out across the street from the temple just as the Ford pulled up with the lights off. The temple was a large stone building with Montefiore chiseled in granite on a sign out front. I’d been real close with the name. The axis of morons climbed out, and I heard the unmistakable sound of empty beer cans clank to the pavement. I suspected Pabst Blue Ribbon; it was about their speed.

  All three wore baseball caps with the brims contorted over closely cropped hair, various colors of camouflage pants that no real military would ever be caught dead in, and black army boots. If anyone ever claimed there were no rednecks in Massachusetts, these three would totally destroy that theory.

  The tallest one, who called himself Buck, stayed back at the pickup and the other two, whom I’d nicknamed Dipshit and Bubba, grabbed two red plastic five-gallon gas cans each from the truck’s bed. The streetlight next to the temple was out, making the area especially black. Buck took something from behind the seat that even in the darkness I couldn’t mistake for anything but a shotgun. I reached for my phone to call Shea but found the case was empty. Somewhere between my Jeep and here, I’d lost it—probably hopping over a fence. Until Shea figured out that he wasn’t getting a call, I was on my own.

  “Hurry the fuck up,” Buck ordered.

  “Shut up, asshole. This shit’s heavy,” Dipshit said. They all spoke with thick Boston accents, and it struck me as funny considering their appearance looked more Alabama than Merrimack Valley.

  Bubba and Dipshit ran up the steps to the temple dragging the gas cans. For a couple of tough guys, they weren’t in very good shape. If I planned to act, this would probably have been a good time.

  “Don’t you guys think you’re a bit early?” I yelled across the street. “Temple’s not until Saturday.”

  “What the hell are you doing here?” Buck asked.

  “Kill that son of a bitch,” Bubba screamed. “He was there at Bobbie V’s.”

  “He must be a fucking cop,” Buck said as he stepped out from behind the truck and leveled the shotgun at me; a silver double-barreled Remington. “I’ll be damned if I’m going back to prison.”

  I hit the ground and rolled out of the way just before he blasted the windows out of some poor bastard’s Mazda parked on the street. In one fluid motion, I drew my .45 and double-tapped off two rounds. They exploded in Buck’s left thigh and he fell backwards screaming in pain, dropping the shotgun to the pavement.

  Bubba and Dipshit looked at each other for a brief moment then dropped their gas cans and ran. I kept my weapon aimed at Buck, moved across the street, and made sure he was no longer a threat. He lay on the ground bleeding profusely from his leg, nearly blacking out from the agony of two .45 slugs tearing through his flesh. A big pool of blood began to form under him, mixing with a rain puddle. The blood looked black in the darkness as it flowed to a nearby storm drain.

  I shoved my weapon into the waistband of my jeans, took off my belt and wrapped it around his leg at the groin as a tourniquet to try and control the bleeding. He might pull through if the cops arrived quickly enough and got him to the hospital.

  Picking up his shotgun, I pulled the remaining live round from the chamber, put it into my pocket, and threw the Remington into the bed of the truck. I didn’t want to take the chance that one of his buddies would circle back and use it against me. Off in the distance, I could hear the whine of police sirens approaching. They had no doubt gotten a few 911 calls reporting gunfire.

  I ran behind the temple and took chase towards the Lower Highlands neighborhood. I was never the fastest runner, but I was damned good at climbing over fences. That comes naturally when you grow up in the city.

  I spotted Bubba about twenty yards in front of me. He had stopped and was bent over, huffing and puffing. Lucky for me, outside of horseshoes and pool, these guys weren’t big on exercise. I was about to grab him, when from out of the shadows, Dipshit jumped me. He reached for my gun, but I drove my elbow into his ribs before he got his grimy hand on it. I rammed my knee into his flabby gut, knocking the wind out of him. He dropped to one knee, desperately trying to suck in air. I looked around, but Bubba was nowhere in sight.

  “You fucking Hebe lover,” Dipshit said between huffs of oxygen. I’d aptly named him.

  “What, you don’t like Jewish girls?” I asked, reminded of my fondness for the name Rachel.

  He didn’t hear me though; he only wanted to escape before the cops arrived. I could see it in his eyes, but it wasn’t going to happen. With a sudden adrenalin surge, he jumped to his feet and pulled a pocketknife with a six-inch blade from his pocket. He waved the knife at my face, hoping to intimidate me and make his escape. I recognized the blade as the kind sold in magazines as collector knives. They usually came with laser etchings on the blade and his had either General Robert E. Lee or Dale Earnhardt on it; I couldn’t tell the difference in the dark.

  “I’m going to cut you up, you little son of a bitch,” he yelled, still a bit out of breath.

  I could have simply pulled my gun and ended our little duel in the blink of an eye. It would have been very Indiana Jones of me, but I really didn’t want to shoot anyone else tonight and at this range, there’s no doubt the .45 would kill him almost instantly. We’d make this somewhat a fair fight, as fair as possible considering my opponent. Dipshit really had no clue what to do with the weapon other than maybe opening a Skoal can. A skilled knife fighter holds the blade inward along the forearm, making it tough for an adversary to block the blade and turn it against you. This bozo waved it around like it was a flashlight and he was directing rush hour traffic.

  The rain started coming down hard again, and I wished I had remembered to wear a hat to keep the water out of my eyes.

  “Are we going to stand here and dance all night, or are you going to do something with that knife?” I asked.

  Dipshit uttered some kind of primal death scream he’d seen on pro wrestling and made a few awkward stabbing motions that I easily blocked. After failing to stab me, he slashed at my head with the blade, lunging in desperation. That
didn’t work either, and Dipshit grew frustrated as the sounds of sirens grew louder.

  “Hold still, asshole!” he demanded.

  I generally don’t respond well to demands of any kind. It’s yet another character flaw of mine, but one I can live with, especially at times like this. Dipshit made a last-ditch downward slash but I caught his arm and knocked the knife out of his hand, flipping him over on his back hard onto the pavement in the process. The air rushed out of his chest as he bounced off the concrete like a rubber ball.

  Using his arm for leverage, I rolled him onto his stomach and twisted his wrist back while applying pressure to his shoulder. He struggled to catch his breath and tried to stand, but I pulled back on the arm. His body writhed in pain like a fish flopping on dry land, and he groaned out in pain.

  Right on cue, a pair of police cruisers arrived, their lights shining on us through the raindrops. An unmarked car pulled up, and Lieutenant Shea stepped out and shook his head.

  Two uniformed officers rushed over and took control of Dipshit. I let him go and ruffled the rain out of my hair.

  “Lt. Shea, meet Dipshit,” I said.

  He jabbed a long thick finger in my chest and yelled, “You’re the only dipshit I see. We found one of them nearly bleeding to death in front of the temple with a hole the size of my fist in his leg. Didn’t I tell you I didn’t want any shooting?”

  “Couldn’t help it, he fired first.”

  “I didn’t see a gun on him.”

  I took the shotgun shell from my pocket and flipped it to him. He looked at the buckshot round like I had handed him a cold turd.

  “You’ll find an empty Remington in the bed of the truck. There’s also a third guy who got away from me.”

  “Already in custody,” Shea reported. “Detective Garcia caught him circling back around. What happened to calling and letting us move on them?”

  “I dropped my phone,” I explained.

  Shea glared at me like I was back in his advanced forensics class and had forgotten another homework assignment. He grabbed my shoulder and squeezed it hard. For a man rapidly approaching sixty, his grip was surprisingly strong.