by David Nees
“But it seems as though Dan has come back,” Mike said.
“What makes you say that?” Tommy asked.
Mike recited the events that took place over the three weeks that they had been in Atlanta.
“So, you don’t have any hard evidence, but you think it’s Dan because of some things he said six months ago while grieving for his wife?” Doreen said.
Mike sighed and hunched over the table. “Look, we all know what’s going on here. Dan vowed revenge and now we have someone shooting a guy in front of Vincent’s restaurant, this string of robberies with shootings involved, a hold up of a card game, a shootout at a warehouse owned by Vincent that no one can explain, a dead animal left at Vincent’s home and a drive-by shoot up of his house. It’s pretty clear someone is after Vincent and his crew. It’s also pretty clear that someone is probably Dan.”
“That’s a nice recitation, but you’re repeating yourself. It still starts with a suspect premise,” Doreen said.
“The bottom line is I can’t contact Dan, but if he contacts me, what are you offering?” Tommy asked.
“Dan has no way out. You can see that. He’s got the mob after him, the NYPD and now the FBI. I’d like to try to save him.”
“That’s noble of you, but what do you mean by ‘saving him’?” Tommy asked.
“I’d like to keep him alive first of all. Then I’d like to get him a light sentence for helping us nail some of the mob. Remember, he’s killed people, even if they are mobsters.”
“That doesn’t sound very enticing,” Doreen said.
“Maybe not, but it’s the best he can hope for since he went down this road.”
“I’m not sure you have the horsepower to pull off what you propose,” Doreen responded.
“I have more than you know. But the key point is I’m his only hope to get out of this alive and with some life left beyond jail.”
“If it’s Dan who’s doing this,” Tommy interjected.
Mike looked at Tommy and then turned his gaze to Doreen. “You can keep up the charade, but be sure to let Dan know about my offer. I’m his best option. We can do this on his timing and on his conditions, but he needs to talk to me.” He paused to sip his coffee. “I don’t know how long you’re planning to staying down here, but the mob is going to find out where you are at some point. If you come back, get in touch with me, and I’ll make sure you’re protected from them. It’s part of the deal.”
After Mike left, Tommy and Doreen continued to talk about his offer.
“We should call Dan,” Tommy said.
“Maybe,” she replied. “But I don’t trust this guy. I don’t think he can get Dan out of the mess he’s in.”
“Still, he may be right that he’s his only hope.”
“Maybe.”
Chapter 35
Dan lay in a ditch five hundred yards from Vincent’s driveway in a large cleared area that would soon have new houses going up on it. He was covered with a camouflage net, blending him in with the bare dirt. His Remington 700 lay nestled in a notch on the rim of the ditch. The rifle’s magazine was loaded with sub-sonic rounds. It was Sunday morning. He had been there since before dawn. His car was parked two hundred yards away along a street with partially completed houses. Innocuous and beat up, it looked like it had been left there by a construction worker over the weekend.
He had his escape route planned. He would crawl back along the ditch for fifty yards. Then, using the cover of some piles of dirt, he would dash back to another ditch leading to a culvert running under a road. After crawling through the culvert, he would emerge, now shielded from Vincent’s house, to the road where his car was parked and slowly drive away. This new subdivision did not connect to Vincent’s street, so he had a clear exit once reaching the car.
Now he waited. By 10:30 he began to wonder if anyone was coming out, but then the garage door opened and a Cadillac Escalade backed out of the garage and down the driveway towards the gate which was opening. When the SUV reached the road, Dan fired a round into the back tire and, quickly working the bolt action, fired another into the other rear tire. With the suppressor and using sub-sonic rounds, you couldn’t hear the shots. The SUV stopped. The driver could tell something was wrong but didn’t know what had happened.
Sheila opened the driver’s door. Dan smiled at this opportunity. As she went around to the back to look at the tires, he sent a round into the driver’s side window. When the window shattered, Sheila looked up and screamed. Then she turned and ran back up the driveway. Dan ejected the magazine and inserted another one loaded with incendiary rounds. He fired three shots into the back of the Escalade. The rounds exploded with intense heat—five thousand degrees upon impact. By the third round the gas tank exploded in fire, engulfing the rear end of the SUV. Satisfied, Dan gathered his spent shells and started crawling back to his car.
Hearing his wife’s screams, Vincent came to the front door. He stared in shock as the Escalade erupted in flames. “What the hell?” he shouted as she came running up the driveway. He grabbed his wife, pulled her back inside and closed the door.
“Someone’s trying to kill me!” she shouted. “They’re shooting at me, I almost got killed! We’re all going to get killed!” She kept shouting and sobbing hysterically. Vincent held her with one arm and tried to calm her down while he called Tony with his free hand.
“Get yourself and some of the guys out to my house immediately. Sheila’s Cadillac just got shot up.”
Just then another car came down the road and slowed as it went by the burning Escalade. The driver pulled out his cell phone, probably to call 9-1-1. Within five minutes sirens could be heard.
“Shit. This is not what I need,” Vincent growled. He knew the fire truck would lead to the cops when they saw bullet holes in the car.
“Not what you need,” Sheila screamed at her husband. “What about me? I nearly got killed. Who is shooting at us? First the dead animal, then shooting up the house, and now this? What’s going on?” She pounded on Vincent’s chest with each question. By then Tiffany and Amber had come downstairs.
“What’s wrong? Mom, why are you crying?” Tiffany asked.
“Someone tried to kill me. In our driveway!” She started crying again.
“Oh, Mom!” Amber grabbed her mother. Both girls began to cry. Soon Vincent was surrounded by a cacophony of sobbing females.
Marty and Jimmy got to Vincent’s house after the fire was put out but before Mike Warner arrived.
“Did anyone order a copter to search the area?” Mike asked Marty when he arrived.
“Yeah. The firemen found the bullet holes and showed them to the patrolman when he arrived. He called it in. The copter probably came too late. They didn’t see anything suspicious.”
Mike went over to the burned Escalade; two shots to the tires, one to the driver’s side window and two or more to the rear to ignite the gas tank. “The ones in the rear must have been incendiary rounds.”
“Yeah,” Marty responded. “The wife says she didn’t hear anything except the window shattering. Then she ran to the house. She could hear some loud cracks when she got to the front door.”
“Shots? Why didn’t she hear anything before that?” Jimmy asked.
“Maybe the guy had a suppressed rifle and sub-sonic rounds. The last ones, if they were incendiary rounds, wouldn’t be subsonic,” Mike said.
“He seems to be well equipped, and he knows what he’s doing,” Marty replied.
“You think this is Dan’s work?” Jimmy asked.
“Who else could it be?” Mike replied. “Let’s talk with Mrs. Vincent. You start.”
“Her name’s Sheila,” Marty offered.
The two entered the house. Sheila was sitting in the living room, now calmer. The daughters were off to one side of the room. Vincent was there on the couch with his wife, and two of his lieutenants were standing nearby.
“Mrs. Salvatore, I’m Detective Singleton. I need to ask you some questions about
this shooting.”
“We’ve already given statements to the police,” Vincent said. “We need all of you to get out. My wife has been traumatized enough today.”
“I’m sure,” Marty replied. “Unfortunately it doesn’t work that way. You know that. I’ve got to ask the questions for myself.” He proceeded to have Sheila go over the morning’s incident again. There was some confusion about how many shots she heard, but she had the basic details straight.
Vincent scowled. “Now can you get the hell out of my house?”
“Mr. Salvatore, do you know why anyone would be trying to kill you?” Mike now jumped into the conversation.
Sheila looked over at Vincent with panic in her eyes.
“You again?” Vincent asked. “Why’re you here? This’s got nothing to do with the FBI.”
“We think it’s connected to the other incidents. As I said before, you’re lives are at risk.”
“Vincent, what’s he talking about?” Sheila turned to her husband.
“Don’t start trying to panic my wife.” He glared at Mike, and then looked back to Sheila. “No one’s at risk. This is just scare tactics. Don’t listen to this scumbag. He’s just another cop trying to make our lives miserable.”
“So someone hangs a dead animal on your gate, shoots up the front of your house and shoots up your car, almost killing your wife, and then, maybe in frustration when he misses, he ignites the gas tank and burns it up. That happens for nothing? Maybe he was just trying to scare you but from where I’m standing it looks like your family may be in serious danger.”
Tiffany and Amber now began to cry again over in the corner; Sheila looked to her husband with panic in her eyes. “Vincent? Tell me what’s happening?”
“Nothing.” Then turning to Warner, “You shut the fuck up. We’re done talking to you. Get the fuck out, now!”
Mike just shook his head as Marty looked at him nervously. “We’ll be going, but I feel it’s my duty to express my concerns.” He looked directly to Sheila. “Call me if you feel you want some protection. We don’t want this killer to get to you or your daughters.”
“Get out!” shouted Vincent.
Back outside, Marty spoke to Mike as they walked down the driveway. “You laid it on pretty thick. Holy shit, I thought Vincent was going to come over and slug you. What the hell are you trying to do? You scared her shitless.”
“Exactly.”
That same day a courier dropped off a box at Carmine Gianelli’s office. The box contained a phone with a note that said he would receive a call at 4 p.m. The phone rang promptly at four. Carmine had one of his men take the phone outside to answer it.
“Yeah?” the capo asked.
“Now that you know the phone isn’t a bomb, get Carmine. I need to talk to him.”
The man came back in from the street and handed the phone to Carmine.
“Who is this?”
“I’m a guy that Vincent ambushed last week. He and I made a deal and he didn’t follow through with it, so I’m calling you.”
“I don’t have anything to do with Vincent.”
“Don’t be coy. I know you’re Vincent’s boss. You’re the underboss for Silvio Palma. He runs this section of Brooklyn. Now Vincent’s been having trouble, and he missed a chance to end it. Maybe you want to do what he didn’t.”
“You the guy who’s been robbing people in Vincent’s neighborhood?” Carmine’s voice, normally smooth and rich, grew harsh.
Dan ignored the question. “I’ve got a proposition for you. Vincent’s operations are a mess and Mr. Palma must be getting impatient for the trouble to go away. I’m the trouble, so your chance to end this is to pay me off.”
“You want me to pay you to go away?”
“Think of it as a protection payment, just like you collect from the local businesses. Only you pay me not to disturb your business.”
“You got a lot of balls coming to me with that.”
“I think I’ve made my point about how disruptive things can be.”
“So what do you want to stop all of this?”
“Five hundred grand a year.”
Carmine snorted, almost a laugh. “You gotta be kidding. You must be high on something. You’re a punk. We don’t pay off punks, we eliminate them.”
“Carmine, that hasn’t happened yet. I keep hearing that, but no one can find me. I can strike from a distance or up close. Your guys are amateurs compared to me.”
Carmine didn’t say anything for a moment. “If I’m willing to pay you off, I may need you to do some work for me.”
“That’s not part of the deal. I don’t work for you. You pay me to leave you alone, that’s all you pay for.”
“So I pay you and you stop now?”
“No, I called you to let you think about it. There’s two more things I got to do before I stop. Then we can do a deal.”
“What two things?”
“I’ve got some business to finish. Some of it fixes a problem for you, some of it’s personal. Keep the phone, I’ll call you when I’m done.”
Later that night, Frank Varsa sat in his car behind the empty warehouse. He had pulled up near the loading docks. It was eleven p.m. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, his eyes searched the dark around him. Getting a call to meet with Carmine made him nervous. Throughout the troubles Dan was causing, Frank made sure he was not the target of Vincent’s blame. Finding this guy was hard and now with the cops crawling all over the area, he had to move more carefully. His plan to stop everyone who looked like one of Dan’s disguises had to be put on hold; the cops were doing that for him. Carmine surely couldn’t be pinning this crap on him?
After ten minutes Carmine’s S500 Mercedes drove up and stopped twenty yards from his car, facing him. The lights went out. Frank couldn’t tell if the engine was still running. Then the headlights flashed once. Frank got out and walked towards the car. He felt exposed in the open, not being able to see inside the vehicle.
As he approached, someone got out of the front passenger door and stood facing him. When he got to the car, the man, without a word, opened the rear door for him to get in.
“You’re Frank, Vincent’s enforcer, right?” Carmine asked without any introduction. He was smoking an expensive cigar. The car was filled with an almost overpowering aroma even though Carmine’s window was cracked open.
“Yeah,” Frank replied.
Carmine flipped on the overhead light and turned to look directly at him. “You doing much enforcing lately?”
Frank knew he was being checked out. He needed to act carefully around the man. “Not really. That guy, Dan, has the crew all screwed up.”
Carmine studied him. “I need to get this problem stopped. It’s bad for business and it’s drawing too much attention to us.”
Frank didn’t say anything, just waited.
“I need to know what’s going on and what’s being done. You’re going to work directly for me from now on. You stay where you are, but you let me know what’s going on down there to get this under control. I want you to report to me every day.” Carmine handed Frank a slip of paper and a cell phone. “You call this number with this phone and tell whoever answers what’s going on. Understand?”
“Yes sir.” This was a good sign. Frank was now on the safe side of the mess. He was going to be Carmine’s eyes and ears.
“And you don’t tell Vincent. Understand?”
“Understand.”
Chapter 36
Tommy and Doreen arrived back in New York. It had been five weeks since they had left, but Mike had informed them that Dan was still on a tear, disrupting the mob’s activities. He advised them to stay in Doreen’s apartment in Queens. Mike considered it safer.
Jane Tanner was alerted when Tommy and Doreen returned. She boarded a flight from DC the next day. Upon arriving, she was met by Gilbert Short, an agent assigned to the city. The agency was not allowed to spy on U.S. citizens, but after 9/11, they kept some personnel in New
York to follow up any possible terrorist leads. If they found anything of interest, they were to notify the FBI and turn any investigation over to them. Jane told Gilbert to help her make contact with Tommy and Doreen. He made the arrangements over the phone and that same evening Jane arrived at Doreen’s door.
After being let in, she followed them into the kitchen.
“Now, who are you, how did you find out about us, and what do you want?” Doreen asked as they sat down.
Jane smiled. “First, I’m here to help. I know about the situation and your position in it. I can’t say how, but I’m in possession of all the important information. I want to help Dan out of the situation he’s in.”
“You and the FBI. Everyone wants to help Dan out,” Tommy said.
“Perhaps you should tell us about yourself and why you’re interested in us.” Doreen said.
Jane could tell she wanted—no, needed—some answers. Why all of a sudden everyone was interested in Dan. Apparently Mike Warner’s answers didn’t satisfy her, so Jane assumed Doreen would try to get more information from her.
“My name is not important at this point, but hear me out.” Tommy and Doreen waited for Jane to continue. “I need to get in touch with Dan. There is not much time before he will have no way out of the situation he’s in.”
“We’ve heard it before. Everybody wants to get in touch with Dan,” Tommy said. “First the mob, and they almost killed me because of it. Then the cops, the FBI, and now you, whoever you are. Dan’s really popular since he went on his crime spree, and we keep being pulled into it.” His voice rose in anger. “I got a business to run. I’ve closed it down because my life was threatened. Who the hell’s going to repay me my lost customers? Dan isn’t. The FBI certainly isn’t. Are you?”
Doreen put her hand on Tommy’s arm. “It’s been pretty hard on us these past five weeks. Our lives have been completely disrupted.”
Jane nodded. They were playing a round of “good cop, bad cop” whether they knew it or not. These were not stupid people. She sensed a measure of stubbornness in both of them. It might help her if they thought she was an outsider, not part of the system that was closing in on Dan. “I know that a Mike Warner from the FBI talked with you recently. I’m here to tell you that I am not working for his team—the FBI. He has an agenda that he probably hasn’t disclosed to you”.
