After chugging down three cups of coffee, Van Buren glanced at his watch and saw it was almost six. Time to wake up his men and tell them they had twenty-four hours to bring in the Ferrari. He laughed, thinking how easily they’d deceived the Ventura police. Van Buren’s source inside the department had informed him that the cops thought the chain of murders had been committed by a serial killer, exactly what he wanted them to believe.
When you brokered arms, you had to be prepared to take down anyone who got in your way. When the car had disappeared en route to the shipyard, the situation had instantly became volatile. They’d already killed nine people in their attempt to find the Ferrari. If not for the Mexican punk who had carjacked the vehicle after the flatbed truck they’d used had broken down in Oxnard, Van Buren would already have his ten mil and the car would be on its way to Shanghai.
Raphael Moreno had killed one of his men and injured Dante Gilbiati. Dante had gone on a hideous killing spree, fearing what Van Buren would do to him when he learned he had allowed someone to steal the Ferrari. Having worked for the mob, Dante had been trained never to leave a witness alive. He had murdered the Hartfield family because Moreno hadn’t come out of the house to tell him the Ferrari wasn’t there, and when Dante had gone inside, the people had seen his face.
The Koreans had insisted that he remove the GPS system so no one could track their plutonium. Otherwise, the material would already be in the hands of the man he had spoken to in Shanghai. He wouldn’t make that mistake again. His men had been instructed to attach a magnetic GPS to the car as soon as they located it.
At that point, Van Buren had no choice but to call in a professional.
Claire Mellinger, the woman he’d met at the Biltmore Hotel, was one of the top female assassins in the world. She killed by means of a lethal injection. She’d never been apprehended. Like Dante, she killed every witness.
Before the hit woman had arrived, Van Buren had personally executed Dante Gilbiati. This was the kind of situation that caused even an arms dealer to have nightmares.
Van Buren did not condone killing children. He had to draw the line somewhere. His greatest mistake had been to underestimate Raphael Moreno. If things had gone down differently, he would have offered the kid a job. Barely twenty, Moreno had outwitted Dante Gilbiati, a hardened criminal, by hiding in the Hartfields’ Cadillac and waiting for the police to arrest him. His family had not been as fortunate. Dante decapitated Moreno’s disabled mother, then later returned to kill his sister.
He wondered if Moreno had found out where the plutonium was hidden and was attempting to sell it from inside the jail. Could a petty-ass car thief possess connections of that magnitude? Van Buren had placed three men inside the jail to beat the truth out of Moreno and recover the Ferrari. The three men had left the jail in an ambulance.
As soon as Moreno was placed on a bus to prison, Van Buren would have him snatched and brought to him immediately. The Ferrari had been sighted, then disappeared again. The twenty-year-old appeared to be playing cat and mouse with him. Right now, the only game Van Buren was willing to play was target practice.
Chapter 36
Wednesday, December 29—4:47 P.M.
Carolyn’s voice pulled Moreno back to the present. He had been speaking so low that she’d moved her chair only a few inches away. Many times his words were slurred, almost garbled, so much so that she couldn’t make out what he was saying. It was all being recorded on tape by the PD, to be played over and analyzed by scores of law enforcement officers and criminal psychologists.
Moreno could be leading her down a deadly path, toying with her until the right moment came to make his move. He had admitted shooting and killing the driver of the Ferrari. He had taken a life for no other reason than to steal a car. Murder for profit was not an impulsive act.
“I want to hear more about the car, Raphael,” she said, “but right now, I need to know who killed your mother and sister.”
“Nothin’ happened the first week,” he said, “most of the time I hung out with my mom at the hospital. The doc fixed the infection. Soon as I knew she was okay, I thought about gettin’ outta the business. You know, going straight. Th-the next day…”
Carolyn saw his chest rising and falling with emotion. She moved her leg, accidentally brushing up against his knee. She felt a powerful rush, similar to a bolt of electricity. The experience was terrifying. It was as if she were being sucked into his mind. She cursed herself for bringing in the autopsy pictures. Even she felt overwhelmed by the grotesque images. They turned Carolyn’s thoughts to her father. What her mother had seen that night must have been as if someone had burned horrifying pictures inside her head, pictures that could never be discarded or stored away in a plastic box. Every time Carolyn looked at pictures of head injuries, she thought of her father’s bloody death. Now Moreno had to live with it as well. His mother had been decapitated and his sister’s skull had been crushed by a hammer.
Moreno seemed to be emitting grief like waves of radiation. He compressed in his seat. Because of his size, Carolyn knew the heavy shackles must hurt. She convinced herself against reason that he’d slipped one of his hands out of the restraints because they were painful. His skin was chafed on his neck and wrists. She wrestled again with the decision to end the interview. She was in too deep, though, and his story was too important.
She didn’t prompt him again. She waited until he began speaking on his own.
“I cruised around that night lookin’ for cars,” Moreno told her, staring at a spot over her head. “I knew something wasn’t right as soon as I walked in the door. The lights were still on in the living room. Maria was supposed to turn off the lights before she went to bed every night. I didn’t have my shooter anymore. I had to get rid of it, you know, ’cause I didn’t want the cops to find it.” He drew in a deep breath. “When I opened the front door, I saw my mother on the floor. I thought she might have fallen out of her wheelchair. Then I saw the blood. There was blood everywhere. Oh, Jesus…why did he have to kill my mother?”
Carolyn reached out and stroked his hand. “Take your time. We don’t have to go over every detail right now. Let’s not talk about your mother, okay? Where was your sister?”
“Maria was alive,” he said, speaking louder than he had before. “She was tied up in a chair. When I ran to her, a big man grabbed me from behind. He told me he was going to cut Maria’s head off, too, if I didn’t tell him where the Ferrari was. Then I seen his face and knew he was the guy who’d shot me. You know, the passenger in the Ferrari.”
“What happened then?”
“Shit, I didn’t know where the car was,” Moreno said, his foot tapping on the linoleum. “I brought the car to the chop shop a week before the guy who killed my family showed up. Angel delivered it to the buyer a few hours after he got it. These people wanted that car back bad. And I don’t think it was just to drive it or sell it. I think there was something inside it.”
Carolyn knew she had to find Neil as soon as she left Moreno. Everything was adding up, and every road led back to the damn Ferrari. “What makes you think there’s something valuable inside the car?”
“’Cause people were willing to kill for it,” Moreno told her, shifting in his seat. “No matter how much the thing was worth, it was a car, you know. Look what they did to my mother! And they killed her while Maria watched. The guy did it so I would take him to the car. He didn’t want to take a chance that I would trick him or ditch him.”
“What do you think was inside it?”
Moreno shrugged. “Don’t ask me, ’cause I don’t know. The only thing I know ’bout is stealing cars. I don’t even know how to fix a car when it breaks down.”
Carolyn retrieved the envelope again and pulled out a mug shot of Dante Gilbiati, which Hank had given her. “Is this the man who killed your family?”
“That’s him!” he shouted, trying to snatch the photo out of her hands. “That’s the fucker who butchered my mother and killed
my sister. Where is he? Give me thirty minutes with him and I’ll plead guilty to every murder you got. I don’t care if they execute me.”
“Calm down,” Carolyn said, fearful Hank would think he was out of control and terminate the interview. He was probably furious that she was sitting so close to the prisoner again. But he was also monitoring the conversation, and he wouldn’t step in unless it was absolutely mandatory. Hank wanted the information as much as she did. “How did you get away from Gilbiati?”
“He left Maria tied up at the house. Told me he’d come back and kill her if I didn’t help him get the car back. We went to the shop, but Angel and the rest of the crew had gone home. The man told me not to call Angel because he knew Angel wouldn’t tell him what he’d done with the car and he didn’t want to tip Angel that they were looking for it. Angel ain’t no sweetheart, you know. Take something he wants and he’ll kill you and put you in the ground. No telling how many bodies are buried around the shop. Angel tells us not to hurt anyone because he don’t want no trouble with the cops, you know. When one of his crew steps out of line, he drops them right on the spot.”
“When you say ‘they,’ Raphael, who are you referring to?”
“How do I know?” he snapped. “These guys weren’t local homeys or anything. I’ve mixed it up with some of the members of La Colonia Chiques.”
Carolyn knew the street gang Moreno was describing was a serious menace. The Oxnard police had recently passed an injunction preventing them from congregating in public in a 6.6-mile radius in Colonia, a barrio populated with low-income people, most of them immigrants. Studies had been done which indicated the children in neighborhoods like La Colonia suffered from asthma and obesity because their parents kept them indoors.
Once more, Carolyn fell silent, wanting for Moreno to pick up where he left off. He seemed far more relaxed, and she felt completing the interview shouldn’t be a problem.
“The Chiques are mean mothers, man. But these guys…they were the worst.”
He was rambling. Carolyn redirected him. “Do you know who Dante Gilbiati was working for?”
“I heard him talkin’ on the phone to someone. I think his name was Larry. He got more crazier every time he talked to him, slapping me around and yelling that if we didn’t find the car, Larry would fucking kill him. He was scared of him, man. And this guy ain’t scared of no one. I can take most guys, even guys twice my size. This one I couldn’t touch without takin’ a bullet or blade.”
“Have you ever been in a gang?”
“Not lately,” Moreno said, a smile surfacing. “I work alone. Guys in gangs are losers. Gangs are clubs. Thugs spend all their time watching their backs and goin’ to funerals. Why I need that shit? I was making good money boosting cars for Angel and I didn’t have to watch my back.”
The young man in front of her was truly a mixed bag, Carolyn told herself. His clean-cut appearance was marred by his cultivated street demeanor. She wondered how many people he had killed. The way he told it, he hadn’t hesitated when he shot the driver of the Ferrari in the face. “What happened at the chop shop?”
“I went through Angel’s desk and found the address of the people who bought the Ferrari, a Mr. and Mrs. Rainey.” He leaned his head back and his eyes drifted to the ceiling.
“Look at me, Raphael!” Carolyn said, afraid he was going to spot the guns. “We can’t stay here all day. Nine people are dead. If we don’t find Gilbiati fast, he’ll kill a lot more.”
He rubbed his eyes, then began speaking again. “We went to these Rainey people’s house and found the lady. After her husband bought the Ferrari, man, she saw him driving around with a young chick, so she gets wasted and trades his Ferrari for some paintings. Gilbiati wanted the address of the store, but she said she’d gone to some guy’s home. All she remembered was the numbers of the house…‘1003,’ and that the street had the word ‘Sea’ in it. He roughed her up, then told her he’d come back and kill her if she called the police.”
Carolyn blew a strand of hair off her forehead. As cold as it had been when she’d entered the room, her forehead and upper lip were damp with perspiration. Neil had the Ferrari. She had to get it back before Larry and his men killed him. She also knew Hank would have already dispatched a patrol unit to pick up Mrs. Rainey, and talk to her about what had happened with Gilbiati. But Carolyn couldn’t conclude the interview yet. The lab had worked up the car and found nothing outside of Moreno’s blood. Even if something had been hidden inside the car, she assumed it must be gone by now.
“Gilbiati drives us to 1003 Seaport Avenue,” Moreno told her, his eyes narrowing in hatred. “He tells me to break in and boost the car back while he stands watch outside. I know he’s gonna kill me and my sister as soon as he gets what he wants ’cause we can ID him.” He paused and swallowed. “I crawled through the window, okay? I see a crib with a baby in it, then I see another kid watching cartoons in the other room. I get to the garage without them seeing me. Nothing in there but a white Caddy. What next, I ask myself. I decide if I stay in there long enough, the guy waiting for me might give up and leave.”
Moreno’s eyes began wandering around the room. He must sense something wasn’t right. She had to distract him fast. “Where did you learn to do that? You know, finding a way out of the restraints.”
“That’s not somethin’ you learn, you know,” he said, focusing on her face again. “You born that way. It has something to do with the way your bones and muscles work. When I was a kid, people used to tie me up and put me in a suitcase to see if I could escape. My grandfather was able to get out of anything. Some circus people smuggled him out of the country. I made a lot of loot when I was a kid. Once, I had them tie me up with chains, put me in a suitcase, and throw me into the river.”
“What happened to the Hartfield family?” Carolyn remembered the gruesome autopsy and crime scene photos. The baby was heartbreaking, but it was the three-year-old girl who’d touched her the most—her beautiful blond hair curled in natural ringlets around her face, skin like a china doll’s, her chubby knees, her tiny hands with the pink-painted fingernails, the bloodstained butterfly clips to hold her bangs off her face. She forced the images away, then asked softly, “Did you kill those people, Raphael?”
“No,” he shouted, a muscle in his face twitching. “Why would I tell you this stuff if I’d popped them? You still don’t believe me, do you? Get the hell outta here. I ain’t talkin’ to you no more.”
“Knock it off,” Carolyn said, moving her chair to a safe distance. “Your tough-guy act is bullshit. You can’t pull that on me anymore. Whether you realize it or not, you need me as much as I need you. Don’t you want to see the man who killed your family brought to justice?”
He fell silent, a sullen expression on his face. “Okay,” he said, looking away. “I locked myself in the trunk of the Caddy, deciding I’ll wait there till the police showed up. Then I hear gunshots and screaming. Not one…” He tapped his finger on the arm of the chair. “Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang. Five people in the house, five shots. Christ, he shot a baby. A little baby couldn’t ID him. The guy’s a psycho, man. He gets off killing people.”
“You stayed in the trunk of the Cadillac until the police arrived, right?”
“Shit, yeah,” Moreno said. “What else was I supposed to do? If I came out, that Dante guy would have blown me away. My mother was dead. I knew Maria was dead. I only wanted one thing. I wanted to stay alive until I killed him. That’s why I let the police arrest me, you know. I needed protection. Now all I need is a way to do what I need to do.”
“Why didn’t you tell the police the truth when they arrested you? You pleaded guilty to seven counts of second-degree murder. Two other women have now been killed. You might have saved their lives.”
“I got to deal with my own shit, man,” Moreno said, his face twisting in anguish. “Do you know what it’s like to see your mother like that…her head sliced from her body? Her eyes were open when I found her. She
was looking right at the bastard when he…” His face turned red and the chains began rattling. “He didn’t just chop it off, he sliced it like a butcher carving a piece of meat. That’s the picture I see when I wake up, when I go to bed. Every damn minute I see it, even when I take a piss. I can’t talk, eat, sleep, understand? When people talk to me, it sounds like they’re jabbering in a foreign language. The only reason I keep breathing is the chance that I might be able to kill him. Other than that, I don’t care. I’m already dead.”
Carolyn stood, linking eyes with him. “If we can prove what you just told me,” she said, “we may be able to have your conviction overturned. You’ll have to plead guilty to killing the driver of the car. That is, if the body surfaces. But that’s only one murder term instead of seven. With good time and work time credits, you could conceivably be out in seven years.”
“No shit,” he said, the muscles in his arms flexing. “Seven years, huh? You think Dante will still be around in seven years?”
Things were winding down. Carolyn was exhausted, but she felt a sense of pride. She had accomplished what seasoned investigators had failed to do, men like Hank Sawyer and Brad Preston, and she had done it without injuring herself or the suspect. Breaking Moreno would add to her reputation. Maybe she would check out the FBI. The job paid a lot more than what she was earning as a probation officer. Out of curiosity, she asked, “Why did you talk to me, Raphael?”
He smiled. “You’re my salir.”
“I’m sorry,” she told him. “What does that mean?”
“Come over here and I’ll tell you.”
Sullivan’s Justice Page 33
