For Nothing

by Nicholas Denmon

Sal slapped the cigarette out of Victor’s hand and yelled, “That fuck Rafael Rontego smokes those faggot Russian cigarettes.” With that, Sal threw the napkin on the table, allowing a finger to roll across the slab.

  “That’s my boy’s finger.” Sal stated it so devoid of emotion that Victor caught himself staring at the emotional gangster. “Frankie,” he called out to his friend across the room. “Get the car.” He tossed Frankie his car keys and the man hurried off.

  Victor eyed Sal, waiting for him to speak. The man did not disappoint as he again stated, “Tonight, we avenge my son.”

  Garducci nodded his head and walked past Sal. He needed to tell someone about what was going down. This was about to be some serious shit. Every time he thought he might be able to find a clean way to disengage, this kept on getting messier. Now though, he had a name. Rafael Rontego. It had to be him. Garducci walked into the bathroom in a daze.

  The undercover agent looked under the stalls to make sure he was alone. Establishing that he was, he pinched the sides of the transmitter button on his jacket sleeve. He spoke into the device.

  “Suspect’s name is Rafael Rontego. Find his residence ASAP. Prepare for fireworks.”

  Hopefully Hi-Def would receive the call and put the guys into motion. Alex took a deep breath. The moment for revenge was near. How odd was it that his unlikely allies would include both cops and cold-blooded gangsters?

  Alex splashed his face with some water from the sink. As he toweled off he heard the door swing open and Sal entered the bathroom.

  “You ready Vic?”

  Alex Vaughn looked at himself one last time in the mirror as he patted his face. “Yeah, I’m ready.”

  With a wave, Sal led the way and Victor Garducci followed to the car idling in wait outside.

  They rode in silence. A slight crack in the window allowed a small bit of cool air to whistle into the car. Frankie DeRisio turned the windshield wipers on pushing off flecks of snow as they steeled their resolve for the mission ahead. The street lights drifted on past one another into the darkness for about fifteen minutes until Sal spoke.

  “Pull over here,” he said. “We’re about a block away.”

  Frankie did as he was bade, and pulled the car over under a light post on the corner of the block. Diagonal and across the street was a low rise building.

  “That’s where the fuck lives. I waited out here all night for my boy to come out. I should have had the courage to go in then. We’ll say I was suffering from a bit of shock. But tonight, we’ll finish what I should have before.” Sal pursed his lips together and walked around the back of the car popping the trunk open.

  Frankie came up beside Sal, and looking into the trunk, let out a low whistle. “That’s what I’m talking about, serious firepower.”

  Garducci walked around the car and looked inside. There was a compact sub machine gun of the Israeli variety, an Uzi. Sal grabbed this and tucked his arm inside the folds of his overcoat. There was also a sawed-off shotgun, which Frankie scooped up and tucked along the inseam of his trench coat.

  Seeing that there were no more heavy artillery pieces to be had, Sal looked at Victor and shrugged. “Since you don’t have the big guns, stay a couple steps behind us and pull up the rear.”

  With a nod, Victor fell into step behind Sal and Frankie as they made their way across the street. As they hustled across the road, Victor took a quick glance down it and noticed a familiar white van parallel parked about a block away. He patted his Beretta tucked in its shoulder holster.

  The trio paused for a second outside of the building’s doors which lead into a small entry way with a dimly lit stairwell. They paused, as Sal took a deep breath, and then entered through the front door. They entered, as the back doors swung shut in the rear of the building. They entered as another car carrying a large solid block of a man parked at the rear of the residence.

  Chapter 20

  Rafael Rontego pried yet another floorboard loose and grabbed a stack of hundreds rubber banded together from amongst the rat poison that shielded his money from the rodents. He tossed it into a duffle bag that was fast becoming full of cash. He then moved on to the last place he had money stowed away.

  As he walked to the closet, he looked at the Cleaner who was still peering out the window on the roadway below. The guy was all business. Rafael respected that about the man.

  With a grunt, the assassin took his crowbar and pulled a panel off of the inside of his closet. Taking a flashlight he peered into the darkness inside the wall and saw the familiar green of his money, dusty but undisturbed.

  “Hey Raf, I think we have company. A white van just pulled into a parking spot down the road and is just sitting there. Might be time to leave. You almost done?”

  The Cleaner, not waiting to hear from Rafael, walked past him and into the bathroom. He took Rafael’s metal trash bin and started shredding up paper and cloth from an old shirt, placing the material into the bin.

  Rafael shook his head and tossed the rest of his money into the bag, zipping it closed.

  As he continued filling the bin with material and dousing it with accelerant, the Cleaner continued, “Rafael, I was serious when I told you that you can’t swim against the current forever. Times are changing. You need to think about getting away from here for a while. What do you have there? Two hundred, three hundred thousand dollars? You can lay low for a long time with that.”

  Rafael shot him a glance as he became aware of the fact that his life savings was very exposed at the moment.

  Catching on, the Cleaner continued, “Relax tough guy, you think I need your chump change? I’m getting out of here myself. I have a nice little nest egg and I don’t plan on dying before I get to use it.”

  Rafael was startled to hear that admission from the Cleaner. He’d been around for as long as Rontego could remember. Maybe the Cleaner had a point. After all, he survived almost as many wars as Rafael. Perhaps things were getting too dicey.

  As odd as it was, Rafael never thought much about retirement. He couldn’t go on killing for money forever. It would be nice to get away from the life, maybe.

  The Cleaner lit the material in the trash bin on fire as he flicked a match into the accelerant and walked out of the bathroom. Rafael made his way to the kitchen and placed his hand on the gas dial.

  “Where will you go then?” he asked.

  The Cleaner paused for a moment. “Me? I have a cabin up in Canada. I might just stock it with some food, and spend a year fishing.”

  “What should I do, if not this?” Rafael looked at the Cleaner, hoping for an answer.

  “Fuck, I don’t know Rafael, haven’t you ever been happy? You know, doing something else? I don’t know. I’ll tell you what. If you want to leave and can’t think of anything better to do, come here.” The Cleaner handed Rafael a post card with an address in Canada on it. “Hell, it can get lonely fishing by yourself for a whole damned year anyway. But I will tell you one thing. When we walk out the back doors of this building, I am not looking back. From your apartment, straight to Canada. I won’t look back no matter what.”

  With a nod, Rafael flicked the gas switch to ‘on’ and the two of them left the apartment. As they descended the stairs, Rontego thought more about the offer. It seemed like it might be a good idea. Rafael the fisherman? The assassin chuckled as they reached the back door. He couldn’t believe he was even contemplating it.

  The two men paused for a second, bracing to meet the cold Niagara air that was sure to blast them on the other side of the door. Rafael looked at the small man in front of him.

  “Hey Cleaner.”

  The slight man turned toward the assassin.

  “Are we friends?”

  The Cleaner let a smile creep up on his lips. “Friends? You know men like you and I don’t have friends.”

  The Cleaner grabbed the door handle as Rafael started to contemplate why that truest of statements disappointed him so much.

  “But then again,” the
Cleaner continued, “if we weren’t, than why would I let you know where to find me?”

  With that, the amazing man slung his duffle bag over his shoulder and started walking down the road. Rafael stood there for a minute and smiled. He too opened the door and slung his duffle bag over his shoulder. That is when the smile disappeared from his lips.

  As the door closed behind him, Rafael saw a large form, topped with a fedora, fall in step a dozen feet behind the Cleaner. He appeared as if from nowhere, materializing from the shadows, gun held out at a forty-five degree angle from his body.

  Rafael knew who it was.

  He grabbed a pistol from its holster and fell into step behind the figure, moving as quick as a cat to close the gap between himself and the Cleaner’s would-be pursuer.

  It seemed like an eternity. The large silhouette gained a step on the Cleaner for every two steps Rafael closed between himself and his sudden target.

  At the corner, at the end of the block, the oblivious Cleaner paused to check for traffic. His heart racing, Rafael thought he would be too late as the form raised his pistol and leveled it the back of the Cleaner’s head.

  In full sprint now, Rafael closed the gap, his own pistol raised and at the ready. The sudden rush of motion, however, alerted the dark form and it whirled around just in time. Just in time to catch a solitary bullet from Rafael Rontego in the side of the head. A solitary shot sent a cloud of bloody smoke onto the icy sidewalk. The form crumpled to the ground.

  True to his word, the Cleaner, startled, straightened up, but didn’t look back. He just kept walking across the street as Rafael watched him depart.

  Rontego stooped over the motionless form, and rolled the man over. He avoided looking at Muro’s face while he riffled through the pockets of his jacket. After a moment, he found what he was looking for. He pulled the small wooden pawn out, and slipped it into his own pocket. He stood up, stepped over the body at his feet, and took a left across the street at a ninety-degree angle from the Cleaner and continued walking as well. He holstered his weapon inside the folds of his coat and pulled a Sobranie cigarette from a pack.

  As he paused to light it, he mumbled, “Goodbye Muro, my old friend.”

  *

  The three gangsters padded along the corridor. Their footsteps were measured and careful in the insufficient light generated by the low wattage bulb suspended above the narrow staircase. Their shadows elongated below them, casting an eerie shadow along the wooden banister and cascading onto the floor below.

  Victor Garducci could hear his heartbeat pulsating in his neck and working its way up to his temples. Sal Pieri and Frankie DeRisio inched along ahead of him, a full five steps up front. Victor was weighed down by the thoughts assaulting his senses as they crept along towards the door at the second level. How far was he willing to go to satiate his vengeance? So far, he was able to straddle the line. If the time came would he be willing to break all of the laws he swore to defend? How far was too far in the quest of bloody fulfillment?

  Sal looked down and back at him, an evil grin spread across his face and his eyes danced with a wild fire. As Sal crested the top of the stairwell, there was a sudden ‘pop’ in the distance. It sounded like a car backfired, but it did not matter to the three men so on edge.

  As one, they crouched in a defensive posture and sucked in their breath. Frankie’s finger slipped to the trigger of his shotgun and the barrel rose to ward off the noise.

  They waited for what seemed like an eternity, but hearing no further sounds, they inched along again. Sal reached the door first. He crept low in front of the door, regarding the lock. His hand went to the door and he turned the knob. The door knob didn’t turn far though, it was locked.

  Frankie gave a snort and Victor couldn’t tell whether he scoffed in irritation, or in bemusement. Sal’s hand slid down the door and came to rest on an almost invisible string tied taut about six inches off of the ground above the doors cracked and eroded weather strip.

  “Booby trap,” Frankie said, the alarm crept into his voice and he took a step backward down the stairs.

  Sal shook his head, negating the concept. His voice etched with the stress and excitement of the moment, he wheezed declaring his own theory.

  “Warning wire.”

  To emphasize his point, he flipped out a small three inch blade and cut the string in front of the door.

  Both Victor and Frankie crept downward another step. Their concern drew a scowl from Sal who motioned for the two to come back up. As much as he wanted his revenge, Victor admitted to himself that he was nervous. If this guy was better than Jack, he was unsure how well he might fare against such an adversary, even with his band of unlikely allies.

  Sal took a lock pick from a chain around his neck and began fumbling with it in search of the right tool. This brought another grunt from Frankie, who lifted his shotgun again and jerked it in the direction of the dead bolt.

  Another grin from Sal declared the capo’s approval and it was his turn to take a step back from the door. His submachine gun came around and pointed at the front of the door. Victor decided now was as good of a time as any to bring his own firearm to bear and held the Beretta out in front of him at eye height, but due to his positioning on the stairwell, he was not aiming much higher than Sal and Frankie’s waists.

  Another pause ensued while the trio took a steadying breath, then with a nod from his leader; Frankie leveled his shotgun at the door lock and blasted a hole through the door about a foot in diameter.

  The force of the blast shoved Frankie’s arms upward and sent pieces of wood and metal flying into the apartment. With a kick, Sal flung the door ajar, and took half a dozen running strides into the room. Frankie took a step inside and brought his shotgun around the door, first left, then right.

  Sal, frantic, looked around the empty apartment. He looked for any sign of his target in the immediate room. Not seeing Rafael Rontego in the living room, he began to creep towards the bedroom, to the right of the apartment’s entrance. Still maintaining the illusion of stealth despite the noisy entry, Sal crouched as he walked, when a low hiss came from Frankie.

  “You smell that?” Frankie’s forehead was scrunched up and he was sniffing the air.

  “I don’t smell nothing,” Sal said.

  Victor watched the two men and paused where he was, inside of the door frame, his back to the hallway. Sal pushed open a door on the side of the room, and a small billow of smoke escaped the previously shuttered room behind.

  “Holy shit!” Sal coughed as he took a few steps backward away from the haze.

  Frankie shifted his weight and glanced at Victor, perplexed. Sal looked at the two of them as if he were about to say something when an explosion rocked the room and a large fireball shot forward from the blaze in the room.

  The flame seemed to jerk forward, encompassing Sal Pieri and catching his clothing on fire. The window behind him exploded outward, showering the street with glass and flaming material from the interior of the apartment.

  Sal let out a shriek of surprise that soon became one of excruciating pain. At the same instance, the force of the initial blast sent Frankie DeRisio airborne over Victor and launched Victor off his feet and backward.

  For a moment, the entire world slowed down and Victor could see all of this play out before him. As Frankie’s airborne body flew over him, he could see that the blast ripped the skin from the man’s face and singed the edge of the wounds.

  Then everything sped up in double time as if time had to catch up with itself and Victor flew into the wall behind him. Frankie tumbled down on top of him and their bodies crashed together on the floor. For a moment, everything went black as Victor Garducci struggled to maintain consciousness.

  A gash along his forehead burned with an odd sting and wetness which Victor understood to be his own blood falling down his face. He could barely breathe. His breath crashed out from his lungs as he collided with the wall and the weight of Frankie’s smoldering body on
top of him impeded his lungs even further.

  Victor pushed Frankie off of him and rolled over onto his side. His jacket was on fire in several places and he rolled around on the floor extinguishing the flames relying purely on instinct.

  What the hell happened?

  Sal continued screaming inside the apartment and an unbelievable stench assaulted Victor’s nostrils. The stench of burning flesh was something Victor was unaccustomed to. Unable to stand, he began crawling forward; his thought was to get to Sal and to do something, anything to help the tortured man.

  Sal, too, was crawling and thrashing on the ground and his hair was burned, leaving scorched scalp and blistering skin as the unrelenting flames licked around his body in its pursuit to consume him as fuel.

  Sal’s lidless eyes flicked toward Garducci and his lipless mouth shrieked the most awful thing Victor heard in his life, “Shoot me! Shoot me! Shoot me!”

  Thrashing and begging for mercy, Sal’s voice came out in harsh screams, gaining pace with the urgency of his pain.

  Victor pulled his gun from the scorched doorway, and pointed it at Sal’s charred and screaming face.

  Sal, unable to find the strength to move, fell forward despite the obvious pain of falling on burned limbs. He flopped to his stomach. His strength was leaving him or the sinews of the limbs that would support his weight burned and melted through, Victor could not discern which.

  Pleading with his last breaths, he whispered, “Shoot me.”

  Victor, his face set with the determination of going forward with an impossible situation, closed his eyes.

  One last shriek blasted forth, and then there echoed the solitary pop of a well aimed bullet.

  It flew straight and true, merciful; it found its way into the trapped and tortured brain of Sal Pieri, releasing his soul to whatever awaited it on the other side. Victor, knowing that if an afterlife existed, hoped that whatever God existed gave Sal Pieri, the last of the Pieri line, some credit for time already served in the fires of hell.