“Is it all right to touch them now?” she asked Mitch.
“Yes,” he told her, his voice strained. “We secured the whole area last night. The forensic team was here early this morning and got whatever prints there were. They took pictures, too.”
Cassie sank to her knees. Gingerly, she reached to the top of the pile. Her chest tightened.
“What is it?” Mitch asked, squatting down next to her.
“A yearbook.” She stared at it before tossing it aside, then waded through more of the heap. “They’re all here. All my yearbooks. For every year I taught. Every single one is either torn apart or covered with the paint.” Her voice caught on the last words.
“Honey, maybe you should let me and some of the guys clean this up.”
“No.” The word was sharper than she intended. She reached for his hand and squeezed it in apology. “I told you last night I wanted to do it. Something may be salvageable.”
“I don’t think so, Cass.”
“I want to see for myself.”
“All right.” Mitch stood. “I’ll be back here.” He indicated the rear of the room. “I want to make sure that window is secured.”
Cassie nodded. Turning back to the pile, she sifted through it methodically. Carefully, she examined each of the yearbooks, remembering the kids she’d taught, trying to visualize the faces of all those whose lives she’d touched and who had influenced her. Now their images were covered with red spray paint. She tossed them all into the bins Mitch had provided, cringing at the irrevocable loss.
Underneath the yearbooks was her collection of classic novels and plays. Over the years, she’d found leather-bound editions in the city, out-of-print copies in rare books stores, a few first editions in out-of- the-way places. She smiled as she picked up a copy of Romeo and Juliet. She’d gone without new clothes for months so she could afford it. Now pages were ripped out, and globs of red paint stuck the rest of them together. Its dark leather binding had been slashed.
Her poetry collection had met a similar fate. Mitch came back and knelt down next to her. She looked up, shaking her head, holding one of the mutilated volumes. “Seth gave me the set when I graduated from Geneseo. He and his wife came up for the ceremony. My mother was dead by then. He brought these all wrapped up in pink-and-silver paper. There were twenty volumes.” She dropped the book she held and picked another one up, battling back the tears when she recognized the title. “Did you know e.e. cummings is my favorite poet?”
Mitch reached out and ran his knuckles down her cheek. “Now, why doesn’t that surprise me?”
“You’ve read him?”
Mitch nodded. “Yeah. He’s a little too avant garde for my taste, but I managed to understand a verse or two.”
Cassie smiled, but when the doorbell rang, she startled.
Gently, Mitch soothed his hand down her back. “Shh. It’s okay. It’s three o’clock. The security guy from Strong’s said he’d be here midafternoon.”
“Mitch, I don’t...”
She didn’t finish because Mitch’s face darkened. Cassie watched him once again tamp down the rage that had almost erupted last night when she’d driven back to his condo to tell him what she’d found when she’d gotten home: someone had smashed in a first-floor window and broken into her house. Throughout this whole ordeal, he’d kept a rein on his temper, and she appreciated his squelching his own feelings to help her get through it.
Now he took a stand. “Don’t say it, Cassie. You need a security system, period. I won’t back down on this.” He stood and crossed to the foyer.
Two months ago Cassie couldn’t have imagined letting anyone impose his will on her like this. But she’d acquiesced on everything. Last night, he’d demanded that she stay with him until her place had been taken care of. This morning, he’d insisted on getting the house wired. Cassie had let him take over. She didn’t want to admit to herself what it meant about her feelings for him that she’d allowed him to make these decisions for her.
He opened the front door. From her vantage point on the floor, Cassie could see the security expert greet Mitch. But before the man came in, Johnny materialized in the archway.
Mitch let them both in. As the security man set his gear down, Mitch drew Johnny aside, spoke briefly to him, then went back to discuss the alarm system.
Johnny approached her. “Cassie?”
She looked up at him, suppressing what she felt. “Hi.”
Just like Mitch, he reached down and squeezed her shoulder. “This is awful.”
“How did you find out?”
“Ms. Caufield told me. But it’s all over school. The Connors,” he said, referring to her next door neighbors, “saw the police cars last night and their son Jimmy got a peek at the inside of the house before he came to school.”
“Well, it was bound to get out.”
“I hope it’s okay I came. I want to help.”
Cassie looked back down at the remains of what had been her only good memories of the past. “I’m glad you came. I was going to do it all myself. I thought I could salvage some things. But it’s all destroyed. I...” She looked at Johnny and her voice trailed off.
He’d knelt down and picked up a ruined book. A glob of red paint caked on his fingers.
“Be careful,” she said, falling easily into the teacher role. “You’ll get messy.”
Before Johnny could respond, Mitch joined them. “The security guy is going through the house now.”
Cassie watched Johnny. The boy was frozen, staring at the red paint, slowly rubbing his fingers it. Without a word, he looked up at Mitch.
Mitch said, “You want to tell her, or should I?”
Soberly, Johnny said, “I will.” He faced Cassie. “I’m sorry, Cassie. The Blisters...” He glanced back down at the red paint again. “This is their trademark.”
* * *
Something hard slapped across Johnny’s mouth. His eyes flew open. It was dark in his bedroom, but he could see a figure looming over him. He felt something cold and sharp against his neck. Every one of his muscles constricted. He could be dead in an instant.
“It’s me.”
Johnny’s body sagged with relief.
After a moment, he shook his head, trying to dislodge Zorro’s hand. Zorro dropped his right arm from Johnny’s mouth, but kept the knife strategically positioned at Johnny’s jugular.
“What do you want?” Johnny asked.
“We gotta talk, home boy.”
Home boy? So Zorro hadn’t given up on him yet.
“Why the blade?”
“So you’ll listen.”
Then it came flooding back. Cassie’s sad eyes and drawn features as she threw her most precious belongings in the garbage.
Heedless of the danger, Johnny spat out, “You bastard.”
“I didn’t do it.”
“Yeah, sure. Red paint is the Blisters’s trademark.”
“I didn’t do it,” he repeated. “It’s one of the reasons I’m here.” Slowly, Zorro pulled back his stiletto. Flipping it in, he reached down and stuck it in his boot. Then he pulled up a chair and switched on a light on the bedside table.
Johnny leaned back against the pillows. “Tell me you know nothin’ about it.”
“I know somethin’,” Zorro said. “Doesn’t mean I had anything to do with it.”
“You hate her.”
“She’s a bitch.”
Johnny stiffened.
“Ease up, man,” Zorro said with a shrug. “DeFazio jumped in today.”
Johnny expelled a heavy breath. “He’s a jerk. Why you want him?”
“Gotta keep up our numbers, Tonto. Besides,” Zorro said, his eyes slitting with anger, “I need a new sidekick, now that you ditched us.”
“So you pick a dopehead?”
“My business.” Zorro stared at him. “Just came here to tell you we didn’t know he’d go after the teacher.” Zorro smiled silkily. “You know he had to do somethin’ heavy to jump in. J
ust to start out right with us.”
Johnny couldn’t believe he’d once been a part of this—done these things, made others do them. “So why tell me?”
“I didn’t want you to come after me for it.”
Johnny looked at his friend carefully and, despite all that had happened, felt a tug of regret at losing him. “Why do you care? You’re done with me, remember?”
Leaning forward on the straight chair, Zorro linked his hands between his knees. “Yeah, well, I been doin’ some reevaluatin’.”
“Why?”
Zorro looked up at Johnny with the eyes of the old friend he’d always been. “Cause she’s gonna turn on you, man.”
“So you said before.”
“And I changed my mind about you and me. Since we got history together. I’ll be here when she does it.”
“Don’t hold your breath.”
“She’s gettin’ chummy with the cop.”
Johnny tensed, remembering his conversation with Mitch.
She okay? Johnny had asked.
Yeah.
You didn’t let her stay here last night, did you?
Ah...no, she’s staying at my place for a few days.
Her closeness with Lansing had felt okay then. “So?”
Zorro shook his head, as if Johnny had said something incredibly stupid. “Push comes to shove, she’ll pick him over you any day.”
“What do you mean?”
“The pig’s after somethin’ from you, Tonto. Why else he want anything to do with you?”
For a moment, Johnny saw his father, standing over him, a belt in his hand. You good-for-nothing brat.
“You don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.”
“Wait. It’ll happen just like I say. They’ll use you. And my guess is, it’ll be to get at me. At the Blisters. When it happens, you come back to your family, man. We be there for you.”
And as stealthily as he’d come, Zorro disappeared into the night.
* * *
“I don’t care what you have to do,” Mitch barked into the phone. “I want the results by noon.” He slammed the receiver down and clenched his fists to keep from throwing the whole instrument across his office. Consciously, he leaned back in his chair. Just as the counselors had taught him, he closed his eyes and willed every muscle in his body to relax one at a time. It worked better this morning than it had two nights ago.
Seeing Cassie’s fear when she’d returned to his place, watching the realization sink in, witnessing her suffering as she threw out the pieces of her past. He’d wanted to howl with rage—and tear somebody apart.
Preferably the Blisters.
Instead, he’d promised himself he’d stop this gang, no matter what. He’d end their threat to Cassie—and to Johnny, the boy who had also come to mean so much to him.
It had enraged him to see Johnny’s pain as he told Cassie the red spray paint was a calling card of the Blisters, that they had done this to her.
And amid her very real suffering, she’d comforted Johnny. She’d told him it didn’t matter. That the books were only material things. She’d made him promise to let Mitch take care of this and not get involved.
It was in that completely selfless moment that Mitch had realized he was in love with Cassie Smith. He didn’t know what he was going to do with the knowledge, but it was there, in a corner of his heart, for safekeeping.
A movement across the room drew him from his reflection.
Mitch’s jaw dropped when he saw Joe DeFazio’s father in the doorway to his office.
“Mr. DeFazio.”
“Captain.” The man’s voice was hoarse. And he looked different from the brash, arrogant bully who’d told Mitch five weeks ago to leave his son alone. DeFazio’s shoulders were hunched and his eyes bloodshot, as if from lack of sleep.
“What can I do for you?”
DeFazio inched into the room.
“Sit down.”
The man perched on the edge of a seat in front of Mitch’s desk. His eyes darted around the office. Mitch waited.
“It’s my boy.”
“Joe.”
“He’s...he’s gone.”
“What do you mean?”
“He hasn’t been home since last weekend.”
“Why haven’t you notified us?”
“Because he called his ma. Told her he was staying with friends. Says he’s quitting school.”
“How old is he?”
“Eighteen.”
Legal age to make the decision. “Do you know where he is?”
“He wouldn’t say. But we called a buddy of his. Youngblood. The kid told us he thinks Joey’s hanging out with a gang in the city. They tried to get Youngblood to go with them, but he said no.” DeFazio looked up at Mitch. “My boy said yes. Why’d he say yes, Captain?”
For a brief moment, Mitch took pleasure in the fact that Youngblood was able to resist the lure of the gang. But it was quickly overshadowed by the fact that DeFazio had been sucked in. “Your boy said yes for a thousand reasons, Mr. DeFazio.”
“Can you help me?”
“I’ll try.”
* * *
It was a mistake. Mitch could see it as soon as he put the question to Johnny. Mitch had gone to Kurt’s clinic, to find the boy, to ask for his help, over Cassie’s objections....
“I don’t think it’s a good idea to involve Johnny.” Cassie had stared at Mitch over her desk when he’d come to school to tell her about DeFazio.
“Cassie, he can help us. I need to know where the Blisters hang out.”
“Get the New York City police involved. They should know something.”
“Time is important. Besides, Johnny’s strong enough. He’ll be able to handle this.”
“I’m not sure. Insecurities like his are hard to overcome. I know.”
“I think you’re wrong....”
But she’d been right. Mitch knew it as soon as he’d broached the subject with Johnny. The boy had stiffened first, then shut down right before Mitch’s eyes. “What do you mean, I could help? I’m not part of them anymore.”
Mitch tried to backtrack when he pegged Johnny’s reaction. “It’s okay. I’m worried about the DeFazio boy. I figured if you knew how to contact him, we might be able to do some type of intervention.”
“You want me to tell you where the Blisters hang out, don’t you?”
“Look, Johnny, I’m not making myself clear here. I just thought—”
“Cassie know about this?”
“Cassie?”
“Yeah. Does she know you’re here?”
“Yes, but—”
And before Mitch could explain, Kurt burst in on them. “I need Johnny and all available staff members. Stat.”
The emergency had taken two hours. Mitch had stuck around, but by the time he got to see Johnny again, the kid had his mask back in place. “Sure, it’s cool. I understand.”
Mitch suspected Johnny didn’t.
* * *
Johnny waited for DeFazio in the back room at Pepper’s. It wasn’t very private, but it was where DeFazio had wanted to meet.
Closing his eyes, Johnny leaned back against the rough plaster wall and tried to stop the anger. First Lansing, now DeFazio. Why was everybody wanting to talk to him? Shit, he just wanted to be left alone.
They’ll use you...they want something from you...my guess is, it’ll be to get at me. At the Blisters.
Johnny tried to banish Zorro’s claim, but it had taken root and grown in the twenty-four hours since Lansing had approached him. Johnny had finally gotten the nerve to talk to Cassie about it. She’d been evasive, tiptoeing around her feelings about him helping the cops out. It had made Johnny more nervous.
There was a loud rap on the outside door. Johnny unlocked it to find DeFazio shivering in the alley. He stumbled in. Enraged at what this punk had done to Cassie, Johnny grabbed DeFazio by the collar and raised his fist. But he halted when he saw the kid’s face.
“You l
ook like shit.”
“I feel like shit.”
Bruises covered DeFazio’s forehead and cheeks. His nose and one eye were swollen. The bruises hadn’t yellowed yet. It had only been four days since his initiation. He looked grotesque.
“What you want from me?” Johnny asked, releasing him. He couldn’t make himself pound the punk’s already battered face.
DeFazio sagged against the wall, his eyes darting around the small room. “This safe?”
“What? You got national secrets?”
“I got information. Bad information.”
Johnny scowled. “About?”
“They kill, Johnny.”
“Who?”
“The Blisters.”
Johnny shook his head. He’d never seen the gang kill anybody, but there had been talk. Which Zorro had denied, so Johnny had ignored.
“You don’t know what you’re sayin’.”
“I do. They...that...you know, that guy who...” DeFazio sank onto a chair and put his hands over his face.
Johnny waited.
“They killed that cop last year. He was only twenty-four. He had a pregnant wife.” DeFazio looked up at Johnny. “Geez, I didn’t know they killed people.”
“How do you know this now?”
“I overheard Zorro and Hulk talking.”
Johnny digested that.
“What should I do, Johnny?”
Johnny sank into a chair. “I don’t know.”
The door that led to the pool room opened. Pepper stood in the archway, his wrinkled features accented by a frown. “What are you guys doing back here?”
“You eavesdropping, old man?” Johnny asked.
Pepper straightened. “This is my place, kid. Not yours.”
Johnny remembered talking to Cassie once. You ask Pepper to keep an eye on me, Teach?
Yes, Johnny, I did. I’ll do anything to keep you straight.
Just then, one of the workers called back, “Pepper, phone call.”
“I’ll be right back,” Pepper said, and left.
Johnny turned to DeFazio and swore.
Heart Stealers Page 21
