“This is my buddy Michael from Chicago.” Val gave a wink and nod that Maksim was certain implied something he wasn’t aware of. “He helped out with Pop’s funeral last month.”
“Oh.” Vito grimaced. “I meant to go to that, bro. Your dad was always a stand-up guy to me back when you and I played ball. Things came up. Mr. Russo said he sent flowers.”
“Yeah, they were nice.” Val’s tone pulled so tight it quivered. Maksim glanced at him worriedly, but his expression was flat.
“Anyway, of course, Mr. Russo knew how people felt about Esposito. He felt that way himself. He’s got no use for selfish fucks like that rat bastard.”
“He liked Val’s father, though,” Maksim remarked, watching Vito closely, testing his reaction. He didn’t miss the confused puckering of the man’s eyebrows before they smoothed back out, and he didn’t think Val did, either.
“Well, yeah, everyone liked Gio,” Vito offered lamely.
“Clearly, not everyone.”
Val stared at him with glittering eyes, and Maksim had no idea what that meant. Was he upset that Maksim had usurped his interrogation? He considered handing the reins back over but they were finally getting somewhere.
“He caused Mr. Russo some trouble, sure, but he was a good guy,” Vito said slowly.
“Esposito caused his own share of trouble.”
“I guess.” Vito watched him warily. “But he caused everyone trouble. That’s why I think Marty whacked him.”
Val frowned. “His cousin?”
“Who else? Now Marty gets to inherit the business, and he doesn’t need to put up with Esposito’s bullshit. The whole thing’s a pain in the ass for Mr. Russo, though.”
“Why?” Val asked.
“Because we’re this close to closing on that renewable energy deal, and his house is a fucking mess, that’s why. It’s embarrassing.”
“The deal with the Russians?” Val asked with deceptive laziness.
“Yup. Fucking wind farms.” Vito snorted. “Who would have guessed, huh? In a single generation we’ve gone from casinos to fucking wind farms. The Families are becoming a bunch of pussies.”
“It’s a new age, my man,” Val drawled.
“Yeah, well, you can keep it. I’ve got to drive Mr. Russo out to the Dalles tomorrow to check out the turbines, or whatever they’re called. Good thing Esposito got himself chopped up before the deal goes through. One less headache for the boss.”
Maksim leaned back and cranked an arm over the back of his chair. “What did Esposito think of Miller?”
“Miller?” Vito looked blank.
“Brent Miller,” Val supplied, shooting Maksim another of those unreadable looks. “I heard he had beef with a couple guys like Pop and Esposito.”
Vito rubbed the back of his neck, gaze skittering down the hall before bouncing furtively back to them. “Take it from me,” he said grimly, “the less you know about Brent Miller the better.”
A champagne cork popped.
Maksim’s attention jerked to the bar, but Mauricio was scrubbing the ice machine.
It wasn’t until Val jumped to his feet that he realized it was a gunshot. He would have thought he’d be used to the sound of the real deal after yesterday, but apparently not.
Maksim scrambled to his feet and followed, a hundred small details filtering through his brain at lighting speed.
Three more shots resounded through the club. The patrons nearest the door bolted outside while the businessmen near the stage hunkered down beneath their tables.
Mauricio had a baseball bat in one hand and a telephone pressed to his ear.
Vito was on his feet and yelling after them as they tore down the hall.
Val threw open the first door he came to, but it was only an empty and exceptionally cluttered office.
“I’ll check the bathrooms,” Maksim announced, hand on the swinging door of the men’s restroom, only to be yanked back by a furious Val.
“The hell you will,” Val snarled, throwing him against the opposite wall. His weapon was at the ready as he eased the battered door open.
Maksim had just stepped up behind Val to get a better look, when a door at the end of the hall burst open and a dark figure rushed them.
14
Maksim
The figure flew down the hall like a vengeful wraith. The hood of a black rain poncho was pulled low and obscuring their face.
Val raised his weapon and shoved Maksim hard behind him, but there was no time to get a shot off before the figure rushed out through the open room of the bar.
“Reese!” Val shouted.
Maksim stumbled upright just in time to see the rumpled man near the stage leap to his feet. He gave chase with the lethality of a tawny, hungover lion, pursuing the fleeing figure out the door with a crash.
“What the hell was that?” Vito demanded, stomping down the hall and peering into the empty bathroom.
Val ignored him and stalked down the hall with his gun drawn. From his angry body language, Maksim didn’t think he suspected any further danger. The gun was just a precaution, so Maksim followed, well aware of Vito on his heels.
Val pushed open the door at the end of the hall, the same door the assailant had burst out of. For a scant fraction of a second, all three of them froze.
“Motherfucker!” Vito yelled. He shoved between them, practically falling into the little room.
It was filled with a couple armchairs and an extra-wide futon, but absent the prostitute Mauricio had claimed was working that afternoon. In fact, it didn’t look as if sex had been on the menu at all.
Brent Miller sat slumped in his chair, with his bargain suit buttoned and zipped, as if he’d been attending a business meeting rather than getting his rocks off. A large, wine colored stain was spreading across his white shirt.
Maksim hadn’t paid the rogue detective much attention back during Val’s interrogation. The biggest impression Brent Miller had given back then was one of obnoxious arrogance, of a level even Maksim couldn’t tolerate. That quality had overshadowed any other observations he might have made about the man.
He couldn’t say he made a stronger impression in death. He looked like the physical embodiment of squandered potential.
The waxy, white-haired body of Russo’s elderly capo lay at Miller’s feet, with an ever widening pool of blood beneath his torso. His eyes were open and locked sightlessly on the ceiling fan.
Bile rose in Maksim’s throat, but he managed to unlock his limbs and check Miller’s pulse. The detective’s throat was still warm as he pressed his fingers against soft flesh, then moved them a few centimeters and tried again.
“Don’t bother,” Val muttered, tucking his gun back into his waistband. “They’re dead.”
Maksim withdrew his hand and gulped air, but it was tainted with the metallic stench of blood and only made the nausea worse.
“Yup,” Vito agreed. He crouched down on his haunches and closed the old man’s vacant eyes with one hand. “Gotta do it while he’s fresh,” he muttered, “or else he’ll be staring for hours once rigor mortis sets in.”
Their cavalier reaction was unsettling. Maksim coughed into his fist to cover his discomfort. “Where’s Mauricio?” he asked. “I’d think he’d want to know what’s going on in his club.”
“Not in this club,” Val scoffed. “The employees want nothing to do with what happens back here. I guarantee he called Marty and Russo before he called 911.”
“Not like any of this is news to the boss.” Vito snorted, rising from his crouch and scrubbing the back of his hand over his mouth.
Val’s eyes narrowed. “You saying this was a hit?”
Vito shrugged. “There’s more than one cop on the take in that department. Miller was getting greedy, giving out info to anyone with enough cash. Mr. Russo demands loyalty.”
“If it was a hit, why didn’t he ask me to do it?”
“Do you even have your phone?” Vito sneered. “Problems crop up fast in th
is business, Rivetti.”
“Who’d he get to do it? Because I’ll be damned if that was a pro.”
Vito shrugged elaborately. “How the shit do I know? I’m his bodyguard, not his best friend.”
The hair on the back of Maksim’s neck was standing on end. He felt uncomfortable standing in the open door, so he angled his body to see anyone approaching down the hall.
Val’s complexion had gone dark and his eyes were spitting fire. “So you expect me to believe you were just shooting the breeze with his capo, who ends up dead and you know nothing about it?”
“I don’t care what you believe, Rivetti.” Vito glared. “Take it up with the boss if you’ve got questions. I’m getting out of here before the pigs show up.”
The rest of the club had emptied fast. Only a couple bewildered businessmen remained, gripping the bar and speaking to Mauricio in flustered voices. The bartender didn’t spare them a second glance as they exited the building. Maksim guessed his livelihood depended on him regularly acting blind, deaf, and mute.
Vito gave them the finger, in what he seemed to think was an affectionate gesture, then jogged toward the club parking lot without a backward glance.
They wasted no time crossing the street and fleeing the crime scene. It went against every law-abiding bone in Maksim’s body to leave the corpses of two men lying there in the open, but letting Val get caught in front of another mob murder was asking for trouble. The police would hold him as long as they possibly could, and in the meantime, Maksim and Emma would be sitting ducks. Val would be none too safe cooling his heels in lockup, either, if Maksim knew anything about the mafia’s reach.
Still, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he looked incredibly suspicious, glancing over his shoulder and hoofing it to the truck they’d tucked away behind a dumpster.
Val’s disheveled friend came loping down the sidewalk just as they got the doors unlocked. His eyes were glassy and bloodshot, but the color was pure as a green glass bottle, bright enough to have Maksim doing a double take.
The man gave Maksim a nod and then slipped around Val and into the backseat of the truck.
Val raised an eyebrow at Maksim and they both climbed inside.
“He got away?” Val asked incredulously as he twisted the key in the ignition.
The engine rumbled to life. He reversed out of the parking lot and got them heading away from the club before the first cruiser pulled up.
“He hopped into an SUV idling at the curb. Not much I could do but get the plates.”
Val grunted.
“J.D. Reese,” the man announced, leaning between the seats and stretching a calloused hand out for Maksim.
“Maksim Kovalenko.”
“How about you explain the mess you boys got yourselves in before Rivetti drops me at my motel?”
It didn’t take long to catch Val’s friend up to speed, considering he was already well aware of the fate of Val’s parents and had at least suspected the dark paths Val was walking in search of answers. Filling him in on the events of the past few days was simple enough, considering they barely knew anything.
Reese listened politely, though he reached out and smacked Val in the back of the head when Maksim detailed his arrest outside Esposito’s apartment.
“Ow! I’m driving, jackass!”
“What the hell am I doing wasting time in this city if you won’t call me when you need backup, Rivetti?”
“I called you today, didn’t I?”
“Pffft.” Reese reclined back with his arms folded behind his head. The bench seat in the rear of the cab was so low that his knees were cranked up as high as his chest. His thighs looked massive beneath the shredded fabric of his jeans. “I bet you only called me because your lawyer made you.”
Val didn’t bother taking his eyes off the road as he lifted a hand and flipped him off.
Reese chuckled. “So this Vito guy thinks Russo is cleaning house?”
“He wanted us to think so,” Maksim said. “Whether he thought so himself is less certain.”
“Vito’s a rotten liar, always has been,” Val said. “What I can’t figure out is why he’d sit chatting with a Russo family capo before sending him back there to get offed? Why waste his breath?”
“Perhaps he was attempting to sway the man to his cause,” Maksim theorized. “When that failed, he sent him under some guise to the back room where Brent Miller’s assailant was waiting.”
Val was kneading the steering wheel in frustration. “Vito’s dumb as a box of rocks. No way he’s working alone.”
“Who stands the most to gain by turning Russo’s employees against him?”
“The Russians, but it isn’t their style. The Saint Valentine’s massacre is more their speed. Besides, what could Pop have possibly known that would be a threat to them?”
“Who else?”
Val shrugged helplessly. “Someone high in his own organization?”
“Who might that be? Assuming his capos are as old and complacent as you say, it’s unlikely to be them. Nor would it be a soldier without money and influence. It would need to be someone who can command multiple hitmen, someone who thinks they have a chance of swaying Russo’s loyal friends to their side.”
No one had a reply to that.
Maksim stared out the window as the gray cityscape rushed by.
Eventually, Val muttered, “I need to talk to Russo. He’s not blind. He’s got to have some clue what’s going on.”
“If it ain’t him, he’s done a piss poor job managing the situation,” Reese pointed out.
“Yeah. But I don’t have much of a choice. Without his help, I’m shooting blind.” He glanced at Maksim. “We’re going on a little road trip.”
“Can’t you just call him?”
“That’s not how things are done in this world. Let Miguel know we’re keeping his truck for a couple days.”
“Who’s Miguel?” Reese asked.
Maksim ignored him and put in the call.
Miguel’s boisterous greeting blasted out of the stereo when Maksim’s phone automatically synced to the truck’s bluetooth. “Sup?”
“We’re taking your truck to Seattle,” Maksim announced.
“The Dalles,” Val corrected. Maksim frowned at him. “He’s checking out his new wind farm tomorrow, remember? I’d rather catch him off his home turf, without a house full of bodyguards and a shed full of plastic sheeting.”
“Jesus,” Miguel swore. “You two had best be careful. I’ve been digging into things. Folks around Russo have a habit of winding up dead these days.”
“Like who?”
“Besides Robert Esposito and Gio Rivetti? Russo’s best friend was carjacked in June. Then they lost a guy named Raymond Tucci in August.”
“That was Russo’s old trigger man, the one I replaced.” Val scowled. “I thought he had a stroke?”
“If he did, it was helped along by two slugs to the back of his head.”
Maksim’s gut churned. “I don’t want you digging into this any more, Miguel. Someone just took out Brent Miller. Word is he isn’t the only cop on the take.”
“No worries, bro. My contacts are solid.”
“And if they trust the wrong people? I’m not putting you in jeopardy like that. I’m relying on you to keep Emma safe.”
Val was doing some silent communication with his friend via the rearview mirror. Maksim gave him an inquiring squint.
“Acosta,” Val spoke louder than he needed to, practically yelling into the truck’s dashboard. Maksim winced. “I’m dropping my buddy off to keep an eye on you.”
“Uh, thanks for the thought, Rivetti, but I’m good. My mama didn’t raise no fool.”
“I know, brother, but do this for me. With all the action going on at Esposito’s, I can’t guarantee someone didn’t check out your truck. All it would take is their PPB contact running your plates, and you’re on the shit list with us.”
Miguel gave an aggravated growl. “He better like
Mexican.”
“Both the food and the people,” Reese drawled lazily.
There was a pregnant pause, then Miguel laughed. “Okay, Rivetti. Bring him on by.”
15
Maksim
Emma was much less enthusiastic about Val’s friend joining them than she had been about staying with Miguel.
Not that Maksim could blame her. Val insisted J.D. Reese was the most honorable man he’d ever known, but he looked as if he lived under a bridge and had just come off a three-week bender.
“He’s gotten me out of so much trouble, it was practically his secondary job description,” Val assured him. “He’s like a brother to me. I trust him with my life.”
Miguel had regarded the stranger in his home with the same cold reserve Andrea Nilsson gave all her suspects across the interview table, a learned assessment that hadn’t left Miguel when he’d left the force.
Reese had flashed a brilliant smile, all lazy southern charm and dimples, but there was a forced edge to his grin.
Miguel, with that strange compassion he often exhibited, took that false smile and turned it real by pushing Reese into a chair and thrusting a plate of enchiladas into his hands.
“It’s my abuela’s recipe, so you better love it,” he warned.
Maksim couldn’t blame him for the impulse. Reese had an abundance of tightly packed muscle on him, yet there was a gauntness to his face, as if he’d had a recent bout of illness and could use a good meal.
The constant alley cat wariness he maintained reassured Maksim that nobody would sneak up on him unawares. Miguel would keep Emma safe, and Reese would keep Miguel safe.
Before Val and Maksim left, Miguel lent them a semi-automatic rifle he removed from his gun cabinet.
“Old habits,” he said with a shrug when Maksim looked at him askance.
The ease with which Val stowed the weapon in the back seat unsettled Maksim. It was ridiculous, considering what the man had done for a living. Academically, Maksim knew Val’s casual disregard resulted from familiarity and long experience. If Maksim felt like he was driving with an oiled steel snake behind his seat, that was his problem.
Murder Aforethought Page 12
