1 Murder Takes Time

by Giacomo Giammatteo

  Soon fear chased the euphoria away. The trembling started in her stomach and worked its way up, lingering in her shoulders, tracing down her arms. She gripped the wheel with both shaking hands, fighting the desire to pull over. The only thing stopping her was the fear that cops would want to know why she was on the shoulder of an interstate. She checked the rear view mirror for what seemed like the hundredth time, and fought off images of what Tito would do if he caught her. If she were lucky, he’d put a bullet in her brain—if she were lucky.

  A few tears came. She managed to stifle the flood lurking inside her, but for how long she didn’t know. She thought this was going to be easy—get the money, go home, live happily ever after. But nothing with the mob was happily ever after; she should have known that from living with her father all those years. He had given her mother enough nightmares to last several lifetimes.

  She both loved and hated her father. He treated her well, but he was a degenerate like the rest of his mobster friends, and it cost him in the end. He lived the last years of his life afraid, and hiding in dingy apartments on the back streets of towns he hated. The problem was, he had taken her along for the ride. She hated him for that, but she hated the mob worse. Especially Tito Martelli. If she never saw another Italian for the rest of her life, it would be too soon.

  Signs for Hershey flashed on the side of the road. New fears stirred inside her. Would Tito be waiting? Had he found out what she was doing? Would she open her apartment door and find a guy with a gun? She said a quick prayer. Her life was in God’s hands now.

  And Tito’s.

  TITO GOT A GUN from his closet and headed for the door, only stopping when Manny talked sense into him. “You don’t know anything. Calm down, and we’ll figure this out.”

  “I’m gonna kill Chicky and Donnie.”

  Manny grabbed his arm and led him to the kitchen. “It’s not their fault. Who could have figured she’d be that smart? You got to admit, she pulled a fast one.” He walked to the sink and got water. “Why not let her go? If Carlo is dead, it makes no difference.”

  “How do I know Carlo’s dead? Besides, I don’t want a goddamn sword hanging over my head like that Greek.”

  “You mean the Sword of Damocles?”

  “Yeah, that’s the one.”

  “Give the kid a break. She lost her parents. Now she’s got you on her ass.”

  “She wouldn’t have if she hadn’t called. I’d damn near forgotten about her and her father both.”

  “That’s bullshit, Tito.” Manny shook his head. “What would you do? If you were broke. Needed money and were afraid to go anywhere. I’d do the same thing.” Manny grabbed a piece of fruit from the table. “I’m telling you, Tito, I’d let her go.”

  “That’s why you’re not running this crew.” Tito stared at him. “You know how long it took me to make that much money coming up? Long fuckin’ time. And I ain’t giving it up to some broad for nothing.”

  Manny shrugged. “So what do you want us to do?”

  “Find her.”

  CHAPTER 39

  DNA DOESN’T LIE

  Brooklyn—Current Day

  Frankie brushed the snow from his cashmere coat and kicked a dusting off his Moreschi shoes. Fucking goddamn cold weather. He hated snow more than anything, even more than his Irish father and his Sicilian mother, both of whom scarred him for life. He should have gone to Miami or Houston, anyplace where it didn’t snow.

  He lit a smoke then sat on the stoop outside of Donnie Amato’s house, careful not to tear his pants. Frankie dreaded the thought of sitting on cold, rough concrete, but he’d have no more contamination of crime scenes. Kate would be there soon. He’d let her have the first look. Soon a car came down the block, pulling up to the curb at a crawl.

  Has to be Mazzetti. He drives like an old woman.

  Lou Mazzetti moved up the sidewalk even slower than he’d pulled to the curb.

  “Hey, Lou, you got lead in your ass today?”

  Mazzetti took the last drag on a smoke before tossing it aside. “Didn’t figure Donnie was in any rush from what I heard.” He sat on the stoop next to Frankie. “Hit me with a smoke, Donovan.”

  “You just threw one out.”

  “Yeah, well, I’m old.”

  “What the hell does that have to do with anything?”

  “Us old people just don’t give a shit.” He held his hand out, waiting.

  “Goddamn nuisance is what you are,” Frankie said, but he gave him a smoke.

  Kate pulled up a few minutes later, popping out of the car with an exuberance difficult to imagine for a medical examiner—not an occupation Frankie associated with good moods.

  “Good afternoon, gentlemen. Waiting for me?”

  “Damn right,” Frankie said. “I’m not about to have my DNA on another scene without witnesses. If Morreau gets hold of that before I clear it…”

  Kate stopped and looked at him. “Frankie, I have to turn it in, and the report goes out tomorrow.”

  Frankie shrugged. “If I get fired, I’ll make you feel bad.”

  “You’re top shit,” Lou said, and used Frankie’s shoulder to raise himself up.

  “When are you retiring?” Kate asked

  “About a hundred years from now. Can’t afford to before then.” Lou offered a hand to Frankie.

  “When I need you to help me up, just shoot me.”

  “Be happy to,” Lou said, and walked in with Kate.

  The odor hit them as soon as the door opened. “Jesus Christ,” Lou said, and ducked back outside.

  Frankie turned back too. “Goddamn.” He held a handkerchief over his mouth and nose. “Kate, you alive in there?”

  “Sissies.”

  “She’s right,” Lou said. “We’re pussies.”

  Lou went in, holding his breath. Frankie followed, unwrapping the white silk scarf from his neck and using it to cover his mouth.

  Kate was across the room, stooping to examine Donnie’s genital area. “Holding your breath will only help you for about a minute at best, boys. And if your lungs are as bad as I think, probably less. Might as well get it over with and take a long, deep breath.” After she said that, she inhaled deeply.

  Lou looked at Frankie then back to Kate. “Screw you.”

  “I don’t think you have the stamina, Detective. I’ve seen you climb stairs.”

  “Well fuck you, then.”

  “Ah, here we go, the male genital response mechanism.”

  “Fuck you twice now.”

  Kate laughed. “Now you are into extreme fantasizing.”

  Lou laughed until his sides hurt. “You’re getting awfully close to Donnie’s dick, aren’t you?”

  “Jealous?”

  “I could show you better.”

  Kate turned to him wearing a smirk. “Even burnt and shriveled up, I think I’ve got a better specimen here.”

  “Ouch. That’s cruel. I give up.”

  Kate looked up at Frankie. “I better not find any of your semen down here, Donovan.”

  “I ought to kick your ass,” Frankie said.

  “You ought to do something with my ass, but kicking is not what I had in mind.” She paused. “Rhymed with it, though.”

  Lou coughed. “I didn’t know this was an X-rated investigation. If you two need the bedroom…”

  “I’ve tried keeping Donovan in bed before, but he won’t have it.” Kate reached down and pulled something off the floor. “Gum anyone?”

  Frankie looked closer and shook his head. “Did he set Donnie’s balls on fire?”

  “Everything.” Kate stood up, eyes rolling. “One sadistic son-of-a-bitch. Set his feet on fire. His genitals. He also stuffed a cloth soaked in some flammable in his mouth and lit that.” She nodded. “Look at the face.”

  Frankie winced. He’d seen it, but only as a glimpse.

  “Sick fuck,” Lou said.

  “Guy must have done something really wrong,” Frankie said.

  Kate looked at him
as if he were nuts and gestured toward the body. “He did something wrong?”

  Frankie nodded. “For someone to do this. Whoever did it must have been pissed.”

  AFTER HER CREW GOT there, Kate finished up and left the scene to Frankie and Lou. There was the usual assortment of random evidence, including rat shit. Frankie looked in every room, went out back, even searched the basement, but there was no dead rat.

  Lou was in the kitchen, leaning on the counter, when Frankie came down from the attic. “Hey, Donovan, we got a shitload of reporters outside.”

  “Don’t tell them anything.”

  “I know that, but more importantly, you want to tell me what’s going on?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Nothing, my ass. You come into Nino’s place and go ape shit over rat shit, then clam up on me. Now you’re running around here looking for something that ain’t here.” Lou walked right up to him, face to face. “I’m asking as your partner. What’s going on?”

  Frankie raised his voice. “I said nothing, Detective. Got that?”

  “I’ll tell you what I got, Detective. According to Kate, we have your DNA at crime scenes where you didn’t investigate. We got DNA underneath blood, which means it was there before the vics were killed.” Mazzetti poked Frankie’s chest with his finger. “You want to explain that to me? Because if it’s not you leaving this evidence, who has your DNA?”

  Frankie was silent for a few seconds. “All right, Lou. But this is you and me.”

  “Convince me.”

  Frankie told him about Nicky, about how he used to leave rat shit as a joke to let people know they were the ones who did the crime. And he told him about how Nicky and Tony put the rat in Tommy Flannagan’s fridge. “If Nicky thinks someone betrayed him, he could do this. Maybe. And he could easily have my DNA.”

  Lou stood there, arms crossed, staring at him. “That’s it? Rat shit?” He laughed so hard, he started choking. “There’s rat shit in every home in New York. I got it in my house.”

  Frankie stood still, lips pursed, fist clenched. “There was also a dead rat in the fridge at Nino’s.”

  “You’re basing your hunches on dead rats? You’re too stupid to be a detective.”

  “Hey, Mazzetti, remind me not to eat at your house. I don’t like rat-shit pasta.”

  “Try it sometime,” Lou said, and headed for the door. “I’m outta here.”

  Frankie double-checked everything, but there were no dead rats. He leaned against the kitchen counter, pondering.

  Suppose Lou is right. What if all this is just bullshit? Then Frankie thought of the crime scene and how Tony had squirted lighter fluid down Timmy Benson’s pants one time to scare him. Frankie didn’t want to tell Lou about that. No sense in bringing Tony Sannullo into the picture—not yet.

  FRANKIE WALKED OUT OF Donnie Amato’s house and into a wall of reporters.

  Tom Mason, Channel Three, shoved his mic forward. “Detective Donovan, is this a mob hit?”

  “No comment,” Frankie said, and kept walking.

  “Does this have anything to do with Nino Tortella’s murder?” That question came from Megan Simms.

  “Can’t say.”

  A flurry of shouts hit him, but Frankie held his ground. “Not now. When we’re ready, we’ll make a statement. Everyone will get a fair shot.” He ducked into his car, locked the door and started the engine. He wanted nothing more than to get away from these leeches.

  It took thirty minutes to get home, and ten more to find a parking spot. As he trudged along the sidewalk toward his apartment he saw a familiar face on the stoop—Shawna Pavic, a good Irish girl who had the misfortune of marrying an ill-tempered Russian. Frankie had a thing with her once, but he knew she was here to get a story, and that pissed him off. Even so, he might as well be civil. “Hey, Shawna. How’s it going?”

  “Hi, Frankie. Been waiting for you. Figured you’d be pissed when you saw me.”

  “No shit?”

  “Yeah, no shit. Way I figured it, you would tell those other reporters to fuck off, and then you’d head home. About now I figure you’d want a bottle of wine—which I happened to bring—and maybe even some company.” She stood, pulling a bottle of Chianti from a brown paper bag.

  It brought a smile to Frankie’s face. “Only one other thing would have gotten you an invite into my apartment.”

  “And I ain’t doing that, Donovan. Excuse my pissy grammar.”

  Frankie laughed. “Come on up.”

  After settling in, they shared the bottle of Chianti, along with a few smokes. Frankie filled her in on the details. He kept back the parts no one knew, like how the killer spread mounds of DNA evidence at each scene. And he held back on the burning of Donnie’s balls, but she still got some gory stuff. Enough to make her salivate.

  “You tell anybody where you got this and I swear I’ll hang you.”

  “My lips are sealed.”

  “Don’t go that far. I’d like—”

  She tensed. “Screw you. This is fair play.”

  “Don’t worry. I work with you because I trust you. That’s all.”

  She relaxed. “Thanks. You don’t know how tough it is nowadays. When you’re a sweet young thing just coming up, you’re the star, but at my age, things start going bad.” She took a long sip of wine. “That’s the difference. Guys age and get promoted. Women? We disappear.”

  Frankie held up his glass. “To your health and long lasting beauty.”

  They tapped glasses. “And yours.”

  Shawna finished the last of her wine a few minutes later, then stood. “I’ve got to go. I hope you don’t think…”

  “Don’t give it a thought. Go write your report.”

  She leaned in and kissed his cheek. “You’re the best, Donovan.”

  “You got that right.”

  After Shawna left, Frankie refilled his glass and lit another cigarette. Another night alone. He took a long drag, then blew a few smoke rings. What was tomorrow—Thursday? He made a vow that tomorrow would be a new day for him. A day for change. If he changed something each day, he might even become the person he wanted to be. With that in mind, he called Kate Burns and asked her to dinner.

  THEY MET AT A small Chinese restaurant by her house. Frankie asked for a table near the back. Throughout dinner he talked mostly of cases they had worked, but he never let it get personal. Kate refused dessert. He ordered a piece of carrot cake, and she got tea.

  “It’s been a long time, Frankie. This invite have anything to do with the DNA stuff we’re facing?”

  He held up his hand to stop her. “No way I’d do that to you.” Her question hurt, but she had a right to wonder. It had been a long time. “Nothing to do with it; I promise. I just felt like going out, and I didn’t want to ask Mazzetti.” It was a weak attempt at humor and it didn’t work.

  Kate shifted in her seat. “Look, Frankie, I know we kid a lot, and I like you, but…”

  “But you don’t want to go to bed with me, is that what you’re saying?”

  “In a kinder, gentler way. Yes.”

  “Don’t bother being kind, Kate.”

  She looked at her teacup for an inordinately long time, took a sip then stared. “The way you said that, I was waiting for the ‘no one else has’ line to follow.”

  He laughed. It was a cover-up laugh, but he did it well. “That line was there. I stopped myself before the words came out.”

  Kate sipped her tea, looking at him over the rim of the cup. “How’s your little friend?”

  Frankie’s face lit. “Alex? He’s great. That boy’s a survivor.”

  “You really like him, don’t you?”

  “Somebody’s got to love him.”

  “So Frankie Donovan has a heart after all.” She smiled when she said it.

  “Yeah, well…”

  Kate reached over and took his hand. “You want to go somewhere and talk?”

  “Why, you a good listener?”

  “I’ve gotten
to be. Remember, I work with dead people all day, so when I get someone who actually speaks, I pay attention.”

  Dessert came, and Frankie ate it in silence, then remained silent as Kate finished her tea. When he was counting money to pay the bill, he looked her in the eyes. “Kate, I think I’ll pass on the offer to talk, but I do appreciate it. It’s just…”

  She nodded. “You’re not a talker.”

  “Something like that, yeah.”

  They stood, and before leaving the table, she leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “The offer stands. No expiration date.” She looked at him with warm eyes. “Okay?”

  “Sounds good,” he said, and took her arm to walk her out.

  Alex wasn’t around when Frankie got home, so he watched a movie alone, but mostly, he thought about Donnie Amato. He was convinced that these killings had something to do with Tito Martelli, and Tito had a connection with the mysterious girl Nicky called about, and Tony worked for Tito. But what did Nicky have to do with Tito? Frankie knew from the FBI surveillance tapes that he didn’t work for Tony. Nicky had been seen a few times going to the union hall, but he didn’t believe for a minute that he worked there. He was going to see Tito about something. And what did Nicky have to do with the girl? The names kept rolling around in his head—Tito, Nicky, Tony, the girl. Frankie had to figure it out, and he had to do it fast. The bodies were piling up.

  CHAPTER 40

  MOTIVES

  Brooklyn—Current Day

  The day after Donnie Amato’s body was discovered, Donovan was called into Morreau’s office. “You wanted me, Lieu?”

  Morreau picked up a piece of paper from his desk and held it before him. “I got a report from Kate Burns that your DNA is at the scene of several of these crimes.”

  “Lieu, I can explain—”

  Lieutenant Morreau got up and shoved the door shut, his voice raised a level or two when he continued. “What is there to explain? We’ve got your DNA at a scene you never investigated. Give me one good explanation.”