Just when I thought I’d seen my last curveball, Dave Casey smoked one right past me. I looked up at Kylie. Her mouth was open, but nothing was coming out.
“From the look on your faces, I’m guessing Salvi didn’t explain why he and his crew were there,” Dave said. “He wouldn’t. It’s family business. He’s been looking for whoever killed Enzo all these years, and he just stumbled on the truth a few days ago. Totally blindsided us.”
“That explains why a guy as high up the food chain as Salvi didn’t send in a hit team,” I said.
“It’s all on the tape,” Casey said.
“That’s the one thing that doesn’t compute,” Kylie said. “Guys like Salvi wrap themselves in secrecy. If there’s a camera in the room, they smash it. Did he not know the tape was rolling?”
“Salvi’s the one who told Jojo to turn it on. All he wanted was to record me and Gideon confessing to Enzo’s murder and bring it home to his wife. I doubt if he planned to pull the trigger on tape, but that’s the funny thing about video cameras—you get distracted, you forget it’s on.”
“What distracted him?” I said.
Dave cracked a smile. “Just watch the movie. I don’t want to ruin the ending for you. By the way, you probably want to send a copy up to the One Oh Six in Howard Beach. They’ve got a twelve-year-old cold case I’m sure they’ll be happy to close.”
I was positive that someone on the other side of the looking glass was already doing just that.
“Dave,” Kylie said, “you were kids when you killed Salvi’s son. It was a personal vendetta. What about these other random killings?”
“They weren’t random. We were cleaning up a city that couldn’t or wouldn’t clean up after itself. Are you telling me you never felt like doing anything like that?”
“Feeling like it and going ahead with it are worlds apart,” Kylie said. “We’re cops, not vigilantes. We work within the system.”
He smiled. “You two—especially you, Kylie—only work within the system when it’s working for you. Then you blow right through to the other side and do whatever the hell you want. Don’t forget, you’re the ones who had me and Gideon running an illegal tail on a couple of innocent cops.”
Kylie looked over her shoulder at the mirror. I could pretty much guess what kind of a look she was getting from the other side.
“A lot of people supported the Hazmat Killer,” Casey said. “I know you don’t condone what we did, but don’t pretend that you don’t understand.”
“Help us understand it a little better,” I said. “Take us through it from the beginning.”
“It all started with a simple question,” Casey said. “Do you think Hitler was a nice guy when he was in high school?”
He talked nonstop for the next two hours. When he was finished, he looked directly into the camera and said, “Well, that’s my video confession. None of it was coerced. All of it was voluntary. I just want to add that my sister, Meredith, never had a clue that Gideon and I killed Enzo or anyone else. Yes, she did tell Gideon that Rachael O’Keefe would be holed up at her aunt’s house in Jersey, but that’s only because Gideon got her drunk and pried the information out of her. We were cops. She trusted us. A lot of people trusted us, and, in fact, Detectives Jordan and MacDonald also shared confidential information with us. Meredith was just one of the many people we duped. She played no part in any of our crimes and shouldn’t have to suffer any of the consequences.”
He folded his hands and rested them on the table. “I think I’m done, but I have two more questions.”
“Go ahead,” I said.
“What’s the status on Rachael O’Keefe?”
“She was taken to the trauma center at New York–Presbyterian,” Kylie said. “Her sister is with her, and there’s round-the-clock NYPD protection to keep away the press, the crazies, and the usual assortment of bottom-feeders who want to exploit her ordeal.”
“Tell her I’m...” He stopped. “No, there’s nothing I can say that she wants to hear.” He shook his head, trying to clear away regrets that no doubt would haunt him the rest of his life.
“What’s your second question?” Kylie said.
“What do you think will happen to the Salvis?”
“The DA’s office screened the videotape, and they’re one hundred percent positive they can convict Joe Salvi.”
“The tape is definitely admissible?” Dave asked. “The courts won’t throw it out? They like to do that, you know.”
“Not this time,” Kylie said. “The DA confirmed that Salvi knew the camera was there. He says something at the very top about being the director of the movie. And the lens was open wide enough to catch him gunning down a cop. That’s life without parole. And Jojo will get at least twenty-five years as an accessory.”
“You know, my father was a cop, and deep down inside, Gideon and I were always cops. And even though we went off the rails, we managed to take down an entire Mafia dynasty. Joe Salvi and his two sons. Gid would be pretty goddamn happy about that.”
“I imagine a lot of people in Howard Beach will be pretty goddamn happy about that,” I said.
“You don’t know the half of it,” Casey said. “Everybody lived in fear of them. It’s the end of a sixty-year reign of tyranny. Nobody in Howard Beach will miss the Salvis.”
He paused, and an eerie smile crept across his face. “Except maybe on Thanksgiving, Christmas, Fourth of July, and Halloween.”
Epilogue
Hazmat’s Final Victim
Chapter 83
It was the Wednesday morning after Election Day, and I bounded up the stairs of the precinct with a shopping bag in one hand and a newspaper in the other. I was surprised to see Kylie at her desk.
“I thought you were driving Spence to rehab,” I said, setting the shopping bag on the floor.
“He can’t check in till three p.m., so I figured I’d come in here and give him some alone time. I’m sure by the end of the day, he’ll have had more than enough of me.”
“I know the feeling,” I said, and held up a copy of the Daily News. “Did you see this?”
There were two photos on page one—a jubilant Muriel Sykes making her acceptance speech and a forlorn Mayor Spellman watching the returns on TV. There was a one-word headline above each photo:
SYKES!!! YIKES!!!
“Zach, I know who won. We all know. The networks all called it for Sykes last night an hour after the polls closed.”
“Yes, but only the Daily News mentions us,” I said.
That got her attention. I turned to page three. “‘Despite the fact that one of the Hazmat Killers was shot down in cold blood by Mob boss Joseph Salvi, and the other was apprehended in a daring raid by NYPD’s elite Red unit, the two serial murderers have claimed one final victim—the political career of Mayor Stanley Spellman.
“‘For four months Hazmat terrorized our city, but Spellman refused to call in his powerhouse Red team. Only when his political opponent’s campaign manager became the latest homicide did the Mayor call in the finest of New York’s Finest. The effort, led by Detectives Zach Jordan and Kylie MacDonald, cracked the case in only four days. Exit polls confirmed that Spellman’s failure to harness the Red team sooner was a key reason why so many voters pulled the lever for Muriel Sykes.’”
“Powerhouse Red team…finest of New York’s Finest…I’m guessing Damon Parker didn’t write the piece,” Kylie said. “What’s in the shopping bag?”
“It’s a Go board, handmade out of a seven-hundred-year-old kaya tree. Plus, a box of authentic Yuki stones. It’s for the old Chinese guy in Columbus Park. He’s too good to be playing on plywood.”
“You bought him a gift?”
“No big deal. It cost less than I would have paid a CI for the same information. Didn’t you ever do something nice to thank a witness?”
“No.”
“Well, maybe you should start by taking that short fat guy, Joe Romeo, out for dinner. He was angling for some kind of
reward.”
She punched me in the shoulder just as the elevator doors opened, and out stepped a tall woman in a tailored blue business suit, accented by a red, white, and blue Hermès scarf.
It was Muriel Sykes.
“You should see the looks on your faces,” she said, walking toward us. “Like a couple of schoolkids who got caught roughhousing in the classroom by the new principal. Take me to Captain Cates’s office.”
We walked her down the hall. Cates’s door was open and Sykes walked in. “You too,” she said to us. “Inside.”
We followed her in, closed the door, and stood there clueless.
Cates, on the other hand, is a political pro. Her face brightened, and she stood up, came around her desk, and shook Sykes’s hand.
“Mayor-Elect Sykes,” she said, the perfect mix of bubbles and bullshit. “Congratulations. This is an honor. What can I do for New York City’s first female mayor on this historic day?”
“Thank you, but this is more about what I can do for you,” Sykes said. “I know there were people involved in my campaign who trashed NYPD Red.”
“Not people,” Cates said. “Just Damon Parker. He said he’d like to turn Red back into Blue.”
“I know. Damon can behave like a total ass, but that’s politics, and now that the election is behind us, I want to assure you that I’m your biggest supporter.”
“That’s good to know.”
“I’m grateful for what you did, Delia,” Sykes said. “I’ve known Detectives Donovan and Boyle since back in my U.S. attorney days. They are definitely not Red material, but they are fiercely loyal, and they’ve been my go-to guys for years. The fact that you brought them in for the collar after they bungled the case for months meant a lot to them and to me. So thank you.”
“Anytime.”
“City government has been male dominated long enough,” Sykes said. “I’ve made it a priority to find smart women I can count on.”
“If I come across any,” Cates said, “I’ll send them your way.”
Sykes laughed and turned to us. “As for you, Detectives, congratulations on your brilliant police work. I can see why Irwin Diamond handpicked you for the case. Nobody gets anything past you. Including me,” she said.
And that, I knew, would be the one and only reference she would ever make about the fact that she had violated every statute in the book by hijacking Evelyn Parker-Steele’s laptop.
“Not only did you solve the Hazmat case, but you rescued an innocent kidnapping victim, and on top of that, you nailed the most notorious Mob boss in the city on a charge that is guaranteed to stick.”
We both thanked her.
“I just wish we had the death penalty in New York,” Kylie added. “Nobody deserves it more than Joe Salvi.”
“I agree,” Sykes said. “Which is why first thing this morning I put in a call to Fred Pearson. Fred replaced me as the U.S. attorney for the Southern District. New York can’t execute Salvi, but the Feds can.”
“We knew that,” Kylie said, “but there’s a difference between ‘can’ and ‘will.’ It almost never happens.”
“You’re right,” Sykes said. “Almost never. But the Feds have struck out before, trying to indict Salvi on RICO charges. Fred Pearson is a protégé of mine, and I know he’d be thrilled to have a video of Joe Salvi murdering a police officer in cold blood.”
“But Salvi knew that Bell was a crooked police officer,” I said.
“True, but it doesn’t negate the fact that Bell was with NYPD and on duty at the time. Also, Salvi killed him because of a personal vendetta, so he can’t exactly claim he was on a public service mission. No promises, but the Feds would love to burn that bastard, so don’t be surprised if Joe Salvi winds up on the wrong end of a lethal injection before I run for reelection in four years.”
“Thank you for your support, Mayor-Elect Sykes,” Cates said. “If there’s anything we can do, just let us know when your reelection campaign starts.”
Sykes inhaled and rose to her full impressive height. She stared straight on at the three of us and said, “It just did, Captain. It just did.”
Chapter 84
Wrapping up the paperwork on the average homicide investigation can take days. But this case was anything but average. Two cops were the killers, someone from the DA’s office had leaked confidential information, and one of the victims had been the campaign manager for our new mayor. Kylie and I were drowning in official procedure.
“I think we just passed the point where it’s taking us longer to finish filing these reports than it did to solve the crime,” Kylie said as she got up from her desk at noon. “Sorry I can’t stick around for the rest of the fun, but Spence and I have to be on the road to recovery in thirty minutes. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She left, and thirty minutes later, I got a text.
What in the world is more interesting than me? C.
I’d forgotten my lunch date with Cheryl.
I hit Save on my laptop and ran around the corner to Gerri’s Diner.
Gerri was at the register. “Hello, handsome,” she said. “I heard you have a new girlfriend.”
“I’m fifteen minutes late, so the current one may be pissed at me, but why would you think I have a new one?”
“Rumor has it that our new mayor came a-callin’ on you this morning. None of my business, but Muriel Sykes is old enough to be your mother.”
“None of your business? Gerri, everything that happens at the One Nine seems to be your business. And don’t worry about the new mayor. If I ever start dating women my mom’s age, you’ll be first on the list.”
“Promises, promises,” she said. “Now hustle over to that booth before that British computer guy steals Dr. Cheryl right out from under your nose.”
I hustled. My lunch date was halfway through a small salad, and Matt Smith was sitting opposite her.
“Mind if I join you?” I said.
Matt jumped up. “I’m not staying,” he said. “Just keeping your seat warm, and making sure none of these randy cops hit on your girlfriend.”
Cheryl stopped eating and looked up from her salad, but she didn’t say a word.
I sat down. “My what?” I said.
“Come on, mate—I know you think it’s a well-guarded secret, but I don’t have to be a bloody genius to see there’s something happening between you two. More power to you. You’re a fantastic couple.” He looked at his watch. “I guess Kylie is on her way up to the rehab with her husband.”
“Sit down,” I said.
He sat next to me.
“You are a vast storehouse of personal information,” I whispered. “How the hell do you know about Spence?”
He shrugged and leaned in, keeping his voice low. “Information is what I do. What do you think the ‘I’ in IT stands for? I promise I won’t breathe a word of it. I just brought it up because I knew that the two of you knew. This is not Spence’s first rehab. Do you think he’ll make it?”
I looked at Cheryl to see if she’d take the question. Not a chance in hell.
“Yes,” I said. “He knows that if he doesn’t, he’s going to lose the best woman he ever had.”
“That’s precisely what I was thinking, and if Kylie MacDonald ever winds up single again…” Matt took a long, thoughtful pause into fantasyland. “Hell, mate,” he said, “I don’t have to tell you how fantastic she is.”
“No, you don’t,” I said, trying to keep my eyes away from Cheryl and my head as far away from the past as I could and even further away from the future. “No, you don’t.”
“Well, enjoy your lunch, you two,” Matt said, getting up. “And I know I’ve said this before, Zach, but brilliant job on the Hazmat case.”
He headed toward the door. Cheryl stared at me without saying a word. Ten seconds into the silence, she burst into a girlish giggle, and I immediately started laughing with her.
“Well, that certainly gives new meaning to the phrase embarrassingly awkward social
situation,” she said. “You thought he had the hots for me, and it turns out he has the hots for Kylie. How do you feel about that?”
“I feel like it’s something I don’t want to talk about,” I said. “Certainly not now, and absolutely not within a hundred yards of Gerri’s Diner.”
“How about a hundred miles from Gerri’s Diner?”
“I don’t understand.”
“I think I’m ready to take this relationship to the next level,” she said.
“Okay…”
She slid her iPhone across the table. “I know I’ve mentioned it, but I’ve never even shown you a picture.”
I looked at the screen. It was a picture of a white house, its roof, front yard, and driveway covered with snow.
“It’s even prettier in the summer when the flowers are out, or in October when the leaves are turning,” she said.
“Is that your house in Woodstock?” I said.
“Half the time. The settlement says that Fred and his child-bride-to-be have it the other half, but…”
“But what?”
“They won’t be using it for a while. The soon-to-be-next Mrs. Fred Robinson is pregnant.”
“Hmmm,” I said, stroking my imaginary beard. “And how do you feel about that?”
“I feel like it’s something I don’t want to talk about,” she said. “Ever. So, would you like to drive up to Woodstock this weekend, rake some leaves, breathe some country air, lie by the fireplace, and drink wine?”
“It sounds like it could be almost as much fun as the paperwork I’ve been grinding out.”
“You’ll love it. That house was once a very joyful part of my life, and then one day it wasn’t. I’m finally ready to go back there and find the joy again, and I’d like it to be with you. So, what do you say? This weekend?”
“Are you kidding? I was wondering if you were ever going to invite me.”
“Well, now you can stop wondering.”
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