Fourth Victim (9 page)

Walking through the kitchen, he saw Bob Healy at the opposite end of the hallway that connected the kitchen and the living room. Healy was kneeling over Noonan, pressing a blood soaked bath towel down hard on the man’s chest. Debbie Hanlon’s lifeless body, arms straight out in front of her like Superman in mid-flight, lay in the hallway between them. There was a dark splotch almost dead center between her shoulder blades, one on her lower back, and a nasty little red crater in the back of her head. Her pretty blond hair wasn’t so pretty or so blond anymore. There was a big pool of blood beneath her. Serpe didn’t want to think about what those. 45 slugs had done to her on the way out.

“He’s still alive,” Healy said breathlessly. “Call the cops.”

Even before Joe dialed 9-1-1 on his cell phone, he could hear sirens filling up the night. He walked over to Debbie Hanlon and retrieved Healy’s card from her back pocket. Odds were, she wasn’t going to have used it anyway. Now it was a sure bet.

T
here were the four of them in the office in Hauppauge: Hoskins, Serpe, Bob and George Healy. They all looked like shit, but Serpe and Bob Healy were in the sorriest shape. Neither one had slept more than ten minutes and both had endured several hours of police interrogation. Serpe’s hands were caked with his own blood, his face scratched and dirty, his pants and jacket ripped, bloodied, and filthy. Bob Healy had almost as much of Hank Noonan’s blood on his clothes as Noonan had left in his body when the EMTs showed up. Worse for them both was the guilt over Debbie Hanlon. Sooner or later they’d go home and shower, put on fresh clothing, and get bandaged up, but they understood that they would never be wholly clean again.

George Healy laid the phone back in its cradle. “That was the DA who just got off the phone with the police commissioner. You just can’t imagine how pleased they both are with this mess. And guess whose job it is to clean it all up and make it smell sweet and look nice and pretty for the media?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “That’s right. It’s mine. Now what the fuck am I supposed to—”

The phone interrupted George before his tirade got going in earnest. Just as he picked up the phone, the fax machine behind his desk began chittering away. George spun his chair around and scooped up the fax as soon as the transmission was complete.

He thanked the person on the other end of the line and hung up.

“Well, well, gentlemen, it’s our lucky day. Noonan’s dead. He started bleeding again and crapped out on the operating table at Stony Brook.”

“How’s that make us lucky?” Hoskins asked.

“Deathbed confession, right?” Serpe said, pointing to the fax in George’s hand.

“That’s right. The little scumbag gave the three of you a going away present just before his shredded artery blew its patch. He dictated a statement to a Detective Braun,” George read off the fax. “The statement was witnessed by a doctor and two nurses and was signed by Noonan.”

“What’s it say?” Bob Healy wanted to know.

“It says that you and Serpe were right, but for the wrong reasons.”

“Huh?”

“It wasn’t about the body shop’s cash flow, at least not directly. Here,” George said, handing the fax over to his brother. “It seems that Burns knew some bikers who were raising cash to bring in loads of high quality marijuana from Canada. The minimum buy-in stake was five grand in cash, but Burns only had a grand. Debbie Hanlon put in two grand, but Noonan had nothing. He was in debt up to his eyeballs and the business wasn’t his to sell. So Burns came up with the plan to rob one of the Epsilon drivers at the end of a busy day. Noonan said the papers gave Burns the idea because they listed how much money was taken from the other dead drivers. They had the girl blow Jimenez while they checked out his route for the day and then set a trap for him. Noonan says it was Burns that beat Jimenez to death and who broke the girl’s finger to warn her about keeping her mouth shut. They thought that by leaving the truck and body over by the Poospatuck Reservation that it would get blamed on the tribe.”

“What a bunch of rocket scientists,” Hoskins said. “Jesus, if these guys had half a brain, we’d be in trouble.”

“Yeah, that’s why my brother and Serpe figured it out in three days and you had your thumb stuck so far up your ass you were gagging on it.”

Hoskins’ jaw clenched. “I had five fucking homicide investigations to deal with at once and the press breathing down my neck. Sorry, I don’t have time to play Sherlock Holmes. I was checking leads. I woulda gotten to these guys soon enough.”

George Healy slammed his palm down on his desk. “Soon enough! When was that gonna be? Don’t lower my opinion of you beyond where it is now.”

“What about tonight—I mean, last night?” Joe asked.

“Apparently, the girl got spooked,” George said. “She called Noonan, who, like the total jerk-off that he was, called Burns. Burns figured to cut his losses and killed both of them. My guess is he was probably gonna do it eventually. Noonan and the girl were the only two witnesses against him and he had the cash to buy into the marijuna deal. He didn’t need to split his take. If you two hadn’t been lurking around, he would’ve gotten away with it too.”

Hoskins scowled, but kept his mouth shut.

“Cops picked Burns up?” Bob asked.

“Not yet, but they will.”

“Where do we go from here?” Serpe was curious.

“We,” George said, “aren’t going anywhere. My brother is going to hand over Noonan’s statement to Detective Hoskins who is going to read it until he can recite it word for word. He’s also going home to get showered and shaved and dressed in a suit that doesn’t look like it fit him when he used to hang out with Travolta and the Bee Gees. And he’s gonna be back here for a ten o’clock news conference. And during that news conference, he’s apt to say that he had suspected the crew at Noonan’s all along and that he was about to break the case when Burns took things into his own hands. He’s also going to say that he’s investigating the possibility that these suspects were involved with the other killings.”

“But that’s bullshit,” Bob said.

“Yeah, we know that, big brother, but Detective Hoskins is going to say it in any case. It’ll keep the press off our asses for a few days until it’s clear to them that the first four cases were unrelated to the Jimenez homicide. By then …” George Healy turned and glared at Hoskins. “What the fuck are you still doing here? You have the statement. Make sure you’re back up here at nine-thirty so we can go over your story.”

Hoskins hesitated, opened his mouth to say something, but thought better of it. He left without farewells. When he was gone, both Joe and Bob stood to follow.

“Where do you think you’re going?” George said. “Sit down!”

They sat.

“Not you, Serpe. You can wait for my brother downstairs or go home or do whatever it is you do when you’re not getting my brother into trouble.”

Joe got up, left, and didn’t look back. George paced until he heard the elevator ring and the doors slide shut.

“What the fuck are you playing at, Bob? You could’ve gotten yourself killed tonight.”

“But I didn’t.”

“Brilliant argument.”

“It’ll do.”

“No, it won’t,” George said, taking a plastic evidence bag out of his pocket and tossing it on his desk.

“What’s that?”

“It’s a favor.”

“Are we doing riddles now, little brother?”

“You tell me.”

“That’s almost funny, George.”

“You think?” He picked the evidence bag up and tossed it to Bob. “It’s a piece of an NYPD business card that one of the techs found at the scene. He told me about it before he logged it in and I asked him not to. I guess you and Serpe didn’t get all the pieces when you cleaned up after yourselves. What did you do, flush the other pieces down the can? You realize what I’m doing could cost me my job, right? Was the card yours or Serpe’s.”

“Mine.”

“So you were both in the house before and after the homicides.”

“What makes you think that?”

“The brain God gave me and almost twenty years doing this job.”

“We were there before the murders,” Bob admitted.

“So you went in impersonating cops and. Come on, tell me. I’m already in up to my nipples. If I’m gonna get fucked, I might as well know why.”

“Both Joe and I knew there was something wrong going on in that shop, but we couldn’t be sure if it was connected to Jimenez’s murder. We also knew the girl would probably be the weak link. She seemed like a good kid, but in over her head. We figured to throw a scare into her and.”

“The ploy worked.”

“A little too well. It—no, we got her killed.”

“Noonan got her killed. He called Burns, not the girl.”

“Somehow that’s not making me feel much better.”

“Go home and get some sleep.”

“Okay.”

“Just one more thing,” George said, reaching into his desk. “Here’s your two weapons. Funny thing, though.”

“What’s that?”

“In all your time on the job, I never knew you to carry two pieces.”

“I’m getting more insecure as I get older,” Bob said, a sad smile on his face.

“I figured. I know you’re way too smart to let a guy like Joe Serpe carry a weapon registered to you.”

“Way too smart.”

“Yeah, Bob, that’s what I used to think.”

“Me, too, little brother. Me too.”

B
ob Healy ignored the phone and threw his empty coffee cup at the TV screen.

“Come look at this shit!” he screamed to Serpe. “Five days later and they’re still going. Now they got Debbie’s mom on camera, collapsing in front of the funeral home. Look at the poor woman. These media whores have no shame.”

“Shame? No one has shame anymore, or haven’t you noticed?” Joe said, clicking off the TV. “Come on, answer the phones. We got a business to run.”

Serpe had long ago learned how to ignore the press. For years after the Abruzzi trial and Ralphy’s subsequent suicide, Joe stopped reading the papers, listening to news radio, or watching TV news. He blamed the media—not without some justification—for blowing up his marriage. TV reporters at his front door became as much a fixture as the statue of the Virgin Mary on his lawn. Reporters followed his wife to work and his son to school. As he once told Healy, “If you think all news is bad news, it’s worse when it’s about you.” But Bob Healy was a news junky and could not look away.

Although the murders of Debbie Hanlon and Hank Noonan and their connection to the oil driver killings was not quite a grand slam like the Amy Fisher/Joey Buttafuoco debacle had been, the local media were doing a major circle jerk over the story. And they would keep at it until the next best thing came along. With Iraq War fatigue in full swing and no one wanting to read yet another story about suicide bombers at the fruit market or hear about one more of our own killed by a roadside bomb, a nice local story of murder and betrayal was just what the doctor ordered. So the TV and radio stations and papers had given the story the full Shakespeare-Ringling Brothers treatment.

With leaps of faith and fiction, but few facts, they had woven the relationship between Hanlon, Noonan, and Burns into a love triangle with wheels. Poor Debbie had been cast as Long Island’s low rent Desdemona and Burns as Iago on a Harley. Noonan, a buffoon his whole life, had, in death, been miraculously transformed and thrust into the roles of both Cassio and Othello. None of the casting nor the mechanics quite fit, but the press never let the facts get in the way of a good story. They had long since traded in their honor for entertainment value. Perhaps the most egregious bit of miscasting was their portrayal of Detective Tim Hoskins as a real life Sherlock Holmes. Highly placed, unnamed sources inside the Suffolk County PD had let it be known that Hoskins was up for a medal. And Alberto Jimenez, the only really tragic figure in this whole mess, was forgotten by Monday morning, his memory washed away like the blood off the pavement of Old Northport Road.

“Still …” Healy growled.

“Let it go until the TV movie comes out.”

“It’s eating at me, Joe. It’s eating at me.”

That was another thing Healy was unaccustomed to; the guilt. Joe knew all about the guilt. First with Ralphy and then with Marla, he’d had to learn how to bear that cross. With Debbie, he had a few rough days, but he’d come around.

“Look, partner, remember what you told me your brother said. Burns would have killed the girl and Noonan soon enough. He wasn’t gonna split his profits with them and they were the only ones who could’ve fingered him for Jimenez. We gave her a chance to save herself and she fucked up by calling Noonan. I know it’s harsh, but if she had just come clean with us …”

“We didn’t go to save her.”

“That’s true,” Joe said. “But we threw her a line and she didn’t take it.”

“Maybe she didn’t know how.”

“Maybe. You gotta face it, Bob, there’s plenty of guilt in this life we deserve to carry. There’s no need to go looking for extra weight.”

“Sounds nice, but I don’t think it’s going to help me sleep.”

“Sleep. I gave that up a long time ago.”

With the weather having turned cold and snow in the forecast for the weekend, Serpe and his drivers were as busy as they’d been in weeks. Healy couldn’t answer the phones fast enough. So when his cell buzzed in his jacket pocket, Serpe just assumed it was Healy calling with another stop.

The weird thing about people and weather was that sub-zero temperatures didn’t seem to panic them much, but the mention of snow sent them into oil-buying hysteria. Of course, folks had it exactly wrong. Snow didn’t burn oil. Low temperatures did. It was like that stupid bread and milk phenomenon. The weatherman predicts a Nor’easter or a hurricane and people who haven’t touched a slice of white bread or had a glass of milk in thirty years, rush out to the supermarket for milk and white bread. Joe Serpe wasn’t complaining nor was he feeling bad about it. Oilmen were pretty low on the totem pole of businessmen who profited from people’s stupidity.

Serpe pulled to the curb and answered the phone.

“Hello,” he barked over the noise of the engine.

“Joe … Is that Joe Serpe?” It was a woman’s voice.

“This is Joe.”

“Hey,” her voice brightened, “it’s Georgine Monaco.”

“Hey yourself. What can I do for you Gigi?”

“You busy tonight?”

He was surprised to hear himself say, “Not that I know of. Why?”

“Let me buy you dinner.”

“Okay.”

“Come by my apartment around eight. I got something to show you.”

“Sounds good.”

She gave him her address and hung up. The phone buzzed again before he could get it back in his pocket. This time, it
was
Healy calling with another stop.

Now that the phones had finally slowed down, Bob Healy took full advantage of the opportunity to torture himself. He clicked from news channel to news channel, hoping to catch a still shot of Debbie Hanlon or footage from the funeral. What he got instead was footage of Noonan’s tearless father, a
my-son-had-it-coming
expression pulled across his hard face, yakking at a row of microphones. He could see the man’s lips moving, but the father’s words were drowned out by Healy’s own disgust. The elder Noonan seemed more upset that his son had ruined the business than by his murder.

The phone rang again and Healy thanked God for it, aloud. He turned his back to the screen and picked up.

“Mayday Fuel, how can—”

“Detective Healy?”

“Not any more.”

“It’s me, Detective Hines.”

“Blades?”

“Your memory works good for an old man.”

“Very funny. What’s up?”

“The D-O-I.”

“The what?”

“The Department of Investigation.”

“What about it, huh?” Healy asked.

“I’ll give you two guesses who put the lockdown on Rusty Monaco’s files.”

“What would the New York City Department of Investigation want with a retired detective’s files?” Healy said. “Strange how that retired detective turned up dead.”

“Funny how I was thinking that same thing.”

“You know what they say about great minds.”

“Yeah, that they don’t believe in coincidences,” she said.

“Blades.”

“What?”

“Do we know what DOI was looking at?”

“I’m working on that now. I got some friends over there.”

“IAB detectives have no friends.”

“You may be old, Healy, but I didn’t think you was blind.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“My friends over there are
special
friends, if you hear what I’m saying.”

“Blades, I think you and my business partner would get along. The first thing he asked me about you was if you were cute.”

“And what did you say?”

He ignored the question. “Let me know when you get something.” Healy put down the phone and turned back to the TV.