“What’s in the case?” I said.
He smirked and took another sip.
“Let’s have a look,” I said.
That’s when Mario decided to take a swing at McCracken. The P.I. slipped the punch and shoved him against the wall again, less gentle about it this time.
“No can do,” Alfano said.
I pulled my Kel-Tec and pointed it at him.
He gave me a blank stare, then worked the combination lock and raised the lid.
“Still full, huh?” I said. “What’s the story? Doesn’t anybody want your dirty money?”
“Hey, give me a chance. I only got to town last night.”
“You were here last week, too.”
“With a different briefcase,” he said. “I don’t like to lug too much cash in a single trip.”
“Afraid you might get ripped off?”
“Nah. I never worry about that. The people I work for? Only a fool would steal from them.”
“Why, then?”
“Cash is heavy, pal.”
I took the chair across from him, rested the automatic on my lap, picked up the wine bottle, and downed a slug.
“Nice,” I said, although I had no idea if it was.
“A 2007 Stonestreet chardonnay. I always go first class.”
“Sorry about your brother,” I said.
“You know my name?”
“I do.”
“You’re not here to rob me?”
I shook my head no.
“Who sent you?” he asked.
“The question is, who sent you.”
“Are you from Zerilli?” he asked.
“The bookie? No. I work for The Dispatch.”
“Ah. The newspaper.”
“That’s right.”
“Piece of shit,” he said.
“I agree.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Mario lunge for the revolver. What did he think he was going to do with an unloaded gun? Throw it at us?
“Leave it be,” McCracken said, “if you want to keep that hand.”
“So let me ask you again,” I said. “Who sent you?”
Alfano didn’t say anything.
“I know it was Atlantic City casino interests,” I said. “What I don’t know is which ones.”
“If you want to live to see your next byline,” Alfano said, “you should stop trying to find out.”
I slid a Partagás from my shirt pocket and clipped the end. “Mind if I smoke?”
Alfano didn’t say anything.
I dug the lighter out of my pants pocket.
“It’s a nonsmoking room,” Mario said.
“And you’re never one to break a rule?” McCracken said. “I guess shooting a state legislator doesn’t count.”
I set fire to the cigar, took a long draw, and blew a smoke ring. Alfano’s eyes followed it as it drifted toward the ceiling.
“You know,” I said, “you and my buddy Mario here are quite the odd couple.”
“How do you mean?” Alfano said.
“Mario’s got high hopes. He’s angling to inherit his uncle’s bookmaking business. But if sports gambling is legalized, it would ruin everything for him. You, on the other hand, are bribing legislators to get the gambling bill passed.”
I glanced at Mario in time to see his eyebrows shoot up.
“What?” McCracken said. “You didn’t know what your boss is doing here?”
Mario looked at the carpet and didn’t say anything.
“Well,” I said. “I’ve enjoyed our little chat, but I must be running along. Tomorrow’s newspaper won’t come out all by itself, you know.”
I rose, plucked the cigar from my lips, and doused it in his wineglass. I hated spoiling a good cigar, but I thought the gesture gave our departure the proper cinematic effect.
“You just put a target on our backs,” McCracken said as we rode the elevator down.
“I know,” I said. “So let’s put one on theirs.”
From the lobby, McCracken listened in as I called state police headquarters and asked for Parisi.
“If you hurry,” I told him, “you can find Mario Zerilli in room 914 of the Omni Providence. The suite is registered to Michael O’Toole of Atlantic City, New Jersey.”
“Who the hell is that?”
“It’s the fake name Romeo Alfano is registered under. Romeo is Lucan Alfano’s brother, and he’s holding a suitcase full of cash. He’s using the money to bribe state legislators, and he’s paying Mario to do strong-arm work for him. And Captain? Be careful when you bust in. Mario’s packing.”
Then I rang Wargart at the Providence PD and gave him the same tip. That, I figured, would finally get the homicide twins off my back about killing Mario.
29
Late that afternoon, I was sitting in my cubicle bantering with Hardcastle, the metro columnist, about how the other Hasbro toys were taking Mr. Potato Head’s pending elevation.
“The way I hear it,” I said, “G.I. Joe’s so jealous that he wants to stab all the spud’s eyes out.”
“And the My Little Ponies are planning to stampede,” he said. “They want to trample him into mashed potatoes and feed him to Pokémon.”
Hardcastle, who’d been looking for an angle to write a satirical column about time-wasting state legislators, thought the idea had potential.
We were still tossing it around when the security guard rang from the lobby to warn me that three plainclothes cops were on their way up.
I met Parisi and the homicide twins at the elevator. Wargart and Freitas were grinning. Parisi looked grim. I led them to the meeting room, where we seated ourselves around a small table.
“Did you catch Mario?” I asked.
“Course not,” Wargart said. “He was never there.”
“Sure he was,” I said.
“Bullshit,” Freitas said. “We aren’t buying your lies.”
“What about Romeo Alfano?”
“Oh, he was there, all right.”
“And the briefcase full of cash?”
Wargart and Freitas didn’t answer. I glanced at Parisi. He shook his head no.
“Alfano’s in custody?” I asked.
“Not exactly,” Wargart said.
“Don’t tell me you let him go,” I said.
Wargart and Freitas smirked and exchanged glances.
“Romeo Alfano is in the morgue,” Parisi said.
“Aw, hell.”
“And you,” Wargart said, “are the last person to see him alive.”
With that, he rose, ordered me to stand, told me to empty my pockets, and pulled my hands behind my back.
“There’s no need to cuff him,” Parisi said.
Wargart slapped the bracelets on anyway. Chuckie-boy looked on stone-faced again as the three detectives led me out. This was getting to be a habit.
At Providence police headquarters, Wargart and Freitas sat across the table from me and hurled questions. Parisi, arms folded across his chest, leaned against the wall and silently observed. From the interrogation, I deduced that Alfano was found dead on his hotel room couch, shot twice in the chest and once in the head.
“We found a cigar in a wineglass,” Freitas said. “Same brand you tossed on the table when you emptied your pockets. Pretty careless of you to leave it at a murder scene.”
“Wasn’t a murder scene when I left,” I said.
“Bullshit,” Wargart said.
“It was Mario,” I said, “and now he’s on the run with a couple of hundred grand in hundred-dollar bills.”
“Blaming the zombie again, huh?” Wargart said. “Where did you stash the money, asshole?”
That rattled me. I nearly blurted out that McCracken could back up my story. But it wouldn’t be right to involve him without making sure he was going to be okay with it. For now, I kept my hole card hidden and invoked my right to an attorney.
When Yolanda bustled in, she told the cops to get out and had me fill her in. Then she summoned Wargart and Freitas and demanded that they charge me or release me.
“We can hold him for twenty-four hours,” Freitas said.
So they stuck me in a holding cell till late the following afternoon.