Lamentation

by Joe Clifford

“Does it matter?”

  “No,” I admitted. “Not really.”

  The girl stood and bent down, picked up an old fountain drink container at her feet and extinguished her cigarette stub. Apologetically, she asked for another. I passed her the pack. She considered her selection.

  “Keep them,” I said.

  She didn’t say thank you, just reached over me to snag the lighter from the table. I could see the inside of her arm, intersecting tracks from pit through crook to wrist, a down-bound train that ran all night long.

  “That was his friend they found the other day,” I said. “Dumped in the stream behind the store. He’d been strangled. Face busted up.”

  “Cops came around talking to everyone.”

  “What’d they want to know?”

  “The usual. If anybody saw anything, heard anything, knew the guy.”

  “And?”

  “Nobody sees anything around here.” She attempted a smile. “I didn’t know the guy. Like I said, I make it a point not to.” She crossed her frail arm over her little boy body, twitching her legs again, knocking knees together, foot scratching calf, the jitters. “Not that it’s gonna matter much soon. I’m not long for this place.”

  That might’ve sounded like a cry for help. But I knew it wasn’t. Her wounds, whatever their roots, had scarred over thick, made her hard. This girl would survive. Which was the real tragedy.

  “Are you moving?” I asked.

  “Don’t you keep up on your local politics?”

  I didn’t get the joke.

  “They’re tearing this place down,” she said. “It’s been all over the news. Putting up a ski resort or some shit.”

  “Must’ve missed it.”

  “Someone’s about to make a fortune. They’ve been sending thugs around the last few weeks, trying to scare off everyone, clear the place out so no one tries to claim squatter’s rights. Won’t see that story on your evening news.”

  I remembered the soundless News at Noon report from the other day, the one where they interviewed the family on the slopes.

  “What’s the real story?”

  “Overheard one of them,” she said, “this tatted-up, muscle-bound dude, talking with Earl Hinkle—he’s the guy that owns this place. Guess it’s gonna be quite the resort. Fancy, five-star, huge.”

  I don’t know what made me ask the next question, or why I thought she’d know the answer. But her response didn’t surprise me.

  “You know who’s building this resort?

  Her mouth twisted up. “That big construction company up here. What’s the name? Lombardi.”

  Charlie still hadn’t called when I walked through my apartment door just after midnight. I’d hung around the motor lodge and TC as long as I could, which was shortly after the junkie hooker, whose name I never did get, dropped the Lombardi bombshell. Roads would be closed soon. Had no choice but to head home.

  It made sense that Lombardi would be handling the construction of a new ski resort, and the news alone probably wouldn’t have registered at all, had Chris not broken into Gerry Lombardi’s house a few hours earlier. If they were demolishing the motor lodge, I could only assume that meant the truck stop was out too. Surely, I would’ve heard something about that. Wouldn’t I? Not sure a thread tied the two together, this new construction project and my brother’s break-in, but the timing sure felt odd.

  I tried to recall specifics from my conversation with Chris, when he’d been blustering about secrets and hard drives, and I knew the Lombardi name had come up in my talk with Turley, although that was hardly a smoking gun; my brother had had a problem with the entire Lombardi family since high school and the wrestling team snub, or at least what he’d perceived to be a snub. When it came to my brother, trying to separate fact from fiction was a sucker’s bet and a loser’s proposition. At the very least though, this Lombardi connection spelled a weird coincidence. Which made me recall what Fisher had said last night about coincidences: In the world of investigation, there’s no such thing.

  I phoned Turley. I knew he couldn’t file a missing persons report on a guy gone only a few hours, but he could at least keep an eye on the street and an ear to the scanner. Turley said his shift was over but that he’d pass the information along to Ramon.

  “What were you and Charlie doing out at the TC anyway?” Turley asked.

  “Looking for my brother.”

  “Any luck?”

  “Don’t you think I would have led with that?”

  “Too bad,” said Turley. “I’d like to get McGreevy off my back. He’s really taking this case personally.”

  “Isn’t it a little strange that a Concord detective would be up here investigating the murder of a junkie?”

  “He’s not up here anymore,” Turley said. “Headed back down to the city. Wants constant updates, though. Driving me crazy.”

  “I mean, why’s the Concord PD so interested in Chris?”

  “That truck stop has always been a lightning rod. Michael Lombardi’s up for re-election in the state senate. His whole platform is pro-family and anti-drug. Won’t help his campaign to have addicts fished from streams in his hometown. Plus, y’know, there’s that whole business with those fancy new condos for the ski crowd. Don’t want to scare off potential investors. Drug-related, violent crime sorta shatters the illusion of quaint country living.”

  “Speaking of which,” I said, glossing over the fact that I’d just learned about this ski resort via an underage junkie prostitute in a motor lodge an hour ago. “I hear they reached a deal to tear the place down?”

  “What’s that?”

  “The Maple Motor Inn.”

  “Oh, yeah, I think I read something about that.”

  “Isn’t that what you’re talking about? Replacing it with a new ski resort?”

  “That’d have to be a pretty small resort!” Turley laughed. “No, I meant the new condos going up across town, big money trying to cash in on the Black Mountain crowd.”

  “I thought they were building a new resort at the TC.”

  “Not that I know of. Where’d you hear that?”

  “I can’t remember.”

  “The Maple isn’t owned by the same folks as the truck stop. I don’t know why anyone would want it, frankly. Kind of a dump.”

  “Maybe they want some new luxury condos there too.”

  “Next to the truck stop?” Turley said. “Who’s plunking down good coin to live next to that freak show?”

  “These other condos you’re talking about—Lombardi’s building them?”

  “Of course. Who else?”

  “You know who the developer is?”

  “Don’t recall. It was in yesterday’s paper.”

  “That’s all right,” I said. I knew I still had the Herald lying around somewhere.

  “Hold on,” Turley said. “Got it right here.” I heard rustling pages. “Um, it says the developer is Campfire Properties.” He paused. “Why are you so interested, Jay? Looking for some investment property?” He laughed.

  “Not exactly. I’ll let you go. I should call it a day too. Just be sure Ramon calls me if he hears anything.”

  “Of course,” said Turley. “I wouldn’t worry too much if I was you. Charlie’s a big boy. Probably picked up some sweet young thing at the Peachtree. So long as he didn’t mack on the wrong trucker’s girl, I’m sure he’ll be fine.”

  I knew Turley was joking. But the comment got me thinking about that computer shop and Charlie pissing off those crazy bikers.

  “Something wrong, Jay?”

  Maybe it was time to trust Turley more. “Charlie and I stopped by that computer shop.”

  “When?” Turley asked.

  “Couple days ago.”

  “And?”

  “Have you actually been in there? Felt more like a motorcycle gang clubhouse than a computer removal store. Guys were tatted, jacked up, heads shaved, looked like they’d all done lengthy stints in NH Correctional.”

  “
Commanderoes.”

  “Common what?”

  “Commanderoes. Motorcycle club. Gang. Bad dudes. Not as big or well organized as the Hells Angels or anything, but still not guys you’d want to mess with.”

  “I thought you told me it was a computer shop?”

  “It is. Your brother lives in a sketchy world. Attracts all sorts of undesirables.”

  “Jesus Christ, Turley—and you sent me in there?”

  “Hold on, Jay. I never told you to go anywhere. All I said was that Chris had a business operation. I never said to start investigating any crimes.”

  “No, just that it was in everybody’s best interest if I found my brother first.”

  Typical cop doublespeak. This is why I could never trust them. It was a dirty cop trick. Technically, no, he hadn’t told me to go up there. Just wound me up and pointed me in that direction.

  “That stretch of the Turnpike isn’t even in our jurisdiction,” said Turley. “That’s Longmont County. Gave them a ring after all this went down. Police Captain’s the one who told me about the Commanderoes hanging out there. Probably trading hot merch for drugs.”

  “Stolen electronics? Drugs? Why don’t you send somebody to arrest them?”

  Turley laughed. But not like we were in on the joke together, more the way you’d laugh at a little kid who didn’t yet understand gravity or the offsides rule in hockey. “Don’t work like that,” he said. “You need warrants, there’s court orders, lawyers, wrongful arrest lawsuits. Protocol has to be followed. And, like I said, that’s Longmont’s territory, not Ashton’s. It’s not like there’s a law against being high.”

  “Yes, Turley, there is. And laws against stealing and dealing drugs too.”

  “I don’t know what they are or aren’t doing in there, Jay. I’m only speculating. Nobody cares about a few dopers.”

  “Someone cared enough to send up a detective from Concord when one of them died.”

  “Yes, because it potentially affects careers and multi-million dollar real estate deals.” Turley sighed. “If you want to know more about the Commanderoes, you really should talk to your ex’s new boyfriend.”

  “Brody?”

  “He ran with them back in the day, if I recall.”

  My stomach sank. I’d known Brody was in a motorcycle club. Just didn’t think it was that kind of motorcycle club.

  As if he could hear the panicked thoughts racing through my head, Turley did a quick about-face. “A long time ago. Like years and years. Sorry I said anything. I’ve been working too many hours straight. Should’ve kept my big mouth shut. You’ve got enough on your plate.”

  “What do you know about it, Turley?”

  A fist pounded outside my door.

  I automatically gripped the phone like a hammer.

  “Open up! It’s me, Charlie.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Charlie looked like a giant freeze pop, chunks of ice in his hair, skin tinged an unhealthy shade of blue, entire body convulsing with a teeth-chattering shiver as he cupped his hands and huffed into them.

  “What the hell happened to you?

  “Dude, you have no idea,” Charlie answered, blowing past, searching my claustrophobic kitchen, scatterbrained.

  “Did you walk here?”

  “You have any beer?”

  “Fridge,” I said. “You sure you wouldn’t rather have some hot coffee?”

  He waved me off with a dismissive flick of the wrist.

  I blasted the radiator, cranking the dial as high as it would go, old pipes sputtering before unleashing hot, hissing steam.

  Charlie swiped a cold one from the top shelf, leaving behind the empty plastic rings beside the borderline edibles—a crusted wedge of Cracker Barrel cheddar, a questionable hardboiled egg at least two weeks old. He popped the tab and took a good long glug. A rosy glow returned to his cheeks. He dropped into the chair, kicking out his big, booted feet. Dirty snow water pooled underneath.

  “Where did you run off to?” I asked. “You couldn’t at least text me you were okay? I actually called Turley.”

  “Lost my phone.”

  “When? I’d talked to you, like, five minutes earlier.”

  “I ran into this guy who said he knew your brother.”

  “Where?”

  “Coke machine at the motor lodge. Tweaker. Trucker cap, fuzzy little mustache. Never got his name.” Charlie peered up. “You have any cigarettes?”

  I reached for my coat on the table before remembering I’d given the whole pack to that girl at the Maple. “Sorry. All out.”

  “This kid swore he knew your brother, said he was supposed to meet him, in fact. That’s when I phoned you.” Charlie drained another swallow. “What’d Turley have to say?”

  “A lot.” I decided to hold off on motorcycle gangs and real estate deals for the time being. “So what happened? I take it you didn’t find my brother?”

  Charlie rolled his eyes and shook his head. “After I hung up with you, we’re standing outside the door. Kid’s jumpy as hell, flinching practically every time a snowflake lands. He’s staring into the storm. A pair of headlights pulls into the gas station. Suddenly he says, ‘We’ve got to go now.’ And I’m, like, ‘to meet Chris?’ And he says, ‘Yeah, Chris.’ I told him I have to wait for my friend first. He says I can wait but he’s leaving, and he takes off running toward that little parking lot—you know, not the main one, but the one for the motel.”

  I nodded.

  “I thought, fuck, what if this is our best chance to find your brother? So I bolt into the blizzard, slipping and sliding, ’cause the snow’s really coming down, and the tiny lot is up that hill. I’m barely able to catch up with him. I get in his car, this piece of shit from, like, 1984. Greasy, balled-up McDonald’s bags, vending machine wrappers, scraps of scorched tinfoil on the floor, half of it eaten away by rust. I mean it, Jay. You could totally see the ground.

  “Kid tears up the Turnpike. He’s constantly checking his rearview, side view—like he’s expecting someone to be behind us. He starts ranting about the DEA and other covert government organizations, how they’re tailing him, tapping the phone lines, trying to scare him.”

  “Sounds like my brother.”

  “I know, right? But he’s getting really worked up about it, all the time speeding faster and faster, and it’s icy as hell out there. This kid is coming unhinged and we’re about three seconds from careening off the Turnpike and joining that crane in Duncan Pond. I’m doing my best to calm him down. No use. He’s talking about how the government’s been sending agents to the motor lodge, roughing up everyone, slapping them around. I know he’s high. I tell him it’s all in his head, and that’s when he reaches over and pulls up his sleeve. Welts and bruises, wrist to biceps. Like a goddamn eggplant, Jay.”

  I thought about that junkie girl telling me how thugs had been coming around lately, intimidating the riffraff to clear out the motor inn. These tenants didn’t sign leases; you could kick them out with little due process. Then again, why bother? You could do whatever you wanted to these people. It’s not like they were going to file a complaint with the police.

  “We’re tooling down the Turnpike,” Charlie continued, “and he’s pointing at everything—telephone poles, fire hydrants, goddamn icicles—and it’s all some form of undercover surveillance. I went to call you and that’s when I realized I’d lost my phone. Must’ve fallen out of my jacket when I ran to the car.

  “We’re driving through Ashton, and then we’re out in the sticks, getting farther and farther from the center of town. I ask where we’re going. He starts in about his wife he’s gotta find, how she’s the only one who’s ever loved him and how he knows he fucked up, but he’s gonna win her back and get it right this time, and it’ll be like before, she’ll see. I ask, ‘What about Chris?’ Kid stares over like he’s seeing me for the first time. He doesn’t even know what planet he’s on, Jay, irises the size of nickels, and he’s all, ‘Who’s Chris?’”

&n
bsp; “Jesus, Charlie, what are you doing getting in a car with someone like that?”

  “He swore he knew your brother.”

  With the heat blasted, Charlie had started to melt. I grabbed a towel from the bathroom shelf and tossed it to him to dry off.

  “We ended up way out by that cemetery on 23,” Charlie said. “You know, over by Eagle Ridge, before the 23 turns into the 12 on the way to Middlebury? The really old one with those crypts from the Civil War. He parks at the gate and kills the engine. I’m trying to talk sense into him, but really I’m thinking of ways I can wrestle away those keys. That’s when he reached under his seat.” Charlie panned over. “He had a gun, Jay. Put it right on his fucking lap.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Finger on the trigger, hand twitchy, he busts out sobbing—chest-heaving, snot-bubbling, like a little kid who can’t catch his breath. Full-on waterworks.”

  “What’d you do?”

  “What do you think I did? I got the fuck out of there.”

  “You walked all the way here from the 23?”

  “Ran is more like it. Your place is before the Dubliner and a helluva lot closer than my house. I nearly froze to death.”

  “Had me worried sick, Charlie.

  “Sorry, man. I knew you’d be worrying.” Charlie kneaded the back of his neck, clearly frazzled over his midnight adventure. “I never knew this town was so fucked up. There’s this whole world I didn’t know about. That I don’t want to know about.”

  I phoned Ashton PD and let them know Charlie was all right. I also mentioned the kid with the gun by the cemetery, not that I expected he’d still be there.

  “You want me to give you a lift to your truck?”

  “Mind if I crash on your couch and we grab it tomorrow?”

  “Don’t you have to be to work at like seven?”

  “After tonight, I think I deserve a sick day, don’t you?”

  I pulled a pillow and blanket from the closet.

  “Almost forgot,” he said, peeling wet layers of clothing and setting them on the radiator to dry. “Got a call from Fisher before I lost my phone. Remember that whiny guy who called you wanting his computer back? The restricted number? Fisher did some digging. Goddamn pay phone on Archer and Black Spring.”