"Not yet," squeaked Kyle.
"Too bad," said Vern.
CHAPTER 36
WATCH OUT FOR THE SUIT," said Kyle as Vern and the second lug pulled and shoved him so quickly along the sidewalk that his feet barely touched the ground.
"Worry less about the suit and more about your skin," said Vern.
"My skin doesn't need to be pressed at the dry cleaner when it wrinkles."
"And now that you mention it," said Vern "your tie could use a little color."
"So says the heavy in the purple velvet sweat suit."
"It ain't purple, baby, it's violet. And it ain't velvet," said Vern with an extra shove, "it's velour."
They were headed toward a narrow alley that cut through Kat's block. Kyle had spent enough time with these creeps in an alley to know that was not where he wanted to go. He grabbed at Vern's wrists and struggled to get away, but Vern held on tight as he lifted him off the ground, and another blow from behind left Kyle gasping and limp.
"Don't fight so hard," said Vern. "We ain't killing you. This time. But the boss said we ought to put a bit of giddyup in your gallop."
"I've been looking."
"Mr. Sorrentino wants that you look harder."
As they approached the alley, Kyle went through his options. He couldn't go right at Vern, he was being held too close to put a shoulder in the big man's chest, and whenever he started swinging his arms, the lug clobbered him from behind. At the same time, he couldn't wipe out the lug, because Vern's grip kept his shoulders from turning. Somehow he had to switch the odds into his favor, but now it was two to one against, and the geometry was all wrong. He needed to find the correct angle.
And then, as his shoes slid over the cement, he figured it out.
Time slowed as Kyle grabbed once again at Vern's wrists. He knew that Vern would press up with his hands, as he had before, but this time Kyle wouldn't fight it. This time Kyle would wait for the upward lift and then use it to his advantage.
When it came, raising Kyle off the ground, he brought his knees forward, banging them sharply into Vern's thighs. Vern jerked back, twisting away, and Kyle twisted with him, gaining just enough room to turn his body to the side. Leveraging off Vern's bulk, he whipped his legs out behind him as savagely as he could.
He felt his heels dig into the lug's soft middle even as Vern staggered away from him, leaving him free and horizontal in the air. He stayed like that for a strange, delicious moment in the slow motion of his action time before he fell like a stone smack onto the cement.
Despite the pain, he rolled to his hands and knees and took stock of his position. The lug was writhing on the ground behind him. Vern was still on his feet and stepping toward him now, one hand reaching behind his back.
Kyle drew his legs into his chest, a sprinter readying to charge at the sound of the starter's gun, when a flash of chrome and green metal jumped the curb in front of him and slammed into Vern, sending him flying into a brick wall. Vern's head bounced off the brick like a basketball.
Kyle stood up slowly. The green car was now stopped dead and almost wholly on the sidewalk.
The passenger door swung wide. Liam Byrne, behind the wheel, leaned toward the open door. "Having some trouble, boyo?"
Kyle looked around at the two thugs sprawled on the sidewalk. "I was."
"A fine suit you have on now."
"Thanks."
"The tie could use a bit more flash, though."
"So I've heard."
"Are you okay?"
"I think."
"And the suit?"
He checked it out quickly. "Seems no more distressed than usual."
"Well, then, get in. We have much work to do yet, and time's a-wasting."
Kyle looked around at the scene one more time. The lug lay groaning on the ground, grabbing at his lower chest as if to keep shattered ribs in place. Vern was propped up against the wall, holding his cracked head with bloodied arms. Kyle himself, except for a banged hip and scraped palms, was uninjured. He had been in the middle of something dangerous, one of those intense physical moments where time had slowed down on him. These were the moments when he was always on his own, with his fate hanging by the thread of his own physical ability. But here, now, for the first time in memory, someone actually had his back. And how incredible was it that the someone turned out to be his father?
"Okay," he said as he started climbing inside. "Let's get out of here."
Before he could close the door, his father jerked the car into reverse, sending it spinning back to the road, amid the jagged sounds of brakes and horns. And then he started off again, turning sharply right and left and right again, making good their escape.
"Who were they?" said Liam Byrne. "More muscle from the senator?"
"No," said Kyle. "Muscle from your old partner, Tiny Tony Sorrentino. They were sending a message."
"And what message was that greedy little popinjay sending?"
"He wants the O'Malley file, and he wants it fast."
"Of course he does. They all want a piece. Well, we'll take care of him soon enough, but first we have a meeting to arrange. Now, you remember what I told you?"
"I remember."
"You know what to say."
"It won't do any good."
"It's all in the attitude. Don't slump in like a loser. You're now a man in control, a man bound for glory, a man in a suit. Go in like the cock of the walk."
"He's a senator. I'm a nothing. He's not going to meet with me."
"Oh, he'll meet."
"He'll come all the way up from Washington just for me?"
"He's coming up tomorrow anyway. He has a fund-raiser. He'll meet you before it. Just set it up like I told you, and he'll show like a dog chasing a bone."
"You wish."
"No wishing about it. You need to shed your doubts, boyo. Doubters end up proving themselves right by creating their failures. It takes boldness to create the world. Be bold, Kyle. It's the only way to cheat gravity. Are you ready to fly?"
"I suppose."
"We've no time for such bland equivocation. Are you with me, boyo? Are you fully on board?"
Was he? Could he ever be? Kyle knew in his bones it was daft, this whole ridiculously convoluted plot of his father's to expose the murderous machinations of a United States senator. To believe that it could possibly play out the way his father predicted, leaving a Truscott in jail, Kyle untouched, and his father returned anonymously to his second life in San Bernardino was strictly a fantasy. Not to mention the fact that he couldn't shake the feeling that his father hadn't been completely honest with him about . . . well, about anything. And yet his father had slammed Vern against the wall with the car and spirited Kyle out of there, his father had come to his rescue, and the glow of that truth illuminated his path here. The path would be trust. Despite their history, Kyle was choosing to trust his father.
"Sure, Dad," said Kyle. "I'm on board."
"No more doubts?"
"No more doubts."
"That's good. That's grand. It touches my heart, it does."
"But how will I get the senator to go along?"
"It's just like any other piece of business. You need to make him see your point of view."
"If I had a million dollars to donate, I could get him to listen, maybe. But what have I got?"
"You've got the file, boyo, which means you've got his sack in your hand. All you have to do now is squeeze."
CHAPTER 37
DETECTIVE RAMIREZ FIGURED it wouldn't be much of a trick to get a copy of Liam Byrne's death certificate. She knew the year of death, and Kyle Byrne said it happened in New Jersey, so she assumed that after a quick drive to Trenton she'd be in and out. But of course she assumed wrong. She had forgotten she was dealing with a government agency. It took her forty-five minutes just to find the right desk.
"Name of deceased?" said the clerk.
"Liam Byrne. B-Y-R-N-E."
"Year of death?"
"Nin
eteen ninety-four."
"Municipality?"
"No idea. That's what I'm here to find out."
"At least you know the county, I hope."
"How many counties are there?"
"Twenty-one," said the clerk, a snappish woman with owl eyes who seemed to have already had a tough day even though it wasn't yet noon. "That many?" said Ramirez.
"So you don't know the county either. I'm afraid this might take some time."
"I don't have much time," said Ramirez, flashing her badge. "I'm in the middle of a murder investigation."
The clerk leaned forward, looked at the badge, glanced up at Ramirez before sitting back. "That's not a New Jersey badge, is it?"
"No, ma'am. Philadelphia, actually, but I figure you guys care about homicides as much as we do."
"Only if they occur in New Jersey."
"Well, Liam Byrne's might have," said Ramirez.
The clerk looked at her flatly for a moment before saying, "Take a seat, and I'll see what I can do."
The call about the fire had sliced Ramirez's sleep in half, and now, the afternoon after, she was too tired to make a scene, too tired to insist on seeing the supervisor and banging on his desk. Instead she sat in one of the blue plastic seats and waited. TRENTON MAKES, THE WORLD TAKES, said the sign on the bridge, but as far as Ramirez could figure it, Trenton only made you wait. And wait.
She stretched her long legs out for a moment, rested her neck on the back edge of the blue chair, closed her eyes.
"Union County."
Ramirez snapped awake and looked up. The clerk, staring down at her, had a file in her hand. Ramirez glanced at her watch. She'd been asleep for an hour.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I must have dozed."
"That's okay. I suspect they keep their homicide detectives busy there in Philadelphia." The clerk opened the file, read a bit. "Your Liam Byrne died at Overlook Hospital in Summit. I made a copy of the certificate for you. But it wasn't a homicide."
"No?" said Ramirez, rubbing her eyes.
"No, dear," said the clerk, closing the file and handing it off. "It was a heart attack."
Ramirez took the file, opened it, quickly examined the certificate. Liam Byrne, born in Philadelphia, July 15, 1941, died in Summit, New Jersey, June 4, 1994. And there it was: cause of death, myocardial infarction, a simple heart attack. All of it certified by a Dr. Manzone of Overlook Hospital. That should be the end of this road, she should get back home. She had too many real crimes to investigate, too many families still raw from the pains of their loss and looking for answers that only she could give, closure that only she could provide. She didn't need to be investigating phantom crimes in a distant jurisdiction.
"Thank you so much for your help," said Ramirez. "I really appreciate it."
"Anything else I can do?"
"Just one thing," she said. "How do you get to this Summit?"
"UP," HAD SAID THE CLERK. Ramirez took it as a smart remark, but the woman simply meant north, Route 1 to the turnpike to the Garden State Parkway. Welcome to scenic New Jersey. Not for the first time did Detective Ramirez wonder how anyone could live here. Philadelphia had snap and life, New Jersey, other than the shore, had places to drive, and places to watch TV, and places to die. Overlook Hospital was one of the places to die. It was a large, formal brick building on the edge of one of the sprawling suburbs that seemed to make up the entire state.
It took a bit of bouncing around and waving her badge until she found the records room. This new clerk was quite busy and let her know it with a dramatic sigh at her request. When she showed him her badge, he almost sneered.
"This will take some time," he said. "Not too much, I hope."
"It's off-site, dearie. I have to call it in and then have it delivered. It could take all day."
"I don't have all day. Do your best to speed it up, could you?" she said with a bat of her eyelashes that did nothing.
"It will take what it will take."
"Of course it will. Is there a decent place to eat around here?"
"What do you like, other than lipstick two shades too bright?"
"Right now I feel like something raw."
"Oooh," he said with a sly smile.
He directed her to a sushi joint not far from the hospital. As she banged down the number-two maki roll lunch special and a glass of tea, she wondered how much of this quixotic lurch into New Jersey was about solving the Laszlo Toth murder and how much was about solving Kyle Byrne. Somehow the kid had gotten under her skin. She couldn't tell for sure if he activated the procreating or maternal center of her brain, but she felt the intense desire to protect him. And after seeing him in the hospital and then, later, seeing the burned-out hulks of his house and car, she knew for sure that he needed protecting. He was a fool kid in over his head in waters he couldn't fathom. But he swam with such a plucky charm that he couldn't help making her smile. Who was the last man who had made her smile? Santa, maybe, when she still believed, and that was a long time ago.
Kyle Byrne was still on her mind when she returned to the hospital for the file. Except there was no file.
"I don't understand," said Ramirez. "There has to be a file."
"Well, it's not so hard to understand, is it?" said the clerk with un restrained pique. "You were obviously mistaken. We have no record of a patient by that name that entire year."
"If he came in DOA, would there still be a record?"
"If he walks in, is wheeled in, or drops in from the sky, we don't do a thing until a file is opened. Why don't you try Summit Oaks Hospital on Prospect Street?" He leaned forward and lowered his voice as if he were confiding. "That's for psychiatric cases. You might have better luck there."
"You are a wonder, aren't you?" said Ramirez, whipping her own file out of her briefcase. "The death certificate held by the State of New Jersey has Liam Byrne being declared dead at this hospital in 1994, so I suggest you cut the cattiness and look again."
"Let me see that," said the clerk.
The clerk took the copy, examined it closely. Slowly the officious look slid off his officious little face like a gobbet of ice cream slipping off a cone and splattering on the cement.
"Ah . . . er," said the clerk. "Is your name by any chance Houston?"
"No. Why?"
"Because we have a problem."
"How delicious." She leaned forward and rested her knuckles on the desk. "Now, why don't you tell me about our little problem before I start getting curious."
"It's the doctor who signed the certificate and declared Mr. Byrne dead, the Dr. Manzone whose signature is right there."
"That's not his signature?"
"No, that at least appears to be legit."
"Then I'll need to talk to your Dr. Manzone."
"That might be difficult." The clerk winced involuntarily. "He's not with us anymore."
"No?"
"He was indeed here in 1994 when he signed the certificate, but he's gone now. Gone, gone, gone."
"I get the sense I'm being shuffled like a deck of cards, but all right, deal. Where can I find this Dr. Manzone now?"
"Rahway."
"In another hospital?"
"No, ma'am. In the state prison. There were some—how should I put it?—irregularities."
Detective Ramirez smiled a wolfish smile and sat down in one of the chairs facing the clerk, leaned forward over the desk, glanced right and left to make sure no one was in earshot. "All right, you sweet little man. Dish."
ON HER WAY to the East Jersey State Prison in Rahway, New Jersey, a quick thirty-minute drive from the hospital, she called Henderson.
"You would not believe the shit that we stepped into."
"I've been trying to get hold of you," said Henderson.
"I had to turn my phone off in the hospital. Now, listen to this. Liam Byrne's death certificate was signed by a Dr. Manzone. Man-zone certified that Liam Byrne died of a heart attack at this hospital in a place called Summit, New Jersey. But the hospi
tal doesn't have any record of Liam Byrne. It might be just a clerical error, right? Except that this Dr. Manzone isn't your normal ear, nose, and throat guy. He had something else going on the side."
"Ramirez, you need to come back."
"You're not listening. There was this place in Elizabeth that was doing embalming for a host of funeral parlors from New York, New Jersey, and even Philadelphia. I thought everyone did their own, but apparently often they outsource. But it wasn't enough to just juice these bodies with formaldehyde. These guys in Elizabeth would cut out the kidneys, the eyes, even the bones, and sell them to distribution centers, some kind of biomedical supply houses, to be used in transplants. And the guy doing the harvesting was our Dr. Manzone."
"Where's this heading?" said Henderson. "Because we got stuff going on down here you need to be a part of."
"Hang on, Pops, it's just starting to get interesting. Sometimes the corpses they got weren't in good enough shape for the transplants— too old or they died too long ago or there was some disease eating at their bones. So what did our guy Manzone do? The son of a bitch doctored the death certificates, or made new ones, so that the organs they were selling would look like A-one used parts instead of the rusted refuse of rent-a-wrecks. Are you getting me? I'd bet dollars to those doughnuts you stuff down your gut each morning that Liam Byrne didn't die of something as natural as a heart attack."
"Where are you going now?"
"Rahway. Our Dr. Manzone is in the same prison where they held Hurricane Carter. Manzone cooperated fully with the New Jersey authorities and apparently could remember the details of every doctored certificate, down to the specific parts cut out and sold. I bet he'll remember what the hell happened to Liam Byrne."
"Forget it, Ramirez."
"Forget it? Are you crazy, old man, or just lazy? We're on top of something huge here. If Byrne was murdered fourteen years ago, then Toth might have been killed by the same guy for the same reason. Which means this same bastard was probably trying to kill young Byrne last night. And the reason was in that file cabinet. I wouldn't be surprised if we have a serial killer on our hands and Kyle Byrne is next on the list."
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