Robert B. Parker's Cheap Shot

by Ace Atkins

  “Fuck,” he said.

  “Where did you learn your oratory skills, Kevin?” I said. “They are stunning.”

  “Eloquent,” Hawk said.

  “Yep,” I said.

  Murphy ran a hand over his very unpleasant face and took in a deep breath, his white, hairless stomach straining at the waistband on his boxer shorts. He would not look at any of us.

  “That true?” I said. “Are you going to lead us to Akira through your underworld connections? Because if so, let’s go. We would love to get this done right now.”

  “Takes time,” Murphy said.

  His voice was low and barely audible. He sounded like a crazy man talking to himself.

  “What’s that?” Hawk said.

  “Takes time,” Cristal said. “He has to talk to his people and get the word out. But these fucking people are dead if they did anything to Akira. They’re going to be dead.”

  “And Kevin is going to get that bounty?” Hawk said. “Ah.”

  “Don’t be so quick to judge,” I said. “Maybe it will be a generous gift to the Boys and Girls Clubs.”

  “Screw you,” Kevin said. “I got people. I know people. I’m trying to help. More than you’re doing. All you’re doing is breaking into people’s houses and giving them shit.”

  I tilted my head in a very modest way. He had very compactly and neatly explained my best investigative technique.

  “And to motivate Kevin, you fuckin’ him,” Hawk said.

  Cristal crossed her arms over her chest. Her knees tight together as she stood. She wasn’t standing so good and had to free an arm to brace herself against the kitchen counter.

  “Run home to what you know,” Hawk said.

  “Screw you,” Cristal said.

  “Come on,” I said. I reached out a hand. “This guy is lying to you.”

  “He knows,” Cristal said. “We’ll find Akira alive. We need him.”

  Hawk turned to Murphy. He took two steps forward, his nose nearly touching Murphy. “Be straight with her.”

  “She came to me, man.”

  Hawk raised his hand. Murphy flinched. Hawk and I waited.

  “I don’t know where he is,” Murphy said. Again speaking down low on level one.

  “What about the Mob?” Cristal said, wobbling and walking toward him. She slapped him hard across the face. “You told me the Mob. What the fuck, Kevin? What the fuck? I just let you screw me back there. What the hell?”

  “True love,” Hawk said. He turned and walked back out the door and into the rain.

  I reached out my hand.

  “Fuck,” Cristal said.

  “Sometimes words fail us,” I said.

  She was crying very deep and hard now. She was stoned and drunk and a mess as she recovered her clothes and walked outside with me. Murphy did not move from his place by the sink. He stood flabby and useless, the faucet tapping behind us, unable to lift his eyes as the door closed shut.

  56

  Bright and early the next morning, Martin Quirk called to tell me that Lela Lopes had been found dead, bound and stuffed into an oil barrel in an Eastie industrial park.

  Twenty minutes later, I stood with Quirk at a sprawling complex of oil holding tanks and rusting metal warehouses with a spectacular view of the Mystic River. Frank Belson was there, speaking to some men in coveralls. One of the men was pointing out into the river at a slow-moving tug.

  “I had begun to get lonely,” Quirk said. “So nice of you to call the other day and ask about Miss Lopes.”

  “I didn’t want you to feel excluded.”

  “You working with the staties and the Feds, I wasn’t so sure you’d even remember your pals at BPD.”

  “‘I thrust my hoe in the mellow ground,’” I said. “‘Blade-end up and five feet tall.’”

  “Do you even know what the fuck you’re talking about?”

  “Disappointingly, yes.”

  The complex and much of the access road was now a crime scene, with cops and techs walking along from Route 1 and around the huge holding tanks. Quirk was Quirk, thick-bodied and square-jawed, spotless raincoat over a pressed suit and shined shoes. His eyes registered a trace of annoyance as I recounted our encounter with Victor Lima.

  “So the door was busted when you and Tonto got to Roxbury?” Quirk said.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And without a word, this fucking guy Lima just shagged ass from the apartment?”

  “Yep.”

  “Wouldn’t be that he thought you guys broke in and were about to put a gun between his eyes?” Quirk said. “Maybe he was searching for Miss Lopes, too.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “So no need to test it for, eh,” Quirk said, appraising my footwear, “a pair of eleven-D Red Wings?”

  “Twelve,” I said. “Don’t short me.”

  “And what does Z wear?” Quirk said.

  “Hand-tooled cowboy boots made in Montana,” I said. “Buffalo hide.”

  “Of course he does,” Quirk said. “Jesus Christ.”

  “So what do we have?”

  “Guy on the late shift tried to ash a fucking cigarette in the barrel and saw the vic wrapped up tight in clear plastic,” Quirk said. “We think she was dumped within the last eight to twelve hours. Whoever killed Miss Lopes should get a merit badge in Christmas present wrapping. The woman was wrapped so tight, we had to cut into the plastic with box cutters.”

  “How was she killed?”

  “Extreme trauma to the upper body,” Quirk said.

  “Shot in the back of the head,” I said.

  “Yeah, you might say that. Small-caliber weapon. Pro job. Nice and clean. Okay. Now you tell me about this girl’s connection to the Heywood case.”

  I told him about the nightclub shooting, my trip to New York, and ultimately the revelation of Ray Heywood paying off Lela Lopes and Victor coming back into the scene. I left out the part about Cristal Heywood and her film aspirations and taking her home last night. Quirk preferred a linear story without digressions.

  “Looks like someone wants to collect some of that NFL cash,” Quirk said. “Your client prepared to pay up if the son of a bitch steps forward?”

  “He’ll need sufficient evidence as to who pulled off the kidnapping of his son,” I said. “He’ll also want answers about his son’s whereabouts.”

  “You know as well as I,” Quirk said.

  I nodded.

  Quirk took in a long breath, keeping eye contact. He turned his head and spit. “Animals,” he said. “And this was going to be the Pats’ year, too.”

  Frank Belson walked away from the two workers, carrying a steno pad and holding an unlit cigar loose in his hand. As he moved through a grouping of techs, workers, cops, and reporters, he lit up the foul brown thing and started to puff.

  “What does Lisa say about those things?” I said.

  “Lisa believes I’ve quit,” Belson said.

  “And you’d risk your marriage and health for a fifty-cent smoke?”

  “I’ll tell you what, I’ll quit with the cigars when you quit with the donuts and beer.”

  I looked to Belson with wide eyes. “Blasphemy,” I said.

  Quirk had turned his back to take a call, and when he hung up, he said, “Anyone hear anything?”

  Belson shook his head.

  “See anything?” Quirk said.

  Belson said, “Nope.”

  “Hell of a nice place to dump a body,” Quirk said. “I want to dump a body and I’d come here, too. But I’d put it in one of these fucking tanks. Why not stuff the girl where they keep the oil?”

  “Maybe that was the plan,” Belson said. “But the tanks are locked tight.”

  “Lucky for us, she was found,” I said.

  Belson scratched his neck
and puffed on the cigar. “You know this girl is Jesus DeVeiga’s half-sister?”

  “And that might mean something if I knew who in the hell Jesus DeVeiga was,” I said.

  Belson looked to Quirk and Quirk to Belson.

  “Get with the times,” Belson said, blowing smoke from the side of his mouth. “Biggest fucking gangbanger in Roxbury.”

  57

  To get up to speed, Quirk suggested I speak to an officer named Carlos Canuto with the gang unit. The gang unit, or what some called the Youth Violence Strike Force, worked out of District A1 in Charlestown. It was a short drive from the crime scene, and not thirty minutes later, I sat with Canuto in his office on the second floor. He was eating at his desk, a tuna sandwich on wheat, and catching up on the earlier shift’s overnight arrests.

  “Jesus DeVeiga,” I said.

  Canuto was a short, stocky black man, not yet thirty. He wore jeans, a black T-shirt, and a backward Chicago White Sox ball cap. The name caught his attention in a big way, although he finished chewing to speak. “You think Jesus DeVeiga kidnapped Heywood’s kid?”

  “DeVeiga’s half-sister was just found in a trash barrel in Eastie,” I said. “I’d be a pretty lousy investigator if I didn’t try and find him.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Lela Lopes. Also goes by Eva Lopes.”

  “Don’t know her.”

  “Antonio Lima?” I said. “Victor Lima?”

  A smile crossed Canuto’s face. His wiped his mouth with a napkin and put down the sandwich. “Now we’re talking, man.”

  “You guys have run-ins?”

  “Frequently,” Canuto said. “When Antonio got killed in New York, I remember thinking he’d been headed for that bullet his whole damn life. Should have figured he’d be tied in some way with the Heywood kid.”

  “Me, too,” I said. “But it’s taken some time to clarify. I kept checking the angles in New York.”

  “That’s how it goes, man.”

  “I knew Lima had priors. Some drug dealing. Stolen goods.”

  “His report wasn’t nothing,” Canuto said. “You probably didn’t see his juvie record. He was a name on the street, him and DeVeiga, even before his eighteenth birthday. I’m from the same place in the islands, same neighborhood here. I’d have gone the same way if I hadn’t had some people look out for me.”

  “What about Victor?”

  “He’s an up-and-comer for sure,” Canuto said. “Picked him up a few years ago on outstanding warrants. But I heard he’d moved away with his mother when he turned eighteen. She’s a good lady, tried to do whatever it took for her boys.”

  “I thought I found him living near his mother in New York,” I said. “She runs a grocery in Yonkers.”

  Canuto nodded. He apologized but said he didn’t have a lot of time. He picked up the tuna sandwich and took a bite, chewing as he thought. A large picture window behind him had a nice view of Bunker Hill and the obelisk monument.

  “This kind of stuff is bad for the whole Cape Verdean community,” he said. “Most of us have come here and made good in this country. But it’s only the criminals who make the papers. People hear Cape Verdean and instantly think gangbanger.”

  “This won’t help,” I said. “You know where I can find DeVeiga?”

  “I wish,” he said. “We’ve been looking for him for three months. There was a man shot at a barbershop in Dorchester in June and he was seen walking away. If you get a lead on him, let me know.”

  “Any idea where to start looking?”

  “We have the gang unit and the Fugitive guys looking for DeVeiga,” Canuto said, standing. He slipped into a black Kevlar vest and righted his baseball hat with the bill forward. He wiped his mouth again and picked up an energy drink, taking a long swallow.

  “But he’s mainly Roxbury.”

  “Some believe he’s taken over Roxbury,” Canuto said. “Those kids move a lot of drugs and make a lot of money. I do a lot of community outreach, go and give the kids pep talks in the gymnasiums, do fund-raisers for the Cape Verdean community. But they see a guy like DeVeiga with all that cash and power. Man. They just want to be him.”

  I nodded. “Can you check your sources for anything on Victor Lima?”

  “Sure,” Canuto said. “Let me see what I can do.”

  We shook hands and walked out of the A1 building together. The building was all sharp angles of concrete and glass, very modern for a police station.

  “You’re different than Quirk said you’d be,” Canuto said.

  “More charming?”

  “No,” Canuto said, smiling.

  “More witty?”

  “Quirk said you were a real pain in the ass,” Canuto said. “And to talk to you or you’d be bugging the shit out of him for days.”

  “Dogged,” I said. “Quirk meant dogged.”

  58

  I returned to my apartment, took a hot shower, and ate a late breakfast of two poached eggs over hash with black coffee. I dressed in a navy button-down, jeans, and lace-up boots. I fitted my .38 on a holster behind my right hip and slipped into my leather jacket and ball cap. It was still raining. It had grown a little cold in the Back Bay. Not cold for Boston but cold for September. When I got to my office, I called Hawk at the Harbor Health Club and told him I needed another favor.

  “Of course you do, babe,” Hawk said.

  And hung up.

  I made a few phone calls, including one to Kinjo, letting him know Cristal was back home. I called Susan and left a message about Nicole.

  I then read the Globe and paid particular interest to the sports columnist’s take on the Heywood kidnapping and Kinjo refusing to stop playing. Everyone now knew about the return of Akira’s bloody clothes. The writer’s stance was contrary to all the sports wackos on the air and on the Web. He believed that Kinjo was doing the right thing and showing his respect and love for his child. Kinjo had not spoken to the press since the kidnapping, but it seemed to me he had spoken to the columnist. The title of the column was called “A Beacon of Light.” It was very sad and very powerful, and after reading, I closed the paper and set it aside on my desk.

  I made coffee and turned slightly in my chair, to watch the dark skies and grumbling weather over the Back Bay.

  I did not like this job or the way it had turned out. I did not like my own performance on letting go of the Limas and the club shooting. I wondered why Victor Lima had been in New York City if he’d been involved in taking Akira in the first place. I needed to find out more about Victor Lima, his time in Boston, and his connection to Jesus DeVeiga. And if I was feeling wildly ambitious, maybe I could find DeVeiga, too.

  Before I grew too introspective, Hawk walked in my office door. He removed a black rain slicker and sat down in my client’s chair. The chair creaked with Hawk’s weight and heft. The chair was more comfortable with long, lean females with shapely legs.

  Hawk leaned forward in his chair and waited. A few raindrops dotted his bald head.

  “I need an audience with Tony Marcus,” I said.

  “Okay.”

  Hawk leaned forward, picked up the phone on my desk, and dialed a number. He told someone at the other end, presumably Tony Marcus, that we were headed that way.

  Hawk stood. I stood. And we drove into the South End and Marcus’s club, Buddy’s Fox.

  Most of the South End had now gone high-end, but Marcus was implacable. Buddy’s Fox, with its long, stainless-steel front and elegant red cursive neon, was a beacon to the old South End, gateway to Roxbury. The parking lot was empty, since Buddy’s Fox was not a lunchtime spot. A large black man in a white shirt and white pants had set up a barbecue grill outside. He was turning some ribs and the air was rich with smoke.

  We walked in the front door to find Ty-Bop sitting in a chair, front legs off the ground, his back leaning against a
wall. His satin Pats jacket loose and open, a very large automatic worn below his left arm.

  I smiled and shot him with my thumb and forefinger.

  Ty-Bop nodded.

  A very large black man named Junior stood behind the bar, washing glasses. Junior did not acknowledge us as we walked past the bar and through a door to a hallway and then into Tony’s office. Tony was at his desk, ushering us in as if he were a CEO to a Fortune 500 company and not the city’s biggest pimp.

  “You smell them ribs when you come in?” Tony said.

  “Hard to miss,” Hawk said.

  “Want some?” Tony said. “I’ll get him to make up some plates. I’ll even make one up for Casper, too.”

  “After all these years and all we’ve been through together,” I said. “Do you still see color?”

  “Oh, please motherfucking forgive me, Spenser. Didn’t you put my ass into Walpole some time back? Or is your memory slipping out on your ass?”

  “How’s your daughter, Tony?” I said.

  I looked to Hawk and Hawk shrugged. “Man do have a point,” Hawk said.

  Tony pursed his lips, put the tips of his fingers up under his flabby chin, and told us to sit. He was wearing a canary-yellow suit with a white shirt and a black tie with a black handkerchief in the pocket. The suit was bold and ugly, but Tony was a pimp, and pimps had certain fashion expectations.

  “So,” Tony said, lighting up a cigar and placing some equally ugly black shoes on his desk. “What the fuck do you want?”

  “What do you know about the Outlaws?”

  Tony lifted his chin, studied the end of his cigar, and blew on it, getting the red tip glowing bright. “Hmm,” he said.

  “You know them?”

  “Everybody in Roxbury knows those punks,” Marcus said. “They make a lot of trouble for the working man. Make the streets unsafe, gangbang battles. All this shit. Nothing changes. Kids always want to puff themselves up, be men when they ain’t nothing but kids.”

  “Ty-Bop was a kid when he came to you,” I said.