Momma Lupe, Book 1 in the Ty Connell 'Novella Series. A Mystery/Suspense Thriller. Cooking or killing -- Momma Had Her Funny WAys

by Michael C. Hughes

  Connell eyed the shot from all angles.

  The guy said, "You'll never bank that shot. You're done, pal."

  Connell was only a fair pool player and, like most fair pool players, he had just one good trick shot. It was a shot he had practiced until he could pull it off most times he attempted it. It involved coming down on the cue ball and jumping it over an obstructing red to drive another ball into the pocket. Most other players, when they tried to "jump the ball," as often as not the cue ball itself followed the struck ball into the pocket. But Connell had learned how to put a backspin on the cue ball so that it ran up to the lip, then pulled back. But it was considered a hot dog maneuver by serious players, and wasn't much appreciated, so he only pulled it out on rare occasions.

  He knelt and eyed the shot again and said, "I think I can drop it. You want to bet on the shot?"

  They already had a bet going on the game.

  The Italian guy glanced at Ty, then glanced at his friends: he'd already committed himself by saying the shot couldn't be drain.

  "Yeah, sure," he said. "How much?"

  "That's up to you, amigo."

  "You got a hundred?"

  Connell paused as though coking on the amount. He got that do-I-even-have-a-hundred look and dug out his wallet. He turned his back for a moment to have a private peek inside.

  When he turned back, he said, "Yeah. Okay. I’m good … just."

  "O-kay," the guy said, and laid his money on the table. "Let's do it."

  Connell laid his bills down and walked the table, eyeing the shot again from all sides, finally positioning himself with the cue stick high behind and over the ball. He rammed the cue down hard and the ball jumped the red and smacked the black, driving it into the pocket. The cue ball followed dangerous close to the lip, and then rolled back.

  There were a few whistles and hoots from those watching, but he could see that the Italian kid was not pleased.

  But rather than pick up the money, Connell left it on the side of the table. He knew the guy's name was Tony, because the others had addressed him as such, so he said, "Don't worry, Tony. I'm not the kind who gets lucky and runs. I only got one good shot, and you just saw it."

  They played another few games and Tony won his money back and a little more, which made him a happy guy again.

  It was soon others turn to play, and Connell and Tony took a table nearby and called for a couple of beers. Tony was in his late twenties: muscular, handsome, thick black hair gelled and combed back, and vain. Connell sensed that he was the kind who wanted you know how just well connected he was. It turned out he worked at a fitness centre around the corner, also did some bouncer work in his spare time at a nightclub nearby. So he was in a position to hear things.

  Connell had the Herald laid out on the table and he began flipping through casually, making idle comments. He worked things around slowly from soccer to music to films to the hit on that mob guy downtown. There was a follow-up story about it in that day's paper. Connell stopped at the page.

  "Man, they got this guy good, eh?" he said, tapping the article.

  "Now, that one was cool," Tony said.

  "Cool?" Connell said, sounding a little surprised. "They went right into the guy's garage and got him in his pajamas. That's brutal!"

  Tony waved that off.

  "Ah, it was just business," he said. "Vinnie wasn't a good boy. Matter of fact, he was a very bad boy. You fool around with the wrong people, that's what you get."

  "Did you know this guy?"

  "Vinnie? Nah. I just heard he was way out of line."

  Connell didn't comment. He continued to look over the article.

  Tony then leaned forward and looked both ways before speaking lowly, in a conspiratorial tone. "You know they made the sucker get down on his knees and beg for his life. And then they shot him," he said, pleased with himself for knowing this arcane bit of detail.

  Connell knew that that hadn't made it into any of the news reports. It was a holdback. Something only police and the killers knew.

  Connell made a little huff of skepticism. "I dunno about that. You can't believe everything you hear."

  Tony shrugged. If Connell didn't believe him, he didn't care one way or the other. He leaned back and rested his arms along the bank of the small booth.

  "It says here that it was a pro hit," Connell said, reading from the article. "You really think they made him kneel?"

  Tony nodded knowingly. "It's all about revenge, my man."

  "What'd he do, sleep with somebody's wife?"

  Tony leaned in and spoke lowly again. "He tampered with something wasn't his. But it wasn't nobody's wife. It was business."

  "Really? Well, I wouldn't mess with those guys," Connell said, shaking his head and taking a long drink of beer.

  "This wasn't even wise guys," Tony said, continuing to lean forward and speak lowly. "This was a crazy old French bitch ordered this one."

  Connell tried not to convey his suddenly very keen interest. He set his beer down as though the statement barely interested him.

  "A woman ordering a hit?" he said, offhandedly. "Mmm, I doubt that." He turned back to the paper.

  Tony smiled.

  "You'd be surprised, man. This old bat's connected. And hell has no fury, right?"

  Then Tony seemed to realize he'd said enough. He looked at Connell a little more closely and he decided to zip it.

  "So you want to shoot another game, or what?" he asked.

  Connell glanced at his watch. "Yeah. Sure," he said. "One more. Then I gotta head to work. I gotta make the midnight run up to Bar Harbor tonight. Fricking Wal-Mart. Man, I hate that drive."

  He spent another half-hour playing pool and left the hall.

  The next day at the stationhouse, when Morgan walked in, Connell was already at his desk.

  "Morning, little brother," Morgan said, and he looked over quizzically as he hung up his coat, clearly wondering if Connell'd had any luck on his behalf.

  "Well, I had a chance to have a look around for you," Connell said.

  "Unh-huh?"

  "I played a bit of pool with an Italian kid up near the airport. He works at a fitness club up there. Does some bouncing at a nightclub as well. So he's in a position to hear things. He claims that word is that the hit on Vinnie wasn't a mob hit at all."

  "Say what?"

  "This kid says it was ordered up by a woman."

  Morgan plunked his two hundred and seventy pounds into the swivel chair, and looked at Connell skeptically.

  "Man, there's only one woman I know in this town who could call for a hit like that," Morgan said.

  Connell nodded. "Momma Lupe."

  "Yeah. You know her?"

  "Never met the woman. Hardly know anything about her. But I came across her name a few years back when I was working that case with the guys up in Revere. The biker case. She's French-Canadian. Operates out of the south end, I think. Supplies strippers to biker and mob clubs. I think she’s tight with Veltro and his mob pals. And that hit on Vinnie? It's her style. Even the part about Vinnie kneeling. Have him beg for his life. She's nuts. And sadistic. Vindictive, sadistic, and nuts."

  "Momma Lupe. Don't that mean crazy or something in pisano?" Morgan asked.

  Connell nodded. "Strictly speaking, it means she wolf. But the pisanos use it to mean more. A complete mental case she wolf. A rabid she wolf with pups. Crazy vicious. Crazy unpredictable. I got the whole story from the Revere guys when I worked up there."

  "And you think this pool hall kid knows what he's talking about?"

  Connell nodded. "I think he's heard things."

  Morgan adopted a thoughtful expression; mulling something over.

  "You really think the mob would let an outsider weirdo like Momma Lupe call for a hit on one of their own guys?"

  "I was wondering the same thing myself. I guess it depends what Momesso did. If he crossed her bad enough —and it hit Veltro in the pocket— the guy might have stood aside. Let Momma ta
ke care of business her own way."

  Morgan sat up straight in his chair. He seemed to be suddenly motivated, like a weight off his shoulders.

  "Well, bro, it looks like you might have hit the mainline. How you feel about trying to pin this down a little more? I'd feel a whole lot better if I could be sure this ain't mob business. We might even have a shot at cracking it."

  Now that they had a name, and a face, and a sheet, they at least had someone to zero in on. If what Connell had heard was true. Not that pinning anything on Momma Lupe was going to be easy either.

  "I wouldn't count the case closed just yet, John," Connell said. "It's still a third party hit with no witnesses, no weapon and no perp. Yet. No bookmaker would give us more than 50 to 1, even if it was Ma behind it. But tell you what, leave it with me for another day or two."

  Connell went to the CORI site, Criminal Offender Record Information, the local police-only portal that archived police and court records statewide. He typed Lupanier and waited. But he got a surprise —nothing came up.

  Really? Nothing?

  He tried again. He type in the whole name this time: Isabel Lupanier.

  Still nothing came up.

  Very strange. Especially for someone as active in an illicit trade as Momma was supposed to be. Nothing? Police, when they knew they had felons active in their jurisdiction —not merely active but growing their businesses— made it a point to find ways to charge these people with even the most minor offences. This to start a sheet so that, at some time down the road, they could demonstrate a build-up in criminal activity. Someone like Momma, even if she had moved to the Boston area only in recent years. You don’t drop into her line of work from another planet. She supposedly supplied strippers and hookers to strip clubs all across. To have no sheet at all? How was it possible? But there it was —none of the usual litany of minor misdemeanors related to her trade: possession restricted substances, being a found-in, trafficking in prostitution, soliciting, living off the avails, running a common bawdy house.

  “Not even a traffic ticket?” Connell said aloud.

  He then went to the DMV site, Department of Motor Vehicles.

  Not only did Momma have a clean record there as well —she wasn’t even registered.

  She apparently didn’t own a car and didn’t drive!

  Things weren’t adding up.

  Connell went back to the CORI site. To the Comments section and, off the official record, there were some interesting notes. Of particular interest were several reports from different officers from different jurisdictions in recent years trying to tie Momma to the disappearance of various rivals, associates, and even girls connected to her operation. But none of these cases had ever gained enough substance to become charges. So Momma's record in the State of Massachusetts was clean on the all counts.

  The file did give a current address: a back street in Mattapan, a low-rent district in the city’s southeast corner.

  Connell, when he was done, was more intrigued than ever.

  He decided to have a closer look at Momma. And her operation.

  On Monday morning Morgan entered the C-11, curious again to know how Connell had made out.

  “How you makin’ out, brother?” he said.

  "Not bad, John. Some news to report."

  Morgan sat down and straightened around to listen.

  "I hit half the strip clubs in the city over the weekend," Connell said and John arched an eyebrow. Connell knew very well that John’s opinion was that such places were a blight, were the devil’s work against women and that they should be leveled, not attended. Connell didn’t disagree, but he pushed on. “The rumor that Ma has a lock on girls coming in seems to be true. Half the girls I overheard spoke with French accents. Heavy French accents. Just off the bus from Quebec.”

  “You know, Ty, I know that most of the girls working these clubs are imports from somewhere else, a lot are here illegally. But I don’t need to hear too many details about these places.”

  “Anyway,” Connell said, pushing ahead again. “I needed to get a feel for where the scene was at. I also bought a few dozen beers for my buddy at the B-3, Mattapan District. He knows Mattapan and he knows Momma and her operation about as well as anybody does."

  Morgan nodded that that sounded promising. "And …"

  "And I found out that Momma runs her little empire from her home. From her kitchen table. A little place off Fuller, north of River Street. According to my guy, she runs card games on Friday nights, which biker and mob guys are known to show up at. Crazy thing is, again according to my guy, she runs them like a church social. No smoking, no drinking, no swearing, no spitting, no cheating, no arguing, and no guns at the table. And they sit there playing till all hours of the night."

  "I don't get it," Morgan said. "Why would bikers or mob dudes show up to play cards with a wingy old French bat at a place with rules like that?"

  "To stay on the right side of Momma, I guess."

  "Weird."

  "And there was one other very interesting feature about her setup."

  "Yeah? What's that?"

  "Her kitchen is at the front of the house, on the west side, on Fuller, but looking down a street called Milton Avenue."

  "Uh-huh …"

  "Milton runs down and meets Morton Street which runs to where River and Dorchester meet, the main crossroads in that part of town. Momma's house is right on the corner of Fuller and Morton."

  Morgan looked confused. “Man. All this geography. It’s making my head spin.”

  Connell pressed on.

  "There's a great big picture window with no drapes or blinds on it and that looks right into Momma's kitchen from the street —or out to the street from Momma’s kitchen, whichever way you want to put it. Where Momma and these guys sit watching the world go by playing cards."

  "Ty, is there a point in there somewheres?"

  "Yeah. Two points. Point one is, from her kitchen she can see anyone approaching her place from five blocks away. Point two is that, if she's running her business from her kitchen, and her kitchen has that big picture window, and the window faces a corner and a long side street, we could maybe get a truck parked along the street far enough down not to alarm her. We could get a parabolic mike on that glass."

  Morgan sat back. "I like the sounds of that. Now maybe we're gettin' somewhere. But we need a warrant and a budget to put a sound truck and a team on it."

  "I'll leave paperwork to you, bro,” Connell said. “See Nolan about a tap warrant. Meanwhile, I got another angle I can work. I’ll let you know how that one goes."

  "Okay, man. Let’s do it."

  What had occurred to Connell was that, since Momma’s primary activity was importing and booking girls in strip clubs all around New England, that there had to be a girl or two out there who had been abused, cheated, or otherwise wronged by her. Or by one of the lunatic sons, or one of Momma’s other hired goons. Maybe a girl who might know inside things about Ma's business and be willing to talk about it.

  He just had to find one.

  And he knew just the guy.

  Paul Geddes was a small-time dealer/user and a creature of the late night world of seedy bars, sleazy nightclubs and stipclubs, and all night donut shops. He was a junkie who would sell his mom for a twenty-dollar hit. A true bottom feeder. Every time Connell had met with him he was wearing the same greasy old buckskin jacket and greasy blue jeans that smelled like neither they —nor Paul— had been near a washing for years. And probably hadn’t. The guy had body odor and bad breath that could knock you back a few feet just by saying hello. He was short, stocky, and had teeth so yellow they looked like corn kernels. A true denizen of the netherworld.

  But he could get access to information no one else could.

  And, as far as intel went, he'd tell you anything, or find out anything —for a price. And he frequented the north end biker club scene to boot, so he'd be well familiar with Ma's operation.

  Connell just had to find him.
Last time he'd seen Geddes, the guy was sitting in a run-down little donut shop on Bennington, the main thoroughfare in the north end and where Connell had just been the day before on his tour of north-end pool halls. Also a known hangout for heroin addicts.

  Connell made the drive and, sure enough, he spotted Geddes in almost exactly the same spot he'd last seen him two years before. Parked at the same small round window-side table, dressed in the same greasy buckskin jacket, greasy blue jeans, stained black T-shirt, and snakeskin cowboy boots with silver-tipped toes. And he still had that reptilian quality about him. His skin shiny with dirt and grime. Scaly, like a lizard.

  He was holding court with several other candidates for Citizen of the Year who wandered off quickly when Connell stepped in and pulled a chair around.

  "Hey, my man," Geddes said, a bit surprised and a bit wary to see Connell again. He gripped Connell’s thumb in a musician's handshake. Even the handshake was smarmy. There was nothing musical about Paul.

  They traded small talk for a few minutes, then Connell said, "Paul, I'm gonna need a little information."

  "Yeah, well. We all got our needs, don't we?" Geddes said, and he cast a sideways glance at Connell, assessing how much urgency Connell might have on this particular occasion.

  Geddes's mind didn't run to what the information might be. That was immaterial. He’d give up anything that didn’t get him killed. It ran only to how much that info might fetch. And for Geddes, every dollar translated strictly into cc's of heroin: his lifeline. He knew, from working with Connell before, that Connell worked some sort of undercover detail that had access to cash for info. So he knew how it worked and what to expect. It all just came down to bargaining.

  Connell said, "This could be a nice payday for you, Paul. Something like last time. Depending what you bring me."

  He could see that Geddes was interested. Was still much in the game and on the needle.

  "Can you define 'nice'?" Geddes said.

  "I gotta check. Maybe up to five grand.”

  “Up to leaves a lot of wiggle room.”