12 Bullets

by O'Neil De Noux

  “Hey, Coppers!” This from the shooter, Carlo Polina, “I told you, the dink came at me with a pistol, black semi-automatic, looked like a Glock. Told me to give it up. I pulled out my Beretta instead of my wallet and shot him three times in the torso.”

  No Mississippi accents. More east coast. New York, New Jersey.

  “The guy you shot,” goes Beau. “He was alone?”

  “Far as I fuckin’ know.”

  Two EMTees rush up to help the doctor.

  Beau catches the eye of the two cops who’d arrived at the same time as Rosalie. Both black, both bigger than Beau, name tags read: O’REILLY and O’DONALD. Couple Irishmen, no doubt.

  “Come with me.”

  He holds his magnum against his leg and turns to the front door of Bontonomo’s.

  “Hey,” Bruno Tortona calls out. “I didn’t do nothin’.”

  “This is New Orleans, asshole. Cop points a gun at you – you do what you’re told.”

  “He said two apprehensions! I’m under arrest?”

  “You got a a concealed-carry permit?”

  “In Mississippi.”

  Beau chuckles, tells the O’s they’re looking for a brunette in a red dress and leads the way into the dark restaurant and for a moment he’s on the set of The Godfather. Looks just like the place Al Pacino killed Sollozo and the New York police captain, checkboard tile floor, small bar on the right, wooden tables with white tablecloths, chairs with round tops, place smelling of tomato gravy and parmesan cheese. It takes a few seconds for Beau’s eyes to adjust. Group of ten people stand huddled in a far corner.

  A plump waiter approaches and Beau holsters his magnum.

  “Woman in the red dress. Where’d she go?”

  The man shrugs.

  Beau tells the nearest O, “Get his fuckin’ ID.”

  The man’s jaw drops.

  Beau shakes a finger in the man’s face.

  “Shouldn’t lie to the police, asshole.” He faces the huddled customers.

  “Where did the woman in the red dress go?”

  One woman looks toward the back of the place, the others shakes their heads and Beau tells the other O to get everyone’s driver’s license.

  “We’re gonna need statements.” He passes the group, knows he doesn’t have to but calls back, “Check them for weapons.”

  He moves through the place to a hall, passes two more waiters and steps into the kitchen. Man and a woman cooking.

  “Turn everything off and go out to the cops in front.”

  They hustle to oblige. Neither admits seeing a woman in red. Beau steps back into the hall, finds the bathrooms, checks both. Back in the hall he sees a staircase and a back door he pushes open, a rear parking lot behind the restaurant.

  Beau goes back in and climbs the stairs, finds three doors, the first two are storerooms, the third is locked.

  “Police. Open the door.”

  Nothing.

  “I’m gonna kick it in.”

  Still nothing.

  He kicks the door next to the knob and it crashes in.

  A wide office, desk across the room, filing cabinets, a tall safe, windows and a young woman in a red dress sitting on a sofa on the left side of the room. She pulls an iPhone away from her ear, stares at him now. She crosses her legs and runs a hand through her long, straight hair.

  Damn.

  The two prettiest women Beau has seen since he came to New Orleans are Jessie and Lizette. By far. This woman’s as gorgeous, a classic Italian beauty with luxurious dark brown hair, Mediterranean-brown eyes and fair, almost pale-white skin, full lips, probably her best feature, perfectly sculptured, her top lip rising to a cupid’s bow shape. Brigit Bardot lips like Jessie. Must be a Sicilian trait.

  Her big eyes stare at Beau and her face seems to glow in the dark office. She brushes her hair over her shoulders, a soft look on her face now, lips pressed together. Painted bright scarlet. Same hue as her clingy dress, some sort of silky material low cut enough to make it interesting, short enough to show most of her slim legs.

  Beau crosses the room, looks under the desk. He clears his throat, says, “We need to speak with you. Downstairs.”

  Her big eyes don’t blink, remain fixed on his.

  She letting her eyes talk, a fuck-me look, seductive as hell.

  “Now, Miss.” He steps closer. “Stand up.”

  He reaches over and takes the small purse off her shoulder, looks inside, gives it back.

  She smiles and her face warms and this woman’s stone-fuckin-gorgeous. She straightens her dress. She’s slim, about an inch shorter than Jessie, about 5’3” but her heels take her up a couple inches.

  “Are my bodyguards all-right?” A sweet-southern light Mississippi accent.

  “Bodyguards?”

  She steps up to Beau, smiles, sticks her hand out to be shaked.

  “Lucy Incanto.”

  “Chief Inspector John Raven Beau.”

  Incanto? Oh, no.

  No wonder she has bodyguards.

  Fuck. An out-of-state made-man just killed a New Orleans armed robber. Classic.

  Wait ‘til the fuckin’ media gets a hold of this.

  Beau leads the way downstairs just as the rear door of the restaurant opens and Nick Cataldo steps in with two bodyguards, sees Beau, freezes.

  Beau calls out to O’Reilly or is it O’Donald. “Take this lady to a front table. Stay with her.”

  Cataldo presses his fists against his side. He’s in a shark-skin black suit.

  “So, Nick. What it is? A sit down?”

  No answer.

  “If y’all woulda passed out front you’d have seen the pretty blue lights and blood all over the sidewalk.”

  Nothing from Cataldo.

  “One of Miss Incanto’s bodyguards shot an armed robber.” Beau takes a step closer. “I know you’re not gonna tell me anything.” He nods to the back door. “Y’all might wanna slip away before the Intelligence Division gets here.”

  A slight nod from the Mafia boss before he turns and the three leave with quick footsteps.

  Damn. I’m sure LaStanza would have had something cleaver to say.

  Beau takes out his cell phone, calls Chief Féroce.

  “You still in the office?”

  “Yes.”

  “You might wanna avoid Carrollton on the way home.” He tells her what happened and asks if she wouldn’t mind get a hold of the commander of the Intelligence Division to come by.

  LUCY INCANTO SIPS from a coffee cup as she sits at one of the front tables, her legs crossed, dress a little higher, O’Reilly standing watch as Beau arrives. She offers both cops a cappuccino.

  “No, thanks.”

  “I’ll take a beer,” goes O’Reilly and Beau says to go ahead and O’Reilly tells her he’s joking. He passes Lucy Incanto’s Mississippi driver’s license to Beau. She has a Pass Christian address. He puts the DL on the table, takes out his iPhone and takes a picture of it, takes one of Lucy Incanto, her left eye narrowing slightly as he snaps the picture.

  Two plainclothesmen come in the restaurant, Homicide Detective Mike Gonzales – an Andy Garcia look-a-like and a new face he introduces as Detective Jimmy Olson. Name sounds familiar to Beau but not the face.

  “The DB’s 10-7?” Beau asks. Out of Service, permanently. Dead.

  “Yep,” From Gonzales.

  “What’s a DB?” asks Lucy.

  “Douche Bag,” O’Reilly says, drawing another smile to Lucy’s gorgeous face.

  Beau pulls Gonzales aside, tells him who the woman in red is as Gonzales checks her out, has to explain about the Incanto family and how Gonzales has two made-men handcuffed outside.

  “Are you fuckin’ kidding me?”

  Beau shakes his head and Gonzales says he’s gonna need rank over here. He lifts his radio but doesn’t have to use it as the Homicide Division commander steps in.

  Captain Mark Land, a human grizzly bear without the fur, glowers at Beau and Gonzales. A burly Napol
itano Italian with standard-issue dark brown hair and dark brown eyes, wide face, thick moustache. He steps up to Beau and says, “The chief called. Talk to me.”

  Mark glares at Lucy Incanto as Beau tells him the story, adding how Nick Cataldo came in the back door. Mark huffs, grunts, taps Gonzales in the chest.

  “This baby’s yours. I’ll process the scene. Let Jimmy take the statements here. Get the men in black outside to the Bureau.” He looks at Beau. “Can you take Miss Incanto to the Bureau? Sit in on her statement?”

  “IS THAT A CAMERA?” Lucy asks as she fastens her seatbelt. She’s in the back seat of the SUV as Beau adjusts the rear-view mirror with the video camera recording the interior of the vehicle.

  “Yes, it is.”

  “In case I say something incriminating.”

  “As if. It’s in case you say I was rude or tried to molest you.”

  “Or I molest you.” She readjusts her hemline, her right eyebrow rising. “You haven’t heard?”

  Beau starts up the engine, smelling her perfume now, similar to Jessie’s Parisian perfume, but not the same.

  “Heard what?”

  “I’m a hussy, a wench, a wanton woman. I sleep around.” She waits for him to look at her in the rearview mirror before adding, “I’m a Mafia Aphrodite.”

  The fuck?

  “My husband and I have an open marriage. Are you married?”

  Beau shakes his head, picks up his radio to notify Headquarters he has a white female witness in route to the Detective Bureau, gives the mileage on the odometer. Does the same thing when he parks the SUV at Headquarters.

  Gonzales asks Beau to take Miss Incanto’s statement. Gonzales takes the shooter into to one of the tiny interview rooms – no window, small table with a hardback chair. Beau uses the captain’s office, puts a desk between himself and the Mafia Aphrodite. He finds a notepad in Mark Land’s desk, takes out his ball point and turns on his digital audio recorder – starts with the date and time, introduces himself on tape. “This is the statement of Lucy Gabriella Incanto.”

  He lifts Lucy’s DL and reads the information. She’s 27. Looks 20.

  “You mention you are married, Miss Incanto. What’s your husband’s name?

  What are her eyes doing? Staring right into Beau’s eyes.

  “Sal Comodo.”

  “Did you witness the shooting outside Bontonomo’s Restaurant today?”

  “Yes.” She puts an elbow up on the desk, purses those glistening lips.

  “What did you see and hear?”

  “Direct questions. I like that in a man.” Her face grows mock-serious, eyes searching Beau’s again. “We stepped up to the restaurant’s door, Bruno opening the door for me. Bruno Tortona with Carlo Polina trailing, I heard a deep voice say, ‘Give it up’. I turned and Bruno pulled my arm to move me away.

  “Carlo stood facing a skinny black man with a pistol in his hand pointing it from Carlo toward me and back to Carlo who said something, waited for the man to point at him again pulled out his pistol and shot the man three times. Bruno stepped in front of me with his gun out and shoved me into the restaurant.

  “A waiter, the heavy-set one, took my hand and led me through the place and up the back stairs to the office where you found me. He told me to lock the door. It had a dead-bolt with a twist latch inside.

  “I called my husband on my cell phone, told him what happened and he told me to stay put.”

  Lucy brushes her hair back, eyes doing it again. What? Like touching Beau.

  “Where was your husband?”

  “Mississippi. At our house in Pass Christian.”

  “You didn’t call Nick Cataldo? Warn him about coming over?”

  She shook her head. “Didn’t have time. The Guag got on the phone and kept me on the line.”

  “The who?”

  “John Guagliardo. A cousin. He’s our advisor. Financial advisor.”

  Ah, Consigliere. Beau saw The Godfather films.

  “You came and kicked in the door.”

  “Why didn’t you unlock it when I called out ‘Police’?”

  “The Guag told me not to.”

  “What was the skinny black man wearing?”

  She shakes her head and he tells her she has to say something, touching the recorder.

  “This isn’t a camera.”

  She gives him a throaty laugh. “Yes. I don’t remember what he wore.

  “What color was his pistol?”

  “Black. An automatic.”

  “Nick Cataldo being there. Business or pleasure?”

  A sly smile crosses the pretty face.

  She shakes her head, says, “No comment.”

  Someone knocks on the door and Beau calls out, “Recording in here. Go away.”

  Back to his questions, “Had you ever seen the man who pulled the pistol on you before.”

  “No.”

  “Did either Carlo Polina or Bruno Tortona say anything to you after the shooting?”

  “No.”

  Knocking again the door, lighter. Beau rolls his eyes.

  “Is there anything you wish to add or take away from your statement?”

  “No.”

  “This concludes the statement of Lucy Incanto.” Beau reads off the time, turns off the recorder and pulls out a business card, passes it to Lucy who picks it up, studies it.

  Beau thanks her.

  “Getting eye-witness accounts help.”

  “Is Carlo in trouble?”

  “Your bodyguards shouldn’t be carrying concealed weapons without permits, but that’s not a serious offense. So long as everyone agrees the man he shot pointed his gun at y’all, I don’t see a grand jury indicting Carlo. But I’m not in charge of this investigation.”

  She nods.

  More knocking on the door and Beau gets up, yanks open the door to Detective Ed Delany who’s been a detective for maybe six months. The small man steps back.

  “The lady’s lawyer is here.”

  Beau takes two breaths, brushes cigarette ashes off Delany’s shoulder.

  “The way it works, son, we never interrupt recorded statements.”

  “I know but the lawyer – it’s him.”

  Beau shakes his head. “I’m him. Is he called The Great anything?”

  “Huh.”

  “I’m The Great Beau. Haven’t you heard?” Beau smiles now.

  “No. It’s Joseph LaRussa.”

  “PANO attorney?” PANO – Police Association of New Orleans.

  “Go get him.”

  Beau turns to Lucy standing behind him, close enough to violate his personal space. She puts a hand on his arm.

  “Did he say my attorney’s here?”

  Short, burly Joseph LaRussa rushes across the squad room, eyes focused on Lucy. He pulls out his cell phone and punches in a number as he arrives, listens a second and says, “She’s right here.”

  LaRussa hands Lucy his phone.

  She listens a few seconds, tells Beau, “It’s the Guag.”

  Talking into the phone, she goes, “Yes. Yes. Yes.” She nods. “OK. OK.” Hands the phone back to LaRussa who steps away with it.

  Lucy to Beau, “I’ll be at the Monteleone. If you’re finished with me.”

  Gonzales comes out of an interview room with the shooter, Carlo Polina who rubs his wrists.

  Beau steps over to Gonzales, passing Polina on his way to Lucy, and tells Gonzales what Lucy said in her statement.

  “Are we finished here?” LaRussa says as he approaches.

  Mark Land picks that moment to enter. It takes a couple minutes to have Detective Delany babysit Polina back in the interview room, ask Beau to sit with Lucy in the squad room, LaRussa can stay with them as Mark takes Gonzales into his office.

  “So, what’s happening?” LaRussa asks Beau as Lucy and Beau sit.

  “Why is a PANO attorney here?” Beau shoots right back.

  “I’m not a PANO attorney anymore. My contract wasn’t renewed. You should go to meet
ings. Your new PANO attorney is Frederick Plum.”

  “What? Of Plum, Smith, Leopold & Loeb?

  “Who else? He’s in his 90s.”

  Lucy touches Beau’s arm.

  “Leopold and Loeb? Like the killers?”

  “Long story.”

  “Tell me.” She raises her chin, having fun now.

  Beau explains the NOPD tradition of pairing up officers with names like Frost and Snow, Lemon and Macarte, Fitz and Gerald, Rowling and Stone, Leopold and Loeb, and the intersections - Robertson and Bartholomew, Julia and Carondelet. City street intersecting one another.

  “James Leopold and Ferdie Loeb are lawyers now.”

  “Harrison County Deputies Washington and Adams caught me skinny dipping when I was fifteen.” Lucy flips her hair. “Their mistake was taking me home naked, thought they’d embarrass me in front of my Papa. Who the hell brings the daughter of a Mafia Don home with no clothes?”

  “What happened to them?”

  “Cuba.”

  Beau stares back at her, waits.

  “My Papa told them they had 48-hours to reach Communist Cuba and never come back.” She touches Beau’s arm again. “Too bad. Adams was cute.”

  Beau keeps staring.

  She raises her right hand. “Look it up online. It was in the local papers. Harrison County deputies defect to Cuba, twelve years ago.”

  A smile now. “Better than a shallow grave in piney woods.”

  “So, your Papa is the Don.”

  “My Papa’s dead now.”

  Lucy traces a finger down Beau’s chest. “I’ll never be coy with you, big guy.”

  She reaches into her purse and pulls out a business card, hands it to Beau. It reads:

  Lucy Incanto

  Pass Christian, Mississippi

  228.555.1000

  Gonzales comes over and thanks Lucy for her statement, ignores LaRussa’s extended hand. Lucy blows a kiss at Beau and leads the way out.

  “Heard she’s fast,” Gonzales says.

  “Why wouldn’t you shake LaRussa’s hand?”

  “Fuckin’ Wops. Thicker than red gravy.”

  “My girlfriend’s Sicilian.”

  “I know.” Gonzales nods toward Lucy. “Guinea girls are gorgeous, dangerous as hell and sweat John Raven Beau.”

  THE ALARM BEEPS twice indicating deactivation of the house alarm. Jessie and Beau look at the kitchen panel, see the front door light blinking. Stella scampers out of the kitchen into the hall. If she ran the other way, Beau would have to pull out his magnum. The alarm beeps twice again – reactivation. Jessie shakes her head. Gotta be the only other person with a key to her house.