Vendetta

by Nancy Holder

  And you could be sentenced to hell.

  Rikers.

  She had gotten recalcitrant suspects to break down and confess by threatening to send them to Rikers. Of course that wasn’t up to her. She didn’t pronounce sentences, she just made the arrest. But she could put in a good word for someone who cooperated.

  Let this guy be cooperative, she thought, looking up at the gloomy sky. It was going to start snowing again any second. That would muddle the evidence at the Dumpster crime scene even more. That was convenient. It was also convenient that they had told Robertson and Gonzales that Claudia McEvers had wanted to meet with them. She and Cat hadn’t taken it all the way by telling the two FBI agents that she’d gone as far as arranging a rendezvous, but the dots would connect.

  But maybe it had been too convenient.

  Tess had a very bad feeling that they’d already known that, taken steps to ensure that McEvers would not make that meeting.

  They’re dirty.

  They were her prime suspects in Angelo’s kidnapping. Did they participate in Reynolds’ disappearance as well? That would give her and Cat more ways in to investigate them. And bust them.

  Cops got fast-tracked to talk to prisoners, which was a good thing. She wanted to talk to Joey before he found out about McEvers’ death. As it was, he might have gotten a call from the cook, or seen it on TV, the way the cook had.

  She saw security cameras everywhere, recording, watching. J.T. had not yet located the footage of Reynolds’ breakout. She wondered if it was being suppressed or if the cameras hadn’t worked during the blackout. Special Agent Gayle Thurman was the Special Agent in Charge. Aside from Hendricks from IA, no one from Thurman’s squad had questioned Cat about the case, which surprised Tess.

  The badge was her golden ticket, and soon she found herself sitting at a Plexiglas barrier with a phone in her hand. On the other side of the barrier sat a very young, stressed-out guy with a thatch of red hair and matching eyebrows that made him look like Harry Potter’s friend in the movies, only if Harry Potter had lived in the Bizarro World.

  “Joey,” she said quietly, “I’m Detective Vargas. Listen carefully and stay cool. A few things have changed.” She figured she might as well be straight with him. If he already knew about Claudia’s death, and she lied to him, there was no way he would talk to her.

  “The person that your friend…” she began. And then it hit her: this guy had red hair, and so did Claudia. Maybe they were related.

  Maybe this was her kid.

  “Where is she?” he said querulously. He began compulsively pushing down the cuticle of his left thumbnail. It was bleeding. “Why are you here?”

  Okay, he didn’t know. She had limited time but she had to secure his cooperation. “I came in her place. What have you heard?” She kept her voice low.

  “Man, they just dragged him out.” He was excited. “Everyone was waiting for it. But I didn’t think they’d be able to pull it off. Couple of other guys tried to go, too, while the lights were out, threatened to yell but the guards knew, too, so who cared? The guards knew the brothers were going to try to blow, and they put us all in lockdown. So he was the only one.”

  Oh, my God. He’s talking about Reynolds. She stayed quiet in hopes that he’d keep talking.

  “What was it like?” she asked him.

  “It was crazy, man! Friend of mine said they had on ski masks and weapons. In a frickin’ prison.”

  It was hard to know if that was true. Prison gossip was like other gossip. She reminded herself that she was here to work on Angelo’s case, but Reynolds was just as important. Just not as official.

  “Do you know anyone who actually saw it happening? Maybe someone in the cell next to his?”

  He flashed her a lopsided grin that startled her with its sweetness. She had checked his record: Joey Palmieri was in for possession of controlled substances with intent to sell. But it seemed like he was more the type to be hawking Girl Scout cookies or collecting donations for Unicef.

  “Right now, everybody in here is claiming that they saw it. And that they knew the guy. Anyway…” He hunkered forward, eager to get back to business. “Are you guys are going to bust those a-holes?” His light-blue eyes were bright, expectant. “She’s got everything she needs to make it stick? Because you say the word, I am testifying and they are going down.”

  Her best guess was that Claudia had been collecting sufficient information to make some kind of case against Robertson and McEvers, and that Joey was going to testify in that case. In exchange for a lighter sentence? Claudia McEvers was in no position to offer him anything like that… unless she was working undercover. Or it could be that once she amassed enough evidence, she could possibly aid in overturning a false conviction.

  “Hey,” he said slowly. “Something ain’t right here.” He sat back in his chair, putting more distance between himself and Tess. “Where is Mrs. McEvers?”

  “Okay, listen,” Tess said, leaning forward, attempting to establish her own connection with him, not simply as Claudia’s proxy. “You and I have some things to talk about. But first I want to know a couple more things about the blackout.” She just couldn’t stop herself. “Did you hear anything about how it occurred? It wasn’t an accident?”

  He frowned at her. She remained silent. He said sarcastically, “Right. An accident.”

  She didn’t react. She just waited.

  “We heard it was some mucky-muck high up in the utility. He flipped a switch and the boroughs went out. He’s long gone. And rich, I bet.”

  “Who paid him?”

  “The guys who snatched the Feeb, I guess.”

  “The Feeb” had to mean Reynolds.

  “So, Miss Cop, you better tell me what’s going on.” He gazed up at her through his false bravado like a little kid whistling in the dark. She felt bad for dashing his hopes.

  “Okay, I’m going to be honest with you,” she said. He took a little breath, afraid. Good. It was smart to be afraid at this point. “Claudia McEvers has been murdered.”

  “Oh, God.” He could barely grind the words out. He fell backwards against his plastic chair, nearly tipping it over. “Oh, God, oh, God. I knew it. I knew they would never let me go.”

  She took a chance. “You mean Robertson.”

  So much depended on what he said next.

  He keened, his voice high and crazed with fright. He rocked back and forth. Behind him, across the room, a burly guard took notice. Tess lifted a hand. It’s okay, she signaled. But she didn’t know if the guard knew she was a cop.

  “He said he would bury me here. He said I would never get out. He was right.” Joey started to cry. “I didn’t do anything. I never did anything. That’s why I’m here! Because I wouldn’t!”

  “Tell me everything. Quickly. Get it together,” Tess ordered him as the concerned guard shifted his weight. Joey hadn’t asked her how she had known to come to him—if Claudia had sent her, or given her Joey’s name before she’d died—and she was glad he hadn’t thought of it. It would keep her lies to a minimum, and she hadn’t thought of a good lie to explain it anyway. If Robertson and Gonzales were involved, she had to stay well off their radar.

  “He wanted me to be a mule. Carry drugs. And I said no. But I was so stupid. I said I was going to narc on him, tell the police all about him. So he planted some coke in my house and called it in.”

  Tess figured that he had already said all this at his trial, except maybe he’d been too afraid of Robertson to say anything. Copping a guilty plea might have been the only way he had to save his life.

  “He planted it,” he said again. His face was chalk-white. Prison was hell for just about anybody, but it had to be a special kind of hell for a tender baby-face like him.

  “And Claudia had proof of that,” Tess said. “That he did that to you.”

  “Yes! This morning she said she had everything she needed and she was going to go to the DA. She said if I would testify they’d find me innocent a
nd let me out.” He gripped the phone with both hands. “Listen, please, listen to me. I was in college. The first person in my family. I wasn’t into drugs at all!”

  She had been lied to many, many times in the past, and so her first impulse was to assume Joey was also lying to her. But this guy was convincing, and her heart tugged. Robertson was evil, doing this to him. Guys like Robertson were why Internal Affairs was necessary, as loathsome as she and the majority of her fellow cops found them to be. Law enforcement wielded a lot of power, and the checks and balances didn’t always work.

  Look at her and Cat—and yes, Gabe, before he had turned into Darth Vader—how they had broken not only protocols and procedures but actual laws to protect Vincent and destroy Muirfield. They had logged so much time off the books that they had almost lost their jobs. And they were “the good guys.”

  What was the saying? Everyone is the hero of their own story. She had no idea how Robertson could believe that. Maybe he didn’t need to. Scumbag like him wouldn’t rationalize his actions. He’d just act.

  “Listen,” she said, “we’re in the middle of something really intense. It involves Claudia’s death. But as soon as it plays out, I’m going to look into this. If you’re not lying to me, I swear I am going to help you.”

  He kept crying. He wrapped his hands around his head and sobbed. Tess chewed her lower lip, willing him to calm down. If he kept it up, the guard was going to end this, cop or no cop. And that would close her window of opportunity.

  He wiped his eyes and sniffled. He was in serious need of a tissue. He was just a kid. What the hell was he doing in Rikers? Why not minimum security?

  So Robertson could keep an eye on him.

  While keeping an eye on Reynolds at the same time?

  “Listen,” she began. “I am the real deal. Just don’t tell anyone in gen pop that I was here, and—”

  “You’re all alike,” he muttered losing hope. “When I saw the ADA here, I thought it was over. I figured she’d given him all the information and he had come to talk to me about my testimony. But he didn’t ask me a single question.”

  Tess went cold. Ice cold. “The ADA,” she said carefully.

  “That guy who’s on TV all the time. We call him ‘the movie star.’”

  Gabe? Was here?

  “But he didn’t talk to you,” she said, and he shook his head. “Who did he talk to?”

  “I don’t know, I don’t know.” He started crying again. “He killed her. He knows. He’s going to come for me!”

  She knew he was referring to Robertson but the creepy thing was that she could substitute “ADA Lowan” for “He” and it almost worked for her. She had really liked Gabe. He had tried to kill Vincent to save himself from life as a beast. But then the beast in Gabe had been killed. After he flatlined, Cat restarted his heart with a defibrillator, and his beast side stayed dead. After that, he had remained in the city to make amends, risked his life for Vincent and stuck by Cat… yeah, and loved her so much he had gone all immoral on their butts.

  She tapped the barrier to get Joey’s attention. “Stay calm, okay? Do you know that for a fact? That Robertson knows Claudia contacted you? Or are you just scared?”

  He stared at her as if she were crazy. “’Just’ scared? Just scared? Oh, yeah, why would I ever be just scared in here?”

  “Bad choice of words,” she murmured. “Please answer the question. We don’t have much time.”

  In fact, they didn’t have any time. The guard was on his way. She assessed the man. He could be in Robertson’s employ, keeping tabs on Joey for him. In which case, she was endangering Joey further.

  “Play along with me,” she said quietly. Then she raised her voice. She said, “Just think over what I said. It’s not too late to keep your little brother from going down the same road as you.”

  “Palmieri, time’s up,” the guard announced.

  Joey stared at her with a haunted look. “You stupid idiot,” he hissed under his breath. “I don’t have a brother.”

  The guard approached. Joey crumbled. “I’m sorry,” he whispered to Tess. Tears streamed down his face. “I didn’t mean to be rude.”

  “I know. Remember what I said.” I am going to get you out of here.

  And remember that you are not Wonder Woman, she told herself. But for this kid, she would be.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Rest in peace, Claudia. In the morgue.

  Cat handed off Claudia’s case to the Midtown homicide squad, and a uni drove her back to the 125th so she could write her report and get her car. No police office in the history of law enforcement stayed current on paperwork but again, there was that noose that IA had dangled in front of her. So Catherine took the time to file it.

  On the subject of IA, she requested a meeting with Hendricks, wondering if proof of her altered footage might crack her father’s disappearance. She nosed around the NYPD system as best she could and noted the APB that had been put out on him. Her father. Murderer, conspirator, fugitive. The fact that she was genetically related to him repulsed her. She understood Vincent’s discomfort with the nature of his DNA all too well.

  She had showered at the precinct, but she’d not replaced her usual spare set of clothes in her locker the last time she’d had to change at work, and she put her Dumpster-diving ensemble back on. She was looking forward to going home so she could change.

  From texting, she knew Vincent was there and she had a strange feeling of déjà vu as she entered the apartment to find him clean and in his bathrobe. He had made a pot of coffee in anticipation of her arrival and poured her a cup as she crossed the threshold. He moved forward to kiss her as he handed it to her but she gave her head a quick shake.

  “I am absolutely disgusting.”

  “Never,” he said. Then he dimpled. “Okay, maybe this once.”

  She savored the coffee as she went into the bathroom and took off her smelly, stained clothes. Maybe this outfit should be put out of its misery.

  She washed her hair again and styled it into a loose bun rather than take the time to dry it. Then she put on her white bathrobe, the twin to Vincent’s, and belted it as she padded barefoot back down the hall.

  The house smelled great. He was making her a grilled cheese sandwich for dinner. Standing over the stove as he flipped the sandwich onto a plate, he had a mischievous little boy grin that seemed entirely inappropriate for a murder investigation, but it was infectious. She offered him half of the sandwich but he shook his head, and his smile broadened.

  “I already ate,” he said.

  There clearly was a punch line to that statement. She waited for it.

  “Someone cooked me a Mars burger.”

  “Oh, my God, Vincent, you found the cook!” she cried. “And I’m guessing from your smile that he wants to cooperate.”

  “On the nose.”

  She began to set down her sandwich to give him a hug but he gestured to her sandwich. “You haven’t eaten for hours.”

  “I haven’t hugged you for hours, either.” She tore off a corner of the grilled cheese and popped it into her mouth. “Where is he? What’s his connection?”

  “He’s Joey Palmieri’s cousin. Joey, the guy in prison Tess went to see.” He picked up the plate with her sandwich on it and her coffee cup and carried them into the bedroom. She crawled onto the mattress, weary, hungry, and delighted.

  “He’s scared to death of Robertson and Gonzales,” he said, joining her on the bed.

  “Gonzales too?” She was disappointed, but not overly surprised. On the surface, Gonzales was the more likable of the two. But she had pretty much pegged him correctly: insincere to the core.

  “Gonzales and Robertson are partners at the Bureau and in crime,” Vincent confirmed. “The cook is named Nicolo Palmieri but he goes by Nico, and the whole family has been terrorized by those thugs. Seems Nico’s father ran drugs for the two agents and he died. Suspiciously. Robertson and Gonzales wanted the family to stay in their operati
on but everybody else said no. So they made an example out of Joey.”

  “Why not make an example out of Nico? Their dealer’s son?”

  Vincent’s mouth stretched into a tight line. “Joey’s in college. Tess said he’s the family’s pride and joy. He had more to lose than Nico.”

  “A life is a life,” she said fiercely. “One’s not ‘better’ than the other. And they actually did more damage that way, destroying one branch of the family by killing the father and another by burying their son alive. No wonder Tess was a mess after she called me from Rikers.” She paused, still unsure about discussing her father’s escape. She let a couple seconds drag by. Sometimes the best way to get over something was to go through it. It was foolish to think that it wouldn’t be on Vincent’s mind. Constantly.

  “She also told me what Joey said about my father’s escape. The guards knew, Vincent. They let it happen.” His mood went darker still and she saw the anger smoldering in his eyes. He could tame it now, most of the time. But how could she expect him to not to react when she could feel her own blood boiling?

  “So did guards let him out? Or did people come in?” Vincent asked.

  She said, “They wore ski masks and they carried weapons.”

  “So, covert ops all the way. I wonder how they made it happen. Rikers is huge.”

  She shared every drop of his bitterness. “You only have to buy off a couple of people if you know which ones to go to. But even Joey knew about it.”

  “Unless Joey’s lying. Maybe he’s trying to come up with the right information to make himself valuable to you.”

  “Tess wants to get him released as soon as we can.” She drank some of her coffee. She hadn’t realized until that moment that she’d used up all her reserves. She’d been running on empty for so long it had begun to feel normal.