“Why don’t we talk in private?” I offered.
“I don’t think so,” he said, his voice maybe even an octave louder and echoing through the now quiet diner. He smiled as he noticed how uncomfortable I was, then turned sideways to address the rest of the room.
“You’ve got a celebrity with you,” he said. “Lenny March, mass murderer extraordinaire. The piece of shit they’ve been talking about in the news who killed twenty-eight people for the mob. The same one who murdered my dad.”
When he first started his speech I felt a hotness flushing my face. That was gone now, replaced by something cold. Everything had gotten very still. The rest of the room seemed to dissolve as I stared back at this man, my voice odd and unnatural to me when I asked him who his pop was.
His lips curled as if he wanted to spit at me. What he spat out was the name, “Frank Mackey”.
I nodded, remembering Mackey. “Your old man was quite a piece of work,” I told him. “He used to do truck hijackings, but that wasn’t why Lombard ordered the hit. Mackey grabbed a sixteen-year-old girl off the street, and held her for three days in the basement of an abandoned warehouse where he repeatedly fucked every body orifice this poor girl had. Her family wanted justice, but they also didn’t want this girl humiliated any further by the police or the courts, so they appealed to Lombard.”
What I said stunned him. “You’re lying.”
“Sorry, I’m not. Your old man was one of the few hits that I would’ve gladly done for free. Lombard wanted it to be more than just a hit. He wanted me to make sure there would have to be a closed casket, and more, he wanted your old man to suffer. And I did a hell of a job with it. Kept him alive for hours while I whittled away pieces of him. Now get the fuck away from my table. I’m eating.”
His skin color had dropped to a milk-white. Any fury that had been raging in his eyes fizzled. He was unsure of himself, wondering how much of what I told him was true, although at some level probably realizing all of it was. I picked up my fork and continued eating my French toast. He sat across from me for another minute and made a few idle threats about how this wasn’t over, but the steam had been taken out of him. There was too much doubt, or maybe not enough.
The room remained deathly quiet after he left. I could sense people staring at me, but I just kept methodically cutting my food and chewing it slowly. Minutes later when I looked up Lucinda was standing by my table, her face hard and inscrutable, her eyes small black ice chunks.
Her voice brittle, she said, “I liked you better when you were just an old coot.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Do me a favor and find some other place to eat breakfast. I’d just as soon never see you again.”
“Lucinda, that was all a long time ago, I was a different person back then…”
My voice faded on me. The look on her face showed what I said didn’t matter. “Okay, sure, if that’s what you want.” My voice again sounded distant and foreign to me. “As soon as I’m done here you won’t see me again.”
I turned away from her, fixed my attention back on my food and continued eating my breakfast. I would’ve liked a refill on my coffee, but I wasn’t going to ask Lucinda for one, and instead planned on getting a cup at a convenience store. As I ate I looked up and met all of their stares until they looked away. I didn’t care any more whether people recognized me. In a way this was good, it hardened me to the prospect. It also woke me up about the way I was spending money. I was living as if I only had another month or two left, but I’d already been out over a week without any sign of Lombard’s boys, and the only relative of any of my victims who bothered looking me up turned out to be a gutless wonder who just wanted to spout off in front of an audience. It was possible that I was going to fade into the background, and that I’d be around a lot longer than I’d thought. I needed to quit eating out as much as I did, maybe buy a few pots and pans and start cooking more for myself.
The place was still as quiet as a tomb when I finished eating. I hesitated for a moment before dropping a twenty dollar bill to cover the food and tip, then left without looking back.
That afternoon I tried calling both Michael and Allison, and left them messages. I didn’t expect them to return my calls, but maybe I’d wear them down over time. After that I went to the library, and a reference librarian helped me try to track down Paul’s address and phone number on a computer. We came up empty. It was at best a wild goose chase. For all I knew he could’ve changed his last name, or be living overseas somewhere. He could even be dead for all I knew.
That same night while I was working I heard voices drifting in from the lobby. I was vacuuming a third-floor office when that happened. When I later asked the kid working security about it, he tried to look through me as if I didn’t exist, then finally admitted that he had been talking to his girlfriend on the phone.
“Some sort of law against that?” he demanded.
“You better lose the attitude,” I warned him, and left to finish my cleaning.
I thought about those voices I heard. It had sounded as if there was more than one person talking, but it was hard to tell with the noise the vacuum made, and by the time I’d realized what was happening and turned it off the conversation had ended. I guess it was possible the kid working security had his girlfriend on speakerphone, but that seemed far-fetched. More likely he was doing some business on the side, probably drugs, and had one or more customers over. If I was my old self I would’ve gotten the answer out of him quick enough, but I was no longer my old self. Besides, it was no concern of mine whether he was lying to me to cover some illegal activity. I had no interest in trying to push my way in on it, so it didn’t really matter one way or the other.
I had more important things on my mind.
chapter 15
1978
Vincent DiGrassi’s face looks older and grayer, as if he’s aged five years in the six months since I’ve last seen him. He appears stiffer also. His neck and back must be bothering him with the way he’s grimacing and the twisted off-kilter way he’s holding himself. He gives me two names. One of them is Joey Lando.
“That one you got a history with,” he acknowledges bluntly. “The same punk who sold you out to me after a five-minute beating.”
So he remembers. Christ, that was thirteen years ago. The guy’s mind is like a steel trap, nothing gets out of it. Even remembering every kid he ever ordered a beat-down on.
His grimace tightens, deep lines etch his face. “What the fuck the long face for?” he demands. “I thought you’d be chomping at the bit to pay that punk back.”
“What’s the reason for the hit?” I ask.
DiGrassi doesn’t answer, just tries to stare me down, his grimace turning into something menacing.
“You’re right,” I say to break the silence. “I’ve got a history with him. You can tell me the reason for the hit.”
The old DiGrassi would’ve been looking to tear my head off for asking that. This one, there’s something not quite right with him. His menacing look cracks, and he mutters something about Joey being a punk. “Is that good enough for you?” he asks sarcastically.
“I have my reasons for wanting to know,” I say.
DiGrassi’s eyes waver as he stares at me. He looks away first. “Your old rat friend is bringing special attention from the Feds because of his bank jobs. We asked him politely to lay off, and what does he do? The fucker hits five more deliveries to bank machines. And he doesn’t even offer to kick over any of it. He’s a punk, and a lesson needs to be made of him and his partner. Satisfied?”
“How come only two names?” I ask. “What about his inside person?”
DiGrassi’s scowling at me. “What do you mean inside person?”
“The one working at the bank who’s giving him the delivery schedules.”
“How do you know this?”
“I just do.”
At first his eyes blaze because I’m not giving him more of an explanation,
but they slowly turn glassy as he calms down and accepts what I’m telling him. “Get this guy also.”
“It’s a woman.”
“Whatever. And Lenny, make these bloody. The bodies have to be recognizable for the Feds, but this still has to be a statement.”
It isn’t hard finding Joey, nor is it hard getting him into the back of a stolen van. In his heart he believes I’m crooked and can’t accept that I’m leading a clean life, so when I tell him I have forty cases of stolen booze that I want to unload cheap, he goes in willingly. Before he realizes what’s happening, he’s out cold.
I drive the van to a secluded garage where I have another stolen car waiting for me. Joey’s tied up in back. It doesn’t take much to get him to give up where his partner is holed up and the name of his inside person. No more than a couple of minutes of persuasion and only two lost fingernails. When I leave him he has this odd expression on his face, kind of a mix of hurt and validation.
I first go to Joey’s apartment where I pick up enough evidence so I can tie him to the bank jobs, then I find his partner where he’s holed up, and leave him sprawled out on the floor with a full clip from a forty-five in his torso. When I find their inside person I have a change of heart. She’s just a wisp of a woman. Cute in her own way with stringy red hair and this innocent baby face that makes her look even younger than her twenty-four years. I’ve never killed a woman before – all my hits have been men, and I decide I don’t want to start with this one. I end up making a deal with her instead. I have her type up a confession. I’m going to let her make a run for it. Maybe she makes it to Mexico before the Feds catch up to her, maybe she doesn’t, but I let her know what will happen if she ever mentions a word about me. I’m wearing a ski mask so she can’t identify me, and I show her Polaroids I took of Joey’s partner so she knows I mean business. As far as DiGrassi is concerned, the story I’ll give him is that someone must’ve tipped her off. He’ll find the confession curious, but in the end he’ll accept what I tell him. He has no reason to think that I’d go soft with a woman target. I watch as she packs a small suitcase and leaves. I’m not worried about her talking if she gets caught. If that happens, I’ll deal with it.
When I return back to Joey, he’s gotten himself a little more courage. Somehow he’s convinced himself I’m just trying to rip him off. I listen to what he says, then I make it bloody like I’m supposed to. I leave behind the evidence tying him to the bank jobs. Then I leave the van in a place where it can be found after an anonymous tip.
I had put on overalls so I could finish the job with Joey without getting any blood splatters. I take them off, also an old pair of sneakers, and bring them with me so I can incinerate them later. I’ve also brought a change of clothes. The ones I’m wearing are clean but they’ll be incinerated with the rest of the stuff. I know it’s crazy, some sort of a phobia I’ve picked up, but I just don’t want to risk my kids smelling death on me.
I slip on a pair of loafers that I brought along and I go to the YMCA so I can take a shower, change into my new clothes, and be clean for when I go home to Jenny and my two kids.
chapter 16
present
The next morning my cell phone rang again. I almost didn’t answer it assuming it was the same tough guy from before, but then looked at the caller ID and saw it was my son, Michael. At first I didn’t believe it, thinking my eyes were playing tricks on me.
“Michael?” I said, my voice cracking as I answered the phone.
“Yeah, it’s me. You called yesterday.” There was a pause, then, “I guess you’re out of prison.”
I laughed at that. I couldn’t help it. “Come on, you must’ve seen something about it on the news.”
“I don’t watch much TV or read the papers these days.
What do you want?”
“What do I want? Michael, I’m your father. Chrissakes, I haven’t seen or heard from you in over fourteen years.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” There was another long pause before he added, “After what you did you’re expecting some sort of father-son relationship? Are you out of your mind?”
His voice wasn’t angry or sarcastic, just tired. I felt tongue-tied for a long moment before stumbling out with, “Whatever I did, it doesn’t change that you’re my son.”
I’m sure it sounded as stupid and trite to him as it did to me. I sat cringing, waiting for his response. It seemed a long time before he answered me, and when he did his voice sounded like he was on the brink of exhaustion. Like it took every bit of strength he had to respond.
“Let me explain the obvious to you. You murdered twenty-eight people. For money. Whatever you were back then you were never my father. Fathers have real jobs, they’re not mob hit men. They’re not cold-blooded psychopaths. Do you have any idea what all that did to me? How many years of therapy I’ve gone through, and how fucked up I still am? And not just me, but Allie and Paul? And Mom, too. You don’t think that had anything to do with her developing cancer?”
He wasn’t telling me anything I hadn’t thought about for years. After hearing about Jenny, I read everything I could about liver cancer in the prison library and I knew some people believed stress played a large role in it.
I said, “I just want to see you.” I wanted to ask him for Paul’s address and number, but stopped myself, knowing that that request would lead to a quick hang-up. Instead, carefully choosing my words, I added, “I don’t want anything from you other than that. A half hour, Michael, that’s all I’m asking.”
“Yeah, well, you’re asking a hell of a lot. I spoke to Allie this morning. She doesn’t want you calling her again and leaving any more messages, so don’t.”
“Maybe Allie will change her mind someday.”
“She’s not changing her mind.”
I hesitated, my voice lowering almost to a whisper. “Michael, you’re my son. I love you. I just want to see you.”
He laughed at that, a tired, exhausted laugh. “Next thing you’re going to tell me is that’s what kept you surviving prison.”
I lied then and told him it was partly that. In truth, I wasn’t sure what it was that kept me going all those years. I knew it was self-preservation and anger that made me cut the deal in the first place. During those early years I was driven by wanting to see Jenny again, and to a lesser extent, wanting to walk out of prison as a big loud fuck-you to Lombard. After Jenny died and I no longer had any sort of life waiting for me on the outside, that fuck-you message I wanted to deliver stopped seeming all that important to me. I had to fight while inside prison to make it from day to day, but the thing was, I’d be damned if I knew why I bothered.
Michael took some time digesting what I told him. When he spoke again it was to tell me that I was lying, but there was a hint of doubt in his voice. “Don’t call me again,” he said. “Maybe I’ll call you back someday, I’m not sure, but don’t you ever fucking call me again.”
He hung up then. I felt jittery inside, but also a little hopeful. Before his call, I never thought I would hear his voice again, and it went about as well as I could’ve expected.
Christ, my head was hurting me. Like it was being cracked open like a walnut. I sat for a while with my head bowed, cradling it in both hands. When I could I straightened up and reached for the bottle of aspirin that I kept next to the bed. My hand shook as I spilled several tablets into it. I chewed them slowly without bothering to get any water. I knew they weren’t going to do much good. They never did much good.
Later that morning I was at a coffee shop trying to mind my own business while I ate a two dollar and fifty cent maple-banana-nut muffin and drank a three dollar cup of coffee – all of it costing more than a full breakfast at Lucinda’s diner would’ve cost – when I noticed a woman sitting a few tables over staring at me. She was in her thirties, thick dark hair, dark features, probably of Italian descent, and all I could think was that I was about to have a confrontation with another of my victims’ relatives.
> I stared back. I didn’t care. Let her shout and scream all she wanted. She got up from her table and walked over to me. Up close her hair was all tangled, like a hornet’s nest. It looked like it hadn’t been combed in days, that it needed washing and, even more badly, some work at a salon. But as bad a hair day as she might’ve been having it didn’t hide that her features were striking, even given how skinny she was.
“I must’ve been staring,” she said, keeping her voice soft and low. When I didn’t say anything in response, she showed a trace of a shit-eating grin, and added, “I was there yesterday morning at the Blue Bell Diner when you and that fat guy gave us your two-man show. It was very entertaining. Do you mind if I join you?”
She waited a few seconds for me to answer her, and when I didn’t, she sat across from me anyway, her shit-eating grin stretching a fraction of an inch. I remembered her then from the diner. She’d been sitting at a table in the back and I caught a glimpse of her when I stood up to leave. If she hadn’t been so strikingly beautiful I wouldn’t have noticed her. But as beautiful as she was, she was also somewhat a mess, both with her hair and her clothing, and no makeup on. My first thought would’ve been that she was a drug addict, except her eyes were bright and clear, and her skin too healthy for that.
“Did you follow me here?” I asked, my voice cracking and coming out as a hoarse rumble.
She laughed at that. It was a nice throaty laugh. “Hardly,” she said. “Boy, are you one paranoid sonofabitch, but I guess given your situation I can’t blame you for that.” Her eyes glistened as she looked at me. “I was in here minding my own business when I recognized you from the other day. A coincidence, that’s all.”
“What do you want?”
She raised an eyebrow at that, her grin growing more amused. “It’s not enough that a somewhat attractive woman wants to sit at the same table with you?” she asked.
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