She felt a hand on her shoulder and turned to look into the soft eyes of Alex Vaughn. It rang strange to her that a man whose eyes, just moments before, were so hard and angry, were now so docile. “It’ll get easier every day. I promise.”
She nodded. Her eyes flickered from Briggs to the low flying helicopter now flooding the area with a searchlight.
“I know this is a lot, but Sydney? Sydney, are you listening?” Alex Vaughn snapped his fingers in front of her face.
“Yes.” She shook her head. “I’m listening.”
“I need you to call out an APB.” He placed his other hand on her shoulder and forced her to look directly at him.
“For who? We don’t know who killed the cops, Conrad, Randal Boone. We don’t know!” She tried to look away, but Alex Vaughn held her shoulders fast and maneuvered his face so she had to look at his scarred face.
“Sydney. Randal Boone was never reported dead. I know why. Rather,” he looked at the ground, “I know who he really is and it’s my fault I missed it.”
Sydney felt her body tense.
“I need you to put out an APB for Randal Boone also known as Elliot Nash.”
Chapter 28
Don Ciancetta sat in the back of the car with The Pope. It turned out that he didn’t have to drive his old friend around because his son Joey Ciancetta was waiting in the lobby. He was a larger, more muscular clone of his father, straight down to the green eyes and dark hair. But he reached a height of almost six feet, which made his old man look small by comparison.
This Escalade is nice though.
The Pope admired the spacious vehicle and the black leather seats. They smelled of Armor All and pine. The carpeting on the floor was springy and clean almost as if brand new. The ride was almost worth the embarrassment of having to be wheeled out by Joey after he almost toppled over on his way out of the hospital.
When he tried to walk down the small flight of stairs his legs nearly buckled and he swooned. It seemed to him that the stairwell elongated as he hovered with his foot in the air about to step downward and onto the step below.
The Don supported him down the stairs to where Joey awaited. The younger Ciancetta grabbed a wheelchair and the two of them forced him to suffer the humiliation of being wheeled out like a cripple.
He sighed, reflecting back on the ordeal. As if that wasn’t bad enough, he nearly flipped out when that doctor bumped into him as they exited the automatic doors. For a brief second he thought he saw a spider tattoo on the man’s forearm. He made Joey swing him around to look but when he did the man was gone.
A trick of a weary mind.
His phone rang, bringing him back to the present. The caller was listed as unknown on the I.D. Most people left those for the voicemail, but those were the kind of calls The Pope always took.
“Yeah?” he answered.
The Don cast him a wary look.
“It’s me. Paying back that favor. Two things for you. A man named Antonio Benedici was picked up inside the perimeter not far from a dead Russian connected to you named Ivan Nivski. So far they have nothing on him and he ain’t talking.” The voice was hushed but The Pope recognized him. He recognized all his plants at the BPD.
“And the second part?” The Pope prodded.
“The second part is a two-parter. First, everyone over here is going ape-shit because some guy, who you might know, wasn’t picked up. The other is a turncoat cop become cop-killer was made at the scene; a guy I know you know named Elliot Nash.”
The Pope worked hard to remain calm but he could feel his heart blasting in his temples.
“So we good?” the voice asked.
“We’re good when I say we’re good.” He hung up the phone.
The Don tossed him another concerned glance. “Out with it Chris.”
He knew the look all to well and decided this was something they both needed to know. “A guy I sent to clean up Rafael and Ivan got picked up at the site.”
“Jesus Christ!” He looked up at the ceiling of the vehicle. “Are you fucking serious? What about those two?”
The Pope took a deep breath. “Ivan’s no longer with us but Raf disappeared.”
“You mean to tell me that the L’Angelo Della Morte is out there somewhere and now he’s pissed off at me?” His voice was rising and The Pope leaned a bit away from him in the backseat.
“We don’t know that he’s pissed off at you. I sent Ivan to clean Raf, and Antonio to clean them both. Only Ivan, for whatever reason, didn’t do it on time. There is a chance Raf doesn’t know anything.” He said it as convincingly as he could. He had to hope that there was truth in his words.
“A chance? We go about business as usual on a chance?” He looked away from the consigliore and out the window. “Fuck.”
“There’s more.” He looked at his hands, feeling even wearier than in the hospital.
“More?” Don Ciancetta scoffed.
“Yeah. Remember that dirty cop that we chased around for a couple months?”
“Yeah what was his name, Eli?”
“Elliott. Yeah.” He swallowed. “Well apparently he was at the site tonight too and I can’t for the life of me figure out why. He tried to bankroll Rafael’s switch of allegiance, we know that much. But that was for Falzone’s crew and they’re all dead.”
The Don pursed his lips together and folded his hands making a steeple with his index fingers. “It doesn’t make sense.”
They sat there, both so deep within their thoughts that they never saw it coming. Like a heat seeking missile a grey Cadillac launched into them from the side. There was a moment of freefall where The Pope felt himself lurch to the side simultaneously with the sound of exploding metal. He tumbled across the Don’s lap and somehow he registered that the man’s head had cracked into the side window and bounced off. The car spun in a circle and Joey Ciancetta rolled the wheel left and right trying to regain control of the spiraling automobile. The sound of shrieking tires seemed to continue their yell inside The Pope’s head even when the car sat in the middle of the vacant intersection. Smoke from the burned rubber of the wheels hung like a fog over the car and he could barley see into it through the one, still-working headlight that flickered with the remnants of its life.
Don Ciancetta groaned and The Pope checked himself, realizing he was miraculously unscathed. He looked over at his friend and noticed, first the blood along the side window.
That should have broke.
“You okay? Dad? You okay?” Joey Ciancetta looked back and grabbed his father’s leg.
“Yeah.” He tried to sit up but he looked woozy from the impact. “I think so. What the fuck happened?”
As if in answer, something thudded against the side of the door.
Rat-a-tat-tat-tat-tat.
Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud.
Something bounced off the window.
“Get the fuck down!” Don Ciancetta folded up underneath the ledge of the window. “Joey! Drive the damn car!”
Joey didn’t need to be told again. None of them were strangers to gunfire. He tried to roll the engine over but it just hissed in protest.
“I can’t get it started!” Joey pulled open the glove compartment and yanked a small pistol out. He put a hand on the door as if to push out, just as the source of the gunfire came walking towards the car. Two gunmen in black masks and black jumpsuits carried automatic rifles and fired as they walked, one from the left and one from the right. They were peppering the car with bullets, oblivious to the lack of effectiveness.
“Stay the fuck down!” Don Ciancetta yelled at his son. “It’s bullet proof glass and siding. Let these cocksuckers run out of ammo first!”
Joey listened to his Dad and pulled his hand from the door as a fresh spray of metal bounced off the side of the car. He tried to start the car again without success. Both men continued shooting and advancing. The one on the driver side ran out of ammo first. He dropped his clip to the gravel on the road and reached into his wais
tband for a second clip.
But the younger Ciancetta wasn’t waiting. Staying low and keeping the car between himself and the gunman firing away into the passenger side, he kicked his door open and fired two shots at the asshole on the left. Both shots struck the man in the chest. He fell to the ground instantly and his gun clattered across the roadway behind him. His legs twitched and he screamed out in pain. The assailant on the right stopped walking, startled by the return gunfire and his companion’s screams. He took a step backward, firing erratically as he did so. His own gun clicked to empty after a few scattered shots and he threw it to the ground and turned to run.
Joey Ciancetta popped off another couple of shots, one of them clipping the fleeing man in the spine as he ran. He grunted and stumbled forward to the ground as if someone had launched a drop kick into the small of his back. The first gunman to go down suddenly went very silent except for a low gurgle The Pope could make out from almost a dozen feet away. Joey glanced back at the man and then walked forward towards the second gunman to finish him off. The Pope watched him walk over very methodically towards the man who was now trying to propel himself forward in a slow crawl away from the scene. He stooped over the man, flipped him over onto his back then stood up. His face creased and he looked back at their car as if seeking an answer to a question he never asked. Then he looked back down at the man, said something The Pope couldn’t hear and pulled the trigger. The muzzle flashed once and the man’s head snapped back to the pavement as if it had been glued there.
Joey Ciancetta walked back over and began stuffing a rag down the gas tank of their car.
“Can you walk?” The Pope asked Don Ciancetta.
“Yeah, I just need a little help.”
The two of them put their arms around each other and stumbled away from the scene. The Pope looked back just in time to see Joey lighting the rag on fire with a zippo lighter and running to catch up to them.
“That car clean?” The Pope asked.
“Like all the rest. They’ll know its ours, but good luck proving it.” The two men limped away, to where, The Pope didn’t know or care as long as they got the fuck away from that disaster.
The Don’s son caught up to them, panting as he did so.
“You still have the gun?” The Pope asked, his mind going into legal overdrive.
“Yeah.” Joey Ciancetta held it up for him. “Only got one bullet left in it though.”
“It’s clean too?” The Pope asked, breathing heavily. He couldn’t tell which of the two of them was supporting the other.
“Yeah. Of course.”
“Wipe the prints and toss it down the gutter. They can match the bullets with the gun.”
Joey did as he was told and then said, “We need to get off the street. Ricky Vincenzio lives near here. We can go to his place.”
“Good thinking.” The Don seemed as if in a daze and The Pope wondered whether he had just witnessed his second concussion of the night.
“What the fuck just happened?” he asked to himself. He felt a cough coming on but stifled it.
“I know what happened,” Joey announced as he walked ahead of them and towards an alley that ran alongside a duplex. He pulled open a wrought iron gate that lead to a small patio enclosed by cinderblocks painted an ugly beige color. A dying plant hung in front of a metal door. “That prick I just put a bullet into was Philip Mirra.”
Don Ciancetta disengaged from his arm and leaned back against the wall as Joey knocked on the door. The Pope nearly swooned and turned away from both of them and gripped the iron bars.
It all makes fucking sense.
His mind whirled like a hummingbird as the pieces started falling together. The payment Rafael Rontego was supposed to receive from that middleman Elliott. They assumed it was from Falzone in his attempt to turn the hitman before the war. But the assassin had killed that cop without asking all the necessary questions.
The Russians. What was it Pavel had said?
“Angelo Della Morte,” he whispered.
It was Carmine Galante that had coined the term. The same term used by the Russians in Pavel’s presence.
“You’ve got to fucking be kidding me,” Don Ciancetta said.
Joey Ciancetta turned and looked at his father, his face set and stern. “I wish I was.”
“The Bonanno Family,” The Pope said. It was all he had to say. They each knew what it meant to have the most powerful crime family in America deciding it was better off without the Ciancetta family.
It was a death sentence.
Ricky Vincenzio opened the door with a smile.
*
Kira looked out the window as row after row of cornfields floated by in waves of gold and green. She had dozed off for almost a half hour and the time was enough to make the rest of the day seem like a dream.
Or a nightmare.
Bobby asked few questions after a single look from Kira when he picked her up. He took her to her place where she grabbed what she could in a hurry. A duffle bag full of clothes, a large purse stuffed with cash, a gun, anything she thought might identify her, and the only picture she owned of her father and mother.
Uncle Dick, prick that he ended up being, had taught her well.
Keep a home but keep it in a bag ready to go.
Thirty minutes outside of the city and you entered straight-up country town. She passed a make-shift ball park on her right as she blinked open a swollen eye that kept shutting on its own accord.
“Turn left.” She knew the area well. The house she purchased there was supposed to be a rental property and it was the first thing she had ever bought with her “working” money.
Bobby turned as directed and she saw yet another cornfield. This one was small though and it ran into a long wooden house with a tricycle turned upside down in the drive. She sat up and cast a quick glance at Bobby who must have been looking at her because he looked away in a hurry.
“It’s just a few more houses up on the left.” She looked at the worry that lined Bobby’s usually smile riddled face. A piece of her felt bad for dragging him into this but she really couldn’t think of another option. “Trust me. The less you know the better.”
He glanced at her again and the worry didn’t ease a bit from the furrowed brow turning down along the corner of his eye. “Whatever you say, Kira.”
“Pull over here,” she waved towards the side of the road.
“The one with the ivy?”
“No. The one just past, “she pointed. “The one with the detached garage.”
He pulled his mom’s car over but kept the engine running. “You sure I can’t come in? Check the place out?”
“I’m sure, Bobby.” She grabbed the duffle and her purse and climbed out of the vehicle. The gravel of the drive met her feet. Directly across from the house was a guardrail that bordered a small wooded area that dropped into a steep cliff that rolled into a tiny creek surrounded by walls of slate rock. She took a breath and realized the air felt foreign to her. She walked over to the driver side door where Bobby had rolled the window down. “You need to get back to school and forget you ever saw me.”
“People are going to ask about you. Gina’s going to ask about you.”
Damn his puppy-dog eyes.
She felt the gun on her hip when she adjusted her posture. For a brief moment she wondered if she should take Bobby out just to close any loose ends. She shook her head and the thought fell away.
“So let ‘em ask.” She brushed her hair out of her eyes and felt a lump along her cheek. Thankful there wasn’t a mirror facing her, she continued. “If anyone asks, you don’t know shit. In fact, we aren’t friends. I’m a bitch, a slut, whatever. Tell Gina I tried to sleep with you. That ought to piss her off.”
Bobby laughed and she finally saw a bit of his grin creep back. “Gina? She knows we’re just friends.”
Bullshit.
“Whatever.” She looked down at the gravel. Something seemed to have strapped around her feet an
d her heart decided to backflip across her stomach for some reason. When she looked up she saw a widening grin on Bobby’s face.
“I don’t know if it’s all the bruising or if you’re blushing.”
“Fuck you Bobby.” She almost smiled but when she started the pain was too much. “Get the fuck out of her.”
He laughed out loud. “Out of her? Or out of here?”
Her cheeks lit on fire. Turning around she extended a middle finger and started to walk up the broken sidewalk that led to the back of the house where she knew her door key would work.
Bobby called out to her. “Can I visit?”
She stopped walking and without looking back said, “Sure.”
Bobby revved the engine, yelled something she couldn’t hear, and squealed his tires on the gravel.
Kira admonished herself for her stupidity and spun around to take it back but by the time she turned, the car was nearly half a block down the road.
“I should have killed him.”
*
“Two of my men are dead and I want answers!” Chief Wilcox had a stubby finger in Sydney Price’s face and Special Agent in Charge, Todd Simmons, just stood by and watched her take the verbal beat down. The rising sun winked over the horizon and twinkled on the edge of the man’s bald head. He was shorter than Sydney and his wobbly neck skin shuddered with each shout that made its way past his chapped lips. “And you,” he roared. “You son of a bitch. Must you be involved in everything?”
Alex Vaughn raised his eyebrows at the onslaught but said nothing.
The chief of the Buffalo Police Department held the gaze for a moment and then spit on the ground and stomped off to where several of his other men clustered together. Sydney watched the man run the gambit of emotions as he held his hat in his hand and addressed his men. He hung his head and patted the nearest one on the back.
Buffalo Soldiers (An Upstate New York Mafia Tale Book 2) Page 27