Chicago Blood: Detective Shannon Rourke Book 1

by Stewart Matthews

  “Give me the stash,” Michael said. “If Afonso asks you what happened, say this one,” he pointed at Fat, “gave it up for a deep dish.”

  Skinny nodded. He opened the front door just wide enough to reach in and pull out a black trash bag.

  It clinked with glass when he handed it over to Michael.

  He peeked into the bag. The veins in his arms pounded. They ached for what was inside—little baggies of heroin intermixed with glass vials holding crack and meth.

  Michael closed his eyes tight. He’d have to put this temptation away if he wanted to find out who killed Colm. It was only a moment before the desire to shoot every baggie of heroin into the pits of his elbows, the veins around his wrists, and even the little places between his toes passed.

  He closed the bag.

  “There’s, what, twenty grand worth of product in here?” Michael jingled the bag.

  “Something like that,” Skinny said.

  “You think your boy Afonso will come talk to me if I hide this from him?”

  “Yeah,” Skinny said.

  “Okay then, let him know I’d like to talk to him about Colm Keane.” Michael backed down the steps, keeping the Judge pointed at Skinny. “It’s very important you remember that name. Say it.”

  “Colm Keane,” Skinny said.

  Fat moaned in pain.

  “Good.” Michael said. “Now turn around and keep saying it.”

  “Colm Keane,” Skinny said. He turned his nose to the house. “Colm Keane. Colm Keane.”

  “You’re doing great!” Michael said from the far side of a car parked out front of the house. “Don’t forget: I’ll be at the park.”

  “Colm Keane,” Skinny responded.

  CHAPTER 18

  Silence pushed in from the interrogation room’s white walls. Shannon and Dedrick looked at each other, wide-eyed. The idea that they might have a witness here who could help them pin a credible murder against a captain of the Irish mob was a lot to process—ignoring the moral implications of a man killing his own son.

  “Detective?” Isabella glanced at Shannon.

  “Saying that Ewan had Colm killed is a big accusation to make.” Shannon stood up from where she’d been leaning against the wall. “Do you know why he would’ve done that?”

  “You don’t believe me?” Already a tear welled up on the edge of Isabella’s eyelid.

  Dedrick appeared at her side in a heartbeat.

  “No,” he said. “What Detective Rourke means is we’re just a little surprised, is all. It took a lot of courage to come forward like you have.”

  Isabella nodded. She sniffled and dabbed at her eyes with her fingertips. She was trying to keep the tears from ruining her makeup, but mascara had already started to run from her eyelids.

  Dedrick reached into his pocket and gave her a handkerchief. Of course he had one. The guy pictured himself the modern incarnation of Sidney Poitier.

  Isabella took it and wiped under her eyes. Black splotches of mascara stained it.

  “Great.” She sputtered a laugh between her tears. She held the handkerchief up for him to take. “I’m sorry I ruined it.”

  “It’s all right.” Dedrick smiled at her. “You hang onto that for a minute.”

  She swallowed and balled the handkerchief in her fist.

  “Colm stole from his father,” Isabella said.

  “How do you know that?” Shannon said.

  “It’s my fault.” Isabella’s hands pulled the handkerchief like she wanted to rip it apart. “I pushed him into it.”

  Shannon looked at Dedrick, but he had his eyes fixed on Isabella. It was like he hadn’t heard what she said—or maybe he didn’t find it a little dubious.

  “So you came here to confess your involvement in a robbery?” Shannon asked.

  Isabella balled up her fists and cried harder this time. She was scared. And she had every reason to be. No matter which side she played—CPD or the Irish mob—she was in danger.

  “I don’t think it would be wise to prosecute Isabella for a robbery,” Dedrick said. “Given that she’s willingly come forward with information about a murder.”

  Why would he say that outright? The threat of an arrest for her involvement in the robbery could have been the leverage they needed to get good information out of Isabella. Did he have to say that in front of her? He couldn’t step outside and talk to Shannon about something like that?

  Of course they weren’t going to arrest her.

  “I’d rather leave that decision up to the State’s Attorney’s office,” Shannon said, “after we’ve finished hearing what Isabella has to say.”

  She turned her attention back to Isabella.

  “So you say Colm stole something from his father. What was it?”

  Isabella took a breath to relax herself. Then she was back to her fingers again. She stared at them. She weaved the handkerchief between her knuckles and picked at her fingernails.

  “Money,” Isabella said at a whisper.

  “How much?”

  “Colm said it was eighty thousand.” She looked down at the handkerchief again.

  “Where is it now?”

  “I don’t know. No matter how many times I asked him, he wouldn’t tell me.” She wiped her nose. “We thought it’d be enough to start a new life in Canada together.”

  She met Shannon’s eyes and tried to smile through her tears. She barked a sharp laugh at herself.

  “We were stupid,” she said. “You don’t rob a man like Ewan and get away with it—no matter who you are to him.”

  No question. And Colm should’ve known that.

  Shannon remembered what her brother said about Colm’s demeanor the last few months—that he was on edge, that everything seemed wrong until suddenly, it all wasn’t. He’d turned some kind of corner which made him relax—probably that was when he stole the money. Furthermore, stealing money from his father matched with what Robbie had told them.

  “Why did the two of you need to go to Canada?” Shannon asked. “Why not stay here?”

  “Colm couldn’t get away from his problems if we stayed here,” she said. “We both knew that.”

  “His drinking?” Dedrick asked.

  She nodded.

  “You think he would’ve quit if he left for Canada?”

  “He promised he would,” Isabella said. “He’d been going to meetings since we found out I was pregnant, but I know he slipped up a couple times.”

  Shannon and Dedrick gave each other a dubious look.

  “And you believed that leaving the country was the only way to keep Colm sober?” Shannon said.

  “His sponsor thought it would. Colm said the guy was leaving Chicago. He was going to live in Stockholm, where he’d get a chance to start over without all the baggage from his addictions. We both thought if it worked for him, it’d work for Colm too.”

  Shannon’s stomach sank to her knees. The hangover couldn’t hold a candle to what she felt now. If Michael realized he’d planted the idea of starting over in a new country into Colm’s head, he wouldn’t be able to live with the guilt. Shannon feared he might turn to heroin again.

  “That’s funny,” Dedrick said. “Detective Rourke and her brother are set to leave for Stockholm in a couple days.”

  “Michael was Colm’s sponsor,” Shannon said.

  That hung in the air for a moment. Shannon expected Isabella to cry harder, or shoot her a dirty look. But to her surprise, Isabella didn’t react at all.

  “When were you supposed to leave for Canada?” Shannon asked.

  “Yesterday morning.”

  “Did Colm pack a bag?” she asked. “Clothes? Toiletries? That sort of thing?”

  “I have it in the back of my brother’s car,” Isabella said. “It’s out in the parking lot if you want to see it.”

  “Take us to it.”

  Isabella dabbed at her face with the handkerchief one last time before she worked her way up from her chair—the baby must’ve weighed mor
e than it looked. She followed Dedrick and Shannon out of the room.

  Outside the station, the sun beat down. The day was clear and humid, and thank God they didn’t have to leave the shade of the concrete parking garage. Shannon beat back another wave of nausea.

  “The car’s over there.” Isabella pointed at a black Chrysler 300.

  The car was like an oil stain against the gray concrete walls. It had black paint, black rims, and windows tinted black as chalkboards. The car was in pristine condition, save a crack in the rear windshield that stretched from one side to the other.

  As they got closer, Shannon noticed the engine was running.

  “Is someone in the car?”

  “My brother,” Isabella answered. “Afonso.”

  The driver side window lowered. A man talking on his cell phone scowled out at Isabella, waiting for her to say something.

  Shannon recognized Afonso from a couple of the Facebook pictures she’d seen. He looked hard then, and he looked worse in person. The guy had a face you could start a match off of. Part of his left ear was missing, and the skin beneath it was scarred, as if his ear had been cut off or something similarly gruesome.

  “Pop the trunk,” Isabella said.

  The trunk popped up. She lifted it open. Inside were some children’s toys, an emergency road kit, some other odds and ends like window cleaner and a couple hand towels, and an olive-green army surplus duffel bag.

  “Is that Colm’s?” Dedrick asked.

  Isabella pulled it out with one hand.

  “Seems awful light for someone getting ready to move their entire life to a new country,” he said.

  “Colm didn’t want to take too many things with him. He said if we crossed the border with everything we had, it’d look suspicious. He was afraid they’d search us and maybe find our money. He promised we’d buy whatever we needed when we got there.”

  “Then he had Ewan’s money with him,” Shannon said.

  “I don’t think so,” Isabella said. “We got into a fight that night. About the money.”

  “What happened?”

  “He didn’t bring it with him,” she said, “and like I told you before, he wouldn’t tell me where it was. He didn’t trust me. I felt like, I’m starting my life over with this person, and he wasn’t being honest with me. I have a problem with liars.”

  “Did you two make up?”

  Isabella tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. Then she knotted her fingers together again.

  “No, not before he…” She closed her eyes and a tear squeezed out.

  “Before he went to the liquor store?”

  She nodded.

  A child’s crying came from the back of the car.

  “Ugh.” Isabella shook her head. She was at the car’s rear passenger-side door in a flash. She threw it open.

  Shannon peeked into the door, over Isabella’s shoulder.

  There were two children strapped into the back of the car. One crying and one smiling.

  Sopping tears rolled down the little girl’s face. Her feet kicked over the edge of her booster seat.

  “Marti took Reina!” she said.

  A doll laid at the little boy’s feet.

  “I told you two to be quiet.” Isabella reached across the girl and grabbed the doll from the floor of the car. She threw it back on the girl’s lap, and jammed a finger in the boy’s face.

  “I told you to cut it out,” she said to him. “And if I hear another word out of either of you, you’re both picking out switches when we get home. Got it?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Both children nodded their heads.

  Isabella closed the door, then rejoined Shannon and Dedrick at the back of the car.

  “You try to be nice and they just take advantage.”

  “That’s all right,” Dedrick said. “I don’t think my kids would last ten minutes sitting out in the garage here.”

  “Oh, they aren’t my children,” she said.

  “You a nanny?” Dedrick sounded a little surprised.

  “No, they’re my little sister and brother. They’re usually good kids.”

  “Where are your parents?” Shannon said.

  “My father left us six years ago, and my mother has been gone for four years. I’ve been a mother to these two since I was nineteen.”

  “I know exactly what that’s like,” Shannon said. “My father was a mean drunk and my mother may as well have never been around.”

  Isabella rested her hand on Shannon’s arm. She gave her a little look of commiseration.

  “Hey, Bella!” Afonso was off his phone. He had the front passenger window rolled down. “We gotta go!”

  She shot him a dirty look.

  “I still have more to say to the detectives.”

  “It’s an emergency,” he said. “Auntie Maria is sick.”

  “What?” Isabella looked at him like he’d just spouted total nonsense.

  “Now, girl,” he said. “We gotta go before she’s really hurt.”

  “If you need to leave,” Shannon said, “we can continue this when it’s best for you. Would you mind giving us your name and address?”

  “Got some paper?”

  Dedrick pulled out his pocket notebook and a pen. He handed them both to her.

  She wrote her information down and handed it back to him.

  “You want to talk to me or Detective Rourke, you call this number right here.” He passed her a business card.

  “I will.” Isabella opened the front passenger door. “Thank you, detectives.”

  As soon as she closed the door behind her, Afonso’s car took off. He drove down to the front gate of the garage like he was being chased. He laid on his horn until the attendant raised the boom and let the car out. He floored it down the street.

  “Well, she was nice,” Dedrick said.

  Shannon rolled her eyes.

  CHAPTER 19

  After ending their conversation with Isabella, Shannon and Dedrick wasted no time getting to Ewan Keane’s office.

  The Galway Tap, the restaurant where he kept his office, was a short drive northeast from the CPD station on Blue Island. When they arrived at Keane’s restaurant in Boystown, Dedrick pulled up to the curb along the front of the building and parked—a rarity. Shannon couldn’t remember ever finding a parking spot that easily in this part of town.

  “What are the odds Ewan Keane tells us anything we want to know?” Dedrick said as he turned off the car.

  “He’ll have to tell us something.” Shannon unbuckled her seatbelt and pulled her work bag over her shoulder. “Since Isabella pointed a finger at him, he might be compelled to say something to defend himself. In that case, we can at least check her story against his.”

  “If he doesn’t lawyer up before he answers anything.”

  They got out of Dedrick’s Impala. Shannon pulled on the front door of The Galway Tap. It was locked.

  “You sure he’s here?” Dedrick said.

  Shannon knocked on the glass. No one came forward. She shielded her eyes from the mid-day sun and peered into the big window at the front of the restaurant.

  “We can always grab lunch and come back,” Dedrick said. “I’m sure there’s somewhere to eat around here. If you’re feeling up to it.”

  She glared at him. The hangover hadn’t gone away quite yet, but that was on a need-to-know basis.

  “I’ve felt fine all morning.”

  “Well, great.” He grinned at her from behind the driver’s door of his car. “I’m looking forward to getting a couple Blood Marys with you over lunch. There’s a place I know.”

  She marched over to the passenger’s door and got into his car.

  “You think the police union would recommend suspension if I maced a fellow officer?”

  “Depends on who it is,” Dedrick said.

  Shannon smiled at him and batted her eyelashes.

  “Well,” he said. “The union might not like it if you maced a fellow detective. Probably a couple
sergeants who’d want to give you a commendation, though.” He started the car. “Take your pick.”

  They went up North Broadway a couple blocks. Dedrick parked outside of a bar and grill called North End. Inside, the place was stuck in the 1950s. It was dressed in chrome, red vinyl, and black and white tile. They took a spot at a little square table for two with a checkered red and white tablecloth. It was all very wholesome.

  Their waitress came to the table immediately. She was somewhere in her late thirties with light hair and tired eyes. She wore a poodle skirt and a little black varsity sweater.

  “How are you, Dedrick?”

  He flashed that big smile at her.

  “I’m doing great.” He held a hand out toward Shannon. “This is a co-worker of mine, Detective Shannon Rourke.”

  “Hello,” Shannon said.

  “Pleased to meet you.” The waitress smiled and nodded at her. “What can I get the two of you to drink?”

  “A water for me,” Dedrick said. “She’ll have a Bloody Mary.”

  Shannon gagged.

  “Water please,” she said. “No ice, lots of lemon.”

  The waitress smiled. “Lots of lemon. I’ll bring you an entire cupful.”

  “That’d be great.” Shannon smiled back.

  “Then I’ll be right back with your drinks.” The waitress smiled at Shannon again. She gave Dedrick a knowing look before she walked toward the kitchen.

  On the far side of the restaurant, a computerized jute box played Buddy Holly’s “That’ll Be The Day.” It was just at the part where he belted out the first guitar solo.

  Dedrick tapped the toe of his dress shoe along with the beat. He hummed the tune to himself while he looked over the menu.

  “I didn’t think you would’ve liked a place like this.” Shannon opened her menu.

  “I like taking my kids here,” Dedrick said. “Food’s not too bad, either.”

  The upholstered booths to her left looked like they’d been snatched from a Cadillac Series ’62. She pictured him sitting in one with all three of his children bouncing around him and laughing with each other. It almost made her heart melt.

  “So you been feeling okay?” he asked.

  “I’m fine, I guess.” She kept her eyes on the menu. The grilled chicken salad looked nice and mild. “My stomach hurts a little.”