Campanelli: Sentinel

by Frederick H. Crook

  He did not wish to contemplate the implications of the discrepancy. For the moment, there were more pressing matters. He turned his attention back to his work.

  From the details in the file he had compiled so far, it looked like Antony had disappeared from the face of the Earth. Detectives assigned by Vanek found Antony at home that following Saturday morning. He had not been observed leaving the house, but had disappeared nonetheless. His friends and family had been questioned and their residences staked out with no result. Despite alerting the authorities of the surrounding suburbs, counties and states, the holes in the dragnet were huge and Frank knew it.

  Meanwhile, Antony’s accomplices were indicted and unexpectedly, Beritoni’s underlings had them plead guilty. A trial by jury was avoided, so the pair went to prison in Statesville to serve a five year sentence. Considering the multiple diseases circulating throughout the joint, they were not expected to live more than a couple of years. That was fine by Campanelli, but it was not enough.

  The Homicide Division’s door opened abruptly and Marcus came in.

  “Frank,” he greeted in a serious, somber manner. It would be a while before the effect of the morning’s activity would wear off.

  “Marcus,” he returned likewise, not taking his eyes from the two dimensional screen.

  Williams read his partner perfectly, but asked the question anyway. “Anything new?”

  “Nope,” Campanelli said absently as he looked over the information for what must have been the thousandth time.

  “Our stakeouts have turned up nothing?”

  “Nope,” Frank reiterated as he shook his head and sighed. “I’m gonna hafta pull Tomlinson and Miskowski from Antony’s aunt’s house. They have other cases.”

  “Still no hits on the car?”

  Frank punched up CPD gateway to the GPS records and entered Antony’s license plate number with boredom. “Nope. Still nothing since it was parked near the corner of Adams and South Michigan Thursday…evening,” he said and frowned in thought.

  “Okay. Wait…did you say evening?” Marcus perked up and came around the desk to see what Frank was seeing.

  “Yeah, Nine-oh-nine PM,” Campanelli rubbed his chin in thought, annoyed that the exact time had been missing from earlier reports. Only the date had displayed before.

  “Naw. The satellite data must be goofy. Why would he have gone back to the lawyer’s office that night?”

  “I don’t know,” Frank answered. Campanelli switched tacks and checked the GPS service’s maintenance records for that evening. “Damn it! The service went down for one hour…eighteen minutes after this last sighting.” Frank leaned back hard in the chair and rubbed his face in his hands. “The delay in the full report explains why the detail watching his home never noticed him leave. He was already long gone. They couldn’t have even run a query to verify that the car wasn’t in the garage.”

  “That’s a lot of time. During which he must have destroyed the plates, stolen someone else’s or changed cars.” Marcus surmised.

  “There are still no hits on his credit cards and his bank balances have not been touched since he paid for bail and the lawyer,” Campanelli said frustratingly. “No one reported a stolen car from that area, either.”

  Williams noted something else on the report. “Wait. How can a high-priced lawyer like Beritoni charge the guy five hundred? The bail was two hundred grand. You would think that he would’ve wanted at least a couple thousand for his time.”

  “It couldn’t have taken him that long to process bail,” Frank protested.

  “A couple hours at minimum, Frank,” Marcus said with some certainty. “Taylor, Taylor and ‘who-ever-the-hell-else’ would charge a grand an hour for a junior partner’s time.”

  Frank Campanelli took all this in and processed it. Why would they take on this little fish’s case for peanuts and then let the other two stew in Statesville? He gave Antony’s bank account another look, this time for transactions before the expenditure for bail. He slapped his desk hard.

  “What, Frank?”

  “Less than an hour and a half prior to his release, Antony’s account received a transfer for two hundred ‘K’!” Campanelli exclaimed.

  “Okay,” Williams said and leaned over Frank’s shoulder. “From who?”

  Campanelli took the account number of the transaction and set it into another database for identification. Although to the general public this information was hidden, the police had their clearance.

  “It’s a personal checking account. The holder is one Gianfranco Beritoni,” Frank read in fascination.

  “Son of a bitch,” Marcus whispered and straightened up.

  After a moment of thought, Frank stood. “Feel like taking a ride, Marcus?”

  “Let’s go,” Williams agreed and beat Campanelli to the door.

  ***

  As they strode to the car, Frank accessed his Homicide Division’s detective list and quickly picked through it to determine whom he could reassign temporarily. Picking two pairs that were relatively close to One Twenty-Two South Michigan, he sent orders to case the area for the car and sent the description of it and Jimmy Antony.

  Campanelli set the destination in the car’s computer and let it take control. “Dispatch, this is Unit Five-One-Six-Two,” he called aloud to the dash mounted radio.

  “Go ahead, Five-One-Six-Two,” the female dispatcher answered.

  “Requesting renewal of APB on suspect vehicle. A white twenty seventy-eight Mako Speedster,” he dictated then gave the license plate, case number and its last known location.

  “Roger, Five-One-Six-Two. Sending APB to server. All units in the area: check update and assist.”

  Frank took control of the car once they approached One Twenty-Two South Michigan. They cruised slowly along its length and both detectives scanned parked cars, even those that appeared abandoned. Seeing nothing that matched the description, Frank made a U-turn at the intersection of East Monroe and drove along South Michigan to Adams, where he turned right. Very few vehicles were parked along Adams. When the cruiser passed the law firm’s office building, Frank pulled into a parking spot and stopped, pointing to the building with a sign that read, 55 E. Monroe Self Park. “Here’s where we search next.”

  “I thought we were on Adams,” Williams said, confused.

  “We are. This garage is attached to the building next to it and that takes up the entire west side of the block,” he explained then quickly exited the cruiser as did Marcus. He came around the car and stood next to his partner. The both of them stared at the odd-looking structure.

  “Is it still in use?” Williams asked, raising his voice over a passing liquid-fueled van of great age that was obviously not running well.

  “Well, the scraper it’s attached to is,” Frank gestured to lights in the window of a first-floor restaurant. A man and a woman in business clothes went inside. When Campanelli tried to access the CPD server for more information on the building, his connection failed. “Shit,” he uttered then went back to the car. He dropped into the seat and, with the door open, linked his implant to the police radio and tried again.

  This time it worked, so Frank entered his inquiry. The building was collectively known as “The Park Monroe,” a combination condominium and office building with some small stores and a restaurant housed on the first floor. It had once been scheduled for demolition by the end of 2108 and had been nearly emptied of its tenants just before being saved by legal injunction by none other than Taylor, Taylor & Packey. The passing of the Anti-Migration Bill the following year merely cemented the structure’s existence. Campanelli accessed the tenant list and was not surprised to find some familiar names.

  “Guess who lives here?” Frank called out.

  “Oh, just about everyone who works for Del Taylor?”

  “You’re one smart cookie, Marcus.”

  “So is Beritoni, Frank,” Williams protested. “He wouldn’t protect Antony that far.”

  �
�That doesn’t mean that Antony didn’t dump the car in there,” the Captain of Detectives explained then turned his attention to the police radio and beckoned for his two chosen detective units.

  After a brief exchange, Frank exited the car and gave the door a push to close it. Removing a cigarette from his jacket pocket, he placed it in his mouth and turned to the north to shield his NYPD lighter’s flame from the wind. Looking up, his eyes caught the corner of a building some distance beyond the raised “L” station on South Wabash. The building was windowless, but that was not unusual for an abandoned structure. What had gotten his attention was the fact that it seemed familiar. Frank understood that it might have been the fact that he and Marcus were just here a few days earlier, but there was more to it.

  He pushed out a cloud of white smoke and checked for traffic before walking out to the middle of the street, keeping his eyes on the cream colored building.

  “What is it, Frank?” Williams called from the sidewalk.

  Campanelli shrugged, but as he did, a memory shot into his brain. It was a photograph from one of his picture books that was triggered by his position in the street. The picture must have been taken in almost the very spot in which he stood, for Frank could recall it clearly. The building that had gotten his attention had not been the subject of the photograph, but it was in the foreground. The subject had once been one of the tallest buildings in the world, known at the time as the Willis Tower. Gone for almost thirty years, it had been meticulously dismantled story by story for its materials by one of the foremost starship builders in the country. The building’s demise had been touted as one of the city’s most devastating losses.

  Looking again at the windowless structure, he recalled that a giant green sign had once hung from its side. Within the field of green had been the letter “P.”

  It was another parking structure, far larger than the one right next to them.

  “Hey, Marcus,” Frank motioned his partner over and once the big man had joined him, he pointed toward the great structure. “Whaddiya think? It’s well within walking distance. There’s ten, maybe twelve stories of parking.”

  “It’s also condemned and supposedly empty, Frank,” Marcus supplied after having looked it up on the CPD server.

  “Perfect.”

  “According to the computer, the entrances are blocked by concrete barriers,” Marcus added in a tone which seemed to protest the idea. “If Antony didn’t dump the car here or in the Grant Park Garages, why would they hide it in there?”

  “It’s a Mako, Williams. Very rare. I have a hunch that Antony wanted it hidden in a place that had the best chance of keeping it safe. See if you can get a crew out here from the street department.”

  “Okay,” Williams conceded.

  The two men retreated to the sidewalk as a car and a truck turned onto Adams behind them. The car was a police cruiser carrying two of Campanelli’s men. It parked behind Frank’s car and the men got out briskly.

  “Lyman, Davies,” Frank greeted. “Did you guys get a look at the case file?”

  “Yessir,” Hank Lyman answered. Daryl Davies nodded.

  “I want you two to search Fifty-five East Monroe here,” Campanelli ordered and gestured to the parking garage across the street. “Take your cruiser and your sweet time. If there’s any vehicles under a tarp, get out and remove it for a good look. The Mako is a very tiny car, only about twelve feet long and very low to the ground. If you run into any problems, call me or get backup. Go.”

  “You got it, boss,” Davies answered as both detectives jumped back into their car. In seconds, they disappeared into the parking structure.

  Frank lit another cigarette as they waited for the other pair of detectives. Campanelli began to pace and every time he turned westward his eyes washed over the target of his strong hunch. He could not wait to get inside.

  A few moments and a few more cars went past before the cruiser belonging to detectives Jorge Chavez and Charles Morgan arrived. Frank flicked his spent cigarette away and walked up to the driver’s side.

  “Sorry, Frank,” Chavez the driver offered. “We had a call on an old case.”

  “Somethin’ you need to get right away?”

  “It can wait a day,” Jorge affirmed.

  “I want you two to search for Antony’s car in Grant Park garage. North first. If you can get help, do it.”

  Frank wasted no time after Chavez and Morgan sped off. He and Marcus hopped in their sedan and Frank took off, pressing the both of them into their seats for the short trip to the last survivor on its block, the parking structure. All the rest had been skillfully razed, their lots open sores of foundations, full of debris and partially filled by long-gone demolition crews. Quickly, Frank realized that Marcus had been right. Several concrete barriers, normally used for road construction, had been placed across the entrance and exit facing Wabash. Behind the barriers, large wooden panels had been attached to the building covering both openings entirely. Getting out of the car, Frank strode past the identically boarded up retail spaces on the ground floor to the corner and, staring westward down Adams, confirmed the same had been done to that entranceway.

  Frank walked back to the Wabash side of the structure and stared at the barriers and wooden coverings for some time. Marcus stood quietly beside him, not quite sure why they were not moving on to help Chavez and Morgan search the old Grant Park structures. He found himself smiling awkwardly at the few pedestrians that walked by, giving his boss looks of curiosity. Besides their footsteps and the sound of the occasional vehicle, it was deadly quiet. A moment later, he saw that Campanelli had turned his attention to the sidewalk. He swept the soles of his loafers over the surface and looked up into his partner’s face with a sudden smile that took Williams off guard. Campanelli tapped his foot and wiped the smile from his face, replacing it with a glare of impatience.

  Marcus looked to the foot and quickly found what his Captain had discovered. The sidewalk had been scraped in several rough half-circles. Following the paths, Marcus deduced that the barriers had been dragged away at the center to allow access to the wooden boards. Williams stepped closely to them and inspected the mountings, which were heavy screws.

  “This board-up’s been taken down and replaced, Frank,” Marcus smiled, though he regretted that he had not seen it first. “The heads on these screws are freshly scratched.”

  “Mmm-hmm,” Campanelli grunted in affirmation. “Get us some uniformed back-up and expedite that damned road crew before I use my own goddamned cruiser.”

  “Yessir,” Williams acknowledged and jogged back to the car to make the radio call.

  ***

  Two police cars arrived in less than five minutes, but it was another fifteen before the street department’s yellow pickup truck arrived. Easily as old as Tamara’s convertible, the rusted machine creaked and rattled to a stop at the curb.

  Campanelli was annoyed and fired at Williams, “Didn’t you tell ‘em what we needed?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  Frank cussed and strode over to the truck. “Don’t you guys have somethin’ bigger? We have to move these barriers.”

  “No problem, we do that all the time,” the passenger, an older man of about sixty answered gruffly but somehow pleasantly. “Clear da way!” he called out the open window to the gaggle of policemen.

  Standing aside, Frank and Marcus watched with the waiting uniforms as the ancient and beaten vehicle rolled out into the street and backed its tail to the barriers. Getting out, both men took down the tailgate and retrieved rusty chains from its bed. The older man wrapped one end of the chain upon the tow hooks of the truck’s frame while his younger, larger partner fed his end underneath and over the first barrier, hooking the end of the chain back on itself. Getting into the driver’s seat, the younger man guided the truck as it labored noisily to pull the barrier away. The concrete mass scraped the sidewalk yet again, almost exactly along the grooves that it had made previously. They repeated the procedure
for the other barrier.

  “You guys have any tools for takin’ this down?” Campanelli asked of the older street department employee as he gathered his chain. He dropped the chain noisily to the sidewalk and stepped to the wooden wall.

  “I don’t have no power drill for the screws,” the burly old man said, “but we got axes an’ picks.”

  “Let’s do this,” Frank said and followed the man to his truck. In the back where the chains had lain were a collection of hand tools including shovels and brooms. “Officers?!” he called as he took up an axe and handed it to the first. “Take these and get that open.”

  The four uniforms took the offered tools and went to work. A couple of them looked to each other as if to question whether or not it was their job, but a hard stare from Campanelli and the fact that Williams was the first one taking a whack at the board-up convinced them.

  “’Scuse me, detective,” the older street worker said to Campanelli, “but you guys are goin’ in dere?”

  “That’s the idea,” Frank answered a bit annoyed at the apparently silly question.

  “I think ya should know dat the place is crawlin’ with squatters. They get in by peeling the boards from the shop windows or from the back doors at the alley. At night you can see their campfires.”

  Frank had anticipated this, which is why he had called for backup. In a city full of abandoned apartment buildings and surrounding suburbs with empty single family homes, places like the parking garage still attracted the homeless for some reason.