December Boys (Jay Porter Series)

by Joe Clifford

  “We all will, Charlie.”

  “I was trying to protect you.”

  I scrolled down the names and addresses I’d cribbed from Fisher’s notebook, double-checking best I could through my eyes watering from the smoke. The problem with finding houses in these parts, people moved up here to stay lost.

  “Pretty sure the Shaw place is over that ridge,” I said.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner.” He patted his person, searching for a lighter.

  I knew his heart was in the right place. I pulled out the old Zippo I’d pocketed, passing it along. I pointed out the windshield. “Take that left.”

  We cleared a cluster of witch-hobble and moosewood, curving around a boulder, steering toward the glowing patch of porch light. Didn’t matter that these homes were in the middle of nowhere or that folks cherished their privacy: no one ever switched off their porch light.

  “So we cool?” Charlie said.

  “Yeah, we’re cool.”

  I was hoping the Shaws were going to be receptive. I could use a little light shined. One thing I could not wrap my head around was why these parents had signed off. Nicki said incarceration at North River was a mutual decision. Courts and Mom and Dad. Why would parents do that to their own kids? I’d wanted to reach out to Donna Olisky again, circumvent this entire process. Except last time we’d spoken, Donna hadn’t been feeling all that friendly, and I doubted she’d had a change of heart. After all, in her mind, I’d cost her family five large. Plus, I wasn’t sure who’d alerted DeSouza that I’d been hanging around Longmont. Could’ve been Donna as easily as security guards reporting license plate numbers. Unless someone else was watching me. There was a reason that car sat parked down the block.

  I knew taking on this fight again wasn’t going to improve my life, not professionally, not personally. My ribs and kidneys still felt tender from last week’s beating. But what could I do? I owed a debt. My dead brother deserved vengeance. I was finally close to getting that for him, so much so that I was having a tough time focusing on anything else.

  That’s the problem with tunnel vision: you can’t appreciate peripheral danger. Until it’s too late.

  * * *

  The Shaw homestead would’ve been just another unremarkable shelter in the foothills of Lamentation Mountain, secluded from the road, shrouded in secrecy, swallowed by tall winter evergreens. Except that unlike many of the old farmhouses you find out here, which were hundreds of years old and in need of major renovation, planks peeling off the frame, shingles checkering the rooftop, this home had benefited from a serious makeover.

  As our headlights fanned up the driveway and the exterior, I could see the extent of repairs and expansion. A second story had recently been added, walls still unpainted plywood. An entire new home had been built atop the existing one, transforming a meager ranch into a split-level, doubling its market value. There was a new veranda, a new roof. Sandbags, paint cans, and a ladder lay on the side of the house buried beneath blue tarp.

  “There goes the neighborhood,” Charlie said.

  “Why don’t you wait here?”

  Soon as I set foot in the snow, a barrel-chested man in bibbed overalls, with a bushy beard and ham hands, pushed open the front door. A frail boy, twelve or so, stood behind him in the doorway.

  “You lost?” the man said.

  “Sorry to bother you. Are you Ken Shaw?”

  “I’m Shaw. What do you want?”

  “I was hoping to speak with you about your daughter, Wendy.”

  Ken Shaw spat, hitching up his giddy. He stared past my shoulder, at Charlie’s clunker belching fumes in the driveway. “Who are you?”

  I’d pulled a business card from my wallet, deciding whether to pass it along. Given the trouble I’d suffered at the office lately, mentioning the job wasn’t the smartest move, but I’d also learned that if you say anything with self-confidence and authority, people follow your lead. I figured insurance sounded less threatening than independent investigator. Especially to these libertarian mountain men up here with their inherent distrust of, well, everything.

  I tried to hand him the card, but Shaw stepped from the porch, backing me down the stairs. Damn thing flew out of my hand, carried off on the wings of the night.

  All trace of pleasantry gone, a sneer formed on his lips, apple cheeks blazing beneath farmer scruffiness. “What did you say about my daughter?”

  “I didn’t mean any disrespect, Mr. Shaw.” You’d think I’d asked if his baby girl entertained sailors on the wharf. I showed my hands in surrender. I come in peace, I mean no harm. “Wendy’s in the North River Institute, right?” I didn’t know what response I’d been hoping for—by that point I could see Shaw wanted to throttle me, hard expression twisting harder with each passing moment—might as well get to it. My time here was almost up.

  Charlie waited in the shadows. A quick engine rev cut through the howling squall, my friend’s way of letting me know he had my back when I was ready to run away. Ken Shaw paid no heed, content eyeballing me with the significant height and weight advantage he enjoyed. I didn’t know why the farmer pegged me for such a threat—I’d said little more than hello—but he treated my presence like a wolf sniffing around his hens.

  The snow started coming down steadier, slanting with the mountain jet stream, howling through the valley. Shaw’s eyes whittled mean, trap stuck between sneer and scowl.

  He barked an order over his shoulder to the young boy, who retreated inside.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Shaw,” I shouted into the wind. “I think we got started off on the wrong foot. I am here to help your daughter.”

  Ken Shaw turned around and walked up the steps to his front door. Reaching inside, he brought out a shotgun. The big man cocked his big gun.

  That was all the incentive I needed.

  I jumped in the car and Charlie peeled out the driveway. Looking back I could still see the madman on the porch, standing guard over the henhouse with his shotgun. On the new second floor landing, the young boy stared out a window. Our eyes remained on one another until the entire home receded into darkness.

  The storm had rolled in sooner than expected, and by the time we made Charlie’s place, the damage piled high, snow falling hard and heavy, at least three inches in less than an hour. Soon Ashton would ground its plows. Without tire chains and four-wheel drive, I wasn’t making it back to Plasterville tonight. I had nothing to go back to anyway. I called Nicki to see how they’d made out.

  “Any luck?”

  “Nope.”

  “What are you doing now?”

  “Driving around, waiting for you to call.”

  The sound of highway whisked by in the background. Fisher was behind the wheel.

  “What now, genius?” I heard him say, voice muffled by speeding engines and racing winds.

  “You guys better get off the road,” I told her.

  She repeated my message.

  “Tell him no shit.”

  She put the phone to his ear, because I could hear him better.

  “You at Charlie’s?” he said.

  “Yeah. Just got here.”

  “We’ll see you in a few. I can’t see shit in this blizzard.”

  Nicki got back on the line. “Guess we’ll see you at Creepy Charlie’s soon.”

  I glanced over at Charlie, who sat bloated and balding in a chair with a beer, staring at a wall without pictures, lost in deep thought.

  “Yeah, sorry about that.” I didn’t want to throw Charlie under the bus, not with my friend sitting there. Nicki got it.

  “No worries,” she said. “Happens all the time.” She laughed. “Maybe that’s why I like you so much.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “You don’t seem to notice.”

  “I’m not blind, Nicki. Just married. There’s a difference.”

  Then it hit me. Jenny had told me I could see my son tomorrow. Which would soon be today, buried beneath a nor’easter with no exit off
the mountain. My head was too far up my ass to hear about the blizzard—I possessed a strange, unfortunate ability to compartmentalize—but Jenny would’ve known about the storm. I felt a gully in my gut a mile wide when I realized my wife didn’t want me anywhere near my child.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  NO ONE SPOKE much at Charlie’s. Following fifteen coffees at the Olympic, racing to get ahead of the storm, we’d been so geared up. For what? A big crash. We had no business kicking over stones. Where was the crime, anyway? A judge who favored punishment over rehabilitation? Businessmen who liked to make money? Prime real estate used to build stuff on? If there were impropriety—if incriminating evidence existed anywhere in that hodgepodge collection of loose-leaf—none of us were qualified to lead the charge.

  Fisher attempted to broach the subject at one point, outlining a plan of action, and I told him to shut the fuck up. I said it hotter than I intended. I was in a mood. Mixing whiskey and beer is never a good idea. Not that it stopped me. I knew I was losing her, could feel the pangs in my heart, ties being cut without a word, the rest of the night a blur. I kept drinking. Conversation dried up after that.

  Next morning, the plows were back out, roads cleared. Nicki drove me back to my place. Final accumulation tallies fell well below doomsday predictions. A foot, tops. In other words, a typical Wednesday.

  Nicki was ten years younger than the rest of us but she owned a much nicer ride. Funny, most girls I knew her age were slobs when it came to their cars. The floors of Nicki’s Jetta were freshly vacuumed, cupholders wiped clean, interior sterile and unlived in, like Grandma’s place with the plastic still on the furniture. Of course that meant I couldn’t smoke. Nerves on edge, the ride took forever. I rested my head against the cold glass and pretended to sleep to avoid the threat of talking.

  Dropping my keys on the counter, I sifted through the day’s mail I’d brought in with me from the foyer. Credit card bills. Gas bills. Water bills. A flyer begging for donations with pictures of kids looking a helluva lot happier than me. I flipped the pile to the table with the rest of the crap that would now be my problem.

  I switched on the TV. Just for the background noise and color. I stood at the window. No cars idled down the block. I wondered if that car from yesterday had been there to watch me at all. Could’ve been a husband and wife letting the engine warm before an exciting date night on the town, dinner and a movie, in bed by ten. At least the snow was pretty. For as much as I bitched about the weather up here, I couldn’t imagine living in a place like Florida or California, where the sun shines all the time. I needed these quiet moments. This was the part of winter I enjoyed. The fresh snowfall, everything pristine, untainted. Give it a few hours and all this prettiness would be gone, trampled on by dirty boots, tires spitting mud, rendering white powder brown and ugly. For now, though, the world remained perfect.

  My cell buzzed. Any thought my wife might have the decency to check in passed when I didn’t recognize the number.

  “Mr. Porter?” The voice apprehensive, small.

  “Yeah, this is Jay Porter. Who’s this?”

  I heard a hand cupping the receiver. “This is Seth Shaw. I found your business card on our porch.”

  That weird little kid from last night. He sounded so timid, I felt bad even asking his name. I’d seen his old man, who I assumed beat the shit out of him.

  “How can I help you, Seth?” I realized, for some reason, I was whispering too.

  “It’s about my sister, Wendy.” The boxy connection made me picture the boy crouched in a closet. “We got a lot of money after she went away.”

  I walked into the kitchen and grabbed my cigarettes. “Who got money?” I couldn’t find a lighter so I used the stove.

  “My dad and me. To fix the house. A lot of money.”

  I’d seen the house. Additions like that didn’t come cheap.

  “How old are you, Seth?”

  “Fifteen.” And then before I could respond, he added, “I’m small for my age. There’s a problem with my spine. I’m a regular person. I’m not stupid.”

  “Didn’t say you were. Do you talk to your sister?”

  “Not in person. Used to get letters all the time saying how awful it was inside there. Haven’t gotten any letters in a while. Wendy has been in North River for a long time. You know she’s not my real sister, right?”

  “I don’t know anything about your family, Seth, other than Wendy got in trouble for making a website.”

  “Her mom married my dad. Like when I was three. I’ve known her my whole life. My stepmom died when I was seven. My dad never liked Wendy. But she’s my best friend. My sister didn’t do anything wrong. She wasn’t bullying anyone. She was trying to protect someone from being bullied.”

  I wished I could reach over the line and hug this kid; he sounded so wounded. I wanted to help his sister, too—that’s why I’d gone out there in the first place. But if I suspected kickbacks and fraud, the knowledge didn’t suddenly grant me superpowers to fix the mess. I lacked any smoking gun. Seth was a lot smarter than I gave him credit for.

  “Mr. Porter, they pay to keep my sister locked up.”

  “Who pays?”

  “I’m not sure. But I saw the man who brought the check to the house. I’d skipped school that day and was downstairs in the basement. My father drives trucks. He’s out of work. He didn’t know I was home. A man came to our door. I climbed on the couch and could see them on the porch through the cellar slots. I saw the man give Dad a bag. Heard him say, ‘Good luck with the repairs.’”

  “When was this?”

  “Like eight months ago? Contractors started showing up right after that. I asked my dad how we could afford all the repairs. We’d barely been able to keep the bank away since my stepmom died. My father said he’d applied for a government program that helps people like us who don’t have a lot of money get their houses fixed. You didn’t see our house before, Mr. Porter. It was falling apart.”

  “Do you know when he applied for the program?”

  “My dad said before he met Linda. That was my stepmom’s name.”

  “So, over ten years ago?”

  “Yeah.”

  “But you see didn’t a penny until they locked Wendy up? You don’t know the name of the man who brought the money? Maybe you found his business card lying in the snow, too?”

  “He didn’t drop a card. He was driving a construction truck.”

  “Didn’t say ‘Lombardi’ on the side, by any chance?”

  “No. Began with a ‘T.’ Red letters.”

  “Did you see anything else?”

  “No. Just the logo on the side of the truck as he was pulling out.”

  “Okay, Seth,” I said, “Thanks for calling. I’ll do what I can—”

  “Oh, and the driver had a tattoo. On his neck.”

  “A tattoo? On his neck? Thought you said you didn’t see anything else?”

  “It was a pretty big tattoo.”

  “You remember what kind of tattoo?”

  “One of those Jewish stars.”

  * * *

  Charlie wasn’t picking up, and the number I had for Fisher was out of service. Which showed how often I talked to the guy. I called Nicki. Got her voice mail. I was anxious to share the news. Even if I wasn’t sure what the news meant.

  I remembered that first day driving around looking for the Olisky house, taking a wrong turn and stumbling across the abandoned construction site with old Lombardi equipment rusting in ditches. That’s where I’d seen the name before. On the guard shack on the way out. Tomassi. Red lettering and logo. At the time, I’d assumed vendor, on-site management, security of some sort. A quick Google search yielded Tomassi as the largest construction outfit in Massachusetts, one of New England’s oldest. Big fish gobbled up smaller fish all the time. This had to be the construction truck Seth saw. The more distressing factor was the Star of David neck tattoo, which could only belong to one man: Erik Bowman, Adam Lombardi’s old head
of security, with whom I’d had a run-in last year when he broke into my place searching for the hard drive my brother had stolen. Made sense a guy like Bowman would land another job in the same field. Except Bowman was no ordinary security guard. He was a former motorcycle gangbanger who beat, intimidated, and murdered, a thug with no conscience. In addition to knocking me out cold, I was pretty sure he’d killed my brother’s junkie pal, Pete. Not that

  I could prove it. Now he was delivering hush money to keep a girl locked up in North River? Which made sense if he were still working for Adam. But he wasn’t.

  My cell vibrated. I took the call without a glance, expecting Nicki or Charlie, still buzzing over the implications of Bowman’s involvement.

  “Are you okay?” my wife asked. “You sound out of breath.”

  I didn’t bother with the truth, that my lungs were working overtime funding a two-pack-a-day habit. “Running to catch the phone,” I lied.

  “You picked up on the first ring.”

  “Must be a delay on your end.” I knew how stupid that sounded.

  “Yeah,” she said, either not buying my excuse or not caring. “I didn’t know if you were still planning on coming up to see Aiden today?”

  When she mentioned my son, I remembered her offer coming on the eve of a nor’easter. “Thanks for the invite, by the way. Great time to plan a trip. Last night was supposed to be the storm of the decade.”

  “I forgot you were getting slammed down there. I heard it was a false alarm though, no?”

  “You forgot?”

  “Yeah, Jay. I forgot. Same as you did, apparently.”

  “They close the mountain roads out of Ashton, you know that.”

  “Except you don’t live in Ashton anymore.”

  “I was there last night.”

  “How am I supposed to know that?”

  “Or maybe you didn’t want me coming up to see Aiden in the first place.”

  “I’m over two hours away. The storm wasn’t going to hit us up here.”

  “So, what? Now Burlington’s your hometown?”

  “Think whatever you’d like,” my wife said. “Are you coming to see your son today or not? I need to know so I can plan my day—”