“How’s Rayney?” he asked.
“He’s a pain in the ass.” Maggie popped a second piece of gum.
“Good,” the old man rumbled. He unconsciously folded the gum wrapper Maggie tossed on the table and put it in his pocket. “That’s what I pay him for.”
A long silence hung between father and daughter.
“Time’s up, Mr. Quinn,” Joe said softly.
It was a cue, Maggie knew. When the two had nothing left to say, the visit ended. Paddy Quinn appreciated graceful exits and Joe always provided one.
“That was quick.” The old man pushed himself up and straightened his coveralls. “Now that you’re feeling better, get back to the old schedule. I expect it.” Paddy Quinn grabbed his child before Joe took him and gave her a parting hug. He didn’t like what he felt. Cold and stiff. Like putting your arms around a corpse.
“It’s fifty-fucking five, you worthless motherfucker,” Rayney yelled as he laid on the horn.
Maggie sat with him in traffic on the 57. She thought of suggesting Archer to Harlem, but decided to let Rayney call the shots while she stared out the window. Paddy Quinn had only seen his granddaughter from the confines of a four by seven visitation cell. Erin asked just once why her grandfather never came out.
“Grandpa Quinn broke a lot of rules,” Maggie finally explained.
“Will he ever learn to do better?”
Maggie chewed on that one for a while. “I don’t know. I’d like to think so, but I don’t know.”
She was eleven when her father went to prison. Maggie knew he would do well. He was a rarity. An Irish man who sided with the Outfit rather than his own people. The Outfit valued a man who took a fall. Paddy Quinn never gave up a single name or event that even remotely implicated his superiors. He kept his mouth shut and he stayed alive. For the donation of the balance of his life behind bars, Old Man Quinn was put in charge of business on the inside. As usual, he landed on his feet, albeit in a cell in Stateville. Maggie, on the other hand, was shuffled off to her father’s second cousin, an elderly woman on the west side, who only kept the girl because she was afraid of the repercussions if she didn’t. No one on her mother’s side of the family wanted the trouble that came with the Quinn name.
“You hungry?” Rayney asked.
Maggie shook her head.
“We’ll stop for something.”
“I still won’t be hungry,” she whispered.
They got home in time for Maggie to catch a few hours of sleep in the bright afternoon sun. In her dreams, she chased the man in the blue nylon jacket who took the little red-haired girl. Different location, same outcome. She woke up dripping sweat just as the sun was setting and Rayney was banging around in the kitchen.
Blue nylon slipping through her fingers. The image scraped across her brain during dinner. Rayney was dutifully obnoxious, threatening to force the spaghetti down her throat and the garlic bread some place less nutritionally beneficial. They played cribbage after dishes. Rayney cracked a beer as Maggie swept their third game while staring out the window at the writhing darkness.
“You could at least do me a favor and act like you’re paying attention.” Rayney spat the words at her.
“Sorry.” She glanced down at her hand, then at the young man. “Fifteen two, fifteen four, fifteen six and a pair is eight. That better?”
He tossed the cards down. “I’m going to bed.”
It was a slap in the face. Rayney was going to sleep. At night. Like normal people. Maggie nodded and packed up the cribbage board, jabbing the small silver pegs into their storage space.
“You were in on it with my dad, weren’t you?” she asked suddenly.
“In on what?” Rayney said as he stood and stretched.
“The old man could’ve taken care of Richard, but that wasn’t the plan, was it?”
Rayney just looked at her. “You are so full of shit.”
He was lying, of course. Maggie could see it. Antoine Rayney didn’t cover well. Not like her dad could. Not like she could.
“I’m going to bed,” Rayney repeated quietly. “Good night.”
She watched as he did his final evening check, locking up anything Maggie wasn’t allowed to have. Anything sharp. Anything from a pharmacy. Anything remotely lethal. Kid-proofing. Rayney meant well, she knew that. He was doing his job. Keeping the boss’ kid safe. Maggie didn’t have the heart to tell him the truth. If she really wanted to give it a second go, there would be very little anyone could do to stop her.
Chapter Ten
There were already four squads, one unmarked and an ambulance on the scene by the time Nick Dublowski showed up. As he straightened the new tie around the neck of his pristine dress shirt, Nick tripped over the sidewalk, nearly landing in the arms of one of the uniforms on the scene.
“They’re up on the second floor,” the officer scowled as he watched the young detective fumble to show his gold shield. Nick Dublowski shouldn’t have bothered. Everyone knew the detectives. The men in the suits.
“Thanks.” He flashed his smile, the one that usually got him out of deep shit. “First day. Does it show?”
Like most of his old buddies from the beat, this officer returned the grin. “Second floor,” the man chuckled.
Nick nodded and beat feet. This wasn’t the way his first day as a detective should start. Still, there wasn’t much to be done. Nick was in personnel when he got the call. Chief Tierney needed him to join up with his new partner over at the warehouse where a body was found. The detective was wired. His first homicide and he was ready to hit the pavement running. Unfortunately, his confidence was already shaken. He had trouble finding the place, then nearly fell on a uniform. It was a bad way to start.
The stairs leading to the second floor of the warehouse were littered with paper, old cigarette butts and discarded Styrofoam cups. As he stepped further into the room, Nick paused. Jesus Christ, there was blood everywhere. And the smell. Sweet. Heavy. The body must be a couple of days old. Nick Dublowski fought his way through a group of officers standing in the middle of the room so he could get a good look. Then the young detective fought to keep from throwing up.
“Holy Mother.” The words spilled from his mouth.
The woman’s face was beaten so badly she didn’t even look human. Mid-twenties, maybe, the detective guessed and that was only because of the way she was dressed. Her neck was twisted at an odd angle. Broken, probably. Maybe strangled first? She was cut from her neck to her crotch. What was left inside wasn’t pretty.
“Heart’s cut out,” he heard the EMT tell one of the officers.
Nick looked up. On the northeast wall was a splattering of blood where the organ hit, then bounced to the floor. It lay in a pulpy mass on the opposite side of the room. Someone was pissed.
“Hey, you Dublowski?” barked a thick Chicago accent from behind.
Nick spun around to face his new partner. Ray Halverson looked like a bad actor playing a detective rather than the real thing. His suit was worn. A huge gut spilled over a belt that was too tight and too low. His hair was slicked back, a shiny film of oil spilling across the hairline and onto a face that was leaking sweat at every corner. He chewed a toothpick, rhythmically switching it back and forth, from one side of his mouth to the other.
“Du-blow-ski?” the greasy man repeated like he was talking to a trained chimp.
“You can call me Nick.” The young man offered his hand and flashed his smile.
Halverson just looked at him. “You a Polack, Dublowski?”
Four years as a uniform and Nick had heard all the jokes. “Yeah,” he said flatly. “I’m Polish.”
“Yeah, well that explains a lot.” Halverson chuckled to himself as he flipped through the pages of a small, cheap notebook he held. “Ray Halverson. You can cal
l me Detective Halverson.” Another chuckle.
How about Asshole? Nick thought. He was hoping for a younger partner, not one of the Old School boys. It didn’t matter. Nick didn’t care. He was finally a detective.
Crime Lab showed up a few minutes later, followed by the wagon. An old man entered along with a younger man and woman, both carrying cases. The ME, Dublowski thought. The guy could’ve been Halverson’s brother. Not because they looked alike. Both carried themselves in the same tired, careless way.
“Jesus, it’s like an oven up here,” Duane Monroe coughed.
“Doc,” the old detective grinned. “Looks like you got one fucking mess to clean up.”
“Not me. That’s the wagon’s job.” The ME wheezed as he gasped for air. “Jesus. I thought they said she was fresh?”
“I’m thinking two, maybe three days fresh,” Halverson said, looking at the body.
“The heat. Speeds things up,” Nick spoke without thinking.
“What, so you got your ME license while you were a uniform?” Monroe sneered.
“Looks like her john got a little pissed,” Halverson said.
“Or her business manager,” the ME answered.
“We don’t know she’s a hooker,” Nick said.
Halverson rolled his eyes. “Look where we are, for Chrissakes. Only get hookers and juicers in this neck of the woods.” He hiked up his belt and spit a chunk of lung onto the floor. “Dublowski, you wrap it up here. I’ll go talk to the beat and see if they got anything else.”
“But…” the young detective began.
“I’ll be outside,” Halverson smiled as he dragged himself to the steps. He stopped a moment at the window. “Jesus H. Christ, the fucking press is here already. Fucking leeches.”
Dublowski watched his partner leave. “Great, what now?” he mumbled.
He watched as the ME took measurements and photos. Cops wandered around the scene. Some talking, some trying not to look at the corpse. A couple of guys were laughing as they huddled around the pulverized heart. Others looked focused, like they were running ideas through their heads, looking for evidence, trying to piece the crime together. Nick used to do the same thing, pretend to be the detective. The young man smiled. Now he didn’t have to pretend.
But where should he start? Don’t move anything. That was the biggest mistake. That’s what rookies did. But then what? He expected his new partner to show him the ropes, lead him through the scene. Nick just finished his course work, but he was never great at hitting the books. He bluffed his way through a lot of it, relied on a helpful classmate for the rest. Now there was no way to bluff. He was in charge.
Nick stood in the middle of it all and tried to stay calm. It would be okay. He just needed to get a little of that old Dublowski confidence back. It carried him when he was a uniform and it would carry him now. The young detective squeezed his shoulders together for a moment, then relaxed. Yeah, it would be okay. Halverson was handling the canvass outside, so Nick needed to secure the crime scene inside. He was handling a homicide investigation. It would be okay. Nick Dublowski pulled out his notebook and pen and got started. It would all be okay.
John Tierney rubbed his forehead for the sixth time in as many minutes. He spent the morning biting his tongue while his boss stripped Tierney’s department down even more. The afternoon was eaten up by the press, running interference, dodging questions on the new strangulation. Now one of his oldest friends was on the phone and needed a favor. Problem was, he couldn’t do jack-shit.
“I lost a lot of my old timers. Mandatory retirement. They pulled the younger ones, anyone with any mark against them. Put those back on the beat just to have warm bodies. Walker dropped my budget down another fifteen percent,” Tierney paused. “But I’m still supposed to keep my numbers up.”
“You sound tired,” Paddy Quinn said.
“I tell you, Paddy, two more years and I’m gone. No more of this bullshit. Just a lake in Wisconsin and a steady supply of beer and walleye and I’ll die a happy man.”
“Can you do anything?” Quinn spoke quietly into the receiver.
Tierney swallowed three pills from the bottle he kept in his bottom drawer. “Look, Paddy, I’d take Maggie back in a second. You know that. But it’s not my call.”
“Whose call is it?”
Tierney rubbed his head again. “Walker. And the mayor. There is no money. If I take an extra shit, it’s gotta be signed off.”
Paddy Quinn still worked a few miracles, but this wasn’t going to be one of them. Superintendent Jerome Walker didn’t want to play and the mayor wasn’t talking to anyone close to the Outfit, not with elections coming up in the fall and the press up his ass.
“Look, Paddy. Maybe it’s better this way. The guys would be hard on her. It would make a tough job impossible.”
“Impossible is what Maggie needs,” the old man sighed.
“Pushing her may not be such a good idea,” John Tierney said. “Give her more time. Give her time to get strong again. You don’t want her looking at bodies all day after what she’s been through. It’s tough enough on…”
On sane men, Old Man Quinn completed the thought.
“On good days.” The words came softly through the black receiver.
The area chief only stumbled a little. That’s why Paddy Quinn and John Tierney were still friends. The chief always knew what not to say.
“Thanks,” Paddy Quinn said. “How’s the leg?”
“A little sore. Nothing serious,” the chief lied. It seemed like every day he needed more pills to take the edge off the old injury.
“If you need anything…” Paddy began.
There was a long silence.
“I’m fine,” Tierney finally answered.
“Thank you for trying, John.” Paddy Quinn hung up the phone, then asked Joe for one more call. A case of painkillers would be at John Tierney’s house by tomorrow night.
Chapter Eleven
Marcus Galen had two more surgeries to perform. A triple bypass. Nothing major. Then a transplant. His biggest problem there was waiting for the okay to harvest the donor. Marcus had the quickest hands at St. Andrew. He could get in and out of a chest twice as fast as any other surgeon he knew and he knew a lot of surgeons. Students watched, later questioning how he could move so fast during such intricate procedures. It was simple. Marcus Galen was the best.
Right now, however, he wasn’t moving quite as quickly as he would like. A news blip he saw during lunch was pulling his mind away from Mrs. Studeski’s chest cavity. A young woman was found dead. Foul play was suspected. Galen wished they included more information, but the segment was vague. No names, no details. Nothing. Reminiscent of two other deaths. Nancy Cramer and Brittany Rosenberg.
Perhaps the police suspected the killer had taken a third victim. Galen fought to keep his mind on the bypass. Not possible. They would make the connection. The media couldn’t resist a good serial killer. Unless? Unless the police didn’t want to create a panic. Marcus Galen paused after he knotted the last stitch. Or, he thought, perhaps there was little evidence and no suspects in custody. The investigators frequently left things out so they could confirm actual leads from nuts who read the paper or watched the news. He would make a few calls, see if the guys could get together later. Maybe he could pick up something useful.
A jolt, the odor of smoldering blood, and Mrs. Studeski’s heart was beating.
Chapter Twelve
Area One Violent Crimes was packed with desks and tables loaded with computers, phones and stacks of files. Even the desks that were unoccupied were piled with files. A handful of detectives were working. Some on the phones, some on computers, others filling out paperwork. There was constant movement and constant noise.
“Got anything on the strangulation yet?” Tierney asked as he w
alked through the room.
“The Denver Omelet?” Halverson chuckled
Tierney just stared at him.
“Phillips. The strangulation case,” Halverson grinned as he chewed his toothpick. “You know, that John Denver song. ‘You stomped on my heart and smashed that sucker flat. You just sorta squished my aorta.’”
“Stuck in the Seventies, Ray… just like your wardrobe,” Art Weinstein chuckled.
“You little…”
“Shut up. That’s the last time I want to hear you refer to this case with those words, Ray,” the chief said harshly. “The press is up our ass already. The last thing we need is something like that on the front page of the Trib. When’s the report coming in?”
“She’s on the block this afternoon,” Halverson said. “Man, you shoulda seen what the fucker did.”
“Mutilated,” Art Weinstein said flatly from his neatly kept desk. “Our boy’s back.”
Tierney rubbed his eyes. “That’s what I’m afraid of.”
“Too bad we don’t have Quinn,” Phil Gillette said.
There was a sudden, dead silence.
Then Tierney nodded. “Yeah, it is. Art, I want you to take a look at what Halverson and Dublowski have. See how it compares to Rosenberg and… who was the other one?”
“Cramer.” The thin, well-dressed man leaned back and stretched the stiff muscles flanking his spine. “I’m gonna have to look it up. Quinn ran Rosenberg solo. I was out with my back.”
“Okay, get on it. Ray, you sitting in on the Phillips autopsy?”
The old man grabbed his potbelly. “Come on, Chief, I’m still getting over the stomach flu.”
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