Jackpot (Frank Renzi mystery series)

by Susan Fleet

  “He was setting her up!” Starr exclaimed. “He wanted the money.”

  “You bet your ass. Motivation with a capital M. He asked her to do a pre-nup, she balked so he killed her.” He skewered Starr with a look. “I don’t give a shit if the feds think some weirdo is killing lottery winners. Nigel Heath murdered Victoria Stavropoulos and I’m gonna nail his ass for it.”

  ____

  Sandwich

  The cop was watching him. A half hour ago the police officer had followed them into the Seaside Diner, sat at the counter and ordered coffee. Between listening to his mother’s idiotic comments and checking on the cop, he could barely eat. He pushed his plate aside and scratched his hand.

  Why was the cop watching him?

  Arlene finished taking an order from a young couple, then came by their table and left their check.

  “You folks have a nice day,” she said, and turned to leave.

  “Why don’t you sit down, Arlene?” his mother said. “We’ve hardly had a chance to chat today.”

  “I better not. I’ve got work to do in the kitchen.”

  “Oh, sit for a minute, Arlene. You deserve a break.”

  “Well, okay, but just for a minute.” She sat down opposite his mother, took off one of her hoop earrings and fussed with it, not looking at him. After a moment she said, “There’s an article in today’s Inquirer about that serial killer.”

  “What serial killer?” his mother said.

  “The one I told you about. I saw it on Rivera Live. Geraldo said some guy is killing lottery winners. The article in the Inquirer said he already murdered four women, maybe more.”

  His heart surged. Finally, they had noticed him!

  “The cops have no clue who he is!” Arlene rubbed her scrawny arms. “It gives me the creeps. The last one was in Nashua, New Hampshire!”

  “When was that?” His mother looked at him, frowning.

  “I’m too scared to buy a Powerball ticket,” Arlene said. “If I won, he might kill me!”

  He saw the cop at the counter look over. Arlene’s voice could be shrill when she got excited. He smiled at her, but she avoided his eyes, fiddling with her earring again. “Go ahead and buy one, Arlene. You’ve got nothing to worry about.”

  “Don’t encourage her, Billy. You know gambling is bad. How many times do I have to tell you?”

  He watched her mouth move. It reminded him of Ruthie and her dog, yap-yap-yapping until he made it shut up. He wondered how his mother’s mouth would look if—

  “I hear the FBI is on the case,” Arlene said.

  He glanced at the counter. The cop was watching him. When he turned back, Arlene was watching him too, but her eyes shifted away when he looked at her. “How do you know?” he said.

  “I think I heard it on Rivera Live.” Arlene turned to his mother and said, “Maybe the serial killer murdered that girl up in Boston.”

  “ Don’t be silly,” his mother said. “The conductor did it. They were having a romance and he killed her for the money.”

  He clenched his fists. Stupid, stupid, stupid!!

  “Come on, Billy, we have to go. You promised me you’d wash the kitchen floor today.”

  Arlene rose from her chair, but she didn’t smile at him the way she usually did. She looked at his mother and said, “Take care of yourself, Mrs. Kay. See you next Sunday.”

  ____

  Plymouth — 3:00 p.m.

  Gina opened a bottle of water and guzzled half the contents. She hadn’t had a hangover in years, but she recognized the symptoms: an unquenchable thirst and a dull headache. After their Friday night meeting with Nigel, she and Franco had stayed up late. Lord knows they had plenty to talk about: his divorce, her fight with Ryan, the Jackpot Killer. But when Franco made love to her, all her worries had faded away.

  Saturday morning she’d left his motel at 10:30. Franco had a basketball date with the little boy he’d taken under his wing. He had a soft spot in his heart for boys with no fathers. Unlike Ryan, who only thought about himself.

  That’s why she was staying in this cheap motel.

  It was Memorial Day weekend. Ryan would be at their house in Westwood, and she didn’t dare stay at the beach house. Ryan might go there looking for her. He didn’t have a key, but still.

  Last night, she’d polished off a small bottle of Merlot, ruminating over her situation. Ryan was ruthless. If he found out she was having an affair, he’d file for a divorce. Forget the house. She’d be lucky to keep the clothes on her back. But she had no control over Ryan. All she could do was stay out of his way. Ryan would never change. He wanted her to quit her job and have her life revolve around him.

  But she loved her job and she loved Franco. He understood her.

  She trusted him and he trusted her. Sometimes Franco played the part of the gruff, steely-eyed cop, but he had always been gentle and kind with her. He was smart as a whip, a terrific detective, and a fantastic lover, not to mention funny as hell sometimes. He had even agreed to talk to Nigel.

  Poor Nigel. Friday night he’d looked like a whipped dog: forlorn and dejected, mournful eyes, slumped shoulders. But afterwards, Franco seemed convinced that Nigel didn’t kill Vicky, the Jackpot Killer did.

  She got up and looked out the window. It was a gorgeous day, sunny and mild, a perfect beach day. Too bad she wasn’t at her beach house. Some of her fondest childhood memories were the summers she’d spent in Squantum, a tiny peninsula jutting into the ocean south of Boston.

  Thirty years ago when beach property was cheap, her grandparents had bought a two-story bungalow facing the ocean, a sea captain’s house built in 1878. The kitchen was antiquated, but so what? Nobody cooked in the summer. The second floor had three bedrooms. She had claimed the biggest one. It faced the ocean and there was a widow’s walk outside the windows. Sometimes on hot nights, she sat out there to cool off. There was always a delightful breeze. Unlike this stuffy motel room.

  She went outside and sat in a molded-plastic chair in front of her room. The exterior of the two-story motel had seen better days, fading yellow paint, rusty wrought-iron railings on the second-floor walkway. Several motorcycles, campers and pickup trucks sat in the parking lot. She had intended to rent a room in Sandwich, but all the cheap motels were booked for the weekend, and she couldn’t afford to pay for three nights in an expensive hotel.

  So here she was in Plymouth, twenty miles away.

  She fired up a cigarette and sipped her water. The key to her financial future—and freedom from Ryan—was a lucrative book deal. She figured she had a good shot at it. Due to the Boston Pops connection, Vicky’s murder was big news all over the country and so was Nigel. Now that the Jackpot Killer murders had made the national news, that was hot, too.

  She’d talked to Vicky, she had an inside track on the Jackpot Killer, and she was Nigel’s only confidant. But to write a bestseller, she had to spice it up with intimate details. When Nigel was young, did he ride a bike, play cricket, have a teenaged crush on a girl? He’d asked her not to write about his mother’s suicide, but his mother had been an opera singer. She made a mental note to ask Nigel about her career. Surely he wouldn’t mind that.

  Nigel’s father sounded like a tyrant. Practice, practice, practice.

  Could she persuade Nigel to tell her what caused their rift? And she needed some juicy details about his ex-wife. According to the information she’d found on the Internet, Joanna was a minor film actress, an older woman, but still attractive: wavy blonde hair, a pretty smile and a curvy figure.

  But the main focus would be Nigel’s relationship with Vicky. She’d have to tread carefully there. Nigel was still grieving, holed up in his hotel, belting down scotch and smoking like a fiend. If she wanted the inside scoop, she’d better hurry. Nigel’s lawyer seemed to think Gerry Mulligan might arrest him soon and charge him with Vicky’s murder. Then Nigel would be in jail, and murder suspects rarely got out on bail.

  She drank some water and puffed her cigarett
e. Franco seemed to think the Jackpot Killer murdered Vicky, but he’d warned her not to tell Nigel, and if Franco asked her not to repeat something, she didn’t. That was the deal.

  But it didn’t sound like Franco was going to arrest the Jackpot Killer anytime soon. He had a suspect, but when she asked why he didn’t arrest him, all Franco did was talk about evidence and search warrants. He wanted to talk to the suspect’s mother while he was at work.

  But tomorrow was Memorial Day, and on Tuesday Franco would be in court all day testifying on a murder case. But she wouldn’t.

  She smiled, recalling the ploy she’d used to worm the suspect’s name out of Franco. She sounded out the name: Kar-a-pitch-oo-lik.

  She had no idea how to spell it. But he lived in Sandwich, and Sandwich wasn’t New York City. How many people with a weird name like that would be living in a little town like Sandwich?

  She went back in her room, took out her cell and dialed information.

  A bored-sounding female voice said, “How may I help you?”

  “I need the phone number of a Sandwich, Massachusetts, resident. I’m not sure how to spell it, but it begins with K.” She sounded out the name for the woman: “Kar-a-pitch-oo-lik.”

  “One moment please,” the woman said.

  Gina gripped her cell phone. Please find the number.

  The operator came back on the line. “I checked the Sandwich residents with names that start with K-A-R. There aren’t many. Do you have a first name?”

  “William,” Gina said, and waited anxiously.

  Thirty seconds passed, an eternity.

  At last the operator came back and said, “There’s a William Karapitulik living at 14 Bittersweet Lane. K-A-R-A-P-I-T-U-L-I-K.”

  Gina scribbled down the address. “Thank you. May I have the number?”

  CHAPTER 28

  Monday, May 29 — Swampscott, MA

  It was a beautiful day, bright and sunny, too nice to be at a cemetery, Frank thought, but that’s what you did on Memorial Day. He stood three paces away from his father, giving him space to grieve. Lost in thought, Salvatore Renzi stared blankly at the carved granite headstone he’d bought five months ago for Mary Sullivan Renzi.

  His father still had a full head of black hair but now it was speckled with gray. At seventy, he seemed as sharp as ever, but today he looked old, his face lined, thin and stooped in his dark suit.

  Was that new, Frank wondered. Or hadn’t he noticed?

  Maybe he just never appreciated what great parents he’d had until one of them was gone. He made a resolution to spend more time with his father.

  This morning he’d driven to the house in Swampscott where he’d grown up, a small two-story Cape, nothing fancy. His father had bought it in 1960, two years before Frank was born. Back then his father had been an assistant DA and didn’t make much money. The firstborn son of Italian immigrants, Salvatore Renzi was the first in his family to graduate from college.

  Grampa Sal owned a grocery store in the North End; Grandma Rose stayed home to raise Salvatore, Jr. and their three daughters. Frank hadn’t seen his aunts in years; they were living with their husbands in California, Arizona and Florida. A child of the Depression, his father had heard his parents sing the praises of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, which was why he’d named his son Franklin. Frank’s middle name, Sullivan, was a concession to Mary Sullivan Renzi’s Irish heritage.

  This morning, driving through Swampscott, a seacoast town fifteen miles north of Boston, he realized he missed his hometown. As a kid he loved going to the beach, gazing at the skyscrapers across the water in Boston, the ever-present lure of the city. Swampscott had a great school system and a terrific basketball coach, but when Evelyn got pregnant, she had insisted that they live in Milton near her parents. She had no interest in visiting Frank’s parents. So they’d bought the house in Milton.

  “I can’t believe she’s gone,” his father said, drawing him closer. “Some days I go home and walk in the door thinking Mary will be waiting for me in the kitchen. She was a beautiful person.”

  “Yes, she was. I miss her a lot. I wish—” He stopped, thinking: I wish she were here so I could tell her about the divorce. He loved his father, a man well-respected in the legal community and a wonderful role model. But he’d always been emotionally closer to his mother. Only now did it dawn on him how often he’d relied on her to be the intermediary. Tell his mother about some problem and she would relay it to Sal.

  “What?” his father said, gazing at him with his dark Sicilian eyes, eyes that intimidated crooks and lawyers alike when they entered Judge Salvatore Renzi’s courtroom.

  “Nothing. I was just thinking what a great mother she was. She was always there for me.” He squeezed his father’s shoulder. “You were too, but you didn’t bake the chocolate-chip cookies.”

  That brought a faint smile to his father’s lips.

  “I miss her a lot, but not as much as you. Married, what, forty-three years?”

  Fighting for control, his father nodded. “Forty-three wonderful years.”

  “I’ve got something I need to tell you. Want to go have coffee?” He hadn’t wanted to deliver the news in a phone call. That seemed cowardly. But how could he tell him while they stood at his mother’s grave?

  “No,” his father said. “What is it you need to tell me?”

  He spit it out fast. “Evelyn and I are getting a divorce.”

  His father remained silent for a moment. Then, “I’m not surprised.”

  Stunned, Frank stared at him. Not surprised? That was a shocker.

  “I haven’t seen much of you and Evelyn lately, but . . .” His father smiled faintly. “Over the years I’ve developed a certain ability to read people. You two haven’t looked happy for quite a while.”

  “Years,” he said. Anything to fill the void, anything so he wouldn’t have to explain.

  “Your mother always said you had a way with women.”

  Another shocker, and an opening as big as a house. “Not a way with women. One woman in particular. For the last nine years.”

  “Nine years.” His father puffed his cheeks. “That’s a long time. Almost half your married life.”

  That was true enough. The last half anyway. No need to tell him about the first half.

  “I won’t bother asking why you didn’t get a divorce. I’m sure you had your reasons. You need to talk to a divorce lawyer. I’ll make some calls and get you some names. Does Maureen know?”

  Pain knifed his gut, cutting him to the core.

  “Yes. Evelyn told her.” Told her more than she needed to know.

  “How’s she taking it?”

  His throat tightened. Mom says you’ve got a girlfriend. Is that true?

  “She’s pretty upset. She won’t talk to me. I’ve called her several times but she won’t answer. I left messages asking her to call me back, but . . .” He stopped, unable to finish.

  His father put his arm around him. “I guess Grampa Renzi better give her a call and tell her she needs to talk to you. Can’t have my favorite girl in the world not talking to her dad.”

  Frank felt a wave of relief. If anyone could reach out to Maureen, it was his father. She was his only grandchild and he adored her. “Thanks, Dad.”

  But the words seemed inadequate. He wanted to say more, wanted to tell his father how much he loved him, wanted to tell him how much he enjoyed talking to him about police work and legal matters and NBA basketball games and the Boston Celtics. So open your mouth and say it, stupid.

  “You’re the best, Dad. I love you more than I can ever say. Thanks for being there when I need you.”

  His father smiled. “That’s what fathers are for, son.”

  ____

  Gina got up at nine, ate a hearty breakfast of scrambled eggs at a nearby diner, left her motel at ten and set out for Sandwich. It only took her a half hour to get over the Sagamore Bridge onto Cape Cod, but vehicles headed in the other direction leaving the Cape were b
acked up for miles.

  She passed a roadside billboard: WELCOME TO SANDWICH, SEASHORE RESORT FOR ALL SEASONS. Sandwich had the largest collection of Victorians on Cape Cod, the perfect excuse for her interview. Last night she’d called the number for William Karapitulik, poised to hang up if a man answered.

  But after one ring, his mother answered. It had been surprisingly easy to convince her to do an interview. What Gina knew about architecture would fit in a thimble, but last night she’d used her laptop to find photographs of Sandwich’s historic landmarks on the Internet.

  She entered Sandwich’s Historic Town Square, taking mental notes as passed the Hoxie House, a seventeenth-century saltbox, the Town Hall, built in 1734, and the First Church of Christ, easily identified by its soaring white steeple. Along the main drag beyond the square, Victorians were lined up like wedding cakes. Several times she slowed to a stop, gawking at the mansard roofs, the steep-pitched gables and the elaborately-carved wooden shutters around the multi-paned windows.

  But then she thought, forget the architecture. Find William Karapitulik’s house. She sipped from her container of take-out coffee, recalling the news report she’d seen this morning on television, gruesome details about the murder in Nashua that Franco had told her about. Last week someone had beaten an elderly lotto winner to death, striking her head repeatedly with a blunt object. While trying to protect her, the woman’s dog, a small fox terrier, had also been beaten to death.

  The Jackpot Killer was a monster.

  No wonder Franco wanted to catch him.

  She’d used her laptop to map the address the telephone operator had given her so it was easy enough to find.