Hardware

by Linda Barnes

  “The kind of letter you keep,” I commented.

  “The kind of letter you remember,” she said. “We tried to convince Joey to go away, to accept an alias. He said he couldn’t. He had to be a bona fide relative to visit his father in prison.”

  Sam. The visits to Providence.

  “Did Sam tell Joey Senior that his kid was coming home?”

  “No,” Lauren said. “Sam sounded him out, that’s all. Joey wanted to break the good news in person. He wanted to see his father. Said he was scared his father would die, and they’d never have a chance to straighten out all the things between them.”

  I set my coffee on the table. The bottom was wet; it would leave a round stain.

  “So what do you think?” I asked. “Did Joey try to kill Sam?”

  “No. Absolutely not.”

  “Why not? Sounds to me like he was jealous of Sam. I think you used the word psycho, said he was on drugs. How’s this for a scenario? When he got what he wanted, and it didn’t make him a different person, he bided his time, earned some cash, and now he’s turning on the people he blames. It was e-mail that lured Sam to Green and White. I’d watch my step if I were you.”

  “I do watch my step,” she said. “Joey’s very upset about Sam.”

  “Where is he?”

  “I can reach him.”

  “He’s in Boston?”

  “Why should he run?” Lauren said. “He would never hurt Sam.”

  I have a kitchen extension. I don’t use it much, but it keeps me from burning dinner on the rare occasions when I cook and the phone rings. I picked it up and dialed a number I know well.

  Mooney didn’t answer. I thought about trying to raise Oglesby. Dialed another number and persisted till I had Leroy on the phone.

  “How’s Gloria?”

  He sounded uncertain. “Okay. Quiet. Not like her. Okay, I guess.”

  “You?”

  “I dunno.”

  “Leroy, I need a favor and there’s nobody else I can ask.”

  “I’m not leaving the hospital.”

  “I’m not asking you to.”

  “What are you askin’?”

  “Go stand outside Sam’s room till I can get there or till I can get somebody there.”

  “Just stand?”

  “Make like a guard.”

  “Sam’s got plenty of guards, believe me,” Leroy said.

  “Yeah, but I don’t think they’re watching for the right guy.”

  “Carlotta, you know I’d do ’most anything for you, but that’s one family I don’t wanna mess with.”

  “I’ll be there as soon as I can. You might save Sam’s life. He’s your sister’s friend. He’s her partner.”

  “Okay,” Leroy said reluctantly. “Make it fast.”

  I gave a brief physical rundown on “Frank” as I’d last seen him. No reason for Leroy to hassle the candy stripers.

  “You’re wrong about Joey,” Lauren Heffernan said as I hung up.

  “Did he handle explosives when he was in Vietnam?”

  “Carlotta!” Roz shouted from the other room. “I don’t care what you’re doing in there, you need to see this.”

  “You mind waiting?” I asked Lauren.

  “I’ll make more coffee,” she said.

  “You want to help,” I said. “Here’s the phone. Get Joey here. Whatever the hell he’s calling himself today.”

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  I stormed into the living room and halted at the desk. Roz, probably chilly in her gauzy evening attire, had pulled one of her more modest Tshirts over her head. It was chrome yellow and announced: BEER—IT ISN’T JUST FOR BREAKFAST ANYMORE.

  She wore last night’s fake nails, spiky and black. No wonder the keyboard clacked so loudly.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Crabby today,” she observed.

  “Very,” I agreed, tight-lipped. “Make this fast.”

  She sailed a folded sheet of printout paper airplane-like across the room. “You were right,” she said. “Yesterday I was looking for the wrong stuff. Checking if Sam was planning to sell Green and White. No indication of that. So there goes my next question. Who’s he gonna sell to? He isn’t selling. Ergo, shit.”

  “I didn’t realize you spoke Latin.”

  “Huh?”

  “Roz, what in hell did you find?”

  “Sit down, stop pacing, okay?”

  “Talk!”

  “It’s about money,” she said.

  “Money,” I repeated. A fascinating subject.

  “Sam’s records are clear as the driven snow.”

  “Pure,” I said. “Pure as the driven snow.”

  “Whatever. Receipts. Deposits. Salaries. Plant. Upkeep. Taxes. Insurance. Nothing the IRS wouldn’t applaud. Green and White’s not making anybody rich, but it’s keeping its head above water. Not much in the way of expenses. Low rent. Gloria works cheap because she’s got a place there, no rent.

  “Sam’s own stuff, his personal cash, is in several accounts, three different banks, which is smart because he can take advantage of FDIC. Green and White keeps all its accounts at Bank of Commerce and Industry. Loyalty, maybe. They loaned Sam money when he started out.”

  I stared at my watch. “Fascinating, Roz. Fascinating.”

  “Sam doesn’t update his files often enough. The bank statement you lifted—Bank of Commerce and Industry—was still sealed. It made such interesting reading, I figured I ought to find out more. Courtesy of ‘Frank,’ I accessed the bank, and since I’ve got all Sam’s account numbers and shit, I brought him up to date.”

  “He’ll appreciate it.”

  “Dammit, Carlotta. Look. The past few months, money’s been going in and money’s been going out like you wouldn’t believe. I’m surprised a bank officer hasn’t questioned Sam about the activity on Green and White’s accounts. I would have, knowing how they’ve behaved in the past. Suddenly it’s like a whole new thing.”

  “Where’s the money coming from? Can you find out?”

  “Most of it’s wire transfers, which gives me locations of the banks. I made a list.”

  I read them. “Providence. New York. Chicago. Las Vegas. Cayman Islands. Bahamas.”

  “You want to know where the money’s going?” Roz asked. “After it takes its little detour through Green and White?”

  “You want to tell me?”

  “The same holding company that owns Siren Hiring, your very own phony employment agency. Getaway Ventures. In Singapore.”

  “Frank.”

  “Lauren,” I called. “You know anything about computers?”

  “Not much.” She entered the room balancing a tray and three steaming cups. “I can do Lotus One-Two-Three.” I didn’t realize Roz and I counted a tray among our kitchen crap. It looked metallic. I hoped it wasn’t one of Roz’s developer pans.

  “Joey’s on his way over,” Lauren said.

  “Good. Run Joey Frascatti for me, Roz.”

  “SSN?”

  “Don’t know it.”

  “Well, I need something.”

  I grabbed the phone book. “Last known address: Four fifty-two Howser. Boston.”

  She punched buttons.

  “Here.”

  “Must be the father, not the son,” Lauren said.

  “Frascatti hasn’t done any credit purchases in six years,” Roz said. “Think he’s dead? Or maybe he went to one of those financial self-help gurus, cut up his credit cards.”

  “He’s in prison,” I said, remembering my conversation with Mooney. “Dammit. Try any other Frascattis at that address.”

  “Okay.”

  “Get me employment histories. Credit. Business loans.”

  “Right.”

  “Hard copy.”

  The printout was easier to read than the screen. The Frascattis owned restaurants. Dry cleaners. Bars. Hotels. They’d received loans from banks in the Cayman Islands. The Bahamas. Providence. Chicago. Las Vegas. I blinked and stared again
. The same locales that had recently become so beneficent to Green & White.

  “Now run Gianelli,” I said quietly. “Anthony Gianelli, Sr. Hanover Street. Boston. Same thing.”

  “Okay,” Roz said.

  “Some electronics expert,” I murmured. “Young Joey Frascatti.”

  “Yes,” Lauren said. She seemed genuinely puzzled. Almost defiant.

  “He may be in the running for computer hacker of the year,” I said sharply, “but I’m willing to bet he never earned an honest dime off electronics, Lauren. He stole every penny. Skimmed it. From his family. From other families. From the Mob.”

  “No,” Lauren said. “He’s worked all over the world. A freelance contractor. He’s brilliant. Brilliant.”

  “Save it,” I said. “I’m out of here, Lauren. If Joey shows up, keep him here.”

  “You want to look at this screen or what?” Roz demanded.

  “Later, Roz. Keep him here, Lauren. I mean it.”

  “I’ll try,” she said.

  “Roz,” I said. “Keep him here.”

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  I longed for flashing cop lights on my Toyota. Without them, I couldn’t force slower vehicles to the side of the road, barge through stop signs or red lights. I flicked my brights at a Volvo doing the sightseer gawk in the fast lane, passed on the right in frustration. Squeezing by jittery traffic on Memorial Drive, I glanced at the other side of the river to find Storrow Drive almost empty. I whipped across the B.U. Bridge, made two illegal lefts, and sped onto Storrow. Clear sailing. No place to park near the hospital. I slammed the car into a loading zone.

  “How’s Sam?” I asked Leroy after giving him a hug.

  “I don’t know. Maybe you can tell me why I’m here, in case anybody wants to know.”

  “The guy I described, I think he wants Sam dead.”

  “That’s not what I meant, Carlotta. Why’m I the only one here? Any of these citizens look like Mob grunts to you?”

  I did a quick survey of the waiting room.

  “Is Sam still here? Is he okay?” I tried to keep my voice low, but I could hear it rising.

  “Calm down,” Leroy said. “He’s sleepin’. I stuck my head in, and he’s breathing, that’s all I know.”

  “You’re a good man, Leroy,” I said. “Thank you.”

  “Sam don’t deserve this shit. My brother didn’t deserve it, either.”

  “I know,” I said.

  “Is somebody gonna try to kill my sister, Carlotta?”

  “No,” I said. “This isn’t about her.”

  “You want me to hang around?”

  “Please. A little longer.”

  I scribbled a phone number on a scrap of paper, dug a quarter out of my pocket. “Use the pay phone. Don’t identify yourself. Tell whoever answers to let Papa G know that there are no guards at the hospital. Tell him it’s urgent.”

  “Will do.”

  “I’m going to visit Sam.”

  There was nobody to stop me. I inhaled deeply and deliberately, pushed open the door. No one had told me much concerning his condition; I was almost afraid to look.

  He wasn’t sleeping. He was lying motionless, fingers steepled on his chest. His skin tone was bad, grayish in the glaring light. I leaned over and kissed him on the forehead. Aside from a small bandage on his right cheek, his face seemed untouched. I ran my hand over his left cheek. He hadn’t shaved. He breathed. I closed my eyes and said a brief prayer of thanks to a God I didn’t believe in.

  “Visions of sugarplums?” I asked.

  “Nowhere near such pleasant thoughts,” he said. “Glad you interrupted.”

  “Do your legs hurt?” The words came out before I could stop them. His eyes were weary and glazed.

  He said, “Pretty numb. Lucky. I remember starting to run, to help Marvin. If he hadn’t wrestled that door open, hadn’t yelled, I’d have been sheltered by the desk, like Gloria. But then, if he hadn’t tried to stop the guy, I’d be dead. I’m alive … Marvin’s dead.”

  “Your legs?”

  “There was a fireball. I tried not to breathe, to hug the floor. My back, well, it’s not much worse than a bad sunburn. The beam cracked and fell. It’s like I can still hear it. I know my hair was on fire. Gloria put it out.”

  “Can I get you anything?”

  “Water.”

  To reach the empty cup, the sink, I had to negotiate my way past an IV stand. Burn victims need fluids; I remembered that.

  I held the cup while he drank through a straw. I could see a patch of his singed hair. Smell it.

  “I’ve got this gizmo,” he said. “Pain pump. I push the button when it hurts too much. Instant anesthesia. Great stuff.”

  His left leg had so much hardware sprouting from it that it barely resembled a leg at all. There was a huge metal device clamped around one knee with shiny metal pins descending into the flesh. Another chunk of machinery clamped his ankle. His right leg was draped in gauze.

  “Who tried to kill you, Sam?”

  “Don’t treat me like a case, Carlotta.”

  “I need to know. I’d want to know even if I weren’t working for Gloria.”

  “Some goon Gloria fired,” he muttered. His room was filled with overblown floral tributes: red-and-white carnations arranged in crosses, stuff that would have looked more appropriate at a funeral.

  I pulled up a chair, sat, and took Sam’s hand in mine. “Or maybe Joey,” I said.

  “Ah, sweet Jesus,” he said. “What a mistake that was.”

  “What mistake?”

  “He told you his real name. Now you tell me, Carlotta. Is Joey your new flame?”

  Startled, I said, “No. No way. I’m not saying things are the way they were, but it’s not Joey.”

  “Small favors,” he said. “I never should have introduced you. But you insisted. And he wanted to know everything, everything, to absorb my whole life. What worked and what didn’t. He was always like that. So goddamn curious, like he’d eat information for breakfast, swallow it whole. But he was never jealous before. He saw you, I knew there’d be trouble.”

  “Wait a minute—”

  “Look, I’m not trying to make like you’re Helen of Troy or something.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Any woman I was with, I think.”

  “Thanks again.”

  “Carlotta, quit it.”

  “Sorry,” I said. “It’s not every day I get compared to Helen of Troy.”

  “You love me?” he asked.

  I felt my shoulders tense. “Sam,” I said softly. “You were the first guy.”

  “Now.” His voice was hard, implacable.

  “I love you; I’m not in love with you.”

  Silence.

  I said, “It used to be easy. I’d just see you—God, Sam.…” He glanced down at his sheet-covered body. On the leg that wasn’t suspended from the pulley, only the toes were visible, grayish.

  “Look at me now, kid,” he said.

  “I do love you, Sam.”

  “But there’s somebody else.”

  “I assumed you had somebody else, Sam. You were spending all your time at Lauren’s.”

  “It was over between me and Lauren before I ever met you.”

  “Yeah, well, I found out a little late. And it wasn’t just Lauren. We were drifting, Sam. Going no-place.”

  “Why was that?” he asked.

  I chose evasion. “Look, Sam, this new guy, it may not work. He flunks a basic test.”

  “Lousy in bed?”

  “Worse. He’s a doctor; my mother would have approved.”

  “That damned shrink, right?”

  “Nothing happened until after you’d decided we were lovers.”

  “Don’t tell me I put the idea in your head.”

  “I don’t want to talk about this. I want to talk about Joey.”

  “Long as you’re not screwing him.”

  “He’s screwing you, Sam. He’s moving money through Green and White. H
e’s using you to launder cash.”

  “No. He wouldn’t.”

  “You knew about the money?”

  “No, but if he’s using Green and White, it’s gotta be some temporary thing. He must have gotten in some kind of bind. Or it’s a surprise. He’s gonna earn me a pile in two weeks and surprise me.”

  “Sure.”

  “Joey would never do anything to hurt me.”

  “Sam.” He seemed remote, distant in a way I’d never experienced before. He could have been in another room, having a different conversation.

  “Don’t protect him,” I said.

  “I’ll protect whoever the hell I want to, Carlotta! You can’t fucking read my mind! I have a right to my own thoughts. Get out of here!”

  He couldn’t make me leave, not flat on his back, not drugged.

  “You can’t keep protecting Joey,” I insisted.

  “I wouldn’t. Not if I believed he did this.”

  “Tell me about him.”

  “You talk to Lauren?”

  “She’s at my place now. Talk about Joey, Sam.”

  “I’m supposed to be resting. I could buzz for a nurse, have you tossed the hell out.”

  “She’d have to get past Leroy.”

  “Why’s Leroy out there? My dad’s guys—”

  “Are gone,” I said. “Leroy’s there to keep Joey from finishing you off.”

  “You’re so wrong, Carlotta.”

  “Convince me.”

  He closed his eyes. Briefly. Sighed. “Joey,” he said. “He’s a hell of a responsibility.”

  “Even if he didn’t try to kill you, he set you up. Unless he’s incredibly stupid.”

  “He’s coming in from the cold. I guess it was real cold for him out there.”

  “Guy sets you up, you forgive him? You feel sorry for him?”

  “There are people in your life you forgive. Joey’s mine. He’s the guy with the great future behind him, you know what I mean? Christ, he’s smart. I was half as smart as Joey, I’d run the world. When we were still in high school, he nailed the phone system. Got all these manuals from the phone company, some legit, some he dug out of their Dumpsters, and pretty soon he’s asking me, do I want to talk to a friend of his in Germany. Friend of his in Sweden, Denmark. Pay phone. No charge. He’s got phones in his locker, phones in his car. When he, uh, went AWOL, he had so many buddies overseas, I figured it would work. He had a bunch of pals in West Germany—”