“Yeah, Loose Park. I know the difference between Loose Park and Gillham Park. It was definitely Loose Park.”
“And it was solid brick with white columns in front?”
“Yeah. I told you that. Why do you keep asking the same questions?”
“No reason. Anyhow, thank you very much for being so kind to answer all my questions and taking the time to talk to me.”
“Yeah. Listen, I did go out of my way to talk to you. Maybe you should buy me dinner for my inconvenience?”
“Check will be in the mail,” I said. “Thanks again.”
At that, I walked out of her house, with her shouting after me. “What do you mean, check will be in the mail? You gonna send me some money? Hey, get back here!”
I ignored her, got into my car, and drove off.
The next day, I made a motion to inspect “Vittorio’s” body. I was going to see if Vittorio had a large scar. I had the feeling that Enzo had been using Vittorio’s identity all along. That Vittorio was not actually the person who was raping these women, but Enzo.
The question was whether or not the fact that Enzo was using Vittorio’s identity had anything to do with Vittorio’s death? The two things might very well be connected – if Enzo was going around telling women that he was Vittorio, then Vittorio could very well have been popped by somebody that Enzo was raping.
I didn’t want to get too far ahead of myself, though. I had a hunch, but I wanted it to be proved. And then I was going to have to get Gina back in here and tell her what I knew. Tell her that she was lying, and I had proof. And then see if I could withdraw.
First things first, though. I needed to inspect that body.
Two days later, the order came in from the court, allowing me to go down to the hospital morgue and look at Vittorio. His body was still there in a freezer, being held as evidence for the trial. The reason why the morgue still had his body was that the results of the toxicology report had not yet come back, plus, I hadn’t yet received the autopsy report. I had made a motion to the court, when I got on this case, to preserve the body pending those two results.
I was glad that I did make a motion to the court to preserve the body. I was going to find out, once and for all, exactly who I was dealing with. Who the victim in this case was. I mean, I knew that it was Vittorio, but I didn’t know if Vittorio was the mad rapist.
I called Heather, knowing that going to the morgue to look at Vittorio’s body was something that she probably would be into. She was that type of girl, I thought – somebody who would actually enjoy going to a morgue and seeing a dead person.
“Cool,” she said when I called her. “When are you going?”
“I was actually going to go today,” I said. “You get here to the office and we’ll go.”
“I’m not doing anything today,” she said. “I’ll be there in a half hour.”
A half hour later, Heather appeared in black sweater, tight jeans, thigh-high boots and a grey pashmina. She was wearing designer sunglasses and her long hair was piled high up on her head. “Let’s go,” she said. “I’ve never done this before. I mean, I’ve seen a dead body. I saw my adoptive mother after I killed her. But I’ve never seen a stiff before.”
I had to smile. Little things, like going on prison visits and going on morgue visits, seemed to get Heather’s juices flowing. I remembered, way back when, in the days after I was sprung from prison, feeling the way that Heather did. Everything was a revelation to me. Every meal that I ate was the best I ever tasted. After all, it wasn’t prison food. Every night that I slept in my own bed was a miracle - it was an actual bed, not a tiny cot on a metal frame. Trips to the grocery store gave me untold moments of joy. Eating pancakes at IHOP almost brought tears to my eyes. All the little things in life were things that I couldn’t take for granted. I wondered how anybody could be unhappy when they have freedom and soft beds and all the food that they wanted and they could drive out to see changing leaves in October.
Unfortunately, that renewed zeal for life didn’t last that long. I soon found that I, too, was taking things for granted. And life started to wear me down once more.
I hoped that Heather’s excited attitude might bring that Damien back. The Damien that could get excited about the smallest things.
We got to St. Luke’s Hospital, which was the closest hospital to Vittorio’s home. It was a beautiful modern hospital, situated right off the Country Club Plaza. It faced Volker Park, which was the park that was a part of the enormous art museum, the Nelson-Atkins. Vittorio, who lived in Hyde Park, which was just a few miles away from the hospital, was apparently brought here when he was found in the home.
I went to the front desk, showed her the court order that permitted me to inspect Vittorio’s body, and she directed me to the basement. She told me that I needed an escort to go down there, so Heather and I took a seat to wait for the escort to come.
I also wanted to wait for Ally. Since she was the prosecutor on the case, she wanted to be present for the viewing as well. She still didn’t know anything about Sarah, and I still felt guilty whenever I saw her. It couldn’t be helped, though.
Ally came to the hospital about ten minutes after Heather and I got there, and ten minutes after that, a person appeared in a white lab coat. She approached us. “Hello,” she said, “My name is Dr. Prorock, and I was the Medical Examiner for Mr. Degrazio. I understand that you’re the attorney for the defendant in that case, correct?”
I nodded my head. “I am. I have the court order to inspect Mr. Degrazio if you need to see it.”
“And I’m Ally Hughes,” Ally said, extending her hand. “I’m the prosecutor on the case.”
“Please let me see the court order,” she said, and I handed it to her. She nodded her head. “Follow me.”
We followed her to the service elevator. She inserted her key and the car lurched downward. “Thank you for accommodating us,” I said to her.
“Not a problem.” She looked at me. “Is this your first time coming to a hospital morgue?”
“No,” I said. “I’ve been to a few.”
The elevator got down to the ground floor, and we followed her down a long hallway. She opened up the double doors to a room, and she went over to the cooler. “Okay,” she said. “Here is Mr. Degrazio.” She opened up the cooler door, and there he was, laying cold on the hard metal slab.
“Could you please lift him up?” I asked. “I need to see both of his shoulder blades.”
Dr. Prorock lifted him up on one side and then the other. I carefully looked at both shoulders, didn’t see any kind of a scar and nodded my head. “Thank you.”
“Are there any questions that you have for me?” she asked.
“Yes. I see that the deceased doesn’t have any major scarring on his shoulders. Did you observe the same thing?”
She had Vittorio’s file in her hand. She looked through her notes and then shook her head. “No. I didn’t observe that Mr. Degrazio had any kind of scarring on his shoulders or any other part of his body. Is there anything else that you would like to know?”
“No,” I said, looking at Ally. I didn’t want to give too much away. “That’s all that I needed to see.”
We all followed Dr. Prorock back to the service elevator and took it to the lobby. “Thank you again for accommodating me,” I said to her.
“My pleasure.”
We got out into the sun, and Ally turned to me. “You’re going to be mysterious about why it was that it was so important that you view that body, aren’t you?”
“Of course,” I said. “You’re the prosecutor, I’m the defense attorney, I can’t give too much of the game away.”
She smiled and locked her arm through mine. “Are you going to introduce me to your assistant?” she asked.
“Oh, yes. Heather, this is Ally Hughes, Ally, Heather.”
“Hi,” Ally said looking over at Heather. “Guess you’re working for Damien?”
“I am. And Harper. I’m le
arning the ropes right now.”
“Well, you could do worse than learn the law from Damien. He’s a pretty crack attorney.”
I smiled. “You’re not so bad yourself.”
“So,” Ally said, getting to her car. “You’ve been hiding yourself away lately. What do you say that we get a drink or something after I get off work? We need to catch up.”
I took a deep breath. “About that. I thought that maybe we should lie a bit low until after this trial is over. I don’t want anything to distract me from defending my client.”
Ally looked disappointed. “Damien, you’re a defense attorney. I’m a prosecutor. We’re going to have cases together, probably quite a few. If you want to stop dating every time we’re on opposite sides of a case, then we might as well not date at all.”
Dammit. I felt like she was putting me on the spot, and I didn’t really know what to say to her. “I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s a new thing for me to be dating. I’ve been with Sarah for so many years. I just have to feel my way around this. I hope that you understand.”
Heather looked at the two of us. “I’ll wait for you in the car, Dami,” she said, and then rapidly went over to the car, which was next to a tree, and sat down next to the tree.
“Actually,” Ally said, “no, I don’t understand. It sounds to me like you’re using weasel words to hide what you’re really thinking. You’re a lawyer. You know how important it is to communicate clearly. So, without using weasel words like ‘feel your way around,’ tell me what’s really going on.”
I tried to make a joke. “Hey, weasel words are good enough for a politician,” I said. Ally didn’t smile. “It’s just that-“
“It’s just what? What are you thinking right now?”
“I think that maybe I got into dating too soon after Sarah. I mean, I’ve got my kids at home. My youngest is only 6 years old, and she’s in recovery from a bone marrow transplant. She was very sick with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, and I almost lost her. Her older brother is trying to deal with his sister being very sick, and the breakup of our family, so he’s been acting out in school. Add to that this murder case and a class-action lawsuit that I’m trying to bring on behalf of people who have been affected by toxic mold, and I’m looking for more plaintiffs so that I’ll be more likely to get the class certified. That case has been a lot of work, and I already feel guilty for not spending more time with my kids. So…”
She nodded her head. “I get it. I guess that’s what I have coming to me. Everybody told me not to get involved with a guy who was going through a divorce. I didn’t listen to them.” She pushed the beeper on her keys, and the car unlocked. “You have a nice life, Damien,” she said, getting into the car.
I knew by the way that she backed up and shot out of the parking lot, her tires squealing, that things were about to get really ugly between us.
Just what I needed.
Chapter 11
In the car, Tom called me. “Good news, buddy. I’ve been finding plaintiffs for you, left and right. I’ve just been knocking on doors in the three apartment buildings, and I’ve found that most of them have some kind of mold. I’ve found lots of other sick people in these places. So far, I’ve found 15 more people. That makes 22. How many did you say that you needed to bring a class-action?”
“About 40. Great work, though. I’m going to have to visit all of them in the next few weeks and get them signed up. Keep going. Keep trying to find more people. It looks like we’ll have our class in no time.”
“I’ll email you the info on these new people. By the way, how are things going with that murder case?”
“Well, you’re not going to believe what I found out. Or, maybe you will.”
“What?”
“Vittorio wasn’t the rapist. Enzo was. He apparently was posing as Vittorio. I have a feeling that that might be the reason why Vittorio was popped.”
“Oh, really? Sounds like Enzo was a dirty bastard.”
“Yeah he was. Good lord. He was going around, raping women and telling them that his name was Vittorio. Then Vittorio gets murdered. I wonder if it was one of the women that Enzo raped. Or maybe there was another reason. I’ll have to ask Gina about that.”
“Sounds like you got a winner on your hands,” Tom said. “I’ll send you the names of the people that you need to contact for your mold case. And, by the way, I’ve also been doing a more deep-dive on who is responsible for these apartments. So far, I found out that the rich bastard Robert Weismann is the main person who owned these apartments, but I also found out that he had some help. He has a secret partner, and I’m trying to dig out who it is.”
“A secret partner? I wonder why he brought somebody else into this mess?”
“Probably because he knew that those places were death traps and he wanted somebody to take the blame. Or at the very least, spread the blame around. Listen, I need to do some more digging and find out who else is involved. I’ll get back with you on that.”
“Thanks, buddy.” We hung up, and I immediately called Gina. “Gina,” I said, “I need you to come into my office. Today.”
“I can be there at 5,” she said.
“It’s 2 now. I’ll see you then.”
In the meantime, I got a flash of insight. “Heather, why don’t you and I pay somebody a visit?”
“Who?”
“Her name is Coretta Taylor. She works at the Peanut.”
“Let’s go.”
Chapter 12
I went to The Peanut, and sat down at the bar. An attractive woman with black hair was working there. She had tattoos on her fore-arms, which were showed off by her sleeveless black t-shirt. Her hair was long, her breasts were large and her face looked like that of a Playboy model. She looked like she didn’t take shit, yet she also looked like she attracted just that – shit. Men were probably hitting on her constantly.
She saw me sit down, and she nodded her head. “Just a second,” she said, “I need to pour this beer.” She poured it and shot it down to the guy at the end of the bar. “What can I get for you?” she asked me.
“Actually, I need to speak with you.”
She looked suspicious. “What about?”
“About Vittorio Degrazio.”
She took a deep breath. “You a cop?”
“No. I’m not a cop. I’m a defense attorney. I represent Gina Degrazio, who is accused of murdering Vittorio.”
“What do you want to know?”
“I need to ask you about an incident with Mr. Degrazio.”
She looked over at a guy who was walking by the bar. “Rick,” she said. “Cover for me? I need to go outside for a smoke break.”
The guy walked behind the bar, and Coretta walked to the end of the bar and came out on the floor. “Follow me,” she said. “We’ll talk outside.”
I was happy that she was so willing to speak with me. I was afraid that she wouldn’t.
“By the way, this is Heather,” I said, motioning to Heather. “She’s my assistant.”
“Cool.”
I followed her out the back door, and we were in the alley by the parking lot. “Okay,” she said. “What do you need to know?”
“I got your name from Bianca Cassavettes,” I said. “She told me that she had been date-raped by Vittorio and she said that you were, too.”
“I was.” She shook her head. “Guy was kinda my type. He used to come in here all the time. You know, I knew the score on him. He would come in, buy women drinks, and would go home with them. About twice a week, always the same. But I got a thing for little Italian men, and I thought he was cute and pretty funny. I thought that it might be kinda fun for me to give it a whirl, too, you know? So, one night, he stays until close. It’s a weekday night, we’re kinda dead around closing time, people clear out before 1 on the weekdays. There’s some stragglers around, and he’s one of them. I’m cleaning up the bar, doing my thing before getting out of here, and he comes up and asks me what I’m doing after I get off work.�
�
She got out a pack of cigarettes. “You mind?” she asked, and I shook my head. She lit the cigarette and took a large drag. “So, yeah, I say I’m going home after my shift, because I worked a double that day. When I work, I work all day, from open to around five, but I worked a double that day, so I was pretty tired, you know? But he says that he wants to buy me breakfast at Chubby’s. Well, I gotta say, I love me some Chubby’s, and, as it happens, I’m not working the next day because I pulled a double that day. That means that I can go home and sleep in. So, I ended up saying ‘sure, let’s go to Chubby’s.’”
“We go to Chubby’s, he buys me breakfast, I’m starving, I haven’t eaten since noon. Then he asks me to go to his place. I kinda like him, he’s kinda fun, I say sure. We end up at his house, this huge house in Loose Park, and I’m thinking ‘whoa, this guy is loaded.’ Not that that means anything, or nothing like that, but that was what I was thinking about.”
“And you get to his place, and-“
“Yeah. He puts on a record on a turntable, I think it was Frank Sinatra. I’m thinking it’s pretty sweet, you know, you don’t see people with vinyl anymore. I always like to pick up vinyl myself. There used to be a cool place on Main called Recycled Sounds, that was just like in that movie, High Fidelity. God, I miss that place. I used to go there all the time when I was in high school. Anyhow, I digress. But did you know that there’s a cool second-hand record store in downtown Overland Park that sells vinyl? You can do wine tasting there, too.”
She was speaking faster and faster, and I had the feeling that she was deliberately stalling. Like she didn’t want to tell me what had happened next.
“Anyhow, he gets me a drink. It’s a whiskey sour, it tastes pretty damned good. I tell him that he missed his calling, he should be a bartender, and he laughs. And we’re talking on the couch and then boom. I’m down for the count. The room starts spinning, and everything started getting blurry. It’s my first drink of the night. I wake up on his couch the next morning, and, you know, I could tell that we had sex. I try to piece together everything that had happened the night before, and I couldn’t figure out how I passed out on only one drink.”
[Damien Harrington 01.0] The Alibi Page 11