Blow Fly

by Patricia Cornwell

  Rudy is in room 511. It is not his room. He got inside the hotel very much the same way Lucy did, only he got a good break, got to walk in with a crowd of businessmen returning from dinner. Fortunately, he was smart enough to wear a suit and tie. Rudy is an odd breed. Former HRT comrades envied his beautiful muscular body and accused him of taking steroids, which he has never touched. Lucy would know, because Rudy may have his flaws, but he is so honest and sincere that she sometimes calls him girlfriend. She knows every detail of his diet, vitamin and protein supplements, and grueling workout routines, and his favorite magazines and television shows. She can’t remember the last time he read a book. She also understands why he sexually assaulted her in the Tire House and, if anything, feels bad that she broke his nose.

  “I thought you were hot for me, too. I swear,” he explained with the most pitiful expression on his face. “I guess I got all excited rolling around between tires and shooting, and you were right there with me with cartridge cases pinging everywhere, both of us dirty and sooty, and you looked so good I couldn’t stand it, so I asked you that question—when I shouldn’t have—and then you said you wanted sex whenever you could get it. I thought you meant with me.”

  “Right that minute?” Lucy said. “You really thought that?”

  “Yeah. That you were hot and bothered too.”

  “Now and then you should watch something besides action movies,” Lucy replied. “Walt Disney, maybe?”

  They had this conversation inside her room at the FBI Academy, both of them sitting on her bed because she was not afraid of Rudy and never has been. He was the one with stitches below his lip and a broken nose that required the skills of a plastic surgeon.

  “Besides, and I know this may sound like bullshit to you, Lucy, but I’d had it with what the other guys were saying. Maybe I wanted to prove something—prove you weren’t what they’ve been saying.”

  “I get it. If we had sex, then you could go back and tell them all about it.”

  “No! I didn’t mean it like that. I wouldn’t have told them anything. It’s none of their business!”

  “Hmmm. Let me sort through this. Having sex in the Tire House would have proven to the other guys that I’m into guys—even though they wouldn’t have known about our having sex in the Tire House because you’re too honorable to kiss and tell.”

  “Ah, fuck.” Rudy stared dejectedly at the floor. “I’m not saying it right. I wouldn’t have told them a thing, but next time they bad-mouthed you, accused you of being gay or frigid or whatever, I could have given them a look, done something to indicate they didn’t know what they were talking about.”

  “I appreciate that your intention was my welfare as you tried to rip off my clothes and rape me,” Lucy replied.

  “I wasn’t trying to rape you! For Christ’s sake, don’t use a word like that! I thought you were turned on, too. Shit, Lucy. What do you want me to do?”

  “Never try a stunt like that again. Or next time I’ll break more than your nose.”

  “Fine. I won’t ever do anything again unless you start it. Or change your mind.”

  He resigned from the Bureau and eventually came to work for her at The Last Precinct. Rudy is a perplexing mix. In some ways, he is the big, handsome dope incapable of making a commitment to any woman he has ever claimed to desperately love (and his choices, as far as Lucy knows, demonstrate appallingly bad judgment). But as a crime fighter, he is as meticulous and skillful as he is as a helicopter pilot. Rudy isn’t selfish or narcissistic. He rarely drinks and never touches drugs, not even aspirin.

  “One good thing about it.” Rudy looked up at Lucy as they sat on her bed. “When the plastic surgeon was fixing my nose, he went ahead and shaved that little bump off it.” He gently touched the splint on the bridge of his nose. “He says I’ll have a perfect Roman nose. That’s what he called it, a Roman nose.”

  He paused, slightly perplexed. “What exactly is a Roman nose?”

  LUCY KNOCKS ON the door of room 511.

  It has a Do Not Disturb sign hanging on the knob, and the TV is loud inside, hoofs pounding, guns firing. It sounds like Rudy is watching a Western. But what he’s watching is Rocco.

  “Yeah.” After a pause, Rudy’s voice sounds from inside.

  “Down and secure,” she uses helicopter talk and scans the hallway as she pulls latex gloves out of a pocket and works her hands into them.

  The door opens wide enough for her to slip through, and she closes it behind her. Rudy is also wearing surgical gloves, and turns the lock and dead bolt. Lucy takes off her windbreaker and stares hard at Rocco Caggiano, at his flabby, fat body and his bloodshot eyes. She takes in every detail of the room. Draped over a chair is his black cashmere overcoat, and in a corner on the carpet are a plastic tray and an empty bottle of champagne next to a stainless-steel ice bucket filled with water. It would have taken hours for the ice to completely melt. The bed is king-size, and directly across from it in front of a window with the drapes drawn are a small glass table and two chairs. On the carpet are several British newspapers. He’s recently been in England, maybe. But Rocco has never bothered to learn a second language. The papers could have come from anywhere along his route here.

  Parked between the table and the bed is a room-service cart with nothing on it but four stainless-steel plate covers. Lucy can’t help but think of Rocco’s estranged father, Pete Marino, as she eyes a gnawed T-bone, the shredded skin of a baked potato, a plate with one pat of butter left (melted), an empty bread basket and a glass goblet filled with wilted lettuce, cocktail sauce, wedges of lemon and shrimp tails. He so completely devoured a slice of chocolate cake, nothing is left but smears made with Rocco’s fingers.

  “I gotta go.”

  “Be my guest.”

  She hurries into the bathroom. The stench is horrible.

  “He sober?” Lucy asks Rudy when she returns.

  “Sober enough.”

  “Must be in the genes.”

  “What?”

  “The way father and son take care of themselves,” she says. “But that’s all he and Marino have in common.” This to Rocco: “Drop by Szczecin to check on a few spare firearms? Maybe some ammunition, explosives, electronics, perfumes and designer clothing? How many phony bills of lading are in your briefcase?”

  Rocco glares at her, his attention dropping to her cleavage.

  “Keep your goddamn eyes to yourself,” Lucy snaps, having forgotten about her appearance. She buttons up and resumes her interrogation. “Probably thousands of them floating around somewhere, right, Rocco?”

  He says nothing. Lucy notices vomit on the carpet between his black crocodile loafers.

  “ ’Bout time you gagged on your own shit, Rocco.” She sits on the edge of the bed.

  “That a pickle up your sleeve, or you just happy to see me,” Rudy says to Lucy without a smile, without taking his eyes off Rocco.

  Lucy remembers the tactical baton up the sleeve of her linen blouse, slips it out and sets it on the bedside table. It is warm in the room. She glances at the thermostat, verifying that Rudy turned up the heat to seventy-four degrees. Any higher than that could arouse suspicion. Blowing heat moves the drapes drawn across the window on the other side of the room. The window is large and faces the front of the hotel. Rocco stares at the pistol, his eyes filling with tears.

  “My, my,” Lucy remarks, “you’re quite a crybaby for someone so mean and tough. And by the way, your father doesn’t cry.” She looks at Rudy. “You ever seen Marino cry?”

  “Nope.”

  “You ever seen him shit in his pants?”

  “Nope. Did’cha know that Rocco here had plans to put a bullet in Marino’s head on his fishing trip? You know, the one he always takes to Buggs Lake.”

  Lucy doesn’t comment. A flush creeps up her neck. Hopefully, Marino will never know that she and Rudy came here and probably saved his life. Rocco won’t be shooting anyone ever again.

  “You could have killed your
father years ago. Why this August?” Lucy asks him.

  She knows when Marino takes his annual fishing trip.

  Rocco shrugs. “Instructions.”

  “From whom?”

  “My former client. He has scores to settle.”

  “Jean-Baptiste,” Lucy says. “So the two of you have remained close. That’s touching, because he’s the reason you’re about to die.”

  “I don’t believe you!” Rocco exclaims. “He’d never . . . He needs me.”

  “For what?” Rudy asks.

  “Outside work,” Rocco replies. “I’m still his attorney. He can send me anything he wants. Contact me anytime he wants.”

  “What does he send you?” Rudy asks.

  “Anything. All he’s got to do is mark it Legal Mail, and no one can open it. So if he wants letters or shit sent to somebody who obviously ain’t a lawyer, he sends it through me.”

  “The letter I got from him that ratted you out, Rocco, did he send it through you?” Lucy asks.

  “No. He’s never sent me a letter with your name on it. I never open them. Too risky. If he ever found out.” He pauses, his eyes glassy. “I don’t believe he sent you a letter!”

  “We’re here, aren’t we?” Rudy says. “So how did that happen if Chandonne didn’t send a letter and tell us everything we need to know?”

  Rocco has no answer.

  “Why would he want you to kill your father?” Lucy isn’t about to forget that subject. “Especially now. What scores to settle?”

  “Maybe Jean-Baptiste don’t like him. I guess you could consider it a parting shot.” Rocco briefly looks smug.

  “Mind if I see that for a minute?” Lucy holds out her hand for Rudy’s pistol.

  He drops out the magazine and clears the round from the chamber. The cartridge bounces on the bed. Lucy picks it up and Rudy gives her the Colt. She walks close to Rocco and pushes the loose cartridge into the magazine with her thumb.

  “Your father taught me how to drive,” she tells Rocco in a conversational tone. “You ever seen those huge pickup trucks of his? Well, that’s what I learned in when I was so little I had to sit on a pillow, even with the seat raised.”

  She racks back the slide and aims the pistol between his eyes.

  “He taught me how to shoot, too.”

  She squeezes the trigger.

  Click.

  Rocco jumps violently.

  “Oops.” Lucy smacks the magazine back inside the handle. “Forgot it wasn’t loaded. Get up, Rocco.”

  “You’re cops.” His voice trembles in fear and disbelief. “Cops don’t kill people. They don’t do this!”

  “I’m not a cop,” Rudy says to Lucy. “Are you a cop?”

  “No. I’m not a cop. I don’t see a single cop in this room, do you?”

  “Some CIA paramilitary operatives. Bet they sent you into Iraq, didn’t they? To take out Saddam Hussein. I know what people like you do.”

  “Never been to Iraq, have you?” Lucy says to Rudy.

  “Not recently.”

  ANOTHER WESTERN is playing on the TV.

  Mouths move out of sync as two cowboys dismount their horses, voices dubbed in Polish.

  “One last chance,” Rudy says to Rocco. “Where’s Jay Talley? Don’t lie. I promise I’ll know.”

  “He took a statement analysis course at the FBI Academy,” Lucy says drolly. “Was the star of the class.”

  Rocco slowly shakes his head. It is apparent by now that if he knew, he would tell them. He is a self-serving, sniveling coward, and right now he is more afraid of them than he is of Jay Talley.

  “Here’s the deal. We’re not going to kill you, Rocco.” Lucy tosses the pistol back to Rudy. “You’re going to commit suicide.”

  “No.” He shakes as if he has Parkinson’s disease.

  “You’re history, Rocco,” Rudy says. “A fugitive. A Red Notice. You can’t go anywhere anyway. You’ll be grabbed. If you’re lucky, you’ll end up in prison, probably in Sicily, and I hear that’s not a holiday. But you know better. The Chandonnes will take you out. Instantly. And perhaps not as humanely as you can end your own miserable, stinking life. Right now.”

  Lucy goes to the bed and digs an envelope out of her shoulder bag’s back pocket. Inside it is a folded sheet of paper. She opens it.

  “Here.” She offers it to Rocco.

  He makes no effort to touch it.

  “Take it. A hard copy of your Red Notice. Hot off the press. You must be curious.”

  Rocco doesn’t respond. Even his eyeballs seem to be shaking.

  “Take it,” Lucy tells him.

  Rocco does. The Red Notice shakes violently in his hands as he leaves his fingerprints on the paper, a detail he probably isn’t thinking about.

  “Now read it out loud. I think it’s very important you see what it says. Because I’m confident you’ll decide you have no choice but to kill yourself right here in this lovely hotel room,” Lucy says.

  The single page has Interpol’s crest in the upper right corner, of course in bright red. Prominently displayed is Rocco’s photograph, easily acquired. Egotist that he is, he has never ducked the camera when he’s represented criminals in scandalous trials. The picture on the Red Notice is recent and a very good likeness.

  “Read out loud,” Lucy orders him again. “Story time, Rocco.”

  “Identity particulars.” His voice wavers, and he continues to clear his throat. “Present family name, Rocco Caggiano. Name at birth, Peter Rocco Marino, Junior.”

  He pauses at this, and tears brighten his eyes. He bites his lower lip, then continues, reading on and on, all about himself. When he gets to the judicial information and reads that he is wanted for the murders of the Sicilian and French journalists, he rolls his eyes toward the ceiling.

  “Jesus,” he mutters, taking a deep breath.

  “That’s right,” Lucy says. “Arrest warrant number seven-two-six-oh for poor Mr. Guarino. Arrest warrant number seven-two-six-one for poor Monsieur La Fleur. Issued April twenty-fourth, 2003. Two days ago.”

  “Jesus fucking Christ.”

  “Your faithful client, Jean-Baptiste,” Lucy reminds him.

  “The bastard,” Rocco mutters. “After all I did for the ugly piece of shit.”

  “It’s over, Rocco,” Rudy says.

  He drops the Red Notice on top of the table.

  “I understand the Chandonnes can be pretty creative,” Lucy says. “Torture. Remember how much Jay Talley liked to string people up with rope and eyebolts and burn them with heat guns? Burn them until their skin was charred black. While they were alive and conscious. Remember how he tried to do that to my aunt while his fucking accomplice Bev Kiffin tried to blow me away with a shotgun?”

  Rocco stares off.

  She steps closer to him, the thought of what almost happened to her aunt tempting her to whip open her tactical baton and beat Rocco to death. She glances at it on the bedside table, knows better.

  “Drowning is another pet choice,” she goes on.

  Rocco jerks at this. “No,” he begs.

  “Remember Jean-Baptiste’s cousin Thomas? Drowned. Not a nice way to die.” She gives Rudy a look.

  He carefully wipes off the Colt with a corner of the bedsheet as an extra precaution, his face hard, his eyes gleaming with a detachment and determination that makes it possible for him to block out the sudden wave of empathy he feels for Rocco, no matter how unworthy of life he is.

  Rudy glances at Lucy and briefly their eyes touch like two sparks.

  Sweat rolls down Lucy’s face, wisps of hair plastered to her temples. She is pale, and Rudy knows that each of her attempts at dry humor and harshness are forced as she plays the most terrible role of her life.

  He pulls back the slide, chambering a round, and approaches Rocco.

  “Right-handed, you agree, partner?” Rudy calmly says to Lucy.

  “I agree.”

  She doesn’t take her eyes off Rocco. Her hands have begun to shake
, and she wills herself to think of Jay Talley and his evil paramour Bev Kiffin.

  Images.

  Lucy envisions the grief on her aunt’s face as she scattered what she believed were Benton Wesley’s ashes over the water. Lucy’s brain seems to slide inside her skull. She has never been seasick. It must feel something like this.

  “Your choice,” she says to Rocco. “I mean it. You can die now and feel no pain. No torture. No burns. No drowning. The Red Notice is found right where you dropped it, your suicide completely understandable. Or you can walk out of here, never knowing when you’ll breathe your last breath and what nightmare you’ll suffer when the Chandonnes get you. And they will.”

  He nods. Of course they will. It is a given.

  “Put out your right hand,” Rudy tells Rocco.

  Rocco rolls his eyes toward the ceiling again.

  “See? I’m holding the gun, I’m going to help you,” Rudy goes on, lightly, indifferently, as sweat drips on the carpet.

  “Make sure the barrel is pointed up,” Lucy says, thinking of the decapitated Nazi’s head.

  “Come on, Rocco. Do what I say. It won’t hurt. You won’t even know it.”

  Rudy touches the barrel against Rocco’s right temple.

  “Up,” Lucy reminds him again.

  “Your hand goes around the grips, and my hand goes around yours.”

  Rocco closes his eyes, and his hand jumps up and down. He closes his pudgy, short fingers around the grips, and Rudy’s big, strong hand immediately clamps over his.