Face blind, p.8
Face Blind, page 8
Hannah looked down and shuffled her feet. “I’m sorry, I’m afraid I don’t.”
“I’m George from the bank. We all miss you, you know.”
“Oh, hi. No, I changed jobs.” She still wasn’t sure who he was. “What… what are you doing up this way?”
“I’m on my way to see a client. Hey, it’s nice to see you. I’ll tell everyone hello for you!” With that, he continued on past her, not looking back at the bewildered woman. He waited a few moments, then turned around.
Hannah had continued walking south. She hadn’t recognized him at all. Cutler had no idea if there was a George at her old job. If so, then he had gotten lucky. If there hadn’t been, then it just added to her confusion.
Cutler crossed the avenue so that he could follow her from the opposite side. She’d never see him, and even if she did she wouldn’t know who he was.
He was convinced. The girl’s ability to recognize faces was nonexistent. Furthermore, the feeling that she was somehow familiar to him returned in full force. Cutler was fairly certain that he had met Hannah McCleary before, prior to the “dark time.”
Chapter 11
“Spits” Spinozza wiped the sweat from his forehead as he jogged around Washington Square. He cleared his throat and spat to his left, a habit he had nurtured since he was eight years old. It’s what blessed him with such an endearing nickname.
The jogging was just for show, of course. He really wasn’t putting much effort into it. But if there were any cops watching he could easily use the exercise as an excuse for being there. What he was really doing was selling nickel and dime bags of cocaine to his regular customers. The routine was simple. When he saw one of them, he would stop running but continue to jog in place. He would slap hands with the guy and in doing so deposit a small plastic bag of white powder into the customer’s palm. They would chat for another minute while Spits continued to prance, and then a final handshake would deliver the money from the customer to Spits. Spits would then take off jogging around the square again. He did this every day at noon for a full hour, and his customers knew to come and see him then. It worked like a charm.
Spits had completed a transaction with a strung-out New York University professor who was one of his regulars and had started running again. As he rounded a corner, he noticed a tall man standing in his path at the other end of the square. Spits had never seen him before, but the man was staring at him as if he were waiting for him. Perhaps he was a new customer, put on to him by one of the regulars? The guy looked too scary to be a cop. In fact, he looked like a Castellano goon.
Spits slowed the jogging as he approached the man.
“What’s up, man?” he asked, out of breath.
“Your name Spits?”
Spits performed the action that warranted his nickname. “Yeah,” he said, as he wiped his mouth. “Who the fuck are you?”
“Stop jogging.”
There was something about the way the man made the command that sent a chill up Spits’ back. Normally he would have ignored a guy like that, but in this case the menace was clearly tangible. Spits stopped and tried to catch his breath.
“Do I know you?” he asked again.
“Who I am is not important,” Dominic DeLauria said. “What’s important is that I find out who you sent to meet Charlie Patrone the other day.”
Spits felt his stomach jump into his chest. So that’s what this was about.
“Why?” Spits asked. “Something happen?”
“You don’t know?”
“No. What?”
“Patrone and his man were killed. Their stash was stolen. The Pontecorvas are not happy.”
“Shit, man, I didn’t know that! Honest!” Spits cried.
DeLauria put his arm around Spits’ shoulders and walked him over to a bench.
“Relax. Sit down,” he said. “We’re just gonna talk.”
Spits was still hopelessly attempting to catch his breath. “I swear I didn’t think that was going to happen. Man, I’m sorry! Shit!”
“Who were they, Spits, and how is it that you sent them in your place?”
“Listen man, I think I was conned. This chick found me here and she said she was from the Castellano family. She didn’t tell me her name.”
“What did she look like?”
“I dunno, man, pretty. Well, pretty damn pretty. A fox. She looked too good to be a con artist, you know what I mean?”
“Go on.”
“She was with a guy. He looked real familiar to me, but I couldn’t place him. Not until later. Anyway, she said that Marco Castellano wanted her to pick up the week’s shipment from Charlie instead of having me do it. I asked what am I supposed to do about my regular customers, and she said that Marco was gonna make it up to me in a week. This was last Wednesday, so that’s today. I was expecting him to come around. In fact, I thought that’s what I thought you were doing. I thought maybe Marco sent you.”
“No, Marco Castellano didn’t send me. Freddie Pontecorva sent me.”
For once, Spits swallowed instead of spitting. He knew that meant trouble.
“This woman didn’t give you her name?” DeLauria asked again.
Spits shook his head. “No. But the guy, I swear I knew him. I think he was that writer who was big about twenty years ago or so. John Cozzone. You know who he is?”
“No.”
“He wrote a couple of best sellers in the seventies. I’d swear it was him. I guess he’s a doper now, because the chick acted like they were gonna be distributing the stuff together. I don’t know, she just knew so much about the operation that I figured she was legit. I shoulda checked with Marco first.”
DeLauria nodded. “Is there anything else you can tell me about these two?”
Spits shook his head. “That’s all I know. I swear.”
“She didn’t go by the name of ‘Hannah,’ did she?”
“Not that I know of. I never heard her name.”
DeLauria sighed. “All right. Here’s what we’re gonna do. Come ‘ere.” He gestured for Spits to lean in so that DeLauria could whisper in his ear. As Spits did so, DeLauria thrust a Bowie knife into his victim’s belly. Spits gasped and grunted once, and then he clutched DeLauria’s shoulders as if he were confessing his sins to a dear friend. DeLauria forcefully pulled the knife up and into Spits’ upper cavity. Then he withdrew the knife and wiped the blood on the victim’s shirt. DeLauria immediately stood and walked away. Spits fell over, the blood spurting out of him as if he were a spigot. A girl nearby screamed. Two black kids playing basketball looked over and pointed. Someone yelled to call the cops.
DeLauria walked out of the square and got into a black sedan that was waiting at the curb. It sped away before anyone could get a positive I.D. on the license plate.
Inside the car, DeLauria told the driver, a kid named Favio, to take him home to his apartment in lower Manhattan. He was still holding the Bowie knife. He stuck it in the sheath that was strapped to his calf, under his trousers.
At least he had a lead, John Cozzone. DeLauria would find out more about this guy, learn where he lived, and discover what he was up to. Wherever Cozzone was, this “Hannah,” would also be, if that was her real name.
“I can see the Sears Tower,” Sophia said.
They were on the highway known as the Skyway, a toll road that curved around Lake Michigan from Indiana to Chicago.
“You know, we’re really fucking late,” Cozzone said as he passed a slow eighteen-wheeler. “Let’s hope Ramon hasn’t given up on us.”
“I thought you said you called him last night.”
“I did. All I got was voice mail. Hopefully he got the message.”
“Maybe we shouldn’t have spent so much time in Cleveland.”
“Hey, you’re the one who wanted to spend all day at the fucking Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame,” Cozzone said. “You’re the one who wanted to take a side trip to Philadelphia to see an old boyfriend who wasn’t home. Jesus, we left New York last Friday and here it is Wednesday!”
“Look, I thought he’d pay us a lot more for the stuff than your guy in Chicago, okay? And as for Cleveland, I haven’t had a goddamn vacation in years. So shoot me.”
Cozzone shook his head. “That’s the problem. I’m afraid somebody will after what you did in New York.”
“Are you still whining about that? They’ll never find us. Spits didn’t know who we were. He’s an asshole.”
“I just don’t like playing games with someone like Freddie Pontecorva. Or Marco Castellano. I may be Italian, but I’m not crazy.”
“Just shut up and drive,” Sophia said. “Marco Castellano’s not gonna do anything to me. He’s my cousin.”
“Yeah, I know, and Carlo Castellano’s your great uncle.”
Cozzone was fuming. He had had just about enough of Sophia Castellano. She had been wonderful for the few weeks he had been seeing her, she was fantastic in bed, she looked like she just stepped out of the pages of a Victoria’s Secret catalog, and she enjoyed drugs as much as he did. But she was beginning to be a First Class Bitch. Ever since he had agreed to go in with her on what they called the “Big Score,” she had assumed control and insisted on calling the shots. Cozzone had been more than happy to let her have her way, but enough was enough. The killings in New York changed everything. Cozzone was too freaked out to enjoy himself. They hadn’t had sex once in the five days since they left Manhattan. He wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to go to bed with her again.
What did he know about her, really? Only that she was the great niece of the head of one of New York’s alleged crime families. Carlo Castellano was the stuff of legends, a lot like his counterpart in the Pontecorva family. Cozzone knew quite a bit about how the Italian mafia worked these days because he had attempted to write a book about it. One thing was for sure – they didn’t act like the mobsters of the golden age. Cozzone thought that TV show, The Sopranos, got it right. What was left of the crime families in New York generally cooperated with each other and worked together.
Sophia Cabrini had known how the two families operated with regard to cocaine distribution. It had been her idea to con the Pontecorvas out of a shipment. Cozzone now realized that he had been an idiot for going along with it. During the ride through Indiana, Sophia had revealed that she was on the outs with the Castellano family for certain “acts” she had committed when she was younger. Now Cozzone didn’t trust her claim that the family would protect her if the Pontecorvas caught the two of them. She had proven in New York that she was dangerous, that she was a killer, and that she was unpredictable.
Frankly, she scared the shit out of him.
Chapter 12
Bill Cutler had spent all of Wednesday night turning MedScript’s storage room into a doctor’s office.
The room was located on an upper floor of the same building, which was inconvenient with regard to MedScript’s needs, but it was the best that the building management could offer. Doctors’ offices occupied the first three floors and other businesses took up the rest. The storeroom contained office supplies and spare furniture, including an unused desk. As manager of MedScript, he had the only key to the room. His brother didn’t give a damn about it. Thus, he felt fairly confident that he could do anything he wanted with the room and no one would be the wiser.
The first thing he did was to get a sign made that read: “Tom Cagle, L.C.S.W.” The initials stood for “Licensed Clinical Social Worker,” a title he had picked up from medical tapes. The sign had a reusable adhesive on the back so that he could put it on the outside of the door when he wanted it there, and then remove it when he didn’t.
The next thing he did was to find a place to store the excess supplies. These were made up of photocopy paper, desk supplies, cassette tapes, and the like. He decided that he could keep most of it in the trunk of his car, and the rest of it he could store at his apartment.
After the room was cleaned out, he re-arranged the spare furniture so that it appeared to be a respectable therapist’s office. The desk remained, of course. There was a filing cabinet, a bookshelf, and a couple of easy chairs. Cutler bought a small table that could fit between the chairs and on which he could place a tissue box and an ashtray. No reason why patients shouldn’t be allowed to smoke when they were revealing their souls! He stocked the bookshelf with several used books on psychology, substance abuse, and medical journals that he picked up at the Strand Bookstore.
Finally, the room was finished. His “patient,” Hannah McCleary, would be arriving at 7:30 that evening. Best that he go back to MedScript and put in some hours before then.
Hannah arrived on time and knocked on Dr. Cagle’s door.
Cutler had used theatrical spirit gum to paste on a fake mustache and had combed his hair differently in order to disguise his appearance somewhat. If what he had read about her condition was correct, then his patient would not recognize him as Detective Sean Flannery.
“Come in,” he said as he opened the door. “You must be Hannah?”
“Yes,” she said. She didn’t perform a double take when she saw him, so Cutler figured that he was home free.
“You’re right on time. Have a seat.”
“What kind of office is this?” she asked.
“I beg your pardon?”
“I mean, there’s no waiting room. What if you had someone else in here when I arrived?”
“Oh, don’t worry about that,” Cutler said. He had worked hard to achieve the accent he had first used on the phone, something a little like a Boston dialect. “I never schedule patients back to back. I do things a little differently, but I think you’ll find that’s why my patients like me.” He chuckled at his own good humor and sat down behind the desk.
Hannah stood in the middle of the room, unsure of how to react to the unorthodox environment.
“Please,” he said. “Sit down. Can I get you something to drink? Coffee? Soda?”
“No, thank you.” Finally, she sat in one of the lounge chairs. “I’ve never been to a therapist like this before. Usually there’s a couch and all.”
“I don’t believe in having my patients lie down when they talk. The point of all this is to discover things about yourself that might be causing problems. Sometimes this takes some work, and one can’t work lying down. I’ll never understand the whole lying down thing. I find that patients are able to talk better when they sit up.”
“I see.” She wouldn’t look at him. Her eyes tended to dart all over the room, never focusing on any single object.
“If you’d feel more comfortable turning the chair to face another direction, that’s quite all right,” Cutler said. “Some patients open up more if they’re facing the wall. You don’t have to look right at me.”
She shrugged. “I’m okay.”
“Fine.” He pulled out a folder and began to examine some papers he had placed inside of it for show. “Hannah McCleary. Doctor Lazar has told me about you, of course, but I’d like to hear a little from you. Why don’t we start by you telling me a bit about yourself?”
Hannah looked lost. “What… what do you want to know?”
“Anything that comes into your mind. If you had to describe yourself to a biographer, how would you do it? Not how you look, but how you are as a person. What kind of person are you? How did you grow up to be the person you are now? Who is Hannah McCleary? What does she like, what does she dislike? What are her dreams and her goals? What is she afraid of? What are your hobbies? Really, tell me anything you’d like.”
She still looked lost. “I don’t know where to begin.”
“All right, start with your childhood. Where are you from? What was your family like?”
She shrugged again and looked at the floor. Cutler noted that she was terribly shy. “I don’t know, they were okay,” she mumbled. “I grew up in Albany. I’m an only child. My mother was a librarian and my father sold insurance. My father died of a heart attack when I was six. My mother died of cancer when I was fourteen. I lived with an aunt for a while until I finished high school, and then I moved out into an apartment. I went to business school for two years, and then I came to New York. I’ve been here ever since.”
“What did you study in college?”
“Business.”
He gestured with his eyebrows, urging her to be more specific.
“Well, accounting, mostly. I’m good with numbers,” she answered.
“I see. And did you find work in the big city?”
“Yeah. Someone I knew at school had a job in a bank here, so I had an ‘in.’ I worked downtown at Chase for several years until… well, until I couldn’t…”
“Until what happened to you happened?” he asked gently.
She looked down again. “Yes.”
“That was five years ago, right?”
“Yes.”
“Before we get into that, tell me some more about yourself. What do you like to do? What do you want to do that you’ve never done?”
She was quiet for a few seconds and then she shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess I used to like to go shopping. But I never had much money so I ended up not buying anything. I don’t… I don’t go shopping much anymore. I don’t like crowds.”
“What else? What do you like to do now?”
Cutler found her uneasiness painfully endearing. She was cute in a librarian sort of way. It was interesting that her mother had been one, for she was the stereotypical type of young librarian a schoolboy would have a crush on.
“I don’t like to do much of anything now,” she said. She had begun a nervous tic of pulling on her fingers.
“Do you go to movies? Read books?”
“I don’t go to movies much. I can’t follow them because I often can’t keep the characters straight. I read magazines, mostly. Sometimes I’ll read a book. I listen to the radio. I like music, I guess.”
“Do you have many friends?”
She shook her head. “I don’t have any friends. Well, I guess I have one or two. My neighbor, a floor below me, she’s okay. Her name is Liz Rosenthal. She’s… well, she’s a lesbian and I think she likes me, if you know what I mean, but she’s never made a big deal out of it. She comes over and we have coffee together, or I go to her apartment.”
