Blue Smoke (30 page)

“One of his tires was flat, late at night, dark country road. They figured he flagged down the wrong person, or somebody came along, tried to shake him down. Kills him. Pushes the car into the woods, lights it up, hopes the fire covers the tracks. Which, essentially, it did. The case is still open.”

She drew a breath. “I never made any connection, not on the surface. Hell, my uniform buttons were still bright and shiny. Who was I to question seasoned cops just because I had a sick feeling down in the belly? We'd gone out a couple of times, and we were both thinking it might lead to more. But we weren't a couple. He was killed in North Carolina. Arrows weren't pointing at somebody who'd fired up my father's restaurant a dozen years before. I should've seen it.”

“Yeah, too bad your crystal ball was on the fritz that day.”

While she appreciated the sarcasm and the sentiment behind it, it didn't cool her blood. “Fire, O'Donnell. It's always fire. Josh, Hugh, Luke's car and now Bo. It's always fire. There might have been more, things I didn't focus in on. Case is still open.”

“Difference is, now he wants you to know.”

Laura Pastorelli worked the counter at a 7-Eleven near the Maryland/ D.C. line. She was fifty-three, and carried the years poorly on a rickety frame. Lines, dug deeper by worry and sorrow than by years, scored her face. Her salt-and-pepper hair framed it without style. Around her neck was a silver cross. That and her wedding ring were her only jewelry.

She glanced up when O'Donnell and Reena came in, and her gaze passed over Reena without recognition.

“Help you?” She said it without interest, something she said by habit dozens of times a day.

“Laura Pastorelli?” O'Donnell showed his badge, and Reena saw the instinctive flinch before Laura's lips thinned.

“What do you want? I'm working. I haven't done anything wrong.”

“We need to ask you a few questions regarding your husband and your son.”

“My husband lives in New York. I haven't seen him for five years.” Her fingers crept up her skinny chest to fondle the silver cross.

“And Joey?” Reena waited until Laura's gaze shifted to her face. “You don't remember me, Mrs. Pastorelli? I'm Catarina Hale, from the neighborhood.”

Recognition crept as slowly as her fingers. When it hit, Laura averted her eyes. “I don't remember you. I haven't been back to Baltimore in years.”

“You remember me,” Reena said gently. “Maybe there's somewhere more comfortable where we can talk.”

“I'm working. You're going to make me lose my job, and I haven't done anything. Why can't you people leave us alone?”

O'Donnell walked over to a doughy-faced man in his early twenties, who wasn't doing much to pretend he wasn't avidly listening. He was wearing a name tag that said: Dennis.

“Dennis, why don't you take over at the counter for a few, while Mrs. Pastorelli takes a little break?”

“I gotta do stock.”

“Paid by the hour, aren't you? Watch the counter.” O'Donnell walked back. “Why don't we step outside, Mrs. Pastorelli? It's a nice day.”

“You can't make me. You can't.”

“It'll be more difficult if we have to come back,” Reena said quietly. “We don't want to have to speak to your supervisor, or make this any more complicated for you.”

Saying nothing, Laura came out from behind the counter, walked outside with her head bowed. “He paid. Joe paid for what happened. It was an accident. He'd been drinking and it was an accident. Your father pushed him. He said lies about Joey and pushed at Joe so he got drunk, that's all. Nobody got hurt. Insurance covered everything, didn't it? We had to move away.”

Her head came up now, tears glimmering in her eyes. “We had to move away, and Joe went to jail. Isn't that enough penance?”

“Joey was awfully upset, wasn't he?” Reena said.

“They took his father
away.
In handcuffs. In front of the whole neighborhood. He was just a little boy. He needed his father.”

“It was a difficult time for your family.”

“Difficult? It busted my family to pieces. You—Your father said terrible things about my Joey. People heard what he said. What Joe did wasn't right. ‘Vengeance is mine, sayeth the Lord,' but it wasn't his fault. He'd been drinking.”

“He served additional time. Got himself in some jams when he was in prison,” O'Donnell pointed out.

“Had to protect himself, didn't he? Prison scarred his soul. He was never the same after.”

“Your family has grievances against mine. Against me.”

Laura frowned at her. “You were a child. You can't lay blame on a child.”

“Some do. Do you know if either your husband or your son has been back to Baltimore recently?”

“I told you, Joe's in New York.”

“Not a long trip. Maybe he wanted to see you.”

“He won't talk to me. He's fallen away from the Church. I pray for him every night.”

“He must still see Joey.”

She lifted a shoulder, but even that small gesture seemed to take more effort than she had to expend. “Joey doesn't come around much. He's busy. He has a lot of work.”

“When's the last time you heard from Joey?”

“Few months. He's busy.” Her voice took on an insistent shrill, almost like weeping. Reena thought of how she'd wept into a yellow dishcloth.

“You people are always pointing the finger at him. They took his father away, they took
him
away. So, he got in some trouble, he did some wrong things. But he's okay now. He's got work.”

“What kind of work?”

“He's a mechanic. He learned about cars when he was in jail. About cars and computers and all sorts of things. He's got education, and he's got good, steady work up in New York.”

“At a garage?” O'Donnell prompted. “You know the name of it?”

“Something like Auto Rite. In Brooklyn. Why don't you leave him alone?”

S
he didn't recognize me,” Reena commented when they were back in the car. “But once she did, she wasn't surprised I was a cop. Somebody's kept her abreast of the local events from the old neighborhood.”

O'Donnell nodded, acknowledging Reena as he made a call, scribbled a number. “Got an Auto Rite in Brooklyn.” After a brief hesitation, he handed the page from his notebook to Reena. “You take Junior, I'll take Senior.”

Back at her desk, Reena put a call through to the garage. Over the sound of the Black Crowes, and considerable clanging, she had a brief conversation with the owner.

“Joey did work at the garage,” she told O'Donnell. “For about two months, a year ago. Place was broken into twice during that two months, equipment and tools stolen. Last break-in somebody drove off with a Lexus. One of the other mechanics claimed he heard Joey bragging about the easy pickings. Owner informed the cops, who questioned. Couldn't pin him, but he got fired over it. Five months later, the place is broken into again in what looks like vandalism. Cars beat to shit, graffiti all over the walls, and a wastebasket fire.”

“And where was our boy when the party was going on?”

“Allegedly in Atlantic City. Had three people verify. His alibis are connected, O'Donnell. The Carbionellis. New Jersey family.”

“Your childhood nemesis got himself connected?”

“It's going to be worth finding out. I'll run the three names who backed him up.”

“Meanwhile, Senior's currently unemployed. Had work cleaning a couple of bars, lost it for helping himself to too much of the booze. Six weeks ago.”

“One or both,” Reena added. “One or both are in Baltimore.”

“Oh yeah. Why don't we call our friends in New York, ask them to check it out?”

Her stomach was knotted, something she wasn't ready to share even with her partner. She offset it by concentrating on the routine of the work. Gathering data, drawing the lines, writing it up until she was ready to update both her partner and their captain.

A case. She had to think of it as a case, objectively, with just that sliver of distance. Because she couldn't actively—officially—investigate the
vehicular fire, she signaled Younger and Trippley before she went with O'Donnell in to the captain.

“You two need to hear what we've got,” she told them.

Captain Brant gestured them in.

“Working on a theory,” O'Donnell began and nodded for Reena to take the lead.

She ran through it, from the fire at Sirico's the summer she'd been eleven, to the destruction of Bo's truck the night before.

“The younger Pastorelli is known to pal around with three members of the Carbionelli family, out of New Jersey. He did some time in Rikers with a Gino Borini—a cousin of Nick Carbionelli. It was Carbionelli, Borini and another low level who alibied Pastorelli for the night the garage was hit.

“It looked like kids,” she continued. “Five months since he'd gotten the ax, and it was set up to look like a bunch of kids, or amateurs. Destruction, petty theft, a half-assed fire to cover it. They didn't look at him very hard.”

“We've got the locals doing some legwork,” O'Donnell added. “It's not on their priority list, but they'll send two detectives out to last known addresses.”

“There was a lot of similarity between the car fire several years ago involving Luke Chambers and the one last night.” She looked at Trippley. “Maybe he used the same device in the gas tanks.”

“We'll look at that.”

“Captain, I want to reopen Joshua Bolton's case.”

“Younger can take it. Fresh eye, Detective,” he said to Reena. “You've been looking at that case regularly for years. Let's get the tap on your phone. Goodnight's phone. Take another pass at the wife.”

L
aura Pastorelli's shift had ended, so they headed to her address. It was a small, tidy house on a narrow street. An old Toyota Camry sat in the drive. Reena noted the St. Christopher's magnet on the dash, and one of the trinkets called a parking angel perched on it.

When they knocked, the door was opened by a woman of about the same age as Laura, but with a lot less wear on her. Her face was round and carefully made up, her dark brown hair styled. She wore navy pants with a white camp shirt tucked neatly in the waistband.

A fluffy orange Pomeranian sat at her legs, yapping its lungs out.

“Be
quiet,
Missy, you old fool. She's an ankle nipper,” the woman said. “Fair warning.”

“Yes, ma'am.” Reena held out her badge. “We'd like to speak with Laura Pastorelli.”

“She's at church this time of day. Goes by every afternoon after work. Was there trouble at the store?”

“No, ma'am. What church would that be?”

“Saint Michael's, over on Pershing.” Her eyes narrowed. “If there wasn't trouble at the store, this must be about either her worthless husband or her worthless son.”

“Do you know if she's been in contact with either Joseph Pastorelli Senior or Junior?”

“Wouldn't tell me if she had. I'm her sister-in-law. Patricia Azi. Mrs. Frank Azi. You might as well come in.”

O'Donnell looked dubiously at the still yapping ball of fur, and Patricia smiled thinly. “Give me a minute. God sake, Missy, will you put a lid on it!” She scooped up the dog and carried it off. They heard a door slam before she came back.

“My husband's in love with that idiot dog. We've had her eleven years now, and she's still half crazy. Come on in. You want to talk to Laura, she'll probably finish wearing her sackcloth and ashes in another half hour.” She sighed heavily, gestured toward a small, cozy living room. “Sounds bitchy, sorry. It's not easy living with a martyr.”

Reena gauged the ground, offered a sympathetic smile. “My grandmother always said two women can't share a house comfortably, no matter how fond they might be of each other. It's got to be one woman's kitchen.”

“She really doesn't get in the way much, and she can't afford her own place. Or barely. We've got room. Kids're grown. And she works hard, insists on paying rent. Are you going to tell me what this is about?”

“Her husband and her son may have information regarding a case we're investigating,” Reena began. “When we spoke with Mrs. Pastorelli earlier today, she indicated it had been some time since she'd had contact with either of them. We're just doing a follow-up.”

“Like I said, she wouldn't have told me if she'd seen or talked to either of them. She wouldn't tell Frank either, not after he laid down the law.”

Part of cop work was simply picking up on someone's rhythm and going with it. So Reena smiled and said, “Oh?”

“He showed up right before Christmas last year, right out of the blue. Laura cried buckets, her-prayers-had-been-answered sort of thing.” Patricia cast her eyes heavenward.

“I'm sure she was happy to see her son again.”

“When a bad penny gets stuck in your shoe, it's smart to dig it out before you end up half crippled.”

“You and your nephew don't get along,” O'Donnell prompted.

“I'll say it straight out, he scares me. Worse than his father, sneakier, and I guess a lot smarter.”

“Has he ever threatened you, Mrs. Azi?”

“Not directly—just the look in his eye. He's been in jail a few times, I guess you know. Laura likes to make excuses for him, but the fact is, he's a bad one. And here he is, on my doorstep. We didn't like it, Frank and me, but you don't turn family away. At least you don't want to. So he shows up . . . Sorry, I didn't offer you any coffee.”

“We're fine,” Reena assured her. “Joey came to see his mother for the holidays?”

“Maybe. I know he was full of himself. Driving a fancy car, wearing expensive clothes. Gave her a watch with diamonds around the face, and diamond earrings. Wouldn't surprise me if he'd stolen them, but I kept quiet about it. Claimed he had a big deal going, some club he and some
partners
”—she made air quotes around the word—“were going to open in New York and make piles more money. My husband asked him how he was going to open a club, could he get a liquor license because he had a record, and like that. Got under Joey's skin, I could tell, but he just got
that little sneer on his face and said there were ways. Anyway, that's not important.”

She waved it away. “He stayed for dinner, said he had himself a hotel suite, and spent an hour or so bragging. But every time Frank asked him a direct question about this new business of his, he got evasive and pissy with it. Things got heated, and what does Joey do? He swipes his arm over the table, broke my dishes, threw food all over the walls. Yelling and cursing at Frank, who got right up in his face. Frank's not one to back down, and you can bet he's not going to tolerate that kind of thing in his own house.”

She gave a decisive nod. “He's got a right to ask questions and express opinions in his own home. Laura's taking up for Joey, grabs at Joey's arm, and what does he do? He hit her. He hit his own mother in the face!”