Charlie Opera (28 page)

Now the Nicholas Cuccia dilemma was a sideshow. Walsh had had enough of Detective Iandolli for one day. He instructed the organized crime detective to stay where he was. “I’m ordering you to wait there for me,” he said. “I’m ordering you to stay right there at the crime scene. Don’t move. Don’t dare move.”

When the connection was broken, Agent Walsh punched the roof of the sedan he was standing alongside. It was bad enough that the detective had cut him off and was disobeying orders. It was another, more important, issue that Walsh had no idea where Iandolli was going.

Iandolli left Gold in the hotel room with the maid as he searched the pool area just outside the tower elevator bank. He tried the shopping arcade and some of the stores along the Appian Way. When he spotted the entrance to the big shopping mall, Iandolli knew it was where Nicholas Cuccia had escaped. Still, he had no idea how long ago or in which direction the New York mobster-killer had gone.

Iandolli returned to Anthony Rizzi’s room to see how the maid was doing. When he got there, Iandolli saw Gold sobbing on the edge of the bed. The maid lay at Gold’s feet. Her eyes were opened wide in an all-too-familiar death stare.

“If you let me, when he shows, I’ll shoot the son of a bitch right in the face,” Gold told Iandolli.

They were watching Charlie Pellecchia from the surveillance van parked across the street from Samantha Cole’s residence. Pellecchia was walking up the block from the corner. A taxi had dropped him off. He walked a small white dog on a leash. He carried a small cage with his free hand. They could see a large plastic bag inside the cage.

“It’s not your way,” Iandolli said, “whacking somebody in cold blood. It’s not my way, either.”

Gold was holding his weapon on his lap. He wiped sweat from his forehead with the back of his free hand.

“I just hope he shows,” he said. “I hope he didn’t make it out of Vegas.”

Iandolli was checking his rearview and sideview mirrors. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Cuccia isn’t leaving Las Vegas without taking a last shot at this poor slob walking that dog. Not after what Pellecchia did to his life.”

Gold watched as Pellecchia stopped to let the dog urinate on a small patch of grass. “He thinks he’s back in New York,” he said.

Iandolli said, “You want to write him up?”

Samantha decided to wait on the porch for Charlie. It was early evening. She sat on the top step and nodded at the officer sitting behind the wheel of the cruiser parked in front of her apartment. She noticed the white van parked across the street and wondered if Charlie had sent flowers ahead of his arrival.

When she heard a snippy bark to her left, Samantha craned her neck to look over the bushes. She spotted Charlie’s head and used her crutches to stand up. When she saw the small white dog on the leash, Samantha waved.

“What’s her name?” she asked from the top of the porch. Samantha held her hands out for the dog to come to her.

Charlie scooped up the bichon frise and brought it to her. He talked at the dog as he carried it. “Okay,” he said. “Now you really have to perform or she’ll kick us both out.”

“Did you name her?” Samantha asked again. She held the dog up to her face to kiss. The puppy was in the middle of a licking frenzy. Samantha had to turn her head away.

“Rigoletto,” Charlie said. “And she’s a he.”

Samantha checked the dog’s sex. “Oh,” she said. “That’s a weird name, Rigo-what?”

“Rigoletto.”

Samantha set her crutches to the side and sat again. “That’s a real name?” she asked. “Rigo-something?”

“Rigoletto,” Charlie repeated. “
Rigoletto
is an opera.”

“Opera?” Samantha said, as she rolled her eyes. “You poor baby,” she told the dog in a high-pitched voice. “Yes, yes, yes. You poor baby.”

“Oh, boy,” Charlie said.

The tiny bulb above the mirror in the bathroom provided just enough light to read the local street map. Cuccia had been sitting quietly in the women’s bathroom of a Texaco station for the past forty minutes. His legs were numb. He stood up and down over and over to pump blood through his legs.

He knew he had to stay off the streets. His face was too bruised not to attract attention. Every cop and federal agent in the area was looking for him.

His jaw hurt. He could taste blood around the stitches inside his mouth. The tiny mirror above the small sink in the bathroom reflected Cuccia’s badly bruised face. He parted his lips as much as he could to see the gap where two teeth were missing. He saw gauze and blood instead. He wiped at blood that trickled out of his mouth.

According to the street map, Samantha Cole lived less than half a mile from the gas station. Cuccia opened the bathroom door a crack to peek outside. It was dark and time to move.

They had moved the van after Charlie Pellecchia and the woman went inside the apartment. Iandolli drove the van around the corner, out of sight of the apartment. He took a pair of night vision binoculars from the equipment box in the console, and the two detectives headed around the back of the complex.

“What do you think?” he asked Gold.

“I think he’ll come this way, but we’re too far from the door.”

“Me, too.”

“We may be here all night,” Gold said. “We don’t communicate with anybody, we won’t know if he’s been found or not. Cuccia could be dead for all we know.”

“I can have Gina monitor the radio at home,” Iandolli said. “Just in case.”

“Don’t involve your wife,” Gold said. “Trust me.”

Iandolli smiled. “Where do you think we should post?”

“Close as possible. But you’re the surveillance expert.”

“I agree. He’ll be looking for an address, but he’ll come this way when he spots the cruiser.”

“You really think Cuccia will find his way here?”

“It was our first thought, both of us,” Iandolli said.

“Great minds,” Gold said.

Special Agent Walsh flashed his badge to stop John Denton and Lisa Pellecchia. The couple was leaving the hospital for the airport. “Sorry, sir. Ma’am. You can’t leave Las Vegas just yet.”

Lisa looked up at Denton from her wheelchair. “Why not?” Denton asked.

“Because Nicholas Cuccia has escaped custody, for one thing. And I say so is the other reason.”

“You say so?” Denton asked.

“This is serious, Mr. Denton. A federal drug enforcement agent is in a coma right now because of Nicholas Cuccia. We have reason to believe Cuccia may be looking for Mr. Pellecchia. Until we can locate the suspect, we don’t think you or Mrs. Pellecchia should be left unprotected.”

“Then take us to the airport,” Lisa said.

“She has a point,” Denton said. “If this is really about protection.”

“We don’t have the manpower,” Walsh said. “Sorry.”

“So we’re detained until this guy is caught?” Denton asked. “Are you serious?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“For what? Unless you’re going to arrest us. Are we being arrested?”

Walsh wasn’t in the mood for a lawyer. “I can do that. If you’d like. I can arrest you.”

“For what?” Denton repeated.

“For what?” Lisa added.

“Assault,” Walsh said. He turned to Denton. “Back at the Bellagio. I think you know what I’m talking about.”

“This is bullshit,” Denton said.

“We need to find Mr. Pellecchia,” Walsh said. “Ma’am, do you know where he is? You might save his life. Nicholas Cuccia has killed at least three people today.”

Lisa spoke without thinking. “His girlfriend,” she said. She looked to Denton. “Right?”

Denton frowned. Walsh waited. “Mr. Denton?” he said. “You could save the man’s life.”

Denton looked down at Lisa. She looked up at him with a gentle smile. “I lived with the man for five years,” she said. “I figured it out.”

Denton nodded at Walsh. “All right,” Denton said. “All right.”

The puppy lay asleep on Samantha’s lap as Charlie set a cover on the pot of sauce he was cooking. She smiled at him when he took a seat on the couch beside her.

“Smells pretty good,” she said.

Charlie leaned across her lap to pet the dog. He kissed Samantha on the cheek. “So do you.”

“About how long will that sauce take?” Samantha asked.

“Forty minutes.”

“Can you make it take forty-five?”

They kissed.

“I missed that,” he told her.

“Me, too,” she said.

They kissed again. Samantha held Charlie tight. It was good holding him again. She missed him. She was glad he was there.

He moved closer as they embraced around the dog. He leaned into a kiss when he felt something hard under his leg. “What’s this?”

He pulled a .25 from between the couch pillows.

“Oh, shit,” Samantha said. “That’s what he shot me with. Beau, Carol’s husband. I just assumed he took it with him.”

“Yeah, and so did the cops,” Charlie said as he set the gun on an end table. “Which reminds me,” he added as he removed the .22 he had bought from the hookers from his pants pocket and set it alongside Beau’s gun.

“Where did you get that?” Samantha asked.

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” Charlie said.

The puppy was climbing on Samantha’s chest. It licked at both their faces as its tail wagged excitedly.

“Ooooh, the pretty baby!” Samantha said in a high-pitched voice. “Oooh, the pretty baby!”

She picked the dog up to hold against her face. Charlie shook his head as he backed away from them on the couch. He said, “I knew I should’ve bought flowers.”

When Minh learned where Charlie Pellecchia was, he grinned. It was the same address Minh had copied on the street where all the police activity had been the day before.

“Police cruiser park in front,” his man told Minh in broken English. “One cop in car.”

Minh told his man to make sure he was waiting behind the apartment complex and that his gas tank was full. Then he screwed a silencer onto the end of his weapon’s barrel and picked up an order of Chinese food from a local restaurant.

Minh planned to make a delivery to the address where the police cruiser was parked. Then, as soon as Minh was inside the apartment, he would shoot Charlie Pellecchia.

Gold was crouched behind the bushes alongside the narrow gap between buildings where Samantha Cole lived. On the other side of the gap, Iandolli used night vision binoculars to scan the area behind the complex.

“How long before you figure the Feds roll up?” Gold whispered.

“They may already be here. Up the block somewhere we can’t see, or on a roof. Who knows? They’re anxious to get Cuccia after what happened.”

“They’re probably still tripping over their own feet.”

“Maybe,” Iandolli said. He could tell Gold was nervous. Neither detective had ever been in this type of situation before, laying in wait for a killer.

Iandolli scanned the area to his left. He held the binoculars steady as he moved slowly from left to right across the tops of the hedges around the pool. When he reached the last hedge to his right, Iandolli noticed somebody walking alongside it. He whispered to Gold to remain quiet.

The Glock was stuffed inside Cuccia’s pants against his lower back. The agent’s weapon was jammed in the front of his pants. He pulled down the baggy Hard Rock Café sweatshirt he had bought from a souvenir shop to cover both guns.

It was too dark to spot a surveillance team, but the police cruiser parked up the block couldn’t be more obvious. Cuccia had walked the half mile from the gas station without a problem.

Samantha Cole lived at number 6325. Cuccia stopped to read one of the addresses on a building to his right. “Sixty-three thirteen,” he whispered to himself. He walked around the corner to the back of the apartment complex.

As Cuccia passed the building on his left now, he counted to himself. He did the same with the next building and the one after that. When he came to a stop again, Cuccia was standing directly behind 6325. He reached for the gun in his waistband when he heard the sound of a motorbike nearby.

Minh Quan parked two spots behind the police cruiser and crossed the front lawn diagonally to the front door. He carried the bag of Chinese food to cover the Beretta tucked in his pants. When he reached the short stairway, the policeman was out of the car and called to him.

“Food delivery,” Minh said, affecting a more pronounced accent.

The policeman eyed him a few seconds until Minh held up the bag of food. Then the cop waved him on and sat back inside the cruiser.

Minh rang the doorbell two times as he grabbed the gun.

Gold hadn’t prayed for anything in a long time. The veteran detective didn’t have much faith in religion. He believed that mankind made its own bed. He believed in the justice his police work was supposed to provide. He believed in the law.

But the law had failed miserably for a forty-six-year-old maid going about the business of earning a living, and Gold couldn’t get over her death. Ever since he had tried and failed to revive the poor woman, Gold prayed for the chance to kill the man who had killed her.

Now that man was standing about ten feet away.

Iandolli saw the motorcycle make a sharp U-turn in the background. He watched it until he saw Nicholas Cuccia reaching for and holding the gun. Iandolli set the night vision glasses on the grass and stood up in a firing stance.

“Hold it!” he yelled. “Drop your weapon!”

“Fuck me,” Cuccia said. He had half-turned toward the sound of the motorcycle. When he looked back, Iandolli sighted his weapon on Cuccia’s chest.

“Drop it!” Iandolli repeated. “Drop your weapon!”

Iandolli waited for Cuccia to drop his gun before half-stepping across the back lawn toward the gangster. “Don’t fucking breathe,” Iandolli said.

Cuccia raised his hands slowly as the sound of screeching tires filled the night air. “Take it easy, big man,” he said. “You could hurt somebody with that thing.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Iandolli said.

Cuccia saw another cop coming out from behind the bushes. He was short and bald. The cop held his weapon loosely in his right hand. He was close to a foot shorter than the big cop standing to his left.