Worth Dying For (20 page)

She really liked Phil but she enjoyed Jesse’s company the most. He was a riot to be around and was sure to lift the dourest of spirits. She also loved that he liked to shop and the two of them had went on several shopping sprees in the specialty shops down in Palo Alto. She was grateful for the friendship they had so easily offered her. Her only wish was that it had happened under different circumstances.

Chapter 16

Sonny looked at the shadowy figure standing in the recessed doorway. “You’re taking a big risk meeting like this,” he said.

“I didn’t have much choice. The Assistant Deputy Director’s getting too close.”

Sonny lit his cigarette and laughed. “Well, what do you want me to do about it? Kill him?”

“I don’t know but you need to do something and do it fast. He has some hotshot programmer back in Washington running some new computer program. It’s only a matter of time before my name comes up.”

“Don’tcha think you’re overreacting a bit? You’re the last person on the planet they’d ever suspect of laying in bed with the mob,” Sonny snorted.

“Damn it to hell. Do not tell me how to react! I’m telling you we have a problem and if they tie me to these hits, your ass is going down right along with me.”

“I thought you said you covered your tracks,” Sonny said, unable to keep the agitation from his voice.

“I did cover my tracks.”

“Then how the hell they gonna trace it back to you?”
  

“They’re not just looking at Scala’s murder, they’re looking at Vinci and Pisano and a few others, too.”

“Vinci and Pisano?” Sonny asked, not understanding the meaning.

“Did I fucking stutter?”

Sonny leaned back against the doorframe, trying to place the names. After a few seconds, it dawned on him. “Vinci and Pisano. Jesus, that was over ten years ago,” he said, taking a long drag on his cigarette. “Vinci and Pisano were killed in car accidents. Why are they looking at them now?” he asked.

“I don’t know and I really don’t give a rat’s ass. All I care about is me not being linked to them in any way, shape, or form.”

“Can’t you do something on your end to derail the program?”

“No, it would only make it look more suspicious. I’m too close to the investigation as it is.”

Sonny dropped the cigarette butt and stomped it out with his shoe. He nodded as he looked at the shadowy figure. “Well, you’re right. We have to do something. You have any ideas?”

“Yeah, I do. I have one that just might work, but you’ll have to move fast.”

Sonny smiled and lit another cigarette. “I’m all ears,” he said, exhaling the smoke.

###

Rheyna hit the speed dial again and waited for Laura to answer. It rang seven times and then went into her voice mail. “Damn it,” she said, pressing the speed dial again. Once again, it rang seven times and then went into her voice mail. She decided to leave a message this time. “Hey, Laura, it’s me again. I left you a voice mail earlier and I hope you’re getting these messages. You know I wouldn’t normally do this without any backup or a safety net, but I don’t have much choice. This might be the only chance I get to check out Bayshore. If you’ve listened to my earlier message, you’ll know the details. Also, if you don’t hear from me within two hours, send re-enforcements.”

She hung up the phone and then made sure it was on vibrate, just to be on the safe side. She definitely couldn’t afford for it to ring if Castrucci or his goons were around. She also knew that Laura wouldn’t call until the two-hour window had passed.

She tucked the phone inside her side pocket and then reached over to open the glove box. She pulled out a four-by-four-inch black case. She flipped the lid open, removed the wireless ear bud, and inserted it into her ear. She blew into the tiny microphone to test the receiver and cringed at the highly amplified sound that echoed straight through her brain. She wasn’t sure if she would need these items tonight, but had packed them just in case.

What she was about to do was the riskiest move she had made so far in the investigation, next to planting the pen in Castrucci’s office. Earlier in the week, she had gotten the chance to affix a quarter-sized radio transmitter under the edge of the table by the pool where Castrucci conducted business. The downside to the device was that it had a battery life of about eight days.

She had thought her time had all but run out when she caught a break. Castrucci, Sonny, and Henry were having lunch when Sonny received a phone call. It was difficult to put it all together, since Caroline was talking in one ear while she was trying to listen in on the conversation at the table with the other.

The phone call was from someone named Charlie. She hadn’t heard his name mentioned before and couldn’t remember him being listed on any of her briefing reports. Castrucci had referred to him as
Tuna
. From what she could gather, Charlie had a package for them at Bayshore, as well as a gift for Roberto. Those names she did recognize. Roberto was Massino’s right-hand man and Bayshore was one of Castrucci’s exporting warehouses down at the docks.

After consulting with Castrucci, Sonny confirmed that they would stop in at the warehouse later that evening. He told Charlie they had a previous engagement and would stop by around eight or nine. After Sonny hung up, she had said her goodbyes a few minutes later, leaving under the pretense of a photo shoot appointment. The only appointment she had was with Bayshore, and she was hoping Castrucci showed up closer to nine. The later the better and nine o’clock meant that it would be dark enough for her to move around more easily. It would also lessen her chances of being discovered.

She went home and prepped her gear, grabbed a bite to eat and took Annie for a walk along the beach. Afterward, she slipped on a pair of black cargo pants and a matching hooded jacket with a drawstring and headed out the door. She arrived around seven-thirty and parked her Jeep in a crowded parking lot behind a warehouse located a
 
little way from Bayshore. She parked there because she couldn’t risk Castrucci or his men recognizing her Jeep.

She glanced at her watch and then opened the car door. Her plan was to get there before they arrived and get inside the building to look around. She wasn’t sure if the building had an alarm system, so she came prepared, bringing along a bypass switch and clip to override the alarm inside the main box. After seeing how the Castrucci estate was wired, she had no doubt that Bayshore would be protected just as well. She made her way across the parking lot and through a field of tall grass that led to several more parking lots.

She heard voices and ducked down in the weeds. She watched several people from the warehouse closest to her file out the back door and head to their cars.

“Come on, damn it. Not now,” she swore under her breath. Two of the women from the warehouse stopped next to a red truck. They were having a heated discussion. The shorter of the two was upset and flailing her hands wildly in the air. The other woman nodded her head and patted the shorter woman on the shoulder.

“There’s no way I can move. They’ll see me” she whispered as she watched the women. Whatever the other woman said, it must have calmed the shorter one down. It was only a few minutes but it felt like forever before they finally got in their cars and backed out of the parking lot.

Bent in a half-crouched position, she quickly made her way across the parking lot. She pressed her back against the side of the building to avoid an approaching set of headlights. She dropped down behind a set of boxes, just as the car turned into the parking lot. The car slowed to a crawl, its searchlight moving up and down the back of the buildings. She held her breath and leaned forward so she could see around the boxes.

She watched the patrol car drive slowly by, and used the back of her arm to wipe off the perspiration beading on her forehead. From her position, she could see the corner of Bayshore. She figured it was approximately fifty to seventy-five yards away. She waited for the patrol car brake lights to disappear around the corner and stood up. She waited a few more minutes to make sure he turned back on the main road before continuing toward the building.

The sun had set and it was getting extremely dark. She glanced at her watch and silently cursed herself. She had wasted more than thirty minutes getting across the parking lots. She couldn’t believe how quickly the sun had disappeared, making it almost impossible for her to see her hand in front of her face.

She slowly made her way across the back of the building and thought she was doing pretty good to keep quiet, considering the stabs of pain shooting through her legs each time she bumped into a wooden skid, or whatever else was stacked on the ground.
I’ll be covered in bruises this time tomorrow,
she thought when she finally reached the edge of the building. She peered around the corner and looked into the small alley that stood between her and Bayshore.

She listened to make sure she didn’t hear anything and then quickly made her way over to a tractor-trailer backed against Bayshore’s dock door. She ducked under the trailer and walked toward what vaguely resembled a set of steps that she assumed led into the back of the warehouse. She missed the first step and stretched her arms out to break the fall. She swore under her breath as pain shot through both kneecaps. She stood up, dug the small pebbles out of her palms, and then continued up the steps.

As she ran her hands up the side of the door, she found the bundle of wires. She traced the wires up the long edge of the door, finding that they terminated at the top.

 
The building had an alarm system and not just any alarm. It was an elaborate, state-of-the-art setup. She looked back at the dark parking lot, finding it odd that there were no lights affixed to the outside of the building, considering the length that Castrucci had went to with the alarm system. She was grateful for his lack of insight, but it made her job a hell of a lot harder. She felt like a blind person stumbling around in the dark.

Carefully, she descended the steps and used her hand to trace the wires along the bottom edge of the building. It was imperative that she find the main box in order to disarm the alarm system. She had brought a penlight with her, had it in her pocket, and didn’t want to risk using it, but the lack of lighting gave her no choice. She could tell by the amount of wires in the bundle that she would have no room for error when it came time to clip them. If she screwed up on the termination, she would set off the alarm instead of disarming it.

She was about to turn on the penlight when the sound of gravel crunching stopped her dead in her tracks. The minute she saw the headlights, she dropped to the ground with a thud. She scooted across the ground on her stomach, ignoring the pain as various objects dug into her skin. She slid behind something solid and took a deep breath to quiet her nerves. She looked up in time to see a pair of glowing red taillights pass by. The car came to a stop just a few feet away from the back steps.

The driver, no doubt Tommy, turned the headlights on bright, illuminating the back of the parking lot. Rheyna glanced around and realized that she was crouched next to a large trash compactor and a bunch of wooden crates. She wedged herself between the compactor and the crates, figuring that if she couldn’t see the men in the car, they couldn’t see her. She heard two car doors open and shut and peeked around the edge of the crates.

Sonny rapped his knuckles on the passenger side window and Tommy rolled it down. “Leave the lights on a minute so we can see what the hell we’re doing here,” Sonny said before turning to follow Big Tony and Henry up the steps.

“I’m gonna run up and fill the tank. Be back in a few,” Tommy yelled before rolling up the window. Sonny shrugged him off with a wave of his hand.

Big Tony flipped the alarm code box open and punched in the code.

“We really need to do something about the lighting back here,” Sonny said as he and Henry followed Big Tony inside.

“Have Charlie take care of it tomorrow,” Big Tony said, flipping on the light switch.
 

Rheyna waited for the limo to disappear out of the parking lot before coming out from behind the crates. She looked up at the row of windows located across the back of the building. There was no way she could get in the building using the door, even if it was unlocked. With her luck, it would squeak.