Boston Noir (19 page)

Her phone rang before the alarm clock. She ignored both and slept past 10:00. Her body required eight or nine hours of sleep and took it. That's one reason she'd stopped touring. She washed her face, brushed her teeth, gargled with hydrogen peroxide, then popped her morning elevator. She took her ritual cup of hot lemonade with honey to the computer and found a message from the judge. Darcelle was out of town but gave Nina the name of a female attorney in Roxbury. Nina forwarded it to Isaac, then tried his cell. She ignored his voice mail and tried the house.

"Hey, Miss Nina," Devon answered before the second ring.

"Now that's how I know you love me. You screened me in. What you been up to?"

"Working, working, working."

"One would have been enough. More makes me suspicious. How's the grades?"

"I'm passing."

He was a grown hard-back man now--or thought he was. She had to tread lightly. Concern without badgering. She asked about his plans for the summer.

"I'm going to work the rest of the year and go back full-time next spring."

She feared he would never make it back. "Not many students live rent-free. Do you really need to work full-time?"

"The rent's free, but that's not exactly money in my pocket."

Nina always thought his living arrangement curious. He and Isaac were quasi-superintendents. Handled trash, shoveled snow, showed units to prospective tenants in their building and other properties Mrs. Sheridan, the landlady, owned.

"What's the gig?" she asked.

Property management, he said. He was still showing Mrs. Sheridan's units. Painting them too. And he was getting his real estate license. "It's crazy out here, the money from flipping houses. Mrs. Sheridan's been cleaning up."

That's her main thing now? Nina wondered. Houses? Nina knew her as the wig lady. She owned one of the biggest wig and beauty supply stores in Roxbury and another on Central Avenue in Cambridge.

Of course, Devon didn't need a license to flip houses. But she told him it certainly wouldn't hurt to have one in addition to his degree.

"Exactly."

"Listen, I'm trying to catch up with Isaac."

"He was gone when I got up."

Nina didn't want to assume what Devon knew about Isaac's legal difficulties so she didn't mention the attorney. "When are you coming by so we can really catch up?"

Sunday's were usually good, he told her, though not today.

"Next Sunday work for you?" she asked. "Around 6?"

He said he'd be there.

Nina Sojo had first seen Devon Mack in a second-grade St. Louis classroom. She was the sub. He began the day beating on the kid beside him--any kid beside him. And the boy roamed. She tried to manage him by keeping him on task with challenging puzzles, painting, and storybooks. But there were twenty-three other kids with matching proclivities. Before noon, he had kicked the trash can at Nina's bent back. She'd spun around, dropped the loaded can on the boy's head, and made the terror clean the mess that rained down over him. "And don't you ever in your life even think of kicking me, or anything at me, again." Later, she took him aside and said that when little boys are so ready to fight it usually means they are unhappy about something. "Are you unhappy about something?" By 3:15 he was slumped in her arms, his eyes overrun ponds.
Will you come back tomorrow? Are you ever coming back? Why can't you come back?
The questions of too many sad children she'd meet year after year.

Nina had discovered his birthday was the following week and showed up that day with a cake, coloring books, and a box of Crayolas in a big red bag. The principal arranged for Nina to drive Devon home.

"Where you taking me?" the boy demanded, cringing in the backseat of her car.

"Your house. They know we're coming."

Four blocks later, Nina encountered a pregnant teenager and an older woman waiting with smiles. And Devon's hard jaw relaxed.

Nina sent the boy a card every birthday for three years. Then stopped for four. Nothing matched the way she felt those years. Then, early in '98, Devon's sister--the pregnant girl--sent Nina an e-mail. Her AOL address had been printed on the business card Nina planted in the big red bag. Tania Mack said her health wasn't too good and asked,
Could you check on my baby brother time to time?
He still lived with their aunt, but the aunt's new husband wouldn't mind seeing Devon gone. Tania died of leukemia shortly after that and Devon went to stay with Isaac. They were already living in the Roxbury sweet spot when Nina arrived.

She called their Fort Hill place sweet because of the area's history and the quality of the renovated housing. The Hill had been known for its tie-dye-and-dashiki brigades when she was at Berklee. The dissidents and artists remained, renovated and spurred investment from people like Mrs. Sheridan. Isaac and Devon's unit had elegant crown moldings, granite counters, a spa tub...in exchange for shoveling snow. And use of Sheridan's company vehicle: a 2001 black Durango. Nina wanted their gig.

Before taking Devon in, Isaac had been rooming with another student in a nice-looking space around the corner from Dorchester's "Hell Zone." Murder round the clock. After sundown, thugs ran the streets while owners of homes worth a half-million cowered in their parlors.

Tania and her baby-daddy had had an understanding. He'd made the hookup that put Devon and Isaac in the sweet spot. "He's friends with Mrs. Sheridan. Both of them are Korean," Isaac eventually explained, one long weekend months ago.

"Korean immigrants, you mean?"

"Uh-uh. Korean American." The man had big money and a big family, Isaac went on, holding Nina close. They were cuddlers big-time, for about four weeks.

"You know him?" Nina had asked.

"I know he had a thing for Tania."

Tania couldn't have been more than sixteen when Nina met her. She'd asked about Tania's baby and learned it had been put up for adoption. All of it arranged before the child was born.

These days, Nina was still suspicious of the living arrangement. She didn't tell Isaac, but she had met the landlady.

Mrs. Sheridan tagged her late husband's name to her real estate enterprise and
Paradise
to her beauty supply business.

Nina had been to the Paradise location in Roxbury. It was a long space, with three aisles. She'd barely been inside a minute when a stocky Latino guy coming one way fingered the crotch of a voluptuous Jamaican sister walking opposite him down the middle aisle. The woman wore black leggings and a smile. She tried to swivel around him while he held on a few more seconds. Evidently, the maneuver helped an itch get scratched. They both worked there. He custom-blended hair for weaves and braids. The woman cut and styled wigs. She had a busy operation. Two in chairs, four waiting. Her partner, built like a sprinter, cut hair like one too. Fast. Nina liked the way she was layering the cut on one customer's wig. They called the sprinter
Rocket
, Nina would learn later. And it had nothing to do with speed.

Juliette Choo Sheridan, the owner, clearly spent some time in the mirror. It reflected pinkish-red hair swept into a short, spiky ponytail. Blunt cut bangs that stopped short of her carefully placed false lashes--just a few spidery ones on the upper lids. And pouty pink lips. Between all that and the red boots with stiletto heels was a tight black dress to tone things down. Nina had eyed the plunging V-neck for signs of wrinkles. But Mrs. Sheridan didn't have enough tits for cleavage. Nina figured she was forty-three.

"You should try this," Mrs. Sheridan had suggested, pointing to a golden-hued version of the short dark wig Nina held.

Nina had smiled. "I don't think so."

"Ohhhh, you too conservative," Mrs. Sheridan scolded, scanning Nina's bare face. "You pretty lady. Don't be afraid to jazz it up."

Nina was standing in Bruno Magli pumps and wearing an Italian blue tweed suit worth several grand. The suit's short skirt proved one reason Tina Turner had hired her.

When Nina responded, "I'll bear that in mind," the temperature in that zip code dropped ten degrees.

Nina fell asleep after talking to Devon. It couldn't have been a deep sleep; her armpits woke her up. Or maybe it
was
deep and she was just one frowsy bitch. She hadn't showered and the stink enveloped her.

Suitably deodorized, she put on a T-shirt and yoga pants. Ate some yogurt and a banana. And turned on Betty Carter.

Nina checked her e-mail while Betty sang "Spring Can Really Hang You Up the Most."

Isaac had sent a thank-you message. He and the lawyer connected.
I'm seeing her Monday. I'll let you know what happens.

He did. The lawyer wanted cash up front, he explained in his next e-mail. He was a student.
She said I was a little boy.

On Tuesday, Isaac's case was continued. Nina considered this her cue to wish him
Godspeed
. Heading over to the Newton courthouse had entered her mind. Get a peek at the Collar. Check out the public record. Read the complaint. But she was saved from herself when a Berklee prof and his wife invited her to Martha's Vineyard for a week. She rearranged her schedule and left Thursday.

From the ferry ride over to her last breakfast at The Grind, Nina continually ran into characters from her life's first act. Most significantly Barry. Her stabbing victim.

They stared.

He did a playful bob-and-weave. "Do I dare come closer?" he asked.

Why not? It was only a superficial wound. He had easily disarmed her.

He had been a player. Did time for a mob-related shooting in the '60s. Fresh out of Norfolk State Prison, he had cruised Boston with Nina in a spanking new '78 Corvette one week, a '77 Peugeot the next. Both cars compliments of the unofficial wives Nina knew nothing about. Barry was a decent bass guitarist and, these days, a vocational counselor.

It was late morning in Martha's Vineyard. They sat outside an Edgartown cafe. He remembered how she drank tea instead of coffee.

"You crossed my mind the other day," Nina told him.

"Why? Caught a foul smell or something?"

"I needed the name of a decent criminal attorney."

"I don't know any in Boston worth a dime," Barry charged.

She told him why she had been tempted to call and gave the case CliffsNotes.

Barry's lightning assessment: "This dude sounds like a jive turkey to me." Then he told her--two types of guys volunteer to talk to cops: the ones who really are stupid, and the ones who think that they're smarter than everyone else.

Isaac got a new lawyer. Juliette Choo Sheridan paid. The Collar asked for several more continuances. Too many and a case can get dismissed. But these gave Isaac more time to fuck up.

Late September, he and Devon came home to their Fort Hill sweet spot and couldn't get in: locks changed. Later that night, while crashing with friends: Durango reclaimed. Juliette Choo Sheridan owned the property and knew where the tapes had been buried.

The money shot: Isaac yanking the leash on a bitch blowing his cock. Devon's plugging her ass. The leash was black leather and thin; the collar rhinestone-studded and delicate. Nina cataloged the scene as S&M Lite, but still unbecoming a former Marine and M.I.T. scholar--especially one facing an assault charge and looking for a university gig. The action around Isaac was more damning. Rocket from Paradise--her tits were like missiles--was one of two women being gang-raped. For insurance, the video was all over the Internet before Juliette Choo Sheridan sent copies of it to the prosecutor and the Collar's home address. She and Sindi, former rivals, had become comrades.

Isaac took Mrs. Sheridan's money, fucked to her satisfaction, but refused to move into her Newton contemporary mansion--which Sindi had frequently cased. And Sheridan joining an African harem had never been an option.

Early in December, Isaac's attorney--he was back to the Roxbury sister--got a plea agreement. There was evidence of guilt but no hard proof. He could apply for a job and truthfully say he'd never been convicted of a crime.

By January, Devon was back in St. Louis and Isaac Elimu Sayif, a.k.a. Calvin Isaac Nethersole, a.k.a. Lite Dick Nethersole (most popular on the Internet), had unwanted websites sprouting like fungi after rain. The sexploits of Lite Dick streamed against the hazy image of his curriculum vitae and generated 87,000 hits on the worldwide web every day, 609,000 each week, 2,436,000 each month...

Isaac remains all but dissertation six years later.

A
t the close of his twenty-third birthday, Michael Mosely sat behind the wheel of a 1968 Chevy Bel Air, looked around the empty bank parking lot, lifted a pint of vodka, and took a good slug. He screwed the top on and put it under the passenger seat. He sat up straight, shook his head like a dog drying off, pulled the shift lever on the column toward him, dropped it into drive, and eased the nose of the car out onto Broadway. Amped and fuzzy at the same time, he cranked the window down to let in the clammy night. The windshield wipers squeaked into action, smearing greasy mist into greasy streaks. He looked to the left, and cut the wheel hard right, making the power steering squeal and moan. He toed the gas. The right rear tire dropped off the curbstone, thumping into the gutter with a hollow, rubbery sound.

He inched along beside the high curb, rolled by the bank, and braked to a quiet stop in front of the steak house. Using his left hand, he pinched the fleshy web on his right hand. The pain yanked him back to his body and sharpened his mind.

A swirl of darkness exploded through the glass front doors of the steak house, and three men wearing Red Sox caps atop blurry faces rushed at the car. Two of the men held handguns, while the man in the middle clutched a satchel like it was Ann Margaret.

TJ, carrying the bag, yanked the front passenger door open and jumped in. Paul pulled the back door open and dove in headfirst, followed by Larry, large and loud. He slammed the door closed and yelled.

"Go!"

The air in the car boiled with kinetic energy, but the scenery outside didn't change.

"Nope," Michael said. "Not until you say please."

The large man tried to articulate some sort of threat, but only produced a lowing noise.

The thin guy sitting shotgun looked sad but sounded giddy. "Oh no. That's not funny, man."

"Time, little brother," the guy directly behind Michael said. He put his hand on Michael's shoulder. "Gotta go. Not too fast. Slick road." Michael looked at his brother Paul in the rearview mirror, then stomped on the gas, pinning them all to their seats. The five-year-old green sedan, as anonymous as a telephone pole, zipped down Broadway toward Sullivan Square.

"Okay, ladies," Paul said, "get down so we can take off the stockings."

In shotgun, TJ pulled off the stocking mask as he slid out of his seat and into the foot well like liquid mercury.

"TJ," Michael said, "be a good fella and hand me my jug while you're down there."

"No, you can wait, Mikey," Paul answered from the floor in the back.

"Just need to loosen the straps a little," Michael said.

"Fuck! Stop fuckin' talkin'!" Larry was the size of a newborn killer whale, and now wedged in between the seats, he sounded near hysteria. "You're s'posed to be alone if anyone fuckin' sees you, you stupid fuckin' fuck. Just drive the fuckin' car, you fuck. Fuck the fuckin' booze."

"Aunt Betty'd slap your face," Michael said, "if she knew how her little Larry swore--"

"Shut up about my mother!" Larry barked.

"Easy, boys. Mikey, anyone behind us?"

Michael checked the rearview. "Just the dark."

At the Sullivan Square traffic circle Michael spun the car around the far edge, with the tires slipping, and then whipped up the crumbling street that ran along the short section of elevated road. A quarter-mile up, the car turned right at Middlesex Avenue and then broke off a fast right into the employee parking lot at the First National Stores grocery warehouse, where there must have been three hundred cars parked in the open dirt lot.

Michael slipped the Chevy Bel Air down to the row of cars against the chain-link fence and stopped at a dark '65 Ford Falcon. The three passengers got out. Paul keyed open the trunk of the Falcon, and they tossed in their guns, hats, stockings, and the money bag. TJ pulled off his sweatshirt, dropped it in the Falcon's trunk, and pulled out two license plates and a screwdriver. He moved to the front of the Chevy Bel Air, ducked out of sight, and popped up again before Michael had time to find his Zippo, chunk it open, and fire up his Winston. TJ paused at Michael's window on his way to the back of the Chevy with the second license plate.

"That's it for me," TJ said. He was wearing an Esso gas station T-shirt with the name
Thomas
over the pocket. "You suck to work with. I'm not going back to jail." Thomas Jefferson Moran walked to the back of the Chevy.

Paul knocked on the passenger window, and Michael leaned over and rolled it down.

"What's TJ saying?" Paul asked. He leaned in the passenger side as he pulled off his warm-up pants. Underneath a bulky turtleneck sweater he wore a white shirt and a red silk tie.

"Nothing, post-game jitters. You're all dolled up."

"Late date." Paul turned back and closed the trunk of the Falcon. He threw the trunk key over the fence, out into the growth of bulrushes in the marsh.

Larry got into the front passenger seat of the Chevy. He had worn a Patriots jersey during the robbery, now he had on a Led Zeppelin T-shirt.

"Rock on, man!" Michael said. He held his hand up for a high five.

Larry sneered. "One of these days, Michael."

Paul and TJ got back in the Chevy and Michael dropped each of the three at their own cars, which they had driven to the lot earlier that night.

Michael parked the Chevy, fished the vodka out, and took a drink. He got a rag from his back pocket, soaked it with vodka, and wiped down all the surfaces in the car that anyone might have touched. Then he tossed the Chevy key over the fence. He drank the last of the vodka, dropped back, and tried to spiral the bottle over, hoping to reach the oily creek, but it fell short and smashed into something solid, silencing the marsh.

He walked up two rows to his car, a black GTO. He put his key in the door, and felt the top end of his throat stretch itself wide. He turned his head and threw up beside the car. Wiping his mouth with the rag, he muttered, "Fuckin' egg salad."

He placed his feet carefully around the puddle, opened the door, and dropped backwards onto the driver's seat, pulling his feet in.

When he was done shaking, he woke the Goat and drove it to North Quincy.

The Sagamore Grill
was the name on the liquor license, but it was commonly known as The Sag, partly because there was no actual grill. The only grill any of the patrons ever saw was the cross-worked iron bars at the Quincy police station.

On Saturday morning, Michael sidled up and placed his order with Bud, the day bartender. "Hi, neighbor, I'll have a 'Gansett, please."

Larry and TJ came in together, stopped at the far end, and ordered. Bud lifted the hose from behind the bar and squirted soda into a couple of glasses. They crossed the room to sit at a red square Formica table, way at the back. Michael took his beer and followed.

"Look at this guy," Larry said to TJ. "Beer for breakfast. My aunt's dying of cancer and her son's getting gassed every time I see him."

"When you're not here, I drink milk," Michael said. "I see you, I lose the will to live."

The front door opened and Paul came in followed by the sun, and by the time the door chopped off the outside light, he was cutting a path through the tables. Michael watched him move; fast, without hurrying; covering a lot of ground with deceptive speed. Paul sat down at the small table.

"Hey," Michael said. "I forgot to ask, how was your date last Saturday?"

"Good. Nice girl, but not the one. The search continues," Paul replied.

"Girl from work?" Larry asked.

"In a way. I met her when I took a customer to lunch. She was our waitress."

Paul was a sales rep for Triple-T Trucking, a union carrier that operated in the New England and the metro New York-New Jersey area.

"Which customer?" Michael asked. He was a driver for Triple-T, jockeying trailers around, making local deliveries and pickups.

"The traffic manager from Schrafft's Candy, he suggested this place, which, I found out too late, doesn't take credit cards. I didn't want to look like a chump, so when the check came, I pretended to go to the restroom, flagged down the waitress, said I didn't have enough cash on me. I was short a buck for the bill and had no money for a tip. I told her if she lent me a dollar and waited for the tip, it would be a good one. I went back the next day, gave her a fifty, and asked her out for Saturday. She said she was working; I said after. I'd be in the area."

Michael watched Larry and TJ do the quick nod, polite but impatient, waiting for Paul to get to the good part: their share of the robbery. Michael took a drink from his beer, brought the bottle down, and rapped the bottom against the tabletop a few times.

"Get it?" Michael said. Larry and TJ stopped nodding and looked over at him.

"Cash only," Michael said. "No cards? That was our restaurant last Saturday night."

Larry's jaw fell like the trapdoor on a gallows. TJ shook his head.

"And you went back to pick up the girl?" Larry asked.

"Shhh. Turn it down," Paul said. He leaned back against the booth in his bright white starched shirt. No matter how grimy the environment, somehow Paul remained spotless.

"Did you know?" TJ asked Michael.

"I just figured it out," Michael said. "Anyway, how
did
we do?"

Paul shrugged. "Better than we'd do tonight, now that they're going to start taking credit cards. That's what they get for trying to shortchange the IRS." He flashed a phony smile, followed by a real one; he was charmed by his own insincerity.

"My brother, the patriot," Michael said.

"You get eighteen hundred each," Paul said.

"You get twenty-four," TJ said.

"That's the deal. Twenty-five percent more," Paul said.

"That's thirty-three, isn't it?" Michael asked.

"Okay," Paul said. "Then you get seventy-five percent of what I get, which is twenty-five percent less. Whatever makes you feel better. Either way, it's like five weeks take-home driving a truck."

"What do we do next, boss?" Larry asked.

"Keep in mind," TJ interrupted, "I'm gone. Mahla wants to move to Florida. She don't like the snow."

"What snow? It's June," Michael said.

"Fuck off, man. It gonna stay June?"

The front door opened and they watched a figure lurch into the shadows before TJ spoke again.

"No, I hear you," Paul said to TJ. "Especially with the toy guns. But this new thing has no need for weapons, real or otherwise, which I knew you'd like. We're going to liberate a truckload of cigarettes." Paul smiled like a dust bowl Bible salesman, going face to face to share his look of joy and wonder.

"Cigarettes? From where?" Michael asked.

"One of the car loaders, Blue Ribbon Distributors."

"What's a car loader?" Larry asked.

"A warehouse with a railroad siding. It transfers freight between rail cars and trucks."

"Can't be from Triple-T. We don't haul smokes, or booze either," Michael said.

"We do now. My new boss, Guy Salezzi, is the nephew-in-law of Mr. T.T. Tortello, so I guess he can change the policy. They're going to start using us on cigarette loads to the BPM warehouse in East Bridgewater next week. I've called on Tony Bentini in the Blue Ribbon traffic office for fourteen months and never got a sniff of the work. Why? Because company policy is we won't take cigarettes, and he won't give me any other loads unless we take them too. Nobody wants the smokes. But Salezzi went to Fordham with Bentini. So now we're getting business because they're pals. They're going to give us one load, see if BPM is okay with us. If so, we'll get more."

Larry smiled at his older cousin. "You got some balls, man. You want to knuckle a load the first week?"

"We better act while we can, right? What if we lose the account?"

Michael said, "I guess we're going to ignore the fact--"

"The rumor," Paul cut in.

"--that Mr. T.T. Tortello is a member of the Gambino family."

"Tortello started that rumor so no one would steal from him," Paul said. "This is good for forty grand. Split evenly. We each put ten in our poke." Paul leaned toward TJ. "Think: forty thousand bucks. A few like that and we quit. Become homeowners, family men, good citizens."

"God bless America," Michael said.

"I spent six months at the farm," TJ said. "Watching corn and punkins come up out of the ground. I'm not going back. How long you think you can steal from your company before they start investigating and whatnot?"

"They'll look at the Teamsters," Paul said. "I'm management."

They stared at Michael the Teamster. He snapped open his Zippo, touched the Winston to the flame, and inhaled. Then he smiled around the cigarette and clapped the lighter closed.

"Is Michael going to get this load?" TJ asked.

"No, they pick up at 3 p.m.," Paul replied. "He starts at 6 a.m. He's on OT at 3. They'd give the pickup to a straight time guy. We have fifty drivers that start at 8."

"Good chance I'll deliver it, though," Michael said. "There's only two of us at 6."

Paul nodded. "BPM wants all loads backed in and ready to unload when their crew starts at 7 a.m. Which means the driver will come from the 6 start." He looked at his brother. "If Rosie gives you the P&G or the Jordan Marsh load, you call the apartment, let the phone ring once, and hang up. If you get the right load,
don't
call. Even Rosie might notice if you did. If you don't get this one, we'll have to hope you get the next, assuming there is a next."

"And listen, Michael," Larry warned, "lay off the booze! Someone might smell you."

Paul turned to Michael and raised his eyebrows but didn't look directly at him. "He makes a good point, Mikey. Work has to come first. By the way, go see Ma today, will you? Eat something, take a nap, and go see her."

Michael pulled the GTO up behind the old man's Rambler, across the street from the house, a small brown bungalow with a screened porch. A strip of sidewalk and a patch of grass separated the house from the street. If an eighteen-year-old kid who stood six feet tall tripped in the gutter and fell forward, his head would bounce off the bottom cement step. The morning after the night that Michael proved that, his father had thrown him out.