At home he made a protein shake and microwaved some chicken, eating in front of the Bulls-Sonics NBA Finals. Then he showered, put away some laundry he had stacked up, opened his mail. All of which was a prelude to the night's main event.
A pot stash, junkie works, porn mags, fishnets and garters-- the sneaker box on the floor of his closet could have held any old shameful fetish, but Frawley's kick was minicassette-tape dubs of old crime-scene interviews. He wired his Olympus recorder through his stereo receiver, first warming up with a few older teller debriefings from past cases, some Greatest Hits-- tellers weeping, reaching out to him for answers,
Why me?
-- just to get his mind in that place. Then with the lights off and the shades down, he lay on the floor and listened as Claire Keesey's voice filled his room, transporting him back to the Kenmore vault and his desire for justice for her on that day...
... The one who was sitting next to me. Not
next
to me... but in the same seat, the same bench, the two of us. The one who blindfolded me. I could tell somehow... he was looking at me...
27
Next Morning
H
E HAD PUT UP with the blaring music all night. On his way out of the house, pissed-off first thing in the morning, Doug came down banging on Jem's door like a cop.
Nothing. No response. Doug's pounding was just more bass in the mix.
He was near the bottom of the stairs when two guys unlocked the inside door. Young guys with clipper haircuts, thick with new muscle, sporting different T-shirts but matching fatigue pants and paratrooper boots. Camo kids who looked like they'd walked straight off the rack of the Somerville Army/Navy Surplus store.
They entered like they belonged there, the loose pane of glass rattling in the door. Doug thought he recognized them, maybe just from around the Town. Then he remembered-- the Tap that night, the two younger guys Jem was talking to in the corner.
They nodded at him-- not friendly, more out of respect of Doug's size coming off the steps. "Hey, man, 's'up?" Something like that.
Said Doug, "Who're you?"
"Aw, we're going up to see-- "
"How the hell'd you get a key?" He was on the landing now, facing them.
"Jem, man. He gave it to us." They said it as though Jem's magic name solved everything.
"What's that mean? You live here or something?"
"Naw, man." Now they looked at each other like cats, sensing trouble, wondering what to do. "Yo, we got some business with him."
"Yo, no you don't. Not in this house."
Another look between them. "Look, man," said one, coming on confidential, "hey, we know who you are. We know-- "
Doug was on him fast, grabbing him by his T-shirt collar and driving him back up against the door. "Who am I? Huh? What do you know?"
The loose pane of door glass popped out, shattering on the floor of the dingy vestibule. Doug hadn't meant to do it, but he didn't care much either. He shoved the camo kid halfway through the empty frame.
"Take it easy, man, we just-- "
Krista's door flew open behind Doug. She came out barefoot in a short black silk Victoria's Secret robe that was familiar to him. "What the-- ?" she started to say, but seeing Doug there with the camo kid silenced her.
Dez appeared behind Krista, rushing to the noise, pulling on a shirt. He saw Doug and paused a moment-- then stepped out onto the threshold, ready to back him up.
The music grew suddenly louder upstairs. "Hey!" Jem was over the railing, looking down at the broken door. He turned and came down a step, wearing a ratty white hotel bathrobe open over smiley-face boxers and sweat socks, coffee mug in hand.
Krista's hand pressed against Dez's chest, and he stepped back against her door.
"Duggy," said Jem, coming down two more steps, "what the fuck?"
Doug released the glaring kid. They went around him to the stairs, seething, starting up toward Jem.
Doug looked for some explanation, but Jem made a
Later
face and waved him on with his coffee mug. He started up ahead of the camo kids, then turned and came back down a few steps, seeing the light coming out of Krista's door. "If that's my sister, tell her I'm out of underwear here, she could throw in a wash."
He turned and followed his pets up onto the landing, the door closing on the music.
Krista sulked, Dez looking apologetically at Doug.
Doug turned and walked out the front door, boots crunching glass, getting the fuck away.
28
Leads
I
NSIDE THE HANGAR GARAGE of the South Quincy wreck yard, Frawley and Dino examined the charred corpse of a 1995 Dodge Caravan. The heat had blown out all the glass. The rear and middle were hopelessly charred, the front hood buckled up over the fused metal of the engine, but the dash had survived. The steering wheel was warped silly but remained whole.
"They made some mods to the vehicle," said Dino, pointing out a blackened strap attached to a clip soldered to the frame along the driver's door. "Racing harness, in case of a chase. They also replaced the steering wheel-- the original had a Club on it and must have got cut. The accelerants were in freezer bags duct-taped to the floor in the rear, which is why the bad burn there."
Frawley leaned inside the driver's window frame. The melted upholstery gave the stinking heap its extra-toxic stench. The steering wheel was plain black with grip grooves and an illegal "suicide" knob clamped on for fast steering.
"No prints," said Dino. "The driver guard, Washton, said he saw driving gloves on dinosaur man."
Magloan. Frawley fit Coughlin for the quiet one with the clown mustache who shot up the inside of the lobby, MacRay for the talker, the earphone man with the cosmetic burns. "Stolen out of New Hampshire?"
"Wal-Mart parking lot, week ago Monday."
"Handicap plates?"
"Off a customized Astrovan outside a medical building in Concord, the day after."
Frawley went around to the blackened rear of the still-warm car.
"Little spots of latex there from the disguises, and some shreds of incinerated clothing," said Dino. "That would be the uniforms, stolen out of a dry cleaner's in Arlington. That melted box there, that's the guard's radio unit."
Frawley returned to the front. Something about the warped steering wheel bugged him. "Wheel wasn't stolen though."
"No. Probably new. Pick up a wheel at any auto store anywhere."
"You say the dinosaur wore driving gloves?"
"Right."
"The kind with the holes in the knuckles?"
"Probably so."
Frawley pointed. "They print the entire wheel, or just the grips?"
Dino shrugged. "Long shot, with the flame heat-- but good question."
"One of the 911 callers from the highway-- you remember?"
"She said they were hitting the horn, getting stragglers out of their way."
Frawley mimed it. "He's fired up, strapped in with a racing harness and a suicide knob, just pulled off a big job, speeding down the highway, hitting his horn..."
Frawley punched the center of his pretend steering wheel with his fist.
* * *
THEY TURNED IN THEIR loaner hard hats and stood in conference outside the Billerica work site, having just been lied to, lavishly, by Billy Bona. The double whistle went off, which, according to warning signs on the fence, meant a blast was imminent.
"These guys used a shape charge in the Weymouth armored job, one of the early ones."
Dino nodded, crossing his arms and sitting back against the Taurus's trunk. "Wonder what the arrangement is here. Maybe they got something on this Bona."
Frawley squinted up into the sun, promising himself that when this all came down, he would personally deliver Bona his subpoena for aiding and abetting.
"Problem is," said Dino, "on paper they were here yesterday."
"Yeah. He happened to have their time cards right there with him."
"We could go man-to-man here, break down every hard hat on this job, waste a day or two trying to find one who's ever worked with these two goofs-- "
"Funny how they're not here today. 'First day they've missed, I can remember,' Bona says. Lying to a federal agent. The
balls
on that guy."
"Then there's Elden too, at work all day yesterday, and that one's verified-- "
"Yup. Boss says yesterday Elden checks in with him before getting in his truck-- says he remembers this because the guy's never
once
before stopped in to shoot the shit, ask how the kids are, the whole production."
"Means he knew it was going down. Maybe there was no falling-out. Not if he's part of their alibi. And Magloan-- let's face it, he'll have somebody swearing up and down he was otherwise occupied the whole day. Bottom line is, bogus or not-- we got nothing. Not enough to bring anybody in on."
"I'm not talking about putting them in a lineup."
"It's not even enough to go around shaking trees," said Dino. "We start turning the Town upside down over this-- even if we ignore Elden and his squeaky-clean record-- lawyers will be leaping out of their wing tips crying witch hunt. We don't have it."
"We can get it."
"Not enough to haul in these jokers. DA's office would ball this up and throw it right back at us, and we'd be poisoned for the next time. Where'd you get the authority to check their tax returns for employment anyway?"
"This MacRay has no credit cards, nothing in his name. His ride, this '86 Caprice Classic piece of crap, it's registered to the Coughlin sister who lives on the first floor of their house. I run her-- it turns out she's got seven different cars reg'd to her name, her insurance. One of them's a high-line Corvette. Fifty dollars says she doesn't know about any of them."
There was a hot crack of thunder, a cannon shot, and Frawley felt the pulse in the ground like a shudder. They could not see the blast but heard the echo riding out, fading away.
Dino said, "I think we need to go full-court press on this. Bring on some assistance."
Frawley watched for rising dust. "No need."
"If these tea-pissers are feeling our heat, then we need to go broader, push them harder. Farm out some of this work."
"We can push them ourselves."
Dino said nothing, meaning Frawley had to turn back to face him.
"Okay," said Dino. "Now tell me what the hell is going on here."
"What's going on is, I'm trying to catch some bad guys."
"No, I think what's happening is, you're taking this thing personally. I can't figure why, but that is the numskull approach and you're too clever for that. This is how mistakes get made."
"I want to bring this one home ourselves."
"Look, Frawl-- I can play hard. I've been a detective seventeen years, I know how. I don't particularly mind going to war. All I need is a good reason."
"This is no war," said Frawley, backing off. "Boozo and his crew, they were like a big rock we flipped over, all these other little bottom-feeders wriggling out into the light. MacRay and company, we know who they are and we know where they are. Them squeaking by has gone on long enough."
"MacRay?" said Dino. "I thought you liked Coughlin as honcho."
"I'm thinking now it's MacRay."
Dino frowned impatiently. "And this is based on?"
"Call it a hunch."
Which Frawley regretted saying as soon as it left his lips. Dino slow-crossed his arms, leaning against his car, Frawley waiting for it. "What is this you're giving me now? Bullshit
hunches
?"
"Dino, look. These guys, they're an insult, an affront. Laughing at us. Now it's our turn to make them sweat a little. Let's take a bite out of
their
day for a change, just to let
them
know
we
are but a matter of time."
Dino's cell phone rang. "We get one chance," he told Frawley. "One." He went into his car for the phone and stood there with his elbow high, talking fast. He hung up and turned back to Frawley almost disappointed. "Your steering wheel," he said. "It's dirty."
29
Roundup
D
OUG STEPPED OUT OF Lori-Ann's coffee shop and saw two uniformed patrolmen waiting at the curb. Only a split-second reluctance to spill the large tea in his hand saved him from obeying his first, immediate, and not entirely irrational impulse, which was to take off running. Illness rose in his chest, a gut reaction to these two uniforms and the death of freedom they represented. But running would have been a huge mistake, and this near catastrophe was a second cup of ice water down his back.
