"V" is for Vengeance (56 page)

I stopped in the lobby and asked the volunteer at the desk for Dodie's room number. She checked her roster, which was revised and reprinted daily as patients were admitted, moved, or discharged. She was a woman in her seventies, probably a grandmother and a great-grandmother, though quite the looker for someone her age. She seemed momentarily confused and made a phone call to ICU for Dodie's status, since her name wasn't readily available. When she hung up, she said, “Mrs. Ford passed.”

“Passed what?” I said. I thought she was talking about a test. Then my mind skipped to the notion of a blood clot or a kidney stone. This seemed like an odd piece of medical data to be sharing with me. She was clearly uncomfortable at my pressing the point.

“She passed over first thing this morning, but that's as much as I was told.”

“Passed over,” I repeated. “You mean, she died?”

“I'm terribly sorry.”

“She
died
? But that can't be true. How could she do that?”

“I wasn't given an explanation.”

“But I called twice yesterday and I was told she was fine. Now you're telling me she
passed
? What kind of word is that anyway,
passed
. Why don't you call a spade a spade?”

The woman's cheeks were suffused with pink, and I noticed that two visitors seated in the lobby had turned to stare at me.

“Would you like to speak to the chaplain?”

“No, I don't want to speak to the chaplain,” I snapped. “I want to talk to her husband. Is he here?”

“I don't have information about next of kin. I'd imagine he's meeting with a funeral director about services. Really, I'm so sorry to upset you. If you'll take a seat, I'll have someone bring you a cup of water.”

“Oh, for god's sake,” I said.

I turned and headed for the door. I didn't doubt her word. I just thought it was ridiculous that Dodie had died when she'd been fine last I checked. Ever quick with the old defense mechanisms, I was using anger as a counterweight to my surprise. I didn't feel sorrow. I didn't know Dodie well enough to experience the loss. Pinky would be devastated, and what sprang to mind was his vow of retaliation if anything happened to her. Now that he was faced with the worst-case scenario, he'd go off on a rampage, and Cappi would be his target.

I drove the four blocks to the duplex. I had no idea the state I'd find him in or what I'd say to him. I parked across the street, noticing that Dodie's gaudy yellow Cadillac was gone. I felt a prick of anxiety, like the tip of a knife touching me between the shoulder blades. I took the porch steps two at a time and knocked on the front door while simultaneously ringing the bell. There was no response, so I did the next best thing, which was to try the knob. The door was unlocked. I opened it and stuck my head in. “Pinky?”

The house had that empty air of lingering food scents and humming appliances. I called his name again, though I was silly to do so when I knew he wasn't on the premises. I moved into the living room. One of the couch cushions had been tossed on the floor and Pinky's gun was gone. I sat down abruptly and put my head in my hands. There was no doubt in my mind he'd gone after Cappi. It was exactly the sort of rash move he'd make. What chance would I have of reaching Cappi before he did? More important, how would I find him? Rapidly, I ran through my options. My first impulse was to dial 9-1-1. And say what? I could describe Dodie's car. I could describe the man driving it, but that was that. I could call Dante and warn him Pinky was on the loose. He was the man most likely to know where his brother was. Maybe he could put out a companywide alert and let him know what was going on. My third option was to warn Cappi myself if I could figure out where he was.

I tried to clear my mind of chatter. I remembered Pinky mentioning something in the course of his morbid ramblings the night Dodie was shot. What had he said? That Cappi couldn't find a job so he'd been reduced to working in his brother's warehouse, which was how he was able to leak Dante's business to the cops. I'd been to a warehouse in Colgate that I surmised was associated with the retail-theft ring. I roused myself and returned to my car.

I merged with traffic on the 101. Time must have skipped six beats, because I couldn't remember traveling on surface streets to reach the access ramp. My impulse was to jam the gas pedal to the floor, which with a Mustang is the equivalent of being shot out of a cannon. However, as I pressed down with my foot, I caught sight of a black-and-white passing on my left. I eased off, marveling at my good luck. Nothing worse than peeling out when you've got a cop car next to yours, equipped with radar. I stuck to the middle lane, so bound by good behavior that I almost missed the appearance of a second black-and-white sailing by on my right. Neither patrol car was traveling at great speed, but the driver closest to me was
intent
. There was something purposeful in his posture, as though he didn't want to be late for festivities I hadn't been told about. A party, parade, some coplike activity requiring him to be punctual.

The two patrol units left the highway at the Fairdale exit, with me bringing up the rear. What was the deal here? When I spotted a third patrol car coming up on my tail, I pulled into the right-hand lane and let them catch up with one another. I reached the intersection, where the red traffic light inspired a stop on my part while the police cars slowed briefly and slid through. By the time I turned right, the three patrol cars seemed to have vanished as suddenly as they had appeared. I continued half a mile until I passed the oversize screen of the now-defunct drive-in theater, popular when I was a kid. I turned right onto the adjacent side road. The orchard of speakers on stands had been removed. I glanced at the empty acres of cracked asphalt and nearly ran off the road. The entire lot was being used as a staging area for patrol cars and unmarked vehicles. Two dozen uniformed officers were milling around, law-enforcement personnel in an assortment of jackets reading FBI, POLICE, and SHERIFF. I was guessing all wore Kevlar vests under their shirts. I jerked my gaze back to the road, but I knew the significance of what I'd seen. Diana had heard something big was going down and this had to be it. No wonder Cheney had been short with me. The only location of significance in the area was the Allied Distributors warehouse. The joint police agencies had to be gearing up for a raid. Whatever intelligence gathering they'd done over the previous months and years had now culminated in an armed response. My heart was thunking and a rush of adrenaline coursed through my frame, making me feel electric. Pinky, the gunslinger, if he managed to catch up with Cappi here, would find himself in the midst of a cadre of officers and FBI agents more hyped up than he was.

A quarter of a mile farther down the road, the warehouse appeared at the end of the cul-de-sac. Crisscrossing lines of railroad tracks ran behind the building. It was possible in times past, goods were moved from the warehouse by train, a miniterminal devoted to the business of commercial transport. Now the tracks were the sole domain of the Amtrak freight and passenger trains that went through town three and four times a day. Abruptly, I put my foot on the brake. To my right, Dodie's yellow Cadillac sat at an angle, wheels off the side of the road and slightly sunk in the grass. Pinky hadn't bothered to park carefully. Then again, he was on his way to shoot a man, so perhaps the finer points of roadside etiquette had escaped him.

The wide metal gates to the warehouse property stood open. The employee parking lot appeared on my right with the warehouse itself on the left. Six tractor-trailers had been backed up to the loading docks and all the rolling metal doors stood open. Five or six guys seemed to be enjoying a smoke while two forklift operators wheeled in and out of the warehouse with loads. At the far end of the building, two white panel trucks sat side by side, back doors open while men shifted boxes from the pallets on a flatbed and into the interiors. I scanned for Cappi but didn't see anyone with his build and body type. I didn't see Pinky either, and I didn't know what to make of it. Dante's employees were caught up in an ordinary day at work, no urgency, no threat, no cause for alarm.

I parked in the employee lot and crossed to the main building. The two-story structure was a quirky blend of the old and the new. Parts of the building were aging brick and frame, with a newer steel addition affixed to the front. The whole of it was probably twenty-five thousand square feet of space. I entered by way of a side door, avoiding the receiving area, which had to be hazardous if you didn't know what you were doing. At the mezzanine level, I could see the business offices. Around the perimeter, catwalks were affixed to the ceiling by a series of cables and steel posts. The offices overlooked the storage blocks that were separated by wide aisles. I spotted zigzagging sets of stairs every hundred feet or so, like fire escapes in a tenement. The place seemed well organized, with a system at work that only the practiced eye could assimilate.

I passed the restrooms, a locker room, and then a lunchroom lined with vending machines. The ten tables I saw were sparsely occupied by a smattering of workers on a coffee break. I crossed the concrete floor and climbed the stairs to the offices, moving as quickly as I could. It's hard to remember what I was thinking at the time. Under the circumstances, I shouldn't have been there at all, but I felt I had to intercept Pinky before all hell broke loose. Judging from the fevered activity I'd seen at the drive-in, a raid was imminent. The strategy had been worked out and the cops were suited up and ready to roll. The goal would be to contain and control the warehouse, subduing its occupants by hitting hard, then moving in rapidly before anyone could escape or destroy the evidence they were after. They'd have arrest and search warrants in hand, and they'd seize files, records, computers, and anything else that would provide details of illegal activities. Who knew how many guys they'd round up in the process?

At the top of the stairs, the offices were enclosed in waist-high wainscoting, with glass panels above. The door was open, and a young girl with a mass of frizzy blond hair sat at her desk. There was a computer in front of her and an old-fashioned typewriter on a rolling table nearby. Unlike Dante's downtown offices, this place was grubby—plain linoleum on the floor, fluorescent lights overhead, battered wooden desks, and cheap rolling chairs. The room was rimmed with file cabinets, and I knew the raiding party would be all over them. She looked up at me. “Can I help you?”

I was caught off guard by the calendar on her desk. It was one of those thick blocks of sheets with the date writ large on each page, which would be torn off and discarded at the end of the day. Even upside down, I could see it was Thursday, May 5, and I could barely suppress a yelp. May 5th is my birthday. That's why Henry had made a point of coming home. That's why he'd offered to take me to dinner. The downside of being single and alone is having a birthday come around and catch you by surprise. I was suddenly thirty-eight years old. Still distracted, I said, “Is Mr. Dante here?”

“In there, but he said no interruptions.”

Dante opened the door and stepped out of his private office into the reception area. “I'll take care of this, Bernice,” he said to her. He turned a flat look on me. “What can I do for you, Ms. Millhone? You have no business being here. I hope you know that.”

He'd seemed friendlier in the limousine, but I needed his help, so I decided to overlook his surly attitude. I put my hand in the crook of his elbow while I steered him out of reception and into his private office. “Pinky's got a gun and he's either here on the premises or not far away. Dodie died this morning and he'll kill Cappi if he catches up with him.”

I expected him to react, but he was engaged in a more important task. His wall safe was open, and he was transferring thick packets of cash into a soft-sided suitcase that lay on his desk. He didn't seem to care that Cappi's life was in jeopardy or that Pinky was on the verge of bursting in with a loaded gun. His manner was relaxed; his movements efficient and methodical. He had a job to do and he was doing it with no wasted energy.

“Do you know where Cappi is?” I asked.

“I sent him on an errand to get him out of my hair. Sorry about Pinky's wife. I never met the woman, but I know he was devoted. I suggest you get out before he and Cappi cross paths. Neither one of us has a dog in their fight.”

“Can't you put a stop to it?”

“No more than you can.”

I stared at him, fascinated by his calm when I was in such a state of panic. I said, “It gets worse. You've got three dozen cops down the road about to descend on this place.”

“That's Cappi for you. The guy can't keep his trap shut and this is what comes of it. My best guess, he'll make sure he's rounded up with everyone else so it looks like he's in the same jam. He better hope he succeeds. This isn't a business where a snitch gets away with it. If Pinky doesn't kill him, someone else will.”

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“What's it look like?”

As though on cue, I heard shouting down below, and Pinky's voice echoed through the vast warehouse space. “Cappi! This is me, Pinky. I got a debt to settle with you. Show your face, you son of a bitch.”

I moved toward the door.

Dante said, “Don't go out there.”

I ignored him and left the office. I went out on the landing and looked over the rail. Pinky was drunk and weaving on his feet. He looked like he hadn't slept in days, and when he'd managed it, he'd slept in the same clothes. He held the gun in his right hand, relaxed at his side. If Cappi showed up, he probably didn't want him to spot the weapon until he took aim and fired.