Sacrifice Fly (Raymond Donne Mysteries) Page 20

  “And I’m saying we have to go to the police.”

  He shook his head. “Nah, man. Not the cops.”

  “You can’t just keep running, Frankie. It’s just a matter of time before they find you. The cops or the guy in the white van. Shit, they found me.”

  “Who did?”

  “The guy in the van,” I said. “And he’s got a partner.” I told him the story about getting nabbed by Ape and Suit outside Muscles’s the day before. I left out the part about my sister. “Did you see anyone in the passenger side?”

  “Nah, had tinted windows. But damn,” he said. “You okay?”

  “I’m here,” I said, trying to sound nonchalant. “Let me bring you to Detective Royce. He’s the—”

  “But I didn’t do nothing!” he yelled. Then in a lower voice, he added, “Mostly.”

  “What do you mean mostly?”

  He put his cap back on and adjusted the brim. “My dad’s suitcase,” he said.

  “Yeah?”

  “Had money in it, Mr. D. Stupid money.”

  “How much stupid money, Frankie?”

  “About ten gees, more or less.”

  I leaned into him. “Ten thousand dollars?”

  “In hundreds. Some fifties.” He reached into his pocket and showed me a little green.

  “Not a good idea walking around with that kind of cash, Frankie. Your dad tell you where he got that kind of money?”

  He pushed the bills back into his pocket and said, “Like I said. Selling shit. But he was lying. He ain’t never sold that much stuff in his life. Probably stole it.”

  It struck me how casual he was being about his substance-abusing father who stole shit for a living. Frankie stepped over to the railing and shut his eyes. After a few seconds he said, “You’re right, Mr. D. Does kinda sound like a waterfall up here. Never noticed that before.”

  “Yeah, sometimes you just got to stop and smell the exhaust fumes.” After a half minute of listening to the traffic hum by below us, I said, “So why’d you call me if you’re not ready to go home?”

  Frankie shoved his hands in his pocket and gave me a meek grin. “You know how in class you’re always telling E to catch a clue?”

  “Yeah?”

  He pulled a pink piece of paper out of his pocket and handed it to me. “I think I caught one. About my dad.”

  I kept my eyes on Frankie as I unfolded the paper.

  “It’s a truck rental receipt,” Frankie said. “It was in the suitcase. My dad rented a truck a few days before he … y’know.”

  “So?”

  “Look at it. It’s a one-way. To Florida.”

  He was right. His dad had rented a truck and was going to drop it off in Florida. “Did he tell you about this?” I asked.

  “Just that he was gonna take me and Milagros away from … here … and we was gonna start a new life somewhere like a real family. Somewhere where Milagros could ride her bike every day, and I could play ball in the winter.” He slapped the paper. “He was serious this time. My dad was looking out for us, Mr. D. He was gonna try Florida. My dad was getting us away from all this shit. He was putting stuff together to start a new life.”

  And look where it got him.

  “That’s great, Frankie,” I said. “Where’s the rest of the stuff from the suitcase?”

  “It’s with some people I hang with,” he explained. “Gonna go pick it up after I leave here. I’m staying somewhere else tonight. At a friend’s who’s got a computer.”

  I folded up the truck receipt, slipped it into my front pocket, and said, “Let me tell you how I see things, Frankie. First—”

  “No offense, Mr. D. But I don’t got time for one of your lectures. I gotta—”

  I surprised him—and myself—by grabbing his wrist. “What you gotta do is listen to me, Frankie.” He tried to pull away, but I tightened my grip. “You’re the kid here. I’m the adult, so just shut up and listen.”

  He looked at me with fear, a new round of tears in his eyes. “You’re hurting me.”

  “Too bad,” I said and immediately felt like shit. I loosened my grip. “You got the police thinking you’re involved in your dad’s death.” He was about to interrupt, but I cut him off. “They figured you were probably dead, but once Milagros came back, they got to thinking maybe you have more to do with this situation than just bad luck.”

  “I didn’t kill my dad, Mr. D.”

  “I know that. But you know how the cops look at things. And think about it,” I said, slipping my hand off his wrist and into his hand, like a handshake. I lowered my voice. “Those guys your dad was so scared of, the ones who messed with me, they’re looking for you, too. The best move—the only move—right now is for me to take you to the detective in charge of your dad’s case. Royce. He’s not a bad guy. Tell him your story.”

  He considered that for about ten seconds, and then said, “I can’t do that, Mr. D.”

  I felt my grip tightening again. “You can’t do that? Let me tell you something. You don’t have a choice. I’ve spent the last week looking for you, and I’ve been pushed around a little too much for my liking. By the same people who are looking for you, because that shit your dad shoved into his suitcase? It belongs to them. I finally find you, and you tell me you—”

  “I called you,” he said.

  “What did you say?”

  “You didn’t find me, Mr. D. I called you.”

  I took his hand and pushed him away from me. “You listen to me. This isn’t just about you and your father anymore. They broke into your grandmother’s apartment looking for what he took. You think they won’t come back and try again? With your sister there?” I paused to catch my breath. Tears were coming down Frankie’s face again. Too fucking bad. “Twice I thought I was done with this shit. First with Milagros at my apartment, and now meeting you here. You can’t have it both ways, kiddo. I’m in. You’re coming with me if I have to throw you over my shoulder and carry you into the precinct myself.”

  Frankie glared back at me with angry, wet eyes. He pointed his finger at me, struggling for the right words. “Fuck you.” He found them. “I came to you for help. I thought you, out of all people would understand—I found my father dead.”

  We stood, glaring at each other, waiting for the other to speak. I realized I had just told Frankie I was the adult. I took a deep breath. “I’m sorry about everything that’s happened, Frankie. I am. But if you don’t think I’ll drag you in, you’re mistaken. I’ve come too far to let you just—”

  “You come too far?” he said. “And you think I’m being selfish? Listen to you. Just because you got me into that holy-rolling white-boy school don’t mean you’re in charge of me. You’re not my father.”

  “You’re right,” I said. “I’m not your father. I don’t do drugs and put my family at risk by stealing money from dangerous people who end up—”

  Without a word, he charged at me. I slammed so hard into the railing that a shockwave of pain spread throughout my midsection, doubling me over. A low rumble of nausea started in my gut. I put my hand over my mouth and bit down on the fleshy area between my thumb and forefinger. I’m not sure how long it took before I was sure I wasn’t going to vomit. It was the sound of Frankie sobbing that made me look up.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. D,” he mumbled. “I didn’t mean to…”

  Fuck this. I’d been getting knocked around too much lately. And now by the kid I was sticking my neck out for?

  “Okay, Frankie,” I said, straightening myself up. My knees were yelling at me to get back down, but I ignored them. “Do what you want. I’m out of it.”

  “I don’t want you out of it.”

  “Then I’ll ask one more time. Come with me.”

  “I can’t do that right now.”

  “Then go.” I motioned with my head toward the Manhattan side of the bridge. “Just get the hell out of here.”

  “You’re not going to help me?”

  “Jesus, Frankie. Th
at’s what I’m trying to do here. But I’m not going to help you get yourself killed. You’re doing a pretty good job of that by yourself. I just don’t know why you’d drag your sister and grandmother into it.”

  “That’s not my fault. I didn’t do that.”

  “Well, that’s what happened, Frankie. They’re in it, and the longer you keep running, the longer this plays out into something bad.” I thought about Rachel. “Not just for you.”

  Frankie gave that some thought and took a step forward to let a Hispanic woman pushing a stroller and dragging another kid pass. He was next to me and leaned up against the railing. I felt behind my knees. I was hurting and glad the trip back to Brooklyn was downhill. The only question was whether or not I was going it alone. He either comes with me, or I’m out of it. Royce and my uncle were right: I wasn’t a cop anymore and was probably doing more harm than good. Let the cops take it from here. It’s what they do, and they’re good at it.

  “Okay,” Frankie said. “I’ll go with you.”

  I looked up. “Say that again?”

  He took his hat off again and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. “I don’t want any shit to happen to my grandmother or Milagros. I’ll go with you, but I gotta get that suitcase.”

  I straightened up, wincing as the back of my legs caught fire. A low moan came from deep inside me. It took all I had not to double over again. Frankie reached out and held my arm.

  “Sorry about that, Mr. D.”

  “Me, too, Frankie. Why don’t we wait on the suitcase?” I said, not wanting anything to get in the way of getting this kid home. “It’s safe, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Then we’ll have the cops pick it up.”

  “Nuh-uh, Mr. D. I don’t want my friends in no trouble with the cops.”

  Good point. “How about I send a friend of mine?” I was thinking about Officer Jackson. “He’s a cop, but he’ll be cool.”

  “You trust him?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay, then. I guess.”

  “Good.” I pointed to the cell phone clipped to his shorts. “Why don’t you call your grandmother. Tell her to meet us at the precinct.”

  “Yeah, right,” he said with a smile. “Be nice to see her again. She not gonna be too happy to go to the precinct, though. Grams don’t like cops all that much.”

  “Tell her to bring Elsa with her.”

  “Yeah, that’d be good. Gotta call Elsa anyways, come to think of it. Grams’s phone is probably still outta order.”

  He unfolded the phone and started dialing. I took out mine and speed-dialed Muscles’s office to have him pick us up on the other side. As I listened to the ringing, I saw a cop on a bike coming our way. Frankie saw him, too. The nervous look came back.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “He’s probably just—”

  “Hey!” The cop yelled, pointing with his walkie-talkie. “You two! Hold it!”

  Frankie closed up his phone. “Shit, Mr. D. You called the five-oh?”

  “No, Frankie. I swear. I have no idea…”

  The cop started pedaling faster. “I said hold it!”

  Frankie clipped the phone to his shorts again. “I trusted you, Mr. D.”

  “Frankie,” I said, “I told you I—”

  “Damn!” he screamed. He turned the other way and was just about run over by the two kids on the bike. They skidded out, and the bike flipped over, sending the two riders barreling into Frankie and me. Mostly me.

  “I told you to goddamn stop!” The cop was about twenty yards away.

  Frankie picked himself up, grabbed the bike off the ground, got on, and took off.

  “Frankie!” I yelled, pushing one of the kids off my chest. “He’s not here for you. I didn’t call them!” He kept pumping. “Frankie!”

  He didn’t look back. He just rode toward Manhattan as fast as he could, weaving in and out of the pedestrian traffic.

  “Damn it!” I screamed, rolling myself over and pulling myself up with the help of the railing. Someone touched my back, and I twisted around. “Get your fucking hands off me,” I yelled into the face of the cop. “Damn it. I’m sorry, I just…”

  “Sir,” he said, pointing at me. “Calm. Down. Are you okay?”

  “No,” I said. “I’m not okay.” I looked over at the two kids brushing themselves off and checking their arms and legs for injuries. “These two … kids almost killed me.”

  “That guy stole our bike, mister,” one of the kids said as they both turned in the direction Frankie rode off. “He was with this guy. They was talking. We want our bike back.” He turned his angry face to me and said, “Sue your white ass.”

  I took a step toward the kid, and the cop put his hand on my chest.

  “Do you know the young man who took the bike, sir?”

  “What?” I said, staring at the two assholes who just blew my chance of getting Frankie home. “Yeah, I know him. He’s one of my kids. One of my students.”

  “You’re a teacher, then.”

  “Yes.” My breathing was getting steadier. “I’m a teacher.”

  “And you two,” the cop said to the kids. He raised his radio. “I got two calls about you. What the hell do you think you were doing riding around like that?”

  “Just havin’ some fun, mister. Whatchoo gonna do about our bike?”

  The cop took off his hat and used it to fan himself. “Why don’t you come back to the precinct with me, and we’ll fill out a stolen property report?” He paused to give a cop grin. “Get your parents to come pick you up.”

  The boys looked at each other for two seconds, and the verbal one said, “Nah. Bike was bootleg anyways. We’ll just walk on home if that’s okay with you.”

  “Why don’t you do that? And don’t get into any more trouble on your way.”

  The police officer stepped aside as the two did a junior pimp walk past us, their punk-ass grins in full mode, just begging to be slapped upside the head. They were about fifty feet away when the cop said, “Bootleg. Means it didn’t belong to them.”

  “Thanks for the translation.”

  “I take it you’re going to be okay, sir? What with the sarcasm and all?”

  “I’ll be fine,” I said.

  “And the young man you were with. Your student?”

  I opened up the phone and called Muscles. “I don’t know,” I said to the cop.

  “Okay, then,” he said. “Try to have a good evening.”

  “Yeah,” I said as he biked away. “I’ll do my best.”

  When Muscles picked me up, I told him what had happened on the bridge. He was not happy with me. But it was the truth, and that’s what I had promised in exchange for his driving services. He was less happy when I told him I had no intention of notifying the police.

  “What am I going to tell him?” I pictured Detective Royce’s face. “We had a meeting, I didn’t bother to call the cops, and then let the kid slip through my fingers?”

  Muscles started the car. “So the kid’s talking to his dad one minute, and thirty minutes later the guy’s dead, and all it looks like he’s got is a bloody nose?”

  “That’s how I’m hearing it.”

  “Interesting.”

  He took me back to the office where he insisted I soak in the hot tub, undergo a not-so-deep-tissue massage—which hurt like hell just the same—and an icing down of the knees with another round of electric stimulation. When it was over, it still felt like a truck had run over me, only a slightly smaller truck. Muscles offered to drive me home, but I was starving and in no mood to fend for myself, so I asked to be dropped off at The LineUp.

  Chapter 21

  MIKEY GREETED ME WITH THE wave of a towel. “There he is!”

  “Cheeseburger,” I said. “Fries and a pilsner. And Tabasco.” Muscles had told me about the capsaicin in the hot sauce easing the pain. I pointed to the empty pint glass next to the can of tomato juice. “Set me up next to Edgar, and get him another round on me, Mike
y.”

  “If you say so.”

  I headed off in the direction of the men’s room and ran into Edgar as he was coming out.

  “You okay, Ray? You’re walking a little funny.”

  “Too much horseback riding,” I said. “I’ll be right back. I gotta hit the head.”

  “Hey,” he said, “you hear about—”

  “I’ll be right back, Edgar,” I repeated. He got the message and went over to his stool as I entered the men’s room.

  As I was washing my hands, I took a long look in the mirror. I didn’t completely fuck up on the bridge. I had Frankie coming home until that cop and those kids got in the way. I couldn’t control everything, couldn’t foresee every possible way a situation like that could go south. I did a decent job, got some new bruises for my troubles, and now it was time for some food and a few beers. Just like old times. Almost.

  When I got back to the bar, Mikey had the Yankee game on. As I slid onto the stool, Edgar picked up right where he’d left off.

  “You hear that the kid’s—Frankie’s—sister came back?” he asked.

  I took a long sip from my pint glass and said, “You think I live in a vacuum?”

  “Nah. It’s just you’re at work all day and then … well, whatever else you do when you’re not at work. I thought maybe you missed the news.”

  “No, Edgar. I didn’t miss the news. In fact…” I went on to tell him everything about Milagros’s return up to the point of my leaving the precinct last night.

  “Holy shit, Raymond,” he said. “That makes you like some kinda hero, don’t it?”

  “No, Edgar. It makes me some kinda delivery boy.”

  “So what’d she say about Frankie? Where is he?”

  “She didn’t say. Just that he’s fine.”

  “Well, why didn’t he come in with her? Didn’t the cops ask her that?”

  “Yes, they asked her. She didn’t say.”

  He poured a little tomato juice into his Bass and watched it make its way down the inside of the glass. After it had settled, he took a sip. “Did she say who killed her old man?”

  “She doesn’t know, Edgar.” Mikey came over and put my burgers and fries in front of me. “Thanks,” I said, and then to Edgar, “Let me eat a bit, huh? It’s been a long day. If you’re good, I’ll tell you another story when I’m done.”