The Boardwalk Read online

  Rigo had been crying. His eyes were nearly as red as Mary Patrick’s. He had also been drinking. His breath smelled of vodka. His sweat smelled of it. His clothes too. Rigo was a blob of a man with a big belly and a double chin. His time behind a desk had not helped him. He was even fatter now than he was when they met. Gulliver didn’t like Rigo. Rigo didn’t like Gulliver. But they both really cared about Sam Patrick.

  “You believe that bullshit about the shooting?” Rigo asked Gullie.

  “Not for a second.”

  Rigo’s fleshy face lit up. He didn’t believe it either.

  “I keep telling people that it’s crap,” Rigo said. “But no one will listen to me. Why would Sam be on the boardwalk in the freakin’ snow?”

  Gulliver nodded. “I feel the same.”

  “Where’s this mystery woman? She was screaming, but no one can find her. And no witnesses!”

  “Forget that,” Gullie said. “Sam called me that day. He was supposed to meet me at Plumb Beach at eight that night. So what was he doing on the boardwalk at all? You knew Sam. He would never do that. Just not show up. No. Somebody got him to the boardwalk.”

  “But who? And how? He wouldn’t blow you off without calling,” Rigo said, “unless he thought it was an emergency.”

  “Good questions. But there’s more,” Gulliver said. “When Sam didn’t show the other night, a van ran me off the road. Nearly killed me.”

  “You think Sam’s shooting and you getting run off the road are connected?” Rigo asked.

  “Can’t see how they’re not.”

  Rigo agreed. “Makes sense. But why?”

  “Another good question. I think it’s got something to do with my sister’s murder. Sam told me the reason he wanted to meet with me was about Keisha. Did he ever talk to you about that?”

  “Never,” Rigo said. “He didn’t like talking about his time at the Seven-Five.”

  “That’s just what his ex-wife said.”

  “Listen, Dowd, I want to help find out what went on with the shooting.”

  “Not if you keep drinking, Rigo. You’re no help to me drunk. And you’re no help to yourself.”

  “Okay, Dowd. No drinking.”

  They shook hands on it.

  “First thing is, you have to stop telling people you don’t believe what happened to Sam. We don’t want to get too much unwanted attention. I know you like to go at things straight ahead. Not this time, Rigo. We have to be a little careful.”

  “Then what should I do?”

  “We have to talk to the cop who shot Sam. Do you know anything about Stevens?”

  “Sorry, Dowd. I don’t know Stevens at all.”

  “All right. That’s your job. Find out everything you can about Officer Stevens. Call in favors. Spread cash around if you have to. I can give you some if you need it.”

  “That’s okay. I’ll find out about him.”

  “How about finding out where he lives or where he’s being stashed,” Gullie said.

  Rigo shook his head. “Forget it, Dowd. No one’s going to tell me about that. The brass don’t like these kinds of things. Until Stevens gets cleared of the shooting, he will be hard to see. I doubt his family even knows where he is.”

  “Let me worry about that, then. You find out what you can about Stevens.”

  They shook hands again. Gulliver watched Rigo walk away. It had begun to snow again. He turned up his coat collar. He hoped Ahmed had the heater going.

  EIGHT

  Mia was leaving for work as Gulliver got home. Mia was the head vet tech at an animal hospital in Sheepshead Bay. Gullie had met Mia when he was working his first and only missing-dog case. A street kid named Ellis Torres came up to Gullie at Valentino Pier in Red Hook. Ellis asked him to find his missing dog. The dog was named Ugly. When Gulliver found the dog, he saw that Ellis had given the dog the perfect name. Ugly was about the weirdest-looking dog he’d ever seen. As someone said, Ugly looked like a cross between a dog and an alien. And the dog was pretty smelly too. So Gulliver took Ugly to the nearest vet clinic. Mia was on duty that day. Gulliver had been grateful to Ellis and Ugly ever since.

  “How are your ribs?” Mia asked as she put on her coat.

  “Sore, but better.”

  “When is Sam’s funeral?”

  “Friday.”

  “I’ll come with you,” she said.

  “Thank you. I knew there was a reason I loved you.”

  She leaned over and kissed him hard on the mouth. “I hope there’s more than one reason.”

  “After a kiss like that, I can think of a few hundred reasons.”

  She smiled that beautiful, shy smile of hers. “You and Ahmed make any headway?”

  “Some,” he said.

  “That means you don’t want to talk about it.”

  “There’s one more reason I love you.” He winked. “You know me so well.”

  “I’ve got to go.” She leaned over and kissed him again. This time softly on the cheek.

  “Love you.”

  After Mia had gone, Gulliver found himself staring out the window. He was trying to piece together what had really happened to Sam. But it was like trying to see the ocean through the snow and darkness. He knew the answers were out there somewhere. He just couldn’t see them. One thing he was sure of. Keisha’s murder was at the center of this somehow. One question kept going around in Gullie’s head. Why did Sam want to talk about Keisha now? Gulliver figured if he could answer that question, he could answer all the others. The phone rang.

  “Dowd here.”

  “It’s Ralph Rigo.”

  “What you got for me?” Gullie asked.

  “This guy Stevens. The cop who shot Sam. He’s a real piece of shit. He makes me look like a Boy Scout.”

  “Only Attila the Hun could make you look like a Boy Scout.”

  Rigo wasn’t laughing. “Very funny. For a midget freak, you got a big mouth.”

  “Sticks and stones, Rigo. Sticks and stones. Listen. We don’t have to like each other. But we both want the same thing.”

  “To find out what happened to Sam,” Rigo said.

  “Right. So I won’t bust your chops. You won’t bust mine.”

  “Works for me. Like I was saying. Stevens is a badass. I think his Internal Affairs folder is two feet thick. I don’t know how he’s stayed on the job this long.”

  “How long is that?” Gulliver asked.

  “Twenty years plus.”

  “And he’s still a patrol officer?”

  Rigo laughed. “Trust me. With his rep and record, he’s lucky he’s not a meter maid. Word is the Six-O in Coney Island is his last stop.”

  “So how does a guy like that stay on the job?” Gullie wondered aloud.

  “He got a rabbi. Someone higher up who watches out for him. Someone with juice. With power.”

  “Like who?”

  “Good question,” Rigo said. “Good question. Maybe I’ll try to find out.”

  “Do that. How about Stevens? Did you find out where he’s at?”

  “No luck, Dowd. No one I know has any idea where Stevens is. One guy who knows him says he’s pretty sure he isn’t home.”

  “Okay, Rigo. I’ll try to call in a favor.”

  “I tried that.”

  “Not with the person I’m going to ask,” Gullie said.

  Rigo couldn’t imagine that a little man like Dowd had connections. “Yeah. And who would that be?”

  “Joey Vespucci.”

  There was a moment of silence. Then, “The Joey Vespucci? Joey ‘Dollar Menu’ Vespucci? The Mafia don?”

  “No. Joey Vespucci who owns the fruit stand on Bay Parkway.”

  “How do you know the most powerful man in the Five Families?” Rigo’s voice cracked.

  “We took ballroom-dancing classes together.”

  “I thought we weren’t going to bust each other’s chops, Dowd.”

  “Sorry. You’re right. I met Joey when I was working a case. He once of
fered help if I ever needed it. Now I need it. We need it.”

  “Good luck with that,” Rigo said. “One more thing. I don’t know if it means anything.”

  “What?”

  “Stevens worked at the Seven-Five precinct at the same time as Sam and your sister.”

  “Maybe,” Dowd said. “Maybe.”

  When he hung up the phone, Gulliver went back to staring out the window. He still couldn’t see the ocean. He still couldn’t see how the pieces in Sam Patrick’s death puzzle fit together.

  NINE

  The media called him Joey “Dollar Menu” Vespucci. No one who knew him or feared him called him that. Few people knew him. Everybody feared him. When everyone else in the mob ran away from the spotlight like kitchen bugs, Joey stood under it. What Gulliver had found out was that the “Dollar Menu” thing was just part of a false image. It was make-believe. A mask. The real Joey Vespucci was a serious man. A deadly serious man. But he only showed that side of himself inside his home. To people he did business with. Far away from the spotlight. Even the front of his house was part of the cheap image. The first time Gulliver saw the house, he thought it looked like a cross between a fast-food joint and a strip club. Just like the image he had of Joey. His opinion changed when he got through the front door.

  Joey lived in the Todt Hill area of Staten Island. A favorite mob neighborhood. These days Joey was the only one left. The mob had been torn apart since the RICO Act was put into law. In the old days, no one ratted anybody out. These days mob guys flipped on each other at the speed of light. But Joey Vespucci was the last of his kind. Feared. Respected. Careful. Gulliver didn’t think of Joey as a friend. He couldn’t be friends with a man who had other people killed. And who had murdered people himself. But in the world of a PI, you can’t always keep clean. You have to deal with the people in that world. Not with people you might pick and choose. You can’t swim in dirty water without getting a little muddy yourself. Joey Vespucci was far from the worst person Gulliver had been forced to deal with. But he was the most powerful.

  The last time Gulliver was here, he had Ahmed park around the corner. Not this time. This time Joey knew he was coming. Ahmed drove his Escalade right up to the front door. Gulliver told Ahmed to stay in the car.

  “Trust me, Ahmed,” said Dowd. “You would make all these guys jumpy.”

  “ ’Cause I’m black?”

  “ ’Cause you look like you could kick their asses.”

  Ahmed nodded. “I can.”

  “That’s the point.”

  Ahmed smiled.

  Tony met Dowd on the front steps. Tony was Joey V.’s main muscle. A bodyguard. He was stout. He seemed to have no neck. Tony and Dowd had history. Not a good history. On his first visit, Gulliver had got the better of Tony. He’d taken Tony’s gun away from him. Tony wasn’t happy to see Gullie then. He wasn’t happy to see Gullie now. But Tony feared his boss more than he hated Gulliver.

  “The boss is waiting for you, Bug,” Tony said.

  “Give it a rest, Tony. And maybe I won’t take your gun away again.”

  As Gullie walked into the house, he heard Tony cursing to himself. He found Vespucci where he had the first time. Joey was seated behind a big fancy desk in his study. Gulliver wondered what Mafia dons studied. A broad smile lit up Joey’s face when he saw Dowd. He stood up behind his desk. He came around and shook hands with Gulliver.

  “Nice to see you again, little man.” Joey Vespucci was the only person besides Ahmed to call him that and get away with it. “You manage not to take Tony’s toys away today?”

  Gullie shook Joey’s hand. “Tony and I played nice today. Good to see you too.”

  Vespucci motioned for Gulliver to sit. “Can I get you something to drink?”

  “Vodka. The cheaper the better. On the rocks.”

  “Coming up.”

  Gullie watched Joey pour the drinks. Joey was a slender man in his mid-sixties. Handsome. With fiery brown eyes. His hair had gone silver. He handed Gullie his vodka. Joey had scotch. They clinked glasses. Then Joey sat down behind his desk.

  “What can I do for you, little man?”

  “You once said if I needed your help you would see what you could do.”

  Joey smiled again. “I remember. So you’ve come to ask a favor?”

  “I would have asked last night on the phone,” Gulliver said. “But I know you don’t like talking business on the phone. And this is the kind of favor you ask face to face.”

  “Okay, Gulliver. You have my attention.”

  “Have you heard about the detective who was shot on the boardwalk?”

  “Sure,” Joey said. “It was all over the news. What about him?”

  “The detective was named Sam Patrick. He was my friend.”

  Vespucci’s smile went away. “Sorry for your loss. You may not believe this, but I like cops. Flip side of the same coin. Most guys I grew up with became cops. You know what I mean?”

  Gullie nodded that he did.

  “But that had nothing to do with me, little man. Bad for business to kill cops.”

  “I know that,” Dowd said. “But I don’t think it was an accident. I think he was executed. I have to speak to the cop who shot him. The thing is, the cops have him stashed somewhere. I need to know where.”

  Joey wrinkled his brow. Sipped his scotch. “That’s a tough one.”

  “I’ll understand if you can’t do it.”

  “I didn’t say that,” Joey barked in anger. Then caught himself. “I can do it. But why should I?”

  “Because you said you would.”

  Joey’s smile came back. “You got a set on you, little man. I like that. How you come in here like you’re the man with the power.”

  Gullie laughed. “I’m not?”

  They both laughed. They finished their drinks.

  “Give me a day,” Joey said. “I’ll get in touch with you.”

  Gulliver got out of his chair. Shook Joey’s hand. “Thanks. I owe you one.”

  “I’ll hold you to that, little man. Don’t think I won’t. I like you. But business is business.”

  “I got it, Joey. Business is business.”

  Vespucci walked Dowd to the study door and said, “You ever hear from Nina?”

  Gullie’s heart sank. Nina Morton had been the love of Gulliver’s life. She had wormed her way back into his heart and life a few years back. She’d begged Dowd to help find her missing daughter. During the search he found out that Joey and Nina had been in business together. That’s how Joey and Gullie met. In the end, Nina broke Gulliver’s heart a second time. But this time she had paid a bigger price than he had. A much bigger price.

  “No, Joey. I haven’t heard from her in over a year.”

  “But you found her girl, right? Man, what a mess that was.”

  “I found her daughter. Beautiful girl. Smart. A great artist. But she doesn’t speak to Nina anymore. She’s cut Nina out of her life.”

  “Too bad for Nina. It would kill me if my girls did that to me,” Joey said. He looked behind him at the pictures of his daughters and grandchildren on his mantel. “It would kill me dead.”

  Gullie shrugged. “She got what she wanted. Then got what she deserved. Sometimes those are the same things. Sometimes not. It blew up in her face.”

  “Gotta watch out what you wish for, huh? Don’t always work out like you think. Oh, well. Take care, little man. We’ll talk.”

  Gulliver left. Joey shut the study door behind him. It was hard for Gullie not to like Vespucci. That bothered him. Gullie wondered why it was that everything Joey said sounded like a warning. Maybe it was.

  TEN

  Their next stop was back in Brooklyn. Due to his injuries and the death of Sam, Gulliver had put off going to speak to the cops. He had to talk to them about getting run off the road. He knew he couldn’t put it off for too long. And he knew something else. That the cops just wanted an explanation. Almost any story would do. The stuff about cops always wanting
to find the truth or get to the bottom of things was for TV and the movies. What the cops wanted was to close cases. Period. End of story.

  The detective handling Gulliver’s case was a young guy named Andy Cohen. Cohen didn’t quite choke on his tongue at the sight of Gullie. But he was pretty surprised by the small man who walked into the squad room and introduced himself. He was even more surprised when Gulliver explained that he was a licensed PI. That his sister had been a cop killed on the job. Cohen didn’t know what hit him. But if Gullie thought Cohen was so off-balance he would swallow any story he was fed, Gullie was wrong. Just his luck to get some eager young hotshot who still thought the truth was important.

  First Cohen had Gulliver review the statement he had given to the highway-patrol cop on the night the van was rammed.

  “So, Mr. Dowd, is your statement correct?” asked Cohen.

  “It is.”

  “Why do you think another van ran you off the Belt Parkway?”

  “Road rage, maybe. I don’t know. I guess you’d have to ask the guy who tried to run me off the road.”

  “Did you happen to see what he looked like?”

  “No, Detective, I was too busy trying to save my life at the time.”

  Cohen said, “Well, we found his van.” He tossed some photos in front of Gullie. “It was stolen. That’s it there, on fire. We found it next to what used to be the Fountain Avenue garbage dump.”

  Gulliver shrugged his shoulders. “Hope the guy the van was taken from has good insurance.”

  “Weird, don’t you think?” Cohen said.