Deadly Diamonds (9 page)

The barracuda made a two-handed motion that said lift your arms. Lex did. The thorough body search revealed that he was unarmed and telling the truth about the cell phone. The next gesture was more a command than an invitation to enter the room.

A short, dark-skinned, balding man in a gray suit that made him look like an overstuffed sausage sat in an upholstered chair across the room. A straight-back chair was set in front of him.

“Now, Mr. Smart-ass Lawyer, suppose you sit, and we have this conversation you wanted.”

A jab in the back set Lex in motion toward the chair. He sat down in silence.

“You go first, lawyer. What's this thing you want to talk about?”

“I think you know. I assume you're Salviti.”

Lex felt the point of something sharp at the base of his skull.

“That's ‘Mr. Salviti' to you.”

“Easy, Tony. Mr. Devlin's a big shot lawyer. He thinks he can threaten me with arrest for something about perjury. We should treat him with respect. Up to a point. What's this business you have with me, Devlin?”

“There's a charge of child molesting against Monsignor Matt Ryan in Charlestown. It's a sham. It's brought by a man named Casey. He's been scared out of his wits by a Tony Napolitano. I hear he's your man.”

Salviti looked at the man standing behind Lex. A grin crossed his face.

“Tony, you know anything about this?”

“I'm just listenin', Mr. Salviti.”

“So I take it this Monsignor is a client of yours. Maybe an old friend. Yeah?”

Lex nodded.

“And you think that I can make all this trouble for your friend go away. That's why you wanted this little meeting.”

“I hope we can do business.”

Salviti stood up to his full height of five foot four and walked to the window. “You're a lawyer, Devlin. You should know what business means. It means I maybe do something for you—after you do something for me.”

“I'll do whatever I can to get this thing off Matt Ryan's back. You know that or we wouldn't be here.”

“Ah, very perceptive. Then you're ready to deal.”

“I said I'll do what I can.”

Salviti walked back to within a foot of Lex's chair. His pointed finger was inches from Lex's face.

“No, no. You'll do what I tell you. No limits. You do, and maybe I'm grateful. You don't, and I'll let Tony take over my side of our conversation. He explains things more clearly than I do. Is that understood?”

There was no point in debating the unchangeable. Lex just nodded.

“Good. Then here's what you'll do for me.”

CHAPTER TEN

When I left the Marliave, I went back to the office and waited in case Mr. Devlin tried to reach me. Neither Julie nor Mr. D's secretary, Lois, had a clue, and the phone was deadly silent. By ten o'clock, I was jumping out of my skin.

I strained every ounce of memory fiber for what I could recall of Mr. D's telephone conversation with Dominic Santangelo. The only thing I could pull back was the mention of the name, “Packy.” That rang a bell. That was the name mentioned by the Irishman, Burke, as the right-hand man of the deceased occupant of the trunk, Barone.

Those two names rattled around a restless, sleepless mind all night. It was not until six o'clock the next morning that an idea broke through. When you keep hitting dead ends, go back to the starting point. This whole disaster began because young Kevin O'Byrne made a misguided trip to Patrini's Restaurant in the North End, allegedly for pizza.

I checked back in the office for any message and did a number of useless, time-killing things through the morning. Still no word.

At quarter past eleven, I walked into Patrini's Restaurant on Endicott Street in the North End. I was just short of planless, but my senses told me that I was in the right area. Even an Irish/ English/ Puerto Rican kid from Jamaica Plain like me could tell you that if you wanted to put a few dollars on a number or an illegal sports bet, or get in on a variety of other illegal enterprises courtesy of the Italian mob, Patrini's was the spot.

When I walked in, the waiters were setting up for the lunch
crowd. Instinctively I went to the nerve center of any place with a bar—the bartender. He gave me a coaster and a smile. The first words out of his mouth rang of a higher intellect than I'd expected.

I ordered a draft Sam Adams and said something snappy about the weather to break the ice. We chatted easily until I leaned over the bar and tried the only name I had in my kit.

“How do I get in touch with Packy?”

The smile remained the same, but the alert code in the eyes went from green to high orange.

“Who's that?”

“Tell you what. I'll give you the first bet of the day. I'll bet a ten spot at ten-to-one odds that you know exactly who I'm talking about.”

He went on polishing glasses. “And if I did?”

“Uh-huh. Then we're on first base. Let's try for second. I'll make it easy. You don't have to say anything to me. I just need to get a message to him. Don't say no until I give you the message.”

He just kept smiling.

“If you can get word to Packy that Michael Knight, the partner of Lex Devlin, has what he wants and is ready to deal, I'll pretend I lost the bet.”

I took out the hundred dollar bill I carry in the back of my cash roll for just such an occasion. I put it on the bar and kept my hand on top of it. His eyes were on it, and then on me.

“And if I should know such a person and he got your message, where could he reach you?”

“I'll make that easy too. You see that booth down there in the back? Right there. The office'll be open.”

I picked up the beer and took my hand off the hundred dollar bill. As I walked to the back booth, I checked back. The bill was gone from the bar.

By twelve thirty, I'd nursed two and a half pints of Sam Adams fine lager. At twelve thirty-one, the bartender left a now-thriving business at the bar to walk to the booth. He set another Sam in front of me
on a coaster that was upside down. I lifted the frosty glass before the moisture ran the writing on the coaster. The message was terse: “Pi Alley off School Street. Four o'clock. Alone.”

Terrific. I had what I wanted. A date with Satan and who knows how many of his fallen angels with just me alone to deal for the life of the man I loved like a father. I had baited the hook with the promise that I “have what he wants,” when I could more easily have guessed Rumplestiltskin's name than whatever the hell it was he wanted. Not too promising, longevity-wise, but I could think of not one single alternative.

I'd walked the narrow Pi Alley with my father as a kid more times than I could count. It was the location of most of the printers' shops back in Ben Franklin's day. It was called “Pi Alley” because the printers would throw the used pieces of type said to be “pied” out the window into the alley. It held good memories, but I was dead sure this was not going to be one of them. Today that narrow, darkened path between tall buildings felt like a cattle chute to the slaughterhouse.

At four o'clock, the sun was behind the buildings, and a brooding darkness was settling in. From the first step I took off of School Street, I had to will my legs to take every step. If this Packy didn't show, I was desperate for ideas. If he did, I had absolutely nothing but my life to trade. With those comforting notions, I moved one lead foot after the other into the totally vacant, soundless, dark alley.

I had crossed half of the two-hundred-foot stretch with my heart dropping closer to the pit of my stomach with every step, when I saw two silhouettes at the far end. They looked like Abbot and Costello, one short and fat, the other tall and slim, but not a trace of humor. They were moving in my direction.

We were fifteen feet from each other, when I caught the faint glint of light reflected off the barrel of a gun. The thin one gave the order.

“Right there, Knight. Hands behind your head.”

I froze and obeyed. My eyes scoured the scene for an escape hatch. There was absolutely none. The fat one spoke.

“So you got what I want, do you? Let's have it.”

“I don't know what—”

I got that far before a hand came from behind. It locked my forehead in a grip like a vise. I could feel the steel edge of a blade at my throat. My body went rigid when the cutting edge started to draw liquid. I couldn't have taken a deep breath without the blade cutting deeper.

“I didn't come here to bargain, Knight. I see it this way. Maybe you don't give a damn about your own life, but I figure you wouldn't be here if you didn't care about the old man. So, here's the deal. You got what I want, cough it up. I don't see it in ten seconds, you'll both be food for the mackerel in Boston Harbor. Can I make it any clearer than that?”

It was nearly impossible to speak. I could almost taste the panic of knowing that, as promised, in ten seconds I'd be on the ground with a bullet or a slashed throat. I had nothing to give him, and even if I did, I knew I'd never leave that alley alive.

I could hardly move my throat muscles to speak. I squeezed out a whisper of the only thing I could think of to buy time. “I don't have it with me.”

The fat man moved closer.

“You just bought another ten seconds. Where is it?”

“I can't talk. Give me some slack.”

The fat man thought for a second before nodding to the ape behind me. I felt the blade move an inch away from my throat. At least I could speak, but I had nothing to say.

“So talk. I make one call, and you can hear your old partner's last words before it's your turn. Your ten seconds are counting.”

I had no words left. I used the ten seconds to speak to God rather than the fat man.

At the count of five, I was pulled out of my prayer space by an incongruous sound. I heard whistling behind me. I was even aware of the tune. It was “The Fields of Athenry.” I'd heard it in a pub in Dublin.

The footsteps from the same direction were calm and deliberate. I had no idea who had wandered into that alley, but I thanked God for the brief freeze it put on the fat man's plan.

When the footsteps were nearly abreast of us, they stopped. The fat man spoke first.

“Keep movin' or you'll get a piece of this.” The man beside him flashed the gun on the new arrival. I expected a panicky dash in the opposite direction. Instead, I heard the quiet, unflustered Irish accent that I had heard on that porch in Dorchester.

“Now that wouldn't be the smartest thing you could do, Mr. Salviti. Do you see this here? And do you know what it is?”

The Irishman held his two hands in front of him. The light from the side windows was just enough to make out a roundish object the size of a baseball in his right hand and his left hand holding something attached to it.

“What the hell are you—?”

“Come now, Salviti. You're old enough to recognize an old-fashioned hand grenade when you see it. This here's the pin. If I should separate the two, you'd have three seconds to clear the alley before tiny pieces of steel would rip every inch of your body. Do you think you could run that fast?”

Salviti just stared. Now he was planless, but only for a few seconds. It was still a standoff, and the blade was still an inch from my throat.

“You won't pull that pin. You'd be blown up with the rest of us.”

“Ah, now that's perceptive. I'll make you a bet, Salviti. I'll bet my life that you're a sleazy skunk of a coward. I'll bet all your useless life you've had others do the killin' for you without ever puttin' that fat, pampered ass of yours in danger.”

There was no answer.

“And that's the difference between us. I've lived with death an inch away all my life. I'm not afraid of it. So let's put it to the test. Now I'll give you ten seconds. Let's count them out together before I pull this pin. One—”

Salviti stood fast. His voice never shook when he gave the command to the two thugs with him. “You boys stay where you are. He's bluffing.”

“Two—three—four—”

Burke held the grenade straight out and closed his fist around the pin. I could hear the feet of the man behind me shuffle. He held me with one hand, but the knife dropped away from my throat.

“Stand your ground, men!”

“Five—six—seven—”

The count was slow, but relentless. What was relief at Seamus Burke's arrival turned to the certainty of another kind of death, only this time with company.

When the count hit “eight,” the man behind me threw down the knife and ran for his life. Salviti shrieked at the man beside him.

“Shoot him down before he pulls that pin!”

Burke's voice never quavered. “No use in that, Salviti. I'll still have time to pull the pin. And that brings us to nine.”

The man beside Salviti broke. He bolted for the end of the alley as fast as his shaking legs could carry him. Salviti knew he was alone. All of his weapons had been in the hands of his thugs. It was his turn to face death. He fell to his knees and begged.