Deadly Diversion: A Medical Thriller (24 page)

The Gunther’s German shepherd, Siegfried, lumbered up to greet me, nudging his nose under my hand until I had petted him sufficiently.

“He smells Cat, I imagine,” I told Max, following the glow of his cigar up onto the platform. Max had built the gazebo himself, planning and measuring as carefully as he did his lab work. It was his refuge from the stress of the hospital, he’d told me.

My eyes adjusted to the night just enough so I could make out Max’s bulky form. He laughed softly and asked me to join him.

We sat in quiet reverie for a few moments. Siegfried settled himself at my feet, laying his nose across my open-toed sandals. His breath felt warm on my toes.

“I don’t like to beg,” I said finally, getting ready to do just that. “But I’m here to ask you to reconsider.”

“Reconsider what?” Max asked, unable to keep the sigh out of his voice. “I haven’t heard about your test yet, if that’s what you’re wondering. Don’t worry. I’m sure it was those poppy seeds.”

“It’s about that patient. Huey Castle. I think you should run that test for succinylcholine.”

He reached down and patted his leg, signaling Siegfried to move over to him. “I told you it’s too expensive.” Siegfried’s tail thumped on the floor as Max scratched behind the dog’s ears.

“I went up to the med room on the second floor. The one by surgery.”

Max’s cigar glowed red for a moment.

“The key was in the lock. Anyone could have opened it and taken out anything inside. Including succinylcholine.”

“How do you think they got from the second-floor cabinet into your patient?”

“First let’s find out if they did.”

The moon came out from behind a cloud, a sliver of light illuminating Max’s face. He was frowning. “I think you’re wrong about this, Monika. Succinylcholine isn’t very stable in solution. It would have to be mixed shortly before it’s given.”

“How long before?”

“I don’t know. More than a few minutes but probably less than an hour. I couldn’t say for sure.”

A cloud moved in front of the moon, and we sat quietly for a few minutes. Finally, Max sighed. “I made some calls. There is a private lab in St. Louis that does them.”

I quelled my desire to shout, and let him take his time.

“The test is called high-performance liquid chromatography. The more common assay is gas chromatography/mass spectrometry. It’s used to determine the presence of a variety of chemicals, including narcotics. In both assays, chemicals are extracted into a concentrate.”

I could picture him lecturing to the medical students.

“If the substance being measured is unusually complex or volatile, liquid chromatography is used and the concentrate is subjected to high pressure rather than heated gas. It’s very specific, sensitive and reliable.”

The decision was made. I sat back, my small smile of triumph hidden. “You still have a specimen?” I asked.

“It’ll take a few days,” he said, standing.

“That’s okay. He’s not going anywhere.”

NINETEEN

Friday, 17 August, 0845 Hours

TONY VINCENTE LIVED in the Hill section of South St. Louis, the area that still housed many Italian-Americans in St. Ambrose parish. Neat bungalows, perfect lawns and square-trimmed shrubbery made for a look-alike neighborhood. That was so no one would get “above himself’ as Aunt Octavia was fond of saying.

The house was a white frame, shotgun house, so-called because if you stood at the front door you could shoot all the way through the house and out the back door. One room wide, the bedroom followed the living room and the kitchen was at the back. This arrangement eliminated hallways and so used every inch of space. With houses on either side within an arm’s width away, it allowed the most light into the living room and kitchen and kept the bedroom relatively dark. Shotgun houses had been designed to fit on narrow, urban lots in residential neighborhoods in the early part of the twentieth century. Working-class people, proud of their heritage whether it was Italian, Irish, or German, had kept them in good repair ever since.

A large American flag hung on one side of the front porch, capturing the morning heat in the narrow space. A metal porch chair had been recently painted kelly green, and the screen door sported newer mesh. The front door was open and I could hear water running in the kitchen. When it stopped, I knocked.

He came to the door wiping his hands on a dish towel, a pleasant, but not quite a welcoming, smile on his face. He wore a snug white T-shirt and well-washed jeans. He was a little on the small side as men go, but compact, as if he’d been packed tightly inside his skin.

I introduced myself and Mr. Vincente ushered me inside.

“I don’t know what I can tell you,” he said as we made our way through the house to the kitchen. He offered me lemonade and when I accepted, he pulled a tall glass out of the dish drainer beside the sink and filled it with lemonade that looked homemade. He added a sprig of mint that had been draining on a paper towel and motioned me toward the back door.

The postage-stamp backyard was as neatly trimmed as the front with zoysia grass leading to a vegetable garden along the back fence. Tomato plants, laden with late summer fruit, drooped from the weight, and two rows of corn guarded them, their tassels motionless in the muggy morning air.

“Like I told you on the phone,” he said as we settled ourselves in wooden Adirondack chairs under a tree, “I’ve been retired for several years.”

Adirondack chairs weren’t the most comfortable for short people like me. The seats slanted backward at an angle so that my feet dangled a few inches above the ground.

He asked me about BJ’s husband, Don.

“He just got a promotion. He’s a detective now.”

“Good for him. He thinks like a detective. He’s a good observer, pays attention to details and he’s curious if something doesn’t seem right.”

“That’s what makes a good nurse, too.”

“I never thought about that. How’s his wife doing, by the way? She’s a cop, too, isn’t she?”

“BJ. She’s a patrol officer in this area. She’s the one who gave me your number. I really appreciate your willing to talk to me. I know you had a lot of experience.”

He waved away my compliment.

“Do you hear anything about what’s going on now?”

“I talk to a few of the guys from time to time.”

“It’s about a patient we had last week,” I began, repeating what I had told him the evening before. “A few days earlier a Mr. Guardino died.”

Mr. Vincente raised his eyebrows.

“Yeah, I know—BJ told me who he was. Anyway, the Guardino son was pretty upset.” I rubbed my head automatically although the spot no longer hurt. “He shoved some of us around.”

“You better stay away from those guys. They’d just as soon kill you as look at you.”

“You knew them?”

Sun-browned skin crinkled around his blue eyes, and he scratched at the gray crew-cut on his head. “Yeah, I knew the older brother of the guy who died. He was the power then. But that damn lawyer got him off every time we nailed him.”

“Silverman? I met him.”

“You couldn’t have met the Silverman I’m talking about. He’s dead now. You must have met junior,” he said, staring at me with a look that could nail a suspect to her chair. “Stay away from him. He’s just like his dad, both of them shysters as bad as the criminals they represent. I never could understand it. How such a slimy guy could get the women,” he said, shaking his head. “He has a wife and no end of other women hanging around just for a chance to be with him.”

I squirmed in my seat, remembering how I’d felt when I met him.

He heaved a sigh. “But what does that have to do with this other man’s death?”

“The patient wanted to talk to the police, but before they got there that day, he died. His name was Huey Castle. You know him?”

“Not offhand.”

“He had one arm. Lost the other in Vietnam.”

“Oh, yeah. He was small-time, nothing too much. He hung around the edges of the mob, but I don’t think they paid much attention to him. He wasn’t a player, if that’s what you want to know.”

“Can you think of any reason the Guardinos...” I lowered my voice “.. .would want to get rid of him?”

“Why would they? He was dying anyway, you said. Those guys may not always be the sharpest, but they’re not stupid. They’re not going to take a chance when they don’t need to.”

He sat back and studied his garden as we sipped our lemonade. I was right; it was homemade. A slight breeze ruffled the tree above us, scattering a few yellowed leaves on the ground. Fall wasn’t far away in spite of the day’s heat.

“Mr. Vincente,” I began.

“Call me Tony.”

“Tony. Tell me about the mob. My friends said you worked that, uh, area.. .most of your career.”

He scrubbed his face with work-roughened hands and looked off in his memory. “It’s all different now. I don’t know if we made a difference or if they changed. You know they came over from Sicily?”

I nodded.

“Prohibition gave them the big boost. Everyone wanted booze and they were glad to supply it.” Leaning forward, he added, “They didn’t have to pay tax on something that was illegal. Or on the money they made. They couldn’t have asked for a sweeter deal than the Nineteenth Amendment.” He chuckled softly and went on. “Here in St. Louis it wasn’t quite as bad as, say, Chicago was bad, or Kansas City. But we had our fair share. Then Prohibition was repealed, but they had been used to all that money so they diversified.” He smiled. “You know, like they tell you that about the stock market—diversify. And they did. Gambling, unions, politicians. They were all in bed together. Police even,” he added with a grimace. “If you wanted to be a cop back then, you had to take payoffs or be run off. Or worse. Besides, being a cop didn’t pay enough to risk your life or feed your family.” The sharp edges of wood were cutting into my legs. I wished I’d worn long pants instead of shorts. I pulled myself forward and perched on the edge of the seat so my feet would reach the ground.

“Unions, that’s what they had,” he said. “You probably know that.”

“I’ve heard it, but what did they get from the unions?”

“Jobs. There were two hundred jobs in the Teamsters alone here in St. Louis. And the money, of course.”

‘They could make money off the unions?”

“It was the pension funds. They could launder money through them, but it also gave them a source of ready cash they could borrow at no interest.”

“You knew some of them?” I asked.

“Yeah, I knew them. I wish I hadn’t.” He gazed into the middle distance. “I’ll tell you a story,” he began, “that might help you understand. But you can’t repeat it.” He turned toward me, his expression hard.

“I know about confidentiality. I’m a nurse.”

“My partner and I went into a bar on the Southside one night. Inside were a bunch of mob big wigs, including Guardino—he was the older Guardino brother of your patient. Convicted murderers, felons, people of interest. They were all sitting around a table in the back, acting like they owned the place, which they probably did. Bar owners could lose their liquor license if they allowed convicted felons to gather in their place. We hassled them some and ended up citing the guy whose name was on the license. They had to close down for three, four days.

“Our intel later told us a contract had been put out on me. And my family. I had twenty-four-hour protection. City, county, FBI all helped. I carried a shotgun inside my coat for more than a month. You can’t imagine what it’s like to walk around day after day, afraid, watching every moment, seeing shadows wherever you go, worrying about your kids and wife.” He squinted into the sun, deepening the creases around his eyes. “We checked out where the contract came from. It was the Guardino brothers. They had hired a guy from Chicago for the hit.

“So one night we caught up with Guardino, took him down by the river and walked him out up to his waist. I stuck that shotgun in his mouth and told him if me or my family was hurt that every cop in the city would hunt him down and kill him.” Tony grinned. “Know what he did?”

I shook my head.

“Defecated in his pants.”

I sucked in my breath.

“We marched him back out and a little later our intel said the contract had been cancelled.” Tony chuckled softly. “That ought to tell you a little bit about how it worked back then.”

“But no longer.”

“Nah. The older generation are all dead or dying—either from natural causes or otherwise—or in prison. In St. Louis at least. The younger ones who didn’t become respectable business people are just thugs. People of interest might be watched if they come in from the outside. I heard there’s some around right now.”

“You mean mobsters?”

“Nah, just some muscle from Chicago. Union stuff, I heard.”

I wiggled in my seat, wooden slats pressing against the backs of my legs. “Did you hear where? The nurses are trying to unionize at St. Teresa’s.”

He laughed. “I doubt they’d care about nurses. They’re muscle for the heavy-duty laborers, steel-workers, for example.”

“What do they do?”

“Intimidation, mostly. If a company threatens to use non-union workers, someone might call up a few of these guys to just hang around. They look menacing enough. They don’t even have to do anything.”

“Isn’t that illegal?”

“It’s not the union officials who do it. It’s some of the workers trying to protect their jobs.”

“Does it work?”

“Sometimes.”

“But what the company’s trying to do is illegal if they have a union contract, isn’t it?”

“That’s not new.” He smiled at me as if I should know what he meant. “Crooks who wear suits and ties,” he explained. “CEOs of big companies. Those are the bad guys today. They’ve stolen more money than the mob ever did. And gambling’s legal. They call it gaming.” He smiled to himself. “And the players, gamers.” He turned to me. “I call them losers,” he added with a chuckle.

I shifted on my seat, still smarting from my close call at the casino Wednesday night.

“And casino owners give their money to politicians legally,” he said.