Play Dead (17 page)

TWENTY-EIGHT
R

occo “Butchie” Pistone had been a Philadelphia police officer for thirty years. In his time he had worked as a patrol officer in the Fifth District, as well as a detective in West Division before coming to homicide. When he retired, two months ago, he bought into the Aragon Bar on Lehigh Avenue, a tavern owned by his brother Ralph, also a retired cop. It was a halfway popular cop stop for the officers in the Twenty- sixth District.

Now in his sixties, Butchie lived above the tavern and, rumor had it, held court in the club a few nights per week, running a mediumstakes poker game in the basement.

Jessica and Byrne parked the car, walked the half block to the bar. The entrance to the apartment on the second floor was a doorway about twenty feet west of the entrance to the tavern.

As they approached, Jessica saw that in front of the door were three beefy white guys in their twenties—knit watch caps, sleeveless T-shirts, fingerless gloves. Two drank from brown paper bags. The smell of pot smoke was thick in the air. Real House of Pain types. A boom box on the sidewalk played some kind of budget white- boy rap. As Jessica and Byrne got closer—and it became clear that they were heading for the doorway—the three guys went a little chesty, like this was their piece of geography, their inch of Google Earth, that needed to be defended.

“Yo. Excuse me. Somethin’ I can help you with?” one asked. He was the smallest of the trio, but clearly the alpha male in this pack. Built like a Hummer. Jessica noted that he had a crucifix tattooed on the right side of his neck, just below the ear. The cross was a switchblade with a drop of blood on its tip. Charming.

“
Yo ?
” Byrne said. “Who are you, Frank Stallone?”
The kid smirked. “Funny stuff.”
“It’s a living.”
The kid cracked his knuckles, one at a time. “I repeat. Somethin’ I

can help you with?”
“I don’t believe there is,” Byrne said. “But thanks for asking.” The biggest of the three, the one wearing a bright orange ski vest

in eighty- degree weather, stepped into the doorway, blocking their access. “It wasn’t really a question.”

“And yet I answered,” Byrne said. “Must be my upbringing. Now, if you’ll step aside, we’ll go about our business, and you can go about yours.”

The big guy laughed. It was apparent that this was going to continue. He pushed a stiff finger into Byrne’s chest. “I don’t think you’re hearing me, Mick.”

Bad idea,
Jessica thought.
Very, very bad idea.
She unbuttoned the front of her blazer, took a few steps back, flanking the other two.
In a flash, Byrne had the big goon by the right wrist. He brought the arm down, twisted it under, turned the young man around, jammed the arm skyward and slammed him face- first into the brick wall.
Hard.
The other two went on alert, but didn’t make a move. Not yet. Byrne hauled out the kid’s wallet, tearing a pants seam in the process. He tossed the billfold to Jessica. She opened it.
One of the other two thugs took a step toward Jessica. She flipped back the hem of her jacket without looking up. The butt of her Glock was exposed, along with the badge clipped to her belt. The punk backed off, hands out to his sides.
“What are you gonna do? Fuckin’
shoot
me?”
“Just the once,” Jessica said. “They have us buying our own bullets now. It’s a cutback thing.” Jessica tossed the wallet back to Byrne. “This gentleman is one Flavio E. Pistone.”
Byrne patted the kid down, spun him back around. Flavio’s nose gushed blood. It might have been broken. Byrne stuffed the wallet into Flavio’s vest pocket, looked him in the eye. Inches away now. “I’m a police officer. You put your hands on me. That’s assault. That’s three to five. You don’t go home tonight.”
The kid tried to maintain eye contact, but he couldn’t hold on to Byrne’s gaze. Jessica had never seen anyone actually do it. “My uncle’s an ex- cop,” Flavio said. The word
cop
came out
gop.
His nose
was
broken.
“He has my condolences,” Byrne said. “Now,
Flavio,
I can cuff you right here on the street, in front of your little Eminem social club, haul your ass down to the Roundhouse, or you can step aside.” Byrne stepped back, squared off. It was almost as if he wanted the kid to make a move. “Out of respect for your uncle, I’m willing to forget about this. But it’s your call. Anything else?”
Flavio smirked, but it didn’t play. He was clearly in a world of hurt, but doing his macho best not to show it. He shook his head. “Good,” Byrne said. “It was nice meeting you. A true delight. Now get the fuck out of my way.”
Byrne stepped forward. The three thugs nervously shuffled to the side. Byrne opened the door, held it for Jessica. They entered the building, crossed the small lobby and headed up the stairs.
August,
Jessica thought. It brings out the best in everybody. “Not bad for a guy with sciatica.”
“Yeah, well,” Byrne said. “We do what we can.”

Butchie Pistone was a short squat man; thick arms and bull neck, navy tats on both forearms. He had a stubbly head and a boozer’s eyes, ringed with crimson. Liver spots dotted his hands.

They met in his small living room overlooking Lehigh Avenue. Butchie’s chair was right in front of the window. Jessica imagined him looking out onto the street all day, in his retirement, a street he used to patrol, watching the neighborhood go through its throes of change. Cops never strayed too far from the curb.

The room was stacked with cartons of liquor, napkins, swizzle sticks, Beer Nuts, sundry bar supplies. Jessica noticed that the man’s coffee table was actually two cases of Johnny Walker Black spanned with a piece of varnished plywood. The place smelled of cigarettes, citrus Glade, frozen dinners. The sounds of the bar drifted up from the floorboards—jukebox, inebriated laughter, ringtones, pool balls clacking.

Byrne introduced Jessica, and the three of them kicked the small talk around for a few minutes.
“Sorry about my nephew,” Butchie said. “Got his mother’s temper. Rest in peace.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Byrne said.
“She was Irish. No offense.”
“None taken.”
“And his two cousins down there, eh? Talk about the shallow end of the gene pool.”
“They seem like nice young men,” Byrne deadpanned.
Butchie laughed, coughed. The sound was a raspy backfire. “They been called a lot of things. Never that.” He crossed his legs, wincing with the effort. He was clearly in some discomfort, but the half empty bottle of Bushmills and small forest of amber pill vials on the table next to his chair spoke to the fact that he was working on it. Jessica noticed a cell phone, a cordless phone, a half dozen remotes and a SIG P220 in a leather holster on the table, as well. From his leather La- Z- Boy throne it appeared that Butchie Pistone was ready for just about anything.
“Ike still your boss over there?” Butchie asked.
Byrne nodded.
“Ike Buchanan’s a good man. We worked the Fifth when he was on the way up. Give him my regards.”
“I sure will,” Byrne said. “I appreciate you seeing us.”
“No problem at all.”
Butchie looked at Jessica, then back, his small talk exhausted. “So, what can I do for you, Detective?”
“I just have a few questions,” Byrne said.
“Whatever you need.”
Byrne put the picture of Caitlin O’Riordan on the coffee table. It was her missing- person photo, the one in which she was wearing her backpack. “Remember her?” Byrne asked.
Butchie shook a Kool out of a near-empty pack. He lit it. Jessica could see a slight shake in the flame. A tell.
“I remember.”
“Back in May Freddy did some interviews.” Byrne put the activity log on the table. Pistone barely glanced at it. “He talked to some street kids.”
Butchie shrugged. “What about it?”
“The interviews are noted, but nothing was typed up, and the notes are gone.”
Another shrug. Another cloud of Kool smoke.
“Any thoughts?” Byrne asked.
“You check the binder? Maybe they got moved around.”
“We checked,” Byrne said. “We didn’t find them.”
Butchie waved a hand at his surroundings. “You may have noticed, I’m not on the job anymore.”
“Do you remember these interviews?”
“No.”
The answer came a little too quickly, Jessica thought. Butchie remembered.
“You continued to work the case for another month,” Byrne said.
Pistone coughed again. “I clocked in, did my job. Just like you.”
“Not like me,” Byrne said. “You mean to tell me that you opened this file another dozen times, and you didn’t notice anything missing?”
Pistone stared out the window. He took a long drag on his cigarette, hotboxing it. “I was a cop for thirty fuckin’ years in this town. You have any idea the shit I’ve seen?”
“I’ve got a pretty good idea,” Byrne said.
“That kid was my last case. I was drinking at seven in the morning. I don’t remember a thing.” He took a sip of his straight Bushmills. “I did her family a favor by pulling the pin. I did the city a favor.”
“We may have a compulsive out there. We found a second body today. Young girl. It looks like the same guy.”
Butchie’s face drained of all color. He hit the Bushmills again.
“Nothing to say?” Byrne asked.
Butchie just stared out the window.
“It’s not like we can ask Freddy, can we?”
Butchie’s face darkened. “Don’t go there, Detective,” he said. “Don’t even fuckin’ go there.”
“This is going to go where it goes, Butchie. If you misplaced these notes, or even worse, you lost them, and you didn’t make a note about it, it could get bad. Especially if another girl dies. Nothing I can do about it now.”
“Sure there is.” Pistone put down his cigarette and his drink. He struggled to his feet. Byrne stood up, too. He towered over the man. “You can turn around and walk out that door.”
The two men stared at each other. The only sound was the click of the old wind- up alarm clock on Butchie’s table, the cacophony of muffled shouts and laughter coming from the bar below. Jessica wanted to say something, but it occurred to her that both of these men may have forgotten that she was even in the room. This was real
High Noon
stuff.
Finally, Byrne reached out, shook the man’s hand. Just like that. “Thanks for seeing us, Butchie.”
“No problem,” Butchie replied, a little surprised.
Byrne was really good at these things, Jessica thought. His philosophy was, always shake a man’s hand. That way, when the whip comes down, they never see it coming.
“Any time,” Butchie added.
Except this lifetime,
Jessica thought.
“I’ll pass along your regards to Sergeant Buchanan,” Byrne said as they headed to the door, twisting the blade.
“Yeah,” Butchie Pistone said. “You do that.”

They rode in relative silence for a few blocks. When they made a right on Sixth Street, Byrne broke the quiet. It wasn’t anything Jessica expected him to say.

“I’d see her sometimes.”
“What do you mean?” Jessica asked. “See who?”
“Eve.”
Jessica waited for him to continue. A block later, he did. “After we stopped seeing each other, I’d see her out on the town.

Usually all by herself. Different bars, different restaurants. Mostly bars. You know how this job is. We all end up going to the same places. As soon as you find a place where cops don’t go, somebody finds out about it and it becomes a cop bar.”
Jessica nodded. It was true.
“I always thought about approaching her, seeing if we could just be

friends, just have a drink and walk away. I never did.”
“How come?”
Byrne shrugged. “I don’t know. On the other hand, I never just

turned around and walked out, either. I just seemed to sit there and watch her. I loved to look at her. Every man who saw her did, but I had this notion that I had reached her somehow. Maybe I did for just a second.”

“Did she ever see you?”

Byrne shook his head. “Not once. If she did, she never let on. Eve had this way of shutting out the world.”
They turned onto Callowhill, then onto Eighth Street.
“And here’s the crazy part,” Byrne said. “Do you know what she was doing most of the time?”
“What?”
“Reading.”
It was the last thing Jessica expected him to say. Calf- roping and macramé would have come first. “Reading?”
“Yeah. I’d see her in some pretty rough places—Grays Ferry, Point Breeze, Kensington—and she would just be sitting there, sipping her drinks, and reading a paperback. Usually a novel.”
Jessica conjured the image of this beautiful, tough as nails woman, dressed up, sitting in a bar by herself, reading a book. This woman was
something.
“What did she drink?” Jessica asked.
“What do you mean?”
“What was her cocktail of choice?”
“Wild Turkey, rocks,” Byrne said. “Why?”
“Just curious.”

Byrne put the car in park, cut the engine. The car clicked and clacked and shuddered. It eventually fell silent.
“What’s in those missing notes, partner?” Jessica asked.
“I wish I knew.”
“You think they were just misfiled?”
“It’s possible,” Byrne said. “I’ll go rooting around a little tomorrow.”
While it was possible the notebook pages were placed into another binder by mistake, it was unlikely. They might never know what was in them.
The activity log did not give full names for these interviewees. Just street names. Byrne felt weary just thinking about the effort needed to try and track down three people without last names, pictures, or Social Security numbers.
The point was, something in those notes might lead to their doer, something that would take him off the streets before he killed again.
“All right,” Jessica said. “I’m out. I feel like I’ve been up for three days straight. After that crawlspace, I want to take a five- hour bath.”
“Okay. See you in the morning. Bright and early.”
“I’ll try to be early,” Jessica said. “Don’t expect bright.”
Jessica got out of the car, began to cross the lot. Byrne watched her go. He rolled down his window.
“Jess.”
She turned around. “Yeah?”
“I like your nails.”
Jessica smiled, the first time in days.