A Scourge of Vipers Read online

  Yolanda Mosley-Jones was sitting alone at the battered mahogany bar, her long legs curled around a rickety stool. She looked at once professional and sultry in gold hoop earrings, matching bangles on her right wrist, and a pearl-gray silk business suit that fit like it had been cut and stitched just for her. The shoulder-length, raven hair I remembered was gone now. In its place was a close-cropped Afro that looked great on her. I’d never seen Yolanda in Hopes before. She looked as out of place as Mario Andretti in a Volkswagen Beetle.

  Behind her, five off-duty firemen were drinking Budweiser and playing Texas Hold ’Em at the table by the pinball machine. One of them tossed his cards down, wet his index fingers with his tongue, and used them to smooth his unruly eyebrows. Then he slapped a grin on his face, strutted to the bar, and whispered something in Yolanda’s ear. Never raising her eyes from her drink, she murmured two words, three at the most. His grin vanished, his shoulders slumped, and he slinked back to his buddies. I knew exactly how he felt.

  I started to back out, but she spotted my reflection in the mirror behind the bar. She spun, lit me up with her high-beam smile, and beckoned me with red talons. I hesitated, then went to her on unsteady legs and claimed the adjoining bar stool. Without a word, I took the glass from her right hand, held it up to the light, and then took a small sip.

  “This is a shot-and-a-beer kind of joint,” I said. “Did you bring the martini in with you?”

  “The barkeep had the fixins’,” she said, “but I had to instruct him on how to mix it.”

  “Any good?”

  “You tasted it.”

  “Yeah, but I wouldn’t know the difference.”

  “It’s not bad enough to toss out.”

  “So how have you been, Yolanda?”

  “Good. You?”

  “I’m doin’ okay.”

  “I’ve missed you,” she said.

  “I’ve missed you, too.”

  “So why haven’t you called?”

  “You haven’t called me either,” I said, and immediately wished I could retract it. I sounded like a pouting high-schooler.

  A couple of years ago, Yolanda and I had spent time together, going on long walks around the city, sharing drinks in a better class of joint, taking in a couple of ball games at Fenway, and once even grooving to Buddy Guy in a Boston blues club. But she’d insisted that going places together didn’t mean we were “goin’ together.” She’d succumbed to my clumsy attempts at seduction by letting me hold her hand, but that was as far as I got. I’d fallen hard for her anyway.

  The night she told me she was getting serious about a Brown University chemistry professor, she made me promise that we’d always be friends. I assured her that we would, but I knew we wouldn’t. I was no good at not wanting more. I’d gone on a few dates since then, but after Yolanda, nobody else measured up.

  Her martini glass was empty now, so she asked the barkeep for another. I still wanted the beer I’d in come for, but it wasn’t going to be enough. I needed a shot of morphine, but Hopes didn’t carry it, so I settled for a double shot of Bushmills and a Killian’s back.

  “I didn’t mean for this to be awkward,” she said.

  “Sounds like you came in here looking for me.”

  “I thought I might find you here after work. You always were a creature of habit.”

  “Something on your mind?”

  “A couple of things.”

  “Why don’t you start with the easy one?”

  “Okay. I know you’ve been covering the gambling bill, so thought you ought to know what I’ve been working on.”

  “You’re still a partner at McDougall, Young, and Limone?”

  “I am.”

  “Go on.”

  “We’ve been retained to prepare a federal lawsuit that will be filed if the governor’s bill, or some version of it, gets passed. The suit will seek to enjoin the state from permitting any form of sports gambling.”

  “Retained by whom?”

  “A super PAC called Stop Sports Gambling Now. I understand you met its vice president, Cheryl Grandison, this afternoon.”

  “I had that pleasure.”

  “Miss Grandison instructed me to inform you that her organization is prepared to spend upwards of twenty million dollars on legal fees, lobbying, and media buys to defeat the governor’s plan.”

  “Why didn’t she tell me that herself?”

  “For one thing, she prefers to remain in the background and has asked me to be the group’s local media contact. For another thing, she took an immediate dislike to you.”

  “Imagine that,” I said.

  “She said you were rude.”

  “I prefer to think of it as persistent.”

  “She was quite upset that you took her photograph.”

  “Tough shit.”

  “So from now on,” Yolanda said, “any questions you have for her should be directed to my office.”

  “I’ve got a few now.”

  “Okay.”

  “Twenty million is an astounding amount of money for Rhode Island,” I said. “It’s more than double what all our candidates for governor, the U.S. Senate, and the U.S. House of Representatives spent in our last statewide election.”

  “I know.”

  “Why did Grandison want to telegraph this?”

  “She didn’t say, but I could speculate.”

  “Please do.”

  “I believe she hopes the figure will intimidate the bill’s supporters.”

  “Do you know who’s funding the super PAC?”

  “I can’t say,” she said.

  “Can’t, or won’t?”

  “Won’t.”

  “I’m betting it’s the NCAA and the four major sports leagues,” I said.

  “Off the record?” she asked.

  “How about not for attribution?”

  Yolanda picked up her martini and drank, taking a moment to think it over.

  “How would you phrase the attribution?” she asked.

  “How would you like me to phrase it?”

  “To a source familiar with the organization.”

  “Works for me,” I said.

  “In that case,” she said, “your assumption is correct except for one detail.”

  “What?”

  “It’s not four major sports leagues. It’s five.”

  “Five? What am missing?”

  “The MSL,” she said.

  “Huh?”

  “Pro soccer.”

  I nodded and picked up my glass. Seeing her had unnerved me. I wanted to chug the whiskey down. Instead, I took half a minute to sip a third of it, hoping she’d feel compelled to fill the silence and reveal more of what she knew. Sometimes, like this time, that reporters’ trick doesn’t work.

  “You know, Mulligan,” she finally said, “things are going to get crazy around here.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “If the anti-gambling side is going to spend this much, imagine what the pro-gambling side is going to spend.”

  “Sounds like our struggling economy is about to get an unhealthy injection of out-of-state funds,” I said.

  “Unhealthy? You don’t think this will be good for us?”

  “It won’t,” I said. “Rich people who treat the state legislature as their private supermarket are never a good thing. Besides, they won’t spend all of their war chests on lawyers, lobbyists, and media buys. They’ll tuck some of it into our lawmakers’ pockets.”

  “You shouldn’t be so cynical,” she said.

  “Yolanda, I know for a fact that it’s already happening.”

  She didn’t have anything to say to that.

  “Of course, there are worse things than bribery,” I said.

  “Such as?”

  “Soccer.”

  I picked up my glass and drained it.

  “You said there were a couple of things on your mind,” I said. “What’s the other one?”

  She circled a finger around the rim
of her glass. “I thought maybe we could talk about us.”

  18

  “Us?” I asked.

  “Us.”

  “There’s an us?”

  She sighed. “I should have known you were going to make this difficult.”

  “I’m sorry, Yolanda. I’m just surprised by your choice of words.”

  She sipped from her glass and set it down on a cocktail napkin. Then she spun on her stool and looked into my eyes.

  “Are you seeing anyone?” she asked.

  “I was living with a slinky creature named Tuukka for a while, but that’s over now. She died.”

  “Oh, my God! I’m so sorry.”

  “But last night, somebody new moved into my place.”

  “Oh.… Is she nice?”

  “He drinks a six-pack a day and farts a lot, but he’s good company. Oh, and did I mention that Tuukka was a garter snake? Could have been a girl snake, but I’m not sure. Our relationship never got that far.”

  She lowered her head and closed her eyes. “You done with the jokes now?”

  “I’ve been trying to cut down.” My sense of humor wasn’t helping matters, but it was the only shield I had.

  “You’ve been on my mind a lot lately,” she said, her voice almost a whisper.

  “I have?”

  “Yes.”

  “What about that Brown professor you shacked up with?”

  “We never shacked up, Mulligan. Besides, that’s history now.”

  “What happened?”

  “He took up with one of his grad students.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry.”

  “No you’re not.”

  “You’re right. I’m not. I never liked him.”

  “You never met him.”

  “I didn’t have to.”

  “You know what the worst part is?”

  “What?”

  “She’s white.”

  “Damn. That must have pissed you off.”

  “Let’s just say they better cross the street next time they see me coming.”

  “So is that why you’re here now? To get back at him by breaking your I-don’t-fuck-white-guys rule?”

  She turned her head away, snatched up her purse, and stood.

  “Don’t go, Yolanda. I’m sorry. I should never have said that.”

  “No, you shouldn’t have.”

  And then she was gone.

  19

  “Jesus!” Joseph said. “Even for you, that was fuckin’ stupid.”

  “It was.”

  “Couldn’t of gone any worse if you hauled off and slugged her.”

  A former strip club bouncer wasn’t the best source for relationship advice, but Joseph was the only one handy.

  We were sitting on opposite ends of a blue-and-green striped sofa he’d found on the street, a six-pack of cold Narragansett and a Caserta Pizzeria pie between us on a wine-stained seat cushion. He’d furnished the place with a few other trash-day treasures—a battered maple rocker, a couple of wobbly mahogany end tables, and an old microwave that still worked. He’d also bought me a mattress for a few dollars at the Salvation Army and dragged it up the stairs. He’d hauled all the slashed and broken furniture out to the curb, mopped the kitchen floor, scrubbed the counters, and swept all three rooms. He’d placed my books back on the shelves, arranging them alphabetically by author. He’d even cleaned and restocked the refrigerator, although the only thing he’d stocked it with was cheap beer.

  “By the way, thanks for doing all this, Joseph,” I said. “You’re going to make someone a fine wife someday.”

  “Fuck you, Mulligan,” he said, but he was laughing when he said it. “So whaddaya gonna do about this broad?”

  It took a second to realize who he was talking about. Yolanda was no broad.

  “No idea.”

  “What’s she look like?”

  “Remember Marical?” I asked.

  “The Haitian chick?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Fuck, yeah,” he said. “Great ass on her. Legs up to here. Skin so black it was almost blue. Always wore a pink thong with sequins. Never bothered with pasties.”

  “Like that,” I said, “but taller. And with class.”

  “Damn! You want her back?”

  “I think so.”

  “You’re not sure?”

  “I guess maybe I do, but—”

  “But she ripped your heart out the last time, and you’re afraid she’s gonna do it again.”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “She probably will, but I still think you gotta go for it.”

  “Why?”

  “Ain’t she worth it?”

  “She is, but after tonight, I wouldn’t know where to start.”

  Joseph rubbed his brow with a big paw, popped open a can of beer, and guzzled half of it.

  “Maybe you could buy her somethin’ romantic and send it to her,” he said.

  “Like what?”

  “Shit, I dunno. Chocolates? Flowers? A box of ribbed condoms?”

  I laughed at that, but Joseph didn’t. I had to entertain the possibility that he wasn’t kidding.

  After two more beers, I decided I needed advice from a more genteel source. So fifteen minutes later, I was sitting in the wet grass at Swan Point Cemetery, running my fingers over an inscription cut into a marble slab. It was too dark to read, but I knew the words by heart.

  ROSELLA ISABELLE MORELLI.

  FIRST WOMAN BATTALION CHIEF OF THE

  PROVIDENCE FIRE DEPARTMENT.

  BELOVED DAUGHTER. FAITHFUL FRIEND.

  TRUE HERO.

  FEBRUARY 12, 1968–AUGUST 27, 2008.

  I unfolded an autographed Manny Ramirez jersey and draped it over the shoulders of her gravestone, just as I did every time I visited. Manny had been Rosie’s favorite Red Sox player, not because he could hit but because she thought he was, as she’d often put it, “smokin’ hot.”

  Rosie and I had been best friends since we were six years old, and we’d always told each another almost everything. She’d died in a car crash before Ramirez got caught up in the steroids scandal, but I figured she didn’t need to hear about that.

  “I’ve spent two years trying to forget her, Rosie. And now she shows up out of the blue.… What does she want? I’m not sure.… No, I didn’t ask.

  “What do I want? Jesus, I don’t know.… Okay, you’re right. I do know. But she scares the hell out of me. I couldn’t stand losing her a second time.”

  I don’t how long I sat there with my arms wrapped around the headstone. When I finally headed home, it was with the same advice Rosie had given me the last time I thought I was in love: Buy her something pretty that she can wear against her skin.

  At midnight, I sat at my kitchen table and scanned jewelry sites on the Internet while Joseph snored on the couch in the next room. Yolanda usually wore gold, but that was out of my price range. A sterling scales-of-justice pendant on a delicate silver chain seemed fitting for a lawyer. I arranged for it to be shipped to her with a terse message.

  Forgive me.

  20

  “Mulligan?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’ve got that airport surveillance video you wanted.”

  “Fantastic. I’m on my way.”

  “No need,” McCracken said. “I’ll walk over and drop it at your office.”

  Ten minutes later he stepped off the elevator, strode to my cubicle, and handed me a high-capacity portable hard drive.

  “We’ve got video from the three cameras that cover the passenger pickup area,” he said. “All seven days for the first week of March. My source wouldn’t part with anything from inside the terminal. Something about not wanting to reveal internal security procedures.”

  “Jesus,” I said. “It’s going to take seven days just to scan through all this.”

  “No, it won’t.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “I checked the arrival times for flights originating in Atlantic City,
” he said, and handed me a slip of paper. “This should narrow it down.”

  “Good thinking,” I said. “I should have thought of that.”

  “Yes, you should have.”

  “Have you looked at it?” I asked.

  “No.”

  “Got time now?”

  “I can spare an hour or two,” he said, so we slipped into a vacant meeting room off the newsroom and attached the drive to a desktop computer.

  The second March 3 flight from Atlantic City had touched down at quarter past eleven in the morning. Fifteen minutes later, one of the video cameras caught Lucan Alfano strolling out of the terminal doors dragging a small rolling suitcase with his left hand and clutching a black briefcase in his right. A wiry man in a Bruins sweatshirt got out of a waiting car, stepped behind it, and popped the trunk. Alfano tossed the bags inside. Then they got into the car and drove away.

  “Bet there’s a shitload of cash in that briefcase,” McCracken said.

  “No doubt.”

  I rewound the video, slowly rolled it forward, and froze it just as the driver slammed the trunk lid down.

  “Isn’t that Mario Zerilli?” McCracken asked.

  “Either him or his twin.”

  “I don’t think he has a twin.”

  “He doesn’t.”

  A theory was taking shape inside my head. Alfano had tried to bribe Phil Templeton and been turned down. Templeton subsequently had gone missing. Mario was violent, and he worked for Alfano. So maybe Mario had beaten Templeton, shot him, and dumped his body in the Blackstone. True, the little pistol Mario had threatened me with was a .22, and Templeton had been killed with a large-caliber handgun. But a thug like Mario probably had more than one firearm. Chances are, the murder weapon was lying in muck somewhere along the bottom of the river.

  “I’ll be damned,” McCracken said. “What do you think this means?”

  “Can’t say for sure,” I said. “But nothing good.”

  21

  At eight o’clock sharp on Saturday morning, Coach Martin split the twenty remaining Vipers hopefuls into four five-man teams. Benton, the flashy but undersized point guard, and Krueger, the leaper with the brace on his knee, were on my team for the first thirty-minute scrimmage. Benton penetrated and dished often enough for me to nail four three-pointers with only one miss. But on defense, I had to guard Sears, the former All–Big East shooting guard. It was no contest. He blew by me for sixteen easy points, and we lost by twelve.