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CHAPTER NINETEEN

September 17, 1996

Tuesday lunchtime

W ho am I? I needed to decide who I was. I’d managed to gloss over the whole name thing when we’d talked to people, but I knew I couldn’t walk into a room full of people and not give them a name. Obviously, I wasn’t Dom Reilly. Was it safe to be Charles Henderson?

The police weren’t investigating the family. Or at least not yet. They’d decided a Black kid had killed Joanne. But that could change. What if they started asking questions about the family and my name came up? What should that name be?

Charles Henderson had recently flown to Los Angeles and never came back to Detroit. Cass Reilly had flown from Los Angeles to Reno and then to Detroit. There were no records as to how he’d gotten to Los Angeles.

It was okay that I was registered in a motel as Charles Henderson and that I rented a car under that name. As long as I didn’t go introducing myself to Cass’s family as Charles, that name should never come up in an invest?—

Oh shit. I’d made a mistake. A big one. Cass had flown to Reno, flown to Detroit with Dom Reilly. That was bad. Really bad. I needed to do some work covering that up. I needed to have a long conversation with Cass.

Before I got out of the car, I decided it might be smart to drive around the block. I drove to the end of the street and turned right. Approaching the next block, I slowed so I could look down the street and not have to—yup, as expected there was the white van. The Chevy Suburban was probably in front of it. I didn’t worry about whether it was actually there. Seeing the van there was enough.

I kept going forward and then worked my way back to Cass’s house in such a way that the Feds couldn’t see me. I parked a half block away from the house and walked down. Cass’s Belvedere sat in the driveway, seeming not to have moved since the last time I’d been there. The Voyager was there again, parked on the street this time, as was the blue Corvette. There seemed to be more Sedan DeVilles than there had been the night before.

Getting to the front door, I rang the bell. After a few moments Aunt Suzie answered. She let me into the foyer, but that was as far as I got before she said, “I called Big Brothers of America. They don’t work with any nonprofits who find kids’ lost parents.”

I put a smile on my face and said, “Sorry about that. Didn’t Cass tell you we met in an AOL chatroom about missing relatives. My daughter was missing for two years. Drugs. I was able to find her and get her into rehab. She’s doing really well now.”

“Is he paying you? That’s what he told me.”

“He’s just paying a few of my expenses.”

She searched my face for signs that I was telling the truth.

“You also didn’t tell me your name when you came to my house.”

“Nick. Nick Nowak.” Ironic that after hiding out for eleven years the safest name I could think of was to use was my own.

“Is that short for Dominick?”

“No. Mikolaj.”

“Pollack,” she said, looking suspicious again. “Pollacks say No-vack, not No-wack.”

“Yeah, well my grandparents got tired of having our name spelled wrong all the time so they started using a more American pronunciation.” It was the truth, but I wasn’t sure she believed me. I distracted her with, “How is Cass doing?”

“He was crying a lot last night. But this morning he’s gone silent. He’s upstairs in his bedroom.”

I glanced into the living room. There were three older men sitting on the couches. Joanne’s father and uncles, I assumed. With them was a younger guy in his mid-thirties. He looked completely bereft, his eyes red and swollen. He sniffed and held a hand over his face, trying not to keep crying. The older man next to him slapped the back of his head and said something in Italian.

“I’m going up to see Cass” I said to Aunt Suzie as I went up the stairs. When I got to his bedroom door I didn’t knock, I just opened it. He lay on his bed in a pair of ill-fitting black slacks and a white dress shirt.

I put a finger over my lips and nodded toward the bathroom. I turned and went back into the hallway toward the shared bathroom. Luckily, he followed me. When we were in, I closed the door and turned on the water. Quickly, I glanced out the window. I could see the van sitting in the next block.

“What are you doing?”

“The Feds are following your second cousin Luca. Their van is right out there,” I pointed to it through the window. “I’m guessing they’ve got some kind of parabolic microphone aimed at the house. They might have bugged the place, too. Though I’m not sure he’s been seeing enough of your mother lately that they could get a warrant.”

“What the fuck?” He looked out the window at the van.

“Yeah, what the fuck,” I repeated, hoping that closed the subject. “We have a lot to talk about. I just told your aunt we met in an AOL chatroom about missing family members. I told her I had a daughter who was into drugs, but I found her and got her into rehab. Can you remember that?”

“I guess.”

“What have the police told you?”

“That it was some Black kid trying to steal the Eldorado.”

“That’s not true. I’m pretty sure it was someone who?—”

“No. It was some Black kid. The police said so. You have to find that kid.”

“It’s not logical that we were trying to find out who killed your dad and then your mom gets killed randomly. No. Something we did led to this.”

“No—”

“Think. Think about what makes sense.”

“I can’t! You’re saying I killed my own mom!”

Oh shit. That was a road I didn’t want to go down. “No, that’s not what I mean. You didn’t kill your mom. You had no way of knowing what might happen if we looked for your dad’s killer. Okay? None of this is your fault.”

He stood there, absorbing what I’d said. Then he said, “You have to find out who killed my mom.”

“Yeah, something told me you were going to say that.” I took a deep breath. “The police found something. The killer went back into the building and hid something in the men’s room ceiling. Either the gun or the hoodie or maybe your mom’s purse. They haven’t said anything, have they?”

“No. They came by yesterday and told me she was dead and they think it was a carjacking gone wrong. That’s all I’ve heard.”

“You should call them later on today and ask if they know anything else. Then let me know what they say.” I told him that I’d moved to the corporate flophouse and registered as Charles Henderson. Then I asked, “Did they want to know where you were yesterday at five o’clock?”

“I said I was picking up Chinese food for dinner.”

“And you didn’t mention me?”

“No.”

“What else did they ask?”

“Nothing really.”

“They didn’t ask about your mom’s love life or if she had any enemies?”

“It wasn’t Luca.”

“Why do you say that?”

“You think he killed my dad. And maybe… But there’s no way he killed my mom. He’s really upset. He keeps crying. More than me even.”

I didn’t think it was Luca either, but not because he was crying. The Feds were watching him. They wouldn’t just watch him kill a woman and not do anything about it.

“Tell me about the gun you gave me. It belongs to Luca, doesn’t it?”

“Kind of.”

“Kind of? What does that mean?”

“He buried it in our backyard. He didn’t think we knew about it, but my mom figured it out, dug it up, and brought it into the house.”

That wasn’t exactly what he’d told me before. Before he’d said Luca gave it to his mother to keep. I said, “So he did something bad with the gun. Do you know what that is?”

He shrugged. “My grandfather was in some trouble. But then the judge got shot in a robbery and we got a better judge. It was around that time.”

“Is the gun registered to him?”

“No. That would be dumb. He had a girl he knew buy it.”

That was not much smarter. He could still easily be traced to the gun. “Why did your mother dig it up?”

Cass looked embarrassed. “Insurance.”

If she needed insurance then she was afraid of Luca. Or someone who cared about Luca. “Has Luca said anything to you about the gun?”

Cass shook his head.

“If he does, let me know.”

Abruptly, there was a knock on the door. I jumped. “Shit.”

I turned off the water. We were going to look pretty suspicious when we walked out of the bathroom together. I opened the door, just to get it over with.

Aunt Suzie glowered at me. “What are the two of you doing?”

I made a snap decision, pulled her into the bathroom and turned the water pack on. “The Feds are investigating Luca, they’ve got a microphone aimed at the house.”

“How do you know that?”

“Their van is in the next block. You can see it out the window. It’s white.”

She walked over and looked out the window. Then she said, “Okay. What does this have to do with the two of you?”

“He’s Cass’s cousin. I thought he should know.”

“Are you going to tell Luca?” she asked Cass.

“I don’t know. Should I?”

“I want you to think about coming to live with me. You need to stay away from your mother’s family as best you can.”

“She’s right, Cass. You should do that.”

She looked at me suspiciously even though I was agreeing with her. And she had every reason to look at me that way.

“They loved my mom. They love me.”

“That doesn’t mean they’re good for you,” I said. “Love doesn’t always work that way.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” he said reflexively. I suspect it made more sense to him than he wanted it to.

Aunt Suzie turned the water off, effectively ending our conversation. She opened the door and left the bathroom. Cass and I followed her downstairs.

Little had changed in the living room. Everyone was silent. Aunt Suzie excused herself and slipped by us, going to the kitchen. There was an awkward moment, and then I elbowed Cass.

“Oh. Yeah. This is my friend…”

“Nick Nowak,” I said.

He glanced at me, he’d not heard the name before, then he continued, “Nick, this is my great grandfather Salvatore Di Stefano, my grandfather Gianni Di Stefano and my great uncle Fredo Amato, and my second cousin Luca Amato.”

Uncle Fredo was the one who’d slapped Luca in the back of the head earlier.

“You have my condolences,” I said. None of them seemed to hear me.

Luca sniffed, and then asked, “Who are you? Where did you come from?”

Neither question was the one he wanted answered, I trotted out my cover story. “I met Cass in a chatroom on AOL about missing people. I’m trying to help him find out what happened to his dad.”

That caught Fredo’s attention and he turned to glare at me, but it was Gianni who said, “He ran off. The piece of shit. Left my helpless little girl alone with a baby.”

Our brief acquaintance had told me Joanne was anything but helpless.

“We’re trying to figure out where he ran off to. Cass would like to see his father again.”

Attention shifted to Cass, who said, “Yeah… I would… like to.”

Strangely, Gianni just shrugged. He knew we’d never find Dominick Reilly and he seemed to not care if we tried. I said, “If you have any ideas about where he might be…”

Even Cass understood what a dangerous thing that was to say. He said, “Let’s get some food, okay?” He led me across the foyer to the dining room where the table was already covered in food, mainly cookies.

I wondered if the Feds had gotten most of the conversation in the living room. Then I wondered if that would be a good thing or a bad thing. For one thing, I’d used my real name. Was that a bad thing? Maybe not. There had to be a hundred Nick Nowak’s in the country. And this Nick Nowak could disappear, and would, at a moment’s notice.

A woman in her early thirties came out of the kitchen carrying a platter of cookies.

“Aunt Josette, this is my friend, Nick,” Cass said.

She moved a few things, set down the platter, wiped her hands on her apron then extended one to shake. I shook it. Then she pointed to the table and explained, “Pignoli, amaretti, pizzelles, butter cookies, anisette. There will be real food out in a bit.”

I picked up a paper plate and picked out a few cookies. Aunt Josette was watching me. Defensively, I smiled.

“Did you come by the bakery? I heard someone was asking questions.”

“Ah, yes. That was me.”

“No, Vicky said the guy was named Charles. Are you Charles?”

“Sometimes it’s good not to leave your name, you know?”

“If you’re up to no good, it certainly is.”

This conversation needed a change of direction, so I said, “I enjoyed the biscotti I bought. Are these the same kind?”

“Biscotti,” she corrected my pronunciation emphasizing the strong ‘o’ sound in the middle. “What exactly were you trying to find out?”

“Cass wants to know what happened to his dad. Your coworker said you think Joanne had him killed. That you though she was a narcissistic whore.”

She had the decency to look embarrassed by that. To Cass she said, “Oh honey, you know what happened to your dad. Everyone knows what happened to him.” She lowered her voice, and said, “His killer is sitting in the living room. I wouldn’t be surprised if…”

Cass said, “Luca seems really upset.”

Aunt Josette shrugged. “Yeah, it seems genuine. But that’s men… crying about messes they’ve made themselves.”