Reed Coleman - Empty ever after

He flushed red. I’d hit a nerve. “I don’t see what that has to do with anything, Moe. I’m not here to discuss Carmella and me.”

“I didn’t know there was a Carmella and you.”

He bowed his head, clearly trying to regroup. It never failed. Beauty and desire cut through the bullshit. For all the trappings of success, the Duke was, on the inside, like every other man I knew: an insecure fifteen-year-old boy who wanted to sleep with the prettiest girl in school.

“Listen, Moe…I wanted to talk to you about-”

There was a knock on the door. Whoever was on the other side didn’t bother waiting for permission before stepping into the room. It was Detective Feeney with Carmella Melendez in tow. Feeney was old school right down to his brush-cut gray hair, white shirt, and squeaky black shoes. He smelled of cigarettes and coffee and wore an expression that bespoke a perpetual sour stomach. The detective had his face in a file even as he walked. Carmella’s expression was hard to read.

“Looks like you were right about Martello,” Feeney said, pitching the file on the desk. “We’ve tentatively matched a hunting knife we found on his body with the weapon used to kill the kid. And there’s a bloody sole print by the bedroom window that’s a match for the shoes he was wearing. And I just got off the phone with that Vandervoort guy upstate. He confirmed your story.”

“Do you have an identity on the kid?”

“The vic? John James, born August 18, 1981, San Pedro, California. He’s got a sheet. Arrested several times by the LAPD for everything from shoplifting to sword swallowing, if you catch my meaning.”

“That was his name, John James? Did he have an alias?” I asked.

“If he did,” Feeney said, scanning the file, “it’s not on his sheet. Why?”

“Nothing. Forget it.” It was stupid, I know, but I was pissed off that the kid had lied to me about his name. I think maybe I was madder at myself for believing him. No one likes being played for a fool.

“We found Martello’s Yukon parked on Ave Y. The sick bastard had human remains in the vehicle, a bag of bones complete with skull.”

“My brother-in-law?”

“Probably. That’ll take a few days to confirm. We’ll be a week going over the stuff he had inside that SUV. All I know is, this guy musta hated you something wicked to go through this rigmarole. It was me and I wanted revenge, I’da just shot you.”

Dukelsky’s eyes got big. “I’m certain my client takes great comfort in that knowledge, Detective Feeney.”

“Hey, I knew Martello’s old man, the captain. He was an asshole too, but this is some crazy shit the son was doing. He made a cottage industry outta revenge.”

“Is Mr. Prager free to go now, Detective Feeney?”

Feeney winked at me. “Sure, but don’t go to the South Seas until this is all buttoned down, okay?”

He shook my hand and Carmella’s, wished us both luck. Dukelsky was smart enough not to offer up his hand. Feeney was the type of cop who had no use for lawyers and would have told Dukelsky to shove his hand up his ass.

Outside, the wind in the wake of the thunderstorms was crisp, almost autumnal, but the strength of the sun, even this early in the morning, put the lie to that. The three of us stood there in front of the precinct. I just wanted to get home, take a shower, and get some sleep. I didn’t care who drove me back to my car. Dukelsky kept looking at his watch, but didn’t seem that anxious to leave. Carmella still had that funky, unreadable expression on her face.

“Would you guys like to go to breakfast? My treat,” said the lawyer.

“No, thanks. I just need somebody to drive me back to my car before I collapse.”

Carmella sighed with relief. “I’ll take you. Come on.”

“Just as well,” Dukelsky said, “I’ve got to get back to Sag Harbor.” He was lying and rather unskillfully at that.

“Thanks, Paul,” I said, shaking his hand. “I can’t thank you enough for helping me out. Send me the bill. I’m sorry about getting cranky in there. It’s been a rough couple of weeks for me.”

“Tell me about it. Don’t worry about the bill.”

“Okay then.”

“So long, Carmella,” he said.

“Bye, Paul.”

Carmella drove me toward my house and not to my car. She said she would just arrange to have my car driven to my house and that she didn’t trust me to drive in my present state. I didn’t argue. I fell asleep before we made it to Sheepshead Bay Road.

The sun wasn’t particularly bright nor the sky severely blue. The clouds that drifted overhead weren’t shaped like angels’ wings nor were they ominous and gray. The wind blew, but only enough to disappoint. It was a plain summer’s day that no one would ever sing about or write a poem about or paint a picture of. In this way, it was like most days of most lives: a nearly blank page in a forgotten diary. I think if we could remember our individual days, life wouldn’t seem so fleeting. But we aren’t built to work that way, are we? We are built to forget.

The Maloney family plot was, as Father Blaney had pointed out on that dreary Sunday in the rain, a pretty place to be laid to rest. And the priest, in spite of himself, presided over the third burial of Patrick Michael Maloney. It was a small gathering: Katy, Sarah, Pete Vandervoort, and me. I had thought to invite Aaron and Miriam and their families, but Sarah confided in me that she had had to lobby her mother just to let me come. Katy was still pretty delicate, her feelings raw, nerves close to the surface. We all had new things to work through.

Wisely, Katy had waited for the press to lose interest before putting her little brother into the ground for a last time. It was a hot story, but only briefly. Most of the reporting focused on the sensational aspects of the kid’s homicide and the Martellos’-senior and junior-history of misdeeds. There were only a few oblique references to my involvement and nothing about Katy. I’m sure the press would have made more of it if they could have, but no one was talking. A story is like a fire, rob it of oxygen and it dies. Y.W. Fenn taught me that.

No one claimed the kid’s body and John James was buried out in a field somewhere with the rest of the unclaimed, unwanted, and anonymous human refuse New York City seemed so proficient at collecting. I think in my younger days I might have made some gesture, maybe to pay for a decent burial or to find the kid’s people. Not this time, not anymore. My time for the useless grand gesture had come and gone. I just couldn’t muster much sympathy for the kid, even if he had gotten in too deep and hadn’t meant to hurt anyone. It was petty, I know, but I was still pissed at his lying to me about his name. I also couldn’t ignore the fact that his antics had helped shatter whatever fragile bonds that remained between Katy and me after the divorce. Sure, things might someday have collapsed under their own weight, but I would never know that now. Ray Martello had his revenge.

The day after the murder, I put in a call to Mary White to let her know how things had turned out. The awkwardness between us that began during my visit to Dayton had a long shelf life. I heard the strain in her voice during our conversation. I guess she just wanted to move on after all these years. Who could blame her? I wanted the same thing. There was genuine surprise in her voice when I told her about Martello’s revenge.

“Really?” she said. “The police are certain it was him?”

“One hundred percent. His car was full of evidence linking him not only to the murdered boy, but to the plot itself. There were cash receipts, fake IDs, just a ton of stuff.”

“If you’re sure then…”