House of Paine - A Full Length Bad Boy Novel (2 page)

After breakfast they went to the Bronx zoo and walked around for hours looking at the animals and talking about her classes at Princeton. He was always interested in how she was doing, but that visit was almost as if he were desperate to keep her talking about anything that had nothing to do with him. After the zoo they went to a movie and then had dinner. Throughout the day Greg took about ten phone calls, each time walking as far away from her as he could. He usually looked even more nervous after one of those calls. Paige asked him a few times if he was okay and who was on the phone. He would say he was fine and the phone calls were “work related.”

Before Paige left the next day she made sure her brother’s apartment was clean. She talked him into showering and shaving and she went grocery shopping and filled his refrigerator and pantry. It was the first time she ever had to take care of her older brother. It was also the last time she would ever see him alive

The mayor gave his speech and talked about all of Greg’s arrests and commendations. Then the Chiefs of Police from both Princeton, where Greg worked as a patrol cop, and New York where he’d been for the past two years, gave their speeches. They both held him up as one of their best. When it was time for the eulogy, Greg’s partner Tommy stepped up to the podium. Paige had passed on saying anything. She knew how she felt about her brother and anyone who knew them, knew that as well. She knew she wouldn’t be able to hold it together long enough to make a speech. When she looked at Tommy, she had to wonder if he could either. She could tell that he’d already been crying.

She’d met Tommy more than once on her trips to New York. He seemed like a really good man to her and Greg thought the world of him. Tommy cleared his throat and said, “Monsignor Byrne, Monsignor Romano. Mayor Todd. To Greg’s mother Crystal and his sister Paige and any members of his extended family, the New York City Police Department and I extend our deepest condolences to you.

Today, as we honor the memory of Detective Greg Acosta. I’d like us to recall the words that stand forever engraved on the national law enforcement memorial in Washington D.C.: “it was not how these officers died that made them heroes; it is how they lived.”

Today, we remember how Greg Acosta lived. He lived large. He was full of life. He loved his family and his friends. He cared deeply about the lives of his fellow officers. Greg was the guy who would always defend the weak against the strong and fight for what was right. He didn’t become a cop for the paycheck. He did it because he firmly believed that good should triumph over evil. His life was dedicated to making it so, and each day that I showed up for work and saw him there beside me, I felt safer.

Greg was the guy you wanted to show up if one of your family members ever needed help. His devotion to his own family was legendary. His father was a cop. Greg lost him too young, but he never forgot him. Bruce Acosta was a legend in his own right. He was a cop for almost twenty years before cancer took his life too soon. His son thought he walked on water and from what I hear from the cops that worked with Bruce, that wasn’t far from the truth.

Greg’s locker at the 102nd precinct is covered with pictures of his father and mother and his sister, Paige. Those of you who have eyes know that Paige is a beautiful girl. Those of you who wanted to retain your balls took care how you mentioned it to Greg.”

There was a rumble of laughter through the crowd. Tommy took a drink of his water and went on. “His family meant everything to him. He fought crime because he wanted his family to have a safer world to live in. If Greg had lived long enough to find his soulmate, she would have been one lucky lady. As it is, the world will be a sadder place not only without him, but without the lives he could have brought into it and nurtured and cherished.

Like most cops, Greg hated for his family to worry. He didn’t share any of the details of his day to day life on the job with them. When Paige would come to visit and we’d all go out, she would ask him how his day was and what happened…Greg would smile and say, “It was a slow day, Sis. Tommy and I sat on our asses and drank coffee.” In the two years Greg and I were partners, I can count on one hand the times we sat on our asses. Greg was extremely active and he spent the last two years of his life working deep undercover. For those of you who have never done it, I will tell you this: It’s like being in hell. Some mornings you wake up and forget who you are and where you’re at. You live in a constant state of fear that you’re going to forget at the wrong time and they’re going to make you for a cop…Greg didn’t have an easy life, but he thought what he was doing was important enough to make sacrifices for.

The mayor gave his speech and I’m sure you all heard this but I will repeat it, this year alone, Greg and I made over fifty arrests. We took hard core drug pushers off the streets. We broke up a sex-trafficking ring and we closed down more than one meth lab. We didn’t sit on our asses, and that was how Greg liked it. The first call I ever took with Greg was on his first night as a vice cop. I was skeptical when they put me with the rookie…I always am. Every time we step out of the house, we’re in the line of fire. You have to know you can trust your back-up, and I didn’t know that about Greg…yet.

We responded to a call at a strip club. The reason vice went in was because this was a place we’d been watching for a while in the hopes of establishing that they were selling drugs out of this establishment. One of the girls made the call. She was the suspect’s girlfriend and he actually shot her while she was on the phone with 911. When we got there, he was barricaded in a room upstairs and as soon as we got out of our cars, he started shooting from the windows. We found out later that he had an arsenal of weapons up there. We exchanged fire with him and when the shooting stopped and it was time for someone to go in and get this guy, Greg’s hand was up first.

I’m going to make this sound easy…Greg apprehended him. That took over an hour and a flesh wound to his shoulder. There was a lot of talking and a lot of bleeding. Greg saved a lot of lives that day, mine included. That rookie earned my respect and the respect of at least ten other officers at the scene. He was awarded a Medal for Exceptional Merit. It’s an award that some thirty year officers have never received. During that award ceremony every officer that was on the scene that day spoke about him and they all said basically the same thing. He was calm under pressure. He had an easy way with people. He was patient and didn’t rush in trying to be the hero…he just wanted everyone to be safe.

Greg was an exceptional officer, an exceptional son and brother and the best friend that I ever had. I think it’s important to ask ourselves where cops like him come from. I have to say that although he is certainly testing our faith on a day like today…the same God that brought us here, brought him to us. We can’t change the plans that God had for this incredible man, but we can thank him for sharing him with us, if only for a short time. I thank you all for listening, for being here today…and I thank God for the two years I had with my best friend.”

Paige wiped the tears once again from her face. She knew her brother was tough. She knew he was brave, and she knew he was an incredible human being. But, it was good to hear that other people knew it as well. The pain of losing him was still the most intense pain she’d ever felt, but somehow it felt better to know that she and her mother wouldn’t be the only ones mourning him.

As she had that thought and they were setting up for the 21 bells, she saw a familiar face standing back under a tree. It was her former step-father, Jackson Paine. He was standing with two young men. The two men looked very much alike. They both had dark hair and light colored eyes. She couldn’t see the color of them from where she sat, but they were quite a contrast to the dark wavy hair on their heads and the facial hair that one of them sported. They were both big guys, dressed in expensive suits but looking like linebackers. The ripple of their jackets hinted at a rock hard body underneath. Their features were different enough that it was obvious they weren’t twins, but alike enough that they had to be brothers. She wandered for a second who they were, but decided that they were probably Jackson’s bodyguards. Jackson Paine never went anywhere unaccompanied. When she was a girl, she used to think it was just because he was such an important businessman. Greg was the one that had at fourteen, discovered the truth: Jackson Paine was one of the most powerful drug lords that New York had ever known. That discovery caused a rift in Greg and their mother’s relationship. Crystal didn’t believe him and Greg suspected that it was because she just didn’t want to.

Paige’s attention was drawn back to the funeral by the sound of the bag pipes. After that was the final radio call…it was a hero’s funeral, and in spite of the way her brother had died, Paige firmly believed that he deserved it. Her mother clutched the American flag she was given tightly to her chest as if it were a life raft and Paige found herself slightly envious because she could feel herself being dragged under. As the service dragged on, it became harder and harder to breathe. When Taps were finally played, her mind once again drifted back.

Paige was three days from finishing the school year. She couldn’t wait for the small reprieve that summer vacation would offer her before starting her internship in August. It was May and the sounds and colors of spring were everywhere. Normally that would have made her happy, but there was one thing holding her back…Greg. His texts over the past few months had been sketchy at best and each time she tried to go see him, he would tell her that he was working overtime and that although he missed her, they’d have to postpone it. That day as she left school, thinking about what she needed to take care of before it closed for the summer, she got a text.

She pulled out her phone and looked at it. It was from Greg and it said, “Paige, I need your help. Call me. I need to talk.”

She stopped where she was and called him right away. The phone rang a few times and went to voicemail. After the tone she said, “Greg it’s me. Call me back. I’m worried.”

She kept the phone in her hand as she got on the bus and all the way home. Her brother didn’t call or text her back. When she stepped off the bus a few blocks from home she texted him again. “Greg, you’re really worrying me. Please call…or at least text to let me know you’re okay.”

He didn’t call or text. The next two days Paige called and text him at least twenty times. He never responded. She was crawling out of her skin and on the verge of skipping her last final and driving to New York when she finally received a text. It was a cryptic one and it didn’t make any sense to her. It said, “Make sure you check my apartment. I have something hidden there that is very important.”

She text back right away, “What does that mean? When am I going to check your apartment?” He didn’t answer her and she didn’t hear back from him at all that night. She went to bed that night resolved to drive to New York in the morning and find out what the hell was going on.

The next morning she got up at six a.m., showered, dressed and she was headed down the hall towards the kitchen to get some coffee. She heard her mother up already. Before she made it to the kitchen, the doorbell rang. Her mother came out of the kitchen and they nearly ran into each other.

“Who in the world is here so early?” her mother asked as she headed for the front door. Paige saw her stand on her toes and look out the peep hole and when she came back down to her feet, her face was as white as a sheet.

“Mom? What is it?”

Her mother looked frozen, like she couldn’t speak and she was visibly trembling. Paige walked over and tried to look out. Her mother nudged her back. “Mom! What is wrong with you?”

Paige gently moved her out of the way and pulled open the door. Standing on their front steps were the two men you least want to see when your brother is a cop. One was an N.Y.P.D. officer in a uniform with a lot of brass and the other was her father’s partner Joe.

“No!” Paige backed away from the door.

“Paige.”

“No! Go away!” Paige was screaming at them. She ran to her room and grabbed her phone. She called her brother. It went straight to voicemail. She could hear the men talking in the living room and then she could hear her mother’s sobs. She called him again and again and again. Several minutes later, Joe was in her doorway.

“Paige, I’m so sorry honey. Is there anything I can do?”

“Where’s my brother? Do not tell me that he’s dead! Where is he? Is he sick? In the hospital? Do not tell me that he’s dead!”

“I’m so sorry…”

“No! Don’t be sorry! Tell me he’s been shot or stabbed or even ran over…but he’s still breathing!”

“Paige, maybe you should sit down…”

“No! I don’t want to sit down. I want my brother! I want Greg!” She tried to push past him but Joe was a big man. He grabbed her and wrapped her up in his arms. She pushed and fought against him until she finally collapsed into his massive chest in a torrent of tears. Paige had no recollection of time passing during all of that. At some point he let her go and helped her sit down on her bed. He told her that Greg was found dead on the floor in the living room of his apartment by his partner. “He was murdered?”

“No…at least that’s not what they’re thinking. He had a needle in his arm…heroin…”

“No! My brother was not a junkie!”

“Paige, no one is saying that he was. He lived a very dangerous and stressful life…”