Mad Dog Justice (3 page)

Roddy looks up. The morphine is dripping at a slow rate, just enough to keep Dan in a stupor. Reminds Roddy of the night with Grange, when they hauled the fat bastard upstate to Snapper Pond. Dan’s in a twilight state—but not as deep as the one Grange was in. Dan’s eyelids flutter again; they remind Roddy of a hummingbird’s wings.

“Dan, you’re in St. Joe’s. You were shot, but you’re gonna be okay. You understand?”

A grunt comes from deep in Dan’s throat.

“Dan, it’s Roddy. You hear what I’m sayin’?”

There’s another grunt.

“Don’t say a word to anyone. You’ll be out of here soon. Then we’ll talk. You understand?”

A brief moan comes from Dan’s throat.

“Not a word.”

Roddy puts his ear to Dan’s chest. His heart beats steadily, strongly. Only a few squeaks and bubbles come from his one working lung. There won’t be an asthmatic attack so long as Dan’s sedated.

“Say nothing, kemosabe.”

Danny snorts.

Roddy’s eyes water and his vision blurs. His throat constricts. He bends down and caresses Danny’s mop of hair. Sorrow fills him as he looks at Danny’s face, one he’s looked at since before he has memories—back to the beginnings of their lives. He plants a kiss on Danny’s forehead.

“Be well, my brother. Be well.”

Danny grunts and his eyelids flutter. “Roddy,” he rasps.

“Yeah, Dan. It’s me.”

“We had to do it. We had no choice.”

“I know, Dan, but don’t say—”

“Had to do what?” says a voice from behind.

An electric charge bolts through Roddy; he whirls around and stands by Dan’s bedside. His heart throttles in his chest.

A tall man with dark hair and bushy eyebrows stands at the bedside curtain. He wears a gray sports jacket, a black tie, and black trousers. A wool overcoat is draped over his arm. The fragrance of cologne fills the curtained-off area.

“I’m Detective Harvey Morgan of the Yonkers PD,” he says. Morgan’s eyes narrow. A V-shaped crease forms on his forehead. “What is it you
had
to do?”

“I—I don’t know what he’s talking about, Detective. He’s completely out of it.”

Jesus, a goddamned detective. And his antennae are way up
.

“What do you think he meant?” Morgan’s head cants slightly.

“I have no idea.” Roddy’s hands feel weak.

“None at all?” Morgan’s eyes dart from Roddy to Dan and then back to Roddy.

“No.”

Danny snores loudly.

Roddy shoots a quick look at Dan. “I don’t think he’s in any shape to talk, Detective.”

Morgan nods his head toward the lounge. “Can I speak with you for a moment?”

“Sure, Detective,” Roddy says. His heart begins decelerating.

In a small lounge down the hallway, Morgan tosses his overcoat on a couch and takes a seat in a nearby chair. He crosses one long leg over the other. He motions to another chair. Roddy sits, wondering if he can keep his hands from trembling. Morgan’s cologne is less penetrating now, but Roddy still smells it.

“I understand from your wife that you and Mr. Burns go back a long way.”

“Since childhood.”

Morgan has deeply recessed, dark eyes. They glitter in the room’s lamplight. “Any idea why this happened?” he asks.

Roddy shakes his head. He wonders what Morgan thinks about Danny saying, “
We had to do it. We had no choice.”
Churning begins deep in Roddy’s guts. His skin feels like it’s crawling. “You think it was a robbery?” Roddy asks, trying to deflect the detective.

“It’s possible, Doc. We’ll know more soon. Forensics is crawling all over Mr. Burns’s office. They may have some answers for us.”

Roddy holds Morgan’s stare as the detective’s eyes bore into his own.

Morgan sets an elbow on the chair’s armrest and rests his chin in his palm. “Lemme ask you, Doc. Mr. Burns have any enemies?”

Roddy shakes his head, wondering if he’s coming across too earnestly, like he’s seen in a million cop shows on TV.

“Anyone who’d wanna hurt him?” Morgan squints and his lips purse.

“No.” Roddy shakes his head.

Morgan nods. “He’s an accountant, right?”

“Yes.”

“Any unhappy clients? Anyone who’s in trouble with the IRS? Someone who might have a vendetta against him?”

Vendetta … a strange and telling word
.

“No, nothing at all.” Roddy’s blood is humming.

“Your wives say you guys are best friends, right?”

“Yes.”

“He’d tell you if something like that was going on, right?”

“I’m sure he would.”

“What about his personal life?”

“What do you mean?”

“Maybe a girlfriend, something he wouldn’t tell his wife. Something that could have, let’s say …
repercussions
? You know—a jealous husband or a woman he might’ve jilted.” Morgan’s eyebrows dance. His lips press into a thin line. He looks like he’s stifling a smirk.

“
Danny
? Never.”

“You’re sure?”

“He’s not that kinda guy, Detective.”

This guy sees the seamy side of life. He can smell bullshit a mile away
.

Roddy’s heart begins bludgeoning his chest.

Morgan’s dark eyes look questioningly at Roddy. Now his lips curl into a full smirk. Roddy holds Morgan’s stare and waits. He feigns calmness, but his blood feels like it’s simmering.

“Any idea what Mr. Burns meant in there, Doc?”

“About what?”

“‘We had to do it. We had no choice.’ What’d he mean?”

Roddy closes his eyes and shakes his head.

When he opens them, he sees Morgan’s eyebrows arch toward his hairline.

Roddy feels his heart throbbing in his neck. “Look, Detective, the guy’s all drugged up. He doesn’t know what he’s saying.”

“Tell you what, Doc. Here’s my card,” Morgan says, handing Roddy a business card. “Call me if you think of anything, okay?”

“Sure.”

“You have a card?”

Roddy reaches into his pocket, removes his wallet, and extracts one. He hands it to Morgan, hoping the detective can’t tell his fingers are trembling.

Morgan glances at it and says, “General surgery, huh?” He slips it into his pocket. “I may call you when the ballistic report is in. Meanwhile, think about what I asked you.”

“No problem.”

He watches Morgan stand and leave the lounge. Roddy feels blood drain from his head and his heart quivers like jelly.

R
oddy steps out of the elevator into the lobby at Lawrence Hospital. The place is a maelstrom of visitors, doctors, nurses, and aides. It’s six thirty in the evening, nearly twenty-four hours since Danny was shot.

Roddy suddenly realizes he missed the fourth-floor skyway leading directly to the garage level where he always parks. He’s been in a fog—a haze of preoccupation—since what happened last night. It almost feels like a dream state. Now he’ll have to either get back in the elevator and take it to the fourth floor or walk the garage ramp all the way up to level four.

At least the surgeries he did today went well. When he’s in the OR, he feels he’s in another dimension, one where the patient’s abdominal cavity takes him away from thoughts about Danny, Grange, Kenny—and what happened ten months earlier.

Instead of taking the elevator upstairs, he decides to walk up to level four of the garage. He walks down a corridor, presses a wall button, and an automatic door swings open. He walks quickly along the corridor, aware of its Plexiglas siding. A cold wind gusts against the windows. Roddy buttons his overcoat, anticipating the garage’s frigid air. The facade of the multitiered garage, with its dull interior lighting, is visible through the Plexiglas.

He presses another wall button; the next door swings open. He’s at level one of the garage. The damp air smells of exhaust
fumes. He’ll hike up the ramp to level four. It’ll get his blood moving after a long day standing in the OR.

Standing is a helluva lot better than lying in bed—the way Danny is right now. There’s no way on earth Roddy believes what happened to Dan last night was a random robbery. For the hundredth time, Roddy wonders if the shooters were Grange’s mob associates or some goons from Jersey or Brooklyn—ones to whom Kenny owed a ton of money. More likely it’s Grange’s people … and there could be a vendetta against him and Danny, to use Morgan’s word. Vendetta: from Latin and Italian—
vindicta
, meaning vengeance.

The garage is fairly empty at this hour—only night staff and visitors have parked their cars here. Roddy trudges up the oil-stained ramp. The garage smells of cement, tire rubber, and motor oil. The place is cold. Caged bulbs on the concrete ceiling cast dull, yellowish light throughout. Shadows are everywhere. Looking out the structure’s apertures, Roddy sees the hospital lights and the village of Bronxville.

He hears something behind him, jingling keys or metal clicking. Maybe a car door opening; it’s strange because he didn’t notice anyone getting into a car as he passed. He turns and looks back, aware his heart has accelerated. Scanning the ramp, he sees rows of parked cars and painted yellow lines on the cement floor. Nothing else. He stands stock-still for a moment, and listens. He hears nothing. Once again, his eyes sweep over the cars, painted lines, and pillars. He sees no one.

He turns and resumes walking up the ramp. At level two, Roddy hits his stride. He can’t wait to get home and have dinner with Tracy. Tom will be sulking in his room—probably listening to his iPod—while Sandy will be doing her homework. What a great kid she is. But Tom? The kid’s constantly sullen, and Roddy smells trouble coming down the pike.

Don’t be so quick to judge, Roddy Dolan. You were far worse
at his age—street fighting, stealing, gambling, and running cigarettes up from the Carolinas—penny-ante bullshit and some not-so-minor crap. You nearly landed in prison at seventeen because of that screwed-up appliance store burglary. And what are you now? You’re nothing but a murderer when push comes to shove
.

Roddy’s in a rhythm now, tramping up the ramp toward level four. He forces himself to think about the appendectomy he did this evening to avoid thinking of Snapper Pond and the .45 he used on Kenny and Grange. Memories of that night nag at him, though he shunts them aside as best he can.

Until last night when Danny got shot, the rawness of it all seemed to be fading. He’s been sleeping better these last few months, awakening only once a night, not to piss, but to cogitate about that night. Is it possible things might have been different? Maybe he could have handled Grange differently, not put the fat bastard in the ground. Before last night, he would wake up and lie in bed, staring at the ceiling. But his heart no longer pumped like a piston that had broken through its crank case. His body no longer pulsed as he waited for sleep to return. Gone were the night sweats or chills, and he no longer heard his heart drubbing like a bass drum through the pillow. He hadn’t dreamed about a grave or a loaded pistol for at least the last month, maybe two. And images of Snapper Pond no longer invaded his thoughts at random times during the day.

Tincture of time seemed to be working, until last night. Even though there’s more distance from what happened, Roddy knows he feels less alive than before the horror of Snapper Pond. It’s as though some part of him has shriveled. He feels things less intensely; he’s less emotional—even less loving—with Tracy. He no longer feels that rush of desire mixed with intimacy. The flavor, the spice of being alive seems to have faded.

Yes, murder can make you feel like a beast, killing to survive.
Will I get beyond this? Do I need help? Should I see a shrink? If I
do, I can’t talk about Grange and Kenny. It’s a life of secrets. Will the old Roddy ever return? And just who was the “old Roddy”? Was he a caring, loving professional with a great wife and kids, or just a street thug from a tough neighborhood in Brooklyn, a murderer masquerading as a decent man living a quiet life in the burbs?

Can you kill two men and simply go on with your life as though nothing happened? His fear of being arrested or of mob goons retaliating had begun fading to a distant shadow. Had he
really
thought the McLaughlin’s fiasco was just a minor bump in the road, an unpleasant interlude that would fade away?

But Danny getting shot changes everything.

If I’m killed, what happens to Tracy and the kids? Jesus, don’t let that be the end of all this. Am I praying now? It’s just a small jump to where I’ll turn to religion, like Danny does
. Roddy recalls that insane, dreamlike drive down the Taconic from Snapper Pond after he’d shot and killed Grange and Kenny. There was that mind-numbing moment when Dan asked him that question.
“Roddy, you believe in God?”

Halfway up the ramp leading to level four, the smell of exhaust fumes grows stronger. It mixes with the biting cold of damp winter air and swirls into Roddy’s nostrils. He tastes the noxious mix on his tongue. The pungent odor reminds him of driving the Sequoia that night. There was the smell of gunpowder, the reek of Grange’s empty bowels, the moist soil, and the fungal stench of the pond.

He rounds a concrete pillar. About to trudge the last forty yards to his parked Rogue, Roddy sees the source of the fumes. His heart crawls up to his throat. A jolting sensation pulses through him. A black Lincoln Navigator is parked with its engine running. Its nose faces the cinder-block wall. Its rear bumper faces his car. Roddy’s body freezes as he stands next to the pillar, motionless, eyes locked on the Navigator. The blackened window on the driver’s side is lowered halfway. A man wearing a dark coat
and a black beret sits behind the wheel, smoking a cigarette.

The Navigator’s lift gate is open. Another man, wearing a waist-length, black leather jacket, stands behind the gate with one foot perched on the rear bumper. His back is to Roddy as he talks into a cell phone. He can’t make out the man’s words, but he’s talking in some Eastern European language. There’s urgency in his voice. A chill overtakes Roddy as he stands hidden by the concrete pillar.

This could be it: an ambush. Roddy doesn’t recognize them as hospital employees. And they’re not getting out of the vehicle to head to the hospital to visit someone. They’re parked in a mob-mobile, a Navigator with blackened windows, waiting, with the engine idling, near Roddy’s car. What could they possibly be doing other than waiting for
him
? The guy at the rear could pull a weapon from the cargo bay—it would take only a second—while the other guy’s ready to pull out, burn rubber, and make tracks.