When we got back to the car, I unfolded the scrap of paper from Giuseppe. On it was written a location, a time, and one simple instruction:Bring the Fed.
It was not unexpected, but I had been hoping it wouldn’t come just yet. The Boss surmised, then, that Bax and I were working together. Or perhaps he was unsure of the nature of our relationship. God knew,Iwas unsure. But I had other problems to worry about then.
How exactly was I going to explain Special Agent Baxter Flynn to Luca D’Amato, the Morelli Don?
Chapter Twenty-Four
Baxter
“Ithought we were past this shit,” I grumbled as Angelo drove. He’d made me put the blindfold on again, even though it was dark now anyway.
“Let me tell you something, kid. You want to get all that cheek out of you before we walk into that warehouse. Don’t sass Luca D’Amato. Don’t sass anyone else who might happen to be there, for that matter. You and I might have reached some kind of understanding, but to them, you’re still just the enemy.”
His voice was tight, gruff. It flushed away the happy glow that the red wine had given me at dinner, and I asked, only half joking, “They’re not going to whack me, put me in concrete shoes or anything, right?” Angelo did not reply. “Right?” I asked again, slightly panicky this time.
“I don’t know why the Boss wants to see you, but if you keep the blindfold on, it gives him one less reason to want you out of the picture.”
I thought that over. “Maybe he just has information for you about the case,” I suggested.
Angelo snorted. “The Morelli Don has more important things to do than chase up some deranged serial killer.”
“But the Morelli Underbossdoesn’t? Anyway, this guy we’re chasing is no serial killer.” I’d told him plenty of times before that the Central Park Slayer did not fit the definition of a serial killer, but he never seemed to listen. “Why are you so open about this all of a sudden, by the way? Tonight you’ve made more admissions of your Morelli connections than in the entire time I’ve known you.”
There was another pause, and we came to stop at a light, or so I assumed. “I’m serious, Bax,” Angelo said softly, and I felt a hand on my thigh. “You show respect, you don’t talk back, and you follow my lead. Got it?”
I still felt like pissing myself at the idea of meeting the Morelli Don in the flesh. I’d focused on Angelo Messina in my study of organized crime, but my first idea had been to look at Luca D’Amato, and I’d done some preliminary research on him and even his husband, too, the one they called Finch. Messina had turned out to be of more interest to me, but Luca D’Amato was just as ruthless when it came to protecting his own.
And I was decidedlynothis own.
“Oh, I’ll be a good boy, you can count on that.”
Angelo gave my thigh a reassuring rub, but then removed his hand. I wished like hell he’d left it there.
* * *
Wherever this place was,it wasn’t in Brooklyn. We drove for a long time, and when Angelo parked and came around to help me out of the car, I could have sworn I heard water lapping. Angelo walked me over gravelly ground, his hand at my elbow.
“Will it be okay?” I asked.
“Don’t give them a reason to kill you and it will be.”
For a moment I stumbled. Angelo caught me and pulled me upright. “Is that why you’ve been so open about stuff tonight? Because you know it doesn’t matter anymore? Because I’ll be—I’ll be sleeping with the fishes after this?”
“Calm down,” he said, and damn him, he actually sounded amused.
“Please don’t let them kill me,” I whispered. “Not until I solve this case, anyway.”
“Cheer up, kid,” he whispered back. “Pretty sure tonight’s not your last on earth.”
“Prettysure?” I stopped walking altogether.
His arm went around my shoulders and gave a reassuring squeeze. “I’m not gonna let anyone kill you, okay?”
There was something in his voice that made me believe him. “Okay. But if they do, I’m totally gonna haunt your ass.”
“It’s a deal. Come on, now. Won’t do to keep the Boss waiting.”
I let him guide me gently on, and then I heard a metal door screeching on hinges, and we were off the gravel and onto something hard and smooth, cement or tile. But still Angelo drew me on, until it felt like I was a long way from the door. Not exactly comforting.
