“We just have to carry on,” he told them, thinking of the September 11 jumpers who’d had no time to say goodbye.
Malloy’s question brought Morrow’s attention back to the case.
“Are you any closer to nailing the fuckers who hit us?”
“That tattoo’s a good start,” Morrow said.
“What about upstate? Did you find the getaway bikes?”
“Not yet, it’s only a matter of time.”
“You guys keep saying that, but I don’t know if you’re ever going to find these cocksuckers.”
“We’re working on it,” Morrow said.
“You’re working on it?” Malloy scratched under his chin, his jaw muscles pulsating. “You’re working on it. You want a dose of honesty?”
“Sure,” Dimarco said.
“It makes me want to puke when I see that shit in the press that you think this is an inside job.”
“These guys knew exactly what they were doing, Moe,” Dimarco said.
“We think they had help,” Morrow said.
“Bullshit. Not in my yard. I built this company from nothing. I was a tow-truck driver from Uniondale when I towed a beat-up armored truck. The bankrupt company couldn’t pay. I kept the truck and started my own business with it. That was twenty-two freakin’ years ago. Now I got a fleet of twenty-five rigs, one hundred people on the payroll. Not one loss. Not one problem. American Centurion is financially sound. We’re audited every six months. We’re inspected. We’re fully insured. We’re solid. Our operational policy is one of the best. Our contracts are competitive, our staff screening and training is intense. I
“I appreciate how difficult this is,” Morrow said, “but the subjects knew where to go, when to go, and that the truck was heavy. Do you think that was a lucky guess, Moe?”
Malloy turned to his window, ran a hand across his face and watched another jet lift off. Morrow and Dimarco allowed him a moment.
“Some of the guys are pissed off at me. They say I’m starting up too soon, that it’s disrespectful to Phil and his crew. I know it is. But goddamnit, we got contracts and deadlines. I got three funerals coming up. We’ll have to shut down again for each of them. Everybody here is torn up. This is killing us,” Malloy said. “So what do you need today, just showing that tattoo picture around?”
Dimarco opened his folder, handed Malloy a sheet of paper.
“We need to reinterview these people.”
“But you already polygraphed them, like you did with everybody.”
“Yes, and we’d like to talk to these people again.”
Malloy let out a long, slow breath.
“Lester’s here. I’ll call Donna.”
Lester Ridley’s huge tattooed biceps flexed when he folded his arms. He eyed Morrow and Dimarco, sitting across a small table from him in an otherwise-empty office.
Morrow scanned his file again. Lester was thirty-two, had five years with the company as a driver. Before that he had seven years with the army. Lester had two little boys. His wife, Roxanne, ran a day care out of their home to help with the bills.
“You grew up in Levittown. Your mother raised you alone after your father walked out,” Morrow said.
“So what?”
“When you were seventeen you got into a jam. You and two older guys knocked off a liquor store. You pleaded out and gave up your friends. The D.A. ensured you had no record. This was a little something your prescreen missed. Nobody here knows but us,” Morrow said.
Lester pressed his thumb and forefinger over his mustache and blinked.
“You and Roxanne are sinking in debt. You missed a mortgage payment and the bank’s leaning on you, isn’t that right, Lester?” Dimarco said.
“That’s none of your business,” Lester said.
“The results of your polygraph were inconclusive. We need you to tell us all you know about the hit,” Morrow said.
“I told you everything.”
Morrow glanced at his watch.
“This is what’s going to happen,” Morrow said. “Very soon Roxanne will likely call you. She’ll be upset because FBI agents will be in your home, in every room, executing search warrants. They’ll seize your computer, go through your house. We will obtain your phone records, credit card and bank records. We’ll know who you called, who called you, who you emailed. Tell me, what are we going to find, Lester?”
Lester’s chest rose and fell as his breathing quickened.
“Nothing.”
“Hold up your hands, show us your wrists.”
Dimarco checked them for tattoos. Nothing of note. Then he slid the sheet bearing the cobra tattoo toward Lester.
“You’re familiar with tattoos, who do you know that has one like this?”
Lester glanced at it.
“I never saw one like that. I already told your guys out there.”
“Lester, this doesn’t look good for you,” Dimarco said. “Make it easy for yourself, for Roxanne and the boys. Protect yourself, like you did when you were seventeen. You probably didn’t mean for anybody to get hurt in Ramapo. Tell us what happened.”
Lester shook his head, tears came to his eyes and he looked off.
“Phil, Ross, Gary, they were my friends. I got money problems, but Roxanne’s brother’s going to give us a loan. Help us out. Yeah, I got into some trouble when I was a kid, but the two douche bags set me up. Why are you wasting time on me when you should be looking for the scum who did this? You two are assholes, you know that?”
“Lester.” Dimarco leaned into his space. “We got four murders, six million in cash gone. People tend to lie when we ask questions. When our examiner asked you if you had any financial stress, you said no. When we checked, we found that you owe close to two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. This is how you help your friends, Lester, with lies?”
“I got nothing to do with this, I swear.”
“Let’s see what we find out with the warrants later,” Dimarco said.
Lester’s cell phone rang.
“Roxanne, I know, I know…take it easy…”
Less than fifteen minutes later, Donna Breen arrived with her husband.
Morrow and Dimarco asked him to wait outside as they interviewed her. Donna was nearly eight months pregnant. She apologized as she positioned herself into a cushioned chair that Morrow rolled in from the office nearby.
“I’m sorry. I can’t stop crying.”
Donna was Moe Malloy’s young cousin, a churchgoing newlywed. She had worked at American Centurion for three years as an office assistant who handled personnel files. She did not undergo a polygraph because of her condition, and her preliminary interview the day before was curtailed because of nausea.
Morrow consulted the interviewing agent’s note: “Subject is cooperative, credible and may possess useful information on other employees. Reinterview recommended.”
Dimarco showed her the cobra image.
