Eleven on Top

  It took a moment to get my balance, and then I very carefully shuffled into the bathroom. When I shuffled out I felt a lot better. My hands were no longer numb and the cramps in my legs had subsided. We were in a house that looked like a small '70s ranch. It was sparsely furnished with mix-and-match hand-me-downs.

  The kitchen linoleum was old and the paint was faded. The counters were red Formica dotted with cigarette burns. The white ceramic sink was rust stained. Some of the over-the-counter kitchen cabinets were open and I could see they were empty. The casket was in the kitchen, and I was guessing it had been wheeled in from an attached garage.

  “Is this in retaliation for Spiro's death or the fire in the funeral home?” I asked Con.

  “Only tangentially. It's a bonus. Although it's a very nice bonus. There've been a couple nice bonuses to this charade. I got to kill Mama Macaroni. Who wouldn't love to do that? And then I got to bury her! Life doesn't get much better. The Macaronis bought the top-of-the-line slumber bed.”

  I cut my eyes to my slumber bed.

  “Sorry,” Con said. “Molded plastic. Not one of my better caskets. Lined with acetate. Still, it's good quality for people who haven't set aside funeral expenses. I'd like to put your grandmother in one of these. Her death should be declared a national holiday. What is this morbid obsession she has with the dead? I have to nail the lid down when there's a closed casket. And she's never happy with the cookies. Always wanting the kind with the icing in the middle. What does she think, cookies grow on trees?” Con smiled.

  “Maybe I'll nail your lid down just to annoy her. That would be fun.”

  “So, I guess that means you're not going to bury me alive?”

  “No. If I buried you alive I'd have to put you back in the casket. And I have plans for the casket. Mary Aleski is on a table back at the mortuary, and she'll be on view in that casket tomorrow. And besides, do you have any idea how much digging is involved in burying someone in a casket? I have a better plan. I'm going to hack you up and leave you here on the kitchen floor. It's important to my plan that you're found in this house.”

  “Why?”

  “This house belongs to Spiro. It's tied up in probate because he hasn't been pronounced dead. If Spiro killed you it would be in this house, don't you think?”

  “You still haven't told me why you want to kill me.”

  “It's a long story.”

  “Are we in a rush?”

  Con looked at his watch. “No. As a matter of fact, I'm ahead of schedule. I'm coordinating this with the last of the Spiro sightings. Spiro will be seen in his car around midnight, and then I'll come back here and kill you, and Spiro will disappear forever.”

  “I don't get the Spiro tie-in. I don't get anything.”

  “This is about a crime that happened a long time ago. Thirty-six years to be exact. I was stationed at Fort Dix , and I masterminded a hijacking. I had four friends who helped me. Michael Barroni, Louis Lazar, Ben Gorman, and Jim Runion.”

  “The four men who were found shot to death behind the farmer's market.”

  “Yes. An unfortunate necessity.”

  “I wouldn't have pegged you for a criminal mastermind.”

  “I have many unappreciated talents. For instance, I'm quite good as an actor. I play the role of the perfect undertaker each night. And as you know I'm a genius with makeup. All I needed was a hat and a jacket, some colored contacts and handmade scars, and I was able to fool you and that pizza delivery boy.”

  “You always seemed like you enjoyed being a funeral director.”

  “It has its moments. And I hold a certain prominence in the community. I like that.”

  Constantine Stiva has an ego, go figure. “So you masterminded a hijacking.”

  “I saw the trucks come through once a week, and I knew how easy it would be to take one of them down on that isolated back station. Lazar was a munitions expert. I learned everything I know about bombs from Lazar. Gorman had been stealing cars since he was nine. Gorman stole the tow truck we used to drag the armored truck away. Barroni had all kinds of connections to launder the money. Runion was the dumb muscle.”

  “Do you want to know how we did it? It was so simple. I was on guard duty with two other men. The armored truck pulled up. Runion and Lazar were directly behind it in a car. Lazar had already planted the bomb when the truck stopped for lunch. Kaboom, the bomb went off and disabled the truck. Runion killed the other two guards on duty and shot me in the leg. Then Gorman hooked the truck up to the tow truck and hauled it off about a quarter mile down the road into an abandoned barn. I wasn't there, of course, but they told me Lazar set a charge that opened the truck like he'd used a can opener. They killed the truck guards and in a matter of minutes were miles away and seven million dollars richer.”

  “And no one ever solved the crime.”

  “No. The army expended so much energy hushing it all up that there wasn't a lot of energy left to investigate. They didn't want anyone to know the extent of the loss. That was very big money back then.”

  “What happened to the money?”

  “There were five of us. We each took two hundred thousand as seed money for start-up businesses when we got out. And we agreed that every ten years we'd take another two hundred thousand apiece until we hit the forty-year mark and then we'd divide up what was left.” “So?”

  "We had a vault in the mortuary basement. We had a system that each of us had a number, and it took all of us to open the vault. No one knew, but over the years I'd figured out the numbers. So I borrowed from the vault from time to time. Then you and your grandmother burned my business down. The vault survived, but I didn't. I was underinsured. So I took what was left in the vault and used it to rebuild. Two months ago, Barroni found out he had colon cancer and asked for his share of the money. He wanted to make sure it went to his family. We set the meeting up in the field behind the farmers market so we could take a vote. I knew they were going to give Barroni the money. And they were going to want their share early, too. We were all at that age. Colon cancer.

  Heart disease. Irritable bowel. Everyone wants to take a cruise. Live the good life. Buy a new car. They were going to go down to my basement, open the vault, find out I'd stolen the money, and then they would have killed me."

  “So you killed them.”

  “Yes. Death isn't such a big deal when it's happening to someone else.”

  “How do I fit in?”

  “You're my insurance policy.”

  “Just in case one of my comrades shared the secret with a wife and she came looking for me, maybe with the police, I would confess to telling Spiro about the crime. Of course, it would be my version of the crime and I'd be non-culpable. Easy to believe Spiro would return to extort money and then resort to mass murder. And easy to believe Spiro would be a little goofy and take to stalking you. And I'd be the poor grieving father of the little bastard.”

  “That's the dumbest thing I ever heard.”

  “You fell for it,” Con said. “Actually my original plan was just to leave you a few notes. Then I realized you'd made so many enemies you might not consider Spiro as the stalker, so I had to get more elaborate. Probably I could have stopped after you identified me at Cluck-in-a-Bucket, but by that time I was addicted to the rush of the game. It's too bad I have to kill you. It would have been fun to blow up more cars. I really like blowing up cars. And it turns out I'm good at it.”

  He was crazy. He'd inhaled too much embalming fluid. “You won't get away with it,” I told him.

  “I think I will. Everyone loves me. Look at me. I'm above suspicion. I'm the social director of the Burg.”

  “You're insane. You blew up Mama Macaroni.”

  “I couldn't resist. Did you like my present to you? The mole? I thought that was a good touch.”

  “What about Joe? Why did you run him over?”

  “It was an accident. I was trying to get home, and I couldn't get rid of you and your idiot grandmother. I hit the curb and l
ost control of the car. Too bad I didn't kill him. That was a slow week.”

  Shades were drawn in the house. I looked around for a clock.

  “It's almost ten,” Con said. “I need to have Spiro seen one last time, driving the car that will be found in this garage. Sadly, it will be my final Spiro performance. And your body will be found in the kitchen. Horribly mutilated, of course. It seems like Spiro's style. He had a flare for the dramatic. I suppose in some ways the apple didn't fall far from the tree.” He held the stun gun up for me to see. “Do you want me to stun you before I put you away or will you cooperate?”

  “What do you mean, put me away?”

  “I want you to be freshly killed after Spiro is seen driving the car. So I'm going to have to put you on ice for a couple hours.”

  I cut my eyes to the casket. I really didn't want to go back in the casket. “No,” Con said. “Not the casket. I need to get that back to the mortuary. It was just an easy way to transport you.” He was looking around. “I need to find something that will keep you out of sight. Something I can lock.”

  “Ranger will find me,” I told him.

  “Is that the Rambo bounty hunter? Not a chance. No one's going to find you until I point him in the right direction.”

  He turned and looked at me with his pale, pale eyes, I saw his hand move, I heard something sizzle in my head, and everything was black.

  My mouth was dry and my fingertips were tingling. The jerk had zapped me again and stuffed me into something. I was on my back, and I was curled up fetus style. No light. No room to stretch my legs. My arms were pinned under me and the cuffs were cutting into my wrists. No satin lining this time. I was pretty sure I was crammed into some sort of wooden box. I tried rocking side to side. No room to get any momentum and nothing gave. This wasn't as terrifying as being locked in the casket, but it was much more uncomfortable. I was taking shallow breaths against the pain in my back and arms, playing games to occupy my mind, imagining that I was a bird and could fly, that I was a fire-breathing dragon, that I could play the cello in spite of the fact that I wasn't sure what a cello sounded like.

  And suddenly there was a very slim, faint sliver of light in my box. I went still and listened with every molecule in my body. Someone had turned a light on. Or maybe it was daylight. Or maybe I was going to heaven. There were muffled sounds and men's voices, and there was a lot of door banging. I opened my mouth to yell for help, but the box opened before I had the chance. I tumbled out, and fell into Rangers arms.

  He was as stunned as I was. He had a vise-like grip on my arms, holding me up. His eyes were dilated black, and the line of his mouth was tight. “I saw you folded up in there, and I thought you were dead,” he said.

  “I'm okay. Just cramped.”

  I'd been stuffed into one of the empty over-the-counter cabinets. How Con had gotten me up there was a mystery. I guess when you're motivated you find strength.

  Ranger had come in with Tank and Hal. Tank was at my back with a handcuff key, and Hal was working on the shackles.

  “It's not Spiro,” I said. “It's Con, and he's coming back to kill me. If we hang round we can catch him.”

  Ranger raised my bruised and bloody wrist to his mouth and kissed it. “I'm sorry to have to do this to you, but there's no we. I've just had six really bad hours looking for you. I need to know you're safe. Sitting in this house waiting for a homicidal undertaker doesn't feel safe.” And he clamped the handcuff back on my wrist. “You've had enough fun for one day,” he said. And the other bracelet went on Tank's wrist.

  “What the ...” Tank said, caught by surprise.

  “Take her back to the office and have Ella tend to her wrists and then take her to Morelli,” Ranger told Tank.

  I dug my heels in. “No way!”

  Ranger looked at Tank. “I don't care how you do it. Pick her up. Drag her. Whatever. Just get her out of here and keep her safe. And I don't want those bracelets to come off either of you until you hand her over to Morelli.”

  I glared at Tank. “I'm staying.”

  Tank looked back at Ranger. Obviously trying to decide which of us was more, to be feared.

  Ranger locked eyes with me. “Please,” he said.

  Tank and Hal were goggle-eyed. They weren't used to “please.” I wasn't used to it either. But I liked it.

  “Okay,” I said. “Be careful. He's insane.”

  Hal drove, and Tank and I sat in back in the Explorer. Tank was looking uncomfortable with me as an attachment, looking like he was searching for something to say but couldn't for the life of him come up with anything. I finally decided to come to his rescue.

  “How did you find me?” I asked him.

  “It was Ranger.”

  That was it. Three words. I knew he could talk. I saw him talking to Ranger all the time.

  Hal jumped in from the front seat. “It was great. Ranger dragged some old lady out of bed to open the records office and hunt down real estate. He brought her in at gunpoint.”

  “Omigod.”

  “Boy, he was intense,” Hal said. "He had every Range-man employee and twenty contract workers out looking for you. We knew you disappeared at Stiva's because I was monitoring your bike. Tank and me started looking for you

  before Ranger even landed. You told me you were coming back and I got worried."

  “You were worried about me?”

  “No,” Hal said. “I was worried Ranger would kill me if I lost you.” He shot me a look in the rearview mirror. “Well yeah. Maybe I was a little worried about you, too.”

  “I was worried,” Tank said. “I like you.”

  Hot damn! I leaned into him and smiled, and he smiled back at me.

  “We went through the funeral home, and we went through the undertakers home,” Hal said. “And then Ranger figured they might own property someplace else, so he got the old lady in the tax records to open the office. She found that little ranch house under Spiro's name. It was all tied up because Spiro was never declared dead.”

  Forty minutes later, I got dropped off at Morelli's. I had my wrists bandaged, and I had some powdered-sugar siftings on my black T-shirt. Tank walked me to the door and unlocked the cuffs while Morelli waited, a crutch under one arm, his other hand hooked into Bob's collar.

  “She's in your care,” Tank said to Morelli. “If Ranger asks, you can tell him I unlocked the cuffs in front of you.”

  “Do you want me to sign for her?” Morelli asked, on a smile.

  “Not necessary,” Tank said. “But I'm holding you responsible.”

  I ruffled Bob's head and slipped past Morelli. He shut the door and looked at my T-shirt.

  “Powdered sugar?” he asked.

  “I needed a doughnut. I had Hal stop at Dunkin' Donuts on the way across town.”

  “Ranger called and told me you were safe and on your way here, but he wouldn't tell me anything else.”

  Ranger was going to take Stiva down, and he didn't want anything going wrong. He didn't want to lose Stiva. He wanted to do the takedown himself, without a lot of police muddying the water.

  “I accidentally got lost trying to find the memorial service and happened to stumble into Con's personal workroom. I tripped an alarm and Con found me snooping.”

  “I'm guessing he wasn't happy about you snooping?”

  “It turns out Spiro is dead. Con said he found Spiro's ring in the fire debris. Con needed a scapegoat and decided Spiro was the ghost for the job. So Con's been going around in mortician's makeup, looking like a scarred Spiro.”

  “Why did Con need a scapegoat?”

  I told Morelli about the hijacking and the money missing from the vault, and I told him about the mass murder.

  Morelli was grinning. “Let me get this straight,” he said. “In the beginning, you basically made all the wrong assumptions about Anthony's involvement and Spiro's identity. And yet, at the end, you solved the crime.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Fucking amazing.”

/>   “Anyway, Stiva locked me up in a casket and took me somewhere to kill me. He left so he could do one last Spiro impersonation, and while he was gone Ranger found me.”

  “And Ranger's waiting for him to return?” “Yep.”

  “He should have told me,” Morelli said.

  “Probably didn't want the police involved. Ranger likes to keep things simple.”

  “Rangers a little psycho.”

  “ Marches to his own drummer,” I said.

  “His drummers are all psycho, too.”

  I looked at Bob. “Has he been out?”