Chapter 4

My mother made me take French when I was a child. The romance wore off faster than I could have believed. I found I had no skill with languages to the dismay of my mother who strived tooth and nail to raise a cultured child. What she got was a morbid child, a quite child who read more than she spoke. I suppose learning French was negated by my lack of social ability to flaunt it. Parents are inherently selfish in some ways, I never really understood it.

I washed down the stainless steel gurney with the antibacterial toilettes that I never keep far from me. Paul paced restlessly the heels of his shoes echoing irritatingly off the bland walls. I could hear the men's hushed voices float in. It took me a few moments of puzzled eavesdropping to realize they were speaking another language. At first I suspected that I had suffered from some kind of mind altering stroke as the fact that two blatantly Irish men fluently speaking something that wasn't garbled English or archaic Gallic simply blew my mind.

"What is that?" I asked Paul, who halted his pacing, listened to the hushed voices, and answered.

"Italian, I think."

"I thought so, but I wasn't sure." I said, noting the unintentional feebleness in my voice with a grimace. The flimsy attempt at normal conversation was suffocated easily by the awkwardness of the situation, and I felt my face grow inexplicably warm at the thought of our stiff introductions.

I closed the door behind them, and caught a glimpse of a black car with heavily tinted windows parked at the curb. Its driver's side window was cracked and the acidic reek of cigar smoke met my nose even at that distance. These would, of course be the police officers Paul had promised me would keep this meeting a private and invisible one. I was troubled as I locked the door firmly, the sound of the heavy mechanical inner workings echoed off the walls and down the empty hallways, if I could spot the police parked so suspiciously than anyone could. I turned to them and slipped my identification badge back around my neck.

"Lidia, this is Connor, "Paul gestured to the man closest to him. The man stiffened immediately, and didn't meet my gaze; he was instead engrossed with glaring at Paul with confusion. I realized then that Paul had used his real name, something the man and even I wasn't expecting. Paul glanced back at him, raising an eyebrow to urge the man on. Connor must have suddenly realized that I was still standing in front of him as he snapped his head back and smiled awkwardly, raising his hand for me to shake. His hand were cold, the skin tight and dry with the night chill. His face was long and symmetrical but he seemed distant and weary. His polite smile faded and a solemn mask replaced it. His forehead was high, as were his cheeks. His eyes were thoughtful and contemplative.

"Nice ta meet you" he mumbled solemnly. He tried to smother his Irish accent but it bled through all the same. That was probably one of Paul's ideas, as they weren't exactly as cautious during the whole Yakavetta operation.

I didn't answer him; I simply nodded my head and smiled. As he drew his hand back to plunge it into his jean pocket I saw a flash of tattoo that crawled from the meat of his hand up his index finger, but I couldn't make sense of it. I redirected my attention, fearful of the discovery of my impolite gaze and the further awkwardness it would inflict.

"And this is Murphy." Paul continued, gesturing to the second man who took my hand in his own with less delay. His grip was equally stiff and cold, but he smiled in the same warm manner as his counterpart. His eyes held an eerily similar cold pensiveness, his face was squarer, his jaw line more pronounced.

A wave of silence hit us then, Paul plunged his fists into his pants pockets and I tried to subdue a growing sense of panic. They didn't look like killers; they were too young, barley into their mid twenties, and too docile. They didn't sneer, or look me up and down. They looked too normal.

"I'm sorry for your loss." I offered weakly which earned stiff nods from both of the men.

I backed away slowly and turned on my heal. I could hear Paul's footfalls behind me.

I was grateful for the company, it made me feel less insane and besides, I needed help transporting the body from the refrigerator to the gurney. It really isn't that hard, the cold steel slab David's corpse rested on had several inner wheels that allowed it to slide in and out of the refrigerator easily. Once the slab began to roll it was simply a matter of positioning the gurney correctly.

Paul stripped his coat from his shoulders and flung it atop a derelict desk crammed behind the door. He held the gurney stiffly until the corpse has slid into place. I nodded my thanks.

The two men looked up unsettlingly simultaneously. They glanced at each other with a knowing sadness, and turned to face the gurney as I pushed it noisily into place at the very center of the room. I pulled back the rubber sheet to reveal David's face, only then did the two strangers move forward, solemnly shuffling their booted feet toward the corpse. I pulled the sheet down only enough to uncover his face and the top half of his torso that remained unmarred by the gun blast that had torn into it so savagely. The Y incision was admittedly unsightly, the stitching thick and raised almost half an inch above the skin. It was beyond me why the court had insisted on the autopsy, the cause of death was obviously the sever internal trauma sustained by the gun blast. Although the autopsy itself was unnecessary, it did give me the chance to understand how internally devastating such a wound could be. The bullet's sheer force had shattered David's sternum causing fractured pieces of bone to lacerate the heart and both of his lungs. His lungs had begun to fill with blood, but the trauma to his heart was so severe that he died before he could drown agonizingly on his own blood. His missing fingers were an added touch, two pinkies had been completely blown off, although one had time to clot and heal, third degree burns on the finger suggested that it had be poorly cauterized, the other had been inflicted much more recently.

The rubber sheet had mussed the dead man's long stringy hair; it fell in dull strands across his cold face. I swept them gingerly back into place, earning me a strange quick glance from Connor, instantly embarrassing me. I imagined that the motion seemed almost loving but it certainly wasn't intended to be. It was a reflex. The strangers beheld David's corpse with in silent sorrow, brows furrowed and lips pursed tightly.

He did not smell, and that was a relief. Unlike several of the other corpses found at the Yakavetta home David had been recovered almost immediately following his murder. The dry coldness of the refrigerator had taken its toll on the body, tightening the skin so severely that unsightly wrinkles began to form around his eyes and his bluish violet lips were beginning to curl upwards in a slight grim faux smile. Paul placed a large warm hand on my shoulder signifying that a graceful departure from the room in order to give the men some time alone with their departed friend was not uncalled for. I stepped away slowly, smiling my own faux apologetic smile, and followed Paul out.

The men's stiffness seemed to ease visibly upon our departure. They spoke softly to themselves, their murmurs floated into the open door. I realized suddenly how tired I really was as I felt myself sway on my aching feet.

"Why don't you sit?" Paul offered, gesturing at the vacant chair to his left that belonged to the derelict desk crammed behind the heavy door. Piles of old paperwork littered that desk, nothing critical mostly follow ups on tedious toxicology reports. I mindlessly rifled through them as I sat. The chair was hideously old and groaned noisily as I sat making me instantly tense awaiting a sudden and crushingly embarrassing collapse.

Paul leaned lazily against the pale wall, his elbow nudging the doorframe whose paint was beginning to peal. Paul rubbed at his forehead; this whole mess had taken its toll on him as well. He was worn-down, his resolve threadbare with angst and exhaustion. I felt instantly selfish, this hadn't really been all that taxing, all it meant for me was a few sleepless nights and a few extra hours spent farting around work. I suspected that in less than an hour this would all be over for me, and tomorrow I would wake up and it would be done. For Paul it was nowhere near over. He still had to find a way to smuggle two of the most wanted criminals out of the country as quickly and quietly as possible.

It was a full hour and a half before the men had sufficiently paid their respects and shuffled disturbing our artificial chatter. I walked them to the door in absolute silence. The world had grown frigidly cold outside, shivering I shook the men's hands, although they seemed to glance behind me more than once no doubt at the corpse of their late friend. They stated their thanks with glassy eyes and brittle voices. Paul shrugged on his coat and patted my shoulder before ushering the men out the door and into the black car still belching cigar smoke.

David's hand rested perfectly flat on his abdomen, the nails gleaming blue and the cuticles an unsightly purple. The wooden beads the delicate rosary that had been wrapped around his cold wrist clanked against each other as I gingerly tucked his hand back under the sheet. Devout Catholicism seemed an unlikely religious denomination for mass murderers I noted as I kicked the gurney brakes up.

I'd like to say that things went back to normal, but the truth was that the danger Paul had put himself into was never far from my mind. We would meet for occasional lunches and dinners and I would nudge bits and pieces of the story out of him. He acted like my questioning annoyed him, but I suspected that it was a bit relieving to have it all out. It made for a compelling story and was almost laughably serendipitous. It seemed to me that despite all of Paul's blathering about otherworldly feelings and inexplicable signs from god his lapse in judgment had been induced by a growing sense of dissatisfaction with his occupation and self doubt steaming from that. I kept it to myself, nodding my head and pretending to understand how he could continue to convince himself that what he was doing was called for. He confided in me the trouble he was having extraditing the fugitives out of the country. It was proving more difficult than he had imagined and he was becoming increasingly frustrated, and honestly so was I. The longer these men stayed in the country the more likely their being successfully perused and prosecuted became and that put not only Paul in danger but according to him a fair number of Boston Police investigators by association.

It was simply shocking to me that these two men had honestly seduced not only Paul, but half of the South Boston police force into believing in their warped cause so wholeheartedly that they would put their occupations, their lives and the lives of their loved ones in serious peril. I had to admit that the idea of annihilating people like Yakavetta for society's safety and benefit seemed strangely agreeable, and I knew that the legal system was far from infallible, but one could not simply wake up one day and decide to murder people, even if they were bad people.

This point seemed to escape Paul; I suspected that he had smothered it under layers of jargon about feelings and god and the good of human kind. Why was it so clear to me that these men were not otherworldly, and yet to Paul they were the Saints? To me they were nothing but the same kind of common criminal that gets dissected in my examining room every other week, and yet to him and half of the city they were saviors and defenders of the innocent.

I told Deb about William two weeks after my encounter with the Saints of South Boston. As predicted she unleashed an ungodly amount of "OH MY GODS!" and angry explicative's as I reiterated the story. I kept myself together, stating my suspicions with cold indifference as she paced angrily around the office.

"What the hell is wrong with your family? No offence." She blurted.
"I mean, she's your cousin. That's sincerely fucked up."

"Yeah, I know." I answered stiffly.

"How are you so okay about this, I would be going on a killing spree right about now!"

"I don't know, things hadn't been great even before all of this. And I always knew Christina was a disgusting whore. I'm not saying it wasn't hard at first, it was. I guess at this point I'm just glad that I found out who he really is before I did something stupid like marry the asshole." I gave my best fake smile.

"So, what did you do with the ring?" She asked gesturing at my naked finger.

"Nothing, its sitting on my dresser collecting dust and cat hair."

An evil sneer crept across Deb's face, almost frightening in its Grinch like resemblance.

"Let's pawn it." She said, extenuating every syllable with wicked delight.

My first reaction was a visceral no, and I began to form the words with my mouth when the beautiful simplicity of the deed sunk in.

Deb pounced, taking advantage of my hesitation, grabbing my hand and pulling me toward the door. I put up token resistance, before succumbing.

I ran into my apartment, slamming the door right as the cat began to bond down the hall. I sprinted into my room, leaping over my dirty cloths hamper and snatched the ring off the dresser. The white gold of the band was cold in my hands and it gleamed in the sunlight that streamed in between the blinds. The single large diamond glittered in the golden light, as did the six diamond chips that were inlaid in the band, three to either side of the center stone. The ring would fetch a pretty penny, and I almost felt bad as I opened the passenger side door of Debs car. The ring was Williams Grandmothers after all.

I tried not to grin as the jeweler counted out three thousand four hundred dollars.

Deb and I ordered an early dinner from my favorite Italian restaurant, complete with a bottle of wine. We completely abandoned our work and I didn't really care, I knew I would be playing catch up for the rest of the week but for the first time in a long time I felt almost myself again. We laughed like old friends.

"Why don't you go home, relax a little bit." Deb offered smiling. I accepted, feeling lighthearted for once. We chatted idly as she walked me to the door.

"I feel bad leaving you here." I said, trying to make it sound convincing as I searched my purse for my keys.

"I've got work to do, I can handle it"

Suddenly her face grew inexplicably serious.

"Hey, this will work out. " She encouraged me solemnly. She hugged me unexpectedly, but I was surprisingly glad she did. The warmth of her arms around me was comforting, and didn't feel forced or dutiful. My throat grew tight and I felt suddenly ridiculous for feeling so emotional over such a slight affection.

"Everything happens for a reason." She said smiling sadly. Those words hung in my head as I drove home, the sun casting purple stripes across the sky as it set.

That was the last time I saw Deborah, those were the last words she said to me.

dragonzfire718- Thanks! ;) Sorry that it takes me so long to update, I am usualy working on chapters every free second that I have!

Yodalovr- Sorry about the grammar stuff, I have always had a problem with it. sigh
One of these days I plan on going through and fixing all the mistakes, so it will probably take me a while. Bear with me!
Thanks for the encouragement, its sourly needed. Back at you with the force stuff.