Back at the precinct, the detectives were creating a spread, charting Sophia Danatto's case. A photograph of her taken at the hospital was tacked to the center, beneath it, photos of her injuries. It made Carisi sick to his stomach to look at. How could he reconcile the girl he knew from his quiet Arden neighborhood to the one who had become a victim like this?
"You said you were neighbors growing up?" Benson appeared at his side, looking over at the beginnings of the spread. Sophia's testimony hadn't given them much - there were photos of the crime scene, male silhouettes of attackers A and B, but that was all they had so far.
"Yeah," Carisi said, swallowing tersely. "Her family lived the next street over from mine. I think she might have been friends with one of my sisters for a while - I don't really remember."
"Was she a good kid? Kept out of trouble?"
"Yeah, yeah," Carisi said, his eyes going to the photos of her. "She was three years younger than me, so I didn't know her that well, but she was smart. She told me she's a teacher now. Math, I think."
"And her family?"
"Her mom was a kindergarten teacher," Carisi said, remembering how Sophia had looked when she told him not to contact them. "Her dad was a mechanic. They were a nice Catholic family."
"You can't let your emotions get the best of you in this one," Benson said cautiously. "I know that you knew her from your past, but you still have a job to do."
"I know," He said dismissively, shaking his head. "I know that."
Just then, Detective Tutuola came forward, balancing an open laptop in his hands. "We've found security footage that places Sophia at Moretti's Italian Restaurant, at twelve am the night of the attack," He said, pressing play. The grainy traffic cam showed her stepping out of the restaurant in the same dress she had been found in. Behind her, a young man stepped out, his arm around her waist. He ushered her towards the curb, towards a waiting taxi cab on the street.
"Who is that?" Carisi asked, watching as the man opened the door for Sophia, made sure that she got in, and shut it behind her. The man stepped back, watching the cab disappear down the street, before going back into Moretti's.
"We haven't ID'd him yet," Fin replied. "And, the license plate on the cab's a fake. It hasn't matched to anything on our registry. We're still looking, but we lose her from here until two-fifteen, when she was found by the officer."
"That's over two hours where the assaults took place," Benson mused. "We need to fill that gap. Find out who was with her the night that this happened, and anyone else she may have talked to.
"I'll go," Carisi volunteered, and Benson held back.
"Actually, Carisi, I need you here. Fin, you and Rollins go down to the restaurant. Find out who was there that night."
"This is making me hungry," Fin grumbled, as he and Rollins got out of the car, facing Moretti's.
"Nice place," Rollins commented, pushing the front doors open. A surprisingly spacious dining area extended back from the street, lit by the daylight from the windows from the street. The place was entirely empty, and the detectives slowly navigated through the sea of tables and chairs towards the back.
"We're not open yet," A man came out behind a set of doors, holding a clipboard in his hands. Rollins flashed her badge, and the man stiffened, setting it down.
"We just have a few questions about the night of July 16th," Fin said, sharing a look with Rollins. She noticed the kitchen staff in the back, preparing to open for the day. She headed towards the back, as Fin was getting the man's name.
"Hey, you can't go back there," He protested, raising his voice.
"You're not in any trouble. Are you the owner?" Fin asked, drawing him inside and distracting him as Rollins entered the kitchens. Several of the staff looked up in perturbed annoyance, and Rollins showed her badge to them too.
"I'm Detective Rollins with NYPD. Was anyone here working the night of the sixteenth?" She asked, watching them exchange looks with one another.
"I wasn't…" Someone mumbled, returning to chopping onions, and the rest followed suit. Rollins sighed, trying not to become too frustrated. It wasn't unlike witnesses not to want to talk sometimes.
"Come on, that was two nights ago," She frowned. "There really was no one here that was working? We can find out who was, but that makes things harder on you."
Again, the uncomfortable murmuring silence. No one was willing to answer her, which was already setting off alarm bells in her mind. Had someone told them not to talk? They were interrupted by the sound of the double doors being tossed open.
"Get back to work," The owner said sharply, turning towards her. "You and your pal, get a warrant and come back. We're not answering any questions." Behind him, Fin shrugged his shoulders in defeat, and Rollins realized that there wasn't anything else that they could do.
"Alright," She said, throwing her hands up in defeat. "We're going."
She couldn't shake the strange feelings she had gotten from that place as they walked out the doors. The owner had been openly hostile, and his staff completely clammed up.
"What a charmer." She rolled her eyes.
"That was Louis Moretti, and he's definitely hiding something," Fin commented. "Doesn't want to involve the police."
"No one on the kitchen staff would talk to me either," She added. "Even before Louis came in. I hadn't even told them about Sophia yet."
"Detective!" Both Rollins and Fin turned around to see a teenaged boy hurrying out of the side entrance and towards the road, looking behind them to make sure that no one had seen him come out. The detectives exchanged a glance before meeting him near the alley, so that he couldn't be seen from the front windows of the restaurant.
"You work here?" Fin asked, and the kid nodded, pulling off his rubber gloves and stuffing them in a white apron.
"Yeah," He muttered, keeping his voice low. "But don't tell Louis that I spoke to you, okay? I don't want to lose my job."
"It's alright, we won't," Fin reassured him. "What's your name?"
"It's ah, Michael," The kid said, looking over back at the restaurant again. "Mike Scofield. I just bus tables and wash dishes, but I was working that night. There was a big banquet going on, really late in the night after we had officially closed. Louis told me to change the time on my timecard so I wouldn't get in trouble for working overtime."
"Does your boss usually have you work late for events like this?" Rollins asked.
Mike shrugged. "Sometimes," He said. "I'm sixteen, so there's a limit to how many hours -" He paused, his eyes flaring. "Am I gonna get in trouble for this?"
"Labor law isn't really our concern," Rollins said.
"You see anyone who looked like this?" Fin asked, showing a picture of Sophia Danatto on his cell phone. She was smiling, unbruised, unafraid, and wearing a blazer. They had pulled it off of the staff pictures page on the school's website where she worked.
Mike narrowed his eyes, studying her face. "I don't know, there were a lot of people, and I was mostly in the back," He frowned.
"Think harder," Fin urged. "She with a young guy maybe? Tall, brown hair?"
"That could be half the people at this party," Mike shook his head. "Sorry."
"It's alright," Amanda said, as Fin put his phone away. "Do you know who was hosting the party?"
The kid swallowed, looking nervous. "I heard a couple of the chefs saying that it was the Lucchese family?" He asked, and Fin felt a jolt go through his chest. He tried not to show the concern he felt on his face. "They were here until like, two a.m. I didn't see anyone doing drugs, or anything like that. It just seemed like a normal party to me. I just figured I'd tell someone. If two detectives were poking around, I didn't want to get in trouble for hiding something."
"Thanks, Mike," Fin said, digging into his wallet and taking out a business card. "You did the right thing. Here's my contact, in case you remember anything else."
"I gotta get back to work," Mike said, taking a step and looking back towards the side entrance in the alleyway.
"Thanks again," Rollins called after him, looking towards Tutuola, perplexed, as they got back into the car.
"The Lucchese family?" Rollins asked him, beginning to drive away. "Ever heard of them?"
"I know you've been in New York for a few years now, but there's still a lot you don't know," Fin explained. "The Lucchese family is an old crime family. The patriarch - Alberto Jr. just got out of prison a few years ago for money laundering."
"That's not so bad," Rollins pushed. "So why do you look like you've seen a ghost?" Fin shook his head.
"That's all they've been able to charge him with," He frowned. "Junior and his associates have gotten away with far worse than money laundering. Since the Lucchese's moved into the drug business, they've been responsible for dozens of murders and missing persons cases. They're old school though, and they've perfected their whole operation. It's nearly impossible to trace things back to them. I had to deal with them a few times when I was in Narcotics. They've got hundreds of connections all through Manhattan."
"So Sophia was at that dinner with our unknown male, presumably connected to this crime family," Rollins mused. "He puts Sophia in a shady cab, alone, and over the course of the next two hours, she's beat up, raped twice, and nearly stabbed to death. You think she was a target of a mob hit?"
"Maybe," Fin pinched the bridge of his nose. "I hope not. That makes everything so much messier."
Thank you to everyone who has read, favorited, and followed so far! Again, forgive me if legal/criminal terminology is off - I don't have a beta and am by no means an expert in this kind of thing! Please R&R!
