Invasion of Privacy

pizza-face.”
    Cocozzo said, “Boss...”
    “You too, Coco , for chrissake. Give me his piece.”
    “His piece?”
    “His gun, the one you took off him. I ruined my loafers in this fucking pigsty, I don’t want to wreck the suit too, playing butcher boy with those fucking knives.”
    Cocozzo reached into a jacket pocket, sending the revolver to the younger man in an easy, underhand toss.
    When Junior caught it, he moved toward my bench, hefting the gun rather than pointing it. Cocozzo shifted with him, so as to have a clear field of fire toward me.
    Ianella said, “ Coco thinks you’re lying, I think you’re lying, no matter what this fucking stooge here believes.” Primo made a noise, deep inside.
    Junior turned to him. “You got something to say, pizza-face?”
    Cocozzo said again, “Boss...”
    “Shut up! Answer me, pizza-face, you got something to say?”
    “Mr. Ian—”
    The quick cuff to the chin, rocking Zuppone a little this time. “When I ask you that question, and you know I don’t want to fucking hear nothing from you, you just shake your head, you understand? You keep your mouth closed and you just shake your fucking head, you got it?”
    Primo’s whole body was shaking as he just nodded this time, once and decisively.
    Now Junior turned back to me, glowering down. “Your story don’t add up, Cuddy, and I think you’re running some kind of game on us. But even if you ain’t, even if you’re just stone fucking stupid and DiRienzi outsmarted you, the fact is, you lost him, and you don’t have a single fucking clue where he went. And that makes me very fucking mad.”
    Speed-talking, Zuppone said, “Mr. Ianella, DiRienzi ran before Cuddy here even met you, so—”
    This time not a cuff, but a backhanded clout that knocked Primo sideways. “Shut the fuck up, you fucking pimple-freak, or you’ll get the first slug! And you, Cuddy, you make me fucking sick. My father’s rotting away in a cell because some Judas fuck set him up and sent him up, and then you lose the piece a shit who should have paid for it. Which means you get to pay for it. One part of you at a time.”
    Junior cocked the revolver and pointed it at my crotch, a step too far away for me to lunge for it. I was still going to try when Cocozzo made the only mistake I’d seen him commit.
    He stepped toward his boss, blocking his line of sight on Primo.
    Zuppone drew the Beretta from its shoulder holster and shot Rick Ianella twice. Junior lurched against his bodyguard as the balding man was trying to elevate his own gun hand. Then Primo emptied the rest of the Beretta’s clip into Cocozzo, who fired his weapon three times, reflexively but harmlessly, into the ceiling. Dust from above began wafting slowly downward as the two Milwaukee mobsters, clutching each other like clumsy dancers, fell to the floor.
    I looked at Zuppone, the Beretta jacked open and empty, the trembling of his right hand scattering the smoke curling up from the chamber.
    “Primo—”
    “No! No.” His voice was raspy. “Don’t say a fucking word till I tell you.” Then he seemed to notice how the gun was moving in his hand and lowered it. Something short and harsh in Italian was followed by, “The fuck did I do here?”

    We were coming over the Charlestown Bridge into the Boston Garden area of the North End when Zuppone stuck a fresh toothpick in his mouth and said, “All right, talk.”
    “Thanks.”
    Zuppone glanced over to me, then at each of the Lincoln’s mirrors. “For letting you talk?”
    “No, for saving my life.”
    A movement of his head that was more shudder than simple shake. “Maybe only temporary, for both of us.”
    “How long can you leave the bodies there?”
    “After I drop you, I make a couple, three calls from a pay phone, handle it the same way as last time.”
    Which meant a no-questions-asked team from the friendly funeral home. “And the death certificates?”
    “Dr. T.—the guy helped us out before?—he’ll put down anything I want. Only thing is...”
    “The people in Milwaukee will expect the bodies back for burial, right?”
    “Right. And our coordinator here—the one who called them out there in the first fucking place—he’s gotta be satisfied that this didn’t happen the way you and me know it did.”
    “Which means?”
    “Which means that I gotta fucking account for a clip full of bullets in two organization guys. And that means I gotta give Milwaukee and our coordinator somebody who