Shallow Graves

to me. “Mr. Vincent Dani, Esquire, he’s the trustee or whatever the fuck you call it, he’s got a set. We all got keys, but nobody’s got no reason to kill Tina. Your theory’s all fulla shit there.“
    At that point, the door to the shop flew open and three teenagers came in, jostling and punching each other on the arms. All were male and black-haired, the sideburns cut half an inch above the ear, the rest moussed up and combed back. They each wore baggy athletic pants in different metallic colors and Ah Jordan sneakers. They ordered three espressos as they yanked out chairs.
    Tommy Danucci cued Zuppone with his eyebrows. Zuppone moved toward them.
    “Hey-ey-ey, guys, how about you get lost for a while, huh? We got a little meeting going on.“
    One of the kids smirked at Primo. Raising his right hand slowly, its back toward Zuppone, the kid sent his index, middle, and ring fingers northward. “Read between the lines, zit rack.“
    If I hadn’t been expecting it, I’m not sure I would have seen Primo’s hand moving. It closed around the kid’s three fingers, and I heard a snap. The bravado left the boy’s face as he howled, standing up only to drop to his knees, the three fingers dangling loosely, like a glove when your fingers aren’t in the sleeves.
    The other two kids took one look at Primo and took off, the third kid teetering up and through the door just before it closed behind his friends. The counterman seemed particularly engrossed in a saucer he was washing.
    Zuppone came back, huffing a little from excitement rather than exertion. “Sorry, Mr. Danucci.“
    “An insult nobody could take, Primo.“ Then to me, “The old days, then families would of known me and told them to be respectful. Now....“ A dismissive wave.
    I waited him out.
    Danucci cupped his hand around the new capuccino, but didn’t lift it. “Like I was saying, your theory’s all fulla shit. Besides, it all depends on the Jap, right?“
    “On Shinkawa’s hearing the fire escape, yes.“
    “So, maybe he’s lying.“
    “Why?“
    “The fuck do I know why? You’re the detective, right?“
    “He’d only be lying if he did it, and that brings us back to the timing and choosing a bad opportunity given that he knew about the party downstairs.“
    “Okay, okay. Let me tell you something else, so you’ll know it. Maybe he’s just mistaken, eh?“
    “About hearing the clanging?“
    “About it being that fire escape. There’re—what, Primo, twenny buildings backing on that alley there?“
    “Easy twenty, Mr. Danucci.“
    “So call it twenny, twenny-two, whatever. When the Jap goes to the window, he looks down, right?“
    “That’s what he told me.“
    “So, he looks down and maybe at the alley, too. He don’t look around to the other buildings, see if somebody’s on one or a pot falls over, am I right?“
    Danucci had a point. “And if Shinkawa is wrong about somebody being on the fire escape...“
    “Then it don’t got to be family, which I don’t see in the first place. Then the fucking crackhead did this to my Tina coulda heard the Jap at the door, then gone down the fire escape all the way to the bottom and run up the fucking alley while the Jap and everybody is coming up the stairs and busting down the door, right?“
    “Except for one thing.“
    “What?“
    “How does our burglar get into the building in the first place without going past Sinead Fagan by the kitchen window or using a key on the front door to the building?“
    Danucci wiped his face with the palm of his hand. “That just means somebody we don’t know about had a key to the front door. Somebody who didn’t know about the party account of you and your timing thing. Find out who it was.“
    Which led me back to George Yulin and Erica Lindqvist. “Slightly different question?“
    “Go ahead.“
    “How come Primo went to scare Oz Puriefoy away from dating Tina?“
    Danucci’s blood rose. “Dating her? The fucking monkey was living with her.“
    “How did you find out they were together?“
    Danucci looked to Primo, but not so much to ask him to answer as just to make sure he could hear what the old man was about to say. “My daughter-in-law, she called me about it.“
    “Your...?“
    “Claudette, from down on the South Shore there. She got wind Tina was seeing a colored, and Claudette was worried Joey might do something to the guy, he found out. Besides, she—I don’t know, from over in Vietnam there, she was scared stiff