Black Irish by Stephan Talty Read Free Book Online Page B

her Social Security, black female, in one of the sketchier blocks off Delavan. The door was kicked in, some of her jewelry was gone. But then we looked at the body and it was obvious that the intruder had spent some time in the place. He’d left knife marks on her face.”
    “What kind of marks?”
    “He jabbed her in the cheek and forehead while she was laying in the bed, tied up.”
    “Could be he was finding out where the jewelry was.”
    “Could be,” Alexander said. “But the good stuff was in the top drawer. That didn’t take much looking.”
    “He didn’t take anything with him?”
    “Besides the valuables? Nothing.”
    Abbie nodded, then looked at Perelli. “Feels different to me.”
    Perelli sighed. “Look at the file anyway. What else do we know about Ryan?”
    After leaving the scene at St. Teresa’s, Abbie had gone to the Ryan home, interviewing the relatives who’d come by. A car had been idling out front as she pulled up, with two men inside. After she’d told Patty Ryan her husband was dead, two of her uncles had emerged from the car and come through the door to comfort the widow. Abbie wanted to ask them how they’d got the news so quickly. But she knew. The newswire.
    “The wife was … unable to talk to me. After I told her about the husband, she collapsed and had to be sedated.”
    “Background?”
    Abbie looked at her notes. “Jimmy Ryan was forty-eight, grew up in the County, attended Bishop Timon, where he played JV football and got solid C’s. He went to work for Mohawk Gas, which became National Grid. His brother told me there were no financial problems—no gambling, no drugs. I tend to believe him but I’ll be checking the credit cards and the mortgage payments. The marriage was unhappy but not to the point of anyone leaving. We’re going to be talking to his co-workers to see if they know anything, neighbors.”
    “Zangara?”
    “I spoke to his boss. Jimmy Ryan started in 1980 as a trainee, right out of high school. No major complaints but there never are right off. Respect for the dead and all that. I expect we find that Jimmy was just bumping along over there. Thirty-one years at the company and he was still walking through slush and dog shit to look at gas meters? Obviously he hadn’t impressed National Grid too much.”
    “So the question becomes, what was Jimmy Ryan talking about that caused him to get murdered?”
    “Well, good thing it’s the County,” O’Halloran said. “They’re probably lining up around the block to tell us.”
    The detectives laughed, but Perelli glared at O’Halloran.
    “I don’t want to hear anything about how difficult working South Buffalo is, all right? It’s like every other precinct. You have informants on the streets, you have skels in the bars who we give breaks to. Get them to talk to you. Work your sources. Do not let this County shit get in the way of carrying out your investigation.”
    The detectives were looking down at their notebooks.
    “Does everyone hear me loud and clear?”
    They nodded.
    “Okay, that’s it.”
    Abbie and Z walked back to their cubicles, glass-walled ones with black steel frames. Abbie sat down and began going through the crime scene photos more carefully.
    “And these,” Z said, leaning over and dropping another sheaf of photos onto her desk.
    Abbie picked up the new stack and paged through them slowly.
    “He could tie a knot, couldn’t he?”
    The way the rope was tied was complex, looped three times, forming a collar above the knot.
    Z nodded through the glass.
    “I wonder if those are Navy ties,” she said.
    Z shrugged. “Dunno. I was Marines. They only taught us how to kill people.”
    She went through the first batch a second time.
A murder victim is brought to a church
, she thought to herself,
tied up in a chair. The killer cuts off both his eyelids and carves the number “1” in his forehead. What did the “1” mean—that this was the first of many?
    The killing looked