Chapter 84
Louis and Angel returned to their apartment.
They offered to help with whatever was happening in The Plains, but while I would have welcomed their company, I didn’t see what dragging them all the way up to the Kennebec Valley would achieve, beyond making the locals nervous.
While that might have been fun, so far the locals had done nothing to deserve it.
The relationship between Roger Teal and Edward Kenney continued to worry me, though putting eyes on them would be dull, time-consuming work.
The Fulcis would take it on—they were remarkably stoic men, until they weren’t—but while Alcock could be persuaded to sign off on their hours, I’d end up knowing only where Teal and Kenney went, and perhaps who they met, but not what was said once they got there.
Also, the Fulcis were suited to surveillance that allowed them to work from a fixed position, like a house or stationary vehicle, but once they began to move around, they attracted attention.
Only a blind person could be followed by the Fulcis and fail to spot them, and even then it would have to be a blind person without a dog.
Finally, properly monitoring two men required four to six people, which Alcock was certainly not going to sanction.
I called Tony Fulci, explained what had to be done, and asked him to come pick up the trackers as soon as he could.
He said he’d be there within the hour, and he was as good as his word, arriving after forty minutes dressed in a sports jacket, a pressed white shirt, khakis, and brown Sperry top-siders.
His hair was freshly cut and he smelled of cologne that if not itself expensive, was based on a fragrance that might have been.
He looked like someone who was trying desperately not to get thrown out of a country club.
“You didn’t have to get all dressed up for me,” I said. “Flowers would have been enough.”
“I’m going to lunch,” he said. His face, red at the best of times, darkened toward beetroot.
“In Kennebunkport, with the Bushes?”
“No, with Faith. You know, the woman from that night at the Bear. The night of the, uh, altercation.”
“You mean the dislocation,” I said. It was an unusual dating tactic, but it must have worked. “How has her ex taken the rejection?”
Tony jammed his massive fists in the pockets of his khakis, as though storing hams.
“He left town.”
“Willingly?”
“Sure, after Paulie and I packed up his stuff and put it in his car. It was that or watch it burn.”
“And does Paulie like Faith?”
I’d never known either of the Fulcis to date anyone before. Until now, their loyalties were solely to their mother and each other.
“He thinks she’s nice,” said Tony, beaming.
“And your mother?”
The beam died.
“Faith hasn’t met our mother yet.”
“Saving it for Thanksgiving?”
“Thanksgiving some year,” said Tony, who could be droll when the mood struck.
I showed him the two trackers, which were encased in heat-shrink dark covers to blend with the underside of a car, and provided him with a printout of the home and work addresses of Roger Teal and Edward Kenney, as well as the license plate numbers and makes of their vehicles.
“I’d like this done today,” I said. “It’ll take two people, one to tag the cars and the other to keep watch and run interference if required. I don’t want to spoil your date, but if you pass this on to Paulie, Angel might have to go along with him for the ride.”
Paulie was solid, but his capacity for lateral thinking was less well developed than his brother’s.
“We’re taking Faith to Otto’s on the River,” said Tony. “We can swing by Teal on the way and afterward drive north to do Kenney.”
Otto’s was an upscale waterside joint in Augusta.
“That’ll work,” I said. “Wait, who’s ‘we’?”
“Paulie and me,” said Tony.
“Paulie’s going with you on your date with Faith?”
“I never said it was a date. I said it was lunch. You said it was a date.”
“But it is a date.” I paused. “Isn’t it?”
“I want to take it slow,” said Tony. “I don’t want to, you know, scare her off by coming on too strong.”
Tony had dislocated her ex’s finger before railroading him out of town, and soon both Tony and Paulie would be sitting down to lunch with this woman between bouts of illegally tagging cars with tracking devices.
If that didn’t scare her off, nothing would, and we’d all be choosing hats for the wedding before the year was out.
“Make sure you and Paulie bill me for your hours,” I said. “And add the lunch at Otto’s to the tab. Alcock’s good for it. If not, Moxie will pay.”
Moxie would cover lunch just for the pleasure of hearing the story.
“These two guys,” said Tony, as he prepared to leave, “what did they do?”
“I don’t know. I’ve only met one of them, but I didn’t like him.”
“Then I don’t like him either,” said Tony.
Which was about as solid a definition of loyalty as one could get.