The Lucifer Messiah by Frank Cavallo Page A

Before anyone else gets to him.”

BOOK II
“Festival’s Eve”

SEVENTEEN
    D RYING SHEETS, SHIRTS, AND SOCKS HUNG FROM LINES spread across the cramped space between apartment windows. Suspended from a forest of clothespins, the laundry seemed to dance as it dried, swaying to and fro and casting jubilant shadows on the bricks below.
    The pulleys usually made a squeak when the lines were rolled in, but Maria Torriella couldn’t hear it as she gathered her wash. Four children,
four little monsters
as she often said, howled from the living room of their tiny third floor walk-up. Frankie and Ernie, the two oldest at nine and seven, were teasing six-year-old Ralphie. As they tossed his baseball glove back and forth, just high enough to be out of his reach, tiny little Anita wailed from her crib.
    To make matters worse, the sauce on her stove was bubbling over, and the garlicky red paste was beginning to burn on the outside of the pot. Maria, curlers in her hair despite the late hour of the day, was deftly tending to all three things at once. One hand on the laundry, one on the stove, and her booming voice making every attempt tosilence the kids. She might have succeeded, and might not have spilled sauce all over the front of her housedress, if the knocking hadn’t erupted just then on her door.
    With a slap on the back of the head to Frankie and a swat on the rump to Ernie, she swept across the length of the little apartment and unlatched the lock. She did not expect Vince Sicario to be on the other side, nor did she expect him to come busting into the room a second later.
    But she was ready.
    â€œWho the hell do you think you are?” she spat at him, holding her hand out to keep him at bay.
    â€œI’m a friend of your brother’s. You are Frankie Pen-tone’s sister, right?” he answered, the kids still screaming.
    â€œLittle Frankie’s little sis.”
    â€œMy brother ain’t got no friends,” she answered back, the wooden spoon in her other hand poised like a weapon.
    â€œI guess he never mentioned me. That’s too bad, ‘cause, you see, I know a lot about you.”
    â€œYeah, like what?”
    Vince took a quick glance around the place. It was cluttered. Toys were scattered all over the floor. Wicker baskets of laundry sat on the couch. There was an old, giant radio on the mantle that predated the War. It smelled of macaroni and tomato gravy and dirty diapers.
    â€œLet’s see. You’re twenty six years old, you got four kids, you hang your clothes out the window to dry.”
    Maria was shaking her head. He was too big to force out of the doorway, but she wasn’t about to yield an inch.
    â€œWho are you, the goddamn police?”
    â€œNo. I’m just someone who wants to find your brother.”
    Maria had no time for his questions. She knew what her brother did for a living, and she wanted nothing to do with it.
    â€œYeah? Well I don’t know where he is. Nobody does,” she answered.
    Vince wasn’t convinced, despite her apparent temper.
    â€œBullshit,” he said back, stepping closer to her.
    â€œHey, no swearing in front of the children, you asshole! Now get the hell outta here! I don’t know where Frankie is.”
    â€œDon’t make this hard, I’ve had a really tough coupla days, and my patience is wearing thin, lady.”
    Vince moved farther into the apartment, closing the door behind him. Maria backed off. Keeping the children corralled in her shadow, she carefully moved them toward the kitchen. Vince didn’t care. From under his overcoat he was slowly drawing out his revolver.
    Maria turned white.
    â€œSee, it’s very important to me that I find your brother,” he said, lifting the pistol in a deliberately garish motion.
    Her heart started racing. She felt the heat and the wetness under her arms and around her neck. Suddenly she couldn’t swallow.
    â€œDo you know who