Laurie looked at Cerino. Cerino didn’t answer; he didn’t even move.
“I don’t believe it,” Lou said.
Laurie’s head spun around. She looked at Lou and saw the shock registered on his face. “What’s happening?” she asked.
“I knew something weird was going on,” Lou said.
“What?” Laurie demanded.
“It’s Vinnie Dominick,” Lou said.
“Who’s Vinnie Dominick?” Laurie asked.
Vinnie shook his head, surveying what was left of Tony, then walked over to Lou. “Detective Soldano,” Vinnie said. “How convenient that you’re here.” He pulled a cellular phone from his coat pocket and handed it to the detective. “I imagine you’d like to contact your colleagues to see if they’d be so good as to come over here. I’m sure the D.A. would like to have a long talk with Paul Cerino.”
In the background Laurie was aware of the three men who had been lounging around before Vinnie Dominick arrived. They were now going around the room collecting guns.
One of them brought Lou’s over to Vinnie, having retrieved it from Angelo. Vinnie proceeded to give it back to Lou.
In disbelief Lou looked down at the phone in one hand and his gun in the other.
“Come on, Lou,” Vinnie said. “Make your call. Unfortunately I’ve got another appointment, so I can’t be around when the men in blue arrive. Besides I’m kind of a shy sort of guy and I wouldn’t feel comfortable with all the acclaim the city would want to throw my way for saving the day. Obviously you know what Mr. Cerino has been up to, so you don’t need my help there. But if you don’t, don’t hesitate to give me a call. You know how to get ahold of me, I’m sure.”
Vinnie started for the door, motioning for his men to follow him. As he passed Angelo he turned back to Lou. “You’d better call an ambulance for Angelo here,” he said. “He doesn’t look so good.” Then, looking down at Tony, he added: “The mortuary van out there will be fine for this dog turd.” With that, he left.
Lou handed Laurie his gun while he used the cellular phone to call 911. He identified himself to the 911 operator and gave the address. When he was finished, he took back his gun.
“Who is this Vinnie character?” Laurie asked.
“He’s Cerino’s main rival,” Lou said. “He must have found out what Cerino was up to and this is his way of turning him in. Very effective, I’d say, with us here as witnesses. It’s also a clever way to get rid of his competition.”
“You mean Vinnie knew Cerino was behind all these overdoses?” Laurie asked. She was stunned.
“What are you talking about? Vinnie must have figured out that Cerino was killing off patients ahead of him on Jordan Scheffield’s corneal-transplant waiting list.”
“Oh, my God!” Laurie exclaimed.
“What now?” Lou asked. After the night he’d been having, he wasn’t ready for much more.
“It’s twice as bad as I thought it was,” Laurie said. “The drug overdoses were really homicides to get eyes. Cerino was having people killed who’d signed up with the Manhattan Organ Repository for organ donation.”
Lou glanced at Cerino. “He’s more of a sociopath than I could ever have imagined. My God, he was working both sides of the problem: supply and demand.”
Cerino lifted his head from his hands. “What was I supposed to do? Wait like everybody else? I couldn’t afford to wait. In my business, every day I couldn’t see, I risked death. Is it my fault the hospitals don’t have enough corneas?”
Laurie tapped Lou on the shoulder. He turned to face her.
“There’s a strange irony to this whole affair,” Laurie said, shaking her head. “We argued with one another about whose series was more socially relevant and therefore more important, your gangland-style murders or my upscale overdoses, only to learn that they were intimately connected. They were just two sides of the same horrid affair.”
“You can’t prove a thing,” Cerino growled.
“Oh, really?” Laurie said.
Epilogue
* * *
January
10:15 a.m., Wednesday
Manhattan
Lou Soldano stamped the wet snow off his feet and walked into the morgue. He smiled at the man in the security office, who didn’t challenge him, and went directly to the locker room. Quickly he changed into green scrubs.