Who's Afraid of Joe Vincente
A Kenneth Hall Mystery
 

 by: Hankster

© 2018 by the author

The author retains all rights. No reproductions are allowed without the author's consent. Comments are appreciated at...

hankster@tickiestories.us

Chapter 8

Jim’s body was discovered at 2 AM by one of his neighbors, who worked the night shift at a clothing manufacturer.  He immediately called 9-1-1.  The first responders looked at the way Jim was dressed and concluded that it was another faggot lovers’ quarrel, but when they examined Jim’s wallet, and found his ID, they called the police at once.  There was plenty of money in the wallet, so they ruled out robbery as a motive.

The first cop, who arrived on the scene, saw the condition of the victim’s knee caps, and he immediately called Lt. Morton, who in turn, called Ken.  Morton’s call woke both Ken and Joe, leaving Joe to remark, “Maybe I should have made you quit the force after all.”

“Brace yourself, honey,” Ken said.  “The bastard got Jim.  I should never have let him go to the bar alone tonight.  I should have made him take the night off.”

“You can’t blame yourself, Ken.  This Cole guy is very slippery.  He would have gotten Jim one way or the other.  You told me that Jim Canella and John Cole had a history of mutual hate.”

“I know you’re right, but I need a couple of days to rationalize, and then let it sink in.  I’ve got other worries too.  Now Tom is near and dear to you, and we’ve got to protect him.  And what if Cole wants to reclaim Georgie, and he does harm to the Andersons?  He might also want to take revenge on Keith for dumping him.  His web is stretching, and more and more people are in danger.  There aren’t enough cops in the city to protect all these people.”

“That’s true,” Joe said, but I can recruit an army in a couple of hours.”

“It’s best you don’t tell me what you’re thinking, but I won’t stop you.”

Joe didn’t say another word to Ken, but within a span of three hours, no less than three of his ‘consultants’ were protecting each possible victim.  Joe called Monte Barnes and arranged for Keith’s protectors to be inside the theater during Keith’s performances.

James Canella was buried with full police honors.  The funeral was well covered by the press because his son was a Broadway star and a Tony winner.  Keith was pretty broken up, but Ken managed to get him aside.

“I want you to think very carefully, Keith.  I need any clue as to where that bastard might be hanging out.”

“I want to catch this son of a bitch as much as you do.  You can bet that I’ll rack my brain.”

Ken had given Cole’s picture to the police computer geeks.  They prepared photos of Cole as he was, with glasses, with a mustache, with a full beard, etc.  Then they produced the same pictures with his hair lightened.  In all, fifteen picture versions of John Cole were circulated around the city.  Joe made sure that his ‘consultants’ had a picture of every possible version.  Keith added a $10,000 reward for information leading to John Cole’s arrest. 

John saw the pictures in the newspapers and on TV.  He now knew that the police had identified him.  He wasn’t quite so smug anymore.  Being seen in public was a definite risk now.  There was one place where he liked to hang out, and where the clientele was a little seedy.  They would not be apt to want to turn him into the police, even for the reward, because many of them were in hiding, too. 

Ken, Joe and Tom were at dinner the evening of the funeral.  The mood was very somber.  Ken’s telephone rang.  It was Keith.

“Detective Hall,” he said, “there’s another place John liked to hang out.  It’s a pool hall on the west side.  I think on Ninth Avenue.  He fancies himself a pool shark.  He stopped going there when we were together, because he knew I disliked the whole idea.  I was afraid he would lose his shirt, and money was always a problem with us.”

“Thanks Keith, that’s very helpful.”

Ken hung up and called Lt. Morton.  “We need a new stakeout for John Cole at a pool hall on Ninth Avenue.  I don’t know how many pool halls there are on Ninth.  Please check and let me know.  I’m hoping there’s only one.”

Morton called back in a few minutes.  “There’s only one on Ninth and the corner of West 68^th.  I’ve got a couple of plain clothes cops on the way.”

“I’m going also,” Ken said.

“Be careful!”

Where’s the pool hall?” Joe asked.

No sooner did Ken call Joe and tell him the location of the pool hall, he was on the phone recruiting some more ‘consultants’.

Ken rushed through dinner, and flew out of the house.  Tom was frightened.  “Please be careful,” he called after Ken.  Joe wrapped an arm around Tom’s shoulder and held him tightly.

******

In spite of needing to be more cautious if he left his furnished apartment, John felt that if he holed up, he would go stir crazy.  He decided that the pool hall was a safe haven, and he would risk a trip there.  Nevertheless, he pulled a baseball cap low over his forehead, and further hid his face with the hoodie of his jacket.  When he entered the pool hall, he removed his jacket.  Only the baseball cap concealed his identity, but not by much.

The two plain-clothes cops were there, and spotted him immediately.  They approached him, flashed their badges, pointed their guns at him, and cuffed him.  One of them frisked him and removed Jim’s stolen gun.  Half the clientele of the pool hall took off faster than the proverbial speeding bullet.

Joe’s men came in a second later, surveyed the scene, and high-tailed it out of there also. They didn’t want to get involved with the police either. As soon as they were in the street, one of them called Joe, who then relieved the other men from duty, and promised them all hefty bonuses.

Ken arrived shortly after the policemen hustled John into their car.  He didn’t see any cops or any of Joe’s men.  He asked if anything had happened here, but nobody was in the mood to talk to him.  He represented the enemy.

Fortunately, his phone rang.  It was Joe.  He wanted to make sure that Ken was okay, and it was he who actually filled Ken in on what happened.

“Look sweetie,” Ken said, “I’m going down to the precinct to make sure that bastard is properly booked and locked up tighter than a can of sardines.  Then I’ll come home.  Are you and Tom alright?”

“Yeah, Georgie came over presumably to do homework together, but Tom’s door is tight shut.  I suspect that they’re doing homework, but not the school type.”

“Shush.  You’re making me hot.  I’ve got plans for tonight.”

When Ken finally got home, Joe and the two young students were at the kitchen table just finishing up some milk and cookies.  Georgie got up to leave, and Ken went with him.  He came back only when he saw that Georgie had safely entered his house.

“Have you figured out yet why John threw all those red herrings at you?” Tom asked Ken.

“I think so.  First of all, young man, you should know that your guardian has a reputation of being the biggest crook in New York.”

“I really don’t mind,” Joe said.  “It gives me a glamorous mystique.”

“Let me continue, please,” Ken said, glaring at Joe.

“Okay, okay.”

“He knew that Joe got his boyfriend fired, but he didn’t know that ultimately Joe got him a better role.  In revenge, he tried to pin the original murders on Joe.  He knew, and he was right, that when we saw the MO, Joe would be our prime suspect.  When his plan didn’t work, his anger at Joe was exacerbated, and so he knocked off a couple of people Joe cared for, still hoping to keep the spotlight on Joe, and to cause him grief at the same time. 

“When his murders were more and more successful, he began to tease us.  The theater ticket to ‘Mardi Gras’ was supposed to make us wake up to the fact that another of his targets was Jim, and maybe Keith.  He was successful in that. After we interviewed Keith and Jim, and established John’s relationship with them, we did indeed conclude that Jim was a target also. 

“He must have known that we would identify Jim’s missing gun as the murder weapon sooner or later, but when Jim failed to be arrested for murder, John killed him.

“He grew so smug, he began to visit his old haunts.  Big mistake.”

“Now I know more than ever that I want to be a cop, but in the meantime, what can I tell Georgie?” Tom asked.

“It’s always best to tell the truth, but if you can, point out how lucky he is to be where he is, and that he’s better off forgetting all about his brother.”

Tom just nodded.

Ken looked at Joe, and said, “I’m exhausted, honey.  I think I’ll go to bed.”

“I’ll be right up,” Joe said.

“I can take a hint,” Tom said.  “It’s way too early to go to sleep.  I’ll be watching TV in the den.”

When they were alone together in the bedroom, Ken asked, “Did you notice the little devil didn’t ask to join us in our love bed like he does every night?”

“Well, we told him to get a boyfriend, and he did.  I think the two boys knocked each other out when they were ‘studying’.

I actually touched that piece of vermin at the station,” Ken said, “and I feel dirty.  How’d you like to shower with me?”

“My pleasure.  Have I told you lately how much I love you?”

“You can’t tell me enough.”

“You’re tired.  I’m going to do all the work tonight.  No arguments.”

“Making love to you never tires me out,” Ken countered.

“Just the same.  I insist.”

They stepped into a nice hot shower, and never vacated it until the water was ice cold.  You would think that they spent a lot of time having lots of sex, but they didn’t.  They wrapped their arms around each other, and just held one another tightly.  It demonstrated the love they had for each other better than any poke up the ass.

When they finally got to the bedroom, they were stunned.  Tom was lying in their bed sound asleep.

“He must have figured that he’d seduce us tonight, but we were in the shower so long he fell asleep waiting for us,” Ken whispered to Joe.

“What the hell,” Joe said, and he fell into bed.  Ken joined him, lying on the other side of Tom.

The three naked men hunkered up to each other, and slept well all night long.

The End.

Posted: 08/24/18