Hot-Wired in Brooklyn Read Online Free PDF Page B

guess whose?” asked DeMassio.
    I didn’t answer.
    “Kid uses his own hammer, doesn’t even wipe the prints. Pretty stupid if you ask me.”
    “Pretty stupid,” I echoed. I studied Shork again and walked behind his body to the desk. The wide top drawer wasopen. Except for a few pencils, scraps of note paper, and a ruler, it was empty. He’d either just opened it or was ready to
     close it when he got hit from behind. He’d turned his back, carelessly, on his murderer, as if getting a ball peen hammer
     in the brain were the last thing he’d expected.
    “You wanna see anything else?”
    “Naah,” I said. “Haul him away.”
    I followed DeMassio outside as the attendants rolled the gurney in.
    “Well?” he asked finally.
    “Well what?”
    “Is this
your
case? Or is it just fun to look?”
    My heart and my head weren’t in sync, so I couldn’t give him an answer. I couldn’t even give myself one.
    “Well? What’s the situation, Eddie?”
    “I don’t know yet, Nick. Honest to God.”
    “Kid’s a lost cause. Open and shut case.”
    “Looks that way.”
    “That’s what you want, isn’t it?”
    “Should be.”
    We walked back to our cars, DeMassio’s face moving through a series of slow contortions, like something was puzzling him.
     I had the same feeling, but I was managing not to show it.
    “What is it, Nick?”
    “One thing I can’t figure. The kid’s facin’ a murder charge, he practically signs his name to it, and he’s
laughin’
when he’s picked up.”
    “You don’t know Arnold,” I cracked. But even to me the words sounded empty. The smile of certainty I’d planted onmy face wasn’t convincing either, but DeMassio was too cold and bored to see through it.
    “The little bastard can’t be that stupid,” I said under the hard cranking of DeMassio’s engine.
    The wind gusted as DeMassio drove away. Then, just as suddenly, the air became as still and soundless as the inside of a bell
     jar. The laughter that rang in my ears was from inside my own head. My chest tightened, the sound of Arnold’s mockery grew
     bolder and more cruel, and the squadron of moths in my stomach found new wings.

CHAPTER
8
    I got back home around five-thirty. It was still dark, but I wasn’t ready to go back to sleep. Or dream.
    So I made coffee.
    At seven-thirty, my two closest
goombahs y
Tony and Angelo, came by.
    I’ve known them my whole life. They’re as dumb as barber poles, as guileless as window glass, as true as still water. Only
     occasionally do they make me crazy. They’re the best arguments I know for living an honest, slow-witted life. If there were
     more people with Tony and Angelo’s kind of stupidity, this world would be a much better place.
    It was Saturday, so Angelo didn’t have to open up St. Margaret’s School, where he’s the custodian. Tony should’ve been on
     his shift for the Yellow Cab Company, but you never know with either of them.
    “We saw your light on, Eddie,” said Angelo as I let them in. “We figgered you was awake.”
    “You figured right. So, Tony, you takin’ the day off?”
    “Huh?”
    “Why aren’t you at work? You on a different shift now?”
    Tony looked like he didn’t know, so Angelo chimed in, “We’re gonna watch ’em skate up at Rockefeller Plaza. You like hockey,
     Eddie?”
    “Sure, but what’s that got to do with Rockefeller Plaza?”
    “That’s where they play hockey.”
    “No. That’s where they
skate,”
Tony insisted.
    “It’s the same thing,” Angelo protested.
    “Ain’t,” said Tony in a small huff.
    “Is so. It’s the same thing, right, Eddie?”
    “Not exactly,” I said.
    “See?” said Tony. I felt one of their debates coming on, and I wanted no part of it. They can argue for a day and a half about
     why snow is white.
    “So who’s right?” Tony asked.
    “You both are,” I lied. “People go ice-skating at Rockefeller Plaza, and hockey players wear ice skates.” That seemed to do
     it. Before they