Chapter 6 - Blood on the Ledger
The holding cells beneath the Marquetti carriage house smelled of old concrete, damp limestone, and diesel fumes from the backup generators.
Frank Corsi sat on an unbolted steel stool in the center of the windowless room, his hands cuffed behind his back with heavy transport irons.
His face was untouched, but the sweat had soaked completely through his pale blue dress shirt, leaving dark rings under his arms and across his chest.
Across the small table sat Tommy Velez, shaking so badly that his knees knocked together beneath the gray formica.
When the heavy steel door creaked open, both guards looked up with the desperate terror of condemned men hearing the trapdoor slide.
Rhett walked in first, wearing a tailored charcoal overcoat draped over his broad shoulders like a mantle.
Winnie followed, carrying a small, plastic utility bucket containing a bottle of ammonia, two wire scrub brushes, and a roll of industrial trash bags.
She set the bucket down in the corner with a loud, wet clatter that made Tommy jump six inches off his seat.
“What is she doing here, boss?” Frank croaked, his voice raw from hours of shouting into the empty air.
“She’s here to make sure I don't leave a mess that requires overtime to clean up,” Rhett said without an ounce of warmth.
He dragged a metal folding chair across the concrete floor, the screech of steel on stone making Frank’s teeth ache.
Rhett sat down backwards on the chair, resting his forearms across the backrest, his dark eyes boring into Frank’s skull.
“Let’s talk about your daughter’s tuition at Boston College, Frankie,” Rhett began, his voice deceptively casual.
Frank’s eyes widened, a sudden, animal panic flaring in his pupils.
“Rhett, please... leave Angela out of this.”
“I paid the fall semester out of my personal discretionary fund,” Rhett continued, ignoring the plea completely.
“Sixty-two thousand dollars, wire-transferred directly to the registrar’s office in Chestnut Hill.”
“I did that because your father took two slugs in the gut for my uncle during the dock wars in seventy-eight.”
“I thought loyalty ran in the Corsi bloodline like iron in well water.”
Frank lowered his head, staring at the scarred table between them.
“I didn't poison the glass, Rhett,” Frank whispered.
“I swear on my mother’s soul, I didn't touch the bottle.”
“No,” Winnie’s voice cut in from the shadows near the generator.
She walked forward, holding a worn black leather ledger she had pulled from Frank’s personal locker in the guard barracks twenty minutes earlier.
“You didn't poison the bottle, Frank.”
“You just accepted an offshore transfer of seventy-five thousand dollars into an account in Grand Cayman at 1:15 this morning.”
She dropped the ledger onto the table, flipping the pages with her thumb until she reached a hand-written note with account numbers.
“You’re an idiot for writing down the routing numbers in your daily duty book,” she added, shaking her head in disgust.
Frank looked up at her with pure, unadulterated venom.
“You stupid, fat scrubwoman... you don't know what you’ve walked into.”
Before Frank could finish the sentence, Rhett moved with blinding, explosive speed.
He didn't draw a weapon; he simply leaned across the table, grabbed Frank by the collar with one hand, and slammed his forehead down against the metal surface.
The crack of bone against steel sounded like a pistol shot in the enclosed room.
Frank let out a muffled scream as blood began pooling from a split above his left eyebrow.
Rhett didn't let go; he kept the guard pinned against the steel, his voice dropping into a register that made the hair on Winnie’s arms stand straight up.
“You speak to her with respect, Frank,” Rhett hissed directly into the man’s ear.
“Because if she hadn't broken that lock, you’d be sitting in that chair waiting for Lorenzo to put a bullet in the back of your head to close the audit.”
Frank gasped for air, his cheek pressed flat against the bloody metal.
“Lorenzo... Lorenzo told me you were already dead, Rhett,” Frank wept, the tough exterior shattering into pathetic fragments.
“He called my personal burner phone at one in the morning.”
“He said you’d taken the nightcap and that it was over.”
“He said if I held the hallway until two-thirty, I’d take over the entire South Shore gaming routes.”
Rhett released his grip, stepping back and wiping his hand with a clean paper towel Winnie handed him from her bucket.
“And Tommy?” Rhett asked, turning his dead-eyed stare onto the younger guard.
Tommy immediately slid out of his chair onto the filthy concrete, curling into a ball at Rhett’s feet.
“I didn't know, Mr. Marquetti! I swear by Christ Almighty, I didn't know anything about Lorenzo!”
“Frank told me to keep my mouth shut and stay away from the door no matter what we heard!”
“I wanted to open it, Mr. Marquetti! Ask Winnie! Tell him, Winnie, please!”
Rhett looked at Winnie, raising an eyebrow in silent consultation.
Winnie crossed her arms over her chest, leaning her shoulder against the damp concrete wall.
“The kid was shaking so hard his coffee was vibrating, Mr. Marquetti,” she said honestly.
“He’s a coward, but he’s not a traitor.”
“He was just following orders because he was terrified of Frank.”
Rhett looked down at Tommy, his expression unreadable as stone.
“Get up, Tommy,” Rhett ordered.
The young guard scrambled back onto his feet, wiping tears and snot from his face with the sleeve of his uniform.
“You’re going to walk out of this basement,” Rhett told him, “and you’re going to stand guard outside the formal dining room on the first floor.”
“At noon today, the five family capos are arriving for the monthly revenue sit-down.”
“You will check every man for weapons, and you will not say one word about what happened behind my door last night.”
“If you flinch, if you sweat, or if you look at Lorenzo with anything other than normal deference, I will let Winnie take the crowbar to your other knee.”
Tommy nodded frantically, practically tripping over his own boots as he scrambled toward the heavy steel door.
“Thank you, Mr. Marquetti! Thank you, Winnie! I won't let you down!”
Once the door clanged shut behind Tommy, only three people remained in the dim, humming room.
Rhett pulled a short, snub-nosed revolver from inside his charcoal coat and placed it quietly on the table in front of Frank Corsi.
The cold steel gleamed under the naked halogen bulb overhead.
“You have five minutes, Frank,” Rhett said, his voice entirely devoid of anger, which made it ten times more terrifying.
“For your father’s sake, Angela keeps the college money and the house in Warwick stays in your wife’s name.”
Frank looked down at the gun, his shoulders slumping as the finality of his fate crushed what remained of his spirit.
“Thank you, Rhett,” Frank whispered, tears streaming freely down his bloody cheeks.
Rhett turned on his heel and walked toward the exit, holding the heavy door open for Winnie.
Winnie picked up her utility bucket, took one long, unblinking look at the broken man at the table, and walked out into the corridor.
They had barely taken six paces down the concrete hallway when the sharp, flat report of a single gunshot echoed through the subterranean corridors.
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Winnie did not jump; she simply tightened her grip on the plastic handle of her bucket and kept walking beside the crime boss of Providence.
***
