Political Poison Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  Also by

  Copyright Page

  To the traveling road crew: Barb, Debbie, and Mike.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  For their kind assistance: William B. Kelley, Gerald Hannion, Jr., Paul Varnell, James White, Mike Rockwell and Commander Hugh Holton, Chicago Police Department

  And to that old gang of mine—thanks once again to: Kathy Pakieser-Reed, Michael Kushner, Rick Paul

  ONE

  I’m going to slide on over to our witness on Fullerton and then head home,” Buck Fenwick announced.

  In the Chicago Police Department the detectives never “drove” anywhere. Usually they “slide,” sometimes they “drift” over. The last Chicago cop who drove anywhere was a rookie three years ago, and he simply didn’t know any better.

  Paul Turner nodded at his partner and glanced at the clock over the rumbling radiator. For the first time in two weeks he’d be going home from Area Ten headquarters at four-thirty, exactly on time.

  Minutes later Paul drove home straight down Halsted, through Greektown, skirted the University of Illinois campus, then west on Taylor Street. Two blocks later he turned right and into his garage.

  In the kitchen he gulped down a large glass of orange juice. He heard the thump of feet down the stairs and moments later his son Brian appeared in the kitchen doorway. His seventeen-year-old wore white socks, faded jeans, and a white t-shirt that bulged over his chest and shoulder muscles. Soon the boy would catch up with his dad.

  Brian whispered, “You better talk to Jeff.”

  “Why are you whispering?” Paul asked.

  “I’m serious, Dad. Something’s bothering him, and he won’t tell me what.”

  Jeff, Turner’s eleven-year-old, worshipped his older brother. Their rare fights were quickly over and forgotten.

  “When did it start?” Paul asked.

  “I thought it was because he tripped on his way into the house. He swung his crutch at me when I tried to help him up.”

  Jeff had spina bifida, a birth defect that the three of them had come to terms with, though it had taken many years of struggle. These days Jeff was to the point of handling the occasional falls and frustrations of maneuvering on crutches and in wheelchairs with a grimace and a shrug.

  “He hit you?” Paul asked.

  “It’s not a big deal, Dad, but I’m worried about him. He wouldn’t talk to me. He tells me stuff he doesn’t tell you, but I can’t get a word out of him.”

  Paul found Jeff in the den in front of the Nintendo set. Jeff frequently beat both his older brother and his father at a wide variety of electronic games. The screen showed the beginning of the Tengen edition of the Tetris game, which Jeff preferred to the Nintendo version. The screen finished the opening explanation of how to play, but Jeff didn’t click the controls to begin. Late April afternoon sunlight streamed through gauze curtains, continuing to fade the spot under the window.

  Paul knelt next to the worn, golden overstuffed chair and touched his son’s arm. Jeff flinched, and he wouldn’t make eye contact.

  “What’s wrong, Jeff?” he asked.

  No answer.

  Paul asked, “Did something happen at school? Should I call your teacher?”

  “No,” Jeff murmured.

  “Are you physically hurt? Should I call the doctor?”

  Jeff shook his head.

  Paul waited a few moments, trying to figure out what he could say to get his son to talk. He said, “You aren’t playing your game. I’ve got time for a couple tries.”

  Jeff shrugged.

  “You hit your brother. You can’t do that, Jeff. You know it’s wrong.”

  Jeff glanced at his father. Paul saw a tear in the boy’s eye. “I didn’t mean to hit him,” he whispered. “Is he mad at me?”

  Paul put his arm around his son. The boy didn’t flinch, but Paul could feel tension in the slender shoulders. He said, “No, he loves you. He’s concerned about you. So am I. What’s wrong?”

  Jeff gulped and drew a deep breath. He reached a hand for his dad’s arm. Paul caressed his son gently. Jeff said, “Dad, are you going to die?”

  The question startled Paul. Carefully considering possible responses, he finally asked, “Why do you ask?”

  Jeff hesitated and then all the words came out in a rush. “At school today one of the kids said all gay people are going to die of AIDS and on television all the gay people have AIDS and they all die. You aren’t going to die, are you, Dad?”

  Paul had told both his sons about his sexual orientation when they were ten years old. He wanted to be honest, and to tell them before they heard it from someone else. He and Brian were closer than most fathers and sons, and Paul always put down a large part of this to his honesty about his sexuality. He’d told Jeff last year, and he thought the boy was handling it well. Today’s question was something new.

  Paul knelt in front of his son. Tears flooded the boy’s eyes. Paul brushed the hair back on his son’s forehead, placed his hands on the boy’s arms.

  “Television shows are just pretend, aren’t they?” Paul asked.

  The boy sniffed and nodded.

  “And we’ve talked about how your friends don’t always have accurate information?”

  Jeff nodded. He’d been through a lot with kids and even adults with misinformation and ridicule about his birth defect.

  “We’ve talked about AIDS, haven’t we?”

  Another sniff and nod.

  “You know I was tested and the results were negative. That means I don’t have the antibodies and that I’m okay.”

  “Then why do they only put gay people who are sick on television?” the eleven year old asked.

  “Television doesn’t put very many gay people on its programs.”

  “Why not?” his son demanded.

  “I don’t know, Jeff. They just don’t, but there’s lots of gay people. Uncle Ian, Ben Vargas. You know them. They aren’t dying and neither am I.”

  Paul looked into his son’s brown eyes, the thick dark eyelashes which showed his Italian heritage. “Feel better?” he asked.

  The boy visibly relaxed. He put his arms around his dad, and they hugged. They played three games of Tetris. Paul insisted they quit when Jeff reached level ten.

  Over dinner Paul told them about an incident earlier in the day at a jewelry shop on Wabash Avenue in the Loop. He’d been part of a foot chase that ended up at Buckingham Fountain.

  “Did you get shot at?” Jeff asked.

  “One of the crooks some other detectives were chasing fired one shot in their direction. Nobody got hurt.” He could have lied or told them nothing, but the incident would very likely be on the evening news. He’d rather they hear it from him.

  “Did you have your vest on?” Jeff asked.

  “I sure did,” Paul said. He ruffled his son’s hair. “Don’t I always do what you tell me?”

  “Sometimes,” Jeff said seriously.

  Bulletproof vests were not mandatory for detectives on the Chicago police force but Paul usually wore his just to be careful. They’d discussed the possibility of his getting shot before. Both boys worried about it.

  Paul soothed their fears as best he could. As a single parent, he wanted to assure his sons as much as possible that he would be there for them. Their mother had died giving birth to Jeff.

  When Paul finished, Jeff said, “The kids make fun sometimes because you’re a cop. I tell them to bug off.”

  This was one of the hazards o
f living in a newly upscale neighborhood. A lot of the old ethnic families still remained, but the new condos and town homes were filled with yuppies and their sometimes arrogant kids who looked down on less well-off families.

  “Do you want me to talk to the teacher?” Paul asked.

  “Nah. It’s okay. If it gets bad, I tell them Brian will beat them up.” Brian, the star athlete in the neighborhood, had a reputation of toughness and looking out for his brother. Such threats carried weight.

  After dinner Paul cleaned up as he prepared to go out. He thought of shaving again, he often did before dates, but Ben, the guy he’d been dating for nearly six months, said he liked the heavy beard. Brian popped his head in his dad’s bedroom as Paul was pulling on a gray University of Illinois sweatshirt.

  “Dad, can I have Charlette over to study tonight?”

  “Charlette, the pretty one from over in the town houses on Harrison?”

  “Yeah, you met her last week. Dark hair, nice looking.”

  “All the girls you date have dark hair and are nice looking.”

  “Come on, Dad, I need help with my English.”

  “And Charlette is just the expert you need.”

  “Well, she gets A’s all the time.”

  “I vaguely recall your report card the past three semesters had A’s in English.”

  “Dad!”

  “No dice. If Mrs. Talucci’s at home and she agrees, you can study over there, but you have to take your brother with you.”

  Brian considered his options. He thought of trying whining, but that often backfired into extra sets of chores. Brian said, “Jeff’s here, nothing’s going to happen while he’s around.”

  “Jeff is not going to start chaperoning you at this stage of his career, much as he might relish the opportunity. Mrs. Talucci or nothing.”

  Rose Talucci lived next door. Paul loved her. She cared for Jeff every day after school whenever Paul or Brian couldn’t be home. She often wound up giving the boys and their dad dinner. This was prearranged on a weekly basis. For several years after it started, she refused all offers of payment. Being neighbors and nearly family precluded even discussing such things. One day Mrs. Talucci couldn’t fix a broken porch. Paul offered. Since then he’d done all the repairs on her home and had even done several major renovations. Mrs. Talucci lived on the ground floor by herself. On the second floor lived Mrs. Talucci’s two daughters and several distant female cousins. Mrs. Talucci at ninety-one ruled this brood, her main concern being to keep them out of her way and to stay independent. Numerous times she’d confided in Paul that if they weren’t family she’d throw them all out. She did her own cooking, cleaning, and shopping as she had for seventy-three years. To her daughters’ horror she took the bus on her own throughout the city and suburbs to visit friends and relatives, to shopping-center openings, or to go to anything else that struck her fancy as something new and interesting.

  Brian said, “Best deal I’m going to get?”

  Paul reached for his black leather jacket. “Yep.”

  Brian gave a teenage martyr sigh. Paul grabbed his keys and walked toward the door.

  Brian said, “You could bring Ben home to stay overnight.”

  Paul stopped. He searched his son’s brown eyes. Seeing seriousness there, he bit back the comment that he didn’t know he needed Brian’s permission. Ben had stayed over a few times already, often enough to leave a pair of pajama bottoms hanging on a hook in the closet.

  “Do you love him?” Brian asked.

  Paul said, “Pardon me?”

  “Do you love him?”

  “Is it important to you that I do?”

  “Yeah, kind of. He’s nice. I like when he’s around. And you’re happy when he’s with us. You don’t smile enough, Dad. You’re always so serious.”

  “I’ll tell him you approve,” Paul said. “He can come and ask you if he can have my hand in marriage.”

  “Cool. I’ll say yes, but you have to get Mrs. Talucci’s permission too.”

  “No problem. She’s been trying to get him to move in with us for ages.”

  Paul walked down Taylor Street to Ben’s garage. Ben had inherited it from his dad a number of years ago. With the influx of new homes and yuppies into the neighborhood the garage did better business than it had in years. New cars needed oil changes and repairs as much as old ones.

  The service bay set furthest back from Taylor Street was well lit. Paul strolled back, raised the overhead door and stepped inside.

  “We’re closed,” called a distant gruff voice.

  Paul shut the door. Two legs encased in coveralls squirmed under a Porsche.

  “It’s Paul,” he said.

  A torso appeared above the legs and then a head. Light brown hair tied back in a pony tail, face and hands smudged with grease, Myra Johnson smiled hello. She often worked late. She had an incredible reputation among the expensive foreign car set who begged her to work on their cars. She prized her private time so she often turned them down. They offered her enormous sums, but she serviced only a select number of people.

  “How’s the cop biz?” she asked.

  “More dead people than I ever thought possible,” he said.

  “Works that way,” she said.

  Ben walked in. “Heard voices,” he said. He walked up to Paul, and they embraced and kissed.

  “You guys are disgusting,” Myra said.

  “Jealous?” Ben asked.

  “No, Bonnie keeps me happy. It’s just you guys are always so mushy. You must be in love.”

  Both men blushed. She eyed them carefully. “Sorry, didn’t know you hadn’t told each other yet.”

  The three of them talked for a few minutes. Myra said she had to get finished, and they left her to it. They walked past the parts department to the front offices.

  Paul said, “She must be making a ton of money doing overtime.”

  “We got a new deal,” Ben said. “She works for me half the day, then I rent out that space to her for the rest of the time. She charges her customers and gives me a flat fee. I make almost as much from her work as I do from all the rest of the service. She’s good.”

  “I like her,” Paul said.

  Ben flicked off the lights. He twirled a series of locks to let them out the front. He punched a computer code into a fixture above the door.

  “Myra’s still here,” Paul reminded him.

  “She likes to have the alarm on when she’s working here alone at night,” Ben explained. “She resets it when she’s ready to leave.” They strolled through the parking lot to Ben’s truck.

  Ben and Paul had gone through grade school and high school together, but they hadn’t noted an attraction at the time. Ben stood an inch or two taller. He wouldn’t be called handsome but some might call him rugged. His hair hung a trifle longer than was the usual in the neighborhood. Tonight he wore a white sweater over a blue shirt. These clung to his broad shoulders and tapered into a pair of gray jeans.

  In Ben’s V-8 engine 1949 red Chevy truck they drove up Lake Shore Drive, past the Loop to the north side. They took Addison past Wrigley Field. They were going to the Music Box Theater to see a showing of Harold and Maude. When Ben learned Paul had never seen it, he insisted they go at the first opportunity. That was one reason they were going out tonight, the movie was only playing this once. The other reason was their varied schedules. As a small businessman, Ben rarely had time to get out, and Paul’s schedule as a cop was erratic. Their first serious argument a month ago had been over lack of time spent together. They determined that at least once a week they’d make time for each other.

  “You wouldn’t believe the nut case I had in the shop today,” Ben said as they drove up. “Some guy in full leather drag: cap, jacket, pants, maybe even his shirt. He had hair down to his waist in the back. He wore diamond studded sun glasses and rhinestone encrusted boots. He didn’t give his name. Just demanded to be treated like royalty.”

  “What’s this guy driving
?” Paul asked.

  “A $260,000 Bently Continental R that would start but wouldn’t keep going. Maybe somebody poured cocaine into the tank. Whatever. He’s heard that Myra is the best mechanic in the city and this guy says he only gets the best. No way it could be done. Myra’s booked up months in advance and only does emergencies for friends. The guy got really mad and tried to bully Myra. He even pounded his diamond-studded boot on her workbench and shouted threats.”

  “You didn’t throw him out on his ass?”

  “I didn’t have to. Myra tossed him out on his skinny little butt.”

  “Physically pitched him out?”

  “Yep.”

  “I’d like to have seen that. What happened to his car?” Paul asked.

  “It wouldn’t even start anymore so he had to have it towed away.”

  Paul enjoyed the stories Ben told about the foibles of the patrons of the car repair shop.

  They found a parking space just off Southport a block south of the theater. When Ben turned off the engine Paul reached for the door handle.

  Ben said, “Hey, cop.” He pulled Paul close. Paul enjoyed the strength and warmth, Ben’s now-familiar smell of sweat and Old Spice. He felt the bristly mustache as Ben’s kiss strengthened. They fooled around until it was time for the show to start.

  As Ben had predicted, Paul loved the movie. Afterward in a coffee shop on the other side of Southport, Paul told Ben about the separate conversations with his sons, Jeff’s concern about his safety, and Brian’s concern about his love life.

  Ben said, “I’m glad Brian likes me. I hope Jeff does.”

  “No problem. He lets you carry him. Lots of people offer, but he only permits a few people to do it. You’re okay in his eyes.” Jeff liked to be as independent as his birth defect permitted. The boy’s standing rule was to ‘let me try it, and if I need help I’ll ask.’ The only people permitted to break this rule were his dad and sometimes Brian. Over the years Paul had learned when the frustration point would come for his son. Being carried was something that took an enormous amount of trust on the boy’s part, but he’d taken to Ben from the start.