“Yeah, sure, Til, but relax, okay? I’m not bailin’ out on you.”
The priest smiled at him. “I hadn’t suggested you were.”
Rizzo sat back in his seat. “Oh, yeah, you sorta did. It’s in your eyes.”
“Set my mind at ease then, Joe.”
Rizzo reached into his pocket and extracted a small Panasonic tape recorder/player. From another pocket, he removed a microcassette.
“There’ll never be a better time for me to get this out there,” he said. “Me and Mike are bulletproof now. Maybe not forever, but all we need is right now. You got about a half hour to spare, Father? I got somethin’ I want you to hear.”
LATER, AS Jovino showed Rizzo the door, they paused and shook hands.
“I’ll personally deliver the tape to the United States attorney for the Eastern district. First thing Monday morning.”
“Good,” Rizzo said. “They’ll have no trouble believin’ some runaway left it here at the shelter. Once they start nosing around and find out Daily’s daughter was once a runaway herself, they’ll see the logic of it.”
“Of course they will,” Jovino said, his eyes twinkling. “And despite the rather less than stellar conduct of some few of my colleagues, most people still do trust priests, Joe. They’ll believe me all right. Don’t concern yourself about that.”
Rizzo nodded, lifting his collar in anticipation of stepping out into the dark, cold evening. “Good,” he said.
Jovino shook his head, a sadness coming into his eyes. “I always knew Councilman Daily was something less than noble, Joe. But this … this tape. It’s an outrageous betrayal of trust. Of dignity. Of democracy.”
Rizzo shrugged. “Do yourself a favor,” he said. “Keep it simple. What we got here is a crime, Father. Forget about what’s right, what’s wrong, what’s a betrayal.”
“What we got here is illegal,” Rizzo said, his eyes kind, his tone soft.
“A crime, Father. Just a crime.”
Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five