“Did they reveal who paid them?” I asked.
“The Sturlese boys say it was all about the muscle they tried to put on the facilities VP at Wrigley. They were deep in debt after the downturn, Nabiyev got money for them from the Grozny Mob, but they had to earn it out. The Grozny goons wanted to pour all the new concrete in the Wrigley reno, and when the Cubs wouldn’t talk to them, the Uzbekis sent Fugher in to try to bribe or batter a guy named Brineruck in the Cubs organization. He was the person talking to Fugher in the recording you turned up.”
“How’d you smoke him out?” I asked.
Conrad yawned. “Your friend Villard, the guy who was shot up in Evanston, he made it through surgery. He ID’d the punk speaking to Fugher. Villard called him after you played the recording and the creep panicked, called Brian Sturlese for advice. Sturlese and Nabiyev weren’t going to take any chance on being named in a potential bribery case; they drove up to the Villard mansion with Brineruck, used him as their stalking horse, and shot Villard. The Cubs fired Brineruck on the spot, of course, but we arrested him for conspiracy to commit murder. Bribery, too, but attempted murder always plays well with a jury.”
“What about Sebastian Mesaline?” I asked. “Did he ever show up?”
Conrad made a face. “Punk was hiding in his uncle Jerry’s garage down in Lansing. He dissolved like the soggy piece of Kleenex he is. Sniveled about the loan he’d been forced to take out to cover his embezzlement. His sister, who must have ‘Born to be a Martyr’ tattooed on her someplace, is insisting that he didn’t do anything wrong—even though he locked the Fouchard girl behind a steel barricade and left her to die there. Sis is putting aside money for his legal defense. She tried hiring your mouthpiece, but Freeman Carter apparently told her there’d be a conflict of interest.”
“Was there any sign that Vince Bagby was involved in the Fugher murder?”
“You have a hard-on—”
“Disgusting expression, especially when talking to me,” I said. “The Sturlese brothers didn’t have an interest in anything Annie Guzzo may or may not have hidden under Wrigley Field. I’m trying to find out who planted that in their tiny minds, or in the Grozny Mob’s brains. If it was Vince Bagby—”
“I’m not digging into Bagby on your say-so,” Conrad said coldly.
“He was at Say, Yes! the night that Bernadine and I were beaten up, and he’s been popping up every time something dramatic happens. I don’t know if it’s coincidence, or because he’s keeping an eye on me for Scanlon.”
“I can’t help you there. Maybe he knows you’re an unguided missile and he’s trying to make sure you don’t land on his trucks.”
Derek swallowed a grin.
I curled my lip. “I suppose mocking me is the easiest way to assuage your guilt over not getting to the Sturlese brothers before they dragged Bernadine Fouchard to South Chicago. Thank goodness Mr. Contreras and I rescued her before she died.”
Conrad shifted in his chair. “Sorry. Out of line. But I’m still not going after Scanlon, or Bagby, because you have an itch you want to scratch.”
I sucked in a breath, held it for a count of ten, waited for the red to fade from in front of my eyes. “There’s the business of Annie Guzzo, and what she was hiding in the tunnel at Wrigley, and why she was murdered. And all of that leads back to Rory Scanlon.”
“There’s no connection to Scanlon. And definitely not one to Bagby, who wasn’t even running the trucking company when Annie was killed.”
“Bagby and Scanlon are cousins, and Bagby is the younger one. He wanted the big boys to let him play with them when he was little, so he’d do whatever they said. It got to be ingrained. Now that they’re all grown, Bagby still does what the older boys want so he can be part of the gang.”
“What, now you’re a family therapist? They’re cousins, they do things together, so Bagby helps support Say, Yes! I’ll admit you were a big help two days ago in South Chicago, but I’ve got enough real crime in the Fourth to keep me going until my granddaughter’s in college—and I don’t have a kid of my own yet. I’m not going to start inventing crimes where the system is running smoothly.”
“The system is exactly what runs smoothly only for the people running it!” I cried, exasperated. “Scanlon is funneling money through that Say, Yes! foundation to stuff that’s either illegal or would get his insurance license revoked. Back when Annie Guzzo worked for Mandel & McClelland, she uncovered evidence that Scanlon was using the kids in his Say, Yes! foundation to beat up local businesses and push them into buying their insurance through his agency. Joel Previn overheard Scanlon and Mandel talk about using foundation funds to bankroll Spike Hurlihey’s first political campaign.”