Page 37 of Hard Hitter
O’Doul opened his mouth to express his displeasure at the cop’s tone, but Ari beat him to it.
“Look, I have my own job, okay? And Vince didn’t like that so much. And he had a big chest-beating macho streak. When things went wrong, I was the last person he’d tell. We didn’t do a lot oftell me about your day at work, honey. Besides—his club has a business office. It’s not like he was running the whole show out of my home. I showed his ass the door, and we have not had a conversation since.”
“Okay.” The detective rubbed his chin. “Then can you tell me who he workedwith?You must have heard names, or answered calls.”
She cleared her throat. “The co-owned clubs were with the Pryzyks. They were brothers, I think.”
Pryzyk. O’Doul thought he’d heard that name on the news before.
“You ever meet them?” the detective pried.
“Once. Maybe a year ago? I met Vince at his office because we were going to the opera. And they were there. Not the most friendly people. I didn’t feel the urge to see them again.”
“So you never socialized with his colleagues?” the detective pressed.
O’Doul did not think Ari should have to answer all these questions.
“When I was young and working in Vince’s first club, I knew everyone,” she said. “They were my second family. But when I left to do training in yoga and massage therapy, I wasn’t around anymore. And the turnover in nightclubs is pretty high. All my favorite people moved on.”
“Okay,” the detective said, tapping his pencil on his pad of paper. “Can you tell me if Vincent ever said anything about drugs in his clubs?”
O’Doul felt his gut tighten, but he kept his face impassive. Buying pills in that club was the stupidest thing he’d ever done in his life. The buzz he got from them lasted a couple of hours each time. And now he’d be worrying about this shit for the rest of his career.
“Vince told me once that every club had problems with drugs—that it was hard to keep the dealers out. And then, sure enough, one of his clubs kept getting busted and they lost the liquor license. But he didn’t share specifics, and I didn’t ask because he was such a grumpy bastard all the time about it.” Ari looked the cop straight in the eye as she said it, and O’Doul hoped he would just leave her the fuck alone.
“To your knowledge did Vince Giardi ever decide to use the flow of drugs as an opportunity rather than a problem?”
Ari’s eyes widened again. “You mean... encourage the dealing?”
“Did he take a cut?” the agent asked point-blank.
As O’Doul watched, she went through about seventeen emotions. Disbelief. Fear. Disgust. “God, I don’t think so,” she said finally. “I mean, he’d never tell me if he did. But the thing about Vince is that he isn’t really a schemer. He’d rather pour you a drink and take a spin on the dance floor. Even when he was trying to build up his empire, it was all about the clubs themselves—which A-list celebs were going to show up, which DJs he could book. He got into the business because he wanted to party for a living.” She shook her head. “I don’t think he was the best businessman, honestly. I know he had money problems after the one club was shut down. He owed the Pryzyk brothers money, I think. Either that or he owed somebody else money, and he was trying to get the Pryzyks to help him.”
“Why do you think so?”
She shrugged and looked up at the ceiling. “His phonewould ring with their name on the screen. He’d disappear into another room and argue for a while. I got the impression he wanted their help. But I never heard both sides of the conversation. That’s really all I can tell you,” she finished.
The cop took notes on a pad, writing furiously. “Okay. Thank you.” He looked up. “Have you ever heard the name Andre Karsecki?”
“Um...” Ari’s brow wrinkled. “No? Who’s that?”
O’Doul had heard it. “I saw it in the newspaper—an unsolved murder in a nightclub.”
The cop nodded, and there was an awkward silence.
Ari crossed her arms over her chest. “Look, I told you everything I know about Vince’s work. I wish I’d never met the guy.”
“We’re going to inventory the items from your storage room downstairs, and remove the computer we found there. Did you keep any valuables in that room?” the detective asked.
“Depends who you ask. The collection of vinyl albums is my uncle’s—they’re valuable to him, but I have no idea if they’re worth any actual money. Aside from a few pieces of old furniture I didn’t want, nothing else in that room was put there by me.”
He scribbled another note. “Any files? Any notes?”
“All Vince’s,” she said firmly. “When I looked through the window the other day, I saw a computer I’d never seen before. I have no idea how he was working out of that room. I changed the Wi-Fi password after he left, too.”
“There was a splice,” the cop said, still writing. “A direct line running from your cable connection.”
“Damn it!” Ari yelled. “Thatasshole.”
