When the man looked up and staggered back against the closing door, Jack was momentarily convinced that he would have to diffuse the situation with a stranger—and somehow hope that the man hadn’t heard about the notorious fugitive who was now standing in his living room. When the figure at the door met his gaze, however, Jack saw the small brown eyes staring back into his, and he knew: it was Lenny. He was certain of it.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
Lenny stared at Jack, and Jack felt his heart starting to slow down in his chest.
Lenny’s eyes lit up with recognition. Jack sensed Cassandra shifting to the side, out from behind him, and the drug baron glanced at her briefly before looking back at Jack.
“You. I should’ve known. I heard about you on the news, Hardy.”
Jack’s arm shot out instinctively, pushing Cassandra back as Lenny reached into a pocket of his jacket and took out a knife.
“I don’t know who this bitch is, but I’ve been waiting to run into you.”
Jack fell into a fighting stance, hands ready and body slightly hunkered down. Lenny stared at him intently, hand tightening and relaxing on the hilt of his knife. He let out a guttural-sounding growl and rushed towards Jack, brandishing the knife in his shaking, unsteady hand.
He’s in bad shape, Jack thought, evaluating his opponent as he rushed forward. He remembered the man he had squared off against in a tiny little suburb outside of Newark, back when he’d hunted Lenny down the first time. The drug baron had been quick back then—and he had owned a much sharper-looking knife.
In the corner of his vision, Jack saw Cassandra stumble back. He moved forward, meeting Lenny’s rush towards him. He dodged the swipe and the stab that the decrepit drug dealer made at him, ducking and sidestepping. Years of training and experience came to the fore of Jack’s mind, and he shifted into automatic. He brought the edge of his hand down on Lenny’s knife arm, just above his wrist.
The dealer shouted, dropping the knife. Jack took advantage of the distraction to grab his arm and twist it around, stepping behind the other man and pinning the wrist to the small of his back.
In moments, Jack had him subdued. Lenny twisted and struggled, but with his arms pinned behind him, there was nowhere for him to go.
Jack glanced at Cassandra; her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were wide, but she looked as though she was physically okay. Jack frog-marched the man to the only piece of furniture he could find in the sprawling penthouse apartment: the dirty, tumbled-around mattress. He threw Lenny down, face-first, and held him there until the man stopped struggling underneath him. Cassandra followed in their wake; Jack thought to himself that while she didn’t exactly look comfortable with what she was witnessing, at least she wasn’t screaming.
Jack held Lenny’s wrists against the small of his back with one hand and grabbed at the hair at the back of his skull with the other, lifting the other man’s head off of the mattress.
Lenny shrieked and gasped for breath.
“Fine—fine! What do you want? What do you want from me? You can take it.”
“Information,” Jack said, pushing Lenny’s arms up at the wrist, increasing the pressure on the man’s elbows and shoulders.
“Whatever you want! Whatever you want. I swear.”
“Tell me, Lenny old pal, what have you been up to since I hauled your ass back to jail?” Jack’s grip tightened on the man’s hair as he remembered the time he’d spent in prison for the past three months. “What does your piece of shit life look like these days?”
“I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you. Just…just let up on me a little. I can’t think like this.”
Jack held his grip for a moment longer before relenting just a fraction, glancing at Cassandra.
“Start talking, you rat,” Jack said, his knee pressing into Lenny’s thighs.
“So obviously you caught up to me after they arrested me. You know what that shit was for? Selling dope to some UC bastard. Not even a lot—a gram or two, max. They got a warrant to search my trap based on that bullshit—hauled my car in and found two kilos.”
“What kind of an asshole keeps two kilos on hand when he knows the torch is on him?”
“I had a business to take care of, man!” Lenny yelped when Jack twisted his arm once more. “God—fuck, you been lifting the weights hard, haven’t you bro?”
“Harder than you, that’s for damn sure. What happened after I took you in, Lenny? That’s what I want to know. Tell me, and maybe you get out of this.”
“It was Laura who took me into custody. And after all I done for her, she flips on me like a goddamn light switch. Acts like she’s never even seen me before, pretending like she needs to look at the file to learn my damn name. That’s when I worked out that she must have been the one who set me up. Folks kept slapping her on the back, saying well done for taking down one of the biggest dealers in the city. Think she got a medal out of it, that bitch.”
“That why you killed her, Lenny? Come on, talk to me you piece of shit.”
His grip tightened on the man’s arm, his nails beginning to dig into the loose flesh. He could feel the anger building up inside of him; it was too easy to imagine Lenny dying by his hands, to imagine watching the light leave the man’s eyes.
Jack took a shaking breath and told himself to cool down. He needed to know what had happened, and Lenny wouldn’t be able to tell him anything if he was unconscious.
“Tell me, you asshole. Tell me what you did.”
Chapter Sixteen
Cassandra stood watching the two men in mute shock. I shouldn’t be this surprised. Jack would have done…he was ready to do worse to Riley, back at that storage unit, if he’d had to. She shuddered at the images her mind conjured up.
“I’m telling you man, wasn’t me who killed Laura,” Lenny said, turning his head and spitting over the edge of the mattress.
Cassandra frowned, reviewing what she knew about Laura Granger and the information that had come out since her death—information that Cassandra had been instrumental in discovering and forwarding to the police as part of their investigation.
Laura Granger’s public face had been squeaky-clean, but her private life had been worse than filthy. The NYPD officer and decorated Army vet had been the pride of her community. She had mentored troubled youth, even helping several of them make their way into the ranks of the police, and was given some kind of honor by her high school. Charming, sprightly, and tough, she had won a spot in the hearts of everyone who followed her career.
But even as she had lectured high school students about the importance of staying away from drugs, Laura had been pilfering the evidence bins, stealing confiscated product of all kinds—meth, crack, pot, coke, whatever happened to be available—and distributing it to dealers around the city. Laura had been careful; that was why she hadn’t gotten caught, and why her double life hadn’t come to light until after her murder, when Cassandra had started investigating.
“I moved product for that bitch and when she took me in, she acted like she never even heard my name before,” Lenny said, bitterness overtaking his fear at what Jack might do to him. “I got myself some lawyers, hired the three best criminal defense attorneys in the state of New York. They cost me my savings, but hell, it was worth it.”
“How come you didn’t out Laura after she arrested you?” Cassandra glanced from Lenny to Jack, who was staring down at him with a kind of intensity that didn’t bode well for Lenny’s health or state of mind.
“The lawyers told me that was about the worst thing I could do,” Lenny said, sounding sulky. “I wanted to roll over on her, see if they’d cut me a deal, you know? But she was still the golden child back then; the truth hadn’t come out yet. The lawyers said no one would believe me, and I’d only be making things worse for myself if I tried to take her down with me.” Lenny spit again, and Cassandra thought he might be imagining Laura’s face when he did it. “That bitch pranced around in uniform like she owned
the damn city.”
“So why aren’t you rotting in jail right now, Lenny? How come I didn’t see you in the yard?”
“They had me plead guilty to everything,” Lenny said. He winced at the pain in his arms before continuing. “They chalked my jumping bail up to temporary insanity, and convinced the judge that since I didn’t have a record, I should get off light.” Lenny let out a rusty-sounding laugh. “I don’t know how they managed it, but I guess that’s why they’re so damn expensive.”
“I remember your trial,” Cassandra said, as the pieces fell into place in her mind. “You got house arrest.”
“That’s right,” Lenny said, a smug expression flitting across his face. “Those bankrupting sons of bitches got me that much; I got to stay in here for a few months instead of getting gutted in some fucking cell.”
“If you got off so lightly, how come you’re living like a cockroach?” Jack said, his voice full of disgust.
Cassandra started to tell Jack to calm down, to take a breath; but she could see he wasn’t in a state of mind to take suggestions on his interrogation technique.
“You know what happens to a man who gets snatched up by the 5-0? He’s tainted goods. Nobody would come within fifty feet of me, like they’d put some kind of restraining order on everyone who hustled.” Lenny shook his head. “Nobody would get me product to sell, nobody would buy from me. Even once they took that shitting monitor off my ankle, nobody wanted anything to do with me.”
“You were trying to deal while you were under house arrest?” Cassandra shook her head in disbelief. “That’s stupid as hell.”
“Lenny here’s never been all that smart, have you asshole?” Jack leaned on the man’s arm and Lenny groaned in pain.
“Jack, he’s talking, don’t break his arm, please,” Cassandra said. The words left her before she could consider whether it was wise to interrupt the man at work.
“Listen to her, man,” Lenny said, nodding his head in Cassandra’s direction. “I’m telling you everything—why you gotta break my arm for that?”
Jack grunted wordlessly, but Cassandra saw him loosen his grip on the junkie.
“If no one would work with you, how’d you end up using?”
Lenny laughed again. “They wouldn’t let me sell for them or help me move product, but they’d sell to me, sure enough,” he said. “I started with my own stuff—the stuff the cops never found. I was bored, it was a way to pass the time.” He made that awkward, half-shrugging movement again. “After a while I was hooked. And it got me out of the house.”
“That’s why the place is empty,” Cassandra said, realizing suddenly that the man had sold everything to fund his habit.
“That’s right, man—habit like mine costs money, you know? I started with the jewelry and shit, and then…” Lenny turned his head. “Before I knew it, I was here.”
There was something building up in Jack, in spite of Lenny’s obviously honest words.
“So you’re telling me that Laura Granger ruins your fucking life and you just sit here in the corner doing blow?” Jack gave Lenny a shake. “Tell the truth you asshole! She crashed your little enterprise and let you go to the dogs, so you killed her and pinned it on me because I was the one who turned you over.”
“No! No—no, man, you got it wrong,” Lenny said. The fear flashed across his face again, and Cassandra thought that if Jack put even a few pounds more pressure on the man’s arms, they’d break across his back. “The police thought the same thing. When that bitch turned up dead, they pulled me in.”
“So what happened then?” Cassandra sank into a crouch, keeping in Jack’s line of sight.
“They already had evidence pointing to Jackie here, but he wasn’t talking. When they couldn’t get a confession out of him, they brought in a bunch of possible suspects; dealers Laura had worked with, everyone she’d arrested who wasn’t in jail. They did their job thoroughly alright, I’ll give them that—but the 5-0 always look out for their own.”
Lenny looked at Cassandra, grimacing as Jack’s grip on his arms held firm. “So they haul me in for questioning—big loss there, no one’s going into business with me anyway. But they didn’t have any evidence, you know? And they could tell I’m not even a little hot to kill anybody anymore.”
“You pulled a knife on Jack just now.”
“You was in my place!” Lenny looked at Cassandra wildly. “Of course I’m gonna pull a knife on someone I think is here to kill me. I didn’t mean anything by it.”
“Sure,” Cassandra said dryly.
“Hey—I may be a rat but I ain’t wasteful. You’ve got a pretty face, and a nice body. At most I’d have taken down your man here and told you if you said anything to anyone about it, I’d come pay you a visit.”
“So Laura ruined your life and you didn’t even try to get even?” Jack’s voice was full of contempt. “You didn’t think to maybe pin it on me? Come on Lenny, I’m not stupid.”
“Yeah, she ruined my life,” Lenny said, twisting on the mattress. “And you know what, maybe I did want her dead. But if I was gonna to do it, I’d try and be classy about it. The beast that got her… You could see that wasn’t just business.”
“What do you mean?” Cassandra moved a little closer to the two men, concerned that Jack’s patience might snap at any moment.
“You know anything about that, bitch?”
“I know as much about her as the cops do; I wrote up the case for the newspaper.”
Lenny frowned, looking at her for a moment. “Oh—yeah, you’re that lady who goes on the news sometimes.” He smiled. “How the hell did you end up with this guy?”
“Not really relevant right now, Lenny,” Cassandra licked her lips, thinking. “How did it go down when they brought you in for questioning? Did they try and get you to confess? Did they have anything from the scene that pointed to you?”
Lenny shook his head. “Man, that shit’s ancient history now,” he said, glancing over his shoulder at Jack. “They brought me in the room. They thought I’d killed Laura, same reason Hardy does. Said she ruined my life and I put paid to her, same old story.” Lenny shook his head again. “They brought out pictures of her—you seen those?”
Cassandra nodded, wincing—she had seen more than pictures.
“Then you know that whoever did that to her wasn’t just getting back at her over a deal gone bad, or whatever. No, there were marks all round her neck, face all beat to hell. Real nasty business.”
“What else did they ask you?” Cassandra didn’t dare to glance at Jack; she needed to keep Lenny’s attention on her and keep the tension level in the room down. Training in dealing with hostile interview subjects sure does come in handy where you least expect it, she thought absently.
“All the normal questions, ‘Where were you on this night,’ ‘who was with you,’ ‘do you have any proof that you were there,’ shit like that. The night Laura got killed, I was trying to sling a pair of shoes so I could go buy a gram.” Lenny made a face.
“Is that all you did that night, Lenny?”
“I’m telling you; I bought some stuff, and then I went and hung out at Roxy’s for a while. Then I came back here.”
“What else did the police ask you? Come on, Lenny, I’m doing everything I can to help you out here. Work with me.” Cassandra glanced askance at Jack, who was barely holding in his frustration.
“I told you; they asked where I was, who I was with, all the normal things. That night was the same as every night; get some cash, find some dope, come home and use.” Lenny was shaking slightly under Jack’s weight, and Cassandra could see he was starting to go into the twitchy, itchy state of intense craving.
“I’d be using right now if I had my hands to myself,” he said. “That’s all I know. I wasn’t there, I wasn’t involved. If I’d seen Laura in the street I might spit on her, but I wasn’t in any shape to do what that son of a bitch did to her.”
“Anything else you can remember them asking you? I
know it was a while ago, but I just want to make sure we’ve got all the details. You get that, right Lenny?”
The junkie considered for a moment, his gaze abstracted. “They asked me the same questions so many times I didn’t really think about it.” He licked his lips and looked at Cassandra. “They asked me where I was the night it happened. Who I was with, the clothes I was wearing, if I wore any jewelry, all that stuff. I said to ‘em, do I look like the kind of guy who wears jewelry? I’d sell the clothes off of my back for a hit.”
Something tugged at Cassandra’s mind. She sat back on her haunches, frowning as she felt something tickling at a corner of her brain.
“What? What is it, Cass?” Jack said, turning to look at her.
Cassandra shook her head, holding her hand up to silence his questions. There was something about the mention of jewelry.
There was something… Come on, Cass, think. It was something to do with a bracelet, or a necklace…something.
She shook her head as nothing rose up as she attempted to call the detail to mind. Was it something she’d seen in a police report, or was it something she remembered from walking into the scene itself? It was impossible to remember exactly, but the sudden nagging in her brain was enough to convince Cassandra that Lenny wasn’t the man they were looking for.
“He’s not who we need to be talking to,” Cassandra said finally, taking a deep breath and sighing as she turned her attention back to the two men in front of her. “We’re wasting our time here, Lenny wasn’t involved. I mean, look at him; he can barely sit still long enough to answer questions. There’s no way he would have been able to kill someone and make it look like you did it.”
For a moment, Jack didn’t move. He said nothing, and Cassandra could tell that he was deliberating, trying to decide whether or not he agreed with her analysis. He closed his eyes and Cassandra saw a ripple of tension work through him. A moment later, he released his hold on Lenny and stood up, stepping away from the mattress. Cassandra struggled to her feet, stamping a couple of times to rid herself of the pins-and-needles feeling in her toes.
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