by S. J. Rozan
Sam’s apartment was as Grimaldi had described it. Small, low-ceilinged, nearly furniture-free, it was that staple of New York City real estate, the L-shaped studio. Like his Manhattan painting studio—which was larger—it was neat to the point of irrationality. To the left of the door was a kitchen, where bristles-up brushes sat in a coffee can in the sink. To the right, a couch faced a folding chair tucked precisely under a card table that held lined-up pencils and a carefully squared pile of sketch pads. Pavement-level windows nestled in the front wall over the sink and over the couch. The bathroom, with another window, opened off the kitchen, and the alcove in the back held a mattress covered with military-tight sheets and blankets.
On the right wall, facing the chair at the table, an unfinished canvas was pinned. Apparently, despite what he’d said, and although he now had a huge studio in Manhattan, Sam was still painting in a basement.
I shut the door, walked around Sam, and sat in the folding chair. Sam stood and stared and didn’t start moving again until his glance fell on a half-empty scotch bottle beside the coffeemaker on the kitchen counter. He headed over, picked it up. “Hey, you want a drink?”
“Sure.”
Sam took two coffee mugs from a cabinet. He poured a few fingers into each and handed me one. It seemed to me like one more drink and Sam would pass right out. Fine. I’d stay the night, as I told Lydia, more as a witness than a guard. Not really babysitting, and anyway, that was my rule, so I didn’t have to follow it.
It didn’t take long. Sam sat down on the couch. He reached for his neck as though to loosen his tie, but it was gone already. Discovering that made him grin. Settling in, he drank studiously, steadily, the way he’d work on a project. He didn’t speak. I didn’t say anything, either, sipping slowly, watching him. I wondered how much of the evening had registered with him, how much he’d filtered out, and whether the filtered-out parts would appear in canvases like the one pinned to the wall.
From my chair I could just about make out the pencil lines Sam had transferred from sketches taped around the canvas. I strained, but I couldn’t tell what anything was, and I didn’t want to get up and look more closely, in case movement might interfere with Sam’s losing consciousness.
He must have noticed me looking, though. “You like it?” he asked. “Oh, that’s right, you don’t like my work.”
“I can’t see it very well.”
“You wouldn’t like it anyway. It’s a sailboat. A windy day on the ocean. Waves and sparkly sun. Doesn’t that sound nice?”
“Sounds great.”
His face darkened. “I think the sharks think so, too. And the giant squids. And the electric eels, and the rogue waves, and the rocks, and the orcas, and—”
“Sam. Stop.”
He did. He stared at me, then down at his glass. He finished the drink. A few moments later, he said, “I don’t feel so good.”
“Time for bed.”
Sam nodded and pushed unevenly to his feet. I helped him lurch over to the mattress. He threw himself down, rolled in a blanket, and curled up facing the wall.
I checked that the door and the windows were locked, including the small, pebbled-glass one in the bathroom. I hauled the couch a few feet over until it blocked the doorway. If Sam tried to get out, he’d have to go through me. Not that I expected him to try; this was to prove to him that he hadn’t. I took off my funeral-suit jacket, my tie, and my shoes, and stretched out the best I could on the couch, my head on one arm and my legs hanging over the other. As Sam started to snore, I looked at my watch. Just past eleven. I’d been hoping it was later; it was going to be a long night.
Sam wasn’t a serial killer; I was pretty sure of that. Was there a way to convince him, short of finding the real one? That wasn’t my job, and I was willing to bet the NYPD would do it, and sooner rather than later. Would that be enough for Sam, though? Or would he carry this fear with him, let it creep into his days, put it in his work, for the rest of his life?
When my phone rang, I jumped. Sunlight was edging in the windows. I grabbed the phone and rasped, “Smith,” thinking the night hadn’t been so long after all.
“Grimaldi. Your client doesn’t answer his phone. You know where he is?”
I swung my legs down, rubbed my stiff neck, peered past the card table to the back of the room. “Tucked in his bed.”
“You sure?”
“I’m looking at him.”
“He been there all night?”
A chill ran through me. “Yes. Why?”
“Why the hell do you think? We have another one.”
15
Grimaldi’s closing words had been “Keep him there. I’m on my way.” I didn’t see any reason to wake Sam before she arrived, so I pulled myself off the couch to head for the bathroom. Sam’s jacket and pants were lumped on the floor, and I practically tripped over his shoes in the kitchen. So he’d gotten up in the middle of the night.
The window in the bathroom was open.
I did what I needed to do, finishing with sticking my head under the faucet. In the kitchen, I filled the coffeemaker with water, found coffee in the fridge, rinsed last night’s mugs. When the coffee came through, I poured it into both mugs, took a big gulp from one, and, crouching by the bed, shook Sam, because the open window was a reason to wake him.
“Huh? Wha?” His eyes widened. “Smith? What are you doing here?” Propping himself on an elbow, he looked around, maybe to assure himself he was right about where “here” was.
I handed him a mug. “Where did you go last night?”
He looked at the coffee, past me at the scotch bottle, back to me. “What’s in this?”
I said, “Coffee. The bottle’s empty. Answer my question.”
“There’s another one in the cabinet.”
“Forget it. Where did you go last night?”
“Go? When?”
“After I was asleep.”
“I tiptoed. So I wouldn’t wake you up. I took my shoes off. I had to take a crap.”
“You went out the window.”
“Out? The window? What window?”
“In the bathroom. I wouldn’t be able to fit through that, but I’ll bet you can.”
“The bathroom window? To the alley? That would be silly. There’s nothing there.”
“You opened it.”
“I stunk up the place.”
“Then what?”
“Then what, when? Then what, when, where, why, how.”
“Sam. After you opened the window. Then what?”
“Then the bathroom didn’t stink anymore, so I went back to bed. I took my clothes off, but I guess it was kind of too late, huh?” He pointed to the pile beside the mattress. “Looks like I ruined them. I hope so. I never want to wear them again. I never want to go to that kind of party again! That was—”
“Okay, Sam. Take it easy. I—”
Someone banged on the door. Sam’s eyes went wide.
“It’s okay,” I said, standing. I moved the couch away from the door as the banging came again. I peered out the peephole, but I didn’t see Grimaldi. I did see a cop, though. It was Ike Cavanaugh.
I pulled my shoes on, slipped outside, and shut the door.
“What the fuck?” Cavanaugh sneered. “I should’ve known. Is he in there?”
“What are you doing here?”
“I came for that bastard. He killed another girl.”
“He didn’t, and it’s not your case.”
“Oh? You see another cop around here anywhere?”
“You have a warrant?”
“I don’t need a warrant to arrest his sorry ass!”
“You do to come inside.”
“Move or I’ll take you, too. What’s your deal, anyway? You his bitch? Christ Jesus, I bet you get off watching him kill girls. Too much of a wuss to do it yourself but you love to watch him do it, right?”
He grabbed my shirt. I could smell booze and coffee on his raspy exhale. In another life, he and Sam wo
uld probably have been drinking buddies. I slammed his hand away, pushed him aside, and backed up the steps to the sidewalk. Cavanaugh followed. I was prepared to stay close but keep retreating; I really didn’t want to get into it with a pissed-off cop, but hating on me kept Cavanaugh’s focus off Sam. I was backing along the sidewalk and he was lurching toward me when a black Taurus screeched up and rocked to a stop. Grimaldi swung out and ran toward us, thick curls flying.
“Ike, what the hell?”
“Well, look who’s here. About time, missy.”
Grimaldi’s face turned a ferocious red. “Get out of here, Ike.”
“Screw you. You’re going to give him a kiss and send him to bed. He killed another girl!”
“If he did, I’ll take him up. If he didn’t, I’ll find out who did. Either way, you’re going to get out of my grille or I swear I’ll call your captain.”
“He thinks you’re screwing this up, in case you’re wondering,” Cavanaugh said. “He wishes it were me on the case.”
“But it’s not. How about I call my captain and let the two of them duke it out?”
“You’d do that, Detective Women’s Intuition Genius, wouldn’t you? Rat out another cop. Fuck you!”
Grimaldi took out her phone.
Cavanaugh growled, and his hands folded into fists. He took a step toward her, his beef with me forgotten. She lifted the phone and he hesitated. Would the satisfaction of decking her—which I wouldn’t have called a sure bet anyway—be enough to make up for the deep shit he’d be in if he attacked another cop in front of a witness?
Apparently not. He spat on the sidewalk and retreated to a dented blue Regal, cursing us both. He might have harbored hopes of waiting there until Grimaldi brought Sam out—or left without him—but she just stood with her back to Sam’s building and her phone lifted, staring at him. Finally he drove away.
“Do not,” Grimaldi said to me before I could open my mouth, “think I’m doing you or your weirdo any favors. I just don’t want Ike screwing up any case I might have. Also, if you try to fuck him up for assaulting you or any crap like that, I’ll say I saw the whole thing and you’re full of shit.”
“You’d lie to protect him? You were about to call his captain.”
She shook her head and started down the steps. “You must be one lousy poker player. Now let me in.”
“You have a warrant?”
“You’re shitting me,” she said.
“He’s my client. I can’t just—”
At which point my client, in jockeys and socks, opened the door. “Hi,” Sam said to Grimaldi. “I know you. I don’t remember why, though. I’m Sam.”
“We’ve met. Detective Grimaldi, NYPD. I want to ask you some questions.”
“Ohhh.” Sam took a moment, then nodded. “Oh. Now I remember. I tried to turn myself in and you wouldn’t arrest me. But you came here and you came to my studio.” He smiled. “You scared Sherron. That was cool. Are you going to arrest me now?”
“Now I just want to talk. Can I come in?”
“Sure.”
“Sam, I’m not sure you want to let her in.”
“Wow, you sound just like Peter. You’re not sure what I want to do. Even if I just said what it was.” He stood aside. “Come on in. What’s your name again?”
“Angela. So, Sam, where were you last night?”
“Last night? I was here.”
“All night?”
Sam thought. “No. No, first there was that awful party at the museum. Then I had a drink with Tony.”
“And after that you came here?”
“Yes. With Smith.” He nodded at me. “And someone named Lydia, but we dropped her off.”
Grimaldi looked at me, but I didn’t clarify Lydia’s status. I did, though, have to clarify something, because Grimaldi would find out anyway.
“Not right away,” I said.
“Not right away what?” Sam asked, interested.
“We didn’t come here right away. I had to find you.”
“Oh! Right. You came to where me and Tony were hanging out, at that bar.”
“You had to find him?” said Grimaldi. “After the thing at the Whitney?”
I told her about the mob, the rock—she glanced at Sam’s cut and swollen nose—and the search for Sam.
“So he was alone for about an hour?”
“I don’t know if he was alone, but he wasn’t with me.”
“Around what time?”
“Maybe eight to nine. What do you have for time of—”
She held up a silencing hand. Back to Sam: “Where were you before Smith found you?”
“I ran around. I tried a couple of bars, but the door guys wouldn’t let me in. So I kept going and then I remembered about this bar me and Tony go to, so I went there.”
“Who’s Tony?”
I had every confidence Grimaldi knew the answer to that and just wanted to see what Sam would say.
“Tony Oakhurst. He’s a photographer. He’s a friend of mine.”
“Okay. Can I look around?” Grimaldi started strolling through the apartment without waiting for an answer.
“Not without a warrant,” I said. Sam said nothing, probably replaying in his mind the shouting, the flying missiles of last night’s mob.
Grimaldi had reached the door to the bathroom. She peered in without entering, shrugged, and came back. “I can get one, you know. Okay, so after Smith found you,” she said to Sam, “you came here and you were here all night?”
Still not looking at her, Sam took a couple of beats. A lot of people would have gotten impatient and asked the question again, maybe louder, but Grimaldi just waited. Finally, Sam looked up and nodded.
Grimaldi turned to me. “You can confirm that?”
Now for the other clarification. “I fell asleep. But I had the couch up against the door.”
She looked to the bathroom, where the open window could be seen through the doorway. “That a fact?”
I didn’t answer.
“Okay,” she said, facing Sam squarely. “Here’s why I’m here. A woman was killed last night.”
It took Sam a moment. He went white. “What? I killed someone else?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But you came here. So I must have. Where? Who?”
“You tell me.”
“I can’t. I don’t remember.”
Grimaldi took a photo from her jacket pocket. “When did you meet this woman?”
Sam peered at the photo. I did, too. A young woman with short blond hair and gold earrings smiled at the camera. I wondered how long it had been between that smile and her death last night.
Sam asked, “Is that the woman I killed?”
“Where did you meet her? When?”
“I… I don’t know.”
“Do you recognize her?”
He shook his head.
“Tell me about last night.”
“I told you.”
“I want all the details. Every little thing. Starting from when you left the party.”
Sam looked at me.
“Just tell her whatever you remember,” I said. “Or we can tell her to leave.”
“No. Why? Then we won’t know if I did it. Can I sit down?” He pointed to the folding chair.
“Sure,” Grimaldi answered, dropping onto the couch. I stayed standing.
Sam settled and took a breath. Then, with a concentrating frown: “What were we talking about?”
“Last night. What happened—”
“When we left the party! I remember.” He nodded to himself. “I waved good-bye, with my tie. Leslie made me stop and pulled me like I didn’t want to leave and she was making me. That was funny. We went down in the elevator. With Peter, too. Ellissa didn’t come, or Sherron, either. You mean that?”
“Yes,” said Grimaldi. “Go on.”
Sam took a breath and continued, not stalling out again. He needed to be steered back from side roads a couple of times, accounts
of people he didn’t like and bars he did, but he went over it all: leaving through the back, facing the crowd, being hit by the rock, running. Going from bar to bar, being refused by bouncer after bouncer, with enough specifics that Grimaldi would probably be able to fill the timeline in. Finding Bar Six, Tony coming in soon after, me and Lydia after that. I was surprised by how detailed his memory was.
“Okay,” Grimaldi said when he was done. She slapped her hands on her thighs and stood. “Those the clothes you were wearing last night?” She pointed at the pile by the bed. “And those shoes?” Sam nodded. “Can I take them?”
“Help yourself. I never want to see them again.”
“Sam—” I started.
“In plain sight,” Grimaldi said. “And with the owner’s permission.” I noticed she didn’t say “suspect.” She pulled on nitrile gloves and plucked Sam’s shirt, pants, jacket, and shoes from the floor. Beaming at me with a you-lose smile, she said, “I’m out of here. Don’t leave town.”
“I’ll be right back,” I said to Sam and followed Grimaldi out. Once the door closed behind us, I said, “What’s the rest of it?”
“The rest of what?” She trotted up the stairs.
I followed. “Come on, Detective. You didn’t like Sam for those other killings, but you came straight here on this one.”
She regarded me. “The vic,” she said. “Kimberly Pike. A friend of one of the earlier vics.”
“Oh. Shit.”
“It may not be as bad as it sounds. Or it may be worse. She went to that protest with a couple of friends.” Grimaldi opened the trunk of her car and took out two black plastic bags. She stuffed Sam’s clothes in one and his shoes in the other and slammed the trunk. She turned to face me. “Seems a private investigator named Lydia something had come around with a photo of Tabor, asking people if they’d seen him with Annika Hausman.”
