by John Lutz
Bobby knew he was lying. The man behind the desk hadn’t believed his story, or hadn’t thought it important if he had believed it.
“What’s your name?” Sergeant O’Day asked.
Bobby backed away. “Never mind.” There was nothing in it now for him or for anybody else. He’d made a mistake coming here, imagining he’d be believed. “Too much haste and purpose. I still got the eye. I know. That’s all. I just wanted to help.” Bobby was moving toward the door. Nobody—not O’Day, not another uniformed cop who’d just walked in from one of the offices, nobody—tried to stop him. Nobody gave a fuck. “I still got the eye,” Bobby repeated.
“Maybe you do,” said the sergeant in a patient, kind voice. But not the kind of voice he’d have used if he believed. “Maybe you do, son.”
“Not son,” Bobby said. “Don’t give me that shit.”
“Okay, I won’t.”
Bobby was out the door, down the steps, back in the night air and smells and sounds of the city. Back on the street.
Where he knew he belonged.
“That one’s not ripe,” the man said.
Zoe was in the produce department of the neighborhood grocery store, actually shopping for food this time. She put down the casaba melon she was considering and looked at the man who’d spoken to her.
My, my! He was about average height and extremely handsome; one of those men so perfect that there was a suggestion he might be effeminate. But there was also something about this guy that said otherwise—that shouted otherwise. He was wearing an obviously expensive tan raincoat, unbuttoned to reveal a dark suit, white on white shirt, and silky red tie. A gold ring, then a gold watch, glittered as he pointed at the melon.
“Sorry to interrupt your melon squeezing,” he said with a great smile, “but I already tested that one.”
“I don’t resent a kind gesture,” Zoe said, scrambling to maintain her mental balance. “Kindness is what makes the world go round.”
“Don’t we all wish?”
“Should make the world go round,” she amended. This was a fish she didn’t want to swim away. “What I was really looking for was arugula. I’m going to a dinner party and I promised the hostess I’d buy some for the salad. I was too ashamed to tell her I didn’t know what it was. Do you have any idea what it looks like?”
He studied her with steady, calm eyes, so appraisingly, the way he might size up the produce.
His smile again, wider. “You know perfectly well what arugula is.”
Huh? She shifted her weight from leg to leg like an embarrassed schoolgirl. “Yeah, I guess I do.”
“That’s not to say there’s nothing I could teach you,” he said, still smiling.
Zoe was grinning now. She knew this drill. “Aren’t you the bold one?”
“The realistic one. Maybe the simple one.”
“Simple?”
“When I see a woman as desirable as you, I try to get to know her better. Simple as that.”
“Suppose I’m attached, maybe married?”
“You’re not. I’ve seen you shopping in this grocery store before.”
“Alone, you mean?”
“I don’t want you to walk out of here and out of my life,” he said, ignoring her question.
“That isn’t likely,” she said.
“I didn’t think so,” he said.
Now Zoe sat at her dresser, brushing her long red hair. She wanted to finish with her hair, get it just right, before slipping into the black dress she was going to wear tonight. She was sure she could work the dress over her head without having to rearrange her hair, and this way there wouldn’t be any brushed-out hair on the dress’s shoulders.
The last date she’d had, with an intellectual type who was an out-of-work museum curator, hadn’t developed into anything near the kind of relationship she sought. Zoe didn’t give up. Single women living alone and working in New York didn’t lose spirit easily, or they wouldn’t live in New York.
This man she’d picked up (or maybe he’d picked her up) at her favorite hunting grounds, the neighborhood grocery store, was an exception. Maybe the exception. Of course, she’d thought that before about men she’d met in the produce aisle. There had been more than a few such men. She wasn’t sure why the produce aisle was such a good place to meet men, but she sensed it had something primal to do with the juxtaposition of women and raw food. At least in the minds of men.
Zoe knew little about this one other than that he was smooth, extremely handsome, and if his clothes were any indication, very rich. His pickup patter was intelligent and charming, and disturbingly knowing. Definitely a guy worth taking a chance on, since he seemed harmless.
She smiled at the thought of her dinner date also dressing to impress her before coming to the apartment. If he wasn’t married, gay, or terminally ill, he had to be one of the most eligible bachelors she’d ever met. Handsome, rich, and intelligent. The trifecta. Now if only he was honest and had a kind heart. Something about him made her think he might have both those attributes.
She did suspect that he might wear a toupee, but nobody was perfect.
30
Nothing came easy. Working from diagrams and the autopsy report, Meg, Birdy, and half a dozen uniforms took almost a week to locate the sniper’s nest.
It was Officer Nancy Weaver who found it. At least, she was the one who called Meg on her two-way.
When Meg and Birdy got to the address, Weaver led them upstairs to the top two floors of the building, which were being renovated. At the end of the hall on the top floor was an apartment with the door standing open.
Weaver stepped aside so they could enter.
No furniture. A newly drywalled, unpainted living room. There was old padding, but no carpet on the floors. The place smelled like plaster dust. More than smelled. Meg sneezed. Birdy hoped God would bless her.
“They’re renovating all these places,” Weaver said. Another uniform, who’d been securing the apartment, nodded in somber verification. The light streaming through bare windows didn’t shine on anything that would reflect it other than steel staples in the carpet pad.
“Looks like work stopped some time ago,” Birdy said.
“Four months,” Weaver confirmed. “The manager told me the owners ran out of money. They’re trying to get refinancing now.”
Meg walked back to the hall door. “Lock looks okay.”
“Not this one,” Weaver said, and led them into a bedroom.
Meg saw what she meant. The locking latch on one of the French windows leading out to a terrace had been forced. There was some furniture in the bedroom, an abandoned dresser without drawers, a wooden headboard with the veneer peeling off. The furniture was dusty and hadn’t been touched in a long time. Carpet padding in here, too, prevented any footprints.
“Looks like he fired from the terrace,” Weaver said. “Out there at the corner.”
Meg went out onto the terrace and imagined herself lining up a shot at someone in Peru Norte’s outdoor dining area. She leaned forward slightly and could barely see the restaurant. The sidewalk table area had been cleaned up but was still closed. The table where Lee Nasad and his fiancée had sat was visible.
Backing away from the terrace’s low parapet, Meg shielded her eyes from the late afternoon sun and looked straight up. Had to be.
Weaver had been watching her figure it out. “I’ve been up there,” she said. “The Night Sniper lowered himself from the roof to the terrace, then let himself into the apartment so he could make his getaway. Probably just took the elevator down and left without anybody seeing him.”
Meg thought about it. Uh-huh, it would work. The Sniper was probably out of the building before anybody at the restaurant fully realized what happened. Shock played hell with logic. Eyewitnesses, too.
“Reminds me of that Night Spider case,” Weaver said, “where the killer dropped from the roof on a line, like a spider, and entered the victims’ bedrooms through their windows.”
&
nbsp; “Sort of,” Birdy said. “But looks to me like the Sniper was just following the easiest course of getting into firing position without attracting attention.”
“He was probably here before the night he fired the shot, too,” Meg said. “Figuring out where he wanted to shoot from. And he didn’t want to walk away leaving a sign that one of the apartments had been broken into.”
“Say what?”
Repetto had arrived. He nodded to Weaver, then listened while Meg and Birdy filled him in.
“Nice work again, Weaver,” Repetto said.
“Thanks. But there’s more.” She walked carefully across the carpet padding toward a spot near the French doors. Meg and Birdy exchanged looks. Weaver had obviously waited until Repetto had arrived to spring her big find. The woman wanted a promotion. Meg had to smile. She begrudgingly admired Weaver at the same time she resented her ambition and manipulation. Reminded her of someone a few years ago, before that someone had wised up.
Or maybe after.
They followed Weaver until she stopped and pointed. “See? Look careful and there’s a muddy footprint.”
They did look.
“About size ten,” Repetto said.
“Narrows it down to a few million guys and me,” Birdy said.
“There’s more of what looks like that kind of mud on the roof, where someone would be if he were attaching a rope to lower himself to the terrace. I checked the elevator, but it’s been used too many times to give up anything.”
“Gotta be the killer’s print,” Birdy said, “if it’s the same kinda mud that’s on the roof.”
“It wasn’t raining the evening Lee Nasad was shot,” Repetto said.
“That’s what makes it odd that there’s mud,” Weaver said. “But it’s on the roof and here in the apartment. Out on the terrace, too.”
It occurred to Meg that Weaver shouldn’t have taken them out there without telling them about the mud. But maybe she would have warned them if they were about to step on any evidence. That’s what Repetto and Birdy would say, anyway, if Meg said anything critical of Weaver. The little schemer worked these guys as if they were sock puppets without eyes.
The mud was on the edge of the parapet, and more or less all over the terrace.
“Techs are on the way,” Repetto said, “but I don’t think they’d mind this.” He used his forefinger to scoop a tiny amount of mud from the parapet. “Let’s go to the roof, see if this matches whatever’s up there.”
The mud did match, at least to the eye and feel. Light brown and gritty. More like clay. Meg wasn’t surprised by the match. Probably Weaver had already been up here with her own mud sample, or she wouldn’t have mentioned the mud.
When they went back down to the apartment to wait for the techs, the light had changed somewhat. Something tiny but with almost luminescent glitter caught Meg’s eye. Something near the forced lock of the French doors. She moved to the side and could no longer see it.
But when she walked over to the door, there it was again. She leaned close and peered at a three- or four-inch strand of black hair stuck in the space where the brass handle rotated. There was something about the hair ...
Everyone had stopped talking and joined her.
She didn’t touch the hair, but pointed it out to Repetto.
“Let’s find out if the previous tenant or any of the workmen who were in here wore a hairpiece,” she said. “Unless the lab proves me wrong, I’m going with this not being a human hair.”
31
1990
Dante spent a month in the burn unit of Roosevelt Hospital, then was transferred to the Holmes Burn Clinic in New Jersey. Another three months of skin grafts and pain followed. Hell was a lasting thing.
At first Dante was in a ward, then a semiprivate room he shared with an old man who’d been in a gas fire. But soon he was in his own room, and able to get up and walk to his meals and for some of his medical procedures. For a long time he thought being burned had become his life, and he was ready for it to end anytime.
The nurse who’d been assigned to his case kept his spirits up at least high enough to get him through his ordeal. Her name was Jane Jones. She was in her early thirties and liked to read to her patients, who were all burn victims. But Dante she enjoyed reading to more than anyone. He had an amazingly quick and bright mind and was often ahead of her in whatever story she was reading. He was particularly good at discerning the endings of mysteries.
It didn’t hurt their relationship that she was an attractive, willowy blonde, and Dante developed a crush on her. She was something to think about other than the pain.
One morning when Jane came into his room and sat in the chair by his bed, it was obvious she’d been crying.
Dante wanted to help her but felt inadequate to the task. “You okay?” The question seemed awkward and inane.
Jane smiled and touched a knuckle to the corner of one eye. “The thing is that you’re okay now, or getting to be.”
Dante didn’t think he was okay. Not when he looked in the mirror. One side of his face was a drooping red and purple scar, and his hair grew not at all on the left side of his head, and only in patches on the right. He didn’t know how Jane could stand to look at him.
She leaned forward in the chair and locked gazes with him. “You’re getting better fast now, Dante. It’s time for you to become an outpatient.”
“What’s that?”
“It means you won’t live here at the clinic anymore.”
A sob lodged in his throat. It hadn’t occurred to him—not consciously, anyway—that he’d ever have to leave here. It was possible that, despite the pain, he’d been safer and happier here than anywhere else. “But I’ll come in every day for treatment? Is that what you mean?”
“Yes and no. You’ll be an outpatient, but you’ll live and your treatment will be in Arizona.”
Dante let his head rest back on the pillow and tried to comprehend that. Arizona. He knew it was another state, but it might as well be another country. Desert and cactus, cowboys. A place you visited if you were rich, but no one really wanted to live there.
“Why Arizona?” he asked.
“That’s where the Strong Foundation is. Their headquarters is a ranch where the boys and girls live while they receive their remaining treatment.” She paused. Dante was looking blankly at her. “The foundation’s been paying your medical bills, Dante. Your treatment in New York and your stay here at Holmes.”
It hadn’t actually occurred to Dante that someone must be paying his medical expenses. He thought it would be the state, or some other government entity. Or maybe the hospital and clinic themselves. Wasn’t that what hospitals and clinics did, made people well? “I don’t understand this foundation.”
“It was started years ago by a very wealthy man named Charles Strong. Mr. Strong died long ago, and now the foundation’s managed by his son, Adam. Its mission is to save homeless children and provide whatever opportunity is left for them.”
“A ranch. I’m supposed to be a cowboy?”
Jane laughed. “Not exactly, though it is a working ranch that raises cattle. And you and the other children you’ll live with will work. That’s part of the reason for the ranch, to teach work and responsibility.”
“Is everyone there sick or injured?”
“In some way, inside or out. The foundation tries to make them whole again.”
Dante turned away from her and gazed out the window at the branches of a willow tree. “It sounds like an orphans’ home.”
“I suppose it is, in a way. But it’s also something more than that.”
“The other kids there? Are they orphans like me?”
Jane seemed to search for words. “They need someone to care for them, Dante. They have no one else.”
“I have you.”
“I’m your friend. We’ll remain friends. But I can’t care for you forever. I can’t afford it, and I have a life outside the clinic. . . .” Jane’s voice broke. “Are
you crying?”
“No!”
“You’ll like it at the ranch, Dante. In fact, you’ll learn to love it there. Other kids have. Are you crying? You can’t go back to living on the street. It’s dangerous. You’re too young. Nobody, whatever their age, should have to live on the street. Damn it, Dante, are you crying?”
She leaned forward so she could see his face and kiss his undamaged cheek.
He was crying.
32
The present
Meg stopped the unmarked for a traffic light and watched through the metronomic sweep of the windshield wipers as pedestrians stepped over a puddle near the curb and crossed the street. She’d taken the car home last night and was on her way this rainy morning to pick up Repetto. They were to meet Birdy at their precinct office.
When she pulled the car over to the curb in front of Repetto’s house in the Village, she saw him standing with Lora in the shelter of the small awning over the entrance. As soon as the car stopped, he leaned down and kissed Lora, then took the concrete steps to the sidewalk with the casual adroitness of a much younger man.
Lora followed, teetering on high heels and balancing her purse as she opened a black umbrella while on the way down the steps. A multitasker. She was on her way somewhere work-related, Meg thought, wearing a blue raincoat and dress-up shoes of the sort Meg could never wear to work unless going undercover as a hooker. When she saw Meg, Lora smiled and waved. Meg lifted her fingers that were curved around the top of the steering wheel and wagged them.
Repetto opened the passenger-side door and slid into the car, bringing heft and moisture and the scent of wet clothing with him. He shut the door in a hurry, trapping the dank morning scents inside the car.
“Lousy morning,” Meg remarked.
“You were right,” he said, smoothing back his damp hair with both hands, then glancing at his wet fingers. “About the hair.”
At first Meg thought he was referring to his hair; then she realized what he meant.
