GRAVE WALKER: A gripping noir thriller (Thomas Blume series of Hard-Boiled Mysteries)

by PT Reade

  “By hand?”

  “Seems that way,” Remay said. It was clear that she was in a hurry to get off of the phone. I tried to imagine what she must be thinking. I felt like a prize asshole.

  I wasn’t sure what to say, and I think Remay picked up on it. She sighed and said, “Well, I’ve got a ton of work to get back to.”

  “Thanks, Remay. This is a huge help and—”

  “Yeah,” she said. “Don’t mention it.”

  Without a goodbye, she terminated the call and left me looking at nothing more than a blank screen. I stared at it for a moment and then went back into the living room. I found myself furious with Zoe, which made no sense because none of this was her fault. As usual, it all came down my mistakes, and I’d made so many of those that they seemed to be gathering interest.

  “Everything okay?” she asked as I walked into the room.

  “Yeah,” I said. “Work stuff.”

  “About Darcey?” she asked.

  “Yeah.”

  She nodded and stepped closer to me. “You know,” she said. “We were both a little hammered last night when we…”

  “Yeah,” I agreed.

  She put a hand on my shoulder and smiled. “I think if we give it another go right now, it could be even better.”

  Her touch was paralyzing. A hand fell to the button of my pants, and she unclasped it. Again, my body responded as any male would in the situation. But somehow, I fought the urge. I shook my head and took a step back.

  “I can’t,” I said.

  “No?” she asked.

  “No. Believe me…I’m sure I’ll regret it later, but we can’t. It’d be wrong, and besides that, I should probably get back to the station.”

  She nodded, and I was relieved to find that she seemed to understand. “First, though,” she said, “you might want to stop somewhere to shower and change your clothes.”

  It was then that I realized that all of my luggage was still at the precinct, sitting in Rey’s office.

  I rubbed at my increasingly aching head and sighed. It was already shaping up to be a long day.

  “So what’s new about what happened to Darcey?” Zoe asked, having no issue with changing the subject.

  “Not sure,” I said, cautiously. “Just some potential leads.”

  This wasn’t completely honest, but I wasn’t about to tell her anything at all until we knew for sure what was going on. The bit about the jewelry certainly seemed to peg the ex-boyfriend, but he had already been cleared.

  “Give me a second,” I said, pulling my phone back out. I pulled up my e-mail and composed a new one to Rey. Who do I send a request for more information about Darcey’s marine biologist beau? I typed.

  “Is there anywhere I can take you?” I asked, turning back to Zoe.

  “Well, I have funeral arrangements to finalize, so I’m heading to Manhattan. How long do you have the car for?”

  “Shit,” I said. I had somehow nearly forgotten about that. With another sigh, I pulled out my phone again and called the rental company, extending the lease. I knew it would be expensive, but I didn’t see any other way around it. I couldn’t even begin to imagine the reaming I was going to get from Kinsey about the state of the precinct car I’d ruined on the bridge.

  Once things were arranged with the vehicle, I saw a notification that I had a new mail in my inbox. It was a reply from Rey, letting me know that I needed to send a request to a detective Stein, the original lead on the case, for information on Darcey’s ex. I did that as I stood there, not seeing the point in wasting any time.

  “Now what?” Zoe asked.

  “Now we head to Manhattan,” I said.

  “I’m hungry. Can we grab breakfast first?”

  I gave it some thought before nodding. I could go out in my bloodstained shirt, but I’d have to throw on a jacket. It was going to make for a hot morning, but I saw no way around it. Besides, maybe some food would do wonders for my hangover.

  “Sounds good,” I said.

  With that, we left the apartment. I locked up behind us and placed the key back inside the hiding spot. I let my hand rest on the brick for a while, knowing that this time, I might be saying goodbye to the place for good.

  TWENTY-ONE

  It was just after 9:00 in the morning when I dropped Zoe off. Overhead, the heat of the last few days had built to a breaking point. It was sticky and humid outside while distant dark clouds loomed.

  I headed for the station and eased the car to a stop by the precinct. I hustled inside as quickly as I could and made my way to Rey’s office, relieved to find him there, at his computer. When I entered, he waved at the door, motioning for me to close it.

  “What the hell is going on?” Rey asked, sounding concerned.

  “Well, Kinsey is going to be pissed at me, that’s for sure.”

  “Forget Kinsey,” I said. “Right now, I’m pissed at you. Where the hell have you been, man?”

  I told him everything that had happened yesterday, from going to Riker’s to meet with Victor Lem to the shootout in the cemetery. He never stopped me a single time, listening with something like disbelief. I ended with dropping Zoe off and then the office fell into silence.

  “Jesus man, you do attract trouble. So where’s the motor pool car?” he asked.

  “New Jersey chop shop? Bottom of the Hudson? A junkyard? Who knows? It was a wreck.”

  Rey placed his face in his hands before looking up at me. “This isn’t good. Kinsey is going to have your ass.”

  “I figured,” I said. “And she can have it. But first, I’ve got to hit the locker room. With all this blood and booze on me I smell like an Irish wake.”

  “Get down there and be quick about it. Kinsey’s already out for your blood. If you don’t see her within the next hour or so, she’s going to go nuclear. And I’m sorry, man…but with the car and the shoot-out, I don’t know how much I can cover for you this time.”

  “I wouldn’t expect you to,” I said.

  With that, I grabbed my bag from Rey’s floor and headed down to the showers. On the journey to the locker room, past the gym and cafeteria, I found myself getting nostalgic for the old days, but given the time, I couldn’t allow myself the luxury. I showered quickly, making sure the hot water allowed me to sweat out the whiskey, and then switched it over to a quick blast of shocking cold to help with the hangover.

  I was dressed in fresh clothes and heading back upstairs ten minutes later. In the cafeteria I downed two aspirin and grabbed a cup of coffee. Feeling refreshed and slightly more human, I headed down to the makeshift office I had been given. As I did, I ran into a man who looked familiar. He stopped me with a smile and a handshake.

  “Blume, good to see you again,” he said.

  “Again?” I asked. And then I knew how I recognized his face; he was the muscular, shaven-headed driver in the van from the stunt at the airport. “Ah, one of Rey’s accomplices,” I joked.

  “Yeah,” he said grinning. “Sorry about that…I’m Detective Stein, Roger. Listen, I got your email this morning. That report, you needed, about the marine biologist? It’s on your desk.

  “Oh right, thanks.”

  “Also…you should know that Kinsey is looking for you.”

  “So I heard,” I frowned.

  “I gotta get to it, but good luck,” Stein said. “Let me know if you need anything else. I owe you one.”

  “More than one,” I quipped, as he disappeared down the hall.

  I ducked into my joke of an office and scanned Stein’s report for a minute. Looking it over, I started to see how Darcey’s ex had been dismissed as a suspect so easily. The marine biologist, Noah Murphy, hadn’t been anywhere near New York around the time of Darcey’s death. He’d been on a boat somewhere in the Caspian Sea working on a research project. He also had three witnesses to attest to that fact. As far as alibies went, being on the other side of the planet was a pretty good one.

  Still, there were a few notes in the report tha
t raised red flags. When investigators had called Murphy, he had spoken at length about his relationship with Darcey and how unstable she had become, ultimately driving them apart.

  “….at the end, she wasn’t the same Darcey I had met. She was paranoid, always convinced people were talking about her or behind her back. And her sister. Shit. One minute she would be talking about how much she hated her sister, how she ruined her life, the next minute she would say how jealous she was of her. It was like an obsession or something…”

  Murphy’s transcript made for interesting reading. I couldn’t match the woman in the description with the sweet girl I had known all those years ago. Something drastic must have happened in the time since we’d broken up.

  People change.

  I closed the report, ready to head upstairs and face what I’m sure would be a pretty severe lecture from Kinsey. I didn’t think she’d rip me off the case just yet, but she had the grounds to do so. Hopefully, my reputation preceded me, and she’d give me the benefit of the doubt.

  As I headed out the door, I glanced at my cell phone and saw another e-mail notification. I checked it, not recognizing the address or the name, but very familiar with the subject line. The e-mail was from one of Darcey’s friends that I had contacted, hoping for answers of some kind.

  I’d almost forgotten about sending the emails out. Having not expected any responses, I couldn’t help but open the e-mail instantly. I read it in the doorway, my inevitable berating from Kinsey temporarily forgotten.

  At the end of the e-mail, there was one simple message. Feel free to call me if you need anything else.

  I wasted no time, closing the door and returning to my little desk. I called the number in the e-mail signature and listened to the phone ring twice in my ear before it was answered.

  “Hello?” a woman’s voice said.

  “Hi. Is this Rachelle Wagner?”

  “It is. Who is this?”

  “This is Thomas Blume. I just read your e-mail. Is this a good time?”

  “Sure,” Rachelle said. “I only have a few minutes though.”

  “That should be plenty,” I said. “If you don’t mind, can you just start with a summary of everything you told me in the e-mail?”

  “Sure. Well, see, like I said in the e-mail, I worked with Darcey, um Dr. Holland, for a pretty long time at the hospital—Saint Stevens—and we started to become pretty good friends. Most of the Doctors treat us nurses like crap, but Dr. Holland was different. Always took time to listen to what we said and wasn’t afraid to get her hands dirty. All the nursing staff liked her.

  “So what happened?”

  “She started seeing this other doctor…um, Cooper was his name. They thought they were clever, keeping it quiet, but we knew. Nurses know everything,” Rachelle chuckled. “Anyway, I think when she understood that everyone knew. They made it almost official. But then Dr. Holland, Darcey, went all weird when her sister shows up one day.”

  “Zoe was there?”

  “Right, Zoe, that’s it. I never liked her from the start. And who did she think she was fooling with that hair? I knew it was extensions. Anyway, she came to the hospital one day out of nowhere and said she wanted to start trying to help people just like Darcey. I guess she was tired of partying in Ibiza or wherever the rich kids go.”

  “And did she help people?”

  “I guess. I mean, Dr. Holland eventually got her a job doing admin for radiography. It wasn’t a glamorous job, but nothing in a hospital is. Things aren’t like on TV.”

  “Tell me about it,” I mumbled.

  “What?” Rachelle asked.

  “Tell me about Zoe.”

  “Oh yeah. She was working there for about three months and then…well, that’s when it all went to hell. I never saw it, but apparently Dr. Holland walks into one of the break rooms after hours and finds Zoe doing the nasty with Doc’s boyfriend, Dr. Cooper. Now, I’m not one to gossip, but that’s just plain nasty. Anyway, now keep in mind…everything I tell you from here on out is just rumors, but a lot of people say that Zoe and Darcey got into a fight—that Darcey threatened Zoe with a knife.”

  “A knife? Then what?”

  “After that, we didn’t hear much. Both of them were fired from the hospital, I guess. I tried to find out what happened, but it was all hush-hush. The board didn’t want it getting into the papers I suppose.”

  “How long ago was this?” I asked.

  “Oh lord, three years ago, I guess,” Rachelle said. “And it’s funny, because I bumped into Darcey not too long ago down near Columbus Circle…only a few months back. She seemed happy, like the Darcey I knew before she got involved with that other doctor. I can’t believe she’s gone. It’s so sad.”

  It was sad, but the suicide theory was getting thinner by the second. It seemed there was a lot more going on between the sisters than I’d realized. Why hadn’t Zoe mentioned any of this? I wondered.

  “Why was she so happy?” I asked.

  “She’d finally gotten herself a man and not some no-good punk like that Cooper. She said it was real this time, she had even just gotten engaged.”

  “Do you know who she was engaged to?” I asked.

  “Oh lord, I’m not sure but I think it was Mark or Michael or something. Yes, Michael, that was it.”

  The name fired in my mind and a pattern started forming.

  “Thank you, Rachelle, that’s a big help.”

  “You be sure to pass on my condolences, and I hope you catch the bastard who did this.”

  “I will, and thank you. It’s been a big help.”

  I ended the call and leaned back in the chair, weighing the options as the new information swirled in my mind. I punched in Rey’s number, and he answered on the third ring. “You ready for your death march to Kinsey’s office?” he asked.

  “Not quite yet,” I said. “Look…how much longer do you have custody of Teach?”

  “A little less than eight hours,” Rey said. “He’ll post bail at 5.15pm.”

  “Thanks.”

  Rey said something else, but I ended the call. Time was running out, and a trip to Kinsey’s office would only slow things down. If I skipped out again and didn’t face the consequences for what had happened yesterday, I knew I’d be officially off the case, but I didn’t see how I had any other choice.

  I took a deep breath and decided. The chair squeaked as I got to my feet and left the office, closing the door behind me for what could be the final time. I was going to need my car. For now, Kinsey would just have to wait.

  I headed back out to the street as Rachelle’s words ran through my mind and dots started joining up.

  “Yes, Michael, that was it,” the woman had said.

  Or in Russian, Mikhail.

  TWENTY- TWO

  Finding the whereabouts of a man like Mickey Lem was no small feat, especially in a city like New York. With the right connections, a man who didn’t want to be found usually did a very good job of staying hidden. But I’d seen enough crime in the town to also know that father-son relationships borne out of crime usually created strained parental bonds. I knew this was also true of Mickey and Victor Lem.

  Running a basic database search for Mickey’s residence was a dead end, but it did remind me that when I’d been a beat cop in New York, there was one field of interest that all of the gangs were interested in: property.

  Whether you were a street thug or a “made man,” you needed somewhere to sleep, and you needed somewhere to run your operation from. These were the basics of getting by as a hood in the Big Apple. You also couldn’t go through the normal channels, so a certain few unscrupulous realtors were the go-to guys for landing your next apartment/drug den.

  It was 10:43 when I sat down at a table in a small coffee shop three miles away from the precinct. I’d arranged to meet at 10:45, and I was very impressed when my target showed up right on time—something I knew from experience that real estate agents were not known for.

  The agent�
��s name was Quincy O’Brien. He was an overweight fifty-five year old who made million-dollar deals on a weekly basis. It was also no secret that he preferred clients like the Lems; clients who paid well and kept quiet.

  When I saw him come in, I waved him over. He approached cautiously and did not sit down when he approached the table.

  “Are you Jameson?” he asked.

  I nodded. “Thanks for meeting with me, O’Brien.”

  Relaxing a little, he dropped his frame into the booth seat across the table from me and pulled out a small computer tablet. He began what I assumed was his usual sales pitch, and I instantly regretted my ruse.

  I knew there was no way O’Brien would willingly meet a cop, even an ex-cop, so I had called his assistant, posing as Henry Jameson, a “businessman,” looking for a discrete location. Apparently he’d bought it so well that I was about to get the hard sell on whatever hideout he was peddling.

  “What kind of place are you looking for, Mr. Jameson?”

  I bluffed as best I could, playing the role of the wealthy criminal.

  “Somewhere in Midtown, I guess, and a view would be nice. But it can’t be in my name. I will be entertaining…friends there, and it can’t be traceable back to me.”

  O’Brien didn’t even flinch. Apparently a gangster looking for somewhere to bang his mistresses was nothing new in his world.

  “I have a couple of properties that would fit that description perfectly. The first here is especially unique, a corner apartment with lovely views of—”

  “What kind of place does Mickey have?” I cut in.

  “I’m sorry, what?”

  “Mickey Lem. He referred me to you. What kind of place does he have?” I fixed the man with a hard stare. Yes, I was pushing my luck, but time was running out.

  “I, um, I can’t discuss other clients, I’m afraid.”

  “That’s a pity because he recommended you highly, and I’m prepared to pay whatever it takes to get a place that makes Mickey’s look like a homeless shelter.”