Borderline

by Joseph Badal

  “Humor me, Ms. Stanley. Tell me about Navarro.”

  “Humor you?” she blurted. “I don’t owe you anything, Detective. You’ve treated me like shit. You want to talk to me, call my lawyer.”

  “Don’t hang up on me.”

  There was silence on the other end of the line, then Marge said, “What?”

  Barbara’s patience had been stretched to the breaking point. “Dammit,” she barked, “tell me about Navarro.”

  Marge sighed. “Shawn’s a couple years younger than me.” She laughed. “He had a crush on me in high school, but it never amounted to anything. I went off to college and, after he graduated, he went into the Army. We lost touch until about ten years ago. He got into horses and we ran into each other at an event down in Las Cruces.”

  Barbara didn’t even have to think about her next question, but she faltered for a moment. She suspected what Marge’s answer would be, but she didn’t want to hear her say the words. “What’s the nature of your relationship, your’s and Navarro’s, now?”

  “Is this really necessary?”

  “Come on, Ms. Stanley. I need to solve two murders. I assume you’d like me to clear your daughter at the same time.”

  Marge sighed again. “He was so sympathetic to my situation, when I told him what Victoria had done to my marriage, to my husband, to my daughter, to me. It just happened so naturally.”

  After a few seconds, Barbara prompted her. “Yes . . . .”

  “We became . . . lovers.”

  “How long did that last?” Barbara asked.

  “It hasn’t ended.”

  Barbara’s mouth tasted sour. She was dismayed at her own stupidity. She should have known better. Someone like Shawn Navarro would never have fallen for her. “I like you just the way you are,” he’d said. Bullshit! He’d gained her trust so he could milk her for information.

  “You there, Detective?”

  Barbara cleared her throat. “Yes, I’m here. Thanks for your cooperation.”

  “That’s quite all right, but why are you asking about Shawn?”

  “Maybe later. I think you should come down to Albuquerque as soon as possible. Things are about to come to a head and your daughter might find herself in the middle of things. She’ll need you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t have a clue what I mean. But my instincts tell me you should be here.”

  CHAPTER 66

  Barbara’s blood boiled, despite her shattered heart. She’d felt this way once before, when cancer had taken her husband. She was still angry with God for taking a good man, angry that Jim had “left” her. Now she was angry with herself for falling for Shawn Navarro’s deceit.

  Navarro had played with her mind and her emotions and she would make him pay. She checked her watch. Her date with him was two hours away. As much as she wanted to confront him alone, she knew that was not a smart thing to do. She used her cell phone to call the homicide office. Salas had already gone home. She told the operator she needed to talk with Salas as soon as possible. “It’s an emergency.”

  Barbara waited in her car for ten minutes before her telephone chirped.

  “Lassiter,” she answered.

  “What’s up?” Salas said. “I just sat down to an early dinner. We’ve got a deal at the kid’s school tonight.”

  Well, ex-cuse me. “Lieutenant, I got Nathan Stein’s killer. I want to take him down tonight, but I’ll need backup.”

  “Who is it?” Salas asked. “The killer.”

  “Shawn Navarro.”

  “The P.I. I met at the hospital?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “What’s his stake in all of this? What his motive?”

  “I’ll brief you at the office. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

  No response from Salas.

  “I need to know that my ass is covered, Lieutenant. Navarro is a former soldier and cop.”

  Salas sighed. “Hell, Lassiter, you’re a ball-buster. If you weren’t such a good cop . . . .”

  Barbara almost said thanks.

  “What’s your plan?”

  “I have an appointment with Navarro at 7:30 at N.Y.P.D. Pizza, downtown on Central. You know where it is?”

  “Yeah. Third and Central.”

  “I’ll go to the office to get a wire. I need you to authorize a commo van, and I need someone I can trust inside the restaurant.”

  “What did you tell Navarro to get him to show up at the restaurant?”

  Barbara swallowed hard. “It wasn’t difficult, Lieutenant. We had a date tonight.”

  CHAPTER 67

  Barbara called the owner of the pizza parlor on her way to headquarters. She told him she was on a case and needed him to hold a table for her. NYPD Pizza was as much a take-out place as a sit-down restaurant. It had eight tables, plus several stools at a counter. The owner said he was more than happy to cooperate with a police officer. Cops were major patrons of the place.

  After she was fitted with a wire, she made a copy of the murder DVD and logged the original into the evidence room. She slipped the copy into her shoulder bag, inspected her service revolver and put it in her bag, and called Lieutenant Salas’s cell number. She told him she was set to go to the restaurant and confirmed he had done what she had asked.

  “I’ll do a sound check before I go inside the restaurant. Where will the commo van be?”

  “In the parking lot next to the restaurant, as far from the building as possible.”

  “When will you be there?”

  Salas laughed. “I’m already there, Lassiter. Get your ass in gear. We have an arrest to make.”

  Barbara drove from headquarters to the city parking garage on Copper and Third Streets, a block north of the restaurant. The structure was nearly full. The bars and restaurants on Central Avenue—Old Route 66—would be bright with neon and crowded inside. Even more people would be out on the sidewalks. After the interstate system had made Route 66 obsolete, the city’s downtown had almost died. But a nightlife revival had given the downtown area a badly needed shot in the arm.

  Barbara took a shortcut down an alley, the parking garage to her left and the backs of older buildings to her right. One of those, a converted movie theater housed NYPD Pizza. She turned right at the corner of the building and suddenly felt her arms grabbed from behind by powerful hands that spun her around.

  Barbara yelped and jerked her right knee upward, aimed at the man’s crotch, but he had anticipated that, released her, and jumped backward.

  “Didn’t your mommy ever warn you about dark alleys?” He smiled.

  “What the hell’s wrong with you?” she shouted. “I could have shot you.”

  “Nah,” he said, “You always carry in a shoulder holster or in your purse.” He patted her shoulder. “You’re not packing tonight, and you couldn’t have pulled your pistol from your purse in time.”

  “I don’t usually come armed for a dinner date. How about you, Shawn?”

  “Only if I have something to fear.” He touched her arm. “I’m starved. Let’s go inside.” They stepped out of the alley and moved along the building to Central Avenue, where they weaved through the crowd on the sidewalk.

  Barbara glanced at the restaurant parking lot. It was packed with cars, pickups, vans. But she couldn’t spot the commo van.

  The pizza-shop owner stood just inside the front door, behind a small reception counter. “Hey, Detective,” he said with a flourish, “I got your table ready for you.”

  Navarro smiled at Barbara. “You made reservations at a pizza joint?”

  Barbara ignored the jibe and led him to the table the owner had indicated.

  “What to drink?” the owner said.

  “Ginger ales,” Navarro said. When the owner had gone, he asked, “How’d the day go?”

  “Lots of surprises,” Barbara said, while she looked around and tried to locate the backup man Salas had sent. She couldn’t spot him. The place was so small she couldn’
t figure out where he might be. Besides the people at the seven other tables and three young women at the counter, there was the owner and a waitress by the front door and two guys in white aprons and chef’s hats at a stove behind the counter. She was nervous and touched her bag on her lap.

  “Something wrong?” Navarro asked, as a waitress brought their drinks.

  Barbara felt her face warm. “Nah, just doing my normal cop thing. I always like to know who’s around me.”

  Shawn nodded and sipped his drink. “What kind of surprises?”

  “Surprises?”

  “You said your day had lots of surprises.”

  “Oh, right.” There was no point in dragging this out. She just hoped the communications guys were able to pick up her transmission. Because Navarro had surprised her outside, she hadn’t been able to do a commo check as she had planned.

  Barbara popped open the clasp on her bag, extracted the DVD copy she’d made, and placed it on the table.

  “Is that entertainment for later? Something kinky, I hope,” he said with a grin.

  Barbara wanted so badly to keep her voice calm, to not show any nervousness, but she knew her anger seeped into her words and her expression. “It’s about as kinky as it gets. You like snuff flicks, Shawn?”

  Navarro seemed to pick up on the change in her voice. He looked around, as though to be sure no one had heard Barbara. He bent toward her. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Snuff flicks. You never heard of them?” She slid the DVD at him. “You know, where someone gets killed for real.”

  Navarro’s face seemed to age in an instant.

  “That’s right, Shawn. Nathan Stein had a sick little hobby. He liked to record his sexual escapades. He left the camera on after he and Connie had sex. You must have just missed her.”

  Shawn sat back in his chair. “Oh shit,” he whispered. “I guess there’s no point in denial.”

  Barbara just stared at him.

  “What do you want from me?”

  “Why’d you do it, Shawn?”

  “You care about why I did it?”

  Barbara didn’t trust her voice. She nodded.

  “Marge asked me to find Connie and try to get her to come home. I found her, but I couldn’t get past Victoria Comstock. That woman had a sick hold on Connie.”

  “How did you connect with Nathan Stein?”

  “Marge told me Stein was Connie’s therapist, so I called to see if he would allow Marge and Connie to meet in his office. I told him it was urgent. He invited me to come to his office the next afternoon, but I had to be in court. He then suggested we meet at his home at 9 the next morning before he went to his office. He told me he had back-to-back appointments, starting at 11 a.m.

  “I showed up about fifteen minutes early. He’d left a note on the front door telling me to come in. I went into his living room and called out, but he didn’t respond. The only thing around was a huge German shepherd in the back yard. After a few minutes, I looked around for Stein. He wasn’t on the ground floor, so I went downstairs.”

  “I asked why you killed Stein,” Barbara said. “I don’t need the complete story right now.”

  “Please bear with me, Barbara. I want you to understand what happened.”

  Barbara nodded again.

  “I entered a bedroom and called out Stein’s name. I heard him shout he would be out in a minute. Told me to take a seat. I went to a chair that had a remote on its seat. I picked up the remote and sat down, but must have pressed the PLAY button on the remote because the television screen came to life. It showed Stein and Connie in bed together.”

  Navarro wiped sweat off his brow with the palm of his hand. “I went into his bathroom and grabbed the sonofabitch. He took a swing at me, started yelling, and ran into the bedroom. I was afraid I’d kill him if I used my hands on him, so I grabbed a large candlestick holder on the floor and used it as a prod. I only meant to rough him up. But he came at me. It was an accident.”

  “What made you so angry about him and Connie having sex?” Barbara asked.

  He swallowed and his eyes suddenly glistened. He suddenly seemed tongue-tied.

  “Come on, Shawn. It makes no sense that you would react the way you did about some asshole doctor sleeping with a client’s daughter.”

  Navarro lowered his head, hesitated a moment, and then looked back at her. “Marge had just told me I’m Connie’s father.”

  Barbara almost let her jaw drop.

  “It happened when I was home on leave from the Army one summer. She was home from college. We ran into one another. We were just kids.” He shrugged. “I took off a couple days later. I always thought Joe Alban was Connie’s father. Marge was pregnant when she married him. The poor guy never knew any different.”

  Barbara thought, How many more ways could Connie Alban’s life be screwed up? The man she thought was her father wasn’t, and her real father was about to go to jail for the murder of her psychiatrist-lover.

  Navarro wore a hangdog look.

  “Here’s how this will go down,” she said. “You’re going to stand up and turn around. Then I’ll cuff you.”

  Shawn stiffened. His mouth opened as though he wanted to say something. Instead, he slowly stood up, turned around, and put one hand behind his back. Barbara grabbed his forearm and was about to slip one cuff over Navarro’s wrist, when he suddenly whirled around, twisted free of her hands, and pointed a knife at her throat.

  “I can’t let you do that, Barbara.”

  The other customers quickly became aware of the situation. Someone shrieked, “Knife!” Others screamed. A table got knocked over. One man lifted a chair and stepped closer.

  “Let her go, man,” he yelled.

  “Back off, asshole,” Navarro roared, “or I’ll cut her throat.”

  The customer retreated, but still held the chair over his head.

  Navarro spun Barbara around and pressed his forearm against her throat. He placed the knifepoint against the side of her neck. “We’re going to walk out of here. If you’re a good girl, you may get out of this alive.” He started to drag her away from the table toward the open floor area near the counter. From there it was only a few steps to the door.

  Barbara heard a massive clang. She felt Navarro’s hold on her loosen, and then he sagged behind her to the floor. She whipped around. Navarro was out cold on the floor. Detective Bennett, in the white outfit of a pizza chef, paper hat and all, stood over him. He held a black iron skillet down by his side.

  CHAPTER 68

  Barbara found little satisfaction in Shawn Navarro’s arrest. Despite Lieutenant Salas’s praise and the fact that every word of her conversation with Navarro had been recorded, she couldn’t get past her sadness. Navarro’s betrayal and the loss of what she had thought was a budding relationship. The first time she let her guard down, since Jim died, her heart had been broken. To make matters worse, after Navarro regained consciousness, he’d laughed at her. His words had cut through her like a knife: “Do you really think I found you attractive? Get a grip. I used you to get information about both murders. I wanted to know if you’d found Victoria Comstock’s killer. I fucked you to protect Marge.”

  Barbara filed her report at headquarters and finally left her desk at a few minutes before 10 p.m. She was exhausted and needed sleep. But she needed a friend more than she needed sleep, and the only real friend she had was in the hospital.

  The nurses’ station on Susan’s floor was empty. But she heard banging sounds come from down the hall, near Susan’s room. Barbara ran toward the noise.

  Barbara walked inside. Nurses stood on either side of Susan’s bed. Susan stared up at the television mounted on the wall, while she banged a small metal tray against her bed’s metal rail. One of the nurses tried to take it away from her.

  “What’s going on?” Barbara asked.

  Susan presented a smile that shined like a flashlight in the semi-darkened room. She relinquished the metal tray to the nurs
e and pointed at the television. “You’re what’s going on,” she said. “There’s a special report on TV about Navarro’s arrest.” Susan turned to each nurse in turn and announced, “Here she is, ladies, the woman of the hour. The best damn homicide detective in New Mexico.”

  One of the nurses beamed at Barbara and said, “Congratulations, Detective.” Then the two nurses quickly left the room. The second nurse stopped at the door long enough to tell Barbara, “Ten minutes. She’s had enough excitement for one night.”

  Barbara nodded and went to Susan’s bedside. “How are you?”

  Susan’s expression went from jubilant to morose. “The question is, how are you? I’m sorry, Barbara. I know how you felt about Navarro.”

  “I’ll get over it.”

  Susan shook her head. “He killed both of them?”

  Barbara moved to the one chair and dropped into it. “I don’t think so, Susan. Shawn was in love with Marge Stanley. He called Stein to see if he would arrange a meeting between Marge and Connie. He wanted to help Marge, who recently told him that Connie was his daughter.”

  “His daughter? You gotta be shittin’ me.”

  “Nope, that’s what he told me. When he discovered Stein was screwing Connie, he went crazy and wound up killing the guy.”

  “Why did he start a relationship with you?”

  “To get information from me about Victoria’s murder. To stay on top of our case, and to steer us in the wrong direction, if possible.”

  “Why would he care about who killed Victoria?”

  “My theory is that he either knows or thinks Marge killed Victoria. By hanging around me he could try to misdirect me away from her. But I think Shawn is wrong about Marge. I still don’t buy her as the killer.”

  Susan adjusted herself in the bed, groaned with the movement. “I can’t wait to get out of here.” She eyed Barbara. “So, Navarro tried to help Marge and Connie. It was love that motivated him.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Then the identical motive may be behind Victoria Comstock’s murder.”