Steel scratched his cheek until red lines streaked it and kicked out his feet under his desk. Son of a bitch who did this to this poor woman, he thought. He swiped his first two fingers across his moist tongue and read one page at a time from the manila folder in front of him, flipping each sheet over and to the right after reviewing it. He stopped at a picture of Desiree. The photo had been taken from Fratt & Johnson’s website, from a list of lawyers who were employed there, and had been printed and included in the file.
He stared at the image, but flipped up his head at the computer screen flickering in and out, and a red and white screensaver slideshow of the Phillies’ 2008 World Series Championship flashed for brief seconds. Ryan Howard hoisted the trophy over his head as Jimmy Rollins, Chase Utley and Jayson Werth held up their arms in the background, beads of fresh champagne dripping down their smiling faces and foamy, wet hair. He lowered his eyes back down to the photo of her. Desiree smiled back up at Steel, her full lips wrapped around perfect teeth, confident eyes, smooth light brown skin, straight hair that stopped at her black suit jacket’s shoulders, the look of a woman who appeared invincible, as if she could possess anything she put her mind to, as if nothing could affect her. Her smile ached Steel’s heart, the pressure in his chest as though it were a brick hanging by the thread of a string and ready to collapse into his stomach. Even after dealing with countless murders, and vicious, pointless, meaningless violence and acts against humanity daily, each new case still bothered him, still shocked him. The wickedness of human nature sometimes. The propensity for evil in our blood. And being an idealist didn’t help. He dreamed often of a perfect world, without hatred, competition, envy, greed, murder, but his job dealt in real life, and evil was a part of his daily existence and here to stay. Acknowledging the world’s evil drained him at times, almost broke him, because he knew that life was brutal, painful, wicked, hard, that only the tough, those who roll with the punches, survived its fury. But flashes of goodness he also saw at times gave him hope. Exceptional occurrences when ordinary citizens band together against an injustice, do charity work, selflessly help one another, survive natural disasters, overcome life’s obstacles and give back. He’d often dwell on life and concluded, in his opinion, that humans were just spirits inside an animal, an animal that must survive in a cold world, and that that survival caused the competition, greed and ruthlessness occasionally, that humans form groups and fight with one another, from kids on street corners to countries at war, all to survive, but if that human body didn’t need for anything, want for anything, need to clothe, feed or protect itself, if just a spirit or soul such as in the promised afterlife in heaven, there could be total oneness, love, no need to destroy one another for survival. Peace and love would reign.
One could daydream; Steel just happened to do it for most of the day.
He snapped out of his daze and flipped Desiree’s lawyer profile page over. Next were a series of e-mails he’d received from Fratt & Johnson. He’d reviewed them earlier but marked one set from one specific person as important—copies of e-mails from one of her clients, a schizophrenic man who’d applied to Social Security for disability payments but had been denied. He threatened her after the case had ended, didn’t understand why he’d been turned down. She responded that they’d appeal the decision, and that the denial may have been because his psychiatrists hadn’t supplied enough of his medical records or strong enough written evidence before the hearing. The e-mails and threats had stopped at that point, but Desiree had filed a complaint with Fratt & Johnson. She had even filed a report with the police department. Steel marked off that man on the list of people he’d need to visit later that day.
“Ohhhh, there he is,” a deep, rough voice called out.
Steel cringed, knew it was Detective Johnny McKnight.
“Congrats, buddy. Heard you got engaged.”
Steel spun his seat around and extended his hand. “Thanks Johnny.” He felt bad for cringing before the congratulations, until Johnny spoke again.
“Mine-as-well chop off your prick and balls, won’t be needing them anymore,” Johnny said.
Steel couldn’t help but chuckle wryly. “Why’s that?”
Johnny ran his massive hand over his round, bald head, the hand like a piece of iron. “Married life, man. Sex…” He whistled and threw his hand forward. “…out the window.”
“You watch too many movies, John.”
Johnny burst out laughing. “Just wait…you’ll see…and wait when the kids come…you’ll be too tired for anything.”
“How will I have kids if sex is out the window when I’m married?”
Johnny’s face froze for a moment, his eyes still and wide and his mouth open just enough to see his tongue about to speak. He laughed again and pointed. “You got me there, asshole, just a little hazing. You’ll be fine. I’m breakin’ your balls.”
Steel smirked. He turned back to the manila folder and drummed a finger on it, and Johnny walked away to his cubicle.
Steel closed his eyes and breathed deeply, hoping to relax before going on a quest for Desiree Jones’s killer.
14
“T
hank you,” Steel said.
“You’re welcome,” a thin twenty-something receptionist of Fratt & Johnson answered, her voice low and apprehensive. Her white blouse with tan stripes and skin-tight tan slacks matched perfectly as if she were a model from a Macy’s catalogue. She half smiled with tight lips and no teeth showing, pointed to John Fratt’s office, and lowered her eyes and walked away with her head down. Steel thought of telling her to get a new job because she didn’t seem happy, but kept quiet.
He knocked and entered. Marisa followed. John Fratt was waiting, knew they were on their way since he’d received a call from Steel about questioning just an hour prior.
John Fratt pressed his palms on his desk and pushed himself off his chair, swung his hip around the side, and greeted them. “John Fratt.”
“Detective Steel.”
Marisa shook his hand. “Detective Tulli.”
Fratt waved a hand, palm up, at two chairs aligned in front of his wooden desk. “Please, have a seat.”
Strong cinnamon filled the room and hit Steel’s nose, and he detected the source after shifting his eyes to a half-eaten bagel on the desktop, salvia still hanging from the edges of the bite marks in the lightly toasted bread. As Steel sat, he circled his eyes across the office. He noticed about three or four Men’s Health magazines on Fratt’s desktop and thought it was fitting for a man who looked like he’d done more steroids than a professional wrestler in the Nineties. Fratt seemed like the type of guy who wore a muscle shirt during a snowstorm just to show off his biceps, regardless of how cold the temperature was outside, didn’t matter if he’d freeze and end up in a hospital. Steel knew John Fratt before he had even introduced himself: married, kids, in his 40s, ruthless, valued “success” at any cost, and probably suffered from one of the biggest cases of fear of failure and insecurity. After all, he seemed as though he ran a marathon daily and still wasn’t satisfied with his physique as he appeared stiff while trying to pose in front of them the right way to amplify his chest, had beady shark-eyes just waiting to attack his prey, and appeared to worry about his image to the point of obsession, and the evidence was in how meticulously placed every item was across the office and how his clothes didn’t have a wrinkle or mishap, even his cuffed shirt seemed to have a grand design to the fold. Steel thought John Fratt looked as honest as a politician who “fought for the poor” just after he had left his barber shop with a three hundred dollar haircut. Steel could be wrong, but he’d seen many of John Fratt’s before.
Fratt lowered his body into the seat and sat one buttock at a time. He squinted like a rich guy who thought his money made him exempt from the pleasantries of conversation with the middle-class. “Detective…this is just…I’m, I mean, I’m in shock over this.” He dropped his face into his fingertips and shook his head.
“Were y
ou Desiree’s direct supervisor, sir?”
John shifted in the seat and leaned over the desk, grabbed at his tie, looked up and narrowed the shark-eyes. “She was on my team, as an associate. She worked for the firm for about ten years. I’ve been partner about five, and she worked for me since, ah, about then, yeah, five years. My partner, Todd Johnson, has his own team, but he’s never here, spends most his time in Florida and works remotely. Desiree worked under my direct lead, though.” His eyes darted from the ceiling and across the room. He sighed repeatedly.
“You okay, Mr. Fratt?”
“Fine, just nervous and devastated over the circumstances. It’s just…this whole thing’s a shock. I mean, the day Desiree was murdered we’d discussed her possibly being made partner.”
Steel glanced over at Marisa and she snatched a pen from her pocket and scribbled on a legal pad.
“Tell me a little about Desiree, Mr. Fratt?”
John patted his chest, fell backwards into the seat, oscillated a few times. “Hmm. She was bright—I mean bright is an understatement, brilliant more like it. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania on a full scholarship. And it wasn’t an affirmative action thing, believe me, this woman was smart, may have even had political aspirations down the line. Had charisma, too. And now she’s gone.” He balled his fist, pounded the arm of the chair, and pointed a finger at Steel, clenched his jaw and narrowed his eyes. “You better find the person who did this. This isn’t how life’s suppose to—”
Steel didn’t react much, just observed, figured Fratt was used to being in control. Marisa kept scribbling.
Fratt swirled in the chair and shook his head. “Look, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to take my anger out on you…it’s just…whoever is responsible for this has to be brought to justice. Why would someone do this? For what? For what reason?” He reached over and snatched a picture frame and stared into the glass that caught a shot of light from the fluorescent overhead. He flipped it around and pointed at two little smiling girls, about eight or nine, and about a year or two apart, probably taken at his summer house. “If anyone ever hurt these girls, I’d—I swear, I’d—”
A knock on the door vibrated and spread throughout the office. All three turned their heads. The door swung back against the wall and rattled and a man in a dark gray suit entered. The guy froze in place at the sight of Steel and Marisa. His eyes shifted from John, to Steel, to Marisa, and back to Fratt. “I’m sorry, John, I didn’t know you were with people, just got back from City Hall.” The man stepped forward with a wide stride and handed him a manila folder.
Fratt waved a hand. “It’s all right, Jimmy. These are the detectives working on Desiree’s case.”
Jimmy nodded and waved, then frowned, his eyes sad.
“Jimmy’s one of our associates here,” Fratt said.
“Well, have to get back to work, sorry for the interruption,” Jimmy said. He shot a curious glance at Fratt, back at Steel and Marisa, his eyes sunken into swollen red sockets, as if he had been crying earlier.
Steel wagged a hand, shook off Jimmy’s apology. “No worries.”
Fratt bobbed his head slowly, squeezed his lips until they disappeared, and stared at Jimmy as if each shared the same pain over Desiree.
Jimmy flipped the door shut, and Steel waited for the metal hinges to click against the frame before facing Fratt.
“So, where were we?” Steel said. “Do you know anyone who could’ve done this, had anything to do with this, any motive whatsoever?”
“Detective, as far as I know, from her professional life, because she rarely discussed her personal life, she didn’t have an enemy in the world. She was so sweet.”
“Sweet?”
“The sweetest person in the world. Everyone loved her. Absolute sweetheart.”
“Where were you the night Desiree was murdered?”
John Fratt stared into Steel’s eyes. “Home with my family, Detective.” His tone sharpened. “And please don’t do that to me again.”
“Just a standard question, sir. But let me ask you something. She did have an angry client once, correct? She even filed a report against him after some disturbing e-mails.”
John blinked four or five times, confused, as if remembering if he’d told them that already. “Yes, I believe so, but that was a couple of years ago, done and over with. I highly doubt that that is a plausible scenario.”
Steel smirked, more sarcastically than he should have. “I’ve been doing this job too long to know that even the smallest details are plausible scenarios.”
Fratt squinted and nodded as though he understood.
“Can I have Desiree’s e-mails sent to my office?”
John slid a finger across his lips, blinked again. “I’m sure I can have IT pull the e-mails up and send them over for you right away.”
Steel always kept initial interviews brief, and used that strategy to gather pieces of information from numerous people and then connect it all together, focus in on a few. He stood and handed John Fratt his card. “Send it there, to me directly.”
John rose and ran a hand over his freshly shaved head, and his toned bicep under his shirt, running alongside his scalp, grew to the size of a tree trunk and pressed against the shirt’s fabric as he glanced at Steel’s business card in the other hand.
“Sir, thank you for your time. I’ll be in touch,” Steel said.
“Thank you.”
At least Steel had learned one thing so far…he didn’t care for John Fratt.
15
S
teel gripped the transmission in his palm and shifted it into park and the car jolted, each of their shoulders snapped back and forward. He cut the ignition and sat for a moment. The wind wrapped around each side of the vehicle and tapped the doors. The windows frosted like they were covered with a white layer of steam, and if a child was in the car, they would’ve been tempted to draw on the glass with their fingers before being yelled at by the adults.
He turned his head toward Marisa and ran two fingers over his rough, stubbly chin from a day unshaven. “Let me ask you something?”
She spun her neck toward him, her eyes a swaying sea of chocolate, and slowly chewed her gum on one side of her mouth. “Yeah…”
“Have you ever thought what the point of life is?”
She shook her head, giggled the sweetest echo. “Oh, boy. You get philosophical at the worst times.”
“I was just thinking about it on the ride over. I wanna know your opinion…I’m serious, come on, for real, all jokes aside.”
She flipped her hair behind each ear, spun her hips around. “Of course I think about it sometimes, but who knows? It’s subjective, different for everyone, I guess.”
Steel looked away for a second and thought. Cold air seeped into the car because the heat had been turned off when he killed the ignition, and he shrugged his shoulders and shivered for warmth. He spoke and his breath hit the chilled air and formed a floating white cloud. “I mean, we go about our lives…work, eat, pay bills, laugh, get angry, watch television, day to day, and for what? To eventually die? To raise children so they could repeat the same cycles? And then they have children and so on? We live to suffer, no? Generation after generation of false hopes and dreams until each realizes it was all bullshit? What’s the point of our existence? We have no clue why we’re on Earth.” He rolled his arms out in front of himself. “The same cycles continue over and over without any concrete answers of why we’re here.”
She lowered her eyelids and studied him, her mouth half-open. “But along the way, it’s all about the moments, the people, family, growing, I guess. The relationships we form. Are you all right?”
“Yeah, I’m fine, but I just feel we as a human race stopped asking these questions…the important questions in life, about what truly matters. Our society seems to think that material things are why we’re here, aspiring to own the biggest home in the suburbs or getting the newest Lexus, but is that really what matters? To col
lect a bunch of things. To have the best career? What about passions? We forget those unless they can make tons of money. I mean, I think we’re too worried about the NFL, reality shows, the latest social media app. Just ask somebody what the meaning of life is and they’ll say, ‘Ah…I don’t know, it’s too early in the morning for that, or that question is too deep…’ But ask them what they think of the latest episode of a reality show and they’ll talk for hours, or if they can name the best starting quarterback in Philadelphia Eagles history and they’ll tell you McNabb or Jaworski or Cunningham or Norm Van Brocklin. I think we stopped asking the important life-questions because we’re too distracted, too entertained, got our fucking heads up our asses. It was common to discuss these things before the advent of modern technology, when people only had one another and life-questions for entertainment, when all they could base life off of was their interactions with one another. The great philosophers of ancient Greece and all. People during biblical times. Those people were thinkers.”
Marisa shrugged and her black hair bounced below her shoulders, her gaze one of intelligence, independence. God, it turned Steel on. “They were thinkers, but that was before science and all, before we knew that a thunderstorm wasn’t punishment from the gods. And they had their own forms of entertainment, too.”
He nodded and spoke quickly, “I agree, but I think we’re dummying ourselves down. We still have great innovators, don’t get me wrong, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and the like, and we’re still the same human race, even more intelligent and evolved, but as a society as a whole, we chase the wrong things, live our lives for the wrong reasons. Our values and families are messed up, take a back seat to possessions. And kids are fed that the only way to be successful is to ruthlessly climb the corporate ladder. What happen to being kind to one another, to the average Joe who goes to work, earns a living, takes care of his family, and treats his neighbors well? A guy who has a beer with the other fathers from the neighborhood and joins a fucking bowling league on Tuesday nights, I don’t know, but you know what I mean. A person who lives for the experiences of living, instead of conquering, succeeding at all costs. What do we give up to conquer, to succeed, to have more things? What is it all worth in the end? All we want is more, never satisfied. You’re right, though, it’s the people and relationships that make life rich. Think of this…if we were to be given an island to live on with every single material possession we could want, but without people, just ourselves—we’d get bored, would run off the island and back for human contact, for human touch, for human interaction. It’s the people in our lives that make things great, not the things in and of themselves.”
Divine (A Benny Steel Novel) Page 10
