Hell Gate

by Linda A. Fairstein

  “What was she screaming for? Doesn’t she want to help you?”

  “She doesn’t want anything from me. She’s hysterical right now,” Ethan Leighton said, mopping the sweat on his temple and smoothing back his hair. “Anita’s full of crazy ideas. She thinks I’m the one who killed Salma.”

  FORTY-TWO

  I stepped out into the hallway and called Mike on his cell.

  “Yeah?” he asked. “Wassup, Coop?”

  “Returning the favor. Sorry for the early wake-up call. I’m in the Three-three with Mercer. We think we have the baby that Salma borrowed to put pressure on Ethan Leighton.”

  “Alive and well? When did you get there? Why are you only calling me now?”

  “Because Mercer didn’t know what he had when he was on his way uptown.” Because I thought I could handle things without getting you out of bed, is what I wouldn’t say out loud. “And we’re about to have breakfast with Leighton himself, in case you want to join us.”

  “Give me twenty minutes and I’ll be there. The baby and her mother okay?”

  “Baby’s sleeping through the whole thing. Like a baby. Patrol is combing the ’hood for Mama.”

  “Hold tight. See you soon.”

  Mercer had sent one of the uniformed officers out to pick up sandwiches and coffee. We had turned the discussion around, explaining to Leighton our fears for Anita’s well-being, alone on the streets at this hour of the morning, and the importance of finding her before she was hurt.

  While the congressman took a few minutes to eat, I went downstairs and asked the desk sergeant to get in touch with ACS—the Administration for Children’s Services. This time, baby Ana would be examined at a hospital and placed with a good foster home until the circumstances of her parenthood and living conditions could be determined.

  Leighton was beginning to understand that there was no possibility that the child would be released to his care at this point in time. It wasn’t clear that he trusted us, but he seemed to get the fact that we needed to look for Salma’s friend.

  We learned from him that her name was Anita Paz, and that she was twenty-two years old. She had not landed in quite the kind of luxurious lap that had cushioned her friend Salma recently. She shared an apartment with a distant cousin on the Upper West Side, in the vicinity of Columbia University.

  “When did you meet Anita?”

  He was gnawing on a toothpick. “Why does that matter?”

  “Maybe something you say will help us find her.”

  “I met her when Salma came back from Texas with the baby. She lived in the apartment for a while, sort of helping out until she got her own place. She was so grateful to Salma for getting her out of—you know—the business, and the way she could repay the kindness was by taking care of Ana.”

  It was becoming more and more obvious to Mercer and me that Anita was the likely birth mother, loaning her child to Salma in order to blackmail the congressman.

  Leighton had been ringing Anita’s cell number every fifteen minutes. It went right to voice mail and she hadn’t returned any of the calls.

  “She’ll cool down and get back to me.”

  “Mind if I try her on my phone? The number’s blocked so she won’t know who’s calling.”

  “Suit yourself,” he said, extending his hand to give me the phone.

  I made note of the number and dialed it. The voice mail message was in English. I left her my name and number and told her that I was a friend of Salma’s who wanted to help her.

  “How does Anita support herself?” I asked.

  “It’s not what you think, Alex. She’s not in the sex trade anymore. She’s—she’s just an escort. Very occasionally. Nothing sexual, just conversation and company.”

  Put that in the category of wishful thinking.

  Mercer and I were both trying to restore ourselves with hot coffee. “Now, why would Anita go and accuse you of hurting Salma?” he asked, as though the thought itself was the height of absurdity.

  “I can’t fathom it myself. She knows how good I was to her.”

  “That little display you put on, throwing the law books around, is that typical for you?”

  “Not at all. I’m—I’m just horribly frustrated by what’s going on tonight. I want that child to be safe. I’m prepared to take whatever legal steps are necessary to have her with me.”

  “Like Alex says, you’re free to leave. The baby goes nowhere.”

  When Mike walked into the squad room, Leighton stood to greet him but I took him aside first and told him what we’d learned.

  He and Mercer picked up the conversation while I sat a few desks back, out of Leighton’s line of vision. They were going to do the “guy thing,” persuading him to open up about his relationship with Salma and her circle of friends.

  Mike started the conversation and I pretended to busy myself in paperwork. He was at his most proper and polite, trying to get into the low-down sex life of Ethan Leighton.

  “Look, Ethan,” Mike said. “We’re going to find Anita and we’d like to do it sooner rather than later. What happened tonight, huh? What’s this all about?”

  He rambled for minutes before telling the story. “After I heard about Salma’s death, I knew Anita was out of control. And I knew she had the baby and that I had to reach out to her.”

  “Didn’t Lem think that was dangerous?”

  “I didn’t tell Lem. My father keeps a suite of rooms at the Waldorf that he uses to entertain business guests from out of town. I told Anita to move in to one of them for the weekend. To bring Ana there.”

  “Because of your concern for her well-being and the baby, or because you were worried about how she was spinning things?”

  “Both. Fair to say it was both.”

  “More worried about yourself—your reputation—than about her?” Mike asked.

  “Anita’s made of tougher stuff than I am, Detective. I also needed a place where Claire could go to meet the baby,” Ethan said, dropping his voice. “I mean, in case she was willing to do that.”

  “And did she go?”

  “No. Not yet. She—uh—she wasn’t ready for that.”

  Score one for Claire Leighton.

  “Did Anita actually move into the hotel with Ana?”

  “Yes, she did.”

  “Did you visit them there?”

  “Briefly.”

  “You didn’t think that was stupid, I mean in the event the paparazzi sniffed it out?”

  “My family is well-known at the Waldorf. No one would think twice of my coming or going there.”

  “So was the purpose of your visit to see Anita, or—?”

  “Anita went out for a while. I gave her some cash so she could shop for some things she needed. I hope you understand this, Detective. I have to get to know my daughter, spend time with her. Let her get used to me.”

  “Let me figure this,” I said. “Even though Anita suspects you had something to do with Salma’s murder, she left you alone with her—with the baby?”

  “Not alone. She left her cousin there, sort of babysitting, in case I needed help.”

  “A cousin?”

  “Yes, a seventeen-year-old named Luci. Anita lives with Luci’s family.”

  “What do you know about Luci?”

  “Well, she comes from a good stock. Decent people. Hardworking. Her mother’s a nurse’s aide at one of the hospitals on the West Side.”

  “I’m missing something here,” Mike said. “How’d you wind up in this dogfight on Edgecombe Avenue tonight?”

  No answer.

  “The stork drop the baby out of the sky?”

  No reaction.

  “Let me tell you something, Mr. Leighton. This is a neighborhood where the men are men and the women don’t have teeth, okay?”

  The congressman’s head jerked up.

  “A pretty young thing like Anita on the loose here in the middle of the night—well, it doesn’t always have a happy ending. I’m going out for a spin
around the block. Kinda like looking for a needle in a very rotten haystack, so anything you can do to make things a little easier for me would be greatly appreciated.”

  Leighton reached for his cell phone to see if there were any messages. “Anita lied to me.”

  “Story of my life, Mr. Leighton. Everybody lies to me. Deal with it.”

  “I thought she had gone home for the night to be with her family, like she told me she planned to do. About one o’clock this morning I got a call at my apartment from the front desk at the hotel. Anita’s cousin was in the lobby, with the baby. I raced over there.”

  I wondered where Claire stood with this mess that must have turned her life upside down.

  “What’d she want?”

  “Anita had gone out around eight o’clock. Said she’d be home by midnight. When she didn’t show up, her cousin called her cell. She said Anita answered but was crying hysterically. Told her to have the desk find me. She doesn’t have our home number, but she wanted to get the baby to me so Ana would be safe.”

  “Safe with you? Have you ever freaking diapered a kid?”

  “That’s the least of my problems, Detective. I can pay any idiot to do that. I was in the hotel suite with her cousin, whom Ana adores.”

  I stood up from the desk and moved closer to Mike and Mercer. “Did you call her? Did you speak to Anita on the phone?”

  “She finally answered about the third time I called.”

  “What did she tell you?” Mike asked.

  “She was only worried about the baby. She was afraid someone was going to try to take the baby away.”

  “Someone specific?”

  “Yes. A man. She wouldn’t tell me who.”

  Maybe it was the guy who had shown up at Salma’s apartment earlier on the night she was killed—the guy who claimed to be the father of the baby.

  “She asked me to meet her. To pick her up and bring her back to the hotel.”

  “So that’s what you did? And you took the baby with you?”

  “I had no choice, Chapman. What was I to do? Leave Ana in a hotel room with a seventeen-year-old who doesn’t speak the language? Whose address I don’t have? I made Luci walk me to the hotel garage and put the child in the portable carrier she’d brought. Then I sent her back to the room to wait there in case Anita called.”

  Mike yelled out to one of the uniformed cops who was standing by for a possible assist. “Get downstairs and tell the desk sergeant to get on the phone to the Waldorf security office. Tell them to sit tight on the Leighton rooms. Get a scrip on the broad in the suite, okay? Order room service for her, whatever she needs. Just make sure she doesn’t move.”

  “What am I telling him?” the cop asked. “How long you want her?”

  “Till the Seventeenth Squad finishes shining their shoes and gets over there. Till mañana and the day after that. Think for yourself, will you, kid? I’m occupied.” Mike turned around to Leighton. “Where’d you find her? Your friend, Anita?”

  “She’d been working, Detective.”

  “In this shithole of a precinct? Rough trade up here. A girl could get hurt.”

  “Anita got in over her head is what it is. Salma said she took too many risks.”

  “On her back? She got in over her head while she was on her back?”

  I could hear crying from the far corner of the room. The baby had awakened and was beginning to wail as the policewoman picked her up. She was talking softly to Ana, going to the refrigerator to take out a bottle of milk that had been put inside, I guessed, when Leighton had been brought upstairs.

  The congressman looked helplessly across the room.

  “Don’t even think about it,” Mike said.

  “It’s some kind of private club, Chapman. All I know is that Anita was supposed to have dinner with a gentleman who belonged to some kind of club. He paid her a lot of money, just to spend the evening with him. That’s what she told Luci when she left the hotel.”

  It was Mike’s turn to raise his voice. “You know what kind of clubs they got up here, Mr. Leighton? You serious? They got clubs you can buy every kind of street junk ever cooked up by a dealer. Clubs you can find every kind of whore except a clean one. Clubs you can drink and snort and smoke in till you’re blind and crazy. They’ve got no book clubs. They’ve got no supper clubs. And they sure as hell have got no gentlemen’s clubs.”

  “I’m telling you what I know.”

  “Sounds a little bit too much like your own club. Like your father’s tontine, with your two-faced buddies like Donny Baynes.”

  “What’s Donny got to do with this?” Leighton rubbed his eyes with both hands. “If he told you about the Tontine Association, he also told you it was disbanded years ago.”

  I thought for a moment that Mike had hoisted Ethan Leighton on his own petard, that the slick politician had dangled a piece of misinformation in front of us, not realizing that Baynes had tied himself in knots too. I’d hoped Mike connected tonight’s events to Moses and Ethan Leighton, Donovan Baynes, and perhaps Mayor Statler himself.

  “Did Anita tell Luci anything else about this man she was meeting—or about the kind of club it was?”

  “Only that she said she felt safe when she went out tonight, because the guy who asked her to do it was an old friend,” Leighton said, pausing before he remembered another fact. “Yes. Yes, there is a name. The club is called Sub Rosa. It’s all very discreet like that. That’s what she told Luci.”

  “Sub Rosa,” Mike said. “I get it. Secret, confidential, private.”

  “You don’t get it at all. Go for the literal translation, Mike,” I said. I thought of the small tattoo—the property stamp of the snakehead, the trafficker—that was on the bodies of our Jane Doe #1 and on Salma Zunega. That might have been part of Salma’s bond with Anita. “Doesn’t that expression mean ‘under the rose’?”

  FORTY-THREE

  “ ‘Under the rose’ it is,” Mike said. “The nuns who taught me would have been proud of you. I didn’t think your Latin was that good.”

  “Just the basics. I don’t know why it means what it does.”

  “It’s a practice from the Middle Ages.” Mike’s parochial school education had served him well. “In medieval days, a rose was hung over council chambers if the proceedings were to be kept secret. Sub rosa. You should come to church with me more often. A lot of times you’ll see roses carved into the confessionals, for exactly that reason.”

  “That’s my point,” I said. “Find Anita, find the friend who set her up tonight, and we’ll have the bastard behind all this misery. We’ll learn why these girls are the property of the rose.”

  “Where did you locate her?” Mike asked Leighton.

  “On Edgecombe Avenue. I really don’t know this area. It was just before two A.M.”

  “Edgecombe and what? You want to see her alive, or don’t you care?”

  There was an urgency in Mike’s voice now that Leighton caught too.

  “Yes, I care. A Hundred and fifty-sixth Street, maybe a Hundred and fifty-seventh. I’m not certain. As I drove along, Anita ran out into the roadway. There was a park on the right. I remember that.”

  “High Bridge Park. I hope to God she isn’t in there.”

  I’d handled scores of cases that had occurred in the long strip that stretched north from 155th to Dyckman Street, with rugged topography and a treacherous slope that ran down from Edgecombe to the Harlem River Drive below it.

  “She was waiting for me, sort of hiding behind a tree until she recognized the car.”

  “Was she okay? She wasn’t hurt when you got there?” I asked.

  “No, no she wasn’t. Just scared.”

  “Did she get in the car with you?”

  Leighton hesitated.

  “There’s no time for you to even blink right now, man, so don’t start with censoring your answers,” Mike said. “Did she get in the car?”

  “That’s what we were fighting about. She refused to get in. She wan
ted to take Ana with her.”

  “Take her and go where?”

  “I don’t know. Don’t raise your voice to me, Chapman.”

  “Make sense, then. Why didn’t Anita get in your car? Where was she planning to go in that neighborhood with the baby, in the freezing cold?”

  “That’s what we were fighting about. She told me her friend was waiting for her. That he’d take care of her.”

  “The guy who did the dinner fix-up?”

  “I guess. I wouldn’t give her the child, and she wouldn’t come with me.”

  “Why do you think that is?”

  “Because she’s still all mixed up about Salma’s death.”

  “While she was standing in the road, arguing with you, was Anita yelling?”

  “Yes, yes, she was. Then she saw the patrol car coming. She accused me of calling the cops on her. That’s when she flipped out and started to run.”

  “Into the park?”

  “No, no. The other way. She ran west, but I don’t know those streets.”

  “And she left this child with you?”

  “Yes.” Leighton practically whispered the word.

  The baby had stopped crying and seemed to be drinking her bottle, so Mercer came back to join us. “Where are the clubs around here, say, west of a Hundred and fifty-sixth?” Mike asked.

  “Amsterdam Avenue, mostly,” Mercer said. “A few on St. Nick.”

  “What’s she wearing, Leighton? What does she look like?”

  “Medium height. Long dark hair.”

  “Skin color?”

  “White. Brown eyes. She had on black slacks and a jacket—it looked like fake fur, almost iridescent. A short fur jacket.”

  “I hope to God it glows in the dark. Give me your car keys.”

  “What?”

  “The Jag. Let me have the keys,” Mike said, holding out his hand. “Every mope in this part of town can make a department Crown Vic. At least I’ll look like we’re hustling for drugs in your father’s wheels.”

  Ethan Leighton reluctantly handed over the keys.

  “You want to ride with me, Coop?” Mike asked, walking away from the morose congressman to discuss our plans. “Mercer, why don’t you take your car, and we can tag-team to see who’s walking the streets. Back us up.”