by Konstantin
Still David didn’t seem to hear. “If I go to the cops and the press gets hold of it…that’s the end.”
“Talking to the police is no crime,” Mike said.
“Being dragged into this…a dead girl, sex videos…no, that would be it.” David rubbed his forehead. “What if it turns out she’s a suicide? What if it turns out the girl in the paper isn’t even her?”
Mike’s voice was steady and soft. “I know people in the department. I’ll put out feelers. If it turns out the police think her death was suicide, then obviously there’s no need to do anything. As for whether she’s Wren or not, we can try and get a better description of the body— where exactly the tattoo is, birthmarks— but beyond that, I’m not sure how much we can know beforehand.”
David breathed a long, shaking sigh. His legs wobbled and he collapsed into a chair and looked at me. The bottom had fallen out of his eyes. “So what you’re telling me is I’m fucked. The police will identify her, find her videos, trace her calls, and— bang— I’m the prime suspect. And my only choice is whether I’m fucked now or later.”
Mike pursed his lips. “The police will be interested in you, but— from what John has said— you won’t be alone. For starters, they’ll want to talk to every other man Wren videotaped. On their own, those guys make for plenty of reasonable doubt— and apparently one of them succeeded in finding her. And then there’s the guy John ran into at her apartment, not to mention all the usual suspects: boyfriends, family, business associates.”
“Who’s to say the cops can find those guys?” David said. “I thought all the faces and voices on the video were masked.”
“They were,” I said, “but there are the phone records, and if they get hold of the unedited videos, or if she made notes, those will point them in the right direction.”
“Too many fucking ifs,” David said, and smacked the table again. “How long will it take for all those ifs to happen? And in the meantime, it’s me the cops are talking to, and my house with the fucking camera crews out front.” He shook his head. “No way. I’m not signing up for that.”
“There aren’t many levers for us to pull just now,” Mike said. His voice was calm and reassuring. “We can’t change the fact that the police are likely to notice you, but we can change how they feel about it when they do.”
“By having me walk in there?”
“Trust me,” Mike told him, “there’s a big difference between going in on your own and being invited.”
“Maybe, or maybe I’m just serving myself up on a platter. Who’s to say that once they have me in their sights, the investigation won’t stop right there? Can you guarantee they won’t decide it’s easier to make a case against me than to go chasing after a bunch of nameless men?” He looked at Mike and then at me, and neither of us had an answer.
“And no matter how it goes,” David continued, “the press will be all over me.”
“Going to the police on your own gives us some influence over that. We can get assurances of confidentiality from—”
“Right.” David snorted. “I’m sure those count for a lot. Who do I complain to when somebody makes the first anonymous call to Fox?”
Mike looked at me and raised an eyebrow. “It’s a risk,” he said softly.
“It’s fatal, is what it is. If this becomes public, it’s fucking fatal.” David put his head in his hands, and no one spoke. Only the whoosh of air in the ducts relieved the heavy silence.
“You can’t wait for them,” I said after a while. “If they come for you—”
David straightened. Some color returned to his face. “If I go to them, I’m not going alone.”
Mike nodded. “Of course not. I’ll be there, and so will John, and you’ll have the full resources of this firm behind you as well.”
David waved his hand impatiently. “That’s not what I mean. If I go talk to them, I’m not going in empty-handed. I’m going in with other names.”
Mike looked at me, confused. He wasn’t the only one. “What names are you talking about?” I asked.
“If I go in there and the police have no other suspect but me, there’s a chance they’re not going to look any further. And even if they do, for as long as mine is the only name on the table, I’m going to be the only news story. But if I go in with other names— the guys in the other videos, the guy who hired the lawyer, the guy who punched you out, boyfriends, whoever the hell else you can find— then I’m not alone. There are other people the cops can build a case against, and other guys the press can chew on.” He looked at Mike. “Like you said, plenty of reasonable doubt.”
My mouth opened, but it took a moment for the words to come. When they did, they sounded far away. “Whoever I can find? You’re asking me to investigate Holly’s death?”
David waved again. “Her death, her life— whatever. I need names I can bring with me to the cops— anyone they’ll be more interested in than me.”
I looked at Mike, who tapped his chin. There was a glint in his eye, and it was familiar and unwelcome. I shook my head. “Have you forgotten that this is an active police investigation?” I said. “The NYPD is not overly fond of strangers pissing in their garden, and even less when the stranger’s a PI and the brother of a likely suspect.”
Mike nodded slowly. “Of course, but David does have a point. This woman led a high-risk life— her videos are testimony to that— and it’s important that the police be made aware of this as they’re setting the course of their investigation, and before they settle on a suspect. It should also give the DA’s office something to consider, when they’re thinking about cases that are winnable and cases that aren’t.” I shook my head more vigorously, but Mike ignored it. “And it’s not as if you haven’t done this sort of thing before: checking stories, finding new witnesses, identifying inconsistencies— developing alternative theories.”
“But usually it’s postindictment, when we’ve got charges and a defendant and a trial coming up, and when the police have finished their investigation—‘finished’ being the operative word there. In this case, they haven’t started yet.”
“But you have done it before. Your relationship to the client is something of an issue, but not insurmountable. You’ll need to be meticulous with your reports, and chain of custody on any evidence you may find— but you’re careful about those things anyway. The police won’t be thrilled, but it should be manageable.”
David squinted at me. “I need you to do this, dammit,” he said. “And since when do you care who you piss off?”
* * *
It was almost eleven o’clock when David left for the Klein & Sons offices, still brittle looking but with necktie straightened and at least some of his abrasive composure back in place. Mike had assured him several times that he’d call if he learned anything about the dead woman from his contacts in the NYPD, but cautioned him against optimism. Even so, David was all too hopeful when he walked out the conference room door. Mike sighed and helped himself to what remained of the soda water.
“I should be annoyed that you don’t return my calls,” he said, “but at least when you finally show, you bring new business along. I guess we’ll call it even.”
“Give it time. A few more meetings with David, you may wish I was still MIA.”
“He is…intense.” Mike smiled. “And given what you’ve said about your family, he’s not a referral I would’ve predicted.”
“You and me both.”
“So this isn’t a rapprochement?”
“It’s a job.”
Mike peered into his glass and mostly hid a skeptical look. “You have a plan in mind?”
“I know where to start: looking at her place, talking to the neighbors, to the family, to Krug and anybody else I can find— all the usual stuff. After that, it’s read and react.”
“How about her friend— the actress?”
“Jill Nolan? That’s a tough call. I’m not sure how far I’d get with her on the phone— her hackles were
raised pretty high when we spoke— and if she hasn’t seen the mermaid stories in Seattle, I don’t want to get her thinking more about Holly than she is already.”
Mike nodded and drank off the last of his seltzer. “I assume your brother’s hobby took you by surprise,” he said. I nodded. “You think he’s told us all there is to tell?”
“I know he hasn’t,” I said. “He won’t talk about Stephanie, for one thing.”
“You think that’s all there is?”
“If you’re asking me to vouch for the guy, I can’t. I know less about him every day.”
“I’m just wondering if there are shoes waiting to drop.”
“Clients lie.”
Mike frowned. “Your brother has a lot on the table here— his marriage, his job, potentially, not to mention the black eye all this would give Klein & Sons. His situation is shaky enough without keeping secrets.”
“You’re preaching to the choir,” I said. “If I was the cop who caught the case, and I had a choice of spending my valuable investigating time on a guy who’d already been strong-armed into being in one of Wren’s videos, or the guy she was in the process of strong-arming when she died, I know who I’d pick.”
Mike nodded gravely. “And the window we’re working in isn’t big. If Jane Doe really is Wren, the police could be coming around soon.”
I nodded. “A week or two, I figure. No more.”
14
The ice gave way to lashing sleet by afternoon, and the sidewalks were glazed and perilous in Brooklyn. Meltwater dripped from my parka and puddled at my feet as I stood in the vestibule of Holly Cade’s apartment building, which still smelled powerfully, though of bleach now rather than decay. The intercom speaker was still banged up, and if I wasn’t mistaken, a few more names were missing from the buttons.
I pressed the button for 3-G, Holly’s apartment, and got no response. No surprise. I tried her irate, curious neighbor, Mr. Arrua, in 3-F. Silence there too. I pushed another six buttons at random, but the three voices that replied— one in English and two in Spanish— wanted to know who the hell I was before they’d buzz me in. The inner door was firmly locked, and though I had vinyl gloves, a screwdriver, and a small pry bar in my pocket, I wasn’t sure I wanted to use them just yet. I went outside.
There was a short flight of metal stairs under the stoop, and a metal door at the bottom. It was heavy and imposing and accessorized with a fat deadbolt that would surely have secured the basement against all comers, were it not for the folded paper coffee cup that someone had used as a doorstop. I went in, and past the darkened laundry room to the elevator.
The door to 3-G was still locked, and no more scuffed than it had been last time; I was relieved to see no crime scene tape on it. I knocked, expecting nothing, and wasn’t disappointed. Then I turned to 3-F. I rapped twice and heard shuffling and a scrape of metal by the peephole.
“Yeah?” said the reedy voice from behind the door.
“Mr. Arrua? I was here last week, looking for your neighbor, and I—”
“I remember you. You gave me your card and I told you to leave me alone.”
“That was me,” I said. “I was wondering if we could talk.”
“I had nothing to say then and I got nothing to say now.”
“Have you seen Holly lately?”
“You remember that number: nine-one-one?”
“I don’t need a lot of your time, Mr. Arrua, and I can pay for what I use.”
“I guess you’re still hard of hearing,” he said, but he didn’t threaten to call the cops. “You’re what, a private detective or something?”
“Yes.”
Arrua chuckled behind his door. “So, what’s my time worth?”
“You tell me.”
It was quiet for a while and I thought I’d lost him, but I hadn’t. “What’s the weather like outside?” he asked.
“Crappy,” I said. “There’s sleet coming down and the sidewalk’s like an ice rink.”
“Wait,” Arrua said. He shuffled away from the door and shuffled back in under a minute, and a slip of notebook paper appeared by my foot.
“The market’s around the corner,” he said.
* * *
It came to two bags of groceries: coffee, condensed milk, eggs, a sack of rice, a jar of dulce de leche, two papayas, a loaf of bread, and paper napkins. Arrua opened the door to 3-F and took the bags from me, and I followed him down a short hallway to his living room.
He was a small man, worn but well-kempt in khakis, a gray cardigan, and a white shirt. His apartment was much the same. The living room was a narrow rectangle with white walls, beige trim, and a hardwood floor that had seen rough use, but also a recent waxing. There were two windows that looked onto a fire escape, and that were fortified by metal accordion gates. In front of them was a sofa covered in gray fabric, with arms that had frayed and been carefully mended. There was a bookshelf in the corner, stocked with Spanish titles, and some pictures hanging above it. A photo clipped from a newspaper and yellowing under glass: Argentine soccer players in white and sky blue, and Maradona’s infamous “hand of God” goal against England. Next to it, a plaque commemorating twenty-five years of service to the Metropolitan Transit Authority— hail and farewell, Car Maintenance Engineer Jorge Arrua. Next to that, another photo, black and white, of a pale, pretty, sick-looking woman in a high-necked dress. Wife, mother, sister, daughter— whoever she was, I got the impression that she hadn’t survived her illness, and that it had all happened long ago.
Arrua pointed at the sofa and went into an alcove kitchen. I sat and watched him put his groceries in the half-sized refrigerator, and fix a pot of coffee on the half-sized stove. While the smell of brewing coffee filled the room, he toasted thick slices of bread and opened the jar of dulce de leche. A tabby cat appeared from somewhere and threaded itself between his legs and looked at me sideways.
Arrua was seventysomething and thin, with a soldier’s posture but a faltering stride. His hair was metal gray, cut short and slicked against his head, and his sallow skin was like parchment. He was clean-shaven and there were deep grooves around his mouth and pale eyes that gave him a stubborn, argumentative look even as he poured coffee and set the mugs on a tray. He carried the tray to an oak coffee table and sat opposite me, in an armchair. He added condensed milk to his coffee and sipped at it and sighed.
“Breakfast’s all I like now,” he said, “so I eat it every meal.” He spread some dulce de leche on toast. “Help yourself.”
I poured condensed milk in my coffee and drank. It was thick and sweet and powerful. I sighed too.
“When’s the last time you saw Holly, Mr. Arrua?” I said.
“I guess you can call me George. I saw her in the hall, a couple weeks ago maybe. I don’t keep track.”
“Do you usually see her more often?”
He shrugged. “I see her three, four times in a month. I go to bed early and get up early, and she’s on a different schedule, I guess. It used to be I knew this whole building— all my neighbors— but not now.” He shrugged again.
“So you don’t really know Holly?”
“I know her to say hello.”
“Is she a good neighbor?”
Arrua looked at me and drank some coffee. “Sure.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Last time I was here, you were complaining about the noise.”
“You made a racket outside my door.”
“You made it sound like it wasn’t the first time.”
He tilted his head. “I got no problem with her,” he said. “She keeps to herself and mostly keeps quiet. It’s the people she has over who make trouble. Shouting, banging, slamming doors— it sounds like they’re coming through the walls sometimes.”
“Are they fighting or partying?”
“It’s no party,” he said. The tabby rubbed its head against his trouser cuff and purred loudly.
“Is it yelling-fighting or hitting-fighting?”
“It’s yelling
and throwing things. As far as anything else, I don’t know.”
“Have there been a lot of fights?”
Arrua thought about it. “Maybe ten altogether.”
“Recently?”
He shrugged. “Last time was a couple weeks back, I think. Before that, not for a long time— not since summer or beginning of fall.”
