“Tell me what you want.” He detected an accent. From the islands, perhaps Jamaica.
“First of all, let me tell you, I’m, uh, friends, with Captain Frisano.” Just don’t call him to verify that, he thought.
She looked around the portion of the street she could see, as if he’d said a bad word. Or maybe the right one, a cop version of open sesame.
“Come in,” she suddenly said, unlatching the hook from the screen door.
“Are you sure?” Jimmy asked, not certain why he’d given her the sudden out. He’d been granted clearance. He questioned her motives now. It’s just how the job went. They could each play a game of suspicion.
“You obviously came here for something,” she said. “I’m curious to know what that is.”
Jimmy slipped inside the house. Looked around for signs of anyone else. “Kids home?”
She shook her head. “I decided to send them to school. We need a return to normalcy.” She paused to consider her next words, finally came up with, “Whatever normal is.” Her body language seemed in contrast to the defeatism he heard in her voice. She was five seven, had dark, ashy skin, with a wiry build and a muscular definition to her long arms. Probably a runner, Jimmy surmised. So was that why she wasn’t worried about letting a stranger inside her home? She could outrun him? But then she said, “My brother lives next door. He’s home now.”
Warning issued, she then became friendly again.
“Won’t you sit down? Then you can tell me what this is all about.”
Definitely an accent to her voice, but refined, as though she were fighting against its sing-song nature. Trying to assimilate.
He was escorted into a tasteful, if small, living room. Jimmy preferred to stand but wanted to ease her mind. He sat on the edge of the sofa. She joined him on the opposite end, both primed to get up at a moment’s notice. She clasped her hands together. He noticed a shiny bracelet on her wrist but said nothing. He thought it looked expensive. Didn’t fit the décor around him.
“I’m sorry,” he started with. “About your husband.”
“Denson was a good man.”
A good man who got himself murdered. Executed. There was always more to the story. He held back on hurling an accusation. He needed her on his side.
“Mrs. Luke, I’m here to help. You, and to be honest, myself.”
“Dahlia,” she said.
“Excuse me?”
“You may call me Dahlia. Right now, I want to be myself, not the widow Mrs. Luke.”
He nodded, cupping each hand on his knees. He gazed about the room, looking for anything that might spark a clue to the real lady he was dealing with. He saw no photographs, just a lot of candles, on table surfaces and on sconces upon the walls. Many looked like they’d been lit lately, blackened wicks curled over. There was a floral fragrance in the air. Her way of calming herself after such a tragedy?
“I hope you’ll call me Jimmy.”
“You say you know Captain Frisano. How?”
“As a private investigator, sometimes your cases overlap with those of the cops.”
She seemed to absorb this before saying, “Is this one of those cases?”
“Depends who you ask.”
“So I’m guessing you are not here on an authorized visit. Captain Frisano is, how shall we say, not in the loop?”
“He has an official investigation. Mine is more informal, and more personal.”
“Did you know my husband?”
Jimmy shook his head. “No, I did not.” He didn’t want this conversation to veer off. So, he went for a direct hit. “My father was NYPD also. Killed while off duty. I was fourteen.”
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“I witnessed it. I cradled him while he died.”
He didn’t mean to paint such a picture. But he needed her to know how important this case was to him. Perhaps the mental image silenced Dahlia Luke. His tough words brought a tear to her eye. She wiped it away and after a minute, said, “Awful. No child should see that.”
“No matter the circumstance, a child losing a parent is wrong.”
“My children, they don’t truly understand. They are eight and ten. A girl and boy.”
“They will need you. Just as I needed my mother, my sisters. Death bonds.”
“Death only hurts the survivors,” Dahlia said.
Another silence fell between them, her truthful words softening their facial expressions and easing their body language. Jimmy felt a deepening connection with Dahlia Luke. She got it. She understood. He wanted to help.
“May I ask, Jimmy, what brings you to me? Other than sympathy, if that’s what this is.”
“It goes beyond sympathy. Like I said, I want to help. I aim to find out who was responsible for killing your husband.”
“Why?”
“Because I think whoever pulled the trigger was also behind my father’s murder.”
His words hung in the floral air. Dahlia’s silence returned as she smoothed down her slacks to distract herself. Suddenly she stood, and Jimmy felt that he was about to be dismissed, to be asked to leave her to her grief. Instead, she announced she was going to make some tea, would Jimmy like some? He nodded his okay, then watched as she exited the living room and walked toward a kitchen at the back of the house.
Jimmy sat for a moment longer, then stood. He considered his situation. He wasn’t sure what he had expected—a widow with tears in her eyes, a defiant woman who would toss him out on his ear? Cooperation had been his hope, and here she was giving it. He’d been invited into her home, she’d listened to him and he had listened to her, and together they found enough common ground to continue to share their stories, to seek out truth, answers within puzzling questions. Jimmy knew he was acting on instinct here, and that any hope of finding a connection between the fifteen-year-old killing of Joseph McSwain and the week-old murder of Denson Luke was a longshot. Yet here he was, sensing a loose thread between two people whose lives were like torn fabric. Both realizing a thread between past and present might exist.
She returned not five minutes later. Jimmy was plinking out a nonsense tune on an upright piano situated in the corner.
“You play?” she asked.
“No. But music has always been a part of my life. My mother, she works Broadway shows. I grew up in that world, running up and down the aisles of the theatre. Sometimes I hid in the orchestra pit. You? Are you the piano player in the family?”
“No. That was one of Denson’s hobbies. At work he was all about helping people. At home music became his way of blocking out the violence.”
“A cop’s life. Dedication.”
“I always knew he would die young,” she said. “Every night, I would light a candle.”
Jimmy gazed at the array of candles, colorful, thick and thin, with curled, melted waves of wax.
She set a tray down on the coffee table, poured two cups of tea. Jimmy returned to the sofa, settled in. It was time to get down to business. He sensed Dahlia was ready to talk. Her comment about him dying young, it was potent, but filled with resignation. An inner fear becoming an outer truth. He sipped at his tea. It had a minty flavor.
“The last six months, things changed,” she suddenly said.
“How so?”
“You see this?” she said, indicating the gold bracelet on her arm. Since she’d called attention to it, Jimmy took a more concentrated look at the sparkling bauble. Diamond-crusted, it glowed when the sun coming through the window caught it. This was no piece of costume jewelry. Still, he offered no opinion on it, wanting her to continue to offer information. “Our anniversary—our thirteenth—this was his gift to me. Of course, I loved it, it’s a beautiful bracelet. I’m not one usually swayed by gaudy trinkets, but seeing the look on Denson’s face, how could I deny him the happiness of seeing me happy? At being able to afford such a piece, to shower me in such a way.”
“Except you doubt its, uh, shall we say provenance?” Jimmy asked.
“If that’s your way of saying it was hot, yes, I feared that was the case.”
“You think your husband was on the take?”
“I think Denson would have done anything to ensure his family lived a happy life.”
“Money, gifts, they don’t often achieve that.”
“That’s what I told him, late one night. The kids were asleep. He came home, he still in his police uniform but tickling the ivories, me sitting amidst my lit candles. I remember the way the flickering light hit the bracelet when he handed it to me, at times shiny, at times dark. He told me how beautiful I was. How beautiful the bracelet looked on my wrist. Like it belonged. It was only the first of the gifts he gave us. Electronics for the kids, a new car that was his pride and joy. On his off days, he would polish it with a zest, whistling. Except, I saw what his newfound wealth was doing to him. Eating at him.”
“How so?”
“I saw it in his eyes. The light had dimmed.”
“Guilt,” Jimmy said. “Blood money.”
“Jimmy, how does what happened tie in with your father’s case? What am I missing?”
“That’s what I’m trying to find out, all these years later. My father’s killer was never found. Justice was never served in that case.” Jimmy paused. “The police dropped the ball, for a reason I never understood. I don’t wish the same fate for your family.”
She paused, sipped at her tea. “What can I do?”
“You’ve already been very helpful. Very welcoming, and very informative. It’s my job to sort out what it all means.”
“Denson was a good man,” she said, repeating her earlier mantra.
“Sometimes good men get caught up in trying too hard.”
“Meaning what?”
“The pursuit of happiness often leads down a dark path. Some don’t find their way back.”
“Like my Denson?”
His answer veered off in a different direction. “Would you mind if I took a picture of that bracelet? I’d like to have a visual.”
She slid it off her wrist, set it down on the coffee table. Jimmy took out his iPhone, snapped a photo.
“You think it’s important?”
“I would suggest you not wear it, at least for a while. Tuck it away somewhere it can’t be found. Not a jewelry box.”
She left it on the table, as though fearful of it now. Jimmy finished his tea. He thanked her for her time but said he didn’t want to take up more of it. At the door, he turned to her and said, “I will keep you informed, if you want. But remember, what I’m doing on this case and what the cops are doing, it could be considered at-odds. The NYPD is all about protecting themselves. They are considered the city’s finest, and I don’t doubt that most of them are. But not all are. We have to be careful.”
“Jimmy, thank you for coming here, and for your gentleness.” She paused, considering her next words. Her voice faltered at first, as though the words in her mind were blocked from being spoken. She collected herself, and with a wave of fresh emotion said, “Just yesterday, after the funeral, shortly after I was presented with the American flag that rested on Denson’s casket during the funeral, Commissioner Delaware himself shook my hand and said they would find the truth. My husband would find rest. I wanted to believe him. Tell me that I can.”
Jimmy felt a tightness in his throat. He too had heard similar words, fifteen years ago. Not by a high-up official like the commissioner, but from a detective named Tolliver whose assurances ended up containing nothing but empty promises. Joseph McSwain was still not at peace. Silently, Jimmy had to wonder if Denson Luke was set to face the same fate in his afterworld, restless, endless sleep. But unlike Joseph McSwain, was Denson aware of his killer? He took a deep breath, where he held Dahlia’s newly trembling hand in his.
“Unlike our loved ones, the truth cannot remain buried forever,” he said.
She squeezed his hand. She understood his intentions. He understood her. “Even if the truth isn’t what we want it to be?”
Her words chilled him. Not all he had learned needed to be true. He looked around, to see if they were being observed.
“Remember, I was never here,” he said.
And then he went down the steps of the porch, into the sunshine. Into the light. Thinking about what he’d learned, what he hadn’t. Sometimes the truth was found in between the words.
Five minutes later, he went down to the subway. The darkness had returned.
§ § § §
Jimmy supposed it was official now. He had a new case, and his client was someone he answered to every day. Himself. Yet it was for more than just him, it was for Dahlia and her children, and for a woman he’d barely known, Seetha Assan, who had seen her brother Rashad fall under the seductive spell of whatever was going on deep within the NYPD. The past year had been one of new clues, leaving Jimmy starved for the truth of a mystery that had all but defined his life. How many others were out there that had been affected by the mysterious Blue Death insignia? Had any of those other kids awakened in a bed of sweat in the middle of the night, wanting comfort, wanting closure? Wanting the gentle hug of the parent who should have been there?
He was inside his office, one floor up from Paddy’s Pub, owned by his uncle, who also rented the space to Jimmy on the cheap. A cross between a studio apartment and an office, Jimmy often thought of it as his Fortress of Solitude, the place he went when he needed to think, or when he needed to revisit the vital pieces of the Forever Haunt. Or when he just wanted to be alone. He supposed that tonight what he sought was all three.
He’d hopped into the shower upon returning from Queens, washing away the mental stains imprinted on his mind from listening to Dahlia Luke’s story. Her husband had given her expensive jewelry, the kids had gotten pricey toys, he’d bought a new car. Didn’t sound like normal behavior for a cop with five years of service. Somewhere along the way he’d been compromised, Jimmy was certain of that, and whether it was his doing or he’d been lured in, the gifts were a ticket to prosperity. Dahlia had spoken of the guilt behind her husband’s eyes. Had he tried to get out? Was it possible? Sure it was, Jimmy thought. Death was the answer to everything.
Murder was the escape for the desperate. Or the disposable.
Jimmy emerged from the shower, his body refreshed if not his mind. With a towel wrapped around his waist, he slicked back his hair, stared at himself in the mirror. His eyes always went to his left shoulder, the mottled skin from where a bullet had sliced through. More than a flesh wound, less than life-threatening, he wore it like the badge he’d never allowed himself to wear. Some days his shoulder ached, reminding him what he did for a living could be dangerous. It’s funny, his shooter had been a fancy society lady. He was more scarred from that than the brutal fist fight he’d endured with Mickey Dean more recently. Was that because he’d let his guard down around the least likely suspect? A mistake he wouldn’t soon repeat.
Everyone was a suspect. Everyone had the potential to be dangerous, to be deadly.
Jimmy flicked off the bathroom light, he and his shadow emerging into the main room. He grabbed a bottle of Bass from the small fridge he kept in the corner, popped the top and then took a long sip. It was after five in the afternoon. He could hear the loud music pulsing up through the floorboards from Paddy’s. So, he wasn’t alone in his imbibing. He took another sip of sustenance, of reassurance. The beer was cold and it calmed his nerves.
Walking over to the desk in the corner, where he kept a laptop for mostly online research, he realized he’d left his phone here, forgetting to charge it. The battery was low, in the red, and so he plugged it in. Had he missed a call, or perhaps a text? Both should still have gone through but he saw nothing but an empty screen. He sipped at his beer as he waited for the charge to strengthen to a higher percentage. Five minutes later, he checked again and his voicemail revealed itself to be empty, so was his message center. So was his beer. Life had gone quiet.
He thought about what to do about Frisano.
Jimmy didn’t think he was wrong to pursue a lead on the Luke case, but perhaps his timing had been off. He owed him an apology. Did he want to send one via text or call, or was it better to stop by? Where would he be at this hour, at the sublet or at the precinct? As it turned out, Jimmy’s night took a new, different turn, the ringing of his cell phone in his hand taking him by surprise. It was his sister Meaghan. His heart skipped a beat. Was she in labor?
“Meaghan?”
“You in your office?”
“Yeah. Why? What’s going on?”
“Come downstairs,” she said.
“You’re at Paddy’s? Meaghan, you’re nine months pregnant…”
“Just get here, okay? Mallory’s here. She just did her third shot. Not sure what she had before I got here.”
Mallory was a teetotaler. She’d drink wine on occasion. Something was up. Jimmy quickly threw on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, tossed on his shoes and pounced down the stairs two at a time. He hit the street, ignored the cold attacking his bare arms, then did a quick turn and grabbed at the front door to Paddy’s. He saw his uncle first, who appeared to be waiting for him.
“Where is she…never mind,” Jimmy said, quickly scanning the bar and seeing her on a stool in the far corner of it.
“Something’s set her off,” Paddy said. “I let her have a few, but she’s cut off now. Kind of got snippy with me when I told her.”
“Thanks, Paddy. I’ll take it from here,” Jimmy said.
The narrow pub wasn’t that crowded, a few regulars enjoying the Happy Hour special while sitting in their usual seats, watching Daily News Live. The back room was mostly quiet, no pool table action. It was early, not yet six. Usually Mallory was still at her job at the law office, burning the midnight oil in her pursuit to advance to partner. This was definitely not part of her routine. Jimmy feared perhaps she’d been fired. As he neared, he saw her eyes zero in on him.
“Oh God, you call the cavalry, Meagh?” she asked, her words slightly slurred.
Forever Haunt Page 5
