Free Fall

by Chris Grabenstein

  “I didn’t want to mention this in front of his children but, late last night, just after midnight, Arnold Rosen called me.”

  “And?”

  “He told me he was ‘surrounded by assassins.’ This autopsy you’re doing? I feel it could prove a wise and prudent move.”

  26

  MRS. CEEPAK OFFERS US COFFEE IN CHINA CUPS WITH SAUCERS.

  I don’t have any saucers, just coffee mugs. This is why there are numerous brown rings staining most of my furniture.

  Hope Christine can deal.

  Mrs. Ceepak also has an assortment of Pepperidge Farm cookies. And they’re not in the box or the bag. They’re on a glass tray sculpted to look like a flat flower.

  “We wanted to ask you about your conversation last night with Dr. Rosen,” says Ceepak.

  “Fine, dear. Would you like a Mint Milano, first?”

  “No, Mom. Thanks.”

  “How about a Brussels?”

  “No, thank you.”

  “A Tahiti? They have that coconut you like.”

  Ceepak takes a cookie and crunches it. I guess he’s lost this battle before.

  I pick up a dainty cookie, myself, and almost extend my pinky finger while I nibble around its edges. Almost. Mrs. Ceepak is crunching a Mint Milano. And since we all know it’s rude to talk with your mouth full of food, the only sound in the room is that of crisp cookies being ground to bits by multiple molars.

  Ceepak finishes his cookie, dusts off his hands.

  “Mom, in your conversation last night with Dr. Rosen, what else did he say?”

  “Oh, John, he was so sad. Felt like his whole family was against him. His two boys, his daughter-in-law.”

  “Were those the assassins he feared?”

  “I suppose. Apparently, David and Judith were furious because, just last week, Arnie visited his lawyer and made a few changes to his will.”

  Okay. Maybe I’ve seen watched too many “48 Hours Mystery” shows and old episodes of Columbo. But “Last Minute Changing Of The Will” is always a prime murder motivator—either to stop the changes or reap the rewards.

  “What changes did he make?”

  “I’m not sure, John. Arnie didn’t go into specifics. Just said that, when he told David and Judith what he’d done, they both blew up. ‘You’re jeopardizing your only grandson’s future,’ they said. His other boy, Michael, the one from Hollywood, he didn’t seem to mind, but Michael has money of his own. Do you think the changes Arnie made to his will is the reason someone murdered him?”

  “First, Mom, we don’t know yet whether he was murdered or not …”

  “I do.”

  “You do? How?”

  “Female intuition.”

  Oh-kay. Too bad the Supreme Court won’t let us arrest people on the grounds of “my mother said so” anymore.

  “Second,” Ceepak continues, “we’d have to know the particulars of the will alterations or amendments to see who would benefit, who would lose.”

  Mrs. Ceepak puts down her cup and saucer. “Then it’s all my fault.”

  “Come again?”

  “Arnold told me that what I did with Christine, paying for her defense attorney, inspired him to help those less fortunate. He said he wanted some portion of his last will and testament to be a mitzvah. To do some good.”

  “Perhaps he bequeathed a generous donation to a favorite charity,” says Ceepak.

  “Which would funnel money away from his kids and grandson,” I say.

  “You see?” says Mrs. Ceepak. “It is my fault.”

  Ceepak reaches over and places a gentle hand on his mother’s knee.

  “Mom, if the autopsy indicates foul play, rest assured, justice will be served.”

  Mrs. Ceepak puts down her tiny cookie.

  “I liked Arnie Rosen, John. Felt sorry for him, too. He could get so angry over the smallest slights. One time, a gal at the senior center brought him sweet tea when he wanted it unsweetened. He blew up. Called the gal all sorts of horrible names.” She sighs. “Growing old, you lose control over so much of your life. That can change people. Make them moody. One minute you’re sweet, the next you’re yelling at a gal at the senior center. Other times, after bingo, Arnie and I would just sit and talk. He is a very intelligent man. Quite the vocabulary. He taught me when to use ‘who’ and when to use ‘whom.’ I told him about Billy.”

  Ceepak puts down his cookie.

  “How your father always teased him about being a sissy boy. How that horrible priest took advantage of him. How Billy died.”

  I put down my half-eaten cookie, too.

  “That’s when Arnie told me about his son. Michael. The one who lives in Hollywood.”

  “We met Michael at Dr. Rosen’s house today,” says Ceepak.

  “Nice boy?”

  “Seems like it. Of course, we only had the briefest encounter …”

  “Arnie didn’t like the fact that his son was ‘blatantly and openly gay.’ Those are his words. Blatantly and openly.” Mrs. Ceepak shakes her head. “I tried to tell him that your son is your son and you love him no matter what. Arnie didn’t want to hear it. Between us, I think that’s why the boy moved so far away. He knew he wasn’t welcome at home.”

  That’s when Ceepak’s other cell phone jangles like an alarm clock.

  It’s his work phone. He always carries two; doesn’t want to blur the line, he says, between his professional and personal life.

  While Ceepak tugs the thing off his belt, I’m wondering if Dr. Kurth already has our test results. If so, it’d be a new Indoor Forensics record.

  “This is Ceepak, go.”

  Yeah. That’s how Ceepak answers his work phone.

  “Roger that. Call nine-one-one. We’re on our way.” He clips the phone back to his belt. “Danny?” He reaches behind his back, just to make sure his Glock is still in that cross-draw holster. I stand up and tap my hip under my shirttail to do the same.

  “What’s up?” I ask.

  “Gatehouse.”

  “Got you.”

  We’re kind of talking in code. No sense scaring Ceepak’s mom by letting her know her ex-husband has come a’callin’.

  27

  WE HOP IN MY JEEP.

  “Is it your dad?” I say.

  “Negative. His emissary.”

  I think emissary means messenger and not a building full of foreign diplomats. I’ll look it up later. Right now, I slap the swirling red light on the hood of my ride. When he sees us coming, Mr. Ceepak’s “emissary” will know he or she just stepped into a pile of serious trouble.

  We break The Oceanaire’s posted 15 mph speed limit and whip around the roads snaking back to the gatehouse.

  Bruce Southworth, the young security guard, is out of his hut, his clipboard clutched in his hand, like he’ll use the thing as a weapon if he has to.

  Young Benjamin Sinclair, decked out in his sloppy StratosFEAR uniform khakis and polo shirt, is straddling the seat of his motor scooter, holding a bunch of flowers wrapped in a cone of clear cellophane. One of the bouquets they sell at the Acme grocery store near the dairy department.

  “Yo,” Ben says to Southworth. “Open the freaking gate, dude. Sun’s wilting the flowers, big time.”

  “Mrs. Ceepak does not wish to receive anything from anyone associated with her ex-husband,” says Southworth, professionally and politely.

  “Roger that,” says Ceepak, as we roll out of my Jeep and march over to the guardhouse.

  “Yo!” says Sinclair. “Help me out here, po-po. Tell this clipboard monkey fool to step off and get out of my grill. I just be delivering flowers from your old man. They’re for your old lady.”

  “She doesn’t want them,” I say because Ceepak is too busy trying to figure out what the heck Ben just said.

  “For real, dawg? Dag. My pops only be sending my moms flowers after she catches him bangin’ some skanky beach babe.”

  “Mrs. Ceepak does not want flowers from her ex-husband,” I say.


  “Aw, come on. Let me in. I promised Joe Cool I’d make the drop, dawg.”

  “The grounds of The Oceanaire are considered private property,” says guardhouse Bruce. “Access to the area beyond this gate is only granted to our residents and their invited guests.”

  I’m impressed. The kid’s good.

  In the distance, I hear the wail of police sirens.

  He also knows how to dial 911.

  Ben hears the approaching cop car, too. He tugs down on the strap of his motorcycle helmet. If he wasn’t wearing one, I’d arrest him on the spot for violating the State of New Jersey’s Mandatory Helmet Law.

  “Go home, Ben,” I say as the sirens move closer.

  “Can’t, Holmes. I’m OTJ. On the job.”

  “Then go back to the boardwalk.”

  “A’ight, a’ight.”

  “Ben?”

  “Yo?”

  “Why do you talk like that? You go to Pine Barrens. It’s a prep school.”

  Ben doesn’t answer, but he does drop his fake ghetto gangsta act.

  “What am I supposed to do with these stupid flowers? Give ’em to the other cops when they get here?”

  Ceepak steps forward. Snatches the bouquet out of Ben’s hand. I feel sorry for the roses. From the sound of crinkling plastic, I think Ceepak is strangling their stems.

  “My mother,” he says, quite calmly, “is an avid gardener. She keeps a compost bin. These will make a excellent contribution to her pile of vegetable peelings and kitchen scraps.”

  “She still in Unit Three?” asks Ben with an ugly little smirk.

  Ceepak glares at him, hard.

  “Yeah,” says Ben. “Mr. Joe Cool knows exactly where his old lady lives, dude. Deal with it.”

  Ben putters off on his scooter.

  Ceepak and I wait for the on-duty guys to arrive. We fill them in on what went down.

  “We’ll cruise up this way a little more often,” says Julie Whitaker, one of the officers in the patrol car. “Keep an eye on things.”

  “Appreciate that,” says Ceepak.

  He gives Julie a two-finger salute. She snaps one right back.

  When Julie and her partner drive away, Ceepak and I head back to Unit Three.

  It’s time to talk to Ceepak’s mom about installing a home security system.

  Something other than her son.

  28

  WE TELL MRS. CEEPAK ABOUT HER HUSBAND’S PRESENCE ON the island then try to persuade her to install a burglar alarm (and maybe a machine-gun nest up on the roof).

  She thinks a home security system would be a “silly waste of money. That’s why we have the nice young guards in the gatehouse.”

  So Ceepak and I decide we’ll try, once more, to persuade his skeevy dad to leave the poor woman (who just happens to be filthy rich) alone.

  We have to wait through ten drops of the StratosFEAR ride till Mr. Ceepak gets his 3 P.M. break.

  “Roses have always been her favorite,” says Mr. Ceepak. “I used to bring her a single rose every time I took her out on a date.”

  Why do I think the young Joe Ceepak used to pluck those roses off a neighbor’s bush ten seconds before knocking on Adele’s front door?

  The three of us are squeezed inside a cramped, glassed-in building. The free fall ride’s control shack. Outside, the walls are painted sky blue with wispy clouds. There’s even a sign labeling this tiny booth “Mission Control.”

  Inside, the walls are sheets of bare plywood and two-by-fours. Windows ring the upper third of the hexagonical hut, turning it into a hothouse reeking of vomit.

  “Sorry about the stench, boys,” says Mr. Ceepak, who sits on a stool near a metal box of chunky control buttons and knobs. A mop handle leans against the wall. Its stringy head is soaking in a murky bucket near Joe Ceepak’s feet.

  “Couple college kids got tanked on beer before riding the ride. Blew chunks like puke geysers when they landed. Vomit splattered everywhere. I had Ben mop it up before sending him over to Adele’s. Good kid, that Ben. Hard worker. Type of boy that would make any father proud.”

  Mr. Ceepak takes a swig from a quart jug of warm orange juice. I might be the next to hurl.

  “You know, Johnny, I would’ve delivered those flowers myself but, like you told Bob and the guys at Sinclair Enterprises, this ride can only stay open if there’s a factory-trained and certified operator running things in the control booth. For now, that’s me. They got me working twelve-hour shifts, seven days a week. Not that I mind. The pay is decent. The overtime is even better. And son, not that you care—I need the cash.”

  “Sir,” says Ceepak, “I will only say this one more time: stay away from my mother and her money.”

  “Her money? Who said anything about her money?”

  “I know why you are here.”

  “Well, you should. From what Bob tells me, you’re the one who told them they had to hire me. And for that, I am eternally grateful …”

  “For the record,” says Ceepak, “I never instructed Sinclair Enterprises to specifically hire you.”

  “Geeze, Johnny. Why do you always have to be such a hard case? Maybe you should talk to a cop shrink. Work on your anger-management issues. Does this town seriously have some kind of law against people surprising their wives with flowers?”

  “She is not your wife.”

  “Says who?”

  “The State of Ohio and an ecclesial tribunal of the Catholic Church, which granted her an annulment.”

  “In defiance of God’s holy word? No church can do that, son. Even if they have a Pope.”

  “Sorry, sir. They did.”

  “‘I hate divorce, says the Lord God of Israel.’ Malachi. Two-sixteen. That’s from the Bible.”

  “Stay away from her. Or you will be arrested.”

  That’s from Ceepak’s personal bible.

  Mr. Ceepak shakes his head. “I fear for your immortal soul, son. Helping Adele defy God’s Holy Word? ‘A wife is bound to her husband as long as he lives!’ That’s from the Bible, too.”

  “So is that guy with boils all over his butt,” I say, remembering the Book of Job from my stint in Catholic High School.

  Mr. Ceepak has a confused look on his face again; the one he used to get when he was tanked all the time.

  Someone raps knuckles on the glass windows.

  Bob.

  He raises his arm. Taps his wristwatch. Shoots me and Ceepak a wink and a smile.

  “Duty calls, boys,” says Mr. Ceepak, gesturing toward the squalid little shack’s flimsy door to let us know it is time for us to go. “And Johnny, as you probably know, only certified operators are allowed inside the control booth while the ride is running. So, I gotta ask you boys to leave. Now.” He gulps down another chug from his warm orange juice jug.

  Ceepak puts his hand on the door. “Stay away from my mother.”

  “Yeah, yeah. I heard you the first time.”

  Ceepak and I walk out of the booth. Manager Bob follows after us.

  “Your dad sure has one heck of a work ethic, Detective Ceepak. And don’t worry. The guys in HR have another factory-trained and certified operator all lined up. Fellow by the name of Shaun McKinnon. Should be on the job Monday. Coming down from Ohio. We’ll be able to give your pop a couple nights off. Maybe you two can catch up and smooth things over.”

  “That, Bob, is never going to happen.”

  As we walk around the StratosFEAR, I see why Mr. Sinclair was so eager to open his new ride: There is a line, maybe a hundred people long, snaking through the switchbacks and down the pier.

  Behind me, I hear a chorus of high-pitched squeals and screams as the open-air chairs whoosh down the girder tower at breakneck speed.

  “Awesome,” I hear a couple kids on line say in breathless anticipation of their own plunge.

  And guess who’s at the end of the line?

  Judith Rosen and her son, Little Arnie. Thirteen or maybe fourteen, he’s wearing a Philadelphia Phillies baseb
all cap (sideways) on his boy band blonde head. Fortunately, Mrs. Rosen isn’t wearing a miniskirt today, just tight jeggings and an unfortunate tank top. It looks like she’s smuggling neck pillows around her waist.

  “Good afternoon, Mrs. Rosen,” says Ceepak when he sees her.

  “Good afternoon, detective. Little Arnie was growing restless at home.”

  “Understandable,” says Ceepak.

  “So, have you heard anything?”

  “From the M.E., you mean?”

  “Yes. The, uh, tests you wanted done.”

  Both Ceepak and Judith are trying very hard not to use words like “medical examiner,” “autopsy,” and “toxin screening” in front of the late Arnold Rosen’s only grandson.

  “No, ma’am,” says Ceepak. “These things sometimes take days.”

  “I see. David, of course, works for Sinclair Enterprises,” Judith continues. “So, we’re lucky. We get free tickets for all the rides; discount coupons for the restaurants and car washes. Comes in handy. Just about the only decent perk they give him …”

  “Well, enjoy your day as best you can,” says Ceepak. “And again, our condolences on your loss.”

  “Thank you,” says Judith. “Officer Boyle?”

  Yikes. I’m sort of surprised she remembers my name.

  “Yes, ma’am?” I say.

  “I understand you’ve met my sister, Shona? You’ve even been to her house?”

  Oh. I get it now. We’re still talking in code but she’s letting me know that she knows I was the OIC the night her nephew called 911.

  “Quick question.” She still sounds as Midwestern sweet as sugar-frosted corn flakes. “Why did you side with Christine Lemonopolous?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Why did you only photograph her injuries? Why not my sister’s?”

  “I, uh …”

  “Mrs. Rosen,” says Ceepak, “if you have queries about police procedure, past or present, might I suggest that you come to our offices to have them answered?”

  “Of course. I just think you made a bad call, Officer Boyle. So be careful. Keep an eye on Ms. Lemonopolous. That girl has an extremely short fuse. I’m certain it’s only a matter of time before she hurts or injures someone else.”