The Weeping Buddha

by Heather Dune Macadam

  Aileen flopped down in the chair next to her roommate. “You want to talk?”

  “I want to be shallow for about an hour and not think about murder, death, or disappearing people.”

  Aileen poured them wine and settled back into the cushions of the chair to watch yet another pouty-faced dirty-blond actress with big eyes, and even bigger lips, fumble her way through her life’s pitiful problems. Fortified by hot soup and crusty ciabiatti bread, Devon began to feel less shaky from fatigue and hunger. Aileen hit the mute button as a commercial invaded the atmosphere.

  “What I don’t get is why someone killed Edilio.” Aileen obviously wanted to talk.

  “I don’t get any of it.” Devon swirled the wine in her glass and watched the watery film catch the sides and drip down quickly—not a vintage year. “Not Edilio, not Beka and Gabe … How could someone I know do this?”

  “How do you know it’s someone you know?”

  “There are indications.”

  Aileen leaned forward and stared at her friend disbelievingly. “Really?”

  “Yeah, like my beeper going off. We still haven’t found Beka’s phone, but I think it could have been the murderer calling me.”

  “Oh my god … that means they know your number …”

  “But it could have been Beka, too.”

  “… and maybe where you live. Do you think you’re in danger?”

  “I can’t believe I didn’t call her back.”

  “Devon, are you in danger?” Aileen’s eyes widened with fear.

  They looked at each other—the words said more than either of them cared to admit.

  “The only thing I’m in danger of is losing my faith in people. I feel like everything I knew for sure is no longer true, and people I thought I could trust are not—maybe never were—trustworthy.” Devon pushed back a tear with her index finger.

  “Remember that song Cindy Lauper used to sing, ‘True Colors’?”

  “I don’t think this was what she meant by her lyrics.”

  “Yeah it is. Everyone lies.”

  “The law doesn’t. It’s there to back us up.”

  “You’re an idealist,” Aileen observed. “Now, Loch and I are cynics.”

  Devon chuckled; Aileen was right. “You know the worst thing about all of this? The cold-bloodedness. Loch’s been working up a profile, and a killer like this would have to be totally anti-social. These people are nothing but socialites.”

  “Maybe they’re not the way they appear.”

  “Obviously! But Aileen, I’m at the zendo tonight, meditating, and all I can think is what if it’s one of them?”

  “You’re going to figure this out. I know you will. You always do. You’re good, Dev.”

  “You’re always so encouraging.”

  “Hey, you’ve always been in my corner.”

  “Not always.”

  “Well, almost always.”

  “You’re my oldest friend.” Devon stressed the words as she held her glass up to the firelight to stare at the flames through the bloodred of the wine.

  “Great, now I’m going to get killed, too!”

  “Don’t say that.”

  “Here, have some more wine.” Aileen refilled their glasses and they drank in silence.

  Devon yawned. She could feel her energy running out of her spine like battery fluid. Last night she had felt like Loch, up all night, working and figuring things out, jazzed by the investigation. Tonight she felt like a damp rag wrung out and hung up to dry. As soon as she could get up off the couch, she would go to bed so that by the time Loch arrived, if he ever arrived, she’d be in dreamland.

  They watched the rest of the show without much conversation until the theme song signaled the conclusion of their mental intermission for the evening. Devon started up the stairs, but stopped partway up. “Aileen, when was the last time you saw Beka?”

  “Schiavoni’s a couple of weeks ago. She was buying porterhouse and I was getting rump roast.”

  “Did she look okay?”

  “She looked great, as usual. We just time-of-day’d it and talked about the weather.”

  “You guys were a lot alike in some ways,” Devon said.

  “Yada, yada.”

  That was Aileen’s way of letting Devon know she had stepped too close—Aileen hated sympathy.

  “Hey, that guy Loch was with yesterday?”

  “Gary?”

  “What’s his story?

  “No story. Just divorced.”

  “You cops always have a story, but …”

  “What are you thinking?”

  “Nice ass.”

  “I hadn’t noticed.”

  “We could double-date.”

  “Soon as this is all over.”

  “How about Saturday?”

  “Aileen!” Devon laughed out loud. “You’re as bad as Gary.”

  “What ya mean?”

  “He was asking Loch the same thing last night.”

  “Then it’s meant to be!”

  Law and Order was starting—it was Aileen’s favorite show, but Devon had had enough off both. She patted her thigh to signal Boo. He leapt up off his bed by the fire and pushed past her on the way up the stairs.

  “I got one for you!” The lilt in Aileen’s voice stopped her. “What’s the Hamptons’s theme song?”

  “I give.”

  Aileen began to sing, “Oh Lord, won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz …”

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  The master swordsman is like the lotus blooming in the fire.

  Such a man has in and of himself a heaven-soaring spirit.

  —PORTION OF A ZEN KOAN

  Devon woke up and stared at the other side of the bed—empty. She knew Loch would stay at the office, or maybe he had gone home to his own bed. It didn’t matter. The fingers of depression seeped into her consciousness like fog clouding her mind, making it hard to get up, get going. It was still dark as the middle of the night, not six in the morning, and she knew if she let her eyelids fall shut again she would slip into the welcome arms of sleep and not wake again until daybreak. She swung her legs over the side of the bed and onto the warm belly of Boo, ever faithful, still asleep by her side of the bed. She rubbed her feet into his form and watched his tail thump against the floor. He rolled to a sitting position and stared at her expectantly; this was one creature who never had trouble waking up. “Just a quickie,” she told the dog. “Aileen will take you for a longer walk later.” He jumped up excitedly.

  Devon figured Boo had a vocabulary of about thirty words, walk being the first he had ever learned. He also knew the words pig ear, bone, chew, baby (the name of one of his toys), go to bed, go to jail (for when he was bad), and phrases such as Cross the road, Go back home, What the hell are you doing? Get the hell back here … The list of phrases was pretty long, too, Devon mused, although she wasn’t sure if it was vocabulary or tone of voice that he understood. It didn’t really matter, she wasn’t a dog trainer like Aileen, but she considered Boo to be exceptionally intelligent because he was also, like herself, exceptionally stubborn.

  She took him outside for a quick pee, and put him back in the house. He would bark indignantly when he heard her car starting and realized she was going somewhere without him—they didn’t call them coach dogs for nothing—but there was no other way around it. Maybe she should have become a fireman, then her dog could have come to work every day. His outraged but muffled baritone sounded from behind the kitchen door as she started the engine; he would stop by the time she reached the end of the driveway. She looked both ways, more out of habit than necessity, and pulled onto Bay Street. The boats still moored in the harbor were real fishing boats; there were no yachts towering over the piers as in the summer, and the gentle tinkling of masts in the wind should have made her smile. She loved it when the town was still and empty. She stopped at the 7-Eleven, grabbed an extra-large coffee, and headed across the Sag Harbor Bridge and on to North Haven.

  The
sun was just beginning to break open the iron mass of clouds floating low over the bay and Sag Harbor Cove as she made her way past the inlets of water sandwiching Long Beach. Seagulls hung in the air almost motionless as they tried to fly toward the bay while the wind pushed them steadily back to shore. Steel-blue waves of surf curled and chopped across the pebbles and shells that made the beach rough on the tenderfooted. She slowed down and pulled over at the lookout point. Behind her a small herd of deer grazed on the marsh grass, raising their heads momentarily to check her out before returning to their foraging. Devon popped the lid off her coffee and took the first sip to wake her out of the stupor that had taken hold.

  The sky began to show shreds of magenta and orange as the light filtered across her little town, and she felt the strongest desire to flee the investigation, flee it all and go to Hawaii the next day with Uncle Biz and Bert and Beka’s body. She wasn’t sure what was bothering her, and thought maybe she’d feel better if she had a little cry—but no tears came. She was too tired, too numb to feel much. What she really needed was a vacation. And that was the last thing she was going to get.

  “Pull yourself together, Devon,” she chided herself out loud, then cracked the car window to feel the comfort of salt air and wind.

  The coffee made her feel more focused and alive. Maybe she could talk Loch into going to Oahu with her after they solved this case. Loch probably had thousands of hours due; she’d never known him to take any time off in the five years they’d been seeing each other. Hawaii. She looked at the surf and thought of the perfect azure and cool greens of Kailua and Kaneohe Bays. She could taste the salt water, smell the hot sand, and feel the cool shade of palm and banyan trees protecting her from the sun. She shifted her car back into drive and took another gulp of coffee—as soon as this was over, they’d go away. They’d sit on the beach all day and eat jabons and guava from Auntie Mack’s garden and platters of carryout from Kozo Sushi. They’d snorkel at Hanauma Bay, or maybe just stay at the Imamura beach house on Kaneohe Bay and hitch rides on a boat out to the reef where they could snorkel and picnic until the tide came in and they caught a ride back home. She would take Loch to all the places Beka had taken her on their many visits to Oahu. They would visit Beka’s grave at Bodyo-in Temple and set a ginger lei on the water at low tide in her memory. They would rest and make love on the dock and forget they were cops—they would make plans to retire in Hawaii. They would never come back.

  It was a nice daydream, a gentle flight of fancy that soothed her nerves and made the day seem more bearable. She just wanted it to be over.

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  Praise to you, violent god of the Yellow Hat teachings, Who reduces to particles of dust Great beings, high officials, and ordinary people …

  —ZEMEY RINPOCHE

  Tension was higher than usual at the station that morning. Lieutenant Whittaker was like an old hound on an even older scent, and followed them around the office as they tried to finish the Printrak search that had been running all night on the national fingerprint database system. There had been four hits out of the twenty full and partial sets of prints—two of them had been arrested on cocaine charges, one for male prostitution; the fourth was none other than Eric Heron.

  Of course, no sooner had they discovered the connection than Sergeant Houck called Loch for a meeting to update him on their progress. It was almost as if the man were psychic when it came to breaks in cases—though Loch would have preferred waiting a few hours before he laid it all out for Houck. Unfortunately, a few hours was not what he had. The foursome arrived in Houck’s office under the strictest orders from Loch to keep their mouths shut. Houck for his part did not allude to whether or not any of Marders’s allegations against Devon had reached his ears. Instead, Houck nodded approvingly as Loch told him how it looked like Gabriel Montebello had been getting away with murder for almost two decades.

  “I can’t believe nobody saw anything!” Houck yelled when Loch was done explaining the prints they had found.

  “I’m sending Frank and Devon back over to the Montebello estate as soon as we’re done here,” Loch explained. “But as for witnesses, even Gabe’s secretary, Jenny O’Doherty, hasn’t seen anything and she’s worked for him for ten years.”

  “Something’s not right.”

  “We’re considering the possibility that he worked with someone.”

  “Ferraro?”

  “That would have been nice, except who killed Montebello then?”

  “Did he have any other business partners?”

  “Just Imamura.”

  “And you’re still looking for a someone?” Houck’s eyes narrowed. “Sounds like you have it solved. Tell me …” He looked directly at Devon. “Would you want to be married to this guy? Would you call your friend the cop and have him get off because of some legal technicality, or kill him yourself?”

  “I believe in the law, sir.”

  “Did your friend?”

  “We just want to make sure we don’t miss anything,” Loch reminded him.

  “Sounds to me like Ferraro was his partner; she finally figured it out or got fed up with it and did what nobody else could. Is that a stretch or am I an idiot?”

  Devon did not answer his question.

  Loch was steamed but didn’t let his ire show. “A few things don’t add up, sarge.”

  “Make them.” Houck nodded to Loch’s team. “As much as you don’t like it, NYPD may have this right. The mystery now is how many guys did this nut actually kill, not who killed the nut. Wrap it up.”

  Loch did not push the issue; he knew better than to do that when Houck was acting like the bureaucrat—clear the case and get good press—and not a cop. He followed his team out of Houck’s office, but just as he was about to reach the door, he heard his superior add, “And Brennen, try not to piss off Detective Marders any more than you absolutely have to.”

  They were waiting for him in the hallway, waiting for his instructions. “Devon, Frank, you two are on the estate. Go over everything, the barn, the house. Find something that tells us what Gabe’s sick little fantasy was. Gary, you head into the city to find this God person and see if you can stop by Marders’s office and find out what they got on the Edilio Ferraro case.” He shook his head at Devon. “I don’t think Imamura is our killer, but until you guys come up with something concrete, she’s the fall guy, so get busy.” Frank and Gary headed down the hall but Devon stood in front of him, not like his girlfriend but more like a bad dream that won’t go away. “What now?”

  “I’m going to be at the zendo tonight.” She told him about the all-night meditation Hans had planned.

  “What do you mean—you sit all night staring at a wall?” Her plan to participate did not thrill him.

  “We meditate through the darkest hours and when the daylight breaks we chant for the enlightened way,” she explained for the third time. “I think if I can keep an eye on these people I can figure it out.”

  “And how many people are there at this little shindig?”

  “Usually it’s called Soka Gakkai, and anywhere from ten people to just me and the Jikido will be there.”

  “What’s a Jikido?”

  “I believe it’s Jenny O’Doherty.” She grinned at him.

  “Were you going to tell me or just let me find out?”

  “What do you think?”

  “There’s no way you’re getting stuck in a room with her alone—she’s a fruitcake and I haven’t cleared her off my list of suspects yet.”

  “I can handle O’Doherty.”

  He stared at her, one eyebrow levitating toward his hairline.

  “Hey, if she’s the killer and attacks me, I’ll have her. End of story.”

  “If she attacks you, she’s a fool. And I think that’s actually what you’re hoping for. I won’t have it. I’m fine with decoy surveillance—not on your own and without backup. I’ll be outside in my car and you’ll be on radio.”

  “No way!”

>   “Only way. You aren’t sitting with your back toward anyone who might be a potential murderer, Devon. No one! You understand me? I won’t have your safety compromised for an investigation.”

  “I’m going to be well aware of what’s going on around me.”

  “Yeah, at four-thirty in the morning when your eyes get heavy, are you going to be so ready? The only way I can authorize this is if I’m posted outside.”

  “What exactly are you watching for?”

  “It’s an all-nighter in the middle of the woods not six miles from where the murders occurred, and almost directly connected to the crime. What do you think?” He was irritated with her; anyone else would be happy for extra protection, but not Devon. Well, he was damned if she was going to have all the fun.

  “Okay, you have a point, but the real reason you’re coming along is you’re afraid you’ll miss something and I know it. You can’t stake the zendo out on the side of Swamp Road, though, people will see you.”

  “Let me worry about that.”

  “Maybe Hans would let you sit in the kitchen. Nothing’s going on but a bunch of people sitting around with their eyes half shut—or half open, depending on how you look at things.”

  “What sort of vantage point would I get from the kitchen?”

  “Your butt will stay warm.”

  “You have to be on radio in case something happens while you’re meditating.”

  “Like enlightenment?”

  “You have to be able to contact me if necessary.”

  “The equipment will be too bulky.”

  “Wear a big black robe like that monk of yours. I insist. I won’t have you off radio.”

  “You’re really nervous about this. Why?”

  “Because I’m a good Catholic boy and not used to this mumbojumbo religious crap.”

  “Oh, and Catholicism isn’t full of mumbo-jumbo?”

  “We call it mysticism.”

  “So do we.” She jutted her chin out and dared him to push the point any further. “Nothing’s going to happen.”

  “That’s exactly what I’m hoping for—a nice uneventful evening. We haven’t been bored in days.”