The Good Kind of Bad

by Rita Brassington

  ‘This is her,’ Maggie squawked from behind the glass-topped desk, waving a sausage-fingered hand at me before returning to her phone conversation.

  After I landed at the desk, he forced forward a hand.

  ‘CMP,’ he chewed, flashing me the badge on his belt. ‘I’m Detective Zupansky with Violent Crimes. Ma’am, there’re some questions I need to ask you.’

  I felt the blood drain from my face, my extremities numbing as I watched my future float away out the door. I had to steady myself. I had to think. Strategize. Nina can’t have told Mickey, she can’t have told the police. She wouldn’t do that. Someone must’ve overheard us in Bemo’s. George? Anton?

  ‘You have somewhere we can talk? An office or something?’ he asked in a guttural voice, a frown creasing his forehead.

  We headed toward the lift as Maggie elongated her neck, eager for gossip to flutter around the building. My feathery footsteps became painful plods as I tried to deny it. The detective had come about the Faith robbery, though I didn’t remember anyone being separated from a body part, and a commercial burglary was hardly a violent crime. Who was I kidding? There was only one reason Zupansky was here, and here to talk to me. Not Nina or Cherry. Me.

  After offering him the coffee he politely declined, we spent the ride back up to Faith in that mandatory of elevator silences, smiling on meeting glances before exiting on the thirty-first floor and making our way to Faith’s boardroom.

  After taking a seat, he cleared his throat. The words sat poised, ready to take me down as I yearned to blurt it all out ‒ to scream how Evan murdered Joe, wrapped him in a carpet and kicked him into a shallow grave. Maybe then I’d sleep at night, with my conscience clear, but I bit hard on my tongue. I couldn’t do it.

  Detective Zupansky pulled his chair closer to the table before unfolding a pair of glasses from his jacket breast pocket. On opening his file, he selected various documents, including one with Joe’s mug shot and another containing a list of dates and offences.

  ‘Why is a detective from Violent Crimes here to see me?’ I asked.

  ‘Is that what I said? Sorry, ma’am, force of habit. My department and Missing Persons have recently merged. Slip of the tongue.’ He didn’t deem me worthy of eye contact until he brought out the big guns. ‘Can I ask why you haven’t reported your husband missing, Mrs Petrozzi?’ His large hands clasped together, resting over the paperwork.

  ‘Missing? He’s not missing.’ My attempt at casual was weak, the panic woefully disguised.

  ‘You’re married to Joseph Alphonso Petrozzi? An employee of UPS, where he’s a courier?’ Zupansky enquired, reading aloud from the file.

  ‘That’s right, though I think they fired him.’

  He peered at me from over his glasses. ‘And you last saw him, when?’

  When he was lying dead on our kitchen floor? ‘Um, two weeks ago? I’m not sure. He was never the stay-at-home husband or anything.’ Cool, calm, composed; that’s me.

  ‘You don’t think it’s weird your husband disappears for weeks and no one’s seen him, at all?’

  ‘Look, Officer—’

  ‘Detective,’ Zupansky corrected.

  ‘Detective,’ I repeated, with a hint of disdain. ‘Joe left me a month ago, not before telling me he’d met another woman and they were leaving Chicago together. He left, and I’m getting on with my life, end of story.’ It was a convincing lie. Surely, he had no choice but believe me.

  ‘You weren’t sure if it was two weeks ago but now you know it was a month? Which one is it, Mrs Petrozzi? Or would you prefer we used first names?’

  I gave Zupansky an unimpressed flash of my eyebrows. ‘Mrs Petrozzi is fine. I am still married to him, after all.’

  Zupansky expelled a breath that seemed to go on forever. ‘So, you’re telling me Joe’s gone somewhere and with someone, but you’re clueless on either? Not only that, but he’s left you for good? I hope you don’t mind me saying, ma’am, but you don’t seem, what’s the word . . . upset?’

  This guy was good.

  ‘My wife takes off with another man, and hey, I’m at least a little pissed.’

  I needed a counter move, and fast. ‘Upset? Joe was a violent alcoholic who beat me. I’m sorry I’m not bawling my eyes out because he decided to inflict his awfulness onto somebody else.’ I was surprising myself. The lie was so convincing even I believed it, though the only real deception was Joe’s choice to leave.

  ‘You haven’t filed reports over any attacks, and Mr Petrozzi is not a registered alcoholic,’ Zupansky shot back, checking the papers.

  ‘What? I did file a report. Detective Thomasz from District 31 took a statement.’

  Examining a print out, he shook his head. ‘Not according to the file.’

  ‘The file’s wrong! Are you saying I’m making this up?’ I pushed the hair aside, pointing at my forehead. ‘That’s where he kicked me. This cut on my arm is where Joe threw me from a car. Shall I take my clothes off now, or are you still convinced I’m lying?’

  ‘Ma’am, please. I’m not doubting you, but you enter a wrong letter on the computer keyboard and records get misplaced. How do you spell your last name?’

  ‘P-e-t-r-o-z-z-i,’ I enunciated, though after presenting myself as number one suspect, I calmed my tone to something more mellifluous. ‘What’s all this about, Detective? What’s Joe done this time?’

  ‘You father-in-law reported Joe missing on July 17th.’

  ‘What?’ I asked, a little too loudly.

  ‘Joe visits every Sunday, but he’s not answering his phone and the visits have stopped. You know his dad well? Nico?’

  I smiled and Zupansky took note, adding a half grin of his own.

  ‘Something funny?’

  ‘I know as much about Nico Petrozzi as you do, Detective. I’ve never met him.’

  ‘You’ve never met your father-in-law?’

  ‘Joe told me his dad died in a car crash, but he’s actually playing checkers in a Skokie nursing home. How sick is that?’

  Zupansky didn’t answer, and instead stared down at the file. ‘This woman he took off with. She have a name?’

  ‘I don’t know. There were so many, I lost count. Cristal, Courtney, something like that, though their stripper names won’t be their real ones. I don’t know where they went and I really don’t care, but I do know he’s not coming back.’

  ‘Oh?’ As the pitch of Zupansky’s voice rose, I felt like kicking myself.

  Messily, I cleared my throat. ‘Isn’t it obvious? He didn’t tell his father he was leaving. He wanted to sneak away into the night.’

  ‘And you didn’t think to tell his father he’d left?’

  ‘As I just said, I don’t know him.’

  ‘He knows you. He knew Joe had a wife who worked at Faith on LaSalle. You still sure you’re not acquainted?’

  Joe told his dad about me but told me his dad was dead? Why? ‘Look, I’m sorry Mr Petrozzi won’t see his son again but Joe is not a good man. Everyone is better off without him.’

  I was more than overplaying my role. If Joe’s body ever was discovered, I’d have means and motive and be heading for a long stretch inside. There was an uncomfortable pause. My unfaltering stare didn’t faze him. He clicked and un-clicked his pen. Cleared his throat. Steepled his fingers. I couldn’t tell if he was buying it. Reading his reactions was impossible.

  ‘We’ll be in touch, Mrs Petrozzi. If you think of anything else or he turns up on your doorstep, begging for forgiveness? Give me a call.’ He sighed wearily, placing his card on the desk and, after collecting his papers, he left the room.

  I let a tear gather but blinked it away. There the white card lay, teasing me. I picked it up, letting my fingers trail the cutting edges until I broke the skin, the slick of blood oozing out over my fingertips.

  Back at my desk, and after the paranoia began eating away, I was all ready to confess to Detective Zupansky. One little phone call, that’s all it’d take. I stared at my des
k phone, pondering how much Zupansky knew. Every day Joe was being forgotten a little more, but he’d never truly be gone. There would always be another Zupansky, waiting in the wings, armed with more dangerous questions. It was then I realised he’d never be gone. Joe would haunt my dreams for the rest of my life.

  Zupansky must’ve known more than he’d let on. He had to be keeping something back. His visit was an off-the-Richter type development in our little disaster movie and Evan needed to know, if he didn’t already. Joe’s father may have put the brakes on the forever freedom, and not only mine.

  Evan was ignoring his phone, so I walked the long way to his apartment on West Superior. Night replaced dusk as I strode the streets alone, delayed by Quentin’s extra workload. The lamps were a dull orange, throwing out hardly enough light, though as I turned each block corner I wasn’t afraid. I peered down the alleyways, hoping a mugger lurked in the darkness.

  I yearned to place myself in danger, to be hurt like Joe. My life meant nothing so long as I awoke to the truth, to the threat, to knowing the police were onto us, and somehow they saw the body in the boot and the shovel and the grave, that they were there when the rain fell, that day in the woods.

  I didn’t want to be left for dead, I didn’t want to die, but the world was out of balance, the scales skewed. Joe may have been a heartless bastard, but what’d happened to him was still wrong.

  Outside Evan’s building on West Superior, it took a while before he answered the buzzer, his mouth overflowing with food when he did.

  ‘Yeah, speak,’ came his crackled reply.

  ‘Evan, it’s me. Are you busy? I need to talk to you,’ I asked, hopping from foot to foot out on the street.

  ‘Can’t it wait?’

  ‘Not really.’

  ‘You sure? It’s just I’m . . . busy tonight.’

  ‘Busy enough for Joe?’

  My husband’s name was like Open Sesame. I was buzzed up, but it wasn’t long before I found out why he’d been eager to get rid of me.

  In Evan’s living room, I forced an uncomfortable grin at her, feeling like a spare part. ‘Evan . . . you should’ve said you had company.’

  She was there, the beer festival-opening Brandi. Her bottle-blonde extensions and an electric blue dress my mother would’ve described as ‘underwear’ were draped over my sofa, the one where I’d lain bruised and bloody. A Papa John’s pizza lay half-devoured on the coffee table, and the adjacent bottle of Rioja was fast approaching empty.

  ‘Hey, no, it’s fine. I’d like you to meet Brandi, my girlfriend. Brandi, this is . . . a friend.’

  ‘Hi,’ I said, accompanied by the lamest wave ever. She was how I’d pictured the waif, Evan’s ex-wife, though this version had much bigger boobs (double E-cup? Pah!), ratty blond hair extensions and a face full of collagen. Only twenty-one? Someone had been telling porkies. She couldn’t frown if her life depended on it.

  ‘I hear your dad’s some big shot chef . . .’ I began.

  ‘Brandi, I’d better call you a cab. It’s way past your bedtime,’ Evan interrupted, evidently not keen on us making friends.

  ‘But I thought I was staying here tonight. I’ve missed you, baby.’ Her bottom lip jutted out, and a wink accompanied the voice so sweet I could feel my teeth rotting.

  ‘Honey, there’s been a change of plan, all right? My friend from work has some urgent . . . work stuff we need to go over.’

  Oh, please. Evan’s gravelly tones had become as sickly as hers.

  ‘Wow, you’re a cop too? That’s so brave, you being a woman and all? I could never go round shooting at bad guys. I’d be too scared I’d hurt somebody.’

  ‘Guns will do that, honey. Best leave it to the professionals,’ Evan added.

  ‘You’d be surprised, Brandi,’ I chipped in. ‘Seems like they’re letting anyone on the force who thinks they’re a crack shot these days.’

  That earned me a killer stare from Evan before he spent the next five minutes fussing and fretting around his girlfriend, before Brandi was bundled into a cab post-haste.

  ‘You want to tell me what’s going on?’ Evan asked, his back to the wall by the fireplace after she’d gone.

  ‘You mean with Joe?’

  ‘Forget Joe! How about why you’re here? How about why you happened to swing by during our intimate evening?’

  ‘What, you mean with Barbie?’

  ‘It’s Brandi. Her name is Brandi,’ he said, karate-chopping his hand to drive home the point.

  ‘Don’t flatter yourself. You think I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t life-or-death important? A detective came to Faith today, asking about Joe and why I hadn’t reported him missing.’

  ‘You filed a missing report then? Great. Glad we had this chat.’ Shaking his head, he began ushering me toward the door.

  ‘Will you get off me?’ I replied, pushing him away. ‘Why do you think someone came to see me? Mr Petrozzi Senior beat me to it. He filed the missing person’s report, Evan. Joe is officially MIA now.’

  There wasn’t a flinch. ‘Who was the detective?’

  ‘Didn’t you hear me? Joe’s Houdini act is under investigation!’

  ‘Tell me who came to see you!’

  ‘Here. He gave me his card. Read it and weep,’ I taunted, pulling the card from my pocket and flinging it at Evan.

  He leant down, snatched it off the floor, retrieved his glasses from the neck of his Cubs T-shirt and read aloud, ‘Zupansky? Are you freakin’ kidding me? And why has this card got blood on it?’

  Okay, maybe he wasn’t so calm.

  ‘They know, Evan. They know he’s dead and we’re going to jail.’

  He flung the card into the fireplace. ‘Will you stop with this prison shit? No one is going to jail.’

  ‘Then why did Missing Persons, Violent Crimes, whatever, come to interrogate me? You know Joe’s car isn’t outside the apartment anymore? I went and checked. They must’ve towed it away. There’ll be a record of that somewhere. Maybe it’s just me, but why would a guy skip country and leave his car behind?’

  ‘Plenty of people leave their cars behind. Do you know how many cars are abandoned in the city each year? You’re thinking too much. What’s with you?’

  ‘What’s with me? How about you and me sort of drove out of Chicago with a dead body in the trunk, got out beside a wood and . . .’

  ‘Enough! You think I don’t know what’ll happen if they find out? Don’t think we’re on different pages here.’

  I could’ve gone to the police, but hadn’t. I could’ve called Zupansky, but didn’t. I could’ve done those things, though deep down I was too much of a coward to expose myself.

  ‘And why do you even care?’ Evan continued. ‘After everything that dick did to you, after all the blood he drew, you ran to his side. I should be the one worrying if this is heading south, not you.’

  ‘You think I’ll tell because I went to help a dying man?’

  ‘A dying man who’d just thrown you out of a car! If you’ve had a crisis of conscience and shot your mouth off to anyone, I need to know, or I go to prison and you can kiss your life goodbye too. You know what they do to cops in prison? It ain’t pretty. I’ve been trying to forget him, and you should too. If we don’t? There’s a padded cell at the Lakeview with both our names on it. There must be some reason you’re still carrying such a torch for him. What did he say to you that night?’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Before he died, what did Joe say?’

  ‘Nothing, he said nothing,’ I lied.

  ‘Bullshit. He didn’t call you over to watch him splutter to death. Don’t lie to me, what did he say?’

  ‘He said . . . he said three words. He said those three words.’

  ‘What, I love you?’ Evan chuckled. ‘That’s why you’ve been so upset, because he said he loved you? He was a drunk, honey. He attacked you more than once. Please don’t say you’d have chosen him if it came down to it.’

  ‘Wait, if it came down to wha
t?’

  Evan glanced at his feet. ‘Nothing. I, I’m thinking aloud.’

  ‘No, you mean if it came down to you or him? Deciding between you or him? That’s why you killed him, to get rid of the competition?’

  ‘No! I’m with Brandi, aren’t I?’

  ‘Like that ever stopped a man before. Look, however you try and pretty it up, we covered up murder. You might be able to deal, to pretend, but I’m in way over my head. Doesn’t it feel wrong to you?’

  ‘Feel wrong? It is wrong! You think I’m not going through hell here myself? Forget if anyone finds him, if anyone saw us . . . For all my years on the force, shit, I never killed anybody. I keep having this nightmare, where I’m searching for the bullet in his chest, but there’s just more and more blood. It begins pouring from everywhere until I’m covered in it. Until it blinds me. If you think you’re in way over your head, then I’m drowning here, man.’

  ‘Nightmares aren’t real, Evan, the police investigating us is. I don’t know. I’m thinking of going away, until everything’s a little less . . . dangerous.’ I neglected to mention I wasn’t planning on coming back.

  He smirked. ‘Oh, no. No way are you bailing on me. We’re in this shitty mess together, all right?’

  ‘But I stay and there’ll always be another detective snooping around. Eventually they’ll put two and two together. One day someone will discover what happened. Look, you should think about leaving too. What about the LAPD job? Staying here now this has happened? It’s a death sentence.’

  Evan’s words had run dry. He didn’t see it, couldn’t comprehend how close this was to being blown wide open. Joe Petrozzi was now formally missing, the police actively investigating any foul play. Why would anyone sit around and wait for them to check the street cameras, the eye-witness reports, the, ‘I did see a guy lugging something body-shaped down the stairs. Come to mention it, I haven’t seen Joe in a while.’ I hadn’t heard any rumours in Armanti, there was nothing on the news, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t another investigation, other than Zupansky’s, currently on going.