Quick Study

by Maggie Barbieri

  “Excuse me,” she said snottily.

  I didn’t have time to go back to explain my situation or tell her to buzz off so I kept running, hoping the light at the corner would turn red and I would be able to pull Max from the car. The last thing she needed to do in yesterday’s clothes and with her marriage falling apart was spend the day hanging around with the supermodel biathlete. The car sped off through a yellow light—but not before Morag and I locked eyes in her rearview mirror.

  Where the hell were they going? And why? Max was certainly a bit off-kilter emotionally but I had no idea what Morag was doing in this neighborhood and why Max would get in her car and go off to parts unknown. I walked dejectedly down the street, passing the same lady with her little dog. “Well, I never,” she harrumphed as I passed her again.

  “I don’t doubt it,” I whispered under my breath, giving her a dazzling smile. “Have a nice day!”

  I went back to the diner, where I found Crawford in our booth, but now with Abreu and Goldenberg. They were sharing a laugh about something and the sight of the three of them, chuckling away, made me a little suspicious.

  I slid into the booth next to Crawford. “I see you’ve met?” I said, pointing at the men across from us.

  “Where’s Max?” Crawford asked, still munching on her leftover fries.

  “She had to go,” I said cryptically. I pinched him, hard, under the table, and he grimaced. I didn’t know why, but I didn’t want Abreu and Goldenberg to know about Max, lest they get the idea that they needed to question her, too. That was the last thing she needed.

  Goldenberg had a fresh cup of coffee in front of him into which he spooned more sugar than one person should consume in a week. He stirred it around in the cup and then took a small, dainty sip. “So, Dr. Bergeron, what’s been happening with you since we last saw each other?”

  “You mean since the time you called me a Hispanic male?” I asked. Crawford obviously had no idea what I was talking about and looked at me, his brow furrowed. I didn’t feel the need to elaborate.

  Goldenberg smiled slightly.

  “Any further along in finding Madeleine’s real killer?” I asked.

  Abreu looked down at the table. “Not really. Any ideas?”

  “No.” I looked at Crawford. “What about Jose Tomasso?”

  Goldenberg smiled sadly. “No on that front, too. But that has more to do with your. . .” he paused, “. . .paramour here than the FBI.”

  “Paramour.” Now there was a word I could get used to saying. I looked over at him. “Did you fill them in on my excellent adventure?”

  He nodded, eyeing the remainder of Max’s cheeseburger. “But they already knew. Feds are smart,” he said in a way that neither Goldenberg nor Abreu could tell was with sarcasm.

  Goldenberg took another tentative sip of hot coffee. “I’m going to let you in on something, Dr. Bergeron.” He stirred some more sugar into the cup. “We do not think that Mr. Tomasso’s death is linked to Agent Cranston’s.”

  I waited for more information. When none was forthcoming, I asked, “So?”

  “That’s it.”

  “And you came all this way to tell me that?”

  Abreu smiled at me. “No. We just like to follow you around.”

  Goldenberg shot him a look. “I’m actually curious to find out what you think about that.”

  I had no thoughts and I wasn’t sure why they were interested in anything I had to say. Up until a few hours ago, I was sure they had been thinking that I had had something to do with it. “It’s no wonder that the federal government has a multitrillion dollar deficit,” I said, moving out of the booth. “If this is how you guys spend your money, you need a new accountant.” I stood next to the booth and looked at the three of them.

  Abreu held my gaze. “Where’s Hernan Escalante, Dr. Bergeron?”

  I hadn’t expected that question and I tried not to let it show on my face. “I don’t know,” I said, adding an exaggerated shrug for good measure.

  Abreu continued to look at me. “You do know that harboring a fugitive is a federal crime?”

  “A fugitive?” And was it really harboring if he wasn’t actually living with me? I decided not to ask that question.

  “Mr. Escalante is being sought in the murder of Federal Agent Cranston,” Abreu said in his monotone. “A crime that carries a life sentence.”

  My pancakes turned to acid in my stomach. “That’s interesting.”

  “I don’t want to get into the sentence for harboring a fugitive.” Abreu looked at Crawford, who looked like he was in the middle of a bad dream.

  “How do you look in orange?” Goldenberg asked. “Jumpsuits?”

  “Hey, Goldenberg? Back off,” Crawford said testily. “There’s no need to go there.” He reached across the table and grabbed my hand.

  “This is a very serious situation, Detective Crawford,” Goldenberg said.

  “You don’t think I know that?” Crawford asked, sitting up a little straighter.

  “Well, your girlfriend seems to think that we’re joking around.” Goldenberg stirred the coffee a little more. “We’re not.”

  “Trust me,” Crawford said, leaning over the table, “she knows exactly how serious the situation is.” He looked at me and the expression on his face said, “Don’t you?”

  Their little exchange allowed me to regain my composure. I nodded enthusiastically. “If I find out anything about Mr. Escalante, I will be sure to let you know,” I said. I realized that I had slumped a little bit so I pulled myself upright again and looked at Crawford. “Coming?”

  He looked at me. “I haven’t ordered yet,” he said pointedly, leading me to believe that he had a few things to discuss with the agents.

  I looked at Max’s decimated plate; if the remains of her breakfast hadn’t satisfied him, I didn’t know what would. “OK. I’m going back to the apartment. Can I have the keys?” I asked.

  He reached into his pants pocket and pulled them out. “I’ll see you back there?” He squeezed my other hand.

  I nodded. “I’ll be there.” I nodded to Abreu and Goldenberg. “And I hope this is good-bye,” I said. I got out to the street, pulled my cell phone from my pocket—luckily I’d left it at home last night—and dialed Max’s number. She picked up on the first ring. “Where are you?” I asked.

  “Heading downtown,” she said. “Morag is going to drop me off at my apartment.”

  “A cab would have sufficed, don’t you think?” I said. “What was she doing outside the diner?”

  “She lives in the neighborhood.”

  “She does?” This was the first I was hearing about that little detail. I thought she lived with Richie on the Upper East Side.

  “Yep. Right around the corner.” I heard another voice, presumably Morag’s, in the background, and I heard Max respond with my name. “Listen, I’ll call you later, OK?” She hung up.

  I stopped in front of Crawford’s building, his keys in my hand. I jingled them slightly, noticing the key to his car, the biggest and heftiest on the ring, slapping against my palm. I shoved my cell phone back into my pocket and continued walking past the apartment and toward Ninety-eighth Street, where Crawford had parked his car the night before. Something about Max being with Morag didn’t sit right with me and I was going to drive downtown just to make sure that she got home safely. Call it a hunch. In the back of my mind, I wondered if I should call it jealousy—was Max replacing me with a supermodel biathlete?—but I pushed that aside. I was concerned about my friend. If I was wrong and Morag was just providing a shoulder to cry on, I would feel a little foolish but at least I would know that Max was safe. And if Morag was more involved in this whole situation than I originally thought and was now involving Max, then I would need to get to the bottom of it. I pointed the key ring at Crawford’s car and unlocked the doors. It wasn’t the first time in our relationship that I had appropriated Crawford’s car but I told myself that it would be the last.

  My cell
phone rang as I got the seat into a comfortable position. It was Jimmy Crawford. “Hey! Did you forget about me?” he asked.

  Yes. I had forgotten about him, Hernan, and a bunch of other things. That’s what happens when you get locked in a trunk for several hours: You forget things. “Oh, Jimmy. Hi. I’m sorry I didn’t call you back.”

  “Not a problem. Did you tell Bobby that I have his will?”

  I adjusted the rearview and side-view mirrors in preparation for my trip to Tribeca. “I did. He hasn’t called you back?”

  “No, but I didn’t expect him to. We’ve got a command performance at Mom’s next week so I figured I’d give him the stuff then. I just wanted to make sure that he knows the will is ready.”

  “I told him but I’ll remind him.” As I pulled out of the spot and into the sparse, Sunday-morning traffic, Jimmy asked me why I had originally called him. “Oh, that.” I explained the situation with Hernan and asked if he knew a good immigration lawyer.

  “As a matter of fact, I do. Where’s your friend now?”

  I hesitated. I thought about federal prison and how I wouldn’t enjoy it.

  “If you tell me, you’ll have to kill me?” he asked.

  “Something like that.” I merged onto the West Side Highway and headed south.

  “Well, I’ll need a little more information to go on in order to help you.”

  I hadn’t taken that into account. “Listen, Jimmy. I’ll call you when I get home so we can either talk about this in more detail or we can meet and discuss it. How would that be?”

  “Sounds good. Hey, the Rangers are doing great this year, huh?”

  That brought a smile to my face. “They are. And I’m taking Bobby to a game next Thursday night.”

  “The good seats?”

  “The good seats,” I confirmed.

  “That oughta make him happy. If not, wanna be my girlfriend?”

  I flipped the phone closed and threw it onto the seat next to me. I figured I had another twenty minutes before Crawford realized that I was missing, then another ten before he realized I had his car. I prayed that I would find Max in her apartment, her arms wrapped around that Neanderthal she called her husband.

  I called her cell phone one more time but this time it rang about ten times before going to voice mail.

  Thirty-Four

  I sat outside Max’s building waiting to see if she appeared. I had double-parked outside the building and run in to ask the doorman if she was home. She wasn’t; I had just missed her. And neither was Fred, but I didn’t know that until I saw him walking down the street with a petite redhead alongside him. I slumped down in the seat so that my head wasn’t visible over the steering wheel but I always forget: detectives are observant. It was only seconds later that a giant hand was rapping on the driver’s side window. I recognized it as Fred’s. I looked up and gave him a little wave.

  “We don’t allow double-parking on this street,” he said through the closed window.

  I sat up. “I’ll be moving along shortly.”

  He shoved his hands into his pocket. “Where’s Crawford?”

  “Eating breakfast.”

  He looked at the car, clearly not mine, and raised his eyebrow at me. “Did you have fun last night?”

  I made a face. “What do you think?” He was either completely clueless or the most accomplished asshole I had ever met. I decided to go with the former.

  “Where’s my wife?”

  “I don’t know. I was hoping that you did.”

  He stared back at me and for the first time since I had met him, I saw the traces of emotion on his face. He was worried.

  We stared at each other for a few seconds until our inaction was interrupted by my cell phone. I saw Max’s number on the caller ID and immediately felt calm flood through my body. “Max! Where are you?”

  “I’m on my way to Riviera Pointe. The sales office. I’m buying an apartment.”

  I looked at Fred but I didn’t tell him what she’d said. “Don’t do that.” I tried to sound forceful without arousing Fred’s suspicion. Too late: he was walking around the car and getting into the passenger’s seat before I had a chance to think.

  “It’s over, Alison. It was a huge mistake,” she said. In addition to being a fast runner, an infrequent crier, and my best friend, nobody makes a decision as quickly—and with as much finality—as Max. “I got married too fast. You were right.”

  “No,” I said. “Listen, I’m with Fred. We’ll come up there. Don’t do anything until we get there.” She protested slightly but I could tell that her heart wasn’t entirely in this acquisition. “Wait for us. We’ll be there in twenty minutes. Tops.” I closed the phone, for once ending the conversation before she could. I angled out of my awkward double-parked spot and onto the street, heading back toward the West Side Highway, this time to go north to the Bronx.

  “What did she say?” he asked.

  I didn’t respond to the question. “More importantly, who’s the redhead?”

  “God, you’re a pain in the ass.”

  “I’m a pain in the ass?” I asked, incredulous. “Your wife is ready to call it quits with you and I’m trying to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

  “She is?” He seemed genuinely surprised at that news.

  “What did you think when she didn’t come home last night? After what had happened to us, don’t you think she would have wanted to come home to you?” I asked.

  He turned and looked at me, his giant bald head just inches from my face. “She told me that she was going to spend the night at your house and that I shouldn’t expect to see her until this afternoon. What happened to the two of you?”

  I filled him in on the night’s events. He put his face into his hands as I recounted my evening and Max’s role in it. “So, to recap, there’s an ex-con out there with my car, my house keys, and all my credit cards and cash.”

  He groaned a little bit. “Who’s looking for him?”

  “Hopefully the entire state of New York, but for sure, the Westchester County cops are on the case.”

  “You’re not going home, right?”

  I looked at him and gave him a look. “I think that’s obvious.”

  “You can stay with us if you wear out your welcome with Bobby,” he said.

  I was hoping that wasn’t a possibility but I thanked him for his hospitality. I didn’t want to remind him that he might not be living with Max for very long and that I might be her permanent roommate in the wake of his departure. I looked at him out of the corner of my eye and got the impression that he was considering the same thing. His right elbow was resting on the edge of the window and his forehead was resting in his palm. He stared out the window at the passing cars.

  After a few minutes of silence, I asked my initial question again. “Who’s the redhead?”

  He hesitated, seemingly deciding whether to tell me anything, and if so, how much. He started and then stopped. Finally, he said, “She’s the Bronx ME.”

  I’ve learned a thing or two in the years since I divorced my late ex-husband. One, where there’s smoke, there’s fire. And two . . . well, there is no two. Let’s just say that I’m really, really paranoid and suspicious as a result of Ray’s philandering. “What’s the Bronx ME doing in your neighborhood on a Sunday morning?”

  He hesitated again and then started talking. And talking. And talking. In the year since I had met Fred, he hadn’t said so much. Now he wouldn’t shut up. The upshot? They had had a relationship a long time ago. They had even talked marriage. But the relationship had ended badly.

  It still didn’t explain what she was doing in the neighborhood on a Sunday morning, but it explained Fred’s “no secrets” rule. He and Melanie Moscowitz—the infamous Bronx ME who Max was obsessed with—were now working more closely than either had anticipated when they had parted eight years earlier and he was trying to find a way to tell Max. Or not tell her. He couldn’t decide what to do. Because based on his reactions to fin
ding out about Max’s prodigious dating career prior to her marriage to him, he wasn’t sure how she’d react to her finding out about Moscowitz.

  “You’ve really created a problem where none exists,” I said, pointing out what I thought was obvious.

  “How so?”

  “Do you really think that Max is going to care about a relationship that was over eight years ago?”

  He shrugged and grunted. “She might.”

  “But you’ll never know until you talk about this like adults,” I said. Boy, did I sound reasonable. I had no idea how Max would respond but I had to give her the benefit of the doubt. I had never known Max to be the jealous type, but I had never known Max to be in love, either. It was a crap shoot, but in my heart I knew that this was not an insurmountable problem. Maybe I should open up a relationship counseling center; I seemed to be very good at this kind of thing.

  “The relationship ended because I had a one-night stand.” He looked out the window. “With her sister.”

  “OK . . .” I said slowly. Forget the relationship counseling center. I didn’t have the stomach for this.

  “It was a long time ago,” he said. “A long time ago.” He turned and looked at me. “I’m not that guy anymore, Alison.”

  You’d better not be, I thought. I chewed on all this for a few minutes. Strangely enough, I believed him. I wasn’t the same woman who had married a serial philanderer, so I knew that people could change. “So why was she down here today?”

  “She wanted to clear the air. We’re going to be working together and we couldn’t have this stuff between us.”

  We needed to spend more time on this topic, but we had pulled up to Riviera Pointe and had to suspend our discussion, at least temporarily. I pulled into the same spot that I had the first time I had been there but saw no sign of Class of ’59, my cranky friend—and I breathed a sigh of relief for that. I didn’t think I could take much more of him, given the events and revelations of the last twenty-four hours.

  I turned off the car and took off my seat belt. “This is not the best time to get into this with Max, obviously, but you have to tell her, Fred.”