by Ian K. Smith
“I know a couple of agents,” I said. “There’s a lot of TV work here with all the shows like Chicago Fire and Empire shooting in the city.”
“I’ve always wondered if there was extra work,” she said, leaning forward even more. Her voice quivered with excitement.
I looked around the office. “What time they let you out of this place?”
She turned and looked back at the clock. “In about an hour when all of the examination rooms are empty.”
“Perfect,” I said. “My name is Dwayne McHenry. We can grab a coffee or something if you have time.” I extended my hand.
“Regina,” she said, taking my hand. “Regina Dalrymple.”
“I think I saw a celebrity just leaving your office,” I said, lowering my voice. “She was getting on the elevator as I was getting off.”
Regina’s eyes lit up. “Who was it?” she said.
“I’m not certain, but I think it was the daughter of one of the richest men in the city.” I closed my eyes as if deep in thought. “His name is Randolph Gerrigan, I think. Lives somewhere up there on the North Shore with the rest of the billionaires.”
Regina’s eyes widened. She looked around to make sure no one was paying us any attention and said, “Oh my God, Dwayne! You saw Tinsley Gerrigan.” She put her hand on top of mine. “I shouldn’t be saying anything, because I could get in big trouble for it. Patient confidentiality is really important, especially in our office. But you must be used to dealing with celebrities and their privacy.”
“A big part of my job,” I said. “I just wasn’t expecting someone like her to be leaving your office.”
“You’d be surprised,” Regina said. “We get them all. Wives and secret girlfriends of professional athletes, actresses from Second City, news anchors. If you want the best baby doctors in Chicago, you come to us.”
“Is this Gerrigan woman nice?” I asked.
Regina hummed her approval. “Couldn’t be sweeter,” she said.
“Well, at least she can afford these expensive medical bills,” I said. “I’ve heard that having a baby can set you back a little.”
She leaned closer to me. “Last time she came in, she paid her bill in cash. Just pulled out a stack of hundreds and paid the entire thing.”
I shook my head. “How could a girl from such a rich family not have medical insurance?”
“Oh, that wasn’t the problem,” Regina said. “She definitely has insurance. But she wants to remain anonymous. The girlfriends of the married athletes do the same thing. They come in with Gucci bags stuffed with cash.”
“How expensive are these appointments?”
“Really expensive. Good baby doctors aren’t cheap.”
“A few hundred a visit?”
“More than that. And if they have something like an ultrasound, forget it.”
“Try me.”
Regina ran her fingers across her keyboard. I moved slightly so that I could get a better look at the screen. She had typed in Tinsley’s name. The screen showed her alias to be Jennifer Bronson. I quickly scanned down the screen and found her emergency contact information. No name had been listed, just a phone number. I committed it to memory.
“Could be as much as twenty-seven hundred for one visit,” Regina said. “It gets pricey when you have a level two exam.”
I decided to stick with a soft approach. “The doctors here must be really good,” I said.
“They are,” she said. “But what makes you say that?”
I leaned forward a little and looked furtively around to signify what I was about to say was important.
“I just got to thinking about how special a place it must be if such high-profile clients trust you guys with something so important as their babies. That’s a reflection of you too. You’re around celebrities and socialites all the time. They have the money to go anywhere, and they choose your office. That’s saying something.”
“And for the most part, they are very respectful.” She leaned in. “But you know how some of them can be, especially the ones from the North Side. But the Gerrigan woman is a North Sider, and she doesn’t have her nose all turned up. Very down to earth.”
“Her baby will be lucky to have her as a mother,” I said.
“Babies,” Regina whispered.
“Twins?”
“Identical boys.”
“Wow, she’s gonna be busy.”
“Very,” Regina said. “She’s a little different.”
“How?”
Regina leaned closer. “Just like with paying cash and not using her real name,” she said. “Everything is such a secret. Dr. Calderone, the mother, is very protective of her. Won’t let anyone else in the practice see her, not even her daughter. She rarely does that. One of the nurses said it was something the patient insisted on.”
“Must be tough,” I said. “At a time when you should be the happiest and sharing the news of your pregnancy with the world, and you have to go it alone for fear someone is going to recognize you. And everyone thinks it’s so easy being rich and famous.”
“Oh, she’s not alone,” Regina said. “She has good support from what I’ve seen. One time the father of the baby came with her. He was very affectionate. Holding her hand and talking to her nicely. And he’s . . .” She ran her index finger over the back of her hand to indicate that he was black.
20
I WAS HEADING HOME from Obel’s Gourmet Market with my hands full of groceries, humming a Bruno Mars tune I couldn’t get out of my head. I had decided to treat myself to a sirloin tip roast cooked in a medley of carrots, potatoes, and celery. I had gotten the recipe from Barefoot Contessa on the Food Network. The wine was already back at home chilling. For dessert I was going to warm up a small apple pie I had taken home the other night courtesy of Penny Packer’s chef.
I was only a couple of blocks away from my building when I spotted the vehicle out of the corner of my eye. It was a black SUV with large shiny wheels, and it was moving very slowly. I picked up my pace a little, and it did the same. When I was stopped at the light at the corner of Grand and North McClurg Court, it sped up and pulled over. Two of the doors swung open, and two men in matching black sweatpants and hoodies descended upon me. They weren’t as big as the two from my first encounter with Ice’s security detail, but I could see the bulges of their muscles.
“Get the hell in the car,” the tallest one said. His head was shaved clean, and he was wearing black aviator sunglasses. Very provocative. I was frightened enough to cry.
“You really need to learn some manners,” I said. “People tend to respond better when you speak to them nicely.”
“You don’t have your sidekick with you today, wiseass,” the other guy said. “Now let’s see how tough you are.”
I didn’t have my gun either. But that was fine too. It was still an unfair fight. They had only two. I set my bag of groceries carefully on the ground. After this brief interruption I was still planning on cooking a wonderful dinner.
A short woman with wet curly brown hair was standing on the sidewalk with a bulldog on one of those retractable leashes. I heard her gasp and say, “Oh my God, Harry. We need to get home right away.”
The biggest one was smart enough to take off his shades. He was the first to reach me. He took a big windup and threw a right hook that my blind uncle in Mississippi could’ve seen a mile away and my ninety-year-old grandmother could’ve slipped under. I ducked and rolled and came up with a quick left jab to the center of his chest, just underneath where his ribs met. A doctor friend of mine once told me this was the home of the diaphragm, the body’s breathing muscle. Hit it hard enough and the diaphragm spasmed, and breathing became extremely difficult. The guy, however, took the first blow rather nicely, but when I connected with my right in the same spot, that was enough to bend him over. I kneed him in the ribs, and that was enough to put him down.
By the time I turned around, the second goon was already winding up with his left. I took a hal
f step back, and he just grazed my shoulder. No damage, just a little sting. I threw a kick that connected with his flank just above his right kidney. I rolled under a second wild punch and drove my elbow as hard as I could into his groin. No more punches today. It was rather difficult preparing a Michelin-starred meal with broken fingers. The goon backed up into the street with his hands covering his crotch and his eyes squeezed tightly. I was hoping he would say something to test the theory that blows to the genitalia had a way of lightening the voice. My own little experiment.
I calmly walked over to pick up my bag of groceries. The woman with the bulldog was already across the street watching with a look of horror on her face and her hand over her mouth.
“Okay, show-off,” a deep voice said. I turned to find the driver, a short, wide man with a small Afro, standing next to the car with an enormous gun pointed at me. It looked like a Desert Eagle .45 Long Colt, one of the biggest pistols on the street. “Ice would like you to join us for a little ride.”
“But of course,” I said, walking toward him. I handed him my grocery bag. “Don’t crush the groceries. Special dinner I’m making tonight. Feel free to stop by.”
I got into the back of the SUV. The two goons had collected themselves and followed in behind me, mumbling incoherently.
Ice was seated in the third row by himself. I couldn’t make out much other than his silhouette. He had his hat tipped to the side and was smoking a cigar. He waited for the car to pull away before he spoke.
“Nice work out there,” he said calmly.
“Wasn’t a fair fight,” I said. “There was only two of them, and they only outweighed me by some four hundred pounds.”
“Cocky bastard,” Ice said. “I want to hire you.”
The driver rolled us slowly through my neighborhood. We were now riding along the Chicago River. The water was full of ugly boats crammed with overeager tourists and their digital cameras.
“Thanks for the offer, but unfortunately, I don’t work for the nefarious,” I said.
“What the fuck?” one of the guys said from the front seat. “We gonna always need a damn dictionary to communicate with this muthafuckah? Speak some goddamn English for once.”
“Easy, Flex,” Ice said. His voice remained even. “I’ll pay whatever your rate is plus twenty-five percent.”
“Why do you need me when you’ve got the dynamic duo?”
“I don’t need muscle,” Ice said. “I need some detective work.”
“My forte,” I said. “But what would I be detecting?”
“I want to find out who killed my nephew.” He paused for a second as if gathering his thoughts. “Then I’m going to rip their body apart limb by fuckin’ limb. And I’m gonna make sure they’re alive when I scrape their eyes out.” The calm tone and quiet of his voice never changed. Killing was a subject he knew very well.
“Someone wants you to think it was the Warlords,” I said.
“I know they didn’t do it,” Ice said. “Wouldn’t make any sense. We’re at peace right now. Chico and I ain’t friends, but we have an understanding.”
The driver pulled up slowly to the front of my building. I could see the lobby filling up with other residents returning home from a productive day of work. I wanted to join them and retreat to the quiet of my apartment.
“I don’t want your money, Ice,” I said. “I want to find Chopper’s killer for my own reasons.”
“Which are?”
“First, I think whoever killed Chopper might have something to do with Tinsley’s disappearance.”
“You worried about that little rich bitch,” Ice said. “I’m worried about my flesh and blood.”
“Our interests don’t conflict,” I said.
Ice seemed satisfied for the moment.
“Second, I liked your nephew. We talked only that one time in my office, but he was genuine. And he definitely had a future. The kid knew Shakespeare. I want the person who did this as much as you do.”
“I’ll be checking in,” Ice said.
“And I’ll be detecting.” I grabbed the bag of groceries and opened the door. “My sirloin roast tip awaits.”
21
CHOPPER MCNAIR HAD LIVED IN a luxury doorman building on South Michigan Avenue and Seventeenth Street. The glass-and-chrome facade rose prominently above a cluster of low buildings and quiet storefronts. Light from the gleaming marble foyer bounced through the doors as I approached. A short older man with a horseshoe rim of hair and an ill-fitting black suit sat behind a cherrywood desk outfitted with several monitors and an elaborate intercom system. He had been reading the Sun-Times as I walked across the lobby.
“Hey, Joseph,” I said, reading his name tag. “I was hoping you could give me a few minutes.”
“Are you here to see someone?”
“Not really. I just had a few questions.”
He took off his reading glasses and shoved them in his vest pocket as he stood. “The management office is closed,” he said. “They open nine sharp tomorrow morning.”
“I was hoping I could talk to you,” I said.
Joseph shrugged. “Sure,” he said. “Whatchya got?”
“I’m here about Chopper McNair,” I said. “Did you know him?”
“What’s your name, son?” he said.
“Ashe Cayne.”
“Ashe, I’ve been here since this building was put up fifteen years ago and worked the building that was here before that. I know all of my residents. That’s my job. Why are you asking about Chopper?”
“I’m a private investigator,” I said. “I’m trying to understand what happened to him.”
“Don’t make no sense to me,” Joseph said. “He was a good kid. Smart kid. He didn’t cause no trouble. Very mannerly every time I saw him.”
“Did he have guests visit him?”
Joseph shrugged. “Not many. A girl here and there, but for the most part, he kept to himself. He was a young man, so he was social, but he didn’t carry on like some of the others who live here—coming in all hours of the night, three sheets to the wind, can barely get on the elevator.”
“So, nothing unusual or suspicious?”
“Not that I can think of. He pretty much kept to himself and didn’t bother nobody. He loved the Bulls. We talked all the time about the games and the players. One year he gave me a pair of tickets for Christmas. Two seats behind the bench. Nicest gift anyone ever gave me here. I just can’t believe the kid is gone. Who would do something like that?”
“That’s what I’m trying to piece together.”
The revolving door swung open and two young women, dressed as if they had been out partying, walked through the foyer. They spoke to Joseph, who then called them both by their names and bid them a good night.
“Something happened a while ago that was unusual,” Joseph said. “It might not have been anything, but I remember it caught my attention.”
“How long ago?”
“At least six months or so. Sometime over the winter.”
“What happened?”
“I’m not really sure exactly what the problem was, but there was a problem. Chopper came down in the elevator one night, but instead of coming out through the front here, he went out the back of the elevator and left through the back door that leads to the alley and loading dock. I looked down at the camera, and there was a dark car parked out back. It was around ten o’clock or so, about an hour after I had started my shift. The back door of the car opened, and a white man got out.”
“Do you remember what he looked like?”
“Rich. Really rich. He was wearing a long coat with a silk-looking scarf, and he had a suit underneath. Pinstripes. I remember, because the stripes were so wide. Chopper walked up to him, and they started talking. It seemed okay at first, but a couple of minutes in, the man started pointing at Chopper; then Chopper started moving his hands around like he was upset. He turned away from the man, walked a little, then came back and they started again. The man point
ed at Chopper again, then got back in the car, and it pulled away.”
“You catch the make of the car?”
“Black Rolls-Royce SUV.”
“How are you so sure?”
“Because one of the partners who owns this building just got one. But it’s white.”
“You still have the surveillance video from that night stored somewhere?”
“Unfortunately not. After three months, the machine records over the old video. It’s been at least six months since this happened, probably longer.”
“Had you ever seen Chopper with this man before?”
“Never.”
“Do you remember his face?”
“Not so much. Wasn’t easy to see it on the monitor the way he was standing.”
I took out my phone and pulled up a photo of Tinsley and her father at some black-tie function. I handed the phone to Joseph.
“That’s Chopper’s girlfriend,” he said right away. “Pretty girl. Very polite every time she came here. You know how they can act all high and mighty sometimes. She wasn’t like that. Very respectful. Sometimes she would bring me a coffee and a muffin. I didn’t know I liked cranberry bran until she brought me one.”
“Anything else you can think of?” I said.
He shook his head. “I just hope you find who did this. He was a good kid. I still can’t believe he’s gone. I keep looking at the door, expecting him to walk in any minute. Somebody needs to pay for this.”
22
WEST HUMBOLDT PARK HAS long claimed the inglorious distinction of being one of the most violent neighborhoods in the city. It had become a cultural revolving door, starting with the Scandinavian immigrants in the late 1800s, followed by the Germans, Italians, Russians, and Polish. In the mid-1960s, a huge influx of Puerto Rican immigrants poured into this once pastoral setting just west of the enormous two-hundred-acre park. They never left.
The years and migratory patterns had not been kind to naturalist Alexander von Humboldt’s dream. Poverty, hopelessness, and lawlessness had transformed his vision into yet another urban neighborhood fractured and dominated by several local gangs. The biggest territory belonged to the Latin Warlords, eminently ruled by Chico Vargas, a skinny Puerto Rican who was obsessed with the White Sox and never missed Sunday mass unless there was a home game at what the old-timers still called Comiskey Park. Vargas ruled his empire from the back of the Taco Shack, a small storefront that was part convenience store and part restaurant that served tacos, seafood, and pizza. It was also known to have the largest array of condoms in all Chicago.
