The Alamo - John Milton #11 (John Milton Thrillers)

by Mark Dawson

  “Sure,” she replied. “But I only got coffee.”

  “Is that okay?” Milton asked.

  Freddy had retreated into himself once more. He sat on a plastic chair in the corner of the room, cradling the football.

  “Freddy?”

  He nodded his head.

  “Thank you, Felicia,” Milton said. “And one for me too, please.”

  Felicia was in the process of pouring hot water into the two china mugs that she had found when the police finally arrived. A uniformed officer knocked on the door; Milton could see the woman through the window. Felicia hurried across to open the door and let the officer inside. There was another one outside—this one older and male—speaking into his radio.

  “Got a call about a dead body?”

  The sight of the police officers seemed to reinvigorate Felicia’s confidence. Perhaps it was the uniforms, the feeling that reinforcements had arrived, but she bustled forward and put out her chest. “I called it in,” she said.

  “Where?”

  She pointed to the restroom. “In there.”

  “Door locked?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Could we have the key, please?”

  She went over to her desk and, after a moment spent fumbling through loose papers during which Milton was concerned she might somehow have misplaced the key, she found it and handed it over. The police officer handed it to her partner and waited with them as he went to check the room.

  “What’s he gonna find?” she asked.

  “Body on the floor. Lot of blood.”

  “Did you find the body?”

  “No, I did not,” she said. She pointed at Milton and Freddy. “They did. They came out and told me. But I went and checked that it was true and I called you.”

  “Sir,” the police officer said, “that true? You found it?”

  “I did,” he said. “But I think you’d better speak to him first.” He pointed to where the boy was sitting in the corner.

  “The kid? Why?”

  “He went in first. He found the body—I found him.”

  “And he’s not with you?”

  Milton shook his head. “No.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “John Smith.”

  “So how do you fit into it?”

  “I was going to use the bathroom. I opened the door and saw the body. The boy was in one of the cubicles.”

  “Right. Have you spoken to him?”

  “Just briefly. He’s scared.”

  “You know his name?”

  “Freddy.”

  “Last name?”

  “Didn’t ask for that.”

  The office was tiny, and it would have been impossible for the officer to speak to Freddy without Milton being able to hear what she said. She knelt down so that she was at his level and put a hand on his shoulder.

  “I’m Officer Farley,” she said. “You’re Freddy, right?”

  He nodded.

  “What’s your last name, Freddy?”

  “Blanco.”

  “How old are you?”

  “Thirteen.”

  “You out on your own tonight? It’s pretty late.”

  He nodded.

  “He’s been to the Giants game,” Milton offered.

  Farley turned to look at him. “I got this, Mr. Smith.” She turned back. “Were you in the restroom?”

  Freddy nodded.

  “Tell me what happened.”

  “I needed to pee. I came out and saw…”

  “Go on.”

  “I saw the man coming in.”

  “The man? Do you mean the victim?”

  “Yes. I saw him come in. He started barfing at the sink, and then I left.”

  “But you found his body? How’d that happen?”

  “I left this in the bathroom.” The boy tapped a finger against the football that was clutched to his chest. “I got out to the street, realised I’d left it and came right back inside.”

  “And then?”

  “Found the man on the floor.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Like what?”

  “You see anyone else?”

  “Two men. One of them, a black guy, was waiting outside the door. I thought it was strange. Then a white guy came out of the bathroom and they left.”

  “You get a good look at them?”

  “I…” The words trailed off.

  “Did you see them, Freddy?”

  Freddy shook his head. “Not really.”

  “You saw them or you didn’t?”

  “I only saw the black guy, really” Freddy said.

  “And?”

  Freddy shrugged. “That’s all. I was trying not to look at them.”

  The office door opened and the second officer came inside before Farley could ask Freddy anything more. Farley glanced across at him. “So?”

  “So it’s like they said. It’s a guy, Latino, looks like his throat’s been cut. It’s messy. We’re gonna need homicide down here.”

  27

  Carter dumped his soiled jacket in the back seat and drove them both away from the station. At the corner of Fulton and Marcus Garvey Boulevard, he pulled over, wiped the knife with a rag to remove the blood and his prints, got out of the car and dumped both items in a dumpster outside Royal Bengal Fried Chicken & Grocery. He would be more careful with the recorder—he’d toss it off the bridge on the way home.

  He got back into the car and followed Fulton to the west until he reached Nostrand Avenue. The Mystery bar was between two hair salons: one that advertised itself for men and women and another that promised the best hair extensions in Brooklyn. He pulled over outside the bar and switched off the engine. He reached back for his jacket and held it out: there were big splashes of blood right in the middle of it.

  “Motherfucker,” he cursed. “Just bought this last week.”

  “So buy another,” Shepard said.

  He had another lightweight jacket in the truck, so he took that and put it on, then got out and led the way into the bar. It was run by an ex-cop called Cousins who had worked the precinct three years ago, cashing out his pension and buying the bar. He had a clientele of cops from the surrounding sectors, a group of regulars who came here knowing that they would get a good deal on their booze and an atmosphere of peers who would keep whatever was discussed inside private.

  Cousins was behind the bar and raised a hand in greeting as Carter and Shepard came inside and took a table at the back of the room. Shepard went up to the bar to get a couple of beers and Carter took the opportunity to check his phone for messages from Becky. She had sent a text two hours ago reminding him to get a crib and then another asking where he was. He tapped out a reply to that message, telling her that he was having a drink with Shep. She would know that would mean that he would be home late and wouldn’t wait up for him. Carter would grab the crib on the way into the precinct tomorrow. No problem.

  Shepard came back with the beers and handed one of the bottles to Carter. He took it, held it up, and touched it against Shepard’s bottle.

  We got lucky,” Carter said. “You didn’t see anyone?”

  “Just some kid.”

  “And you’re sure the cameras don’t work?”

  “Haven’t worked for weeks,” Shepard said. “You know Carl Rivera?”

  “Sure,” Carter replied. “Dumbass. Sells weed on Pitkin, least he used to.”

  “Transport cops busted him inside the station last week,” Shepard said. “I know someone who knows him. Had to let him go because the cameras weren’t working.”

  Carter held up his bottle again and Shepard clinked it once more.

  He took a swig of his beer. “What do we do about Carlos?” he said, wiping his mouth.

  Carter had been thinking about that on the drive across Brooklyn. “We gotta tell him. We can’t not.”

  “We should’ve spoken to him before. Him and González were tight.”

  “We had no choice,” Ca
rter said, annoyed with his friend’s concern. “If González had gotten to the cops, we would all have been in the shit. We would’ve been the first to get rolled up. And you think Carlos would just let that happen? You think he’d take the chance that we’d talk? No. He would’ve done us both. And González could still have spilled on him, too. He’s gonna be pissed with González, not with us. We did what we had to do.”

  “Who were you riding with today?”

  “A rookie,” Carter said. “It was his first day.”

  “What you tell him?”

  “That the baby was coming. It’s fine—I’ll say it was a false alarm.”

  Shepard grinned at him. “You remember your first day?”

  “You gonna bring that up again?”

  Carter remembered it well. They had sent him out on a foot post. He was on the corner of Liberty and Fountain with his thumb up his ass. He got a ten-two call over the radio, but he didn’t know the codes, so he just ignored it. He got back to the station at the end of the tour and the sergeant and a few of the other guys, including Shepard, were waiting for him at the front desk. The ten-two was an instruction to get back to the station house. The sergeant held up the license plate for his car and handed it to him. A drunk driver had slammed into the back of his prized Camaro and crushed it against a wall. The plate was all that was left of it.

  “Your face,” Shepard said. “I’m never gonna forget it.”

  Carter allowed himself a smile and finished the rest of his beer. “I got to get out of here.”

  “You don’t want another?”

  “Some of us are still working,” he said. “I got another shift tomorrow, and we’ll need to see Carlos before. I’m tired. I need to get some sleep.”

  “Pussy,” Shepard said, but he raised his bottle in a friendly salute, said he was going to stay for another and that he would get a cab home. He told Carter to call him when he had spoken to Acosta.

  Carter said that he would. He zipped up the replacement jacket and went out to the truck. It was cold and getting colder. The forecast for snow looked about right. They said a big storm was coming. He hoped the baby came before that happened, or getting to the hospital might turn into more of a challenge than it might otherwise have been. He opened the door of the truck and got in. No sense in worrying about that now.

  There was no sense in worrying about González, either. They’d done what they had to do and they’d done it well. They were in the clear.

  He started the engine and pulled out onto the empty street. He had a long drive home ahead of him.

  28

  The uniformed officers had a patrol car parked on the street outside the entrance to the station. They led Milton and Freddy outside, opened the rear doors, and invited them to get inside. The front of the car was separated from the back by a wire cage, and he knew, as the door was pushed shut, that he wouldn’t be able to open it. There was no suggestion that Milton was being treated as a suspect, but he had a long-ingrained aversion to places that he couldn’t easily leave. He had an aversion to authority, too, and he was finding the experience unsettling. He had begun to wonder whether it might not have been a much better idea to have slipped out of the restroom and disappeared into the Brooklyn night. But, as he had that thought, he remembered Freddy in the car beside him. The boy had the ball in his lap and his hands were clasped over the top of it, his fists clenching and unclenching as he struggled with obvious anxiety. Milton’s unease was irrelevant in comparison to Freddy’s. He had promised to help him, and that was that. He had to stay. He was going to do the right thing.

  The officers got into the front of the car and they set off, heading west on Pitkin.

  “Where’s the station house?”

  “Sutter,” Farley said. “Five minutes.”

  They turned onto Essex Street and then onto Sutter Avenue.

  “Freddy,” Farley said, “you want to give me your dad’s number again? I’m not getting anything when I try it.”

  Farley had already tried to call the boy’s father three times, but had no luck. Milton saw a flicker of unease pass across the boy’s face, but he repeated the number and waited in silence as Farley put it into her phone and called again.

  “Nothing,” she said. “Is he usually this hard to reach?”

  “Don’t know,” the boy said with a shrug. Milton could see that he was withholding something.

  “Never mind,” the officer said. “I’ll keep trying. If he doesn’t answer, I’ll just drive over and get him.”

  Milton looked out at the darkened streets, almost deserted at this late hour, and settled back in the seat to wait for them to arrive. They would want him to give a statement. He would do that, and stay with Freddy until his father arrived, and then he would be on his way.

  The precinct house for the Seventy-Fifth Precinct was on Sutter Avenue, but Milton and Freddy were driven around to a yard at the rear of the building. There were other patrol cars, and officers stood outside the doors talking over cups of coffee that steamed in the cold. The patrol car pulled into an empty space and Farley got out to open the door for them. Milton got out first and then Freddy slid across the seat to join him.

  “This way,” Farley said, pointing to the doors.

  They went inside, making their way along a dingy corridor until they reached the main room of the station house. Farley pointed to a bench where they could wait, and then left them to go and speak to the desk sergeant. Milton took his place on the bench next to the boy and casually looked across the room. The information desk ran across the front of the squad room, facing the entrance corridor. The wall behind it was fitted with a large number of pigeonholes for sundry forms. There was a blotter on top of the desk with a PC terminal behind it. There were filing cabinets to the right and, on a low bench, a TV screen played back footage from the security cameras around the building. A widescreen TV had been affixed to the wall and Milton watched as it cycled through a series of promotional videos for the NYPD.

  Milton turned to the boy. “You okay?”

  He was clutching the ball to his chest as if that might help him through the next few hours.

  “Do you know where your father might have gone?” he asked.

  Freddy shook his head.

  “Is it unusual?” Milton pressed. “Is he often out of touch like this?”

  “No,” the boy replied.

  “What about your mother?”

  “She don’t live with us no more,” he said tersely, and looked away.

  Milton would have tried to get a little additional information from him, but he noticed that Farley had returned with another woman. She was dressed in a pantsuit and carried a small leather pouch. Her dark hair was parted and swept back tightly behind both ears. She had a severe aspect, everything underlined by flinty eyes and a mouth that didn’t look as if it was accustomed to regular smiling. Milton guessed that she was in her early forties.

  “Hello,” she said. “I’m Detective Mackintosh. You’re Mr. Smith?”

  “That’s right,” Milton said.

  “Could you come through here, please?” She made a quarter turn and indicated a door at the side of the room.

  Milton paused, looking down at Freddy.

  “You’re not related, are you?” The question was rhetorical; it was obvious that Milton and the boy were not kin.

  “No,” Milton said.

  “Then don’t worry. Officer Farley will look after him until his parents show up. Please—this way.”

  29

  Milton followed Mackintosh into the interview room. It was dark; the detective reached out for the light switch and flicked it on. To call the room that was revealed ‘functional’ would have been generous: the walls were painted concrete blocks, with vents down toward the floor and a window into an empty observation area in the adjacent room. There was a single desk in the centre of the room with two metal folding chairs facing one another. Milton’s attention was drawn to the two cameras on the wall facing him.
There was one in each corner, both aimed to cover the table from two directions.

  “Take a seat,” Mackintosh said.

  Milton pulled out a chair and sat down at the table. The detective sat down opposite him. There was a small device with three buttons on the table. Mackintosh took out a pad of paper and a pen from the pouch that she was carrying and laid them out next to the device.

  “We’ll record our conversation,” she said, pointing up to the cameras. “Is that okay?”

  “Yes,” Milton said, although the thought made him uncomfortable.

  She picked up the device. Milton could see that the buttons were labelled START, STOP and RECORD. She pressed the button marked RECORD.

  “This interview is being tape recorded at the station house of the Seventy-Fifth Precinct. I am Detective Rebecca Mackintosh. There are no other officers present. We are in interview room three. For the purpose of the tape, could you please state your name and date of birth?”

  “John Smith.” He gave her the date of birth on his fake papers.

  “Thank you very much. The date is the twenty-seventh of November and the time is 23:20, so twenty minutes after eleven in the evening. Okay. So, Mr. Smith, this interview is being tape recorded so should this ever go to court one of the tapes will be sealed and it can be used in evidence should this ever get that far.”

  “I understand.”

  “So—John Smith. That’s an anonymous-sounding name. That’s definitely you?”

  Milton found the lurch into a more aggressive form of questioning a little disconcerting. “Want to see my passport?”

  “That’s all right. Where you from, Mr. Smith? England?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Holiday?”

  “No. I’m working here.”

  “That right?”

  “I’m a cook.”

  “Where?”

  “There’s a place in Coney Island. Red Square.”

  “I’ve never heard of it.”

  “No reason why you would. It’s not going to win any awards.”

  “You got a visa?”

  He exhaled. “Want to see that, too?”