by S. J. Rozan
“I’m the one who should have thought of it,” I insisted. “My client, my setup.”
“But it might not have mattered,” Bill went on. “Just because you’re looking for trouble doesn’t mean you know where it’s coming from. It might have happened the same way anyway.”
Andrew and I both drank our drinks. We looked at each other suspiciously, the way we used to as kids when we wanted to get back to playing but neither of us was willing to take the blame for whatever fight we’d been having.
“Listen,” Bill said. “You two aren’t going to settle this tonight. Isn’t there some other reason we’re here?”
He leaned back in his chair, sipping his drink and waiting for Andrew, as though Andrew were just a person and not a brother of mine.
I tried to do the same, to act objective and professional. I sipped my drink and leaned back in my chair, too.
“I don’t know,” Andrew said, still belligerent. “I’m not sure I should tell you about it. You’ll probably just get in more trouble.”
By “you,” he clearly didn’t mean Bill. I felt my cheeks redden. Bill shot me a look. I closed my mouth, which had opened automatically. Bill said to Andrew, “But you called. You had a reason for wanting to tell us whatever it is. Is that reason still good?”
Andrew nodded reluctantly. He waited a little, while the sounds of trendy, probably easier conversations drifted under the tiny spotlights.
“Genna’s a good friend of mine,” he finally said. “I wanted to help her.” He looked at me, and he looked sorry about something. “When she asked about you, I thought she just wanted something looked into, some investor or some deal to make sure it was legit. It seemed like that would be a nice safe case for you, something that would keep you out of trouble for a while.”
I reddened again. I kept my eyes off Bill, in case he was shooting me another look, but I kept my mouth closed. Andrew went on, “When she told us last night what the problem was, I couldn’t believe she just wanted to pay the money. But family business … well, who knows what’s going on? I don’t like to get involved in other people’s.”
I could relate to that. Chin family business is complicated enough for anyone.
But I didn’t know this was family business.
“And you said it wouldn’t be dangerous,” he added, to me. “And I believed you.”
Andrew rested his large dark eyes on mine. His belligerence was completely gone, but his eyes weren’t twinkling. My brother was very serious.
I tried to match his openness. “It’s what I thought,” I said, not apologizing, but not hostile either. “Sometimes I’m wrong.”
He took a breath. “The point is, Lyd, I don’t want you in the middle of some other family’s blood feud.”
“What do you mean?” I asked him, leaving aside for the moment the question of what he wanted and who cared. “What blood feud?”
“The Jings’,” he told me. “Genna and her sister. That’s who stole the sketches. Her sister Dawn.”
“Dawn?” I peered at my brother through the half-light of David L. Kim’s. “Genna has a sister?”
He nodded. “Eight years younger. Genna doesn’t talk about her. I don’t think she likes her. But it’s complicated.”
“It usually is,” Bill said dryly. He asked, “What makes you think it was Dawn?”
“Genna’s given her money before. I thought that stopped a while ago—I’d heard Dawn was finally making a living—but I guess I was wrong.”
“Just because you give your sister money—” I began.
“There’s always been trouble between them. I don’t even think they see each other anymore. Dawn could easily have gotten desperate enough to do this.”
“How come you know so much?”
“What are you getting defensive about?”
“I’m not defensive! I just want to know how you know all this about Genna’s sister.”
“She’s in the business,” Andrew told me. “She’s a model.”
Before I could ask my next question, the waiter appeared to check on our drinks. I suddenly realized I was starving. I ordered another orange juice and a casserole. I don’t usually eat big dinners, but I wanted this one, now. Bill’s eyebrows raised slightly, but I ignored him. Neither of them ordered anything except another drink; it seemed they both had already eaten.
“Now wait,” I said to Andrew when we were alone again. “You think Dawn would do this to her own sister? Why?”
“Oh, come on, Lyd! For money!”
“And what about the shooting? What would have been the point of that?”
“I don’t know.” Andrew shook his head. “But whatever the reason for it was, I don’t want you involved.”
I ignored what he wanted, but I also passed over the chance to tell him to go fry ice. “She would do that?” I asked, sticking to the case. “This could ruin Genna’s whole career. Her sister would do that?”
Andrew just shrugged. I looked at Bill. His eyes met mine, but I wasn’t sure what was in them.
Bill spoke to Andrew. “Are you telling us Genna thinks this too? That Dawn stole her sketches?”
“I’m sure she does.”
“Well,” I said, “that would explain one thing: why she’s able to focus on her work while she waits for the next phone call.”
“Sure,” Andrew agreed. “Because she may be furious, but she’s not really frightened.”
“But she hasn’t talked to you about it?”
“No.”
“And why didn’t she tell us?”
Andrew sighed. “Because it’s her sister.” The way he said it, you’d think there wasn’t a sibling in the country, no matter what dirt was done to them, who’d rat on the sibling who’d done it.
Bill looked at me, and I at him. “There’s a problem with that theory,” I told Andrew.
“What’s that?”
“Genna’s already fingered someone else.”
Andrew paused for a beat. “What do you mean, fingered someone else?”
“She called me this afternoon, and said she thought a guy named Wayne Lewis was behind it.”
Andrew frowned. “Wayne Lewis? The show producer?”
“That’s what she said.”
He shook his head. “No way.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“Why would he?”
“For money? That’s what you said about Dawn.”
“For fifty thousand dollars? Talk about ruining careers: that’s a big risk to take for fifty thousand dollars.”
“For Dawn, too.”
“She doesn’t have a career to ruin. She probably doesn’t even have a credit rating.”
“He may have some sudden need for cash,” I said.
“I think Genna’s blowing smoke, you guys,” said Andrew. “She was afraid you’d catch onto Dawn. That may have been my fault. I told her getting shot at and losing her money would make you so mad you’d never give up now. She probably told you she thought Lewis had done it to throw you off.”
I exchanged another look with Bill. “Maybe,” I said. “But there’s another problem, too.”
“What?” Andrew asked.
“He’s dead.”
“What?” Andrew looked quickly to Bill, then back to me. “Who’s dead?”
The waiter, as though waiting for the moment of maximum impact, appeared right then with their drinks and my dinner. Bill had to light a cigarette and Andrew had to bite his tongue to get them through the placing of the dish and the opening of the cover and the ceremonial breaking of the yolk of the egg that was baked on top of the meat and the rice.
Finally the waiter left. Andrew leaned forward. “Who’s dead?”
I swallowed and said, “Wayne Lewis.”
“What do you mean, he’s dead?”
“Someone killed him this afternoon. Before we had a chance to talk to him.”
“Killed him?” Andrew shouted. People at the surrounding tables turned to look. Andrew dropped
his voice. “My God, Lydia, what’s the matter with you?”
“With me? What do you mean, with me?”
“You didn’t report this to the police? You’re still involved? People are getting shot at and killed and you think nothing can ever happen to you?”
“The police were there!” I threw down my fork. “You have no idea what you’re talking about!”
“Why didn’t you tell me about this when I first came in?”
“Why should I have? I didn’t know why you were here, and I didn’t know you knew him.”
“And you knew how I’d feel about your still working on a case where someone had been murdered.”
“As a matter of fact,” I said hotly, “Genna fired us.”
Andrew stared at me, narrowing his eyes. “You’re telling me you’re not involved anymore? I don’t believe you.”
I flushed in anger. That had been what I was implying, though it wasn’t true; but I’d hoped it would get him to stop. But Andrew’s known me too long. And I hate being caught in a lie. “No, I’m telling you that what I do is my business, and I’m doing it the best way I know how, and I want to be left alone to do it!”
“You think—”
“You have no idea what I think! All of you just go along making assumptions about me and what I’m doing—”
“Well, someone has to think for you, since you obviously aren’t thinking for yourself! And neither are your so-called friends.” He turned angrily to Bill.
“Leave Bill out of this,” I snapped, before Bill could say anything.
“I don’t believe it!” Andrew slammed his palms onto the table. “You want me to just stand around and watch while you get yourself killed, without even opening my mouth?” He stopped and stared at me angrily, suddenly out of words.
I met his eyes. “No,” I said. “I want you to let me live the life I choose.”
“This life is crazy, Lydia!”
“But it’s mine.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know.” He pushed away from the table and stood up. “I don’t know.”
My brother turned and left.
I watched Andrew stalk out of the restaurant. Then I stood, threw my napkin on my chair, and pushed my way between the tables to the ladies’ room downstairs. It had a mosaic tile floor and a vase of flowers and a silver-rimmed mirror in which I could watch the fiery color recede from my cheeks and my jaw muscles unclench.
I rinsed my face and neck, wincing as I touched the bruise I’d forgotten. Then I went back upstairs to my partner and my dinner.
“Don’t say anything,” I said as I sat back down across from Bill. The waiter must have come by; Andrew’s half-finished drink was gone, his place cleared.
“For how long?” Bill asked.
“Until I’m not mad at him anymore.”
“Or hell freezes over, whichever comes first.”
“Then say whatever you want,” I snapped. “But not about him.”
“Fair enough.” He nodded, as though that really were a reasonable request. “Who socked you?”
I looked at him sharply. “How do you know?”
“You don’t eat like that unless you’re hurt,” he said. “When you ordered a dinner that big I inspected you. You have a bruise on your cheek.”
My shoulders drooped. “In a minute,” I said. “Okay?”
“Okay.”
In the hum of quiet conversations around us, Bill drank his drink and I worked my way through about half my dinner. Finally I felt human again, ready to talk.
I put down my fork and looked at Bill.
“I shouldn’t let him get to me like that, should I?”
He shrugged. “ ‘Should,’ ” he said. “That really doesn’t mean anything when it comes to families.”
“What are you saying?”
“Well, look at you. A rich racist on the Upper East Side threatened you; someone mugged you, or something; and you had a fight with your brother. Look which one you’re most upset about.”
“But that’s the point! I have real things in my real life to worry about. Why should I worry about how Andrew makes me feel?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “But you always will. Who socked you?”
I shrugged helplessly, and shook my head. The headshake was for the fight; the shrug was for Andrew. Bill, I think, knew that.
I told him the story, short as it was, about the fight, the black-masked man, and the cobblestone pavement.
“Would you recognize him, anything about him?” Bill asked, at the end.
“No. Those masks are like hoods; you can’t see anything but eyes, and it was too dark to really see those. When he spoke he whispered. I guess it’s even possible it wasn’t a man, but I think it was.”
“Are you okay?” He didn’t hover, and I was grateful.
“Yes,” I said. I added, “And that’s actually a little strange.”
“What is?”
“Well, in the end, I was on the ground and he was standing. He was in a good position for a kick or something, and he’s obviously trained in some mysterious Oriental martial art.” Bill grinned at my sarcasm. “But he didn’t do it. He just warned me off Genna Jing, and ran.”
“Maybe he hadn’t expected you to fight back, and he didn’t want any more trouble. Sounds like you were pretty well matched.”
“I think we were. It would have been pretty bloody if we’d fought to any kind of finish.”
“He’d gotten your attention; maybe that was all he wanted.”
“Maybe. But he’s going to have to count on me wanting to give up the case, because he didn’t even try to hurt me so badly I’d have to.”
“I’m glad.”
I stopped, leaned back in my chair, and smiled at him. “So am I. You’re a very nice guy, you know.”
“No, I’m not. Everybody says so.”
“They don’t know. Can I buy you a drink?”
“Anytime.”
I signaled for the waiter. Bill ordered coffee and I ordered a pot of orange pekoe tea, something uncomplicated and calm. While the waiter cleared away the decimated remains of my dinner and brought the tea and coffee, Bill lit a cigarette. “Did it work?”
“You mean, did he scare me off?” I was amazed that Bill would even ask that; you could hear it in my voice.
He grinned. “I knew it wouldn’t.”
“Why, because I’m courageous and unfrightenable?” I straightened my shoulders.
“No, because you’re willful and disobedient and you hate to be told what to do. Isn’t that what your mother always says?”
“Only because I won’t stop working with you. Of course, being willful and disobedient, if she suddenly changed her mind about you, I’d drop you like a hot potato.”
“Sure you would,” Bill said, in tones of confident unbelief.
His sureness irked me.
“Oh?” I queried. “You think you know me all that well?”
He shook his head and said in quite a different voice, “Not well enough.”
Feeling my cheeks suddenly hot, I looked into my tea, bronze in a creamy white cup. There’s something about Bill, about how he feels about me and what he wants, that makes him take risks sometimes, lets him make himself vulnerable in a way that confuses and upsets me. And frightens me, too: it gives me a power I’m not sure I want.
I swallowed some tea, simple and bracing. Get back to the case, Lydia. Logic and deductive reasoning and work, that’ll clear all this messy emotion out of your head.
“Who would want to scare me off the case?” I asked, staring across the room, trying to think.
To my relief—and as I knew he would—Bill took my cue. He put away what just had or hadn’t passed between us and went back to work.
“I don’t know,” he said. “We don’t even really know what this case is.”
“It’s a theft,” I said. “Extortion. And a murder.”
“Is it? Maybe the murder’s not involved. That’s what John Ryan sa
id. Maybe, based on what Andrew said, it’s true.”
“That Dawn stole the sketches? And Genna put us onto Wayne Lewis to throw us off Dawn? And Wayne just coincidentally happened to be dead when we went to see him?”
“I don’t like that, either,” Bill admitted. “But don’t you think we should talk to Dawn?”
“I certainly do. I wonder where we find her?”
“Well,” he said, grinning, “you could call Andrew and ask.”
“And you could go jump in the lake. But I do have another idea.”
“What?”
“Andi Shechter. And Francie Whatever-her-name-is. They might know how to track her down, if she’s really a model.”
“And she must really be a model, because your Honorable Elder Brother said so.”
“You tread on thin ice sometimes, white man.” I stood up to leave, suddenly weary, feeling the soreness in my muscles from the fight.
“You’re going to walk out and stick me with the bill?”
“Your kind owns the world. Pay the bills.”
I did walk out. It was close to eleven; it had been a very long day. On Bank Street I found a cab, and it wasn’t until I was halfway home in it that it occurred to me Bill had not pointed out that I’d offered to buy him a drink.
EIGHT
I woke about nine the next morning, bright sunlight streaming into the room I’ve always lived in. On my first birthday my parents moved me out of their bedroom into this one, a room of my own. Andrew and Tim, who had shared this room until then, got piled in with Ted and Elliot across the hall. My brothers were always jealous of my space; I was jealous of their illicit late-night laughter, their sharing clothes and their being able to wake from a scary dream and have other people breathing peacefully right next to them.
The night before, I’d gotten home too late to do anything besides take a hot bath and go to bed. My mother, who was sitting fully dressed in the living room watching the Cantonese cable channel when I came in, noticed the bruise on my cheek when I bent to kiss her. My mother notices everything.
“Karate class?” she asked me, frowning disapprovingly.
“Umm,” I said. Saying it that way wasn’t really lying.
