by Ace Atkins
“I found no charges against Peter Steiner or his significant other, Poppy Palmer.”
“That’s because the charge was expunged,” she said. “You know how that works, don’t you?”
“Money.”
“Money,” she said. “And a good attorney. And having an entire rock-solid case deep-sixed by the goddamn DA’s office.”
“Who was the victim?”
Glass shook her head, offering the thinnest of smiles. “You know better than that,” she said. “Victims of sexual battery are confidential.”
“So Steiner raped someone?”
“Yep.”
“And this was your case when you were on sex crimes?”
She nodded. “I hadn’t been a detective long,” Glass said. “If I had the same case now, I could’ve done more with it. But even then, as green as I was as an investigator, I still did good. The case was good. It was more than enough to prosecute.”
I stood up and stretched, walked to the wall, and straightened one of my two Vermeer prints. It was of a young woman seated at a piano, a much older man standing beside her. I believed the man was her instructor, his mouth hanging open in song.
“One of the vics worked for Steiner,” she said.
“One?”
“There were two.”
“One was his personal assistant.”
“That’s right,” Glass said. “What else do you know?”
“I know she was an artist,” I said. “And that Steiner had promised to be her patron.”
“Yeah,” she said. “He’s a real philanthropist. He’s known to pull out his johnson faster than Quick Draw McGraw.”
“Please don’t ruin Quick Draw for me.”
“Too late,” Glass said, smiling. “Already have. This thing that happened—”
“Allegedly?”
“Not even close,” she said. “This thing that happened wasn’t just Steiner. It was Poppy Palmer, too. They’d offered the victim a place to live and work close to Steiner’s home. Some kind of fake residency. Even had an official name for it. One night, Steiner and Palmer come over and either get her drunk or drug her. We’re not sure. But the things the victim recalls about that night are so sick and twisted, I wouldn’t even wish them on you.”
“Steiner and Palmer,” I said.
“She’s the recruiter.”
“She’s procured other young women for him.”
“Do your clients want to make a case?” Glass said. “I would be thrilled to put them in touch with detectives at Sex Crimes. That idiot DA is long gone now. He was a drunk and a gambling addict and left the office in shame.”
“I remember,” I said.
“Steiner’s people got to him easy,” Glass said. “Makes me want to puke. But I sure found out fast how this goddamn town worked. I’d like to have a second shot at this guy.”
I nodded. Glass shuffled in her seat. Her black suit jacket was slightly open, and I could see the butt of a very large revolver. She noticed me noticing and grinned.
“Don’t fuck with me, Spenser,” she said. “This thing with Steiner is important. I’ve never forgotten what he did.”
“We’re on to something.”
Glass stood and smoothed down her jacket over the gun. She was a good head shorter than me and had to look up when I stood, too. But something about her made her feel substantial in the room. Her feet shoulder-width apart and hands on her hips. “You better be.”
“You mentioned a second victim?” I said.
“Second vic was the woman’s younger sister,” she said. “Girl was fifteen. Son of a bitch used the older girl to rope in the younger one. The kid sister thought she could trust Steiner because her sister worked for him. Neither one of them knew what the hell was going on. Steiner and Palmer working them at the same time. I wish I could tell you more, but that’d give you too much.”
“You want me to work for it.”
“Work for it a little more,” she said. “Find some more people to talk. And then I can maybe reach out to the sisters and see if they want to join up.”
“I’d like that.”
“I’m sure they would, too.”
I offered my hand. Glass looked down at it and then back at me. Her hands remained on her hips. “Frank Belson swears you’re okay.”
“Frank is a very smart man.”
“Says you helped find Lisa when she went missing a while back.”
“True.”
“Well,” she said. “You haven’t done shit for me. I figure it’s about time you start.”
16
I had dinner with Susan and Hawk that night at Harvest in Harvard Square. Since I’d just run six miles up and down the Charles with Hawk, I felt confident to order the fried haddock with french fries and coleslaw. Susan had the roasted beet and red endive salad with lobster bisque, and Hawk had a dozen Island Creek oysters from Duxbury and a bottle of Iron Horse.
“Prepping for a big evening?” I said.
“Don’t need no oysters for that,” Hawk said.
“But it doesn’t hurt,” I said.
Hawk selected another oyster off the ice and slurped it from the shell.
“Like a Boy Scout,” Hawk said, turning to study a woman standing at the bar. She had long brown hair and wore a very short blue romper. The silky material rode up high enough to know her area code. “Always prepared.”
The woman glanced at Hawk and smiled. Hawk said something about needing to earn another merit badge.
“You know I’m right here,” Susan said.
“Did you hear something?” I said.
Susan gave me the side eye. “Don’t bother with the oysters tonight, haddock boy.”
Hawk laughed. He refilled his champagne glass from a silver bucket. I was still working on a pint, and Susan had barely touched her glass of Riesling. She had on a purple silk camisole that showed off her lovely tan shoulders. Her dark black hair pinned up high on top of her head.
“Haddock should be on the state flag,” I said, forking off another bite.
“Save some for the puppy,” Susan said.
“Heard you still not calling that dog Pearl,” Hawk said.
Susan finished a small spoonful of bisque. She patted her lips with her napkin. “I advocated calling her something else,” she said. “Not to conflate Pearl’s memory.”
“Pearl’s memory is conflated with our two Pearls and the Pearl I had as a kid.”
“As a trained therapist,” Susan said. “I’d say you’re trying to evade grief.”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe his ass just crazy,” Hawk said. “Only so many blows a man can take to the head.”
I cut off a small portion to save for Pearl. I ate a few french fries, considering the discussion. “Makes as much sense as anything,” I said.
“Reincarnation?” Susan said.
“I think I used to be a big-breasted white lady back in the day,” Hawk said. “I think about them all the time.”
“What about a big-breasted black woman?”
“I think about them, too,” Hawk said. “And Asian. And Latina. I don’t discriminate.”
“It’s okay to be sexist,” Susan said. “As long as you’re not bigoted?”
I drank some beer. “If Hawk and I didn’t discuss women, we wouldn’t have anything to talk about.”
“You talk about sports and music,” Susan said.
“I turned this white boy on to Fathead Newman.”
“I already knew about Fathead Newman.”
“Bullshit,” Hawk said. “You only knew about ‘Fathead’ Newman as a sideman to Ray Charles. Not as a solo artist.”
Susan looked to me. I turned to her and grudgingly nodded. She drank some Riesling. I worked on the haddock. And Hawk worked on his Iron Horse.
<
br /> “This conversation on sexism and ogling women isn’t over,” Susan said.
“What if I ogle you all the way home?” I said.
“That,” she said, “is not only permitted, it is encouraged.”
Hawk shook his head and stood up. “Excuse me,” he said, heading toward the woman at the end of the bar, champagne glass in hand. Something he said made the woman throw back her head in laughter.
“You never told me what you found out about the woman Wayne Arnett mentioned.”
“Had a visit from my biggest fan today,” I said. “Captain Lorraine Glass. Can you believe that woman still doesn’t like me?”
“You’re an acquired taste.”
“I have explained that to her,” I said. “She’s still hesitant.”
“What did she have to say?”
I told her about my conversation with Glass.
“Sisters,” Susan said, shaking her head. “That’s horrible.”
“Yep.”
“But pretty common,” Susan said. “A sexual predator will often use a family member like a sister or even the child’s mother to get close to them. The child will blame themselves and not tell what happened. The proximity to family and the predatory grooming makes it all the more shameful and scary. They feel alone and isolated. What happened to the case?”
“The DA dismissed it.”
“Who was the DA?”
I told her. Susan knew many stories about him from Rita and how he’d been the reason for her leaving the DA’s office and going into private practice.
“It was either a bribe or blackmail,” Susan said.
“Probably,” I said. “Steiner appears to have unlimited resources.”
Susan sipped some more Riesling. I looked over to the bar to see how Hawk was doing with the woman in the mini-romper. She was feeling his biceps as he flexed.
“But Peter Steiner is probably used to dealing with the morally compromised or greedy.”
“True.”
“And you are neither.”
“That is true, too.”
“You’ll help Mattie and her friend until he’s punished,” she said. “While finding out if there are others.”
“That’s the idea.”
Susan tapped at her chin with her forefinger. She closed one eye as if giving me a long, careful consideration. I smiled back.
“It’s almost as if you like me,” I said.
“You are a taste I have acquired.”
“Hawk left half his oysters.”
Susan reached out and pushed the platter toward me.
17
Two days later, Mattie and I were back in South Boston looking for Chloe Turner. Calls, texts, and emails had gone unanswered.
“Maybe she’s on vacation,” I said.
“Sure,” Mattie said. “That’s it. She left Southie and jetted off for the South of France.”
“Did you try her sister?”
“Of course I tried her sister,” Mattie said. “You think I’m a freakin’ idiot? That’s how we got into this shit in the first place. She says Chloe’s been home all week. And now Chloe has decided to ghost me. After all we did for her.”
“I had to put on a coat and tie for the sycophants at the Blackstone Club.”
“If she’s scared, she should just say so.”
“She was scared.”
“But she said if we found more victims, she’d talk,” Mattie said. “This is complete bullshit. You can’t let a guy like Steiner do whatever the hell he wants.”
I parked along L Street where it met Sixth. Mattie and I got out of the car and crossed the street to the triple-decker duplex where Chloe Turner lived. We barely made it to the sidewalk before a middle-aged woman in a sleeveless pink top and blue jeans walked out onto the porch and down two steps. Her blond hair had been touched by a curling iron, and she’d put a lot of time and effort into her makeup. Her fingernails were long and red. I had a chance to study them as we got close and her index finger pointed straight at my chest. “You that Spenser guy?”
“I’m incognito,” I said. “Usually I wear a cape.”
“She said you were big,” the woman said, shaking her finger. “Said you looked like a pro wrestler with a big neck and a busted nose.”
I turned to Mattie. “Chloe’s mom?”
Mattie nodded.
“So shines a good deed in this weary world,” I said.
“Mattie,” the woman said. “Is this the guy?”
She looked at me. “This is the guy, Mrs. Turner.”
“You should know better,” Mrs. Turner said to Mattie. “Your mother brought you up to have more sense. God rest her soul. Don’t bring these people down here to make trouble. I had to miss work yesterday because of all this crap. Knocking on doors, asking people personal questions. You’re not a cop. You’re just a freakin’ kid.”
“I’m twenty-two,” Mattie said.
I introduced myself and handed her a business card. I explained that Mattie worked for me. As Mrs. Turner studied the card, I noticed she had on very tall, very pointy suede heels. The kind that could twist into the back of a grown man’s hand and make him beg for mercy.
“A private investigator?” the woman said. “Bullshit. You can get those cards printed anywhere.”
I opened my wallet and showed her my license. It had both my photograph and an impressive and complex watermark.
“Look, I heard about the backpack,” Mrs. Turner said, hand resting on one hip. “And Chloe admitted to me about the shit she’d pulled. Taking the T into town and going to some fancy club. I told her she got exactly what she deserved. What did she think she was doing for five hundred dollars? Playing Parcheesi?”
“Did she tell you what the man did?” I said. “It wasn’t Parcheesi.”
“More like pop goes the weasel,” Mattie said.
“Yeah?” Mrs. Turner eyed me and nodded. “She told me enough of it. And I heard his side of things from the attorney who showed up two days ago.”
“The esteemed Counselor Greebel?” I said.
Mrs. Turner nodded. She pulled out a pack of Marlboro Lights from her purse and fired one up with a plastic lighter. She turned her head and blew smoke off the porch.
“That Greebel guy is a creep,” Mattie said.
“He said the guy thought Chloe was eighteen,” Mrs. Turner said. “Whose fault is that, Mattie? My own daughter acting like a goddamn whore.”
“That’s not what happened,” I said.
“Oh, yeah,” she said. “What the fuck do you know, Ace Ventura? This is my little girl we’re talking about. She’s a good kid when she’s using her head. Going to give a man a rubdown for five hundred dollars. Do you really think I like my neighbors knowing about this crap?”
“This man is a predator,” I said. “Your daughter was lucky to have gotten away.”
“That’s why she never should have gone in the first fucking place,” Mrs. Turner said, pointing two fingers at me now, the cigarette stuck between them.
I looked to Mattie. She placed her hands into her Sox pitcher’s jacket. Her red hair pulled into a ponytail. Her jaw working on some bubble gum.
“What did this Greebel guy tell you?” I said.
“Nothing,” Mrs. Turner said, shrugging.
“Did he offer you more money?”
“More money?” she said. “No.”
“Did he threaten you?”
Mrs. Turner didn’t answer. She touched her tongue to her upper lip and turned to Mattie. She just shook her head. Mattie leaned against the railing and looked over to me. Mrs. Turner stood in heels as tall and thin as matchsticks.
“How’d he threaten you?” I said.
“I don’t want trouble.”
“Too late,” I said. “This guy sexually assaulted
your daughter. This guy Greebel is trying to intimidate you.”
Mrs. Turner took in a long drag of the cigarette, turned her head, and blew out the smoke. “He knew I had a job with the city.”
I nodded.
“He said if you guys kept on making trouble, maybe I wouldn’t have that job anymore.”
Mattie blew a pink bubble, and it quickly popped. Mrs. Turner just stood at the porch and stared at me. “I don’t want trouble,” she said again.
“He hurt some other girls, Mrs. Turner,” Mattie said. “We know he raped at least one.”
“Jesus,” Mrs. Turner said, cigarette burning down in her fingers. “Jesus Christ.”
“All of ’em kids,” Mattie said.
“This wasn’t Chloe’s fault,” I said.
“This guy Greebel said he was connected with some powerful people,” Mrs. Turner said. “He said you were a bottom-feeder looking for money. And that if you tried to blackmail them, you’d get taught a lesson.”
“Eek.”
“You a toughie?” Mrs. Turner said. She smiled for the first time, eyeing me. She was more attractive when she smiled, again touching her upper lip with her tongue.
I shrugged in a weak attempt to appear modest.
“Can I please talk to Chloe?” Mattie said.
“She’s not here,” she said. “She got scared. She’s with her loser father. Like he’s gonna do something. Someone comes after Chloe, and he’d probably throw his back out getting out of the way.”
“Can you tell her to call me?” Mattie said.
Mrs. Turner looked to Mattie, smoke scattering off the porch and down the street, and then back to me. I stood straighter to make sure she knew I was indeed a toughie.
She nodded slowly. “But please let this go,” Mrs. Turner said. “No cops. Not here with my little girl.”
18
Matthew Greebel, attorney at law, kept an office in a high-rise on Atlantic. I parked at the parking deck next to the Harbor Health Club and walked across the street. I rode to the twelfth floor of a tall glass building, where I found a heavyset woman with henna-colored hair who was blowing her nose.