I turned my cellphone off. This wasn't my fight. Charlie married a lawyer, not me. And now he could fend for himself against that clothe-less vampire.
21
THE THOUGHT FIRST OCCURRED TO ME only seconds after turning my cell phone off, which meant the return journey to Brownstone on Bleecker Street was more or less a sprint, and I paid little attention to my aching legs and thighs while catapulting up all eight stairs to Apartment 402. I rushed straight into Leah's room, glistening of sweat, lungs wheezing, and woke her.
“Do you still have that extra ticket?” I said.
“What?” Leah struggled to lift both eyelids at once.
“The extra ticket for tonight's show, do you still have it?”
“Last I heard, Rebecca Romijn married Jerry O'Connell and they're expecting a child.” She pulled the sheet to her neck and turned over so that any further conversation would be held with her back (and a very cute, shapely butt).
“You remember.”
“How could I forget the 1999 SPORTS ILLUSTRATED Swimsuit Edition that you kept stashed under your mattress?”
“I still can't believe you knew to find it there. My own mother couldn't....”
“I know men. I know what men like to stare at all day. And I know what men want when they wake me up in bed. And I also know its somewhere around eight in the morning, so unless there's been another Bin Laden attack, I could strangle you with both legs for this.”
“Yikes.” Actually, it sounded like an incredible way to die. One could only hope and dream. “This time I've got someone better than Rebecca in mind.”
“Uh-huh. Let me guess, Heidi Klum?”
“Do you know her?” I perked up.
“No.” Leah sighed with a stern, almost disapproving demeanor, except I was almost certain that those clamped lips of hers quickly dialed into a smile. “But if I did, I wouldn't tell you.”
“I'm being serious.”
Leah turned over to face me, smile gone and seemingly defeated as sleep was concerned. “At eight in the morning it's not possible for me to be serious.”
“It's not even 7:50 yet.”
“Oh hell.”
“Her name's Penny Parker.”
“Was she on the 1998 cover or something?”
“No, she's more of a Comic Con sort of girl than a Sports Illustrated swimsuit supermodel. You know, Princess Leia in Jabba's slave outfit, posters of David Hasselhoff on her bedroom wall. And she's your number one fan.”
“Wow, number One fan.” Leah discretely stretched, making sure to yawn a mouthful of morning breath into the palm of her hand. “That's not code word for CRAZY or anything, is it?”
“You'll like her.”
“Oh, goodie,” her smile dripped with sarcasm. “Does she really own one of those Jabba slave outfits?”
“And be nice.”
“Damn.”
22
PENNY DIDN'T ANSWER HER PHONE on the fourth ring. It went directly to voice mail, so I hung up and dialed her number again. This time she answered.
“I’m looking out my window and it’s totally dark out,” she said. “So unless this an emergency or someone is dead, I’m going to murder you.”
I said: “That's weird, because from where I’m standing the sun’s been up for a couple of hours. I don’t usually trust science, being a religious fellow and all, but maybe they’re right about the world not being flat.”
“You’ve got five seconds before I hang up.”
“Isla Elliot.”
There was only silence from her end until well after the five seconds expired.
“What about her?” She finally said. “You went to bed with her, didn’t you? You’re next to her right now, and you thought of me. She’s totally naked, and she doesn’t know how dirty you’re being by calling me.” Typical Penny. “I’m a nursing student, you know. Check-ups with me are…science.”
“I’d love to tell you everything Penny, all the juicy scientific details, but that would interfere with doctor-patient confidentiality.”
“Damn,” she said.
“But that’s not actually why I called. Do you still have Leah Bishop’s poster hung on your wall?”
“Has my apartment been robbed? Of course it is.”
“That’s all I really wanted to know. Goodnight.”
More silence. “Okay, now I’m going to murder you.”
“You may want to hold off on that. Actually, since I have you on the phone, I’ve managed to acquire an extra ticket to tonight’s performance of REPUBLICAN BLUE if you know anyone that might like to go.”
“Shut up.”
“Okay, sorry to bother you.”
I started to hang up.
“You do realize tonight is her last performance as Isla Elliot…. ever.”
“I heard a rumor about something like that.”
“You’re attending?”
“And no one to see it with.”
“Maybe I’ll just take a leap off the Vincent Thomas Bridge.”
“Before you do that, there’s a flight leaving Long Beach Airport at 9:05, Pacific Standard Time. JetBlue. It arrives at JFK around 5pm, plenty of wiggle room to make the show at 8.”
Silence, except for what might have been a mouse-like squeal. More than likely Penny was trying to hold explosives in, the sort of impending scream that could detonate the entire world, kind of like Charlton Heston at the end of that second Planet of the Apes movie.
“I’m buying you a plane ticket just as soon as we hang up. There’s still a few seats left, I checked. That gives you exactly four hours to be on that flight.”
“I’ve never been to New York before.”
“I know. It’s just for the night though, so you won’t need more than a handbag. We can fly home together tomorrow morning.”
“Shut up,” she said. And then she let it all out with a murderous scream. I pulled the phone from my ear, and Leah, now standing in the bedroom doorway, smirked at the sound of it. The world didn't explode as I thought it might.
Leah said: “Number one fan, huh? Great.”
Penny dove into a frantic frenzy about not knowing what to wear and how should she do her hair and what did people dress like in New York?
“Just come as you are, Penny.”
“But I’m not wearing anything.”
“That could be a problem. I’d at least go with a hat.”
“OMG, Joshua, what am I supposed to wear?”
“You’ll figure it out. You’ve got four hours until the plane lifts off the ground, so get there as early as you can. Text me when you arrive at the airport and when you land. I’ll have transportation waiting for you.”
Penny started to scream again. The universe remained on its hinges. Still, I decided to hang up before going hard of hearing.
23
IT WAS WITHIN SECONDS OF PURCHASING a plane ticket for Penny that Richie made his way from the coffee pot to the window, just to the right of the television (he was sipping his morning joe from his favorite I HEART NY mug), and spotted the press gathered in the street four stories below their Brownstone apartment complex.
He yawned and then gasped and said: “Why are NBC and Fox News parked outside?” Coffee even managed to escape his lips and dribble down his neck.
Leah and I scrambled to the window just left of the television and peeled the curtains back. Richie had been modest in his assessment. There were actually several different news sources on the scene. Even CNN had arrived. And from the looks of things, nobody was leaving until they had their story.
And I was their story.
“They know I'm here,” I too gasped, making my way for the laptop.
Fingers clapped MSNBC into the Google search engine, which immediately revealed a picture of myself jogging on the Bleecker Street below, clearly not my better side. It couldn't have been taken more than fifteen minutes earlier on my return to Brownstone (amazing how expeditiously the twenty-first century press could report their stories)
, and underneath a caption read: MISSING SUSPECT IN MANCINI MURDER SPOTTED IN NYC. I even saw my name typed into the story below, Joshua Chamberlain. The article was so hastily uploaded that only a paragraph of information was contained therein, probably already written for such an occasion, copied and pasted. Other key words or phrases included wedding photographer and grandson of famed war photographer Ira Chamberlain. My lungs emptied.
Leah was equally breathless, except she gained just enough wind in her pipes to swear.
“How did they find me?”
I looked to her, still recollecting my breathing habits, and started to answer my own question by pronouncing the first name that came to mind, Jack Hoskins (I even considered New York City's self-appointed birdie whisperer, Devine), but Leah beat me to it.
“Lawrence Greenberg,” she said.
“Why would Lawrence Greenberg turn me in?”
Leah hadn't wiped off the bad aftertaste of his name from her cheekbones just yet. “I could quote you something he said in bed a couple of nights ago; I am the media, babe...”
“Let's not be hasty without visual images,” I said.
Richie formed the same expression of expired cream cheese by the window, curdling his lips at the thought of Greenberg in bed.
Leah's frown deepened. “And because giving you a black eye didn't feel orgasmic enough for someone so sadistic.”
I still wasn't fully convinced that he had a part in it. Somebody did. Another words the paparazzi sighting wasn't random. Perhaps I'd never know who. But Hoskins or Greenberg, or even Sinatra, now that I thought about it, didn't really matter. I disliked the first two on an equal playing field, and I still hadn't made up my mind quite yet about the man in the fedora. Still, another important question dominated my thinking, who was her scowl of disapproval presently reserved for, Greenberg or me? I feared the answer.
“Leah, I'm so sorry I put you in harm’s way like this.”
Leah tightened her lips and the diamond tips of her eyes. I took that to mean her anger, at least some of it anyways, was directed at me. I turned towards the front door and started in that direction.
“Where are you going?” She finally said.
I flipped around with my hand on the knob. “I'm going to face them in person. I can't run forever. And I'm not a suspect. Josephine even called me up to let me in on that point. The police and the media haven't been passing too many notes during class on this investigation. Once we get that sorted out, they're certain to leave me alone. They don't have to know that we spent the weekend together.”
“Hold on. Slow down and think about this.” She closed her eyes, desperately trying to collect herself with a winded trail of breath through her nose. “They'll know I took you in. I won't go down in history as being more popular for a part I didn't play in a scandal than my talents acting on stage. Every time Wikipedia writes up an article on the murder of a mobster's daughter, they'll link my name to it. Because that's exactly the sort of thing people want in their gossip column. You've already tainted your career. Don't drag me into this any further.”
Richie nervously twitched his eyes between the two of us.
“What do you plan to say to them?” Leah again.
I shook both cheeks, raised my fingers, and said in my best Nixon: “You won't have Nixon to kick around anymore, because ladies and gentlemen, this is my last press conference.” I even formed two peace signs with my fingers, but my attempts failed miserably. If it was at all possible for Leah to tighten her eyes or parch her lips any more than what she'd already done, she succeeded.
Richie held a hand to his chin as he considered the matter. He said: “Definitely. I think you should go with that.”
“Joshua, you can't....” Anger escalated. I suspected the incoming threat of tears too. “You can't stay here and be seen again. You can't involve me in this. I can't....” The first of several more tears. “I thought I could handle this, but...”
“You won't be involved. I won't let Greenberg.....”
“What the hell, Joshua? I've got the entire press corps camped outside my apartment and all you can do is quote Nixon.”
“Leah, listen to me. Nobody has to know. You won't be involved.”
“I'd ask you to hide out in the tub for the next several days, but I don't even want to look at you right now, much less have you show up at my final performance tonight.” She threw both hands up as a gesture of her anger.
“And you won't have to. I'll slip out the back.” I retrieved my tooth brush from the bathroom and stuffed it into my carry-on. Faded jeans and a button-up shirt with a driver's cap were laid over the sink. I closed the door and slipped out of my jogging clothes without ever bothering to change my underwear or shower.
“What are you doing?” Leah's voice.
“I'm changing. You said I couldn't stay here.”
“That's not what I said.”
“Yes, it is.” I opened up the bathroom, freshly changed, picked up my camera bag and carry-on, and hurried across the room for the front door. “Richie, you'll need to direct me to the nearest back exit, no pun intended.”
“Darn,” he said.
“If I can help it, I can make it to JFK and home before the press and I have our final meet and greet.”
“You've got it,” he said.
“Joshua, stop!” Leah clenched her fists.
I did just that, door opened, fingers still clutching the knob.
“I'm sorry.” She tried to calm herself now. There were no more tears but she wiped her eyes anyways just to be sure of it. “I don't want you to leave. It's the butt crack of morning. I'm stressed and tired. The press is camped outside my apartment. I'm not thinking clearly right now, that's all. Nobody’s made me coffee. And I'm probably PMS-ing.”
“Looks like they've already got the alley covered.” Richie never peeled his eyes away from the window. He then cupped five fingers to his mouth and whispered, “And F.Y.I., she's been PMS-ing all weekend.”
I was still standing there with the door open when Mahoney helped himself into Leah's apartment, Cyclops eye bulging over his shoulder, and the red light was on. “Hey guys, have you seen the press?”
“Yeah, we've sort of been discussing that,” Richie said.
“Somebody die or something?”
“More or less.” Richie again.
“Mahoney.” I patted him on the shoulder, thrilled for his arrival into this particular scene of my life. He swung the lens in my direction. “How would you feel if I stayed with you all weekend, starting last Thursday night around 6pm?”
“You've got it, buddy.”
“Just so we're clear, Leah doesn't even know me.”
“This will never work, Joshua,” Leah said. “You've got those pictures of me from that Boston wedding all over your website. We acted in high school together. They'll connect the dots, if they haven't already.”
I said: “Either way, I need proof that I was here in Brownstone last night and not in Boston. You filmed me at your party.”
“Totally got that goat ramming your exit sign. Classic material, man.”
“Mm-hmm, your movie is my alibi. And maybe we can choose not to show that footage. Are you filming this now?”
“Is this not America?”
“Let’s not show this footage either.”
“You've got it, buddy.” Mahoney again, only the camera continued rolling.
Still, I was content with his answers, ignored Leah's common sense, and so started down the hall, except then I wasn't content with anything at all and slugged my head back through the door.
I said: “How do we know each other?”
Mahoney quickly thought about it and snapped his fingers at an equally delightful pace. “I knew your grandfather, what's his name.” He continued snapping while trying to recall.
“Ira Chamberlain.”
“No, that's not it.”
Leah sighed.
I said: “Yes, it is.”
“Sure, if
you say so.” Mahoney shrugged his shoulders. “Isaac...”
“Ira,” I said.
“Ten-four, buddy. Hey, you mind if I film the press conference? You know...”
“Yes, your documentary, of course. I get the feeling that you'd film it anyways even if I said no.”
“This is America; freedom of the press, man.”
“Mm-hmm,” I exited into the hall, contemplated the matter again, and made another appearance through the door. “I have to know. Is there a first name, Mahoney?”
“It's just Mahoney.”
“And where did you and Ira first meet?”
“We were drinking buddies whenever he was in town. Oh, I know. He inspired me to become a filmmaker. Taking you in was a gesture of our friendship.” It might work. Most of Ira's War Generation friends were in retirement homes or dead, but I had met up with some on one or two occasions. “Besides, did I have to first meet him at all?”
Leah dropped her head and sighed with despairing discomfort.
“Yes, the fine details are rather important.”
Mahoney's eyes lit up. Another snap of his fingers and he said: “I've got it. It was one of those Civil Rights rallies in Washington.”
“That might work,” I said, and exited into the hall. Seconds later I popped my head back into Leah's apartment. “No, it won't. You couldn't have been more than a few years in age when Martin Luther King marched to Washington. And besides, my grandfather died twenty years ago. How old are you again?” He looked to be fifty at best.
“Old enough.”
Seeing as how both Richie and Leah had the same lack of information about their very intriguing neighbor, they looked just as equally interested in his answers as I, however abstract.
“Did you ever actually attend one of those rallies?”
“No. Should I have?”
I shook my head. “This is never going to work.”
24
I WAS DESCENDING THE SECOND of four zigzagging staircases, ironing out the killer kink in my neck, when my iPhone decided to play Every Breath You Take by the Police. A quick looky-loo pronounced DETECTIVE HURLEY on the call screen. I guess I’d already forgotten about Mahoney’s camera and thought, why not, shrugged my shoulders and answered.
Goodnight Sometimes Means Goodbye (Wrong Flight Home, #2) Page 27