Cold Night (Jack Paine Mysteries)

by Al Sarrantonio

  The man said, "What's the matter?" and then he began to breathe rhythmically. He was trying to work against her sounds. Ginny sighed and began to make the "ah" sounds again. The "ahs" went away abruptly and then she was crying out, in short steady moans. The man breathed, "Yes yes yes."

  And then the painful sound came again into his wife's throat. She said, "No!" The bed stopped moving. The man's breathing broke. He said, "What is it?" This time his voice was sharper. Ginny said, "No, no," and then Paine heard someone get up off the bed. His wife began to sob.

  Paine turned and walked out of the apartment, closing and locking the door behind him.

  The rain had stopped. Paine looked up through the long telescope formed by the apartment buildings around him and saw that the sky was still dark and cloudy. No Mars or Venus. But they were up there somewhere.

  He left the car where it was and got on a bus. It was only nine o'clock but it was a Thursday night and the bus was almost empty. There were three girls along the back seat, in solid sweaters and new jeans and open slicker raincoats. They looked like college girls. They were laughing about something. A little later they got off. Two stops later Paine got off.

  He didn't salute the night doorman because he didn't know him. He signed in and showed his ID, then took the elevator upstairs. He used his key and went in. He turned on the light in the reception area and then the hall lights, and walked down the hall to his office. He didn't open the door. The cleaning woman had left the empty refuse pail outside. He left it where it was.

  He walked back up the hallway and turned on the light in Jimmy Carnaseca's office. The contraption on his desk was taller but still unrecognizable, a grid of girders that refused to take geometric shape. Paine turned off the light and walked to the end of the hallway.

  He heard music. The light was off in Barker's office. Paine thought the door would be locked but it wasn't. He eased it open.

  The room was empty. He saw the outline of Barker's long chair and the length of his desk. The Rachmaninoff Third Piano Concerto was still playing.

  Fucking idiot, Paine thought. Barker had the tape on a loop; when the time came, a guy would come in and put another tape loop on, something like the Mozart Piano Concerto 21—classical music for people who knew nothing about it but wanted to think they did without having to listen to it.

  Paine turned the light on on Barker's desk. He looked for a switch to turn the tape loop off. There wasn't one. He only found a volume dial set into the wall inside one of the bookshelves. He turned it down all the way, which wasn't enough but at least it was low enough so that he really couldn't tell what it was without concentrating. The last thing he felt like doing was concentrating.

  He went to Barker's couch. He bunched his jacket into a pillow and lay down.

  He pulled out the photos from his pocket and flipped through them, one by one. Les Paterna and two other creeps, and three pictures of barbecue folks. Who the hell were they? He lingered on the last picture, the head-and-shoulders shot of the man in a corporate pose. He was smiling slightly but his eyes looked old. He looked like he had once smiled a lot but then something had happened to him and he had never smiled like that again. He looked haunted.

  He put the pictures back in his pocket. He got up and turned the light on the desk off and lay down again. He closed his eyes. As low as the Rachmaninoff was, the notes came to him distinctly now, striking one by one on his ears. But he was so tired it didn't matter.

  Fucking idiot . . .

  The world came back.

  It was still dark. He held his watch up and pushed the little button on the side that made the digital display light up. Ten twenty-five. Now with his eyes open he saw the blackness of night outside Barker's window. He saw a single star. The rest were out there somewhere, fighting to get through the buildings. The room was filled with dark shadows. Paine yawned and then froze.

  Someone was walking down the hallway tentatively. The cleaning woman? No. Whoever it was stopped at a doorway and opened it. He heard the click of a light switch and then another click and the close of a door. The steps retreated.

  He got up and walked to the doorway and looked out. "Can I help you, Mrs. Meyer?"

  Rebecca Meyer was out there. She still looked boyish, her hair combed to one side, a coat thrown over a tennis shirt and slacks.

  She started, but quickly recovered herself. "Mr. Paine," she said. "I was looking for you." She walked down the hallway toward him. "I was told you were up here working."

  "Sleeping," he said. "Who let you in?"

  "The guard downstairs. He said you had signed in at nine and hadn't signed out again. I . . . thought it would be all right."

  Paine went back into Barker's office and sat down on the couch. He picked his jacket up and started smoothing it out.

  "What made you look for me here?"

  "I called you at home. Your wife answered and said you might be here."

  She knew, Paine thought. She knew I was there. He snorted a laugh. "Sure."

  "May I sit down?" She was standing straight in front of him.

  He waved at one of Barker's interrogation chairs, but she sat next to him on the sofa.

  "There was something I had to tell you," she said. She was uncomfortably close. "Mr. Paine, can I be direct with you?"

  "Why not?" he answered. "Everybody else is."

  "I'm attracted to you," she said, putting her hand on his arm.

  "Mrs. Meyer," he said.

  "My name is Rebecca."

  "I don't think this is something you want to do."

  He felt the heat of her hand on his arm.

  "My mother taught me," she said, "never to be shy about getting what you want. It's something she taught all of us."

  "So here you are," he said.

  "Yes," she said. She moved her hand up his arm to the soft part of his neck and then his face. He looked into her eyes. They had the same deepness they had the first time he'd spoken to her—direct and at the same time chameleon-like—eyes he could lose himself in.

  "What about your husband?" he said.

  "Gerald is not my husband," she answered. "He used to be my husband. And your wife?"

  "Over," he said.

  She put her lips on his. It was as if something melted in him. Then he didn't know where he was. He became hands and eyes and mouth. His brain went away. His mouth was on her mouth and then her neck and then her throat and her breasts; his hands were helping but her clothes seemed to go away by themselves. There was nothing but the two of them. They were sitting on the couch and then they were on the floor. She was whispering to him, begging him, and he said, "I have a problem there."

  Her eyes went wide and she smiled. Then the world went away again and she did something and then suddenly everything was all right.

  "That's the way," she breathed. "That's it."

  And then he heard only her breath.

  "Why do you think your sister Gloria didn't tell me she knew Les Paterna?" he asked her. He looked at his watch; it was seven o'clock. The sun had pushed the stars out of the sky. He finished smoothing his jacket and put it on.

  "Gloria was pretty chummy with Les Paterna at one time. And I was sure she'd try to hush up this thing with my father and sister."

  "She already has." He told her about Hartman.

  "You think Gloria told Paterna to have you shot at?"

  "I'm sure she knew that if she told Paterna I was nosing around he would take care of things in his own way. She might have told him to keep a leash on it and just try to scare me."

  "My sister is a bitch."

  He looked at her levelly. "What do you know about Paterna?"

  "I only know that he was partners with my father for a while, and that my father couldn't stand him."

  "Did they ever have any obvious fights?"

  "All the time. My father did most of the yelling. Paterna never stopped smiling."

  "Was there blackmail involved, something like that?"

  "Black
mail?"

  He kept his gaze level on her. "That's what I said."

  "Not that I know of."

  "When you said Gloria and Paterna were chummy, did you mean they had an affair?"

  "I don't think so. Paterna did some business with my sister after his break with my father. My father, of course, disapproved."

  "And that mattered to your sister?"

  "I already told you about Gloria."

  She put her hand on his arm, but he carefully slipped his arm away. "Look," he said, "I'm sorry if it sounds like I'm grilling you, but I'd be lying if I said I thought you were telling me everything. What about the other photographs? Are you sure there's nothing else?"

  "There's nothing else."

  What was it about her? When he held her it was as if he'd held someone familiar and yet far away. She was like a stranger he had always known.

  She stood up; just straightening her skirt she looked ready for tennis. "I should go."

  "Yes."

  "I'll . . . call you later."

  There was awkward silence as he stared at her.

  "I'll talk to you later," she said, and left.

  Paine went into his own office and turned on the lights and sat down. His mind was dancing. He closed his eyes but the dancing wouldn't go away. It was like being drunk without the happy places that drunkenness would at least take you before dropping you back into the real world. He could still feel Rebecca Meyer's smooth flesh against his hands. He wanted to touch her again. But at the same time he wanted to push her away. He looked at his hands and remembered her, and then he closed his eyes and kept them closed.

  At eight-thirty he dialed the phone. Someone answered and told him to wait a moment. The line cut off and music came on. Christ, even there? he thought. Then the music went away. There was the sound of a distant typewriter and someone said, "Bob Petty."

  "Hello, Bobby," Paine said.

  Petty sighed. "How have you been, Jack?"

  "Not too bad. I need background on a guy named Les Paterna."

  "Mind if I ask why?"

  "He's a creep, but doesn't act like one. At least not anymore. I know the bastard's got a record eight blocks long."

  "I'll see what I can do." Then Petty added, "Dannon's after your ass again."

  "Dannon's a fuckhead."

  "I saw him yesterday. He tried to get me to help reopen your case."

  "And—"

  "I told him to fuck himself. But I don't think that'll stop him. He wants to bring criminal charges against you."

  "Jesus."

  "I don't know how far he'll get. Listen, Jack . . ."

  Paine waited through the silence, and finally said, "Bobby, I know what you want to ask. The answer is still, I don't know what happened. Only Dannon knows, and he says what he says."

  "What's the problem with you and Dannon, Jack?"

  "He was always a fuck. He never treated me like a partner. He treated me like shit. I saw him take payoffs the first day I rode with him. He never even tried to hide it from me. The last good word he said to me was, 'Want a little of this?' and when I told him no he turned to stone. He knew I wasn't bastard enough to say anything about it, but from then on he didn't trust me. I always kept an eye on my back."

  "Why didn't you tell me any of this before?"

  "Because then I was a fucking cop and now I'm not a cop anymore. If he tries to go civil with me I'll blow his fucking face all over the newspapers. Tell him that for me. I don't care what he thinks about me anymore, or what any other fucking cop thinks about me, including you, Bobby, if you want to know."

  "All right, Jack, take it easy. I just thought you should know."

  "I appreciate it, Bob." He took a long breath. "I do."

  "You've still got a few buddies over here."

  "Name another one."

  "I'll get back to you about this Paterna creep," Petty said, and hung up.

  There came a knock at the door. Paine looked up to see Jimmy Carnaseca standing there.

  "Morning, Jack," he said.

  Paine held up a tired hand in greeting.

  "You look like shit," Carnaseca said. "What you need is sex."

  Paine stared at him.

  "Don't you want to know how I've been, Jack?"

  "How've you been, Jimmy?"

  "Just fine. Listen," he said, fiddling with the strap of his camera bag, "you really should try one of these hubby-cheater things. You never can tell what's going to happen."

  "What happened, Jimmy?"

  Carnaseca winked and walked past him. "Never mind. You really do look like shit." He laughed and went down the hall.

  TEN

  The lights were still on in his apartment. He opened the door loudly, letting it swing back against the doorstop with a bang, then closed it and went in. The bags were gone from the side of the chair. There was only one coat there now. He heard movement in the bedroom.

  She was leaving the room as he walked in.

  "Oh!" she said. "I thought I heard someone at the door." She smiled uneasily. "How are you?"

  She was wearing a denim skirt and a turtleneck top that showed the outline of her small waist and breasts.

  He shrugged. "And you?"

  "I'm okay. I hope you don't mind me taking those things . . ."

  "Good a time as any. Should I leave?"

  "No, of course not. I'm . . . almost finished."

  "That's good."

  "Why don't you . . . make some coffee or something? I'd like some."

  "All right."

  He went into the kitchen. He heard her hurrying through the bedroom. When he came out with two mugs and set them on the coffee table, she had four bags filled with clothes and a couple of garment bags laid neatly across the arm of the chair with her coat.

  "You'll need help," he said.

  "I've—" she began again. "Someone is coming up to help me."

  He gave her the coffee and sat. She perched on the thin arm of the chair with the garment bags on it. She didn't look at him. He found himself thinking again about her moving under him, trying, her eyes going from moist to rock-hard, the fright in the corners filling them up—

  "I don't know what I'm supposed to say," she said.

  "Neither do I."

  "Jack . . ." she said, trying to make herself sound reasonable, "I really don't know if this is a good way to end things."

  "It's as good a way as any."

  "Do you have to be cryptic? You always sound so cynical about everything."

  He said nothing.

  "Jack," she said, "I guess what I'm trying to say is that I wish it had worked out. I think I'll always wish that."

  "Always?"

  "Yes."

  "As long as it was both our faults, I guess that's okay." Something changed in her face. He knew he had chipped away a piece of her.

  "Ginny," he said, "I'll always feel that you thought, deep down inside, that almost everything was my fault."

  "Yes, that's true."

  "Can you tell me why?"

  "Because you didn't have to do the things you did. You could have been better than what you are."

  "I don't understand, Ginny."

  Her face began to change. The self-consciousness was gone; it was as if she had realized that this was the last time she would be able to say these things.

  "Goddammit," she said. "What do you think it was like living with you? I never knew what the hell you were going to do. Every time I talked to you I didn't know which Jack I was going to get—the happy one, the one in a black mood, the wiseass one or . . ."

  She bit her lip.

  "Or what?"

  "The one with the gun to his head! Don't you think I knew about the box of shells in the kitchen cabinet? Goddammit, Jack!" She began to cry.

  She stood up and gathered her things. She threw her coat over her arm, scooping the bags of clothes into her two hands. "I've got to go."

  "Can't I help you?"

  "I'll . . . meet him downstairs. I've got to
go."

  She opened the door and walked out.

  He rose and put his hand on the door. He stood with it open, listening for the elevator, and then it came. The elevator doors kissed shut and he heard it go down.

  Behind him, the telephone rang.

  "Jack?" Bob Petty's voice said.

  "Yeah."

  "Are you okay? You sound strange."

  "I'm all right. You have something on Paterna?"

  "Sort of. Paterna is dead."

  A slight chill rose up Paine's back as Petty went on.

  "He hung himself in his bedroom. His girlfriend found him about three this morning. She says they had a fight and she sent him home alone last night."

  "Was there a suicide note?"

  "No. That's one of the reasons we're holding the girlfriend. But there's something else funny. I started poking around and hit a brick wall on this guy. There wasn't any Les Paterna seven years ago."

  "He was a wash job?"

  "New name, new face. Probably a federal witness."

  "Thanks, Bobby."

  "No problem. You sure you're okay?"

  "Yeah."

  "Want to shoot some pool tonight?"

  "I'm all right, Bobby."

  "Remember what I said about Dannon."

  "I will. Thanks."

  He hung up.

  ELEVEN

  He was in the second bad place. Again, it was more a feeling that it would get bad because it didn't start that way. He was with Tom, and they were in the woods. For the first time in a long time it was like it had been. He was home. He had his uniform on. Tom had a beard and long hair. The air in the woods smelled good, and it was getting late in the day. He always liked this time. He had his coat off and if it had been just a little warmer he would have taken his shirt off, too. He had an axe in his hands. He swung it in long high arcs and it felt good coming down on the wood. The wood made a good clean sound when it split.

  "Been a long time since I did this," he said.

  "Bet they had you doing plenty of other shit in the Army," Tom said.