by R.J. Ellory
guy-'
'What thing?'
'Danny had a sideline, you know? Least he said he did. Had a thing with some guy who was always on the lookout for the younger ones, just the wrong side of legal. Fifteen, sixteen, whatever.'
'And Danny Lange was going to let his kid sister do a porno with this guy?'
'He wanted the money, man. She wanted the money too, but she was into it big-time. She was into doing this thing more than he was. She didn't have a fucking clue what she was getting into. She had some wide-eyed fucking Hollywood thing going on. She was gonna blow some guy and everyone would take her for Carmen fucking Electra. Sad fucking state of affairs, but she was really fucking determined to do this thing.'
'Danny told you this?'
'Danny and the sister. Last time I saw them.'
'And it didn't occur to you that this might have some bearing on Danny's death?'
'Hey, man, you know the way this goes. You do what you do, I do what I do. You think I'm gonna go running to the callbox and call you up because I think that maybe I have a tiny fucking idea about some junkie scumbag from Brooklyn? We're on different sides here, Detective Parrish, or hadn't you realized that?'
'Who was the guy?'
'I haven't a single fucking idea,' Swede said emphatically.
Parrish nodded, looked at Radick. 'Cuff him,' he said. 'We're taking him in.'
Swede got up fast. 'What the fuck are you doing? I told you what I know, I answered your questions.'
Radick stood with his cuffs.
'Tell us the guy, Swede,' Parrish said.
'I don't know the guy, okay? Seriously, man, I don't know who the fuck it was. He just said some guy. That was all. Just some guy.'
Parrish looked directly at Swede. Swede didn't flinch, didn't look away, stood there resolutely.
'Okay,' Parrish said eventually. 'You know anyone who might know which guy?'
'No, I don't,' Swede said too quickly.
Jimmy Radick stepped forward, reached out to take Swede's hand.
Swede snatched his hand away, stepped back.
'You don't wanna test me,' Parrish said. 'Seriously, you don't want to fucking test me today.'
'Go see Larry Temple.'
'And who the fuck is that?' Parrish asked.
'Two blocks east. Big high-rise place. Something tower. Third floor, apartment six. Tell him if he helps you out then he and I are quits. And just ask him the fucking question, okay? Don't go busting him, eh?'
Parrish nodded. 'Third floor, apartment six, Larry Temple.' 'Right, right. Larry. Go ask him, see if he knows who the guy was.'
'And what makes you think he might know?'
"Cause he watches that shit, man. Young girls, all that stuff. He's into all that sick shit, man.'
Parrish started towards the door. 'I find you held out on me, Swede, I'm gonna come back here and kick your ass all the way to Staten Island.'
Swede didn't say a word. He just stood there watching them, willing them to leave.
TWENTY-FIVE
On the drive over Frank Parrish tried to blank out the thought of Rebecca doing a porno. He tried not to think about her brother selling her for dope. Some police believed that the nature of the work didn't have to set the tone of your life. All they were saying was that they hadn't done the work for long enough. Give them another couple of years, five at most, and they'd sing a different tune.
Parrish thought about Eve, and then he thought about the ever-present discomfort in his lower gut. He wondered once again if he was sick, not just a flu or a virus or something, but proper sick.
'You know this Larry Temple guy?' Radick asked as they pulled over against the curb.
'Name's familiar,' Parrish said, 'but I can't place it.'
'Let's go see whether you're old friends then, eh?'
Larry Temple was no different from the rest of them. They all had bad skin. They gave off a smell - body odor, cheap disinfectant, the underlying decay that came with their predilection. As if they were deteriorating from within, dying from the inside out, the odor escaping through their pores.
He was predictably resistant until Parrish mentioned Swede, told him if he answered questions he and Swede would be quits. With that Larry Temple stepped back and allowed them entry to his apartment. Here there was no scattered garbage, no greasy burger boxes or damp mattresses; here was a man who at least was trying his best to appear normal. An upstanding citizen. One of the good guys.
'You owe Swede?' Parrish asked.
Temple shrugged.
'You know who we are, you don't want us in here, I mention his name and you're Mister fucking Sociable all of a sudden?'
'I don't have anything to hide,' Temple said.
Parrish looked at Radick. Radick smiled.
'How many times you been inside, Larry?' Parrish asked.
'Just the once,' Radick interjected.
Parrish's eyes widened. 'I remember you now. You got busted for kiddie porn a ways back. You lived over in—'
'That was a long time ago,' Temple said. He was nervous. He kept smoothing his hand over his hair.
'And you're not like that anymore, right?' Parrish asked. 'You're not into that shit anymore, eh?'
'No,' Temple replied. 'I got some help. I'm all clean now, all clean.'
'Not what we heard.'
'From Swede? Swede don't know shit—'
'Swede?' Parrish asked. 'Where the hell did that name come from? Hey, Jimmy, did you mention Swede?'
Radick turned his mouth down at the corners. 'I didn't mention Swede, no—'
'You just told me—' Temple interjected. 'You motherfuckers. You're messing with my head. What the hell is this?'
'We were telling you that we heard a few things, Larry.'
'From who?' Temple asked. 'If it's not Swede, then who's been saying shit about me?'
'Doesn't matter,' Parrish said. 'We got someone who's trying to work himself a deal downtown. He wants to give up on some people, you know? Lessen the burden he's carrying an' all that. Your name got mentioned, a few things of interest, and we figured we'd come over, say hi, chat for a while, see what's happening in your neck of the woods.'
'You ain't got nothin' on me,' Temple said defensively.
'We got word about a girl who was up for a porno. Kid sister of someone you know.'
Temple opened his mouth to speak, and once again he hesitated.
'You shouldn't do that if you don't want any trouble, Larry,' Parrish said.
'What? Shouldn't do what?'
'Look so fucking guilty.'
'Look guilty? I don't look guilty.' His complexion warmed. His eyes were back and forth from Parrish to Radick, real deer-in-the- headlights.
'Tell us about Danny Lange,' Parrish said matter-of-factly.
'Oh w-wait a fu-fucking minute here,' Temple stuttered, and started backing away. Radick took a step to the right and blocked him. He had cuffs in his hands.
'Wait a goddamned minute here,' Temple said. 'I heard about that. I heard about Danny and his kid sister, but you don't have anything on me and the—'
'Who said anything about a kid sister?' Parrish asked.
'You did. You said someone's kid sister was up for doing some porno . . .'
Parrish frowned. 'Did you hear me say anything like that Jimmy?'
Radick shook his head. 'Nothing like that, Frank. I think you were talking about the weather or something.'
'Oh fuck off! What the fuck is this shit? What the fuck are you doing here? You can't pin this on me. Who the hell do you think you are?'
'Couple of cops doing our job,' Parrish replied. 'I went to see Swede on this Danny Lange double homicide, he mentions your name, we come over here to just check things out and all of a sudden you bring up Danny Lange's kid sister and how you were going to do a porno with her.'
'What? What the fuck—'
'Heard it loud and clear, right, Jimmy?'
'Loud and clear, Frank.'
'You guys—'
'S
tart talking, Larry.'
'About what? Talking about what? What the fuck does this have to do with me?'
'You're into this shit up to your neck,' Radick said. 'You've already got a bust for this kind of business on your sheet. You know who's who. You know who's in the market at the moment, what they're doing, where they're working from—' 'I don't know anything like that,' protested Larry, almost hysterical now.
'Larry,' Parrish said. 'Larry, let's calm the fuck down for a minute, eh? Take a seat. Let's talk this out all civilized, okay?'
'Talk what out? There isn't anything to talk out. . .'
'Larry, sit the fuck down right now!'
Temple dropped into a chair and looked up at Parrish and Radick.
Parrish sat facing him. Radick stood to the right.
Larry Temple - wide-eyed, anticipating the worst - swallowed audibly.
'This is really, really simple, Larry. You know who we need to talk to. Danny Lange was setting up his kid sister for doing a porno, and you know who he was talking to.'
'Wha—'
'Just cut the crap, will you? You know who we need to talk to, Larry. Tell us who we need to talk to or I'm gonna leave Jimmy here with you while I go get a search warrant for your place, you understand?'
'You can't do that—'
'Try me.'
Larry Temple inched forward on the chair and then sat with his hands on his knees, his head bowed. He stayed that way for a moment or two, and then he looked up at Frank Parrish.
'I heard something,' he said quietly. He waited for Parrish to respond, but Parrish said nothing.
'I heard word of something, just a maybe, but this was some time back. Only reason I mention it is because Danny said something when I last saw him and it might have been connected.'
'When d'you see Danny?' Parrish asked.
'I don't know . . . three, maybe four weeks ago.'
'And you spoke to him?'
'Some, yeah.'
'And what was it he said?'
Temple hesitated, and then he looked away towards the window. 'He said he had a good score going on. He said he was gonna do a thing that would make a difference.'
'And what made you think there was some connection to what happened with him and his sister?' 'What he said after that.'
Parrish raised his eyebrows.
'He said he had someone lined up to do a skin flick, that he was gonna get some serious money for it—'
'And you thought that this might have a connection,' Parrish said sarcastically.
'Hey, this is like a month ago. I'm just shooting the shit with the guy and he says he might have someone for a skin flick. He didn't say anything about his sister, he just said that. It was only when I heard that he'd gotten himself killed, that his kid sister was killed too, that I wondered if she was the one that he might have lined up for it.'
'And if she was?'
'Then . . . well . . . then something must've gone wrong.'
'A bit of a fucking understatement, Larry.'
Larry Temple lowered his head again.
'So who would Danny Lange have gone to if he was selling his sister into this shit?'
'You know as well as me,' Temple said.
'This isn't small-time shit, Larry. This is someone who's into it deep enough to kill two people.'
'How the fuck would I know?'
'Because this is your world, Larry. This is what you do. These are the people you go hang out with, the other sick fuckos who watch this—'
'It's an illness,' Temple interjected. He looked confounded and hurt. 'It's a mental illness. It's something you're born with. It's not something you can just turn on and turn off whenever you feel like it.'
'Don't give me the fucking sob story, Larry, just tell me who Danny Lange might have been talking to.'
'I don't know, Detective Parrish, I really don't. I've told you what I know, and that's all I know. I'm not so close with the crowd anymore. Things have changed.'
Parrish was quiet for some time. He believed Larry Temple. There was just something in his expression, something in his eyes; Parrish had seen enough liars to know what they looked like. And he knew Danny Lange for what he was, so much the same as so many others. Big ideas, all mouth. I'm doing this, I'm
doing that, today will be different, today I have a thing, today I'm gonna get out of the life. And they never did, and they never would. Addiction was addiction.
Did Parrish believe that Danny Lange might have sold his sister to do a porno? Yes. Did Parrish believe that Rebecca might have been into it? That Danny sold her on the idea that it was a cool thing, that she'd wind up with money, and her name in lights? Sure. It changed his perspective on the girl, but he was no stranger to this kind of thing. This shit went down all the time. And then what happens? She winds up dead, Danny either wants his money or he's going to the cops, and he gets whacked too.
Parrish rose to his feet.
Temple watched him stand, braced himself for a beating. The beating never came.
'You hear anything more you let me know,' Parrish said. 'You know how to get hold of me. I track some other line on this and find out you didn't tell me something, well I'm gonna come back here and I ain't gonna knock on the door, know what I mean?'
Temple didn't speak, but the recognition of what Parrish meant was in his eyes.
Parrish led the way, didn't speak to Radick until they reached the stairwell, and it was Radick who spoke first.
'You think he gave us everything?'
'Yeah, I think so. He knows the same names as me. I don't think there's some big fish that he's aware of that we don't know about.'
'So who do we start with?'
'I want to go back to the office first,' Parrish said. 'I want the tox results before anything else.'
TWENTY-SIX
The tox test on Rebecca Lange's blood and urine came back negative, but there was a note to say that hair had been sampled and would be processed before the end of the day.
Parrish sat at his desk, aware of the stack of files in his drawer and feeling some sense of urgency, a need to look further, delve deeper. He needed to pursue the possibility of any Child Services connection to Jennifer Baumann and Nicole Benedict. He had no reservations about the competence of Hayes, Wheland, Engel or West, but something such as this would have been so easy to overlook had they not known what they were looking for. The smallest fragment of information could change perspective utterly.
Parrish was frustrated that he'd not had these names before his visit to Child Services Records and Archives. It required time, but he didn't want to get Jimmy Radick in deep. Not yet. Not until there was something more substantial. Too many times he had fixated on a case, come to some wild conclusion, and chased it relentlessly, only to find out that the conclusion was a figment of his too-fertile imagination. This time he didn't want to go that route. Discretion and tact had never been his strong points, but now - in the current climate - it seemed that to ignore caution would be to court further criticism and censure. It was either tread carefully or get handed an official suspension. His only assigned homicides were Danny and Rebecca Lange, the hooker, the subway death, and the campus stabbing. The last three wouldn't go away, and yet Parrish felt no compelling duty to pursue them. For a moment he wondered if he could convince Radick to work them, but he knew that wouldn't fly.
Nonetheless, apart from Rebecca, it was those earlier homicides he was interested in - Karen, Jennifer and Nicole. With Rebecca, that gave him four girls, two aged sixteen, two of seventeen. The first - Jennifer - had been found in January 2007; the second - Nicole - in August of the same year; Karen was found in that December, and finally Rebecca. Karen's body had been in clothes she wouldn't ordinarily have worn, and Rebecca's hair had been cut and her nails painted. Parrish knew little of the other two, save that Jennifer was found in a motel room, Nicole in a mattress bag with her neck broken. The circumstances of their disappearances had been as unremarkable as those of Karen and Rebecca.
They just went somewhere, and they never came back. Somewhere between one and three days later they were found dead.
Parrish told Radick to start familiarizing himself with the different report forms that needed to be completed for ongoing cases. While he was distracted with this, Parrish spent a couple of hours going through the files again. Wheland's unmistakable scrawl, Engel's cryptic notes that only Engel would ever understand. They were standard open cases - the canvass, the preliminary reports, the autopsy, the friends and relatives QA. Autopsy was of the greatest interest to Parrish, both Jennifer and Nicole having been found within twenty-four hours of their respective TODs. Jennifer's death was caused by strangulation, apparently manual, and in Nicole's case it had been a clean break between the second and third vertebrae. As if she'd been hung, the medical examiner reported, but there were no outward abrasions or ligature marks to the neck that a hanging would have left.
A severe contusion on the right side of Nicole's head suggested that she had been hit with something - or against something - with sufficient force for the neck to break. Against was the considered opinion of the ME, simply because there was no indentation, no shape to the injury as was usual when an object was applied with external force. This contusion showed just a flat and even impact, as if her head had been slammed against a wall. However, it was a neck-related injury that had occasioned the death of both girls - of all four girls.
There were no notes in these files regarding manner of dress, alterations in usual outward appearance, or other such things that might have alerted Parrish to a similarity to the others. Of course, they may have been present, but gone unnoticed. It was not, however, those outward signs that had grabbed his attention, but several other similarities common to all four cases. First, there was height, weight, coloring and age. Then the fact that each had engaged in sexual intercourse some short time before death, yet in no instance were there indications of rape. The fact that they all came from within a couple of miles' radius of one another was possibly significant. The fact that each body had just been left for someone to find. That no attempt had been made to hide the victims from the eyes of the world was an aspect that intrigued Parrish particularly. Criminal psychology was a field all its own, but homicide touched on it periodically. Parrish was not a profiler, but he understood sufficient to be aware of the four types of killer as detailed in standard texts. One man, or four different men, it didn't matter. Four dead girls. Four open cases, three in-house, and one that belonged to Richard Franco at the Williamsburg 91st.