Chill of Night n-6

by John Lutz

  She took several long strides to reach the phone, then hesitated when she noticed the time on her watch.

  Past midnight. Beam would be asleep. Looper, too, dozing blissfully next to his wife, unless the snoring that Nell had endured in the car during stakeouts hadn’t driven Mrs. Looper to a separate room. Despite the unpleasant notion, Nell found herself wondering whimsically what it might be like to be married again, this time to someone who loved her and acted like it. She was finding being single more and more problematic. It was like drifting through life as a ghost.

  Don’t be an idiot. You’ve got your independence, and everything that means. And you’ve got your job. Your work. Maybe someday you’ll even live down the trouble with the shooting and the missing knife, the shooting that was goddamned righteous.

  Don’t rake up the past.

  Focusing on the computer monitor, she felt her adrenaline kick in again and quicken her pulse.

  Nell took a deep breath, then released it slowly.

  She was calmer now, and more objective. So she’d hit pay dirt with her computer research. What did it mean? There were certainly two more Justice Killer victims; he’d been killing in New York for the past four years, but now he was picking up the pace.

  That was predictive in serial killers. Really not such a big surprise.

  Maybe Beam and Looper wouldn’t be so impressed. Maybe she was exhausted and making too much of her find. Possibly she’d make a fool of herself by not waiting till morning to share her success. After all, if you held it up and looked at it, there wasn’t much there that couldn’t wait till morning.

  Nell thought about it and decided again not to call and share her information. Not at this hour.

  She rethought.

  She picked up the phone and punched out Beam’s number hard enough to hurt her fingers.

  14

  Melanie Taylor was juror number five and would act as foreperson in the capital criminal trial of Richard Simms, the rapper known professionally as Cold Cat.

  Melanie was thirty-nine, single, and office manager of Regal Trucking, a general hauling company with executive offices in lower Manhattan. She’d been married briefly, to a man who turned out not to love her when it was discovered she’d be unable to bear children. The divorce had been fifteen years ago, and she hadn’t again considered marriage. It was, after all, about children.

  Her heart-shaped face, radiant smile, and generous figure had garnered her more than a few proposals of marriage. Some of the proposals she’d accepted, but without the marriage part. She was living alone now, in a small apartment in Tribeca, and seeing no one romantically. After her last bitter parting, she’d decided to take time off from romance-maybe the rest of her life.

  “…can be no doubt that he dearly loved his wife, Edie Piaf,” Robert Murray, Cold Cat’s attorney was saying.

  Melanie’s gaze went from Murray to Richard Simms, whom she could think of by no name other than Cold Cat. She’d heard some of his songs, violent, assaults on the ear, full of deprecating lyrics about society in general, and women in particular. He didn’t look at all angry or menacing now, a rather placid seeming black man about thirty, with pleasant, even features and liquid dark eyes. His hair was cropped short, and he was wearing a well cut conservative gray suit, white shirt, blue tie. To Melanie, he appeared more the type to be selling insurance or continuing his education than the author and performer of his big hit “Do the Bitch Snitch!” As the prosecutor had pointed out, the song advocated using a knife in unpleasant ways on a woman who’d turned evidence over to the police. But Cold Cat wasn’t on trial for cutting or stabbing his wife, the singer Edie Piaf. Allegedly, he’d shot her.

  Murray, a smiling, calm man with rust-colored hair and a spade-shaped red beard, paced before the jury and talked soothingly of Cold Cat’s many musical accomplishments, his generosity to artists less talented or fortunate than himself, his participation in charity performances for AIDS victims and starving children.

  “I must object!” Nick Farrato, the lead prosecuting attorney, blurted out, standing up from his chair as if jerked by strings. “Mr. Murray seems to be nominating Cold Cat for sainthood rather than making an opening statement. This defendant is the man who writes songs about slaughtering women, and who took his own lyrics too seriously and willfully-”

  “You shut your lyin’ mouth!”

  Astounded, Melanie and the rest of the jurors turned in their chairs and saw a heavyset black woman standing near the middle of the crowded courtroom. Farrato, a chesty little man in a dark blue suit, normally cocky as Napoleon, was momentarily nonplussed by the outburst.

  “You know nothin’ ’bout my boy, you fat-headed piece of shit. You gonna be sued yourself, you don’t watch that ugly mouth of yours.”

  Laughter rippled through the courtroom, but it was nervous laughter.

  Judge Ernestine Moody, a somber African American woman with gray hair and deeply seamed features, was the only one who seemed unsurprised and unshaken. Melanie figured Judge Moody had seen it all.

  “I’m going to ask you once to sit down and be orderly, ma’am,” she said to the woman making all the fuss.

  “I sit you down, you keep messin’ with my boy!” the woman said, bringing gasps this time rather than laughter.

  And Melanie understood. This was Cold Cat’s mother. Late forties, overweight, overdressed, overheated, mad as hell.

  Still, the judge was unmoved. “Ma’am-”

  “I ma’am you, the way you helping these police an’ bald-faced lyin’ lawyers tell what ain’t true an’ railroadin’ my boy straight to jail. You think I’m gonna sit here an’ watch that happen?”

  “Ma’am-”

  “That ain’t gonna happen!”

  Murray was sidling up the far aisle, a smile stuck on his face, motioning with his arms for his client’s mother to sit down.

  The judge simply sighed and nodded to the bailiff, a husky blond man, who in turn nodded to a uniformed patrolman on the other side of the courtroom. The one in uniform made a hand motion that stopped Murray, and he and the bailiff converged on Cold Cat’s mother.

  That was when Cold Cat leaped to his feet. “You best leave my mom alone. Lay a hand on her an’ I’ll buy your ass and sell it to somebody not gonna treat it kindly.”

  From somewhere behind the bench two more uniformed cops appeared, a beefy man and a small, determined looking woman. They grabbed Cold Cat and forced him back down in his chair. Farrato was dancing around now, waving his short, stocky arms and objecting to everything. He finally lapsed into simply yelling, “Outrage! Outrage!”

  Cold Cat’s mother calmed down immediately when the two men reached her, as if she’d suddenly been shot through with a mild anesthetic that allowed her enough consciousness to remain on her feet, but no more. Braced between the two men, she accompanied them from the courtroom without a struggle until they reached the doors behind the gallery. Then she turned suddenly, as if she’d experienced a brief last surge of energy.

  “This here’s a place of lies!”

  She repeated herself loudly in the hall after she was led from the room.

  “Everybody,” Judge Moody said, holding out both palms toward the courtroom. “Everybody calm down, and sit down.”

  “Put-up deal for the media!” Farrato grumbled. “Cheap stunt by the defense!”

  “You sit down too, Mr. Farrato. You too, Mr. Murray.”

  “Certainly, your honor.” Murray seemed sobered and much concerned over what had occurred.

  “We’re going to continue these proceedings in an orderly fashion,” the judge said.

  “Thank you, your honor.”

  “Quiet, Mr. Murray.”

  “Your honor-”

  “I will not entertain an objection during an opening statement, Mr. Farrato. And for purposes of this trial, you will refer to the defendant as Richard Simms, not Cold Cat. And of course the jury is to disregard this…disturbance.” To the defendant: “When Mrs. Simms-the
defendant’s mother-agrees to behave herself, she will be allowed back in the courtroom.”

  Murray smiled beatifically, as if he’d just achieved a victory. “Thank you, your honor. Your demeanor and judicious temperament are commendable.”

  “I’d like to request a short recess,” Farrato said.

  “Not in the middle of an opening statement, Mr. Farrato.” The judge fixed her baleful stare on Murray. “You may continue, Mr. Murray.”

  “Despite attempts to silence those who know my client as a kind and generous man,” Murray began, seizing on opportunity and making Farrato squirm, “the defense will prove to you that it was absolutely impossible for Richard Simms to have murdered Edie Piaf.”

  “Right on!” a Cold Cat supporter in the courtroom said softly.

  Judge Moody silenced him with a laser-like glance.

  Melanie knew the judge’s instruction to ignore the disturbance was simply a matter of form. How on earth could a juror actually put such a thing out of his or her mind?

  She knew she couldn’t, and decided that if any relevant impression stayed with her from the recent outburst, it was that Cold Cat loved his mother.

  Of course, it was possible to love your mother, hate women, and murder one.

  Wasn’t it?

  15

  “This is just terrific!” da Vinci said in disgust.

  He hadn’t taken the results of Nell’s computer research quite as she anticipated. She and Beam, seated in da Vinci’s sun-washed office, glanced at each other.

  “Not only do we have two more Justice Killer murders, but they’re old homicides we never connected with him.”

  “It’s important information,” Beam said. “It enlarges a pattern, and it indicates that the killer’s increasing the rate of his murders.”

  “Yeah. Just what the media in this town will want to know. Do you realize what they’re going to do to me? To you?”

  “Stay ahead of the curve and notify the media,” Beam said, ignoring da Vinci’s questions. “Act as if the discovery of two earlier murders represents progress, which in fact it does. These victims didn’t die again just because Nell discovered their connection to the Justice Killer. The more we know, the sooner we’ll nail this asshole.”

  “Can I quote you?”

  “I’d clean it up.”

  Da Vinci grinned. “Well, I’d be quoting you.”

  Nell was normally intimidated by these two, but she’d had about enough. Besides, the office was too hot; a trickle of perspiration found its way out from beneath her bra and trickled down her ribs. “I don’t get it. I find something useful and you act as if I did something wrong. Maybe I oughta talk to the media.”

  Da Vinci stood up behind his desk and Nell actually winced.

  So did Beam. “She didn’t mean that, Andy. Not the way it sounded.”

  “The politics of this business are delicate and complex. I’ll concentrate on that part of our game while you concentrate on yours.”

  “That’s what I was-”

  “Nell.” Beam reached over and rested a big hand on her knee. For an instant she thought inanely that he might squeeze just behind the kneecap, prove she was boy crazy. “This is one phase of the game you don’t understand, Nell. You did nothing wrong and everything right-we all know that. It’s just that we handed Andy something valuable, but hot enough to burn his hand.”

  We. Nell liked that. Beam and Nell together against the bureaucratic monster. “Okay,” she said, “I’m sorry, Chief.”

  “Deputy Chief,” da Vince corrected. He actually smiled. Nell had to admire him for it. “Keep unearthing whatever you can,” da Vinci said. “And go wherever the investigation takes you. You’re the one who’s right, Nell, we’ve gotta have faith that the truth will bear us out. It’s our job, finding the truth.”

  Nell thought he was getting a little sickening. Beam gave her a cautioning glance.

  Beam stood up suddenly, surprising Nell.

  “We’ll get back to our end of the game while you take care of business on your end,” Beam said to da Vinci. “All I’ll say is that if I were you, I’d dump it all on the media before it leaks on them. You know how it works; there’ll be less pressure on us that way in the long run.”

  “Yeah,” da Vinci said, obviously pretending to become engrossed in some papers on his desk. “They’ll think we’re actually doing something.”

  Outside One Police Plaza, as they were walking toward Beam’s car, Beam said, “da Vinci’s right about this, in some ways.”

  “I thought you were on my side,” Nell said.

  Beam smiled. “I am. You’re right about it in every way.”

  “Departmental politics are a pain in the ass,” Nell said. “I’ll never understand them.”

  “Probably not. Best thing.” They crossed the street. “Know what would help?” Beam said,

  “Tell me.”

  “If we solved one of these crimes.”

  “And then the others,” Nell said, reaching for the Lincoln’s sun-warmed door handle.

  “And then the others.”

  16

  Cold case files, suddenly hot.

  Beam and his detectives studied the Rachel Cohen and Iris Selig murder files, then Beam sent Nell and Looper to snoop around the Selig crime scene. He took the Rachel Cohen murder, in the Village, himself.

  Cohen had been single and a freelance journalist who hadn’t sold much. She’d been supported by her lifetime partner, a woman named Angela Drake, who’d discovered Rachel’s corpse in their apartment on MacDougal Street. Drake had long ago moved from the city. The people who lived in the apartment now, a young artist and his wife, consented to let Beam look around; but as Beam suspected, nothing much resembled the four-year-old police photographs of the murder scene. The furniture was different, and the papered walls with their fleur-de-lis pattern had been stripped and painted.

  Beam was driving back uptown and turned onto Fourteenth Street when he noticed a small antique shop, Things Past, where he’d expected to see a jewelry store. His reaction was out of proportion to his surprise. A block away, he pulled to the curb and switched off the ignition.

  Five years ago Things Past had been Precious Gems Limited, and was owned and managed by a fence, Harry Lima, who was one of Beam’s most valuable and reliable snitches. More than one burglary ring had been broken up after using Lima’s services to handle stolen goods, without the arrested parties suspecting the reason for their downfall was their fence.

  But Beam had pushed when he shouldn’t have, and pressured Lima into informing on a jewel theft ring that was connected to organized crime and particularly dangerous. Despite Beam’s promises of protection, Lima was killed. Most of his body was found in a dumpster; his severed right hand, wearing his gaudy trademark diamond ring and clutching a dollar bill, was discovered six blocks away and served as a ghoulish and striking message as to why he was murdered. Tabloid news photos of the hand and ring were viewed by others in Harry Lima’s business who might be considering informing. It was more than a year before sources of information about jewel thefts in Manhattan began to open up again.

  Beam was still haunted by the ghost of Harry Lima. Harry was one of the few major mistakes in his career, but more than that, he’d given his personal guarantee and let Lima down. Beam had been-and this is what Beam still came face to face with in his dreams-responsible for Harry Lima’s death.

  It wasn’t only Harry Lima who haunted Beam. It was Harry’s wife, Nola, who’d been skeptical from the beginning about her husband’s safety, and who’d never completely believed Beam about anything. Nola had been a stunningly beautiful woman whose dark eyes and wide cheekbones suggested Native American ancestry. Harry had once caught Beam looking at his wife with more than professional interest, and it seemed to amuse him. He’d begun bragging about Nola’s beauty and passion, more than Beam wanted to hear, and told Beam she was half Cherokee. Both men knew Nola was off limits to Beam, not only because of Harry, but because
of Nola herself. This wasn’t a woman to be used; she was the brains behind the legitimate retail jewelry business, and for all Beam knew, the brains behind the fencing operation.

  Beam had found himself thinking more and more about Nola’s calm beauty, her slender waist, ample breasts, and what he saw as her noble bearing. He was attracted to her and couldn’t deny it. For a while, it even threatened his marriage to Lani. Not that Nola showed the slightest attraction to Beam. He knew that to her he was simply a danger to her husband, a cop, somebody on the other side, a liar. Nola had been right.

  Beam’s problem was that he’d genuinely liked Harry Lima, and he’d more than liked his wife. Nola hadn’t known she’d been a threat to Beam’s career and marriage. She was the one woman who might have derailed him, if she’d taken the time to notice him as anything other than rain in her life.

  Without really thinking about what he was doing, Beam climbed out of the car, fed the parking meter all the change in his pocket, then began walking along the sidewalk toward Things Past.

  The antique shop appeared smaller than when it was a jewelry store, because of the clutter of merchandise. Antique clocks were mounted on one wall. The other walls were lined with display cases. In the central part of the shop were shelves of glassware and pottery, along with various antiques or collectibles ranging from ancient oil lamps to postcards. And to furniture, on which some of the merchandise was displayed.

  Beam stepped around an antique oak bureau on which sat a brush-and-comb set, an old wash bowl, and a two-tiered painted globed lamp of the sort he’d heard called “Gone with the Wind” lamps. When he moved to his left and looked beyond a brass coat rack on which were draped various period garments, he could see a woman seated behind a glass display case on which sat a cash register and charge card scanner. She momentarily took his breath away.