Heart of the City

by Robert Rotenberg

  “You were working for Fox, weren’t you?”

  She nodded.

  “Let me guess,” he said. “You two would exchange notes under the table at Omni and then meet in the backroom of the Huibing Gardens on Spadina on Friday afternoons. You’d go in through the alley in back.”

  A look of admiration crossed her face. “Very good, Detective Daniel Kennicott.”

  “What were you meeting about?”

  “Everyone knows the condo market in this city is a gigantic bubble that’s about to burst. The government is freaking out with all the foreign money coming in, jacking up the prices, building condos that no one is even living in. Meanwhile twenty-five-year-olds are stuck in their parents’ basements or moving out of town because the prices are going nuts. Fox had to diversify out of the upscale market.”

  “That’s where you come in? Low-cost housing.”

  “Subsidized by the government. The other developers hate the idea because their profit margins are cut in half.”

  “And Livingston?”

  “Half a loaf is better than owning empty condos with the glass windows falling out five years from now. And he was genuinely inspired to do a new kind of housing for the poor. In the fifties and sixties, the government built tons of public housing. Problem was it was all shit. Ghettos for poor people that became breeding grounds for crime, like where I grew up.”

  “And you know your way around affordable housing.”

  “Fox had a serous problem. If he was still the Condo King, the government wouldn’t give him a dime. He needed a new image. Credibility. Access. Imagine if he partnered with me, a black woman who grew up poor in Regent Park and put herself through university working as a cashier at a car wash. It was a PR wet dream. I could have walked him into the housing ministry, the mayor’s office, introduced him to key cabinet ministers. He would have charmed them all.”

  She flipped open her water bottle, tilted her head back, and took a long drink. “You didn’t bring any water?”

  “I should have.”

  “Here.” She passed him her bottle. He shot a spray of water into his mouth without letting the bottle touch his lips, then passed it back.

  “What nobody knew was that Fox planned to turn K2, the second development he wanted to build on College Street, into affordable housing.”

  “You’re kidding. His full-page newspaper ads said K2 was going to be the ultimate in luxury condos. If he wanted a new image, why was he promoting it as a playground for the wealthy?”

  “He had it all planned out. After the protesters had their big march yesterday he was going to hold a press conference and say, ‘My goodness, you’re right. I’ve seen the light.’ Like Scrooge waking up on Christmas morning, he was going to be a changed man.”

  “Smart.”

  “Smart? Livingston was fucking brilliant.”

  “How many times did you meet him?”

  “Four. Last time was a week ago. He swore me to secrecy.”

  “Why all the cloak-and-dagger routine?”

  “Fox acted rich, but any one of those guys at Omni could spend him under the table in a heartbeat. Everyone in the business thought he’d overextended himself with this Fox Harbour development. He was afraid if the bank or his backers found out about his new plan for K2 before he had the money in place, they’d freak out and call in his loans.”

  Sweat had formed on her cheek. She wiped it away with her forefinger. It had grown quiet. The seagulls were silent, busy picking away at the pebbles along the shoreline.

  “Was there anything unusual about your last meeting?”

  “He was real nervous. He was convinced someone had found out about his plan and was determined to stop him. He didn’t know who it was.”

  The sun was lowering. Its rays spangled across the water, lighting up Breaker’s skin.

  “Why all the secrecy about meeting with me today?” he asked her.

  She gave him a long look. “Your brother was murdered. Don’t you ever worry that whoever did it might be after you one day?”

  The wind picked up, sending a chill across Kennicott’s skin. He stared at her. This was something he’d never confessed to anyone. Not even Ari Greene.

  She put her hand on his arm. The warmth of her skin seemed to stop the chill. “Don’t you see, Daniel?” she whispered. “I thought Livingston was being paranoid. Then look what they did to him.”

  He could see in her eyes that fear had replaced her usual confidence.

  “But with your connections wouldn’t another developer want to work with you?”

  She took her hand away and wrapped her arms around herself.

  “The last thing they want is a new kind of rental housing to compete with their money-making condos. The government is getting wise to what is happening. They are talking about taxing foreign buyers who buy places and don’t really live in them. Good luck to them. There are a million loopholes, and way too much cash at stake.”

  “You really think you are in danger?”

  She picked up a rock, tossed it in the water. “Okay, I admit, I’m probably overdoing it. But the way Livingston was acting, something was up. I can’t help but feel that this isn’t over, and I don’t want to be the next body.”

  He didn’t say anything.

  “You grew up in a different Toronto than I did,” she said. “My mother wouldn’t let me outside the house after five o’clock, even in the summer, because of all the drugs and guns and stabbings and shootings. A girl I went to school with was killed by a stray bullet. I bet you think I’m just being paranoid.”

  He did. But how could he be sure?

  “I know it sounds foolish, but that’s how I feel. I’m still in shock that this happened.”

  Her eyes glistened in the light reflecting off the water. He’d seen people in shock before. Their reactions weren’t always rational.

  “I can get you police protection,” he said.

  She shook her head and her beaded cornrows swung across her shoulders. “I’m not going home. I packed a bag and left it in my car. I need a safe place where I can disappear for a few days.”

  She started to shake.

  “I have a spare room in my flat,” he said, surprised at himself that he’d made the offer. “But I have to warn you, there’s only one bathroom.”

  She grinned. “That’s no problem for me. We had one bathroom when I was growing up. And there were six of us.”

  Why not? Technically she was a possible suspect, but this way he’d know where she was.

  She took her water bottle and shot a light spray at his face. They both laughed.

  “I’m getting cold, let’s go,” she said. “And by the way, yesterday I didn’t run this way, I went west back into the city. Maybe you should have that partner of yours check the video cameras along Queens Quay.”

  Before he could respond, she took off at a fast pace. He almost slipped on some pebbles before he righted himself and ran after her. This time it took him about half a minute to catch up.

  39

  Alison sat on her bed, opened her laptop, turned on her phone, and clicked on the TV. The eleven-thirty news had just begun.

  Livingston Fox’s murder was dominating the headlines, and her Twitter feed and her blog had lit up with news that the Fox family was holding a midnight ceremony at their wellness centre to honour their son. A few hours earlier, Ari had come home for a few minutes and rushed out again. She was sure this was where he’d gone.

  On the TV, Sheena Persad was standing in front of a line of cars pulled over to the side of the road with their headlights and their emergency flashers on.

  “This is an extraordinary scene out here,” she said. “I’m on Highway 27 north of Toronto, and as you can see behind me, cars are backed up a long, long way.” The camera swung to the side and showed a line of lights stretching into the distance.

  “TO-TV News has learned that the family of Livingston Fox is holding a midnight candlelit vigil to celebrate the life o
f their controversial son. Police are continuing their investigation of his gruesome murder and TO-TV News is fully cooperating with the authorities.”

  Alison sat up in bed.

  She was gobsmacked.

  “The police are looking for an individual we caught on camera on Friday afternoon.”

  Oh no, oh no, Alison thought.

  The video from the march started to play on the screen.

  “You can see this person wearing a Blue Jays baseball cap and sunglasses, with a yellow backpack. Now you can see the individual crossing to the sidewalk on Augusta Avenue where the demonstration took place.”

  There she was, wearing the baseball cap and sunglasses—and that dumb, yellow backpack. They’d drawn a red circle around her head. The camera tracked her as she zigzagged through the crowd. But Persad had called her an “individual.” That meant the police couldn’t tell if she was a man or a woman.

  Persad was back on camera. “Anyone with information about the identity of this individual is asked to contact Crime Stoppers or the Metro Toronto Police immediately.”

  Wait a second, Alison thought. Persad must not have told the police they’d met at the demonstration or they would know that Alison was a female who spoke with an English accent. Persad was protecting her. But she wouldn’t be able to do it for long.

  Alison had to talk to her in person. Right away.

  “We’ve been asked by the police to play this clip a second time,” Persad said. “In slow motion.”

  The video started again. As painful as it had been to watch it first on her laptop, then on TV, now seeing herself for a third time in slow motion was too much. She felt sick. She clicked off the TV and jumped off the bed. She tore her bedroom door open and dashed across the hall. The bathroom door was closed. She flung it open. But she was too late.

  Before she could get to the toilet, she threw up all over herself.

  40

  The cars on the shoulder of the highway had their headlights and flashers on, waiting to drive into the Foxhole Wellness Centre. It was 11:45 p.m. and the night air was still warm. Greene had his window open, as did Bassante, who was sitting in the passenger seat, stewing.

  “Fox told me his hippie parents were nut bars,” he said. “Now I see what he meant.”

  “Every family mourns differently,” Greene said.

  “Yeah. But a midnight candlelight ceremony? Come on. The email says, ‘Please observe all legally posted speed signs on your journey, and carpool if possible, so as to lessen the carbon footprint on the planet.’ Their only son is murdered and they’re worried about the goddamn environment.”

  Four TV news trucks were parked on the other side of the highway while reporters stood talking to their cameras. They weren’t being allowed into the centre.

  Greene drove the last few feet to the entrance, where a young woman wearing a white robe bent to his window.

  “Welcome to the celebration of Livingston’s essence,” she said, and handed him two white Glow Sticks. “Please proceed to the lower parking lot. Thank you for carpooling and helping to save our planet.”

  Greene handed one of the sticks to Bassante.

  “Do me a favour,” Bassante said, as Greene turned into the grounds. “When I kick the bucket, rent a nightclub and throw a party. That’s what Fox would have wanted.”

  The long driveway was lined with burning torches. At the end of it, a tall man, also in a white robe, directed them past a large old house that had a candle in each window to a road that led to a parking lot below. Two white-robed assistants used their own Glow Sticks to point cars to open spots, and a third directed them to a candlelit path. This took them to a field, which was surrounded by yet more burning torches.

  The moon was almost full and high in the sky. It illuminated rows of white sheets that had been laid out on the ground. Most of the spaces were filled with people speaking in muted voices. A wooden platform had been erected in front of the crowd and a white sheet was draped between two trees behind it. Presumably that’s where the mourners were waiting.

  Bassante nudged Greene and motioned to a clump of trees on a small rise off to the side. “Let’s stand over there, out of the way.”

  “Good idea.”

  From this vantage point, it was easy for Greene to make out faces in the crowd. He had checked the Fox Developments Inc. website and read the profiles of the people who worked for what they called “Team Livingston” doing finance, sales, marketing, customer service, accounting, and administration. In their photos, most were young, well dressed, and looked enthusiastic. Greene had counted how many times the word team was used on the site: fourteen.

  Then he’d gone to the website for the Foxhole Wellness Centre. It was much more modest. There were a couple of photos of the buildings and profiles of Karl, Kate, and Gloria Fox, but there was no schedule of classes or treatments, and the rate sheet was a year out of date. He looked at a few travel websites: the latest reviews of the centre were two years old. Most were negative.

  A woman playing a flute and dressed in an Elizabethan gown emerged from behind the sheet. A man wearing a doublet and breeches who was carrying a round Chinese gong followed her on the improvised stage. He struck it twelve times. Greene glanced at his watch. It was midnight.

  Bassante hissed, “Fox would have hated this shit.”

  The gong quieted the crowd. Six more robed people came from behind the sheet.

  Bassante identified all of them for Greene. The older couple were Fox’s parents, Kate and Karl; the woman beside them was their daughter, Gloria; the short woman was Maxine, Fox’s assistant; and the tall woman was Sherani, his chauffeur for the last year. Finally there was his fiancée, Anita Nakamura, whom Fox had met this past winter. She was crying uncontrollably. Sherani put her arm around her. Gloria looked unsteady on her feet. Maxine was beside her, clutching her hand and holding her up.

  Greene fixed his eyes on Fox’s fiancée. The poor woman’s life and dreams had been brutally shattered. Then on his assistant. “The short woman, Maxine, would she know where Fox was yesterday afternoon?”

  “Max was the captain of the ship. She did everything for Fox. But Friday afternoons he’d turn off his phone and disappear for a few hours. It drove her nuts.”

  “You have any idea where he went?”

  “None, until he showed up at the job site.”

  “Do you think he had some secret that was big enough that someone wanted to kill him?”

  “Why you asking me? You’re the homicide detective.”

  On the makeshift stage, Kate Fox came to the front and raised a Glow Stick high in the air. The audience did the same with their sticks, washing the field in a sea of white.

  “It’s hard to imagine the world without Livingston,” Kate Fox said. “He was such a force of nature.”

  Greene looked at the audience. Many people were crying. He’d been a homicide cop for so long, it was easy for him to forget that most people never have to face a murder in their midst. He spotted Kennicott and Darvesh sitting near the back.

  “Put your light away,” he said to Bassante.

  “Sure.”

  Greene put his stick in his back pocket and Bassante did the same.

  “You know many of these people?” Greene asked.

  “Some. Fox’s staff. Builders and contractors. Banker types. Probably some of his ex-girlfriends.”

  Greene returned his gaze to Kate Fox. Something about her seemed unnaturally cold. Removed. Her eulogy felt clichéd. “Livingston was wonderful to his employees . . . Livingston was a doer, never one to sit still . . . Livingston believed in challenges and hard work . . .” She sounded more like a giving a eulogy for someone she’d never met than a mother grieving the death of her son.

  Karl Fox’s face was stern, as if it had been set in stone at a young age and never changed. He was watching his wife, transfixed by her, and paid no attention to the grief of his daughter and Anita Nakamura, the woman who would have been his daughter-in-la
w.

  “How about Fox’s sister?” Greene asked Bassante. “Were they close?”

  “He talked to her all the time.”

  Kate Fox was coming to the end of her speech. “Goodbye, Livingston,” she said. “May your spirit find peace at last.”

  She returned to the rest of her family. The flautist stepped forward and started to play.

  “Why didn’t Fox get along with his parents?” Greene asked.

  “Who knows? Families. They were polar opposites.”

  The musician finished her solo, and the man with the gong struck it again.

  Gloria stepped forward. She took a few deep breaths.

  “I loved you, Livingston,” she said in a half whisper. “You were more than a brother to me. You were my best friend. My only friend.” She stopped, fighting to gain her composure. She looked up and seemed to notice the audience for the first time. “You people thought you knew him, but you didn’t.”

  In a flash, her grief had turned to anger. This didn’t surprise Greene. He’d seen many people overcome with grief morph into rage.

  “Whoever did this terrible deed, I hope you are caught and that you suffer the way you made Livingston suffer. The way we are all suffering now.” She reached inside her robe and pulled out a ceramic urn. She lifted it in the air and spoke to it. “Livingston, my brother, my keeper, my soul mate forever. When I have your remains, I will keep them with me until the murderer is found. Then, I promise, I’ll put one handful of your ashes in the garden of every building you ever built. I’ve always been proud of you.”

  She sank to the floor. Maxine rushed to her side.

  There was a beating sound in the sky. It grew louder by the second.

  Everyone craned their necks and watched a helicopter approach and then hover overhead. Greene could just make out the logo TO-TV News. Someone in the chopper turned a searchlight on, and it started to strafe the crowd with its beam.

  Fox’s father jumped forward and raised his fist to the sky. “Bastards!” he yelled. “Bastards!”

  Gloria looked up, confused. Her mother hurried over and pulled her roughly to her feet. Everyone on stage retreated behind the sheet.