Idyll Threats

by Stephanie Gayle

  “You believe him?” I asked.

  He gave me a look like I’d offered to sell him the Brooklyn Bridge. “No,” he said. “But what I wouldn’t give for the gun.”

  “Any progress on our needles?” I asked, adopting Wright’s description of the two men on the course Mrs. Ashworth had told us about. The ones I’d been systematically eliminating from Elmore’s list.

  Revere rubbed under his eyes. “Based on the old lady’s stunning descriptions?”

  I took that as a no.

  He grabbed an apple from his desk, polished it on his shirt. Then he strolled to the board and looked at our case, such as it was. “So why’d you become a cop?” Revere asked. He tossed the apple up, let it fall to hip height, and caught it.

  Guess we were through discussing our lack of progress. That suited me fine.

  “You know, my father offered me two grand not to join,” I said.

  He whistled. “Adjusting for inflation, that must’ve been what? A million dollars?”

  I crumpled a ball of paper and, without leaning forward, tossed it at his head. It nailed his cheek. “You’re no spring chicken, Grandpa,” I said.

  “I’m a toddler compared to you,” he said. “So why was your father so set against you being a cop?”

  “It just wasn’t what he or my mother wanted for me. They wanted me in some safe, boring job they could brag to their friends about.”

  “Such as?” He tossed the apple up again. His grip made me think he’d played a bit of ball, back in the day.

  “Professor of ecology, like my brother.”

  He whistled again. “Fancy.” He set the apple down on Finnegan’s desk. Where it would likely go unnoticed until it rotted and attracted flies. “My whole family is cops or firemen. And the women are nurses or they stay at home.”

  “I had a partner like that.” Except all the women in Rick’s family stayed at home, working their rosaries and ovens with equal diligence.

  He looked right at me. “The one who died?”

  I nodded.

  “Sorry to hear about that.”

  “Why? You don’t even know if I liked the son of a bitch.”

  He said, “Did you?”

  “More than my brother.”

  Revere chuckled. “A least you’ve got just the one. I’ve got five.”

  “Sweet Jesus.”

  He pointed at me. “That’s right. We’re good old-fashioned Irish Catholics, being fruitful and multiplying, unlike you and yours. What, just the two kids?”

  “Yeah. My parents didn’t go in for housefuls of children.”

  He tsk-tsked, shaking his head. “No wonder you’re such a crap copper, with an example like that. I blame your parents.”

  I lobbed another ball of paper, but he ducked it.

  “Crap aim too,” he said.

  I laughed and challenged him to a game of wastebasket ball. We paced out ten feet. First shooter to make three shots wins. It was cute the way he trash-talked. What was cuter was how I won, three to one. What I hadn’t told Revere was that I hadn’t just played wastepaper ball for years. I was on the all-star team.

  Billy stormed into my open office. “You let Clark go? Why?”

  I recalled what Renee had said about Cecilia’s crush on him. Thought about what this meant for him. How it looked to him. And kept my voice low. “We don’t have enough on him. The DA wasn’t satisfied.”

  “But he admits she was in his car! Right before she was killed! Who else could have done it?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “But his feet don’t match the prints on the golf course. And he has no motive. No gun.”

  “The affair?”

  “His wife knew he was up to his old tricks. And she’s not divorcing him. Far from it. She’s paying through the nose for a new lawyer. Telling his wife wouldn’t have incited him to kill Cecilia.”

  “The STOLIs?” He wanted to put Clark in the frame. But Clark’s pretty mug wouldn’t fit. I’d seen more seasoned cops refuse to see the truth staring them in the face. And Billy was a class-one rookie.

  “Gary Clark is going home,” I said.

  Billy clenched his jaw. “You didn’t know her. Not like me. She deserves better.”

  “Billy?” I rubbed my sandpaper jaw. Squinted at him. “You been talking to the mayor lately?”

  He shrugged. “Sometimes. He’s my uncle. My mom’s brother.”

  That explained everything.

  “You’ve got to stop telling him details of the case.”

  He said, “But I thought since he’s the mayor…”

  “No one outside the station should know details. No one. Not the mayor, not the president. Capisce?”

  “Am I off the case again?” He looked prepared for disappointment.

  “No. Just don’t talk about the case outside of these four walls.”

  “Chief Lynch?” A man in pinstripes and wing tips rapped on my door. Billy moved away from him, farther into my office. Why? “I’m Harold Jenkins.” Ah, Gary Clark’s new attorney. The one his wife had hired after meeting Louis Jacob and declaring him “unfit to try a pizza.”

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Jenkins.” What did he want? His client had been transferred to Osborn Correctional. That’s where he could fetch him. I’d already made the call to have him released.

  “It seems Mr. Clark’s possessions weren’t transferred. He’d like them now.”

  “Fine.” I wondered how much he charged his client for this bit of fetch-and-carry.

  “He’s here now.”

  Gary Clark walked into my doorway.

  My chest got tight. I held my breath. He looked right at me.

  “Where are my things?” he asked his lawyer. His voice was low. The skin under his eyes sagged, and his hair looked grayer than in his photos. His brief jail stint hadn’t improved his looks.

  “Billy, go ask Hopkins where Mr. Clark’s personal effects are, will you?” I coughed. Any second now, Clark would tell his lawyer that I was the man he’d been ranting about. The one from the cabin with the badge. The one Wright and the other detectives had laughed off. Billy left. Thank God. He wouldn’t witness this.

  “Can I go home after this?” Gary Clark’s voice shook.

  We’d both be going home soon. And neither of us would return. What station would hire me after this? None. I’d become a mall cop. No. Not that. I couldn’t be that.

  His lawyer gripped his arm and squeezed. “Yes, we’ll take you home.”

  “Good.” He shrugged his shoulders. “I’m going to take a long, hot shower when I get there.” He looked at me. My body was frozen, waiting for the ax. He quickly looked away. He’d developed a fear of cops. Not surprising.

  “You might keep an eye out for a lawsuit,” Mr. Jenkins said to me. “Violating my client’s civil rights.”

  “You might too.” I wasn’t going to be threatened by some three-hundred-dollar-an-hour suit. Even if I was about to be outed by his client. Civil rights, my foot. “Your client obstructed our case.”

  Billy returned. “His stuff is at the front desk, Chief.” He ignored the two men near him.

  Mr. Jenkins sniffed. “Good afternoon,” he said.

  They both turned and left. Gary Clark didn’t look back. I exhaled. He hadn’t recognized me.

  Then it sank in. The weight was like liquid cement that had settled to stone within me. He hadn’t made me. He might never have been able to pick me out of a lineup. Which meant that I’d wasted precious hours and days staying out of sight, avoiding work. If I’d not been hiding I might’ve seen sooner that Clark wasn’t our man. I’d have been looking for the size 8.5 and 11.5 killers earlier. They say hindsight is twenty-twenty. It’s more like a hard punch to the head.

  Donna set a plate before me. On it was a cheeseburger and fries. The burger’s bun was to its side. On its cheesy surface, someone had ketchuped a smiley face. “What the hell?” I pointed.

  She said, “You looked like you needed cheering up.” I smooshed
the face with the bun and bit it, hard. She took the hint and left me to my meal.

  I looked depressed? Well, why not? I’d let Gary Clark go. My team was pissed at me. Finnegan wondered aloud if Clark would’ve cracked if we’d left him in custody longer. Wright bitched about why did we need to gift wrap perps in order to prosecute them. Revere worried every office item within reach, leaving a trail of broken binder clips and autopsied pens in his wake. And Billy offered up unlikely scenarios. His latest was wiring one of Clark’s poker buddies and sending him to have a chat with Gary about how Cecilia’s murder had gone down. I hadn’t wasted breath shooting down that idea.

  Meanwhile, I’d spent the past few days working my list. All I’d done was eliminate people. The one person I’d spoken to who wore size 8.5 shoes was Dr. Ghentz, and he’d been delivering a baby at Rockville General Hospital the night Cecilia was killed.

  The detectives had also looked at the footprints and harassed the techs for information on brands or styles. So far the techs were being shits. The only thing they’d offered us was advice: don’t trample the crime scene and you might get better prints.

  I’d spent bleary-eyed mornings sorting through the tips, reading suggestions from the citizenry. Most were cranks, clueless, or crazy. As expected. One or two had offered up cars they’d seen in the area. But nothing about two men.

  I’d eaten all of my happy-face burger when a finger tapped me on the shoulder. Mike Shannon? I swiveled and found myself staring at the tall and thin Dr. Saunders. “Hello, Chief,” he said.

  I asked how he was. “Well, thanks,” he said.

  Donna came over and said hello. Asked the doctor what he’d have. “In-and-out martini,” he said.

  She took my plate and walked away, with just a little extra wiggle. I sipped my drink and waited for him to speak. The last time I’d thought of him had been while masturbating in my shower. That cut short my small talk.

  “Heard you got a murder suspect,” he said.

  I took another swallow. “We had to let him go.”

  Donna set his drink down. “You a friend of his?” she asked him.

  He took in the bosomy wonder of Donna. “Is there a correct answer?” he asked me.

  “Work colleague,” I told her.

  “Get him to loosen up, will ya?” she said, before heeding the cry of another patron.

  “That’s Donna,” I said. “She means well, I think. Why don’t you have a seat?” The stools on either side of me were empty. Always the case, unless there was a game on and people had no choice but to sit next to their police chief. Or they wanted to “talk” about their parking tickets. Seems Yankowitz was a hard-ass about those.

  “I was keeping an eye on the tables,” he said.

  “Meeting someone?” Why had I assumed he wanted to talk to me?

  “No. I just prefer a table.”

  “I can probably help you there.”

  “You know a guy who knows a guy?” He tried saying this with a New York accent. It was terrible. The worst thing I’d ever heard. I barked a laugh. And scouted the tables until I found one where a man nursed the foam in his glass. He read the paper.

  I walked over. “Done here?” I asked.

  He glanced up, all angry eyebrows, and then he took in my uniform. “Yeah, just about.” He gathered his paper and took his glass to the bar. I waved to his empty seat.

  “Neat trick,” Damien said. He sat.

  “Thank you.” I hadn’t tried this hard to impress someone since my days in the academy.

  “You do it often?” he asked.

  “Almost never.”

  He smiled, and the scar on his cheek shortened. “So what do you do when you’re not working?” he asked.

  “Watch a game or…” Shit. Why couldn’t I think of anything else? “Or work on my lawn plan.”

  He coughed and set his martini down. “Your what?” He raised his slender fingers to his mouth as he tried to fight his cough. “Pardon me.” He coughed again.

  “My lawn plan. It’s something the neighbors have. I think it involves cutting grass and planting things. Oh, and watering them.”

  He smiled. “Not your cup of tea?”

  I shrugged. “I grew up in the city. We didn’t even have window boxes.” We probably could’ve. My parents had never cared. Too busy with their heads in books to look outside.

  “You could hire a lawn service. They’ll cut your grass, water the lawn.”

  “Huh.” I’d thought about paying neighborhood kids to mow. But a service. That might bear looking into.

  Next to us, a young couple argued about whose turn it was to pay the bill. The man said something about reverse sexism.

  I said, “You have a lawn?” Jesus, why was I asking that? What was it about him? When he got near, I turned idiot.

  “Sort of. It’s a little unconventional.”

  “Would you like another drink?” If drunk, perhaps he’d find my fumbling charming. His martini glass was a third full. My alcohol was long gone.

  “Yes, thank you.”

  I hummed to myself as I waited for Donna to finish a large order of Jäger shots. Ugh. I’d had those at my retirement party last November. I couldn’t drink them again. Ever.

  “What’ll it be, Chief?” Donna asked.

  “Another in-and-out martini and a bourbon, please.”

  “You got it.”

  I thought of things to discuss with Damien. How he got into his work? Most people chose the living to practice medicine on. No, maybe sports or cars or—

  “Here you are.” Donna set the drinks on the bar. “You going to be at Idyll Days?”

  “Working,” I said.

  “Be sure to stop by the kissing booth,” she said. “I work a shift on Saturday.” I made a mental note to assign Yankowitz there.

  Back at the table, I forgot every safe topic I’d identified. So I said, “Can I ask you a question?”

  “You bought the drink. Ask away.” He adjusted his dress shirt. White with blue stripes. Good-looking, but not flashy.

  “Have you ever heard of the Nipmuc Golf Course as a place to cruise?”

  “Excuse me?” His voice was coated with frost.

  “I don’t mean you. But have you ever heard anyone mention it?”

  His fingers stopped playing with the base of his drink and fell to the tabletop. “Why do you ask?”

  I took a swallow before I answered. “It pertains to a case I’m investigating.”

  “You’re investigating?”

  “Yes.”

  He flushed and his scar whitened in contrast. “What’s the case?”

  “I’m not at liberty to discuss that.”

  “So you want me to identify gay men who might’ve mentioned the golf course as a cruising locale so you can, what? Lock them up for public indecency?”

  I pushed my drink from me. “No. No, nothing like that.”

  The couple fighting over the bill was still at it. I worried they’d stop. I didn’t need them overhearing this.

  He said, “You just want to ask them some questions? Maybe they can help you with your lawn plan, is that it?” His lips thinned. He sounded like Wright did when racial politics came up.

  I was making a muck of this. “Look, Damien, I’m sorry if I upset you.”

  “Not at all. When you want to find a gay, ask the only one you know, right? How long did it take your boys to tell you about me? A week? Or was it your first day?”

  “It isn’t personal. I needed help, and since you’ve lived in the area longer, I thought—”

  He stood and pushed his chair back. “Yeah, well I’m sorry I can’t be your one-man homopages, but I don’t provide directory services.”

  “Wait.”

  He didn’t. He pushed past patrons until he got out the door. I stood there, aware of the eyes on me. At the bar, Donna watched. Fuck it. I left.

  His car revved hard. The tires spat gravel. I ran to my crappy loaner. The engine coughed, but I made it respond. He
turned out of the lot, and I followed. There was traffic, but I had no problem tailing him. He drove the speed limit and signaled at every intersection. He’d probably seen too many grisly car-accident results to drive recklessly, even when angry.

  Fifteen minutes in, it occurred to me that he might be driving to let off steam and I could be shadowing him for hours. But I’d nowhere else to be. And it was important that he understood I wasn’t bullying him. I wasn’t singling him out because he was gay. I mean I was, but that wasn’t it. I could’ve asked Mike Shannon. I hadn’t. Why? Mike wouldn’t have gotten angry with me.

  A crack of thunder startled me, made me grip the wheel tighter. My backbone ached. I hated driving through storms. But I followed his car’s lights. Even though I had to max out my windshield wipers, even though I had to fight the wheel to maintain control after my car went through a tire-high puddle. The car’s brakes, iffy on good days, tested the strength of my calves. After nearly an hour, he slowed and turned into a driveway. I parked behind him. The house before me was a two-story flanked by tall trees. It was hard to see much detail. Everything was black and gray. He ran to his door, and I hurried after.

  His keys were out when I yelled, “Wait!”

  He turned. “What?” He stood beneath the cover of his small porch, sheltered from the blowing rain that soaked me.

  I took a few steps closer, to save my voice. “I didn’t mean to offend you. I thought you could help. And I didn’t ask you because you’re the only gay man I know.”

  “Name another.” He sounded tired.

  “Mike Shannon.” Perhaps I shouldn’t have said that.

  Damien said something, but a loud rumble muffled the words. I thought one of them was “slut.” He fit his key into the lock and used a second key on another lock. Quite the security setup. “Come in,” he said.

  I walked up three steps, dripping water like a folded umbrella. In the entryway, he flicked a light. Overhead, a tiny, red, metal chandelier lit the space. He kicked off his shoes and laid them on a bench alongside others. He walked deeper into the house. I removed my boots and put them below the bench. Bit my lip. His back was to me. I picked up his shoe and looked for the size. The print on the tongue was worn, unreadable.