Fear the Night

by John Lutz

  When Melbourne was seated, Repetto asked him if he wanted a drink. “Some good eighteen-year-old scotch?”

  Melbourne smiled and shook his head no. “I’m on duty, sort of.”

  Uh-oh. Repetto settled down in a brown leather wing chair facing his old friend and superior officer.

  Still smiling, Melbourne glanced around. “I don’t see any ashtrays. And I don’t smell tobacco. I guess for health reasons you gave up those Cuban cigars you used to smoke. The bad lung and all.”

  “The lung’s pretty much healed. I still get winded too easy, though.”

  “But still no cigars.”

  “I allow myself one every few days. The doctors said it’s okay as long as I don’t inhale.”

  “Sure they did.”

  “Other than that, I don’t smoke. For Lora.”

  “She make you lighten up?”

  Repetto didn’t bother to answer.

  “So it’s true what they say about life after you retire and you’re home with the wife.”

  “What do they say?”

  “She takes over the company.”

  “Yeah, that’s true. She’s been a cop’s wife over twenty years, Lou. If she doesn’t want me to smell up the house with cigar smoke, I won’t. She deserves to be spoiled.”

  “She doesn’t want you dying of lung cancer.”

  “That, too.”

  Melbourne focused his flesh-padded gray eyes on Repetto. “How’d you and Lora manage it, staying married all this time, you doing the kinda work we do?”

  Repetto had to give it some thought. “I don’t know for sure. Maybe somewhere along the line we learned how to stay out of each other’s way.”

  “That’s an unsatisfactory answer,” Melbourne said with a touch of bitterness. Twice-divorced Melbourne.

  “Lora’s at a meeting with a client,” Repetto said. “You wanna come back to my den and we can smoke some cigars?”

  Melbourne cocked his head to the side. “You won’t get in any trouble?”

  Repetto laughed and stood up. “I haven’t had a smoke in two days. Haul your ass outta that sofa and come with me.” He didn’t tell Melbourne the den was the only place he smoked in the house, and he had to make sure there was plenty of ventilation.

  Repetto’s den was large, carpeted in deep red with thick red drapes, a quiet room, considering it was at street level. There were commendations on the walls, a mounted trout Repetto had caught in Vermont, and several signed and framed publicity photos of Broadway stars.

  Repetto walked over to his desk and opened a small mahogany humidor near the green-shaded lamp. He gave Melbourne a Venezuelan cigar and a cutter, then chose a domestic brand for himself. Before lighting the cigar, he went over and opened a window, letting in some dampness and cool night air. Within a few seconds he could feel cross ventilation from the already cracked window on the adjacent wall stir the hairs on his bare forearms.

  When he returned to sit in his black leather desk chair, Melbourne had already seated himself in one of the upholstered chairs angled toward the desk and lighted his cigar.

  Repetto settled down behind his oversize cherry-wood desk. “You mentioned you were on duty.”

  “Sort of. Here to ask you about something.”

  Repetto smiled. “Am I a suspect?”

  “I don’t believe you lead an exciting enough life now to get in any trouble.” Melbourne puffed on his cigar. “This is great. Cuban?”

  “Aren’t those illegal?”

  “A rhetorical question, I’m sure.” Melbourne might have winked. He knew Repetto favored and could obtain Cuban cigars. He took another draw and seemed to roll the smoke around in his mouth before exhaling. “What exactly do you do these days?”

  “Lora and I go to the theater, dine out with friends, plan on doing some traveling. Things we never had time to do when I was on the job.”

  “Sounds nice, actually. You always had it good for a cop.”

  Repetto was getting the idea Melbourne was hesitant to bring up whatever he’d come to discuss. “Get to it, Lou.”

  “I’m asking you back to the NYPD, or at least to work for us.”

  Repetto didn’t hesitate. “Nope. Lora wouldn’t stand for it.”

  “You’d please her before me?”

  “I don’t sleep with you.”

  “You wanna hear the deal?”

  “No.”

  “Okay, here it is. Last night a guy named Martin Akim was shot to death outside his shop in the theater district.”

  “Marty Akim? Watches?”

  “The very Marty.”

  “Holdup?”

  “No. Shot from a distance. Relatively small-caliber bullet, misshapen by bone and the wall it hit after tumbling through Akim. People heard the shot, but the way sound echoes around all those tall buildings and concrete and glass, nobody knows where it came from. Far away, though, not close by.”

  “Stray shot, maybe.” Like the one that caught me in the lung.

  “We don’t think so.”

  “A sniper?”

  “Yeah. Here’s the thing. Akim wasn’t the first victim. He was the third in the last six weeks. The first was a sales rep from Cincinnati, in town on business. The second a prostitute down in the Village.”

  Repetto leaned back in his chair and drew on his cigar, then exhaled and watched the smoke drift toward the ceiling and make a slow turn toward the open window.

  “A serial killer. Your specialty, Vin.”

  “Was.”

  “Not that you need the money, but we’d like to put you back on the payroll while you track down this sicko.”

  Repetto sat forward and looked directly at Melbourne, then removed the cigar from his mouth. “I wasn’t the only competent homicide detective in the department.”

  “You were sure as hell the best.”

  “And now somebody else is. I’m sorry, Lou, the answer’s no.”

  Melbourne stood up. He walked slowly over and looked at Repetto’s commendations, then stood staring at the mounted trout. “You catch this thing?”

  “Yeah. Only kinda thing I’m gonna catch from now on.”

  “This killer’s been in contact with us. He’s bursting with ego and thinks he’s smarter than we are.”

  “Don’t they all think that?”

  “Some of them are smarter.”

  “A few. The ones we never heard of.”

  “Vin—”

  “Talk to me and not to the fish, okay?”

  Melbourne turned to face him. “I didn’t come here on my own. I was asked.” He looked at his cigar now and not at Repetto. “He asked me. Told me, actually.”

  “He?”

  “The killer. He musta seen all the publicity about you when you stepped down. How you were like a combination bloodhound and avenging angel when it came to tracking serial killers. He wants you on the case. He said you were the only one of us who was a worthy adversary.”

  Repetto stared dumbfounded at Melbourne, then laughed. “Cease the bullshit, Lou. The answer’s still no.”

  “You think I’m kidding?”

  “I don’t care if you are. I don’t dance just because some maniac plays a tune. And I know you don’t either.”

  Melbourne removed the cigar from his mouth. “This one’s different, Vin. If you’d heard him on the phone . . .”

  “The answer’s still no. I mean it. I’m not some pro athlete that can be talked into thinking he might have a little more gas in his tank. I’m retired.”

  “You might get winded a little easier and be a little grayer, but you’re not suited for retirement. You’re gonna go crazy without the job.” Melbourne pointed with the cigar. “You’re gonna rot.”

  “I’m rotting happily. I told you my situation. I’m not gonna double-cross Lora to work on one more case. Put Delmore on it.”

  “The killer laughed at Delmore. Called him up and laughed at him. He wants you, Vin. Only you.”

  “ ‘Only You.’ Isn’t that a son
g?”

  “Your song. Yours and the killer’s.”

  Repetto knew what Melbourne meant. When Repetto was thirteen years old in Philadelphia his mother had been murdered by a serial killer. It was what had made an older Repetto join the police force, then become a homicide detective. His mother had divorced his dad, a Philadelphia cop, and had custody of him, so Repetto was the one who’d found her in her bedroom when he came home from school. She was lying nude on the bed with her legs spread incredibly wide. There was the blood on the wall, his mother’s blood, the bloody numeral 6 indicating she was the killer’s sixth victim, the blood pooled beneath her body, the blood on her pale flesh and between her thighs.

  With his father gone, Repetto was the man of the house. He should have protected his mother. Somehow. Should have been there. Somehow. Even at thirteen he knew it wasn’t logical, but guilt still wrapped itself around his heart. Somehow, he was partly to blame for his mother’s death. He couldn’t get the image of all that blood, her blood, out of his mind.

  He remembered the word it had brought to his lips. Not Mother or Mommy or an expression of rage. Simply, Blood.

  Almost a year passed before he again spoke that or any other word. His father had died in a robbery shoot-out only a month after the death of his mother. For the young Repetto it was like being struck by speeding trains coming and going, and being left to die alone.

  Two of his aunts took him in and brought him back to being human again, raised him with kindness and love, saved him. Mar and Mol, short for Marilyn and Molly. Mol had died ten years ago. Mar was still alive, and would be in town for Repetto and Lora’s daughter Amelia’s twenty-first birthday next week.

  Mar and Mol, the blood ... So long ago and still so vivid.

  Repetto swallowed. He thought he’d gotten past this kind of reaction, the thing that had made him stalk serial killers in a way that was legendary in the NYPD. The reason why Melbourne was sitting across from him now.

  “Jesus, Lou!” Repetto said. “So this guy doesn’t get what he wants. He’ll get over his disappointment.”

  “He’s not gonna quit, Vin. Not this one.”

  “I didn’t say he was gonna quit. Delmore can shut him down.”

  Melbourne seemed about to say something more, then plunked his cigar back in his mouth as if it might prevent him from speaking imprudently.

  “Sure you don’t want a drink, Lou?”

  Melbourne stood up. “No, thanks. This excellent Cuban cigar’s more’n enough.” He moved close to the desk and looked down at Repetto. “Listen, you’re probably right. You deserve a rest. Have a good retirement. Food, shows, booze, travel. Enjoy, old friend. I mean that.” He offered his hand.

  Repetto shook with him, standing up to show him out. He propped his cigar in an ashtray and walked around the desk.

  “Still raining,” Repetto said, when he opened the door to the street. “Take an umbrella. You can keep it as long as you want.”

  “No, thanks. Listen, I sincerely gotta advise you, if you don’t want a troubled conscience, better avoid reading the papers or watching TV news. This sicko’s deeply dedicated to his calling.”

  “Forget the umbrella offer,” Repetto said.

  “Kidding,” Melbourne said with a smile. “Don’t rot.” At the base of the steps, the rain already spotting his jacket, he looked back and up at Repetto. “Really. Don’t rot.”

  “That didn’t sound at all sincere,” Repetto said.

  He stood at the open door, watching Melbourne until he’d crossed the street and lowered himself into his car.

  Then he remembered the open den door, sniffed the air, and went back to extinguish his cigar propped in the ashtray.

  3

  “You said no?” Lora asked, after Repetto told her about Melbourne’s visit.

  “Sure I did.”

  She leaned forward and kissed him lightly on the lips, then, after sniffing his breath, looked up at him with mock seriousness. Well, not completely mock. “Cigar?”

  “Half of one. With Melbourne. Being a good host.”

  “Ah.” She walked over to the window and stared outside. Repetto studied her. The beige dress she was wearing complemented her long, honey-blond hair. Lora was trim not from exercise, other than her daily walks, but from genetic good fortune.

  He thought she might say something else about Melbourne’s visit, but when she turned around to face him she smiled. It was what had first attracted Repetto, that smile. It changed her cool, blue-eyed impassive features into a warm and engaging signal to the world: I’m approachable and up for adventure. Repetto had learned it wasn’t a sexual invitation, but occasionally men took it for such. Lora was used to that response and knew how to fend them off without making enemies.

  “It’s still raining,” she said. “How ’bout I make us some tea?”

  “Fine.” The Melbourne matter was closed. If a maniac was murdering people one after another and might soon be terrorizing the city, that wasn’t Repetto’s problem. He was off the force for good. And it felt good.

  Lora must have guessed what he was thinking. “Thanks.”

  “For what?”

  “Meaning what you said to Melbourne.”

  She went into the kitchen to brew the tea. Repetto walked over and stared through the rain-distorted window out at the street. New York. The city he’d spent his life protecting. His city. A young couple who’d moved in last month exited the building across the street, laughing. The woman, a skinny brunette, ducked her head at the first raindrop, while her bulky, bearded husband squinted up at the sky and opened an umbrella. Watching them, Repetto remembered when he and Lora had moved here almost twenty years ago. It was odd, how the street didn’t change but the people did, generations playing out their lives on the same stage.

  It occurred to him that Lora, who was six years younger than Repetto and not carrying a partially collapsed lung, would almost certainly outlive him. Would she remain here? Wouldn’t she be lonely in this house that was too large for one person? Might she be afraid without him, a single woman living at street level in Manhattan? Their daughter and only child, Amelia, who was in law school and lived on the Upper West Side, might move in with her. Though probably not. Amelia was fiercely independent. Maybe Amelia would marry. Repetto and Lora had their ideas about whom they’d like as a son-in-law. Repetto smiled. Hopeless to expect that kind of wish to come true. But Dal Bricker—

  The woman beneath the shelter of the umbrella glanced over and saw him, and Repetto raised a hand in an understated wave so she’d know he wasn’t spying on the couple, simply happened to be at his window when they were going out.

  He stood awhile longer looking out at the drizzle and lowering light. A lamp came on behind him, and he saw Lora’s reflection on the windowpane and turned.

  She’d placed a tray with a tea set on the heavy table by the sofa. Repetto watched as she poured cream in her cup, part of the set that was Bavarian china, antique but not particularly expensive. They’d bought it together ten years ago at a shop in SoHo. She added a lump of sugar and stirred. He walked over, added a dollop of cream to his tea, then sat down on the sofa and sipped. The tea wasn’t quite hot enough to burn his tongue.

  Lora remained standing. She’d put on her old blue cardigan sweater over her dress and looked an odd combination of sophisticate and homebody that Repetto found strangely appealing.

  She sipped her tea appraisingly and smiled. “The critics like the new play at the Westside, Left Bank.”

  “Internet or newspaper critics?”

  “Both. Not rave reviews, but uniformly good. It’s about expatriates in Paris in the twenties, then later when they return to the U.S.”

  “Sounds political.”

  “It’s not. George Kearn plays the old Hemingway.” Kearn was one of their favorites. And the Westside Theatre, off Broadway but not far off, was also one of their favorites.

  “Sounds okay,” Repetto said. “You working tomorrow?”

 
“Meeting a client for breakfast, then a display house tour.”

  “Maybe I’ll see if I can pick us up some tickets.”

  She took another sip of tea, then leaned down and kissed him on the forehead. Her lips were still warm from the tea. “I love you,” she said simply.

  He knew why she was saying it now. Because he’d refused Melbourne. He lifted her free hand and kissed it. He didn’t tell her he loved her, too. It didn’t seem quite the time, but he knew he should tell her more often and promised himself he’d do exactly that in his retirement.

  He watched her walk to the window with her tea. She sat down at an angle on the window seat so she could look out through the glass at the rainy street. She appeared comfortable and contented. Repetto was sure that if she were a cat, she’d curl up in the window and go to sleep.

  If she were a cat, he’d pamper her.

  The next morning, after Lora had left to meet her client, Repetto walked to the Bonaire Diner on Fourteenth Street and had eggs and a grilled corn muffin for breakfast. He liked the Bonaire for more than its food. It was brightly decorated, with red-vinyl-upholstered booths and stools, and a dark counter made out of the kind of granite that sparked silver when the light hit it just right. A lot of the customers were from the neighborhood, or were people who worked nearby. Regulars. Business drones, artists, tradesmen, along with tourists, and mothers with their kids.

  Carrie the waitress cleared away the dishes, then poured Repetto a second cup of coffee.

  He settled in to scan the Times.

  There was another favorable review of Left Bank. Nothing about a sniper shooting last night. Apparently Melbourne’s serial killer was still between murders.

  Why am I even thinking about this?

  He turned to the sports section and read about the latest Yankees acquisition, an expensive free agent pitcher who was almost a guarantee that the team would make the playoffs. Repetto read on about the pitcher and felt himself relax. When he was on the job, he’d always found solace in this part of the paper. The only murderers’ row in the sports section was the ’27 Yankees.