“How would you know what I need?”
“The pent house in New York is for sale, the house in Connecticut you sold last year, and the one in the Hamptons is in foreclosure. And your firm, Mr. Lynch, Lynch Investments, is in Chapter Eleven. You need the money.”
“I have asked you to leave, Mr. Ruzak. …”
“My point is, it wasn’t about sex; it was about destruction. And I knew that. I knew it the whole time. I had written it in the file: “Wants to destroy him.’ ”
There was a knock on the door. Neither of us moved.
“My wife is here,” Alistair Lynch said. “I would prefer that you not be.”
I looked at my watch. Right on time.
“It’s not your wife,” I said. “It’s Dresden Falks.”
SCENE NINE
Room 1921
A Moment Later
I stood up. Lynch didn’t move.
“Who,” he said, “is Dresden Falks?”
“I figured you’d want him here for this,” I said. “So I took the liberty.”
“I don’t even know who he is,” he fairly shouted at me.
I opened the door. Falks’s thousand-megawatt smile faded when he saw Lynch.
“Ted,” he said. “What’s up?”
“Hey,” I said. “Thanks for coming. We were just getting down to the nub of it.”
I stepped aside for him to come in. He didn’t. He stood in the doorway, smile dimmed to about forty watts; I could see the bottoms of his front teeth pressing into his lower lip.
“Ruzak,” he said. “What are you doing?”
“What I should have been doing since day one, Dres. What everybody does because if they didn’t, they wouldn’t be, and if I had been from day one, I wouldn’t have to be now.”
“Huh?”
“Looking out for numero uno. You really should come in.”
He hesitated. He wasn’t looking at Lynch now; he was looking at me, this Dresden Falks, who didn’t need any lesson from me about who comes first. Finally, he stepped into the room, didn’t speak for a second after I closed and latched the door, and then, as if some internal director had yelled “Action,” attacked the space between him and Lynch in four long strides, right hand extended.
“Dresden Falks. How are ya?”
Lynch folded his arms across his chest and said, “Mr. Ruzak, I have asked you to leave, politely, and now I must insist. You come here clearly drunk—”
“I am drunk.”
“—babbling incoherently—”
“Okay, that’s redundant.”
“—making absurd allegations—”
“ ‘Allegations’?” Falks asked. He was standing between us, head swiveling as we batted the ball back and forth.
“Oh, I have proof,” I said.
“Proof of what?” Lynch demanded.
“What?” Falks echoed. “What proof, Ted?”
“I have to sit down,” I said. I sat back down at the foot of the bed. The covers were still warm from my butt.
“This Polack won’t tell me, but apparently you must know something about this, too,” Lynch said, glaring at Falks.
“Hey, I don’t know nothing except the Polack invited me here to discuss my client.”
“That’s it,” I said. “Your client. His daughter.”
Falks said, “His daughter isn’t my client.”
“Yes, she is.”
“No, she isn’t.”
“Well. Not client maybe. Lover.”
“Christ, Ruzak!”
“It’s a guess, but an educated guess.”
“I’ve had enough,” Lynch said. He picked up the phone. “I’m calling the police.”
“Don’t do that,” I said.
“Don’t do that,” Falks said.
“ ‘Don’t do that’?” Lynch asked.
Falks said, “What have you got, Ruzak? And if you got something, why haven’t you called the cops?”
“He wants money,” Lynch said.
“How much money?” Falks asked.
“We haven’t gotten to that part yet,” I said.
“He claims he’s lost his business,” Lynch said to Falks, but he wasn’t looking at Falks; he was looking at me. Falks sank into the chair Lynch had occupied. There was another chair beside the table, but Lynch didn’t take it. He was wound up. His cheeks were flushed; spittle shone on his lower lip.
“He did,” Falks said. “Stupid shit came to me looking for a job.”
“I’m out of sorts,” I said. “Bottom of the well. Oh crap. Barrel.”
“Oh, this is rich,” Dresden Falks said. “What are you selling, Ruzak?”
“A name.”
“Whose name?”
“Katrina’s.”
Falks’s smile broke the way the sun does at the beach at dawn: sudden, brilliant, hot.
Lynch exploded. “Bullshit!” he bellowed. “I don’t know who the hell you think you are, coming into my room, trying to threaten me, blackmail me—”
“Uh-uh-uh-uh-uh,” Falks said, holding up a hand. “Let’s hear him out. This is interesting.”
“My secretary, before she was my secretary, she was a waitress at the Old City Diner. You know the one? Not exactly the Four Seasons. A few years back, she was waitressing and going to school, studying to be a nurse, but she had to drop out when she got pregnant by a guy who ran out on her. She took a chance on me last year after my mom died and I came into a little money and started this business, and for a start-up we were doing pretty good, until the state shut me down over a minor technicality, and it’s just about gone, all the venture capital and most of the money I made since then, and I feel for her, you know, and of course the kid, too, because he was a preemie and has some development issues. …”
“I can’t believe this!” Lynch exclaimed.
“I could shoot him,” Falks said pleasantly.
“That’s a no,” I said quickly. “No go, Dres.”
“What did you mean, you want to sell Katrina’s name?” Lynch said. He was going to wring it out of this goddamned Polack, so help him.
“Not her old name, obviously. Her new name.”
Things got very quiet then. Falks didn’t say anything. Lynch didn’t say anything. In fact, the air drained a bit from his balloon. His shoulders relaxed. He blew out his cheeks. He sat in the empty chair opposite Falks, so now we were sitting in a kind of circle, though triangle would be more precise. We were triangulated.
“That’s what I have,” I went on. “And I want to be reasonable.”
“This would be an excellent time for you to start,” Lynch said.
“Katrina is alive,” Falks said to me.
“Yeah.”
“She faked her death.”
“With help.”
“My help?”
“Yes. Yours for sure. Mr. Lynch’s here maybe, or after the fact.”
“Why would she do something that like, Ruzak?”
“Well, I’m not in her head. She did tell me more than once that she wanted to destroy him. My guess, the deciding factor was Kinsey’s pregnancy. I think that really pissed her off, which is kind of hypocritical when you think about it, not to pass judgment or anything. It might not have even been her idea originally. It might have been yours, Dres.” I turned to Lynch. “It’s back to that connection thing we were talking about. Dres needed Katrina and Katrina needed Dres. Dres wanted the money and Katrina wanted revenge. She also needed help with logistics, the planning and execution, setting up Tom and setting up a new identity—driver’s license, birth certificate, passport, Social Security card. Maybe it’s more than just a business relationship—that makes sense to my mind—since it’s an awfully far way to stick out your neck, but Tom is worth an awful lot of money. So it could be just money, but it might be love, too. I don’t like cynical people, so I struggle against my own. Not people, cynicism.”
“You,” Lynch said, “are a fool.”
“Oh, you bet. I was played for one since day o
ne. I wasn’t hired to catch Tom; I was hired to create motive, or, more precisely, a file that Dres here could buy from me, pretending he was buying it for Tom. They didn’t end up with quite what they wanted, so Katrina fired me and Dres made up the story about Tom asking him to make a hit on his wife. That morning, they staged the scene, and she called me to get the ball rolling. Why she chose me, I’m not really sure, except after my blowing the case file– setup thing, she figured she might as well try to recoup some of her losses. I didn’t let her down, that’s for sure: taking off to Tybee, finding the car and the glasses, going off half-cocked to New York to talk to you, Mr. Lynch, which worked out pretty good, saving you the trouble of contacting the authorities yourself and maybe setting off some warning bells. Looks better if the key evidence—no pun intended—came from the erstwhile amateur PI.”
Lynch turned to Falks and said, “How much more of this am I expected to endure?”
“I’m liking it,” Falks said. “It’s pretty good. Ridiculous, but good.” He smiled at me. “Like Ruzak. Okay, so your theory is Katrina Bates hires me to frame her husband for murder. …”
“Like I said, Dres, I’m not sure if it was that or something more personal. I do know the odds were good you two knew each other. He used you six years ago on a tail. Probably that’s when you met her, or soon thereafter. It wouldn’t be the first time a dick has fallen for the mark.”
“Tom Bates hired me six years ago. True. Tom Bates hired me again six years later to take some pictures and buy a file from you. Also true. And true that Tom Bates tried to hire me to knock off his old lady. I’m Tom Bates’s dick.”
“No, Dres,” I said patiently. “Tom Bates doesn’t have a dick. You’re her dick.”
“I’m not her dick; you’re her dick.”
“My daughter has no dick,” said Lynch.
“Like I said,” I said, “maybe you were both, Dres. Her dick and her, um, dick. You followed her over to Tybee, where you dropped the car and planted the glasses, and then you drove her to the airport.”
“Well, I see why you came to us instead of the cops. They’d laugh your fat ass right out the door. At least this gentleman’s being a gentleman about it. If I were him, I’d pop you in the kisser for besmirching his daughter’s good name.”
“Which one?” I asked.
“That. Is. Enough!” Lynch said in a guttural monotone, forcing the words through his clenched teeth. “What do you want, Ruzak?”
“Oh God, I thought I was being uncircumspect about that at least.”
“What a wise guy,” said Falks. “What a cutup. Okay, big man, let’s hear it. You say you have a name, give us a name. We’re listening.”
“I’d like to discuss price first.”
“No money without a name.”
“Something in the mid to high six figures.” I was looking at Lynch. “Does that seem fair?”
“Why are you asking me?” he said.
“Because you’re the banker. You fronted the twenty grand for the file and you’re supporting Katrina until the big payout. Well, it would be more than a single big payout. You get a guilty verdict and I guess the insurance would pay out—not to Tom, but to her nearest living relative. So there’s that on top of the wrongful-death judgment.”
“Mr. Ruzak, I’m beginning to suspect you may be mentally ill.”
“I’m drunk. I’ve lost everything I ever had, ever really wanted to have. Not that it was much, but it was mine, and, you know, I’m tired, damned tired, of swimming against the tide. Why should people like you and Deaddick Fuckhead here make out like bandits while my single-mom secretary with the handicapped kid and I suffer? You’re not better than we are. You’re probably not even that much smarter. I’m not sure; you might be, but I’m pretty sure Dres isn’t. I’m sick of it, you want to know the truth, sick of people like him and Walter Hinton and Whittaker, that marplot, throwing their weight around like it matters, like it has any meaning. Life’s not fair; that’s what my old man always said. Or he’d snap at me when I complained, say, ‘Hang on, lemme call the fairness police.’ It seems to me I can go on and be what I’ve always been, some-body’s patsy, everybody’s fool, or for once in my sorry little life I can stand up and demand a little of what’s coming to me. I’m the one who followed it through. I’m the one who wouldn’t let it go, and went to Tybee and found the sunglasses and tracked you down and finished it for you, did your dirty work for you, and now it’s like I should be grateful that I don’t have a fucking thing to show for it, excuse me, not a fucking thing. Well, no more. I’m getting what’s mine, and what’s mine is a prime number with lots and lots of zeros after it.”
Dres Falks burst out laughing. He slapped his thigh. His shoulders shook with mirth.
“You play poker, Ruzak?” he asked after catching his breath.
“No.”
“Good thing.”
“Regina Giddens.”
“What’s that?”
“The name. Her name. Katrina’s new name, the name she chose probably for luck and probably because it seemed to fit the situation so perfectly. Regina Giddens from The Little Foxes.”
Falks removed his handkerchief from his breast pocket and dabbed the corners of his eyes. Then two quick swipes across his nose and back neatly into the pocket.
“I’m impressed,” Falks said.
“Shut up,” Lynch said.
“No, for sure. Where’d you come up with that?”
“From me,” Lynch said. His eyes were closed. “I told him.”
It took a second for Falks to absorb that one.
“In New York, I was telling him about her first starring role,” Lynch said. “Bragging about Katrina. But I never even intimated anything like what he’s accusing us of.”
“Another shot in the dark. Another bluff. When are you going to learn, Ruzak?” Falks asked. He had relaxed again.
“Regina Giddens boarded a Delta flight to Vancouver at the Savannah airport two days after Katrina Bates disappeared.”
Falks was slowly shaking his head. “And you know that.”
“I do know that.”
“How do you know that?”
“I have a friend down that way who has a friend who knows somebody with TSA. They checked the manifest. Regina Giddens, Delta flight one seven five eight, Vancouver by way of Atlanta. They faxed a copy to my friend.”
“Let’s see it,” Falks said.
“Oh, Dres,” I said, gently scolding.
“What does it prove, Mr. Ruzak?” Lynch demanded. “Even if someone by that name was on that flight, what does it prove?”
“It’s the key,” I said. “A key, like a theorem, doesn’t have intrinsic value. The value of a key is what it unlocks. Like the one you gave me in New York. The name is the key and the key unlocks the box containing your daughter, Mr. Lynch.”
He didn’t get it. Dresden Falks did. He said, “The name gives you everything; it’s just grunt work once you have the name. Passport and driver’s license pictures, addresses, Social Security number, everything.” He was eyeing me with a newfound mea sure of respect. Ruzak, of all people, who would have thought?
Lynch rose. Sat. Pursed his lips. Glared at Falks. Falks looked at him like Hey, why you looking at me? You’re the dumbass who gave him the name. Then he looked back at me as I rubbed my thighs nervously, looking back at him with black-rimmed, reddened eyes, chin stubbly but thrust forward defiantly, a man holding a royal flush.
“How?” he asked finally.
“Hunch,” I replied. “Cracker of some of the greatest crimes in history.”
“A guess.” He seemed incredulous.
“It was a long shot,” I admitted.
“So’s this,” Dres said. He had commenced to cracking his knuckles, pushing his fingers back with the palm of his hand until the knuckles answered with a satisfying pop. I think I was supposed to think he was loosening up for a purpose.
“I didn’t know,” Lynch said. He wasn’t looking at me; he
was looking at the carpeting in front of my feet. “The name she chose. She didn’t tell me, said it was best if I didn’t know.” He swung in Falks’s direction. “You should have told me. If you had told me I never would have brought it up!” He turned back to me. “What is your price?”
“Okay,” Dresden Falks said. Pop! Pop!
“Half a million dollars,” I said.
“Okay, okay,” Dresden Falks said. Pop! Pop! Pop!
“And an apology,” I said. “For calling me a dumb Polack.”
“I called you a Polack. No adjective.”
“It was implied.”
“Then I apologize for the inference.”
“I mean, how would you like it if I called you an uptight, bigoted, morally bankrupt, sexually addicted, soulless, inbred WASP?”
“Okay!” Dresden Falks shouted, and came out of his chair. Now both men were standing about two feet from my spot at the end of the bed. “It’s your money, Al, and far be it from me to tell you how to spend it, but he’s taking you for a ride. He’s gonna take the cash and still rat her out to the cops. Listen to me; I know this bozo. Thinks he’s Jesus Christ come back to save the fucking planet, got a white-knight complex and he figures he can have his cake and eat it, too. There’s no way on God’s green earth he’s going to let Tom Bates go down for this.”
“Gee, Dres, that’s flattering as all get-out. I had no idea you thought so highly of me.”
He ignored me. His whole focus was on Lynch.
“There’s no salvaging this if you say yes, understand? Say yes and we’re all going down, you, me, and Katrina. This is serious shit, Lynch; this is serious time we’re talking about. I’ve been there, done that, and bought the T-shirt. Al, you do not want to do time.”
“What is the alternative?” Lynch asked.
The Highly Effective Detective Plays the Fool Page 18