Widows-in-Law

by Michele W. Miller

  Now, a half block from the West Side Highway, where the Intrepid lorded over the highway’s intersection with West Forty-Sixth Street, Carl arrived at the Home Game sports bar. He pulled open the bar’s outer door and passed through a vestibule into a dimly lit twilight. The place was empty except for a Central American day worker who was pulling upside-down chairs from tabletops and placing them on the floor in preparation for the first customers of the day. The day worker turned on flat-screen TVs with a remote control as he proceeded around the room. A replay of Game Six of the World Series emerged on one screen above the bar. Another opened to a soccer game. Beach volleyball players in bikinis were on a third TV over a lounge-seating area near the back of the room. Several more screens were still dark.

  A man in his twenties approached Carl from a shadowy hallway past the lounge area. Wearing a silk T-shirt under a dark suit jacket, the man’s eyes were a piercing blue and his hair was the streaked-blond of a California surfer. He extended his hand to shake. He could have been a model except the top of his head barely reached Carl’s collarbone. “Qué tal, Carl?”

  Carl shook his hand. “I’m good, CB. What’s up?”

  CB peered around. “I’m glad you left your partner home. You two look like Miami Vice.”

  “Aren’t you too young to remember that show?”

  “I spent my summers in DR when I was a kid. The television pickings were slim. Come in the back.”

  A group of women clattered in the door, and one of them approached. She wore black spandex leggings and a white leather jacket that stretched tight across her chest. She had stark cheekbones, jet-black Farrah Fawcett hair, and the physique of a fitness model except for her oversized breasts. “CB, I need to go home early tonight,” she said in Spanish. “The babysitter has to leave by eleven.”

  “Coño,” CB answered in Spanish, “you need to fire that babysitter.”

  Although CB had no trace of Latino features, he spoke Spanish with the accent and slang of a native Dominican. CB’s great-grandfather, a suspected Nazi, had taken refuge in the DR after World War II. He left behind a slew of Aryan offspring in the same town where Jorge Arena grew up. Before CB was born, his grandfather and Jorge Arena’s father worked as secret police together during Trujillo’s brutal dictatorship. The families stayed close after that, although CB’s grandfather immigrated to the US, and Arena’s father spent time in a Dominican prison. It was all in the Bureau’s files. Carl thought Arena’s father must have taught his son some tricks. People tended to end up dead around Jorge Arena, and they suffered before they died.

  “Daisy, have you met Carl?” CB said to the raven-haired Farrah Fawcett. “He’s the new assistant manager.”

  She put out her hand and smiled coyly, “Mucho gusto, Carlos.”

  Carl smiled at her appreciatively, although he wasn’t personally attracted to her. When he wasn’t working, he was a homebody. He liked it that way, although he mentally acknowledged that, if these girls had a choice, many of them would prefer to be homebodies too.

  CB spoke to Daisy. “I may have a few extra hours for you if you want to make up the time.”

  “Gracias, papi.” She leaned down and kissed CB on the cheek.

  Carl followed CB to his office in the back, a room with a glass desk, mirrors, and cameras. It had been designed to count money with transparency.

  “I called Jorge Arena’s cousin, Pedro,” CB said. “He’s Jorge’s body man, his executive assistant you could say. He just came back from Miami with Lucho Arena. Lucho is another cousin and the muscle, a smart guy but meaner than a python. Even meaner than Jorge. Something was going on in Miami.”

  Carl knew about Lucho Arena, had heard his voice on the taps from time to time. Carl sat in a leather armchair. “What do you mean, something was going on in Miami?”

  “I think the trip to Miami had something to do with the missing money.”

  Carl modulated his voice, hiding his level of interest. “So, there’s money missing?”

  “Yup. Last trace of it was in Miami.” CB sat at his desk and pulled out a pack of cigarettes.

  Carl gave him a hard look. “Really?”

  “Okay, all right.” CB dropped the pack on the glass surface. “Pedro tells me they’re expanding their search, looking in New York too. No rock unturned, you know? From what I’m hearing, the money was private action between a gambler Jorge was agenting and a Chinese dude. The bet was processed through Jordan Connors’ website. Arena’s gambler lost a big pot.” CB rubbed his face and unconsciously reached for the cigarette pack before dropping it again. “I guess Arena’s not used to being the one who owes the money, although I’m halfway surprised he’s so hyped about still owing it. The Chinese guy must have a lot of juice.” CB shrugged. “Notable fact: I haven’t seen Jordan in a while. He stops by here a lot. He likes live-action poker upstairs, if we make sure none of the con-teams are at the table when he plays. We let him take a turn beating up our regular customers, fair and square. He buys some coke while he’s here, maybe takes home one of the girls after work. But I haven’t seen or heard a word about him in a couple of weeks. He didn’t mention he was planning a trip. Are you sure he’s still among the living?”

  ***

  Red rays bathed the sides of the Tribeca loft buildings that Carl and Rick walked past. “I spoke to the cops in Florida today,” Carl said.

  Rick raised his eyebrows and looked at Carl. “About what?”

  “Brian Silverman.”

  “Damn. You can’t take no for an answer.”

  Carl pulled open the door to the gym. Warm air hit. Carl spoke quietly, “The cop said they sent the cigarette butt to the ATF for analysis. It was a Newport.” Carl continued to talk despite Rick’s annoyed exhalation. “Silverman smoked Marlboros.”

  Rick pushed open the door to the men’s locker room. “What does that mean? He had an urge for a menthol. It’s known to happen. He bummed a cigarette and died smoking in bed. There was no evidence of accelerant anywhere near the fire.”

  “The cell records came back on Silverman. He made calls from Tortola the night before the fire. Tell me, my man, what was he doing in Tortola the day after he withdrew twelve million dollars? And who would go all that way for only one day?”

  Rick stripped off his button-down shirt and replaced it with a T-shirt. “The Virgin Islands?”

  “The British Virgin Islands—an off-shore banking spot. Silverman had to be Jordan’s runner. I’m telling you, something went wrong, that’s why Arena’s people are all over Miami and New York looking for missing money … and why Jordan’s gone MIA.”

  “Yeah, well, how do you kill a guy with a cigarette? You haven’t even begun to answer that.”

  Dressed in sweat shorts and an old T-shirt his mother had sent him from Puerto Rico, Carl slipped on his leather weightlifting gloves. “Let me ask you this: He was in surgery for hours before he died. With all the Valium and Propofol the doctors pumped into him, how do we know he wasn’t slipped a roofie before he burned?”

  When they reached the weight room, Rick pointed to the lat pull-down machine—they’d work their backs tonight. With Carl standing behind him, Rick sat and grabbed the metal bar, which was attached to a pulley and weight plates. He pulled it down to his shoulders behind his head and did several unassisted reps.

  “One more.” Carl pressed down on the bar with two fingers to help as Rick’s breathing turned into a groan.

  The bar touched Rick’s shoulders, and he let it rise upward. Breathless, he spoke to Carl as they switched places. “You know that theory about the fire being intentional is far-fetched.”

  Carl swung his foot over the low seat and gripped the bar. He pulled it down and began his set. He watched Rick through a strip of mirror in front of him that separated two windows with a view of the Nautilus and stretching room. He spoke between breaths. “Let me ask you this, Rick: Wha
t are the odds of accidentally dying in your sleep if Arena’s involved?”

  Rick placed his palm on the top of the bar for an assisted rep. Carl pulled with the last of his strength, but suddenly Rick’s help was gone. The weights pulled Carl to his feet with a violent jerk. “Are you trying to kill me?”

  Rick bent over and spoke quietly near Carl’s ear, “Shit. That’s Lauren Davis.”

  Carl saw her through the glass window. She was doing hanging leg raises from an overhead bar, raising her muscular legs to a ninety-degree angle before she lowered them. Her hair was tied up in a thick ponytail, and she wore a black sleeveless T-shirt and stretch shorts. She looked great. “She has a membership here.”

  “You knew that?”

  “Can’t say I didn’t.” Carl smiled wryly, covering up his disappointment. “She hasn’t called me though, and I can’t seem to get through to her. I don’t know what happened.”

  Rick let out a clipped laugh. “You’re kidding?”

  “Just tell her you work with me at the sports bar if she asks.”

  “If the boss hears about this, you’re fucked.” Rick raised his eyebrows. “You’re not fucked, are you?”

  Carl frowned, always uncomfortable with locker-room talk. “No.”

  “If the other guys hear about you doing business in our gym, you’ll really be in the doghouse. We’ll have to work out strapped if word gets back to her pal Arena that we’re all here.”

  Carl patted Rick on the shoulder. “Don’t worry about it. Arena’s not her pal.”

  “Have you read her file? She’s no Mother Teresa,” Rick hissed as Carl walked away.

  Carl headed toward the door, watching Lauren hang then jump down from the overhead bar. Despite what her file said, she’d been a kid when she’d last been on FBI radar. A victim, for all intents and purposes. Almost a dead victim. He’d spent enough time with her to know she didn’t have a drop of criminal blood in her veins. He had reliable instincts about such things. She was a mom and a lawyer, and a good athlete. That was it.

  Carl didn’t think she’d seen him, her head bobbed to iPhone music as she reached to the floor and picked up a water bottle. Carl’s sneaker toe caught on the carpeted doorsill between rooms just as she looked up and noticed him. He couldn’t help but look down at the feet that had tripped him. They’d always embarrassed him, size thirteen Saint Bernard–puppy feet by the time he was twelve. He quickly corrected himself, smiling sheepishly. “Hi.”

  “Hi,” she said without taking out her earbuds. Her first glance at him had turned glacial.

  As if he’d been found out, he felt a shot of guilt for deceiving her. Things had gotten a lot heavier the other night than he’d expected. He tapped his ear and mouthed, “How are you?”

  She pulled one ear bud from an ear. “Fine.”

  “Your daughter? Emily, right?”

  She smiled, politely—a polite smile if he’d ever seen one. “She’s fine, thanks.” She pushed the earplug back into her ear.

  Ouch. He reached to touch her arm. She hesitated then unplugged her ear again.

  “Did I do something wrong, Lauren? I tried to call you a couple of times.”

  “I have an appointment in an hour, and I want to get in a quick workout. I don’t have time to talk.”

  The woman was like Jekyll and Hyde. She hadn’t seemed like the bitchy type. He’d heard about things like this, how people who were dating would simply disappear the other person from their lives, ghost them, not even providing an explanation. In this case, they’d only had one date, but it hadn’t felt like it. He had to be honest with himself: she’d really hurt his feelings. “Call me, okay? You have my number.”

  She flashed a false, irritated smile that said he shouldn’t hold his breath. She put the earbud back in her ear and walked away.

  Carl returned to Rick in the weight room. Rick had obviously kept an eye on things. “She seemed real enthusiastic to see you. She dissed you, didn’t she?”

  Carl sat at the lat pull-down machine to do his next set. “I wouldn’t call it that.”

  “What would you call it?”

  Carl thought it over as he pulled the weighted bar behind his head. He looked at Rick in the mirror. “Okay, she dissed me.”

  Rick laughed, “Man, I read that a mile away. You’ve got a way with women, I’m telling you. You’re a regular Bond,” Rick’s accent turned British, “James Bond.”

  CHAPTER 18

  Hector was waiting for Emily at the 103rd Street subway station, across the street from Central Park. She’d taken Metro North from Westchester to Grand Central and from there, the subway. She’d told Jessica she was staying at the computer lab at school for a couple of hours and that she was thinking about catching a school basketball game. Jessica had seemed happy. Emily hoped she wouldn’t get caught. Being mean to Jessica had started becoming unpleasant. Jessica was trying hard to be good to Emily, probably too hard, although Emily would never be the one to tell her that. Emily liked the benefits.

  She also hadn’t told Jessica the things she’d found out, that her dad was probably cheating on Jessica in Tortola. Emily didn’t tell her mother either. She wouldn’t want to be in Jessica’s stilettos if everyone knew but her. So, with much effort—Emily almost blurted it all out a couple of times on Saturday—she’d kept her father’s cheating and the encrypted file to herself, thinking it would be better to find out what was on the file before telling. And after their real estate tour in the Bronx yesterday, it looked like Emily had more important things to think about than who her father was hooking up with. She wanted to know what was going on with the building they’d seen and what was going on that would make Steve cheat them out of her father’s money. Emily thought the encrypted files might be the key to all of it. Maybe she should have told her mother about it once she realized there was more going on than her father cheating. But if her mother knew, she would never let Emily do what she was doing now.

  “You’ve gotta be chill with Tabu when you meet him,” Hector said. “I’m not supposed to tell anyone he’s back on the internet. He’s on parole.”

  “No problem.”

  Hector must have been the geekiest kid in the projects. He always looked like he was wearing a school uniform even when he wasn’t, and he played Dungeons & Dragons, which was as geeky as you could get. He didn’t hang out with Emily’s main group of friends, but she still thought he was a cool kid. They’d been in school together since the sixth grade, until she moved to Westchester.

  It was already dark out and Emily tensed up as they neared the Douglas Projects. She usually walked around, not through, the projects, even though they were right in the middle of the Upper West Side within sight of a Whole Foods. She scanned her surroundings as she walked beside Hector. Surprisingly, the Douglas Projects were pretty with huge, old oaks lining the walkways between brown buildings.

  “He used to do business with people online and never met them,” Hector continued. “That was the way it was back when Anonymous was new. But now he’s not supposed to be on the internet at all, so he said he has to meet you before he’d risk it.”

  “There was a documentary about it on YouTube,” Emily said. “He ratted out all his friends, and they did like ten years.”

  “Yeah, it’s kind of embarrassing. He had to do it, though, so he could help my mother with us kids. She raised him since he was a kid, before we were even born. My mother lost her job during the recession, and he was the only one making money. If he hadn’t cooperated, he would have done twenty years.” Hector led Emily down a path past a playground, toward a building entrance. “He stays inside most of the time since he came home from prison. I mean, it was in the papers that he turned state’s. Luckily, he only ratted out a bunch of white boys who nobody in the projects cares too much about.”

  Emily smelled rice, beans, and cilantro-laced tomato sauce the moment th
ey entered Hector’s apartment. Three dark-haired preteens watched a flat-screen TV in a sparsely furnished living room with spotless, glossy-white walls.

  “Those are my sisters. Mami, I’m home,” Hector called, and brought Emily toward the alley-kitchen with space for a table at the end. “This is my friend, Emily, from school.”

  “Hello,” Hector’s mother said to her.

  “Hi.”

  “Come on,” Hector tugged on Emily’s arm, relieving her of the awkwardness of his mother clearly checking her out. Emily figured Hector didn’t have many girls visiting him.

  Hector knocked on a door halfway down a long, dim hallway. A heavyset man in his late twenties looked out and walked back into his room. Hector led Emily in and closed the door behind her. The room was lit by a single desk lamp. A laptop sat open on the desk.

  “I can’t keep a lot of equipment around, in case my parole officer makes a home visit,” Tabu said, almost apologetically. He looked Emily over, grimacing. “Loli. That’s all I need.”

  “What did you expect, Tabu? I’m Loli.”

  “Boys can’t be Loli.”

  “What’s Loli?” Emily asked, annoyed at them talking as if she weren’t there.

  “Underage girl,” Hector said.

  Tabu shook his head. “Like I don’t have enough problems.”

  “Well, I’m definitely not gonna do anything to make that relevant.”

  Tabu chuckled, seeming to like that answer. “She’s a smart one, coz.” He sat and swiveled toward Emily. “Okay, so what’s going on?”

  Emily pulled out the thumb drive she’d found in her father’s desk. “It has an encrypted file, and I need to know what’s on it.”

  He looked at it as if it were coated in Russian skin-eating poison. “Whose is it?”

  “My father’s.”

  “I’ve gotta be careful what I do. If I get caught hacking, they’ll send me away for ten years.”