Rob heard Phil Menendez yell something in the background.
“I’ve got a problem,” said Rob.
“We’re crunching here, Rob.” Sammy’s voice was becoming a little more imperative, a little more threatening.
“Sammy,” said Rob, “I’ve been with the police all afternoon. My best friend’s been murdered.”
There was silence. Rob heard Sammy’s voice, muffled, saying: “He says his best friend’s been murdered.” Then he heard Menendez reply: “Tell the little fuck we’re sorry and to get his ass back here.”
“Rob?” said Sammy, coming back on the line. “Are you still with the police?”
Rob didn’t reply.
“Rob?”
“Tell the big fuck he can shove his head up his ass!” said Rob. And he almost held on to hear how Sammy was going to translate that.
He looked around. A couple of people were staring at him. He frowned. “Sorry,” he murmured. A couple more people arrived. Rob recognized Caitlin and Andrea, the two editors who shared Emmy’s office. Word was going around that Emmy’s boyfriend had arrived with two cops and they had taken her into the kitchen.
“Rob,” said Caitlin, “what’s going on?”
“Something’s happened.”
Caitlin looked at him anxiously. “Is Emmy okay? I heard the police are here.”
“She’s okay.”
“Then what is it?” said Andrea.
Rob gazed at them. There were half a dozen people around him now. The only ones he knew were Caitlin and Andrea. He couldn’t talk about it like that, as if it were some kind of a story to entertain a crowd. It was his best friend. He heard the words he had said to Sammy: “My best friend’s been murdered.” Suddenly it was real. Greg was dead. It was a fact, and it would be a fact for the rest of his life.
“I can’t say,” he said.
It hit him again. His best friend was dead. Murdered. In his apartment. And then all the things the cops had been saying. Was it really a burglary? Was it an accident or was it on purpose? Was it meant to be Greg, or was it meant to be him? He couldn’t get it straight. What if it was meant to be him?
The crowd outside the kitchen watched him disbelievingly. He saw the way they were looking at him. Blaming him. As if it were his fault, in some way, that Emmy was inside that room with the cops.
“Excuse me,” he said. “Excuse me. Can you just … can you get out of my way!”
Inside, the cops were almost done. When you give people news like that, you’ve got a certain amount of time, a few minutes, when they’re in shock, off balance, and as long as they hold it together, they’ll answer anything you ask. Then their thought processes kick in and you lose them until they’ve had a chance to cry or scream or question or shout, to vent their initial feelings of horror and disbelief. The two cops had gone straight for the key time markers, the ones that would cover the time points Rob had given them. Those were the essential things they wanted to get out of Emmy before she had the chance to talk to anyone else or even think about what she was saying.
Now she was getting increasingly agitated, not addressing the questions, starting to ask questions of her own. But they had what they needed.
“I think we’re done for now,” said Nabandian. “Thank you very much, Ms. Bridges. I know this has been a shock. We may need to talk with you again, if that’s okay.”
“But how could it happen?” demanded Emmy. “What’s happened to the body? My God, who’s going to tell Greg’s parents?”
“We’ll take care of that,” said Nabandian.
Emmy stared at him in anguish.
“Let’s go out and get your boyfriend,” said Engels.
The two detectives stood up. They waited. Emmy got up. Nabandian opened the door for her.
The corridor was full of people. But Rob was gone.
42
Kelly Tan had worked the afternoon shift at the Bean of Content coffee shop on Second Avenue for two years. She’d seen a bunch of weird characters come in over that time. Normally they didn’t worry her, but there was something about the customer down in back that was spooking her out.
She stole a glance at him as she unloaded the cups out of the dishwasher, stacking them still hot and moist over the coffee machine. There were only another couple of tables occupied in the whole place and her boss had stepped out for an hour and told her to hold the fort. There was something plain wrong about the guy in back. Ever since she had taken his latte over, he had sat at the table and stared. His cell phone was on the table, and even when it rang he just continued to stare.
The cell phone rang again. Kelly watched him. He didn’t touch it. The phone rang until it stopped.
Kelly came out from behind the counter. She hesitated for a moment and then went closer to him. He didn’t look around, seemingly unaware that she was there.
“Everything all right, sir?” she said, and she stole a glance at his coffee to see if he’d drunk any.
Slowly, he turned and nodded.
Kelly smiled nervously and retreated back to her counter.
She watched him. He was just staring again. She wished he’d go. She was starting to get a little scared. Maybe, she thought, she should call the cops.
At his table, Rob was utterly oblivious of the effect he was having on her.
He needed to think. He needed to get it straight.
He knew when it had happened. Saturday night. It had to have been. He was no pathologist, and he only saw the body for a few moments, and he didn’t touch it, but the blood on that carpet was dry. And there was a lot of blood, so that would have taken time. And the radio was still on, just as it was when he spoke to Greg. And Greg hadn’t answered his call the next day. So it had to have been then. It made Rob ill to think about it. That knock on the door that Greg had heard—that knock on the door that had cut short their conversation—it had been them. The burglars who had killed him.
And Rob had told him to answer it, told him it was only Mrs. Angelou.
He kept thinking about it, seeing an image of Greg opening the door. Opening the door, pulling it back. His mind focused on that, wouldn’t let it go. What if Greg hadn’t opened the door?
And what if Greg hadn’t moved in until Sunday? Or what if he hadn’t moved in at all? What if he hadn’t broken up with Louise? What if? What if? Too many what-ifs, one after the other, all leading to Greg’s death.
And what if Rob had told him not to answer the door? What if he had never stood there, as Rob could see him in his mind’s eye, opening it?
Rob couldn’t bear to think about it. But that’s all he had been thinking about since he sat down. His cell phone must have rung half a dozen times and he hadn’t once answered. Didn’t even look at it.
What were burglars doing knocking on a door? That was the thing he couldn’t figure out. Burglars don’t knock on the door. All right, maybe they knock on the door to see if anyone’s home, but they don’t go on in if someone answers. Murderers do that, not burglars. A burglar would run away. And Greg had answered, hadn’t he? That’s why he cut the conversation. That’s why he put down the phone. He answered the door.
Maybe it wasn’t a burglary. The cops obviously doubted it. Maybe someone had deliberately intended to kill the person who opened the door. But if that were the case, as the cops said, how did he know they expected it to be Greg who was standing there?
Rob stared into the coffee, deep, deep into the pale brown liquid.
It was his apartment. But they might still have wanted Greg. Or they might have wanted him.
That was another what-if. One that was more unbearable and guilt-inducing than all the others. What if Greg had died in his place? What if he told Greg to open the door to his killers, and what if he died because they thought Greg was him?
It was too agonizing to think about. He couldn’t. He shook his head. He buried his face in his hands. He just couldn’t think about it.
Kelly was getting really spooked. She came out from beh
ind the counter and backed away. She stood by the door. The other people in the place looked at her quizzically, but Kelly didn’t care. She wasn’t going to get trapped behind the counter when that guy in the back pulled out a carving knife or something.
Rob felt as if he were going to hyperventilate. He stopped himself. He put his hands on the table and pressed down hard, to feel something solid. He stared at his hands, still pressing, until he breathed slower. Slower. That was better. Try to be rational, he thought. Try to be analytical. There were two possibilities. They wanted Greg, or they wanted him. Greg or him, he thought. Greg or him … If they’d wanted Greg, they’d gotten him. That was the end of it. If they’d wanted him, they hadn’t gotten him. That meant they would still be looking.
But only if they knew they hadn’t gotten him. They might not know that. They might think they had, because they’d gone ahead and killed Greg. So they probably thought the person who answered the door … the person who answered the door … who opened it …
Rob frowned hard. He had lost his train of thought. For an instant, it had all seemed so clear. But now, all he could see was that image of Greg standing at the door, opening it.
His gaze shifted to his cell phone. It was still sitting there, next to his coffee, where he had put it. He stared at it.
Suddenly he reached into his pocket.
Kelly jumped. She was ready to run out the door. But all he pulled out was a small white business card.
Rob put the card on the table beside the phone. He had meant to call, he remembered. He had a feeling that if he had called, if only he had called, none of this would have happened. It was irrational, he knew. The two things weren’t connected. He wasn’t thinking clearly. He was angry, frustrated. His friend was dead and it shouldn’t have happened. His story should have been published and that hadn’t happened, either. Why not? What was stopping them? He should have called already. He should have called yesterday or even the day before.
Abruptly, he punched the numbers on his phone.
He heard her answer. There was noise in the background.
“Why haven’t you published?” he demanded.
“Who’s this? I can’t hear you. Wait a minute…” Rob heard the background noise diminish. “Okay. Who is this?”
“Why haven’t you published?” repeated Rob in a low, deadly tone.
Standing on a sidewalk outside a bar twenty blocks away, Sandy Pereira froze.
“Answer me!”
“Is that you, Rob?”
“Don’t use my name! Why haven’t you published?”
“Have you got more information?”
“I told you everything I know. You said you were going to publish.”
“Rob … Rob, listen. My editor … he said we need more proof.”
“That’s not what you told me!”
“Well, I didn’t think we did. But we do. He says we can’t go with the story until we know for certain. We can’t go with one source. We need proof. I’ve been trying to get it.”
Rob held on. He didn’t know whether to believe her. “You said I could trust you.”
“You can.”
Rob didn’t reply.
“Rob?”
“That other story you published,” he said, “that was nothing. What did you have? Nothing! Innuendo!”
“That’s the problem. If we put out anything else now that isn’t a hundred percent right, they’ll sue us.”
“How do you know?”
“They’ve told us.”
“I’ve given you hard facts. I’ve given you names.”
“Just names, Rob. Not facts. I need more.”
“Go check.”
“I have.”
“And?”
“I can’t get anything.”
Rob shook his head. “You’re shitting me.”
“No, Rob. I’m not shitting you, I swear. I swear I’m not. You won’t find a newspaper in the country that would publish on the basis of what you’ve given me. I need more. Give me more. Keep digging. When you get more, we’ll publish, I promise. I just need to have—”
“My best friend’s dead.”
There was silence.
“Did you hear me?” demanded Rob.
“What do you mean?”
“He’s dead. Murdered. In my apartment.”
Sandy didn’t speak.
“Can’t you hear me?”
“I hear you.”
“Two days ago. I found him this afternoon. In a pool of his own blood.” Rob waited. “My best friend. In my apartment.”
“What was his name?”
“What difference does it make? Greg Ryan. He’s dead. Go check.”
Sandy shook her head. His name made no difference. She hadn’t been able to think of anything else to say. “Have you called the police?” she asked quietly.
“No!” retorted Rob. “I thought I’d call the fucking Herald first.”
“Okay, Rob. What did they say?”
“They said he’s dead. Aren’t you listening to anything I’ve been saying?” Rob was boiling with rage. “Maybe I was lucky, huh? Maybe they got my best friend instead. Maybe they meant to get me.”
Rob waited.
“Rob—”
He pulled the phone away from his ear and disconnected. He stared at it. The phone shook in his hand. He was physically trembling.
He put it down. He had to get control. He put his hands on the table again, pressed hard.
Two possibilities, he said to himself. Two possibilities. He kept repeating it. Kept trying to get some clarity. Two possibilities. But he couldn’t get past those words, couldn’t figure out what they implied. Every time he tried, he kept seeing Greg, standing at the door of his apartment, opening it.
The phone rang. He looked at the number. Sammy Weiss. He let it ring and go to voice mail.
He got up. For some reason, the waitress was over by the door. He went to the counter to pay. She didn’t move.
“Two dollars,” she called out.
Rob looked in his wallet. “I’ve only got five. You want to come over here and give me some change?”
“Forget about it,” said the waitress. “On the house.”
Rob stared at her quizzically.
“Happy hour.”
“For coffee?”
The waitress nodded.
The other people in the coffee shop looked around in surprise.
Rob headed for the door. Kelly circled away from him as he approached. “Thanks,” he murmured.
He left the Bean of Content. His phone rang. He pulled it out and checked the number. Sammy again. He didn’t answer it. He couldn’t go back there today. Tomorrow, maybe.
He switched the phone off. He headed randomly up Second Avenue, trying to get the image of Greg out of his head.
43
Amanda Bellinger sat behind her desk and watched the two people who were sitting on the other side. One of them was a boyish-looking music star whose face was vaguely familiar to her. The other was his small, balding, worried-looking manager. Behind them, a full-wall window gave a view down Fifth Avenue. The lights of the cabs were beginning to glint in the gathering dusk.
The man-child in front of her wasn’t a major star, but his manager feared that he had just booked himself a one-way ticket to hasbeenhood. A video clip had appeared on the Internet showing him snorting cocaine. Actually snorting it. Through a hundred-dollar bill.
“I don’t know what this shit is,” said the star. “I’m a rock star. I’m supposed to do drugs.”
He had said this a number of times, possibly, suspected Amanda, because he had done what a rock star is supposed to do when he stepped out to go to the bathroom shortly after he and his manager had arrived.
“Well?” said the manager anxiously, ignoring him. “What do you think?”
“You can deny or admit,” said Amanda.
The manager nodded quickly, waiting for more, hanging on every word.
“Is it true?”
asked Amanda.
The manager glanced helplessly at his client.
“I don’t know what all this shit is…”
“I’d be inclined to admit. Never compound an offense with a lie unless you know absolutely that you’ll get away with it.”
“We won’t get away with it,” said the manager.
“Then the lie will kill you quicker than the offense. If there’s one thing we can thank Richard Nixon for, it’s for teaching us that. Now, if you admit, you can show contrition or bravado.”
“What do you mean by bravado?” asked the manager quickly.
“You can be upfront and proud,” replied Amanda. “He’s right. He’s a rock star. Rock stars do drugs.”
“See, I don’t know what all this shit—”
“Shut up!” snapped the manager.
“But I’m—”
“You’re not a rock star! Hendrix was a rock star. Jagger’s a rock star.”
“Who?”
“You sing pop. Not even pop. Pap!”
The pap star stared at him, eyes slightly unfocused.
“Most of his audience are girls of twelve,” explained the manager to Amanda.
“Are they? No, Arnie, come on—”
“Shut up, I said!” The manager, whose name was Arnie Klein, looked as if he were going to hit him.
Amanda coughed discreetly. “Contrition,” she said, “can be done in a couple of ways. You can say you repented. Or you can say you’re going to repent. The choice depends on a number of factors. Now, how long ago was this clip taken?”
“Three days,” said Arnie Klein.
“Ah.” Amanda nodded. “I think we’re going to repent.”
“Damn right we are,” muttered Klein.
“We’re in crisis,” said Amanda, expanding on the theme. “We realize we’ve come to a turning point. We know we have to change our ways. We don’t want anyone else to make the mistakes we’ve made.”
“What mistakes have you made, Arnie?” the pap star asked.
“You, you moron!” yelled Klein.
“Me? Am I at a turning point? Is that good? That sounds really positive.”
“We want to be an example,” continued Amanda, ignoring the subject of her exposition. “We go into therapy. We emerge reborn. Our next album is poignant, deep, meaningful, reflecting the trauma we’ve suffered.”
Due Diligence: A Thriller Page 32