“Well,” Gordon says. “Just get out to California, talk to Rebecca, his widow. Talk to this Franks fellow if you can. Talk to everyone you can think of. I’m not saying there’s this huge mystery that needs to be solved. It was probably a heart attack, like they said. I always told him running was a stupid way to get in shape. Runners drop dead all the damn time.”
Another silence. Amory notes that Gordon is very angry at his son, and wonders if the anger is because of the death or precedes it.
“And if not a heart attack, then the lion. Not a bad way to go, all things considered, eh?”
“All right,” says Amory. “I’ll start right away. I’ll need a retainer, if you—”
“Of course, of course, my assistant will be in touch and she’ll get all that arranged. I appreciate your help. I hope you’re as good as I’ve heard you are.”
They get off the phone. Amory sits right down at his desk, pulls out a pad of legal paper, and starts writing a list of questions, the same way he begins every investigation. Though he is not entirely blind to the tragedy of the circumstance, he is feeling just a little bit lucky to have this excuse to spend time with the extremely hot Caroline Crowe, whom he cannot figure out at all.
Scotty Franks has been hanging around a bar on MLK, still waiting for definitive news of an ID and cause of death on the new case. He quit drinking years ago but still likes to play pool when he’s feeling impatient. Phone buzzes again. It’s Lieutenant Oates. “Scotty? Need you to come in. This one’s…it’s got a few tricky elements to it.”
“Like what?”
“See you in my office. I’m putting Martinez with you.”
Franks grips the phone hard and wonders how much harder he’d have to squeeze to make the thing crumple in his hand.
Tricky fucking elements—he knows what that’s code for, there’s some political angle on the case, some kind of bullshit that’s about to give him hemorrhoids. The vic’s pricey clothes, that was the tipoff, he thinks, shaking his head. Shoulda known right there.
He doesn’t waste any time getting to Oates’s office. The Lieutenant is just a kid, all fresh-faced and full of himself, and most of the time Scotty gets along with him all right. He never wanted that gold bar anyway, he’s always been happy as a detective and had no interest in going further up the ladder—but that doesn’t mean having a kid tell him what to do never makes him gag a little.
“All right, what’s the fucking problem,” he says to Oates.
“Got the ID. You heard of Gordon Crowe?”
“I read the papers. Yeah, I heard of Gordon Crowe.”
“His son. Wilson Crowe, age 26, house in the Berkeley hills on Sunset Lane.”
Franks chews on the inside of his mouth, a habit picked up after quitting smoking. “Fuck.”
“I hear ya.”
“You notified the old man?”
“Yeah. It went about how you’d expect.”
“Gonna be a shitstorm,” says Franks. “Guarantee he’ll hire his own investigators. He’ll be talking shit to reporters before the day is out, saying we’re not doing our jobs.”
“Hold on, Scotty. Likely heart attack, yeah? I understand the family won’t be happy, but they can’t blame us if the kid goes out for a run and drops dead.”
“It was no heart attack.”
Oates starts to object but stops himself.
“We’ll just see what the ME has to say,” says Franks. He grins at Oates. “Anything else?”
“Just…yeah, the press will be on this, so make the usual no comment. Hopefully it’ll all blow over quickly.”
“Who’s doing the autopsy?”
Oates doesn’t answer.
Franks narrows his eyes. “You’re fucking kidding me. Gordon fucking Crowe called up and asked nicely, is that it? Says he doesn’t like the idea of his precious boy getting cut up?”
The detective’s clearance rate is legendary, but Oates will not be sorry when Franks retires. “He was a runner, on a trail in Tilden—”
“I was at the scene. I saw the body.”
“You know we get dead runners all the time. Last year—”
“Don’t give me your shitty statistics, I’m talking about this specific body, Oates. A young man lying in a big pool of liquid feces. Heart attack, my ass. And you know full well the autopsy’s legally required here, I don’t gotta spell it out for you.”
“Go talk to Martinez. Make him point man with reporters. This needs to go away as quick as possible, Scotty.”
On his way out of the station, Franks’s expression turns sour again. Rich people, he grumbles to himself. I’m sick to fucking death of them.
47
Caroline
If ever there was a day to go to the monkey house, this is it, but I feel I have to stand guard at home, at least for a while. No telling what new developments might arise, and I have to keep a close eye on both Gordon and Mummy.
Marecita brought me coffee earlier than usual. She told me she guessed I was not sleeping well, and she was, of course, correct, since that has been true for over ten years. My last good night’s sleep was years ago, possibly in Maine, after a day spent riding bikes all over the place in the sun and swimming in the freezing ocean? I don’t know. Certainly my life after about age fifteen has been a life without anything resembling restful nights.
After the coffee, showering, getting dressed, there’s still plenty of time to kill before the zoo opens. I do not want to venture into the rest of the apartment at this time. I should. But for the moment, I have had enough of Lillian’s wailing and Gordon’s pacing tiger.
They made their bed. Let them lie in it.
I will admit that I am not feeling quite as unburdened as I expected I would. Certain things are undeniably improved. A particular ache of anxiety is gone, but it has been replaced with a different, more panicky sensation, more like having a live electrical wire jumping around inside my body, threatening my existence with every unpredictable twitch.
And then, a few times, when I’ve managed to forget, just for a nanosecond? The fact of Wilson’s death looms up behind me, dark and impenetrably true, and I wonder how I’m ever going to get out from under it.
I’m so sorry, little bro.
Eventually I pull myself together and venture out of my room. The apartment is quiet. A silence like I’ve never felt before, as though all the inhabitants have been drugged to unconsciousness.
I creep down the corridor toward Gordon’s office, my ear cocked. When I get close I can hear a murmur from inside. I don’t dare press my ear against the door for fear of being caught, but I hang around hoping his voice will rise and I’ll catch something. I’ve been lurking outside doors like this my whole life, straining to hear something I can’t quite name. Like if I time it right and am listening at the right door at the right time, I’ll be warned before the tornado hits. Something like that.
Today what I hear is the susurration of my father’s voice, the tone everyday, natural, as though he is talking about the weather. Suddenly he breaks off and I hear a sob. I imagine how it looks, how his body curled inward, the grimace of anguish distorting his face. His tears, finding their way along the crow’s-feet or running down his unshaven cheeks.
When I can’t bear to stay in the apartment any longer, I take off for a crucial errand and to see the monkeys. I pick up the bag that could possibly send me to prison if the right person found it, and make my escape from the apartment. In the elevator I look down at the floor, avoiding eye contact with the little fish-eye of the camera in the corner of the ceiling. Thankfully Ricardo is busy with Mrs. Ferneyhough and I am able to get by with just a wave. And even luckier, the only photographer hanging around outside the building is busy unwrapping a Big Mac on the hood of a car and doesn’t even glance in my direction.
It’s turned cold again, so I start walking. I’m trying to figure out the best place to get rid of the bag, realizing that I’ve held onto it this long because I don’t want to put Kayley in a du
mpster.
But goddamn Katie Luxton saw me wearing the wig, the sweater, the unfashionable jeans. If Amory’s investigation leads him to Katie, and she talks, how will I explain that away? It’s going to look shady as all hell. And what about the real cops, won’t they be sniffing around any minute now?
On the other hand, why would Amory or any cop ever talk to Katie Luxton? It’s not like we’re actual friends. It seems like a long shot.
Then again, I’m part of the family of the deceased. If an investigation starts to consider murder as a distinct possibility, won’t we all be under suspicion? Isn’t that how detectives work, starting with the people closest to the victim because they are the most likely to have killed him?
Think about that for a minute. The Crowes must not be the only family so royally fucked up.
It verges on unbearable that Katie Luxton could ruin my life just because of a completely chance meeting. But there’s nothing to do but accept it and dispose of Kayley Ann Barker, whether I like it or not. I’m like most people, I don’t like doing things I don’t want to do. But I can’t afford to put this off any longer.
On Sixty-Eighth there are two dumpsters. Extensive renovations going on in two brownstones on the block. But what about dumpster divers? Isn’t it possible, even if unlikely, that someone might drag this bag out of the construction debris, and somehow it would find its way into the hands of law enforcement?
I decide “unlikely” isn’t safe enough. I keep walking. Storm drain? Run of the mill garbage can?
I’m still struggling with staying away from blow; the sudden stopping is wreaking havoc with my brain. For once I’m seeing images instead of words but the images are moving through super fast like a slide show gone crazy: Morton, Wilson, Amory, Gordon. Click-click-click.
At last, after walking south and then north for a couple of hours, I veer east. Another dumpster on Eighty-Ninth, overflowing with the guts of yet another brownstone; I grab three bricks and put them in the bag. All that’s left is to get over to the promenade on the East River and toss it in. Preferably unnoticed. I zig and zag my way over, walking the long blocks with my head down.
The surface of the water is choppy and I’m shivering from the brisk breeze. I open the bag and look at the wig one last time. I make sure that both of the glasses we drank out of at Wilson’s, the spoon I stirred his drink with, all that remains of poor Kayley Ann Barker—all of it is in the bag. Everything that could tie me to Wilson’s house is here, present and accounted for.
Would it make more sense to dispose of these things separately? The chance of something being found goes up, but the chance of the cops hitting the jackpot goes down. I lean on the railing, freezing my ass off, considering statistics and probabilities.
I wait. A couple of bicyclists go by, an old man walking his bulldog, a guy in a hoodie who looks like he wants to score drugs. It’s cold and windy and there are not a lot of people out here by the water.
The bag doesn’t fly out that far. It’s not a satisfying heave—the bricks are too heavy. It plops into the water and disappears.
“Bye, Kayley Ann Barker,” I say out loud.
I miss you already.
48
Franks pulls up to the Crowe house on Sunset Lane and sits for a moment, looking around at the neighborhood. Small lots with modest bungalows worth a ton of dough, expensive cars in tiny driveways. He’s already looked up current prices and knows what Rebecca Crowe is likely to inherit just from this one asset.
He also found out she comes from a family far less wealthy than the Crowes, but hardly poor. That she’s from southern California, near San Diego; what her parents did for a living, the names of her siblings, and other facts easy enough to find online even without a police detective’s access.
Franks is thinking what any investigator would be thinking: when a married person is murdered, odds are the spouse is the murderer. When the vic is loaded? The odds are crazy good.
“Rebecca Crowe?” he says, when she comes to the door.
“Yes.” Her expression is slack, her eyes verging on vacant. She’s in shock, he notes. Possibly on tranqs. Hopefully not, given the advanced pregnancy.
“I’m Detective Scotty Franks with the Berkeley Police Department. I’m very sorry about the loss of your husband.” He watches her eyes, her hands, the way she holds herself. “Can I come in and talk to you for a few minutes?”
It’s always a dicey moment, he thinks. You never know whether they’re gonna slam the door in your face. Not to mention how pissed the Lieutenant’s going to be when he hears about this little conversation.
“Yeah, sure,” she says, opening the door wide. “I just got back from the morgue.” Their eyes meet and he sees devastation. Still, some people are talented actors.
“That’s tough,” he says, almost reaching out to touch her arm but deciding it’s too early. She is young and fit, with an asymmetrical short haircut and big green eyes. Franks goes through the list of questions he already knows the answer to: full name, place of birth, number and names of siblings, on and on. Getting to know her, question by question. Watching how she moves, listening to her tone while she’s telling the truth.
“How many months along are you?” he asks gently.
“Eight,” Rebecca says, and her face momentarily crumples as she fights back tears.
“You look beautiful,” he says, and means it. “I know your pregnancy makes this situation feel even more unbelievable.”
“Yeah. And I was so annoyed with him. But the last time I saw him…you can’t help thinking about that, you know? Recently, he’d been…things had been sort of difficult. He was acting like an ass, to be honest.”
Franks raises his eyebrows just a little. He doesn’t pepper her with more questions. He’s thinking: these are not the kinds of things a murderer says.
“He was worried about being a crappy dad,” she says, and looks up at the ceiling to keep tears from rolling down her cheeks. “I think that was what was bugging him? He…oh, none of it’s important now,” Rebecca says, waving a hand. “Nothing like your husband dropping dead to put things in perspective, huh?” She laughs bitterly, and Franks joins in. He can’t help liking her.
“So I was wondering,” he says, softening his eyes as he looks at her. “When did you start to worry about your husband’s absence?”
Rebecca looks down at the floor. It’s the first time Franks has seen her wish to hide something.
“I came back from visiting a friend in LA. He was supposed to be home, but he wasn’t.”
“This was on the 7th, do I have that right?”
“Yes.” She twists her wedding ring around and around, avoiding eye contact.
“And you waited to report him missing until this morning, the 10th?”
“Yes.”
“Can you explain why you waited? I’m sure you had a good reason. Or several reasons.”
Rebecca gets up and walks to the door, looks out the small window set into it. “It…it wasn’t the first time he…” she starts. She leans her forehead against the front door. “Listen, waiting like that, I know it looks bad. But Wilson…like I said, he’s been going through a tough time lately, and I figured he was freaking out and just took off for a little while. To get his head together, you know what I mean?”
Franks waits for her to keep talking.
“The guy at the morgue…he said it wasn’t like there was anything that could be done. That calling in a missing persons earlier almost certainly wouldn’t have saved him or anything.” She does not sound comforted by this.
A good-looking woman, thinks Franks. Does she have a boyfriend on the side? Some jerk urging her to cash in her rich husband? Given the pregnancy, he thinks that scenario’s unlikely. Of course, anything’s possible. But if she did it, it was probably a straight-up play for the money, no accomplice. He makes a mental note to ask about a prenup.
“You get along with the family? Must not be easy, joining a family that well known,”
says Franks.
Rebecca smiles, a bit forced. “We live out here, they all live in New York. They look down their noses on California—and me. I’m not complaining,” she says, holding up her palms. “Wilson was generous and a really sweet guy. He moved out here to get away from them. We’ve been here a year, and no one’s visited except his sister.”
“That’s Caroline Crowe?”
“Yes.”
“Tell me about her. Did you two get along?”
Rebecca looks up at the ceiling, thinking. “I guess. She and Wilson had an intense relationship. I mean come on, just imagine the sibling rivalry if your father is Gordon Crowe! It could get a little annoying being with the two of them. Sometimes I felt like a third wheel almost.”
Franks nods. “So they were close? They fight a lot, too?”
Rebecca shrugs. “He didn’t talk to me about her. The Crowes…they’re not big talkers—at least, not about anything emotional, you know? Sometimes he and Caroline talked on the phone or made plans together, and other times it was chilly. She was here last spring, I think? I was out of town and the two of them spent the weekend together. Behaving badly, from what I heard,” she adds ruefully.
“Have you spoken to his family yet, since getting the news?”
Rebecca gives him a look. “Gordon called right after they were notified. We exchanged about three sentences. I don’t expect flowers to arrive, believe me. They weren’t exactly great supporters of our marriage.”
“In-laws,” says Franks, rolling his eyes. “Never got married, myself. Mostly because every time I got serious about a woman, I met her parents. That usually put an end to things in a hurry.”
Rebecca tries to acknowledge what Franks said but her eyes are flat. She keeps running a hand through her hair and shaking her head.
“I’m wondering—you happen to know of anyone who might have wanted to hurt your husband?” Franks asks, offhand, knowing Oates would want to kick him for asking.
You Made Your Bed: A Novel Page 19