Dead Famous

by Carol O'Connell

  She stood on the threshold, arms folded, glaring at him. “I want a new desk,” she said. “A brand-new desk.”

  The lieutenant smiled against his will. This preemptive strike telegraphed that Mallory knew she was in trouble. He pointed to a chair. “Sit.”

  He was hardly surprised that she remained standing. She paused awhile to peruse his paperwork, reading upside down in a violation of his personal space. Was this payback for her broken desk? Now she sat down. Mallory had only one basic strategy—offensive in every sense of that word.

  “I got an interesting phone call today.” He tapped his pencil on the desktop, and this was the only giveaway that he was angry, for his voice was remarkably calm. “It was an ex-cop who runs Highland Security. The guy’s name is Rawlins. You know him?”

  “I’ve talked to him,” she said.

  How predictable that she would answer that question truthfully, for what was the point of getting caught in a little lie? Mallory was a big believer in truth administered in small doses to improve upon a falsehood.

  Done with chitchat, Coffey dropped his pencil. “Rawlins wanted to talk to our covert ops detective. Well, I told him we didn’t have one of those, nothing that fancy in Special Crimes Unit. Then Rawlins says, ‘Oh, shit!’” Jack Coffey leaned forward. “Now, why should that make me think of you?” He paused a beat, allowing this remark to register with her. “So I said, ‘You must mean Mallory.’ Oh, yeah—now the guy’s more relaxed. He thinks that stunt you pulled on him might actually be legal. So then he tells me this radio celebrity sent his company a huge retainer. Now Rawlins wants to know what they’re supposed to do with the guy’s check since—thanks to you—they’re not doing any work to earn it. I said I’d get back to him.”

  “I’ll tell him not to cash the check.”

  “That’s it?” If he waited for her to defend her actions, he would wait forever, but she had no idea that his best shot was still coming. “I’m really worried about you, Mallory. You’ve never been this sloppy before. Such messy tracks.” Did that get her attention? Well, no, but he pressed on anyway. “Two days ago, Ian Zachary calls Highland Security to set up an appointment. Five minutes later, you call Rawlins and tell him you’re taking over, and he should keep his mouth shut. Five minutes. You should’ve waited longer, Mallory. Now I have to figure you intercepted Zachary’s phone call. I don’t remember asking any judges for warrants to tap a radio station’s telephone. So, of course, you have some other explanation.”

  “I have a snitch at the station,” said Mallory. “That’s how I knew about the call to the security company.” Nothing in her tone said that she expected him to believe this.

  It was a lie, but it would do—in the event that Internal Affairs turned its eyes back to Special Crimes Unit. And now, for his next leap of inspiration, he said, “I’m guessing this all ties back to Riker somehow.” He could see that she was not planning to elaborate on that, but there was no other explanation. She was good, damn good, even better than Lou Markowitz in the days when her old man had commanded this squad. It was unlike her to mess up so badly. Some personal aspect was affecting her judgment.

  And now he allowed it to affect his own.

  “Mallory, get out your damn notebook. That’s an order. I’ve got a list for you, and I want every item to be perfectly clear.”

  Her expression said, Yeah, right. However, she produced a small pad of paper from her back pocket, as a token appeasement. “I’m on comp time. This might have to wait a few—”

  “That’s the first item—you don’t get any more time off.”

  “I’ve got at least fifty hours of—”

  “No comp time.” He could see the next argument coming, and he put up one hand to prevent her from mouthing off. “You used your badge to muscle Highland Security. So now you cover your tracks. Open a case file for Ian Zachary. I’m guessing he wants security because of the Reaper. Those homicides belong to the feds, so make out paperwork for a celebrity stalker. Throw in some anonymous tips, and don’t forget to backdate your file by two days.” He slammed the desk with one hand. “I want to see you writing this down, Mallory.”

  She bowed her head over the notebook, and her pen began to move. A small victory.

  “Next item,” he said. “If there’s an active phone tap at that radio station, make it go away. If that comes back on this squad, I’ll fire your ass in a heartbeat. And the last little detail? Zachary thinks he has paid security, so you keep that son of a bitch alive. Officially, that’s your new job.”

  “He thinks I’m his private investigator—not his baby-sitter.”

  “He better not die on your watch. Get out of my office.”

  For months, Riker had avoided saloons in the precinct of his old squad, and now a local bartender flashed a broad smile. “Long time no see,” the man said, as he set down two drinks on cocktail napkins, bourbon and water for Riker, rye for Jo.

  Another woman, one he had dated casually, had broken up with him in this same SoHo bar. There were many such landmarks in New York City. Over the past twenty years since his divorce, no relationship had lasted longer than a few months. Some of the women had left him in restaurants, and others had dumped him on street corners. Only now did he get around to wondering how he had erred in those brief encounters. It worried him that Jo might walk away before they even got started.

  “I promised you a meal,” he said. “There’s a nice little place around the corner.” A woman named Donna had dumped him there. “You like Italian?”

  “No, thanks. Maybe some other night.” She glanced at her watch. “I should be leaving now.”

  “It’s early,” he said. It was late. “Don’t go.” His feet were tapping a rung of the bar stool, and his hands were sweating. Neither of these symptoms had anything to do with the damage this woman had recently done to him.

  Jo rolled up her sweatshirt sleeve, the better to see the bruise blooming on her right arm. She glanced at his crotch. “Does it still hurt?”

  “Naw. Don’t worry about it. I had it coming.”

  “You mean, you never saw it coming. My father’s best advice—kick a man in the soft parts and run like hell.”

  “Well, I’m glad you stuck around, Jo. That took guts. Most women would’ve been unnerved to see a man cry like that.”

  An hour ago, she had kicked him in the testicles, and then, impressed by his suave fetal posture and groin clutching, she had shared the contents of a pharmacy bottle with him—pain pills, strong ones. Evidently, Jo and agony were old acquaintances. The lady had called it right—he was a jerk. But she was a good sport. Jo had suggested this pub crawl through SoHo for medicinal purposes.

  “Your color’s better,” she said. “Not quite so pale. You’re a very good patient.”

  “Better than Timothy Kidd? You were treating him, right?”

  Now she was taken by surprise. If he had only thought of this earlier, he could have mugged her with words and saved himself a world of hurt. A few moments passed in uneasy silence. Did she regret coming out with him tonight? There was time in this lull to notice that she was wearing perfume. Though they had lifted many a glass at the end of a workday, he never had been so close to her, almost touching shoulders. He breathed deep and stared at the red stain on her glass. Her lipstick fascinated and flattered him, believing as he did that she had tricked herself out on his account, though she was otherwise her old jeans-and-sweatshirt self.

  “You’ve been talking to Marvin Argus,” she said. “He told you Timothy was my patient? Well, he lied. He does that a lot.” She pulled the down jacket from the back of her stool, preparing to end the evening.

  “Wait, Jo. So it was a different kind of relationship—you and Agent Kidd. You were close. I figured out that much. Lovers?”

  “Would you find that hard to believe, Riker?”

  He shook his head, and he must have done a fine job of communicating that he was not at all surprised that any man would want her—that he wanted her—f
or she seemed contrite.

  “Sorry.” She smiled, less anxious to leave him now. “Timothy was my friend.”

  Riker sometimes got lost in Jo’s eyes, foolishly dropping the threads of his thoughts. He wanted to know if she had also worn lipstick for the murdered FBI man. Instead, he asked, “How did you two meet?”

  “He came by my office asking for help on a case.”

  “The Reaper case?”

  Her head moved slightly from side to side, more in wonder than denial. Perhaps, like most civilians, she assumed police omniscience, and now she was surprised by his ignorance. But how could he be wrong about this?

  “Well, the fed was killed by the Reaper. Logical connection, right? And it’s like you said, Jo—Argus lies a lot. So help me out here.” That fed was not the only liar. Riker was already laying plans to hunt down Mallory, to back her up against a wall and find out what else she had held out on him, but for now he must wing it. “So that’s not when you met Agent Kidd? When the murders—”

  “No, I met him before the first juror died. No one had even heard of the Reaper yet. And Marvin Argus met Timothy after the second murder.”

  “They didn’t work together?”

  “No, Timothy worked out of Washington, D.C. Argus is based in Chicago, and he wasn’t investigating the Reaper case either. Argus was only responsible for rounding up jurors and witnesses for protective custody. He probably thought Timothy was in town to check up on him. The second juror died in Argus’s custody.”

  “So, Jo, in your professional opinion, which one of these agents was the most paranoid?”

  She smiled. “Timothy. No contest. He cultivated paranoia, thought it enhanced his insight. And maybe it did. After two minutes, he could tell you your life story and how it would end. Or that’s what he thought. I’ll show you how he did it. Now remember, this isn’t my style. My trade takes more time.”

  She nodded toward a lone patron between two vacant stools at the other end of the bar. “He’s perfect for one of Timothy’s stunts.”

  The young man’s greasy hair was parted down the center and bluntly chopped off below his ears. He was smiling at some lame joke he had told himself, and one pudgy hand tapped out the rhythm of a tune that only he could hear. His polyester shirtsleeves were buttoned down and his collar buttoned up. Riker noted the pocket protector lined with pens and mechanical pencils. Without looking underneath the bar, he knew the pants would be black with shiny knees.

  Jo colored in the rest. “I saw him walk in. He’s wearing heavy correctional shoes, but there’s nothing wrong with his feet. Trust me, I’d know by the walk. He’s probably been wearing them since childhood. There’s a whiff of smothering mother in that detail. He lives with her—that’s why he still wears those shoes. And no barber cuts his hair that way. His mother does it, and she’s always picked out his clothes. That’s why he never fit in with the other kids at grammar school. All his life, she’s destroyed any possibility of a friend his own age coming between them. He wishes he’d killed her while he was still in his formative years—maybe nine or ten. That’s when the matricide fantasy started. When he finally gets around to murdering Mommy, you’ll find him at the crime scene, probably the kitchen, knife in hand. He’ll be very cooperative with the police—and very proud.”

  Riker was not impressed with what the FBI agent had taught her. It was only a parlor game compared to the real carnage, bloody and insane, that was the daily work of Special Crimes Unit. The profiler tricks had never solved a single case, never replaced solid police work. And, as Jo had pointed out, this was not her style either. He picked his next words carefully. “I have to wonder why you’re doing Kidd’s old act. Good job, though. I bet you’ve been practicing since he died.”

  She met his eyes, then looked down at her drink. “It’s only a game.”

  “Yeah, and that’s why your friend never would’ve made the cut for Special Crimes. I was a better detective.”

  Jo’s head lifted slightly, and he could read her thoughts. Though she would never voice this aloud, she clearly had a higher opinion of the murdered agent’s brains and talent.

  “I didn’t say I was smarter, Jo. But I was better. No tricks, no flimflam. I was the genuine article—a cop. I don’t need to look at your hair and your clothes to tell where you’ve been and where you’re going. I only had to read your notes on Agent Kidd and the liquor store.”

  And now those notes were ashes in his fireplace, along with the paper trail for her wine.

  She started to rise. He put one hand on her arm to keep her with him. “You think you were close enough to that poor dead bastard to crawl inside his skin. You collect the Reaper’s favorite wine because that’s what crazy Timothy Kidd would’ve done. And that’s why you only cleaned homicide crime scenes. It made you feel closer to his job, his life. You’re actually hunting the freak who killed him. You’re not a woman in hiding. That hotel is a damn goldfish bowl. It must drive the feds crazy trying to protect you, covering foot traffic and all the exits. And now you’re really good at ditching those bodyguards whenever you like. You’ve been practicing that, too. Think you can actually finish Kidd’s job for him? Am I close, Jo? I think I am—because you won’t even look at me.”

  And here the conversation ended. Jo was done with him. She slid off the bar stool and moved toward the door, donning her jacket on the fly, long legs carrying her out to the street and away.

  His gut was tied in knots. Prior to meeting Jo, he had no idea that it could physically hurt him to lose a woman’s company. This was not the way he had wanted the evening to end. If he could have been any crazier about Jo, he would have shot her in the leg to prevent her from leaving him tonight.

  And me without my gun.

  Once the door had closed on Johanna Apollo, the bar became a desolate place. And then he remembered that she had worn lipstick—perfume, too. That fed him awhile as he followed her away from the bar. And down the deserted street they went, twenty yards between them, heading toward the glowing green balls that lighted the way down to the underground station. During the subway ride, he kept her in sight through the window of a trailing train car. And though he was right behind her as she made her way up the stairs to the Chelsea sidewalk, she had no clue that he was there and watching over her. He stayed with her as far as the hotel, where a nervous FBI agent was pacing before the front door. And then, sadly, Riker turned around and left, for his job was done; he had seen the lady home.

  10

  IAN ZACHARY WAS THOROUGHLY PLEASED WITH the young investigator from Highland Security. The tall blonde was beyond cool—sunglasses at night. Ah, but were those Armani shades a disguise or an affectation? His lawyers had warned him that he trod a fine line between freedom of speech and felony entertainment. The authorities would always be close by, waiting for him to trip over FCC regulations and federal laws.

  However, this woman was not from any tribe of bureaucrats and hardly the type for undercover police work. Days ago, her bad attitude had made an excellent first impression. The expression of ennui, her tone of voice and stance, all said to him at their first encounter, You’re a cockroach. You know it, and I know it. Now, that had attracted him to her, but it was the fabulous black leather coat that had actually sold him. On this criterion alone, he placed her at the top of her profession. The other investigators, hired and fired in quick succession, had been discount shoppers, every one. He also admired the more mundane aspects of his lovely private cop. By the dangerous bulge in the tailored line of her cashmere blazer, he knew that she carried a very large weapon. And he had sexual fantasies about this woman in handcuffs, but in all the most realistic scenarios, he was the one who wore them.

  The investigator entered his studio while he was racking up a pretaped interview for his audience, not trusting his insane engineer to do this right. He leaned into a stationary microphone, saying, “Crazy Bitch, take a break.” And now that they were guaranteed some privacy, he turned to the blonde from Highland Securit
y. Wasting no time on civility, she handed him a fat manila envelope that bore the name of Johanna Apollo’s employer, an ex-detective from Special Crimes Unit.

  Over the past few months, her predecessors had failed to turn up anything in Riker’s habits or his history that was even mildly dishonest. As Zachary perused her paperwork, he smiled, liking what he saw, the evidence of a man living beyond his means. And that would explain why NYPD had gotten rid of Detective Sergeant Riker.

  “I’ve got another job for you. Can you stick around a few minutes?”

  Just the barest inclination of her head passed for a nod.

  He turned another page of the dossier. “My God, this is what he pays for rent? His apartment must be a palace. And what’s the deal with Riker’s first name?”

  “He doesn’t have one,” she said. “I checked his birth certificate. Just the initial P. And it cost you five hundred dollars to have me wait in line for his records. You want to waste more money on that?”

  “No, this is fine.” There was contempt in everything she said to him, and he loved it.

  She stared at the lighted screen of his laptop computer. “So this is your database?” Even that sounded like an insult.

  “Yes, that’s it,” he said. “Couldn’t play the game without it. Are you any good with computers?”

  Without bothering to answer him, she sat down at his console and tapped the laptop keyboard, creating split screens to view two files at once. He watched all these images quickly flicker and change as she scanned his entire repository of fan sightings and personal information on the twelve jurors, living and dead.

  “All the easy ones have been murdered,” he said. “Those were the idiots who gave television interviews. So my fans had their names and photographs.”