by Walter Marks
Mr. Bambang said he could give out no information to American law enforcement without a specific written request from the US State Department.
The only federal government person Jericho knew was Perry Dixon, a former NYPD cop who now worked for the FBI. He called the FBI, got a recorded menu, then got Dixon’s voicemail and left a message. There wasn’t much else he could do at the moment.
At seven PM Maria walked into Jericho’s office and struck a pose in the doorway. She was dressed in black-studded jeggings, Doc Martens combat boots, miniskirt, and T-shirt under an unzipped hoodie. Her eyes were heavily made up, and her lipstick was glossy purple. There was an Iron Cross drawn on her forehead and her hair was down and had a bright red tint to it. She had a long black coat over her arm.
“Jesus,” Jericho exclaimed.
“Jesus was a Goth too,” Maria said playfully. “He was a social outcast because of his beliefs.”
“Your hair…it doesn’t exactly fit departmental regulations.”
“It’s spray-on color,” she said, tossing her locks. “Rinses right out.”
“You look…hot.”
“Well, thanks, Detective.” She entered and sat down in a chair.
“I’ve gotta tell you one thing, Jericho,” she said, smiling. “You’re too old and too straight-looking to get into a teenage Goth club. And if you flash your badge you’ll create a panic with those pot-smoking kids. I, on the other hand, will have no problem.”
“You’re figuring on busting Aaron by yourself?”
“Hey, I brought him in once before with no help from you, remember?”
Jericho nodded.
“I’ve got my cuffs right here,” Maria said, patting her sweatshirt pocket.
“Okay,” Jericho said. “Let’s get going.”
They arrived at the club a little before nine, driving EHTPD’s only PTV (Prisoner Transport Vehicle), a van with steel mesh separating the driver from the prisoner, so Aaron could be safely brought back to East Hampton.
The three-story building was lit up with multicolored floods. The parking lot was crowded but they found a spot close to the entrance. On the building’s brick wall they could make out a faded sign: Jacob Ruppert Brewery. Above it, in vivid pink flashing neon, they read: PHANTASMAGORIA.
Jericho had gotten the plate number of Edna Platt’s BMW. “Let’s search the lot for the Bimmer,” Jericho said. “If we find it, we can just wait near it and bust him when he comes out.”
They searched the parking lot but failed to find the car. “Maybe he’s living in it,” Maria said. “In that case he may have parked it somewhere else and walked here.”
“Or else he’s not here at all.”
“I’ll check out the club,” Maria said.
“Tell you what,” Jericho said. “If you do find him, come back down and we’ll wait till he comes out. That’ll be easier than you trying to arrest him inside a crowded dance club.”
“Jericho,” she said, “if he comes out when it closes, he’ll be with a mob of kids — a bunch of Gothed-out teenagers who all look alike. What if we can’t spot him? What if we lose him? If I see him in the club, that’s a sure thing. I know how to handle him — I’ve done it before. Jericho, let me do this.”
He saw the determination in her face. Her Goth makeup made her more appealing than ever. He was torn between his feelings for her and his judgment as a seasoned detective. Finally, he gave in.
“All right,” Jericho said. “Just make sure you spot Aaron before he spots you. If he’s on the dance floor, don’t confront him. It’s a crowded environment and it’ll be too easy for him to give you the slip. Wait till he’s alone.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll figure it out.”
“Call me on your cell if there’s the slightest problem and I’ll be up there in a shot. This is no traffic bust, it’s a homicide arrest — we cannot lose him.”
“I got this,” Maria said. She exited the car, used the dangling handcuffs to wave goodbye to Jericho, and walked quickly to the club entrance.
CHAPTER 34
Maria entered the building and climbed the stairway to the second floor. The thumping of a drum machine and heavily reverbed bass echoed louder and louder as she ascended the stairs. The second floor entrance was manned by a burly bouncer in a cheap business suit. He gave her a welcoming “Hey, babe” but she pointed to the third floor and continued up the stairs.
At the third floor entrance, a doorman channeling Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange grinned at Maria. He wore a black fedora and one eye had a freakishly long fake lower lash made up with heavy mascara. “That’ll be twenty quid, luv,” he said in a fake Cockney accent. “And no weed, drugs, or alcohol allowed.”
Maria handed him the money and entered the club through a narrow corridor. She felt a hand on her shoulder and turned. The doorman was grinning at her.
“Gotta check you for drugs, luv.”
“I don’t have any…”
“Just a little pat-down. We’ve been having trouble with people smuggling in weed and even harder stuff.”
“Don’t touch me.”
“Relax,” the doorman said. “It’s my job to make sure you don’t have a stash hidden somewhere, like between those big fun-bags you have under your blouse.”
He reached out toward her breasts. Maria slapped his hands away. “Quit it, asshole.”
“I can’t let you in till I check you out,” he said as he slid his hands up her torso. Maria wrenched away from him.
“You don’t know who you’re messin’ with,” she said. She bent her two middle fingers down and stuck her pinky, index finger, and thumb up. Then she turned her hand down. “You know what this is?”
“Is that how you play with yourself?”
“This stands for Eme, ‘M’ to you, Gringo! That means Mexican Mafia. My father’s an underboss. They call him MD. You know what MD stands for?”
“Uh…uh…uh…”
“Muerte dolorosa — ‘painful death.’ You sure you want to pat me down?”
“You…you have an honest face, luv. If you assure me you’ve no drugs in your possession, I’m inclined to trust you.”
“Gracias, amigo,” Maria said as she pushed past him and walked into the club.
With her first breath the ubiquitous pot smoke almost gave her a contact high. The dance floor was packed with mindlessly gyrating, Goth-attired teenagers, moving to the relentless beat of Industrial/Techno/DarkWave/Deathrock music.
The décor of the club was strangely eclectic. The copper pipes of the erstwhile brewery crisscrossed the ceiling, with plastic spiders and bats dangling down on wires. Plywood panels had transformed the five rectangular windows into gothic arches. Each window featured a plastic stained-glass image of a Goth symbol — pentacle, 666, ankh, inverted cross, the Grim Reaper. Projected against the walls were endless loops of scenes from ’20s German Expressionist films, with their oblique camera angles and harshly contrasted darks and lights — Nosferatu, M, The Golem, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, and, anachronistically, Edward Scissorhands.
Maria went to the bar and ordered a ginger ale. While she waited, a young man sidled up to her. He was too fat to look like Alice Cooper but he was trying. “I got blow,” he whispered. “Chalk, Green Dragons, Cherry Meth. Whatchu want, sweetmeats?”
Maria waved him away. Glass in hand, she began to walk slowly around the periphery of the dance floor, looking for Aaron. After a couple of futile passes she realized she’d have to join the dancers or she’d never find him.
Putting down her glass, she began to move her body to the music. Gradually she insinuated herself into the crowd of bopping, rocking, writhing teenagers.
Nobody paid attention to Maria. Everyone seemed isolated from everyone else — each dancer lost in a private world of sensory stimulation. Maria’s eyes scanned the crowd, but Aaron was nowhere to be found. She began to worry if he were in full Goth mode she might not recognize him.
Then, in a corner across the
floor, she noticed a red neon sign — GAME ROOM.
Maria worked her way out of the dance crowd and crossed to the game room. Inside were six players seated in front of gaming consoles and video displays, furiously manipulating controllers. There was a cacophony of sounds — synthesizer game music, explosions, gunfire, and battle cries, combined with the dance music from the club itself. In their Goth get-ups, it was hard to tell males from females. Maria walked behind each gamer and tried to see if one was Aaron.
Finally she found him. What gave him away were the deep scratch marks on the backs of his hands — made by the death struggles of his mother.
Aaron was playing Kataclysmic Kombat, hunched over his controller, using both hands simultaneously with blinding speed. His coat was draped over the back of his chair. He paused as a voice rang out from his speakers — “You have four hundred million six thousand Kill Points. The maximum is one billion Kill Points.”
Maria placed both hands on his shoulders and spoke in a firm voice: “Aaron, don’t turn around. It’s your old friend Officer Salazar — remember me? Nod if you do.…Good. Now turn off your game and listen to me. I said turn it off.…Okay, now understand this. I’m here to arrest you for homicide. Don’t say anything. There’s no way you can get out of this. I have a gun but I don’t want to use it. Do you understand?”
He nodded.
“All right, Aaron,” Maria said. “Let’s make this as easy as possible. Put your hands behind the chair. Link your thumbs…that’s it.” She took out her handcuffs and locked Aaron’s hands together behind him. Then she took his coat and put it over his shoulders like a cape.
“Now get up slowly.”
Aaron complied. Maria noticed his drooping eyelids, a sign of probable meth use.
“I’ll Mirandize you when we get downstairs,” she said. “Now, I want you to walk casually, eyes straight ahead. I’m gonna walk beside you with my arm around your waist, like we’re a couple. Understand? Just be calm. Don’t make any sudden movements. All right. Go.”
They left the game room and walked slowly toward the exit door. As they did, “Body of Light” by Merciful Nuns was playing. Unwittingly, they walked in time to the heavy backbeat.
As they approached the exit door, Aaron suddenly drove his shoulder into Maria. He wrenched free, shrugged off his coat, and bolted across the room. With his arms pinned behind him, he ran crouched low, like a football running back trying to plunge across a goal line. Maria dashed after him. As he reached the Grim Reaper window, she threw herself at him and grabbed at his waist. He slipped out of her grasp and hurled himself at the window, crashing through the fake plastic stained glass and the traditional window behind it. There was a sound of shattering glass. Aaron hurtled out into the cold night air and plummeted to the parking lot below.
Jericho heard the crash, looked over, and saw the body falling to the pavement. There was a sickening thud. He jumped out of his car and ran to where it had fallen.
He saw it was Aaron — he’d landed on his side, one leg broken and sticking out at a grotesque angle. Jericho could see Aaron’s handcuffed hands pinned behind him. A crowd of Goths — black-garbed witnesses of death — began to gather around him. Jericho knelt down and gently maneuvered Aaron over on his back, cradling his head. As he did, Maria pushed her way through the crowd. She stood staring down at Aaron in shock. She tried to speak but couldn’t.
Jericho could see Aaron was still alive, but just barely. His mouth moved, but Jericho recognized the presence of anisocoria — dilation of one pupil while the other is contracted. He saw the watery cerebrospinal fluid draining out of Aaron’s nose and ears. From his NYPD homicide experience he knew death was imminent.
“Aaron,” he said. “Can you hear me?”
Aaron gave a slight nod, then whispered, “She didn’t…get my Kill Points.”
“What?”
“In KK, when someone captures you…they get your Kill Points. I couldn’t let her get ’em.”
“Stay with me, Aaron,” Jericho said. He bent down and whispered in Aaron’s ear. “Listen, please…tell me the truth. Did you kill those two women?”
Aaron’s voice croaked — “Game over!”
He was gone.
Jericho stood up and Maria grabbed him and clung to him in anguish. “Jericho,” she said, “I messed up. I’m so sorry. I messed up, I messed up…”
They could hear the sirens of the Amityville police cars approaching.
“Listen,” Jericho said. “This wasn’t your fault. It couldn’t be helped.”
“I messed up, Jericho. I’m so sorry. God, I should’ve listened to you. Please forgive me…”
Jericho held her close as the cops arrived.
CHAPTER 35
“That’s it!” Krauss shouted at Jericho. “She’s out! Salazar is no detective, and she proved it last night.”
“C’mon, Chief.”
Krauss pounded on his desk. “Jericho, she fucked up. You’ve had your fun, having a hot babe play detective with you — hanging on your every word, idolizing your New York street cop macho.”
“That’s bullshit, she’s a good cop,” Jericho said.
“Jericho — the girl let a suspect escape and kill himself.”
“Maria did nothing wrong,” Jericho said. “Look, when someone is determined to commit suicide, it’s very hard to stop them, especially if you don’t know their intent. Maria followed all the protocols.”
“You don’t send a woman to do a man’s job. You shoulda been the one to make the collar.”
“Shoulda, woulda, coulda,” Jericho said. “In my judgment this was the best way to go. If you want to blame somebody blame me.”
“I’m putting Salazar back on patrol duty and assigning Fred McCoy to work with you.”
“I won’t work with McCoy. You know that.”
“Last time I looked I was Chief of Police. You stay on the case, Salazar goes.”
“Sid,” Jericho said patiently. “You’ve got unsolved murders in your town. It’s only a matter of time before the newspapers start calling for your head. You’re gonna have reporters and TV cameras in your face. And saying ‘it’s an ongoing investigation’ ain’t gonna cut it.”
Krauss said nothing. Jericho went on. “Maria Salazar is doing a fine job, and I need her. It’s not only her language skills but she’s also very smart. In fact, she got a forensic sample that may identify the body connected to foot number one. Salazar did that on her own. Someday she could make detective. You could use another good detective.”
“It’s very simple,” the Chief said. “Rookie POs, especially females, don’t work with detectives, She’s off the case.”
“It’s very simple, Sid,” Jericho responded. “If she’s off the case, then so am I. You can have Fred McCoy take over and prepare yourself to be pilloried in the press and shit-canned by the town board for ineptitude and dereliction of duty.”
Krauss was silent for a long while, then sighed loudly. “All right,” he said. “But if she fucks up one more time she’s history. She’s not only off the case, but I’ll kick her off the force. Understood?”
“Understood.”
Jericho went to his office and called Maria in.
“The Chief was kinda snarky,” Jericho told her. “But I talked him down, and he’s okay with you now.”
“Jericho, I’ve thought a lot about last night…”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Maybe I should’ve cuffed Aaron to myself.”
“You know that’s not the way we do it. With one hand free, a prisoner can really hurt an officer.”
“Anyway, I should’ve listened to you. We should’ve waited till he came out.”
“As you said, we might’ve lost him. It was a judgment call.”
“But it was my responsibility,” she said. “I’m afraid…I’m just not cut out for this job.”
“Maria,” Jericho said. “I messed up plenty when I worked in the city. I put my personal gratificat
ion ahead of my job. I partied and drank my way into being a lousy cop. Don’t blame yourself. You were doing your duty. There were times I didn’t do mine.”
“My duty was to bring the suspect in.”
Jericho paused and took her hand. “Maria,” he said. “I need your help on this case. You’ve helped a lot already. I think we make a good team.”
She looked at him for a long moment. “You sure know how to make a girl feel better.”
“I’ve gotta update my notes,” Jericho said, booting up his computer. “Pull up a chair — maybe you’ll see something I’ve missed.”
Maria nodded and crossed to him. “It’s hard for me to think of you as a lousy cop.”
“I can’t think of you that way either.”
CHAPTER 36
It was late afternoon when the commercial fishing vessel Wet Willie plowed through the choppy waters of Block Island Sound. Captain Willie Vegessi hated working Sundays and preferred to get home before dark, but fishing had been lousy and he needed a decent catch before returning to Montauk. Although fishing was better in the Atlantic Ocean, his wife, harping on his lower back problems, said Willie was getting too old for those monster winter waves. He had to admit she was right.
Large floodlights lit the white-capped water in front of the boat. Trailing behind, a large funnel-shaped net dragged along the seafloor.
Trawling is the most common fishing method of the East End commercial fleet. The weighted net scoops up cod, pollock, sea bass, fluke, and shrimp — but it’s environmentally destructive, damaging the bottom and decimating marine habitat and non-targeted species. Captain Vegessi knew that but he had to make a living.
He put the engine in neutral and yelled out to his crew, “Pull up!”
The four men wore red slickers over bib pants, with rubber boots and neoprene gloves. It took all of them to haul in the net, even with the aid of a hydraulic crank. The net was loaded with a meager catch of food fish, along with green, red, and brown marine algae, coral, and unrecognizable junk and garbage. After the net was swung over by a crane, the men emptied it into the boat’s fish bay.