Lost in New York: A Lucy Ripken Mystery (The Lucy Ripken Mysteries Book 5)

by J. J. Henderson

  LOST IN NEW YORK

  ALSO BY J.J. HENDERSON

  The Lucy Ripken Series

  Murder on Naked Beach

  Mexican Booty

  The X-Dames

  Lucy’s Money

  Sex and Death: The Movie

  Utah

  LOST IN NEW YORK

  J.J. Henderson

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Text copyright © 2015 J.J. Henderson

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Sarah Caley LLC, Seattle

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER ONE

  MORNING ROUNDS

  Alone too much of the time, Lucy Ripken recently had taken to discussing matters with Claud the poodle. Soon, she feared, she would abandon the pretense of talking to the dog and simply argue with herself, not only at home but also down in the street, thereby claiming her place in the diminishing ranks of crazy New Yorkers. There had been a time when the city teemed with amusing lunatics and nobody thought twice about it but now most of those deranged characters had gone away, over the bridges and through the tunnels and across the waters to other lands. Lucy missed them, and she did not want to move to Brooklyn.

  And yet at the moment she didn’t much care about madness or Manhattan. She cared about time. Hers, passing ever faster. Looking into the mirror as she edged her blue eyes with black, she briefly contemplated the possibility of erasing the crow's feet. Fear, real estate, money, and cosmetic surgery occupied far too much conversation time, and brain time, in the first decades of the haunted new millennium.

  No crazy person but rather a practical, hardworking woman who could not afford that sort of work, not this year anyways, Lucy was alone again, for the moment—the day, the week, the month?—in her noisy loft on the corner of Broome Street and Broadway, where she'd been proofing galleys on her book, a perhaps-too-massive expansion of a magazine piece she’d done on an assortment of nefarious characters and their evil activities in Costa Rica. She hadn't talked in person to a human soul for three days except Ignacio the Cuban at the coffee shop across the street and the regulars on the Crosby Street dog-walk. The phone had rung just four times in those three days. The first three calls came from her editor, Peter Schallert, checking her progress on the galleys. Strange thing about book-writing. Out there, somewhere, you hope several hundred thousand people, or several thousand anyway, await your words. Meanwhile, there’s one myopic editor hunkered down in a cubicle in midtown who calls you occasionally to see how it’s going. And seems not particularly interested in your response.

  The fourth call came from Patricia Moody, and Lucy had leaped at the chance for some contact. Now, readying herself to meet Patricia for coffee at Bean & Beluga, Lucy babbled at Claud, who lay on his couch looking worried. The worry came from not knowing, just yet, whether or not he was invited on this outing. "Yo pup, don't be concerned," Lucy said, applying lipstick. "We are soon to hit the streets. Hear me, poodleman?" His head lifted, brown eyes brightening. "We're bound for Crosby to see our pal the fabulous Patty Moody."

  Face fixed, over her black jeans and t-shirt Lucy threw on a quilted deep purple jacket she'd found at Pearl River in its earlier, low rent incarnation, grabbed leash and purse, and opened the door. Sixty pounds of white curls and long, rabbit-springy legs, Claud flung himself into the stairwell and charged down. Lucy locked up and followed.

  In the mailbox at ground level, she found nothing but junk and a postcard that read, “Hola Lucita. I love you. An Admirer.” That would be Harold Ipswich, her sometime lover. Lucy flipped the card. The skyline of Lima, Peru. This was a problem: Harold spent too much time elsewhere, and these days Lucy did not really like living with a rambling man. And so in spite of his hot hands and his easy laugh, after a short-lived effort at co-habitation Lucy had thrown him out—well, sent him back to his East Village walk-up, one-third the size of her fifth floor SoHo loft, and just as noisy, although Puerto Rican radio rather than truck engines provided the soundtrack in his neighborhood.

  And so she lived alone still. In her neighborhood the trucks made the music, rumbling and roaring, backed up from the Holland Tunnel in the daily gridlock, as she and Claud stepped out this fine October morning. Nodding coolly at the silver-haired weasel landlord glowering in his doorway, she swept around the corner off Broadway onto Broome. The last time she’d left town for more than a few days Lascovich the landlord had almost managed to steal her loft. Ever since, the schemer had liked Lucy even less than before, if such a thing was possible.

  Lucy let the short-leashed poodle lead the way, dodging between a pair of eighteen wheelers and heading north on Crosby, clogged with its own horde of loading and off-loading behemoths. En route, Claud met three dog friends, and did his business before they reached Prince Street. They cut back over to Broadway, where Lucy tied the dog to a lamp post outside Bean & Beluga, in plain sight of the front window—dog thieves abounded still in Manhattan, and Claud was a pedigreed poodle—and went in. She scanned the front half of the store, with its heaps of exotic fruits and vegetables displayed and priced like precious stones, and spotted Patricia, draped in red DKNY "work" clothes from head to toe, at the front of the cappuccino line.

  Such a New York case! The girl had it all. At 28, five years younger than Lucy, Patricia was a green-eyed beauty with sculpted Slavic cheekbones and a lush mouth; she was red hot, way cool, effortlessly chic, and equipped with a perfect natural chest and legs so long they stopped traffic—no small feat in a town full of gorgeous women who knew how to dress. Plus she spoke three or four romance languages fluently, and played Mozart on the piano like a pro.

  So why was she so miserable?

  "Hello, darling," Lucy said, putting on a bit of the ritz. "Dressing down today, are we?" No matter what she wore, Lucy always felt ragged next to Patricia.

  "Hey, Luce," said Patricia. "Great jacket! Is it—"

  "Chinatown cheap, Hon. Hey, so what's new, Patty M? I'll take one of those." Lucy addressed the counterman, pointing at a bran muffin. "And a triple tall latte."

  "Just black coffee, please," Patricia said, making a face. "I don't know how you can eat before noon, Lucy."

  "Anyone who knows will tell you breakfast is the most important meal of the day, healthwise, you dummy," Lucy said. "But I tell you that every time we meet, don't I? Let's go over here, I gotta watch the dog." She led the way to a marble-topped counter close to the front door. From there she had a clear view of the street, the sidewalk, and Claud, at the moment suffering the caresses of a tall girl in a green leather jumpsuit and spiky purple hair. Patricia put her coffee on the counter and stood at Lucy's side.

  "Dog looks good," she said. “But that girl is so pathetically dated.”

  "Yes, his wounds have healed," Lucy said, watching the leather-clad punk Valkyrie stroke him. “But he’ll always have that ragged ear.”

  "Too bad," Patricia said
. “But it kind of lends him character, you know?”

  "Hey, I’m just glad that crazy dame didn’t stab him—or me—in the heart."

  "I wish I could have a dog," Patricia sighed, moving things back to her favorite topic, "but my therapist thinks I need to concentrate on relationships with people right now." Lucy glanced at Patricia, seeking irony. There was none. "How's the new book?" Patricia asked.

  "I'm doing galleys this week. Aside from some major editing which changed it into someone else's manuscript, it's fine."

  "When'll it be out? When can I read all about it?"

  "Spring, I guess, unless they...hey, forget the book, Patty. I've been living and breathing the sucker for too damn long. What's new with you?"

  She smiled, a little embarrassed. "Now, I know you're not going to believe me, and I know you're going to think I'm being duped once again, but—I met this wonderful man, and..."

  "He's really different."

  She laughed. "Exactly. Yes, yes, I know, you've heard it before, I've said it a million times, my therapist tells me she's heard it before, and my astrologer tells me he's heard it before, of course he just wants to get into my pants anyways, but Zane is—"

  "Zane?"

  "His name's Zane Smithson. He's like—so real, Lucy, not at all like the people I'm used to socializing with."

  "You don't have to live, work, and play up there, honey."

  "Yes, but I like it, Lucy. You should know that about me by now. I enjoy visiting down here, it's funky, but what's so great about this?" She waved at the traffic and racket of the treeless streetscape of Lower Broadway.

  "Nothing," Lucy said. She sipped her latte. "So what's the drill on Zane?"

  "First and best of all, you'll be happy to hear he's not married," said Patricia.

  "Bravo, Patty," Lucy said. "That's a big step."

  "He's a Gulf War vet—the first Gulf War—a self-made millionaire, in great shape, apartment on Fifth, house in Southhampton, flat in Paris, travels, speaks French, Spanish, and Russian, and plays excellent tennis."

  "Russian! I studied Russian for a year in high school. Once upon a time I thought I needed to read Dostoevsky in the original. Mi patchefone esporchen."

  "What does that mean?"

  "My record player is broken. So why aren't you married yet?"

  "Hey, it's only been a month—but he may be asking soon," Patricia said. "We get along so well, it's like—oh, and one other thing." She grinned slyly. "He is the most inventive lover."

  "Damn," Lucy said. "Inventive, you say? Sounds—"

  "Too good to be true," said Patricia. "I know. You'll have to meet him."

  "So let's do a double date next time Harold's in town."

  "Great. Hey, how are you and Harold, anyways?" Patricia asked.

  "I don't know, same old shit, he's in and out of town, I'm in and out of love, he's out of my house." It sounded so clean and simple, Lucy thought, tossed out like that in a couple of phrases. But it wasn't.

  Patricia glanced at her watch. "Well, listen, cutie, I have some errands to run. Acupuncturist, astrologer, manicurist, masseuse, the usual. Call me when Harry's back—or forget Harry. Just come out with me and Zane."

  "Whatever," Lucy said. "We'll do something. I'll see you." They embraced, and Lucy watched Patricia, patron of the personal service industries, walk out the door. Patricia paused to scratch Claud's head for a moment, then flagged a cab, headed back uptown. The R line stopped right below them, but Patricia didn't ride the train.

  Lucy lingered over her coffee. She figured this guy Zane to be a liar and a thief, but maybe not. Maybe Patricia had got it right this time. Anything was possible.

  For all her style, Patricia Moody was a troubled woman, a New York beauty in a New York quagmire. Somewhere along the timeline of life in Manhattan she had been infected with a serious case of Park Avenue values; if you're not born to that life, such as it may be, pursuing it can use you up. Patty had been chasing it for four or five years now, to no avail. During this time she had been fucked, and fucked over, by several dozen well-bankrolled bastards. She had been manhandled and brutalized, emotionally if not physically; she had reduced herself, in her own eyes, into a bauble, a chic, multi-lingual, piano-playing piece of glittery, sexy ass all set to decorate a well-decorated apartment on the right side of Central Park.

  What drove Lucy crazy was Patricia's self-awareness: she knew exactly what she was doing, every time she chased another bi-coastal or bi-continental monied chump, yet still she did it again and again. This in spite of the Chinese Brazilian.

  The Chinese Brazilian was now 83 years old. Patricia had met him just once, five years back, when her friend Clarice had passed him on to her upon getting married. The Chinese Brazilian had flown into town to sleep with Patricia—a trial run—in a nineteen hundred dollar a day red velvet suite at the Plaza Athenee Hotel. He had spent their one night together sucking her breasts until he fell asleep, and then snoring quietly, fetally curled, with one cool old hand on her perfectly shaped rear end. For this and a mildly pornographic phone call once a month from Brazil, Patricia had been given title to a spacious one-bedroom apartment on Lexington Avenue with twenty years worth of taxes and maintenance paid in advance, and a checking account in which ten thousand dollars magically appeared on the first of each month. Lately the phone calls had tapered off to once every six or seven weeks, but the money kept coming. Not bad, as far as such deals go, though a whore by any other name is still a whore, even when she's a friend.

  And still she chased the millionaires. Patricia's problem, for all her suspect values and the misery they bought her, was the same as Lucy's: she was lonely. They had met waiting tables at a bar in Chelsea, both new in the city. Lucy lasted a couple weeks then bailed out, unable to cope with the service mentality. She had gone on to make a career of sorts for herself, taking pictures and writing for magazines, even doing a couple of books. Patricia had risen from Chelsea waitress to hostess at a French place on East 63rd Street, where she had her first dalliance with a man with serious money. She'd been after it ever since. Lucy had hoped the Chinese Brazilian would give Patricia enough security to let her be herself. Apparently he had. She would never be able to define herself except in the eyes of wealthy men. Self-awareness did not necessarily create self-esteem.

  Like the possibility of an ultimately lonely life, this was the sort of sad truth that becomes evident when you get into your thirties. Lucy had come to understand this, and she had learned not to judge too harshly. She continued to love Patricia as she had ever since those nights at the Blue Guitar Bar on East 23rd Street, back in the under-thirty days when the future lay wide open, and people's habits of self-destruction and self-delusion still had a glamorous edge.

  Lucy shook off her worries and headed out. Patty would be all right. She would disappear into this guy's life, he would seriously mess her up, and then she would reappear, wounded but intact. She always came out all right. Lucy and Claud meandered west on Prince, cut south on West Broadway, then west again on Spring for a stop at the bookstore. With her new book coming out next year, the anxiety she once felt when scanning the magazine racks (there were so many, and she wasn't in any of them any more) had diminished, to be replaced by anxiety at scanning the book racks, filled with these endless rows of brilliant volumes. How, or why, would anybody notice her measly little Costa Rican semi-thriller in the midst of all this literature? She’d already been through it once, and understood now that you could spend a year or more on a book, love it and lavish everything you had on it, only to see it arrive in the bookstores without a sound, ghostlike—and then simply disappear.

  She moved back to the magazine racks. After all, if this book died like the first—and beneath her secret best seller fantasy she knew it probably would—she'd be right back here with the old familiar anxiety. What to write about and where to sell it.

  A look through a few magazines brought home what she'd been feeling for a few months: the Pacific Northwest, h
er old home turf, was moving into center stage of her fantasy life. Both Seattle and her hometown of Portland, O, were big enough now to loom, at least in her dreams, as cities that had her attention. After all, the argument went these days, Manhattan had gotten too rich, had lost its Bohemian edge, had become little more than a vast shopping mall, a retail playground with a few amusingly tattered edges.

  Lucy went out and untangled the romantic Claud and his leash, for he had become amorously entangled with a svelte, moronic female collie and her leash tied to the same lamp post outside the bookstore. She headed home. The noon sun had taken the cool edge off the fall air. Eurotrash Eurobabbled, gallery-hopping and thread-shopping, and Claud the ragged-eared pedigree, a perfect pet in the land of the stylishly unshaven, drew the usual admiring glances. Lucy, waiting to cross Broadway, saw the landlord lurking, thick brows knit under his swept back helmet of white hair, in front of the entrance to her building across the street. At her he glowered. There was no escape. The light changed and Claud led her over. "We haf problem," the landlord said, by way of getting the conversation started.

  "What's that?" Lucy responded amiably. Over the years she had learned that he loved nothing better than a fight, so it was best to be cool.

  "This," he said, waving a handful of letters, the junk mail she had recently tossed. "You haf put personal trash in the can here. Public can. City gifs me ticket." He shook ticket. "You want to pay ticket? No. So why do you put this here?"

  She took one of the letters, looked at her name on it, handed it back. "It's junk mail, Mr. Lascovich. What can I say? I took it out of the box and threw it in the trash where it belongs."

  "Please take up to personal trash receptacle." He handed her the wad of letters. "Cost of ticket I will add to rent next time."

  "Are you serious?" Lucy laughed. "I'm not going to pay extra rent, Landlordovich. You paint the stairwell, and fix the elevator so it runs, say, three whole days in a row without a breakdown, and get the damned door repaired so we have a little security, and make sure the heat comes on every day, and get rid of the rats and roaches in the building, and replace my cracked window, and then we'll talk about extra rent."