City of Fear

by Alafair Burke

  They started with the friends who, at least according to Nick, had not been partying with them the night before. To a person, they denied having been at the club. After getting their basic contact information and head shots for good measure, Ellie and Rogan had cut them loose. They had to. No choice.

  With one exception. The model. Her name turned out to be Ashlee Swain. Ellie had requested consent to search her purse, but she refused. Swain’s fortitude earned her a pair of handcuffs, her Miranda warnings, and a search incident to arrest.

  ‘Word to the wise,’ Ellie said, removing a small ziplock bag from Swain’s purse. ‘There’s always an easy way and a hard way.’

  ‘Whatever,’ Swain said. ‘I want a lawyer.’

  Ellie held the bag up toward the office’s overhead fluorescent lights. She recognized the crushed tan crystalline substance as a snortable form of crystal meth. Same euphoria, agitation, and sexually compulsive behavior. None of the mess and paraphernalia required for smoking. None of the hypodermics that came with slamming.

  ‘What’s the matter? Afraid of needles and fumes? You sure you don’t want to corroborate my testimony that the bouncer over there sold to you?’ Ellie took a look at Jaime Rodriguez, who was playing it cool. ‘Remember: easy way and hard way.’

  ‘Are you sure you’re supposed to be talking to me? Because what I remember is that I’m a two-L at Cardozo Law School who has read the Supreme Court’s opinion in Edwards v. Arizona, and I know I just asked for a lawyer. And for a first-time buy, the hard way, as you call it, is a heartfelt apology, a stop at drug court, and a clean record once I’m done.’

  The woman was six feet tall, drop-dead gorgeous, and knew her legal rights. At that moment, Ellie really hated her. But Ashlee Swain’s recreational drug use was not her current priority. She turned the woman over to one of the uniformed officers to process the drug case.

  ‘Two VIPs to go,’ she said, looking at Tony Russo and Jake Myers. ‘You want the financial analyst or the hedge fund dude?’

  ‘I’ll take the hedge fund prick,’ Rogan said.

  Tony Russo had a thick body and a square head that was losing its black hair. Combined with his large facial features, he might have been typecast as a Brooklyn butcher were it not for the wardrobe, a black sports coat over a sky blue dress shirt and dark gray pants. Ellie began by asking him when he was last at Pulse.

  ‘What do you mean? I’m here right now.’

  ‘Before now,’ Ellie clarified. ‘When was the last time you were here before tonight?’

  ‘I don’t know. I come here all the time. Wait. Last night. That’s how much I’m here. I was here last night.’

  ‘Who was with you?’

  ‘A bunch of people. What is this about? What do you mean, who was with me?’

  ‘I’m just asking you who generally you were with.’

  ‘Well, the same people who were with me are the same people I was with. How’s that for esoteric?’

  ‘You’re making my head hurt, Tony. Who was in your company last night?’

  ‘It’s always Nick’s friends. Nick was here. Jake – that dude over there, Nick’s partner – he was here.’ Russo looked around and saw that the others were all gone from the office or leaving. ‘That was it, I guess. Most of those other people, they were just girls Nick waved in from the dance floor, you know? Or maybe he knew a few of ’em, I don’t know. You gotta ask him. He’s always the ringleader, you know?’

  ‘But you didn’t just get waved in. You and Nick are friends?’

  ‘Yeah, tight. Him and Jake, too. Are you gonna cut me loose here pretty soon, babe?’

  ‘Hey, J. J., Tony here thinks I’m a babe.’

  ‘Man’s got good taste,’ Rogan said, keeping his attention fixed on Jake Myers.

  ‘Yeah, we’re about done. I just need to know whether you remember seeing this girl last night.’ Ellie showed him the photograph of Chelsea, monitoring him closely for his reaction.

  Despite his seeming indifference, Russo took a good look at the picture. No nervousness. No evasiveness. Same breezy, cocky demeanor.

  He tapped the photograph a few times with his index finger. ‘Yeah, yeah, I remember her. Go Hoosiers. She was a real babe. Not as good as you, of course.’

  ‘Did you talk to her at all?’

  ‘Nah. I got a girl. She’s out of town, but I’m not stupid, you know?’

  ‘Not even on a night out with Nick?’

  ‘Not even. Altar boy. Can’t you tell?’

  Actually, Ellie could.

  ‘So, who was she with?’

  Now, for the first time, she did sense a change in Russo’s easygoing manner. His smile fell as his brow furrowed.

  ‘Seriously, what’s going on? I just want to get out of here.’

  ‘This girl was murdered last night.’

  ‘Ah, Jesus. Nick, did you hear this, man? One of those Indiana chicks last night –’

  ‘Hey,’ Ellie said, ‘I can’t have you guys talking to each other right now. Talk to me,’ she said, pointing to herself. ‘No one’s accusing anyone. I just need to know who this girl was talking to last night.’

  ‘Everyone, man. I don’t know. She was toasted, you know? Partying. Getting her freak on.’

  ‘Did she talk to Nick?’

  ‘That’s bullshit. It wasn’t like that. She wasn’t talking to anyone. She was just dancing and hanging out – with anyone and everyone.’

  ‘So she was dancing and hanging out with Nick?’

  Russo shook his head in frustration, apparently finding Ellie considerably less babe-ish now. ‘Yeah, fine,’ he said, lowering his voice, ‘she was dancing with Nick. But she was also dancing with Jake. And our buddy Tom. And some other dude – um, Patrick, another friend of Nick’s.’

  ‘But she didn’t dance with you.’

  ‘No, but that’s only because I don’t dance. Seriously, it wasn’t what you’re thinking. She wasn’t with anyone. That’s how Nick nights are. Girls come in for the free booze and to be our eye candy for the night. No one’s looking for a girlfriend.’

  ‘Not even for one night?’

  Russo didn’t respond.

  ‘When you left, did you leave alone?’

  ‘I told you. Altar boy.’

  ‘I didn’t mean with another woman. I want to know if you saw your friends leave.’

  ‘I don’t like where this is going. My friends are decent guys.’

  ‘Then you shouldn’t mind telling me who left and when.’

  ‘You just don’t get it,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘Don’t take this the wrong way. I’m not trying to be a prick, but I don’t want to say anything that’s gonna bite one of my boys in the ass. I want a lawyer, like that Cardozo chick said.’

  Great. The model had not only invoked her own rights, but had done so loudly enough for Tony Russo to get an introductory lesson about his own.

  Ellie turned to check on Rogan. With the pace of the last thirty minutes, this had been her first opportunity to take a look at Jake Myers, who was trendier than his preppy friends. He was about six feet tall. Thin. Dark brown hair. He had an interesting face – long and narrow with a prominent chin and sleepy eyelids. He reminded Ellie of someone. She was just about to put her finger on it when she heard a high-pitched female voice behind her.

  ‘That’s him. That’s the guy who looks like Jake Gyllenhaal.’

  Chapter Seventeen

  ‘How many times do I have to tell you?’ Jake Myers’s voice was strained. Twenty minutes in, and he was sticking by his story. ‘She told me she had an early flight and left the club before I did. I haven’t heard from her since.’

  ‘What time did she leave?’ Rogan asked.

  ‘I don’t know. I remember that bitchy friend of hers coming by and trying to get her to leave right before.’

  ‘Well, that bitchy friend just ID’d you as the last person to see Chelsea Hart alive. You might want to start coming up with specifics.’

  Myers licked hi
s lips nervously. ‘My guess is she left about half an hour after that, but I’m not sure. It was a late night, and I wasn’t checking my watch.’

  ‘Did you walk her out?’

  ‘No. She left by herself, as far as I could tell.’

  ‘Were you outside of the club with her at all?’ Rogan asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Not at any point?’

  ‘I told you, we were just dancing and hanging out.’

  ‘When did you leave?’

  ‘Late. Ask Nick. He was with me.’

  ‘Anyone else leave with you?’

  ‘No, just me and Nick.’

  ‘Here’s the problem with that, Jake. Nick’s not talking. Neither is your friend Tony Russo.’

  Myers had a hard time hiding the slight smile. ‘Well, I don’t have any control of that, do I? We left at closing time, so I’m assuming it was four, but sometimes the clubs go a little later if they don’t think they’ll get caught. Like I said –’

  Rogan completed the sentence for him: ‘You weren’t checking your watch. Did anything happen between you and Chelsea before she left?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You know what I mean. Single guy. Hot girl. Flirting. Did anything come of that?’

  ‘No, man. I was just dancing with her.’

  ‘You didn’t have any sexual contact at all?’ Rogan was making sure to lock down all of Jake’s various denials, no ambiguities to exploit down the road if they caught him in a lie.

  ‘No. I kissed her – not even, just a peck – when she left. That was it.’

  ‘And no drugs?’

  ‘I told you. I could tell she was drunk, but I didn’t take any drugs. I didn’t give her any drugs. And I didn’t see her with any drugs.’

  Ellie interrupted. ‘Her friend says you were pretty eager to have Chelsea stick around. You didn’t want her to leave.’

  ‘We were having a good time. Did I think maybe it was going somewhere? Sure, but when she said she had to go, she had to go. No means no, right?’

  ‘Not always,’ she said.

  ‘It does with me. There’s always another girl.’

  ‘Was there one last night?’ Ellie asked.

  ‘No,’ Jake said quietly, some of the attitude falling into line.

  ‘All right. Let me talk to my partner for a second,’ Rogan said. He waved Ellie to the front of the office, and she followed. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I think he’s lying.’

  ‘Well, he’s not coming up with any details.’ Innocent people tended to have excellent memories when it came time to account for their whereabouts.

  ‘And I’m not buying all that indignation. Fear? Nervousness? That’s what I would understand from him right now. But he’s so put out by half an hour of conversation?’

  ‘That’s ’cause lying is hard work.’

  ‘And we know he’s lying about the drugs. It’s too much of a coincidence that Chelsea had meth in her system, and we just happen to catch these guys hooking up a girl with meth through Rodriguez.’

  ‘But Rodriguez wasn’t working last night.’

  ‘Doesn’t matter. If he’s dealing out of the club, then he’s probably working with someone else who supplies on his days off. These clubs have more drugs going in and out of them than a Duane Reade. A club can’t be known as a place to score unless they’ve got every night covered. And if Myers is lying about the meth –’

  ‘Then he’s also lying about the girl leaving alone, him leaving without a girl, and everything being Doris Day innocent.’

  ‘Otherwise his friends would back him up,’ Ellie said. ‘Instead, they invoke, and he’s sitting pretty. He’s rolling the dice that we don’t have enough to hold them. The minute we cut them loose, they’ll get together and line up their stories.’

  ‘Not exactly a high-stakes bet,’ Rogan said. ‘No PC for the murder, and the ADA will shoot us down on material witness warrants.’

  ‘So let’s give Mr. Myers what he wants. Let’s go ahead and spring him.’

  ‘So he can get his buddy Nick to vouch that they left together?’

  ‘Nope. Because we’re about to introduce Nick Warden to the overnight comforts of the Tenth Precinct.’

  ‘Jaime Rodriguez. Nick Warden. You’re both under arrest for criminal sale of a controlled substance and con spiracy to commit criminal sale of a controlled substance.’

  Ellie placed her cuffs on Nick Warden, while Rogan pulled Rodriguez’s wrists behind his back. They might not have probable cause to hold anyone for Chelsea Hart’s murder, but she’d personally witnessed Warden negotiate the drug deal between Rodriguez and that Amazon of a law student.

  They walked the two men toward the back of the office, where officers from the Tenth Precinct would take them out a rear exit to complete the booking process.

  Jake Myers took a step in their direction. ‘Whoa, what are you doing?’

  Ellie pointed him back toward his corner at the front of the office. ‘Stay over there. Move again, and I’ll arrest you for obstructing. Someone get Mr. Myers a glass of water to keep him busy, all right?’

  The decision to book Warden entitled her to conduct a search incident to arrest. She pulled a money clip from his jacket pocket, and slipped the entire wad into a baggie. If some of the cash came back with Rodriguez’s fingerprints, it would at least corroborate the deal she’d seen go down between them.

  ‘Smile for the camera,’ she said, snapping a quick head shot with her cell phone.

  Rogan finished a check of Rodriguez’s pockets and gave her a slight head shake. No drugs. Either Rodriguez had sold the last of the ice he was holding to the model, or he had managed to pass off his stash to someone else in the club before he was herded into the back office.

  Without anything to corroborate Ellie’s testimony, the defense would argue that she had misinterpreted a harmless conversation between Warden and Rodriguez. Not that it mattered.

  As a uniformed officer led Warden through the back door, he shot a look at Myers, who was drinking his glass of water as directed. A night in jail would be a good test of Warden’s loyalty.

  Rogan passed Rodriguez off to another officer. ‘Maybe Warden will wake up tomorrow telling us he didn’t leave with Myers after all.’

  ‘At the very least we’ve bought ourselves some time until tomorrow afternoon’s arraignment. The labs might be back by then.’

  ‘Maybe we’ll get lucky and find a witness placing Myers with Chelsea after she left the club.’

  ‘Oh, and by the way,’ Ellie said, ‘that glass of water Myers is drinking from as we speak? He might just leave behind tidy little fingerprints to match the latent on Chelsea Hart’s button.’

  ‘Detectives?’ A uniformed officer looked at them apologetically. ‘I’m sorry to interrupt, but there’s an older couple here asking for you. They’re refusing to leave.’

  Paul and Miriam Hart looked out of place at the club’s entrance in their wool sweaters and matching khaki pants.

  ‘Those two men,’ Miriam said. ‘The men who were pulled out of here. Were they the ones?’

  Ellie placed a hand gently on Miriam’s forearm. ‘Tonight we made real progress. But we arrested those two men – for now – only on drug charges. We believe one of them may have information about what happened to Chelsea last night.’

  ‘What about the man Stefanie identified?’ Paul asked. ‘Stefanie called us from the cab. She said she left Chelsea alone with him, and that you’d found him here.’

  Ellie swallowed. ‘We are following up on that.’

  ‘What do you mean, following up?’

  She didn’t want to tell them that Rogan was currently cutting Myers loose out the club’s back exit. ‘I would call him a person of interest for now.’

  ‘You’re arresting him, then?’

  She did her best to explain the legal requirements for an arrest and all of the ways that making an arrest too early would jeopardize the chances of a conviction
down the road.

  ‘So he just goes home?’ Paul said. ‘We go back to our hotel room and turn off the lights and go to sleep with the knowledge that your “person of interest” is out there doing God knows what?’

  Ellie had tossed and turned her way through countless numbers of those kinds of nights, and she wasn’t going to lie to these people. ‘Yes, that’s exactly what you need to do. And you’ll probably have to do the same tomorrow, and maybe the next day. But I promise you, I would not ask something so painful of you if it weren’t absolutely necessary. We are making progress. I promise.’

  ‘A drug arrest is progress?’

  Miriam began to apologize for her husband, but Ellie stopped her. ‘I know I have no right, but I’m asking you to trust us.’

  As she helped the Harts into the back of a patrol car that would carry them to their complimentary suite at the Hilton, she told herself that Nick Warden’s night in the Tenth Precinct would turn out to be more than just another drug bust. It had to.

  Sleep. What Ellie needed next was sleep. She had been awake for twenty-two hours and desperately needed to catch a few hours of shut-eye. The thought of a soft pillow and clean-ish sheets was paradise.

  What welcomed her instead was Peter Morse, sitting on the step that led to her building’s doorway, staring at his cell phone. His brown hair was tousled, as usual, and he looked cold in a fashionably crumpled corduroy jacket thrown over a T-shirt and jeans.

  ‘Hey, you.’ He stood to greet her, as if waiting outside her door in the middle of the night was perfectly normal. ‘I’ve been calling you.’

  ‘I know. Didn’t you get my text?’ After Peter’s name popped up twice on the screen of her cell, Ellie had sent him a text around midnight, telling him she was wrapping up some work on a case.

  ‘Yeah, that’s why I figured I had a chance of finding you awake this late. I didn’t realize you’d be out all night and coming home wearing – wow, you look frickin’ amazing.’