False Allegations b-9

by Andrew Vachss

  False Allegations

  ( Burke - 9 )

  Andrew Vachss

  "In the first rank of American crime writers. . . . Next to Vachss, Chandler, Cain and Hammett look like choirboys." --Cleveland Plain Dealer

  Burke--ex-con, mercenary, sometime killer--makes his living preying on New York's most vicious predators and avenging their innocent victims. But in Andrew Vachss's mercilessly suspenseful new novel, Burke finds himself working the other side of the street, where guilt and innocence are as disposable as the sheets in a Times Square hotel--and as dirty. Burke's new employer is Kite, a fanatical crusader who specializes in debunking "false allegations of child sexual abuse. Kite has a case that may be the real thing, but needs Burke to tell him if it is. And if mere money can't persuade Burke to cooperate, Kite has plenty of other incentives at his disposal--including a fanatical bodyguard with a taste for corsets and brass knuckles. A tour guide to hell written in icy prose, False Allegations is Vachss at his most unnerving.

  "Burke is the toughest talking first-person narrator since Mike Hammer." --Los Angeles Times

  "Vachss . . . writes hypnotically violent prose." --Chicago Sun-Times

  for Ken Saro–Wiwa

  ACCLAIM FOR Andrew Vachss

  "Vachss is in the first rank of American crime writers."

  —Cleveland Plain Dealer

  "Burke is an unlikely combination of Sherlock Holmes, Robin Hood, and Rambo, operating outside the law as he rights wrongs….Vachss has obviously seen just how unable the law is to protect children. And so, while Burke may be a vigilante, Vachss's stories don't feature pointless bloodshed. Instead, they burn with righteous rage and transfer a degree of that rage to the reader."

  —Washington Post Book World

  "Vachss seems bottomlessly knowledgeable about the depth and variety of human twistedness."

  —The New York Times

  "The best detective fiction being written….Add a stinging social commentary…a Célinesque journey into darkness, and we have an Andrew Vachss, one of our most important writers."

  —Martha Grimes

  "Vachss is America's dark scribe of the 1990s….His protagonist Burke is our new dark knight, a cold–eyed crusader."

  —James Grady, author of Six Days of the Condor

  "Burke s the toughest talking first–person narrator since Mike Hammer….Vachss can write!

  —Los Angeles Times

  "Move over, Hammett and Chandler, you've got company….Andrew Vachss has become a cult favorite, and for good reason."

  —Cosmopolitan

  "Burke would eat Spade and Marlowe for breakfast, not even spitting out the bones. [He] is one tough, mean, pray–god–you–don't–meet–him hombre."

  —Boston Herald

  a warrior, murdered by jackals

  whose voice, unstilled

  scars their dishonor into our souls

  marking our path

  FALSE ALLEGATIONS

  "I have to do it the same way every time," the woman said, her voice full and steady even though she was deep into her workout on a stationary bike. She was wearing a set of dull–gray sweats with matching head and wrist bands of the same material, her face glistening under a healthy sheen of sweat.

  "How long does it last?" I asked her.

  "The whole performance is about fifteen minutes," she said. "I don't know how much of it he watches."

  "And you're sure he—?"

  "Yes! He's nailed to it. A bloody junkie he is, I tell you—he doesn't get his fix, he'll go mad." The woman stopped pedaling. She climbed off the bike, pulling the gray sweatshirt over her head in one smooth motion, leaving her torso bare. She was as relaxed about it as someone who did it for a living. "Let me take a shower," she said, "I'll only be a minute."

  I leaned back in the red leather recliner, turning it slightly so I could see down the hall where she had disappeared. I slitted my eyes, breathing shallow through my nose, slowing my clock, dialing my mind to wait–state—I know what "Give me a minute" means in girl–speak.

  Like most things I think I know about women, I was wrong again. In less than five minutes, I caught a blur out of the corner of my eye—she was padding up the beige–carpeted corridor toward the living room, not making a sound. When she spotted me in the chair, she flashed a smile.

  The only thing she was wearing was lipstick. She had a fluffy pink towel in one hand, patting herself absently with it as she made a full circuit of the living room, her eyes flicking from the bookshelves to the complicated–looking stereo to a solid rectangular platform no higher than a coffee table but much bigger. The platform was covered in light–blue leather, about the size of a pool table, seamless and smooth. It stood in a niche a couple of feet back from a huge window, which was completely covered by a panel of brass mini–blinds.

  "That's where I have to do it," she said, pointing to the platform.

  "How could he—?"

  "They're adjustable," she cut in. "With this…," showing me something that looked like a TV remote.

  I held out my hand for it, but she pulled it away. "I'm not allowed to open the blinds until he calls," she said. "It wouldn't do for you to push the wrong button."

  I let that one pass.

  "Sometimes he wants the blinds open," she said. "Sometimes he wants them all the way up. If he wants it at night, I have these…. Look!" She hit a button on the remote and a trio of baby spots popped into life on the ceiling, each beam trained at a different part of the blue leather platform.

  "What makes you think he—?"

  A telephone trilled in another room. She held up a hand for silence, head cocked to listen.

  Another ring.

  Another.

  Nothing more. I counted to ten in my head. She pushed both palms at me in a "Stay there!" gesture, then she turned and ran out of the room.

  She was back in a flash, wearing a red camisole with matching tap pants and spike heels, a white makeup case in one hand. She quickly crossed over to the blue leather platform and sat down, facing me. She put the makeup case on the floor, popped the locks, and opened the top. A quick eye–sweep satisfied her that she had what she needed. She pressed a finger to her lips, telling me to be quiet. Then she reached for the remote control and hit one of the buttons.

  The mini–blinds slowly opened, angling down—you would have to be on a higher floor to see inside. The baby spots flashed into hot, focused light.

  She did the whole performance without once leaving the blue leather platform, almost fifteen minutes to the second, just like she said. Once you got past the high–tech, it was standard–issue Tijuana Teaser, right down to the disappearing sausage act—she put it inside her, worked it back and forth, her face an ice–mask imitation of a woman scaling a steep orgasmic curve. Soon as she faked letting go, she pulled out the sausage, then licked it a few times before she bit off a piece and swallowed. The curtain closed on her lying facedown, spent and exhausted from the performance, her body zebra–striped from the mini–blinds, long chestnut hair crackling with pale sparks from the artificial light.

  "I know what I have to do by the number of rings," she said later, a tall iced glass of orange juice in her hand. She'd taken another shower, wrapped herself in a white terry–cloth robe. The mini–blinds were closed.

  "How can you tell if—?"

  "It's his line, the phone," she anticipated my question. "Only his. He's the only one who ever calls on it. I'm not allowed to use it to make calls either."

  "What if you…?"

  "There's another phone. Two lines, separate from his. If I'm talking on one of those and I hear his phone, I have to hang up right away."

  "But when you go out…"

  "I can't just go o
ut, can I?" she snapped.

  "I don't know how it works," I said mildly.

  She ran both hands through her thick chestnut mane, combing it back off her face. "I'm sorry," she said. "I get so cooped up here sometimes I feel like biting my own head off. You can't imagine how…trapped it makes you feel."

  "That's okay," I said softly, not telling her that I wouldn't need an imagination. I grew up trapped—and not in some luxo–pad. "Tell me how it works," I urged her, still soft.

  "Seventy–two hours," she said. "Three days, that's the key. Once I…finish, I don't have to do it again for seventy–two hours. It could be more—he could wait a long time to call me—he was out of the country once for almost a month—but it's never less, understand?"

  "Sure."

  "He used me," she said, her voice flat and hard. "He lied. He's a liar. Now he has to pay for it."

  "What did he lie about?" I asked, moving my right hand in a sweep–gesture to cover the whole setup.

  "Who needs to lie to a whore? Isn't that what you mean?" she faced me, bitter–voiced. "Sure, he pays for…this. But it's his, not mine. His name is on the lease. Everything's in his name, even the bloody electricity."

  "He lied about that?"

  "No," she said, her voice a hard sneer against my muted sarcasm. "What he lied about was love."

  "Okay if I smoke?" I asked her.

  She looked up in surprise. "Why would you ask? You see the damn ashtray right there, don't you?"

  "You don't smoke, right?"

  "No, I don't."

  "So if he was over here, he could smell smoke…He'd know you had company."

  Her laugh was a sad, dry thing. "Fat chance. He never comes here. Never."

  "So how do you…?"

  "It's an electronic affair, luv," she said. "Very Nineties, isn't it? I've got a PC in one of the bedrooms in the back. He pays my bills over a modem—anytime I want to see my balance, I can just call it up on the screen. Anything else you want to know?"

  "Yeah," I said. "What kind of name is Bondi?"

  A quick smile played around her lips. "It's from Bondi Beach. Right near Sydney. In Australia, where I'm from. My mom always said I was conceived on that beach, so she gave me that name. She was a young girl then, working square, before she went on the bash. All she could tell me about my dad is that he was a soldier. On leave he was. He left my mom something, all right."

  "Tell me about the lie," I said. "The lie about love."

  "Oh smoke your cigarette, then," she replied, a faint trace of the smile still playing on her lips. "I'll even get you a beer if you want, how's that?"

  "I'm okay," I said, settling back in the chair again. "Tell me."

  She got up, came over to where I was sitting. "That one's built for two," she said. "Move over." I slid as far as I could to the left. She plopped down next to me…a tight squeeze. I pulled my right arm out from between us. She nestled into my chest. I draped my arm over her shoulders. She reached across her body with her left hand, grabbed my right hand and pulled it down, the way you'd pull a blanket over your shoulders. "Give us a puff, then," she said, "I haven't smoked in years, but I remember how good it used to taste."

  I held out the cigarette. She moved her mouth into it, took a quick, short hit. She exhaled powerfully, making a satisfied sound, closed her eyes, snuggled even closer.

  A few minutes passed quiet like that. I was going to remind her of the question again when she started talking in a young girl's voice, the one they use for secret–telling.

  "I was a dancer when he met me. Before that, I was a party girl. You understand what that is?"

  "Yeah. You don't give your friendship to just anyone…but when you do, it costs a bit to maintain it."

  "Un huh. That's about right. Anyway, he met me in a club. Where I was dancing. He was a real gentleman. Left me his card, asked if he could call me sometime. We had a few dates. Very, very, nice. Fine restaurants, a limo, flowers. You know how it goes. We got…close. But there was never any sex. I figured, maybe he was afraid of scaring me off. But, one night, he told me. Told me that he loved me.

  "I thought he wanted me for a beard. You know, that he was gay and he needed some cover when he went out. But that wasn't it. He's…impotent, I guess. But not completely. I didn't really follow it all that well, but, what he's got, he can get aroused but he can't…" Her voice trailed off, as though she was expecting me to cut in.

  I didn't. Another couple of minutes went by like that. She squirmed against me, as if she was seeking a more comfortable position. I moved as best I could in the squeezed spot, trying to help.

  "He said he had a fantasy. A fantasy about me. That I would get so excited just thinking about him that I'd…well, what you just saw…before. Do that. He said he loved me. He knew how much I was…earning. At the club where I danced. He said he didn't want to insult me, but…he could pay me just as much. A salary, like. And if I would…do that, what you saw…for him, whenever he wanted, then he would get stronger. You know what I mean. And, maybe, someday, we could be together. Like for real, together."

  "I still don't see the lie," I told her.

  "I haven't seen him since. Not once. It's all…like I said. Just that. He never even calls me on the phone. Not to speak to, anyway. I was…sad about it, I guess, but then a girlfriend of mine…from the old club…she heard about it. And she told me."

  "Told you what?"

  "He lets other people see it," she said, a catch in her voice. "He lets them bloody watch. That's why I let you…before. I never would have let anybody see it. But…you know what he does? He invites friends over to his apartment. Like to play cards or whatever. And then he calls me. And I put on a show. Not for him. Not for love. For anyone who's in his apartment. He doesn't tell them he knows me—he just tells them there's this really randy girl who lives in the building across the way. A real bitch–in–heat slut, he tells them. Gets so flaming hot she does it to herself."

  I thought she was going to cry then, but she nipped a jagged chunk of air and kept it down until she was calm.

  "Tell me what you want," I said.

  "I'll be right back," she said, sliding the freshly loaded condom off me in one smooth move. I heard noises from the bathroom but I kept my eyes closed.

  I felt the bed react as she climbed back on. "Want another drag?" I asked, not opening my eyes.

  "No," she said, "one's my limit."

  "You're sure about the money?"

  "Dead sure, honey," she said. "And it's cake too, I promise you—I've got it all worked out. I don't know if he even lives there, but he has to be there when I…do it. Soon as he calls, I can call you. It'd only take a second—he'd never know. I've got the key to the apartment—you could walk right in. Right in the middle of me…doing it. He'd never know what hit him."

  "He might not be alone, right? You said—"

  "I know the doorman. Bert, his name is. He's an Aussie too. I met him when I was still doing…you know. Anyway, I take care of Bert. He can always count on me for something, even though I never go to that place anymore. You know, the place where I danced? I tested him. Bert, that is. Twice now. I use this," she said, crawling over my chest to reach into a nightstand next to the bed. She held up a cellular phone. "See? It's perfect. I told Bert I wanted to surprise Morton—that's his name, Morton. So I ask Bert, when Mr. Morton comes in, would he give me a call? When he comes in alone, I say to Bert, giving him a wink, you know? And Bert did it. Twice. I gave him a hundred the next day. Both times. A hundred dollars, a wink, a little bit of hip…that's all it cost."

  "So you want…?"

  "He doesn't know I have this," she said, holding up the cellular phone again. "Bert can call me while he's still in the elevator. So we know he's alone. Then, when he calls me, when he wants his damn performance…that's when I call you. He's got a safe in there. In the living room. Behind a painting—can you imagine? He showed it to me once, early on."

  "You know the combination?"

 
"No, of course not. He wouldn't trust me with something like that. But you can…make him tell you, can't you? It wouldn't take that long, believe me. He's such a weak man.…"

  "Fifty–fifty split?" I asked her.

  "Yes," she said. "I'm going to have to leave as soon as it's done anyway. It won't take me an hour to pack—it's not like I ever needed a lot of clothes for him, right? He could never prove it was me, but…"

  "So how do you collect your half?"

  "You can mail it to me. At my girlfriend's place in the Village. He doesn't know about her. When we get the money, Sybil and me, we're going to take off. Rent a car, load up everything we can stuff into suitcases, drive right to the airport. It's a quick flight to L.A., then a nice jump over the water to home."

  "What if the safe's empty?"

  "I guarantee it won't be, honey. Believe me, this is a rich flower, just begging to be plucked, I tell you true. What do you say, then?"

  "Let's do it," I said.

  She threw me a mega–watt smile, turned her back, wiggled her butt gently as she rooted through the nightstand drawer for another condom.

  "She's got the key, huh?" Michelle's voice, her creamy–silk trademark, the voice that made her a ton of green on the phone–sex circuit. She was perched on the edge of my desk, just past where I had my feet propped up on the battered surface. I was tilted so far back that all I could see was her flashy legs if I looked straight ahead.

  "Sure does," I told her.

  "And she wants you to go in when the guy's home?"

  "Yeah."

  "So you can make him open the safe?" she asked, a barely suppressed giggle in her voice.

  "Un huh."

  "And she's going to split the take with you fifty–fifty—?"

  "Right again," I interrupted.

  "And trust you to mail her share to her?" she asked, losing the fight to keep the laughter down.

  "Yes."

  "Oh baby, I don't mean to sound nasty, but…could she really think you were all that stupid?"

  "No, I don't scan it that way. She's had a lot of experience. With men. Listening to them, sizing them up. That's the way she made her living, not just dancing. Her story's so bogus…it's like an open invitation to double–cross her."