by John Lutz
“Who are you calling?”
“Harley Renz.”
“For God’s sake, Pearl. Don’t stir him up.”
But it was too late. She had called Renz’s direct line.
It took her only a few minutes to tell Renz about the package. Then she listened for about ten seconds and hung up.
“What’d he say?” Fedderman asked.
“He’s sending somebody over from bomb disposal.”
“What?” Quinn said. “One of those robots to open our mail?”
“That robot,” Pearl said, “would be the second smartest person in the room.”
The street door swished open, then the door to the office.
“Fast work,” Fedderman said.
But it wasn’t the bomb disposal guy; it was Lido, come either to report or to work on the high-tech NYPD computer Renz had loaned Q amp;A. He was wearing dark slacks almost as wrinkled as Fedderman’s. His white shirt was untucked and buttoned crookedly.
“You already been at the sauce?” Quinn asked him.
“It’s how I do my best work,” Lido said.
Quinn looked him up and down. They weren’t talking about hot sauce. “Jesus, Jerry! It’s ten in the morning.”
Lido made a dismissive motion with his right hand, as if shaking liquid from his fingers. And maybe there really was liquid on his fingers. “I just pretend I’m someplace where it’s some other time,” he said.
“Does that work?” Pearl asked.
“In some other place it does.” Lido’s bleary eyes fixed on the package Quinn held. “What’s that?”
“We think it might be a bomb,” Pearl said.
Lido stared at all three of them, and then turned around and left.
When they heard the street door again five minutes later they thought Lido was returning. Instead it was the bomb disposal guy, who turned out to be a woman. She was about forty, sweetly pretty, and slightly overweight. Or maybe it was the uniform and all the gear dangling from her belt that made her just look overweight. At her side, held lightly by a short leather leash, was a large German shepherd.
“You the explosives expert?” Quinn asked.
“He is,” she said, nodding down at the dog. The dog looked at Quinn as if daring him to question his expertise.
“What’s his name?” Pearl asked.
“Boomer.”
“Of course,” Fedderman said.
“Can I pet him?” Pearl asked.
“If he’ll let you.”
That was a vague enough answer to keep Pearl where she was in her desk chair.
“I’m Darlene,” the bomb disposal cop said. She fixed her blue gaze on the package on Quinn’s desk corner. “That the suspicious package?”
“If you want to be suspicious,” Quinn said.
“I do,” Darlene said. “It’s how Boomer and I stay alive.”
No one spoke for a few seconds.
“That was sobering,” Fedderman said.
Darlene and Boomer had crossed the room and were standing in front of Quinn’s desk. Darlene brought her forefinger close to but not touching the brown package, and the dog looked up at her and then began sniffing the package.
Quietly, calmly, it sniffed for several seconds, and then backed away.
“It doesn’t contain explosives,” Darlene said. “But just in case, why don’t the three of you leave while I open it.” She didn’t pose it as a question.
“I thought you said it didn’t contain explosives,” Fedderman said.
“There’s only one way to be absolutely sure,” Darlene said. She had opened a case made of black plastic-like material with gray lining. There were various tools fitted inside. There appeared to be more tools than were needed to do the job. “Boomer and I won’t be long,” Darlene said. “Don’t let anyone inside.” She stood motionless, waiting for them to leave.
They went outside and stood on the sidewalk, about twenty feet away from the door. Darlene was right: there was only one way to be sure.
“Whaddya think?” Fedderman said.
“Candy from an admirer,” Pearl said. “In which case, I want to see the card.”
“Cigars from an admirer,” Quinn said, just to get under Pearl’s skin.
“Maybe something to do with the case,” Fedderman said. “Like a clue.”
The door opened and Darlene motioned that they could come back inside.
Fedderman’s guess was closest to the truth. The brown paper and tape lay folded neatly on the desk corner. Near it, on a plain white sheet of paper, lay something Quinn didn’t immediately recognize.
“That was inside,” Darlene said. She pointed to a smaller slip of paper that was creased from being tightly folded. Beneath it was something beneath white tissue that Quinn would get to after dealing with the folded paper. One thing at a time. Darlene would approve.
Barely touching the paper with the tip of his retracted ball point pen, Quinn examined both sides.
There was nothing on the paper other than a small black printed question mark. Admirer or not, the sender was secret.
Quinn used the pen to move the tissue out of the way so they could see what was beneath it.
Again, no one spoke for a few seconds.
“It looks like a pouch,” Fedderman said, “made of soft leather with a leather drawstring on top.”
“I think it’s a tobacco pouch,” Darlene said. “But it would do for jewelry.” She reached out with an exploring fingertip. “That leather’s like butter. It’s pretty high-quality goods. Boomer sure wouldn’t mind chewing on it.” She pointed with her pink-enameled nail to the bottom of the pouch. “What’s that gnarly looking thing on the bottom?”
“That’s a nipple,” Quinn said.
Darlene and Boomer stood staring at the pouch. Darlene’s expression began to change.
Pearl pointed toward the half-bath over by the coffee machine.
Darlene and Boomer crossed the room so fast that Boomer stepped with a heavy paw on Pearl’s toe.
Quinn picked up the folded paper by its edges to look again at the question mark.
50
Q uinn was back behind his desk. Darlene and Boomer had gone and taken the pouch with them. The lab would doubtless be able to match the DNA with one of the victims.
Unless the pouch had been fashioned from the breast of one of Daniel’s earlier victims. Was that what the monster was doing with his victims’ body parts? Using them for some kind of grotesque hobby?
It seemed too horrible to be possible, but Quinn knew that human beings were capable of any nightmare they could conjure.
Helen the profiler had come in to the office. Quinn wanted her to be in on this. Her short, carrot-colored hair was ruffled and looked soft, as if she’d just washed it and sat under a dryer. Probably, Quinn figured, she’d rubbed it dry with a towel and forgotten about it. Her denim shorts made her long legs look even longer. She had on blue jogging shoes and a sleeveless Fordham sweatshirt. Quinn didn’t think she’d attended Fordham, more likely some college in the Midwest where they played basketball. He’d asked her once if she’d played basketball and she told him no, but she was a fan. Just because a woman was over six feet tall didn’t mean she’d played basketball.
Quinn had wondered why not.
“He’s trying to taunt us,” he said.
“More to it than that,” Helen said. She was wearing either no makeup or scant makeup skillfully applied.
Pearl returned from the coffee machine carrying two steaming mugs. “It’s goddamned gruesome,” she said, handing one of the mugs to Helen.
Helen accepted the mug and moved away a few feet to sit on a different desk. She’d been perched on Pearl’s. Now Pearl sat down at her desk and placed her coffee mug on a cork coaster.
“If the killer’s trying to send someone a message, it’s probably Quinn,” Fedderman said.
“And it’s probably more than a simple taunt,” Helen said.
“I don’t know if it’s complicat
ed,” Quinn said. “He wants to get me mad so I screw up. He’s playing chess.”
“The chess analogy goes only so far,” Helen said.
“Maybe the idea is to make you feel vulnerable,” Fedderman said, thinking back on his recent conversations with Penny.
“That’s closer,” Helen said. “But it’s also possible that he wants to demonstrate how vulnerable Pearl is.”
Fedderman appeared puzzled. “Why Pearl in particular?”
“Because he knows we’re living together,” Quinn said. “He sees Pearl as my possession and wants to show me he can take it away whenever he chooses.”
“Women as toys for the sadist,” Pearl said.
Fedderman sipped his coffee, which had become cool. “I dunno, Pearl. It could simply be that you’re his type and he wants you the way he wanted those other women. That’s what the pouch might signify-he’s objectifying you. You’re no more to him than another souvenir pouch.”
“Thanks,” Pearl said.
“Or some other kind of souvenir,” Helen said.
“No, he’s a breast man,” Fedderman said.
Pearl shot him a glance that would have stung a more sensitive person.
“The package was addressed to me,” Quinn reminded them.
“He wouldn’t send something valuable like that direct to a mere possession of yours,” Helen said.
“That might well be,” Quinn admitted. Once you figured out where Helen was coming from, she tended to make a lot of sense.
“Men!” Pearl said. “It’s always about you.”
“Helen’s the one that worked it out,” Fedderman said, “and she’s a woman.”
Pearl had no adequate response to that, but she wished now that she hadn’t fetched Helen’s coffee.
“Whatever is in this sicko’s mind,” Quinn said, “Pearl is in danger.”
“And she’s being followed,” Fedderman said.
“That one’s been worked out,” Pearl reminded him.
“That’s right,” Helen said. “Your daughter.” She smiled. “I’d like to meet her.”
“I’m sure you will someday,” Pearl said.
She wondered as she spoke, had Jody been active in any kind of sport?
51
T his was odd, Renz thought.
Jim Tennyson, an undercover officer on the vice squad, had requested a private interview with him. Ordinarily Renz would have told him to go though the proper channels; scroungy undercover cops didn’t just call their way up the telephone ladder to Harriet Gibbs, Renz’s secretary, and have the unmitigated-or maybe it was mitigated-gall to leave a message asking for an appointment with the police commissioner. It was one word in Tennyson’s rambling message that caused all of Renz’s orifices to draw up: Olivia.
He’d granted Tennyson the interview.
Olivia’s name also prompted Renz to request Tennyson’s file and learn what he could about the undercover cop. These undercover guys could get too close to the goods sometimes and cause problems. Could, in fact, become the problem.
Tennyson had been in uniform for five years before becoming a plainclothes detective, then had almost immediately transferred to Vice and undercover work. He’d requested the transfer.
He’d used his gun once, winging a dealer who was waving his shotgun at the occupants of a crowded subway car. Renz thought about that. A close call, deciding to fire a shot in a crowded subway car. Turning loose one bullet to keep a scattering of deadly buckshot from being fired. Took some balls.
The shotgun had turned out to be empty. As far as Renz knew, Tennyson had had no way of knowing that. The review board had seen it the same way. Tennyson had not only been cleared by the board but had received a commendation.
Renz had to admit, the man’s record indicated he was a good cop. Still, those undercover guys… especially the ones who’d infiltrated the drug world.
Here he was standing slouched in front of Renz’s desk, wearing a dirty sleeveless T-shirt lettered CRASH CAB, equally dirty jeans, and worn-out brown shoes tied with white laces. Renz noticed that the bows were double knots. The shoes wouldn’t let Tennyson down if he found himself on either end of a footrace. Renz saw that the UC wasn’t wearing socks, and his ankles were dirty. All in all, he looked like Robert De Niro playing a role.
“Nice disguise,” Renz said.
Tennyson smiled. A front tooth was missing. Probably only during working hours. “It gets me by.” He didn’t seem at all nervous, even though he was seriously outranked. That worried Renz.
Renz said, “What the hell do you want?”
Tennyson looked genuinely confused. “I don’t want anything.”
“You mentioned someone named Olive Krantz.”
“Olivia. I came across a conversation about her.”
What was this? Blackmail? Renz thought he’d get out ahead of it.
“Came across?”
“In an indirect but reliable way.”
“If you’re here to tell me Olivia’s a call girl, I already know that. And I know she’s damned good at her job.”
“She works for Prime Escorts,” Tennyson said.
“Right again. Now get to the point.”
“Word is she’s playing you.”
“We play together.”
“Different games, maybe.”
“You mentioned a word? Whose word?”
“I don’t know the source, and that’s the God’s truth.”
“Leave God out of this.” Renz leaned back in his desk chair and expanded his already bloated physique. He looked almost as dangerous as he was.
Tennyson’s bearing changed. He was a pro who could see a storm coming. Doubt had found its way in. Maybe he’d mishandled this.
“I’m not interested in any word from any drug fiend or psycho who doesn’t know shit about what he’s yammering,” Renz said. “Why should I be?”
“Olivia might be a fine person, sir. I don’t care squat what she does for a living. But she’s in the trade, so I came across her, and what she was doing. What was the source? Like I told you, I don’t know. But it might’ve been Olivia herself, when she was under the influence.”
“Influence? What trade we talking about?”
“Coke, heroin.”
Heroin! Jesus! Why did Tennyson have to come walking through that door?
“Olivia’s not a user.” Renz heard the hollow defensiveness of his own words.
Tennyson said nothing. His self-assurance had returned.
Renz deflated and sat forward again, his elbows on his desk. His stomach felt like rats were running in it. He didn’t look so threatening now. More threatened.
“I’m not wearing a wire,” Tennyson said.
“I know you’re not. I got a little thingamajig that detects those and electrocutes anyone coming in here wearing a wire.”
“Really?” It was impossible to know if Tennyson was asking a serious question. Toying with Renz now, the asshole.
“Of course.”
“Like I said,” Tennyson told him, “I only wanted to let you know. Avoid any possible trouble. It goes no further than me, whatever you decide to know or not know.”
“You gonna name a sum?”
“I don’t want a sum,” Tennyson said, almost angrily.
“But you wouldn’t mind an angel looking over you from the dizzying height of the police commissioner’s office.”
“Sure, I wouldn’t. Let’s be honest. I wouldn’t mind at all if promotions came to me a little easier. Or more fairly. I don’t want anything I haven’t earned.”
“And you think you’re earning something coming here to me with this bullshit?”
A thin smile ran across Tennyson’s lips. “I took a helluva chance.”
“You did,” Renz said.
“My good deed for the year.”
“Humph! Loyalty. That’s what you’re selling.”
“I don’t think you can put a price on loyalty.”
“And it should work both ways,
” Renz said.
Tennyson nodded. “It’ll run both ways. If you want, I can see that nobody repeats the word, that nobody bothers this Olivia.”
“That’s Harry Primo’s job.”
“He’s an asshole.”
“So many of us are.” Renz stared hard at Tennyson, who seemed unperturbed. “You all done here?”
“That’s it.”
“Now leave.”
Tennyson took his time sauntering to the door, going out.
Renz thought, There’s a young copper with a bright future.
What exactly does he know? How much does he know?
How brief is that future?
52
C razy Legs. Weird.
Neeve hadn’t been crazy about this new manuscript, a biography of Elroy “Crazy Legs” Hirsch, when she’d picked it up from the editor at Hamilton Publishing. Who the hell is he? Neeve had wondered. It had sounded like the book’s subject was a gangster, like Legs Diamond.
But Crazy Legs hadn’t been a gangster. He’d been a football player, and a great one, known as Crazy Legs because he ran so wildly and unpredictably he was difficult to tackle. Neeve was a football fan, so how was it she’d never heard mention of Crazy Legs Hirsch? Well, people often ignored four-leaf clovers they were standing over.
Truth was, Neeve felt lucky. She’d really gotten into Overbite, and wound up enjoying it immensely. And now here she was back on her bench in the park and all wrapped up in Crazy Legs: Elusive Legend. Two good books in a row to copyedit. Life was at least okay.
She did wish Crazy Legs was on disk rather than paper, or had been sent to her electronically. Instead of using her computer, here Neeve was again lugging around a thick stack of twenty-weight copy paper.
Suddenly she realized she was chilled. Leaves rattled above her, and she looked up to see that the sky had darkened and a breeze was wafting through the park, swaying the foliage. Dark leaves silhouetted against the gathering gloom did their restricted dance in the wind. Off in the distance, a man and woman hurried side by side along the trail, in the direction of the exit onto Central Park West. The man had his arm around the woman’s waist. Neeve felt a pang of… what? Envy? Loneliness?