West 57

by B. N. Freeman

  “You don’t honestly believe Irving Wolfe is alive, do you?” Bree asked, standing beside me. “Only conspiracy nuts believe that.”

  Ms. Brown’s brown head swiveled toward Bree. Even her eyes were brown. “You’re the agent who works with King Royal, aren’t you? Bree Cox?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “I have some questions for you, too.”

  “I can’t wait,” Bree said brightly. She added with a sly grin, “I love your outfit, by the way. Polyester is the new silk.”

  Ms. Brown pulled out her gun and emptied her clip into Bree’s smiling face. Okay, no, she didn’t, but she wanted to.

  “What can we do for you, Ms. Brown?” I asked.

  “A reporter was killed last night in a hit and run on 131st near the Hudson,” she told me.

  “Nick Duggan of the Post,” I replied. “Yes, I read about that.”

  “His phone records indicate that he called you a few hours before he was killed.”

  “That’s right,” I said. When a law enforcement officer asks you a question like that, you want to establish your innocence quickly. “I hope you don’t think I rushed up there and ran him down. I don’t even know how to drive.”

  “Besides, she has an alibi,” Bree interjected. “She was getting laid at the time.”

  I winced in embarrassment. Thank you, Bree.

  To make matters worse, Ms. Brown said, “Yes, I know.”

  Great. The FBI was keeping tabs on my sex life. They must be really bored.

  “Why did Nick Duggan call you, Ms. Chavan?” she asked me.

  “I have no idea. I didn’t take the call. I let it go to voice mail.”

  “Did he leave you a message?”

  “No.”

  “He sent you a text a few minutes later and wanted you to meet him.”

  “I know. I didn’t reply.”

  “His text said it was urgent.”

  “I know what his text said, but I was busy.” And you already know what I was busy doing.

  “So you have no idea what Nick Duggan wanted to talk to you about?”

  “No, I don’t.”

  “You’ve talked to him before, though, haven’t you?”

  Ms. Brown said this like it was some kind of amazing revelation. She probably watches NCIS reruns on Saturday nights. If someone is going to interrogate me, I really want it to be Mark Harmon.

  “A couple times, yes. He approached me outside my office building.”

  “What did he want?”

  “He was doing some kind of story about King Royal and his biography of Irving Wolfe, which I’m publishing.”

  “Did he tell you anything about the story?”

  “Reporters don’t usually talk about their stories. They’re afraid of getting scooped.”

  “Of course, with Nick, it was usually a pooper scoop,” Bree added, laughing.

  Ms. Brown didn’t laugh. She studied Bree with the eyes of a turkey vulture spotting an even plumper mouse right next to the one she was hunting. “You knew Nick Duggan, Ms. Cox?”

  “I know every London reporter,” Bree said, which is like boasting that you are intimately familiar with every sexually transmitted disease. It’s not likely to enhance your reputation.

  “Did Mr. Duggan ever contact you to talk about King Royal? Or about Irving Wolfe?”

  “No, he knew I’d never tell him a thing.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because the man was a soiled sheet of toilet tissue clinging to the anus of humanity.”

  “It sounds like you knew him pretty well.”

  “Nick lived off gossip and innuendo. He didn’t care whether any of it was true.”

  “Even so, you and Mr. Royal stand to make a lot of money on this book, don’t you?” Ms. Brown asked. “Neither one of you would want Nick Duggan printing any embarrassing revelations that would hurt sales.”

  “If you’ve seen King on TV, you’ll know he isn’t easily embarrassed,” Bree said. “Neither am I.”

  “I can vouch for that,” I said.

  “Have you seen or talked to Nick Duggan in the past month?” Ms. Brown asked Bree again.

  “I already said no.”

  “What about your client? Do you know if Duggan made any kind of contact with King Royal?”

  “Of course not,” Bree said.

  I must have made a little yurp sound. Ms. Brown looked at me again with her chocolate eyes. “Is there something you want to tell me, Ms. Chavan?”

  “Actually, I saw King talking to Nick Duggan two nights ago,” I admitted.

  “Where was this?” Ms. Brown and Bree asked simultaneously.

  “Outside the Gansevoort. It was late, the middle of the night.”

  “What were they talking about?”

  “I have no idea,” I said. “I was too far away.” I was also drunk, depressed, horny, and flatulent, so I had other things on my mind.

  “King didn’t kill Duggan,” Bree told Ms. Brown. “I happen to know for a fact that he was getting laid last night, too.”

  I groaned. “Oh, Bree, tell me you didn’t have sex with him.”

  “Not me, darling,” she replied, rolling her eyes. “The cocktail twins from the bar. Although it’s a little tempting to see what that monster would feel like, don’t you think? Anyway, I saw them go into his room together, and I’m sure the three of them were doing sticky shots for most of the night. I doubt King had enough time or bodily fluids to rent a car and drive to the other end of Manhattan to meet Nick Duggan.”

  “What about you?” Ms. Brown asked Bree.

  “Me?”

  “Yes, you. Where did you go last night after you left King Royal?”

  “Last night?”

  “Yes, last night.”

  Bree opened her mouth and closed it like a fish in a tank. She obviously didn’t want to say what she was doing. She looked at Ms. Brown, and then she looked at me, and then she looked at the sidewalk, apparently in search of a hole into which she could crawl. “I went back to my hotel room,” she said feebly.

  Bree?

  Her hotel room?

  In Manhattan?

  No, that was a lie and not a convincing one. Bree Cox did not spend an evening in New York watching Top Chef and eating microwave popcorn. A dance club? Maybe. A dinner with Viggo? Also maybe. Getting drunk with the cast of Jersey Boys? Equally maybe. Hotel room? No.

  “You were in your room all evening?” Ms. Brown asked Bree.

  “Yes.”

  “Alone?”

  “Yes.”

  “Doing what?”

  “What difference does it make?” Bree snapped. “I was alone. I was in my room. End of story.”

  “Did you make any phone calls?”

  “No.”

  Now I really knew she was lying. Bree couldn’t spend twenty minutes without making or receiving a phone call, unless she was in the middle of sexual intercourse. Even then, I think she might sneak in a call while changing positions. And, of course, I suddenly realized that’s exactly what Bree had been doing. That’s why she was lying. She’d had sex with someone and didn’t want to tell me who it was.

  It wasn’t much of a leap to figure out the lucky guy. I was already in bed with one of my ex-fiancés. So Bree called the other.

  “Oh, my God, you screwed Kevin Stone last night, didn’t you?” I demanded.

  Bree groaned. “Oh, balls. Yes, yes, all right, I figured everyone else was getting some, so why not me? I’m so sorry, darling. So much for willpower and giving up married men. You can slap me again if you like. It’s a freebie.”

  “Don’t worry about it, Bree,” I said. “I don’t care.”

  “Really?”

  Really. I didn’t care. It surprised me, but I realized that I loved Bree enough to finally forgive her, not just for last night, but for all the mistakes of the past. For all her flaws, Bree was someone I needed in my life. More than that, she was someone I wanted in my life. Cherie was right. I held onto grudges too long
, and it was time to give this one up.

  Bree saw it in my eyes. We were friends again. “Does this mean it’s you and me against the world, darling? Like in the old days? Hos before bros?”

  I laughed. As always, I couldn’t help laughing at everything she said. “You and me,” I agreed.

  She hugged me. I hugged her. It was a tender, intimate moment, except for the FBI agent standing there, interrogating us about a murder. Ms. Brown looked peeved, probably because no one was hugging her.

  “Someone killed Nick Duggan,” she reminded us, “and it’s got something to do with Irving Wolfe.”

  Bree wiped her eyes. It was odd to see her emotional, and I knew how much it meant to her that we were a team again. “Look, J. Edgar, Nick Duggan had more thumbs in pies than Little Jack Horner. He made enemies with every story he did. Why do you think he was killed because of Irving Wolfe? It was probably some politician or celeb or somebody else who got slimed by one of Duggan’s rants. Now leave us alone, okay?”

  The FBI agent stared at me. “Is that what you think, too, Ms. Chavan? Do you really believe Duggan’s death had nothing to do with Captain Absolute?”

  “Captain Absolute is just a book,” I insisted. “A book couldn’t possibly be worth killing over.”

  Right?

  That’s true, isn’t it?

  But I didn’t believe it, and neither did Ms. Brown.

  “Trust me, Ms. Chavan,” she said, “anything involving Irving Wolfe is worth killing over.”

  26

  Naked in the Post. Dead reporter. Questioned by the FBI.

  You’d have to say my day wasn’t off to a great start, and it didn’t get any better when I arrived at the West 57 building. Bree grabbed a cab south to the Gansevoort to pry King Royal off the twins and get him ready for the bookstore event later that day. I went to the office and hoped I could get inside and close my door before anyone spotted me.

  No such luck.

  I slipped into the elevator by myself, but as the doors closed, a hand stopped them, and Garrett got inside with me. He was absolutely the last person in the world I wanted to see. He had coffee for one and no bag of Turkish rum babas. I’d already stuffed my face with Bree, but I would have done it again if Garrett had brought breakfast for me, which he usually did. Not today. We stood next to each other, shoulder to shoulder, not saying a word.

  It was awkward.

  We hadn’t parted on the best of terms yesterday. I was mad at him for making a lame excuse and breaking our date, although it was hard to take the moral high ground, because I’d been about to break our date, too. I’d also lied about meeting my mother for dinner and then had sex with Thad. Plus the whole daisies-over-the-nipples photo spread in the newspaper. I was not really covered in glory.

  I thought to myself: Garrett is not the kind of man who reads the Post. He probably didn’t even know about the photos. If I was really lucky, no one in the office knew, and Garrett would never find out.

  Or maybe not.

  “So how’s your mother?” he asked.

  I heard the acid in his voice. He knew.

  “Since when do you read the Post?” I asked him.

  “Since four of my friends called to ask if I’d seen the hot girl I work with on page six.”

  “Really? They said I was hot?”

  Okay, that’s not important.

  “Look, I’m sorry I lied,” I went on. “I was embarrassed to tell you. Cherie fixed me up with Thad, and I couldn’t get out of it.”

  “Yes, it looked like a mercy date, the way your panties were dangling from your thumb.”

  Anger bubbled up inside me, turning me red. I’m short, and it doesn’t take long for the steam to rise to the top. “That’s all you can say to me? Do you realize what I feel like this morning? This was private. This was personal. Those bastards splashed my life all over the newspaper like I was some kind of hooker. And all you can do is take shots at me? Why do you care who I sleep with, anyway?”

  “I don’t. You don’t owe me anything at all.”

  “Yes, you made that very freaking clear, didn’t you?”

  Garrett started to shout a reply and then stopped himself. He paced in the elevator car, which smelled like beer. The carpet was stained. The walls were faux wood panels. The space was tiny, and we were never more than a couple feet apart. As he stalked angrily back and forth, our bodies kept brushing together. I wondered how many people had had sex in here.

  He leaned back against the metal doors and shoved his hands in his jeans pockets. The toes of our shoes bumped. He looked at me for the first time. “What the hell does that mean?” he asked.

  “You know exactly what it means,” I said.

  “No, I don’t.”

  “You were the one who called it off last night, Garrett. You had an important engagement, remember? If you’re upset about me lying to you, then tell me the truth. What did you do last night? What was so important?”

  Garrett’s jaw clenched. He pushed his brown hair out of his face and left it messy, which made me want to straighten it. He looked away and wanted to lie, but I knew he’d tell me the truth. That’s who he is.

  “I finished reading Woodham Road again,” he told me. “I put a frozen pizza in the oven. I drank three Summits. I watched the Yankees get clocked. Okay?”

  “That sure sounds like an important engagement,” I said.

  “It wasn’t nearly as exciting as your evening.”

  “From where I’m standing, I don’t think you’ve got much right to judge me.”

  “Fine. We’re both liars.”

  “I lied because you hurt me,” I told him, my voice rising. The elevator car felt small and warm. “I was going to tell you the truth about Thad, because I felt awful about having to cancel, but you cut me off. You dumped our date and made it very clear that it was no big deal to you.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “Oh, don’t try to spare my feelings. The only reason you asked me out at all is because I was drunk and you felt sorry for me. You were being gallant, and then you thought, oh my God, what did I do?”

  Garrett came even closer to me. We were breathing the same air. “Don’t you put words in my mouth, Julie Chavan.”

  “Tell me I’m wrong.”

  “You’re wrong.”

  “Oh, really? So why did you lie? Why did you break our date?”

  “Because you came into my office and I could read the truth all over your face. Do you think I’m blind? You got drunk and made a fool of yourself, and when you sobered up, you realized you’d started something that you never meant to finish.”

  “So what, you’re a psychic now? You can read my mind?”

  “I didn’t need to read your mind. You may as well have been wearing a t-shirt that said, ‘I need an out! Please give me an out!’ So I gave you one, Julie. I gave you an out so you didn’t have to feel bad about letting me down.”

  We were both losing it. We shouted like teenagers. The elevator kept creeping toward the floor for West 57.

  “I don’t need you to make decisions for me, Garrett!”

  “No, you’ve got your mother for that. And Thad.”

  “That’s crap!”

  “Oh, really? I didn’t need to give you an out, but you sure took it, didn’t you?”

  “What does that mean?”

  “I mean, Cherie fixed you up on a date, and you couldn’t possibly say no to your mother, who’s been trying to run your life since she gave birth to you. You tell me stories for years about Thad Keller suffocating you, and then he’s back in your life for one day and you fall into bed with him. Real independent.”

  “How dare you!” I screamed, because when someone is right, you want to scream at them about how wrong they are. “How dare you talk to me like that!”

  “Wake up, Julie!” he shouted back at me. “Everyone is running your life except you! Hell, Sonny’s dead, and he’s still telling you what to do!”

  Ding.

&nb
sp; The elevator doors finally slid open, freeing us. We had been inside for what felt like hours. Oddly, it was so sweaty and humid where we were, and we were both breathing so hard, that it was as if we had made love together, rather than had a fight that probably ended our friendship.

  I was angry, upset, frustrated, and embarrassed, so I did the mature thing. I pushed Garrett hard. He is as tall as a tree, and I am a shrub, but I had adrenaline on my side. He stumbled backward. I shoved past him into the lobby of West 57, where half the staff was staring at the elevator open-mouthed. Sound travels pretty well up those shafts. They’d heard most of it.

  I didn’t care what anyone thought anymore.

  I stormed into my office and slammed the door.

  Fortunately, Sonny wasn’t waiting to lecture me on my failings. I couldn’t deal with him now. Instead, the phone was ringing, and I put on a happy face and answered it as if it were the best day of my life. Rather than one of the worst.

  “Julie, it’s Helmut at Gernestier.”

  I don’t think Helmut bugged the elevator at West 57, and I don’t think he’s a reader of the Post. Nonetheless, the man is a master of timing. He manages to find me at my weakest moments. I was still trying to catch my breath.

  “Hello, Helmut,” I said.

  “Today is the big day, yes? You have the first bookstore event at Stables & Proud for Captain Absolute. I’m sure it will go well.”

  “I hope so.”

  “That author of yours, King Royal, he’s quite the character.”

  “Yes, he is, but he’s Sonny’s author, not mine.”

  I wondered why I felt the need to make that distinction to Helmut. To Gernestier, there was no difference. Everything was mine now. However, in my heart, I knew that I was beginning to separate Sonny from West 57. They weren’t the same thing. Sonny was my father, and West 57 was a business running out of money.

  “Of course,” Helmut replied, as if he understood my psychology better than I did. “I know you must be busy, but I hoped you might have time to join me in my office today. We could open some champagne.”

  “To celebrate King’s book?”

  “To celebrate new beginnings.”

  They say you shouldn’t make important decisions at moments of emotional turmoil. Then again, isn’t every crossroad fraught with emotion?