“Will you be wanting to rent a new box?” he asked me.
I was distracted, staring at the box, wondering what was inside. “I’m sorry, what?”
“Well, obviously, we can’t put this box back. There’s no way to secure it.”
“Oh, of course. I haven’t decided yet.”
“Fine.”
I realized he was waiting for me to remove the box. That was my job, not his. I didn’t know what to expect, but this wasn’t the time to say, “Oops, changed my mind,” not with a hole drilled in the bank’s wall. Finally, I tugged on the handle and slid the long box into my arms. I expected it to be heavy, but it was surprisingly easy to carry. With a patient smile, Dumbo guided me to a private room outside the vault. It was small and carpeted, with nothing but a table and chair inside. There was nothing on the walls, not even a photograph or a painting. The bank wants to make sure you know you have complete privacy when you peel back the lid of your box. No hidden cameras. No hidden microphones.
“Just signal me when you’re ready,” Dumbo said.
“Yes, I will.”
He closed the door, leaving me inside. Just me and the box.
I stared at it on the table. I looked around for Sonny, because I thought he would be here to witness the unveiling. I wanted to say to him, “You led me here,” but of course, he hadn’t. He’d kept this from me. Whatever was inside, he never wanted me to see it.
He wasn’t here with me now.
I put my hand on the latch. I thought about what I would find inside. Diamonds. Flash drives. Stock certificates. Gold – no, not heavy enough for that. Maybe a list of bank accounts in countries with a see-no-evil attitude toward wire transfers. Those were the sorts of things you would take from the yacht of a billionaire thief. Those were the sorts of things King Royal would want for himself.
I opened the box. Whatever I expected to find inside, I was wrong, wrong, wrong. This had never been about money. There was no money at all. No hidden fortune. No cash. No jewels. The box was empty except for one ugly, awful thing staring up at me. It made me wish I’d never opened it at all.
Inside the box was a gun.
39
I don’t like guns.
I really, really don’t like guns. I have never held a gun in my life, and seeing one up close didn’t make me want to pick it up. Don’t ask me what kind of gun it was. I have no idea. The big kind. The kind that kills people. In this case, the kind that kills a man named Irving Wolfe before his body is dumped in the ocean to be hauled up with a net full of shrimp a few months later.
That kind of gun.
It was in a plastic bag, one of those zipper bags you use for leftovers. I could simply pop it in the freezer and forget about it. Months from now, I would be hunting for something for dinner: Lean Cuisine, Tombstone pizza, garlic shrimp, mother’s veggie pie, oh and look, there’s that gun, right next to the mocha chip ice cream.
I sat there, paralyzed, staring at it, wondering what to do. I don’t know how much time passed, but it could have been an hour or two. I knew I couldn’t stay at the bank forever. Sooner or later, Dumbo would check to make sure I was still alive. Of course, maybe he’d forget about me; maybe I could wait until the bank was closed, and when I opened the door, everyone would be gone.
Or not.
I had my shoulder purse with me. This was a day when I was glad I didn’t carry a clutch. I put the bag in my purse with my fingertips, like it was something I’d picked up in the park with a pooper scooper. The purse felt heavy as I slung it back over my arm. I closed the lid of the deposit box, opened the door, and signaled Dumbo with a forced smile.
“Did you make a decision about another box?” he asked me.
“Yes, I don’t need one.”
“We’ll close it out then, shall we?”
“Please.”
“Well, I’m sorry for all the trouble today,” he told me. “I know I’ll be seeing you as we wrap up Sonny’s affairs, but if I can help in any way, you know where to find me.” His ears gave me a final, polite flap.
“Thank you, Mr. Barnes.”
I shook his hand and tried not to run for the bank door or fall off my heels as I walked. I just wanted to be out of there, where I could think, where I could decide where to go and what to do next. Sonny’s bank is on the Upper East Side on Park Avenue, so I emerged from the revolving door into a pushing-shoving crowd of upscale shoppers. No one paid any attention to me. I was just one more New York woman with an illegal concealed weapon.
You’d think it would be liberating to carry a gun. Bump into me, will you, buddy? Guess what’s in my purse?
No, it’s not liberating. It was just scary.
I walked two blocks to Fifth and turned north. I didn’t know where I was going. Everything I knew and loved was in the opposite direction, so that was as good a reason as any to go the other way. I stayed on the west side of the street beside the park. A horse cop passed me – that’s a cop on a horse, not a horse who’s a cop – and he eyed my purse and said, “Are you carrying a concealed weapon, ma’am?”
No, he didn’t say that. He just smiled at me.
I walked all the way to the Met, where I sat down on the steps. It was late afternoon already. A long, cold, gray day. I was surrounded by tourists taking pictures, teenagers making out, and bearded liberals thinking deep thoughts. There were banners between the columns advertising museum exhibitions. I sat on the steps, heavy purse in hand, and considered my options.
I could make the gun disappear. Throw it away and wipe my hands. No one knew the gun existed – except maybe King Royal – and no one would miss it. I could board the Circle Line, accidentally lose my purse in the Hudson, and if anyone asked me what was in the safe deposit box, I would say: Nothing. It was empty. Of course, the cops would probably ask Dumbo how long I’d sat inside the bank room, and it was hard to explain spending an hour staring at an empty box. There had to be other options.
You have a gun in your purse, Julie. What are you going to do with it?
I could shoot people. That’s what you do with guns. Just flesh wounds, nothing serious. I would only shoot very, very annoying people, like meteorologists.
I could melt it down into a paperweight. A lump of metal on my desk. What’s that? Oh, that’s the gun my father used to kill Irving Wolfe.
Options. I needed options, but I really had only one option, singular, not plural. There was only one thing to do. I knew that as soon as I opened the box. I knew that as I walked to the Met. I knew that as I sat on the steps. I could go round and round and end up in the same place every time.
I thought to myself: Would it make a difference if Sonny were alive? Would I make a different choice?
No. I’m sorry, Sonny. I only have one choice.
I’d put off the inevitable long enough. I took my phone and did what I had to do. I called Goldy Brown of the FBI.
“You are an honest woman, darling,” Bree told me. “I’m very impressed.”
“You would have done the same thing in my shoes,” I said.
“Me? I don’t know. Did you really give the flesh-wounds-for-annoying-people option enough consideration? That’s got potential. I can certainly think of some Londoners who deserve a little lead in their buttocks.”
“You would have handed the gun over,” I repeated. “I know you, Bree Cox. You’re not as criminally subversive as you pretend to be.”
She shrugged. “Oh, I know, but it’s lovely to dream, isn’t it? Besides, the least you could have done is let me see the gun before you gave it to Brownie McBeige.”
“Sorry.”
Bree took my hand as we walked. We used to walk hand in hand in the old days wherever we went. There was just something about it that reminded us we were best friends. Of course, New Yorkers generally hate people holding hands, because they take up too much of the sidewalk space. However, as women, we get a free pass, because it’s hot.
It was after dark on the New York streets, and the city
glowed with light. We were near the Flatiron Building, where I spent most of my career doing deals at the McNally-Brown Agency. It’s a beautiful building, but the offices are crummy. Too hot in the summer, too cold in the winter. The place had memories for me, though. Kevin making love to me on his desk. Kevin making love to other women on his desk. Me slapping Kevin. Me slapping Bree.
I didn’t say they were all pleasant memories.
Bree saw me staring at the building. “Miss it?” she asked.
“No.”
“Me neither. I’d never work for anyone again.”
“You love being on your own, don’t you?”
“I do,” she said. “Self-employment is heaven. You get all of the stress and long hours with none of the hassles like security and benefits.”
I laughed. I hadn’t laughed much today. Bree noticed, and she squeezed my hand.
“You’ll weather this storm like all the others, darling,” she said. “Next week you’ll be in La-La Land canoodling with Thad. You’ll be calling up Jen Garner, saying ‘Jen, sweetheart, this hooker mother role, trust me, it’s emotionally authentic.’”
I laughed again.
We’d had dinner together in Koreatown. I love bulgogi and mandu, and Bree loves kimchee so hot it makes your eyes water. I didn’t know where we were going now. Maybe to find a club or a bar. The great thing about New York is that you don’t have to know where you’re going, and you’ll wind up there anyway.
I no longer had a gun in my purse. This made the entire city safer.
“Not to bring up a sore subject,” Bree said, “but have you thought about what you’re going to do about the book?”
I knew what she meant. Captain Absolute was a lie. Do I need to have the ending rewritten to portray my father as a murderer? Do I offer refunds to people who bought the book? Do I pull it off the shelves entirely? There was a lot of money at stake in whatever I chose to do. For West 57. For Helmut. For King. Even for Bree. It’s not like I could sue King to get the advance back if Sonny knew that the book was a lie from the start. The real danger is that people would sue me.
“I haven’t decided,” I said, which was true.
“Well, it’s our mess together, you and me. We were both conned. You were right about all this nonsense from the beginning, and I was wrong. I will back you up in anything you need to do.”
“I have a few options,” I said.
“Options? Plural?” Bree smiled and shook her head. “Julie, as long as I have known you, you have been a one-option girl. You pretend you have all these choices competing in your head, and the reality is, you know from day one exactly what you’re going to do. It just takes you forever to get around to doing it.”
I thought I should complain about that judgment on principle. “That’s not true,” I said.
“You only had one option on the gun, right?”
“Yes, but that’s different.”
“Only one option on selling West 57, right?”
“Yes, but that was economic.”
“Whatever you say, darling. You are predictable, and I love that about you.”
“I never thought I would go to Los Angeles,” I protested. “To work with my mother? To start a relationship with Thad?”
“I agree,” Bree said, winking at me. “That’s not like you at all.”
“So you’re wrong.”
“I’m never wrong,” Bree replied cheerily.
“Now you sound like Sonny,” I said.
Bree lit a cigarette, and I thought: Sonny.
I’d been trying not to think about him, ever since I found the gun. I’d put my mind on hold. However, sooner or later, I needed to confront the reality in front of me. Sonny killed a man – an evil man, an immoral man, but a man. It was still a crime. It was still murder. I wasn’t sure I could ever forgive him.
Sonny.
Why did he do it? That was what I really wanted to know. What made him go so far?
Bree blew a cloud of smoke into the street. She eyed me and read my mind. “Don’t go leaping to conclusions, Julie. There’s a lot we don’t know about what happened.”
“Irving Wolfe was shot in the head. I found a gun in a secret safe deposit box that had only been opened once, by Sonny, just days after Wolfe died. I’m not naive, Bree.”
“Well, I’m not suggesting you put on rose-colored glasses,” she told me. “It’s suspicious, that’s for sure.”
“It’s more than suspicious.”
“Maybe you should take up smoking,” she said, taking the cigarette out of her mouth. “Want a suck?”
“No thanks.”
“Are you sure? Nothing says ‘I love you’ like carcinogens.”
I laughed again. I was almost tempted to start smoking, but Bree stopped abruptly on the street, with her cigarette dangling from her fingers. “Darling!” she announced suddenly, with a big smile on her face. “How the freak are you?”
I looked around Broadway, but there was no one nearby. Either Bree was talking to herself, or she’d begun to see dead people, like me.
“How’s Angie?” Bree went on. “Give that sweetie a kiss for me. Is she with you?”
“What?” I said.
Bree winked and pointed at her ear. She was on the phone. Damn Bluetooth.
“God, yes, darling, the video was a freaking riot, wasn’t it? I knew you’d love it. The man is a trip. He’s got a voice, doesn’t he?” She listened, and her face changed. “Seriously? Are you sure? No, you’re right, we’ve been looking for him. What can I say? As usual, you have saved me in the nick of time. You’re a gem. Remember, we need you in the movie of Paperback Bitch, darling. You are the cornerstone of the whole thing. Yes, yes, Cherie will call. Ta for now. Kiss kiss.”
Bree hung up.
“That was Brad,” she said, putting her cigarette back in her mouth.
“Who?”
“Brad Pitt.”
“You were just talking to Brad Pitt?” I asked.
“He’s filming in Capetown. Freaking fantastic.”
“How do you know him?”
“We’re mates, don’t you remember? He got my arse out of a sling when I was starting out.”
That was true. I remembered now. Bree was down to one client and a bench in Hyde Park when Brad Pitt called to save the day by doing a huge deal for a movie that made a fortune.
“So what did he say?” I asked.
“He found King Royal for us.”
“Brad Pitt found King? How on earth did he do that?”
“I tweeted the Assy McHattie video to a few people. Brad nearly bust a gut laughing. So did Angelina. He re-tweeted it to half his contact folder, including, as it turns out, one of the old Law & Order producers here in New York. I loved that show. Da dum!”
“Bree.”
“It was never the same after they lost Orbach, though, don’t you think?”
“Bree.”
“Right. Anyway, I guess this guy texted Brad a few minutes ago to say that he was listening to King sing the Assy McHattie song right now, live and in person. Brad called me. I guess he saw my post to King about giving me a freaking call before I freaking find him and cut off his motherfreaking you-know-what.”
Needless to say, that comment was highly edited.
“So where is he?” I asked.
“The Law & Order guy is on his yacht over at the Chelsea Piers. King’s on the boat across from him.”
“King’s on a boat?” I asked.
“Not a boat, darling. The boat. He’s on the Captain Absolute.”
40
“Julie Chavan!” King shouted to us as we walked up the pier. “Bree of Many Cox! The two loveliest ladies on the planet are here. Captain, my Captain, shall we welcome them as honored guests? Aye aye! Permission to come aboard!”
Yes, King was drunk again. Very drunk.
We climbed the ladder onto the monster yacht, which was like boarding an aircraft carrier. King weaved around the main deck in an unbuttoned silk shi
rt and boxer shorts. His feet were bare. He wore a white captain’s hat, and his curly ringlets bounced under the brim as he swayed.
“Why don’t you sit down, King?” I suggested.
King shook his head fiercely and spread his arms wide. In one hand was an open bottle of champagne. Two other empty bottles rolled around the deck as the boat bobbed. “Sit? Sit? No, we must keep moving, my Captain. Move or die, move or die, move or die, like sharks we are! Move or die!”
Bree was right. When I had the gun, I should have spent more time thinking about flesh wounds for annoying people.
We were in the private marina at the Chelsea Piers on the Hudson, surrounded by a smattering of sailboats, catamarans, and floating mansions. These weren’t party barges serving Pabst Blue Ribbon on summer Sundays. These were the boats that people bought when they got bored with their Lamborghinis. It was ten o’clock at night. Most of the yachts were dark and empty; it was too early in the season, and too cold, to be at sea or partying. A lot of slips were empty. Their owners were probably docked in some blue-green bay in the Caribbean. I did see one impressive sailboat a hundred yards away, brightly lit, with a lone man in a deck chair sipping white wine. He waved at me. I figured he was Brad’s friend, the Law & Order guy.
We were aboard the Captain Absolute. That was the yacht’s name – and, hence, the book’s name – but its checkered legacy would be painted over soon. The trustee handling the claims of defrauded investors was in the process of selling the boat to a private charter company, and soon the yacht on which Wolfe died would be re-christened and re-launched to serve as a luxury boat for corporations catering to their top executives and clients. That was the way of the world.
It was a very nice boat. Well over one hundred feet, three levels, glistening in white and black. A helicopter landing pad. Even Thad probably could not afford this boat. Then again, if you have stolen hundreds of millions of dollars, you deserve a nice place to put your feet up on the water.
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