Street Dreams

by Street Dreams

  “Uh . . . of course.” Decker smiled weakly. “But only if it’s okay with your mother, Cindy.”

  “I thought I’d set her up with some of Koby’s English-speaking, less religious siblings. Maybe a few could stay with Grandpa.”

  “Your mother’s father?”

  “Yes, Dad. I wasn’t thinking of your dad in Florida.”

  “You’re going to sic Jack Cohen on Koby’s relatives?”

  “Stop that!” I scolded. “I love Grandpa.”

  “I love Jack, too,” Dad answered. “He was the best part about your mother. But he’s different.” He shook his head. “Have you really thought about this?”

  I noticed my father turning a slight shade of green. “Maybe we should discuss this later and just celebrate my promotion tonight?”

  “Good idea.” My father looked as if a headache were coming on. Just then Sammy walked in. “Dad, could you—Oh, hi, guys.” He homed in on my fiancé. “Koby, we need to talk. I’ve got this emergency situation. A basketball game on Sunday.”

  “I’mworking, Shmuel.”

  “What time do you start?” Sammy asked.

  “Three.”

  “No problem. The game’s at ten.”

  “Sammy, that’s enough,” Decker said.

  “Our star forward’s grandmother died. I promise you’ll be out by one because we’re all going to the funeral at two.”

  “Sammy, you are truly sick,” I told him.

  My stepbrother ignored me. “Koby, we reallyneed you. Otherwise it’s going to be embarrassing.”

  “Surely there are other token blacks in this area.”

  “Not this late in the series. They’ve already been snapped up. C’mon. I’m going back to New York next week.Please? ”

  “I have to help Cindy pack.”

  “I’ll help her pack after the funeral.” Sammy looked at me. “Where are you going?”

  “I’m moving,” I told him.

  “Oh. Where?”

  Koby raised his eyebrows.

  “Oh.” Sammy looked at Daddy, trying not to smile. “Okay. I’ll help you pack, Cin. I promise.”

  “I can manage. I don’t own that much.” I regarded Koby. “You can play.” I elbowed my stepbrother in the ribs. “Anything to shut him up.”

  Koby rubbed his forehead. “You are a nag, Shmuel.”

  “Persistent.”

  “Just this one last time.”

  “Thank you, thank you.”

  “Don’t expect miracles.”

  “Koby, it’s all a matter of image! Skill doesn’t hurt, either.”

  Decker wagged a finger at him. “You’re overstepping your bounds, young man. I’m only permitting it because he’s now family. Say hello to your brother-in-law.”

  I showed Sammy my ring.

  “Really? Cool!” He kissed my cheek. “I gotta go call Yossi beforeShabbat. He’s gonna freak when I tell him. Thanks, Koby.”

  “Andmazel tov?” Koby prompted.

  “Oh sure.Mazel tov, although it wasn’t exactly unexpected. But it’s still neat.”

  He left.

  “Well, he was certainly excited,” I commented.

  My father laughed. “Sammy was born politically incorrect, God bless him.”

  Rina came into the living room. “I thought I heard voices.” She wiped her hands on her apron. “Dressed like that, I’m assuming you’re staying?”

  “If it’s okay with you.”

  “Of course.” She kissed my cheek. “Shabbat Shalom.”

  Without a word, Koby showed her my finger. My stepmother’s eyes lit up. “Oh my goodness, it’sbeautiful! ” She hugged me hard. “Did you tell your mother?”

  “Yes, she was the first one we told.”

  “Perfect!” Rina hugged Koby and kissed his cheek. “Mazel tov, mazel tov!This is so incredibly exciting!”

  “All this and a gold shield, too,” I said.

  “Oh, that’s right! Wedefinitely need champagne!”

  Koby lifted the bottle.

  Rina said, “I’ll go chill it.” Her face was suffused with pure happiness, unlike the happy but wistful expression that my father wore. “Have you set a date?”

  “We were just talking about this,” I said. “I asked Dad if you could put up Koby’s parents because they’re—”

  “Of course!” Rina said. “We’ll put up anyone you want.”

  “He has between thirty and sixty relatives, dear,” my father remarked.

  “Okay. As soon as you set the date, let me know so I can call the caterer forShabbat dinner and lunch on the day of theaufruf. ” She spoke to Koby. “You’ll have it in our shul, I take it. Unless you want to do it in your shul.”

  “Yourbeit knesset is fine.”

  Rina was beaming. “This is so exciting. I can’t wait to meet your family. And don’t worry, Koby. We’ll put them all up. It’s not a problem.”

  My dad was massaging a wrinkled forehead. Koby put his arm around his shoulder. “Now you see why I left.”

  Sammy came back in and kissed his mother. “Eema, Eema, you’ve gained a son and I’ve gained a forward!” He scrutinized Koby’s face. “I guess you can call her Eema although she’s only what, ten years older than you?”

  “No, she’s ten years older than I am,” I said. “She’s only six—”

  “Can we move on?” Dad interjected.

  “It’s irrelevant becausemother is a state of mind,” Rina pronounced. “Besides, Cindy’s mother would beeema. ”

  “No, my mother will bemom, ” I told her. “Definitely noteema. ”

  “My stepmother is Eema,” Koby said. “To me, you are Rina because that’s what Cindy calls you. Besides, Rina fits your face.”

  “Whatever you want, Yaakov.”

  He focused his eyes on Daddy’s face. “My question is . . . what do I call you, sir?”

  “What do you call me?”

  “Yes.”

  Decker rubbed his hands and thought a moment. “Lieutenant is fine.”

  “Peter!” Rina chastised.

  “It’s my title.”

  “Maybe alittle less formal, Daddy?”

  “No problem.” He threw his arm around my fiancé’s shoulder. “Koby, my man . . . you can call me Loo.”

  special eBook Feature:

  Excerpt

  from

  STONE KISS

  1

  It was the stunned,pale look of bad news. Decker immediately thought of his parents, both in their mid-eighties, and though their health wasn’t failing, they had had some problems over the past year. Right away, Rina had the good sense to tell him that the family was fine.

  Decker was holding his daughter’s hand. Looking down at the little girl, he said, “Hannah Rosie, let me fix you up with some videos and a snack. I think Eema needs to talk to me.”

  “It’s okay, Daddy. I can do it myself. Eema taught me how to use the microwave.”

  “Nine years old and ready for college.”

  “No, Daddy, but I can use a VCR and a microwave.” She turned to her mother. “I got an A on a spelling test. I didn’t even study.”

  “That’s wonderful. Not that you didn’t study, but that you got an A.” Rina kissed her daughter’s cheek. “I’ll be with you in a minute.”

  “Whatever . . .” Hannah left, rolling her wheeled backpack into the kitchen.

  “You should sit.” Decker regarded his wife. “You’re colorless.”

  “I’m all right.” But she sank down into the couch, hugging a blue-and-white-checked throw pillow like a life preserver. Her cerulean eyes skittered around the living room, first landing on the lamp, then bouncing off Decker’s special leather chair, onto the white wicker rocker. Anywhere but on his face.

  “My parents are fine?” he asked specifically.

  “Perfect,” Rina reiterated. “Jonathan called—”

  “Oh God!His mother?”

  “No, she’s fine.”

  Jonathan’s mother was Frieda Levine. S
he was also Decker’s biological mother, making Jon his half brother. Ten years ago, by accident rather than by design, Decker had met up with his maternal family, which included five half siblings. Ties had been forged: more than mere acknowledgments, but less than time-tested relationships. Decker still considered his only parents to be the two people who had adopted him in infancy. “Then what’s going on?”

  They both heard the microwave beep. A moment later, Hannah came out, juggling a pizza bagel on a plate, a big glass of milk, and her backpack. Decker said, “Let me help you with that, sweetie.”

  Wordlessly, she handed her father the food and her schoolbag, skipping off to her bedroom, orange ringlets flying behind her. Like the faithful valet, Decker followed several steps behind. Rina got up, went into the kitchen, and started a pot of coffee. Nervously, she pulled off her head covering and unclipped the barrette holding a ponytail, shaking out a shoulder-length sheet of iridescent black hair. Then she tied it up again, but left the head covering off. She picked imaginary dirt off her jeans skirt, then moved on to the imaginary lint on her pink sweater. She gnawed the edge of her thumb, but that only made the hangnail worse.

  Decker came back in, sat down at their cherry breakfast table—a bit scarred but still rock solid. When he carved it, he had used the best-quality wood he could find, and it showed. He took off his blue suit jacket and draped it over the back of his chair. He loosened his tie, then ran a hand through rust-colored hair heavily streaked with white. “What’s with the Levines?”

  “It’s not the Levines, Peter; it’s Jonathan’s in-laws, the Liebers—Raisie’s family. There’s been a terrible incident. His brother-in-law Ephraim was found dead—”

  “Oh no!”

  “Murdered, Peter. They found him in some seedy hotel room in upper Manhattan. To add to the confusion, he was with his fifteen-year-old niece—his brother’s daughter. Now, she’s missing. The family’s in shambles.”

  “When did all this happen?”

  “I just hung up with Jonathan about five minutes before you came home. I think they found the body around three hours ago.”

  Decker looked at his watch. “Around 4P .M. New York time?”

  “I guess.”

  “What was this guy doing in a ‘seedy hotel room’ with his fifteen-year-old niece in the middle of a school afternoon?”

  A rhetorical question. Rina didn’t answer. Instead, she gave Decker a slip of paper with Jonathan’s phone number.

  “It’s horrible.” Decker fingered the paper. “I feel terrible for them. But this call . . . Is it just a comfort call? I mean, Jon doesn’t expect me to do anything, does he?”

  “I don’t know, Peter. I suppose he’d like you to work miracles. In lieu of that, maybe you should call him up and listen to what happened.”

  “He can’t expect me to go out there.”

  “I don’t know. Maybe. You have a pretty good track record.”

  “A prisoner of my own success. I have ajob , Rina. As much as my heart goes out to them—it truly is horrible—I can’t leave at a moment’s notice and run off to Boro Park.”

  “Actually, Chaim Lieber and his family live in Quinton, which is upstate. His widowed father lives there as well. Jonathan’s wife, Raisie, is Chaim’s younger sister. It’s Chaim’s daughter who’s missing.”

  “In upstate?” Decker thought a moment. “Is the family religious?”

  “Yes. Quinton is a very religious enclave. The family’s black hat, superreligious except for Raisie. She’s Conservative like Jonathan.”

  “The outcast,” Decker said.

  “She and Jonathan were lucky to find each other.” Rina got up and poured two cups of coffee. “They both came from the same background and have altered their lifestyles for similar reasons.”

  “And her father lives in Quinton. By himself?”

  “I believe so. Raisie’s mother died around ten years ago. Don’t you remember their talking about her memory at Jonathan’s wedding?”

  “No, but I wasn’t paying close attention.” Decker stared at the number. “Why don’t you tend to Hannah while I do this?”

  “Don’t want me hanging over your shoulder?”

  He stood up. “I don’t know what I want.” He gave Rina a kiss on the forehead. “I know what Idon’t want. I don’t want to make this phone call.”

  Rina took his hand and squeezed it. “Why don’t you talk from the bedroom? That way I can get dinner started.”

  “Fine. I’m starved. What are we having?”

  “Lamb chops or salmon?”

  “I get a choice?”

  “Both are fresh. Whatever you don’t want, I’ll freeze.”

  “Hannah hates fish.”

  “She hates lamb chops, too. I have some leftover schnitzel for her.”

  “Lamb chops, then.” Decker made a face, then went inside the bedroom and closed the door. He kicked off his shoes and stretched out on his California king bed, dialing the number. It wasn’t Jonathan’s home phone in Manhattan, so Decker figured that it must be either his cell or possibly his synagogue, located near Columbia University. His half brother was a Conservative-pulpit rabbi. On the sixth ring, he answered.

  “Jon!” Decker said.

  “Akiva!” A loud whoosh of air. “Thank you so much for calling!”

  “My God, Rina just told me. That’s terrible! You must be going through hell!”

  “Not as bad as my wife’s family. At this point, we’re all shell-shocked.”

  “I’m sure you are. When did this happen?”

  “About three hours ago. About four o’clock here.”

  “Jeez. And what do the police say?”

  “Not much of anything. That’s the problem. What does that mean?”

  “It means they probably don’t know much.”

  “Or aren’t telling us anything.”

  “That could be. I’m so sorry.”

  There was silence over the line. Jonathan said, “You didn’t ask how it happened.”

  “If you want to tell me the details, I’m here.”

  “I don’t want to burden you. . . .”

  But that’s exactly what he was going to do. “Tell me what’s going on, Jon. Start at the beginning. Tell me about the family.”

  “Oh my.” A sigh. “Raisie comes from a family of five—two boys, three girls. Both of her brothers are older. Chaim is the eldest, then Ephraim, the one who was . . . murdered. Raisie’s the oldest daughter. Chaim Joseph is a typical oldest son . . . reliable, responsible. He and his wife, Minda, have seven children. He’s a good man who has always worked hard in the family business.”

  “Which is?”

  “Several retail electronic stores in Brooklyn . . . one on the Lower East Side. You know, TVs, stereos, cameras, computers, mobile phones, DVDs, et cetera. The second brother, Ephraim Boruch . . . the one who this happened to . . . he’s had some problems in the past.”

  “What kind of problems?”

  “Relationship problems—married and divorced.”

  “Kids?”

  “None.”

  Silence.

  “And?” Decker prompted.

  “Drug problems,” Jonathan admitted. “Addiction and rehab.”

  “That probably had a lot to do with his relationship problems.”

  “No doubt. Ephraim has been divorced for ten years. His ex is out of the picture. She remarried and now lives in Israel. As for Ephraim, he’s straightened himself out. He’s been sober for the last two years. About that time, he also joined the family business with his older brother.”

  “How’s that working out?”

  “Fine, as far as I know. He was always the favorite uncle of all the nieces and nephews. He especially got along well with his niece Shaynda, who is the oldest in Chaim’s family.”

  “The missing niece.”

  “Yes, the missing niece. Shaynda, like Ephraim, has a rebellious streak. She has been typecast as the problem child in the family since grade school. Sh
e’s a beautiful girl, Akiva, with incredible spirit, and maybe that’s part of the problem. She has not walked the walk or talked the talk.”

  “Specifically?”

  “Skipping school, hanging out at the mall with public-school kids. A couple of times, she had sneaked out of the house at night. My brother and sister-in-law came down on her with an iron fist. Unfortunately, the tougher they got, the more Shayndie fought. She and the mother have a miserable relationship. But the shining light had been Uncle Ephraim. He and Shayndie seemed to have had this rapport. More and more, she began to confide in him. They began spending time together—”

  “Hmm . . .”

  “I know what you’re thinking. I would have sworn up and down that it wasn’t that at all.”

  “Wasn’t what?”

  “That he wasn’t molesting her. When they first started spending time, I thought it was odd—the amount of time they spent together. So did Raisie. We had a long talk with Shaynda because we figured no one else would. We asked her point-blank. When she said no—she seemed genuinely shocked—we gave a step by step of what to be aware of. After the conversation, both Raisie and I were satisfied that Ephraim really had the girl’s interest at heart. We had no reason to suspect that Ephraim was anything more than just a loving uncle trying to reach out to his troubled niece.”

  “But now you think differently.”

  A long sigh. “Maybe. The two of them were supposed to be going on an outing this morning . . . to the Met. To see the new Dutch/Vermeer exhibit.”

  “This morning?” Decker paused. “It’s Thursday. She doesn’t have school?”

  “I don’t know, Akiva. Maybe her mother gave her the day off. Maybe her allergies were acting up. I didn’t think it appropriate to question my sister-in-law.”

  “Of course. Go on.”

  Jonathan stuttered a few times, trying to get the words out. “Ephraim was found dead in a hotel room. Did Rina tell you that?”

  “Yes.”

  “He’d been shot, Akiva. He was also . . . naked.”

  “Good Lord!”

  “I know. It’s awful!”

  “Any sign of the girl? Clothes left behind? Personal effects . . . like a purse, maybe?”

  “Nothing that I’ve heard.”

  “Any sign of a struggle? Torn sheets? Things in disarray?” Decker licked his lips. “Blood other than from . . .” He wanted to say the kill spot. “Blood other than where Ephraim was shot?”