“You should have cabbed it,” Paul frowned, concerned.
“Six blocks?” Liddy sat and deep-breathed as Carl, who looked as if he’d already had a few, jokingly asked if she’d taken the sweatshop route, and Nicki told her importantly that she was studying sweatshops in the new global economy.
Liddy smiled. “I saw right away how serious you are.”
A waiter came. The others ordered new rounds of martinis. Liddy nixed alcohol because she still felt light-headed.
The place was air-conditioned, at least, and a tall, cold Coke helped to revive although the leg still hurt. The new martinis arrived, and they all got down to the serious business of socializing - which Liddy loathed even when things weren’t terrible. Socializing means you have to talk, smile sweetly at the guy opposite you who last night your husband said blamed you because the cops bothered him. But no sign of animosity now from across the table; she put on the face and beamed as Carl toasted their “new adventure in their great new apartment,” and there were smiles and pleasantries all around. Carl’s current squeeze was right out of the cookie cutter: young and pretty, a shiny bright undergrad who couldn’t keep her hands off him. He’d worn a blazer over one of his many pastel polo shirts, and her hand kept going under the blazer, patting his chest, his heart, his tummy after she fed him some antipasto in an endive leaf.
“Ooh, crunchy, isn’t it?” Nicki giggled. They were so into each other that Paul had the chance for an aside to Liddy.
He slugged his drink first, then leaned to her. “Why’d you look like you crawled through the desert when you got here?”
“It was hot.” She avoided his gaze.
“Not that hot.” She felt him grin. “You chase one of your ghosts or something?”
It occurred in that moment that Paul was a jerk - maybe the word’s smartest dumb, insensitive jerk. Pity you can’t haul off and smack someone in a nice, sedate place like this, so Liddy’s belly just clenched as she studied her Coke.
“Lemme guess,” Paul pressed, feeling his booze. “I’ll bet you crossed to that building where you saw the fighting couple. Tried to climb the fire escape or something.”
“Stop.”
“Or - you went looking for that girl, that’s it.”
“I said stop.”
She hissed it, but it still came out too loud, interrupting Carl and Nicki who looked up from the menu they’d been cuddling into.
“Trouble in paradise?” Carl asked, raising his eyebrows.
“Yeah.” Paul’s lips curled slightly. “Liddy’s been seeing a ghost.”
“Ooh,” Nicki cooed. “I love ghost stories! Can I see the ghost too?”
“Maybe.” It came out with just a tinge of sarcasm, but Liddy was furious that Paul would make light of what to her was still traumatic. He was so clueless he hadn’t even noticed her anger; had turned away and was suddenly deep in conversation with Carl who was yakking excitedly about rat brains. Well, fine! Since they weren’t looking her way – and Nicki was, expectantly - she subtly reached to her purse and pulled out her sketchbook; opened to the page, kept the sketchbook between them and below the linen table edge, and showed it.
“I saw her in the street and sketched her,” she told Nicki. “Now I’m told she’s the missing coed Sasha Perry.”
I just drew her, not the same as saying I saw a ghost. Carl and Paul were now going on about blocked rodent receptor sites as Nicki leaned closer…gave the sketch a double take.
“Wow, Sasha Perry, I recognize her from the news,” she said in a low oh gee voice, and looked back up to Liddy. “You are good - and you saw her?”
“Well, someone who apparently looks like her.” Still deflecting, but feeling her heart lurch remembering the running blond girl – it was Sasha - the Winnie the Pooh stud in her right ear, a detail Kerri said hadn’t been in any released photos. Too bad, Liddy decided, if no one else on Prince Street saw her; she wanted to jump up right now and call Kerri, but she couldn’t. Paul had just glanced at her briefly and Nicki was ogling the sketch Liddy still held low – then seconds later the waiter returned with salads. Attention was diverted to ordering main courses and the waiter filling the four wine glasses, and Liddy hurried her sketchbook back to her purse. Angry or not, she’d suddenly felt uptight about having it out. Really, she told herself: sleeping dogs, thin ice, keep the fragile peace, maybe take her phone to the ladies room?
The Coke and air-conditioning had restored, and the glass of wine before her looked good. Liddy drank; let it go down, start to work. Ah, better. Nicki was sipping her wine too, listing in her chair a little.
“Finish my martini?” Nicki asked, pushing her half full glass to Liddy. “I had two at the bar before this one, I feel dizzy.”
Liddy thanked, finished Nicki’s martini, and slugged more wine. Paul gave her a slight frown. She gave him a go to hell look.
They were all digging into their salads when Nicki turned to Carl. “You knew Sasha Perry, didn’t you?”
Liddy’s fork stopped halfway to her mouth. The light-headedness from her wild chase was replaced by the effects of the booze, and she wasn’t sure she’d heard right. Paul stared as Nicki dove into Liddy’s purse for her sketchbook and pulled it up and pushed it at Carl, who looked quickly away from it and said no, he’d never laid eyes on the girl, and Nicki insisted, “But wasn’t she in your biochem class? No wait - she only audited – a friend of a friend knew her and said so.”
Liddy blinked as last night flashed - Paul stressing about Carl’s pique, blaming her. He’d told Kerri he didn’t know Sasha.
Tension all around: Carl started to argue with Nicki; Liddy stashed her sketchbook back while Paul helped bury the subject under a tide of thin witticisms about everyone seeing this girl’s ghost. Carl glared, Paul switched to shop talk, and Nicki was easily distracted; felt terrible hearing about adorable little white mice who’d been sacrificed in their experiments – but they hadn’t felt a thing, promise. Just went to sleep high and happy, not so good for us, ha.
Then Paul saw Liddy staring at Carl; caught her eye: Stop, means nothing. She looked away; Oh yeah?
“Can I join the fun?” she heard, and looked up into the pale eyes of Ben Allen standing there, flushed and grinning expectantly from Carl to Paul. “You tell yet?”
How relieved they both looked at the distraction, trading grins that instantly forgot the last few minutes.
What now? Liddy thought.
“The surprise,” Paul said brightly, inviting Ben to sit. Ben pulled up two chairs from a table just vacated as his date named Amber joined them. “Hi!” said Amber. “We’ve been at the bar!”
Then, as if announcing that they’d found the cure for cancer, Paul beamed again. “The boat,” he said, leaning to Liddy. “Carl and Ben are going to buy it. Joint venture.”
Amber started gushing about how thrilled she was, she’d always wanted to learn sailing, and Ben said he was looking forward to losing his New York pallor, get back out in the sun and the wind. He looked excited until he saw Liddy’s expression; looked to Paul, then looked back to Liddy. “You didn’t know?”
Paul told her quickly that they’d just decided yesterday. “Firmly, I mean. We’ve been talking about it for a while.”
They were all a blur. The last few minutes’ chatter had been like white noise to Liddy, replaying instead what she’d heard about Carl and Sasha. She didn’t care about the boat. “It’s Paul’s,” she told Ben after a beat. “I knew it would sell sooner or later.”
Paul reached for her hand and squeezed it. “Hey, we’re nearly flush. Is that a surprise or what? You happy?”
She smiled and nodded; pulled her hand away.
He was disappointed. “You don’t seem happy.”
“It’s not that. My leg hurts.”
“We’ll cab home.”
“Fine.”
Ben leaned closer to Liddy, oblivious to someone squeezing past behind his chair. “This changes nothing,” he said feelingly. His dar
k hair was slicked back, his pale eyes earnest. “We’ll still all of us go out, have good times like always but this way” – his glance flicked to Carl, who smirked – “we won’t have to feel guilty about borrowing the boat so much.”
He was more white noise, just babbling his practiced sincerity.
Liddy was staring at Carl.
Barely joined the others saying ‘bye to Ben as he rose, gave a slightly drunken salute – squint: Gilligan’s Island – then left with Amber, who waved amid lots of “Ship ahoy!” and “nice meeting you!”
Carl’s watch seemed to startle him. “The time!” he said, and clapped Paul’s arm. “We gotta jet. Lab awaits.”
Paul looked back from sizing up Liddy, and shook his head. “I think I’ve had too much to drink. I’ll catch up tomorrow.”
That started another fuss: But that still-alive mouse - they had to test her before she croaked!
While they were at it, Liddy subtly asked Nicki for her phone number, saying she wanted to hear more about sweatshops in the global economy. For a second she thought Paul saw her. She wasn’t sure.
Two cabs were hailed in the street, Nicki dispatched into one, Liddy and Paul climbing into the other.
Neither of them spoke as the cab pulled away.
31
Alex sat, his hands around the steering wheel, his eyes moving from a glance through the windshield to another into the rear-view mirror. It was ridiculous – the street was so dark you couldn’t see anything no matter where you looked; with its kind of inhabitants, what chance did a light bulb have?
“Nothing,” he muttered.
“Wait,” Kerri said.
Muffled transmissions resumed from Gini Tang’s transmitter, the tiny, third button down in the Vice cop’s see-through blouse.
“Ooh, you are my kind of man, such muscles,” she giggled, sounding drunk which she wasn’t; she’d faked it when Ray Gruner picked her up.
“Five blocks,” they heard Buck Dillon whisper, positioned at the rear of the decrepit second floor where Gini was headed with her hookup. The button in her blouse also contained a GPS.
Kerri concentrated on her earpiece; fiddled a stray strand of hair back into her pony tail.
“Jo?” Alex said to his shoulder.
“We’re good,” whispered Jo Babiak, positioned behind the slum, hunched by trash cans opposite the fire escape to block Gruner’s escape. She had uniforms with her. SWAT guys too.
Kerri let out a huge, pent-up breath. This was painful, this time it had to be perfect. It had looked good eleven days ago when they caught Ray Gruner - and then the slime slithered free on a technicality! She worried, she was frantic. It had to go right this time, if not tonight, she feared they’d never get him. The sadist who enjoyed raping and brutally beating his victims to death was also smart. Had lain low; controlled his kill-addiction for a whole eleven nights and even sent a smirk to plain clothes cops tailing him. Alternate pairs had shadowed his every move and he’d had fun taunting them: chatting nicely to the girl in the pizza place, spending his days in his dump, emerging only briefly to buy a newspaper, sit on a bench faking reading while, behind his shades, those narrow eyes watched every woman go by. Tonight was the first night he’d gone out. Cop radios were alerted. Gruner’s addiction had finally overpowered him and he’d resumed his prowl.
“Four blocks.” Buck’s hushed whisper.
“Got it,” Alex answered.
He and Kerri tensed, listening to Gini dicker with Gruner about her price. “Two hundred?” he argued. “I can get it for less.”
“Not what I can give you - oh baby, you ain’t seen shit till you see what I can give you.”
Gruner wanted his kill so he faked relenting. They bargained, moving slowly. Gini’s faked drunkenness was her excuse to dawdle; gave the cops time to move in.
Alex inhaled. “So finish about Sasha,” he said. “We’ve got maybe three minutes.”
“That’s it,” Kerri said morosely. “I’ve hit a dead end.” She watched a homeless man shamble by. Under his rags and long, greasy wig she knew it was another cop. “Carl Finn said he never laid eyes on her, and I can’t find anything that proves he did, not in student registration or canvassing the campus in my free time. In one bar some kid thought he saw her coming out of one of Finn’s classes, but he was stoned that day. Memory’s foggy.”
“But Finn’s the guy in Becca’s selfie?”
“Definitely. I blew the pic way up and compared it to him in person. It’s him.”
Alex grunted. “Circumstantial even if it is.”
“Like I said, I hit a dead end.”
The homeless guy with a Glock under his rags had stopped near their car; turned, shuffled back before the darkened stoop. Kerri bit her lip, watching him, watching two other cops further down, dressed like dealers. They had practically an armed camp around them. Another miss at Gruner would be it; he’d run to another state; disappear briefly, then kill again.
They listened through another transmission – the rapist was getting impatient and they were moving faster, a block away now – no…less than a block.
“But you still like Finn for this?” Alex asked. “Despite the selfie’s circumstantial…”
“I just wish I could tie him-”
“They’re here,” Alex said.
Out of the darkness, suddenly, came Tang and Gruner, Tang in her tight shorts laughing, teasing, pulling him up the crumbling stoop past the watching, hunched cop in his rags. All transmissions stilled; breaths held. What came from Gini Tang determined what next to the split second. Their shuffling sounded on the creaking stairs. Gini’s key in the door rattled. “Shitty old locks,” she giggled; then: “Enter,” she said grandly, throwing the door open as planned; then: “Wait, mind if I check what you got? I’m discerning too, ya know.” She grabbed his genitals as planned; then: “Oh, you’re so small - hey, call that a hard on?”
“Ow!” Gruner yelled in pain. “You bitch!”
Sounds of thudding. Muffled cries trying to scream over obscenities and the sound of struggling, dragging, the door slammed-
But they were out. Up the stoop with their guns up, the cop in rags behind them, joining Buck already kicking the door down, bursting in on big, muscled Ray Gruner on little Gini Tang throttling her, so crazed that if he heard them he didn’t stop, he had one massive hand on her throat and his other fist raised to smash her face-
-only Buck caught it, Gruner’s fist, and Alex and Buck wrestled him off, face down on the floor with Alex’s knee in his back, one hand holding his Glock to Gruner’s head while Buck got Gruner’s other arm behind him.
Yelling, writhing, the three struggled as Kerri kneeled in and got cuffs on him. “Give it up, shithead,” she yelled; then Alex roared, “You are under arrest. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say…”
They’d recorded him, and Gini’s tiny button’s infra red had recorded the attack. This time there’d be no slip-up, no slithering free of the system like when they hadn’t gotten him to speak.
Lights were on, other cops were running in, and Alex pressed Gruner’s face hard to the floor; banged it for good measure. He wanted more; they all wanted more. He bellowed, “Do you understand the rights I’ve just read to you?”
No answer. Yelling and writhing but not what they needed. Gini was on her knees with Kerri holding her. Alex lifted Gruner’s head by his hair, bashed his face down harder. “Do you understand what I’ve just read to you?” he roared.
From the floor came a small, spreading pool of blood from Gruner’s nose. He turned his head to the side; glared at Gini; glared at Kerri.
“Yeth,” he growled because he’d lost a tooth; and then, “You’re hurting me.”
They had him. It was over, witnessed, caught on cop cam and recorded.
More cops arrived. EMTs too but Gruner could walk, they told them, so the EMTs just wiped and stuffed Gruner’s bloody nose. Buck and Alex yanked him up by his cuffs behind him like a side of bee
f, and he howled.
“Fuckin’ police brutality,” he whined, and bitched and whined more as they dragged him down the stairs and out.
32
When the cab pulled away, Paul stood staring at the building across the way.
“Fess up,” he said quietly. “You think you saw that girl.”
“Right,” Liddy snapped, heading for the door. “She’s grown angel wings and flown away. Can we go in, please?”
Paul persisted, following up the stairs that were painful for her. “You arrived looking like you’d seen a ghost. And that glare you gave Carl – you embarrassed me.”
“Why do you always protect him?” Liddy stormed up, not turning.
“Because he has nothing to do with this…obsession of yours.”
“You said he told the cops he didn’t know Sasha.”
“That’s what he told me! Why wouldn’t I believe him?”
“It’s just kind of interesting, isn’t it? That she was in his class?”
“You believe that from a pinhead?”
“You saw how fast he looked away from the sketch - and Sasha only audited, that’s why there’s no record.”
They’d reached their landing. Paul threw his hands up and gestured helplessly as they approached their door. “We made this great move that was supposed to help, and you’ve gotten more...”
“More what?” Through clenched teeth.
“More…like you need more visits to Minton.”
“Maybe you should go to Minton. Denial for the sake of ambition, huh?”
Enough. Liddy’s hands shook and she just wanted to get away from Paul, be alone. He was overdoing his I-give-up tack, standing there sighing and hunched and miserable – it just added to her fury, so she fished in her purse and snapped, “Okay, I saw Sasha Perry.”
He looked at her; blinked. “You couldn’t have.” His tone was flat, frightened.
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