“All I can say is, look to your own house, man.” He gazed pointedly at the two-way mirror. “Look to your own house.”
Seventeen
Jonathan walked to the lieutenant’s office where the others waited for him. Mari stood off to one side of the door while Moretti stood behind one of the visitor’s chairs. Shea stood behind his desk, knuckles resting on his blotter. The only one seated was the A.D.A., with both arms and legs crossed. Jonathan stopped a couple of feet inside Shea’s door.
“Figueroa give you anything?” Shea asked.
“He claims someone approached him to include Dana in a drive-by with Evans as a target. This someone had heard Figueroa wanted to take Evans out. He says he turned this person down, but some of his crew might not have.”
“Did he give any names? Who this person was? Which boys?”
“No.”
Moretti said, “I could have gotten that out of him.”
Obviously, Moretti was still fuming over being asked to leave. He was also implying that what Jonathan got out of him was either too little, made up, or both. Jonathan swiveled his head around to glare at Moretti. “But somehow you didn’t.”
The A.D.A. sat forward and put both feet on the floor. “Let’s lower the testosterone level for a moment, boys. So that means we have nothing, right?”
“Pretty much. Except that if what Figueroa said is true there is someone out there who wants Dana Molloy dead and it has nothing to do with her knowledge of Wesley Evans. That was merely a coincidence that worked in the killer’s favor.”
“If he can be believed.” Shea sat and rubbed his jowls. To the A.D.A., Shea said, “Don’t worry, Figueroa’s not going anywhere. When we picked him up he had a couple of ounces of cocaine on him.”
“It ought to take his lawyer a whole hour and a half to kick him for that,” the A.D.A. said.
Shea shrugged and picked up the phone receiver.
As they filed out of the office, Jonathan could feel Mari’s eyes on him. She grabbed his elbow, leading him away from their desks. “Let’s get some coffee.” Once inside the room she closed the door. “Okay, Stone, spill it. What didn’t you say in there?”
Jonathan glanced around. Moretti had disappeared to God knew where. “Pee Wee said that if I wanted to know who approached him I should look to my own house. Then he glared at the mirror. I guess he figured you guys were still listening despite the arrangement. I wonder which of you he was looking at.”
Without missing a beat, Mari said, “Moretti. Why didn’t you say anything about it to Shea?”
“With him standing there? Besides, if Shea heard the accusation, he’d have to report it to IAB. As much as I can’t stand the guy, I’m not willing to help fry another cop on the say-so of a drug dealer. For all I know, there’s some bad blood between the two of them and the whole story was made up to make Moretti look bad.”
Mari sighed. “What do you want to do about it?”
“I want to find out if there’s any history between Moretti and Pee Wee and if there’s any reason Pee Wee would want to jam him up.”
“You mean you want me to find out.”
“Uh, yeah. I don’t think the animosity between us is any secret down in the 44. It would look suspicious if I tried to check him out.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Work the case. Despite your Rossi angle, I’m still betting Pierce’s death had something to do with what she found out about Malone.”
“Then see you back here later.”
Jonathan pushed off the counter. “If you find out anything significant, call me.”
“You’ll be the first to know.”
The people on Father Masella’s list had relocated to all five boroughs of the city, Westchester, and Long Island, and those were just the people they could find living in New York. Jonathan had already spoken to four of the families with whom Mari made appointments. All of them remembered Father Malone fondly. All of them had gotten similar calls from Amanda Pierce. None of them seemed to have told her anything that might incriminate anyone.
Jonathan pulled up in front of a one-family attached house on Tiemann Avenue. They called this section of the Bronx the Valley, a ten-block slope leading downhill from the peak at Gun Hill Road. He checked the address again and got out of the car. One Andrew Bickford lived at 3014 on this block. He’d moved his family from the neighborhood a couple of years after the church burned.
Bickford met him at the door. “Come in, Detective. Like I said on the phone, I’ll help any way I can.”
“Thank you.”
To the left of the house was a family room that faced out onto the street. Jonathan took the wing chair Bickford indicated, while the other man sat at the edge of the sofa. Jonathan had already heard all of the praise of Father Malone he needed for one day, so he figured he’d cut to the chase. “Did Amanda Pierce contact you?”
“Yes, I spoke to her about two weeks ago. Very interesting woman.”
By the man’s expression he deduced he hadn’t been either impressed or terribly interested in her. “What did you tell her?”
“Mostly how much my family and I appreciated knowing her uncle. Now my wife, she died a few years ago, she was the real churchgoer. She’d take our girls to mass every Sunday. I’d show up for Easter and Christmas. But Father was always kind to us.”
“Do you remember anything about the time right after Father Malone’s death? Any of the speculation about whether his death was accidental?”
“That’s what the police said. I remember there was a lot of talk about one of his partners being a shady character. Then there were a few people who blamed those boys he tried to help. They were a wild bunch.”
It wasn’t the first time Jonathan heard the latter opinion. When he thought about it, it made sense. If someone from Malone’s past had killed Pierce, he needed to be young enough now to take on and subdue a strong young woman. “Was there anyone in particular who voiced that sentiment?”
“I’m sure there was.” Bickford shrugged. “I wish I could remember more.” Bickford’s eyes widened as if a sudden idea occurred to him. “You know who you should talk to? There used to be this old guy who hung around the church. These days we’d call him a homeless person. Back then we called him a bum. But Father Malone used to let him sleep on a cot in the back of the church sometimes, if it was too cold or too hot.”
Jonathan reached into his jacket for his notepad. “Did you tell Ms. Pierce about him?”
“As a matter of fact, I did.”
“What’s his name?”
“Theodore Randall. I don’t know where he lives or if he’s still alive.”
Jonathan was glad Bickford continued to talk and wasn’t really paying attention to him. Jonathan had heard that name before in connection with his case. Or rather he’d seen it, on the list of tenants at the building on Highland Avenue. As Bickford talked, he checked his notes. Randall was the old man they’d talked to in the first floor apartment at Highland Avenue, the man Dana referred to as Old Specs. Son of a bitch! Randall had to be who Pierce had visited in the building. Damn.
Jonathan stood, thanked Bickford for his time and left. Out at his car, he called Mari. “You won’t believe this, but you remember the old guy we talked to when we recanvassed the building?”
“Yeah, ornery bugger.”
“If I’m not mistaken, that’s who Pierce went to see that day.”
“Lovely. Didn’t he tell us he hadn’t seen her?”
“Not exactly.” As Jonathan recalled, he’d asked what a woman like that would have been doing in the building, but he’d never said he hadn’t seen her. “I’m going over there now.”
“Listen, Stone,” Mari said in a hushed tone. “I think we may have a problem. Your friend wasn’t assigned the Evans case, he asked for it. He’d just caught a double homicide and asked to switch with the detective that had the Evans case. Everyone figured he was begging off the other case to get out of doing any real wor
k. He was supposed to coordinate with anti-crime and narcotics but dropped the ball. They never heard from him.”
In other words, he’d done everything he could to squelch the investigation. “How did you find all this out?”
“Seems he has plenty of other friends willing to badmouth him to whoever will listen.”
Jonathan could believe that. “I’ll call you after I speak with Randall.”
“You think this is it, don’t you?”
For Dana’s sake, he hoped so. “Yeah.”
“Happy hunting,” Mari said before she hung up.
It would be if Randall told him what he wanted to hear.
Miraculously, Jonathan found a parking space across the street from the building on Highland Avenue. As he got out of the car he noted the telltale pair of glasses at Old Specs’s window. He was home.
He went into the building and knocked on the door. He got no answer, but then he hadn’t expected one. If Randall wanted to talk, he’d have done so the first time. Jonathan knocked again, louder this time. “Mr. Randall, it’s Detective Stone from the NYPD. I know you’re home.”
Abruptly, the door was pulled open. Randall sat in his chair, a belligerent expression on his face. “Whatchu want now? Can’t you people leave an old man alone?”
“May I come in? I need to speak with you.”
Randall shook his head. “Anything you want to say to me you can say right there.”
Jonathan gritted his teeth, but if that’s how the old man wanted it. “Mr. Randall, Amanda Pierce visited someone in this building the day she was killed. That person was you.”
“I told you, that gal had no business to be in here. What would she want with me? Lessons on getting old and dying? You can get those anywhere.”
It was in the man’s eyes that he was lying, or rather equivocating. He never said he hadn’t seen Pierce; just that she had no need to be there. “She came to see you about her uncle, Father Malone. You remember him from St. Jude’s, don’t you?”
“I don’t remember much from them days. I was a drinking man then.” Randall looked down at his lap, a forlorn expression on his face. “I ain’t proud of it, but that’s the way it was. Whatever memories I had I drunk away.”
“From what I hear,” Jonathan said in a quiet voice, “Father Malone was good to you. If someone hurt him, don’t you want to see this person brought to justice?”
Randall nodded, giving Jonathan the hope he intended to tell what he knew. But when the old man looked up the hostility had returned to his expression. “Don’t think I don’t know what you’re doing, how you cops do. You’re trying to trick an old man into saying something that isn’t true. I don’t know no Amanda Pierce. Never seen her. Now don’t come here no more.” Randall wheeled himself back into the apartment and shut the door.
Dana was sitting on the sofa attempting to read one of the books on Jonathan’s shelf when she heard his key turn in the lock. She dropped the book to the sofa and stood. The first thing she noticed about him was that he looked tired, or maybe disheartened, she wasn’t sure which. Or maybe he was still preoccupied with their lovemaking last night, but she hoped not.
She bit her lip, waiting for him to get to her. When he got close enough, she took a step toward him and wrapped her arms around his neck. She sighed as his arms closed around her. She buried her nose against his neck, inhaling the remnants of his cologne, the aroma of a hard day’s work and his own natural scent. “Hi, stranger,” she said. “How did it go today?”
He pulled away from her, enough so that she could see his face. “You want the good news or the bad news?”
“There’s good news?”
His hand scrubbed up and down her back. “Sort of.”
She could live with that. “How about you tell me after dinner? It’s almost ready.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“Are you going to take a shower?”
One corner of his mouth lifted in a grin. “Are you saying I need one?”
She tilted her head to one side considering him. “No, but that seems to be your habit when you get home.”
“It is. I won’t be long.” He swatted her bottom before moving off.
Dana looked after him as he walked away. Maybe he was merely tired, as she’d first guessed, since he didn’t seem to be in a bad mood. He’d even joked with her a little. That had to mean something. Honestly, she’d been hoping he’d be able to tell her that he figured out who murdered Amanda Pierce so she could go home, or at least get out of this apartment. She missed her brother and worried about him. He wouldn’t return any of her calls, though Linda Kenner reported that he was fine. Damn that boy. He might be bigger than she was, but not so big she wasn’t tempted to take a two by four to him the moment she saw him.
She needed her life back. She needed her work back. Even though she’d thought herself burnt out and frustrated only a few days ago, her job was important to her. The woman working in Joanna’s place had assured her that At-Home Healthcare wanted her to take as much time off as she needed under the circumstances, but she didn’t want any more time. At least not cooped up somewhere with no alternatives.
She went to the kitchen and checked the rice. It was done, as well as the chicken she’d fried and the biscuits she’d made from a mix she’d found in one of the cupboards. They hadn’t finished the salad she made last night, so that would serve as their vegetable.
As she worked, she listened for the sound of the shower cutting off. Jonathan told her he had good news and bad. She didn’t know what either of those might be, but with a sinking certainty, she doubted he was about to tell her what she really wanted to hear—that it was over and her life was once again her own.
Jonathan left the bathroom to head for the dining room. Dana was standing by the table with her back to him. He came up behind her and wrapped his arms around her, nuzzling his nose against her neck. “Everything looks good.”
“Then sit down.”
He could feel the tension in her body and in the way she spoke those three sharp words. He couldn’t blame her. She must be more anxious than he for this case to be over. He did as she asked, taking his usual spot at the table. They filled their plates. He’d barely gotten a forkful into his mouth before she asked, “What’s the good news?”
“I think I’ve found who Amanda Pierce was visiting in the building. You know him as Old Specs.”
Dana’s mouth dropped open. “You’re kidding me. I spoke to him. He didn’t tell me anything about seeing Amanda Pierce.”
“Did you ask him?”
“Well, no. I only asked him about what he’d seen the morning I got shot. It didn’t occur to me to ask him about Pierce. Why would she have been talking to him anyway?”
“Apparently, twenty-five years ago, he was living on the streets around the church. Father Malone took pity on him and let him sleep in the back of the church sometimes. The man I spoke to thinks he might have seen something the night the priest was killed that he told to Pierce.”
“And she got killed for it? How would anyone know so quickly what she’d found out?”
Jonathan shrugged. “Maybe it wasn’t the first time she’d visited him? For all we know, he could have set the fire and set her up to be killed by someone else. I don’t know, but I was loath to drag an eighty-year-old cripple into the stationhouse to find out. I figured I’d sic my partner on him tomorrow. Maybe a female will have better luck.”
Dana shook her head. “He won’t talk to her. He doesn’t like cops, either. His son was shot and killed by the police. He told me that when you came around asking about Amanda Pierce, he lied, saying he wouldn’t tell the police anything. He took a certain amount of pleasure in telling me that.”
“What do you suggest I do?”
“Let me talk to him.”
His jaw tightened. “Absolutely not.”
“Look, Jon, he’s not going to talk to you, but he’s already spoken to me. You already told me that nobody in the nei
ghborhood was out to get me. What harm could it do? If anyone suspected he knew anything he’d be dead by now.”
She did have a point, but he wasn’t willing to concede it yet. He didn’t want her involved any more than she already was.
“What if he’s the one who set the fire and is trying to cover it up? What do you expect he’ll tell you then?”
“Probably nothing, but it’s worth a shot.”
Maybe, but he wasn’t willing to chance it. Apparently she thought the old man was harmless, but he didn’t. Randall’s being in a wheelchair didn’t make it impossible for him to wield a knife or fire a gun if the need arose. Given the level of animosity he’d seen in Randall both times, he didn’t put it past the man to become violent if provoked. “No, it’s not.”
“Why don’t you ask your partner what she thinks of my idea?”
He didn’t have to. He knew Mari would want to go for it. Damn, just what he’d need—the two of them aligned against him. But it would take more than he and Mari to make this work. He’d have to bring it to Shea, who’d probably do an Irish jig at the prospect of getting to the bottom of the case. Maybe Mari was right about him letting his emotions get in the way of his work, but he’d rather find some other way to get Randall to talk. Damn.
“If you are sure you want to do this, I would need to get it okayed. We would need you to wear a wire so that we can hear what he says.”
“I know you don’t want me to do this Jonathan, but I have to know. If Old Specs can tell me, then I have to try. I can’t spend the rest of my life hiding.”
“I’ll let you know,” was all he was willing to concede at the moment. But he knew he could probably get everything in place by late tomorrow morning if he wanted to. That was the question of the hour for which he didn’t yet have the answer, because as much as he wanted to find Pierce’s killer, he wanted Dana safe more. In the end, though, the only way to really protect her was to find out the truth.
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