Dead of Winter (CSI: NY)

by Stuart M. Kaminsky

  “It’s possible,” Aiden said, knowing where this was going.

  “I’ll go with you,” Mac said.

  They had both seen stranger things than a spent bullet sliding into a small space and getting lost or stuck.

  It could be a dirty job.

  Aiden hid a sigh and wished for a cup of coffee. The elevator came to a slow gentle stop at the penthouse floor and the doors opened silently.

  Mac stepped forward and used the knocker.

  Both Aiden and Mac could sense a presence behind the door looking at them through the peephole. The door opened.

  “Have you caught him?” asked Louisa Cormier. “The man who shot that poor Mr. Lutnikov?”

  “Might have been a woman,” said Aiden.

  “Of course,” said Louisa Cormier with a smile. “I should have said that. Please come in.”

  She stepped back.

  The woman wasn’t quite as fashionably chic and casual as she had been earlier. Her hair was almost perfect, but a few of the coiffed curls were slightly out of place and her eyes looked tired. She wore a pair of designer jeans and a white cashmere sweater with the sleeves rolled up revealing a bejeweled watch.

  “Please,” she said, showing perfect white teeth and pointing palm up at a small wooden table by the window. There were three chairs around it, all with a panoramic view of the city.

  “Coffee? Tea?” she asked.

  “Coffee,” said Aiden. “Thanks.”

  “Cream? Sugar?”

  “No,” said Aiden.

  “Cold water,” said Mac.

  “I let Ann have a few days off,” she said as the two police officers sat. “She was really disturbed by the shooting. I’ll go get the coffee. I’ve got a fresh pot started. Frankly, I think she’s afraid to come here till the killer is caught. Ann’s a gem. I’d hate to lose her.”

  Louisa Cormier hurried out of the room.

  “Anything on the Alberta Spanio killing?” Aiden asked.

  “There’s always something,” Mac said, looking out the window.

  Monet had done London, bright and glittering, misty from fog, damp from rain, he thought. Had he ever done New York? What would Monet have seen had he looked out of this window on this day?

  Before Louisa Cormier returned, Aiden told Mac that she had re-searched Lutnikov’s apartment.

  “No sign that he wrote any fiction,” she said. “No manuscripts, no sheets in drawers, just what’s on the ribbon.”

  Mac nodded, his mind taking in what he was being told but also wandering out across the rooftops toward the gray skyline.

  Louisa Cormier came back with the coffee and a glass of ice water. She had nothing for herself. When she sat, she ran a hand through her hair.

  “Long night,” she said. “I have a deadline on a new Pat Fantome novel.

  “If you read any of my books, you’ll see I’m nothing like Pat unless I’m writing. I leave Pat in my office when I get up from my computer and I become Louisa Cormier everywhere else unless I’m doing a book signing or a talk. Then, I think I let a lot of Pat Fantome take over. I’m grateful to Pat, but she’s difficult to live with, driven. I, on the other hand…” and she dismissed the rest of the sentence with the wave of her hand.

  Aiden sipped the coffee. It was hot, good, exotic. Mac swirled the water in his glass, watching the ice cubes.

  “Oh, no,” said Louisa Cormier with a laugh at their expressions. “I’m not delusional. There is no Pat Fantome, not really. It’s just a mode of thinking I adopt when I write. There are a few similarities between Pat and me, but there are far, far more differences. But you didn’t come here to talk about me or Pat. You have questions about poor Mr. Lutnikov.”

  Mac finally took a drink of water and paused before going on.

  “Do you own a gun?” he asked.

  Louisa Cormier looked startled and put her right hand to her neck, touching a thin gold band.

  “A…yes,” she said. “A Walther. It’s in the office in my desk. You want to see it?”

  “Please,” said Mac.

  “You suspect me of killing Mr. Lutnikov?” she asked, amused.

  “We’re checking everyone who uses the elevator,” said Aiden.

  “What more could a mystery writer ask than for material to knock at her door?” said the woman. “I’ll get it.”

  Louisa Cormier, now clearly interested, hurried off toward the closed door to her office.

  Mac’s phone went off. He answered it, said, “Yes,” and listened before saying, “I’ll get there as soon as I can. Half an hour.”

  He hung up as Louisa Cormier came out of the office, gun held by the barrel in one hand. She held out the gun to Mac but he told her to put it on the table.

  “I have a permit somewhere,” Louisa said. “Ann could find it when…”

  “I don’t think that will be necessary,” said Mac.

  Aiden put on a fresh pair of gloves and reached for the weapon. Louisa Cormier watched in fascination. After examining the gun, Aiden said, “It’s a Walther P22 with a three-quarter-inch barrel. Hasn’t been fired recently.”

  “I don’t think it’s ever been fired,” Louisa said. “It exists in that drawer to satisfy a request from my agent who, I believe, likes me very much, but loves his fifteen percent even more.”

  “A few questions,” said Mac, as Aiden handed the gun back to Louisa Cormier after checking the magazine, which was indeed full. Louisa placed it on the table and sat forward eagerly, clasping her hands on her lap.

  “Have you ever been in Charles Lutnikov’s apartment?” asked Mac.

  “No,” said Louisa. “Let me think. No, I don’t think so.”

  “Has he ever been in this apartment?” Mac asked.

  “A few times. Actually, whenever a new book of mine comes out, he comes, or should I say came, up rather shyly and asked for an autograph.”

  “Agent Burn found your books in Mr. Lutnikov’s apartment,” said Mac. “They were unread.”

  “That doesn’t surprise me,” she said. “He was a collector. Signed, unread first editions. He bought another copy to read. He was quite open about that.”

  “We didn’t find any other copies of your books in his apartment,” said Aiden.

  “He gave them away to other tenants after he read them. After all, he had untouched first editions. My God. This is fascinating.”

  “Did Lutnikov ever show you any of his writing?” asked Mac.

  “His writing? I think he wrote catalogue copy. Why on earth would he show me that?”

  “No fiction?” asked Aiden. “Short stories? Poetry?

  “No. And to tell the truth, had he done so I would have politely told him I was far too busy to read his work and that I seldom read any fiction, not even that of my closest friends. If he had persisted, as a few do, I would have told him that my agent and editor had told me never to read an unpublished manuscript because I might be accused later of plagiarism. You’d be amazed at how many frivolous lawsuits are filed against me, which is why I contribute significantly to a lobby for tort reform.”

  “You’re working on a book now?” asked Mac.

  “Should have it finished in a week or so.”

  “You work on your computer?” asked Mac.

  “I know writers, Dutch Leonard, Loren Estleman, who still use typewriters, but I don’t understand why,” Louisa said.

  “What kind of paper do you use?” asked Aiden.

  “In my printer?”

  “Yes,” said Aiden.

  “I really don’t know. Something good. Ann gets it at a stationery store on Forty-fourth.”

  “May we have a sheet of it?” asked Mac.

  “A sheet of my computer…yes, of course. Is that all?”

  “Yes,” said Mac. “We’re finished for now.”

  He rose, and so did the two women. Louisa Cormier, gun in her right hand, made another trip to her office and came back with several sheets of paper which she handed to Mac. The gun was gone.
<
br />   “You should know that I don’t give my publisher a printed copy of my books,” she said. “Haven’t for God knows how many years. I just E-mail the finished manuscript in, and they print it and give it to the copy editor.”

  “So you have all your manuscripts in files on your computer?” asked Mac.

  Louisa Cormier looked at him quizzically.

  “Yes, on my hard drive. I also keep a backup floppy disk copy which I lock in my fireproof wall safe.”

  “Thanks,” said Mac. “A last question or two. Do you own another gun?”

  Louisa Cormier looked mildly amused.

  “No.”

  “Have you ever fired a gun?”

  “Yes, as part of my research. My character Pat Fantome is an ex-police officer with a very good aim. I think it helps to know how it feels to fire a gun. I go to Drietch’s Range on Fifty-eighth.”

  “We’ll find it,” said Mac. “One more question. Do you have any idea how Lutnikov’s blood got on the carpet outside your elevator door?”

  “No. I’m really a suspect, aren’t I?” She seemed pleased by the possibility.

  “Yes,” said Mac. “But so are all your neighbors.”

  “Thanks for the coffee,” Aiden said, picking up her kit.

  “Come back any time,” said Louisa, ushering them to the door. “I’d love to know how your investigation is going. I’m going to call my agent now and tell her about all this.”

  When they were back in the elevator, Aiden said, “Basement?”

  “You’re on your own,” said Mac. “Stella just found Cliff Collier dead.”

  “Collier? The cop who was guarding Alberta Spanio?”

  “Strangled.”

  “Where?”

  “Alley in Chinatown.”

  Aiden nodded and stifled a sigh with a stiff-lipped nod. She would have to go in search of the bullets by herself. She had been at the bottom of elevator shafts before. It was always interesting. It was never pleasant.

  Mac looked at the sheets of paper in his hand.

  He and Aiden were both thinking the same thing.

  “Search warrant?” she asked.

  He shook his head.

  Louisa Cormier had lied. Both Aiden and Mac knew it, but they didn’t know what she had lied about — probably the blood traces. It was a rare suspect who didn’t lie about something, even if they were completely innocent.

  “Not enough cause,” he said.

  “We can ask her nicely,” Aiden said.

  “And she can say ‘no’ nicely and call her lawyer.”

  “So?”

  “We’ll find more evidence,” he said.

  8

  “DONE?” ASKED THE MAN.

  “Done,” answered Big Stevie Guista.

  Big Stevie had made the phone call from a bar down the street from Zabar’s. He had a shopping bag full of food — sausages, rolls, cheeses — a large slice of Gorgonzola, his favorite-flavored spreads, soft drinks, and powdered sugar cookies.

  His plan was to have a mini-birthday party with Lilly, the little girl who lived across the hall from him. Her mother would be at work.

  If Big Stevie had ever gotten married and had ever had kids, his grandchildren would be Lilly’s age. Maybe. She was a good kid. He’d party with her, maybe watch a little television. Tomorrow he’d get laid. Happy Birthday Steven Guista. He wasn’t complaining.

  “Good,” the voice on the other end said.

  Both the man and Stevie knew better than to say any more. They hung up.

  Stevie’s delivery truck was parked illegally in front of a fire hydrant that was just barely sticking its top through a mound of snow. There was no ticket under the wiper when he got in. There never was. The police, the other people who saw the parked truck, usually thought he was making a delivery, which was what he would claim if someone confronted him. There weren’t many people willing to confront Big Stevie about anything.

  Stevie backed out of the parking space carefully, looking back over his shoulder, which was difficult to do because he had very little in the way of a neck.

  The back of his small truck was empty, the wire racks clear. He had delivered the body of the cop to the alleyway more than two hours earlier. There was no smell of death, only the familiar diminishing scent of once-fresh bread.

  Stevie liked that smell. He liked it better when the bread was fresh. All in all Stevie liked his work.

  The body lay behind a Dumpster in an alley behind Ming Lo’s Dim Sum in Chinatown. What had once been Cliff Collier lay on his back, feet straight out, arms roughly folded across his chest, head at an odd angle as if he had been looking almost behind him.

  Stella had eaten at Ming Lo’s at least a dozen times, always on Sunday mornings, always with some relative who came to New York wanting to see something of the city. Ming Lo’s entrance, which was on the other side of the building on Mott Street, was brightly neon lit with a broad escalator inside the glass doors. At the top of the escalator was a massive room jammed with tables. Chinese men and women wheeled dim sum carts around for customers, almost all Chinese, who selected from dozens of choices, all of which were eaten with chop sticks or fingers. Stella’s relatives were always impressed.

  She wondered how impressed they would be by the sight of the dead man in the alley.

  “This is what I do,” she said, imagining a conversation with an aunt or cousin. “I ask dead people questions.”

  The idea of dim sum, which usually made her hungry, now made her feel slightly nauseated. Her stomach was churning. Stella knelt next to the body. Danny had already taken photographs of the dead man, the wall, and the Dumpster.

  Don Flack was near the rear door of Ming Lo’s talking to the kitchen worker who had discovered the body. The clearly frightened heavy-set man responded in Chinese, which was translated by a young woman in a silk dress who shivered as she spoke.

  Flack took off his coat and wrapped it around the young woman’s shoulders. She nodded her thanks. The heavy-set man spoke rapidly, excited.

  “He knew the dead man wasn’t homeless,” the young woman translated. “He is dressed too well and his hair is cut.”

  Flack nodded, notebook in hand.

  “Did he see anyone, hear anything?” Flack asked.

  The young woman translated. The heavy-set man shook his head emphatically.

  Flack looked back at the body. He had known Collier, not well but well enough to use first names and feel comfortable about asking each other about their families. Don remembered that Collier wasn’t married but had a mother and father who lived in Queens. Collier’s father was a retired cop.

  Danny, Stella, and Don all noticed the smell, a mixture of warm, salty and sweet Chinese cooking. Danny would have liked an order of fried wonton or something else that looked good. Maybe he could suggest to Stella that when they finished outside they might go inside, ask some questions, get something to eat.

  Stella gently touched the neck of the dead man and turned the body slightly. It was tight behind the Dumpster but she managed to reach back for her small hand vacuum and use it on the victim’s jacket, neck, and hair.

  Flack wasn’t thinking of Chinese food. Not that he didn’t like it, but the dead man was on his mind and he was focused.

  “Thanks,” he said to the young woman.

  She didn’t have to translate. The heavy-set man glanced at the body and hurried back into the restaurant. The girl handed Flack’s coat back to him. Their eyes met. There might have been something there, but he wasn’t up to it, not now, not here, not with Collier lying there.

  When the girl went back in the restaurant, Flack turned and watched Mac Taylor coming down the alley, moving slowly, hands deep in the pockets of his coat.

  Mac stood next to Danny, looking down at the body and Stella kneeling next to it. Mac’s lips were closed and tight, his eyes searching the narrow alley.

  “Neck’s broken,” Stella said.

  She turned the body on its side. It was a tight f
it and the dead man was heavy. She could have asked for help, but she didn’t want to contaminate the site any more than it had been already.

  “Alley’s full of prints in the snow,” said Danny. “At least six different people. I’ve taken footprints.”

  Danny had first used an aerosol spray snow print wax to retain the details of the prints and stop the effects of melting. Then he had taken a casting of each print, using a pouch of casting powder mixed with water, which he kneaded and poured directly from the pouch into the print, adding a couple of pinches of salt to speed the setting of the plaster.

  “Any particularly large?” asked Mac.

  “One set,” said Danny. “Clean one over here.”

  Danny knew why Mac had asked about large prints. Collier was over six feet tall and more than two hundred pounds. He was also in good shape, worked out. Hawkes would weigh him to get an exact figure.

  Whoever had killed Collier had been stronger and at least as big as the detective, if it was one killer. Again, Hawkes would be able to tell them more.

  Danny pointed to a trio of footprints heading toward the Dumpster and then at two more, approximately the same size, heading away. The ones heading away weren’t as deep as the ones heading toward the Dumpster. The weight of Collier’s body had been off of the shoulders of the man who had dropped the body.

  “Get a cast of the footprints moving away,” said Mac. “Measure the snow density. We’ll find a formula to be sure that he was carrying Collier’s body. Check Collier’s wallet. See what it gives as his weight.”

  Danny nodded. There was no doubt that the footprints belonged to the bearer of Collier’s body, but it might come down to evidence given in court and Mac wanted everything confirmed.

  Flack joined Danny and Mac and watched Stella work.

  The question didn’t have to be asked, but all four members of the CSI unit knew the odds of the detective’s murder being connected somehow to the murder of Alberta Spanio, the woman he had been protecting only hours ago.

  Stella was up now, taking off her gloves.

  Mac could see the places on the Dumpster that had been dusted for prints. There were plenty of them, but it wasn’t likely that any belonged to whoever had dropped Collier’s body here.