Queens Ransom (Sofie Metropolis)

by Carrington, Tori

  Yeah, that would pretty much burn any resource.

  If I found it ironic Eugene had cheated while working a cheating-spouse case . . . well, I wasn’t telling him that.

  ‘OK, let me go get you in,’ I said.

  ‘Just get me a back door key. I’ll take care of the rest.’

  I nodded.

  Within minutes I’d gone in and come back out with the card key, having slid the manager the usual twenty for the trouble.

  ‘Thanks.’

  I crossed my arms. ‘You could have taken care of that. May have taken you another couple of bills, but that’s the price you pay, I guess. So what did you really want to see me about?’

  He pointed a finger at me and smiled, sliding the card key into his front shirt pocket. ‘You good, you know that, Metro? I don’t care what they say about you. You know what you’re doing.’

  Who was saying what about me?

  ‘I need some money.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Yeah. I mean, I don’t like to say nothing negative about a girl, ’cause you know I’m all about the ladies, especially pretty ones, but that Rosie . . . she been something else lately.’

  I agreed.

  ‘With it being Christmas and all, I could really use some cold hard cash, you know? My lady . . . well, she got her eye on this fur coat.’ He chuckled. ‘And you seen my woman. For one her size, I gotta fork over some major shekels.’

  ‘Rosie not giving you enough work?’

  ‘Aw, nah, she giving me enough. I was just hoping you’d throw something a little something extra a brother’s way, you know? Something maybe that pay a little better than serving and photographing people doing what nature intended.’

  Nature intended?

  I wasn’t going to argue the point. After catching my ex-groom with his pants around his ankles on the day of our wedding, I’d argued it enough with myself to last a lifetime.

  But considering his little problem with the night manager, I was hoping maybe he might have learned a personal lesson.

  Apparently, he hadn’t.

  Another point I wasn’t up to arguing just then.

  While I’d used Waters a couple of times outside normal parameters, I’d stopped about a month ago. Back when he’d called me from a dark alley downtown one night, swearing bats were chasing him, then essentially abandoned me when I went to rescue him – ending up with a huge block of time for which I couldn’t account, resulting from a sort of trance mumbo-jumbo the neighborhood vampire’s creepy nephew had put me under – I really hadn’t used him since.

  Hey, you couldn’t blame me, could you?

  I looked toward Lucille parked at the curb to find Muffy practically licking the inside of the driver’s window in a bid for freedom. At this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if his saliva could freeze the glass and a simple tap from his paw could shatter it. It was that cold.

  And the day was working out that odd.

  Before I’d taken Eugene’s call, I’d stopped by my parents’ house, figuring I’d better pick up that saranta token and whatever bland, undesirable food my mother had prepared that day that I’d pretend to eat.

  But she hadn’t been home.

  And my sister Efi said she’d pretty much been AWOL all day.

  Hunh.

  Where could my mother have been all day without pelting me with messages designed to make me feel guilty?

  ‘Actually,’ I said to Eugene now. ‘I’m working a big case now. Let me see what I can throw your way, OK?’

  ‘Cool. Cool. I’ll take anything. No matter how dirty.’

  ‘Now would I give you something dirty?’

  ‘You haven’t yet. But I keep hoping.’

  A car rolled by on the street next to us, slow enough to catch my attention.

  The Crown Vic.

  OK, now this was getting downright creepy.

  ‘All right. I’ll be in touch. Once you get the pics, go home and make good with your wife.’

  ‘Nah. Think I’m gonna let her stew a little.’ He sniffed and straightened the lapels of his tan leather jacket that was probably as effective in battling the cold as my own brown one. ‘Let her miss me.’

  ‘OK. I can only hope I don’t see you with a matching black eye tomorrow.’

  I watched him strut back to his Caddy, presumably to get his camera equipment, and then headed back toward mine. Peripherally, movement caught my attention. I turned my head and gaped at an unfamiliar sight on Queens Boulevard. Hell, in all of New York City, period.

  A deer.

  More specifically, a reindeer.

  Rudy!

  What were the chances?

  I hadn’t even thought about Mrs Claus and her missing reindeer since she’d given me a photo I really hadn’t needed the day before. Yet here he was, large as life and twice as impressive, standing across the street looking back at me.

  What a majestic creature. For just a moment it was easy to imagine he was standing in the snow of some rugged mountainside, the cars a fast-running stream, the buildings behind him rocky outcrops.

  How did one go about catching a reindeer?

  I didn’t know, but I figured now would be a good time to figure it out.

  I quickly opened the car door, prepared to give chase . . . and Muffy zoomed out, heading straight for the Santa standing outside a half a block up ringing a bell outside a drugstore, his collection pot left untouched for as long as I’d been there.

  ‘Muffy!’

  Too late. I watched in abstract horror as he lifted his leg and released a stream worthy of Guinness attention on the unsuspecting Santa.

  When I looked back across the street, Rudy was gone.

  A while later I trudged up the stairs of my apartment building, an unrepentant Muffy in tow.

  My apartment building. Amazed me to think how easy it was now to view the three-story structure in those terms. It had been given to me as a wedding gift by my parents, and while by rights I should have given it back, I hadn’t. Like the unopened gifts still piled against my bedroom wall, time had entered into a warp of sorts when it came to that part of my life.

  Besides, since everyone – including my mother, probably – had known about Thomas’ extra-curricular activities, I figured it was only right I take a while to figure things out.

  So I’d moved into the apartment upstairs, taken the job at my uncle’s, and moved through the hours, days, weeks and months until I stood where I was now.

  Which was where, exactly?

  Muffy barked, his little body a coil of tension where I held him tightly in my arms lest the need to raise his leg on someone or something else he shouldn’t take hold. Although I was pretty sure there was nothing left in his bladder, given the puddle he’d left dripping from the drugstore Santa’s pants leg.

  There went another twenty spot I’d never see again. And the unhappy Santa still hadn’t looked any happier.

  ‘Do you have any idea how much it costs to have this sucker cleaned?’ he’d asked.

  I’d plucked up my crazy dog and left, thinking maybe the Santa trick had been taught to him by his previous owner and my mother’s late best friend Mrs Kapoor, who had never believed in men wearing red suits.

  Of course, a lot of people didn’t. But they didn’t train their furry friends to piss all over them.

  ‘Bad dog,’ I said to him again, in case I hadn’t gotten my point across the other half dozen times I’d said it.

  He barked again and licked my chin.

  I put him down.

  ‘Sofie. You didn’t have to come.’

  I reached the second floor to find Mrs Nebitz waiting in her doorway for me. I opened my apartment door, waited for Muffy to go inside after he did his sniffing, circling bit around the elderly neighbor’s legs – that he thankfully left urine-free – then closed the door after him, ignoring his whine of protest.

  Turd.

  I turned back to Mrs Nebitz. ‘I figured it’s the least I could do. Is he here?’
>
  I’d called the plumber again to confirm the time of his visit earlier and was glad it happened to coincide with my ability to be there to oversee things.

  ‘Yes, yes. But it was unnecessary, really. You see, my grandson Seth is here, as well. I’m sure he’ll be able to fix it. It is only a leaky faucet, after all.’

  ‘Better to make sure. Are they in your kitchen?’

  ‘Yes, yes. Come in.’

  If Mrs Nebitz appeared a little animated, I put it down to the unaccustomed activity she was being treated to, which I suspected wasn’t altogether unpleasant.

  I smiled. The way I saw it, she deserved to have an unleaky faucet.

  Along with the attention of two young, attractive males.

  ‘Hey, Joe,’ I said to the young plumber I’d inherited with the building. So far I had no complaints and I could only hope that would hold.

  ‘Hey, Sof,’ he said back from where he was under the sink.

  ‘You remember my grandson, don’t you, Sofie?’ Mrs Nebitz said.

  Of course I remembered her grandson. Even if he hadn’t looked like the statue of David come to life with all that blonde hair, blue eyes and chiseled physique, there was that whole Rosie heart-stomping thing.

  A little hard to forget.

  Especially since mine had been the shoulder she’d soaked in tears.

  Several times.

  Not to mention her insufferable moods as of late.

  ‘Sofie,’ he said, sounding awkward.

  ‘Seth,’ I said back, avoiding meeting his gaze where he messed around with the faucet head.

  ‘Seth was just telling the nice Mr Wurzelbacher he thinks it’s the soap.’

  ‘The washer,’ he corrected.

  Joe’s voice was slightly muted from under the sink. ‘Never hurts to check a little further.’

  ‘I agree.’

  The room fell strangely silent considering there were four of us in there. Nothing but the sound of metal tools scratching against metal objects.

  ‘Sofie, would you like some knish?’ Mrs Nebitz asked. ‘Seth brought some fresh.’

  ‘I’d love some.’ I jumped at both the chance to leave the room and to enjoy some knish, which was, no doubt, from Knish Nosh, the best in town.

  We sat together in her living room that reminded me of my mother’s, handmade doilies covering nearly every available surface along with photographs, mostly old black-and-white and sepia prints, but some new. The small television was tuned in to Wheel of Fortune but the volume was low, so I watched a voiceless Vanna White pretend to turn letters.

  Wait a minute, Vanna was always voiceless.

  OK, maybe it was the fact that she was sans bells and whistles and dings that made it seem strange somehow.

  ‘So,’ Mrs Nebitz said after cutting me a square of knish and handing me a plate. ‘How’re things?’

  ‘Things are good. How about with you? You looking forward to Hanukkah in a couple of days?’

  ‘Yes, yes. Things couldn’t be better.’

  I found it curious she didn’t launch into a blow by blow of her coming schedule as she normally did.

  Probably she was distracted by the two men in her kitchen.

  Probably she wanted to stay alert in case they said something.

  ‘So . . . how is your friend Rosie?’

  I nearly choked on my knish. Probably I was wrong.

  The last thing I expected was for her to enquire after the feisty Puerto Rican who had nearly upset all of her plans by falling in love with her beloved grandson.

  Hey, I’ll be the first to admit even I was surprised by the odd pairing. The two couldn’t have been more different had you plucked them from rival gardens.

  But when they’d met at my apartment some months ago . . . well, even I, the skeptic, recognized the signs of love at first sight.

  Oh, Rosie had thought she’d hidden the fact they were secretly dating from me – OK, she’d succeeded to some extent – saying she didn’t want to jinx the relationship by sharing too soon, but I’d known that, whoever it was, it was nowhere near a passing fling.

  Of course, I don’t think even Rosie suspected Seth’s reason for keeping their relationship a secret had been a little more substantial.

  Namely, the staunchly traditional woman opposite me.

  ‘Rosie?’ I asked now, wiping whatever crumbs there may have been from my mouth with the back of my wrist.

  Mrs Nebitz handed me a napkin.

  ‘Thank you.’ I swallowed the bite lodged in my throat. ‘Rosie . . . she’s fine.’

  She nodded. ‘Good. Good.’

  Was it me, or did my chewing suddenly sound unusually loud?

  I committed the mother of all sins by eating the rest of the knish in one bite, then said to fill the silence, ‘She has that new nephew of hers. She and her sister plan on spoiling him to death over the holidays.’

  Mrs Nebitz nodded again. ‘Good. Good.’

  I pretended an interest in cleaning my hands.

  While I wasn’t entirely sure what had gone down a couple of months ago that had resulted in Seth’s tossing Rosie’s heart to the floor and doing the hora on it, I did know that Mrs Nebitz’ role had been a large one. She only had the one good, Jewish grandson. And she wanted him to marry a good, Jewish girl. And go on to produce plenty of good, Jewish great-grandchildren.

  And Rosie was as far away as you could get from Jewish.

  And probably as far away from good as well.

  I understood the mentality. My own family demonstrated enough of it for me to be very familiar with it. I comprehended that it wasn’t so much about racism as it was traditionalism.

  Still, I couldn’t help thinking Rosie’s ongoing pain transcended all that.

  What about love?

  When both men appeared in the kitchen doorway at the same time, Mrs Nebitz and I couldn’t have moved any quicker to stand.

  Which meant I leapt up, and she got up in stages.

  ‘I replaced the washer,’ Seth said.

  ‘And I tightened the pipes and checked the pressure,’ Joe said.

  ‘And the leak?’ I asked.

  They both smiled.

  ‘Taken care of,’ Seth said.

  ‘Gone,’ Joe said.

  ‘Good, good,’ Mrs Nebitz was clearly pleased. ‘Now, why don’t you two nice, young men come have some of this knish. It’s the best in town, you know . . .’

  A couple of hours later, I was back at my apartment, unrolling twinkling lights, an old episode of Seinfeld in the DVD player, souvlaki wrappers crumpled up on the coffee table. A sated Muffy was curled in his chair, idly watching me.

  So maybe I’d caught the Christmas bug.

  OK, at least the sniffles.

  I was thinking spotting Mrs Claus’ reindeer might have something to do with it. Even though a street-by-street search following the sighting had turned up nothing.

  Of course, I purposely banned any thoughts related to his being anywhere near Queens Boulevard, which was also unaffectionately called The Boulevard of Death. I argued that anyone else would be sure they were seeing things and would give him a wide berth.

  A human being, on the other hand, they would hit.

  I’d happily called Mrs Claus and reported the news. Why, I don’t know. To let her know I’d spotted him, apparently alive and well? She’d been so overjoyed even I smiled.

  Of course, that didn’t mean that tomorrow he wouldn’t end up sausage or reindeer jerky if the wrong person crossed paths with him.

  Damn. Now why did I have to go and think that? Yuk.

  I thought that perhaps there was something I should be working on related to the kidnapping case, perhaps beating the bushes or pounding the pavement, but since so many others were also on the case, I didn’t like the thought of fighting with anyone the way I had to at department store sales.

  As far as I was concerned, they could have the last pair of red, suede boots at a killer price.

  As for me . . . well,
I planned to wait until the holiday crowds dispersed and a regular clearance sale would get me the same pair without the fight.

  Guess the same could be said of my method of detecting. While chasing down leads yielded important clues, they also led down many a wrong road. I was satisfied for now that I had enough information to work with until I figured out my next step. Since no ransom demand had been made yet, there wasn’t all that much to go on.

  The idea that the little girl might have been taken by a child predator . . .

  No. Chances of that were so slim, they weren’t worthy of consideration.

  And considering the money at stake, my thinking was she would be well looked after.

  Hopefully.

  Anyway, I certainly wasn’t going to solve the case tonight. So I had my notes and background checks and photographs spread out on the back of the sofa, passing them often and pausing here and there to leaf through a page or two while I decorated.

  I didn’t have plans to buy a tree – artificial or otherwise – but while I was out picking up a couple of smaller gifts for my family, I put a few holiday decorations in my basket. Nothing major. Just some colored strings of lights, a couple of cookie trays with Santas on them (which I hoped Muffy would refrain from watering), and two fragrant table arrangements of live pine branches that filled the space with at least the scent of Christmas; one for me, one I planned to take to my mother.

  Seeing as this was my first Christmas on my own, I wasn’t sure how big or how small I wanted to keep it. But while I’d grumbled at Rosie’s overboard efforts, truth was for the most part I liked the little touches around the office. Made it feel more festive somehow.

  Festive. Now there was a word I hadn’t been compelled to add to my vocabulary lately.

  Truthfully, I don’t think I’d used it before.

  ‘. . . then there’s Miss Platterpot, she live downstairs. She no like kids. Always tell Jolie “keep quiet” . . .’

  I’d set up my cell phone to play my earlier interview with Jolie Abramopoulos’ Argentinian nanny. I was a half an hour into the nearly uninterrupted monologue of names and details and had essentially tuned out about ten minutes ago, much as I had during the conversation itself.

  As with then, nothing glaring stuck out at me. But I still had an hour to go on the recording. And if there was something there, bookended with inconsequential details about the night security man’s bathroom habits (seemed he liked to relieve himself on tenants’ car tires), and the nice new mailman who always gave Jolie a head pat, I was determined to find it.