“Another victim of that . . . rosary psycho.”
I cover my mouth in horror. “Seriously? Right here?”
They nod solemnly, mostly out of a smug sense of pride in being the ones to tell me the news. They are the sort people who watch Entertainment Tonight and immediately race to the phone to be the first to tell their friends about the celebrity death du jour.
“I do hope they catch him soon,” I say.
“They won’t,” the wife says. She is wearing an expensive white wool cardigan. She carries an expensive umbrella. She has the tiniest teeth I’ve ever seen.
“Why do you say that?” I ask.
“Between you and me,” she says, “the police are not always the sharpest knives in the drawer.”
I look at her jawline, the slightly sagging skin on her neck. Does she know that I could reach out, right now, take her face in my hands and snap her spinal cord in one second?
I feel like it. I really do.
Arrogant, self-righteous bitch.
I should. But I won’t.
I have work to do.
Perhaps I’ll follow them home, and pay her a visit when this is all over.
40
TUESDAY, 10:30 PM
THE CRIME SCENE stretched fifty yards in all directions. The traffic on the parkway was now bottlenecked to a single lane. Two uniformed officers directed the flow.
Byrne and Jessica watched Tony Park and John Shepherd instruct the
Crime Scene Unit. They were the primary detectives on this case, although it was clear that the case would soon fall under the purview of the task force. Jessica leaned against one of the patrol cars, trying to sort out this nightmare. She glanced at Byrne. He was zoned, off on one of his mind jaunts.
Just then a man stepped forward from the crowd. Jessica saw him approaching out of the corner of her eye. Before she could react, he was upon her. She turned, defensive.
It was Patrick Farrell.
“Hey there,” Patrick said.
At first his presence at the scene was so out of place that Jessica thought it was a man who looked like Patrick. It was one of those moments when someone who represents one part of your life steps into the other part of your life, and suddenly everything is a little off, a little skewed toward the unreal.
“Hi,” Jessica said, surprised at the sound of her voice. “What are you doing here?”
Standing just a few feet away, Byrne gave Jessica a look of concern, as if to ask: Everything okay? At moments like this, considering what they were there for, everyone was a little on edge, a little less trustful of the strange face.
“Patrick Farrell, my partner, Kevin Byrne,” Jessica said a little stiffly.
The two men shook hands. For an odd instant, Jessica was apprehensive about their meeting, although she had no idea why. This was compounded by a momentary flicker in Kevin Byrne’s eyes as the two men shook hands, a fleeting misgiving that dissolved as quickly as it had appeared.
“I was on my way to my sister’s house in Manayunk. I saw flashing lights, I stopped,” Patrick said. “It’s Pavlovian, I’m afraid.”
“Patrick is an ER physician at St. Joseph’s,” Jessica said to Byrne.
Byrne nodded, perhaps acknowledging the difficulties of a trauma room doctor, perhaps conceding their common ground as two men who patched the bloodied wounds of the city on a daily basis.
“A few years ago I saw an EMS rescue on the Schuylkill Expressway. I stopped and did an emergency trach. Ever since, I’ve never been able to pass a strobing rack.”
Byrne stepped closer, lowered his voice. “When we catch this guy, and if he just happens to get seriously injured in the process, and he just happens to get sent to your ER, take your time fixing him up, okay?”
Patrick smiled. “No problem.”
Buchanan approached. He looked like a man with the weight of a ten-ton mayor on his back. “Go home. Both of you,” he said to Jessica and Byrne. “I don’t want to see either of you until Thursday.”
He got no arguments from either detective.
Byrne held up his cell phone, said to Jessica: “Sorry about this. I turned it off. It won’t happen again.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Jessica said.
“You want to talk, day or night, you call.”
“Thanks.”
Byrne turned to Patrick. “Nice to meet you, Doctor.”
“Pleasure,” Patrick said.
Byrne turned on his heels, ducked under the yellow tape, and walked to his car.
“Look,” Jessica said to Patrick. “I’m going to stick around here for a little while, in case they need a warm body to canvass.”
Patrick glanced at his watch. “That’s cool. I’m off to my sister’s house anyway.”
Jessica touched his arm. “Why don’t you call me later? I shouldn’t be too long.”
“You sure?”
Absolutely not, Jessica thought.
“Absolutely.”
PATRICK HAD A BOTTLE of Merlot in one hand, a box of Godiva chocolate truffles in the other.
“No flowers?” Jessica asked with a wink. She opened her front door, let Patrick in.
Patrick smiled. “I couldn’t get over the fence at Morris Arboretum,” he said. “But not for lack of effort.”
Jessica helped him take his dripping raincoat off. His black hair was mussed from the wind, glistening with droplets of rain. Even windblown and wet, Patrick was dangerously sexy. Jessica tried to derail the thought, although she had no idea why.
“How’s your sister?” she asked.
Claudia Farrell Spencer was the cardiac surgeon Patrick was supposed to become, a force of nature that had fulfilled every one of Martin Farrell’s ambitions. Except the part about being a boy.
“Pregnant and bitchy as a pink poodle,” Patrick said.
“How far along is she?”
“According to her, about three years,” Patrick said. “In reality, eight months. She’s about the size of a Humvee.”
“Gee, I hope you told her that. Pregnant women simply adore being told they’re huge.”
Patrick laughed. Jessica took the wine and the chocolates and put them on the foyer table. “I’ll get some glasses.”
As she turned to go, Patrick grabbed her hand. Jessica turned back, facing him. They found themselves face to face in the small foyer, a past between them, a present hanging in the balance, a moment drawing out in front of them.
“Better watch it, Doc,” Jessica said. “I’m packin’ heat.”
Patrick smiled.
Somebody better do something, Jessica thought.
Patrick did.
He slipped his hands around Jessica’s waist and pulled her closer. The gesture was firm, but not forceful.
The kiss was deep, slow, perfect. At first, Jessica found it hard to believe that she was kissing someone in her house other than her husband. But then she reconciled that Vincent hadn’t had too much trouble getting over that hurdle with Michelle Brown.
There was no point to wondering about the right or wrong of it.
It felt right.
When Patrick led her over to the couch in the living room, it felt even better.
41
WEDNESDAY, 1:40 AM
OCHO RIOS, A SMALL REGGAE SPOT in Northern Liberties, was winding down. The DJ was spinning music more as background at the moment. There were only a few couples on the dance floor.
Byrne crossed the room and talked to one of the bartenders, who disappeared through a door behind the bar. After a short while, a man emerged from behind the plastic beads. When the man saw Byrne, his face lit up.
Gauntlett Merriman was in his early forties. He had flown high with the Champagne Posse in the eighties, at one time owning a row house in Society Hill and a beach house on the Jersey shore. His long dreadlocks, streaked with white, even in his twenties, had been a staple on the club scene, as well as at the Roundhouse.
Byrne recalled that Gauntlett had once owned a peach Jagu
ar XJS, a peach Mercedes 380 SE, and a peach BMW 635 CSi, all at the same time. He would park them all in front of his place on Delancey, resplendent in their gaudy chrome wheel covers and custom gold hood ornaments in the shape of a marijuana leaf, just to drive the white people crazy. It appeared he had not lost the taste for the color. This night he wore a peach linen suit and peach leather sandals.
Byrne had heard the news, but he was not prepared for the specter that was Gauntlett Merriman.
Gauntlett Merriman was a ghost.
He had bought the whole package, it seemed. His face and hands were dotted with Kaposi’s, his wrists emerged like knotted twigs from the sleeves of his coat. His flashy Patek Phillipe watch looked as if it might fall off at any second.
But, despite it all, he was still Gauntlett. Macho, stoic, rude bwoi Gauntlett. Even at this late date, he wanted the world to know he had ridden the needle to the virus. The second thing Byrne noticed, after the skeletal visage of the man crossing the room toward him, arms outstretched, was that Gauntlett Merriman wore a black T-shirt with big white letters proclaiming:
I’M NOT FUCKING GAY!
The two men embraced. Gauntlett felt brittle beneath Byrne’s grasp. Like dry kindling, about to snap with the slightest pressure. They sat at a corner table. Gauntlett called over a waiter, who brought Byrne a bourbon and Gauntlett a Pellegrino.
“You quit drinking?” Byrne asked.
“Two years,” Gauntlett said. “The meds, mon.”
Byrne smiled. He knew Gauntlett well enough. “Man,” he said. “I remember when you could snort the fifty-yard line at the Vet.”
“Back in the day, I could fuck all night, too.”
“No, you couldn’t.”
Gauntlett smiled. “Maybe an hour.”
The two men adjusted their clothing, felt out each other’s company. It had been a while. The DJ spun into a song by Ghetto Priest.
“How about all dis, eh?” Gauntlett asked, wanding his spindly hand in front of his face and sunken chest. “Some fuckery, dis.”
Byrne was at a loss for words. “I’m sorry.”
Gauntlett shook his head. “I had my time,” he said. “No regrets.”
They sipped their drinks. Gauntlett fell silent. He knew the drill. Cops were always cops. Robbers were always robbers. “So, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit, Detective?”
“I’m looking for someone.”
Gauntlett nodded again. This much he had figured.
“Punk named Diablo,” Byrne said. “Big fucker, tats all over his face,” Byrne said. “You know him?”
“I do.”
“Any idea where I can locate him?”
Gauntlett Merriman knew enough not to ask why.
“Is this in the light or the shadow?” Gauntlett asked.
“Shadow.”
Gauntlett looked out over the dance floor, a long, slow scan that endowed his favor with the weight it deserved. “I believe I can help you in this matter.”
“I just need to talk to him.”
Gauntlett held up a bone-thin hand. “Ston a riva battan nuh know sun hat,” he said, slipping deep into his Jamaican patois.
Byrne knew this one. A stone at the bottom of the river doesn’t know the sun is hot.
“I appreciate this,” Byrne added. He didn’t bother to add that Gauntlett should keep all this to himself. He wrote his cell phone number on the back of a business card.
“Not at all.” He sipped his water. “Ever’ting cook and curry.”
Gauntlett rose from the table, a little unsteadily. Byrne wanted to help him, but he knew that Gauntlett was a proud man. Gauntlett found his balance. “I will call you.”
The two men embraced again.
When he got to the door, Byrne turned, found Gauntlett in the crowd, thinking: A dying man knows his future.
Kevin Byrne envied him.
42
WEDNESDAY, 2:00 AM
“IS THIS MR. AMIS?” the sweet voice on the phone inquired.
“Hello, love,” Simon said, pouring on the North London. “How are you?”
“Fine, thanks,” she said. “What can I do for you tonight?”
Simon used three different outcall services. For this one, StarGals, he was Kingsley Amis. “I’m frightfully lonely.”
“That’s why we’re here, Mr. Amis,” she said. “Have you been a naughty boy?”
“Terribly naughty,” Simon said. “And I deserve to be punished.”
While he waited for the girl to arrive, Simon looked at a tearsheet of the front page of the next day’s Report. He had the cover, as he would have until the Rosary Killer was caught.
A few minutes later, as he sipped his Stoli, he imported the photos from his camera into his laptop. God, he loved this part, when all of his equipment was synched up and working.
His heart beat a little faster as the individual photos popped up on the screen.
He had never used the motor drive function on his digital camera before, the feature that allowed him to take a rapid series of photographs without resetting. It worked perfectly.
In all, he had six photographs of Kevin Byrne coming out of that vacant lot in Gray’s Ferry, along with a handful of telephoto shots at the Rodin Museum.
No back alley meetings with crack dealers.
Not yet.
Simon closed his laptop, took a quick shower, poured himself a few more inches of Stoli.
Twenty minutes later, as he prepared to open the door, he thought about who would be on the other side. As always, she would be blond and leggy and slender. She would be wearing a plaid skirt, navy blazer, white blouse, knee socks, and penny loafers. She would even carry a book bag.
He was a very naughty boy, indeed.
43
WEDNESDAY, 9:00 AM
“WHATEVER YOU NEED,” Ernie Tedesco said.
Ernie Tedesco owned Tedesco and Sons Quality Meats, a small meatpacking company in Pennsport. He and Byrne had formed a friendship years earlier when Byrne had solved a series of truck hijackings for him. Byrne had gone home with the intention of showering, grabbing something to eat, and rousting Ernie out of bed. Instead, he showered, sat on the edge of the bed, and the next thing he knew it was six o’clock in the morning.
Sometimes the body says no.
The two men gave each other the macho version of a hug—clasp hands, step forward, strong pat on the back. Ernie’s plant was closed for renovations. When he left, Byrne would be alone there.
“Thanks, man,” Byrne said.
“Anything, anytime, anywhere,” Ernie replied. He stepped through the huge steel door and was gone.
Byrne had monitored the police band all morning. The call had not gone out about a body found in an alley in Gray’s Ferry. Not yet. The siren he had heard the night before was another call.
Byrne entered one of the huge meat storage lockers, the frigid room where sides of beef were hung from hooks, and attached to ceiling tracks.
He put on gloves and moved a beef carcass a few feet from the wall.
A few minutes later, he propped open the outside door, went to his car. He had stopped at a demolition site on Delaware, where he had taken a dozen or so bricks.
Back inside the processing room, he carefully stacked the bricks on an aluminum cart, and positioned the cart behind the hanging carcass. He stepped back, studied the trajectory. All wrong. He rearranged the bricks again, and yet again, until he had it right.
He took off the wool gloves and put on a pair of latex. He took the weapon out of his coat pocket, the silver Smith & Wesson he had taken off Diablo the night he brought in Gideon Pratt. He gave another quick glance around the processing room.
He took a deep breath, stepped back a few feet, and assumed a shooting stance, his body bladed to the target. He cocked the weapon, then squeezed a shot. The blast was loud, ringing off the stainless steel fixtures, caroming off the ceramic tile walls.
Byrne approached the swinging carcass, examined it. The entry ho
le was small, barely noticeable. The exit wound was impossible to find in the folds of fat.
As planned, the slug had hit the stacked bricks. Byrne found it on the floor, right near a drain.
It was then that his handheld radio crackled to life. Byrne turned it up. It was the radio call he had been expecting. The radio call he had been dreading.
The report of a body found in Gray’s Ferry.
Byrne rolled the beef carcass back to where he had found it. He washed off the slug first in bleach, then in the hottest water his hands could stand, then dried it. He had been careful to load the Smith and Wesson pistol with a full-metal-jacketed slug. A hollow point would have brought fiber with it as it passed through the victim’s clothing, and there was no way Byrne could have duplicated that. He wasn’t sure how much effort the CSU team was going to put into the murder of another gangbanger, but he had to be careful nonetheless.
He took out the plastic bag, the bag in which he had collected the blood the night before. He tossed the clean slug inside, sealed the bag, collected the bricks, scanned the room one more time, then left.
He had an appointment in Gray’s Ferry.
44
WEDNESDAY, 9:15 AM
THE TREES BORDERING the bridle trail that snaked its way through Pennypack Park were straining at their buds. It was a popular jogging path, and this brisk spring morning had brought runners out in droves.
While Jessica jogged, the events of the previous night ran through her mind. Patrick had left a little after three. They had taken their encounter about as far as two consenting adults could without making love, a step for which they both wordlessly agreed they were not ready.
Next time, Jessica thought, she might not be so adult about the whole thing.
She could still smell him on her body. She could still feel him on her fingertips, her lips. But these sensations were overruled by the horrors of the job.
She picked up her pace.
She knew that most serial murderers had a pattern, a cooling down period between killings. Whoever was doing this was on a rampage, the final leg of a spree, a binge that, in all likelihood, would end in his own death.
Richard Montanari: Four Novels of Suspense: The Rosary Girls, the Skin Gods, Merciless, Badlands Page 21