Even he looked sort of okay. The hair had a touch more gray these days, the widow’s peak was a bit higher. The green eyes were warm that day, though they often grew cold, especially on The Job. His jaw and cheeks never had dramatic actor angles, but the mustache and goatee helped define them, lending some much needed coherence to his mug. Not a beauty, but hey, he’s all right.
And the kids. First, the older one, now well into his eighth year. Friends and family irritated Mallory when they called Kieran little Frank. Sure their features were similar, but look at the boy; he was so much more handsome than Frank had ever been. Four at the time of the portrait, Kieran’s creamy Irish skin only hinted at the soft sprinkle of freckles to come. Even then, he had a serious mouth, wide, open-hearted brown eyes, lighter than his mother’s, beaming intelligence. The boy was a good soul, loyal, especially to his little brother, and the Yankees — though not particularly in that order.
While Kieran was serious, Max radiated glee. An outrageous swirl of sweeping curls surrounded clearly Sicilian features. His huge brown eyes, however, shimmered with a leprechaun’s unbridled mirth. That day in the studio, Max wore out the photographer, waving, making faces, unleashing The Laugh, waddling away—
Waddling? God, Max was not even two then—
“MOM! I’ll have some bacon!”
Mallory grinned at Max, he of the wild mane of curls, now six-and-a-half (very big on the “and-a-half” part) and reclining on the couch, remote in hand, watching cartoons; the king of all he surveyed. “What, I can’t make you bacon?”
“Nah. You don’t cook it right. Only Mom.”
“Mom barely cooks the bacon at all. She’s got you eating raw meat.”
“That’s enough from you, or you don’t get any.” Gina entered, the relaxed, sensual smile in her huge, brown eyes cutting through early morning sleepiness. She crossed to Max, ruffling his outrageous hair. “And what else may I fetch you, my lord?”
Max giggled his answer. “Pink lemonade.”
“Bacon and pink lemonade, breakfast of champions.” Mallory followed Gina to the kitchen. He picked up a Fruit Roll-Up wrapper one of the kids had left on the dinette table, tossed it in the garbage under the sink. “We need to update that portrait, hon.”
“Yeah, okay.” He bent into the fridge.
“Max was just waddling back then.”
Gina straightened, a package of bacon in her hand. “Wow, I didn’t… Okay, fine. When do you want to do it?”
“Tomorrow? Nothing happening then.”
Gina looked at him with an empathy usually reserved for the mentally challenged. “We have work. They have school.”
“After that.”
“I have to get Kieran new sneakers.”
“We got him sneakers last month.”
She took out a large frying pan with ridges. “He’s outgrown them already.”
“Damn. What are you feeding these kids?”
“Raw bacon, apparently.”
“Told you it was a problem.”
She placed four strips into the pan, giving him a chuckle. “You’re off on Wednesday. How’bout then? Sears has a sale.”
“Spy Wednesday? Can we wear disguises and look suspicious? How about Holy Thursday? We can pose like we’re getting our feet washed.”
Gina laughed in soft, deep breathy tones that made him want to carry her back to bed. “Can you remember Wednesday?”
Mallory rummaged through the utensil drawer for a knife and fork. “Got it. Where’s the other king?”
“He’s still in bed. Watching”—
As if on cue, a voice from across the house shouted, “You STINK!”
“Sportscenter.”
Mallory headed toward the bellow. “Sounds like the Yanks lost.”
The boys’ room was a shrine to the Bronx Bombers. Yankee blue adorned the bottom half of the walls, with white up top, a pinstriped border of their logos at midpoint, pulling it all together. Jeter and team posters covered most of the white, with Pokemon and several Robin the Boy Wonder pictures defiantly staking claim to Max’s territory.
Kieran lay on the top bunk, staring at a small television across the room, wearing a frown that seemed to stretch across his entire body.
“What’s the matter, buddy?”
“Jeter dropped a ball. And the stinking Sportcenter guys showed it. Twice. It’s not fair. They’re mean!”
“Jeter’s doing fine. He’s made a few errors lately, but —“
“Jeter doesn’t make errors, Dad!”
“Everybody makes them, Kier. Errors are just mistakes. I make mistakes, right?”
“But you’re just Dad. You’re not Jeter.”
Gina giggled from behind Mallory.
Mallory shrugged. “Apparently the hierarchy goes Jeter, God, you, Max, everyone else in Major League Baseball including the peanut salesmen, then me.”
Gina caressed Kieran’s arm, patted his ever-present, oversized batting glove. “You know, usually they show Jeter making a great play.”
Kieran sat up. “Yeah!”
“We’ll have to see if they show him making one in today’s game.”
The beautiful face grew serious. “Actually, he should because today they play at The Stadium. Facing the Detroit Tigers, who are struggling lately due to injuries.”
Mom smiled at Kieran, he smiled back, and the world was whole again. “You’re so smart,” she whispered. “Now you get dressed and I’ll bring your cereal right in.”
Gina moved quickly, as she usually did in the morning. Kieran climbed out of bed behind her, starting to remove his Spider-Man pajamas. The television broke for a commercial, “This is Bob….”
Mallory recognized the male enhancement ad, frowned; can’t a kid just watch his hero play baseball? Mallory used the remote to switch to the Yankee station. “They’ll show better Jeter stuff here, bud.” The boy became instantly absorbed in pinstripe lore.
Mallory hurried after Gina, through the Italian living room (the kind where every detail is painstakingly micromanaged until the room looks magnificent, then no one is allowed to use it except on Christmas morning). “Breakfast in the bedroom? My Mom never let me have breakfast in the bedroom. Are we spoiling them?”
“They like to watch different things in the morning. It’s important to let them start their day without agita.”
“Then we shouldn’t let him watch ESPN.”
“Usually they show good stuff about the Yankees. Besides, he loves any kind of sports. The other day I saw him watching women’s college softball.”
“I need to have a long talk with that boy.”
The phone rang. Only two people called this early in the morning: Frannie, Gina’s teacher’s aide, or the Lieu. He hoped it was Frannie.
The ring cut through the house again. An all too familiar and never welcome tightening of his stomach told him not to answer it. I’ll spring for a shopping trip if it’s you, Frannie.
It wasn’t Frannie.
TEN
As Mallory entered the squad room, Gunner sat munching a roast beef on rye at his battered gray metal desk in the squad room, reading The Daily News. “What’s the Lieu want to see us about?”
“Don’t know. He’s been in his office since I got here.”
Mallory plunked down a wrapped plate of his in-law’s lasagna right next to the sandwich.
“The News breaks the mayor’s balls for four pages today. Normally I love watching the conniving weasel endure such torture, but he’s under pressure now. Not good for us.” Gunner tore the aluminum foil off the lasagna and carried it immediately to the office microwave. “Breakfast of champions.”
Thumbing through a thick, worn out copy of the Manhattan Yellow Pages, Mallory grunted. Gunner looked over, and read the entry where Mallory’s finger had stopped. He read it upside down, like a real detective. “What, you following up the ticket angle? Needle in a haystack.”
“At least we know where the needle sat in that haystack.”
“Ticketmaster.”
Gunner laughed loudly, sandwich bits flying from his mouth. He opened the microwave door, removed the now steaming pasta. “What could they possibly offer? ‘Yes, there was a concert.’ Come on.”
Mallory picked up the phone, hit buttons. “I want to see if they can tell us anything about who sat in that seat.”
Gunner’s beefy arm swept the sandwich bits to the floor. He put the plate down on the clean spot, and searched on of the desk drawers, coming out with a knife and fork. “Mal, you’ve been to the Garden. Been to concerts. You know how many tickets are sold for shows as well as I do. C’mon, buddy. We’re not that desperate.”
Mallory finished dialing. “Let’s just see where it leads.”
Gunner plunged the fork into the lasagna, cut a bit, speared it, and blew on it briefly before eating. He shook the paper, ready to resume reading. “While you’re at it, Dylan’s coming to the Garden, first time in ages. See if they can get us front row.”
Mallory waved him quiet. “Yes, this is Detective Frank Mallory, Manhattan Major Case Squad, NYPD. I need to speak with Ticketmaster’s public information director—”
City-issued phones were loud. Even Gunner could hear the voice on the other line. “One moment, please.”
A click, then a new voice. “Camille Simmons.”
“Yes, this is Detective Frank Mallory, Major Case Squad, NYPD. I need to speak with Ticketmaster’s public information director.”
“Public relations would take care of that.”
“Can I speak with that office, please?”
“You are.”
“Great. Who would the director be?
“Me.”
“Camille Simmons? Well, then, hello Ms. Simmons.”
Gunner imitated Mallory’s casually pleasant voice. “Ms. Simmons can you find our perp for us?”
Mallory tucked the phone between his ear and shoulder, his right hand waving fingers over his closed left fist until they “magically” raised the left’s middle finger. All the while he kept his voice professional. “Ms. Simmons, we’re working a homicide, and need to track a suspect who purchased a ticket to a recent show at Madison Square Garden. Is that possible?”
“For the record, we do not generate the tickets.”
Mallory rolled his eyes. Gunner let out a sarcastic cackle. Mallory cut a hand across his neck. Camille continued. “What I mean to say is the promoter and the venue generates the tickets. Ticketmaster merely provides the software needed to generate those tickets.”
“So, you can’t track…?”
“Sure we can. If you purchase a ticket through Ticketmaster, we will know where you purchased it. Easily.”
Mallory smiled at Gunner. “You can track where every ticket was purchased?”
Gunner dropped his jaw in mock awe.
“Yes we can. And, if you purchased that ticket with a credit card, we will have all of your information: Name, address, social security number, purchase history.”
“Amazing,” Mallory scrawled notes. “Let me ask you, can you tell when the purchase was made?”
“Let me check.” Camille put Mallory on hold. He gave Gunner a sarcastic smirk.
“Yeah, but can she get me front row for Dylan?” Gunner tossed back.
Camille came back, “About confirming the date of purchase?”
“Yes?”
“We can confirm to the minute, detective.”
“Absolutely beautiful,” Mallory said. “How do I go about requesting this sort of tracking for, say, 80 seats?”
“Give me the seat numbers, and your phone number. I’ll pass it through our general counsel and call you back.” Camille sounded like she was beaming with pride.
Mallory gave Camille a request actually totaling 100 seats, starting in Will’s row and spreading out behind and to the right. He explained all were potential witnesses to events they believe lead directly to a murder, with a likely suspect included, but not singled out.
Once off the phone, Mallory smiled triumphantly at his partner. “Research. That’s the key to detective work, my friend. Research.”
Gunner wiped his mouth with a napkin, folded, wiped again. “Case closed, huh?”
“Don’t start. We have to report to the Lieu, and all we have is this one lead.”
“We’ve done a good bit of work, pal.”
Mallory rolled his eyes again. “‘We,’ huh?”
Gunner used another napkin on his fingers, one at a time. His voice was Sunday-morning-politician-on-a-talk-show sincere. “Ticketmaster magic is not all we have. The roadie more or less confirmed the bottle came from around where the victim sat. His friends confirmed that Willie threw it—”
“Will.”
“William Nimrod Dickhead Hill, okay? My point is we have suspects—”
“If Ticketmaster comes through,” Mallory cautioned.
“She sounded promising. And almost everybody buys tickets using credit cards these days. According to your new girlfriend, we could wind up with a potential list of witnesses and suspects, complete with home address, phone, social, and credit card numbers. In just over a day. That’s damn good work. You’re going to be Lieutenant Dan’s hero once again. God help you.”
ELEVEN
The suits finally left, ignoring the squad like they were lepers. The Lieu called the detectives in, and… listened. Once in a while he rubbed his ever-expanding frontier of forehead, or adjusted his sitting position, but his gray eyes remained steady, impassive, narrowed in a respectful concentration that deepened the crow’s feet at their outer edges. His nose was sharp and came to a point right over a straight line of a mouth that was book ended by deep grooves, like parentheses. Lieutenant Daniel Danvers was a good listener. He never interrupted a report, never gave away what he was thinking while detectives summarized events, never scoffed, huffed, or sighed. In fact, he was one of the most supportive squad supervisors around.
And Mallory hated him for it.
Come on give us a frown, Mallory thought, some disparaging remarks about our work; anything that would mean we’re no longer the Lieu’s star players, kill the jinx.
Instead, those parentheses bowed so that thin line of a mouth could bend up, breaking into a pleased smile. “All that in a few hours? Damn good work, fellas.”
Oh shit.
“I know I saddled you with what is essentially Dunn’s case, but this supports my line of thinking.”
Mallory tried to ward off his praise. “You’re taking heat from downtown—”
“You let me deal with that, Frank,” Danvers waved him off. “Let them ice the press awhile. You just go on doing your jobs.”
“Lieu we’re not even close—”
“You and Al are way ahead of the curve here. You even managed to get Dunn cooperating.”
Gunner smirked. “It might be that cute little drawing of him tagged with a bull’s eye, Lieu.”
“Still. Impressive work.”
Mallory’s heart sunk. The Lieu’s praise did not mean anything, he admonished himself. There are no jinxes, no curses, no blessings, no gifts from God. There is just the work, just the facts.
Detective Laura Jacobi knocked on the door. “Lieu, sorry to interrupt, but regarding Mallory’s case—”
“It’s not my case.”
“A couple of uniforms just called in. Identical scenario, sir, except this one is in the Excelsior Hotel’s garage.”
Gunner smiled. “The mayor may have just gotten off the hook.”
The Lieu’s face formed a question. Gunner shrugged. “If what Laura says is true, we got the same M.O., but in a hotel garage instead of a subway. Then clearly, Hizzoner doesn’t have a subway safety problem. He’s got a demented serial killer problem.”
Lieutenant Danvers nodded. “The mayor will appreciate that.”
Mallory smirked, “Maybe you should work down at City Hall, Gunner.”
Gunner gave a mock shiver. “I thought you didn’t believe in Hell?”
Danvers stood. “Get confirmation. Do it personally. Now.”
TWELVE
While The Excelsior, off Central Park West in the mid 90s, was one of Manhattan’s more exclusive hotels, its garage was as grimy as the rest of the city’s underbelly. Exhaust fumes threatened to subdue what little oxygen crawled weakly through its dank, ramped cavern. Dirt caked the floor and walls, graying the entire space, even the air seemed thick with soot.
Mallory and Gunner flanked a hotel representative, a short, thin, well-dressed man with a hanky held over his nose. They descended an incline past a wide assortment of cars. One side was long-term parking, made obvious by the quality of vehicles found there: a hulking black Hummer, a silver Lexus GS430, four BMWs, two Audis, six Mercedes. The other side had to be employees, with cars ranging from Fords to Toyotas, and bumper stickers proclaiming “Jesus Saves” and “Proud my child is a Bloomfield Honor Student,” or college decals along the bottom of the rear windshields ranging from Penn State to Starfleet Academy.
The trio stepped under police tape, Mallory halting the Crime Scene photographer with an upheld hand, inspiring an eye roll. Mallory shook his head slightly, began to examine the victim.
Gunner nudged the hotel rep. “Talk about checking out.” The diminutive man cringed.
Before them lay Chamberlain Davis Whitfield III, who the hotel rep had reported as being a long-term guest. His death was a culmination of damage that likely took a significant amount of time to complete, even at a brisk pace.
From just a cursory visual inspection, there was evidence of a severe blow to the head, what looked and smelled like animal feces in and around the nose and mouth, and a series of deep cuts to the neck. White or clear granules stuck to the neck wounds in matted clumps, a trail running off the corpse to a discarded container about ten feet away.
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