“No, honey, I didn’t do it. They’ve made a mistake, a terrible, terrible, mistake.” The urge to hold her, stroke her hair, and tell her that everything would be okay was overwhelming.
“But how did the knife get in your car?” She hunched forward, her chin poised above the Bible on the coffee table.
“I don’t know. Somebody put it there. You’ll see, at trial.”
Molly nodded, clearly skeptical. I would have preferred another interrogation by Arlene.
Cathy said, “Dad wants to see you while we’re living apart. Maybe you can spend some weekends here, in your old room. Would you like that?”
My sweaty fingers pressed together while Molly contemplated her response. Finally, she said, “I guess that would be okay.”
My eyes welled, and I wiped the tears away with the back of my hand. “Thanks, sweetie. We’ll have fun, you’ll see. We can go to a movie, get something to eat.”
She made a face. “I think it’s better if we just stay here.”
My teenage daughter was reluctant to appear with me in public, anticipating the stares and whispers. “Whatever you want.”
She sank back into the sofa and looked from me to Cathy. “Are you guys mad at me for anything?”
Cathy nestled Molly’s tiny hand in her own. “God, no.”
“Because they sent me away before, you know, when people didn’t want me.”
“That’s … that’s got nothing to do with this, Molly. All of this is because of me.” Forgetting how vulnerable she was, inside the shell of her tomboy image, was too easy. Cathy drew her close and enveloped her in a tight hug. I had lost the privilege of striding around the table and wrapping them both in my arms.
After awhile, Cathy sat upright and boosted Molly from the sofa. “Why don’t you get that stuff you wanted from your room, sweetie? Let me talk to your dad for a minute.”
Molly stood and then looked down at my sandals. “What about your feet, Dad?”
“Just fine, honey. Who needs all those toes? I’ll get by.” The pain was lessening, and hobbling short distances without the crutches had become routine. Other than two ugly scars, which would forever remind me of a dank basement and bright red lips, I’d eventually be fine.
As Molly padded upstairs, Cathy turned to me and folded her hands in her lap. “What about us, John? Financially.”
My eyes dropped and scanned the figurines on the table. “This will probably take everything we have.” I looked up at her; she was nodding. “I don’t know how else to say it.”
“I’m not surprised. Carl’s asked around about these types of cases.”
“We’ll have to work out a budget. Until, you know …” I couldn’t bring myself to say it.
“The divorce.” Cathy was reserved, nearly emotionless. She seemed to sit in the shadow of the cross above the fireplace.
“I’ll talk to your lawyer.” I cleared my throat. “My situation complicates everything.”
Cathy reached out and ran a finger over the glass surface of the table. “If it weren’t for Molly, I’d probably approach all of this differently.”
I watched her finger meander aimlessly. “Thank you for letting me see her.”
She took a deep breath and sat up straight. “And what about your work?”
“I’m not sure, really. My practice is dead.” I leaned forward and rested my elbows on my thighs. The landlord was already planning, no doubt, to scrub my name from the office door. “Marilyn is transferring files. She knows I’m shutting down and is looking for something else.”
“She won’t have any problem, will she?”
I shook my head. “She’s damn good, and I’ll give her a helluva reference.” If anyone valued my opinion. He cheated on his wife and might have killed someone, but he sure knows his secretaries!
Suddenly, Cathy’s shell cracked. Her lip trembled and her eyes filled with tears. “I thought we’d retire together, be okay.”
I felt my own lip quiver and cleared my throat. “I’ve got responsibilities yet, to you, to Molly. I’ll clear my name and find something. I promise.”
“Alison says we can stay as long as we want.” Cathy looked away, at nothing, and wiped her tears.
I stared at the balletic figurines. “My lawyer will let me help on the case, too, legal research and that sort of thing, to keep her fee down.”
“Nice of her.” She took a deep breath, gathering herself. “Call me. We’ll work out a schedule for Molly.”
Our daughter’s footsteps sounded on the stairs, and Cathy stood as Molly darted into the room, a knapsack slung over her shoulder. If she noticed Cathy’s reddened eyes, she didn’t say anything.
“Got everything you need, little lady?” I went to her, and we walked together to the door. Cathy passed by me and out onto the porch. Molly hugged me, resting her hands on my back for just a moment.
As Cathy backed out of the driveway, I waved. Molly returned a single flick of her hand. They looked like they did in the photograph that had unsettled me in Jennifer’s apartment. I turned and stared at the cross in my living room, praying that they would be safe.
33
“Like she said, hit-and-run in Tijuana.” Jack Corrigan leaned back into the white leather chair next to me and spoke to Arlene, who was seated at her desk. I stared past him and out the window, at a hazy blue sky and slate-colored lake. “The place wasn’t so rough back then—although you could still get about anything you wanted, legal or not—and the California types would shoot down for a cheap weekend.”
Jack had been working the streets, calling his old cohorts, but not a single helpful fact had turned up as we marked off calendar dates until trial. We’d meet periodically, the three of us, to brainstorm, listen to Jack’s update, and discuss anything we needed to do in preparation for trial. Life had settled into a routine, the only bright spot being Molly’s visits every other weekend. I’d even gone for a couple of semi-jogs in Lakewood Park and learned to balance with missing digits.
“What else?” Arlene asked. They looked like creatures from different worlds: Arlene so polished, so poised, in a gray business suit, and Jack in a dingy blue shirt, tucked into a pair of faded corduroys. His white T-shirt was visible through the open collar, and he’d draped his worn leather jacket, needed to ward off a brisk fall breeze, over the back of the chair. Jack had cocked an eyebrow when he’d first seen Arlene—a regal, brown-skinned woman in a power suit—but he’d accepted that hiring her was my decision and let it rest.
“Him working for some kind of import/export business in San Diego, that checked out. Pretty common down there. But other than confirming his employment, they haven’t been very helpful.”
“Maybe we’re wasting time and money.” Arlene, taking notes, sounded testy as she rolled the Mont Blanc between her fingers. “Not a hole in her story.”
“Yeah, but Frank calling John like he did, talking about the hit-and-run, the import/export … somethin’ seemed fishy to me …”
I could tell Arlene was irritated that Jack had paused for effect. She stopped twirling the pen. “And?”
“I hate to say it, but we need somebody on the ground out there, someone connected in San Diego, like I am here. We can keep a leash on him, Johnny, keep the costs down.”
“Is it worth it? Shit like that happens all the time in Tijuana, doesn’t it?”
“Have somebody snoop around, maybe for just a day. Won’t cost that much. I think we ought to know if the marriage was solid, if her husband’s death was legit.” Jack fiddled with the flap on the black leather case strapped to his belt, where he kept his phone. Arlene had insisted that Jack pick up a cell so we could all reach each other as needed.
“I need more than a hunch—it has to be something we can use in court,” she said.
“Okay, fine. Coleman’s only on trial for his life. Guess there’s no need to follow my gut. I’ve only been doing this since before—”
“Since before my people were allowed into Lakewood?�
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Jack’s eyes narrowed, and he looked from her to me, nonplussed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Oh, ’scuse me Officer Corr-i-gan. I sho’ nuff don’t know what come ovah me, thinkin’ I had cause to make some kinda point. Let me do a li’l Oprah head-bobble now and get on back to mah place.”
I was stunned. Arlene’s dialect was straight from an episode of Amos ’n Andy. Never, ever, had she spoken that way. She stared at Jack until he averted his eyes, shifting his gaze out the window and over Lake Erie.
“Hold on, hold on.” A rift on my team would be a disaster. “I’m feeling just desperate enough to hire somebody on the other side of the country to go chat up a bunch of people who don’t give a shit about me.” Another expense. The judge had lifted the injunction freezing my accounts, because Flanagan had found no evidence that I’d scammed any client funds, but the assets that remained were dwindling fast.
Jack looked at Arlene as if he were going to say something, but thought better than to spark a fight. Although it was cool outside, the sun was burning in through the windows, and the room was warm, despite the air conditioning. I had prayed that Jack would unearth a lucky shamrock, but it wasn’t looking so good. And what bug had crawled up Arlene’s ass?
“Fine,” Jack said. “I’ll take care of it.”
“Tell the guy to get on it, because we’re running out of time.” She spoke in her usual corporate, I’m-in-charge voice.
I was afraid that Jack was going to reply with yes, boss, but he just nodded. “I did check the parking lot at her apartment, like you asked, but the only camera is on the door with the building directory, where the tenants have to buzz people in. The parking lot’s not monitored. Jennifer coulda used a side door to put the shit in your trunk, easy, and let herself back in.”
“Any luck with that girl from Ed’s Eggs, Mary?” I wanted her questioned because, just maybe, Jennifer had gone back to the restaurant and convinced Mary to tell her where to find Frank.
“I’ve done my best, Johnny. No sign of her.”
“Well, Christ, go back. Find out her schedule, wait for her.”
“You’re not getting it. I mean, she missed a shift and never came back. No one at that greasy spoon’s heard from her. I’ve tried trackin’ her down, but she’s goddamn disappeared.”
“Disappeared …?”
Arlene said, “People on the low rung of the ladder slip through the cracks all the time, John, you know that.”
Her observation only served to reinforce what the Butcher had said, about the dregs. “But—look, this may sound crazy … maybe Jennifer did something to her, killed her, too. We both thought she knew where Frank was.”
They exchanged glances, and Arlene said, “I understand you’re trying to figure everything out, but you can’t spitball in front of a jury. Without Mary—or at least someone who can link her to Jennifer—we’ve got nothing.”
“I’ll try once more, but don’t hold your breath.” Jack kind of spat out the words, like he was irritated with me and tired of chasing dead ends. “I checked out the neighborhood where Frank was killed again, too. I’m turnin’ nobody up who can put Jennifer near Frank’s place, not that anybody’s exactly lining up to talk to me. The people who work with Jennifer at Business One got no problems with her, and that place where she teaches English to the … Spanish, nothin’ there, either.”
Jack had caught himself before he used a word other than Spanish. And I didn’t think he’d really care that the immigrants Jennifer taught were most likely not from Spain.
“And, the damn thing, John, is all these restaurant people. They saw you with Jennifer, trying to find out where Frank was. And, well …”
“Go on.”
“You let everyone know that you were wrapped up in the killings, the Butcher stuff. That cop, Coufalik, finds it strange that you kept showing up at crime scenes. Salvatore don’t wanna say nothin’, you can tell—although he’s pissed about you cheatin’ on Cathy—but he’s stuck and can’t deny when and where he saw you. Coufalik said somethin’ about maybe you got bit by the murder bug, like Frank was practically begging to get himself killed.”
The absurdity of what Jack just said slapped me so hard that I nearly vaulted from the chair. Jack and Arlene were serious, though; apparently, they did not find Coufalik’s assessment as ludicrous as I did. Arlene rapped her pen against that colorful paperweight a couple of times, click-click.
“And none of her prints are on your car.”
“No surprise. I don’t know … just keep doing what you’re doing.” Arlene uttered the words as though she had already concluded that Jack’s efforts would remain futile.
“Sure. And I’ll try to learn how to make a point without pissing people off.”
Arlene’s face tensed, but she let the remark pass. Jack hoisted himself from the leather chair and left without a good-bye. I started to rise, but Arlene waved me down. “You told me you’ve known Corrigan most of your life.”
“We go back a long ways. He was there for me when my father passed.”
“Then maybe you’ve heard some rumors about him. Back in the day, he had a rep for bustin’ the heads of any of my people who crossed into Lakewood. Maybe not as bad a spot for us as Little Italy, but close.”
Time was when blacks didn’t venture into certain areas of town. Little Italy, on the East Side, had been one. Lakewood, I knew, had been another. “That kind of crap was a long time ago, Arlene.”
“Doesn’t excuse it, now, does it? There’s nothing about it in his jacket; I just heard through the grapevine. You told me how tough he was, his fight with—possibly—the Torso Murderer, but I guess you didn’t know about this side of him.”
“Arlene—”
“You wanted him on the case, so he’s on the case, but if I’d known about this before, we’d be using someone else.” Her dark eyes flashed at me. “He’s doing the job, and that’s what matters. But I’ll bet he probably walks out of here, meets his Irish cronies for a drink, and wonders how the hell you could have hired a nigger lawyer.”
I squirmed in my chair, thinking of jokes we’d shared at the Tam; I felt like a schoolboy under her withering stare.
“So many white folks think everything’s all better now—we even got us a Pres-i-dent. But I never forget that guys like Corrigan got away with what they did, and there’s plenty like him still around. Every test I ever took, every speech I ever gave, there was something to prove to his kind.”
I stared at the plush carpet for a moment before raising my head. “Can you still work with him?”
She folded her hands and gazed across her granite desktop, her intense dark eyes burning into me. “I’ll work with the devil himself, if that’s what it takes.”
“The old Faustian bargain?”
“It’s you who may need to sell your soul, not me. And if that time comes, Johnny, you’d better be prepared. Because right now, we don’t have much else.”
34
“One more, okay?” Molly said, bouncing up from the bleacher-style seat and trotting toward the skateboard run, just south of the tennis courts in Lakewood Park. I shoved my hands into the pockets of my down jacket and watched her dip and weave along the concrete. I’d eventually come to understand the various moves—fakie, boardslide, grind—but learning Latin in ninth grade had been easier, encouraged by the rap of a nun’s ruler across my knuckles.
Lakewood Park had changed since I was a kid. There hadn’t been any access to Lake Erie back then, except for the times in high school when my buddies and I had risked scaling the steep cliffs to challenge each other’s testosterone. Years later, the county installed a terraced ramp, bordered by lime-green railings, that zig-zagged downhill to the break wall. The monkey bars and tall swings of my youth had been hauled away and replaced by colorful plastic configurations with safety railings, all positioned over rubber mats.
Even Molly, zipping along in her jeans and hoodie, wore headgear and kneepads, equipmen
t that had never existed when I was her age. She executed some maneuver, grabbing the front of her board, then spinning and landing smoothly. Effortlessly, she rolled off the track and bounced slightly to flip the board into the air. She caught the front lip, where she had fixed her grip tape—sandpaper—to ensure better footing, and ran to me.
“Looking good, sweetie,” I said.
She pulled off her helmet and ran a hand through her tousled hair. “Want me to teach you?”
“Maybe, some day.”
She laughed and joined me in the seats. I wished that time would slow down.
“You see that spit of land, just past the baseball diamond? That’s where runaway slaves boarded ferries to Canada. Last stop on the Underground Railroad.” I pointed past the oaks, mostly denuded of leaves, as another winter was nearly upon us.
“You told me that before. Plus, we had a field trip here.”
“Same thing when I was a kid.”
“Really? They had buses back then?” Her eyes twinkled, which was rare. Skateboarding was the one thing that seemed to bring her true joy.
“Smart aleck. And we all carried vinyl lunchboxes.”
“Wow,” she deadpanned. “How retro.”
“I probably spent as much time here as you do. They showed movies every Friday, when it didn’t rain. That pool’s where they taught me to swim.” And where I’d first screwed up the courage to spark an awkward conversation with Ellen O’Donnell, irresistible in her lime green Speedo.
Lakewood had been special for Cathy and me, too. I glanced over my shoulder, at the fence that bordered the park. On the other side, a dirt road ran nearly to the edge of the shale cliff, before it twisted and circled through the undeveloped woods. Paths snaked away from the old road, through the trees, to secluded clearings near the cliff face. The stunning view of Lake Erie attracted plenty of young folks who were eager for a kiss, maybe more.
The first time I’d driven Cathy there, toting a blanket and a bottle of cheap wine, we’d necked and listened to the waves lap at the shore below. After we were married, we’d stroll through the park, and Cathy would tease me about that night. How far did you think I’d let you get for a two-dollar bottle of Boone’s Farm?
The Company of Demons Page 21