Keeping Secrets

by Penny Mickelbury

  “I need a shower. I have exactly three hours to sleep then I have to go back. She looked like you, Mimi. She was beautiful, smart, successful. A lawyer, high-powered, lots of money. She was thirty-three years old and she has a two-year-old child.” Gianna crumpled and Mimi caught her, held her, held on to her, until the shakes stopped. Then she got into the shower with her, washed her, put her to bed, and watched her sleep. And while Gianna slept, fitfully, her brow creased with the images, details of her work that wouldn’t recede even in sleep, Mimi tried to imagine how it would feel to look down at death and see a loved one.

  Then she laughed at her ego. Who says she loves you, Mimi Patterson? She’s never said that. “But I love you,” Mimi whispered and smoothed the crease in her brow. “I love you,” she whispered again, even though her mind was already formulating the story she knew she had to write, the story that would most likely drive a wedge between her and this woman she loved.

  *****

  “I will not mention the cause of death, Tyler, period, end of discussion.” And to amplify her point, Mimi switched off the computer and stood up.

  “Where are you going?” Tyler demanded.

  “Police headquarters. Nobody who knows anything will talk to me on the phone.” She winced at how great an understatement that was. Nobody who knew anything would even answer the phone.

  “Patterson, the cause of death is crucial to this story.”

  “It absolutely is not,” Mimi added even more adamantly. “What’s crucial to this story is the fact that a bloody maniac is murdering gay people who thought they were safely in the closet.”

  “We have a responsibility to the readers...” Tyler began. Mimi cut him off with a razor sharp retort. “We have a responsibility to Hispanic gay women—”

  It was his turn to cut her off. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Try to pay attention, Tyler.” She enumerated on her fingers as she spoke. “White male, Black male, Hispanic male. White female, Black female. Even you can figure out who’s next, Tyler. About this same time next month. Just in time for Christmas. Feliz Navidad.”

  He opened and closed his mouth a couple of times then shook his head and stalked off.

  Gianna sat looking at the photographs from Carolyn Green’s car and had to close her eyes to the horror of it. She’d never before had this reaction to a crime scene. Maybe it was because the woman reminded her of Mimi. She looked again at the destruction inside Mercedes Benz, the proof that Carolyn Green, unlike the other victims, was conscious and alive long enough to put up a struggle. Gianna pushed the photos across the desk, away from her and asked again the questions that plagued her: “How did the phone get on the floor, Eric? If she’d gotten her hands on that phone she wouldn’t have dropped it, I’m certain. And where the hell are the car keys? Why was the drivers’ side door locked and the passenger side door unlocked? I think our killer has finally made a mistake and we damn well better take full advantage of it.”

  She was up and pacing, wound so tightly she appeared ready to rupture. “In all five deaths, the killer is sitting right there in the car. Do they argue first? Is there a visible threat from the killer? That can’t be the case because the victim wouldn’t just sit there. So, the victim doesn’t expect the gun and when the shot comes they’re so surprised they just give up and die. But this time was different. This time the victim got mad instead of scared. This time the victim fought back. Maybe she grabbed him, struck out at him, scratched him...”

  Gianna drew the awful images toward her again as if they were some kind of oracle, as if they held some message, some clue, a solution. This was the fifth set of such photos, so familiar yet so very different. Carolyn Green had been determined not to die. That or...

  “You’re making me nervous pacing around like that. You never pace. What’s on your mind?” Eric asked.

  “The psychological profiles I’ve been reading indicate a specific trait or pattern of behavior with certain serial killers. In these murders, it’s the extreme neatness of the vehicles. Until now. This car is a mess, and I don’t think Carolyn Green did it all. I think our pal snapped. Something’s thrown him over the edge and I’ll bet he left lots of goodies for us to find—skin and blood and hair and maybe even a few good prints.” She made a sound in her throat and moved abruptly to the door.

  He looked at her with concern. “Where are you going?”

  “To look at the enlargements.”

  He half stood and she waved him back down. “You don’t need to go. I confess I’m obsessed and about to lose my mind. No need for you to share. Lean on the lab. Don’t let Asa Landing out of your sight.”

  She opened the door to find Mimi standing there, hand raised preparing to knock. Shocked, they stood looking at each other.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” Eric thundered, looking at Mimi with a shocked amazement that mirrored her own at seeing him in Gianna’s office. He crossed quickly to the door and inserted himself between them.

  He glowered at Mimi and said to Gianna, “She’s from the seminar at Metro GALCO, the one on how to tell your spouse you’re gay.” He turned to Mimi. “I asked you what you’re doing here?”

  Mimi said with more calm than she felt, “I’m sorry to shock you. I’m Montgomery Patterson from the—”

  He cut her off with a snort of disgust. “The reporter! You’ve got a lotta nerve, lady! You’re in that seminar under false pretenses.”

  She tried out a half grin on him. “And how many of us knew you were a cop?”

  “I’ve got a job to do, lady!” he bellowed at her.

  Mimi looked from Eric to Gianna, all traces of the smile gone. “So do I. Lieutenant, I’d appreciate a few moments of your time.”

  Eric interrupted. “I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, but you can’t play it here.”

  “Eric,” Gianna said calmly, having managed to shift feelings and emotions into a professional gear, “if you would excuse us for just a moment.”

  “But Anna—Lieutenant, I don’t think—”

  “I’d appreciate it if you’d prepare the enlargements. I’ll be there in just a few moments.”

  Eric turned abruptly and stalked off down the hall.

  Gianna gently closed the door and stood looking at Mimi. “I gather you’re doing a bit of undercover work,” Gianna said quietly, studying Mimi.

  “It was the only thing that made sense. Your...colleague sits next to me. He always seemed like such a nice guy.”

  “Detective Ashby is a very nice guy,” Gianna said with a hint of defensiveness, “and a damn good cop.”

  “We don’t use our names in the seminar,” Mimi said, hoping to somehow ease the tension that was building between them.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about it?”

  “Because we...I thought we kind of agreed not to discuss our work on this case,” Mimi said.

  Gianna closed her eyes briefly and walked to the window. She looked down on the scurrying shapes in the square below, all bundled up against the cold, and shivered. “I take it you’re here in an official capacity now,” she said, turning to face Mimi.

  “Yes. I’d like to know the name of the woman who was murdered last night, to know something of her background.”

  “But I told you about her.” Gianna stopped herself.

  “You didn’t tell Montgomery Patterson, Lieutenant,” Mimi said.

  “May I ask,” Gianna said carefully, “why you don’t know? You knew about the others.”

  “Because,” Mimi said with a small smile, “you’ve shut out my source at the FBI.”

  Gianna’s eyes widened in understanding. “Don somebody?” Mimi nodded and Gianna asked, “What’s his interest? Why is he nosing around this case?”

  “He’s my editor’s boyfriend. Two of the victims were their friends. His interest is totally unofficial and personal, but it’s how I ended up on this story.”

  “I couldn’t figure why the Bureau was interested
since we hadn’t asked for help.” Gianna almost smiled but her fatigue was too great. She picked up the file on Carolyn Green, removed a couple of pages, and gave them to Mimi who read quickly and wrote in her notebook before returning the pages to Gianna with thanks.

  “You need to know,” Mimi said quietly, “that I’m doing a story for Sunday’s paper.”

  Gianna cut her off with a gasp. “Mimi, you can’t!”

  “I have to, Gianna. This thing is way out of control—”

  “I don’t need you to tell me that! I need you to understand what could happen if you panic the public, or, worse, send the murderer into hiding.”

  “Gianna, I can’t sit on this story any longer. I have an obligation to the public just as you do.”

  “Or to your publisher to sell papers?”

  Gianna’s bitter, cutting tone startled Mimi. “That’s not fair and you know it.”

  “Mimi, I’m asking you, please, don’t do this story. It not only could but probably would jeopardize our investigation.”

  “That means you know more than you did last week.”

  Gianna shook her head. “I can’t answer that.”

  Mimi crossed to the door. “I’m sorry, Gianna,” she said softly and left without looking back, knowing that if she did what she saw would take precedence over any story and over anything else in the world.

  Gianna watched her depart with a mixture of sensations welling inside her: a crucial emptiness but also a full measure of pain and fear and desire. For the first time in eighteen years—since she joined the Department—she wished she had another job, the kind that didn’t ask her to make choices, the kind that didn’t get in the way of her life. She looked at the photograph of her father, the one she’d put in the Art Deco frame to jazz up the solemn young cop in the old-time uniform. The father she’d adored but whom she’d rarely seen because he was too busy being a cop. It had been his life. All he ever wanted, all he ever cared about. She’d patterned herself after him in admiration of his dedication, even though that dedication had cost him the love of his wife, cost him the daily interaction with his children, cost him his life.

  “There’s only one way to be a cop,” she remembered him telling her mother after one of their many arguments over his never being at home, “and that’s all the way!” I’m an all the way cop, too, Gianna thought, and as she heard the words reverberate inside her she flung open the door and hurried out of the office and down the hall to the Think Tank.

  She entered and was enveloped by the photographic enlargements of the five crime scenes. Her eyes instinctively, immediately went to the photo of Carolyn Green, her lifeless eyes wide open in the shocked surprise of anticipating her death.

  “Look at her! She’s more surprised than anything else. Not the shock or fear of the others but surprise,” Gianna said to Eric, thinking that she would have liked Carolyn Green had she known her.

  “But wouldn’t they all be surprised?”

  And Gianna was the one surprised to hear the Chief’s voice because until he spoke she hadn’t realized he was present.

  “Yes. But this is different. I’ll explain later. I’m glad you’re here because finding you was my next stop. You should know that Mimi Patterson’s doing a story for Sunday’s paper.”

  “Damn!” Eric exploded and threw a sheaf of papers into the air, giving Gianna a moment to recover from the stinging hurt of saying Mimi’s name out loud.

  The Chief was watching her closely. “How much does she know?” he asked calmly.

  “Enough,” Gianna said with a shrug.

  “I assume all your charm and other efforts to change her mind failed,” he said dryly, still watching her.

  Gianna turned away from him and pretended to study the blown-up death scenes, willing her voice to be steady, normal, and wondering whether she’d misread or misunderstood the innuendo his question contained. “You assume correctly. She said things were too far out of hand to sit on the story any longer.”

  Eric snorted and the Chief chuckled. “That sounds like her. But believe me, Anna, it could be worse. It could be one of those TV types going off half cocked and scaring the shit out of people. Mimi is a good reporter, and a fair one. She won’t hurt you.”

  “Does that mean you want me to cooperate with the press?” Gianna asked through a sinking feeling. Loving Mimi had done nothing to temper her general dislike of the city’s news media.

  “Now you’re getting the hang of it,” the Chief said with a wry grin. “Damn right I’d rather have direct quotes from you and me in the newspaper than a bunch of no-comments to fuel speculation that we haven’t got the first clue. Come on, let’s you and me go find your friend, Captain Davis, and then go huddle with the public affairs people and cook up some statements that sound like we’re in control of this thing.” He charged out of the room.

  Gianna exchanged a look with Eric and followed the chief to the third floor public affairs office.

  They could have saved their time, plans and schemes.

  True to her promise, Mimi reported only those facts that she had learned independent of Gianna, which meant that she did not include the cause of death. She merely reported that the circumstances of the murders were “grisly.” The story, which spread across three columns on the front page and filled an entire page inside the paper, was, Gianna grudgingly admitted, accurate and fair and balanced and generously sprinkled with quotes from the Chief of Police and the head of the Hate Crimes Unit, who said she was confident the case would be resolved within the week. But it wasn’t Mimi’s story that created the firestorm of reaction so intense that even the chief was taken by surprise. It was the follow-up stories done by the tabloids and the TV news outlets that made the murders the hottest topic in Washington since the Capitol Hill sex scandals. One paper carried the headline, “Son of Sam Stalks Gay Washington!” And one of TV stations dubbed the crimes “The Front Seat Murders.” Criticism from every segment of the public flew at the police department in general, and at the Hate Crimes Unit in particular.

  The entire metropolitan area, it seemed, was consumed with speculating on the meaning of “grisly,” and some of the more inventive rumors rivaled the truth for awful. Some family members of the victim were outraged that the secret their loved ones had carried with them to their graves was now a matter for public discussion; and the bank where Phil Tancil had been a vice president issued a statement insisting it had been unaware of Tancil’s “sexual proclivities.” The mayor, already irritated that her city was known as the Murder Capital of America, was furious that once again the place was painted as sinister and dangerous. And some City Council members were making noises about wasting money on the Hate Crimes Unit. So fierce was the reaction from all quarters that Gianna was ordered to hold a press conference Tuesday afternoon to reassure the public, especially the terrified and outraged gay and lesbian community, that law and order still prevailed, that they would not be systematically eliminated, one by one, while they sat inside their automobiles.

  Later, Gianna and her team sat around the table in the Think Tank and watched the television news programs: watched Tony delValle’s wife collapse in tears as she was cornered by a TV news camera crew on her front porch as the reporter yelled questions at her; watched— and cheered— as Carolyn Green’s husband outran and slammed the door in the face of another camera crew attempting a similar ambush; listened to her own words misinterpreted and misconstrued by the serious-faced six o’clock news reader. But what moved Gianna was the fear she saw in the faces of the gays and lesbians on the TV screen, and she wondered if, as the new reader suggested, that she, Lieutenant Maglione, really was responsible for that fear. She was jolted out of her reverie by an angry Cassandra Ali yelling at the television screen.

  “You lying son of a bitch! Where do they get this shit? Can we sue them or something? Did you hear what he said, Anna? I mean Lieutenant.” The rookie quickly gained control of herself.

  “Actually, Cassie, I didn’t.”
>
  “He said you were gonna be replaced as chief of this unit or maybe even the unit would be disbanded! Can’t we make them retract that or something?” Gianna worked to cover a smile at the young woman’s righteous fury. Oh to be that young again.

  “I don’t know, Cassie. That’s why we have Legal Affairs and Public Affairs. They get paid to worry about stuff like that. We, on the other hand, get paid to catch murderers.” And cocking her head toward the TV, she thought, which we obviously don’t do very well.

  She stood, stretched, and checked her watch. Just six-thirty, but the winter darkness made it feel much later. So, too, no doubt, did the lack of recent sleep.

  “Where are you off to?” Eric asked warily when she took her coat and purse off the rack.

  “I’ll be back in about an hour,” she said carefully. And, pointing to the TV, added, “You all shouldn’t watch any more of that crap. It’s not good for your digestion.”

  Mimi got up to answer the doorbell, fully prepared to maim or kill whoever was dumb enough to be at her door this night. Her surprise at finding Gianna was tinged with an inexplicable foreboding, and when Gianna evaded her embrace, her feeling was confirmed. A chill invaded her body as she followed Gianna into the den.

  “Why didn’t you use the garage door opener?” Mimi asked.

  “I’m not staying. I need to get back....” Gianna’s response was distracted, tentative. She’d turned away from Mimi to stand before the wall of bookshelves and was absently fingering the book spines when Mimi moved to stand close behind her.

  “What is it, Gianna?”

  Gianna turned to face her, her eyes clouded with fatigue and hurt and something Mimi couldn’t name.

  “I can’t...handle it, Mimi.”

  “You can’t handle what, Gianna?” Mimi was frozen inside.