by Blake Pierce
“I got lucky,” Ava said. She knew it was partially true, but she also didn’t want to soak up the adulation. It was a rule her father had taught her at the boxing gym. When people start praising a fighter, they get confident, They get cocky, and they go soft. And then when that knock-out punch comes for their heads, it hurts all the worse when you gotta pick yourself back up.
“When you’ve got Tony Two—an admitted member of the mob with a pretty violent streak—yelling that you’re a hell of a fighter, that’s more than luck,” another of the women said. It was one of the women who had not spoken to her on her first few days. Apparently last night’s events had changed her tune.
“Whatever the case,” Frances said, “the important thing is that you were given the opportunity to close the hatchet-killer case and you did. Nabbed a killer and made the streets safer. That’s the important thing.”
“What?” Ava said. “Who said he was the killer?”
“Pretty much everyone,” Frances said. “Why? What’s going on?”
“I don’t really know,” Ava said. “Excuse me, ladies.”
She left the WB offices and headed back upstairs. She was headed for Minard’s office to find out what the status of the hatchet-killer case really was when she caught sight of Frank coming across the bullpen. She also noticed some of the men laughing behind their hands as he walked by them.
Frank caught up to her when she was just a few steps away from Minard’s office. Remaining as professional as he could, Frank said, “Officer Gold, a word, please?”
She nodded as he led her to what she assumed was his desk. It sat slightly off to the side of the bullpen. It was cluttered with a few opened files and looked somehow more prestigious than the smaller desks located in the central bullpen area. She stood at the edge with her arms folded as Frank sat behind the desk. When he spoke, he did so quietly, as if he were terrified the other officers might hear them talking.
“Listen,” he said. “I know you had nothing to do with all that stuff Tony Two was spouting when we brought him in here. But enough people heard it in the station that it’s making the rounds. I trust you’re an honest woman, and I’d appreciate it if you didn’t do anything to add fuel to the fire.”
“I’d never do anything like that,” she said. Honestly, she was a little offended he’d assumed she’d even think of such a thing.
“I figured you wouldn’t. I just wanted to come to an understanding.”
“Of course. Now, speaking of an understanding, I want to know why everyone is saying we have our killer. We never came an agreement that Tony Two was the hatchet killer.”
Frank shrugged and looked nervously around the precinct. “You’re right. We didn’t. And if I’m being honest with you, I’m not sure myself. But the reality of the situation is that it fits. After you left last night, Captain Minard asked if I thought Tony was the killer. I told him I thought it was a very strong possibility that Tony Two was our guy, but it wasn’t a certainty.”
“So where is he?”
“Tony? He’s in a holding cell.”
“But he didn’t do it.”
“You don’t know that,” Frank said, slightly annoyed. “There’s no reason to make this harder than it has to be. Right now, we have someone in custody—someone who at least seems to be along the lines of who we are looking for.”
“And there’s no need to be lazy and flippant about it either,” Ava said. “We have no evidence, and the way he talked about not hurting women last night— he seems more worried about maybe spilling the beans on his friend than the fact that he’s a murder suspect.”
“Listen to me, Gold. It all lines up perfectly and we get a known crime boss as an arrest. This is an absolute win for everyone—yourself included.”
“But we got the wrong guy.”
Exasperated, Frank lowered his voice even further and said, “If you insist on beating this dead horse, I’ll give you one more day to do whatever magic you think you can pull off. Two days at the absolute max. And that’s not me being an ass…that’s me knowing without a doubt that if you drag it out, you’re going to have Minard after you. He’ll steamroll you and you’re going to look like a fool in front of the few people in the precinct that aren’t already against you or rooting for you to fail. If Minard asks where you are, I’ll tell him you’re speaking to witnesses. But that’s it. One day. But you’re wasting your time. Tony Two is our guy and he’s in a cell.”
There were about a dozen things she wanted to say in response, but she took the high road. It was another instance where the rules of the boxing ring came into play. You could run your mouth all day long and just waste your breath; at the end of the day, results came in the form of your actions.
With that in mind, Ava exited the precinct and once again hit the streets, this time with the rather odd task of proving that a mobster was innocent of murder.
***
Rather than rushing out and hitting up the few people she knew from her days as a singer, Ava spent a bit of time walking the streets. She made her way to the area where the first woman had been killed, right behind the Key Factory. She then oriented herself to where the second woman had been killed. It, too, was not very far away from a club—though it was not one Ava was overly familiar with.
Close to noon, Ava caught what she hoped was a break. She was passing by a bank and barely heard a conversation between a robust-looking man and a much smaller man dressed in a very nice suit.
“…and one of these days, the women of this friggin’ city are going to realize that the right to vote didn’t make them invincible. Pretty, young girls walking up and down the street without a fear in the world. I mean, they’re pretty much asking for trouble. She could have been dead as a doorknob just like them other two if I hadn’t shown up.”
Ava didn’t exactly care for his tone toward women, but what he had to say was certainly along the lines of what she was looking for.
She turned to the man and inserted herself into the conversation. “I’m sorry, sir, but could you repeat what you were just saying?”
He looked at her with something akin to appreciation at first but then she got the same hazed glare most men gave women who seemed to want to be informed of anything other than what they should prepare for dinner.
“Ah hell, I wasn’t trying to offend no one,” he said sarcastically. “I didn’t mean—”
“I’m with the city police Women’s Bureau,” she said. “I’m looking for any information at all about these so-called hatchet killings. From what I heard, you helped a young lady in need recently?”
“Yeah, I did,” he said. She could tell by the way he pushed his chest out and slightly tilted his chin that was he was extremely proud of it, too. “Last night, in fact.”
“Would you be willing to tell me what happened?”
“O’ course.” He took a moment to light a cigar and started puffing on it before he began. “It happened just about six blocks from here, in fact.”
“Would you show me where?”
“Ah, lady, I got to get back to work soon.” He seemed torn over it, really wanting to play the part of the hero. “But I can give you the address.”
“That would be very helpful. First, can you tell me what happened?”
“I was out after a few games of pool with my brother. We were walking home and taking our time about it because we’d both lost some money and it was late. We weren’t anxious to stumble in to our wives, you know? Anyway, we’re taking our time and we see this pretty little thing running down the street. She was dressed in one of those tight little outfits you see the dames wearing that work in those clubs, you know? She said she was a cigarette girl, but I don’t remember which club. Anyway, we thought it was funny at first, seeing her running like that, but then we see the guy coming after her and realize he’s chasing her. And he was a fast one, I tell you what. But we yelled at him and scared him off.”
“Did you get a good look at him?”
�
�Nah, it was too damned dark. I’d say he’s average sized, though. White, for sure. But that’s all.”
“And you walked this girl home?”
“Sure did. Me and my brother.”
“Where does she live?”
The cigar-smoking man gave her directions, and seemed almost as proud of giving that information as he had been to tell the tale of his heroics. He told them with such pride that Ava had no doubt that he was one hundred percent correct. And though she knew it was a big city and the lead might turn out to be nothing, it did not take her long to find out that the man was, in fact, spot on.
The girl’s residence was an apartment just six blocks away, in a part of town that seemed to straddle the line between the wealthy section and the section that struggled a bit more than most. There were only seven apartments in the place, and the man had pointed her to apartment number 4.
Ava knocked and waited. She listened to the sounds of the building as she did so—someone coughing a few doors down, the sound of humming from next door. And then she heard footsteps approaching the door of apartment number 4, soft and shuffling. The door was answered by a pretty blonde woman who looked to be in her early twenties. The cigar-smoking man had described her perfectly. Of course, she was no longer wearing the outfit from her job the night before. She was currently wearing bedclothes and somehow still managed to look breathtaking.
“Yeah?” the woman asked. “Can I help you?”
“I’m with the Women’s Bureau of the NYPD,” Ava said. “I understand you were nearly attacked last night.”
The girl stared at her for a moment, perplexed. “They got a whole women’s division?”
“They do. And I’m on a special assignment. What’s your name?”
“Theresa Neilson.”
“Well, Theresa, were you aware that there have been two murders in the last few days, and that both were women?”
“Not until last night when those two men rescued me. They told me all about it—told me I was a daft broad to be walking the streets alone.”
“I don’t know that I’d use that wording, but they were mostly right, you know.”
“So what is it you need?”
“As much information as you can provide about last night.”
“Sure. Come on in. I’ve got coffee on if you want some.”
Ava stepped inside and looked around. The apartment was sparse, but neatly decorated. It did not have the look of a place lived in by a young single woman. “You live here alone?” Ava asked.
“No. It’s me and my mother. But she left for work a few hours ago.”
“Does she know about the altercation last night?”
“God, no, I’d never tell her. She already worries too much as it is. Besides…it was honestly not that big of a deal.”
“It might have been if those two men hadn’t come along.”
“Maybe. So what do you need to know?”
Ava thought the woman was trying a little too hard to convince herself that the moment had not bothered her. She was playing it far too cool. “First of all, why did you not report it?”
“Like I said…my mom. It would have made her have a stroke or something.”
“Did you happen to see what this man looked like? If you could provide that information, that would be a huge help.”
“I just saw his eyes. They were all wide and crazy. but it was dark, you know? And for the first bit, when he was just waiting for me, he was sort of in the dark.”
“Was he standing by an alleyway?”
“Yeah,” Theresa said, her eyes widening a bit.
“You saw no hair, no facial features?”
“No, nothing like that. Sorry.”
Ava let out a little internal sigh. She supposed it had been a bit too much to hope for. Slightly defeated, she asked: “Did you notice anything at all about him that might help to identify him?”
“I don’t think so. It was all so fast and—wait, you know what? I noticed that he was sort of talking to himself. Or maybe to someone he thought might be there with him, like he was goofy or off his rocker or something.”
“Any idea what he was saying?”
“Not really. I heard the word mother a few times, like maybe he was talking to his mom.” Theresa visibly shuddered here and let out a strained giggle. “It was pretty creepy, now that I think about it.”
Ava found it an odd bit of information but tucked it away all the same. A man creeping around in the shadows muttering quietly about his mother…maybe there was something there. She also thought about the figure lurching about at the entrances of alleyways. And while there were indeed a lot of alleys in New York, the fool might be unintentionally making it much easier for her to search the right ones.
First, though, she was going to have to put in some work. Leaving the apartment Theresa shared with her mother, Ava thought it might be time to go knock on some doors.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
It took a fair bit of walking, but Ava returned to the scene of Annie Tate’s murder with the first true spark of promise in the case. Annie had died between a clothing store and an apartment building that looked quite like the one Theresa lived in; it was not glamorous or well-to-do but it was far from a slop joint. She was aware that the dicks covering the murder had questioned the neighbors, but they’d not had the new bit of information she now had at her disposal. So, risking the chance that she might be retreading ground that male officers had already covered, she went inside.
This apartment building contained twenty apartments, covering three floors. By the time she’d knocked on the last one, all she’d gotten were cross looks, irritated women, and two men who laughed at the idea of a woman being involved in a serious police investigation. The few people who were cooperative had little to say other than how the city was going to hell or that they hadn’t seen anything suspicious or out of the ordinary.
With close to an hour wasted, Ava headed back out to the stoop. There was a lone man smoking a cigarette on the stoop and two children over to the right in the shade of the building, playing jacks. She walked over to the alley and peered in. It looked like about a hundred other alleys in New York—grimy and thin, almost as if they were inviting seedy acts to be carried out there.
“You a cop or something?” a voice called from behind her.
Ava turned and saw the smoking man she’d passed by on the stoop. He looked a little disheveled and dirty but he greeted her with a smile when she saw him.
“How can you tell?” she asked.
“I heard you knocking on doors inside,” he said. “Plus…don’t the lady officers where those whistles?” he asked, pointing toward hers.
“Guilty,” she said, tapping the whistle. “Do you live here?”
“My girlfriend does,” he said. “And she won’t let me smoke in her apartment.”
“Perhaps I just spoke to her, then?”
“Nope, she works as a seamstress at one of them glad rags places. And I work out on the docks, which means I got half the day to fart around and do nothing while I wait for her to ger home.”
Ava walked closer to the stoop, figuring she should take any shots that came her way. “Did you hear about the murder that happened here a few nights ago?”
“Sure did. Damn near saw the thing, too.”
“You almost saw the murder?”
“Yeah. Missed it by about a handful of seconds, I think.”
“Can you explain what you mean?”
He took a drag from his cigarette and thought hard about it, trying to recall the moments. “I was out here, doing this very same thing. Smoking. And I notice this fella walk by, sort of in a hurry. And the reason he stands out to me is because he gave me the willies. He was sort of muttering to himself, you know? It was enough of a clue for me to go on inside, to get off the street. So I stand up to do just that, grinding out my smoke. But then these two pretty ladies walk by. Sort of chittering like younger dames do. I might have even said hello to them…I don
’t quite remember. I watched them go for a bit,” he said, a bit ashamed “You know, sort of looking at ’em from behind. And then I went inside.”
“Do you know if one of the woman was for sure Annie Tate, the woman that was murdered?”
“Can’t know for sure. I never saw a picture of the dead woman afterwards. But no, I did not know either of the girls that walked by.”
“Did you get a look at the man walking ahead of them?”
“No. He was walking with his shoulders hunched and he blazed by, walking real fast. I think he might have had brown hair but I’m not even sure of that.”
“You said he was muttering something. Did you hear any specific words?”
“I’m pretty sure I heard him say something like ‘Be quiet.’ And maybe something about his momma.”
“But you aren’t sure?”
He thought about it for a moment longer and then nodded. “I couldn’t swear to it, but I’m pretty certain he said something about his mother or momma, or mom…something along those lines.”
“Thank you,” she said, already heading away.
“Sure thing,” the man called from behind her. But Ava barely heard him. She finally had a link, though it might turn out to be nothing.
Still, she weighed the meaning of it as she hurried back to the precinct. She thought of going straight to Minard with it—that’s how excited she was to finally have something to work with. But she knew Minard would laugh her away and likely remove her from the case altogether if she came to something so weak. She then thought of Frank, but even as she thought of him, a better idea came to her. And when it stuck in her mind, she smiled and put more speed in her step.
She was so consumed with trying to sort the small pieces to the puzzle that she wasn’t even aware she’d come back to the precinct until she was starting up the steps. Inside, she barely even glanced at the bullpen. She headed straight downstairs and was happy to see Lottie perched at her desk. She was not surprised to see that Frances was absent; she was likely on patrol somewhere.