Clean Hands

by Patrick Hoffman

  The drone’s camera stayed on Valencia as she walked. Billy sat on the edge of his seat and watched her.

  When Valencia turned right onto East Forty-Sixth, Billy called in an update to Milton, who was soft-following from a few blocks back.

  They watched Redgrave’s vehicle stop in front of her. “Here we go,” said Billy. On the monitor they saw her stop at the door, and then get in.

  Billy took a little notepad out of his jacket pocket and searched for the code for Escalade. When he found it, he raised his radio and spoke into it: “Blue Dove—Blue, Green, Black, Michigan.” He repeated that, and Milton copied.

  Billy got nervous he’d mistaken the car model, and he asked Colter, “That’s a Suburban or an Escalade?”

  “Escalade,” said Colter. “Looks like a 2016, but it could’ve been a ’14, ’15, or ’16.”

  Then Colter spoke into his own headset and asked his drone pilot to angle on the plate. Fussing with the camera’s remote, Colter leaned forward and read from the screen, “‘New York HWY 4120.’”

  Billy jotted the number down but held off on radioing it. They watched the vehicle drive two blocks east and then saw it enter a parking garage. This led to an extended period of nervousness because they had no idea what was happening. Billy consulted his paper map and took some time jotting down call signals into his notepad.

  “Park-Lex, Park-Lex, Mad-Broad, Mad-Broad, 4-6, 4-7, 1-9, 2-9, 3-8, 3-3,” Billy said into his radio, reading from his notes. He then repeated the same message.

  Milton copied.

  The vehicle reemerged a few minutes later and continued on East Forty-Sixth before circling around and heading west. Nobody knew whether Valencia was still in the SUV. Billy jotted down the directions in his notepad and read the code to Milton.

  Then Billy switched the band on his radio and called Danny Tsui, who was on his computer at a Starbucks in Midtown to avoid any potential listening devices in their office. In code he asked Danny whether Valencia’s phone appeared to be headed west on East Forty-Seventh.

  A few moments later Danny’s voice came over the radio and said they’d lost her phone signal.

  “They took it,” said Colter.

  “Yep,” said Billy.

  They watched the SUV make its way back to Madison Avenue. Colter pulled the camera back and they tried, unsuccessfully, to see if they could spot any other cars trailing their target. He tried to find Milton, but he couldn’t even see him.

  After Valencia hopped out near her apartment, Colter zoomed in on her for a moment; Billy could almost make out the expression on her face. Then Colter moved the camera back to the target vehicle. This was the whole point. They wanted to track him. They needed to know who Jonathan Redgrave really was.

  The SUV made its way to the West Side Highway, looped around and headed downtown. Billy sat poking his tooth with his tongue and wondered where the hell they were going. He spoke into the radio and told Milton to loop back to Columbus and soft-shadow south from there. The SUV made a few countersurveillance moves, but nothing fancy.

  Billy looked at Colter and asked, “Where do you think they’ll go?”

  The older man thought about it for a moment, then, referring to the NSA’s Manhattan spy hub, said, “probably Titanpointe.”

  “That would be fucking hilarious,” said Billy, shaking his head.

  They watched the Escalade travel down through the West Village into Tribeca. When it finally stopped, Colter zoomed his camera in, and they saw Redgrave hop out and walk straight into a building. The Escalade took off.

  “Which building is that?” asked Billy.

  “That would be”—Colter flipped a switch on his control and white HUD characters popped up on the monitor—“99 Hudson Street,” he said.

  Billy rubbed his hands together like he was cold. “What the hell does he want in there?”

  “That’s your job, not mine,” said the drone man.

  Milton Frazier pulled his SUV over on Varick Street and put it in park. He’d been told their target had entered 99 Hudson Street, and that he should sit tight. He took the opportunity to peel and eat an orange. After the orange, he ate some raw cashews, one at a time. He drank water and stared at a passing woman. When he was finished, he put on lip balm, examined his face in the mirror, and checked his teeth for food. Then he leaned back in his seat, thought about Valencia, and told himself she was safe at home.

  His walkie-talkie sounded, and Billy told him to take a look at the target building.

  Milton pulled back into traffic and looped around to Franklin Street. He parked in a loading-only zone and set his NYPD placard on the dashboard. After changing bands on his radio, he called Danny Tsui, and asked him for a list of businesses in the building.

  Inside the glove compartment Milton pulled out a paper envelope that held five thousand dollars. He separated eight hundred dollars from the rest and put that into his pants pocket. A minute later, Danny radioed back and listed some of the companies in the building: a law firm, a film company, an environmental organization, a real estate agent, and a PR firm.

  Milton got out, grabbed his suit coat from the back, put it on, took the cash out of his pants pocket and transferred it to his inside jacket pocket. He took a moment to fix his tie in the reflection of his SUV’s window. He pulled at his shirtsleeves, flapped his coat, and then started walking toward the building. He felt a controlled kind of nervousness.

  Milton studied the building from across the street. He stamped the impression on his mind: fifteen floors, nothing too fancy, a little gold trim, art deco. Valencia would ask for the details: Tell me more.

  When he peered in through the glass door, he was happy to see that the doorman was black, that he had dreadlocks, and that he was the only person in the lobby.

  Milton opened the door and walked toward the desk. “What’s up with you, sir?” said Milton, smiling when he got there.

  The doorman squinted at him, let his head fall to the side, and said, “I’m good man, you?”

  “I’m all right man, but”—he lowered his voice a little—“working all day.”

  “I hear that,” said the doorman.

  Milton looked down at the sign-in sheet, but the last signature was a woman thirty minutes earlier. “Summer’s coming,” Milton said.

  “Gonna be the hottest in years,” said the doorman.

  Milton looked up like an idea had just occurred to him; he tapped his knuckles on the desk. “Listen—I was supposed to give one of my pitches to that white brother that just came in a few minutes ago. You know the dude I’m talking about? He’s got little pimple scars on his face? Skinny guy? Brown hair a little thin up here?”

  The doorman nodded, “Mmm-hmm.”

  “He works here, though?” asked Milton.

  “Yeah.”

  “I feel stupid,” said Milton, like he was confessing something, “but I forgot the man’s first name. What’s his name? Jonathan?”

  The doorman dropped his head and made a pained face. “I’m sorry, brother, I’m not supposed to give out that kind of info.”

  “I hear you,” said Milton, dropping his voice a little to match his register. “We all gotta do our jobs.”

  “I’m sorry about that,” said the doorman.

  “It’s all good,” said Milton. He reached into his coat pocket and palmed the eight hundred, flashed it, and whispered, “I got eight hundred dollars if you tell me the dude’s name and where he went to.”

  He put the money on the desk, his hand still covering it, and slid the cash forward. “It’s worth that much to me, and nothing more.”

  The doorman smiled, reached for the money, didn’t count it, and slipped it into his own jacket pocket. “What’s that dude,” the doorman said. “That dude Jack Glasser, works on the eighth floor, solar place?”

  “He just came in?” asked Milton.

  “Yeah, but ten minutes ago.”

  “He got them little pimples on his cheeks, hair pushed back like an Ital
ian dude?”

  “Skinny dude?” asked the doorman.

  “Yeah, skinny dude with the pitted skin, about fifty.” They were both whispering now.

  A white woman stepped out of the elevator and the doorman said, “Okay now,” to her. They waited for her to leave and when the front door closed, the doorman said, “Yeah, that’s him—Jack Glasser. He’s up there in the Solar Solutions.”

  “Works here?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Dude just came in. He’s like six foot one?”

  “I’m telling you. He just came in ten minutes ago. Only other person came in was two white ladies on the second floor.”

  “I thought he was called Jonathan Redgrave?”

  The doorman made a face like Milton was crazy. “I don’t know who that is. The dude’s Jack Glasser—he works here. Been here ever since I have.”

  “All right then,” said Milton, taking a step back. He touched a finger to his lips, a Be quiet gesture, and then pointed at the doorman. “I appreciate you, sir.”

  “Appreciate you too,” said the doorman.

  The following morning, Michael D’Angelo woke from a nightmare. In the dream, he’d been visiting his mother’s house outside of Buffalo (she actually lived in a nursing home). There was a disturbance outside. When he looked out the window, he saw a dead deer. He went outside to look closer and saw that the yard was littered with dead deer. They’d run through the fence, leaving deer-sized holes where they entered. Some of the deer had tree limbs jammed through their heads.

  It was disgusting, and he woke in a panic. His bedside clock read 5:11 a.m. He had an hour before his alarm was set to go off. Next to him, his wife slept soundly. He touched her back and then got up.

  The Maplewood train station in New Jersey was a ten-minute drive from his house. He arrived there at seven thirty. Everyone waiting on the platform seemed to be in a bad mood; they frowned, they clenched their jaws. People coughed, a man spit. When the train pulled in, they all jockeyed for seats. D’Angelo found a spot near the window. The man who sat next to him looked like a banker. Overweight, he breathed through his nose like a bulldog. D’Angelo was just thinking of moving seats when his phone buzzed in his pocket.

  He cringed when he saw it was Elizabeth. “Good morning,” he answered, staring out the window at a traffic-jammed freeway.

  “Michael, shit, hold on—excuse me, no, thank you. Okay, sorry—Michael? Are you there?”

  “I’m here,” said D’Angelo, pulling the phone from his ear and grimacing.

  “I need you to go to Chris Cowley’s house and collect his laptop. He told us he’d returned all CDH-issued computers and phones, but now Lauren from IT says he checked out a laptop and we can’t—”

  “Shit.”

  “Yep. Can you go directly there?”

  “Yeah, I’m on the train, I’ll jump in a car when I get out.”

  “If he doesn’t open the door, see if you can get the super to give you access.”

  D’Angelo made a face but said, “Okay.”

  When he got to Chris’s building, he stared up at it and cursed the young man under his breath. Of course Cowley lived in a building like this, fancy, and all glass. He was about to press the buzzer, when he decided that this conversation shouldn’t be conducted over the intercom system. He stepped back to the sidewalk and looked up again.

  After a few minutes, a young, wet-haired woman exited, and D’Angelo was able to catch the door before it closed. On the elevator ride up he realized he was feeling nervous. He worried that Chris might cause some kind of a fuss. No, you can’t have my fucking computer, he imagined Chris saying. This is harassment. I’m filing a claim against you.

  When he got to Chris’s apartment, he knocked on the door and stood there waiting. His mouth was dry, and he wanted water. When he didn’t hear anything, he put his ear near the door and pressed the bell. A soft chime could be heard coming from inside. He straightened up from the door and pressed the bell five times in a row.

  God damn it, Chris, he thought. He tried the knob and found it unlocked. After pushing the door open, he looked back down the hallway toward the elevator, then leaned his head into the apartment and called out.

  “Hey, Chris, it’s Michael D’Angelo, I need to talk to you.” His voice sounded pinched.

  After stepping into the apartment, he closed the door without latching it and called out again. “Hey, Chris, you here, buddy?” The walkway from the door to the living room was only about ten feet long. He sniffed at the air and smelled a cleaning product. “Chris?”

  When he saw keys hanging on a hook by the door, D’Angelo stared for a moment and considered how he could use one of those in his own house. Then he realized that the hanging keys suggested Chris was there. He walked farther into the apartment toward what he assumed was the living room.

  As soon as he rounded the corner, he saw Chris lying on the couch. He was fully dressed. D’Angelo said, “Oh, Chris …” but he let the sentence trail off. He stood there staring at him.

  “Chris?” he repeated, and moved closer; but he already suspected that the young man was dead. There was a stillness in the room, and Chris’s skin looked pale.

  D’Angelo stepped even closer and looked down. The young lawyer had an odd look on his face, and his eyes were closed. His arms lay flat next to his sides, both his hands squeezed into fists.

  When D’Angelo touched his neck, he found it cold and without pulse. There was a fecal smell in the air, and D’Angelo stepped away from the couch and held his hand in front of his nose. He looked over the scene and saw a piece of paper on the coffee table. On it, he read: I’m sorry, I did my best, Chris Cowley.

  D’Angelo took out his phone and snapped a picture of the note. He figured Liz would want to know exactly what happened, so he stepped to the other side of the room and took a picture of Chris’s body. After looking more closely at the picture on his phone, he saw an empty orange prescription bottle on the floor. He used a pen to lift it and set it on the bar near the kitchen. There was no label.

  He sniffed it, but it only smelled like plastic. When he looked at it more closely, he could see a white residue inside. He took a picture of the bottle, then used the pen and set it back where he’d found it.

  D’Angelo walked around the back of the couch and looked at Chris’s shoes on the floor. They were untied and laid out neatly in the direction they’d be pointing if he was still wearing them. It looked odd, and it made D’Angelo feel sad. “God damn it, Chris,” he said. He felt a wave of heavy grief, but then it faded, and he went back to feeling almost nothing. He took out his phone and was about to call 911, when he realized that Elizabeth would ask him why he didn’t grab the computer. Stepping away from the couch, he moved toward the kitchen to think about it.

  He played out the scenario in his mind: Came by to get computer, did a wellness check, found him dead, took the property. It didn’t feel right. Fuck you Liz, he thought.

  He dialed 911 and reported that he’d found an apparent victim of a suicide. While he spoke, he moved into Chris’s bedroom; staring out the window he answered all of the dispatcher’s questions.

  After the call ended, the investigator found the computer sitting on top of a dresser. He checked the bottom and saw a Property of Carlyle, Driscoll, and Hathaway sticker.

  When he called Elizabeth, he reached her voicemail. “Elizabeth, you need to call me right away, it’s urgent,” he said, sounding depressed.

  When the option was given, he thought about rerecording it, but decided against it. His mind went to Valencia: What would she do? She’d take the computer before the cops even showed up. She’d tuck it into the front of her pants and walk it out to her car so the security cameras wouldn’t record her.

  He moved a stool to the kitchen and sat there reading the New York Times on his cell phone. After a few minutes, a second wave of grief crashed over him. D’Angelo cried. He thought about Chris and sat there on the stool and cried. The kid had looke
d so lonely lately. He thought about the time he’d walked in and found him talking to his mother on the phone. Stupid kid, D’Angelo thought, wiping his eyes and trying to get a hold of himself. Stupid fucking kid. It’s just a job; there are plenty of jobs out there.

  When the cops showed up, he told them why he’d stopped by. He explained that he entered the premises because the door was open, and he wanted to do a wellness check. He pointed out the pill bottle, and the note.

  The cops were babies; they both seemed to be about twenty-five years old. They had slightly dazed looks on their faces. D’Angelo informed them he’d been an FBI agent for eighteen years. One of the cops, a female, raised her eyebrows and nodded when he said it, but she didn’t seem otherwise impressed.

  When the time came, he showed them the computer, pointed to the “Property of” sticker, and told them that he was going to have to take it with him. He didn’t ask, he simply told them. The cops exchanged glances and shrugged.

  Before he left, D’Angelo took one last look at Chris’s body. There was something almost religious about the way he was lying there. For a second, looking at him, D’Angelo felt a strange moment of peace. But it faded, and he became angry at the kid again. He gave the cops his business card and walked out. By the time the elevator had delivered him to the ground floor, his anger had transformed into a kind of dull despair.

  Elizabeth Carlyle sat in a conference room on the nineteenth floor of their office building. Her mentee, Sujung Kim, was in the middle of explaining some new case law to a cadre of attorneys. Elizabeth only half listened; most of her mind occupied itself by plotting moves in the Calcott case: As soon as the judge ruled against their motion for summary judgment, they’d engage in settlement talks for a while; this would cause a string of delays that would—

  Henry Blatt, who happened to be sitting next to her, tapped her on the thigh and interrupted her thoughts. It seemed inappropriate for him to touch her, and her eyes went down to the spot of the foul. When she looked up, Henry nodded toward the door. Standing there, with his head poking into the room, was Michael D’Angelo. It was only then that she looked at her phone and saw she’d missed three calls from him.