A Danger to Himself and Others: Bomb Squad NYC Incident 1 (22 page)

“It’s a little early for that.”

“I’m on a reverse schedule. That sandwich was supper.”

“I’ve had that experience.” He’d normally say no about the drink, but even though he was on the job, he was off duty. “You got a beer?”

She shook her head. “Some vodka and some white wine.”

He thought better of it. “I’ll pass, thanks.”

She filled a tumbler with ice and poured herself a healthy portion of Popov. He followed her to the living room, where everything was bone white, almost too spotless. He found himself wishing he had a canine to sniff around. Where was Fowler when you needed him? He hadn’t seen him in several days. Maybe out with the flu.

“They call you Manuel?” she asked.

“Manny. But best keep it formal.”

“Oh, come on!” She took a gulp of the vodka. “Lighten up.”

“It would be easier if I wasn’t worried about who’s going to get bombed next.”

“But that’s nothing to do with me. I told you that.”

“I wish I could agree.”

“You don’t believe me?”

“It’s possible there’s a connection you don’t know about.”

She held the tumbler to her lower lip and looked into the clear liquid. “Those were good men, Detective. At least, when I last saw them.”

“When was that?”

“Back in Landstuhl.”

“None of them tried to reach out again?”

“A few over the years.” She looked down into her drink. “None of the ones that you mentioned. Come sit down.”

Diaz took her advice and perched on the edge of a soft chair directly across from her on the couch.

“Do me a favor, Manny.”

He raised his chin.

“Say ‘unique New York’ three times fast.”

“I didn’t come to do parlor tricks.”

“Just do it. What do you have to lose?”

She extended her legs across the carpet so her feet rested between Diaz’s shoes. He observed that she had a hole in her stockings between the second and third toes of her right foot, chipped pink nail polish showing through. He said, “Unique New York, unique New York, unique New York.” Got the syllables mixed up in the last round. Ha ha. Watched her break into a wide grin.

An idea crossed her face. “Say, ‘No atheists in the foxholes.’”

“What?”

“Oh, forget it. That accent of yours. So great. Real.” She shivered. “A little dirty.”

“How do you mean, dirty?”

“You know.” She grinned even wider, a twinkle in her eye.

She’s crazy,
Diaz thought:
The only unique New York thing is my losing control of this conversation to a crazy person?

She took another sip of vodka and slid farther down on the couch, bringing her toes now between his heels. She flexed both feet and ran her toes up onto his ankles.

Diaz jumped up and she rose to meet him, reaching for his jacket. He immediately covered his gun and shoved her away. She dropped herself back onto the couch, giggling.

“What the hell’s wrong with you, lady? I’m a cop.”

“I knew that already. A cop’s a man, too, isn’t he?”

“You lay hands on me again and I’ll slap you.”

“I might like that.” She touched herself on the lip, lifted the tumbler to her mouth again, and looked up at him with cow eyes.

Diaz had seen enough. He stepped forward and wrenched the tumbler from her hand, spilling the remains of the vodka onto the cocktail table, half-melted ice cubes ticking on the glass top.

“Hey!” she said.

She turned to march for the kitchen and he grabbed her by the wrist, wrestling her down to the couch.

“Let go. I need to wipe that up.”

A puddle of clear liquid lay atop the glass of the table.

“I didn’t drive all the way here to put up with crap like this,” Diaz said, “so cut it out. What was your interest in those dead men? We both know it was more than professional.”

She looked at the puddle on the table, met his eyes, and pouted. “I have a thing for guys in that condition, okay?”

Diaz furrowed his brow. Their legs were touching. “What condition would that be? Injured army guys?”

“Like I found them—or they found me. Guys who are missing things—missing parts.”

“Like arms and legs?”

“Fingers, flesh, other parts. It touches me, okay? I feel a need to make them whole.”

He fell silent, thinking. Her eyes were a little wild, not even counting the mottled bruising. There was something poignant in it.

“Can I see your scar, Manny?”

Not said like she planned ahead to surprise him. More of an impulse.

She had to be involved in this madness. It was inconceivable to Diaz that she was not somehow involved. He felt acutely the responsibility to get through to her, to milk her for more information. It was some kind of force that brought him here, him of all people, a veteran with his own issues. He didn’t ever think much about God, but this was like God using him for what made him special, the way some invisible hand had pushed him to resist Kahn and O’Shea early in the investigation.

Diaz stood and she grabbed at his arm, trying to hold him down. He shook her off, crossed the room, and threw his jacket over a chair in the adjacent dining area. He pulled his Glock from its holster, removed the magazine, and ejected the extra round from the chamber, slipping all the ammunition into his pocket, then placed the empty gun in the middle of the polished table. Without further thought he removed his harness and shirt and t-shirt. He turned around and took three strides in her direction.

“Oh,” she said. She rose slowly and took small steps toward him with her hand outstretched.

Before he could react, Diaz felt her delicate fingertips running along the thick, dark scar on his torso. With her other hand she caressed his left nipple, but she had her attention on the scar.

“It’s beautiful,” she said, entranced. “Can I kiss it?”

“No.”

“I want to kiss it.”

She fell to her knees and he dropped with her, grabbing her by the elbows. “I said no.”

“I’m so hot. You’re making me so hot.”

“You’re sick.”

She pressed herself into him, but he didn’t feel aroused. On his side of the transaction it was like a medical exam. And, anyway, he knew he’d already crossed too many lines. He dreaded what Kahn might think.

“Stop, I said.”

Diaz moved his hands up to her shoulders and shook her violently. “Stop. Stop!”

She looked into his eyes. Yearning there. But also a thread of shame. She turned away from him, suddenly back in charge of herself, like someone had thrown a switch.

“What did you do to those guys?” Diaz asked, still standing bare-chested.

A sneer crossed her face. “I fucked them, is that what you want to hear?”

“I want to hear whatever’s the truth.”

“Seduced them and gave myself to them right there in the hospital room.”

She was a lunatic, Diaz realized. But he dared not say it aloud, didn’t want to break the spell.

“All three?”

“Of course all three. Albie, Gavin, Lewis. That’s why I remember them so well. And I’d bet they remember me, too.”

“You’re forgetting that two of those guys are dead. They don’t have no more memories.”

“I did everything I could to make them whole, Detective. Above and beyond the call of duty. They were broken and I proved to them that there was still love in the world. Proved to them that they were still men.”

And that you were still a woman,
he wanted to add. Diaz noticed that she’d spoken with a tinge of pride, but also with an expression of agony on her face. He reached reflexively for his own scar and knew that she hadn’t done what she did just for those men. Without knowing her entire story, he knew for sure that she was broken, too—broken and in need of fixing. Screwing those guys didn’t only prove their wholeness, he suspected. The act made her whole, too.

He turned away and dressed himself in silence, feeling her presence behind him, still standing there.

“Don’t I turn you on?” she said.

He shook his head. “Do you have anything for me?”

“Only that which you won’t take.”

He strapped his harness back on and slipped into his jacket. “Those men… In their position, it wasn’t a choice. You took advantage of them.”

She sniffed at that. “I gave them what they needed. So what if I took back what I needed in return. But I didn’t kill them, Detective. I fucked them, but that was years ago. And I didn’t kill them, didn’t even know they were dead until you told me.”

“You have any idea who might’ve done this?”

She barely hesitated. “A big strong man comes all this way just to find that out. Wouldn’t I tell you if I had?”

KAHN WAS AT HOME AT
four o’clock when the phone rang. He lived with his second wife and their two young kids in a row house in Bayside, Queens, two rooms on each floor, plus a carpeted basement, which was filled with toys. He was helping them clean it up when he saw Diaz’s name on the Caller ID.

“Where are you now?”

“Ninety-five, three hours from home. I made a little freelance visit.”

“O’Shea told me. Then I saw your text.”

“Right. You ain’t pissed?”

“The important thing is, did you find anything?”

“It was way weird, Sarge. The nurse knew both victims but I didn’t see anything that ties her to their murders.”

“What about the third guy, the one we’re now looking for?”

“The nurse admits knowing him, too. But she’s ten cc’s short of a full syringe.”

“What the hell’s that mean?”

“She’s nuts, Sandy. Stark raving mad, if you ask me. She made me show her my battle scar and it got her all hot and bothered.”

“Angry?”

“Horny.”

“Don’t tell me the rest.”

“Ain’t nothing to tell there. All three of those vets...she seduced them when they were on their backs in the hospital.”

“How is that relevant?”

“It’s not, so long as you believe in her good intentions. On the other hand, it must mean something. I just can’t figure out what. They find this Salinowsky guy yet?”

“No.”

“Maybe he’s the perp.”

“How do you figure that?”

“Jealousy?”

“Of what?”

“The other two guys?”

“But that was years ago. And how would he even know?”

“Just a stab. She claims herself not to have ever seen any of them since the hospital. My gut tells me she’s telling the truth, so far as that goes. Whether they corresponded, she hesitated before denying it. There’s a piece missing.”

“More than a piece, Diaz. Salinowsky could be the perp, but for my money he fits more into the pattern as the next victim.”

“I agree.”

“One thing protecting him may be how hard he is to find. If the bomber’s working off veterans’ records like we are, he’s also got the same postal box address as us, no more.”

“On the other hand, he’s been at this longer—more time to search for him. Can Burbette help?”

“FBI’s riding shotgun but they don’t have anything we don’t. All we’re getting from them is a little manpower. Your MP in Germany provided more info than all of Burbette’s channels put together. Sometimes you got to go off the reservation. Like you did.”

Diaz paused. Kahn knew he was waiting for the thank-you that wasn’t going to come. The sergeant worried that his charge had a hero complex, which could cause a guy to act out, already had in this case. With all the pressure from on high, he felt grateful that the kid had pushed the envelope, taking initiative to track down the MP and the nurse on his own. But his approach to the bag at St. Pat’s showed that he liked to skirt fine lines and sometimes ended up crossing them. And then there was that bit about walking in traffic on the West Side Drive. Kahn couldn’t let himself forget that.

“You’re welcome,” Diaz said into the silence.

That set Kahn off. “Don’t be a prima donna, Manny. This isn’t a beauty pageant and there aren’t any prizes for trying. Your reward comes when we catch this guy.”

Diaz sighed through the phone. “What’s our next move?”

“You and I got the rest of the day off. Let the others handle it. If they find Salinowsky, maybe he’ll know something. Or maybe, like you say, we’ll get lucky and he’ll be our guy.”

“Can we put someone on the nurse?”

“I thought you said she was clean.”

“She may know what’s going on or she may not, but there’s a piece she’s not telling. Someone beat her up recently.”

“And she wouldn’t say who?”

“She told me she fell down the stairs in a New York subway. But all the bruises appear to be on her face and arms. You’d think she’d scrape her shins or knees in a fall like that.”

“You checked her head to toe?”

“Of course not, but she wasn’t limping or anything, no casts, no cuts on her hands. Any scabs on her knees should’ve shown through her stockings, but there weren’t any. Sure looked like someone punched her out to me and maybe she put up her arms in defense.”

“Punched her to shut her up?”

“That I don’t know.”

“I’ll see if we can get someone from the fibbies to tail her. Is there anything specific we could take to a judge for a warrant?”

“Negative. Just a feeling.”

“That won’t cut it.”

“I know. That’s why I’m coming home.”

TICK, TICK, TICK, TICK, TICK
 

10.

DAY FIVE—Dark

WHEN WARREN MANIS LOOKED IN
the bathroom mirror he saw a gash on one ear with a fresh scab over it. Sallye had forehead-butted him when she climaxed.
Crazy bitch.
He angled his gaze and stared at the wound from the corner of his eye. Nice bump on the side of his head, too. He cursed her under his breath, cursed that he loved her so much that he hated her. Or was it the other way around? Either way, she was culpable. Despite his early efforts, she’d created a structure in their relationship that he had to rebuild for his own needs. Couldn’t go on this way, always getting the hind end. Couldn’t walk away, either, because like her he wanted to recapture something that he’d lost. But in order to rebuild the relationship, at first he had to destroy the source of the problem, her connection to those men. Maybe he’d started this thing, but she had driven him to everything he’d done lately, driven him with her manipulation, and the knowledge of that made him angrier with each passing day. What he’d done so far would only be half the payback.