All in One Piece (5 page)

I buy a box of Milk-Bones, pass on the apples but say yes to pears and a chunk of feta. George puts the order on my tab, which
is so nice, so different from the mall shopping of my corporate nomad years, the customer service desk and plastic smiles.
Biscuit stands up, tail wagging.

As we’re leaving, Ari leans close to me. “
Psukhe?248-175?
is great gift, Mees Reggie. But you must watch out. Who killed Steven, this is for the police, not your job. We are grocers,
but Greeks know
Erinyes
. How you say it, furious?”

“The Furies?”

He nods. “This Lueez, he is
Erinyes
. He is angers. He is torments. Steven too close. You stay away.”

E
asy to say, tough to do. I walk Tremont, steadied by the commerce of cafés and restaurants, bakery, florist, shoe repair.
It begins to rain, the cold drops plastering fallen leaves to the sidewalk. Biscuit loves the wet. Somehow this beagle’s a
water dog. Tires hiss on the wet pavement, and the meter maid does a brisk business. I walk fast. New Englanders, Jo always
said, do not whine.

Steven’s bloody body, however, flashes like a strobe light. Spiders crawl on the face of every pedestrian. The shop windows
feature Halloween ghouls and bats, and every passerby seems a possible murderer. Could it be the gangly guy in black denim?
The brush-cut blond with shifty eyes who pulls a little too hard at Biscuit’s ears?

The dog trots nicely alongside. Beagles are notoriously friendly. She might lick the hand of the killer, perhaps the muscular
redheaded woman with the heavy stride—at which point I realize the murderer is not necessarily male. I see dead bodies on
the second floor of every building. The windowpanes are eyes of death. It’s raining hard, and Biscuit splashes in every puddle.
It’s no place for light Ferragamos. Since my days of high-end shoes are over, should I let these be ruined?

As if it matters.

Suddenly a bulky black-haired kid bursts out of the video store. His sneakers smash at the pavement. I think of Luis, and
my heart jumps. The kid crosses the street, walking fast, his thighs as thick as tree trunks. He looks older than fifteen,
but who can tell for sure? He’s in orange sweats. I strain to see his hands, as if they’d be bloody even in the rain.

Stop it, Reggie. Back off. Cool it and calm down. I try, my state of high alert bordering on hallucination.

But gut instinct has its uses. Suppose that Steven ignored his. Suppose that deep down, Steven, the Big Buddy, grew frightened
of Luis and tried to dismiss his fears. Maybe he felt trapped between mentoring duty and the guilt of his own terror. Did
Steven send me this message as he described Luis? In my own hit-and-run moment, was I deaf? Was I blind to the look of fear
deep in his eyes?

“Lady, your pear…”

“Oh—” The soggy bag has got a hole. “Thank you.” I take the fallen fruit as Biscuit sniffs an Akita, whose owner clearly thinks
her own dog is slumming. A breed snob, but I’m grateful for the distraction.

It’s been a two-hour time-out. Biscuit and I reach Barlow Square just in time to see the gurney, the body bag, two uniformed
cops struggling down the rain-slick granite steps outside. A small crowd has gathered, a sailor in his pea jacket, a woman
in a yellow rain hat, a man with three Scotties that bark at Biscuit, who whines pitifully the whole time, then tries to lunge.
I am separating dogs as Steven is lifted into a patrol wagon.

There are just four cruisers double-parked now.

But three TV vans are out front with crews taping. The crowd seems reluctant to disperse, as if the sideshow might continue,
as if they might get themselves on TV. I run a gauntlet up my own stairs, gripping the iron banister so I won’t fall.

“Miss, do you live here? Could we just ask you… ?”

“One question: did you know the deceased… just one question… did you—?”

In the vestibule, Sergeant Dorecki peers into the sodden grocery bag as if my own front door is a checkpoint. He tells me
I am now free to scrub my door.

Inside, I take off the wet things, towel my head, and towel Biscuit. Deep breathing helps for calm. I wash and eat a pear.

There are two phone messages. One’s from Gibralter Realty. Meg Givens tells me that Steven Damelin’s employer is Corsair Financial
in Boston’s financial district. I jot the address. The other is Maglia. He requests an interview at precinct headquarters—if
at all possible, this afternoon.

I grab the phone. Ed Maglia’s phone voice is brusque, and I murmur
lawyer,
though he assures me that won’t be necessary. The former Mrs. Martin Baynes, I realize, would go flanked by a bevy of lawyers.
Reggie Cutter goes it alone. One way or another, I’ll speak for myself.

T
he precinct house on Harrison Avenue looks like a modern corporate fortress. A parking space opens up a few doors down the
block, and I take it, grabbing my umbrella and hurrying inside, where it’s all computer screens and blue uniforms. I’ve changed
into caramel slacks and jacket with a white blouse, light on the jewelry.

Maglia shakes hands. He’s thinner than I thought this morning, his skin sallow in fluorescent light. We pass a droopy Stars
and Stripes, and he points me to a small room with a cushioned chair, a venetian blind, a table topped with chipped Formica—and
Detective Francis Devaney. Yes, straddling a wood chair in one corner sits Frank Devaney.

“Hello, Reggie.”

“Hello, Frank.”

Wonderful and awful, that’s the feeling. Seduced and abandoned. Here’s the homicide detective whose tough, stalled cases I’ve
helped solve, the guy whom my psychic aunt worked with for years and was close to. This is the guy I phoned when Steven’s
bloody body turned me inside out.

The guy who failed to call me back.

Devaney runs a hand through short salt-and-pepper hair, and I notice a puffiness around his gray eyes. His hair and crooked
nose have become so familiar over the past months. He wears brown slacks and a light tweed jacket straining at the button
across a barrel chest. Today’s tie, as usual, is the dregs, a rainbow that looks like an oil slick. Is his presence here in
the precinct room more treacherous than comforting, or the other way around?

“Sit down, Reggie,” he says. “How about some coffee?” I accept, and Devaney goes for mugs, sugar packets, a shaker of powdered
creamer under his armpit. “Black as usual?” I nod. He puts a mug on the table in front of me.

I take a tiny sip, and my first sentence is an opening bid. “I’m sorry I accidentally kicked the drill.”

They both stare.

“I should have been more careful, but I was in shock. I hope I haven’t caused problems.”

Both heads tilt as if listening to an exotic birdcall. Maglia says, “This isn’t about the drill, Ms. Cutter. In fact, this
is not about the crime scene as such.”

“Oh?”

Devaney dumps whitener into his coffee, looks in vain for a stir stick, and jiggles the mug.

“What can I do for you?”

Maglia sits forward, and I’m braced for more of his sarcasm. Yet his expression is somehow different this afternoon, perhaps
softer. “Ms. Cutter, we appreciate you coming down here. We would like to ask your help. As the owner of Steven Damelin’s
apartment, you’re in a position to assist with our investigation.”

At last: clarity. They’ve talked, these two, and I’m about to be invited into the case as the psychic. They’ve come to their
senses. My ability is needed, and they know it. Let them approach you, Reggie. Let the recruitment begin.

“You told us you first met Damelin yesterday when you fell in the street and he helped you.”

When a car almost ran me down in a hit-and-run assault.
If I say this aloud, however, I’ll sound self-serving and confrontational.

“Yesterday around two.”

Tipping his chair back, the tactic of a shorter man exerting authority, Maglia says, “Ms. Cutter, an investigation goes forward
on several fronts. Some are technical, some not. It’s not always neat and clear-cut like on TV.”

I could reply that I know this from working homicide cases with Frank Devaney, who thus far seems more interested in his coffee
than the specifics of the moment.

“We’re already making progress, but you might be able to help.”

“Whatever I can do.” Here it comes, the request for a psychic’s help. This is no time to be coy, I’ll say yes at once and
get to work. I’ll tell about Steven’s drowning scene, the vision of the water and the log.

“Here’s the favor you can do for us, Ms. Cutter, and it shouldn’t take much of your time. You can let us know about anybody
who comes around looking for Steven Damelin. Anybody calls for him, anybody knocks at his door, we’d like to know. Another
thing, you could keep an eye on the mail. Just have a look at whatever comes to the apartment addressed to Steven Damelin
and let us know.”

“The mail? Monitor the mail?” My voice cracks in surprise. Have I heard him right? Devaney, who has said nothing, spreads
his palms on the table and studies the Formica. I’m asked to be a household snoop and mail clerk? Is this it?

“It would help us to know of any contacts… particular return addresses. So we can cast a wide net.”

Stunned, I manage for the sake of pride to ask, “Is the postmaster general in on the investigation?”

Maglia’s smile is condescending, so very Marty. “The postmaster general’s office gets involved when there’s reason to believe
a crime violates postal regulations. We have no reason to think that’s the case here. Isn’t that right, Frank?” Devaney looks
up and nods. “But that’s a good point, Ms. Cutter. That’s good thinking.”

Maglia doesn’t mean good thinking. He means dumb. I remember my son’s junior deputy phase, his little badge. Do I get one
to pin on my collar? How could Frank Devaney go along with this? As a senior detective, he outranks Maglia. How could he?

Yet their request for help tells me that so far, early as it is, the police have no notion who Steven Damelin’s killer might
be.

What to do? Walk out in a huff? Tell them to call when they have a better offer? Say I’m a psychic and don’t do windows? It’s
tempting. But if I give in to injured pride, they’ll cut me out of the case altogether. The new Boston life that I love will
end in a heartbeat. These past months of homicide cases working with Devaney, they’re everything to me. Even though I’m unofficial,
a volunteer, the cases are my life’s adventure.

And now, suddenly, my life blood? Steven’s dead body is burned into my brain… and my door marked, patterned in blood,
actual blood. Life blood and death blood. Did that blue car start all this? My daughter is right, I could be a marked woman.

Frank Devaney won’t meet my gaze. He reaches in his pocket for a roll of Tums and crunches a tablet. Maglia drums his manicured
nails. I’ll play the hand they’ve dealt me. “Well, gentlemen, I already have a useful fact for you. The boy whom Steven Damelin
was mentoring. Luis?”

Maglia nods while Devaney’s brow angles up.

“I talked to two grocers who describe Luis as disruptive and temperamental, actually violent. He vandalized their store, and
Damelin paid them for the damage. They did not contact the police, so no official record exists.” I then spell “Tsakis Brothers”
and give the address, knowing George and Ari will not be pleased but will forgive. Maglia’s expression of approval tells me
I’ve got my start as mail clerk and concierge.

Ladylike and cool, I say, “Detective Maglia, Frank, I’m having my locks changed, but I’m worried about security. Can you tell
me how much police protection I’ll get?”

“Ms. Cutter, we’ll have stepped-up patrols on your block, day and night, long enough to ensure safety in your neighborhood.”

Meaning, best guess, only a few days. Then I’m totally on my own. It’s not their personal problem. Nobody marked their doors
in blood. Nobody tried to run them down.

“Can you tell me when the Homicide Division might know more about my front door? When will you know whether the blood marks
are accidental or deliberate? And whether the blood is in fact Steven Damelin’s?”

Devaney leans forward and coughs. His buckle scrapes the edge of the tabletop, the belt out to the loosest hole. Maglia clears
his throat and looks sheepish. “Thing is, Ms. Cutter, an investigation takes time. Many different leads must be followed.
And people aren’t always what they seem to be. For instance, you described your tenant as a clean-cut young man who gave you
first aid when you fell.”

“Yes.”

“We already have information that suggests a very different profile.”

Maddening, they don’t tell me what it is.

Maglia actually smiles. He has a chipped front tooth. “So we’re just asking you to look at the mail and take note of anybody
that might come around asking about the deceased.”

“Just anybody?” I ask. “Or would certain people fit the profile better? Maybe if you could be more specific?” I bat my eyes
for the naive, expectant effect. Neither one bites. The profile is their secret.

“Ms. Cutter, if you just keep an eye out, we’ll take it from there.”

“Let me ask another question. What about Steven’s belongings?”

“I’ll tell you something, Ms. Cutter. We’ve learned that Steven Damelin was estranged from his family.”

“How about his furniture?”

Maglia shrugs. They push back to signal the close of the interview. We all stand. Frank Devaney says, “Consider it yours to
dispose of.” Maglia thanks me for serving as eyes and ears.

E
yes and ears?” I’m at the curb by my Beetle with my car key out and Frank Devaney right behind. He followed me out of the
Harrison Avenue precinct house, and we walked in silence. “Eyes and ears, Frank?”

“Reggie—”

“Or is it bait and switch? That’s what it feels like.”

“I know you’re upset—”

“Upset? A man was murdered on the floor above me in the middle of the night. My front door is marked in blood. Upset? Try
‘terrified.’”