Dead Money (38 page)

I didn’t know what he had either. But he didn’t know that.

And his next move was going to tell me.

And what is it you’d like to know? he asked, as affably as he could manage.

The fish was on the hook.

I dropped the pretense. I put on my poker face. Impassive. Unreadable. I looked unblinking into his eyes.

What’s the big secret? I asked.

He paused. He considered his options.

I’m not at liberty to say, he said.

How’s that? I asked evenly.

As you said, there’s a confidentiality order. I’d be in contempt of court.

I see. But otherwise, you’d be happy to share it with me, of course?

That re-raise he hadn’t expected. He paused again. Looked at his cards. He didn’t have the nuts, that was sure. Did he have something he could call with? Re-re-raise? Did he have enough to beat a bluff?

No, he said, I don’t think I would.

Why not?

Because I have an obligation to my patients. To keep their affairs private.

Even those who sue you? I asked, ignoring, for the moment, the interesting choice of noun: affairs.

Even those.

He sat up straighter. He thought he was getting the upper hand. He was reading me for a bluff.

He was good. He was very good. If I was going to get anything out of him on this cold damp afternoon, I had to take it all the way. I had to tell him what he was holding.

If I was wrong, the game was over.

But it wasn’t really a bluff. It was a semi-bluff. Terry would get me something. I’d win this one in the end.

But I didn’t want to wait. I wanted Steiglitz right then. I wanted to watch his tan go white. I wanted to watch him squirm. I wanted to make it hurt.

Hell, what did I have to lose?

I re-re-raised.

Even those who sue you for sexual misconduct? I asked.

It was only a moment. But it was the decisive moment. The microscopic, instant straining at the corners of his eyes.

I’d got him. I’d figured his cards.

I think this conversation’s gone far enough, he said.

Okay, I said with a friendly smile. I understand. Patient confidentiality. I wouldn’t want to make you breach your patient’s trust.

Just two professionals understanding each other, we were.

He didn’t move. He didn’t say a thing.

There’s just one other thing, I said.

Yes? he said, with a distracted air.

He was deflated. I saw it in his shoulders. He was resigned to it.

It was going to be worse than he thought.

I wondered, I said, if you might not mind giving a DNA sample.

Pardon me?

A DNA sample.

Whatever for?

Well, I said. I think it’s time for me to lay my cards on the table.

He stared at me. His jaw was clenched.

There was an autopsy. Of course, you know that.

An autopsy?

Of Melissa.

The muscles in his jaw let loose. His mouth hung open, just a bit, as though about to speak. But he didn’t.

And there was a curious result.

He gathered himself. He got up from his chair. He went to the window. His back was to me. He looked out at the rain.

Semen, I said. There was semen.

He said nothing.

It wasn’t mine, I said to his silent back.

And it’s been remarked, I continued, that you were the last man she was seen with. Other than myself. Before her death, that is.

He slowly turned around. His eyes were full of tears.

A most peculiar sight.

He walked slowly back to his chair. Sat down. Looked straight at me.

All right, he said. You know.

I do now.

He looked startled. It dawned on him: he’d been outplayed.

He shrugged.

She was a very special woman, he said.

I know that. I married her.

I wanted to spit at him.

You don’t have to do a DNA test, he said.

I know that too, I said with conviction. Now.

But you don’t think …

I don’t think anything. I want to know. I plan to find out.

He sat in thought. He looked up. He looked me in the eye.

Her death was exactly what it seemed, he said.

He’d recovered some of his poise. His gaze was level. His voice sincere.

But that was not enough for me.

How do you know that? I asked.

I don’t know that. But I knew
her
.

My eyes narrowed.

I swallowed hard. I didn’t want to ask the next question.

But I had no choice.

The game had gone that far.

They said there was evidence of – I hesitated at the word – forcing.

He didn’t flinch. He shrugged, apologetically.

I’m sorry, he said. I know how it sounds. But you understand, I’m sure.

I did. I didn’t want to. But I did.

Show me who’s a man
, she’d say.

I hung my head.

I heard his voice from far away.

I was her …well, I was more than her doctor, of course. But the end was inevitable.

I said nothing.

You knew that, he said. You know that.

My body lost a fraction of its tension. There was truth in what he said.

I looked into his eyes.

He didn’t look away.

We were two men in a room.

Two men alone.

I’D HAD THE FORESIGHT
to have the car wait for me. I got in.

What was I going to do?

Nothing. I wasn’t going to do anything. What was there to do?

My forehead felt like bent nails.

A few Scotches at the Wolf’s Lair would help, I thought.

I was right.

Four Scotches in, my cell phone rang. I didn’t feel like talking to anyone. I ignored it.

Thirty seconds later it rang again. I was about to pitch the phone at the men’s room door when I noticed the number: Dorita. Shit. What did she want now?

I answered.

Rick, she said, breathless.

I’m busy, I said.

Something’s happened.

I’ll call you back.

FitzGibbon’s dead.

Jesus Christ. How? What?

We don’t know yet.

Jesus Christ. Where are you?

There’s a meeting tomorrow morning. Be there.

Where?

The office. Ten o’clock. The real office.

The real office? I’m not allowed to go to the real office.

It’s a new and different world, Ricky. Be there.

Where are you?

There’s nothing to do right now. Be at the meeting.

She hung up.

I tried to make sense of the news. I couldn’t get my mind around it. I tried to remember why FitzGibbon was important to me. The fat blowhard. What did I care? Steiglitz, on the other hand, I couldn’t get out of my head.

I tried to stop thinking altogether.

I was more exhausted than I thought a man could be.

I staggered home.

I wasn’t sure I could negotiate the stairs.

I didn’t try.

I fell into the armchair. I slept.

The sleep was deep and dark and dreamless.

When I awoke the sun was streaming through the window. It hurt my eyes. I turned over. My head hurt. My back hurt. My right elbow hurt.

I heard Kelly come into the room.

Daddy? she said.

Yes my angel, I mumbled into the cushions.

What’s going on?

I turned my head. I squinted into the barbarous light.

Steiglitz. Shit. What was I going to do?

My instinct was to tell Kelly the truth. The whole truth.

So help me God, I thought.

I thought again. She was so abominably young. I couldn’t inflict this nightmare on her.

Nothing, I said, I just didn’t have the energy to climb the stairs.

Oh, she said. Okay. I’ll make some coffee.

You
are
so impossibly good to me, I smiled weakly.

I know, she said. Don’t get too used to it.

I dragged myself to my feet. Took a quick shower. Put on some clean clothes. Went to the kitchen.

Kelly was pouring the coffee.

I found myself enjoying the sharp rich stimulating scent of good Jamaican Blue. The quiet company of Kelly.

Maybe life was worth living after all.

The phone rang.

It was Dorita.

Get the hell over here, she said.

I looked at my watch. Shit. Ten o’clock.

AT THE OFFICE EVERYTHING SEEMED QUIET.
Calm. Orderly. Misleading.

In the conference room were Warwick, Shumaker and Dorita.

Warwick looked stricken. Angry and stricken. Shumaker looked like Shumaker. Imperturbable. Dorita looked as nervous as I’d ever seen her. She was smoking. In the same room with Warwick.

Things had come to this.

Seriously? I asked.

Dead seriously, Dorita said.

Warwick and Shumaker nodded glumly.

The rest are on their way, said Shumaker.

The rest of the partners, I deduced. The whole ugly crew. Coming in on a Saturday. Jesus. This was big. This might be the end of the firm.

What the hell happened? I persisted.

We don’t know, exactly, Shumaker said in his even tone. We’re awaiting a report from the DA’s office.

Nothing? I said. We know nothing?

First indications are suicide, Shumaker said.

Warwick shook his head.

Jesus. Warwick was screwed. Hell, the whole firm was screwed. Fifteen million a year out the window.

He fell from the thirty-third floor, said Dorita, instantly rendering my thought both comical and just plain bad.

Jesus, I said. Fell? Jumped? Was pushed?

We don’t know anything yet, said Dorita.

Has anyone talked to Jules? I asked.

Warwick gave me a withering look.

Why? he asked. You think the kid did it? You want to do this pro bono now?

He had a point. I’d sort of forgotten that Jules’s defense was a paying job. And our paycheck had just hit the road. Hard. Still, could we just leave Jules high and dry?

Has anybody talked to the twins? I asked.

Warwick threw up his arms.

They’re at the police station, said Shumaker.

I looked at Dorita. She gave me a tiny nod. She knew what I was thinking.

I excused myself. Went to my office. I was a little surprised to find that it was still there. I called Butch. He wasn’t available. I paged him. I knew he’d call back.

While I waited I reflected on the fact that Warwick hadn’t physically attacked me as I came in the door. FitzGibbon, it appeared, hadn’t called him to complain about our conversation of yesterday.

You would have thought he’d have called the minute we’d left. Two partners of the firm to whom he entrusted millions’ worth of business, violating his trust? Practically accusing him of murder? It’s a wonder he hadn’t put out a hit on me.

Damn, I thought. For all I knew he had.

I needed to know the time of death.

Dorita came in just as the phone rang. It was Butch.

Butch, I said. I knew I could count on you.

Sure, Rick. No problem. But I can’t talk.

Two quick questions, Butch. You in on this FitzGibbon thing?

Sure. Everybody’s in on it. It’s the biggest thing around here since Rockefeller.

Okay, just two things. Then maybe we can meet later.

Sure thing, Rick. But I don’t know when. I’ll have to call you.

All right. First thing, were the twins there?

When he fell?

Right.

Seems they were.

Okay, second thing. Exact time.

Ten thirty-four, he said.

They were at the office at ten thirty at night?

You said two questions, Rick.

Okay, Butch. That one was rhetorical. Didn’t count. Call me when you can.

Will do.

I looked at Dorita. I nodded my head. The twins had been there. Ten thirty-four. In his office. I presumed his office. It was on that floor. And hours after we’d left.

All those hours to call Warwick.

But he hadn’t.

Something had come up, Raul had told us.

It must have been something big.

So, Dorita said. Theories?

We spooked him into it.

Fear. Or remorse. Or both.

Ramon pushed him.

Raul pushed him.

They didn’t want to wait for their inheritance.

A time-honored motive.

Jules pushed him.

Hm. Not with the twins there, he didn’t.

He’s in cahoots with the twins.

There you might be stretching it a bit.

He got drunk and fell.

Unlikely.

Too much of a coincidence?

It’s hard to believe that it didn’t have something to do with our conversation with him.

Yes. The problem being.

That if it did, it doesn’t eliminate even one of the theories.

Exactly.

All we’ve got are theories.

Well, we still have our jobs.

Today.

Tomorrow?

Unlikely.

I just had a great idea, I said.

Yes?

Let’s have a drink.

Rick?

Yes?

You’ve got a problem.

Thank you.

And anyway, do you think we should be letting time go by? Cold trail and all that?

It won’t take long, I said, fishing in the cup of pencils on my desk for the small key that opened my bottom desk drawer.

You’re kidding, right?

Would I kid you? I asked, pulling out a half-empty – well, in the circumstances half-full - fifth of Scotch and two small glasses.

Dorita made a face. But she drank hers down.

That felt good, I said, relishing the distraction of a good gut-burn.

Can’t deny it.

Hey, I said, pouring myself a refill. I never got an answer. Has anybody talked to Jules?

He’s at the station too.

They picked him up on this?

Well, wouldn’t you? Closest blood relative? History of animosity? Suspect in recent murder?

Yeah, I guess so. Jesus, why didn’t he call me?

Maybe he doesn’t know your number.

He knows my number.

Maybe he doesn’t want to see you.

That doesn’t make any sense.

Anything make sense around here for the last month?

You’ve got a point there.

I usually do.