Fifth Ave 02.5 - From Manhattan With Love (18 page)

“Who are you?” Martinez asked.
 
“You wasn’t just here.”

Carmen showed Martinez the badge Spocatti gave her upon leaving the van.
 
“I’m Detective Martoli,” she said.
 
“Chief Grindle sent me to speak with you.”
 
She looked the woman full in the face and waited for some sign of recognition.
 
There was none and Carmen questioned whether this woman had ever seen her.
 
“May I come in?” she asked.
 
“It’ll take just a minute.”

“Your minutes take hours.
 
I wanna get some sleep.”

“It’s only a few questions.”

“I already told you people what I know.”

“The chief has a new lead.
 
He wants me to discuss it with you.
 
I promise this won’t take long.
 
Three questions and I’m gone.”

Martinez glanced past Carmen to the very place Spocatti stood in shadow.
 
She hesitated, moved to speak, but then shook her head and removed the metal chain.
 
She opened the door.
 
Carmen watched her face, tried to read her expression.
 
Had she seen Spocatti?
 
Wouldn’t she have slammed the door shut if she had?
 
“All right,” Martinez said.
 
“But only a second.
 
I’ve got jobs tomorrow.”

Carmen stepped inside and glanced fleetingly at the child, who now was sitting up, her head bobbing, then lifting to dip again.
 
She seemed oblivious to Carmen’s presence, as though she already was lost to the vague world of sleep.

*
 
*
 
*

Martinez closed the door and went to her daughter, moving easily, fluidly, not self-conscious at all.
 
“Before we talk, my kid’s going to bed.”
 
She scooped the girl into her arms.
 
“She’s had it worse than I have tonight.”

Carmen nodded, pleased.
 
She didn’t want the child here.
 
Things would go smoother without her.
 
“That’s fine,” she said.
 
“Take your time.”

Martinez murmured something and left the room.

Carmen was about to follow but decided against it--Martinez only could go so far.
 
She reached into her shirt pocket and removed the heroin-filled syringe.
 
There was enough here to kill Martinez.
 
But her child?
 
No way.
 

And Carmen was happy for that.
 
She’d never admit it to Spocatti, but she liked children.
 
One day, she wanted to have a child of her own.
 
There was no reason for this girl to die.
 
Carmen was certain she hadn’t seen her.
 
Unless she missed something, the girl appeared to be asleep the entire time.

She wondered if Spocatti would take that risk?
 
If he were here, would he be willing to take the chance that Martinez’s daughter had seen him in the few moments they had shared the same space?
 
Probably not.
 
He’d kill her, too.

But how would the police view this?
 
If Martinez’s death was to look like an overdose, she wouldn’t have given her daughter the drug.
 
So, the girl could live.

She held the syringe at her side and moved to the center of the small kitchen, looked around and appraised the details that made up Maria Martinez’s life.
 
Photos of herself and her daughter decorated the refrigerator door; a rainbow of dirty dishes rested against one another in the stained sink; a large plastic crucifix was nailed slightly askew to the wall above the kitchen table; and on the sweeping orange countertop, paperback books were stacked three deep, some so frequently read, their covers were torn or missing.
 

Carmen chose one of the books and turned it over in her hands.
 
Her brother had been a voracious reader, sometimes finishing several novels in a week.
 
But years ago, when AIDS stole his eyesight, it was Carmen who read to him, Carmen who sat at his bedside, Carmen’s voice that rose and fell along with the respirator that had become his lungs.
 
Though twelve summers had passed since she buried him, she missed him fiercely.

She put the book down and stepped to the refrigerator.
 
In one of the photos, Martinez was laughing, her smiling face wide as the sky.
 
Did she know things that could ruin Wolfhagen?
 
Was there something she wasn’t telling the police?
 
Only a moment ago she had been reluctant to let Carmen inside.
 

Had she seen Spocatti waiting in the hall?

Carmen glanced at her watch, then turned to the doorway through which Martinez had carried her daughter.
 
Ten minutes to put a child to bed?
 

She slipped the syringe back into her shirt pocket and left the kitchen.
 
The living room was tiny, so dim it seemed almost gaslit.
 
The brown, threadbare carpet was unyielding beneath her feet.
 
There was a door in front of her, another off to her right.
 
Both were closed.
 
The air was slightly cooler here, as though somewhere there was a breeze.
 
She listened but heard nothing in the adjoining rooms, no sounds of a mother comforting her child, no soft, murmuring voices.
 
Just the breeze.

And Carmen knew.
 

Martinez had known who she was all along.

She lifted her pant leg and removed the gun strapped to her calf, opened the door to her right and glimpsed the empty bathroom before charging forward to the next door, which was locked.
 
Locked!
 

She slammed her fist against it in frustration.
 
She stepped back and kicked the door once, twice, but it wouldn’t give, it wouldn’t open, she wasn’t strong enough and it infuriated her.
 

Behind her, the front door crashed open and Spocatti rushed in.
 
He called out her name, ran into the living room with his gun drawn, listened to her, glared at her and drew back a foot, slamming it hard against the metal knob.
 

The door gave easily--splinters flew like confetti.
 

Carmen groped for a light switch and turned it on.
 
The bedroom was empty, sucked free of life.
 
Beside the unmade bed was an open window, its pale yellow curtains lifting to expose a rusty black fire escape shining blue in the light of a waxing moon.
 

EXCERPT:

“
FIFTH AVENUE
”

A THRILLER

BY CHRISTOPHER SMITH

BOOK ONE

FIRST WEEK

CHAPTER ONE

July

New York City

The bombs, placed high above Fifth Avenue on the roof of The Redman International Building, would explode in five minutes.

Now, with its mirrored walls of glass reflecting Fifth Avenue’s thick, late-morning traffic, the building itself seemed alive with movement.
 

On scaffolding at the building’s middle, men and women were hanging the enormous red velvet ribbon that would soon cover sixteen of Redman International’s seventy-nine stories.
 
High above on the roof, a lighting crew was moving ten spotlights into position.
 
And inside, fifty skilled decorators were turning the lobby into a festive ballroom.

Celina Redman, who was in charge of organizing the event, stood before the building with her arms crossed.
 
Streams of people were brushing past her on the sidewalk, some glancing up at the red ribbon, others stopping to glance in surprise at her.
 
She tried to ignore them, tried to focus on her work and become one with the crowd, but it was difficult.
 
Just that morning, her face and this building had been on the cover of every major paper in New York.
 

She admired the building before her.
 

Located on the corner of Fifth and 49th Street, The Redman International Building was the product of thirty-one years of her father’s life.
 
Founded when George Redman was twenty-six, Redman International was among the world’s leading conglomerates.
 
It included a commercial airline, office and condominium complexes, textile and steel mills and, soon, WestTex Incorporated--one of the country’s largest shipping corporations.
 
With this building on Fifth Avenue, all that stood in George Redman’s way was the future.
 
And by all appearances, it was as bright as the diamonds Celina had chosen to wear later that evening.

 
“The spotlights are ready, Miss Redman.”

Celina turned and faced a member of the lighting crew.
 
Later that evening, the spotlights would illuminate the red ribbon.
 
“Let’s try them out.”

The man reached for the cell phone clipped to his belt.
 
While he gave the men on the roof the go-ahead, Celina looked down at the list on her clipboard and wondered again how she would get everything done in time for the party.
 

But she would.
 
All her life she had been trained by her father to work under pressure.
 
Today was just another challenge.