Hell Gate (5 page)

That was one of the many lessons I’d learned from Lem Howell years ago. My desk was already piled sky-high with detectives’ reports when my first high-profile rape investigation was handed to me. And that hot summer season had seen a spike in sexual assaults that threatened to choke me and my colleagues as arrests skyrocketed because of the latest forensic breakthroughs. Keep all the balls in the air but focus on the case at hand.

“So if it’s not about Claire Leighton, what is it?”

“Ethan’s girlfriend, a woman named Salma. She’s unstable, volatile . . . ,” Howell said, searching for the third phrase to complete his trilogy.

“I get it, Lem. The girlfriend—Salma, is it? She’s a loose cannon. Or you’re going to paint her as one. Salma’s going to try to make herself the victim in this scheme.”

“It’s worse than that, Alexandra. She claims that Ethan Leighton tried to kill her.”

“Too much foie gras?” Nan Toth asked. “Those jeans look like they’re glued on.”

I rubbed my hand over my stomach. “New Year’s Eve at L’Ami Louis. You know it, in the third arrondissement? It’s been there forever on this dark little side street, and Luc adores it. I was afraid to get out of the car ’cause it looked like an absolute dive, but it’s the most sinfully delicious place in the world. I gained three pounds on this trip.”

Marisa Bourgis, Catherine Dashfer, and Kelli Ollsen came into my office right behind Nan. The five of us had been great friends since they started as young prosecutors several years after I did.

“You weren’t in court dressed like that today, were you? Didn’t you have something on in front of Judge Straub?” Marisa asked. “The poor guy has a problem with his blood pressure as it is.”

“Never got there. Besides, if Straub is looking at my derrière, as you ladies obviously are, then blood pressure isn’t his biggest problem. Have you been watching the news?”

My secretary, Laura Wilkie, had rounded up my senior staff when I called to tell her I was on my way back to the office. They arrived just minutes after Lem Howell delivered his message to me.

“All day. NY-One has a constant feed and the networks cut in on the half hour with live crews on the scene,” Nan said.

“You probably know more than I do at this point.”

Marisa looked at her notes. “Nine dead.”

“Only seven when I left.”

“That channel beneath the Atlantic Beach Bridge was dredged to make it deeper for boats. They say the rip is fierce.”

“Were these latest bodies men or women?”

“One of each,” Marisa said.

“Any mention of cause of death?”

“Everyone drowned, didn’t they? That’s what the news jocks are going with.”

“Good. That means the only thing leaking so far is the
Golden Voyage,
” I said. “Sit down and let’s make a plan.”

Catherine handed out legal pads from the stack on top of one of the file cabinets. “You’re suggesting they didn’t drown?”

“Pomeroy thinks one of the girls was dead before she hit the water.”

“How?”

“Shot, maybe. Stabbed. We should have answers tonight,” I said.

“Well, the reporters seem clueless so far,” Nan said. “You can catch a glimpse of Mercer and Mike every now and then, so that’s good for us.”

“Did you see Rowdy Kitts?” Kelli asked. “That brunette from CNN thinks he’s hot. She’s following him all over the beach with a mike in his face.”

“Face it,” Marisa said. “Rowdy’s a fox.”

“And you’re happily married with two kids,” I said. “He’s back on the mayor’s detail, which goes to show you what my judgment counts for. Meanwhile, Donovan Baynes is giving us the female victims in the trafficking case to handle.”

“I only know Baynes by reputation,” Nan said. “Do you like him?”

“Very much. He’s smart and easy to work with.”

Since the feds had so little experience investigating sex offenses, and because Battaglia’s Sex Crimes Prosecution Unit—which I’d been supervising for almost ten years—had pioneered most innovative practices in that field for more than three decades, Baynes had welcomed me to serve with his crew. He didn’t tolerate any of the tension that characterized so many of the NYPD-FBI turf battles.

“Then we just clear the decks,” Catherine said.

“Nobody’s on trial, right?”

“I’ve got two weeks before I get sent out. What do we need?”

“I lost the battle to get them housed decently at a shelter. In a sense, for the moment they’re all suspects in this homicide and whatever other crimes may have resulted from this last-minute mutiny.”

“That’s crazy,” Nan said.

“What do you expect?” Marisa shrugged her shoulders as she scribbled on her pad. “Feds.”

“They’ll be separated from each other, detained in a nearby facility, examined by a medical team starting tonight,” I said. “We round up some Ukrainian interpreters and a bunch of paralegals and we get to work. What they were promised, how much they paid for this deadly cruise, who their contacts were, what they expected to happen here.”

“When do you think we get them?” Kelli asked.

“Not as fast as I’d like. Every one of them will have to be physically examined. Between the shipboard conditions for the last month, the malnourishment, and this morning’s unexpected exposure, there’ll be health problems to deal with first. Then Baynes will have them spread out in detention centers—God knows where.”

“He’ll be lucky if he finds room in Westchester or Suffolk County. All those facilities are crammed with illegals and detainees. This is going to move slowly,” Nan said.

“I’ve got plenty to keep you busy in the meantime.” I flopped my papers on top of the shortest pile on my desk and sat down. “Get everybody over the holiday slump. You want to handle finding the interpreters?”

“Sure. The four of us will set up teams. We ought to get someone undercover in the Ukrainian bars and clubs, don’t you think? Check the network for connections, for word about the anticipated arrival of this new group.”

These women, all in their late thirties and early forties, were consummate professionals. They had seen the darkest side of human nature, sharpened their litigation skills against lawyers for murderers, rapists, and child molesters, and restored hope and dignity to the most traumatized victims ever to pass through a precinct door. Yet at the end of their long days they went home to their families and functioned as loving wives and mothers—their humor, compassion, and souls somehow intact, their style never compromised.

“Mercer will take the lead on this, won’t he?” Marisa asked. “Did you have much chance to talk?”

“He was one of the last men to arrive at the beach, actually.”

“Will you have the lead on the trafficking?”

I shook my head. “Donovan’s going to be calling the shots. I’ll fight to keep some NYPD in the mix, but the feds want to run this,” I said. “The reason Mercer was late is that he’s got a piece of Ethan Leighton.”

“Sounds like everyone but Claire has a piece of Ethan Leighton,” Kelli said. “What’s the dish on that?”

“This doesn’t leave the room, ladies, okay? There’s a girlfriend named Salma, and Ethan’s fathered a child with her.”

“I knew he had political ambitions,” Catherine said. “This puts him well on his way to the top.”

“Mercer said there was a big battle last night at Salma’s apartment.”

“Like a Jewish Selma?” Marisa asked. “Upper West Side? Too creepy, but I’m picturing a blue-rinse old lady who could be Ethan’s mother.”

“Think again. Like Salma Hayek. This one’s from Mexico. Twenty-two years old.”

“Only has a couple of years on Ethan’s twins, then. Ugly.”

“He’s apparently installed Salma in a brand- new condo on East End Avenue.”

“Condo, of course. No co-op, so no board approval necessary. And his own district, so she gets to vote for him too.”

“Stop the commentary, Marisa,” Nan said. “Let Alex finish.”

“The baby was sick,” I said, standing to notch up the numbers on my thermostat, as the draft from the cracked window behind me chilled my neck. “Spiked a really high fever and Salma wanted Ethan to go with her to the emergency room. He refused, a screaming match followed, and two neighbors called nine-one-one. Ethan had been drinking. Must have figured Salma’s antics were attracting a little attention, so he made it out of there before the cops arrived. Maybe you have seen the clips. Flipped the car and all that.”

“Hungover in handcuffs is not Ethan’s best look,” Catherine said. “What happened to the baby?”

“She’s doing fine, according to Mercer. Probably home with Mama by now.”

“I swear if I see Claire Leighton standing by her man for the postarraignment perp walk, I will lose all my sympathy for her,” Marisa said. “My guy did that to me I’d hang him out to dry. For this little story you swear us to secrecy?”

“She’s got more,” Nan said. “So far, all you’ve given us is what everybody else will read in tomorrow’s
Post.
”

“It’s Lem who told me the rest,” I said. “He was dashing down to the arraignment, but gave me a heads-up that the congressman will be painting Salma as a whackjob. Volatile and all that. Lem says she’s claimed Ethan’s tried to kill her in the past.”

“Blame the victim—blah, blah, blah. Lem’s just going to use you because you’ve always been so loyal to him, Alex,” Kelli said, pulling on strands of her naturally curly hair. “Unlike your experience learning from him, my first bureau chief was a total bitch. Watch out for Lem. I bet he had his hands all over you. Besides, who’d she claim it to?”

“All Lem had time to tell me was to check the nine-one-one records. That Salma’s called for help a couple of times before.”

“Don’t you think somebody would have put those complaints right under your nose? He’s a congressman, for heaven’s sake.”

“According to Lem, the cops got there each time but Salma refused to cooperate. Never named the perp.”

“Want me to ask headquarters to hunt down Salma’s phone number and run a check on calls from it?” Catherine asked. “I won’t mention what I’m looking for.”

I nodded and then smiled at Kelli. “And if you think I can’t read Lem Howell and his hand signals after all these years, give me a little more credit than that. Want to check and see who McKinney assigns to handle the Leighton case?”

The head of the trial division, Patrick McKinney, didn’t play well with me in the sandbox. He was the most unpleasant individual in a famously collegial office, and resented the fact that I bypassed him and reported directly to the district attorney. His on-again, off-again affair with the head of the Firearms Trafficking Unit had not only broken up his marriage but soured his already difficult personality and exacerbated his penchant for privacy.

“You going to tell Pat what you learned from Lem?”

“Kelli, you’re giving me zero points for my judgment today, aren’t you? I’ll tell Battaglia, of course, and see if he wants me looking over the shoulder of whoever gets the Leighton DWI case. Do we have a plan, ladies? Will you figure out everything there is to know about human trafficking before we meet tomorrow? Do a crash course on Ukraine and where these women were likely to end up living and working? Identify who their runners were to be?”

“Done,” Marisa said. “I have no life anyway. You’re planning an evening at the morgue?”

“Yes. None of the feds would know how to find the place anyway,” I said. There were very few homicides that fell under federal jurisdiction. Our senior prosecutors knew the morgue as well as the courtroom. “Gives me the jump on learning what happened to the young woman who was apparently murdered on the boat.”

“Well, be sure to ask Mike what his New Year’s resolution is when you see him later,” Catherine said as she gathered her papers and stood up to leave.

“Sorry?”

“He hasn’t told you yet?”

“What?”

“Roger Hayes had a party on the thirty-first,” she said, referring to the popular jurist who had run the trial division in the DA’s Office before ascending to the bench. “Lots of Supremes, prosecutors, court personnel, detectives who worked his cases when he was here. Unfortunately, none of us made the cut.”

“What about it?”

“My sources tell me that Chapman left the party with Fanny Levit.”

“You know who she is?” Marisa asked.

“No. Should I?”

“Perfect name for Chapman,” Catherine said, checking the polish on her nails. “He’d be the first guy to make a joke about dating a woman named Fanny. Really.”

“The mayor just appointed her to the civil court. She was in private practice at one of the big firms,” Marisa said. “Judge Levit now. Very fine-looking brunette with a big brain. Heard she had herself wrapped around our Mikey like a python on a mongoose by the time they left Roger’s party.”

The phone rang. The plastic button that illuminated told me it was Paul Battaglia himself, dialing me directly on what he liked to call his hotline.

“And—?” I placed my hand on the receiver but waited for Catherine to make her point.

“That’s all,” she said as they filed out. “Just wondered whether he’s told you anything about it—his new romance with a judge.”

The phone rang for the third time and I picked it up as I tried to figure out why I was distracted by a knot that tightened in my stomach while my pals fed me the rumor about Mike.

“Alexandra?”

“Yes, Paul.”

“I’ve left dozens of messages for you all day.”

For each of the four I received, he must have repeatedly hectored his longtime executive assistant, Rose Malone, to try to find me.

“I apologize, Boss.” Battaglia hated to be the last to know anything—on the record or off—that related to any case pending in the office. “I can come in now to tell you what’s been going on.”

“No, actually, you can’t.”

I recoiled at the sound of his sharp voice barking at me on the phone.