Nightbird (19 page)

“Winters’s mental state was at home, with his bodily state,” Gregory said. “At the time Gillian Stone died he was not there.
You keep forgetting that, pally.”

“You guys really don’t agree on this at all,” Danny said.

“Was that a light bulb just went on?” Gregory said, waving his hand around in the space above Danny’s head. “By jove, I think
he’s got it.”

Near Wall Street they passed some of the newly renovated piers that housed tennis courts covered by block-long bubbled air
tents. As night fell, the lights glowing yellow inside made them look like giant radioactive beehives out of a colorized Japanese
horror flick.

“You have to admit Winters had motive,” Ryan said. “We know he was having an extramarital affair with Gillian. A relationship
that was blowing up in his face.”

“Right,” Gregory said. “We know that from the neighbor Stella Grasso and the sister, Faye. Both interviews you did alone.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Ryan said. “You don’t trust me to do interviews on my own?”

“I trust you. But I don’t agree with the way you’re handling this. This is my freakin’ case, pally, and I don’t see Winters
as a suspect. You got some private hard-on for the guy, that’s your business. But I call the shots in this case. And I say
we back off of Winters. And, oh yeah, we discuss interviews
before
we do them. No more Lone Ranger shit.”

The smell of fish blew from the Fulton markets. Up ahead, the three bridges loomed into view: Brooklyn, Williamsburg, Manhattan;
all three huge steel and spidery, like an erector set contest of the gods. Spanning a river that was not a river at all.

“If you guys see a mermaid out here,” Gregory said, slapping his big meaty hand on the rail, “ask her what she thinks. Don’t
bother calling me. I’ll be inside dancing with your wife.”

“Keep the Holy Ghost between you,” Ryan said.

A frowning Ryan stared out over the water, as if he were actually looking for a mermaid. Danny knew that on the way back they’d
make one trip around the Statue of Liberty, then linger at Ellis Island. The booze would be flowing by then, the cops full-blown
sentimental. Someone would offer a toast to the struggles of their ancestors. McDarby would play the harmonica. Joe Gregory
would sing “If Old Ireland Were Over Here,” a song he knew in its entirety.

“Should I cancel the interviews?” Danny said.

“No,” Ryan said, resuming his thousand-mile stare. “Absolutely not.”

Above them, the E train rumbled across the Brooklyn Bridge. Inside, on the main floor, Joe Gregory, with the agile grace of
a grizzly bear, danced across the floor with Leigh Ryan.

A
fter the boat ride they wound up in Elaine’s, their group filling three front tables. The mix of cops and reporters spewed
stories faster than you could write them down. Which no one would, because the mere appearance of a notepad indicated a serious
death wish. Joe Gregory sang from his one-line repertoire, the doo-wop years, until Elaine threatened to toss his ass out
onto the bricks.

In the wee hours the newsmen drifted into their own group, cops into theirs. Anthony and Leigh Ryan were the first to leave,
taking Gregory’s date, Cookie Martucci Counihan, home to Queens. At last call only the hard core remained. Joe Gregory sat
at table three in a hushed conversation with Elaine. Danny moved to the corner of the bar near the window and a zaftig redhead
he’d chatted up earlier.

“Where on the West Side?” the redhead said, apparently doubting he was a legitimate Manhattanite.

“On the corner of bedlam and squalor,” Danny said, a line he’d borrowed from Tom Waits.

“In a doorman building?” she snapped, and he knew he was outgunned.

He wasn’t sure what other idiotic comments he’d made. Thick clouds floated through his consciousness. In his defense he could
cite the devastating effects of jet lag, ferry funk, and the juniper berry.

He put his glass down carefully. He didn’t want a spill. In the society of late night drinkers the worst thing you could do
was spill your drink. Better you should fall off the stool, fracture your skull. Your cranium would heal faster than the scars
a spilled drink would inflict on your reputation.

At table three Joe Gregory recited “Dangerous Dan McGrew” while Elaine ignored him, scanning the night’s receipts. When the
redhead finally went to the ladies’ room, Danny leaned over and asked Tommy the bartender if he knew her name.

“Electric Alice they call her,” Tommy said.

“What does that mean?”

“I think it’s more a warning than a name.”

Danny knew that Tommy was right. The prudent thing would be to grab a cab and go home, but prudence jumped ship when man’s
favorite organ assumed command. Discreetly he checked his pockets to make sure he was armed with latex security.

“Does she live around here?” Danny said, thinking maybe her nickname had something to do with her hair, or she worked for
Local 3, maybe Con Ed.

“You think it’s wise to find out?” Tommy said, looking directly at him.

Danny paid his tab as Electric Alice came out of the ladies’ room, fresh lipstick and all. To the exhausted Danny, with his
shoulder aching, she looked as refreshed and rested as Minnesota Fats did to Fast Eddie Felson in that crucial juncture of
their nine-ball marathon. He folded.

He caught a ride down Second Avenue with former squad boss Wally Millard, who dropped him off a few blocks before he turned
onto the Fifty-ninth Street Bridge to Queens. Danny walked toward Third Avenue, figuring he’d make the left down to Fifty-seventh,
where he’d stand a better chance of getting a cab. The air felt cool and clear, benefiting from the breeze and the weekend
dip in air pollution. The city was quiet enough to hear the streetlights click through the changes. It was that surreal hour
when only cops and psychos were on the stroll.

At the corner of Third Avenue he heard the squeal of brakes, a cab stopping near Caramanica’s restaurant. The poorly tuned
engine chugged loudly in the hushed city. Danny jogged toward it. The cab’s back door opened. The driver wrote on a clipboard.
A woman slid money into the safety slot. The cab was a gypsy, “Tremont Taxi” painted on the side. A broken side window covered
with plastic taped to the frame. He started to yell to the driver. Then he stopped.

The woman slammed the door. The cab chugged away. The woman paused, a little unsteady on her feet. Danny waited on the corner
as a Nineteenth Precinct radio car cruised by. He knew she’d be walking toward him. He knew exactly where she was going.

“Danny?” Faye Boudreau said.

“What the hell happened to your face?”

Her eye was swollen, almost closed, the bruise dark purple and fresh. She put her hand up quickly, but her hand could not
hide the welt.

“I fell,” she said.

“From where, the roof?” he said, looking closely. “You have to get that taken care of. I’ll take you to the hospital.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“Don’t be silly, Faye. Get it looked at. You could have eye damage.”

“Just walk me home. I’ll put something on it.”

Faye wore white sandals, a short black rayon skirt, and a black T-shirt from
Cats
with the green eye staring. He could smell the booze, see the shaky gait.

“Who the hell did that?” he said.

The bruise looked worse in the elevator’s fluorescent glare. The purple skin around it appeared parchment thin and dead. Outside
the apartment door she fumbled for her keys. Danny wanted to persuade her to make the emergency room run, but he kept his
mouth shut until she opened the door. He knew how sounds carried in the hall.

Danny knew where to find everything in the apartment. It was exactly as Gillian had left it. Not as neat—Gillian had been
obsessively neat. But it still smelled like her, the scented candles and potpourri.

He took a white terry-cloth dish towel from the kitchen drawer and dumped half a dozen ice cubes into it. He held it up to
Faye’s eye. She winced and stepped back when the towel touched her. Danny put his left hand against her back to hold her still.
She took a breath and allowed him to press the ice against her cheek. Danny couldn’t help himself, his heart beating faster,
being in this apartment again. Nothing had changed. Nothing.

“You really should have this looked at,” he said.

“Mañana.”

Even Faye’s shampoo, her hair so close to his face, was Gillian’s apricot.

“She always said you were a nice guy,” Faye said.

“I fool a lot of people,” Danny said.

“That was a big subject between us. Nice guys.”

Faye wore simple gold hoop earrings. Just one hole in each ear, not four like her sister. She wore no other jewelry, no rings,
no bracelets.

“I miss her,” Faye said. “I never knew I could love somebody like that. Like it hurts. It hurts in my heart. I always heard
that in songs. About heartache, you know? I thought it was just something you say.”

“Are you going to be all right?” he said.

Faye’s profile, in the light of the table lamp, reminded Danny of Gillian. The same bone structure and low thick hairline
as their mother, Lynette. She pulled her head away. He was sure the ice was painful, but it would keep the swelling down.
She reached up and took hold of the towel and put it on the counter.

“Just hold me,” she said, wrapping her arms around his waist. She pressed her body against him, as if trying to go through
him. Then she looked up at him and kissed him. Her lips were full and moist, her breath hot.

“Faye,” he said in weak protest.

She shoved her hand under his shirt, feeling his skin. Even her hands were hot. She yanked his shirt out of his pants, then
stepped back and pulled the
Cats
shirt over her head. She un-snapped her black bra and tossed it. She bunched Danny’s shirt up under his chin, then she pressed
her chest against him. Skin to skin.

He said her name several times but said neither stop nor go. Just “Faye, Faye, Faye.” Her breasts were much fuller than Gillian’s,
her nipples dark and large. She clawed at Danny’s shirt, then his belt, easily frustrated at each small impediment: buttons,
buckles, snaps. “Faye, Faye, Faye,” he murmured.

In red panties, Faye tossed clothes off the bed, then the red panties. She had a tattoo of something peeking above the vee
of her pubic hair. Danny struggled to get his pants off, the condom out. She pulled at him, her legs wrapped around his body
as if trying to climb him. He could feel her wetness on his leg.

She fell backward onto the bed, trying to pull him down on top of her. They were too close to the wall, his feet still on
the floor, knees barely on the bed. Danny tried to maneuver her longwise, farther up the mattress. But she grabbed his cock
and squirmed toward him. Pulling him down.

She came almost instantly… violently… the second he entered her. Her legs straightened, her heel smashing into the wall. He
heard it break the Sheetrock. She moaned and bucked. Then the desperation left her, but she kept riding him. Riding it out.
Working on him. Chanting in his ear.

Later he lay there, looking at the wall. His shoulder ached, but he was afraid to wake her.

A
good tailman gets the glare behind him. Anthony Ryan stood on the east side of Columbus and Sixty-sixth, with his back to
the Monday morning sun. The weather had cooled off, the predicted high only eighty-two. Ryan leaned against the front windows
of the ABC-TV studio. On the big screen in the lobby Regis and Kathie Lee held up a copy of the
Daily News
. The back page headline was
OVERRATED
, yesterday’s crowd chant at Yankee Stadium for the beleaguered pitcher Irabu.

Ryan pretended to watch, but his attention was focused on the sun-drenched West Side, specifically the front door of the Reebok
Sports Club. He was waiting for the wife of Trey Winters to show up for her ten
A.M.
workout.

Darcy Jacobs Winters met her personal trainer three times a week in the Reebok Sports Club. Ryan knew she’d arrive by nine
forty-five in a black Lincoln Towncar. Her driver would be Poochie Englehardt, a former member of the Four Eight Precinct
detective squad, who’d rub his face with both hands when he parked. This gesture courtesy of the blue underground.

The blue underground consisted of thousands of retired cops and feds working at all levels of big business. With its silver-haired
cadre of seasoned detectives, the NYPD provided corporate Manhattan with a ready-made all-star team. A tightly knit network,
it knew all the secrets, where all the bodies were buried.

The Lincoln was right on time. Poochie Englehardt picked Ryan out easily, as if he had a badge painted on his forehead. He
did the face rub, then threw Ryan one solemn nod, as if to say “This is a gift, don’t screw it up.” Darcy Winters hit the
sidewalk running. She wore a raincoat over black tights and white sneakers. Ryan followed her into the lobby.

Ryan figured Darcy’s raincoat indicated her desire not to be caught sporting spandex in public. He made a point not to look
at her as they rode the elevator silently to the third floor. Three was as far as the elevator went in the huge building.
There had to be another bank of elevators.

The door opened onto a room the size of a cathedral with a thirty-foot ceiling and marble floors. Three steps up to the security
desk; the sign read, “Reception Desk.” Ryan picked out all the security people in their Gap blue blazers, a pair of them within
fifteen feet of the elevator. He had his ID ready.

“I’m looking for Mrs. Trey Winters,” he said loudly.

He got the reaction he’d hoped for. They looked right over at Darcy Jacobs Winters, who had stopped at the coat check room.

“Oh,” Ryan said, turning slowly. “Are you Mrs. Winters?”

Ryan introduced himself. He extended his hand quickly, knowing that once they’d shaken your hand you’d scaled the biggest
barrier.

“If I could have just two minutes,” he said, holding on to her hand. “It’s about the Gillian Stone case.”