Obsession (30 page)

“How’d you find out Pete was on meds?”

“He showed me his pills. Mary let him keep the bottle on his nightstand and take them unsupervised. He told me he popped when he felt like having energy.”

“Ritalin?”

“I never read the label, he just called them energy pills, said they’d been prescribed because his school was trying to control him. He said they made him feel good but he still wasn’t going to do any work because school sucked.”

Milo said, “Ever see him take any other drugs?”

“He had a Baggie of weed right out in the open, next to the pills. I saw him roll and smoke a few times. He was also into wine, whatever he’d steal from Mary’s stash.”

“All that and animal guts.”

“Don’t remind me.”

“Why’d you contact Tanya?”

“When Dr. Delaware dropped in here and talked to me about Ms. Bigelow, it got me remembering.”

“Remembering what?”

“That whole period of my life, Lieutenant.”

I said, “Seeing Tanya in the garden.”

“I wasn’t spying, it was nothing weird, she was just there. Mom and Dad were still married but living apart and I was being shuttled back and forth from Atherton. Grandpa was pretty much vegetative. No one had time for me except Patty Bigelow. She’d ask me how I was doing, fix me a sandwich. Tanya and I never spoke a word. She says she noticed me but I couldn’t tell. After you came here, I looked her up on Facebook, saw how pretty she’d become. I copied down her class schedule and pretended to bump into her on campus. I know it sounds like crazed stalking, but I was curious, that’s all. I wasn’t even planning to talk to her. I’m not exactly a player. As if you haven’t guessed.”

I said, “You managed to talk to her.”

“She was eating a sandwich. By the inverted fountain—right where you found us. Right near the physics building, that seemed…providential. I brought my lunch out, we started talking, she was easy to talk to. I came right out and told her I’d looked her up. She remembered me, it didn’t freak her out, she didn’t make me feel like an utter dork. It’s as if we’ve known each other for a long, long time. As friends—I have
not
touched her. I don’t think she sees me that way.”

Staring at us, craving contradiction.

I said, “Now you’re worried about her.”

“How could I not be? You go talk to Lester and the next day he’s dead?”

Milo said, “Who do you think did it?”

“How would I know?”

“Make an educated guess.”

“Pete.”

“Why?”

“He hated his father.”

“He told you that?”

“He never mentioned Lester by name but he always said his old man was a useless junkie and he couldn’t stand him.”

“It just came up in conversation?”

“This was years ago, Lieutenant.”

“Try to remember.”

“If I had to guess I’d say it came up as a comparison. ‘Your dad’s cool, mine’s crap.’”

“What’d he like about your father?”

“That he was rich. That he was a ‘stud.’”

“What else did he tell you about Jordan?”

“Nothing, it wasn’t as if he was preoccupied. If he was obsessed with anyone it was his mother.”

“How much contact did he have with Jordan?”

“What’s that, a trick question? I already told you Lester wasn’t a part of my life and once I stopped going to Mary’s, I never saw Pete.”

“You had no contact with Lester because your dad couldn’t stand him.”

“No one could. Mom’s his sister and
she
would have nothing to do with him.”

“Your dad gave him free rent and hired Patty Bigelow to look after him.”

“So?”

“Nice treatment for someone you hate.”

“Mom probably did that to keep Lester out of her hair. Back when they were married, Dad gave her anything she wanted and she looked the other way when he fooled around. Model family, huh?”

I said, “Why was Lester killed?”

“How would I know?”

“Think it was related to Patty Bigelow?”

Silence.

Milo said, “Tell us what you know, son. Now.”

“Tanya told me what her mom said before she died. Please don’t come down on her. She needed someone to talk to and I just happened to be there.”

“What exactly did she tell you?”

“That her mom felt she’d done harm to a neighbor.”

“Felt?”

“Neither Tanya nor I believe Patty was capable of actually hurting another human being. I’m sure her being terminal had something to do with it. At the worst, she was witness to something that she didn’t report and felt guilty about.”

“Something related to Pete Whitbread?” I said.

“That’s the logical conclusion, right? He’s a sociopath, Tanya and Patty lived a few houses away. Patty probably saw something.”

“What have you told Tanya about Pete’s proclivities?”

“Nothing. I’ve never told anyone.” Sudden, harsh laughter. “Can we draw this to a close? I’ve got a ton of work.”

“Why did you flinch when I mentioned Tanya’s study groups?”

“I did?”

“Noticeably.”

He hunched, scratched his head. “Please don’t tell Tanya but I know for a
fact
that there
are
no study groups. When she claims to be hanging with other students, she’s really sitting by herself in the library. When she’s not in class, she’s in the library doing work-study. She sticks around long after shift’s over, goes into the stacks. Sometimes she’s the last one to leave. She walks to her car alone, in the dark. It scares the hell out of me but I can’t say anything because I don’t want her to know that I follow her.”

Milo said, “Ever think of detective work?”

“Don’t tell her.
Please
.”

I said, “All these secrets, Kyle. Sometimes it’s easier just to go straight from point A to point B.”

“Great theory, but I haven’t found it helpful in real life. I’ve been open with you, don’t betray me. I can’t risk having Tanya think I’m a weirdo.”

“Fine, for the time being,” said Milo, “as long as you continue to cooperate.”

“What else is there to cooperate on? I’ve told you everything I know.”

“What made you suspect there was no study group?”

“She never mentioned the names of any other students. I’ve never seen her with anyone on campus.”

“Just like the old days,” I said. “Playing under the trees.”

He said, “Old days, but not necessarily
good
old days. I was lonely as hell and she was, too, but we never got together. Now we’re friends. I’d like that to continue.”

Milo showed him pictures of Robert Fisk and Moses Grant.

Head shake. “Who are they?”

“Friends of Pete Whitbread.”

“This one looks nasty.” Pointing to Fisk.

The Internet shot of Whitbread/De Paine evoked a nod. “He’s punked himself up, but that’s him.” Pointing to the pretty faces surrounding De Paine’s narrow, bland countenance. “Looks like he does okay with women.”

“No accounting,” said Milo, rising.

“Are you confident you can keep Tanya safe?”

“We’ll do our best, son. Here’s my card, call if you think of anything else.”

“I won’t. My brain feels
leached
.”

He walked us to the front doors. “What are the parameters, Lieutenant?”

“Of what?”

“The rules of engagement with Tanya. I don’t want to get in the way but I do care about her. And
you
can’t be everywhere all the time.”

“You’re planning to guard her?”

“At least I can be there.”

“Be there, but don’t do anything stupid and don’t impede the investigation.”

“Deal.”

We stepped out in the warm, dark silence of Hudson Avenue.

Kyle called out, “So I can still see her.”

“I just said that, son.”

“I mean socially.”

“Go do some calculations, Kyle.”

We got back in the car, sat shadowed by the mansion’s haughty face. I watched as a second-story light went off. Miserly moon; the rest of the block had receded into mist. An easterly breeze ruffled stately trees. Hudson Avenue smelled of oranges and wet cat and ozone.

Milo said, “Young love. So much for Tanya being discreet. Did I screw up by allowing Kyle to be Mr. Protective?”

“Could you have stopped him?”

He rubbed his face. “You trust him?”

“My gut says he’s okay.”

“And if he’s telling it right, she could use a friend. Lying about having a social group. You wondered about that.”

“Would’ve been nice to be wrong,” I said.

“I can’t even imagine going it alone at that age.”

From the little he’d told me of his childhood, he’d felt alienated by age six, a big, fat Irish kid who looked and acted like his brothers but knew he was different. The few times he’d talked about his family, he could’ve been an anthropologist describing an exotic tribe.

I said, “Yeah, it’s tough.”

“But you think she’s doing okay?”

“As well as can be expected.”

He laughed. “Dr. Discreet. Anyway, be nice if we could clear all this up and watch the two of them waltz into the sunset…not that kids waltz, nowadays.” Flash of teeth. “Not that
I
ever waltzed…so where do we stand on Cuzzin Petey?”

“Kyle’s diagnosis seems right-on.”

“Animal guts on his weenie goes beyond basic sociopath, Alex.”

“Plus-four sociopath,” I said. “He was giving out some serious danger signals early on and no one bothered to care.”

“Glommin’ Mommy’s photos.”

“His entire childhood was eroticized. Sex and violence could’ve gotten blended. That makes me wonder if Patty’s ‘terrible thing’ was related to a lust crime. What if she really did kill someone—a bad guy she considered a threat to Tanya?”

“Some scuzzy pal of Pete’s?”

I nodded.

He said, “Scary pedophile crosses Tanya’s path and Mommy uses her little .22. Why tell Tanya now?”

“Maybe she was frightened because she hadn’t finished the job.”

“Sparing De Paine,” he said. “Years later she runs into him at the E.R. and he makes a threatening comment. But if he’d collaborated with another lowlife on something unspeakable, why would Patty off his buddy and give him a pass?”

“Because he was young,” I said. “Eighteen years old when Patty and Tanya lived on Fourth Street. He was also the son of a man she’d cared for. And possibly cared about.”

“Everyone else despises Jordan but she had a soft spot for him?”

“She watched over him as if she did. It’s also possible killing once traumatized her and she didn’t have the stomach to repeat it. It can be like that for good folk.”

The breeze blew harder.

“Okay,” he said, “for whatever reason she doesn’t shoot little Petey. Why not report him to the cops?”

“Because she’d eliminated his accomplice and didn’t want any contact with the cops.”

“Theoretical accomplice,” he said. “Given your logic, someone older. Now all we have to do is conjure this phantom out of the ether. And unearth some unspeakable sex crime no one’s ever heard about. Also, if Patty was worried about De Paine hurting Tanya, why not come out and warn her explicitly?”

“I don’t know. It’s possible the disease
did
affect her thinking. Or she didn’t want to terrify Tanya—or have Tanya go it alone. By being ambiguous and directing Tanya to me, she hoped Tanya would get help from both of us.”

“I guess.”

“It worked, didn’t it?”

He put his hands behind his head. “Imaginative, I’ll grant you that.”

I said, “When Tanya told me she felt Patty was trying to protect her, I put it down to romanticizing her mother. But maybe she had it right.”

He closed his eyes. The dash clock said one forty-six.

“It also fits Lester Jordan’s murder, Milo. What if Jordan knew Patty had spared his son? We come by asking about her, he gets jumpy, wonders if Junior’s finally going to pay. Or if Junior’s into something new. He calls Junior, maybe warns him to stay away from Tanya. Or sends the warning through Mary. Either way, De Paine wonders if Jordan can be trusted to keep his mouth shut. That tops off the rage he’s felt toward his father his entire life. He pays a social call on Dad in the guise of bringing over product. Jordan fixes up, nods out, De Paine lets in Robert Fisk.”

“Oedipus wrecks,” he said.

“You don’t need to be Freud to see it in this family. One of De Paine’s earliest sexual charges was looking at his mother’s movie stills. Feeding his father’s habit put him in the power chair.”

“Do sociopaths dig irony?”

“They process it differently than the rest of us.”

“Meaning?”

“Shark-eats-minnow is good!”

“How does Moses Grant fit in?”

“Nothing we’ve heard about him so far indicates criminality, so maybe he was an oversized minnow. He gave up his day job and his apartment to run with De Paine because he believed De Paine would help his deejay career. Along the way, he saw too much, reacted with fear or revulsion. That kind of weakness would be a danger sign to De Paine and Fisk.”

“Cleaning house,” he said. “You’re figuring Grant was also there when they did Jordan.”

“Fortuno called him a lackey and whatever else he is, Fortuno’s perceptive. We know Grant drove the Hummer so maybe that night he was the wheelman, waiting somewhere up the block.”

Another long silence.

“You do have a flair for the dark side,” he said, looking past me at the mansion. “Start the car, Jeeves. This zip code’s raising my blood sugar.”

Two twenty-three a.m., lights off at my house. When I stepped in, sounds from a corner of the living room made me jump.

Robin said, “Hi, honey.”

As my eyes habituated, I made out her form. Curled on a sofa, concealed by a blanket but for curls raining on a silk pillow. Blanche nestled in the triangle defined between Robin’s belly and arm. The TV remote sat on the floor.

She switched on a low-voltage lamp, squinted, sat up knuckling her eyes and pushing hair out of her face. Blanche curled a tongue and smiled.

I turned the light off, sat down on the edge of the sofa, kissed her hair. Her breath was the sweet-sour of lemon yogurt.

“I was watching a show, guess I conked out.”