Silver Justice (6 page)

“Don’t sweat it. See you
mañana
.”

Mother and daughter trudged down the sidewalk, part of the swarm that was the New York rush hour. Silver always felt the desire to hold Kennedy’s hand, but she had rejected that as suitable only for babies a few years back. It seemed like only yesterday she’d been a toddler, wobbling around on unsteady legs, a drunken sailor on a pitching deck. Now, she was all energy and attitude and independence, having modeled her mother’s self-dependent view of the world.

They crossed the street and weaved their way through the rushing humanity, and made it to the flat in twelve minutes, Silver glancing nervously at her watch. They wouldn’t have much time.

“Go clean up, and don’t dawdle. You need to eat before you go. No excuses,” Silver ordered as she unlocked the two deadbolts, to be greeted by the heady stagnant air from the hall as it wafted past her.

“What’s on the menu?” Kennedy asked as she pushed into the tiny entry foyer and dumped her backpack by the walnut side table.

“Leftover spaghetti. Your favorite.”

“I don’t want any. It’s fattening,” Kennedy said on her way to her room.

Silver considered Kennedy’s frame: three percent body fat, all petulant arms and legs and winsome grace.

“If you eat two pounds of it. But that’s what’s for dinner, so while your health and fitness concerns are noted, you either eat it or someone else will be going to the performance tonight.”

Kennedy greeted the ultimatum with the closing of her bedroom door. Dinner was a purely token, increasingly obligatory battle that she didn’t even expect to win. She was merely signaling yet another veiled criticism of Silver’s parenting. Par for the course as kids went through their snotty phase. Silver only hoped she would grow out of it by twenty-five or so.

While Silver was microwaving and setting the table, Kennedy emerged from the shared bathroom, decked in head-to-toe black – black jeans, a black T-shirt with black sequins on it, and a black jacket she’d insisted on for her tenth birthday. Silver bit her tongue and decided against commenting. Kennedy had taken a decidedly gloomy turn over the last six months, but on balance it was the least of her problems – at least she’d stopped pulling her eyelashes out; what the therapist had diagnosed as Trichotillomania – a form of obsessive-compulsive disorder caused by anxiety.

That had started when she was eight and had developed into a real problem over the course of a year. Kennedy had seemed completely unaware she was doing it, and it had driven Silver nutty on the occasions she had picked her up from daycare and found her to be missing half her upper lashes. They had tried everything – wearing gloves at night, putting petroleum jelly on her lashes, cognitive behavioral techniques – but the problem had continued until Silver had sought a second opinion from a doctor who had been recommended by the school. Dr. Thelma, as she liked to be called, was a large, friendly, cheery woman who specialized in treating children. She had quickly gotten to the root problem – Kennedy felt unbalanced and uncertain about the future since the marriage had ended, and internalized a lot of her worry, ultimately taking it out on herself.

They had worked together as a team on modifying the urge to pull, and Kennedy had been doing well for almost nine months – she’d channeled her dissatisfaction into more traditional forms of protest, like the adoption of the ghoulish styling she and some of her school friends now favored. If it was a choice of a kid who wanted to look like a pallbearer in a vampire film or one that was mutilating herself, that was an easy one.

Silver glanced at her as she walked around the small dining table. “Is that makeup? Eyeliner?” Silver asked, trying to keep her voice neutral.

“Just a little. It’s a special occasion. Big production. The theater.”

“Off. Now. No arguments. We’ve discussed this, and not a chance in hell do you wear makeup before you’re in high school, at the earliest. Go. Don’t start down this road tonight, Kennedy, or I will end it here and now, and you will not be going anywhere. Understood?”

Kennedy pushed back her chair, noisily scraping it against the hardwood floor. “Lots of the other girls are wearing it,” she protested.

“No, they aren’t. Not at ten. And by the way, if lots of the other girls were taking drugs, or jumping in front of busses, would that make it a good idea?”

“This sucks. I feel like I’m in some kind of nightmare prison,” she said, stomping her black hiking boots as she retreated to the bathroom.

“Yes. Poor you. A nightmare where you go to the ballet and have a private chef preparing your meals. It’s a kind of hell on earth, I can see already. How do you manage?”

The bathroom door slammed.

Silver wasn’t even going to get into the issue of Kennedy touching her makeup. That was the least of the offenses, and one better left for another day.

She put the plates of steaming spaghetti on the table and waited patiently. Three, four, five minutes crawled by before Kennedy emerged, sans eyeliner, and truculently took her seat. Silver chanced a surreptitious peek at Kennedy’s eyelashes – thank God, all there.

“Don’t worry. I’m not pulling them out,” Kennedy said as she lifted a forkful of pasta and blew on it, watching the steam rise from the plate as she gauged how hot it was.

“That’s good, sweetheart. You’ve made incredible progress.”

“Yeah. I guess being a nutcase is a lot of trouble for everyone,” she tossed out, then stuffed the noodles in her mouth.

Silver put her fork down, considering this new wrinkle. What was bringing it on?

“You’re not a nutcase, and you’re not a lot of trouble. Kennedy. Look at me. What is going on in your head? Why are you being this way? Why start a fight with me when you’re not even going to see me for the next three hours? Talk. Come on.”

“Never mind.”

Silver refused to rise to the dismissive bait. “That isn’t much of an explanation.”

“Whatever.”

Silver counted slowly to three, fighting the urge to react. Kennedy, for whatever reason, was playing let’s make Mommy miserable, and she wasn’t going to give her daughter the power to trigger an explosion.

“When this case is over, I was thinking about us going away for a week, whenever school has a break. Maybe to Florida,” she tried, changing the subject to something more upbeat.

“Florida sucks. It’s hot and humid, and everyone’s a million years old.”

“Well, it’s true that the weather can be unpleasant, and there are a lot of older folks there…”

Kennedy suddenly became animated.

“Why not California? I can learn to surf!” she exclaimed, loading up another forkful of noodles.

Silver appeared to consider it. “Do they let goth vampires surf? Isn’t there some kind of code of ethics or something?”

“It’s a very flexible lifestyle,” Kennedy intoned seriously, causing them both to explode in a fit of giggling.

They discussed the various merits of California beaches as they finished dinner. The intercom buzzer sounded. Silver glanced at the clock and saw that the time had flown. She got up while Kennedy carried their plates into the kitchen and walked over to the ancient contrivance on the wall.

“Yes?”

“It’s me. Is she ready?” Eric's voice boomed from the speaker.

“YES!” Kennedy screamed from behind her, racing for the door.

“Be there in a second.” Silver wasn’t interested in inviting him up. She grabbed her keys and reached for the locks. “I’ll walk you down. Remember to call me five minutes before you get back so I can meet you at the front door.”

Kennedy responded with her best ten-year-old sneer, but nodded.

They made their way to the ground floor in record time. Eric was standing in front of the building wearing a hand-tailored, navy blue suit, crisp white shirt, no tie. She remained halfway up the first flight of stairs, watching as Kennedy ran to the entrance, opened the door, then threw her arms around her father. That figured – Silver got the cold shoulder when trying to hold her hand, but Eric got greeted like he was returning from the war. She didn’t want to dwell on it, but she could have sworn he threw her a smug look.

At that moment she hated him with an intensity that surprised her. She watched as Kennedy unwrapped herself from him and they set off down the street.

There was only one thing she could think of as she climbed the stairs back to the flat.

It was time for a glass of cabernet and some chocolate.

Maybe she’d clean her guns while she was at it. That always seemed to soothe her troubled spirit.

Just an ordinary evening at home.

Chapter 5

“Glenn. Get in here. I need you to look at something,” Matt Rice’s voice called from the editor’s office.

Glenn Wexler stopped typing and stood with a groan, his back killing him after spending most of the day at his computer screen. Such was the way of the professional journalist in the increasingly difficult environment brought about by the Internet. Budgets had been slashed, then slashed again, and staffing had never been thinner. That meant worker bees like Glenn had to carry a lot more load to get the paper out every day.

He approached Matt’s office with trepidation, hoping he wasn’t about to be handed yet more to churn out before leaving for the evening. He’d already worked through dinner time for the third day in a row. Enough was enough, he decided as he steeled himself for a confrontation. He wasn’t a bath mat. Time to stand up and be a man.

Although being an unemployed man wasn’t so appealing when there were bills to pay.

“Shut the door,” Matt said as he entered.

Glenn complied and raised his eyebrows in a silent inquiry as to what the fire drill was about.

“Come over here. Look at these. I just got them by e-mail.” Matt gestured to a spot where Glenn could see the images on the monitor.

Glenn walked around the desk, careful not to disturb the overhanging stack of back issues.

His eyes went wide. “Holy shit. Is that what I think it is?”

“Yup. From the psycho killer – The Regulator. Shots of his latest butchery, up close and personal.”

“Jesus. You need to call the cops. Maybe they can trace the account…” Glenn blurted.

“I know. I’m going to in a second. After I finish choosing a few for the morning edition. What do we know about today’s killing?”

“Just what the FBI put out. A male New York resident, murdered sometime last night, believed to be the work of The Regulator. Not much more. Name will be released after the next of kin have been contacted. The usual ambiguous routine.”

“Well, the days of ambiguity are over. There’s a message with the photos identifying the victim and making a statement about bringing criminals to justice. Sounds like he views himself as a vigilante. Chuck Bronson –
The Terminator
,” Matt said.

“I think that was
Death Wish
.
Terminator
was Schwarzenegger. Who wasn’t a vigilante. More of a robot assassin,” Glenn corrected.

“Yeah, whatever. I could never tell what the hell either of them was saying. One Chuck Norris could have kicked both their asses. The point is that we have a serial killer who’s giving us gold, and if he wants us to print his side of the story, I don’t see any reason not to, do you?”

“One reason is it could get us in hot water with law enforcement…maybe you should run this by legal before making any final decisions?” Glenn counseled.

“I’m all over it. I have a conference call in a few minutes.”

They studied the message under the photos until Matt finally said, “He’s pretty vague, don’t you think? Says he’s going after untouchable criminals that the system won’t prosecute. Promises more to come, as well as a story that will detail the crime of the century.”

“Uh huh. Let me guess. The trilateral commission and the Templars are secretly keeping Hitler’s brain alive?”

“I know. This gives me the creeps. But still. It’s a gift, and these days I’ll take whatever I’m given. Which brings me to why I wanted to talk to you. We’re going to need fifteen hundred words, and nobody can crank out quality as fast as you. What do you think? Can you get this done stat?”

Glenn sighed. He knew it. Then again, this was an unexpected break, and it would ensure his byline was seen by a huge number of people. Might even go national. This was the sort of thing he would have actually stayed up all night for.

“Give me an hour. I’ll flesh out the bare bones from the FBI and throw in some lurid speculation. Finish with a paragraph that will ensure that nobody feels safe. It’ll scare the shit out of anyone reading it.”

“That’s my boy,” Matt said.

His phone rang.

“That will be legal. I need to take this. I’ll look for your article before I leave. Thanks, big guy.”

“Sure thing, boss. No problem.”

~ ~ ~

A white Chevrolet sedan pulled up to the warehouse on the outskirts of Rochester, New York, a few minutes south of the suburb of Brighton. The worst of the morning commute traffic had died down, and the vehicle had made it to the building in reasonably short time. The area around it was green, thick with trees, typical of most of upstate New York. Aside from the steadily expanding populated areas, the region was still relatively unspoiled – as far from the dense concrete jungle that was Manhattan as one could get and still be in the same state.

The two occupants of the car studied the metal-sided exterior of the building, and were surprised at the absence of security cameras that would usually serve as an early warning system. Which wasn’t positive – it made the information that had come in that much more far-fetched; one of countless false alarms they had to wade through every year in order to glean a real lead.

In this case, they were part of an ongoing investigation into a human trafficking and prostitution ring operated by the aggressively proliferating Chinese criminal syndicates. Already, bloody turf wars had taken place in several East Coast metropolitan areas between the Russians and the Chinese, and that looked to become the norm.