The Bitter Season (16 page)

Cheap Charlie’s was as
much an institution for Minneapolis cops as Patrick’s bar. They had been going to the diner for breakfast for half a century. It was a mean and nasty place in an ugly brick bulldog of a building that squatted at the edge of the vast cracked blacktop wasteland known as Downtown East. For many years the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome had been the centerpiece of the area, a sports stadium that rose up from the desolate fields of parking lots like a giant, ugly concrete ottoman. For years the neighborhood had all the charm of a postapocalyptic war zone. Cheap Charlie’s had flourished.

The current fear was that while the diner had thrived in a climate of adversity, it might not survive the new wave of gentrification that the extravagant new Vikings stadium was bringing with it. Pricey lofts and green spaces, juice bars and trendy bistros—all had a way of crowding out blue-collar hole-in-the-wall traditions, starving out places like this one with boutique rental rates.

For now the place remained, defiant, too mean to die. Everything about it was original, including the grease on the ceiling. The décor harkened back to the 1950s: chrome and red vinyl, black and dingy white checkerboard linoleum. The waitresses still wore uniforms and took orders on a green pad, writing with the nub of a pencil.

The front window was fogged with the breaths of a full house. Nikki parked across the street and hustled through a nasty drizzle,
her shoulders scrunched up to her earlobes against the chill. As she walked in, she was assaulted by the smell of bacon and strong coffee, and a wall of noise composed by two dozen conversations—one of those being led by Gene Grider, on the far side of the room. She stood where she was, staring at him until he noticed her. She made a sour face and walked away.

Kovac sat next to Elwood in a booth, hunched over his eggs like he thought someone might try to steal his plate away. The new guy sat across from him, a big, strapping hunk with shoulders that strained the bounds of his suit jacket.

“Holy fucking shit!” Nikki said, arriving at the end of the booth, laughing as she took a good long look.

Kovac barely glanced up. “Tinks, meet Michael Taylor. I’m calling him Stench.”

“That’s a terrible nickname.”

“Thank you. I agree,” Taylor said, lifting his coffee cup in a toast. He had narrow green eyes under a straight brow line, a jaw cut from granite, and a mouth made for sex fantasies.

“What would you call him?” Kovac asked.

“I like Hottie McHotterson,” Nikki said without hesitation.

“That’s sexual harassment,” Taylor pointed out.

Nikki rolled her eyes. “Call a cop, Sweet Cheeks.”

“I expected more sympathy from a woman,” Taylor remarked, sliding over to make room for her in the booth.

“That’s sexist, too,” she said, sliding in beside him, careful to keep her wet coat between them. He was easily the best-looking man she had ever seen walking around loose in the real world—and probably ten years younger than she. “I have just as much right to be an insensitive jerk as anyone with a penis.”

“Taylor,” Kovac said, completing the introduction, “Nikki Liska.”

“What did people call you when you came on the job?” Taylor asked her.

“Pissy Little Bitch, Mouthy Cunt, Bull Dyke—which I’m not, just
to be perfectly clear,” she said, motioning a waitress over. “We’re not exactly working with poet laureates here—present company excluded, Elwood.”

“Thank you, Tinks,” Elwood said, striking a noble pose. Their gentle giant with the soul of an artist. Nikki missed his insightful observations and his goofy porkpie hats. The hat du jour was made of black oilcloth, to withstand the filthy weather.

“And all these enlightened years later, I still get called all those things and worse,” she said. “Gene Grider is probably sitting over there wracking his tiny little atrophied brain right now coming up with something dirty and degrading to call me. Last night he suggested that the lieutenant and I roll our own tampons.”

Taylor scowled in disapproval.

Nikki shrugged, trying not to stare at his mouth. “That’s Grider. Class out the ass, that guy.”

“Fuck him,” Kovac growled. “My money’s on you in that fight.”

“It had better be. Hey, did you just insult me?”

“Not intentionally.”

She ordered a coffee and a Spanish omelet. “I heard you caught the big double homicide. Have you gotten any sleep?”

Kovac looked like he hadn’t slept in a week, though he had shaved and put on one of the fresh shirts he kept in a desk drawer at the office. She resisted the urge to reach across the table and fix the crooked knot in his tie.

“Sleep?” he said, like it was something for pussies. “Maybe tonight. Maybe tomorrow. This one is extra special, you know,” he said sarcastically. “Seeing how the vics are rich, white, and connected to the U.”

“Killed with a samurai sword,” Nikki said. “A very sexy case. I’m jealous.”

“Funny, huh? Someone gets it in the throat with a screwdriver, they bleed out just the same, but it’s so much less glamorous,” he said, forking up some eggs.

“Suspects?”

“Sniffing around a few. We almost had our hands on one last night. He mule-kicked the kid in the head like a fucking ninja and ran off into the night.”

Nikki looked at Taylor for damage. Taylor frowned at his pancakes and rubbed his neck.

“He’s fine,” Kovac said dismissively. “How’s your thing going? That case is so cold it’s got freezer burn.”

“Thanks for the encouragement. It means so much.”

“I’m here for you.”

Nikki pulled a list out of her coat pocket and handed it across the table to him. “I’m guessing you might know most of those guys. They all worked the Duffy case at one time or another. Which one do you think is worth me trying to talk to?”

He looked at the list and ticked them off. “This one’s dead. This one’s drooling. This one moved to Costa Rica, the lucky son of a bitch. That leaves Peterson. Your winner by default.”

He gave her a look. “You could have picked up the phone and found out all of that in ten minutes.”

“Shut up,” she grumbled, annoyed that he saw right through her. “I asked you and found out in less than one minute. And I’m getting breakfast while sitting next to Magic Mike here.”

“I feel so cheap,” Taylor said.

“I know. It’s tough being the sexy one,” Nikki said, patting his arm. “We all feel really bad for you. So, do you have any tattoos, Mike? And if yes, where are they located on your person?”

Taylor blushed and grinned sheepishly, ducking his head.

“Oh my God, and he blushes, too!” Nikki exclaimed, delighted. “You are the cutest thing ever!”

“It’s lonely back there in the broom closet, isn’t it, Tinks?” Kovac said.

They all had a laugh, and it felt good . . . and it hurt a little, too, Nikki admitted. Maybe more than a little. She was a social animal.
She thrived on camaraderie. Kovac’s character would have been more suited to working cold cases than hers. He at least did a better job of pretending not to need human interaction.

“All right, kids,” Kovac said, hailing the waitress for a check. “These murders aren’t going to solve themselves.”

Nikki’s breakfast arrived as the three others left. She stared down at it, not really wanting it now. She sighed and looked around, her gaze going to Grider, sitting at a table on the far side of the room. He had his big ugly head bent down and was deep in conversation with another big man whose back was to her.

She had gone over as much of the Duffy case as she could the night before, until the words on the pages of reports and statements blurred into a swarm of black dashes on white. She hadn’t come up with any overt misstep by Grider during his various stints on the case.

Had he gone easy on Barbie Duffy? Yes, but more so than any other investigator? Not on paper. Then again, he had been the one writing the reports on his investigations. He wasn’t going to make himself look bad.

No other investigator had hinted at anything wrong with Grider’s handling of the case. But that was a problem coming into a case entirely cold: She had only official reports and statements to look at. The real story of an investigation was in the detective’s personal notes, where he didn’t have to worry about verbiage, and could express his concerns and opinions. Those were the notes detectives took home with them and hoarded in file cabinets and cardboard boxes. She had boxes of her own in her attic. What she would ever do with them, she couldn’t imagine, but she kept them just the same. Nobody left those notes in a file, which was why she wanted to speak to one of the guys who had worked the Duffy case—someone not named Grider.

She didn’t know Peterson, the only viable choice from her list. Would he think Grider had looked the other way with regard to the
alibis of Barbie and Big Duff? Peterson hadn’t solved the case, either.

Maybe she was just being a bitch, wanting to place the blame on Grider just because she hated him. What would his angle have been, to drag down the case, if Ted Duffy was such a great friend, anyway?

He wouldn’t have been the first guy to fall for his best buddy’s wife. But could she see Barbie Duffy sweating up the sheets with Gene Grider? Gross. Even if she could get her head around that idea, the bigger, better theory of the crime put Barbie and Big Duff in cahoots. And why would Grider run interference for either of them, let alone both of them?

As Kovac had taught her, most murders boiled down to one of two motives: sex or money. Barbie had collected on her husband’s life insurance and his pension. Big Duff had also collected insurance on his brother’s death.

She could ask to get Gene Grider’s financials for the months just prior to and after Ted Duffy’s homicide. She could only imagine Mascherino’s reaction to that request. Then again, Mascherino had come from IA. She might not blink an eye. But even as she thought about it, Nikki felt a little dirty. It wasn’t her nature to go after her own kind.

She had other angles to pursue, angles other investigators had discounted or hadn’t considered at all. The obvious routes had been trampled down over the years, to no avail. She would consider every possibility, and eliminate all but one.

Grider pushed his chair back from his table and started to rise. Nikki put her phone up to her ear and glanced down at her eggs. She could feel Grider’s eyes on her as he walked past her booth on his way to the front door. He left alone.

She looked back to his table. His breakfast companion was still there, one arm gesturing as he spoke with the smiling waitress. He had a booming laugh. A familiar laugh. Everyone around him laughed with him as he stood up and turned to go.

Thomas “Big Duff” Duffy.

“Grider,” Nikki muttered under her breath. “You son of a bitch.”

*   *   *

N
IKKI SAID NOTHING TO
Grider as she walked into their office; just gave him a long flat look as she took her coat off and hung it up. He glanced away first, phone pressed to his head.

Candra Seley watched the silent exchange as she crossed the room to Nikki’s desk.

“It’s another beautiful day in the neighborhood, I see,” she said as she pulled up a chair.

Nikki rolled her eyes. “What have you got for me?”

“Jennifer Duffy’s info,” she said, handing her a note card with the address and phone number. “I also sent these to your e-mail, but I’m old-fashioned. I like things written down.”

“Perfect. What about the missing Nilsens?”

“I can’t find Renee Nilsen,” Seley said. “And I mean, I can’t find her anywhere.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously. She seems to have vanished off the face of the earth. The Nilsens never got divorced. She never legally changed her name in this state. She does not hold a current driver’s license. She has not used or applied for a passport; nor has she filed a Minnesota tax return.”

“Was she ever reported missing?”

“No.”

“Shit,” Nikki muttered. “I want to solve one case; now we’ve got a bonus mystery? I hope for her sake she ran off with a hot boyfriend.”

“That’s not all,” Seley said. “I did a little digging to find out what happened to the son.”

“And?”

“Get this: He enlisted as soon as he turned eighteen, just a couple of months after Ted Duffy’s murder. He didn’t even wait to graduate.”

“I guess he couldn’t wait to get the hell away from the old man,” Nikki said. “Who could blame him? Especially if Dad made Mom disappear. Time to get out of Dodge. Then he dies serving his country. That’s sad.”

“It would be if it were true,” Seley said. “He was given a psych discharge nine years ago.”

“Then what happened to him? How did he die?”

“I’m not convinced he’s dead. Or, if he’s dead, he didn’t die in the state of Minnesota. There’s no death certificate. There’s no obituary anywhere.”

“Ah,” Nikki said. “So you’re thinking he might not be dead; he might just be dead to dear old Dad.”

“Imagine how a psych discharge would go over with that man. I think it’s worth checking into. I mean, Jeremy Nilsen could be dead, or he could be living on the street somewhere. You know, a lot of these guys fall through the cracks in the system and just disappear off the grid. He could be anywhere, doing anything.”

“Keep looking,” Nikki said. She swiveled her chair and sighed. “I was thinking last night that the people close to this murder who were overlooked were the kids. No one really seriously questioned any of them.”

“They were small.”

“Jennifer Duffy was nine. That’s not too young to know what’s going on in the family. Barbie Duffy said that her daughter had a lot of issues afterward. Why? And the foster kids were teenagers. My boys are teenagers. They’re wrapped up in their own stuff, but they’re certainly very aware of what goes on between their dad and me, whether they want to be or not. They hear things, they sense things, it impacts them,” Nikki said, thinking of R.J. and his stomachache of the other night, brought on as much by the tension between her and Speed as by too much junk food after the wrestling meet.

“I haven’t found anything on the foster kids yet,” Seley said.
“But I’ve reached out to a woman I know at DCFS. She’ll get back to me.”