The Dead Room (4 page)

He lowered his head. He was smiling, she realized. He was convinced that he had handled things just right, and that by talking about lodging, he had tricked her into deciding to go back.

Maybe he deserved his self-congratulations.

Or maybe it was just time for her to go back.

“You really want to stay there? You're serious?”

“Dead serious.”

She stood, patting him on the shoulder as she started out. She paused in the hallway, looking back at him. “No pun intended,” she said lightly, and offered him a dry grin. “You're right. I'm ready to go back. Excited to go back. Good night.”

She left him, still down on his knees by the chair.

Excited? Dear God, she was a liar.

And yet…

It was true. She never would have thought of it herself. Never would have woken up one morning thinking,
Wow, I'd really love to head back to Hastings House.

But now that she was going…

The past beckoned to her. She needed to come to terms with it.

She
had
to go back.

I
t was late. A strange time, Joe Connolly thought, to be having this meeting. The woman sitting nervously across from him was stunning, but she reminded him of a high-strung, inbred greyhound. She was excessively thin, and her long fingers were elegantly manicured and glittering with diamonds and other fine jewels. She had called that morning and set up this meeting. They were at the venue of her choice—a small Irish tavern off Wall Street. He would have expected her to suggest a private corner at an exclusive club, but perhaps she didn't want to be seen with a private investigator. For whatever reason, she had chosen O'Malley's, which was warm, small and inviting, a pub she had probably visited many a time in her youth.

She had originally come from humble stock, he knew. On her mother's side, she was second-generation Irish; her father, an O'Brien, came from a line of hard-working laborers who had arrived in the United States during the 1840s. Blood, sweat and muscle had taken him far in the trades, and thus their modest family fortune had begun and then risen to riches. Then Eileen O'Brien had married well, and she was now Mrs. Thomas Brideswell, widow of the late senator and construction magnate.

She thrust an eight-by-ten picture of a young woman across the table at him. He stared down at the likeness. Genevieve O'Brien looked back at him. Her eyes were huge and blue, and she was as slender as her aunt Eileen, with beautifully defined features. Her hair was dark, with an auburn sheen. The photographer had captured laughter, eagerness and the optimism of youth.

“How old is this picture?” Joe asked.

“It was taken about two and half years ago,” Eileen said, and hesitated. With a weary sadness and a hunch of her shoulders, she looked down. “Just before her falling out with my brother and me.”

Joe shook his head. “I'm sorry, I don't mean to press the issue, but I need to understand. If she left home voluntarily, and there was already an estrangement between you, what makes you so sure that something's happened to her?”

Eileen sighed deeply. “Donald died soon after she walked out of his house. She came back for his funeral. She wanted to keep her distance from me and what she called my ridiculous family devotion to a ridiculously dysfunctional family. I think she was upset that my brother died without the two of them ever having made their peace, but…” She lifted one of her bejeweled hands. “I suppose it was nasty growing up in my brother's household. There was a lot to be said for everything my father and grandfather accomplished, but it came at a price. Impossible expectations for their children. So much fault-finding when something was wrong.” She shook her head, and Joe felt moved by her obvious distress. There was such a deep and underlying sadness in the woman, despite her reserve and elegance. She looked him in the face then. “Ever since my brother died, she's called me every two weeks. At least once, every two weeks. I haven't heard from her in over a month.”

He leaned back, watching her. He had learned a lot in his years with the police force, and a lot more in the years since he had gone out on his own. Watching someone's face as they spoke was often as important as listening to the words that were said.

“Was there something said between you the last time you spoke that might have caused a greater rift?” he asked.

There was a very slight hesitation.

“No,” she said.

She was lying.

“I need to know everything,” he said firmly.

Again an elegant hand fluttered. “Well, there had been this awful article in one of those tabloids about the family,” she said.

“And?” he prompted.

“She was convinced that her father wasn't her father.”

“She bears a remarkable resemblance to you. I'm assuming you and your brother must have looked quite a bit alike,” he said.

“Exactly,” Eileen said.

He waited. “What was the paper? When was the article printed?”

“You don't want to read that dreadful piece of garbage,” she assured him.

“I need to read it. Mrs. Brideswell, I'm working in the dark here. Your niece is twenty-six. She's an adult. Adults who choose to disappear are allowed to do so. I have almost nothing to go on. You've given me first names and street names for a few acquaintances, and I have her work contacts—though she resigned from her job a month ago. That in itself could indicate that she planned to leave the city. I have addresses for a few of the places where you believe she hung out. You can't hold back on me. And when I find her—
if I find her
—I can't guarantee I can convince her to call you.”

“No! You don't understand. I believe with my whole heart that if she could call me, she would.”

Joe answered carefully. “Do you believe that your niece is dead, Mrs. Brideswell?”

Pain flashed across her features. “I don't know,” she whispered. “I just…I know that she loved…loves me. No matter what came between us…Genevieve would call me. And if she's out there somewhere…crying for help, she's crying to me. Oh, my God, Mr. Connolly, I'll admit there were awful times in the family, times when she was sent away…we were so embarrassed by her activities! My brother was…very strict. With reason, I suppose. My father taught us that we had to behave with propriety, or at least the appearance of it. But still…she loves me. And I know she needs me. I've had to admit to myself that she may be dead, but don't you understand? I have to know. And if she
has
become a victim of…of some misfortune, I have to see justice done for her before I die.”

Joe wondered why she spoke so passionately about her own death; she couldn't be more than forty-something, and she could easily be mistaken for thirty-five.

“A victim of misfortune,” Joe repeated, and asked flatly, “Do you suspect that she was murdered?”

Eileen inhaled deeply, and when she spoke, her words were bitter. “I've spoken to the police, Mr. Connolly, which of course you would imagine I had done. And I don't know if he warned you or not, but it was your old friend Sergeant Adair who suggested I call you, but not until after he gave me a speech about all the other disappearances that are perplexing him. I gather the police are trying to keep what's been going on with those prostitutes under wraps, though of course it's not working. People talk. And those disappearances have been going on for more than a year.”

“But your niece wasn't a prostitute plying her trade downtown,” he reminded her.

She waved a hand in the air. “I know. And we all know that plenty of people
not
involved in…in the trade disappear, as well. But I got the impression that Sergeant Adair sees some relationship between those disappearances and the fact that I haven't heard from Genevieve.”

Joe was confused. He knew that Robert Adair was tearing his hair out over the continued disappearances of prostitutes in the downtown area. There were no clues, no trails of blood. The girls just disappeared, but the police knew they hadn't just moved on—unless they'd moved on without saying a word and leaving all their belongings behind. But what would the daughter of a millionaire have in common with a bunch of missing prostitutes?

“I think this remains a very sensitive area for the police. The women who've disappeared are adults. Adults have a right to move on in their lives.”

Eileen stared at him, her eyes scorning his words. “We both know the truth.”

She was right. It had begun over a year ago. A few months apart, two prostitutes had vanished, but since there had been no clues and no signs of foul play, little had been done when their friends reported them missing. Then a homeless transvestite known as the Mimic had disappeared. Then two more young women.

She leaned closer to him, her eyes still flashing. She might be rich, but she could be tough when she needed to. “The thing is, prostitutes murdered by their johns usually turn up somewhere. A homeless man who freezes to death is found on the pavement. But these girls disappeared off the streets without a trace—just like Genevieve. Do you think aliens are beaming these people up, Mr. Connolly? I don't. I think there is a serial killer at large in New York who knows how to dispose of bodies so they'll never be found. I thought it was disgraceful when I first heard about the disappearances and the apparent lack of concern on the part of our government on the local and even the state level. Now? I'm incensed. Don't get me wrong. I'm not angry with the poor cop just trying to work his beat. I'm furious that someone doesn't step in and say, ‘These people count!' And now I haven't heard a word from Gen in so long, and every day I'm more and more worried, and though it doesn't seem that I have any power, I do have money.”

“All right, let's look at this from the beginning. Your niece was a social worker, yes?”

“Yes, here in the city,” Eileen murmured. “Up until a little more than a month ago. She found it terribly frustrating….” She inhaled deeply. “And not just the job itself. In my family, we were supposed to make—or marry—money. Both my brother and I were terribly hard on Gen, and all she wanted to do was make life easier on those who didn't have the same advantages we did. The frustration and red tape got to her, as well, but…none of that's what matters now. This is the point, this is why I think there's a connection. She'd been working to help prostitutes in the same area where prostitutes have been disappearing into thin air. Don't you see? I'm sure she knew some of those missing girls!” Eileen herself seemed ready to explode at that moment.

“Do you know any particulars on why she quit her job?”

Eileen waved a slender, elegant hand in the air. “Irritation with the system. She wanted to get workfare programs going…she wanted to help some of the girls keep their children. She is really an extraordinary human being, Mr. Connolly. Oh, I am so frustrated. No one seems to believe that I
know
that something's really wrong. The police can't—or won't—do anything.”

“I do understand your frustration,” Joe told her, “but you have to understand that the police are seriously frustrated themselves. The point is, these are
disappearances.
There's nothing for them to go on. And the people who have disappeared—in this particular situation—have lived transient lifestyles, which makes it very hard, as well. They can question those closest to the victims—if that's what they are. They can question people up and down the streets where the victims were last seen. They've harassed known pimps to the point that their behavior borders on the illegal. But absolutely no one so far has seen anything to indicate foul play. Meanwhile, the police still have murders, rapes and robberies to deal with, crimes with sadly obvious victims. There's only so much they can do when they have no victims, no murder weapons, no blood trails, no evidence of any kind.”

“Blood trails?” Eileen said, her eyes snapping. “They have to find out what's going on and stop it before we discover that we're in a
river
of blood! And before my niece is discovered lying dead somewhere. But they're not going to find out what's going on because, as you say, they have to deal with the blood they do see on the streets. I'm not calling our police incompetent. They try. Sergeant Adair has, I believe, been ordered to find the explanation for these disappearances, no matter what. They've searched Gen's apartment—if she disappeared by choice, she did so with only her purse and the clothes on her back, not even a good coat. They've been to her former office. They've tried to question people on the streets. Sadly, I know nothing about her real friends. Or if she was dating. The basics have been done. They've proved nothing. Except that she's gone, which I already knew. So I've hired you.”

“I'll do my best.”

“And you will find Genevieve,” she said passionately. “Because you will make finding her your priority every single morning from the moment you open your eyes. I'll reward you highly.”

He pocketed the picture. “You know my fee. I don't work to be rewarded highly. If I take a case on, it's part of my every waking moment until I have an answer. But I'll need your help at all times. Be ready to answer my calls,” he warned her. “I need to assimilate all that I've learned from you tonight, then get busy on my own and see what else I can discover. But I'll need more help from you. I'll need everything. Everything you know, anything that occurs to you. And don't hold back on me. I'm in your employ. I'll never repeat anything you tell me. Don't let any family embarrassment hold you back from being entirely truthful with me, do you understand, Mrs. Brideswell? I can't help you if you aren't completely honest with me. No amount of money will change that.”

She nodded. Reaching down, she found her purse and produced a small notepad. “I've written down everything I know, what names and places I've heard…anything I can think of that might be some help.” She produced a pen, scribbling down another notation. “I've added the publication I was talking about,” she murmured. “That's it.”

He accepted the notepad from her. “I'll do everything I can,” he told her.

She picked up the teacup before her on the table, her eyes distant. She drank what must have been very cold tea by then.