The Good Kind of Bad (13 page)

It felt like my tooth was about to snap.

‘Not bad, huh?’

A feeble attempt at breakfast, niceties and flattery; it was nothing but Joe’s guilty conscience. I was beginning to wish everything could rewind a week.

‘Look, about what happened,’ he began, drawing up a chair beside me and meeting my eyes. ‘I’m sorry. I feel like a dick. I am a dick. I went way over my limit, went too far. I’m glad you’re home . . . you know, I’m glad you
came
home. Real glad.’

When he placed his hand over mine, his hitting hand, my fingers turned numb, like I’d plunged my hand in snow.

‘Joe . . .’

‘No, hear me out. Know how goddamn sorry I am and how this’ll never happen again, never, or you have my permission to shoot me.’

Joe’s grin grew like a rash as he released my hand and leant back in his chair before rising to answer the ringing house phone. Meanwhile, I continued muddling through the grease-laden breakfast, washing down the dregs with gulps of juice.

He didn’t pick up the receiver, and instead pressed the speak button. ‘Petrozzi residence, master of the house speaking,’ he announced in a mock-posh accent before shooting me a wink.

Breakfast made? Check. Assumed he was forgiven and had permission to joke again? Check.

‘Hello, this is Officer Spencer of the Chicago Metropolitan Police, may I speak with Mrs . . .’

His jaunty mood didn’t last. He didn’t let the officer finish and instead grabbed the receiver and slapped a hand over the mouthpiece.

‘You called the cops on me? You called the goddamn cops! Are you insane? It was nothing, a slap in the face. I already got priors, what’ll they do to me now?’

Standing from the table, I snatched the receiver from him. ‘I did not call the cops. Sit down, Joe.’ Barely listening to the officer, I glared furiously at Joe, pacing the kitchen like a Nazi general. After more staring and loudly agreeing with the officer’s sentiments, I replaced the receiver. ‘They want me down at the station about the investigation at Faith.’ Joe looked relieved. I hoped I looked as mad as I felt. ‘Nothing, was it? Only a slap in the face?’

‘That’s not what I meant, baby. I thought—’

‘Save it, I have to be somewhere.’

There was no time for his reply before I was out the door.

Joe had a criminal record. My husband was a felon. He’d been arrested, charged and thrown in jail. Turned out Nina was possibly right about his gangster status. So much for the new honest and open Joe Petrozzi.

On the journey to the station it played on my mind. Joe could be a murderer, a rapist, a serial bigamist; I didn’t know the first thing about him. Come to think of it, I never had.

Down at District 31’s front desk, I impatiently waited for the detective assigned to my case. There was new information on Faith’s break in and as the main witness-slash-suspect I’d been summoned, though I didn’t think to pack an overnight bag. They had the wrong Petrozzi if that was on the cards.

I was beside the coffee machine in the lofty waiting area, entertaining myself with the largely out-of-date notice board. Right then I’d take any distraction I could find.

The more I tried to forget him, the more Joe’s face appeared on every passing officer or waiting room occupant. My casualness over the slap was a mistake, especially now his
criminal
past had crawled out of the woodwork.

This was my first trip to a police station. Knowing Joe could’ve spent years in and out of jail cells left me uncomfortably numb. This had been his life? One spent looking over his shoulder? Not that I knew why. Maybe he was a super-secret spy, a champion fraudster, or one of those con artists with MIT degrees who counted cards in Vegas.

I only hoped the reality wasn’t assault with a deadly weapon or attempted murder. Or both.

I thought about the church, the wedding, our electric glances during the vows and I’d felt it, I’d
known
. After being consumed with each other from day one, marriage was the next logical step. It’d been the stuff of dreams. We were fated. He was a man so different, and yet I was meant to share the rest of my life with him. I was in the secret club of happy people who’d shied away from the one-night stands and gone straight for forever. What did anybody else know? They didn’t understand. They didn’t get it.

I had to think of something else before my scream found a voice. Breakfast. Joe’s shrivelled egg and sausage combo? That didn’t bear thinking about. The police station then, District 31. It was all very postmodern, but in a good way. Here brutality was replaced by concern and a caring, responsible manifesto: fighting crime and protecting people. With all the glass-mounted photos of beaming citizens and children at the windows of squad cars, the Chicago Metropolitan Police were obviously keen to distance themselves from the embers of their corrupt past.

As police officers milled behind the counter, each saddled with a gun, handcuffs and all manner of interesting accessories, I waited for someone to shout cut. It was like a movie, though a frustratingly tedious one. Nothing was happening.

Where was the serial killer, Chicago’s
Hillside Strangler, bound by cuffs as he was wrestled through the doors? What about the random prostitutes, gang members and television news crews staking out the waiting room, poised for a sound bite with Mr Twenty-Years-to-Life? Come to think of it, this wasn’t like the movies at all.

I caught a glimpse of male officers in blue starchy uniforms escorting suspects behind the desk in the main hall, though when a handful gazed in my direction, I didn’t know whether to be flattered or concerned.

Channelling Nina, I should’ve opted for a dash of
Sister Act
. My skinny jeans, heels and cleavage-enhancing teal wrap didn’t scream
reliable
witness. And when they found out who my husband was? I’d be locked up by association for sure.

After two trips to the desk sergeant and forty minutes ticking by, there he came, Detective Thomasz and his dirty blond hair, striding towards me with all the swagger he could muster. He was without his Clark Kent glasses and resembled his appearance at our first meeting, the assured besuited detective.

‘We have to stop meeting this way; you know, randomly,’ Evan said to my breasts after landing by the coffee machine, ferociously chewing a piece of gum.

Last time we’d spoken, he’d asked me out to dinner, knowing I was married. It also didn’t help he’d never been anywhere near the ugly tree. No, this wouldn’t be awkward at all.

With a disguised eye roll I stood to greet him, if only to stop him peering down my top. ‘Are you in charge of the investigation? The desk sergeant said—’

‘Yeah, I’m who you’ve been waiting for. Apologies if you sat here a while. You know how it is; I’d have to split myself in two to get everything done around here.’ He was all hands, gesturing profusely like I was hard of hearing.

After he pointed the way, I trailed him up a flight of stairs and across the Detective Division on South State Street. Talk about a fast walker. When we did arrive at his desk, it looked like there’d been a mini explosion. Open files and soiled coffee cups lay scattered across it. With a banana peel discarded over his computer keyboard, it bordered on pigsty. Joe had nothing on this guy, and to think Evan’s shirt and suit trousers looked professionally pressed. Maybe he had a maid, or, more likely, a girlfriend. A desk that dirty didn’t scream ironing aficionado to me.

‘Welcome to Property Crimes slash Violent Crimes. Budget cuts for the South Area. Here, take a seat and, again, sorry to drag you here on a Sunday. You want a coffee? I make a mean cappuccino, straight from the machine.’

He pulled up an uncomfortable-looking plastic orange chair before flashing a penetrating smile. He grew nervous again, as if his life depended on winning my affections. Busy collecting the mess on his desk, he discretely chucked a mountain of paperwork behind him before grasping the file for Faith Advertising like a winning lottery ticket.

‘Goddamn filing system. Sorry, did you want that coffee?’ he asked, perching on the edge of his desk.

I shuffled over the chair. ‘I’m fine.’

‘Wise move, Mrs Petrozzi. I think only cops can stomach this stuff.’

‘Please, Evan. Like you said, first names are fine.’ I wanted to remain friendly with a hint of distantly polite. He
was
a police officer, something I couldn’t forget. Maybe Evan could pull out Joe’s list of crimes and shed some light on my husband’s master criminal past. Oh, that’d be fun.

‘First names only. Got it, Mrs Petrozzi. Okay, the Faith robbery. There’s been some progress in the case. It’s nothing solid but we have a few leads, though the department’s only willing to assign me.’ As he took a sip from his mug, I noticed it had ‘I’m a douchebag’ printed on the bottom.

I couldn’t help but smile.

‘How’s the clean-up operation going at Faith?’

‘It’s taking longer than they thought. We’ve been working from a makeshift office a few floors down for a while now.’

‘It was a nasty break in. Worst I’ve seen in a while.’

‘So, what’s the progress you’ve made? In the case, I mean.’

‘Some guy walking his dog by the lake handed a bunch of crap in. It’s always the dog walkers.’ Evan threw a muddy employment ID onto the desk and pointed at it. ‘That is yours, right? I mean, it’s your picture but it says A. Clarke, not Petrozzi.’

It
was
mine; my pass to Faith’s offices and the one I thought Sybil had eaten. ‘It’s my maiden name. When I transferred from London it was easier to keep it all under Clarke. I only recently got married.’

‘How long has the pass been missing? Or was it taken in the robbery?’

A ‘congratulations’ wouldn’t have hurt. ‘No, it’s been missing a while. I’d only had my pass for a couple of days before I lost it. My boss wasn’t too happy. I had to get a replacement and apparently they “cost”.’

‘So, did you lose it or was it stolen?’ Evan’s eyes narrowed as he chewed on the end of his pen.

When I didn’t answer, not wanting to admit I’d thought the culprit was a dog, he continued. ‘You been anywhere near the lake recently, Mrs Petrozzi?’

I was about to reply, until thinking better of it. Was Evan trying to catch me out? To confess my part in a conspiracy to defraud Faith as the inside woman? He stared again with unmatched vehemence, waiting for me to spill my guts.

‘Which lake?’ I asked.

He looked at me like I’d gone insane. ‘
The
lake? As in, the one they call Michigan? You know of any others in Chicago?’

‘Oh. That lake. Not that I remember.’ Great going. Not suspicious at all. So this was Evan in detective mode. I was either terrible at geography, terribly naive or terrible at lying. But one thing was certain: Evan was stellar at
his
job. I was ready to give myself up for robbery and all I’d done was follow Quentin’s orders.

Oh yeah, Quentin, he of the sweater vests. I bet Evan didn’t suspect
him
, though Quentin didn’t look like he could dress himself without assistance, never mind breathe the same air as a bunch of heist merchants. ‘You know it was Quentin Renaud who asked me to start work early that morning?’

‘Yeah, you said, on the morning of the break in? When you thought people were watching you?’

Again he stared at me like my brain was in neutral. Maybe it was. Maybe Joe had stolen all power of reasoning from me.

‘I did a quick recon of the lakeside but there was nothing. Even had my snitches keep an ear out but it’s all quiet. I thought the goods would’ve travelled through every fence in Chicago by now but these master criminals know more than us, as per usual,’ the detective mused.

An officer holding a mug emblazoned with a model in a half-vanishing bikini plonked himself down in Evan’s chair with a sigh. A young detective with a face hidden by stubble, I recognised him as Evan’s partner, the other detective from the morning of the robbery. What a cliché. I hoped this wasn’t their good-cop, bad-cop routine.

The young detective took a gulp of coffee. ‘Heard you were in Whelan’s office this morning, Evan. Captain ask for your badge yet?’

Evan pointed a sideways thumb at him. ‘Mrs Petrozzi, you remember Detective Reeve, my highly inappropriate partner?’

‘How nice to see you again, Mrs Petrozzi. That’s a nice wrap thing you’re wearing.’ He fanned his hand over his chest before meeting my best ‘say-that-again-and-I’ll-kick-you-in-the-balls’ stare. As he cleared his throat and turned towards Evan, I knew he’d got the message. ‘I didn’t know you were still on the Faith case, Evan?’ Reeve slurped deliberately from his mug, the bikini now completely vanished with the heat.

‘That’s why Mrs Petrozzi is here,’ Evan retorted, signalling me with a hand.

‘Didn’t Whelan tell you to put that investigation to bed?’

Evan leant back on the edge of the desk, folding his arms. ‘Did you want something, Reeve?’

‘Only to find out why you were put on report,’ he bellowed across the room, clearly for the benefit of everyone else’s ears as well as Evan’s.