Abracadaver (Esther Diamond Novel) (7 page)

“I swear, the Bowery must be the windiest street in this hemisphere. And when I tried to call to ask where the damn truck was and found out I
couldn’t
call . . . I got upset.”

“Upset?”

“Okay, I acted out. Shouted and cursed and kicked things.”

“Color me astonished.” It wasn’t hard to picture him blowing his stack at that point. Everyone has their moments.

“I scared some kids,” he admitted guiltily. “That was unintentional, but their granny got mad. She hit me and called me bad names. I think she was speaking Fujianese, so I didn’t know what she was saying. But I could tell from the kids’ faces, they were
bad
words.”

“You had a hard day.”

“Yeah. Still I guess Ted Yee and John Chen both had a worse day than I did.”

“What are you doing to your phones, anyhow, that they keep dying on you?”

“I’m not doing
anything
to them. They’re just dying! Shoddy manufacturing or something.”

I could tell from his tone that I was the umpteenth person to ask him that, so I dropped the subject. “Look, the reason I called you . . .”

When I didn’t continue, he prodded, “Yes?”

“Well, we didn’t finish talking about what happened the other night, did we?”

“The other night?”

“What I did the other night,” I specified.

“What you did . . . Hmm. Remind me what you did the other night?”

“All right, I know you’ve had a bad week, but that’s no reason to be mean,” I admonished.

“Okay. You’re right.” There was a pause. “Well, do you want to start, or should I?”

“I’ll go.” I took a breath and forged ahead. “I panicked when I saw the cookie in your car, because those things are deadly. If you had cracked it open—if
anyone
had cracked it open—it would have killed you instantly.”

There was a brief silence.

Then he said, “Killed me instantly?”

“Yes.”

“How? Would death rays have burst out of it and turned me into ashes?”

“Don’t be facetious. I’m trying to—”

“You’re telling me that a cookie crumbling would have killed me, and you think
I’m
being facetious?”

“These deadly cookies are what killed Joe Ning and Benny Yee.” Benny, an underworld figure of lower status than Ning, was Ted’s uncle, and he had been the film’s previous backer—until Susan killed him with a misfortune cookie. His death had been attributed to natural causes.

“I see. Benny Yee and Joe Ning were killed by cookies.” Lopez’s voice was deadpan. “That’s your theory?”

“They were killed by mystical curses concealed in the cookies,” I clarified.

“Did Max give you this idea?” he asked wearily.

“That’s not important. I’m trying to tell you—”

“How many times do I have to ask you to stay away from him?”

I tried to keep my voice level and reasonable as I said, “He’s one of the best men I’ve ever known. You have no idea how many people he has helped.”

I could tell Lopez was trying to sound reasonable, too, when he said, “Look, I know you’re very fond of him. And I know he’s devoted to you. But, all things considered, I still don’t think this is a good friendship for you.”

“I’m not letting you pick my friends for me,” I said firmly.

“Esther, he keeps putting these crazy ideas into your—”

“Will you stop blaming Max?” I said irritably. “Lucky is the one who—who . . . uh . . .”

“Lucky?” His voice was tense now. “Oh, that’s great.”

Well, the cat was out of the bag, so I might as well continue. “The death curses were originally Lucky’s theory, not Max’s,” I said. “And he was right.”

“Just
great,
” Lopez said. “While I’ve got some fast-talking TV lawyer breathing down my neck and claiming I’m a corrupt cop just because Joe Ning fell off a slippery balcony, my girlfriend is chasing magical cookies with a famous Gambello killer. My week just can’t
get
any better, can it?”

I sifted through that outburst, trying to decide which item to address first. I picked the part that was unfamiliar to me.

“What TV lawyer? Who’s calling you corrupt? I don’t . . .” Then I remembered what Nathan had said he’d seen on the news. “Oh,
wait
. That attorney who’s claiming the cops drove Uncle Six to suicide—he’s blaming
you?
”

“Yep,” was the terse reply.

“Why?”

“Because he wants attention,” Lopez said sourly. “He wants TV cameras focused on his face and microphones shoved under his nose. And because he thinks an NYPD cop trying to keep a killer in prison is an easy target.”

“This is the same lawyer that Uncle Six hired to get his brother’s conviction overturned?” I guessed.

“Yeah. But Joe’s eldest son, who’s head of the family now that the old man is dead, isn’t dumb enough—thanks be to God—to throw away a fortune in legal fees trying to overturn a rock-solid case, if I do say so myself, in an attempt to get his rotten uncle back out on the streets so he can commit another murder,” said Lopez. “Uncle Six’s body—or what’s left of it—wasn’t even cold by the time the family terminated Goldman’s services.”

“Goldman?”

“Alan Goldman. The lawyer.”

“Ohhh,” I said in disappointment.

“What?”

“Nothing.” I scowled. “I just hate it when the rich, sleazy lawyer is Jewish, you know?”

“Yeah, and I hate it when the drug-dealing thug is Hispanic,” he replied. “But that’s life, and nobody asks our opinion before they make those choices.”

“I guess,” I grumbled. “But why doesn’t Goldman just move on to defending the next wealthy criminal?”

“Maybe he doesn’t have another case lined up. Or not one that’ll keep him in the spotlight right now.”

“Oh, come on, the city must be full of dirty people with deep pockets who are in legal trouble,” I said. “And it’s not as if anyone’s
paying
him to accuse you of driving Joe Ning to suicide. So why bother?”

“I think Goldman planned to position Paul Ning’s case as a civil rights suit where he sought ‘justice’ for a hardworking family who’d been unfairly targeted because they’re Chinese immigrants.” Lopez blew out his breath. “Well, Joe Ning’s fat fee isn’t on the table anymore, but Goldman can still get plenty of media attention as a crusader trying to expose a corrupt department and a bent cop whose determination to keep Paul in prison drove a Chinatown community leader to suicide. Blah blah blah.”

“But he can’t prove—”

“He doesn’t have to
prove
anything,” Lopez said bitterly. “The media don’t care about proof. They care about attention, just like Goldman. All he has to do, to get lots of mileage out of this, is keep insinuating and accusing.” He added, “But since he’s threatening to sue the department, maybe he thinks he can still get a fat fee out of this.”

“Do you really think he’ll go through with that threat?”

“I don’t know. He probably doesn’t know, either. Not yet. But threatening it gets him the kind of attention he wants.”

Some of the questions Quinn had asked John made a little more sense now. Lopez and his partner wanted to know if Joe Ning had seemed distraught in his final days.

I knew Uncle Six had been murdered by Susan, but I couldn’t prove it. Lopez seemed convinced it was an accident. And it would be easy for someone to claim that it was suicide.

“So if Joe Ning complained to anyone about the cops trying to keep his brother in prison,” I said, “or if a few people thought he looked sad or stressed lately, then a fast-talking, telegenic lawyer who’s eager to be seen as a crusader—”

“—could really run with that,” Lopez said gloomily. “And maybe get somewhere.”

“Is your job in danger because of this?” I asked with concern. I didn’t think that being a cop meant
everything
to him, but I knew it meant a hell of a lot.

“God, I hope not.” Apparently not liking the way that sounded, he added in a sturdier tone, “It shouldn’t be. I haven’t gone anywhere near Joe Ning—or Paul, or anyone else in the family. I just followed procedure to make sure an old conviction was ready to stand up to scrutiny.” After a moment, he muttered, “But that doesn’t mean the media won’t make a meal of this, with Goldman doing everything he can to encourage them.”

“I’m sorry you’re going through this.”

“Joe Ning is turning out to be a thorn in my side even when he’s dead,” he said grumpily.

“And I’m sorry you had to do a lot of paperwork and maybe tell some lies because I smashed in the window of your police car. Your previous police car, I mean.”

“That was the one where the radio kept going dead,” he muttered.

“Look, I was worried about you,” I said quietly. “So I did what I had to do.”

“Break into my car and steal the death-ray cookie,” he said. “That was what you had to do?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, listen,” he said, his tone changing. “Everything else aside . . . like your crazy cookie theory, your friendship with Max, your close association with a Gambello killer, and a lot of really weird water that’s flowed under the bridge ever since I met you . . .”

He’d called me his girlfriend a few minutes ago, but this sounded like the start of a breaking-up speech.

“
Everything
else aside,” he said, “Esther, if you thought there was something deadly dangerous inside my car . . . why didn’t you just call me?”

“Call you?”

“You know, on the
phone?
” he prodded. “You’ve got my number, and I was right in the neighborhood. Why didn’t you call me and say, ‘I’m worried about this thing in your car, and we should . . .’ I don’t know—drop it into an acid bath or something?”

It had never occurred to me to call him that night, since I knew he wouldn’t believe me—and would certainly veto the idea of taking the cookie to Max to be neutralized, which was the only safe solution.

“The situation was urgent,” I said. “You were in danger. I had to get rid of that thing—without arguing about it with
you
half the night.”

“Did smashing in a car window really seem like a better plan than arguing with me?” he demanded.

“Well . . . yes,” I admitted.

He sighed. “Okay, it’s this. Right here.
This
is why I just can’t figure out what to do.”

“What to do?” I repeated.

“About you,” he said. “About us.”

My heart sank a little.

“I can’t get on an even keel. I can’t think straight anymore . . . I try to move forward, and I wind up moving in circles. Esther, I just can’t . . . can’t
do
this.”

I could tell he was very serious now.

“Are you . . .” I cleared my throat. “Are you breaking up with me?”

W
hen asking that question, I deliberately omitted the word
again,
since it would just add humiliation to my hurt.

“Breaking up with you?” he said. “Are we even together? I don’t even know
that
much.”

I didn’t know, either. But whatever the right word was for what was between us, I had a feeling that it wasn’t
together
.

We’d slept with each other, but only once. The closest we’d ever come to going on a date was when he bought me a chili dog in the park on a cold December night. Since we’d met—no, since he’d first broken up with me—months at a time passed without any contact between us. Recently, we’d gone several weeks without even being on speaking terms.

Sounding frustrated, he said, “I have no idea what’s going on with us.”

“A few minutes ago, you called me your girlfriend.” As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I regretted them.

“I did?” He sounded puzzled.

Ouch. That hurt.

I decided not to pursue it. Instead I asked, “What exactly are you trying to say to me?”

“Good question.” He was silent for a moment. “I think there is something I’m trying to say, I just don’t know what. But, uh . . .”

“But?”

“I have the feeling that this isn’t a phone conversation.”

I frowned. “Yes, it is. We’re on the phone.”

“I mean, I think if we’re going to talk about us—and it seems like that’s something we need to do—we should do it in person.”

Right. Where I could see him. So that losing him would hurt even more. Good plan.

Can you lose someone you’re not even together with?

“Maybe you’re right,” I said. “Maybe this isn’t a phone conversation.”

“Esther, I . . .”

“What?”

By the time he finally spoke, I thought he’d changed his mind about saying something.

“I think about you all the time,” he told me.

“Oh,” I said, surprised and pleased. And now I felt a little better. This was what he could do to me, without even trying.

“But I . . . well, I tried to date you, and it didn’t work,” he said. “I tried to break up with you, and that didn’t work, either. I tried to stay away, and I couldn’t. I tried to get back together with you, and it was a mess.”

That depressing summary, I realized, was an accurate account of our relationship.

“That’s why this isn’t a phone conversation,” he said, sounding tired. “It’s not nearly simple enough to talk about over the phone.”

“No, it’s really not,” I agreed.

After a moment of silence, he asked hesitantly, “So are we done talking? For now, I mean?”

I was about to say yes, but then I remembered there was another subject we needed to cover. “There’s one other thing.”

“What?” he asked warily.

“What can you tell me about Detective Quinn?” I asked.

“Huh?” He sounded understandably surprised.

“Andy.”

“Yeah, I know who you mean. Why are you asking about him?”

Inspiration struck me. “Is he single?”

“Yes,” Lopez replied. “Well, divorced. Why?”

“I have a friend I was thinking he might like,” I lied.

“You want to set up one of your friends with Andy?” he asked dubiously.

“Maybe,” I said. “He seems like a decent guy. And he has a good job. But I only met him that one time. So I need to know more about him.”

“Like what?”

I thought quickly. “Does he like animals?”

“Why is
that
what you want to know?”

“My friend is a dog lover.”

“Well, we’ve never talked about it, so I don’t know.”

“Speaking of dogs,” I said oh-so-casually, “I hope he wasn’t too upset about Nelli’s behavior to him yesterday?”

“You mean, was he upset that a dog the size of a minivan tried to go for his throat?” Lopez said. “Actually, he took it pretty well. Never even mentioned it. But now that you bring it up, Esther, you’ve got to talk to Max about that d—”

“Andy is divorced?” I interrupted. “Has he told you what happened?”

He paused for a moment, deciding whether to let me get away with changing the subject, then gave in. “Not really. Just that marriage is tough, especially when one partner is a cop, relationships turn sour, that kind of thing.” After a moment, he added, “His first wife left him for another man, but he doesn’t seem bitter about that. It sounds like the marriage had already run its course by then.”

“
First
wife?” I prodded.

“Yeah, he was married twice. The second divorce—I think that one bothers him more.”

“Bothers him in what way?”

“Still hurts.”

I tried to think of what else to ask. “How about on the job? You’re with him all day long. Is he good company?”

“He’s okay. We get along.”

Lopez’s traditional male reticence about these topics was frustrating. Most women I knew, including me, could have riffed for at least ten minutes on any one of those questions. So could Thack, as well as quite a few actors and male cabaret artistes of my acquaintance. But Detective Lopez stuck to annoyingly brief answers as I continued poking and prodding. Since the two men had been working together for only a few weeks, he also just didn’t know that much.

It sounded like Quinn had a checkered career in the department, but Lopez was vague about that—and it obviously hadn’t been checkered
enough
to prevent Quinn from becoming a detective second grade and getting assigned to the OCCB. His personal life had a few problems (“like most people’s” Lopez said), and his two divorces had played havoc with his finances (whereas unemployment was what tended to play havoc with mine). But there wasn’t anything about him that sounded . . . well,
evil.

“Is he Catholic?” I asked.

“Lapsed.”

I phrased my next question carefully. “Is he into any New Age stuff?”

“Like what?”

“Unconventional beliefs or unorthodox practices?”

In the silence that followed, I realized I had overplayed my hand.

“All right, now I have a question,” he said. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Trying to learn more about Quinn.”

“Why? For real, this time.”

Oh, well, no point in playing dumb. It would just annoy him. “Because there’s something strange about him.”

Lopez snorted.

“Really
strange,” I said.

“Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.”

“That’s why Nelli reacted so badly when she—”

“You know what? I don’t even want to hear it. Just don’t tell me.”

“I’m just saying—”

“No,”
he said. “I’ve had enough. Breaking into my car to steal a cookie is one thing, but this is a
person
you’re talking about. And my partner.”

“That’s why I’m so con—”

“So whatever the hell has got you fixated on Andy now, let it go, Esther.”

“But—”

“I
mean
it,” he said. “Drop it, forget it, and move on. And leave Detective Quinn alone.”

“If you’d just—”

“We’re done here, Esther.” Before ending the call, he added, “Oh, and do something about that neurotic dog of Max’s before she mauls someone, would you?”

After that, I sat staring moodily at my phone for a while, working my way through anger, frustration, sadness, worry, and resignation.

In retrospect, I thought the entire conversation had gone worse than expected. Moreover, I didn’t think I had learned anything useful about Quinn, but now Lopez would be defensive about his partner—and might even warn Quinn that I’d taken an interest in him, so to speak.

I felt like I had failed in every respect.

Plus, it sounded as if, even though Lopez had feelings for me, he was giving serious consideration to ending our . . . whatever was between us.

Which didn’t change the fact that he was partnered with someone who I suspected of reanimating the dead. Someone who I feared might be very dangerous—and might be a menace to Lopez.

I had to learn more about Quinn. And Lopez certainly wouldn’t help.

So I needed to find another way.

But no bright ideas were coming to me, and I wouldn’t have a chance to talk to Max and Lucky before this evening. They were venturing out to the suburbs today to interview the bereaved Capuzzo family and find out what they could about the departed. We would meet at the bookstore this evening to compare notes and decide what to do next.

Meanwhile, I’d been so busy lately that I’d had no time to do laundry or clean the apartment. And since I didn’t need to go look for a job today—long live The
Dirty Thirty!—
I decided to spend the day catching up on chores.

I lived in a rent-controlled apartment in the West Thirties. The High Line, a public park built on an elevated old freight rail line, now ran along the West Side, starting below Fourteenth Street and ending in the lower Thirties. Frenzied development followed closely behind the gradual construction of this park, and so the area had gotten more upmarket—as well as more expensive. My street, however, hadn’t changed a bit yet, and it was almost as elegant as the floor of a public bathroom.

My apartment had the usual flaws of rent-controlled accommodation, being shabby, poorly maintained, and drafty. But I had a lot of space for a person of my modest income living in Manhattan—though it would be considered cramped by the standards of cities with more elbow room. The place was furnished with thrift shop finds, hand-me-downs, and items abandoned by roommates who’d fled New York after a year or two. Although I would have less financial strain if I got a roommate again, I enjoyed the privacy of having my own apartment, so I preferred working a little harder to cover the rent on my own.

All of my clothes were clean and so was most of my apartment by the time Thack called me back that afternoon. I had an appointment for a meeting at D30’s production offices to get a partial script, do a read-through with Michael Nolan and some other cast members, and talk about scheduling. I’d also need to go for costume fittings.

“The first thing that production will ask you to do tomorrow is sign the confidentiality agreement,” said Thack. “You’ll be in the final three episodes of the season, and they want to discuss the story arc with you—but not until after you guarantee you’ll willingly die under torture rather than reveal their secret plot points.”

“I’ll probably have to simulate performing oral sex on Michael Nolan,” I said, “so don’t joke to me about torture.”

I was also very happy with the fee Thack had negotiated. The money would keep the wolf from the door for a few months. And multiple episodes of
D30
would look good on my résumé and maybe generate some interest at auditions.

All right, yes, my love life was a mess and I was worried about an evil corpse reanimator lurking among us, but at least my career was coming up roses for a change.

There wasn’t much in my kitchen besides rice, beans, pasta, and a discount tub of nonfat yogurt. Now that I was sure there was a brief spell of decent income in my immediate future, I went grocery shopping and indulged extravagantly in things like chicken, salmon, fresh vegetables, chocolate, and bran muffins. I also bought a modest bottle of wine, which I took with me to Zadok’s Rare & Used Books that evening so that Max and Lucky could help me celebrate.

“Ah, yes!” Max said, when I told them my good news. “That was the drama where you played the, er, not entirely respectable young woman with whom one of the policemen is infatuated.”

“Talk about art imitating life,” said Lucky.

I ignored that. “Detective Conway isn’t really infatuated with Jilly C-Note,” I said. “He’s just using her for convenient, um, gratification.”

They had brought back some Italian carry-out, and we were sitting down to a casual dinner at the big walnut table. Nelli lay by the gas fire, gnawing contentedly on a large bone.

“He seemed infatuated to me,” Max said as he put some lasagna on a plate and passed it to me. “There was, if I may so, a perceptible alchemy between your two characters.”

I opened the bottle of wine and poured a glass for each of us, pleased that he had paid so much attention to the episode I was in. It wasn’t as if Max was a television watcher, after all.

As we all started digging hungrily into the food on our plates, I asked them about the results of their expedition.

“We got squat,” said Lucky.

“Our interviews and researches produced only a negative result—which I am inclined to think we can consider conclusive.”

“Meaning?”

“Capuzzo’s clean,” said Lucky. “I mean,
really
clean. Good husband, good father, good neighbor, good employer, and a good Catholic. Never involved with anything mystical, occult-related, illegal, or even a little woo-woo.”

“And no connection to Quinn?” I guessed.

“The last time Mr. Capuzzo engaged with a police officer, as far as anyone knows, was twenty-four years ago when he reported a burglary at one of his stores.”

“Hm.”

“Nate was right about the widow being a nice lady,” said Lucky. “She sent some cannoli home with us.”

“And she gave Nelli that lovely bone.”

“You took Nelli with you?” That must have been a surprise for the Capuzzos.

“I wanted to see whether she would react to anyone in the Capuzzo family the way she reacted to Detective Quinn,” he said. “But she was perfectly relaxed in their household throughout our visit.”

“So now we turn our full attention to the redheaded cop, I guess,” said Lucky. “Did you squeeze any juice out of Lopez?”

I immediately banished the mental image that phrase evoked. “I got less than squat. I got squat’s rejects.”

I summarized what I had learned from Lopez and explained that I’d told the truth (or started to) when he demanded an explanation. I concluded, “I don’t think any of the information I got tells us anything relevant. Lopez is no longer a source. And it’s possible he’ll alert Quinn to my suspicion.”

“Ah, don’t beat yourself up, kid. Lopez is a detective. He was bound to notice he was being interrogated.”

“He was in a pretty bad mood to begin with, too,” I said. “It turns out that he’s the cop who that lawyer—the one Nathan saw in the news—is blaming for Uncle Six’s ‘suicide,’ so that situation is causing him problems.”