Holiday Grind (31 page)

Read Holiday Grind Online

Authors: Cleo Coyle

Tags: #Fiction, #Detective, #Mystery, #Mystery & Detective - Women Sleuths, #Mystery & Detective, #Fiction - Mystery, #Coffeehouses, #Suspense, #Women Sleuths, #Cosi; Clare (Fictitious character), #Mystery fiction

BOOK: Holiday Grind
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“That’s the trouble with the holidays,” Dom said with a smile. “People forget the reason—”
“—for the season, I know!”
As we walked back to the wake, I glanced again at the array of faces on Dom’s hallway walls and asked about this year’s donations. Given the economy, I expected the news wouldn’t be great, and it wasn’t.
“Donations are low this year, I’m afraid. I doubt very much we’ll meet our goal.”
“I’m sorry to hear it.”
“A sad irony—with the top rungs feeling the pinch, hands remain clenched. But the people on the bottom rung need help more than ever. Losing Alf is tough for that reason, too. His collections were among the highest in the city, right behind his roommate, Karl Kovic.”
Karl—that’s right.
“I’ve wanted to talk to Karl, Brother Dom. But I don’t know what he looks like. Can you introduce me?”
“I wish I could, but Karl didn’t come to the service today.”
I stopped walking. That sounded wrong. “He didn’t come to the memorial service of his own roommate?”
“That’s right.” Dom turned to face me.
“Why not? Do you know if they were estranged?”
Brother Dom sighed and folded his arms. “The two were longtime friends—since high school. It was Karl who introduced Alf to me and got him the job as a Traveling Santa.”
“Then why isn’t he here?”
“I’m afraid it’s my fault.”
“Your fault?”
Dom nodded. “Word came to me a few days ago that Karl has been rather, well—
naughty
.”
“Naughty?”
“It’s not a sin what he did, you understand, just not something I approved of. He was shooting YouTube celebrity sightings while on duty as a Traveling Santa.”
“Celebrity sightings?”
Dom shook his head, obviously embarrassed. “The Traveling Santa suit let him blend into the background on the Upper West Side—the area Karl’s been covering for several years now. Because he was roaming the city streets all day, he decided to keep his eyes peeled for celebrities, actors, TV stars entering boutiques and shops or eating at restaurants. He filmed them with a small camera, and then he’d approach those establishments and ask if they wanted to buy the footage. Many of them did, and then they’d release it—usually to the Internet for viral publicity.”
“Karl took kickbacks for celebrity photography?” I remembered that footage the guys at the Blend were discussing of actor Keith Judd shopping at some Upper West Side boutiques.
“It’s legal,” Dom pointed out. “He was filming in public places. And whether the store owners paid or didn’t pay was entirely up to them. It was simply a form of advertising. But I didn’t consider it a good reflection on our charity. So I decided to clip his wings. I told him I was taking him off the street and putting him to work in our offices. He didn’t like that. We argued and he quit. Karl’s not the most patient man. I’ve tried ministering to him, but he’s remained hard—a much harder case than Alf ever was.”
As we returned to the party, more people came up to speak with Brother Dom. I thanked him for his time and the book, and stepped away, considering his words.
If Karl Kovic was filming video on the Upper West Side for money, was Alf doing the same thing in the Village? The two men were old friends. They shared the same apartment. They were both Traveling Santas . . .
The economic downturn meant retail businesses needed every advantage to pack shoppers into their stores. Most would pay for that advantage. Alf probably saw that kind of thing as helping the stores anyway—it certainly helped mine.
It was all legal, too, just like Dom said, but what if Karl and Alf wanted a bigger payday? Ben Tower was a professional photographer who was able to get big payoffs for celebrity photos like the ones Madame had just shown me in Gotham Gossip of James Young and Phyllis Chatsworth.
Could Karl and Alf have gotten involved in that kind of photography, too?
That’s when it hit me. The pictures of Young and Phyllis, the timing of that day—it all added up! Suddenly, I knew why Alf was on James Young’s balcony—it wasn’t to burglarize his place! Pulling out my cell phone, I strode swiftly back to that quiet hallway and speed-dialed Madame’s cell.
She answered immediately. “Yes?”
“It’s Clare. Are you with Ben Tower, by any chance?”
“Why, yes. We’re having drinks right now at a bar on—”
“Tell Tower you’re hearing from a source
right now
who’s confirming that he’s been buying photos from Alfred Glockner and Karl Kovic.”
“Yes. Hold please.”
I heard some low voices in the background. Then Madame’s voice more clearly. “I cannot reveal my source, Ben.”
Madame came back on the line. “Yes, Ben is confirming what you’ve discovered.”
Oh, my God.
“Put me on with him.”
“Are you sure, dear? I thought you were trying to remain anonymous?”
“It doesn’t matter now.”
“Hello? Who is this?” Ben’s voice was familiar—a little tentative and also a little slurry. Madame wasn’t stupid. Treating a man like Ben to a liquid lunch would loosen his tongue in record time!
“This is Clare Cosi, Mr. Tower.”
“Oh, God,” he muttered. “The coffee-slinging
snoop
.”
“Charmed, I’m sure.”
Our exchange wasn’t pleasant or long, but it did yield what I’d suspected. Alf Glockner had been sending digital images to Ben Tower the day he was killed.
“Alf sent me photos of James Young and Phyllis Chatsworth in the afternoon. He lost the pair for many hours, then caught up with them again going into a bistro across from the White Horse Tavern. That’s the last photo I got from Alfred.”
And that explained why Alf had been sitting in that tavern and abruptly rose and ran. He hadn’t been following James Young to rob him. He’d been following James Young and Phyllis Chatsworth back to Young’s apartment building to get more photos of them.
I remembered the night I found Alf’s body. His boot prints in the snow had led into the courtyard, where he appeared to pause and loiter.
He probably stood out there in the dark, watching for a light to go on among the building’s windows. Then he climbed the fire escape hoping to get some pictures of the couple together in Young’s living room.
It all made sense now—Omar Linford had told me Alf was paying him back a little at a time: one thousand here, a few hundred there. Alf was also doing the twelve-step program; and one of those steps was to make
amends
. He was obviously trying to pay back his neighbor, pay off a loan that Omar had made him in good faith.
Although I couldn’t condone what Alf had done, I could understand why he’d done it. Making money on those photos wouldn’t just help him make amends to Omar. As long as he was continuing to pay back the man, Alf could feel that he was protecting his wife and daughter from being pressured in any way to sell their house and repay that loan.
The only question now was, who shot Alf? Did James Young do the deed after all? Phyllis Chatsworth? How the heck was I going to prove
that
? And
who
the heck threw me off that ferry? Linford’s amazon of a secretary still seemed the most likely suspect for that.
“There you are!”
As I reentered Brother Dom’s crowded basement, I looked up to find Vicki coming toward me with Esther Best in tow.
“Hey, boss!” Esther greeted me with surprising energy. “I’ve had exams all morning—and, man, am I glad my finals are finally over!”
“Is that why you missed the service upstairs?”
“Yes, but I made it for the wake—” She put an arm around Vicki’s shoulder and gave her a squeeze. “Anyway, I should have called you last night, but I was cramming.”
“Called me about what?” I asked. Esther still didn’t know about the ferry incident, but this wasn’t the time and place for that particular update.
“I have something weird to show you.”
“Show her! Show her!” Vicki pointed to Esther’s cell phone.
I studied the images on the little screen. “What is this?”
“It’s some guy coming out of the side door of Vicki’s mother’s house. When you went in the front door yesterday, I was still warming up your old car, but I noticed this guy coming out. See . . .”
Esther reached over and toggled the photos forward. Frame by frame they showed a man who looked a lot like Alf. He was about Alf’s height and weight with longish gray brown hair and a mustache. He wore a long, white terrycloth robe and slippers, and the digital photos showed him moving out the side door of Shelly Glockner’s ranch, then toward the back of the house—where there was a glass-enclosed hot tub and sauna.
“Who is this guy?” I whispered.
“Karl!” Vicki blurted out so loudly that a number of heads turned our way. “That’s my father’s roommate, Karl Kovic!”
Alarms were going off in my head. “Your mother is involved with Karl?”
“If she is, it’s news to me,” Vicki said looking fairly freaked. “And I can tell you I’m not happy about it. That guy is so
mean
. I can’t stand him!”
I stepped closer. “Mean how? Could he have hurt your dad?”
“Oh, no. I don’t think so. They were good friends. Karl never said much to me when I visited my dad at their place. He mainly kept to himself. It’s the kitten. That’s why he’s mean.”
“What kitten?” Esther asked.
“My dad found a little white kitten a few weeks ago, in an alley—”
“Oh, the kitten!” Alf had told me about the little thing. He’d been forced to sneak it into Karl’s apartment because the building didn’t allow pets.
“I asked Karl to keep the kitten for a short while,” Vicki explained. “My mom won’t let me have a pet at home, but I’m planning on moving into the city in a month or so. Then I’d be able to take care of it. Karl’s refusing to keep it for me until then! He says he’s just going to dump it in the city shelter.”
I scowled. “That
is
mean.”
Vicki’s hazel green eyes, still red from crying upstairs, began welling once more. “Can you help me again, Clare?”
I nodded. “Of course, I’ll stop by this evening and pay a visit to Karl. I have a cat already—I can certainly take care of another for as long as you like. And anyway, it seems to me Karl Kovic and I have quite a few things to talk about.”
TWENTY-FOUR
“THERE he is. Thanks!”
The second I saw Matt, I paid the cabbie and climbed out of the idling taxi. It was past six o’clock, already dark, and for a few minutes I was actually worried I’d phoned my ex-husband with the wrong location.
Vicki supplied the address, but it wasn’t an address that made sense to me. I mean, in the past Alf had mentioned he lived uptown, but I assumed it was
way
up, some tiny apartment on the fringes of Harlem where rents were in the realm of being reasonable.
This part of the Upper West Side, just north of midtown and west of Central Park, was dominated by stately historic buildings sandwiched between gleaming new co-op towers and high-rise offices. The whole neighborhood seemed way too pricey for a lowly Traveling Santa to afford.
All around me, young professionals were hurrying home from office jobs. Backslapping businessmen were ducking into bars, socialites were strutting their stuff in designer ensembles, and couples in evening wear were discreetly debating places to have a light bite before attending Handel’s
Messiah
at nearby Lincoln Center.
In my worn jeans, scruffy sneakers, and old parka, I suddenly felt underdressed. My ex-husband, by contrast, fit right in. Six feet tall with broad shoulders, Matteo Allegro cut a dashing figure in his black-tie formalwear and tailored topcoat. More than one strutting socialite turned her salon-perfected head as she passed him on the sidewalk. I flagged him down with a waving arm, my bag (a new one after the ferry incident) slipping off my shoulder.
“Where were you when I called?” I asked, setting Java’s cat carrier down on the sidewalk to haul my shoulder bag back up my arm. “On your cell it sounded like a party?”

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