Open Season (22 page)

Brandt nodded. “Absolutely. Thanks for coming by.”

I waited until he closed the door behind him. “Stan tells me I’ve been made acting captain.”

Brandt shook his head. “God, I’m starting to think we ought to hire him as a messenger boy. Yes, you have been.” He paused, feeling for a reaction. “Is that all right?”

I got up. “Yeah.”

He let it be. “So, what’s your first tack?”

“To get reorganized. I want to check on what came in last week. Let me see what’s what and I’ll get back to you. From the way it looks now, though, we’re going to end up putting a lot of people on this. If anything else breaks loose, we won’t have a choice about bringing the state police in.”

Among the pile Max had given me was a letter from Beverly Hillstrom confirming the survival of the samples, the official accident report from the Mass State Police, and a message that Floyd Rubin had called.

He was tending to a customer when I walked in, so I loitered by the magazine rack and waited. He saw me and came straight over, leaving the woman at the counter, money still in her hand.

“Lieutenant Gunther, I heard about the accident. I’m so terribly sorry about the other man.”

“Thanks. Why don’t you finish up with her so we can talk.”

“Certainly.”

He returned to the counter and nervously set to work. His demeanor was totally unlike when we’d first met—I’d expected a far more hostile reception. Now, he seemed more scared than anything else.

He showed the woman to the door and locked it behind her, pulling down a shade marked “Closed.” I started to tell him not to bother but then kept quiet. Maybe it was best we were left alone.

“Did you find those time sheets you mentioned?”

He nodded quickly. “Oh yes. Very soon after we talked. You said you’d be going out of town for a few days, so I held on to them, and then I heard about your accident. I became very frightened.”

“Why?”

He rubbed his forehead. “I don’t really know. When we talked, I was left with an ominous feeling, and then the newspaper started reporting on all those incidents, trying to tie them all together to a masked man. And then you almost died, and the other man did. I couldn’t help but feel that your looking into Kimberly’s death was somehow connected to it all. I began to feel very nervous, as if I was in the middle of something, but I didn’t know what.”

“You are.”

He leaned against the counter. “Oh, my Lord.”

“You didn’t tell me everything that went on between you and Kimberly, did you?”

His eyes closed tightly and he shook his head. “Yes, I did. I may have down played my affection for her, but that’s all.”

“You did love her?”

“Yes, I suppose. I know that’s stupid—it’s like a boy falling in love with his teacher. It’s not real—it wasn’t real. I know she felt no similar feelings for me. In fact, she laughed when I told her. Not cruelly, mind you—I mean, I had to laugh with her. She just saw how silly it was, which I couldn’t see until she showed me. That’s why she left and why I didn’t keep in touch. I was too humiliated to tell you all that. You can see why, surely.”

“Don’t worry about it.” I patted him on the shoulder. He looked so utterly humiliated I didn’t have the heart to ask him flat out if they’d actually made love. Odds are they had, which explained his embarrassment cutting so deep. “I am going to ask you for a favor, though, and chances are it’s going to make you twice as uneasy.”

“What is it?”

“A blood test. There is absolutely no suspicion of your being involved in this case in any way whatsoever, understand? But I’m asking everyone who had any kind of involvement with Kimberly for the same thing, just so the totally innocent people don’t clutter up the picture.” I was overstating the case, of course. For all I knew, this man was a closet psychopath. I doubted it though.

Still, he looked shocked. “You can refuse, of course. This is a request only,” I added quickly.

His voice was subdued. “No, I quite understand. Of course I’ll do it. It’s as if this whole nightmare was happening all over again, isn’t it? I’m beginning to feel her loss again, long after I thought I’d put it behind me. I feel like such an idiot.” He shoved his glasses up on his forehead and rubbed his eyes with his fingertips.

“Why don’t you give me those time sheets and I’ll get out of your hair.”

“Of course, of course.” He shuffled off to the back of the store and returned with a shoe box. “Here they are. I put tabs on all the three-day weekends I gave her.”

“Thank you. That was very thoughtful. I’ll send a man around later to drive you to the hospital for the blood test. What time do you close?”

“Seven. But I can close earlier.”

“Seven’s fine, and don’t worry—really.”

I was almost out the door before he called me back, “I forgot to tell you: I remembered a friend she had when she was here. You had asked me earlier.”

“Yes. Who was it?”

“Her name was Susan Lucey. I hired her just for the Christmas season that year. She didn’t really work out and I never saw her again, but I remember that she and Kimberly used to leave together after closing quite often, as if they were going to do something together in the evening—a movie or something. She’s the only one I could remember. I put her address in the box too.”

SUSAN LUCY’S ADDRESS
on Prospect Street was located on a plateau driven into the Y formed by Canal and Vernon Streets—right where John Woll had been mugged—and held tightly in position by St. Michael’s Cemetery, which cut, higher still, across its back. Previously the eighteenth-century neighborhood of a thriving middle class, it had been left behind at some point, high on its exclusive perch, to watch the rest of the city grow prosperous without it. Its homes—the multi-storied gingerbreads and Greek revivals so prevalent in New England—were now weather-beaten and worn, cut up into ramshackle apartments overlooking debris-strewn streets and scruffy yards. It was not a dangerous area, really—although it had its moments—but it was about as forlorn as Brattleboro could offer.

Number 43B was on the second floor of a building half faded red, half bare and graying wood, with a set of stairs attached to its side by pragmatic afterthought. There was no particular reason why Susan Lucey should be home in the middle of the day, but after checking the phone book and finding the address was still hers, the omen was too good to pass up.

I cautiously climbed the unshoveled, icy steps, the banister wobbling under my right hand. The wind whipped at my pant legs and froze my ears. I knocked on the door.

I waited a minute in total silence and knocked again, just for the hell of it. I heard a bang from somewhere inside. Footsteps crossed the floor and the door opened a crack, revealing a young woman’s round, unhealthy-looking face framed by heavy, dull brown hair.

“What do you want?” The voice was flat and hostile.

“Miss Lucey?”

“Who are you?”

“My name’s Gunther. I’m with the police.”

“You got a warrant?”

“Do I need one?”

“Fuck you, Mac.”

“No, wait.” I put my hand against the closing door. “I wouldn’t want a warrant. I just want to talk to you about Kimberly Harris.”

“She’s dead.”

“Let me make you a deal. Whatever you’ve got in there, whether it’s dope or gambling or who knows what, I’m not interested, okay? I just want to talk.”

“This is ancient history.”

“I don’t think so—not any more.”

She didn’t answer, but she didn’t close the door, either.

“Did you read about the killing in the newspaper?”

“Yeah. What’s Kimberly got to do with that?”

“Maybe you can help me find out.”

She sucked on her lower lip and thought a moment. The back of my neck was starting to freeze. “No bust for anything you find in here—right?”

“Not unless it’s a dead body.”

She snorted. “It might as well be. Come on in.” She opened the door and I stepped into a dark cave of hot, rancid, pungent air. She walked across the room and kicked the far door open, a solid naked leg protruding from her stained bathrobe. “Party’s over. It’s the cops.”

There was a muttered oath from beyond and the sound of clothes being put on in a hurry. The outline of a man appeared in the doorway. He quickly turned his face away. “What is this?”

“I just want to talk with the lady.”

Lucey grabbed him by the arm. “That’s twenty bucks.”

He glanced over his shoulder at me; I could hear his brain working. “Pay the lady, or I might ask for some ID.” He reached into his pocket. “Christ, it was hardly worth it.”

“Mutual, I’m sure.” She plucked the twenty from his fingers and shoved it into her pocket.

He walked sideways through the room, keeping his face away from me, tripping over a pile of dirty clothes on the floor as he went. I grabbed his elbow and steadied him. He jerked away and stormed out with a bang.

“All these guys. Pretend they’re hotshots. Who cares what they look like?” She settled into a disemboweled armchair, tucking her legs under her. As an afterthought, having made sure I’d had a view, she tucked her robe around her more tightly. “Thanks for the support.”

I moved a smeared paper plate from a wooden chair and sat.

“Don’t mention it.” My eyes had become accustomed to the dark and I glanced around. The place looked like a cyclone had hit it; from the smell, it had been a long time ago.

“So, how do you connect me to Kimberly?”

“Charlie’s Pharmacy.”

“Oh, that old fruit.”

“How well did you know Kimberly?”

She smiled her best Scarlett O’Hara, complete with tilted head. “Why do you ask?”

I sighed. “How much time did that twenty buy?”

“Usually, as long as it takes. That guy was into overtime. But this might be dangerous—isn’t that what you said?”

“Not if we move quickly. If we can’t, everyone I come in contact with might be hurt.”

She let her head fall back and stretched her neck. “Compromise time, huh? Okay, twenty’ll be fine.” She wiggled her fingers. I pulled out my wallet, got up, and laid the bills in her hand. At this rate, she was making a lot more than I did.

“I knew her well enough. We did stuff together.”

“What kind of stuff?”

“Dinner, movies… We did a few doubles.”

“What do you mean?”

She laughed. “Not double features. Boy, you haven’t been around much. Two on one—you know. Guys pay a lot for that; makes them feel masculine. The joke is, we do it mostly for us. Closet lesbians, I guess.” She laughed again. “I hadn’t thought of that before.”

She reached into her pocket and pulled out a cellophane bag. She pushed some of its contents into a small pipe and lit up. “Want some?”

“No. Thanks. Was she experienced at that kind of thing?”

“Tricking? No, but she was good at it. That’s one of the reasons we broke up; she got too good. I mean, she really got into it. With me, it gets to be a job after a while, if I’m at it for too long. But with her, the more she did, the more she wanted, and she’d give it away too—to total strangers. I don’t suppose partnerships last too long in this business anyway. Ours was no different.”

“How long did you work together?”

“Not too long. A couple of months, maybe.”

“Starting around Christmas?”

“Yeah. How did you know that?”

“Charlie again.”

“Oh.” She took a deep drag and held her breath.

“What was Kimberly like?”

She paused before letting the smoke out in a long hiss. “She was a hot little number. Touch her anywhere and she turned on. I got the feeling sex for her was like water for a man in the desert. And kinky, too. She didn’t care. I mean, there are things I won’t do, you know? But not her. She’d try anything.”

“Did she talk about her past? Where she came from, things like that?”

“Nope. Not a word. I asked her a couple of times. You know, like I once said she must have spent her life in a convent to come on the way she did, but she never picked up on it and I let it be. You learn not to ask too much.”

“I bet. Still, there are usually slips of the tongue, references to the past. Everybody talks about themselves at least a little.”

Lucey took another hit, and I waited for the process to be over.

“Not Kimberly. She said she had nothing to look back on—everything good lay ahead.”

“Unhappy childhood?”

“Hey, I told you: I don’t know.”

“So what prompted the comment about not looking back?”

“Oh, that was weird. We’d taken on this real strange one—an older guy. He was real skinny, didn’t talk much, never smiled. We did a number on him, a pretty good one, too, because we were both feeling good, but he just lay there. I mean, he wasn’t limp—he worked okay—but he didn’t get involved. None of the usual routine, you know? No sweat and wrestle. I said to Kimberly afterwards that he could have gotten as big a kick from his hand, instead of paying for us. I think I called him a cold fish, and that’s when she said something like, ‘Just like my old man.’ And then a little later she said what I told you.”

“Aside from her prowess in bed, what was she like? I mean her personality. Did she laugh a lot? Was she serious? Did she seem well educated?”

Lucey drew on the pipe again and then stretched, bending as far backwards as she could. Her robe parted slightly, revealing a thin line of naked skin from her throat to her lap. She didn’t bother covering up. “She was a little schizo, if you ask me. She could be a lot of fun—a real turn-on—and then she could be real cold and calculating. She could work people, especially old men, or older men, at least. That’s what we did most of, in fact, when we doubled. She wasn’t interested in younger guys much, unless they were super young, like teenagers. It was like she had to have some power over them, you know? Men our age didn’t interest her much. I thought that was too bad. I like an occasional roll in the hay with someone who knows what he’s doing and won’t have a heart attack doing it. But Kimberly had some kind of thing going. I’d watch her sometimes when we were right in the middle of the action, and sometimes—not always—she’d be looking at the guy’s face with, I don’t know, a real calculating expression. And when he finally shot his wad, she always looked pleased with herself. And superior, too, as if somehow she’d put one over on the guy. Maybe that’s why we broke up. I never thought about it before.”