The 8th Circle (2 page)

W
hen Beowulf started to bark, Danny wiped the condensation from the bathroom window. A black Crown Vic sat in the driveway, and a Crime Scene Unit waded through the pond. Headlines ran through his mind:
Death in the Duck Pond
?
Something Fishy in the Pond
?
Death Among the Duckies
?

Out of habit, Danny jerked open the door to the medicine cabinet. A whole army of bottles awaited his command—his multicolored friends, a regular rainbow coalition. He slammed the door shut. He’d taken himself off the antidepressants and tranquilizers months ago. All the medication had turned him into a zombie. Now he faced mornings clear eyed and jittery with a sense of life bleeding back into his veins. He wasn’t sure he liked it.

Danny pulled on a pair of jeans and a black sweater and glanced at himself in the mirrors that surrounded him on all sides of the cavernous dressing room.

Very
GQ
today, Mr. Ryan. Ready for your close-up?

A year ago, his column had run on the front page of the Metro section, three times a week, including Sunday, and Andy had been talking syndication. After all, he had been a valuable asset in an industry dying from the competition generated by
the twenty-four-hour news channels, bloggers, and online self-promoters. He still sold papers. His columns and blogs had helped staunch the hemorrhaging somewhat. Now it was a good day if he got dressed and remembered to eat. The great Danny Ryan. What was it the old man used to say about him?

You can package shite and call it butter, but it’s still shite
. The old man had a way with words. Maybe he should have been the writer.

Danny walked down the narrow back stairs, part of the original house built in the mid-1700s. The steps were steep and treacherous. Beth and he had debated ripping them out, but the handmade beauty of the polished oak had won out. They had settled for childproof gates Conor had quickly learned to open.

Once, Conor had wrapped the fuzzy, blue rug from his bedroom around himself, sat on his plastic, green sled, and launched himself down the back stairs. Danny had run to him, horrified.

“Look what I did, Dad,” Conor had said. “Indoor sledding! Cool, huh?”

Danny had to bite his cheek to control the urge to yell,
Are you fucking insane?
Instead, he had knelt beside Conor and said, “Not cool, dude. You could have cracked your skull. Don’t do it again.” They had spit and shook hands.

He went into the kitchen. His great family home, minus the family.

Beowulf was still barking, but the cops hadn’t approached the door. Danny opened the refrigerator. “Quiet, Wolf. Walk in a minute.”

He tossed Beowulf two hot dogs. Beowulf gave one last growl, grabbed the hot dogs, and settled under the table as Danny pulled out an urn and made coffee. He opened the freezer and extracted eight enormous coffee cakes. Beth and Conor had been gone almost a year, and women still brought him food. He would stuff most of it in the freezer until there wasn’t any more room and then clear everything and take it to the local homeless shelter.

But Danny knew cops loved free food and hot coffee. Why not feed them? The poor bastards were in for a miserable enough morning.

Melting frost on the sunlit windows sparkled in a dancing prism across the cherry cabinets just like any winter morning. Danny could almost believe last night was a dream.

Inferno
. Michael had said that, but what the hell did it mean? Could Michael have been working on something? Danny couldn’t imagine what that something could be. A play about firefighters? A hot new group? A club? It would be a first if Andy had assigned him anything serious. Andy had always treated Michael like the village idiot, even if he was his son.

He picked up his cell phone, charging on the counter. He had a missed call: Alex Burton, the paper’s chief political reporter. He deleted it. Over the past two weeks, she had left messages ranging from “Yo, Ryan, could you give me a call?” to “Daniel, I really need to talk to you.”

He told himself he’d call her back soon.

“Come on, Wolf.” Danny pulled on a jacket, and the big dog jumped up, eager as a puppy. He attached Beowulf’s leash, and they headed out to the duck pond. The two local cops from last night stood watching. Not unusual. After they’d determined Michael had been shot, the county detectives had taken over. The local cops didn’t have the resources to handle a homicide investigation. Of course Michael had died here, but who knew where he’d been shot? In town, probably. That wouldn’t be a surprise. Michael bought his coke in quantity, which meant he carried serious cash. Anyone could have ripped him off. It wouldn’t have been a first.

When Danny drew closer, the cops turned, and he could feel them assessing him from behind their dark glasses. Wolf pulled at the leash, and Danny gave him a little extra lead. They reached the cops, and Wolf lifted his leg to pee.

“Morning,” Danny said in his most ingratiating voice. Why not pretend like it was no big deal to have a CSU wading through the duck pond first thing in the morning? The press would show up soon enough, but he could handle them.

“Sorry to bother you again this morning,” McSomething, the younger cop, said.

“Not at all.”

“Your dog people friendly?”

Danny shrugged. “Depends on the people.” He patted Beowulf’s back. “It’s okay, boy. Shake hands.”

McSomething grinned and bent to shake the dog’s paw. As soon as he did, Beowulf stood up on his hind legs and licked the young cop’s face.

“Whoa. Down, boy,” Danny said. “Sorry, he usually doesn’t do that. He must like you.”

It was one of Beowulf’s best tricks. Danny supposed it was another reason Beth had banished Wolf whenever they had guests.

McSomething was good humored, though. He brushed at the shoulders of his coat and said, “We just had a few more questions.”

“Sure.” Danny glanced at the stone-faced older cop. No paw shaking for him. “You want coffee? I just put on some. Maybe the crew?”

McSomething shook his head. “We’re fine, and they brought their own.”

Danny widened his smile. “Oh, it’s probably crap.” He put his hands around his mouth and yelled, “Hey, guys, if you want hot coffee or food, just go on inside and help yourselves.”

He could see the grateful smiles on the faces of the crew searching the pond. He turned back to the detectives.
See, I’ve got nothing to hide. I’m just a regular kind of guy
. The younger cop looked bemused, but Danny recognized the contempt in the older cop’s eyes. This one was a hard-ass. He probably would have loved the old man.

McSomething said, “Mr. Ryan, when was the last time you saw Michael Cohen?”

“You mean before the accident?”

“Yes.”

“Six months ago, give or take.”

“Six months?”

“I’ve been taking time away from the paper. Why do you ask, Detective uh . . .”

“McFarland. Sean McFarland. And Detective John Novell.”

Danny nodded to Novell. He was letting the younger guy lead, but he was in charge. Danny could sense it by the way McFarland kept looking at him for approval.

“I’d appreciate if you’d tell me what this is about, Detective.”

“Do you own a gun, Mr. Ryan?” McFarland asked.

These cops didn’t still think he shot Michael, did they? He glanced at Novell. His face was neutral, but Danny read curiosity, not suspicion—not yet—in his eyes. They were fishing here. “I have a Tokarev. It was my grandfather’s, a souvenir from World War II.”

“Anything more current?”

Danny shook his head. He had a Glock that he kept down at the firing range, but that wasn’t their business. In any case, Danny doubted Michael’s killer had used a Glock. He figured it must have been a small-caliber gun. Probably a .22. If it had been anything larger, the bullet would have ripped a bigger hole in Michael, and he’d have bled out much faster.

“We’d like to see it,” McFarland said.

Danny stared at him for a moment. “Oh, the gun. It’s in the house.” Right where he’d left it on the hearth. That wouldn’t look suspicious. “What does Michael’s accident have to do with me owning a gun?”

Novell shifted, and Danny knew what was coming now. The big dog was about to take over. Cops were nothing if not predictable. Danny folded his arms and fought back the urge to use the old Clint Eastwood line:
Go ahead, make my day
.

Novell ran his tongue over his teeth and stepped close enough that Danny could smell his morning coffee and breath mints. He figured Novell carried a hip flask.

“Mr. Ryan,” Novell said. “As far as we can determine, Michael Cohen had been missing for twenty-four hours until he showed up at your house last night. What were you doing yesterday?”

D
etective John Novell prided himself on being a quick study. He called it his shark sense. He’d read once that sharks have a kind of sixth sense that helped them track prey. At least that was how he remembered it. In his two tours in ’Nam and twenty-five years in the FBI, it’d saved his ass more than a few times. Now it told him Danny Ryan was hiding something.

Still, he was just a witness. There was no evidence tying him to Michael Cohen’s crash: The skid marks. Lack of blood splatter. Plus, the captain had warned him to go easy. Not only was Ryan just a witness, but he was also a rich, well-known VIP in these parts. Their department didn’t need bad press.

Tommy Ryan’s son was a liberal jerk-off with a penchant for taking swipes at tight-ass politicians and anyone else who pissed him off. He looked the part with his beard and expensive clothes. Ryan’s leather jacket was probably worth a week’s take-home.

Ryan seemed easygoing, but Novell sensed the tension vibrating just below the surface of his calm exterior. He had a way of talking with his head slightly tilted and his mouth curved in a half smile that projected ease. But his eyes were hard. His hands, shoved into the front pockets of his jeans, balled into fists. Still, Ryan was a cop’s kid. He knew how to play along.

He wasn’t much like his old man. Tommy Ryan had been a huge guy with a loud mouth and an attitude, but his kid was slim, dark, and soft voiced. The eyes were the same though: cold, deep blue. A good-looking guy. Slick. Very slick. The kind women liked.

Ryan had lost his family last year, but he also had the bucks to soften the blow. Some woman would step in and make it all better for him. That’s how it went for guys like Ryan. They fell into the shit pile and came out with gold dollars.

Novell followed Ryan through the huge kitchen. No expense spared here. From the jade granite countertops to the stainless steel appliances, this palace was a showcase. The only room that seemed out of place was Ryan’s office.

Tucked into a corner of the house, the room had a lived-in feeling, the brown leather furniture comfortable, not fancy. Novell noticed the journalism awards crowded together on the bookcases and the one that hung over the massive stone fireplace. Probably the only one that counted: the Pulitzer.

A huge mahogany campaign desk stacked with folders stood in front of the fireplace. On it, a photograph of a small boy in a soccer uniform sat to the left of a laptop. Except for his dark eyes, he was a tiny replica of his father, without the wariness. It was probably a safe bet that Conor Ryan had never been abused.

When he picked up the photograph, Novell heard Ryan suck in his breath, and he didn’t have to wonder how Ryan handled his son’s death.

Was Ryan haunted by his wife? Interesting that there were no pictures of her in the room. Still, if Ryan wasn’t devastated by her death, he’d benefited from it. Beth Ryan had been born with that proverbial silver spoon, and Danny Ryan had gotten a big chunk of change when she died. Twenty-five million could buy a man a lot of comfort.

The Tokarev lay on the hearth. Ryan scooped it up and handed it to Novell, his face expressionless. More than seventy years old but in fair condition, it was a souvenir from another war. The bullet that killed Michael Cohen had come from a .22. Still, a
tingle ran from Novell’s fingers up his arms when he turned the gun over in his hand.

“Dangerous to leave a loaded gun lying around,” Novell said.

“I was going to clean it.”

Novell emptied the chamber. He grunted. “Why? Looks like your firing pin’s half-rotted. Did you know that?”

“I do now.” Ryan shifted slightly, and Novell saw a flicker in Ryan’s eyes. He couldn’t quite define it, but it bothered him.

Novell handed back the gun. “Yeah, you do.”

When Novell was much younger, he’d chanced upon a book of martyrs in a used bookstore. He’d been struck by the figure on the front—a saint, pierced with arrows, who lay staring toward the heavens. Novell didn’t know why he thought of that book now, nor was he sure Ryan made a convincing martyr. But the face was similar. Maybe it had something to do with those eyes.

“And you don’t have any other guns in the house?” Novell said.

“No.”

Novell cleared his throat. He hated Ryan’s quiet voice. He hated the way Ryan looked at him, his head slightly tilted, those eyes probing. Novell despised reporters almost as much as he hated politicians.

When his career with the bureau had collapsed in ruins, Novell believed a merciful God would have taken him, but he was the man with shark sense and not much else. After he’d left the bureau, he thought he’d escaped into obscurity. He wasn’t good for much, so he came to Chester County. Just a nice suburban police job to finish out his godforsaken career because a friend owed him a favor. No big deal. But he should have known that was too good to last.

Christ, he needed a drink.

*

Novell sat at his desk and paged through the preliminary lab results on Michael Cohen. They’d gotten them faster than usual because the autopsy had been done almost immediately. Respect
for the family, the captain said. Andy and Linda Cohen wanted their son buried according to Jewish law. No need for bad press, Novell thought.

Gut wounds were ugly things, and despite its small caliber, a .22 could be lethal. The bullet would enter the body and careen around inside doing the maximum amount of damage, but unless it perforated something like your liver and you bled out, you could survive for quite a while.

Novell set down his file. The ME couldn’t be exact, but he estimated that Michael Cohen had driven around for approximately two to three hours with a hole in his gut. If he’d driven himself to the hospital after he was shot, he might have survived. So why hadn’t he?

Why did he have to talk to Danny Ryan? Hell, he had a cell phone on him. If Michael Cohen drove all the way to Valley Forge, he must have wanted to give Ryan something.

Sean McFarland came into the room, his face perplexed. “Car’s clean, except for some traces of cocaine. No coke in the vic’s system though.”

“So he just decided to drive out there for a chat?”

“Nobody just drives out for a chat when they know they’re bleeding out.”

Novell shook his head. “He didn’t give Ryan anything.”

“Information, maybe?”

“Maybe. Though he’d have had to speak fast.” Novell pinched the bridge of his nose. “In any case, this isn’t about Danny Ryan.”

“You sure about that?” Sean stared down at the photographs from the scene. “In less than a year, this guy loses his wife and kid in an automobile accident, then his friend crashes into his goddamn duck pond with a bullet in his gut. I’d call that a pretty weird coincidence.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“I checked Ryan’s cars. Both engines were stone-cold. He hadn’t been out.”

Novell dropped the report. “Well, for now, we start looking at whatever Michael Cohen was working on.”

“The father said he was writing restaurant reviews.”

“Maybe he pissed off a chef,” Novell said. Ryan wasn’t lying when he said Michael Cohen wasn’t an investigative reporter. “Well, we start there. Maybe he saw something.”

“I’m still going to pull the accident report from Ryan’s wife and kid from the staties.”

Novell shook his head. “Stubborn.”

“Yeah.” Sean grinned. “My dad always says I’m a real bullhead. He’s still waiting for me to give up this cop shit and get a law degree so I can join my brother and him and become respectable.”

“So why don’t you?”

Sean looked away. “I guess I wanted to do some good. Help people. I know it sounds dumb. I just couldn’t see myself in law school. This felt right.”

An idealist. Just what he needed. Novell forced a smile.