Chicago Stories: West of Western (17 page)

“You know not. We thought you might have some ideas. Some witch who's murder with a knife, they said.”

She was silent while the detectives dumped sugar in their lattes and sucked up the foam, watching her over the edges of their cups.

“Hmmm. Sorry, can't think who that could be. Of course, I've only been here a few days, and the only woman I've met is Sister Ann. She's pretty abrasive, but I doubt she carries a knife.” Seraphy fought the urge to grin. ”Oh, and there's a young woman named Katya, with a baby, who lives on Cortez. But surely it wasn't her. I'll give you a call if I hear anything.”

“Thanks. Coffee's real good today,” said Terreno, getting comfortable in his chair and reaching for an Oreo.

“So . . . so what's the deal with Phil Jackson?” Seraphy asked. “I hear he's not so happy with Rodman again.”

Chapter 14

Monday. Gray and
wet. Usually she enjoyed work, but today nothing went as expected, details needed reworking, and more reworking, and still looked wrong. The day went on forever. Home after work, she found even that refuge empty and chilly as the rain-soaked day outside. Would there ever be a time when she could forget, could sleep without nightmares about Maria and AIDS and dying babies and dead bodies outside her door?

Prowling around the loft and rummaging through the refrigerator didn't provide the comfort she sought or melt the cloud of wrongness that surrounded her. No, not so much wrongness, maybe something was missing? No, not missing, what? Most of the moving boxes were gone now, emptied, folded and stacked away in the workshop downstairs, her clothes hung up in closets or folded away in drawers. She had no cabinets, but racks were up in the kitchen, dripping with shiny new pots. Mixer, toaster, food processor, espresso machine, all gleamed in stainless glory, even if her cupboards were still only stacked milk crates and her table a door on legs. Her couch, brown leather and fabulously comfortable in the store, looked somehow diminished, bereft in the unfinished loft. Everything she bought was perfect, yet here seemed somehow impersonal, mere furnishings in a showroom.

But she knew there were more boxes. The three boxes Tony had delivered, now hidden in the guest room closet, pushed against the surface of her mind. She was in the mood tonight to clear them out once and for all. Ten years was long enough to lurk in her memory. When she pulled them out of the closet, she was surprised how small and shabby they looked. Rippled and buckling at the corners, the cardboard had become brittle with age and the tape frayed. Surprising they were still together at all. She hesitated then, standing over the unhappy pile, so small to be the remnants of a life. There wasn't much there, really. She and Joe hadn't had much.

An avalanche of memory buried her with the first touch. Champaign, a red brick university town amid lush Central Illinois cornfields. Ricker, the architecture building with the winding stair and ancient elevator. Her eyes stung, her tears made brown spots on the old cardboard. She and Joe in the last year of architecture school, trolling the second-hand stores for dinnerware. In class together. Twelve-hour projects that turned into eighteen-hour projects, sleeping bags on the floor at Ricker during finals. Huddling together under blankets and coats in their uninsulated attic apartment on below-zero January nights. Making plans, so many plans. A last weekend back in Chicago, her birthday, the ring. Joe, dead on the sidewalk under the El at Southport.

She swallowed and rubbed her cheeks, angry with herself. She thought she was over her near-paralyzing grief at Joe's death. Apparently not. Walling that life off and reinventing herself as a soldier and Darkpool agent had only bought her time. Now back in Chicago, trying to pick up where she left off, make a life, a home, the wall was cracking. Shit. Ten fucking years. People had tried to help. Process your grief, they said. Own it. Hell with that. Ten years ago she stuffed everything into three cardboard boxes and sealed them with duct tape. Over and done with.

She escaped to another life half-way across the world, courtesy of the U.S. Marine Corps, a life unlike any she had known. Made friends, lived each day, survived, and found a refuge in what others thought was the hell of war. But after ten years, flight, too, betrayed her, when an IED exploded under her Humvee. Months in Walter Reed, more in rehab, and then, re-entry. Back to Chicago, a dream job and a new life.

Seraphy sighed, got up from the floor and put the scissors away. She was too tired, she couldn't do this. Not yet. Maybe tomorrow. Kicking the boxes across the floor, she rammed them back into the farthest corner of the closet. Her cell phone rang as she finished, bleating out some happy tune. Why the hell couldn't Nokia make phones that sounded like phones? She let it ring six times before she brought herself to answer.

“Hello.” She blew her nose.

“Fee? Is something wrong?” Oh, shit. Mom. She wasn't ready for this.

“No, Mom, I just ran from the other end of the loft,” she lied, and made panting noises, cleared her throat and fumbled for a cheery voice. “I was going to call you this afternoon. I bought a new couch, you'll love it.”

“I'm sure I will. Are you settled in yet? Tony said you still had a lot to do when he was there, but the loft was beautiful.” Why were their phone conversations so stilted? Seraphy heard the unsaid pain of being left out in her mother's voice and was deluged with guilt. Her throat ached, her tears trying to start again.

“Really? It looked like hell when he was here. I can't wait until you see it. I'm sorry I haven't invited you before, but I wanted to have everything right first.” Sounding good, Pelligrini. Downright perky.

“Don't be silly, I'm your mother, you don't have to clean up for me. Besides, you just got there. Fee, is something wrong? You sound a bit down.”

Shit. Her mother could always tell when she was lying.

“Is there anything I can bring you? Do you need furniture? I was thinking you might be able to use Grandmother Pelligrini's wedding chest.”

“The one that's in the guest room? Mom, are you sure?” Seraphy sat up, alert now, envisioning the chest. She had kept her train sets and cowboy boots in it when she was small, her tennis racquet, prom dress and dyed-to-match shoes later. Could she use the chest? Was the Pope Catholic?

“I'm sure, Fee. Grandmother Pelligrini kept her trousseau there, you know. It's a hope chest, meant for a first home—so it's right for you to have it now. You can keep your treasures in it, too.”

“Thanks, Mom. I always loved that chest. Every time I see it I think about Dad, the way he used to talk about bringing it from Urbino with everything he owned inside.” A vision of her bedroom, complete with Grandmother Pelligrini's hope chest, bloomed in her head, and that room was warm and bright and not at all impersonal. Maybe—.

“Umm, Mom, how do you feel about that old rug from the back bedroom? The red one?” Might as well ask. It would look great between her bed and her grandmother's chest.

“The oriental? Are you sure? It's got a hole in it, you know, and it's pretty worn. Of course you can have it if you want it. Let me send it to the cleaners first, Tony's dog's been sleeping in there.”

“Mom, could you come for lunch next Saturday? I want to make something special and that gives me time to shop and all.” The words popped out without her brain giving her advance warning. Suddenly she needed to see her mother. “I really want you to like my place.”

“Of course I'll come and I'm sure I'll love it, but you don't have to do anything special, Fee. I'll come early and we can talk. Elevenish?” She could hear the happiness in Eleanor's voice.

“Great,” she said, needing to get away from any more talk right now. “Listen, I've got to run to make an appointment. Until Saturday, then. Love you, Mom.”

Oh God. She fell onto the couch and put her head in her hands. Whatever had possessed her? Eleanor Bonham Bence Pelligrini, the senator's daughter from Kenilworth, coming here, Saturday. She'd never be ready. Seraphy looked at the loft she loved, and wondered for the first time if it was good enough. Oh God, she'd forgotten the garage door, maybe she could pick up some Rustoleum this afternoon?

She was downstairs collecting her mail a few minutes later when the bell rang. She checked the video screen. Mischa. Bareheaded in the rain, the big man filled the entry, his white mop glistening and his moustache lifted in a smile. Only the tips of his teeth showed as he grinned at the camera.

“Miss Seraphy, I come see you.”

She opened the door. “Come in out of the rain, Mischa, and let me give you a cup of coffee,” she said, leading him up the stairs, ignoring the little voice at the back of her brain warning her against letting strangers into her home. Suddenly she wanted company, and her gut told her Mischa was to be trusted. In some things, anyway.

“Is warm, good,” he said as he shed his wet coat and shoes at the top of the stairs. In the loft, he turned slowly, taking in new electrical outlets, hot-water radiators, softly gleaming floors. “Is good,” he repeated.

He glanced at the new windows and paused, frowned, and casually strolled over for a closer look. Seraphy kept an eye on him as she ground beans and ran water for a fresh pot of coffee. Mischa walked back to the table, rubbing his chin.

“Is there a problem?” she asked, trying not to laugh.

“Windows not right. Okay to look straight, but not at side. Maybe should be fix.”

“You have a good eye.” Unable to keep a straight face, she let herself chuckle. “But, they're supposed to be like that, Mischa.” She pulled out a chair and sat, motioning to him to join her. “When I was tuck-pointing here one night, somebody threw bricks through the old windows.” He nodded. “And when I replaced the windows I didn't want them broken again, so I got these. They look a little funny because they aren't glass and they won't break.”

Mischa was back at the nearest window, his eyes squinched and his nose three inches from the pane.

“I hear about bricks. Okay I touch?”

“Sure,” she said and watched as he ran his eyes over the window inch by inch. “It's called Maalon and it's used in military installations and vehicles. I think they plan to revamp the president's limo with it, too.”

He ran a hand lightly across the surface of the window, then stood close, flicking his eyes rapidly from side to side, and tried it again, this time moving his head as well.

“So. Is bullet-proof? No can break? Is good. I like.” She could almost see Mischa's thoughts flying around his head as he walked back to the table, nodding and mumbling in Ukrainian. Balancing on the edge of his chair, he leaned over the table.

“Where I can get?”

She shook her head. “Sorry, Mischa. Maalon's not on the market yet. I only got it because I used to work for the military and a friend got it for me.”

“I know about friend,” Mischa nodded. “Good to have friends.” He smiled. “I be friend, no?”

“Of course.”

“Like to buy Maalon, okay?”

Curious why Mischa would need bullet-proof glass, she smiled. “I'm honored to have you for my friend, Mischa. Okay, as soon as I hear Maalon's released for civilian sale, I'll call you. Let me get the coffee.”

“Deal. We friends. T’ank you,” he said, relaxing against the back of his chair and looking around the loft again. When she handed him a mug, he loaded his coffee with enough cream to turn it white, then dumped in three heaping spoons of sugar and stirred. Holding his moustache up to sip, he nodded. “Is good. Why I come, garage look bad. Ugly. Not good for you, not good for us,” he gestured around. “I get fix. Paint good.”

She remembered Sergeant Ettinger suggesting she have the door cleaned up and wondered briefly how Mischa knew it would be safe to repaint. Even after she chased Cholo away, the door had been smeared over. Why not again? She was certain Mischa had been the watcher in the shadows that night, curious that she found that comforting. What would he have done if she hadn't disarmed Cholo and his buddies?

“I'd want it done right.”

“I got good painter, Bronko. Clean, prime, Rust-o-le-um. Like new. Start tomorrow, finish next day. Cheap. Hundred-fifty dollars.”

“Semi-gloss black, okay?” Why not? Her mom was coming, she didn't especially want to paint it herself and a little neighborly solidarity might not be a bad thing.

“Okay. Is deal.” He nodded. “Is good. I send Bronko in morning.”

“Don't you think repainting it now might be asking to get it vandalized again?”

“No problem.” His blue eyes sparkled, his moustache flew up, and his white teeth flashed as if at some private joke. “Mischa paints, no gangbangers. I break neck.” He smiled as his big hands twisted opposite directions.

“More coffee?” Seraphy smiled back, glad the big Ukrainian was on her side, wondering where Mischa had been the night Tito died.

Hailstones
pinged against her bedroom windows, startling her awake. Seraphy tried to remember if she had shut the windows in the dining room. Funny, hail in November? By the time a second wave pinged off the windows on the other side of the building, she was fully awake. Not hail, those were bullets, automatic weapons fire. Took her long enough to recognize it, she must be getting soft now she was safe behind her fortress walls. The shooter, make that shooters, were spraying their way along the building, but she was safe inside.

“Have a good time, boys,” she whispered, enjoying the thought of the shooters’ confusion when bullets pinged off the Maalon and relishing her fortress. She threw back the covers, intending to smile and wave a royal Queen Elizabeth-type wave to the shooters and was disappointed when she reached the window to find the street below empty.

Maybe her cameras had caught the shooters. With four cameras, two over the garage door, one out front, and one mounted on the alley side at the roof level, they must have picked up something.

Something was about all they caught. Doorway cameras showed a smudge at the edge of the frame. The roof-level camera had recorded anonymous black-hooded figures in baggy clothing, but they were at too much of an angle to be identified. She caught an edge of green on a black hoodie. Not that she couldn't guess.