Speak of the Devil (22 page)

“How’d you get the name?”

“Diaz’s ex-wife. She told me she’d spoken with the police. How come you didn’t get the name?”

“The officers who questioned Mrs. Montero weren’t looking for an accomplice.”

“Right. Of course. That’s still our little secret.”

Carroll gave me a hard look. “I don’t need your wisecracking. Not today. We’ve got a deputy mayor out there, either dead already or getting whittled down as we speak. And this asshole could pounce again any minute. The mayor wants this over.”

“Then maybe the mayor should unleash the full power of the best police force in the world,” I said. “How about we look for a soft-spoken six-foot Hispanic ex-con named Angel Something? Pale green eyes. Possible pencil-thin mustache. Drug chewer. Violent. Maybe drives a silver hatchback with music booming out of the rear. Muscles on muscles. Ice-cold blood. Aviator sunglasses. Jesus Christ, Tommy, I’m painting you a picture.”

“We’ll look for him,” Carroll said brusquely. “Meantime, you keep looking. Get a last name.”

I asked, “No more word on Byron?”

Carroll muttered, “Fucking Byron.” He shook his head. “No. Nothing. Two fingers tied up like a crucifix. Real cute.”

“I’m sure Byron didn’t think so. What’s the word you’re putting out? There’s been nothing on the news.”

“Illness in the family. Out in the heartland somewhere, a thousand miles from here. It’ll buy us some time.”

“It wasn’t Wisconsin, was it?”

Carroll ignored the crack. “The mayor wants this guy.”

“I heard that.”

“I’m going to give you Cox,” Carroll said.

I was about to take a sip of my coffee, but I stopped. “What do you mean, ‘give’ me?”

“To help find this Angel character. I’ve had Cox put on special duty.”

“I don’t want him,” I said. “Why don’t you give your hero cop a trip to Disney World? A cop who doesn’t pat down a violent suspect, then ends up shooting him in the face in cold blood? I’ll pass.”

“It wasn’t cold blood.”

“Whatever. I wasn’t there.”

“You need help on this.”

I took the sip. “Give me Noon.”

“Noon? What do you mean, noon?”

“Patrick Noon. The guy who stuck me in a bag for you. If you want to loosen up a cop for me, give me Patrick Noon. Or is he still tied up guarding Rebecca Gilpin’s hospital room? Is that how our tax dollars are spent?”

“We’re trying to keep this thing contained.”

“Meaning what? Cox knows too much and Patrick Noon doesn’t?”

Carroll worked a knuckle until it cracked. “Let me talk to Remy Sanchez.”

“Sanchez would love it if you’d talk to him. He’s not happy about being kept in the dark. You’re containing this thing right up the rear, Tommy. How about the mayor just comes clean and explains to the city that we’ve got a problem and we’re working on it? It’s amazing how the truth can simplify matters. He should be unbottling this thing.”

“We’re getting fingers in a fucking box,” Carroll said. “Marty Leavitt doesn’t think that’s going to make him look real good right now.”

“Well, Mr. Marty has to start backing away from the political mirror.”

“This isn’t going to make anyone look good,” Carroll said. “It’s getting out of hand. I want it shut down
now
.”

I opened my mouth to respond, but Carroll’s intercom buzzed. The commissioner practically destroyed the machine crashing his hand down on it. “What!”

It was Stacy. “Mayor Leavitt’s on line one, sir.”

Go figure.

Carroll snarled into the intercom, “Tell him to sit on it for a minute. I’ll be with him.”

“Sir?”

“Tell him to hold on.”

The intercom clicked off. Carroll looked across the desk at me. “It’s Monday. Byron got grabbed on Saturday. It’s not going to surprise me if we hear from Nightmare again today, one way or another. Go find him. You’re a pain in the ass, but you’re a good bloodhound. Just go find this Angel character. Sniff him out and give him to me. And forget the Patrick Noon business. You might be Harlan’s kid, but you don’t run my police force. I’m putting Cox on this. He’s a good cop. Plus he’s motivated.”

“McNally?”

“Exactly.”

“That kind of motivation isn’t always so good,” I said. “I mean it, Tommy. Don’t saddle me with a man I don’t trust. I’m not working with Cox. I’ll go kick down some doors and let you know what I find behind them. What you do with it is your business. Consider this a gift from me to the city I love. But I can take the gift back anytime and go home. It wouldn’t be the first time I walked away from a client.”

“Your old man was a fucking mule, too.”

I stood up. “Now, Tommy, don’t start with the compliments.”

I SLIPPED INTO THE COURTROOM AND TOOK A SEAT IN THE REAR PEW. There were twenty long pews in all, room for at least a hundred onlookers. Besides me, three people were present.

A woman had misstepped coming out the door of a sporting-goods store, where she had just purchased enough gear to tackle Everest on her own. Juggling all the bags had allegedly contributed to the misstep. She hadn’t seen the yellow tape on the edge of the step, nor the sign that read, BEWARE OF STEP, and she’d twisted her ankle. From what I could piece together, she felt she should have been given a verbal warning by the shopclerk or been encouraged to take the bags outside in two trips. Or maybe chaperoned out of the damn store in a miniature hot-air balloon. The ankle had somehow led to a neck brace (Exhibit A) as well as severe interference with the woman’s livelihood, which had something to do with the music-video industry. She was sitting at the plaintiff’s table, legs crossed, wagging a foot incessantly. The foot was adorned with no less than a four-inch heel.

The lawyer arguing the case for the sporting-goods store was named Lance Jennings. He had promised me on the phone that we could talk at ten-thirty. I was giving him until eleven. The judge called a break at ten-fifty-two. I introduced myself to Jennings.

“She’s wearing stiletto heels,” I said.

“Oh, I know. The champagne’s already cold on this one. I’m going to ask the judge to have her go up into the witness stand in those beautiful stupid shoes, then step back down. In front of the jury. I just know she’s going to wobble.”

We went to a coffee shop. “I don’t drink coffee anymore,” Jennings said, shooing my money away. “Acid reflux.” He asked for a cup of hot water and produced his own tea bag from a small container in his briefcase. “Green tea. I’m becoming a damn Chinaman.” I ordered a cup of the acid reflux.

I had told Jennings on the phone that I wanted some information about the Roberto and Gabriella Diaz divorce. After dunking his tea bag in his cup, the lawyer produced a blue manila folder from his briefcase.

“Sweet women marry assholes. Don’t ask me why. This Diaz was a real hard-on. Paranoid, a classic. Thought everyone was out to persecute him and rip him off. First thing out of his mouth in court was that his wife and I were ganging up on him and we were out to get him. I think he eventually included the judge in the conspiracy. Or maybe it was his own lawyer, I can’t remember. He would just go off. A real trigger temper.”

“I understand you were able to get a restraining order on him.”

The lawyer poked at his tea bag with a spoon. “Piece of cake. History of violence, no inkling of remorse. Plus, I was the prime witness to the beating he gave his wife.”

“With the vacuum-cleaner hose?”

“These were no love taps. It was hard plastic. The prick was really whipping her with it.”

“He supposedly also beat Gabriella with an iron.”

“She told me. This is a man who cannot be trusted with domestic appliances. When I intervened, he turned on me. I still have a buzzing in my ear from it. I’ll take it to my grave. The bastard.”

“So what did you think when you heard it was Diaz who shot up the parade the other day?”

Jennings answered immediately. “I felt good that I helped separate him from his wife and daughter. I felt maybe I saved their lives.”

“So then it didn’t surprise you?”

“The shooting? I was horrified, of course, like everyone else. But when I heard it was Diaz? That’s what you’re asking? What can I tell you, it made sense to me. This guy had rage, Mr. Malone. Serious rage. I feel horrible for the people he shot. I guess you can’t put out a restraining order to keep someone away from everyone else in the world. I guess that’s called prison.”

“Or the grave.”

“Right.” He took a sip of his green tea. “The final restraining order.”

I told the lawyer what I was looking for. Angel. I didn’t tell him why, only that I needed to track down Diaz’s former colleague. Jennings caught on immediately.

“You think this Angel guy was involved?”

“I don’t know if he was. I can only tell you it’s important that I locate him. I was hoping maybe you could help. But I’m guessing Diaz didn’t call in a gangbanger like Angel as a character witness at his trial.”

“That would be a good guess.”

“What about the woman? The one Diaz brought to your office, with the rose tattoo. Gabriella told me she and Diaz were an item. She also said she’s obliterated the woman’s name from her mind. She doesn’t want to remember it.”

Jennings smirked. “You mean the hot tamale? I had her called as a witness in Diaz’s assault on me. As I’m sure you can imagine, she was not too cooperative.”

“Hostile witness?”

“That’s one way of putting it.” He rifled through the papers in his file folder. “Here we are. Donna Bia. Ah, that’s right. The lovely Miss Bia. How could I have forgotten?”

I wrote the name down. “Have you got an address?” He did. It was in Brooklyn, not far over the bridge. I wrote that down as well. “Job?”

“The official term is ‘no visible means of support.’ Except take one look at this one, and the means of support is pretty damn visible. Miss Bia was a hustler from the word go. I’m not going to use the term ‘arm candy,’ but I could.”

“Candies like that usually prefer their arms to have some money,” I said. “Diaz sounds a little short in that department.”

Jennings shrugged. “Drugs are candy, too, and our Miss Bia had herself a big appetite. I’m pretty certain Diaz was into some low-level dealing. Aside from the candy itself, dealing lets you flash a decent-sized bankroll now and then.”

“How good do you think this address is?”

“Who can say? She might have made it up on the stand.”

I flipped my notebook closed. “At least Bia isn’t a dime-a-dozen name. I’ll find her.”

Jennings smirked again. “When you find this one, your fripping eyes are going to pop out. She’s a twenty-something wearing dresses built for a ten-year-old. Seriously, you’ll think she paints it on. I guess a person is supposed to lead with their strengths. This hellcat’s got ’em in spades.”

“Oh boy,” I said. “I can’t wait.”

Jennings sipped his tea. His gaze went deep into the liquid. “Hellcat,” he murmured again.

I TOOK A CAB OVER THE BROOKLYN BRIDGE. HELL OF A PIECE OF work, that bridge, with its towering cathedral-window supports and the swooping rows of cables. There’s a story that Annie Oakley and Diamond Jim Brady threw a big party on the roof of a bar down on Water Street in 1883, the night the Brooklyn Bridge was officially inaugurated. Legend has Miss Oakley shooting the hat off one of the attending officials as he came down from the bridge and was heading into the bar. The thing is, you read up on Annie Oakley, you get about a thousand shot-the-hat-off stories. Put me in her day, and I’d have simply removed my chapeau whenever I was in the woman’s presence. The way a gentleman is supposed to, anyway.

The address Jennings had given me for Donna Bia was just off Atlantic Avenue, near the Brooklyn Academy of Music. They call it BAM. Margo’s a big BAM fan. I’ve probably logged a dozen shows there with her. I saw one there once that featured a chunky man dancing in a wool skirt. That one didn’t exactly top my entertainment list for the year, but generally speaking most of the offerings are quality goods.

I stood on a warped porch and tried to shoo a cat away from my leg as I waited for someone to respond to my knocking. The cat had a bald spot near its tail and a mustache like Hitler’s. The house was pale green. Two stories, the second one sagging a bit. There was a red glider couch on the porch, losing a battle to rust.

Donna Bia didn’t live here. Not anymore. A plumber named Ray lived here. He answered my knock in jeans and bare feet, pulling on a dirty white T-shirt. The vibe he put out was that I was interrupting something and he was eager to get back to it. I asked him about Donna Bia, and he told me that he and his wife had bought the house from a family named Bia nearly eight years before. I showed him my PI license and told him it was a matter of life and death that I locate the Bias. He didn’t seem impressed, but he told me to hold on. He shut the door. The cat and I looked at each other for two minutes, then the door opened again and Ray handed me a piece of paper with an address on it. “The Bias called me a couple of years ago to replace an elbow joint.”

A woman had drifted into sight in the dark hallway behind him. She was in a fuzzy bathrobe, smoking a cigarette. I thanked Ray and accidentally kicked the cat as I turned to leave.

“Don’t sweat it,” Ray said. “The cat’s a menace.”

The Bia family had moved to an apartment building on Eastern Parkway, only a few miles from their old home. Specifically, Mr. and Mrs. Bia had moved there once the last kid had moved out of the house. I learned this from Mrs. Bia, Donna’s mother. She was a frowning square-shaped woman wearing a faded pale blue apron. Nothing about her suggested a hellcat had sprung from her loins. She said she had not laid eyes on her daughter in over three months. The name Roberto Diaz meant nothing to her. I told her that it was very important I speak with her daughter. She shrugged, then stepped into the kitchen, emerging a moment later holding a piece of paper. Today seemed to be piece-of-paper day. She handed it to me. “This is where she lives.”

I looked at the piece of paper, which bore a phone number: 917 exchange. Cell phone.

Mrs. Bia went on, “I had to give Donna a hundred dollars to give me this number. I told her if her father or me die one day, maybe it would be nice if she got a phone call. This is my own daughter. I have no idea where she lives. I don’t think maybe she lives anywhere. All the time Donna is growing up, she is beautiful, and people tell her she is beautiful, and they tell me what a good future she will have. But you have to make good decisions to have a good future. Donna is nothing but bad decisions. So now? As far as I’m concerned, she gets what she deserves. We gave her a pretty face and a nice home. What more can we do?”