Nightbird Page 8

  “No, it was an obvious ploy to get information on our interview with Winters. But there’s nothing wrong with being obvious. The idea, though, if you really want the information, is to keep working on me until your persistence wears down my resistance.”

  “Then you’ll tell me everything.”

  “Not a chance in hell,” Gregory said.

  The early sports guy on Channel 2 was lamenting the Yanks’ loss of Bernie Williams, fifteen days on the DL, strained left hamstring. Pitcher Hideki Irabu was wearing long sleeves to cover tiny magnets that adorned his body to relieve tension and promote blood flow. A small cartoon lightning bolt in the corner of the screen warned of thunderstorms.

  “In regards to Trey Winters,” Gregory said. “His alibi checks out perfectly. The guy was long gone before Gillian took the header.”

  “So what does that mean, the investigation is finished?”

  “It’s at least up shit’s creek without a paddle.”

  The lower edge of the bar’s woodwork was ringed with Christmas lights that stayed up all year. Sinatra sang “Nancy with the Laughing Face.” The night bartender came through the door to greetings all around.

  “I never said that Winters killed her by himself,” Danny said. “All I said was that he’s involved. He had something to do with this. Something. And I don’t know about you, but I don’t intend to let him off the hook that easily.”

  “Maybe you need to get mugged again,” Gregory said.

  Then he broke into “Give My Regards to Broadway,” the first line of the song. Gregory had a habit of bursting out in unprovoked song in a deep, operatic voice, his chin tucked down against his chest. Just one line of a song, two at the most. Show tunes, top forty, church hymns, Gilbert & Sullivan, nonsense songs, anything. One line. Then, just as suddenly, he’d stop and resume the conversation as if nothing had happened. It was like watching Tourette’s Syndrome: The Musical.

  “You find out anything new at all?” Danny said.

  “Same story he told on the night of her death, kid. Same old shit, chapter and verse.”

  “Sounds like a wasted day.”

  “All’s well that ends well,” Gregory said, hoisting his glass. “This bar is in my will, you know. Three grand for a big party in my honor. Your uncle is my executor.”

  Danny knew all about Gregory’s legendary will, which was a living will only in the sense that it never stopped growing. His uncle said he had shoeboxes at home stuffed with Gregory’s codicils, written on cardboard coasters and cocktail napkins. Beneficiaries included bartenders, waitresses, coat check girls, cabbies, hookers, even the shoe shine guy in the subway station at Columbus Circle.

  “What does my uncle think about Winters?”

  “Your uncle, bless him, thinks he gave us too many details.”

  “What’s wrong with that?”

  “He says people who give too many details are usually trying to deflect attention away from something else.”

  “Like an affair. He was having an affair with Gillian. You agree with that?”

  “Is the East River a river?” Gregory said.

  “Actually, no,” Danny said. “The East River is a saltwater estuary. A strait that connects upper New York Bay with the Long Island Sound.”

  “Well, it was a river when I was growing up,” Gregory said. “And I do agree, Winters was screwing her.”

  Gregory reared back and sang, “They… tried… to sell us egg foo yung….” Then quiet. He took a drink, then turned toward Danny. “One bitter cold night,” he said, “about a dozen of us are sitting here. All guys from the job. December, January. It’s late. The wind is howling outside, snow swirling. Everything is copasetic… when the door opens. This guy in a ski mask walks through the door. The place goes silent. The guy in the ski mask pauses at the end of the bar, right there. Looking around. He doesn’t say a word. Then he reaches in his pocket. The whole thing took maybe fifteen seconds. When he looks up a dozen guns are pointing at him. The guy falls right out, smack on the floor. We look in his hand and he’s got an address, around the corner. He wanted directions.”

  “A little bit of an overreaction,” Danny said.

  “No shit,” Gregory said. “Who the hell faints, Marie Antoinette?”

  Solitary drinkers did not visit Brady’s Bar. Their isolation alone would make them suspect. Five small cliques made up the entire crowd, virtually all male huddles, except for two cop groupies humping the backs of the youngest group. Two women trying desperately to be discovered, laughing too loudly and rubbing up against men who’d rather hear war stories than love stories. But every time the door opened, every cop in the place, no matter how subtly, turned to check the door. They all went quiet when Anthony Ryan walked in.

  “You two bonding?” Ryan said, touching his nephew’s right shoulder.

  “Your partner is giving me the benefit of his vast knowledge.”

  “That shouldn’t take long,” Ryan said.

  Rank does not matter in a cop bar. No attention is paid to stripes, or bars, or gold eagles. It’s all about respect. Danny had noticed long ago that although most cops treated both Ryan and Gregory with respect, there was a difference. Gregory they treated like a rough-and-tumble older brother. But Ryan was accorded a quiet reverence, as if he were a visiting cardinal.

  “He’s touched on every subject except the Winters interview,” Danny said.

  “I have something of interest,” Ryan said as he dumped a bag of salted pretzels on the bar. “The lab called on the sticky substance on her lips.”

  “Should I leave?” Danny said.

  “No…,” Gregory said. A hint of reluctance.

  Ryan ordered a Jameson and water and frowned when he noticed Danny’s beer on the bar. But Danny was only sipping, well aware of the brew’s effects on his medication.

  “Apparently, right before she died,” Ryan said, “she put on some heavy stage makeup and lipstick. When it mixed with the blood it became sticky. That’s what the lab thinks I noticed.”

  “Case closed,” Gregory said.

  “Not quite. They also found a trace amount of a viscous substance. Something pine based. They think it’s rosin.”

  “Like the ballplayers use?” Gregory said.

  “Coletti says it’s used in some exercise and dance studios, too,” Ryan said. “For grip, to prevent slipping. So we’re going back into Gillian’s apartment. He wants to check her ballet shoes. She might have put them on and touched her face. I made arrangements with Crime Scene for a second search, tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?” Gregory said. “Mid-Town already closed down the crime scene.”

  “I called Trey Winters and told him we needed the key back. We’re also going to simulate her fall.”

  “That involves Emergency Services; that’s a major operation, pally. You got something else up your sleeve.”

  “I’ve got this up my sleeve,” Ryan said, and with his index finger pushed his nose to the side in the universal sign of the bent-nose Mafia thug.

  The crowd in cop bars consists of various circles of men who alternate between raucous, backslapping laughter and solemnly whispered secrets. Anthony Ryan spoke so softly, both Danny and Gregory had to lean forward. He said he’d received the LUDs, the local calls, from Trey Winters’s office phone. Besides calling Gillian on the night she died, he also made three calls to the Orpheus Lounge and one to the Pussycat Palace. The following day he called both locations again. Once each this time. Ryan looked around for eavesdroppers, then said both places were owned by Buster Scorza.

  “Who’s Buster Scorza?” Danny said, and they shushed him.

  “Mobbed up big time,” Gregory said. “At one time he owned over twenty massage parlors and peep show locations. He still owns half the real estate west of Times Square. And he got it the old-fashioned way. With muscle.”

  “You thinking Winters hired Scorza to have Gillian killed?” Danny said.

  “That’s a stretch,” Gregory said.

&
nbsp; Someone handed the bartender a newspaper. The back of The Daily News read, WEATHER HOT, IRABU COLD.

  “Not for nothing,” Gregory said. “But Scorza also has some connection to the stagehands union. It could be legit business. Just make sure you got the res gestae first.”

  Gregory moved away to sell tickets and glad-hand. The bar was packed with potential boat ride customers and guys who hadn’t heard his entire repertoire of war stories. Danny wanted to take a few notes on the cryptic jargon that passed for conversation in a cop bar, but he knew better.

  “What the hell is the res gestae?” Danny said.

  “It means ‘the thing,’ in Latin. It means nothing here. He’s just breaking my balls. Reminding me it’s his case.”

  “The Pussycat is that big porn place on Eighth Avenue,” Danny said. “It’s a raging cash machine. Three floors of sex in every possible contortion.”

  “I don’t want you going near Buster Scorza, Danny. Or Trey Winters. Understand? Even with two good arms.”

  “Where’s the Orpheus Lounge?”

  “Ninth Avenue. Years ago it was a hangout for Broadway musicians. Now it’s a wrinkle room.”

  Danny knew that wrinkle room was shorthand for a bar that catered to aging gays. “Let me help out on this. I could approach it from a different angle. Not everybody wants to spill their guts to cops.”

  “Not Scorza,” Ryan said. “We’ll give you people to interview. Just don’t go near Scorza.”

  “Give me somebody, please. I want to do something. I keep thinking I screwed up here. I should have noticed something was wrong with her. Maybe she’d still be alive today if I had something else on my mind besides getting laid.”

  “It’s not your fault,” Ryan said, and wondered how many times he was going to say it in this case. “Something happened earlier that night. Winters had made his mind up to have Gillian drug tested. Then he apparently changed it between six-thirty and eleven. All we know now is that during that time, he made phone calls to Scorza and had dinner with Abigail Klass.”

  “Abigail Klass the food writer? I can interview her.”

  “Winters says he had a change of heart and decided not to give up on Gillian. You believe that, Danny?”

  “I think he was scared shitless his rich wife would find out about his affair with Gillian.”

  “Gillian’s sister, Faye, spoke to her after Winters left, and said she was very upset, talking crazy. If we believe Trey Winters, she should have been happy.”

  “You think Winters is lying?”

  “All the years I’ve been a cop,” Ryan said, “I talked to a lot of liars. One thing they all do is rationalize. No matter how you push, accuse, insult… they give you a rational explanation. Today I pushed Trey Winters and he never got mad at me. Liars are never angry, Danny. Remember that.”

  13

  Victor awoke to sirens, the music of the Bronx night. The apartment was dark, except for a sliver of light from under the bathroom door. Victor assumed he’d left it on when he took the red pills, earlier. He was slightly foggy, but the rest had helped. He pulled himself up to a sitting position, feeling the tug of his stomach muscles. A good tug, the pain less severe. The retribution from Wednesday’s reckless performances was wearing off. He got to his feet as the bathroom door opened. Pinto stood framed in the doorway.

  “I’m not good enough for you,” Pinto said, his body a question mark in silhouette. “Not smart enough, or you don’t trust me. Which is it?”

  The envelope meant for Trey Winter was not on the table. It was in Pinto’s hand.

  “You have no answers, my friend,” Pinto said, waving the note. “Before you always have answers.”

  “That note is none of your business, Pinto.”

  “It wasn’t my business when I took you from your busboy job and taught you to juggle. It wasn’t my business when I taught you to work crowds.”

  “Give me that,” Victor said.

  “I should have let you waste yourself like your father.”

  “You don’t understand.”

  “You found a way to strike it big, and fuck Pinto. I understand that.”

  “I thought it was too dangerous for you. A man your age.”

  “Oh, too dangerous for me, but not too dangerous for you, taking your pills like little candies.”

  “You never keep your mouth shut about anything, Pinto. What was I going to do?”

  “You thought I would tell somebody? I had schemes in Russia make your scheme look like little potatoes. I didn’t even tell myself things then, in case I talked in my sleep.”

  Pinto threw the letter on the table.

  “See,” Victor said. “You put your fingerprints on the letter. Sometimes you don’t think.”

  “Blackmail needs two to work it right.”

  “I’m not blackmailing anyone. It’s a simple business deal.”

  “That is why you cut words out of the newspapers. Because of a business deal. You think I’m stupid, that insult is worst.”

  Victor walked into the bathroom to wash his face. The water felt good. The smell of the soap invigorated him. Victor had inherited his father’s looks, lady-killers, both of them. His mother always said that if his father prayed at all, he prayed to the Virgin Mary, because he believed he had a way with all women. Victor saw in the mirror a tired man, his skin losing the glow of health. He needed to get out of this city. He heard Pinto banging things around.

  Victor dried his hands. He put his gloves on and took the scissors from the table. He walked into the bedroom. Both dresser drawers had been dumped on the bed. Pinto flung clothes into his old scarred trunk, a trunk they’d lugged for many miles in his Chevy. Victor knew he deserved better than this.

  “We are ended,” Pinto said. “No longer partners, no longer friends. I am driving to Florida in my car; you get your own car. Get your own limo. That’s what you see about yourself. Big boss in the limo.”

  Victor plunged the scissors down into Pinto’s back, but the blow lacked force, and his hand slipped off as the metal struck bone. Pinto jolted straight up, arching like an angry cat. The scissors loosened, dangling down toward the floor.

  “What are you doing!” he bellowed, reaching behind him.

  “What do you think, you dumb bastard,” Victor said.

  Pinto twisted away and ran for the door, scissors flopping, his legs kicking high like a startled deer. Victor grabbed a fistful of the Russian’s hair and spun him around, and the scissors clattered to the floor. He slammed Pinto down on his back and fell on his chest, knees first, with all his weight. “Ooomph!” came out of the Russian. Victor sat on his chest, his knees pinning the Russian’s arms as he wrapped his hands around Pinto’s throat and squeezed with every ounce of strength. Victor’s arms and hands were weakened, but the Russian was no match. Pinto kicked wildly behind him. Victor held the pressure steady.

  A knock at the door sent a surge of adrenaline into Victor Nuñez and he squeezed harder on Pinto’s skinny neck, the veins in his forearms popping like blue electric cords. The knock at the door became louder. “Everything all right?” the landlady said.

  Pinto surged and tried to throw Victor off. He rocked him hard, bucking wildly. Thirty long seconds ticked off the clock as the kicking slowed, then stopped. The gurgling sounds came softer. She kept knocking. “What’s going on in there?” she said. Pinto’s breath stopped.

  Victor rose and stripped off the bloody shirt and pants. Down to his underwear. He took off the gloves, picked up a dumbbell, and went to the door.

  “What is going on in there?” the landlady said.

  “Lifting weights,” Victor said, still breathing hard. “Hurt my shoulder… muscle locked. It scared me and I yelled. Sorry I disturbed you.”

  “Do you need the ambulance?”

  “No, I’m fine,” he said. He opened the door enough to allow her to see he was dressed in his underwear, his chest soaked with sweat. She looked away.

  “I don’t know if I like any
weight lifting on my floors. All the iron banging down on my hardwood.”

  “I’ll be careful,” he said, closing the door. “Very careful.”

  He leaned back against the door and breathed deeply. When he put the dumbbell back under the weight bench he could see blood on his forearm. He wondered if she had noticed.

  It was after midnight when he finished cleaning the blood off the walls and floor. Nothing worked on the stained throw rug. He dragged Pinto’s old trunk across the floor and set it on the rug. It covered the stain completely, in case the landlady decided to snoop. He knew she couldn’t move the trunk with all that dead weight inside.

  14

  Anthony Ryan stood in his second-floor bedroom, looking down at the moonlight shining on his backyard. Spring rains had spawned a jungle of unknown foliage growing out of control along their back fence, a spot where they’d planted hedges years ago. Rip had named it the green monster after the left field wall in Fenway Park. Unpruned and untended, it turned untamable. A deflated basketball protruded from underneath. Rip’s bike and all the sports equipment he was supposed to store in the garage found itself behind the green monster. Ryan had no idea what else they’d find back there.

  “We have to do something about that backyard,” Leigh said. “Before it swallows up the house.”

  “It doesn’t look that bad.”

  “It looks terrible, Anthony. I’m going to get back there this week, take everything out. Plant some flowers along the fence.”

  Ryan looked back down at the old basketball. Rip had played with it so much, he’d worn off the pebble grain. It was as smooth as young skin. A few nights earlier he’d leaped from his bed, heart pounding, when he’d thought he heard the thump, thump of a basketball beneath his window. He’d been half-asleep and imagined it. Heard it because he wanted to. Like he’d heard the words of Gillian Stone. I love you.

  “Everything just keeps growing, doesn’t it?” he said.

  “I still have that old landscaping plan you drew up. Want to take a look at it, see where you went wrong?”