Текст книги "Badlands"

Автор книги: Richard Montanari

Соавторы: Richard Montanari
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Текущая страница: 11 (всего у книги 24 страниц)

The point was, something in those notes might lead to their doer, something that would take him off the streets before he killed again.

“All right,” Jessica said. “I’m out. I feel like I’ve been up for three days straight. After that crawlspace, I want to take a five-hour bath.”

“Okay. See you in the morning. Bright and early.”

“I’ll try to be early,” Jessica said. “Don’t expect bright.”

Jessica got out of the car, began to cross the lot. Byrne watched her go. He rolled down his window.

“Jess.”

She turned around. “Yeah?”

“I like your nails.”

Jessica smiled, the first time in days.

TWENTY-NINE

AS THE SUN SOFTENED into a dusty orange corona over west Philadelphia, Byrne drove to the location where Eve Galvez’s body had been found. The crime scene was still taped off, secured by two officers in a sector car. It appeared that the CSU team had not completed its investigation.

Byrne identified himself to the young officers, passed the time of day with them, commiserating over the sheer numbing boredom of such a detail. He had been exactly where they were many times in his early days on the force. He wondered how badly these two guys had fucked up to draw this one. As a patrol officer, Byrne once had to stake out a trash can in a South Philly alley for a full shift, a trash can in which a homicide suspect had dropped a handgun used in a crime. Ostensibly, Byrne was staking out the Rubbermaid on the outside chance the perp might come back for the weapon. Nothing came of it, except for a sore ass, a stiff back, and a career-long empathy for twenty-something uniforms stuck in a beater, drawing a crap tour on a hot summer evening.

A few minutes later Byrne stood at the edge of the now-empty grave, a pall of sadness and anger washing over him. Nobody deserved a fate such as this, especially not a woman like Eve Galvez. He thought of the last time he had seen her. Then immediately flashed on the first time he had seen her.

That’s all there is, Byrne thought. There are always memories in between, but the landmarks are the first time and the last time. You never get the chance to do those two over.

And you never see either of them coming.

THEY MET AT A WEDDING. The bridegroom was a detective from Central named Reggie Babineaux, an affable, slope-shouldered Cajun in his late thirties who had cut his teeth in the hard Fifth District in New Orleans, pre-Katrina. The ceremony and reception were held at the Mansion on Main Street, a sprawling ornate facility in Voorhees, New Jersey. In addition to a grand spiral staircase, vaulted mural ceilings, and cascading waterfalls, there was also a swan-filled pond and an all-glass ceremony site. To Byrne, it looked like it might have been decorated by Carmela Soprano, but he knew it was all pretty cher, as Reggie Babineaux would put it. Reggie had married into new money. His bride was far from a Vogue cover girl, but Reggie was still the envy of every mortgage-laden, shrew-burdened male civil servant in the room.

He spotted her as she stood at the bar with a fellow detective from the Philadelphia DA’s office. Eve Galvez wore a tight red dress and black heels, a thin strand of pearls. Her silken brunette hair was down around her shoulders, her café au lait skin and dark eyes were incandescent in the soft light of the crystal chandeliers. Byrne couldn’t take his eyes off her. He was hardly alone. Every man in the room was sneaking covert glances at the slender, Latina beauty at the bar.

Byrne asked his old friend, Assistant District Attorney Paul DiCarlo, for the details—the 229 as they said in the trade. A 229 report was a basic background form. DiCarlo told Byrne what little he said he knew. Eve Galvez had come to the DA’s office three years earlier, had quickly made a reputation for herself as a smart, no-nonsense investigator.

DiCarlo added that just about every man at 1421 Arch Street—where the DA’s office was located at the time; it had since moved to 3 Penn Square—unmarried and otherwise, had taken the obligatory run at Eve Galvez. As far as DiCarlo knew, she had rebuffed them all. Rumors abounded, but according to Paul DiCarlo, that’s all they were:rumors. A beautiful woman in law enforcement, anywhere in the country, probably anywhere in the world, was subject to the worst nature of men. If they couldn’t have her, some felt the need to demean her, to minimize her accomplishments, sometimes to thwart her advancement.

ADA Paul DiCarlo said Eve Galvez had taken it all, and had given most of it back. Despite behaviors that bordered on harassment—incidents that might have called for reprimands, even firings—she had never taken it to the bosses.

That night, at Reggie Babineaux’s reception, three bourbons offshore, as the band swung into Robert Palmer’s “Simply Irresistible”—a song Byrne would forever associate with that moment—he mustered the courage to approach Eve Galvez.

The attraction was instant, almost visceral. They verbally sparred for a while, until both realized that neither was going to back down, neither was going to have a glove raised in victory. Byrne was older than Eve Galvez by at least ten years, had three times as many years in on the job, but they quickly fell into a rhythm, a comfort zone that surprised them both.

Byrne recalled the way she leaned against the bar, the way she focused on him to the exclusion of everyone else in the room.

Those eyes.

THEY DID NOT MAKE LOVE on their first date. They had dinner at Saloon in South Philly, a nightcap at Overtures. Somehow it became 4 AM. Byrne drove her home, walked her to her door. She did not invite him in. Instead, on the sidewalk in front of the entrance, she leaned into him, and gave him one of the softest, most seductive kisses on the cheek he’d ever received. The kiss promised redemption, if not life eternal.

Byrne stood there for ten minutes after she’d gone inside, staring at the gated door, willing it to open. No such luck.

Their second date was pretty much over before coffee was served. It was almost over before the appetizers. They made it back to Byrne’s place—barely. But instead of the animal rutting they both expected, things slowed down rather quickly, and it became the sort of sweet, knowing intimacy you hope for deep into a relationship, the kind of love you make, say, on your fifth anniversary. It was that secret.

On their third date, five days later, Kevin Byrne gave Eve a charm bracelet—a bracelet bearing five small golden angels. He’d had her name engraved behind the clasp. He knew it was far too early in the relationship for jewelry, but when he saw the bracelet in the window of a jewelry store at Eighteenth and Walnut, he couldn’t stop himself.

That year, as spring gave way to summer, the crime rate soared. For just about everyone involved in Philadelphia law enforcement, there were three parts to the day: your shift, your overtime, and four hours’ sleep. Family obligations and lawns went untended. Relationships waned.

Byrne and Eve Galvez saw each other infrequently over the next few months. Neither could, or was willing to, explain why. The job and its stresses were the prevailing theory, one they both offered and accepted. They ran into each other at the Criminal Justice Center a few times. Once at a Phillies game. Byrne was with his daughter that day. Eve was with a man she introduced as her brother, Enrique. Weekly phone calls became biweekly, then monthly.

They had never promised each other a thing. That’s who he was. That’s who she was. There was so much he wanted to tell her, so much he should have told her.

Byrne turned his face to the sun for a moment, then knelt down. A bright blue tarpaulin was still stretched over this makeshift grave.

A few moments later Byrne touched the grass just inside the crime-scene tape. The vision came back in a brutal rush. For the first time in his life he wanted it to.

In his mind, behind a bloodred curtain of violence, he saw—

–Eve talking to a man in shadows… her hand in his… an enormous house surrounded by rusting iron spires… the sound of the shovel piercing the soil… the jangle of the charms on Eve’s bracelet as her body was rolled into the earth… a man standing over the grave, a man with silver eyes…

Byrne eased himself to the ground. The grass was warm and dry. The pain in his temples pounded.

He closed his eyes, saw Eve’s face. This time it was from the heart of a beautiful memory, not a dark and violent vision. She tossed her head back when she laughed. She would cross her legs, letting one high heel dangle from her toes as she read a newspaper.

Kevin Byrne stood, put his hands in his pockets, looked at the shimmering city.

A man with silver eyes.

He made Eve Galvez his very first promise.

THIRTY

THE ROOF WAS DESERTED. The wind blew powdery white grit and blistering heat across it.

Swann had brought the chair up to the roof a week earlier, had secured it to the roof with a strong construction adhesive. He could not have the chair blowing over, not at a critical moment.

He placed Katja on the chair, secured her feet and arms. She peered out over North Philadelphia like the masthead of a grand sailing vessel, a sea witch, perhaps, or a golden mermaid. Swann took a moment, reveling in the accomplishment of planning and execution. The flourish—the very prestige of the Seven Wonders—was yet to come.

He unraveled the seven swords from the velvet. Repositioning them would be tricky, but he knew the sight of her would secure his place in history when they found her.

A few minutes later, he was finished. He gathered his belongings, walked across the roof to the stairwell, removed the plastic bags from his feet, surveyed the landscape.

Perfect. He glanced at his watch. Patricia Sato was waiting for him at Faerwood.

Five minutes later he pulled out of the garage, into the alley, unseen. He would return home, to his dressing room. He would emerge in a new guise, in the skin of a new man.

He had one more stop to make, and his preparations would be all but complete.

THIRTY-ONE

ANTOINETTE RUOLO hated tuna fish. Especially the kind that had those funky purplish brown streaks in it. Even though the can said “Solid White Albacore,” you always got some pieces affected with what Antoinette figured had to be some kind of fish disease.

Some kind of fatal fish disease.

And yet she ate tuna fish for lunch once a week. Every Friday. She was raised Catholic and, even though the Pope said you were allowed to eat meat on Friday these days, she never had, not once in her fifty-nine years.

As the elevator climbed upward, she felt the reflux of the sandwich. She wanted to belch, but she dared not. The elevator only held five people, and she figured the four other occupants, all strangers, might not appreciate it.

The car stopped on the forty-fourth floor. They emerged onto the observation deck, and its breathtaking views of Philadelphia. Antoinette took a deep, fishy breath, and continued the tour.

“Originally, it was supposed to be the tallest building in the world at just over 547 feet, but was surpassed by both the Washington Monument and the Eiffel Tower. Both were completed first,” she said. She’d been a tour guide at Philadelphia City Hall most of her working life, having started in 1971 as a “City Hall Bunny,” a silly promotional gimmick someone had come up with in the 1960s, à la Hugh Hefner, the idea being to hire pretty young things to give distinguished city visitors a personal tour.

It had been a long time since anyone had considered Antoinette Ruolo a pretty young thing.

“It was the tallest building in Philadelphia for many years, of course, and was to remain so forever, until the City and Arts Commission broke an eighty-five-year-old ‘gentleman’s agreement’ and allowed the construction of One Liberty Place, which measures 945 feet,” Antoinette said. “Since then, of course, the Comcast Center has eclipsed that honor at a height of about 975 feet, making it not only the tallest building in Philadelphia, but in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, as well.”

As her charges gazed out over the city, Antoinette considered them.

Mostly middle-aged, casually dressed.

“Now, the tower of William Penn is a marvel unto itself,” she continued by rote. “It stands thirty-seven feet tall and weighs twenty-seven tons. It is still the largest statue on any building in the world.”

At this point a man at the back of the group raised his hand, as if he were in junior high school. He carried a huge backpack, the kind hikers carry on long treks.

“I have a question,” he said. “If I may.”

Wow, Antoinette thought. A polite person. “Please.”

“Well, I’ve done a little reading in my Fodor’s,” he said, holding up the tour book. “The book goes into great detail about the building, but it doesn’t say too much about the clock. I’ve always been fascinated by timepieces.”

Antoinette brightened, gave a quick bob to her graying hair. Lord, she needed a perm. “Well, you’ve come to the right person…”

JOSEPH SWANN TUNED the woman out. It was an ability he had developed as a child, listening to his father’s well-oiled patter during his close-up routines, the facility to not listen to someone, but still be able to comprehend and recall everything they said.

He realized he was drawing attention to himself by asking questions, but he just couldn’t seem to resist. Besides, he had learned the art of makeup and costuming from a master. No one knew what he really looked like, and before they would be able to connect him to the events of the next twenty-four hours, it would be far too late.

The truth was, he knew everything there was to know about the massive timepiece at the base of the tower at Philadelphia City Hall. He knew that the clock had begun running on New Year’s Day 1899. He knew that the faces had a diameter of twenty-six feet, and were larger than even those of Big Ben. He knew that each hour hand was twelve and a half feet long.

He also knew that the door he needed to get in was just on the other side of the tower, opposite the elevator. He had taken this tour once before, posing as a much older gentleman, a man with a thick German accent, and knew that the lock on the door was a standard Yale deadbolt. With his skills, it would take him less than ten seconds to open the door. Probably much less.

Swann knew that if anyone noticed he was missing and called security, he would quick-change his clothing and return to the ground level via the south stairwell.

Most important, he knew about the clock’s lighting. He had detailed drawings of the schematics, had pored over them for years. Originally, the clock’s faces were lit by 552 individual lightbulbs. Now gold-colored fluorescents illuminated them.

Yes, he knew everything Antoinette was going to say about the legendary timepiece that graced architect John McArthur’s garish, breathtaking building.

And yet he only cared about one of the clock’s faces.

The one facing north.

The one facing the Badlands.

“…WAS A STORY that began in 1906. It seems that so many people relied on these clocks for time, because they could be seen from great distances, that each evening, at 8:57, the lights in the clock tower were turned off,” Antoinette prattled. “Do you know why they did that?”

Everyone on the tour exchanged a bemused glance.

“Because three minutes later, when they turned the lights back on, the entire city knew it was exactly nine o’clock!”

Antoinette Ruolo glanced at her watch. “Speaking of time, I’m afraid we have to wrap up this tour in a few minutes.” This was her favorite segue. “I’ll meet you all back at the elevator in ten minutes.”

Antoinette walked over toward the elevator, a low grumbling in her stomach. She sat down on the bench, thought about taking her shoes off and giving herself a quick foot massage, but decided against it. It wouldn’t be right for a former City Hall Bunny to be seen with holes in the toes of her support stockings, would it?

TEN MINUTES LATER Antoinette found herself in the lobby, waving good-bye to her last tour of the day.

She looked around the reception area. Had the nice man who had asked about the clock come down with them? Of course he had. Where else would he be?

Antoinette Ruolo signed out, then headed for the exit at the south portal. As she pushed open the door, and stepped into the steaming afternoon, she felt a little better. For at least a dozen reasons, Antoinette was glad it was Friday, one reason eclipsing all others.

No more tuna for a week.

THIRTY-TWO

LILLY SCANNED THE food court at the train station, more with her nose than her eyes. She thought back to her last full meal, a $1.99 breakfast special at a roadside diner on Route 61, a tacky plastic place with a water-stained ceiling and prehistoric gum under the stools.

But now, forty-eight hours later, sitting in the food court of the Thirtieth Street station, her stomach rumbled like one of the trains passing beneath her.

This was the life of a runaway. She knew what she had to do.

Desperate times and all…

THE MAN WAS WATCHING HER.

Lilly had always had the ability to sense when someone was observing her, even if that person was behind her back, even if they were on the other side of the room or the other side of the street. She registered the feeling as a slight warming of her skin, a minute tingling of the hair at the nape of her neck.

She turned, glanced at the man, then looked away. He could have been thirty, he could have been fifty. He sat two tables away. He moved closer.

“Hi,” he said.

Lilly took a moment, playing it out. Here we go.

“Hi,” Lilly replied.

The man’s face lit up. He clearly wasn’t expecting a response. He cleared his throat. “Have you just come in by train?”

Lilly nodded.

“Just now?”

She nodded again, a little too animatedly. She felt like a bobblehead doll. She backed off on the act. “Well, just a few minutes ago.”

“How exciting,” he said. “I love train travel.”

Oh, yes, how exciting, she thought. Train travel. Let’s see: burnt coffee, stale sandwiches, smelly passengers, grimy windows, crappy houses passing by that were so low-rent they were built right on the train tracks. Yeah. This is my dream vacation. This and Cozumel. “It’s okay,” she said.

“Is this your first time in Philadelphia?”

“Yes, sir.”

He arched his eyebrows. “Sir?” He laughed, but it sounded phony. “I’m not that much older than you are. Am I?”

He clearly was, and it was so gross. “No,” she said, trying her best to sound sincere. “Not really.”

He smiled again. His teeth were the color of old mushrooms.

“Well, seeing as this is your first time in the City of Brotherly Love, I’d be happy to show you around,” he said. “If you have the time, of course. It’s a great city. Lots of history.”

Lilly glanced toward the doors that led to Twenty-ninth Street. It was almost dark. The lights on the street shone in the near distance, a grainy canvas of green and red and turquoise. She looked back at the man, assessing him. He wasn’t that much taller than she was, did not look all that strong. She, on the other hand, had played soccer and lacrosse since she was seven. She had strong legs and deceptively strong arms. And she was fast. Lightning fast.

“That would be totally great,” she said, infusing the word with just enough enthusiasm.

The man looked at his watch, then at the huge area of the food court. The evening commuter rush had long since faded. There were just a few stragglers.

“Tell you what,” he began. “I have to make a few calls. I’ll meet you at the corner of Twenty-third and Walnut. We can take a stroll.”

He didn’t want to be seen leaving with her. She understood the play. This told her just about everything she needed to know. “Okay.”

“Do you know where that is?”

“I’ll find it,” Lilly said.

“Are you sure you can?”

Lilly laughed. It sounded creepy, almost sinister, but she was certain this man would not notice. “I found my way to Philadelphia, didn’t I?”

The man laughed with her. Those teeth. Ugh.

A few moments later the man got up, looked at his watch again, and crossed the huge room toward the Thirtieth Street entrance. She saw him adjust the front of his trousers. She wanted to hurl.

Lilly closed her eyes for a moment—not having any idea how she was going to handle this. She thought about her house, her bedroom, her TV and cell phone, her dog, Rip. Rip was a thirteen-year-old cairn terrier, almost blind. Lilly started to tear up at the thought of Rip and his scuffed white bowl, Rip bumping into door jambs, then retreating, embarrassed. She stopped herself. This was no time for weakness, for sentimentality or dependency on the past. She had something to do.

HE TRIED TO MAKE small talk. He succeeded. It couldn’t possibly have been any smaller. “You know, Philadelphia was once the capital of the United States.”

She knew this. Every school kid in America knew this. “I didn’t know that.”

“Do you know who discovered the place?”

Gee, she thought. Penn and Teller?

“William Penn, of course.” He pointed down Market Street, toward city hall. The statue of William Penn glowed in the dusk.

“Wow.”

She felt his hand reach out, try to hold hers. Gross. She reached around to her backpack, covering. She unzipped it, pulled out some gum. She didn’t offer him any. He didn’t notice. Every time she caught him looking at her he was staring at her chest.

“There’s something down here I think you should see,” he said. “ There’s history everywhere.”

They walked down the alley, around a corner. They stopped. There was nothing to see.

“You know what?” he asked.

“What?”

“You’re very beautiful.”

And there it was. On top of it, she knew it was a lie. She looked like crap. She probably smelled, too. She was a runaway. Runaways were skanks. “Thank you,” she said.

“Can I ask you a question?”

Lilly almost laughed. “Sure.”

“Do you like me? Even, you know, a little bit?”

Oh, about as much as a blister or a cold sore, Lilly thought. “Of course,” she said. “I’m here, aren’t I? Why would you ask me that?”

“Because boys are insecure,” he said with gnarled smile.

Boys. She was just about ready to puke. Time to get this party started. “You know, you don’t strike me as all that insecure.”

“I don’t?”

“Absolutely not. You strike me more as the Matt Damon type. Older—like my father’s age—but still pretty cool.”

He smiled again. It was the last thing she wanted.

“You know, I was thinking,” he said. “If you’re a little short of cash, I could help you out. You being from out of town and all. I did the Jack Kerouac thing myself when I was a little younger. I know how it can be.”

“Well, I’ve never been to Philadelphia before,” she said. “I have no idea how much things cost.”

“It can be expensive. Not quite like New York, but pricier than, say, Baltimore.”

Lilly smiled, winked. “How much do you have, big spender?”

Another laugh, as phony as the others. He reached into his back pocket, extracted a camouflage nylon wallet—pure class. He opened it. It bulged with plastic cards, business cards, ID cards. He pulled them all out, and she got a glimpse: Visa, Macy’s, American Express, a Borders gift card. She also saw what looked like a lot of cash. About an inch or so. It might have been all singles, but still.

“Wow,” she said. Girls her age were supposed to say “wow” a lot. Like they were all Hannah Montana. “How much is in there?”

“I don’t really know,” he said. “But I’d be willing to—”

At this moment Lilly turned away, pivoted, and slammed her knee into the man’s crotch. Hard, and fast as lightning. He didn’t have a chance. The man blew a lungful of sour breath into her face, then folded instantly to the ground.

Lilly looked behind her, to the mouth of the alley, then at the windows of the buildings on either side. All dark. All good. They were completely alone.

“Why?” the man managed on a ragged breath. He was curled in a fetal position on the ground, knees to his chest

“Why? Are you kidding me? What planet are you from?”

“I don’t—”

“You’re like a million years old,” Lilly said. “And I’m not even legal, dickhead.” She picked up his wallet, took his driver’s license and the money. “What did you think was going to happen?”

“I thought we might—”

“You thought what?” Lilly asked. “That we were going to fall in love? That we were going to have a romance?”

“No,” he said. “It was just…”

Lilly got down on the ground next to the man. She lay back, then pulled up her T-shirt, baring her breasts. She worked her right arm around the man’s neck, as if they were two drunken people at a wild frat party, or at some tequila-blast on spring break in Panama City. In her left hand she held up her digital camera, the lens facing them. She snapped a picture of the two of them together, then another for good measure: Mr. Mushroom Teeth and his topless teen cohort. Film at eleven.

The flash was bright blue in the darkened alley. It blinded her for a second.

“Now we have a record of our lovely time together,” Lilly said, pulling her top back down. She stood up, brushed herself off. “And keep in mind, if you tell anyone about this, if anyone comes looking for me, they’ll find this camera, okay?”

The man remained silent. As expected. He was in pain.

“Then later tonight I’m going to take some naked pictures of myself,” Lilly continued. “Full naked. And all of these pictures will be right in a row.” She slipped the camera into her bag, took out a brush, ran it through her hair. When she was done she put away her brush, pulled off the rubber band she always kept on her wrist, snapped her hair into a ponytail. “And your wife, your kids, your boss—the cops—they’ll see the pictures, too. Think about it. How many of them are going to think you didn’t take these pictures?” She put her bag over her shoulder, struck a pose. “I’m fourteen, dude. Think about that.”

It wasn’t true. She was older. But she looked fourteen, and she was an unrivalled drama queen to boot.

Lilly stepped back a few feet, waited. She reached into her bag, took out the printed photo she’d carried for two months, turned it toward the man. “This is your house, isn’t it?”

The man tried to focus his eyes on the photograph of the big house with the woman standing in front of it. A few seconds later he did. “My… my house?”

“Yeah. You live here, right?”

“Are you crazy? That’s not my house. Who is that woman? Who the hell are you?”

Lilly already knew the answer to her own question, but none of this would have made any sense if she didn’t ask.

Seconds later, she put the photograph away, took a deep breath, composed herself—after all, she was not used to things like this, even if she had lived it all in her mind for a long time, over and over again—then stepped out of the alley, onto Market Street. No cops. Cool beans. After a block or so she slipped into the shadows, took out the wad of cash, counted it. She had 166 dollars.

Oh, yes.

For a street kid—which was what she was now, officially—it was a fortune. Not Donald Trump big, but big enough.

For tonight.

ON EIGHTEENTH STREET Lilly slipped into a diner, wolfed a hoagie, gulped a black coffee. Twenty minutes later, back on Market, she raised her hand, flagged a cab. The driver would know an inexpensive hotel, she thought, if there were such a thing in Philly. Right now all she cared about was a clean tub and a soft bed.

A few moments later a cab pulled to the curb. Lilly slipped into the backseat. The driver was from Nigeria. Or maybe it was Uganda. Whichever, he had a wicked bad accent. He told her he knew just the hotel. Cabbies always did. She would tip him well.

He was, like her, a stranger in a strange land.

Lilly sat back, sated, in charge. She fingered the thick roll of cash in her hand. It was still warm. The night air rushing in the window made her sleepy, but not too sleepy to think about the next few days.

Welcome to Philadelphia.