'Yeah?'
'You're fired. I'm taking you off the investigation. Back to your divorces and whiplashes. I'll handle it from here. Turn in your badge and your gun. And give me some blood.'
'Blood?'
'Yeah, Jakie. Bleed a little. You like to take it. Time to give. It's for a worthy cause. Just stop at the lab and see Dr. Katzen. And bring the gun into ballistics.'
'The gun. Why?'
'Standard procedure. A man says he found a gunshot victim and the man doing the finding has a gun. Routine request, nothing more.'
The gun.
The last time I saw the gun it was on a black enamel table in Cindy's apartment taking a breather after Pam fired it.
Oh brother. It's one thing to lose your new fountain pen, another to lose a county-owned gun. But what was I worried about? I hadn't done anything wrong. My blood would be red with just the right amount of calcium, phosphorus, and potassium, and a tad too much cholesterol. The gun would be right there where I left it, oiled and shiny. Wouldn't it?
CHAPTER 37
Max Blinderman. Ex-jockey, penny-ante con artist, a life told in a series of yellowed newspaper clips and scraps of microfilm.
Roberta Blinderman. Goes by Bobbie. Ex…Ex-what?
Just who the hell was Roberta Blinderman? No criminal record, at least not under that name. I had been watching her swiveling walk but not paying attention to anything else.
My thoughts were interrupted by someone pounding on my front door. They do that after pushing the button half a dozen times. The doorbell hasn't worked in years. I yelled that it was unlocked. I heard some feeble pushing, but the door didn't budge. In the humidity it swells up like a patrolman's feet.
'Hit it with your shoulder,' I yelled.
A thud, a curse, and a moment later Bobbie Blinderman high-heeled it into my combination library, living room, conversation pit, and entertainment area. It's a library because the sports pages are usually spread across the floor. I spend most of my time here, hence the living room, and I entertain myself with one-sided conversations. At the moment I was lying on a sagging sofa, nursing a sixteen-ounce Grolsch, my gimpy leg propped up.
'I was just thinking about you,' I said, telling the truth.
She wore a black scooped-back dress, molded to her body, with a sweeping skirt. It was the first time I couldn't see a mile or so of thigh.
'You look very nice,' I said. 'Almost ladylike.'
'We need to talk.'
'About Max.'
'No. About Pam.'
'Pam?'
The name sounded familiar, but I hadn't thought about her since she had hustled me into an elevator at the hotel. The emotional wounds must be healing, or were they only superficial? I hoisted myself to a sitting position, offered Bobbie a seat, and she gracefully bent at the knees and lowered herself into the cushion at the far end of the sofa. She had spent some time tending to herself. The blush emphasized the sanguine complexion, the black hair was in a cultivated shag that suggested wildness under control. Her dark, wide-set eyes were accented with liner, shadow, and mascara.
She took a breath and said, 'I thought Pam and I might really have something special. And we do, or did. I gave her all my love, and believe me, Lassiter, it's a lot. You have no idea how hot I burn, the depth of my passion.'
She looked at me with eyes both smoldering and vulnerable. It was a new look, as if she had been playing a role, tough and loose, and now something else had opened up, sensitive and giving. As for the depths of her passion, if I didn't know now, the look said I might soon learn.
'Now Pam wants to know all about you and me,' she said.
'A short conversation.'
'That's what I told her, the truth, that you arouse me and I flirted with you, but you never responded.'
'I responded, but you're married, and even if you weren't, it would be a conflict of interest with the investigation going on.'
I patted myself on the back, gave myself the discretion-is-the-better-part-of-ardor award. Then I realized I wasn't investigating anything anymore. I had been fired. I was supposed to give blood but said to hell with it. I was supposed to turn in my gun, but Cindy couldn't find it. Now, revising the equation, the only hang-up was that Bobbie Blinderman was married.
And promiscuous.
And bisexual.
And her husband may be a maniac who kills anyone who dallies with her.
Other than that, we were made for each other.
'Pam doesn't believe me,' Bobbie said, her eyes on the paddle fan, seemingly hypnotized by the churning blades. 'She's obsessed with the thought that you and I are lovers…'
She let it hang there, and unspoken words passed between us. And if she believes it's true, why not make it true? Because, I reminded myself, she's married, promiscuous, and bisexual, and her husband…and so on and so forth.
And another reason, too, Lassiter, old buddy. The days of easy flesh are gone, my friend. Oh, a guy with an itch can still find an evening's diversion, just a bar stool or computer terminal away. There was a time when even a semi-tough linebacker knew every nightspot in the AFC East and most of the barmaids therein. But no more road trips, groupies fluttering in the lobby bar, then up the service elevator for curfew-busting pregame revelry. It's not the seventies anymore. The sexual revolution has been repealed by a vote of the electorate. And not just because of communicable rashes and deadly viruses. There's an old-fashioned word that makes us smart guys wince: morality. Or if that's too self-righteous for you, remember the flip side. Chilly awakenings in strange beds, the harsh light of morning, and not a word to say. What was her name: Susie, Sandy, Mandy, Candy? A flight attendant or travel agent or cosmetics salesgirl who liked opera or Cancun or hockey. Hey, it's hard enough when you're aglow with the buzz of someone special and it turns out to be a false alarm. No use sighing and sweating just for the exercise.
Jake Lassiter, number fifty-eight, placed on waivers, emotionally unable to perform. Refuses to hit and run. Welcome to the grown-up world, Lassiter. I'm almost proud of you, buddy.
'Look, I don't mean to be rude,' I said, 'but I've got other things on my mind besides your relationship with Pam.'
'Such as?'
'Where's Max?'
She shrugged.
'I mean, if he's following you around, maybe I ought to find my Louisville Slugger, get ready-'
'I told him not to bother you again,' Bobbie said.
'How considerate. Did you tell him not to bother Alex Rodriguez?'
She looked puzzled, so I told her. She kept shaking her head and biting her lower lip. 'What time did it happen?'
'ME says between noon and three p.m. yesterday.' Bobbie let her face relax. 'Max was in the office all afternoon. He drove me back from Key Biscayne after your…disagreement, and we worked all day.'
