Broadbent. Ring any bells.”
“Nope.”
“Malik beat his girl into the long hereafter by only a few weeks.” Klein made a gun of his forefinger and thumb, pressing the barrel to my temple. “Took a few to the noggin.”
“Sorry,” I said. “It’s not helping.”
Bento exploded. “Look, asshole, I don’t care if you was a cop in this house. I don’t care if you built the fuckin’ place. I don’t care if you was a friend of the chief’s. We got a witness places you at the scene.”
“Really? Anyone claiming I did this?” I asked, pointing at the crime scene photos.
“You’re here to answer questions, not ask ’em.”
“Listen, I’m not saying I wasn’t in the neighborhood last night. I was, but I had no connection to this poor woman.”
The light switched on in Klein’s head. “What were you doing there?”
“Basketball.”
“Basketball what?”
“I had dinner with my friend at Nathan’s and then I dropped him off at the courts over by the projects. I couldn’t find a spot by the courts, so I parked on a side street a few blocks away. I walked back to the courts and watched through the fence for a while. When my friend was done, I drove him back to his car and then I went home.”
“This friend of yours got a name?” Klein asked.
“Preacher Simmons.”
Bento’s eyes got big. “Preacher ‘the Creature’ Simmons?”
“Yeah, we’re friends. We play in two-on-two tournaments sometimes. We were scouting this kid to maybe play with us on a three-man team.”
“Kid got a name?”
“Probably, but I don’t know it. They call him Nugget.”
“Big-headed, dark-skinned nigger, about fifteen, with quick hands and a wicked crossover dribble?” Bento asked, “nigger” rolling off his tongue as easily as “Merry Christmas.” “I go down there and watch sometimes. That boy got some game.”
“That’s him.”
Klein looked like he swallowed someone else’s throw-up. “Before you two start humping each other. .”
Bento flushed, chastened by his partner.
“Anybody see you at the courts?” Klein continued.
“I don’t know. Like I said, I watched from outside the fence. Preacher was the one playing in the games. I didn’t make small talk with anyone, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Hey, partner,” Klein turned to Bento, “you seem to know every fucking thing about these courts. What time they close up shop down there?”
“Officially, like ten, but I seen games go on there till midnight sometimes.”
Klein thought about that for a second, opened his note pad and said, “Midnight, huh? Well, the 9-1-1 call came in at 12:52. Our witness says she saw your car pull out around that time.”
“What can I tell you, Detective? Your witness is wrong. Like I said, I was definitely around the neighborhood, but. .”
“That’s your story?” Klein prodded.
“That’s it.”
“All right. Get outta here. Detective Bento’ll give you a ride back to your house.”
“That’s okay. I’ll take the subway. It’s only a few stops.”
“Have it your way.”
I stood to go and made it as far as the door before Klein stopped me.
“You know I don’t believe a word of that bullshit story. It’s gonna fall apart the minute we start checking into it.”
“Look, Detective, I’m an ex-cop, a successful businessman with a family, two cars, and mortgage. Not for nothing, but what the fuck would I want with the hooker-ex-girlfriend of some small-time drug dealer?”
“That’s the million-dollar question, ain’t it?”
Carmella Melendez was waiting for me in the shadow of the el. I wanted to run in the other direction. Between the longing and guilt, I could barely breathe. And the stress she wore on her face made it worse. It angered me. She hadn’t earned the right to be that upset on my behalf. Who was this woman to worry about me? Only Katy had
Melendez said something, but I couldn’t hear her for the screeching and squealing of a train above our heads. Sparks rained down into the false darkness that shrouded us. As a kid I was fascinated by the grinding of steel wheels against steel tracks, at how the grinding produced sparks like shooting stars, shooting stars that burned so brightly and so briefly against the shadows beneath the el that ran along Brighton Beach Avenue. Standing close enough to feel her warm breath on my face, I also felt an overwhelming discomfort. It wasn’t guilt, not this time. There was something in her eyes, the same things I’d seen the other night, something both frightened and frightening. I was so lost in her eyes that I barely noticed the deafening rumble had faded into a distant, almost pleasant clickety-clack.
“Are you all right?”
“For now,” I said. “My story won’t hold up for long. You made the call, right?”
“I did. What did you tell them?”
“Basically that I came down to watch some basketball.”
“Did they buy it?”
“Would you?”
“No.”
“Let’s talk, but not here,” I said.
“Where? I only have about an hour and I can’t be seen with you.”
I turned and pointed toward the ocean and began walking away. “Meet me in the aquarium in five minutes.”
Wedged between the boardwalk and Surf Avenue, the West Fifth Street handball courts and the Cyclone, the New York Aquarium was no more than a hundred yards away from where Melendez and I had stood beneath the subway station, and not more than two hundred yards from the front door of the 60th Precinct. In spite of the aquarium’s proximity to the Six-O, it was highly unlikely we’d run into anyone we knew. The only time I’d ever been there in uniform was back in ’74, when Ferguson May and I had to pull some drunk out of the seal enclosure. But as a dad I’d been there many times, taking Sarah at least once or twice a summer.
Strolling around the grounds, just two anonymous adults lost in a sea of school kids and their bored-to-tears teachers, I told Melendez about what Preacher had picked up at the courts and about my meeting with Kalisha Pardee. But as I spoke about what had transpired during the previous evening, I realized there was very little of substance to tell.
That seemed to be par for the course, because when I looked at the big picture, there was no big picture. It was more like a random collection of splotches on an artist’s studio floor. People were being murdered, but I’d be damned if I knew why or how the homicides were related.
I stopped at the tank where the rays and small sharks lived out their time, and leaned over the railing to watch them swim. I turned to look back at Melendez, who had stopped several feet short of the tank.
“Sarah, my little girl, she loves to watch them swim,” I said. “When she was really little, I used to worry that she’d jump in just to swim with them.”
“Don’t worry about me, Moe. I ain’t jumping in. I hate the water.”
“The ocean?”
“Uh huh.”
“Pools?”
“Especially pools.”
“Really, why?”
