wavy black hair. His dark eyes took in Pearl with obvious interest. She saw that he was wearing leather deck shoes without socks. He was thirty-five, according to Pearl's information, but he might have passed for twenty-five. Pearl thought smoldering would describe him pretty well. Maybe there was something to this C and C operation.
She introduced herself, and they shook hands.
'You're a detective?' he asked, as she approached. 'Like on Law and Order?'
'Uh-huh. Just like.'
Levin stepped aside so she could enter, then closed the door and motioned for her to sit on a light tan leather sofa. There were matching chairs and a low coffee table the size of a small airport. Works of modern art hung on the walls. They were mostly prints, but a few were definitely oils, and something about them suggested they'd been carefully chosen.
Pearl sat. 'Nice apartment.'
'I hired a decorator,' Levin said. 'A few years ago, when things were going well.'
'Things aren't going well now?' Pearl asked.
Levin shrugged. 'You know, Wall Street. I worked for Lehman Brothers, and then a smaller firm after Lehman went under. Five months ago the smaller firm went under.'
'So you're unemployed?'
He smiled. ''Fraid so. But the smaller firm ran hedge funds and I walked away with scads of money, so unemployment doesn't stop me from offering you something to drink.'
'These hedge funds were legal?'
'Barely. Coffee? Something stronger?'
'Water would be good,' Pearl said.
She watched him walk into the kitchen. So slender and athletic. On a tall bookcase near a window was what looked like a skiing trophy.
'You ski competitively?' she asked, when he returned with a tumbler of water with crushed ice in it.
'Used to,' Levin said. 'Downhill slalom. Till I tore up one of my knees a few years ago.'
'That's too bad.' Pearl sipped her ice water. She remained on the sofa. Levin remained standing. 'Do you recognize this woman?' she asked, and stretched out an arm to hand him a photograph of Lilly Branston.
She watched his handsome face as he studied the photo. If he did recognize Branston, there was no sign of it.
He handed the photo back to Pearl. 'She looks vaguely familiar, but I don't think I know her.'
'Her name's Lilly Branston.'
He looked a little less blank.
'She's the Carver's latest murder victim.'
He looked genuinely surprised and then smacked his forehead with the heel of his hand. 'Jesus! Yes. Of course. I think I might have seen that photo-or one like it. There's a bulletin board in the subway stop. It's got her name and photo on it. Said something about her being missing, I thought.'
'No,' Pearl said, 'must be another woman on the subway wall. Lilly Branston isn't missing. We know right where she is-in the morgue.'
Levin made an ineffective pass at looking appropriately grieved, and then he appeared puzzled.
'What?' he asked. 'I should care more than I do?'
'I don't know how much you care.'
'Not much, tell you the truth. Of course I feel sorry for the victim, but I don't get overemotional about that kind of thing. I mean, about a woman I never met. Is there some connection with me? Did she live around here?'
'Not far away.' Pearl placed her water glass on a cork coaster, part of a stack placed for convenience on the coffee table. The table was oak and gave the impression that it might be antique and expensive. 'Have you ever used the services of an Internet matchmaking company called Coffee and Conversation?'
She watched the changes in his eyes. He was thinking furiously. Wondering how he might possibly be involved. Or wondering how to lie so he'd seem uninvolved.
'That Lilly Branston!' he said.
'The dead one,' Pearl said.
'She was next on a list of women I was going to get in touch with.' Levin began to pace, three steps this way, three back, swiveling neatly on the plush carpet. The leather soles of his deck shoes looked as if they'd never been outside. 'I didn't mean to lie to you. It came to me gradually who she is. Was. Lately I've looked at a lot of photos of a lot of women.'
'So you've met a number of women through Coffee and Conversation.'
'No, only two. I'm very selective. I've been divorced for three years. I've learned to be careful about my relationships. Maybe too careful.' He made a sweeping motion with an arm to take in the vast, well-furnished living room. 'As you can see, I'm what you'd call more than reasonably wealthy.'
'You're concerned that women might be after your money instead of you?'
'Yes. But only insofar as they might turn out to be a waste of my time. Fact is, I wouldn't want a woman who didn't at least take my wealth into consideration. I like very smart, very aggressive women. When I saw that Lilly Branston was a real estate agent with the Willman Group, I knew she had to be both those things.' Levin tried a smile. 'Have you ever noticed how aggressive female real estate agents are?'
'Like female cops,' Pearl said.
He gave her a speculative up-and-down look. 'I do read the papers. It's interesting that a cop who's the serial killer's type-and quite beautiful, I will add-is searching for the monster. Kind of like the baitfish seeking the shark.'
'We won't go to that part of the ocean,' Pearl said. 'We were talking about your search for a soul mate.'
'Yes. Anyway, what I liked about Coffee and Conversation was that, if things didn't work out after your first meeting, there were no loose ends. I mean, nobody had anybody's address or phone number. Maybe not even their real name. They had only rudimentary information, and maybe the photo that was on the C and C website, and that was it. Nobody was going to…'
'Stalk you?'
'Not so much that. More cling to me. I've found women to be clingy.'
'You're not short on ego.'
'No, I am not. But I do attract women on the hunt. That's why the C and C concept appealed to me. You contact C and C, and if the other party is willing, they set up a time and date for coffee and a get-acquainted meeting. You are literally strangers when you meet. If either of you so chooses, you can keep it that way.'
'Did your meetings with the first two women on your list go any further than caffeine and conversation?'
'No. I think I was way too aggressive for them.'
'You didn't mention their names.'
He gave Pearl two names that she jotted in her notepad. She would check later and make sure they were C and C clients.
Pearl placed her notepad and pencil in her lap. 'When you say you were 'too aggressive,' do you mean sexually? In your sexual practices?'
Levin stopped pacing and appeared genuinely shocked. 'No, no, nothing like that. What I mean is that I don't apologize for wanting to make even more money, for wanting even more prestige and power. More of everything. It's part of Darwinism, part of being human. Too many people don't accept that. You'd be surprised how many women out there want to turn the world green, or spray paint people wearing fur coats, or eat nothing but arugula lettuce and beans-and all to the exclusion of everything else.' He looked sincerely at Pearl. 'Detective, I don't give a flying flip if the world is two degrees hotter in twenty years or if the ocean rises six inches. I want to be the guy who gets rich building dikes.'
Pearl looked at him. Hoo, boy!
'So you were what…too honest for those women?'
He laughed. 'You might call it that. I don't want to get involved with any woman under false pretenses. Best to get our beliefs and ambitions out there in the beginning. Do I want to be fantastically wealthy and take over the
