“Wouldn’t you like a nice hotel with a big TV and room service, Herbie?” Stone asked.
“Well, sure, but I’d like to get laid now and then.”
“We don’t provide that service,” the other voice said. “You’ll have to talk to a bellhop about that.”
“Herbie,” Stone said soothingly, “there’s nothing you can’t get sent to a hotel room. You can order Chinese or pizza; you can order a girl with her own donkey.”
“Donkey? Why would she want a donkey?”
“Herbie, it’s just an illustration of the wide world that’s available to you from a hotel room. Tell you what, I’ll call the D.A. and see if I can get you a suite.”
“Well, that would be better,” Herbie said, but he still sounded doubtful. “Can my girlfriend visit me?”
“Do you have a girlfriend, Herbie?”
“Not at the moment.”
“Well, then, whether she can visit you is kind of a moot point, isn’t it? You remember
“Uh, yeah, sure. What about my clothes?”
“I’m sure the nice policeman would be happy to stop by your apartment and let you pick up some essentials. My advice is, take lots of pajamas. Pajamas are good to wear when you’re swanning around a hotel suite.”
“Sort of like Hef, huh?”
“Exactly like Hef, Herbie. Look at it this way: You’ll be safe, you’ll be comfortable and you can have anything you want to eat, and the D.A. pays the bills. All that and cable with pay-per-view movies.”
“Will the D.A. pay for the movies, too?”
“Just charge it to the room, Herbie. And when you’re all settled in, you might give me a call and let me know what hotel you’re in.”
“Okay.”
“But Herbie, it’s very, very important that you don’t tell anyone else but me what hotel you’re in. You see that, don’t you?”
“Yeah, okay.”
“Enjoy, Herbie.” Stone hung up and called Dierdre Monahan. “Dierdre, your men have located Herbie Fisher.”
“I heard, Stone; they work for me, remember?”
“Of course. Listen, kiddo, the boy is going to need a suite.”
“A
“Dierdre, the kind of hotel you stash witnesses in doesn’t charge much more for a suite than for a room, and you’re going to have to have a couple of cops on duty there, and they’ll want someplace to hang out. You don’t want to trap them in one room with Herbie Fisher; they’ll blow their brains out.”
She was silent for a moment. “You have a point there.”
“And I’m sure the D.A.’s office can get a really good rate from the hotel.”
“I guess.”
“And Dierdre, don’t take the kid’s cell phone away from him. It’s a throwaway and untraceable, so Dattila can’t find him that way.”
“I got Dattila held without bail,” she said.
Stone could hear her grinning. “That’s great, kiddo!”
“When are we going to, you know, again?”
“Whenever you say; just call.”
“Will do.”
“And be nice to my client.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” She hung up.
Joan buzzed him. “I’ve got Bob Cantor holding on two.”
Stone pressed the button. “Bob? What’s up?”
“I got good news and bad news,” Cantor said.
“Bad news first, please.”
“Bernie Finger has put the penthouse on the market.”
“That is bad news,” Stone agreed. “You think he’s really going to give up the girlfriend and go back to his wife?”
“You haven’t heard the good news. The girlfriend is shopping for a new apartment with the same agent who’s listing the penthouse.”
“Well, I guess she’s got to live somewhere. How is that good news?”
“She’s looking at apartments she could never afford, that’s how. Bernie can afford them, though.”
“That
“Oh, yeah.” Cantor hung up.
Stone toyed with the idea of calling Mrs. Finger and telling her about the masseuse’s search for shelter. No, he thought, not yet; not while Bernie is still being sweet to her. Wait until the girl finds a place and moves in; then Bernie will suddenly start working nights again. Stone would be patient.
49
Dino walked through the detectives’ squad room at the 19th Precinct, tapped one of his people on the shoulder and motioned toward his office. He settled behind his desk and watched the new detective walk toward him.
“Have a seat,” he said. “How tall are you?”
“Six foot, two, Boss.”
“How long you had the gold shield?”
“Three weeks, Boss.”
“You don’t have to call me ‘Boss’ all the time, just sometimes. Try Dino.”
“Three weeks, Dino.”
“How would you like to do a little undercover work?”
The detective’s eyes brightened. “I’d love it, Boss. Uh, Dino.”
“You know why I picked you for this assignment?”
The detective looked thoughtful for a moment. “Does it have something to do with how tall I am?”
“That, and how beautiful you are,” Dino said. “And I don’t mean that in a sexual harrassment way. What’s your first name, Detective?”
“Willa.”
“As in Willa she or won’ta she?”
“Gee, I hadn’t heard that one before, Dino. Uh, Boss. What kind of undercover are we talking about?”
“The dangerous kind.”
“Goes with the territory, I guess.”
“Let me explain, Willa. There’s a corpse out in New Jersey, a very beautiful, six-foot, three-inch woman, and it has only recently been reunited with its head. It’s very likely that she was murdered by someone sent by a man named Devlin Daltry.”
“The sculptor?”
“If you’ve heard of the guy you’re a lot more artsy-fartsy than I am. Yeah, the sculptor. The guy has a history of obsessing over women, stalking them and doing violence to other men who are interested in them. He’s not a very big guy, but he seems to have a thing for tall women who are also beautiful.”
“I get the picture,” Willa said.
“I want you to study up on him, then place yourself in his way and see what happens.”
Willa straightened her skirt and looked uncomfortable. “Do I have to fuck him?”
“Of course not. Do you think I would order a detective to fuck somebody in the line of duty?”
She thought about it for a moment. “I guess not.”
“That would be very unprofessional, even if it was a good idea in the context of the thing.”
