“I’m sorry,” she said again. “I just don’t give my personal number out to anyone. I mean, like, four people have it. You seem like a normal guy, but I don’t know you.”
“You’re absolutely right,” I said, and I meant it. The more careful she was, the better. “You’ve got my number. Call me if anything happens. If I need to get in touch with you, how about I leave a message for you here?”
She nodded, and got up. “John-” She lowered her voice. “Do you think Randy was right? Part of me thinks she was just making this stuff up and now I’m getting sucked into her fantasy. But someone killed her, and if it’s the guy I’m working for, I could be in real danger.”
This time the reassurance came out before I could stifle it. “I think you’re pretty safe, Rachel. Even if he did kill her – and I don’t know, it doesn’t sound right, why would he do it on the roof of his own building? – but even if he did, I don’t think he’s going to try it again anytime soon, not while the police are watching the place. You’re probably safer there than anywhere in the city.”
She nodded, wanting to believe. Then she said, quietly, “It’s Susan.”
“What?”
“You called me Rachel. That’s for the clubs. My name’s Susan.” She held her hand out, and this time I took it.
I watched her go, then paid the check and left myself. The streets were dark, or anyway as dark as it ever gets in Manhattan. Storefronts kept the avenue well lit, but on the side streets it was another story. Streetlamps left pools of light at regular intervals up and down the sidewalk, but outside these pools it was all shadows.
I stepped out between two parked cars and walked in the street itself. I don’t know why I do this. It’s not clear that it reduces my risk – if anything, it adds the risk of getting run down by a car to whatever risk of a bad encounter I might have on the sidewalk. But somehow it makes me feel safer when I’m not hemmed in by shuttered buildings on one side and empty cars on the other.
Tonight I had it easy: there were no people and no cars. You could hear some honking in the distance, and occasionally the squeal of a set of tires gripping the pavement, but that was in the distance. This block was mine and mine alone.
Halfway between Eighth and Seventh Avenues, my cell phone rang. At first I couldn’t make out the voice of the man on the other end, but when I covered my other ear his voice became clearer.
“-my daughter. Mr. Blake? Are you there?”
“I’m here. Who is this?”
“Daniel Mastaduno. You sent a fax with your phone number on it. Is this a bad time to call?”
“No, it’s fine,” I said. It took a second for the name to click. Mastaduno. The roommate. “Your daughter is Jocelyn Mastaduno?”
“That’s right.”
“Where is she? Can I talk to her?”
“I was hoping you could tell me. We haven’t heard from Jocelyn in six years, Mr. Blake. Do you have any idea where she is?”
Six years? “No,” I said. “I-”
The punch came from behind, and it landed square in my kidney. The phone flew from my hand and clattered against the door of a car. I dropped to my knees and took a boot in the stomach that knocked out of me what little breath I’d had left. Another kick dug deep into my gut, and then another. My chest was pounding and my side was screaming with pain. I wanted to move, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t breathe. It was all I could do to keep from throwing up.
Ten feet away, my phone lay on its side, chirping, “Hello? Hello? Mr. Blake?”
A gloved hand gripped my hair, pulled my head off the ground. I felt a pair of lips brush my ear. “Leave it alone, man, or next time they’ll make me give you more than a warning.”
The hand laid my head down gently. The cell phone was silent now. No cars came.
Chapter 8
The look of pity Leo gave me was almost worse than the beating.
“How do you let a guy get close enough to you to land a punch without noticing?”
“I was on the phone, I told you.”
“Goddamn cell phones,” he said, “how many times have I told you-”
“Lots of times. It’s enough.”
“It’s not enough! Look at you!”
“Leo, please. I want you to put me in touch with someone who can tell me about Murco Khachadurian. Someone on the force.”
“Anyone I knew on the force retired five years ago, and I’ll tell you something else – if I did know someone, I wouldn’t ask him to help you. I’m not going to help you go and get yourself killed.”
“I’m not going to get myself killed.”
“Stand up and say that,” he said.
I was lying flat on my back on the leather couch in our reception area. I’d made it to the office because it was closer to the Sin Factory than my apartment, and getting in didn’t require me to climb any stairs. Spending the night on the couch had left me with a stiff neck that I hadn’t had before, but at least the pain in my stomach was a little less intense. My side still felt like someone was sticking in a knife in me any time I turned, and standing up was out of the question.
Leo had found an old hot water bottle in the bottom of one of his desk drawers and he’d filled the thing with water he’d heated in the coffee maker. It had gone cold in the meantime, but it was too much trouble to get it out from under me. He’d also fed me a glass of whiskey, and between the red rubber pad under my back and the rocks tumbler in my hand, I felt like my own grandfather.
“Khachadurian’s involved,” I said. “Whether he killed Miranda or not, he’s part of what happened, and I’m going to talk to him.”
“What are you going to do, call him on your cell phone?”
“Yes. That’s exactly what I’m going to do. I got a number for him from his brother, and if that doesn’t work I’ll get another number somewhere else.”
“I should never have trained you,” Leo said.
“Leo, I’m going to find the man and I’m going to talk to him, and if he killed Miranda, I’m going to bring him in. All I’m asking is, before I make the call, I want to know more about him. The more I know, the better the chances I come out of it in one piece.”
“Have another drink.”
I set my glass down on the floor. “I don’t want another drink. I didn’t even want the first one. All I want is some information. If you don’t help me, I’ll get it some other way. But don’t tell me you can’t get it because you don’t know anyone anymore. You’re not that out of touch.”
Leo took the glass, refilled it, and put it back within arm’s reach. “Here’s a deal. When you can make it to the bathroom on your own, no promises, but I’ll make a few calls.”
I tried to sit up, winced as the pain shot through me.
“When,” Leo said.
“Yeah. When.” I lay back down.
By midday, I could stand on my own, as long as I leaned against the back of a chair. At one, Leo brought me a turkey sandwich and a Snapple, and at three I was leaning against the bathroom door, pissing it away. It was excruciating. But I came back from the bathroom as proud of myself as a newly toilet-trained toddler.
“Zip up,” Leo said.
“You’ll want to start making those calls now,” I said.
I went back to the couch while he went into the other room to work the phone. The truth was that he probably didn’t know anyone still on the force – his contemporaries were all out of the game one way or the other, retired or dead, and even the rookies who’d shaken his hand at his retirement party were probably coming up on
