Troy marched me into the large all-brick building on Mill Road. I took in only the foggiest details: uniformed cops, laughter, scents of coffee and pizza, harsh fluorescent lighting. Snippets of conversations bounced off my eardrums without sinking in. “… since the Redskins traded for McNabb… court appearance tomorrow… can’t believe she slept with… vacation days this year.” None of it made sense. My being here didn’t make sense. I hadn’t killed Rafe.
I clung to that thought as the very polite policeman who had cuffed me led me to a small room with a square white table, three plastic chairs, and bare tan walls. He removed the handcuffs and left, ignoring me when I said, “Don’t I get one phone call?” As the sound of his footsteps faded, I rushed to the door and tried it. Locked.
My brain refused to focus, dwelling on depressing images of life as an inmate and speculating about how the world would be changed when I got out of prison as an octogenarian. I stewed for half an hour before the door opened. Scrambling nervously out of the uncomfortable chair I sat in, ready to leave, I sank back down as detectives Lissy and Troy came in.
“Thank you for making time to talk to us, Miss Graysin,” Detective Lissy said. He pulled out the chair across from me and sat the way my great-aunt Laurinda did, feet flat on the floor, knees together, spine erect. Troy stayed near the door, shoulders propped against the wall.
“It didn’t seem like I had much choice,” I said. “Am I under arrest?”
“We found this yesterday, in the sewer near your house,” Lissy said, thunking a plastic bag with a gun in it onto the table. He aligned it so the bag’s edges paralleled the table’s sides and slid it over to me. “Look familiar?”
I studied the gun through the gallon-sized baggie. “It looks kind of like mine,” I said cautiously. “Mine was silver on top like that, and black on the bottom.” I pulled the bag closer to me with one wary finger. “And mine had that P22 stamped on it, too.”
Troy choked on what sounded like a laugh, then hammered his chest with a fist. “Getting a cold,” he explained.
Lissy didn’t even glance at his partner. “It’s a Walther P22,” he told me. “They all have that stamped on them. Nice little semiautomatic pistol. Ballistics tells us it’s the gun that killed Rafael Acosta. Guess whose fingerprints are on it.”
“Um, the murderer’s?” I asked hopefully.
He smiled, an unpleasant, tight-lipped smile. “Exactly, Miss Graysin. Yours.”
I gasped.
“So why don’t we go over that evening again,
“No!”
“No, it wasn’t self-defense? Now we’re getting somewhere.”
“No is just no. It wasn’t self-defense because it wasn’t anything. I didn’t kill Rafe.”
Someone knocked on the door and Troy opened it a crack. A brief, whispered conversation followed before Troy swung the door wider with a rueful look at his partner. “Her lawyer,” he said.
“My lawyer?” It was news to me that I had a lawyer. I turned to the door and saw a huge grizzly of a man with a full beard, vest stretched taut by a heavy paunch, and graying hair brushed back and wavy to his shoulders like in pictures I’d seen of General Custer. He looked to be in his late sixties and carried a slim leather case.
“Phineas Drake,” he announced in a rumbling voice, not offering to shake anyone’s hand. He didn’t even glance at me as he told Lissy, “Ms. Graysin has nothing further to say at this time.”
Lissy rose, at a distinct physical disadvantage before the ursine Drake. “Perhaps you’re unaware that the murder weapon has her fingerprints on it. We have enough to arrest her.”
I wasn’t under arrest? That was news, too-good news. Phineas Drake laughed, a sound like rolling timpani. “She owns the gun. Of course it has her fingerprints on it. Are hers the only prints on the gun?”
“Acosta’s were on there, too, but since this clearly wasn’t a suicide, that’s not germane.”
“Any others?”
Lissy squirmed. The lawyer seemed to enjoy the detective’s discomfort.
“I am not obligated to share details of an ongoing investigation with you.”
“I’ll take that as a ‘yes,’ ” Drake said good-humoredly. “Clearly, the gun was stolen and someone else used it to murder the unfortunate Mr. Acosta. Even a first-year law student could trump that argument, Detective. She had no GSR on her hands that night and no motive for killing Mr. Acosta.”
“No motive?” Lissy laughed a slight
“But I didn’t,” I said, glad for the first time that Rafe had changed his will. All three men looked at me. “His… A relative gets Rafe’s half of Graysin Motion.”
Lissy flushed an ugly puce shade. “You gave us a copy of his will, Miss Graysin, that named you as the beneficiary.”
“It was an old one,” I said airily.
“There you have it,” Phineas Drake said with an approving nod at me. “Let’s go, Ms. Graysin.”
“Jenkins was checking to make sure the will was the most current one,” Troy told Lissy. From the look on Lissy’s face, I felt sorry for Jenkins for not coming up with the more recent will.
“His name is Octavio Acosta,” I supplied helpfully. “He said he talked to you.”
“He didn’t mention inheriting the dance studio,” Troy put in as Lissy’s color deepened.
“Perhaps you forgot to ask,” I said sweetly, rising with as much self-possession as was possible in the tangerine leggings and sweaty tank top I’d worn to dance with Vitaly.
Phineas Drake held out a peremptory hand and escorted me from the room before I could antagonize the detectives further. He said nothing as he ushered me through the police department and out the doors into a day that had clouded over and was sticky with humidity. A white limo idled at the curb and he gestured me to it, climbing in after me.
“Thank you very much, Mr. Drake,” I said as he settled his bulk on the rear seat and reached for a bottle of champagne chilling in a silver bucket. The limo was so big I was surprised it didn’t come with a steward. Drake popped the cork silently, releasing a faint aroma of pear to mix with the scent of expensive leather perfuming the limo’s interior. I accepted the glass he handed me, watching the bubbles ascend through the cut crystal.
“Thank your uncle.”
“Uncle Nico?” I stared at him in astonishment. “How did he know I was here?”
“As I understand it, a Mr. Maurice Goldberg called your mother and she called Mr. Papadakis at his vacation home in Spain. He asked me to wander over and liberate you.”
“Do you work for Uncle Nico?” I asked.
The big man smiled. “From time to time.”
“You look expensive,” I said frankly, taking a gulp of champagne. The beverage might be meant for sipping, but I’d had a morning that required swigging. “I probably can’t afford you.”
“Don’t worry about it. Your uncle is taking care of my fees. As a favor.” He smiled, crinkling his cheeks below his eyes.
I knew what that meant. Uncle Nico was all about tit for tat. I’d owe him one. A big one. The thought gave me a moment of unease, but I was so glad Phineas Drake had gotten me out of the police station that I let it drift away. Time enough to worry when Uncle Nico showed up to claim his favor.
Phineas Drake’s face turned serious. “This morning was all about frightening a confession out of you, Ms. Graysin.”
“Stacy,” I said, finishing my champagne. “And they certainly succeeded with the ‘frightening’ part of their agenda. I was good and scared. Still am. What’s a GSR and how did you know about it?”
“A gunshot residue test. Did they swab your hands the night of the murder?” At my nod, he said, “Standard procedure. I knew the results were negative or I’d’ve been rescuing you from the city lockup, not a cozy interview room.”
His definition of “cozy” was a long ways away from mine, but I didn’t argue the point. “What do we do now?”
Drake set his champagne flute on the burled wood table beside him. “We give the police another suspect, someone besides you.”
