The Ledger Page 18

  There was a loud bang and thump, followed by a hiss and blast of hot air from the radiator. It hit Reardon’s neck. “This goddamn heating system should have been overhauled years ago. We got the maintenance men coming up here any time this winter?”

  Stoney shrugged. “They’ve been notified. It’ll have to wait until Monday. We’re the only ones who work weekends.”

  “How’s Dudley doing on this little bum, LoMarco?”

  “He’s working with homicide. LoMarco has about sixteen witnesses who’ll swear he spent the night of Celia’s murder with them at a card game. There’s one possibility though. A weak link. Some guy with a warrant on him from Texas, relative to an old homicide. They’re working on him. Depends on what scares him most, LoMarco or Texas.”

  Reardon reached up impatiently. “Give me one of those damn things, will you Stoney?” He lit the cigarette, handed the matches back to the detective. “Back to Elena. She could still be a red herring. Or not. Damn it. It’s the ‘or not’ that’s got me. We could take her all the way to Puerto Rico and back and still not come up with a thing. Or she could be it.” He stared through the cigarette smoke for a moment, then rubbed at his eyes. “What was Opara rambling about? About Elena’s ‘real’ kid being adopted. She didn’t put anything about that in her report, did she? Why the hell didn’t she stick around long enough to bring her reports up to date?”

  “As I remember it, boss, you more or less threw her out.”

  Reardon’s eyes hardened into a glassy stare. He stubbed the cigarette out, glanced at his watch and lifted the receiver. The phone rang seven times before he replaced it.

  “Stoney,” he asked thoughtfully, “if you were Opara, where would you be?”

  “Well, I think I’d take my kid and go away for a few days. Anywhere, just to get out of town until Enzo Giardino forgot my name.”

  “Yeah,” Reardon said tersely. “That’s what you’d do if you were Opara. But you’re not.”

  18

  ELENA VARGAS LEANED CASUALLY against the long walnut stereo unit and ran her tongue around the rim of the glass in her hand. She admired the way Christie Opara dismissed Tonio with a quick, withering look but it was obvious she had expected to find Elena alone.

  Enzo Giardino did not seem as physically large as he had in the back seat of his Mercedes, but his face, revealed by the clear light in the room, was harder and more angular.

  “I asked you, Detective Opara, what you are doing here?” His tone indicated that he was not accustomed to repeating questions.

  Christie shrugged and her shoulder bag slipped to the floor. She picked it up awkwardly. Everything about her felt clumsy and awkward and, automatically, she let that feeling replace the deep grinding fear she had to hold down. And the almost overwhelming anger at her own stupidity: she never should have walked into this.

  “Well, Mr. Giardino, I tried to see Elena at the hotel but they told me she wasn’t there anymore. I was off yesterday, and nobody tells me anything. I mean, I’m away from my office for one day, everything changes but nobody notifies me.”

  It was her own voice, but fighter, higher, younger. She didn’t risk a glance at Elena; she had to maintain the tempo she was building. She fumbled at her pocketbook. Tonio swiftly placed himself between Christie and Giardino. Wordless, he stood, eyes level with hers. Christie leaned to one side and spoke to Giardino.

  “What’s he afraid of, Mr. Giardino? I was digging for the pictures you asked me to give Elena.”

  “Tonio LoMarco stepped aside but his face was a rigid, totally emotionless mask, his eyes fixed on Christie. “You came here just to give Elena those pictures?”

  Christie held out the envelope. “Yes. I’ve been carrying them around with me since the other night. ...”

  “What pictures?” Elena asked.

  Giardino held his hand up, held back her words. “Now, you tell me, Detective Opara, why would you do that? Why would you bother to bring the pictures here?”

  “Well,” Christie said, “if they were my pictures, I’d want to have them.” She glanced at Elena. “So, I figured that Elena would want to have them.”

  “No,” Giardino said softly, “no. There is more to it than that. Tonio, go and sit down, you make me nervous. What did your Mr. Reardon say when you told him about the pictures? That I gave you these pictures for Elena.”

  Automatically, the responses flooded her: mix in enough truth to keep it plausible; don’t he enough to make it obvious.

  “Well, Mr. Reardon said I was an idiot for having gotten into the car with you. He can be a very nasty man when he sets his mind to it.” The three of them stared at her, waiting. Christie took a deep breath and sounded girlish and young, not only because she strove for that effect but because her nerve was beginning to fail and she kept going, quickly.

  “Okay, here’s what you want to know. Reardon said the pictures were just a part of some plan or other you had for us to think that Elena was more involved in your activities than she is. That we were supposed to think you were trying to intimidate her, but that I have been more or less wasting my time.” She took the pictures out of the envelope and held them toward Elena. “He threw them back at me and practically threw me out of the office.” Elena did not move. Christie felt a long, cold stream of perspiration down the center of her spine. “Now, you would be wasting your time, Mr. Giardino, by asking me anything about what Reardon is doing, because I know as much about that as ...” She stopped suddenly. She was going too fast; too far. Beyond a certain point, she knew she couldn’t be convincing. She turned to Elena. “If they were pictures of my son, Elena, I’d sure want them.”

  Elena turned to Giardino. “When did these come, Frank? Why didn’t you send them to the hotel?” She reached, her eyes met Christie’s for a brief moment, then studied the photographs.

  Giardino snapped his fingers at Tonio, who went to the bar and mixed a drink. “I thought you might like to have them, Elena. You haven’t seen Raphael in a while. They change so rapidly, boys his age, and you don’t want to forget him.” He sipped the drink and nodded his satisfaction to Tonio.

  Elena whispered something in Spanish, her face down as she studied the pictures. “You didn’t have to do this, Frank,” she said. Her eyes had brightened, her voice went low. “You think there is something wrong with my memory, eh, Frank, so you have to remind me, with these.” She held the photographs up before him. “Ah, does my memory worry you Frank?”

  “Shut up, Elena!” His hand swung back and Christie thought he was going to strike the girl, but Elena stood, unmoving, head held high.

  “You don’t talk to me like that, Enzo Giardino. You talk to that little animal over there, like that.” She turned to Tonio and snapped her fingers. “Here, Tonio. Run and fetch. Open and close! Go and stay! Stand and sit! To him,” she said directly to Giardino, “you say shut up, but not to Elena Vargas!”

  Christie held her breath, tried to calculate not only what would happen next but what she would do next. Tonio regarded Elena stonily, nothing registered, nothing showed.

  Giardino’s jawline worked: there was a pulling and a tensing and his sallow face seemed darker. His effort at control was obvious, the words he spoke were not the words he wanted to speak.

  “Elena, don’t you think Tonio has any feelings? Those are not nice things to say about him.”

  Elena moved to Tonio, stood directly in front of him. “Do you have feelings, animal? Eh? What kind of feelings? What gives you your kicks, baby?” She leaned her head back, so that her throat was exposed. “Wouldn’t it be fun, Tonio?” With her index finger she jabbed along her throat and into her breasts. “Bam, bam, a little at a time. Look at him, Enzo. Look at his face. Nothing gets to him except ...”

  Christie’s thigh slammed into a table. She had been moving, carefully edging around them so that there would be nothing between her and the door. But Elena’s performance had been so extraordinary, had held her attention. The lamp pitched forward and Christie
caught it before it hit the floor.

  They all turned to her, as though she had been forgotten. Enzo Giardino seemed filled with rage, but a rage deeper than any Christie could have caused him. She sensed this; he turned on her because he could not, for some reason, turn on Elena.

  “Ah, you. You detective.” His voice was filled with scorn. “You’re a filthy little liar, that’s what you are. Out there,” he moved a thumb over his shoulder, “out there they make you feel like a big shot, eh? They give you a gun that shoots real bullets and a shiny little badge. You didn’t come up here to give Elena those pictures, so don’t think I believe your crap about that.” He slowed down, seemed to regain control of himself. He took a careful swallow from his glass and turned to Tonio. “You make the drink just right, Tonio. Just right.” His eyes, half closed, hooded, moved slowly from Tonio to Christie. He jerked his head toward the door. “All right, little big shot. You go now.”

  Christie moved uncertainly, then stopped and looked directly at Enzo Giardino. “Sorry to have bothered you, Mr. Giardino. Goodbye, Elena.”

  She heard the fingers snap behind her but didn’t look back: she couldn’t look back. Tonio reached the door before she did. He opened the door and stepped back.

  “Thank you, Tonio,” Christie said.

  Then Enzo Giardino was at the door and Tonio was in the hallway with her. His voice was a low hissing sound. “Tonio will ride down in the elevator with you.”

  Christie shook her head. “No. No, that won’t be necessary.”

  Giardino’s face, in the shadows, was haggard and hollowed by some terrible hunger. “Yes,” he told her softly. “It will be necessary. It’s a long way down to the street. You never know what kind of creep might be prowling around a large building like this. Tonio will take care of you.” The door slammed shut and Christie heard the chain lock slide into place.

  The hall was long and narrow and low ceilinged. The musty odor of cleaning fluid rose from the carpeted floor. The light was dim and under the relentless soft music which emanated from unseen speakers there was virtually no sound.

  They were in an isolated, insulated, heavy-aired tubular chamber. Tonio stayed to her right and Christie paced herself so that he was slightly ahead of her. He pushed at the elevator button. Christie looked for an exit. She would be better off racing down the nine flights of stairs than getting into an elevator with Tonio. Tonio the creep. Maybe there would be other people on the elevator. Maybe ...

  The elevator was empty. Christie heard herself swallow but her mouth and throat were dry. Tonio pushed a button, but she couldn’t see which button. Her eyes went to the button marked “B.” Maybe he’d pushed the basement button. Maybe. Maybe not.

  There was no room to move. Anything she tried to do, he could block. God. Reardon was right. She was an idiot. She did need a keeper. She needed Casey Reardon, right now.

  Tonio LoMarco leaned against the elevator wall, folded his arms across his chest and watched her. There was a glow in his bright eyes and they moved rapidly over her body. His lips parted and he licked at them. It was the most animation he had displayed. His hands dropped to his sides and his fingers flexed. His eyes moved slowly over her, lingered, moved on. He nodded slightly, pulled away from the wall and moved his feet apart. It was a fighter’s stance: knees easy, body alert but at the same time relaxed. His head went down a bit, so that when he looked at Christie, it was from beneath his brows, wary and threatening.

  “Hey,” Tonio said, gravel voiced, “you ever seen a stiletto?”

  His right hand moved slowly, reached inside his jacket and held. But his eyes moved, rapidly flickered: excited, glowing, stupid monkey eyes intently searching her face for something.

  Not the pictures but the face of Celia came to her. Distorted by terror, punctured throat and body, round terrible wounds; stilettoed, by Tonio and Tonio’s stiletto. He is looking for my terror. It is what he needs. It is what he wants. She could not let herself think of where she was or what could happen; just of who she was and what must not happen.

  Christie pushed herself forward so that she was standing clear, three feet from Tonio. Slowly, deliberately, instinctively refusing his need, she hunched her shoulders forward, balanced with her feet slightly apart. She lowered her head and looked directly at Tonio. Her voice was a surprisingly perfect imitation of his, low and gravelly.

  “Nah. I never seen a stiletto. Ya got one ya wanna show me?”

  Tonio’s small eyes froze. A slow red flush burned upward from his cheeks. He suddenly rubbed the back of his hand across his mouth. “You son of a bitch of a broad,” he said. “You son of a bitch of a broad.” He rubbed his fist compulsively into the palm of his hand. “What makes you think you’re gonna leave this elevator alive?”

  “What makes you think my partner isn’t waiting for me in the lobby?”

  The elevator stopped and the door slid open. Tonio half turned, blocking her way. He breathed in short, loud, hard grunts and there were beads of perspiration along his upper lip. Christie held her pocketbook by the long leather loop, dropped it suddenly. Tonio’s eyes went down to the unexpected sound but Christie’s eyes stayed on his. She crashed her fist into the soft spot just below his jaw, felt the terrible rasp in his throat. She kicked at him, felt her boot contact some part of him.

  As he went down, Tonio’s hand reached, caught at the edge of her coat, then grasped at her ankle. Christie swung her pocketbook and hit the back of his head. He pulled at the pocketbook, almost brought her down, but she yanked away from him; had some fleeting impression of blood.

  She didn’t look back. She ran, straight through the lobby. She felt herself become an explosive force; slammed into some people, a man, a woman; the fragrance of perfume, the sound of outrage pursued her. Her shoulder hit the heavy glass door. She heard the doorman call after her, but all the sounds were lost in the sudden assault of cold wet night air, the slippery sidewalk. Her feet ran too fast for her body to fall. She hit into something, a street sign, then careened against two men, felt the impact of hard metal against her thigh as she smashed into a wastebasket and became entangled in a morass of newspapers and debris.

  Christie felt her breath hurt inside her chest with a deep shocking pain. She couldn’t gasp the air in deep enough to fill her lungs. There was a force holding her back, but not a nightmare force. It was a human force, a hard strong hand on her shoulder. She spun about, tried to pull herself free.

  “Christie! Christie, for God’s sake. Take it easy kid, it’s Tom Dell.”

  She nodded her head up and down, but was voiceless. Dell pulled her against him, led her to the car which was parked across the street from Elena’s apartment. She leaned her head against the car seat, closed her eyes for a moment and tried to concentrate on regulating her breath and her heartbeat, but Tom Dell was insistent.

  “Christie, what the hell happened? Where’d you come from? Come on, Christie, talk.”

  “Tonio. LoMarco. In the elevator. No. Wait, Tom. Wait.” She held his arm. “Don’t go after him. Let me catch my breath. Let me think a minute.”

  She held his arm, nodded at his questions.

  “You okay? He hurt you?” Then, assured she was not injured, Dell asked in a puzzled voice, “When did you get there? Christie, I’ve been here for the last three hours. Jesus, I never saw you go into that building. I’ve been on a stake-out and I never saw you.”

  It was one of the things that happens: you can sit for three hours, never taking your eyes away from a particular door. And then you can sneeze, or reach down to adjust the radio, or bend over to light a cigarette, or blink too long. And all the effort put into the three previous hours suddenly becomes worthless.

  Christie tightened her hand sympathetically on his arm, but she had her own reasons for telling him, “Tom, I think maybe we ought to keep it that way. I’ve never been here and you never saw me. Let me catch my breath and we’ll talk about it, okay?”

  19

  C ASEY REARDON SWALLOW
ED A mouthful of cold, dry hamburger, washed it down with some lukewarm coffee. Two buttons on his telephone lit up at exactly the same moment. He motioned to Stoney. “I’ll take the direct, you take the extension.”

  Wearily, Reardon listened to the State Commissioner’s investigator relay his latest information. “Hold it a minute, will you? I’ve got some notes on that somewhere. ...” His hand moved restlessly across his desk and pulled out the paper he sought.

  Stoner Martin leaned in from the doorway. “Casey, I think we’d better switch calls.”

  “Huh? What do you mean?”

  “Enzo Giardino is on the extension.”

  “Enzo Giardino?”

  “Yeah. And he wants to talk to you.”

  “Hold it a minute.” He spoke tersely into the telephone. “Listen, John, something just came up. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. Right.” Then, to the detective, “Get on the extension in the Squad Room. I don’t know what the hell he’s up to, but I want you to listen in.”

  Reardon waited a moment, then jabbed the button on the phone. “This is Reardon.”

  Giardino’s voice was hard and cold, a careful monotone which could not seem to quite control the slight trace of accent that kept intruding. “I don’t know what you think you accomplished, Reardon, but I’ll tell you this. You don’t push me around. You don’t push my people around. I’m calling my lawyer now, see, and if he says so, we’re going to get a warrant out on your girl. For assault. How would you like that, huh? It wouldn’t look so good, huh? Tonio wouldn’t touch her with a ten-foot pole, unless I tell him. Tonio wouldn’t spit on the sidewalk unless I told him to and I told him nothing but to ride down in the elevator with her.”

  Reardon rubbed at his eyes and tried to follow the rapid, rambling words. He tried to interrupt, but Giardino apparently hadn’t heard him.