Konrath, Joe - Dirty Martini (26 page)

Wilbur opened his mouth, then closed it. He did this a few times, like a fish in a net, before he finally spoke.

“I think I always knew. But I spent the first thirty years of my life denying it. Fighting it. Unable to accept it. Homosexuality was considered a weakness back then. A lack of self-control. Or a disease.”

Wilbur smiled, but it was tinged with pain.

“The University of Chicago had an experimental program at the time. I went once a week to get shocked. Electrocuted. Aversion therapy, they called it. They showed me gay images, had me read gay literature, and then gave me a jolt. Barbaric, by today’s standards. So much has changed.”

“Mom didn’t know?” I asked softly.

“No. And I couldn’t tell her. Not only because of the ridicule she would have gotten from her friends, her family. But it would have really hurt her. She would have felt like it was her fault, that she wasn’t trying hard enough, that she made some kind of mistake. It would have been a much harder rejection for her than me leaving because I was an uncaring bastard.”

I looked at the tuxedo picture again. Saw how happy he looked.

“Did you . . .”

“I never cheated on your mother. Not once. But I couldn’t give her what she needed. If I’d stayed with you, I would have been living a lie, and we all would have been miserable as a result.”

“But what about me?” I asked, my voice very small.

“Your mother told you I was dead. How could I visit you? I sent money, of course, kept sending it up until you graduated from college.”

Now my eyes were glassy too.

“How responsible of you.”

“I’m sorry, Jacqueline.”

I turned away, unwilling to let him see me cry.

“When I got older. When I grew up. Why didn’t you ever try to contact me?”

“I meant to. I always meant to.”

I wiped my cheeks.

“I have to go now.”

“Please stay.”

I looked at him.

“Forty years, Wilbur. You missed out on my entire life.”

“I can’t tell you how hard it’s been. At least you thought I was dead. I knew you were alive. I’ve spent more time thinking about you than most fathers actually spend with their children. Every morning I’d wake up and think about calling you, about talking to you.”

“But you didn’t call.” The tears were really coming now. “I found out you were alive, and
I came.
You knew I was alive, and never came.”

“Jacqueline . . .”

I whispered, “I wouldn’t have cared that you were gay.”

“Please stay . . .”

“Good-bye, Wilbur.”

I walked out of his tidy little house, went to my car, and cried the entire way to the hospital.

Latham was asleep when I arrived. I held his hand and thanked the universe that he was most certainly heterosexual and decided that when we got married, I wanted to have my reception at Chateau Élan because the staff was certainly dedicated.

And when the wedding was over, I’d send Wilbur a picture of me in my dress and write
See what else you missed
on the back.

CHAPTER 35

T
HE DOORBELL WOKE ME UP.
It was still strange to hear a doorbell, having spent my entire adult life in apartments. I peeked at the digital, noted it was almost nine a.m., and calculated that I’d gotten a full eight hours of sleep. After leaving the hospital late last night, I picked up a frozen pizza and a six-pack of Goose Island IPA and finished both of them, then ordered a bunch of crap from HSN that I didn’t need. If memory served, one of the items was a vacuum cleaner that could suck up a bowling ball. This was incredibly important, as most homes in North America are just filthy with bowling balls.

Another doorbell ring. I peeled myself out of bed, wincing because everything hurt, including my head. I had on one of Latham’s T-shirts, big enough to come down to my knees, and I deemed that suitable as greeting wear. That is, until I looked through the peephole and saw who was at the door.

“Hurry up, Jackie! I gotta use the can!”

Harry McGlade. Dressed in the traditional Harry outfit of an expensive suit, wrinkled beyond belief, and a Bogart hat. I rolled my eyes. I’d forgotten today was PoliceFest. Maybe if I didn’t answer, he’d go away.

“I know you’re in there. Your car is parked in the driveway. Open up or I’ll piss in your mailbox.”

I had no doubt he’d do it too. I opened the door.

“Jesus, Jackie, I just spent an hour on the expressway with an Ultra-Mega Big Gulp. My bladder is so full, it’s putting pressure on my heart. Where’s the bathroom?”

“Straight back, to the right,” I told him. “Don’t touch anything. Especially the towels.”

I went into the bedroom and changed into some baggy button-fly Yanuk jeans, Nikes, and an oversized Gap golf shirt. Rather than futz with my hair, I opted for a Cubs baseball cap, pulling my ponytail through the hole in the back. I probably could have used a shower, but I was afraid to leave McGlade unattended in my home for any period of time.

After washing my face and carefully brushing my teeth—my lower lip was still sore—I found McGlade in the kitchen. Every cabinet was open, and he was poking through a Tupperware container, transferring a handful of something to his mouth.

“These are all you have to eat in this entire house,” he said between bites, “and I think they’re spoiled.”

“Really? I just bought them last week.”

“They taste like ass.”

“The cat likes them.”

He stared at the cat treats and frowned.

“This is cat food?”

“Yeah.”

“Liver and onion?” he ventured.

“Liver and tuna.”

He set the container down on the counter. “You got any mints?”

“No. Sorry.”

“How about floss?”

“Bathroom cabinet.”

He scurried off. I sniffed the treats, shuddered, and put them back in the cabinet. Then I closed all the other cabinet doors, poured a large glass of water, and drank it while silently dreading PoliceFest. Last year it had been held in Indiana, and I’d gone with Herb and his wife at their insistence. It was a crowded, hot, loud event, with carnival rides, face painting, pricey beer and hot dogs, and a lot of macho boxing and shooting contests. I snagged second place in one of the shooting contests, but that didn’t mean I enjoyed myself.

Harry returned, scowling.

“Were you telling the truth about the cat treats?” he asked.

“No.”

He seemed relieved. “They’re not for cats?”

“Yes, they are. But they’re not fresh. I bought them a year ago, and my cat hates them.”

I heard a humming sound, and noted that McGlade had clenched his robotic hand into a fist. While he was annoyed, I hit him with more bad news.

“I’m driving.”

“No way. I’m a guy. We can’t let chicks drive. It’s a form of castration.”

“Well, pick up your balls. We’re leaving.”

I double-checked to make sure Mr. Friskers had food and water, and then walked past Harry and out the front door. He tagged along behind me like a puppy.

“I wanna drive.”

“Not gonna happen.”

“Did you see my Vette? It’s fast.”

“I bet.”

“Why can’t I drive?”

“Because I’m driving.”

I got behind the wheel, and Harry sat next to me.

“Your car sucks.”

“I know.”

“Can I park the Vette in your garage?”

“Garage door is broken.”

“Your house sucks.”

“I know.”

I pulled out of the driveway, and Harry began to mess with my radio. Better the radio than listening to him talk. Unfortunately, he switched it off after only listening to three bars of “Freebird” by Skynard.

“Your radio sucks.”

“Let’s try being quiet for a while, okay?”

He lasted a whole two minutes.

“I’ve started to write poetry,” Harry said.

Lord help me.

“That’s nice.”

“It helps me deal, you know, with the pain.”

“VD?” I asked.

“Of losing my hand. There isn’t much physical pain anymore. It’s on permanently. They did a bone graft. Carbon fibers. Want to see where it’s attached?”

“No.”

He showed me anyway, peeling up the latex covering, pointing to his wrist where the scar tissue met the prosthesis. It wasn’t as ugly as I imagined.

“Gotta keep rubbing antiperspirant around the edges, because the latex gets hot and I sweat like crazy. Inside the hand, along with the mechanical parts, are myoelectric sensors, attached to my nerves and muscles. If I concentrate on
open
”—I heard a mechanical whir, and Harry’s thumb and fingers separated—“and
close,
the fingers move. Only three of the fingers are actually robotic. The ring finger and the pinky just go along for the ride. It’s pretty strong, though. See?”

McGlade gripped my dashboard with the prosthesis, and his fingers punched right through.

“Harry!”

“Don’t worry. I’m okay. It doesn’t hurt at all.”

I looked at the damage, realized it was no big loss, and turned onto I-190, passing O’Hare and heading for Skokie. Harry was mercifully quiet for a few seconds.

“So, do you want to hear some of my poetry?”

“No.”

“A short one.”

“No.”

“It’s really short.”

“I don’t care how short it is, I don’t want to hear it.”

A few seconds ticked by.

“Want to see my new phone?”

“No.”

He tugged it out of his wrinkly blazer just the same.

“It’s a phone, a camera, a PDA, and it can even surf the Internet.”

“Have you been tested for ADD?” I asked.

He pressed a few buttons, and a loud feminine moan came from the device.

“This is a good Web site. BubbleBooty.com. It costs twenty bucks a month, but you get free fifteen-second previews of all their movies. So who needs to join?”

More moaning, and then the sound of a donkey braying.

“Or check this out.”

He stuck the camera in my face, and there was a blinding flash.

“Jesus, McGlade!”

“High rez, 1500 dpi. Look at that clarity. I can count the pores on your nose. Well, I could, if I had all day.”

“It’s quiet time again,” I said. “Let’s see if we can be quiet for the whole rest of the ride, okay?”

Quiet time lasted less than a minute.

“Just like the old days, isn’t it, Jackie? Cruising down the highway. Me and you. Young cops with bad attitudes. We had some fun times, didn’t we?”

“Not really.”

I watched peripherally as Harry tried to adjust the air-conditioning vent using his prosthesis, and snapped it right off. He pondered it for a moment, checked to see if I noticed, and then hid it under his seat.

“I don’t regret quitting the force.”

“You didn’t quit. You were kicked off.”

“I don’t miss it. It’s not like PI work. Someone hires me to do a job, I get paid, they’re grateful. Not like being a cop. Too many people hate you. Like all the traps in that house the other night. Someone had to really hate the department to set all that up. I heard it was a cop’s house too.”

Something itched at the back of my head, but I couldn’t quite scratch it.

“This guy has killed a lot of cops,” I admitted. I thought about Sardina, and Roxy, and the two Cicero officers. Plus all of the incidental police officer poisonings; three died at the Sammy’s, and twelve more became sick eating at various locations around the city. Hell, the Chemist even spread his toxins at the German deli only a block away from . . .

“The one-five.”

“You say something?” Harry asked. He was using his prosthesis to touch himself in a private place.

“Can you not fondle yourself in my front seat?”

“Just making a minor adjustment. It’s kind of strange, because it feels like someone else’s hand.”

“Shut up for a minute.”

“Why?”

“I’m thinking. Just be quiet.”

“I was being quiet. You’re the one who started talking.”

“Harry, shut the hell up.”

“Boy, you’re bitchy. Don’t they have hormones for after menopause?”

I tuned him out, concentrating on all of the restaurants and grocery stores the Chemist had poisoned. As I ticked them off, one by one, I realized that there had been a pattern all along.

“Each store was within a block of a police station.”

“Huh?” McGlade had gone back to adjusting himself.

“The police. The Chemist was targeting the police all along. Even the wedding—Captain Bains’s son. Why the hell didn’t I see it before?”