Ladykiller (24 page)

Safir, his eyes glued to binoculars in the front seat of the van,
shook his head. “Nobody’s left the crisis center since the shift changed
and she and Tim got there.”

“Nobody at all,” echoed Wise, waiting his turn in the driver’s
seat.
“Play that last part back again, would you,” Dave asked.
Jamie hit a button and Nita’s voice filled the van.
“I know you’re upset. If you’ve killed a man, I know you feel hurt
and depressed but I don’t want you to do anything —”
The side door of the van slammed open, startling all of them.
Wise had his gun out of his holster first, pointing it two-handed over
the back of the front seat. Dave was on his feet in a split second,
moving in front of the gun, reaching out.
Megan stood in the open doorway, half scared, half puzzled,
taking in the scene before her. Nita’s voice continued to talk soothingly, intercut with Ace’s jittery staccato, alternately cajoling, threatening, begging.
Dave grabbed Megan’s arm and pulled her inside. “You were
supposed to wait in the car.” Jamie slammed the rolling door shut
behind her.With a curse,Wise holstered his gun.
Nita’s voice purred, “Ace, you know I can’t say I’ll meet you outside the crisis center, especially at night, but perhaps you should go
back to the place where we last saw each other —”
“I can’t believe this,” Megan shouted, as the reality of the situation sunk in. Belatedly, Jamie hit a button and Nita’s voice was cut off.
“You’re spying on us.” She angrily shook off Dave’s hand.
“Listen, Megan —”
“Listen, nothing.”
Safir cut them both off. “She’s leaving the building. Let’s roll.”
Dave shouted, “Stay back.We don’t want her seeing us, but don’t
lose her.”
Megan was furious. “You’re using her as bait! I don’t believe it.”
“Keep her here,” Dave said to Jamie as he took out his weapon,
checking the clip.
“Dave!” Jamie protested.
“Don’t bother,” Megan snapped indignantly. “I’m leaving.”
Dave was frantic, trying to switch gears from cop to caring in
sixty seconds. “Please, Megan,” he begged, “I’ll explain later. I promise.”
“How could you? You’re letting her meet some lunatic out there.
You could get her killed.”
Dave and Jamie both lunged for her but Megan ducked out of the
van’s side door before either of them could grab her.
“Stay here,” Dave commanded Jamie, jumping out the door behind Megan.
“Dave —” Jamie protested.
Safir and Wise got out and slammed the side doors, too. They
glanced at Dave.
“She’s already at the corner,” whispered Saffir.
“Let’s not lose her,” whispered Wise.
Jamie leaned out the open side door. “What about Megan, Dave?”
“Forget her.We go after the other one.”
The three men raced off into the night.

The street was swept clean of humanity. Events were clicking into
place like the sound of Nita’s shoes on the nighttime pavement. Nita
felt that old tingle of anticipation, heightened by the thrill of being
back in command again.

She hurried along the dim street, the occasional tree making
strange shadows and stranger murmuring sounds in a light breeze off
the river. When she heard the footsteps behind her, she almost broke
stride but did not. She did not look back.

Megan cursed under her breath. She wasn’t sure which way Nita
had gone. She hurried as fast as she could past the crisis center and
west, toward the river, toward the darkness. She couldn’t be sure, but
she thought a man ran silently past on the other side of the dim street.
She cursed the pumps she was wearing that slowed her. She cursed
herself.

The playground loomed ahead in the darkness. Nita hesitated before
entering. No sign of Ace. The playground, a phantasmagoria of bars
and slides and swings, cast strange angular shadows. Nothing breathed
there, other than the air, faintly stirring off the river.

Nita crossed the dim, desolate lot.When Ace popped up, part of
the long shadows of the jungle gym, she stopped. He approached her
cautiously. In the half-light, his sickly pallor seemed ghostly.

Sobbing with frustration and fear, Megan paused to take off her
pumps.When she glanced up, she was sure she saw Dave, illuminated
in the light from a passing car, at the intersection at the end of the
block. He was running easily and he had his gun out.
“Noooooo,” she cried, flinging the shoes away and sprinting after

Ace pulled back the leather jacket to show Nita his holstered gun. “I
killed someone. I did. I did it for you.”
Nita pulled the .45 out of her bag. “Thanks.”
“Nita,” Ace croaked. “I did it for you.”
She took perfect aim at his head.
“Please.” Ace began to sob.
“Freeze. Police.”
Nita swiveled to face the shouted command.There was a man behind her. There was a running man, coming into the playground. He
had a gun out. Dave Dillon.
“Nobody move,” the detective bellowed. As if he owned the city.
As if he weren’t just another parasite.
Nita pulled the trigger.

When she heard the shot, she nearly stumbled and she screamed
Nita’s name. The second shot seemed to propel her forward as she
raced into the darkened playground, her head light with fear.

There were more shots but Megan ignored them. A child’s swing
was moving, and in the light reflected off its metal surface she
glimpsed a figure on the ground.

Screaming, oblivious to everything else, she raced to the fallen
figure.
At first, kneeling, panting, beside Nita, Megan thought she might
have just fallen. She was lying on her back, her head to one side.
Megan slowly, tentatively, reached for her friend. She touched Nita’s
perfect face, traced the line of her exquisite cheek with her hand. She
spoke Nita’s name softly, like a caress.
Somewhere behind her, there were shots being fired and gruff
men’s voices. Someone was shouting her name, telling her to stay
down. None of it registered.
Nita’s eyes were open and Megan thought she was about to speak
to her. Megan leaned closer. She thought that Nita was crying. Nita’s
right eye, the side of her face that was down in the shadows, seemed
to have shed a tear, a solitary red tear. Megan gently put her fingertips
to the point of Nita’s chin and turned her face toward her.
Then she saw the blasted eye, the skull shattered and dripping,
the horror of a beloved face exploded in violent death. Megan’s stomach churned, the blood drained from her head.
Her first shriek was thin and strangely high-pitched, as if from a
small wild animal. But soon her throat cleared and her tortured
screams, full-bodied and awful, shook the night.

Lt. Blake materializing at the playground to personally take his
statement. Surrendering his service revolver to Blake, so the
crime-scene people could inspect it and log it. Safir and Wise coming
back, reporting that they had once again lost Ace, whose talent for disappearing in this city was becoming a legend.

Making a longer, videotaped statement at the precinct. Drinking
cup after cup of coffee, Jamie always at his side. Blake recommending
that he take a leave.Take a few days.

Asking Jamie and Blake about Megan. Getting no good answer.
She was hospitalized, sedated. No one would let him know where.
Going home as dawn neared and ripping down the photos of the
Ladykiller victims. Trying to sleep. Awakening from nightmares with
the cat licking his face.

When he went in to work, over protests from Blake, Dave learned
that Nita had kept a record of all her clients on a computer disk at her
apartment. Safir and Wise had turned that up in their search.

Ace was still missing.
Dave asked about Megan but he knew he was being stonewalled.
Blake went with him downtown to One Police Plaza where he

had to endure Mancuso’s back-slapping and fake smile. Dave accepted
his clammy handshake for the cameras. He was numb. He could think
only of Megan.
Standing next to Mancuso at the press conference with no other

Ladykiller task force members present, not even Blake, Dave listened
to how Mancuso had all but cracked the case. He was lauded by Mancuso for blowing away the dread menace. He listened to Mancuso say
that the city’s streets were safe again.

Jamie drove him to Jimmy Conlon’s wake. He hugged Jimmy’s mother,
who thanked him for killing the demon who took her son. He overheard Jimmy’s fellow journalists complaining bitterly that Chip, Laird,
and the other office politicos couldn’t attend the wake because they
were dining with the publisher.The newspaper had sent a big wreath.

Jamie was at his side always.
Dave watched his mother whisper to Mrs. Corrigan, as they sat
in the corner of the room, about the black girl who was after her
Dave. He didn’t need to hear the words to know exactly what they
were saying.
Jamie knew, too, but she didn’t care. She knew that Dave was like
an invalid, still in shock, and badly in need of care. She tried not to
think about the future, but a tiny voice kept whispering that patients
always fell in love with their nurses eventually. She could wait.
Dave heard not a word of congratulations from his mother to her
boy, the hero cop.
Standing beside Jimmy’s closed coffin, passing his hand over its
fine wood, Dave said farewell.

Dave called the crisis center and got the runaround about contacting
Megan. He left repeated messages on her answering machine, hearing
her cheerful, sexy recorded voice, until the machine was turned off or
stopped functioning.Then the phone just rang and rang.

At home, Dave tried to sleep, awakening once more to the rasp
of the cat’s tongue.
He bought all the newspapers.
The most telling headline:
LADYKILLER WAS A LADY
. The subhead

Dave gently turned aside Jamie’s suggestion that they have dinner.
“Not hungry,” Dave said. “Sorry.”
“Then you gotta be thirsty,” Jamie purred.
Wise butted in: “Yeah, let’s party.You know the rules.”
Safir added, “You got to, Dave.You crack the case, you buy.”
Dave let himself be taken to McSorley’s. A couple dozen cops

with beers in their big hands came up to touch their glasses to his, clap
him on the shoulder, punch his arm. Jamie, a fixture on the stool next
to him, kept finding excuses to touch him.

Blake on the other side, asked: “So, Dave, you gonna take some
time off?”
“Yes, sir. Maybe a little while. I’ve got some, uh, personal matters
I’d like to handle.”
“Fine,” Blake said. “Just tell me how much time you need.”
Dave stood up. The others looked at him, a little drunkenly, expectantly, as if he were going to make a speech. “I’d like to start now,
if that’s all right.” He threw some money on the bar and headed out.
“Dave?” Jamie called after him.
Blake put his arm around her. “Don’t,” he said.

Encouraged by the recent rainfall, pink blossoms had burst forth on
even the scrawniest tree that poked out of the Manhattan bedrock.To
Dave, however, they barely existed. He headed toward the West Side
Crisis Center, dead to the flowery morning that proclaimed itself
around him.

When he entered the customary bedlam of the crisis center, the
clients stopped their bawling, crying, and drooling at once. Silently,
they watched him pass, headed for the stairs.The heat of their staring
prickled his skin.

Only one of them approached him, the fellow from outer space.
“She was a goddess,” he said to Dave, and he about-faced indignantly,
marching back into his madness.

By the time Dave got to the stairs, the entire group was shouting,
“Goddess.”
At the top of the stairs, the social workers at their desks also
stared at Dave. No sign of Megan.
The young gay guy, Tim, stood up as Dave passed. “Nita
Bergstrom was no murderer,” he said, his voice shaking.
Dave didn’t even slow down.
Dave met Dr. Solomon in the corridor outside his office.
“Oh, dear,” Dr. Solomon said, dismayed to encounter Dave.
“I want to see Megan,” Dave said.
“She isn’t here, I’m afraid.”
“How is she?”
“She’s fine, physically,” Dr. Solomon said. “I put her in the hospital for some rest. I regret to say I’m not going to tell you which one.
They’re sending her home tomorrow. I asked her to stay with Mrs.
Solomon and me for a while, but she refused.”
“Is she — calmed down?”
“She’s on Valium. You’ve got to realize that she’s had a horrible
shock. Nita was her best friend and mentor.”
Dave nodded. “I know.”
“And I gather that you meant something to her too.” Dr.
Solomon’s demeanor was kindly.
“I was hoping that I meant a lot to her. I’m in love with her,” Dave
said.
“Well,” Dr. Solomon said, “when your boyfriend kills your best
friend, that’s a pretty major trauma, wouldn’t you say? Her whole
world is shattered. She needs time to pick up the pieces.”
“Yeah.Thanks, doc.”
“We all need some time,” Dr. Solomon said.
“Time,” Dave said hollowly.
“Yes. I’d have staked my professional reputation on Nita. Hard to
conceive of her as a killer. What a remarkable woman.” Dr. Solomon
walked sadly away.
Dave leaned his forehead miserably against the corridor wall.
“Time?” he said plaintively to himself.

She spotted the tabloid on the floor.Yesterday’s.With Nita’s picture on the front page. She picked the paper up and held it in her lap,
examining it while the cab slid down spring-blessed Fifth Avenue.
With her fingertip she traced the contours of Nita’s dear, familiar, exquisitely beautiful face. She stared at it for a long time.

Finesse and Falstaff were assuming the position against a fence that
sported a massive poster for the Big Apple Circus. Palms open against
the poster’s clown faces and animal acts, feet spread over the filthy
sidewalk.

“Why do I gotta do this?” Finesse complained. “This is shit.”
“I wouldn’t anger the gendarmes,” Falstaff advised.
Blitzer, the young cop, stood behind them, within whacking

distance with his nightstick. “Where is he?”
“I ain’t seen him since he went batshit in the Foxy Lady,” Finesse
said.
“Our good man, Ace, has developed into quite the will-othe-wisp,” Falstaff said. “He doesn’t vouchsafe his whereabouts to the
likes of us, I assure you.”
“We’ll be coming down hard on you till we find this asshole,”
young Blitzer said. “A word to the wise.”
Martino came running up. “I think we got him,” she said.
The two uniformed cops ran along the Deuce to a shanty of cardboard boxes. Something was inside, moving.
Martino radioed for backup. She and Blitzer both drew their
sidearms. “Come on out, Ace,” she commanded. “We know you’re in
there.”
But the face that appeared was that of Stinky, the old bag lady.
“Can’t I get no rest?” she growled.
As the two cops slumped away, Blitzer asked his partner, “Why
do they care so much about bagging Ace? He killed one useless hump
and wounded another.We ought to give him a medal.”
“Lt. Blake feels he’ll go after Dillon.”
“Dillon?”
“Ace was obsessed with Nita Bergstrom,” Martino said. “And
who put a bullet through his beloved’s head?”
“Shit.”

She kicked the door shut behind her. The phone rang again.
Megan glanced at the phone as she put down the packages. The answering machine clicked on. She had erased all the messages without
listening to them.The tape was rewound.

Dave’s voice, warm and rich, filled the apartment. “Megan, I
know you don’t want to talk to me just yet. But I want you to know
I’ll be here. When you’re ready.” The voice faltered toward the end.
After a moment, he hung up.

Megan ignored the phone. She carefully opened the small package and held her new prize up to the light. The plastic bag was filled
with water and it revolved slowly as she held it aloft.

The crisis center staff was assembled but the meeting was not yet in
full drone.They were awaiting the arrival of Dr. Solomon before it officially began. No one had seen him, and the question was whether he
had remembered. People tried to talk about any other topic than the
one foremost in their minds.

Then Tim chimed in, bad taste as usual getting the better of even
his own sentiments.
“Did you hear the one about the social worker who wanted to
change the world?” he asked archly. “She really took a shot at it.”
There were scattered gasps and nervous giggles. Tim didn’t
notice Megan when she came in behind him.
“Did you hear the one about the social worker who wanted to
challenge her clients?” he pressed on. “She blew their minds.”
The silence this time was ominous. Tim turned around and saw
Megan in the doorway, standing there without expression. Tim grimaced apologetically.
“Everybody knows how I felt about Nita,” Tim said. “Well — life
goes on, doesn’t it?”
Dr. Solomon entered the room in his customary fog. He conducted the entire meeting without noticing Megan. It was only at the
end of the session, when Rose made a fuss over Megan, that he saw
her. He asked Megan into his office, where she stood stiffly before his
desk. He sat looking worriedly at her.
“Don’t you think it’s a little soon?” Dr. Solomon asked.
“I need to get back to work, Dr. Solomon,” Megan said. “I need
the routine. I need to feel useful. I need to
do
something.”
“Well —”
“And I’m on the schedule to work the hotline tonight anyway,
with Rose. She gets scared at night, and I can soothe her,” Megan said.
“Oh,” Dr. Solomon said, “I couldn’t possibly —”
“This will be the best thing for me, sir,” Megan said, and she
moved to leave. “Thanks, Dr. Solomon.”
She smiled and walked out briskly. Dr. Solomon sat behind his
desk, pondering.

That night, the wind invaded the streets from the west, jostling the
blossoms, threatening to strip them from the tree branches. Megan
poured herself a cup of coffee while Rose nattered on.

“I’ll be fine, Rose,” Megan said. “But I don’t want to talk for a
while. Is that okay?”
“I understand completely,” Rose said. “I won’t say a word.”And of
course, as soon as she perched on her desk chair, she started her
running commentary. “We’re going to be in for another big rainstorm. I heard on the radio —”
Megan blocked it out. She sat behind Nita’s desk and went
through Nita’s drawers.They all were empty.
“The police did that: emptied the drawers and took all Nita’s
belongings away,” Rose said. “They came in here, with that black girl
detective.The one that’s so pretty —”
The desk, with its vacant drawers pulled out, transfixed Megan.
Rose wasn’t sure whether Megan would cry, so she chattered still
louder.The phone rang, startling them both.
Megan gestured at Rose that she would answer. She picked up
Nita’s receiver. “Crisis center,” Megan said into it. “Can I help you?”
“Do you know who this is?” the voice at the other end muttered.
A sizzle of lighting made the crisis center windows glow.
“It’s Ace, isn’t it?” Megan said. The following thunder erupted
loudly. Another phone rang and Rose answered briskly.
“You saw her dead, didn’t you? You saw what they did to her,
didn’t you?”
“I saw,” Megan said. She felt her throat dry up.
“You know she didn’t do it, don’t you?” Ace said.
“She didn’t do it?” Megan said breathlessly.
“I’m the one,”Ace said, anguished. “I’m the Ladykiller. I did them
all. Every one.”
Megan could hear her heart pounding. She was gripping the
phone so tightly her knuckles were white.
Ace continued,“She was innocent. And I can prove it.”
The lightning lit up the windows again.The thunder came more
quickly this time.The storm was closing in.
“Tell me.”
“I can do better than that,” Ace said. “I can show you.”
Megan gasped, her hand to her throat. “Where?”

The night air held the electricity of the approaching storm. Eerie
shadows jumped and writhed in the rising wind, which coursed down
the street from the west like a great wickedness.

Megan, who had left ignoring Rose’s petulant queries, came out
of the crisis center onto the street and locked the iron door behind her.
She turned and started at the appearance of a man who seemed
to thrust up out of the nightmare-deep shadows.
It was Dave.
“You,” she said.
Dave grabbed her by the shoulders. “I’ve got to talk to you,” he
said. “You’ve got to listen.”
Megan, first rigid in his grasp, began to struggle, trying to get
away. “Let go of me.”
“Megan, please.You’ve got to listen.”
A sudden fusillade of rain pelted them. It was hard and stung.
“You killed her,” Megan cried. She lashed out with all her
strength and anger, punishing him. The wind and the rain fueled her
fury. She pounded at his head. He covered himself to deflect her fists.
Then, over Dave’s shoulder, a new figure rose, as if from the
earth. Ace gripped the gun in one hand. Confusion, fear, and hatred
shone in him as the storm blew about his greasy hair.
Megan froze. Dave whirled around.
Ace wavered. The gun dipped. Dave grabbed the arm with the
gun and twisted it. Ace slammed to his knees on the rain-swept sidewalk. He sobbed in pain, frustration, and failure.
After a moment, Dave released Ace and picked up the gun where
it had fallen on the pavement. Dave looked at Megan, who leaned
against the building wall, limp and emotionally spent.
Dave turned to Ace. “You’re under arrest,” he said mechanically.
Yet before Dave could bring out his cuffs or read him his rights,
Ace bolted.
Dave lunged to give chase, but Megan called out, “Let him go.”
Dave stopped instantly.
“I’ve got to take him in,” Dave said without conviction.
“No. He’s not going to hurt anybody,” she said tiredly. “He
doesn’t have it in him.”
After pocketing Ace’s weapon, Dave reached out to her. Megan
took his hand and let him lead her in the rain down the block.
Exhausted and wet, they got into the car.

In Dave’s apartment, the pictures were off the wall and the cat was in
hiding. The storm howled outside, rattling the windows, a beast let
loose on the earth. Megan’s clothes hung over the bathroom shower
curtain bar to dry. She sat in a chair, wearing Dave’s terry cloth robe,
and dried her hair with a towel, her purse at her feet.

Dave sat on the floor before her, barefoot and shirtless, talking
earnestly.
“It all fits,” Dave said. “Nita’s thesis adviser at Columbia said her
work had gone off the deep end. She couldn’t focus on one narrow
topic. She had to take on all urban ills. And when she found out that,
in the real world, she couldn’t cure them, it drove her mad.”
Megan continued to dry her hair, not looking at him.
Dave got up on his knees and took her hands. “She set them up,
Megan.The ones she considered incurable.The social misfits. She shot
them. In cold blood. She arranged to meet them in lonely places. And
she murdered them.”
“Did you have to kill her?”
Dave peered at her. “She was going to kill me, Megan. I had no
choice.”
Megan returned his gaze evenly.
“For God’s sake, Megan. She was a murderer.”
“And what are you?”
Dave smacked the floor with his fist. He gave her an anguished
look.Their eyes locked.
“Don’t do this,” he pleaded. “I love you.”
For a seemingly endless time, Megan stared into Dave’s eyes, as if
searching for something. Her expression very gradually softened.
Dave took her hands once more. Megan smiled wanly at him. She
sighed and leaned back in the chair.
Dave grinned with relief. He got up and made for the kitchen.
“I’ll get us some wine.”
His phone rang. He didn’t even pause as he busied himself with
the corkscrew. “The machine will get it,” he called. He hummed as he
rummaged in a cupboard for the stemware he seldom used.
The answering machine clicked on. Jamie’s voice, low, musical,
and troubled, filled the air. “Dave, something strange. It all checks out
except for one killing, the murder of Kimberly Worth. Nita was at
Dr. Solomon’s house for a dinner party with some heavyweight grant
people and nobody went home till late, after the body was found.
We’ll keep plugging, but I thought you’d want to know.”
“Christ,” Dave said in the kitchen.
The dial tone sounded briefly before the machine clicked off.
“I’m sure they’re wrong,” Dave called after a pause, pouring red
wine into elegant glasses. “They’ll figure it out.”
Dave came out of the kitchen holding the glasses aloft, his expression tenderly triumphant. “Anyway, we have our future to think
about.”
Megan’s own triumph was written on her face.The .45 felt natural in her two-handed grasp.
She aimed carefully and squeezed the trigger.
Dave took the bullet through his right eye. Perfectly.
If Dave could be said to have had a last thought or could have put
the fleeting, half-formed image into words, it would have been the
glimpse of another woman, also beloved, pulling a trigger. A woman
who had killed and left him to take the blame.
The thunder seemed to echo the report of the weapon.
On the way out, Megan carefully took with her every item of her
clothes and the robe and the towel. She didn’t worry about fingerprints. She had been his girlfriend, after all.
Control.

The next morning, when the rain ended, the sound of the cat’s incessant yowls caused the super to enter Dave’s apartment. He threw up
all over the floor in front of the chair where Megan had sat.

By the time Jamie arrived, the crime-scene people were hard
at work. Dusting for prints, making measurements, taking photos,
writing in notebooks. Safir and Wise stood off to the side, muttering
to each other.

Dave’s body was surrounded by a neat chalk outline.
Jamie stood over him, her face vibrating with grief.
Lt. Blake came over to her, and she pulled herself together.
“Well, Loo,” Jamie said softly, “Dave was right in one respect.”
“What’s that, Jamie?”
“There’s a plan here. By a very smart, cool killer. And he’s rubbing our noses in it.”

Safir and Wise joined them. The four watched silently as Dave’s
body was covered with a sheet.
“So we start over?” Wise asked.
“We start over,” Blake said.

And off in the night, a phone rang in a high-ceilinged, almost empty
building, guarded by an iron door.The ghostly ringing sounded tiny in
the large room — a drab place except for the new fish tank.