Saints Of New York (29 page)

What
Parrish really needed was Melissa. He needed to find her - dead or alive - and
once found, he needed to rule her in or out as a related case. Perhaps she
would turn out to be nothing more than a runaway. What he hoped, and he hoped
this with such sadness in his heart, was that she
was
related, and that she
was
dead, and that on her person would be
something that would help them find the perp. There was a strong possibility
that she might have been the first of the murders, and often - in the case of a
serial - the definitive MO that made them a serial had not yet been fully
formulated. The later victims were strangled. Perhaps the first one had been
shot or stabbed, perhaps battered to death. It was true that the more dramatic
the manner of death, the more potential there was for evidence and subsequent
profiling. A simple strangulation said little more than the need to see the
victims' faces as they died, to watch closely as the life-light faded from
their eyes. A cord, a rope, a scarf, anything but their own hands. But perhaps
there had been something
else
about the first one - something special, something unique - and it would give
them an edge, a means by which they could narrow down their suspects at South
Two. Everyone below five-eight and above six- two, everyone with fair hair is
out of the picture . . . that kind of thing. You lose fifteen percent of your
suspects. Now you only have forty-one to deal with.

Parrish
smiled to himself - a rueful and sardonic smile. He knew he was fooling himself
into thinking this was going to be straightforward, when - in truth - it was
anything but.

He
glanced at his watch. It was twenty to six.

'Take off, Jimmy,' he told Radick. 'I
don't see there's anything more you can do now. We have to wait for the warrant,
and then we go get phone records, but that's gonna happen earliest tomorrow,
more likely Monday, unless Haversaw throws some weight at it.'

Radick rose, gathered his jacket. 'You
okay, Frank?' he asked Parrish.

'Never
been better,' Parrish replied.

'You
gonna go home, eat out, what?' 'Go home, more than likely,' Parrish replied.
'Why? You gonna to ask me on a date?'

Radick shook his head. 'Not that
desperate,' he said, and headed for the door.

Parrish watched him go, and he
smiled. He knew what he would do. He would go get a take-out near Caitlin's and
surprise her.

Parrish
hoped that the girls who shared Caitlin's apartment would be out. He needed to
talk to her; he needed her to finally and forever understand that his
interference was paternal, parental, and - from his perspective - vitally
necessary. At twenty years old you didn't just think you knew everything, you
knew
you knew everything. Sure, the world had
changed - 2008 was not 1968 - but no-one could argue that it had changed for
the better. It had not. Sure, the madness was there twenty, thirty, forty years
before, but with TV, and now the internet, everyone got to share in the madness
so much faster and so much deeper. And what had that done? It had given people
ideas. Parrish was convinced of it. When he was a rookie cop there were ten
ways to skin a cat. Now there were ten thousand.

He
got off the subway at Carroll Street and walked a half block to a Chinese
take-out he knew. He ordered crispy chili beef, fried rice, won tons, a whole
bunch of stuff, and while they prepared his order he went up the street to a
liquor store and bought a half dozen bottles of Corona.

A
few minutes after seven he was knocking on the door at Caitlin's place, waiting
patiently.

When
he heard her voice, the sound of her laughing, he was disappointed. She was not
alone. They were good girls, the ones she lived with, but tonight he could have
done without them.
It
would
feel awkward. Maybe he would just leave the food and
the
beer and go. Make it seem like he'd
brought it up for her and her friends to enjoy. A peace offering.

Caitlin opened
the door, and her expression changed so quickly from surprise to concealed
anxiety that Parrish knew something was wrong.

'Hell
of a way to greet your old man,' he said, intending
to
sound
light-hearted, but it came out all wrong. Sounded bitter, like an accusation.

'Dad
. . .' she said, and it was half a question.

'It
is,' Parrish replied, and held up his packages - a bag stacked with take-out
boxes in one, a bag of bottles in the other. 'Figured we could have some
dinner—'

'I'm
going out to eat,' she said, and it was evident that this wasn't true. She said
it too quickly, too eagerly.
I'm-going-out-to- eat
like it was
just one word.

'So
I'll eat a little, we'll drink a beer, we'll stick the rest in the refrigerator
for tomorrow's breakfast for you and the girls.'

'Dad
- I'm not alone . . .'

'I
know that. Hell, there's enough for everyone—'

'The
girls aren't here,' she said, and Parrish started to smile.

'Aha,'
he said. 'A young gentleman is courting my daughter—'

'Caitlin?'
a voice called from within the apartment, and Parrish saw his daughter flinch.

'What's
up?' the voice asked, and Parrish felt something strange and cold and awkward
surfacing in his thoughts.

He
knew that voice. He recognized that voice.

'Radick?'
Incredulity and disbelief were evident in his tone. 'Radick is in there?'

Caitlin
tried to close the door as
far
as she could while she still remained between the edge and the frame. 'Dad,'
she urged. 'Please, Dad. Don't make a scene. It's nothing, Dad, really. He just
called me the day before yesterday because I was concerned about you—'

'What
do you mean, concerned about me? You are
concerned
about me? What the fuck does that have
to do with my partner? What the fuck is my partner doing coming over and
talking to my daughter about me for?'

Parrish
dropped the bag of take-out on the floor. It landed heavily but the boxes
didn't spill out onto hallway.

He
stepped forward and pushed the door, taking Caitlin by surprise, and the door
flew open and banged against the wall. It rebounded with such force that it
swung back and closed again.

Parrish
strode past her even as she grabbed his jacket and tried to stop him.

Jimmy
Radick stood there in the middle of the room.

'What
the fu—' Parrish started, but Radick raised his hands and interrupted him.

'Don't
read anything into this, Frank,' he said matter-of-factly. He was obviously
agitated, but doing his best to maintain some semblance of calm.

Caitlin
was behind Parrish. 'Dad,' she said. 'Enough already. There's no need for you
to be mad at him.'

Parrish
dropped the bag of beer bottles. One of them broke and beer spilled out along
the edge of the carpet and made its way beneath the sofa.

'Frank,
seriously, this is too much now,' Radick said. 'You listen to me before you say
another word.'

Frank
Parrish saw a great many things in that moment, and none of them were common
sense. He took another step forward and even as he raised his hand to grab
Radick's jacket lapels, Radick sidestepped and pushed him. Parrish lost his
balance and fell into the armchair. As he tried to get up Radick was over him,
his face challenging, his tone decisive.

'Frank,'
he said. 'You listen to me now. Enough of this bullshit, okay?'

Parrish
jerked his foot upwards. Radick saw it coming and turned to block it with his
knee. He stepped back as the pain hit him, and Parrish was on his feet.

Now
Caitlin went for her father, hands flailing, slapping his shoulders, the back
of his head, the side of his face, and it was in that moment that Parrish saw
nothing but his daughter and his partner conspiring against him, talking about
him, denigrating him, finding him a source of pathetic humor. Suddenly he saw
Clare in Caitlin's eyes, and the rage boiled inside him.

He
hit her. Never in twenty years had he hit his daughter, but he hit her then. It
was an involuntary and reactive swipe backwards, nothing more than an attempt
to stop the whirlwind of hands that was coming at him, but her arms were down
in that moment, and the side of his forearm connected with the side of her face
and she went over like a ten-pin.

In
the moment of shock, the handful of seconds it took to truly comprehend what he
had done, Parrish became aware of nothing but his own stupidity and ignorance.
Radick was behind him, had both his arms pinned back with such force that
Parrish couldn't even resist.

'You
asshole, Frank!' Radick said. 'You dumb fucking asshole!'

'Caitlin?
Caitlin? Jesus, I'm sorry . . . Jesus, Caitlin, I didn't mean to . . . Caitlin?
Honey?'

But
Radick was marching him to the door, pinning his arms behind him in a vice-like
grip, and as he used one hand to open the door, he used the other to shove
Parrish out into the hallway, before slamming the door shut.

Parrish
heard the lock turn, the security chain slipping into its mooring, and he knew
there was no going back.

'Caitlin!'
he shouted. 'Caitlin! Jesus, I'm sorry! I didn't mean it! Caitlin!'

Radick's
voice came then - firm and certain from behind the door. 'Go home, Frank. Cool
off. You go home and calm the fuck down or I'll call the Precinct and have them
lock you up for the night.'

'Fuck
you, Radick—'

'Frank!
Listen to me now! You go home and cool the fuck off or I'm calling Valderas and
having your ass in lock-up for the night! You hear me? Back the fuck off,
okay?'

Parrish
took a step backwards. His heel connected with the bag of take-out boxes on the
hallway floor, and in one last moment of outrage he let fly with the hardest
kick he could muster.

Food
exploded along the hallway and up the walls. Noodles, rice, pieces of chicken;
a carton of sweet and sour sauce unloaded its contents down the uppermost
risers of the stairwell, and Parrish watched it all in slow-motion, his heart
racing, his fists clenched, and it seemed for a moment that he was standing
outside of himself, and even he was laughing at the idiocy of his actions.

He
knew then that Radick would not listen. He turned and pressed his ear against
the door. He could hear Caitlin sobbing, could hear Radick consoling her, and
he wondered whether this was now the beginning of the end. Caitlin would tell
Robert, Robert would tell Clare, and the degree of estrangement he had already
caused in his family would be magnified a thousand-fold. Radick would report it
to Valderas, Valderas would speak to Haversaw, and Parrish would find himself
without a partner once again. Perhaps this time they would can him for good.
They would look at his desk and there they would find another six unclosed
cases. That was besides subway, hooker and campus. The board would not look
good. He could even be charged with assaulting his own daughter . . .

Parrish
paused for a moment, unable to breathe. He wanted it all to end. He wanted the
whole world to vanish, leaving behind himself, his daughter, and few minutes of
silence to explain himself.

He
looked at the mess around him - the spilled cartons, the food on the walls and
the stairwell - and he couldn't face it a minute longer.

He
hurried down and out of the building before anyone else saw him.

A gambler feels safe only when he
has nothing left to lose.

Parrish had gambled with his
marriage, his family, his career, his whole life.

Every
day in every way I am not getting better.

He found a watering hole, some
place on Baltic Street. He could have been anywhere, for such places were all
the same - a weathered wooden bar, a sodium-colored atmosphere that made
everyone look sick; a place that served merely to remind you of the very things
you wished to forget.