The Death Dealer (18 page)

“I’ll get back to you. I know of a place where you can work out front and make good tips.”

“Is there a pole involved?” Susie asked skeptically.

Genevieve laughed. “No. It’s an old Irish pub. They’re always busy, so they’re always looking for waitresses, and I swear, you’ll like it.”

“And you can get me a job there?” Susie was clearly still doubtful. “Where is it? I couldn’t keep one job because even with the subway, it still meant a mile walk, and I was always either late or nearly getting mugged.”

“It’s walking distance from here.”

“Downtown?” Susie asked.

Gen nodded. To her distress, Susie suddenly burst into tears.

“What? I’m sorry,” Genevieve said quickly.

“No, no, it’s just that Lori loved downtown so much. You know what she always told me she would have been, if she’d ever made it through school?”

“What?”

“An archeologist. She loved all the old buildings downtown. Trinity Church, St. Paul’s, City Hall…Fraunces Tavern, even though it’s pretty much a made-up restoration. She spent her life hanging out in old places. She even liked cemeteries.”

Susie started crying so hard at that point that she couldn’t talk anymore, but Genevieve couldn’t find the words to stop her. She was too busy thinking that Leslie MacIntyre would probably have loved to know Lori Star, no matter what she’d done for a living. From what she’d learned about Leslie, she hadn’t been the kind of person to judge others.

She suddenly felt as if she really had gotten to know Lori Star. She rose quickly and extended her hand. “I’ll find out about that job for you.”

“I guess you really do wield a lot of power,” Susie said.

“I don’t, but I know people who do.”

Susie was silent for another moment, then asked, “Do you think you can find a way to keep Lori out of a pauper’s grave?”

“I can do that,” Genevieve promised.

At the door to the apartment, Susie impulsively hugged her.

She hugged Susie in return, and thought back to the days before the kidnapping. She had known her way around then. She had changed things with indignation and by insisting that people do their jobs. Right now, though, she was just grateful that she had come from money, because there were promises that enabled her to make.

“I’ll call you, and don’t worry, that’s not hot air. I’ll see to it,” Genevieve promised.

Susie thanked her, managing to regain her composure as she wiped her cheeks.

Genevieve noticed the time when she was out on the street. She had stayed longer than she intended. It was already midday, and finding a taxi to take her back to her apartment shouldn’t have been hard. But short of throwing herself on top of one, she didn’t seem to be able to get anyone to stop.

Cursing beneath her breath, she simply started to walk.

Move fast. He’s behind you.

She jumped, stopped and spun around, staring.

A man with a Yorkie on a leash was to her left. A priest nodded politely as he passed. Two black-clad goths, laughing together, were ambling along in her direction, and a woman in high heels, carrying a briefcase, was talking on her phone as she wove through the others.

Gritting her teeth, telling herself that she must have imagined the voice, she started walking again.

Hurry. Please hurry.

It was broad daylight, and the streets were bustling. She couldn’t possibly be in any danger.

But just as that thought went through her mind, she passed a narrow alley that seemed to contain nothing but dirt and shadows, even at high noon. An attacker could simply push someone into it and…

She quickened her pace, noticing what she seldom did: that there were numerous little alcoves along the way—between buildings, at construction sites—where someone could suddenly take a step—and then disappear.

And suddenly she knew with complete certainty that she
was
being stalked.

She hurried out to the street, her arm raised to attract a taxi, determined not to budge from the spot until she caught one.

Maybe the driver of the next taxi sensed her intense determination. Maybe she had managed to develop new powers of mind control. Who the hell knew?

The important thing was that he stopped, and she immediately slid into the backseat and gave him her address, then looked anxiously back at the sidewalk.

There were so many people there, but there was one man. His back was to her, and he was wearing a hat and a trench coat. She couldn’t have said whether he was young or old, light or dark. But she got the strongest feeling that he had stopped and turned away because he knew she was looking back.

The taxi moved, and she told herself she was crazy. But she couldn’t stop wondering why he’d been staring so intently into the window of a women’s shoe store.

When she got out of the cab in front of her building, she felt ridiculously grateful to see her longtime doorman, and she gave him a huge smile as she went over to chat. Adam was due in ten minutes, so she would just stay close to safety until he showed up, and worry about her sanity later.

Joe still couldn’t quite believe that he was meeting what boiled down to a pack of psychics for lunch. He respected Adam Harrison, and he knew Leslie had loved the man, who had been her salvation after the explosion at Hastings House.

Joe had argued that he simply didn’t believe in any of it. He’d known even then that he had been lying, but it was almost as if by refusing to acknowledge what was going on, he could make it go away.

Adam Harrison, however, had a way of making believing in things simple.

“If my colleagues and I can help in any way, why not let us try?” Adam had asked calmly. “You want to catch this guy sooner rather than later, right?”

And Joe had pictured the body of Lori Star, lying on the autopsy table, then thought of the way she had died, and how he kept seeing Genevieve being throttled in his nightmares.

“Yeah, sure, what the hell.”

But as one o’clock loomed closer, he grew impatient. That morning, he had felt as if he were on to something at last, and what he was thinking required legwork. He wanted to know where every single member of the Ravens had been, not just at the time of Thorne Bigelow’s death, but during every related incident. He had called Raif, who had assured him that he and Tom would be on it, and Joe knew they could check out alibis just as accurately as he could himself and probably a lot more easily. But…

But he preferred things he heard for himself. He believed them. Or, more important, sometimes he
didn’t
believe them. Body language, tone of voice…those were things that were often far more honest than words.

But he had agreed to meet with Adam, so he found himself downtown at a quiet restaurant, one of the old steak houses that had been around forever. He gave his name at the door and was led to a table for five, where he saw that Brent Blackhawk was already waiting.

Blackhawk was an intriguing man, with the very strong features associated with Native Americans, but with light-colored eyes that made his face instantly arresting. He had the look of a natural athlete.

He was alone at the table, reading the menu. But when he saw Brent, the man rose, and his smile was natural and welcoming. “Hi, Joe. Good to see you again.”

The two men hadn’t seen each other since shortly after Leslie’s funeral. Leslie had liked and trusted Brent, just as she had his wife, Nikki.

Blackhawk was a decent guy, Joe knew. He was smart, assertive without being aggressive, and he liked sports. He was a man’s man. What the hell was not to like about him?

How about that he believed in a world around them that most people didn’t see? And Joe had no intention of becoming someone like that.

“It’s good to see you, too, Brent,” Joe said, but words were stiff, even though he tried hard to hide his wariness. “How’s Nikki?” he asked.

“Very well. She’ll be right here—she just stopped off in the ladies’ room.”

“Oh.” Joe sat, wondering what the hell he was supposed to say now.

“How have you been doing?” Brent asked, picking up the slack.

“You’re here because Adam called you, so I’m sure you know what I’m doing.”

“I didn’t ask
what
you were doing. I asked
how
you were doing.”

“You mean, do I see Leslie in my dreams at night? No,” he said. He didn’t add that he did hear her whisper at strange times, that he even thought his cousin, gone two years now, had talked to him.

He knew he was being offensive, but Brent didn’t seem to be bothered. His shrug was easy.

At that moment Nikki walked over to the table. She was a beautiful woman, with light breezy hair, fine features and, like her husband, a natural ease of movement.

Both men rose.

“How are you, Joe?” Nikki had a radiant smile. She was so light and delicate. Brent was so dark and solid. They made a beautiful couple, Joe decided, and he couldn’t help liking them. There was simply nothing about them to dislike, even if they did believe in ghosts.

“Great,” Joe said. “But the circumstances in which we meet don’t get any better, do they?” There was that damned hostility in his tone again, he thought.

“The point is that we have to make the current circumstances better,” Brent said.

“We didn’t do so well last time, did we?” Joe asked, then winced. “God, I’m sorry. We all tried. So hard.”

“It’s all right,” Nikki said, laying her hand gently over his.

He looked into her eyes. They were large and filled with empathy. Not pity, empathy. “Yeah, well…So are we going to try some kind of hocus-pocus? Is that what this is all about?”

A look flashed from Brent to Nikki, and Joe thought the other man’s normal equanimity was about to break. Brent looked as if he were about to say something pointed, but apparently his wife kicked him beneath the table.

“Brent’s great with intuition—and a computer,” she said.

“Nikki, it’s all right,” Brent said. “We all know where you and I…come from. But at the moment, I gather Joe’s been having some
different
experiences of his own.”

There was an edge to Brent’s final words, and Joe had to admit, he deserved it. But as for his own “different” experiences…he would be damned if he was going to admit to them.

“Have you shown him the articles yet?” Nikki asked her husband.

“What articles?” Joe asked sharply.

Brent reached down for a briefcase beside his chair, pulled out a folder and pushed it toward Joe, who opened it to see several photocopied pages.

“What are these?”

“Read them.”

Joe looked down. The first article was from a Richmond paper, dated three years earlier. The headline read, “Poe Scholar Found Dead in Own Basement.”

Joe glanced up. Brent’s face was impassive, so he went back to reading. According to the article, a literature professor named William Morton had been found dead inside his brick-walled wine cellar. He had been strangled. There was no mention of a note being found with his body, but given the Poe angle, a connection to the murders of Thorne Bigelow and Lori Star had to be considered.

“Did the killer leave anything?” Joe asked the other two. “Was there a note found with the body?”

“I know the cops who worked the case,” Brent said. “It’s gone cold, but it’s still open. And no, there was no note found with the body.”

“Did you, um,
work
the case yourself?” Joe asked.

“I just happen to know the cops who landed it,” Brent said. “Check out the next article.”

It was from a Baltimore paper, and it was dated a year ago. This headline read, “Professor Found in Family Tomb. Noted Poe Scholar Dead of Heart Attack.”

Joe read quickly through the article. Bradley Hicks, fifty, had been found lying on the floor of his family’s mausoleum. The door had been unlocked, but the coroner’s supposition was that the man had thought he was trapped, and that his terror had brought on the heart attack that killed him.

Joe looked up at Brent Blackhawk and his wife, who looked back at him without saying anything, allowing him to reach his own conclusions.

Joe skimmed both articles again.

The second mentioned the professor’s scholarly monographs, and the first touted William Morton’s acclaimed fictional account of Edgar Allan Poe’s life.

“No note found at the second scene, either?” Joe asked.

“To be honest, I didn’t know about the Baltimore death until Adam called and I started doing research. In fact, Hicks’s death isn’t even on the books as a murder. It’s listed as accidental. The investigators concluded that he went into the family mausoleum for whatever reason, thought he’d locked himself in, then panicked, had a heart attack and died. As far as William Morton goes, I don’t think anyone ever thought his murder had anything to do with Poe. And maybe it didn’t.”

Joe stared thoughtfully into space. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all. Blackhawk had presented him with some really solid research, the type that could give him what he needed to crack the case.

“We’ll need to find out if any of the New York board members were in either city at the relevant times,” he said.

“None of them,” Brent said. “At least, none of them was living in either place.”

Joe frowned. “You’ve already checked?”

“Of course,” Brent said.

“But either one is easily reachable from here,” Nikki put in. “By air or driving.”

“Do we know if any of the board members were on vacation in either area at the time?” Joe asked.

“I haven’t had time to pull their credit-card records. We’re looking at three different cities and three different states, but we’ll get there,” Brent said. He tapped on the paper. “I know William Morton’s widow,” he said.

Joe looked up at him. “You do?”

“Yes. I happened to meet her when I was in Richmond, doing some…some work at Hollywood Cemetery there. She had brought flowers. We talked. I’d say she considers me a friend.”

“Can we interview her?” Joe asked.

“Yes. And here’s something interesting. Her husband knew Thorne Bigelow.”

“Not surprising, given that they were both interested in Poe. Still, the police in both jurisdictions should start coordinating their investigations. In fact, the FBI should be involved,” Joe said.