Through the Grinder (15 page)

“Damn straight. Federal period designers liked to bring light and bright colors into their living spaces—that coloring is authentic and so is the technique. Strangely enough, they liked to play with the look of wood like that, making it look either like stone, marble, or even wood of another species.”

“It’s beautiful.”

“Thanks, Clare.”

“So…how about that tour?”

He started by explaining that this large parlor room had been two rooms when he’d originally bought the place. He’d knocked down the wall because the house’s original Federal scheme, although calling for a front and rear parlor, provided a sliding door between the two that could be open, as it was now, to turn the two rooms into one larger space.

We glanced in the kitchen, which was a total mess, and I laughed when I saw the only two new and possibly working appliances were a small, office-size refrigerator and an espresso/cappuccino machine.

“I like your priorities,” I said, walking over to the large machine. “And it’s a Pavoni. Good taste.”

“I’ll be honest with you, it was a gift from a client. I haven’t figured out how to use it yet. No time to read the instructions, you know? But I did buy a bag of your espresso blend and I have whole milk in that little fridge.”

I smiled. “I’ll whip us up some after dinner—and give you a tutorial. Good?”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“It’s my business, buddy. Let me show off.”

“Then let me show off mine a little more for you. Okay?”

I nodded and he took my hand. On the stairs, he told me the third floor was the attic, which had once been used for servant’s quarters.

“At the moment, those rooms are pretty stark and filled with nothing but paint cans and building materials, so we’ll skip them for now. But I think you’ll like the second floor.”

The second floor had two bedrooms. The smaller one was obviously the “before” picture, with peeling wallpaper, a stained ceiling, broken moldings, and a hideous pink shag carpet, possibly circa 1970, over the wood floor.

“Oh, yuck.”

“I take that to mean you think I have my work cut out for me?”

“Yes. That’s the technical definition of yuck.”

The master bedroom, however, was nowhere near yuck. In fact, it had been as beautifully restored as the downstairs parlors. He’d uncovered the old fireplace, refinished and polished the wood floor, restored the ceiling and its moldings, and even started furnishing the bedroom with a four-poster bed and matching bureaus. In the corner, I noticed a workspace with a drawing board and shelves beside it, full of books and blueprints. Propped on one shelf was a map of the Village and SoHo covered with arrows of different colors and little colorful circles.

I wandered over, curious. “What are these arrows?”

“The green ones show the direction of the traffic flow. The red, blue, and yellow circles refer to sanitation pick-up schedules—its three times a week in Manhattan and twice in the boroughs.”

“Sanitation pick up?” I repeated, trying not to picture Sahara McNeil’s legs sticking out from under a ten-ton garbage truck. “Why would you need to know that?”

“Those big trucks can stop traffic dead. If my crew has exterior work or needs to move equipment in and out of a particular block, it’s better to do it on a day where we won’t have to worry about the city’s pick-up times—it’s been known to fluctuate from early morning to after dark.”

It sounded like a reasonable answer. Quinn couldn’t fault him for that. I wanted to ask him about Sahara, but since it had happened just this morning, I thought it might be better to wait.

Wandering over to his bookshelf, I skimmed the spines. “Oh, I see you have a big book on the New York subway stations here.”

He nodded. “I’m a fan of that restoration project. It was massive. All that gorgeous mosaic tile work.”

“Have you been in the Union Square station?” I asked as casually as possible.

“Sure.”

“Isn’t that the one where that poor woman jumped to her death at the beginning of the month?”

I watched him carefully. He looked away without expression. “Yeah. I’m sorry to say I knew Valerie. That was her name. Valerie Lathem.”

“I’m sorry, too. Were you good friends?”

“We dated a couple of weeks. She and I kind of mutually agreed we weren’t right for each other, and we said we’d remain friends. She booked my travel. Worked at an agency.”

“I’m sorry, Bruce.”

“I hated reading about what happened in the papers. Felt bad for her family.”

“Was she…depressed…or anything…when you two broke up?”

“Not at all. In fact, she even suggested I try her on-line dating service, SinglesNYC.”

I blinked in surprise. Valerie Lathem had sent Bruce to SinglesNYC? That’s how he must have hooked up with Inga. I filed that little piece of information away.

“She had everything to live for,” Bruce continued. “I don’t know why she…did what she did.”

I nodded. “Do you think it’s possible it wasn’t a suicide then?”

“What do you mean? Like an accident?”

“Or…something else. Could someone have wanted to hurt her?”

Bruce’s brow wrinkled. “What makes you say a thing like that?”

“Uh…just…I don’t know…. I guess I thought may be it didn’t add up. Young woman, just promoted, beautiful…”

“Those things are true about Valerie…but, to be honest, she didn’t strike me as having the kind of personality that would make someone want to push her onto subway tracks. She wasn’t a party girl per se, either…although she was a little naive. I’m sorry to say anything negative about her, but if you’re fishing as to why we decided to part ways, it had to do with the fact that her job ended at five o’clock, and my job never ended. You know how it is to run a business, right?”

“Sure.”

“Well, she didn’t. She wanted the kind of guy who’d be at the happy hour down the street at five fifteen every night. A guy who could jet off to the islands on a spur of the moment low-fare deal. I wasn’t that guy.”

I observed Bruce carefully as he spoke. He didn’t seem angry or guilty or disturbed as much as melancholy about the whole thing. He didn’t seem very evasive, either.

Okay, I thought, one down, two to go.

(And I still intended to follow up with him on the one time he
had
sounded evasive—when he talked about this place being “an escape.”)

I noticed there was an oak desk beside the drawing board. It was a roll-top, and it had been rolled completely down.

“Thanks for telling me about Valerie,” I said. “I’d really like to know more about you.”

Bruce nodded. “Likewise.”

I moved toward the roll-top desk. “This is a nice piece.”

“Thanks, unfortunately, the rolling cover sticks sometimes. But I like the look of it. I keep my laptop under there.”

“A computer?”

Detective Mike Quinn’s voice suddenly boomed in my head:
The person who wrote that note to Inga used a Hewlett Packard DeskJet 840C. A small computer printer. Model 840C…

I cleared my throat. “Do you have a printer?”

“A computer printer? Yeah, sure. But the printer under that roll-top won’t impress you, its just a dinky thing I use for personal correspondence. I know what you want to see—the way I design digitally, right?”

“Uh…right.”

“Well, I can show off some of my fantastic software in a few weeks. But at the moment all my work equipment is in storage while my offices are moving from Westchester to Chelsea. Tonight, I’m afraid, it’s not part of your Federal house tour.”

Bruce took my hand and pulled me back out of the room. “Come on, our dinner’s going to get cold. You must be hungry by now.”

“Sure,” I said, letting him take me back downstairs.

What else could I do? I couldn’t force the issue of looking at his computer printer.

I would just have to figure out some other way of getting myself back into Bruce Bowman’s bedroom.

“…B
UT
for me, the divorce wasn’t as ugly as the last few years of the marriage itself, know what I mean?” asked Bruce.

I nodded, swallowing a succulent forkful of pork loin. “I can relate.”

We were finishing an amazing dinner of braised fennel salad, pumpkin lune (little ravioli “moons” with butter), and pork loin alla porchetta with mirto (Italian for myrtle, which added a delightful and surprising herbal bite to the dish).

Bruce had picked up the basket from Babbo, the Washington Square restaurant where he’d made reservations the night I’d made dinner instead. As an expensive, celebrated gourmet restaurant, Babbo was not your average “take out” place, but Bruce had apparently consulted on some restoration work for the owners, and they always treated him well.

“Your ex give you any problems this week?” he asked.

“No. When Matt’s in the city—and these days, it’s rare—he stays out of my way and I stay out of his. The night you came to dinner, I’m sorry to say, was the exception.”

“What a disaster.” Bruce laughed. “I have to be honest, that’s the only reason you’re drinking the same wine. I’m usually not so boring that I’d drag out two bottles of the Echezeaux in the same week. But you’d seemed so excited about it before Matt showed—”

“—and rudely drank most of the bottle.”

“I wasn’t going to go there.”

“Go there, be my guest. I’ve got a catalog of Matt’s flaws filed away somewhere in storage.”

Bruce smiled. “That’s a loaded comment, you know? I mean, you must be starting the list on me by now.”

“On you? Oh, sure. Let’s see…you’re too darned thoughtful and generous. I hate that about a guy. And you’re too nice to my daughter, too. You’re also too hard working, funny, intelligent, and talented…and let’s not forget you have way too much good taste, not to mention that superior…exterior.” It was my turn to cock an eyebrow. (And keep the whole murder suspect thing to myself, of course.

“You know, Clare, with me, flattery will get you everywhere.”

He moved his hand to the back of my neck and gently pulled me close. I let him. The incredible wine had relaxed me and he just looked too good in that black fisherman’s sweater not to taste. His mouth was warm and soft and I could smell the myrtle from the pork loin and the subtle, sophisticated mix of blackberry, violets, and coffee from the Grand Cru Burgundy.

“Mmmm…” he said as we parted. “Full-bodied, elegant, and complex…”

“The wine?”

He looked into my eyes. “You.”

Oh, no…no, no, no
. I couldn’t let him do this to me, I hadn’t finished my interrogation (as unorthodox as it was)…and I had to take care to keep my head…

“Are you telling me the arrangement with Matt doesn’t upset you?” I asked, pulling farther away.

“No,” he said leaning closer.

I leaned back.

“Why doesn’t it?” I asked, curious.

A barely perceptible sigh came out of him—a subtle exhale of frustration over what would probably feel to him like my second rejection of the night.

He shrugged. “Because I see my ex around, too, just like you see Matt.”

“She’s in the city then? She’s around?”

(
She’s alive?
is what I was really asking—because if Quinn’s theory about Bruce’s having a trigger and snapping out violently were true, it would probably have first manifested on his wife.)

“Oh, yeah, she’s around. And I hate to tell you, I’ve seen her in the Blend. You’ll probably meet her soon enough, but I hope it’ll be later rather than sooner. It’s understandable she’s come to the city. The Westchester place was this vast thing. Lots to care for—grounds, tennis courts, but at least I’m not sharing a space with her.”

“Is that what you meant earlier when you said this house is an escape?”

Bruce shifted. “Yeah, it’s an escape…from her…from the bad marriage…and just…from my past…yeah.”

My past?
What did he mean by that exactly?

Bruce poured more wine for us both. “So you’re telling me that Matt’s a really stubborn guy, then? Won’t give up his rights to the duplex?”

“No…but then neither will I…”

“Joy just as stubborn?”

“I always say she gets it from her father. But I know I can be stubborn, too.”

“Thanks for the warning.”

“Oh, come on, and you aren’t?”

“Yeah, I can be, I guess…I was in the divorce.”

“Over what?”

“Ten years ago, when Maxi and I first moved East, Maxi had put up the money for the Westchester house, but I’d put in a decade of sweat equity. We split the proceeds from the sale after a really long, ugly fight in court. She was determined to keep it all, but I was stubborn about my position, too. My years of work had more than doubled the value of that property. The judge agreed, even though New York’s not a community property state. She made every possible argument, but the judge split it down the middle. She still says I don’t deserve a penny.”

“She put up the money originally?”

“Yeah…to be completely honest with you, Clare, ten years ago, before I started my own company, I didn’t have much. Remember I told you how I grew up in Napa?”

“Sure.”

During his visits with me at the Blend this week, Bruce had told me some general things about his background. Surprisingly, we had a lot in common. Like me, he’d been brought up primarily by his grandparents. Also, like me, he’d grown up without much money, which made his appreciation of the finer things in life all the more poignant. Frankly, I felt the same. It always amazed me when I’d meet people in Madame’s social circle. Some of Madame’s friends were old money, some new, but to many (not all, but many), the finer things were just a function of entitlement or prestige. Appreciation for the history and artistry of a thing was far from a prerequisite to ownership. I didn’t feel that way. And, obviously, neither did Bruce.

In any event, Bruce had told me it was his grandfather who had given him an early mastery of basic carpentry, plumbing, and the general set of “This Old House” skills. It led him to start working in construction, then restoration, and eventually architecture.

“Well…” said Bruce slowly, “what I didn’t tell you was that my grandfather was a handyman on a Napa Valley estate. That’s where I grew up, on the estate itself. It was Maxi’s family’s estate…and when she and I got involved, her family didn’t like it. But Maxi was used to having her way. She’s very bright, too, but she couldn’t make a career work, didn’t play nice with the other kids, you know, kept getting fired from jobs and kept losing well-heeled fiancés, too.”

“Sounds like a real gem.”

“In a lot of ways, she is. Maxi’s beautiful. Brilliant. Rich. She can be a fantastic person when she wants to be. And there were a lot of reasons a lot of men gave her multiple chances, but she was a princess, too, and a lot of men wouldn’t put up with her games. So, when the last fiancé broke it off, she ended up living back in her parents’ home. She was thirty-two at the time and very worldly, and I was barely twenty-four and, in a lot of ways, just a stupid, gullible kid. We fell in love, eloped, and I was too young to see she was using me as a way to stick it to a family she saw as trying to rule her life.”

“Were they?”

“No. Looking back on it, her family just wanted her to get a grip. But she saw them as controlling. Only, she was the one who was controlling…it took me a lot of years to see the picture clearly. It’s hard to get perspective when you’re a twenty-something ignoramus dude, you know?”

“I can’t imagine you were any such thing, Bruce. You were just young.” I knew, all too well, that waking up to reality was the toughest thing of all in a bad marriage. His brutal honesty about it impressed me. “So…it was a hard thing for you to come to terms with?”

“It took a long time to understand how Maxi saw me, if that’s what you mean…or, anyway, how she wanted to keep seeing me. It was her father who decided if he couldn’t get Maxi to use her degrees for anything constructive, if he couldn’t make anything of her, then he’d make something of me.”

“They helped you?”

“Yeah, they paid for my education and helped hook me up with some prestigious projects. I was dutiful and grateful and I stuck it out with Maxi for a long time, even after she became very hard to live with…very damaging. I was changing and she didn’t like it. I wanted to improve things, and I thought moving East would do it. I wanted to make my own mark anyway, start my own business, and I thought if I did that, and we got away from her family, I could prove something to myself as much as them…as much as her…and I did…I built my own company…doubled the value of the property Maxi bought, like I said—”

“But you still feel guilty?” I could hear it in his voice. “You still feel you owe something to your ex? To her family?”

“Yeah, part of me does, I guess…but part of me doesn’t. Part of me feels used, Clare. I spent a lot of years with a woman who made me feel as though I were nothing—barely worthy of her. Maxi’s beautiful, like I said. She’s rich, she’s cultivated. She taught me a lot. And I really did love her. But she also made me believe I was worthless for a long time. Then one day, I stopped believing it.”

“That’s the way it happens. One day, you stop believing the lie.”

“So you can see, that’s the very reason I’m not threatened by Matt. Maxi and I, we ran our course. I’m a different person than I was when we first met. In many ways, I think she still can’t accept it, but there it is. And I know you must have your own reasons for divorcing, too. So that’s why I’m not threatened by Matt. Do you understand now?”

“Yes, I do…I do…” I said slowly, but, my feelings weren’t quite as resolved as Bruce’s seemed to be.

Not that I would ever admit it out loud. But, in my heart, I hadn’t lost all affection for my ex-husband. Matt was still a business partner…a father to my child…and a friend. The truth was, I didn’t necessarily want my ex out of my life as completely as Bruce wanted his gone from it.

I found myself staring into the flames of the fire.

“Clare?”

“Sorry. I was…uh…thinking about—”

The investigation,
I told myself.
Keep going, Clare, keep him talking.

“—about the woman you left the Blend with last week. After the Cappuccino Connection…Joy mentioned that you knew her from school or something?”

“Yes,” he said with a nod. “Her name is Sally McNeil. Crazy girl. Back in college, she changed it to ‘Sahara’ to sound more exotic.” He laughed. “I know her from college, that’s all. We hadn’t spoken for years—not since Maxi and I moved East, anyway. So we just had drinks at a bar that night, and I walked her home. I’ll probably stay in touch with her to be honest with you, but just as a friend.”

Why was he speaking about her in the present tense? The woman had been killed this morning…unless…he didn’t know she’d been killed yet…my god…he doesn’t know….

“Just last night, she e-mailed me the phone numbers of two old friends I hadn’t seen in years. They’d dated her—in succession. To be honest, I never saw why. She’s such an artsy phony. Pretty superficially out for herself, too, you know? Not my type at all…you know why?”

“No.”

He smiled. “
You’re
my type.”

Bruce leaned in. I leaned back.

“And what about other women? You mentioned Valerie Lathem already…and that didn’t work out…but you said you tried on-line dating?”

Bruce laughed. “You’re seriously going to give me the third degree?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. All right. For me, dot-com dating was an unmitigated disaster. It just was the wrong thing for me to get involved with.”

“How many women did you meet?”

“About six or seven, I guess. Maybe ten tops.”

“Anyone in particular strike your fancy?”

“If that’s a cute way of saying did I sleep with any of them, yes, I did. One of them.”

Oh, god. I didn’t know if I really wanted to hear this, but it wasn’t just me wondering, it was Quinn…

“Tell me. I want to know. Who was she? Did you practice safe sex?”

“Of course, I practiced safe sex, and her name is Inga Berg. She lives in one of those new condos by the river, and I used to see her at the Blend, although not lately, and frankly, I’ll be happy if I never see her again.”

I noticed Bruce’s verbs were present tense. He was talking about Inga as if she were still alive. Like Sally McNeil, he didn’t seem to know about Inga’s death. It wasn’t all that hard to believe, actually, since the news of Inga’s plunge hadn’t hit the front page of the papers like Valerie’s had. With all the crime and death in this city, Inga’s was just one more. There’d been a small item in two of the tabloids, but that was it. If you weren’t a daily reader of either paper, you could easily have missed it.

“You want my unvarnished word for her? You’ll probably think I’m a pig, but I found her…” He sighed. “Disposable.”

“Oh, that’s not a good word to use, Bruce.”

Especially when Quinn questions you tomorrow or the next day, or whenever he’s got enough of a case to pressure you into a “confession.”

“I’m sorry, but Inga Berg is such a psycho. She’s attractive, sure, but she made me sorry I got involved with her in pretty much less than two weeks.”

“So you went to bed with her?”

“No
bed
was involved.”

Not the SUV. Please not the SUV.

“I want to know.”

Bruce sighed. Not happily. “Your really want me to totally wreck the romantic ambiance of this evening of ours, don’t you?”

“I just…I just need to know…”

“Fine, you want to know everything, I’m an open guy, I want you to trust me, so I’ll let you know everything. Inga wanted to sleep together from the beginning. She wanted to do it in her new SUV on the roof of her building, but I said no. We ended up against the wall of her apartment’s living room the first night. After that, she wanted to hook up in public places, which I dissuaded her from.