The red GTO was parked at his side door, as Gurney expected it would be. He’d called Hardwick on his way home from Venus Lake and left a message suggesting they get together ASAP, including Esti if possible. He felt the need for other perspectives on his Alyssa interview.
Hardwick had called Gurney back as he was nearing Walnut Crossing and offered to come right over. When Gurney entered the house, he found the man lounging in a chair at the breakfast table with the French doors open.
“Your lovely wife let me in as she was leaving. Said she was off to therapize the local nutcases at the clinic,” he said in response to Gurney’s unvoiced question.
“I doubt she put it that way.”
“She might have put it in cuddlier words. Women love the fantasy that crazy fuckers can be de-crazed. As if the only thing Charlie Manson needed was a touch of TLC.”
“Speaking of nice women getting involved with lunatics, what’s the deal with you and Esti?”
“Hard to say.”
“You serious about her?”
“Serious? Yeah, I guess, whatever ‘serious’ means. I’ll tell you one thing. The sex is seriously good.”
“Is she the reason you finally bought some furniture?”
“Women like furniture. Turns them on. Feathered nests trigger good feelings. The biological imperatives start kicking in. Beds, couches, comfy chairs, cozy rugs—shit like that makes a difference.” He paused. “She’s on her way. Did you know that?”
“On her way here?”
“I passed your invitation along to her. I thought she might’ve called you.”
“No, but I’m glad she’s coming. The more heads on this subject the better.”
Hardwick made a skeptical face—his usual face—stood up from the table and stepped over to the French doors. He gazed out curiously for a while before asking, “Fuck are you up to out there?”
“What do you mean?”
“That pile of lumber.”
Gurney came to the door. There was indeed a pile of lumber that he’d missed on his way into the house. His view had been blocked by the asparagus ferns. For a moment he was at a loss. There were stacks of what appeared to be two-by-fours, four-by-fours, and two-by-sixes.
He took out his phone and entered Madeleine’s number.
Surprisingly, she picked up on the first ring. “Yes?”
“What’s this stuff out back?” Even as he was asking, he realized the answer was obvious and calling her had probably been a mistake.
“Lumber. For the chicken house. I had it delivered this morning. The things you said we’d be using first.”
He started raising his shields. “I didn’t say we’d be using them today.”
“Well, tomorrow, then? Don’t worry about it. If you’re too busy, just point me in the right direction and I’ll get started myself.”
He felt cornered, but he remembered a wise man once saying that feelings aren’t facts. He decided it would be prudent to keep his irritation out of his voice. “Right.”
“That’s it? That’s the reason you called?”
“Right.”
“Okay, see you tonight. I’m on my way into a session.”
He slipped the phone back in his pocket.
Hardwick was watching him with a sadistic grin. “Trouble in paradise?”
“No trouble.”
“Really? You looked like you were going to bite that phone.”
“Madeleine is better at switching focus than I am.”
“You mean she wants you to get involved in something you don’t give a shit about?”
It was a comment, not a question, and like many of Hardwick’s comments, it was rudely true.
“I hear a car,” said Gurney.
“Got to be Esti.”
“You recognize the sound of her Mini?”
“No. But who the hell else would be driving up that crappy little road of yours?”
A minute later, she was at the side door and Gurney was letting her in. She was dressed a lot more conservatively than at Hardwick’s house—in dark slacks, white blouse, and dark blazer, looking like she’d come directly from the job. Her hair had lost some of the sheen it’d had the previous night. She had a manila envelope in her hand.
“You just coming off a shift?” Gurney asked.
“Yep. Midnight to noon. Pretty tiring after all that craziness last night. But I had to fill in for someone who filled in for me two weeks ago. Then I had to get my car inspected. Anyway, here I am.” She followed Gurney into the kitchen, saw Hardwick standing at the table, and gave him a big smile. “Hi, sweetheart.”
“Hey, peaches, how’s things?”
“Good—now that I see you in one piece.” She went to him, kissed him on the cheek, and ran her fingers down his arm, as if to confirm her observation. “You’re really okay, right? There’s nothing you’re not telling me?”
“Babe, I am one hundred percent okay.”
“I’m glad to hear that.” She gave him a cute little wink. “So,” she continued, suddenly all business, “I got some answers. You boys interested?”
Gurney gestured toward the dining table. “We can sit there.”
Esti chose the end chair. The two men sat across from each other. She took her notepad out of the envelope. “Simple things first. Yes, according to the autopsy—pretty basic one—Mary Spalter’s injuries could have been intentionally inflicted, but that option was never seriously considered. Falls, even fatal falls, happen enough in geriatric situations that the simplest explanation is usually accepted.”
Hardwick grunted. “So there was no investigation at all?”
“Zero.”
“Time of death?” asked Gurney.
“Estimated between three and five in the afternoon. How does that square with the floral delivery guy on the security video?”
“I’ll double-check,” said Gurney, “but I think he walked into Carol Blissy’s office around three-fifteen. Any ViCAP hits on the MO elements?”
“Nothing yet.”
“No witness reports of floral delivery vans at homicide scenes?”
“No, but that doesn’t mean there weren’t any such reports. It just means they didn’t make it onto ViCAP forms.”
“Right,” said Gurney. “Anything on Fat Gus?”
“Time-of-death window between ten in the morning and one in the afternoon. And, yes, as you said it might, the word ‘larynx’ appears in the autopsy wound descriptions. Death, however, was not caused by the nails that were hammered into his head and neck. He was shot first—a .22 hollow point through the right eye into the brain.”
“Interesting,” said Gurney. “That would suggest that the nails weren’t a form of torture.”
“So what?” said Hardwick. “What’s your point?”
“It supports the idea that the nails were a warning to someone, rather than a way of punishing the victim. The time of death is interesting, too. In the original incident report on Carl’s shooting it gives the time of death as ten-twenty. The location of the Gurikos murder in his home near Utica would make it impossible for the shooter to have killed him at ten, gone through the nailing mess, cleaned himself up, driven to Long Falls, and gotten set up in time to hit Carl at ten-twenty. So it must have happened the other way around—Carl first, then Gus.”
“Assuming only one shooter,” said Hardwick.
“Right. But that’s an assumption we ought to make, at least until there’s evidence of more than one.” He turned to Esti. “Anything yet on Gurikos?”
“My contact at OCTF is looking into it. She wasn’t directly involved, so she has to tiptoe. She doesn’t want to set off alarms that could prompt follow-up queries to the original investigator. Kind of a tricky situation.”
“That’s different. Klemper never initiated any ViCAP or NCIC searches, because he’d already made his decision about Kay. So I can pursue that more safely.”
“That’s great. And, Jack, you’re chasing after the prosecution witnesses—and whatever you can get from your Interpol friend?”
“Yeah. Nothing yet from Interpol. And none of the witnesses are still at the addresses listed in the case file—which may not be particularly significant, given their basic nature.”
Esti stared at him. “Their basic nature?”
Hardwick’s eyes lit up with the arch look that always got under Gurney’s skin. “Their basic nature is that they lack upstanding qualities. They’re fundamentally scumbags. It’s a known fact that scumbags who lack upstanding qualities often lack permanent addresses. All I’m saying is that having difficulty in locating them does not signify much. But I will persevere. Even scumbags have to be somewhere.” He turned to Gurney. “So how about telling us about your interview with the heiress.”
“The would-be heiress—if Kay stays in prison.”
“Which is becoming less likely each passing day. This turn of events must be having an interesting effect on Miss Alyssa, yes? You care to share your insights?”
Gurney smiled. “I’ll do better than that. I have a recording. Might not be the greatest quality, but you’ll get the gist.”
“ ‘Fuck me and die’? Did she really say ‘Fuck me and die’?” Esti was leaning toward the recorder as they finished listening for the second time to the conversation at Venus Lake. “What was that all about?”
“Probably the name of her favorite rock band,” suggested Hardwick.
“It could be a threat,” said Esti.
“Or an invitation,” said Hardwick. “You were there, Davey boy. What’d it sound like to you?”
“Like everything else she said and did—a combination of cartoon seduction and calculated bullshit.”
Hardwick raised an eyebrow. “Sounds to me like a nasty little kid trying to shock the grown-ups. That FMAD T-shirt you described makes her seem kind of pathetic. Like inside she’s about twelve.”
“The T-shirt may have been harmless,” replied Gurney, “but her eyes weren’t.”
Esti jumped in. “Maybe the shirt wasn’t so harmless either. Suppose it was a literal statement of fact.”
Hardwick ratcheted up his skeptical look. “What fact?”
“Maybe there’s more than one ‘black widow’ in this case.”
“You mean ‘Fuck me and die’ really means ‘Fuck me and I’ll kill you’? That’s clever, but I don’t get it. How does it—”
“She told Klemper her father coerced her into having sex with him. We have no proof of it, but it could be true.”
“So you’re saying that Alyssa killed her father as payback?”
“It’s not impossible. And if she could rope a horny jerk like Klemper into bending the investigation to put Kay in the frame, the ‘payback’ would also include her ending up with her father’s estate. That’s two major motives—revenge and money.”
Hardwick looked at Gurney. “What do you think, ace?”
“I’m sure Alyssa is guilty of something. She may have ‘persuaded’ or blackmailed Klemper into tailoring the evidence to make sure Kay was convicted. Or she may have masterminded the whole damn thing—the murder as well as the frame.”
“Premeditated murder? You think she’s capable of that?”
“There’s something scary in those glittery blue eyes. But I have a hard time seeing her handling the executional details. Someone else smashed Mary’s head on the side of that bathtub and hammered the nails into Fat Gus.”
“You’re saying she hired a pro?”
“I’m saying if she was the prime mover behind the three murders, she would’ve needed help—but none of that answers the basic question that’s been eating at me from the beginning: Why Carl’s mother? It really doesn’t make sense.”
Hardwick was drumming his fingertips on the table. “Neither does the Gus hit. Not unless you buy Donny Angel’s story about Gus and Carl being hit by a guy they targeted. But if you buy that, and you also buy Alyssa as the prime mover, then you’re stuck with the conclusion that she must have been Carl’s original target—which never felt right to me, and it still doesn’t.”
“But it would give her a third motive,” said Esti.
As Gurney considered the Angelidis scenario one more time, with Alyssa in the unnamed target position, it touched a nerve.
“What is it?” asked Esti, eyeing him curiously.
“Nothing very logical. In fact, nothing logical at all. Just a feeling and an image.” He got up and went into the den to get that troubling photo of Carl Spalter from the case file. When he returned, he laid it on the table between Hardwick and Esti.
Hardwick stared at it, his expression tightening.
“I saw that once before,” said Esti. “It’s hard to look at for very long.”
Hardwick glanced up at Gurney, who was still standing. “You have some point you want to make with this?”
“Like I said, nothing logical. Just an off-the-wall question.”
“Christ, Davey boy, the suspense is killing me. Speak.”
“Might that be the look of a man who’s waiting to die—who knows he’s about to die—as the final, twisted result of taking out a murder contract on his own child?”
They all stared at the photograph.
No one said anything for a while.
Hardwick finally leaned back in his chair and let out one of his barking laughs. “Holy Mary, Mother of God, wouldn’t that be the ultimate fucking karma!”