I wake up on the edge of the mattress, staring at a crack in the wall. I’m usually quick out of bed, but I can’t seem to get my body moving. My brain, either. Numb is too strong. I’m not numb, just desensitized. I’m drifting and not caring, my eyes glued to the same crack that’s been there since we moved in.
Sound returns first, a siren outside my window, Sarah Bennet’s dog barking in the apartment upstairs, the elevator rattling. And something else, something I can’t quite identify. Something familiar yet utterly strange. I struggle for a few minutes, until my sense of smell kicks in. Then I know but still can’t accept the obvious, incredible truth.
There’s a man in my bed. A man. In my fucking bed.
And I’m naked, not even panties. And the bureau’s on the other side of the room. And I feel him stir beside me.
“Eleni?”
I leap out of bed as though launched from a silo. I want to fly into the bathroom where there’s at least a towel even if the lock doesn’t work. But the damn bed is so close to the wall I have to inch my way down to the foot. All the while knowing, as I know that every demon in hell joined in a round of applause at our birth, that the bastard’s eyes are glued to my ass.
I close the bathroom door and lean against it, my ear pressed to the wood. There’s no sound of pursuit, no follow-up to his saying Eleni’s name. Now what?
Now I realize that I reek of whatever games Eleni played last night. I find myself vowing to kill the bitch even if it means killing myself at the same time. I turn on the shower and jump in without giving the water time to heat. The blast that hits my body is so cold I want to scream. If I do, of course, Eleni’s boyfriend will come running to the rescue. I fold my arms over my chest and suck down a breath until the water finally warms.
I calm slowly as I scrub away. Until I’m able to admit that the flesh I inhabit will never be my own. It’s rent-a-body, a low-end lease on a few hours of life. Eleni shouldn’t have brought anyone home. She’s never done it before and there’s no forgiving her now. But it’s done, in the past, and the clock only turns in one direction. I not only have to get this asshole out of our house, I have to convince him that he’s not welcome to return.
I turn off the shower and sit on the rim of the tub for a moment. I’m starting to think that I don’t give a damn. Everything’s crazy now and our shitty lives are falling apart. I don’t have the patience for gentle persuasion, so why not give in to the rage we all, even Tina, fight so hard to contain? There’s a metal candlestick with a heavy base on the bureau. If necessary …
When I finally open the bathroom door a few inches, I find our bedroom empty and the door on the other side of the room closed. A trick? To lure me out in the open? I’d laugh if the possibility didn’t parallel many of the games our daddy played with us. But there’s no choice here. Whoever was in my bed is in the kitchen now. Frying bacon, which I smell as I leave the bathroom. Bacon is a rare treat for us and we never have it in the house. That means Eleni’s lover bought it, which also means that he intended to stay the night. As the bitch surely knew.
Somehow, I’m not surprised to find Detective Ortega by the stove, irresistible Detective Ortega, at least to poor Eleni. Ortega’s a good-looking man. It’s undeniable. Perhaps forty years old, he’s strongly built and confident enough to be charismatic. But he’s also a cop who’s tricked us once already. I know Eleni and some of the others believe we’ll never be sent to a prison. But as far as I’m concerned, this is a distinction without a difference. Units in psychiatric hospitals set aside for the criminally insane are as violent as any housing area in any penal institution. As violent, but far more unpredictable.
Ortega glances over his shoulder. His gaze is a little too intense for his ready smile. “Martha?”
“Good guess, detective. Now what?”
“Look, I’m sorry about this morning. I fell asleep. It won’t happen again.”
“Bullshit. You bought the groceries last night. You meant to stay.”
He looks at me for a moment, then asks, “So, how do you like your eggs?”
Our little table is already set and there’s a plate of English muffins, toasted and buttered, in the center. As I slip a muffin onto my plate, Ortega sets a mug of coffee beside me.
“My old man,” he tells me, “ran a lunch wagon, back when the Brooklyn waterfront was still industrial. On weekdays, he opened at six in the morning and closed at six at night. He also put me behind the grill when I was ten years old. Summers, Christmas vacation, spring vacation. I’d stand on a wooden milk crate and cook. So, how do you like your eggs?”
I know I’m being seduced, but I don’t care. That’s because, after all the years in therapy, I’m not seducible. I shift my focus to what Ortega might know about the investigation. What he might know and what he might reveal.
“How ‘bout a cheddar omelet?” he asks. “My specialty.”
“Fine.”
The cop turns and busies himself. He strips the bacon from the pan and lays the slices on a dish towel (clean, if I remember right). Then he drops a chunk of butter into a second pan, whisks four eggs in a bowl, pours the whisked eggs onto the melted butter. While the eggs solidify, he grates the cheese.
I admire precision, the efficient use of any resource, including my own labor. You can accomplish far more if you organize your day than if you let the day happen to you. This is a principle that doesn’t interest Eleni or Serena. And why should it when they contribute nothing to the welfare of our household?
Ortega slides the bacon onto a plate and carries it over. A minute later, he lays the omelet in front of me. “There ya go.”
The omelet’s beautifully cooked, the cheese runny, the bacon crisp. Not exactly haute cuisine, but exotic enough for a body that usually breakfasts on bulk granola. I’m working on the last English muffin when Ortega finally speaks.
“Know what? Me driving you to the morgue wasn’t what you think it was.”
“Do tell.”
His thin smile seems more or less obligatory. “First, I was strongly attracted to Eleni, still am. She’s an amazing woman, totally fearless. As for the formal identification of the body, I admit to using it as a pretext.” His smile widens. “You know, to see her again. I never thought for a minute that she wouldn’t be there when I returned in the afternoon.”
“Gimme a break, detective. You could have done the ID the first time you met Eleni.”
“Maybe I wanted to spend a little time with her.”
“That much is obvious.” I slide my plate into the middle of the table and take up the blue mug that holds my now-tepid coffee.
“I did play you,” Ortega finally admits. “To an extent. So, how about I try to make it up? Ask me any question. If I can’t answer, I’ll say so. Otherwise, I’ll be honest.”
“Cross your heart and hope to die?”
He laughs and I find myself liking him, even though I’m sure liking is the very emotion he wants to evoke. “Go ahead,” he tells me.
“Are we suspects?”
“We searched your home, Martha. A judge signed off on the warrant.” He shakes his head. “You shouldn’t be asking that question.”
“Tell me how my father was killed.”
“He was stabbed, which you already know because we confiscated your knives when we executed the warrant.”
“I’m asking for details. I want to know what happened in that room and when it happened.”
Ortega lays his hand on the table and takes up that sincere expression he’s so good at. “I can’t go there. Crime scene details are always used strategically, mostly during interrogations. For example, we use them to verify confessions or to lure suspects into lying. Remember, anything you say can be used against you. What we never do, on the other hand, is casually share those details with a suspect. Now, I don’t think much of my partner, in general or as an investigator, but he’s the lead on the case and I’m not willing to cut his legs out from under him. Ask me anything else.”
“Fine, I will.” It’s not fine, but I’m looking into his eyes and he’s not flinching. He won’t be moved. “Are there any other suspects?”
“Many others. Let’s start with a paroled con who lived with your father at the Kirkland Housing Facility in the Bronx. The Mott Haven section to be more exact. His name’s Alfred O’Neill.”
I lean toward the cop. “Let me guess. About five, ten, two hundred pounds, tree-trunk neck, bowling-ball arms, jail-house tattoos that reach his ears.”
“You know him?”
“He was around here the other day.” I continue before Ortega reacts, but I’m sure he observed my little pause. There’s something we don’t want him to know. “Why is O’Neill a suspect?”
“He was at the Golden Inn that night, in the room with the victim at one point. He lied about it at first, but after we confronted him with his prints, which we found in several places, he admitted to being in the room before Grand was killed. The way he tells it, he and your father went there almost every night.”
“Why?”
“The answer to that question came from the hookers who use the hotel. O’Neill and Grand were dealing opiates, including heroin. They had an arrangement with the desk clerk and worked out of the same room every night. The odd part is that they didn’t use drugs themselves because they were subject to random drug testing at the shelter. So, our working theory, as far as it concerns O’Neill, is that he and his partner got into a dispute over business and O’Neill took him out. That’s bolstered by a pair of hookers who heard them arguing over money on several earlier occasions. Partners or not, the two men did not get along.”
I get up and clear the table, carrying the dishes to the sink. I can’t bring myself to ask the obvious question. And us, what do you have on us? I pour the bacon fat into an empty pickle jar. Later I’ll use it to fry up collard greens and white beans, greens and beans, an alternative to the rice we … Finally, I blurt it out.
“And what about Carolyn Grand? Is there any reason, besides what you told me before, that she’s a suspect?”
“O’Neill claims that he saw you there, but his ID doesn’t mean much. He didn’t mention seeing you the first time we interviewed him or the second time. Plus, O’Neill’s a suspect and he’s got every reason to lie. In fact, he gave us three other suspects, two pimps and a paroled con who stays at the shelter, before he named you. No, your problem, so far, is a second ID, this one made by a hooker named Josie Sanchez. Josie’s a heroin addict with a long record of solicitation and drug possession arrests. She was stoned when we interviewed her and most likely stoned the night she claimed to see someone who looked like Carolyn Grand, but different somehow. As different, perhaps, as you and Eleni.”
I rinse the frying pan and lay it in the drain basket. “What does all that mean? Are we suspects or not?”
“It means that you’re near the bottom of a long list of suspects that includes every hooker and pimp who used the hotel. But the real hurdle is still out there. CSU recovered substantial organic material at the murder scene and from your apartment. The DNA is being analyzed and will eventually be cross-compared to yours, your father’s, O’Neill’s, and the other suspects’. Take this to the bank, Martha. If my partner can put you in that room, he’ll arrest you.”
“If you do that, we’ll be committed to a psychiatric hospital, even if we’re never convicted.”
Ortega raises a finger. “Greco does not give a shit. He’s bucking for detective, first class, and closing cases is how you get there.” He stops for a moment, his gaze intent. “But if you don’t mind, I have a question. You told me that you were … I don’t know the right word here.”
“In control.”
“Okay, you were in control the night your father was killed. You watched TV, went to bed and woke up still in control. I want to know if it’s possible that some other self gained temporary control while you slept? Without you knowing it.”
“It’s possible, yes. But it’s also possible that I’m lying through my teeth.” As I watch him rise and head for the door, I fire off a pair of questions, my tone now angry. “Why are you doing this? Why are you helping us?”
“You mean, outside of my attraction to Eleni?”
“Yeah.”
He opens the door, smiles and shrugs, even as his eyes sadden. “Forget about reasons, Martha. I’m way past reasons. I have been for a long time.”