The lone occupant of the vehicle was a woman who looked to be in her mid-fifties. Marshall didn’t recognize her. She was in the back, behind the empty front passenger seat, the opposite side of the car to Marshall. She had her elbow up on the sill, thumb and first finger rubbing together in a slow and contemplative fashion, or perhaps in the first outward sign of impatience. Burning off vexation, a micro-calorie at a time.
Marshall pulled his door shut.
The rain on the glass gave the car a submerged, hermetic quality. The guy he’d spoken to stayed on the sidewalk, his murky shape receding toward the relative shelter of a building eave.
The woman said, ‘I’m Deputy Inspector Loretta Flynn. NYPD.’
She opened the black leather purse resting in her lap and produced a badge wallet with a gold shield and an ID.
Marshall said, ‘You did well to find me. Or do you have people outside every lunch place in Manhattan?’
She wore a white blouse and a charcoal suit that looked to be fitted rather than off the rack. Marshall guessed tailoring was a justifiable expense, on a deputy inspector’s salary. She had the sinewy and slightly drawn look of someone who did fifteen or twenty hours a week on a treadmill cranked to a life-or-death velocity. She said, ‘We followed you up Lexington by CCTV. But I did think you’d be more difficult to corner.’
They’d worked him perfectly, he had to concede that. The two cars on Lexington as a visual nudge, prompting him back along Seventy-fifth, directly to where she was waiting.
Marshall said, ‘I was more focused on eating my lunch than playing fugitive.’
‘I see.’
‘How can I help you?’
‘What’s your interest in D’Anton Lewis?’
The question expelled a mint-scent of chewing gum. Nicorette, maybe. He could picture her smoking her way through some tense operations.
Marshall said, ‘I think you know the answer.’
In her pale blue eyes was a faint quality of wariness and contempt. ‘Why do you say that?’
‘I don’t imagine I’m his first ever visitor. And I don’t imagine the previous ones got this kind of treatment.’ He smiled. ‘Or is it standard practice to deploy three unmarked cars and a DI whenever someone knocks on his door?’
‘From what I understand, it went a bit beyond a knock on the door.’
Marshall shrugged. ‘Even if I broke his nose and pulled his teeth out with pliers, I wouldn’t expect the second in charge of a precinct to show up.’
She didn’t answer.
‘Where are you based? The two-three?’
‘I’m second in charge of the one-seven.’
‘Right. So you could’ve stayed in your nice office and signed overtime forms. But instead you came up here. Which means you were forewarned about me. Which means you know what my interest in him is.’
‘I understand that Detective Nevins conveyed to you that this is a police matter. The Vialoux investigation.’
Marshall smiled. ‘You’re not investigating Vialoux.’
Her eyebrows rose. ‘Oh, is that right?’
‘Yeah. Let’s see if I can guess it on the first try. Nevins made an intel request on D’Anton, and because you’re investigating him for something else, it sent up a red flag, and you told Nevins to keep his distance.’
She made no reaction.
Marshall said, ‘And Nevins said he would, but he mentioned I’d probably show up sooner or later. Is that about right?’
‘He told us you’d be along this morning. So you’re a little slow.’
Marshall said, ‘D’Anton stonewalled me. But given your theatrics, I know he’s definitely worth pursuing.’
Flynn’s elbow went back on the sill. Her thumb and first finger resumed their circling. She said, ‘You worked undercover for Lee Ashcroft.’
Marshall nodded. ‘Long time ago, now.’
‘Sure. But you can still appreciate the fact that cases take time to build.’
He shook his head. ‘No. I appreciate the fact it takes time to convince the desk people that the ducks on the street are all in a row.’
She smiled. No emotion in it. Blue eyes unmoving. Like an executioner looking across the blade of a guillotine. She said, ‘I’ve earned my stripes. I did my time. So you don’t need to imply you’re sitting here with some naïve bureaucrat.’
‘You did your time, huh? What, undercover on a drug investigation, and now you’re overseeing one?’
‘Nice try. But no comment.’
‘OK. I had a hunch he was maybe into drug trafficking. But I guess he could just be a recidivist jaywalker.’
Silence for a moment. Beyond the glass, pedestrians went by in rain-blurred anonymity. The man who’d ushered him into the car was still there in the shelter of the eave, Reaperish in vague silhouette.
Marshall said, ‘Maybe you could just explain clearly what you want me to do. Imagine for a moment that your sole mandate is to leave me in no doubt.’
She sighed through her nose, a smooth and visible deflation. Then she opened her purse again and removed a smartphone. Thin and black and glossy, like a piece of limousine glass. She navigated briskly through various menus, and then raised it so the screen was facing him.
A photo was displayed.
A hand, Marshall realized, although it took a moment for the image to register. It looked amphibious, because the digits had been amputated at the first knuckle.
Flynn said, ‘A former girlfriend of Mr Lewis. She called him in November 2017 and said she was going to disclose the infidelity to his wife, but for a million dollars she might keep it to herself. They pulled her out of the Hudson eight days later. You’ll note those cuts are clean-edged. They think he used a box-cutter. One pass, like slicing a carrot.’ She lowered the screen.
Marshall said, ‘I’d say he used that dagger he carries in his coat.’
‘Possibly. And you have evidence now that he’s prepared to use it.’
Marshall said, ‘Is this meant to give me a better idea of who I’m dealing with? I had an inkling before I met him that he’s not an upstanding citizen. And then he told me himself that he’s going to cut me from groin to voice box if he sees me again. I think his phrasing was slightly harsher.’
She didn’t answer.
Marshall said, ‘But you don’t care about dead people, anyway. Otherwise you’d let me ask him about Vialoux. And you’d let Nevins speak with him, too.’
Flynn returned the phone to the handbag. No sign of nicotine gum, but Marshall saw an e-Cigarette. He felt a small and pointless charge of vindication. Flynn pursed her lips for a moment, fine wrinkles emanating radially, and then said, ‘Prison is prison.’
‘Sure. What does that mean?’
‘It means whether you get locked up for murder, or drugs, or jaywalking, at the end of the day, it’s the same result. You’re alone in a cell. And if you stay out of my way, that’s where D’Anton Lewis is heading.’
Marshall said, ‘I don’t necessarily think that he killed Vialoux—’
‘Good. All the more reason to keep your distance—’
‘So what I’m inclined to do now is tell him he’s the subject of an investigation by NYPD, and potentially other representatives of the alphabet. And maybe in exchange he’ll give me an idea about what happened to Vialoux.’
He thought at the very least the suggestion might irritate her. But Loretta Flynn, apparently amused, said, ‘He’s aware he’s a target. Arrogance is his best feature, as far as I’m concerned. Being surveilled by police doesn’t seem to dissuade him from doing business.’
‘Well, if he’s being surveilled, does he have an alibi for last night? Between, say, eight and midnight?’
‘I’m not going to get into it with you.’
‘OK. I’m happy to ask him myself. And if he’s so unbothered about New York’s finest following him around, I can’t see how I’d cause him any distress. Which begs the question, why are you sitting here trying to warn me off?’
He saw the tendons in her neck tauten and then fade. She said, ‘I just want to be clear that if he ends up dead, you will go to prison.’
‘I doubt it. But I’m pleased that in some cases you’re prepared to investigate murder. You might have the budget for it if you weren’t sending three cars and four people to talk to me on my lunchbreak.’
Flynn said, ‘You were undercover with the Italian mob. Tony Asaro.’
‘Nice try. But no comment.’
‘I heard when you ended the operation you took two hundred thousand dollars from Asaro’s wall safe.’
‘Two-fifty, thereabouts. Allegedly.’
‘So not the kind of issue you’d want the law to look into with any kind of vigor.’
‘Indeed. Fortunately, I’m well outside the statute of limitation on robbery.’
‘Yes, but not on trafficking. That’s a Class A felony, with no expiration date. And we might argue that in taking the proceeds, you were rendered complicit. I suspect we’d hand it over to the feds. The Southern District of New York has an admirable track record in such matters.’
Marshall didn’t answer.
Flynn said, ‘Stay out of my way. I’d recommend just sitting quietly and hoping that Mr Lewis ends up incarcerated. Otherwise, I give you my personal assurance that I will have you instead.’ She nodded at his door. ‘You can get out now.’