JM02 - Death's Little Helpers aka No Way Home Page 2

  “Until about a week ago, when the check didn’t show.”

  “If he’s in violation of your settlement agreements, you can take that to court. They might even help you find him.”

  Nina’s mouth puckered and she shook her head. “You sound like my lawyer, for chrissakes. But trust me, court battles are definitely not the way to deal with Greg.”

  I nodded and thought for a while. “You said he doesn’t have many friends. How about enemies? Does he have any of those?”

  She laughed out loud. “Only a zillion or so. Being as fair as I can, John, I got to say that Greg is just not a likable guy. Smart, yes— even funny, in a nasty sort of way— but not likable. And besides the people who know him and don’t like him, there are all those people who followed his stock advice. I don’t expect they’re too happy with Greg either.”

  Nina had a point, and I laughed a little too.

  “Maggie told me you had good references,” she said. I nodded. “She said she didn’t know you personally but everyone she talked to gave you high marks for smart and persistent.” I didn’t disagree. Nina went on. “I hired a PI once before, you know, in the divorce. He was about twice your age and twice your size, and I had to talk real slow around him and use small words.”

  “What did he do for you?”

  “Pictures, credit card receipts— the usual divorce stuff. He did his

  job.”

  “So why didn’t you call him for this?”

  “Because I didn’t trust him as far as I could throw him. Plus, his liver’s probably given out by now.” She stubbed out her cigarette and looked at me. “So how about it— are you going to do this for me?”

  I looked back at her. “Why haven’t you talked to the cops?”

  “The cops?” Nina Sachs looked appalled. “Why the hell would I do that?”

  “Because they have a whole bunch of people who have nothing to do but work missing persons cases, and they have resources and access that I don’t. If you really think something bad has happened to Greg, the cops are the way to go.”

  Nina shook her head vigorously and dug in her pocket for another smoke. “No fucking way. Cops— that’s all I need. You know what Greg would say if I brought them into his business, snooping around? As torqued up as he is about his reputation? Jesus— he’d go ballistic.”

  I held up a hand. “You may not have much choice in the matter. His employers could file a report— if they haven’t already— or a friend or neighbor could. Or the press might get hold of it. On a slow news day, they’d love a story like this.

  “If something has happened to him, he might be grateful that you called the cavalry. Either that or he’ll be beyond caring. And so what if he gets pissed at you for calling the cops; what do you care? You don’t seem to like the guy much anyway.”

  Nina fired up another cigarette and shook her head some more. “I may not like him, but I’ve got to deal with him, for chrissakes. He’d make my life miserable over something like that— mine and Billy’s both— trust me. If the cops get into this, let it be on account of somebody else, not me.” Nina looked at me, waiting for an argument, but I wasn’t going to give her one.

  While I’d meant what I said about the police, I also knew what they were likely to tell Nina, or anyone else who filed a report: that there was nothing illegal in a grown man going missing, and nothing particularly unusual about it either; it happened every day, all across the country, and only rarely was foul play involved. They would take down the facts, and, as the guy had a history of disappearing for weeks at a time and there seemed no reason to suspect wrongdoing, the case would join a lot of others on a very big pile. There were many things the cops could do that I couldn’t— at least not as easily, or legally— but there was something I could do that they wouldn’t: make finding Gregory Danes my highest priority.

  “So, how about it?” Nina asked again. “You going to do this or what?” I looked at her and nodded, and she gave me a quick, crooked smile.

  I had a few background questions for Nina and she answered them and I was about to wrap up when we heard a key in the lock. The front door swung open and a dark-haired woman and a boy came in.

  The woman was five-ten and supple, with cat-black hair precisely cut to shoulder length. It was parted on the side and fell in a glossy wing across her forehead. She had a long face, olive skin, and large almond eyes that were dark and vigilant. Her nose was straight and strong, and there were lines around her wide mouth and in the gap between her brows. I put her age south of forty, but not far south. I thought she might be Latin or Asian or both.

  She wore a green silk suit with a simple cut and a thick gold chain on her neck. She fingered the chain absently as she looked around the apartment. She smiled at Nina, and the somber traces went out of her face. The smile disappeared when she looked at me.

  The boy, I knew, must be Billy. He was small— five foot zero— and slight. His hair was very short and auburn, like his mother’s, and he had her thin face too, though not her pallor. His eyes were watery blue and smudged-looking like his father’s, and his mouth was thin-lipped. But there was none of Gregory Danes’s mocking superiority in his son’s face, at least not yet. Instead there was petulance and anger.

  He wore sneakers that looked like bowling shoes and baggy jeans and a navy-blue parka, too heavy for a warm spring day. He shrugged it off and left it where it fell. Underneath, he wore a black T-shirt, too large for him, with part of a song lyric printed in white across the chest. Like sittin’ on pins and needles Things fall apart, it’s scientific.p>

  It was unattributed, but I recognized it: Talking Heads, “Wild, Wild Life.” Everything old is new again. Billy’s gaze skated across his mother and me and never paused. He headed for the kitchen, his skinny freckled arms stiff.

  Nina stood and looked at the dark woman, who closed the door and returned a heavy key ring to her green leather handbag.

  “The doctor see him?” Nina asked.

  The dark woman glanced at me and nodded. “She saw him and said he is fine. She said he had no fever; it may be a virus that is going around.” The woman’s voice had a nice timbre, and her English was quick and exact but heavily accented. Spanish. “He is fine to go to school— even this afternoon if he likes.” Her dark eyes flicked toward the kitchen.

  “He doesn’t like,” Billy said, in a reedy voice. His head was buried in the refrigerator. The dark woman raised an eloquent brow. Nina jammed her cigarette into an ashtray. Billy leaned on the open door of the fridge and stared inside. Nina put an awkward hand in his short hair.

  “C’mon, honey, Nes will fix you something— or we can order in— and then I’ll run you over to school. You don’t want to miss another day.”

  Billy twisted away from her, his shoulders hunched. “I don’t want anything and I’m not going to school,” he whined. “I still feel like shit.” He took a last disgusted look in the refrigerator and disappeared into the bedrooms. Nina closed the refrigerator door and looked after him. The dark woman sighed heavily.

  “He is just—,” she began, but Nina cut her off.

  “Don’t say it, Nes. I know what he’s just— he’s just a moody son of a bitch.” She shook her head and followed after Billy. I heard doors opening and closing and tight, muffled voices.

  I turned to the dark woman, who was looking around the room. She stared at the mess on the ebony desk and pursed her lips. She put her green bag down and took off her suit jacket and somehow found a spot for it on the coatrack. Her ivory blouse was sleeveless and her arms were sinewy. She sniffed the air and wrinkled her nose. She flicked a wall switch; somewhere a big fan whirred and air began to move and freshen in the loft.

  She picked up the desk drawer, slid it halfway into the desk, and swept the pile on the desktop inside. She knelt and scooped up the paper clips and envelopes and matchbooks, tossed them into the drawer, and closed it. Then she turned to the coatrack.

  Her movements were quick and efficient a
nd practiced. Clothes were plucked from the floor and the furniture and folded or hung. Journals were stacked on a shelf. Tables were cleared, counters were cleaned, and dishes scraped, rinsed, and put in the dishwasher. Her heels made hard sounds as she moved about the loft. She spoke not a word and paid me less attention than the furniture.

  With her advent and Billy’s, I felt as if I’d suddenly become audience to a piece of theater— something contemporary and far-off-Broadway— staged not so much for my benefit as for that of the actors themselves. My business with Nina was done for the moment and I could simply have left, but I didn’t. I was curious; I wanted to see it play out. I got up and gathered a few full ashtrays and carried them into the kitchen. The dark woman was at the sink and looked at me.

  “Garbage?” I asked.

  She looked at me some more and finally pointed. “Under there,” she said.

  I emptied the ashtrays in the trash and went out to get some more. When I returned, the dark woman was drying her hands on a dish towel.

  “I was rude. I apologize. It was a very hectic morning.” She put out a hand. “I am Ines Icasa. You are the detective, no?” Ines— Nes.

  “John March,” I said.

  Her grip was firm. “Come, sit,” she said, and I followed her into the living room. She retrieved her purse and we sat on the sofa. She took a gold lighter and a blue package of Gitanes from her bag and dug in the package for a cigarette. It was empty.

  “Mierda,” she said softly, and crumpled the pack. There was a fresh box of B&Hs on the coffee table, and Ines slit it open with a sharp well-tended thumbnail. She drew out a cigarette, tamped it down, pinched off the filter, and fired up the ragged end.

  “You have settled things with Nina? You will look for Gregory?” I looked at Ines but said nothing. She didn’t seem to mind. She ran a hand through her hair and over her neck, and I saw a scar on her smooth right arm, on the inside, just below the elbow. It was wide and shiny and flat.

  “It is enormous trouble to go through,” she said. She exhaled a great cloud and watched the draft carry it away. “As busy as she is— she should not waste her energies.” Ines turned her vigilant eyes on me. “But this is not your concern, I know,” she said.

  A door opened and closed and Nina Sachs stood in the kitchen. She leaned against the counter and rubbed her forehead with the heel of her palm and sighed. Ines went into the kitchen and stood very close to her and spoke softly. After a while, Nina bowed her head and rested it against Ines’s breast. Ines stroked her hair and neck, and Nina ran her fingers up Ines’s bare arm, from elbow to shoulder and back again. Then she leaned away slightly and turned her face up and they kissed.

  They kissed slowly and for a long time, and when they finished they stood entwined, looking at me. Ines was without expression; Nina wore a smile that was strangely like her husband’s.

  “You still here?” she said. “I thought we were done.”

  I nodded. “I’ll call in a couple of days,” I said. “Sooner, if I learn anything.” They turned away from me and back to their soft conversation. I let myself out.

  2

  Flesh & Blood was a new place just off Union Square that specialized in red meat and game birds and nostalgia for the bull market. It occupied what was once a firehouse, and the hundred-year-old building’s elaborate plaster and tile and brass work had been lovingly restored and augmented with dark wood paneling and crystal chandeliers and a bar across the back that looked like J. P. Morgan’s yacht. It was a small place, but its designers had successfully achieved the cavernous feel and stupefying din of much larger spots. The wine list ran to several volumes, as did the list of single malts and cocktails. The waitresses— and there were only waitresses— were uniformly young and attractive, and clad in short black skirts and white shirts with plunging necklines. If not for city ordinances to the contrary, they would certainly have had cigarette girls in spike heels and fishnets working the tables and firing up the customers’ stogies. It was not my usual sort of place, but Tom Neary was a slave to food fashion, and I owed him more than a few favors— the latest one being this job for Nina Sachs.

  He was at the restaurant when I arrived, standing near the hostess’s podium and making the hostess slightly nervous. Not that Neary was particularly threatening— in fact, with his short dark hair, clean-cut good looks, and horn-rimmed glasses, he could pass for a grown-up Eagle Scout. And he wasn’t saying anything, or doing much at all besides studying the platters that the waitresses hoisted by. But at six-foot-four and 250 pounds, he had a tendency to loom.

  Neary wore a dark suit, a white shirt, and a striped tie— the same G-man look he’d sported when I first met him, back when he was with the Bureau’s resident agency in Utica, and I was a sheriff’s investigator in Burr County. Nowadays, though, the clothes were more expensively cut. Gone from the Feds over three years, Neary had a big-deal job with Brill Associates, a big-deal corporate security and investigations firm. The division he ran covered the whole East Coast, and his clients included some of the largest banks and brokerages around.

  Neary was more comfortable in the private sector than he had been at the Bureau; his masters at Brill let him run on a much looser lead, so long as revenues kept growing. And now that he was firmly ensconced in management himself, a little of the edge had come off his reflexive distrust of authority. And, of course, the money was a whole lot better. Neary used to worry about the moral gray areas of private security work— his Jesuit schooling, he said— but he seemed to navigate those waters well enough, and I didn’t know if he still gave it much thought.

  There were plenty of things I didn’t know about Neary. I wasn’t a guy he invited over for Sunday barbecues or a guy he sent family photo cards to at Christmastime. But he and I had traded favors for years now, and I knew the important stuff— that he was smart and tough and could think on his feet. That he knew the difference between what was right and what was expedient. That I could trust him.

  Neary offered me a massive hand and we shook. The hostess looked relieved and led us to a table near the back. Neary hung his suit jacket on the chair, loosened his tie, and unfurled a white cloth napkin on his lap. A blond waitress recited the menu to us, and he listened closely and nodded slowly as she spoke. She took our drink orders and left, and I took a closer look at him.

  Success was taking its toll. Behind the glasses, his brown eyes were bleary, and the skin beneath them was pouched and dark. There were new lines around his mouth and new gray in his hair. His big shoulders were slumped and rounded. He yawned and stretched out his arms and rolled his neck. I spoke over the clamor.

  “Too much work?” I asked.

  “Too much work, not enough hours. Too many meetings, too much talking—” There was a muted chime from under the table, and Neary pulled something hardly larger than a deck of cards from his belt. It was black and had a tiny screen and keyboard on the front.

  “E-mail,” he said. “Like a fucking electronic dog leash.” But he read it. He shook his head and put the deck back on his belt. The waitress returned with a bread basket and our drinks: ginger ale for Neary, cranberry juice for me. She left with our lunch orders. Neary swallowed some ginger ale and rubbed his eyes. “You take the job?” he asked.

  “About an hour ago. Thanks … I think.”

  “You’re not sure?”

  “You ever meet Nina Sachs?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “I’ve known Maggie Lind for a while, and done some work for her and her clients, but not Nina Sachs. Why?”

  I shrugged. “A difficult personality.”

  “I thought that was the definition of client,” Neary said. He reached across the table for a roll.

  “Why did Brill pass on this?” I asked. “Was it too small for you guys?”

  “Small was part of it,” he said. “But we had a conflict of interest, too. Brill is on the short list to take over security services for Pace-Loyette.”

  I thought about that for a while. “Ni
na Sachs told me that Pace had more questions than answers about where Danes might be.”

  Neary nodded, eyeing an elk steak that passed our table, gleaming and smoking. “If we win this beauty contest, I expect that finding him will be one of the first things Pace management asks us to do. If you’ve already located him by then, all the better.”

  Wheels within wheels. I smiled. “Why are they so interested?”

  “Danes isn’t just another office grunt,” Neary said.

  “I know, he’s their wunderkind stock analyst— or he was until a few years ago, when he crashed and burned along with the rest of them. Now I guess he’s like all the other ex-superstars, the pile of dog shit on the kitchen table that everyone’s trying to ignore.”

  Neary smiled. “His management is afraid he might be an exploding pile of dog shit.” I raised an eyebrow and Neary continued. “You see the articles in the Journal, on pending enforcement activity?” I shook my head. “I thought you followed this stuff,” he said, smiling. “I thought it was in your blood.”

  “I’m in recovery for it. What’s the Journal say?”

  “They’ve been running a series on what the next wave of Fed actions might be. Speculation is that the SEC and the Justice Department are looking at the small boutique firms— the niche players— and that they’re set to land hard on anyone who didn’t come to Jesus when they had the chance a couple of years back.”

  “And Pace falls into that category?”

  “Yep. They’ve got a nice little franchise, providing investment-banking services to tech companies. They’re a one-stop shop: doing M and A, underwriting, lending, syndications, and research. A lot of folks think they never really fessed up, back when the analyst shit first hit the fan— which could make them a prime candidate for some Fed attention this go-round. Pace management has consistently denied any wrongdoing— big surprise— but it’s no secret that they’re nervous.”

  “Danes is a part of their worries?”