“Theft? Assault?” she shouted in disbelief, her voice ricocheting around the tiny closed room. “Reckless endangerment? Receiving stolen goods?” Bennie almost jumped out of her chair, but Detective Maloney had told her if she did that again he’d cuff her to it. Since he was one of the so-called Hollywood Detectives from SIU, or the Special Investigations Unit, she believed it. These guys came to play. “What are you talking about? I didn’t do-”
“Bennie, please, be quiet,” Carrier said, burying her fingernails in her client’s padded shoulder. “Let the detective ask his questions, and you can answer only if I say.” A sheaf of white papers sat ignored in front of her, the form questionnaire issued by the police, certifying that Bennie had been advised of her right to remain silent. Unfortunately, she was exercising her right to freak out.
“But this is ridiculous! I didn’t steal anything! I would never steal anything!” Bennie told Maloney and the other SIU detective, a bald, heavyset man whose name she was too upset to remember. He stood against the wall, taking notes; he was the one who had directed that she and her belongings be searched when they’d first brought her in, but they hadn’t found whatever they’d been looking for. “I would never break the law, I’m a lawyer!”
Carrier squeezed her shoulder again. “Not your best argument, Bennie. Now please, can you be quiet?”
“Settle down, Ms. Rosato. No reason to get worked up.” Detective Maloney remained calm, even relaxed, which was easy because he wasn’t in custody. He was trim and tall, about her age, with longish sandy hair and hazel eyes Bennie would have found attractive if he hadn’t arrested her. He reached into an accordion file folder on the counter and pulled out a typed form she recognized as an incident report, which was the officer’s account of the facts of the crime. He said, “All right, I’ll read this aloud, then I’ll take your client’s statement. If she didn’t do it, we can work it out, okay?”
“Fine,” Carrier answered. Bennie quieted momentarily, and Detective Maloney bent over the report, his neatly scissored bangs falling forward.
“The crime occurred in the Tiffany store, in the Park Hyatt on Broad Street. The store manager gave a statement, and so did his assistant, the saleswoman, and three eyewitnesses. According to the store manager, the perpetrator stole a pair of diamond earrings-diamond studs, they’re called-worth eleven thousand five hundred forty-three dollars from-”
“Earrings?” Bennie asked, dumbfounded. “This is crazy! I didn’t steal any earrings! There has to be some-”
“Bennie, quiet!” Carrier snapped, and Bennie bit her tongue.
What the hell is going on?
The detective continued reading. “The perpetrator browsed in the store for approximately fifteen minutes, then went to a counter which contained diamond earrings on the first shelf. She asked the saleswoman to show her the earrings, which were more than a carat in weight. The store was very crowded, and customers were waiting to be helped. The perpetrator tried on the earrings. When one of the two security guards stationed at the door went to assist an older lady who had dropped her shopping bag, the perpetrator ran for the exit with the earrings on.”
Oh my God. Bennie’s mouth went dry. It was Alice. Alice had stolen the earrings. Alice posing as Bennie. First the Chinese restaurant, and now this. Bennie knew it in her very marrow, the bones and blood she shared with her twin. The realization shocked her into silence.
“The perpetrator shoved the security guard out of her way, and he fell into a glass display case of Elsa Peretti jewelry, whatever that is. The other security guard gave pursuit down Broad Street, but he lost the perpetrator, who ran down into the Broad Street subway and disappeared.”
Bennie’s thoughts tumbled over one another in confusion. How had Alice done it? Why had she done it? What the fuck? This wasn’t mischief with credit cards or even tainting her reputation with the judges. These were felony charges. They could ruin her. Alice was upping the ante.
“What evidence do you have that my client committed this robbery?” Carrier was asking, and the detective scoffed.
“Other than the whole shebang on surveillance tape? Tiffany had three cameras on that counter, and your client is on each one.”
“I wanna see that tape!” Bennie blurted out. She had to see it for herself. With her own eyes.
Carrier cleared her throat. “Detective, may we see the videotape?”
“Fine.” Detective Maloney opened the accordion file and extracted a black Fuji videotape. He got up holding the tape, brushed down his dark slacks with a practiced hand, and walked over to the TV cart with the ancient VHS machine. He slid the tape inside, turned on the TV, and pressed Play.
Everybody turned toward the screen, which showed a busy main room in Tiffany: a grainy view of lush carpeting, attractive shoppers, and display cases full of diamond bracelets and earrings. Suddenly a woman entered from the left side of the picture and threaded her way through the customers. Her face wasn’t visible, because her back was turned from the surveillance camera, but the woman was fully as tall as Bennie, her shoulders equally square, and she was wearing the same suit Bennie had on today, her trademark khaki. The woman’s hair was Bennie’s shade of honey blond, and it had been pinned up in a carbon copy of Bennie’s messy twist. She stopped in front of a display case, her back still to the camera.
“The beauty shot is in one, two, three,” Detective Maloney counted down, and the woman turned on cue and faced the security camera dead-on for several seconds, as if she were posing for a photograph. The detective snorted. “There you are, Ms. Rosato.”
“That’s her,” Bennie said, voicing her thoughts aloud. It was Alice. She had come back. Here was proof positive. Bennie felt stunned. “That’s my-”
“Please be quiet and watch the tape, Bennie,” Carrier warned, and Bennie looked over. On-screen, Alice was putting on the diamond earrings and examining her face-Bennie’s face-in a square mirror sitting on the glass counter, tilted up. An older woman with a cane dropped a shopping bag, spilling its contents of wrapped boxes, and a security guard went to help her. The saleswoman turned away for a moment, and all of a sudden Alice bolted from the counter, knocking over a customer in the process. She punched the guard by the door before he could move to stop her, sending him sprawling backward against a display case, and flew out the door.
Bennie shifted her gaze to the top of the screen, where a black band ran with a date and time. It was today’s date, and the time ticked off: 10:30:10, 10:30:11, 10:30:12. Her heart sank. She had no alibi. At that time, she had been walking back from the federal courthouse, alone. Tiffany lay between the courthouse and her office, on the way. It was more than possible for Bennie to have been there at ten-thirty, stealing diamonds. Alice couldn’t have planned it that way, could she? Did she have people helping her? And who was that older woman who dropped her shopping bag at the exact right moment? Was she in on it, too?
Detective Maloney reached over and turned off the TV. “Let’s get real, Ms. Rosato. It’s you on the tape, I can see that with my own eyes. The manager IDed you positively and two of the eyewitnesses recognized you from TV. You’re wearing the clothes you have on in the video. Your hair is the same too.” He put his hands on his hips. “So cut the shit. Give the earrings back, you’ll get a couple years’ probation-”