"Can you tell me why you think this might be your sister?"
Janet blotted her eyes and looked down at the photographs, handing me one. "That's Amber about a year ago."
I studied the image. The resemblance to Janet was striking. Long, narrow faces, lightly freckled skin, and thin, tapered noses. Everything was consistent with the shape and size of the woman we had seen last night.
"We're not close, like I told Detective Chapman. But we had this deal that we always went out together on our birthdays," she said. "Her birthday was the Sunday before last. She just turned thirty-two."
By this past Sunday, the woman decomposing behind the cast iron façade of the old building had already been dead for more than a week, if Mike and Dr. Magorski were right.
"When's the last time you spoke to Amber?"
Janet straightened up. "Christmas. I think it was right after the holidays. I had gone home-to Idaho-to see the family. I called her when I got back."
"And not once during the last eight months?"
"I told you, we're different. We don't really get along."
"Can you tell us something about her?" I sat down next to Janet to look at the other photographs. I wanted to know what would lead this woman to the conclusion that her sister had been the victim of a murder, rather than that she simply chose to celebrate the event with someone else.
"Amber is-well, she's quirky, like I told the detective. She moved to New York about nine years ago, after college. Worked for a temp agency. Wound up doing word processing at a law firm. That's where she's been for the last five years. Masters and Martin."
"One twenty Wall Street." The offices of the small firm that specialized in patent law placed Amber a short walk from where the body was found. "And how long has it been since she showed up there?"
Mike crossed his arms and sat on the windowsill. "She was let go in July."
"She quit," Janet said defensively. "That's what the receptionist told me."
"Have you called her at home? Or gone to her apartment?"
"Her answering machine is full. It's not taking any more messages. And her cell phone is shut off."
"Are there neighbors?"
"She didn't have any friends in the building, really. I called the super. He hasn't seen her since last week."
"I've got the address, Coop. The East Nineties. You should know they wanted her out of there."
"Behind on the rent?"
"Nope. People didn't like the company she kept. If Janet can-well, if she's able to make an ID," Mike said, "we'll go straight there."
"Did you have a plan to meet on Amber's birthday?"
Janet shook her head. "I started calling on that Friday. Left a few messages then that she didn't return. We go to the same place every year. I just assumed she'd show up."
"Where's that?"
"Dylan's Brazen Head. It's a pub on First Avenue, near her apartment."
I glanced at a photo of the two sisters together, both smiling for the camera. Behind them was the mirrored wall of a bar, lined with bottles of booze. The Brazen Head had been in business for more than twenty years, a magnet for prep school kids from the Upper East Side because of the affable owner's willingness to turn a blind eye to underage drinkers. It was named for the oldest pub in Dublin, which dated back-according to legend-eight hundred years.
"Did you go?" I asked.
"Yes. I went early, at six, and waited there until ten o'clock."
"Tell Ms. Cooper why Amber picked Dylan's."
Janet looked at me sideways before she answered. "Jim Dylan and Amber-well, she's been, I guess you'd say, dating him for three years."
"What she means is that Jim Dylan has a wife and six kids, three of 'em still at home in the nest," Mike said. "So I wouldn't exactly call it 'dating.' "
"Did you ask Mr. Dylan about your sister?"
"He told me he hadn't seen her since May. Jim didn't want to talk about it there. One of his sons was tending bar."
"Is there anything else about your sister that you think puts her in harm's way?"
"Like I told you," Janet said again. "Amber's quirky. I'm afraid this stuff might end up in the newspapers. I just want to protect her if I can."
"What do you mean?"
"My sister supplemented her income with another job, Ms. Cooper," Janet said, blowing her nose again. "She tried to talk me into the same thing a couple of years ago, but I thought it was disgusting. It broke my heart to think of what she was doing."
"What kind of job?"
"A dating service."
I wanted to find a tasteful way to get Janet where she was going. "An escort?"
Mike lifted his blazer from the back of the chair, slipped his finger under the collar, and draped it over his shoulder as he stepped behind me.
"I told her how dangerous her lifestyle was, and nothing I said could get her to stop." Janet rested her head in her hands and started crying again. "Doesn't matter what you called her, she laughed it off like it was a compliment. An escort, a prostitute, a whore, a hooker."
Mike leaned over and whispered in my ear. "I'm thinking she's a dead hooker now.
FOUR
Iwalked Janet Bristol to the rest room to wash her face, then returned to wait for her in my office
You've got to give me a hand tonight," Mike said. "What am I missing?" I looked from him to Mercer.
"We're going to get a hit at the morgue," Mike said. "I can taste it.
I just look at that beauty mark on the side of this broad's neck and picture the one in the identical place on her sister. A patch of skin untouched by the bugs. We got hold of Amber's dentist an hour ago-she had sent Janet to him for an abscess last year. He's faxing over her records to Dr. Kestenbaum. "And if it's a match?"
"Janet tells me that if we're not the first ones to get hold of Amber's little black book, this case will rocket from oblivion to the headlines. Good morning, Idaho. This is your wake-up call."
"Does she know her sister's clientele?" Mercer's six-foot-six frame towered over Mike, and his ebony face was sweating heavily.
"Not specific guys, but according to Amber's stories, they're what the newspapers refer to as boldface names. Lawyers, businessmen, politicians. I want you to come uptown with us, Alex, if Janet makes an ID," Mike said. "You're the one who's going to have to run interference with Battaglia if this investigation takes a detour."
"Don't be luring Coop away from my case," Mercer said.
"You told me this trial would be over in two days."
"It should be," I said. The courtroom circus created by Floyd Warren's defense attorney had prolonged the proceedings for two weeks back in the seventies. Now, the powerful addition of DNA to the prosecution case would change the focus-and pace-radically.
"So by this time Thursday evening, Ms. Cooper, Floyd Warren will be one more notch on your belt and you'll be looking for something to take your mind off the much more important fact that you've got no social life. I can fill all those empty hours for you, kid," Mike added. "Me and my rapidly growing summer-in-the-city body count."
Mercer knew why Mike wanted my company. Mercer and I spent countless hours handholding survivors of violence who needed emotional support to get through the unfamiliar clinical steps that marked their introduction to the criminal justice system. It took as much time, sometimes more, than working the investigation.
Mike was impatient in that role. He was at his best when he set himself up against an unknown predator, teasing secrets from the dead to offer up cold, hard evidence that would lead him to the suspect.
"You want Alex to take charge of Janet Bristol tonight?" Mercer said. "And if the little black book has some dynamite in it, you want her to sit right on top of that keg?"
"Or stick it in her pocket. Give me a curfew, man. I'll have her tucked in. She's so overwired for this trial, you can't be worried about it."
"You want to go with them, Alex?" Mercer asked.