He didn’t answer for a moment. It wasn’t an off-the-wall request. He had nothing against women police officers. But he was curious about the reason-there was always a reason with politicians, even small-time local ones-so, when he spoke, all he said was, “Why?”
“Several reasons. One, it’s time we had a woman in the department. It’s the proper thing to do. Two, I think it’d be a good thing politically.”
“A lot of women voters in East End.”
“That’s right.”
“What if a woman’s not the best candidate?”
“Then I wouldn’t ask you to hire her. But that’s number three: someone’s come very highly recommended.”
He raised an eyebrow. “By whom?”
“Not one of my gay acquaintances, Jay, if that’s what you’re thinking. I don’t live in quite that circumscribed a world.”
That is what he’d thought. “Sorry. I didn’t mean. .”
“That’s all right. I have no idea what this woman’s sexual orientation is. But I’d like you to interview her. She has a superb reputation and it sounds like she’d be a good fit.”
“Okay.”
Mayor Leona Krill handed over a resume and stuck out her hand for Justin to shake.
“No more kissing?” he asked.
“I just like to keep you off guard,” she answered.
“You’re doing a good job so far,” he said. And headed back out to Main Street.
The rest of the day was spent on normal police department business. Justin was surprised how, after a day of talking on the phone to locals about various complaints, passing along instructions to the officers who now worked for him, paperwork, explaining to the head of the town council the pluses and minuses of a proposed roundabout near one end of town, and meeting with the head of the school board about the need for speed bumps on the road in front of the high school, when he looked up at the clock, it was nearly six-thirty in the evening.
At seven-thirty, he met Bruno Pecozzi at the restaurant in the Schooner Hotel on Main Street. Bruno was staying at the Schooner, probably the nicest place to stay, sit, eat, or drink on the entire east end of Long Island. The hotel was built in the late 1700s and it still reeked of colonial charm. The owner, who’d been married six times and, over the years, managed to lose just about everything but the hotel in his various divorce proceedings, kept one of the great wine lists in the country, maintained a superb humidor in the lobby, and always managed to lure top-notch chefs. He kept several tables for regulars and, by the front door, he always made sure there were three backgammon tables so anyone could come in, sit in a comfortable chair or sofa, have a relaxing drink, and play away for hours on end. During the summer, Justin thought the place was a hellhole of tourists and frantic singles. During the winter, it was one of the great places on the East Coast.
Justin shook his head when he saw where Bruno was sitting: the absolute, prime, A-number-one table in the front room. The so-called celebrity table. Bruno winked at him when Justin walked in, and motioned for him to come sit down.
Bruno said right up front that he was paying-it was on the movie studio-and he told Justin to pick the wine. Justin figured what the hell, and ordered an ’82 Cheval Blanc. For his dinner, he ordered a Caesar salad and a pepper steak, medium rare. Bruno had exactly the same-except he asked for two steaks.
“Skip the extra side dishes,” he told the astonished waiter, “but bring two slabs of meat.” When the waiter scurried away, he raised his wineglass toward Justin and said, “Salut.”
They sipped the excellent wine and made small talk for a bit. Justin told Bruno that he was now the police chief, which got a laugh out of the big man. Bruno told Justin that he was screwing the female star of the movie he was working on-the married female star-which got an equal laugh in return. During the banter, Justin got the feeling that Bruno had something else on his mind. He waited, and, sure enough, Bruno soon held his hand up and said, “You know, this is kind of hard for me, I’m not good at this stuff, but I wanna get this out in the open. I know I’m years too late, but I’m really sorry about what happened to Alicia. I didn’t know your little girl but I’m sorry about her, too.”
“Thank you.”
“I wanted to come to the funeral, you know, but I didn’t think it was appropriate.”
“I appreciate it, Bruno.”
“I want you to know something else. We told that shithead to stay away from you. We told him to leave them alone, too.”
Justin didn’t need a name to know who Bruno was talking about. Louie Denbo. He was the thug Justin had arrested, had spent a year investigating, compiling enough information to send him to prison for the rest of his life. On the night before his trial was to begin, Denbo was the one who’d sent two men to Justin’s house. The men who’d shot Justin four times. The men who’d killed his daughter and driven his wife to suicide.
After spending two years in prison, Louie Denbo had been stabbed to death by a fellow inmate. The prison authorities never found the man responsible.
“Anyway,” Bruno said, “I just thought you should know. We warned him. And he got his, the stupid prick.”
And now, for the first time, Justin realized what had happened. He knew what Bruno was telling him. It wasn’t an accident-or even a prison brawl-that caused Denbo’s death. It was a hired hit. Retaliation for crossing the line and disobeying orders.
Justin was surprised that this news didn’t change anything inside him. There was no sudden gratification or sense of closure. The man who’d ruined his life was dead, had been for several years. It didn’t matter to Justin how he’d died or who’d killed him. It didn’t bring back the people he’d killed. So he just nodded at Bruno, acknowledging the info, and took another sip of the superb red wine.
The food came and they shifted the talk to more normal topics: cop and killer talking about movies and music-Bruno enthused about the new Roman Polanski movie and the live bootleg Phish CD of their farewell concert; he was a major Phish fan and until they’d broken up he’d followed their concert schedule whenever possible-and sports and politics. Eventually, the conversation got around to the bombing of Harper’s.
“I saw the guy, you know,” Bruno said, polishing off the last of his side of broccoli rabe.
“What guy?”
“The bomber. The guy with the briefcase.”
“What do you mean, you saw him?”
“We were shootin’ a couple of blocks from the restaurant. Second unit crew, buncha extras, couple of the actors. He walked right by.”
“How do you know it was him?”
“Well, I didn’t know fuck-all when I saw him. But I been readin’ about it. They traced the guy’s path. So I know I seen some Arab guy with a briefcase walkin’ past the shoot. I noticed him ’cause I saw him stop when he saw all the extras dressed as cops. It scared him. He must’ve thought they were real. I remember thinkin’ he was a guy who was doin’ something wrong somewhere or other. Some people look at stuff, know how much it’s worth. That’s their skill. Some people see things, tell you whether they’re beautiful or not. Me, I know when people are scared. It’s my talent. Useful in my line of business. And I noticed this guy ’cause he was scared. But I’ll tell you somethin’ else. Guys who do shit like this, I mean, ready to kill themselves for whatever, they don’t get scared when they see a bunch of cops. They think, ‘Fuck them, they hassle me I’ll take ’em with me.’ This guy was scared. Too scared to blow himself up.”
“You don’t think he did it?” Justin sounded incredulous.
“I’m just saying there’s more than meets the fucking eye, Jay. There usually fucking is.”
“You tell this to the police or. .?”
“Oh sure. I waltzed in to the FBI and explained all my theories to them ’cause we’re such good buddies.”
“Bruno, if you’re convinced you’re right, this is the kind of thing you have to tell somebody.”
“What? My hunch that the guy was too chickenshit to blow himself up? Anyway, I’m tellin’ you. You pass it along. You’re goin’ up to see your FBI buddy tomorrow, ain’t ya?”