Carol, so self-assured just moments before, now sat studying her father’s face, her resolve wavering with the sight of him so upset.
“All right, Daddy,” she said, her tone now soft. “I realize it can be a difficult life. But anything worthwhile is difficult.” She smiled. “Another one of the things you taught me.”
“Don’t make me fight my own words, Carol,” he said. “Please.”
“You’re not,” she said, leaning closer to him, laying a hand on his arm. “You’re fighting the truth. Those words you spoke years ago. That’s what they were, the truth.”
He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, digging spurs of determination into his consciousness even as he frantically fought to recall the words of his mea sured, rehearsed argument.
“Do you want your fire extinguished?” he asked helplessly. “Do you think lockin’ up a few skells will make it all worthwhile?”
Carol’s smile faded, her own determination taking hold again.
“Dad,” she said. “You’re just not being honest with yourself. Don’t forget I grew up watching you. I saw, I heard. I remember when you’d be working a case, dozens of times, important, meaningful cases. I remember seeing you all psyched up and full of energy, tearing into your work. That seemed like fire to me. Real fire.”
Rizzo looked into her eyes and saw the inevitability of her determination. Even as a strange, almost disjointed pride welled within him, his anger, more insistent, more pugnacious, rushed back into his head. He stood suddenly, pulling his arm out from under her still present hand. He looked down at his daughter as visions of childhood transgressions, less than perfect report cards, and sibling squabbles flashed before his eyes, all of them dwarfed and dropped on the trash heap of insignificance by this sudden adult situation.
“Forget the goddamned cops, Carol,” he said harshly. “You’re not takin’ that test and you’re not taking the job. End of story.”
She shook her head. “I refuse to discuss this anymore,” she said with near equal toughness. “How dare you issue fiats! If we’re going to continue to argue about this, I’ll just not come home. I’ll stay at the dorm through the holidays.”
Rizzo nodded, turning to move away. “Yeah,” he said. “You do that. Sleep in an empty dorm room for the holidays. It’ll be good practice for you-for sleeping in a radio car at three a.m. on Christmas morning, next to some fat, smelly old cop, or sleeping on the floor of central booking waitin’ for some idiot A.D.A. to show up and process your complaint. Sleepin’ in some stinkin’, piss-stained precinct holding cell ’cause of some round-the-clock emergency, or outside some shit hole tenement where somebody just found a dead junkie after two months. Sleeping with cigarette filters stuck up your nose to dull the stench, markin’ the hours till some third-world medical examiner shows up and announces, yeah, the guy is officially dead.” Rizzo nodded. “Yeah, Carol, I did every one of those things, more times than I can remember.”
He dug his car keys from his pants pocket, his face flushed. “Then I’d come home and tell you and your sisters a ‘Ben the Bear’ story. Some of the guys just went to the precinct bar, got drunk, and wound up screwing some bimbo who was out trollin’ for cops.”
He turned and began to walk away, his eyes searching for the exit.
“We’ll see what works for you,” he said over his shoulder, picking up his pace and leaving her sitting there alone.
CHAPTER SIX
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 3, DAWNED cold and dreary, a misty rain moving through Brooklyn on a light westerly wind. The front pages of the tabloids screamed bold, black headlines. The New York Times, normally crime free on page one, featured the story prominently.
Avery Mallard, native New Yorker and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright, had been found murdered in his Manhattan home, his body sprawled before a showcase filled with Tony awards, New York Drama Critics Circle awards, two Emmys, the Pulitzer itself, and more than a dozen lesser prizes.
Joe Rizzo sat in the front passenger seat of the Impala reading the Daily News’s version of the murder. Priscilla Jackson wove the car through the now familiar streets of the Sixty-second Precinct, her right hand lightly on the wheel, her left resting on her thigh.
“Shame about this guy,” Rizzo said, closing the paper and tossing it carefully onto the backseat. “He was only sixty-one. Paper says his best years were behind him, though.”
Priscilla shrugged. “Yeah, maybe. But his new play, An Atlanta Landscape, they say it’s a shoo-in for the big awards.”
“Yeah, I read about that,” Rizzo said. “Bunch of bleedin’ heart bullshit. For sure it’ll get all the attention.”
“Yeah, well, not everything can be ‘Animal House Meets The Odd Couple,’ Joe,” Priscilla said. “Some works actually got somethin’ to say, Partner. Matter of fact, Karen and I saw that play about a month ago. It was terrific.”
Rizzo arched his brow. “Well, ain’t you the literary one. All those misspent years workin’ Manhattan got your head turned around.”
Priscilla shrugged. “No, not really. Actually,” she said in a neutral tones, “I do a little writing myself.”
Rizzo turned to her. “No kiddin’? Like what? Plays like this guy Mallard?”
“No, not exactly,” she said. “And for your info, nobody writes plays like this dude. He was the master, had a lifetime run of great works including this new one. No, me, I just write some short stories. And I’ve been foolin’ with a novel. Karen even talked me into taking a class at the Ninety-second Street Y. I go on Tuesday nights when we’re not working.”
Rizzo nodded. “Well, imagine that: a regular Josephine Wambaugh I’m workin’ with.”
“Not quite, brother, not quite,” she said, “but I’m tryin’.”
“Good for you, Cil. I wish you luck with it.”
She frowned, turning her attention fully back to driving.
“Between me and you,” she said, “this is some very private shit. I only told Mike about it a week ago. With you and Karen, that’s just three people who know. I wouldn’t want it getting around the precinct.”
“I’ll bet,” Rizzo said with a laugh. “Don’t worry. Far as I’m concerned, you can barely read, let alone write. Just like the rest of us dumb-ass cops. My lips are sealed.”
She nodded. “Good. I just told you in case it ever comes up. With Mike, maybe, or if you ever meet Karen. Wouldn’t want any awk-ward moments.”
“No, Cil. We wouldn’t want any awkward moments while I’m sippin’ sherry with you and your girlfriend. Heaven forbid.”
“Good,” Priscilla said. “Now, what was that address? This is Sixty-seventh Street.”
Rizzo glanced at his note pad. “Fourteen-forty.”
They scanned the addresses of the neat, attached row houses that lined the street, then Priscilla swung the Chevy to the curb and parked.
As they undid their shoulder harnesses, Rizzo glanced around.
“I knew this block sounded familiar,” he said. “My daughter Carol had a friend from Catholic school lived here somewhere. Years ago when she was in grammar school.”
Priscilla reached across to the glove compartment and removed her note pad. Then, sitting upright, she used the rearview mirror to smooth her hair.
“Yeah?” she said. Then, with a slight glance to Rizzo, she asked, “How’s that goin’, by the way? That situation with Carol and the cops? You talk to her yet?”
Rizzo nodded grimly. “Oh, I spoke to her, all right.”