“-I.A. showed up and wanted to speak to you about this other detective. You didn’t say a word, did you?”
“No.”
“Larry was-”
“-testing me. Yeah, I knew that. It was bullshit. After that, he didn’t call for a long time.”
“How long?”
“I got transferred to the Six-O almost eight months ago. I guess it was four or five months after that.”
“And. .”
“And he met me at some Cuban-Chinese dive in Hell’s Kitchen. Gave me some equipment, told me how to install it.”
“Did he say why he wanted a wire in-”
“I didn’t ask. I didn’t wanna know. I’m not sure I woulda believed him anyway, no matter what he told me.”
“Clever. Believing Larry was about percentages. But what happened next?”
“Nothing. Chief McDonald and I never spoke again. Most of the time, I even forgot that the wire was there. I never even saw the chief again until. . you know.”
“Fountain Avenue.”
“Yeah.”
“Okay, is that all of it?”
“That’s it! Tomorrow, I’ll pull the wire.”
“No you won’t. Leave it there,” I barked. “Right now it’s all we got. Maybe we can use it. Does anybody else know?”
“Not from me, but I can’t say if Chief McDonald told anyone.”
“I doubt it. Not Larry’s style to share. Besides, whatever his reasoning, this was way beyond kosher, even for a chief.”
“So what’s the plan?”
“The plan? The plan is you dig up what you can on the Dexter Mayweather murder while I try and figure out what Larry Mac was up to with this wire.”
“You think they’re related, the wire, the Mayweather thing, and the chief’s suicide?” she asked.
“If it was suicide.”
“Right, if it was suicide,” she agreed. “But do you think it’s all related?”
“Maybe, maybe not. Depends what Larry was fishing for.”
“Huh?”
“Sometimes trawlers catch sharks in their nets. Even if you go to throw the shark back in, it doesn’t mean it won’t bite you.”
Her name was Nancy Lustig, a forlorn little rich girl whose looks bordered on the ugly side of nondescript. I’d met her in 1978 when I was looking for my now-you-see-him-now-you-don’t brother-in-law, Patrick. They’d dated long enough for him to knock her up and abandon her after the abortion. I hadn’t thought about Nancy Lustig in years, but as I drove home along the Belt Parkway in the suddenly un-welcoming fog, she was on my mind.
I guess maybe there was something in Melendez tonight that brought Nancy to mind. Not her looks, certainly, but there was something in Carmella’s eyes, a sadness, a yearning, an old wound that struck the same chord Nancy had struck a dozen years ago.
I don’t know, maybe it was my guilt again, screaming at me like the cranky old steps. It wasn’t lost on me that in the midst of Melendez’s revelations about Larry Mac and her planting the wire, I had kissed a woman in a way married men are not supposed to kiss women who are not their wives. Sure, from the outside it probably didn’t look like much of a kiss, but it was on the inside, and on the inside there was fire.
In a way, I think I was grateful for the bomb Carmella had dropped on me about her dealings with Larry Mac. It put the fire on hold, at least for now. There was only so much I could handle all at
CHAPTER TWELVE
Fishbein met me at a coffee shop in Elmont, just over the Queens border with Nassau County. The D.A. didn’t like being summoned. He was careful not to say so, though his expression spoke all too clearly. Fishbein may have been good at keeping his yap shut when the situation called for it, but he wore his heart on his face. It was forever getting him in trouble, especially during his ill-fated run for governor. His media-savvy handlers spotted the problem right away, making certain Fishbein never appeared on camera in his own commercials. His ads were always full of testimonials, newspaper clippings, and still photos.
The bigger problem was that his handlers couldn’t control the TV news, and whenever they showed tape of Fishbein making a stump speech, the D.A.’s boredom and condescension showed through. It was especially evident when he’d be in some upstate county speaking to a bunch of dairy farmers. Bad enough that he looked so out of place to begin with-Groucho Marx in a Dickies shirt, stiff Levis, and Wolverine boots-but when he started talking about price supports. . Jesus, you could just see the man wanted to be any place else.
“So, what can I do for you, Mr. Prager?” Fishbein asked, pulling a face as bitter as the coffee. He put his cup down.
“That’s the right question, Mr. D.A., but first I wanna talk about my brother-in-law a little bit. You said-”
“I know what I said, but you might as well not ask. Results. Results. Results. They’re the only things that’ll get you answers, so I suggest you get to work.”
“Can you find out if there was any monkey business going on in the Six-O?”
“Monkey business?”
“Was anyone in the precinct a target of an I.A., local, or federal investigation? Do I really have to spell it out for you?”
“Not really, but can you be a little more specific? Even with good hearing, it helps to know what you’re listening for.”
Clever man. I knew we’d eventually get to where we now were. I just hadn’t counted on it being so soon. I’d spent the better part of my sleepless last night trying to sort through everything I had on my plate, never mind the kiss. The kiss. It was all I could do not to let it consume me. But looking across the table at Fishbein’s snide expression made the task that much easier. I went with the truth. An edited version of it, at least.
“Chief McDonald had a wire installed in an interview room at the Six-O.”
Fishbein’s eyes got big and greedy. It was all he could do not to salivate. “A wire, huh? And you know this how?”
“I heard a tape.”
“Of what?”
“For now, that’s my business and it’s beside the point. What I need to know is why.”
“You’re presupposing this wasn’t authorized,” said the D.A., taking a second sip of his coffee. He didn’t like this one any better than the first.
“I’m not presupposing anything. I’m eliminating possibilities. So, can you find out?”
“I can.” Fishbein stood over me. He liked that. Suited his personality much better than speaking to dairy farmers. “I’ll be in touch.”
I didn’t bother shaking his hand, nor did I wish him well. The better I got to know the D.A., the more I hoped he’d get hit by a bus someday. I stayed and finished my coffee. It was bitter, but not so much as Fishbein’s. His lips hadn’t touched my cup.
Like a lot of towns on Long Island, Massapequa, or Matzohpizza, as the locals jokingly called it, was a popular destination on the white flight express. So many city cops, firemen, and school teachers fled there in the ’60s and ’70s that people said Massapequa was Algonquin for civil servant. If you screamed “Help, police!” at midnight, half the porch lights in town went on. One of those porch lights had once belonged to Larry McDonald-Larry having made the move to the Burger
Long Island gave me the chills to begin with, and the thought of visiting Larry’s old house wasn’t making me feel any better. I parked in front of the tidy colonial on Harmony Drive in Massapequa Park and took a slow walk to the door. Yeah, even out here the stratification of neighborhoods had taken hold. The collars were bluer in North Massapequa than in plain old Massapequa, and the houses were a little nicer and the lawns a bit more trim in Massapequa Park than in Massapequa proper. But if you had some gelt, some ’scarole, you lived down by the water in Nassau Shores.
The first thing I did was look at the numbers on the front of the house when a squat man of sixty pulled back the door. Who did I expect, Larry McDonald’s fucking ghost? It’s weird how humans are so good at denying reality. I suppose I thought Margaret would answer. Maybe hoped is the better word.