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  TWO BARE ARMS

  Copyright © 2017 by Blake Banner

  All right reserved.

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the author of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

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  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  EPILOGUE

  NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR

  LAST CHANCE

  EXCERPT OF BOOK THREE...

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  ONE

  It was autumn in New York. Or, to be more accurate, it had been autumn in New York. Now it was November, and lovers who blessed the dark did so in their apartments, where it was warmer and drier than Central Park. The leaves that had made picturesque, russet drifts just a week earlier were now turning to sludge, and the branches that had held them and released them gently onto the sidewalks now reached bare, skeletal, and cold toward heavy, gray skies.

  I held Dehan’s coffee in both hands, and the warmth made me shudder. Through the windshield, I saw her step out of her apartment block. A gust of damp wind caught her hair and whipped it across her face. She scowled and ran toward me as a few fat drops of rain splatted on the glass. It was that kind of day.

  She climbed in and slammed the door, making cold, shuddering noises. I handed her her coffee, and as she hunched over it I, reached around to the back seat and dropped a folder onto her lap. She sipped and eyed me.

  “Want to tell me about it while I warm up?”

  I pulled out into the traffic and sighed deeply.

  “My parents never really understood me. I felt very isolated as a child, which made it hard to relate as an adult. I think that’s why I broke up with my fifth wife…” She was staring at me with hooded eyes. I grinned. “Oh, you meant the case?”

  “Funny. How can you be funny at eight in the morning in November?”

  “And a Monday. Kind of guy I am. This is the case of the two arms found in a lockup in an alley between Revere Avenue and Calhoun Avenue.”

  “Throggs Neck. Barkley Avenue. 45th Precinct is right there on the corner.”

  “That’s the one.”

  “Gotcha. So, is that true?”

  “That two arms were found there? Sure.”

  “No, that your parents didn’t understand you and you were married five times.”

  “No, of course not. My parents thought I was the neighbors’ youngest kid. They used to feed me because they thought I looked hungry and neglected. Pay attention, Dehan. There’s a double row of self-storage units. It is eight units long, and each unit is about fifteen feet deep by ten feet wide. Monday, December 5, 2005, Peter Smith opens up his lockup and finds, lying on top of a stack of boxes, two female arms, severed, with some skill, through the shoulder joint.”

  She sipped, then asked, “Were the arms bare, or dressed?”

  “Excellent question. The arms were not dressed. They were bare. In fact, the investigation ground to a halt after no more than a week because there was zero forensic evidence other than, obviously, her fingerprints and DNA. The only witness was Peter, and he had an alibi. He was with his wife. So, there was nowhere left to go with the case.”

  She blinked out the windshield for a while, hunched over her coffee, watching the wet, gray procession of people and vehicles. The only sounds were the listless squeak and thud of the wipers.

  “No forensics evidence and no witnesses?”

  “Nope.”

  “What’s your plan? You know somebody who can read tea leaves?”

  “Nyeah… no. I think we can do a little better than tea leaves. Sometimes, little grasshopper, people just ask the wrong questions.”

  “And you are going to ask the right questions.”

  “I hope so.”

  “We just passed the turnoff for the station house, so I guess we’re going to Revere Avenue.”

  “Yup.”

  We pulled up outside Peter Smith’s at eight thirty a.m. It was a large, Dutch-style red brick with a small front lawn and six steps up to a white front door. I rang the bell and waited. Nothing happened and I glanced up and down the road. Across the way I saw a man open his front door and stand staring at me. He was in his mid to late thirties, medium build with dark hair. He called over, “Good morning! Pete and Jenny have taken the kids to school. They should be back in twenty minutes or half an hour.”

  His house was smaller, detached, with a white fence and gate. He stood watching us, smiling. We crossed the road, and I showed him my badge as we pushed through the gate.

  “Detectives Stone and Dehan…”

  “I kind of figured.”

  I frowned.

  Dehan said, “Yeah? How’s that?”

  He pointed at us both with both his index fingers and spoke as though he were asking questions. “Your physical interactions? The way you relate to each other? You’re obviously not a couple. You’re kind of purposeful? On a mission? Most likely cops.” He pointed at his front door. “You want to wait inside? It’s awful cold.”

  I nodded. “Thanks. That’d be great.”

  He held out his hand. “Bob, Bob Luff.””

  We shook and he led us inside.

  It was an open-plan living room, dining room, kitchen with a big bow window that gave a clear view of the Smiths’ house across the way. I glanced into the kitchen, saw two mugs and two plates by the sink. He was making his way to the kettle.

  Dehan asked him, “Been here long, Bob?”

  “About fifteen years. We moved in a year before Pete and Jenny. We’re the vets! Coffee?”

  I told him we’d just had some.

  He made himself a mug. He was frowning. “Pete okay?”

  I smiled. “Yeah. Just some routine questions about a cold case. If you were here twelve years ago, you may remember it.”

  His eyebrows rose. “Oh?” He pointed at the chairs and sofa. “Sit. My wife will be back soon,” he added, as though that made it okay to sit. “Twelve years ago…”

  Dehan said, “George Bush was president, Chris Brown was in the
charts with ‘Run It,’ Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire was a hit at the box office, it was your third year in this house…”

  He watched her say all this with a slack smile. She sat and he sat too. I sat where I could see the Smiths’ house. I added, “And Peter found two arms in his lockup.”

  He kind of jerked upright and sighed with closed eyes. “Oh, my goodness! That was twelve years ago.” He glanced at Dehan. There was something reproving about his expression. “Somewhat more memorable than Chris Brown! I remember it well. Poor Jenny was distraught. As was Pete! Imagine! You open your lockup, garage, whatever, and there, staring at you, two arms! It doesn’t bear thinking about. It’s sort of… It always makes me think of Schrödinger’s cat.”

  “Schrödinger’s cat?”

  He smiled at me. “Well, according to the Copenhagen Interpretation, as illustrated by Schrödinger’s cat, until the box is opened, the cat is both alive and dead.”

  I frowned.

  He sighed. “The mystery was never solved, then?”

  I pulled a face. “Sometimes we look so hard at the essential facts that we miss crucial evidence that is not immediately obvious. Thinking back to that time, Bob, does anything stand out in your memory? Anything that at the time struck you as unusual, remarkable…” I shrugged. “Even if it doesn’t seem relevant. You never know how things are going to link up.”

  He sighed again and gazed out at the gray sky. The trees were bowing and tossing, and the odd fusillade of raindrops strafed the glass in the window.

  “My wife will be more use to you than I. She has an elephantine memory. Remembers everything, in minute detail, and she notices things. What sticks out for me from that time is that Pete was away a lot. He was a rep for his company, and he’d spend one or two weeks away at a time. That was hard for Jenny.” He suddenly looked scandalized at what we might have thought and waved both hands at us, like he was trying to rub out what he’d said. “Not that she… in any way at all! She was and is an exemplary wife!” He settled down. “It was just hard for her, you know?”

  I could feel Dehan’s irritation from where I was sitting. I smiled at her. She asked him, “Did you happen to notice any people in the area who seemed out of place, strange behavior… anything of that sort?”

  He gave a small, humorless laugh. “Well, this is the Bronx, but within the usual bunch of crazies and weirdos, no, nothing stands out in my memory. Nothing that made me stop and think, ‘Hello! What are they up to?’”

  Across the road I saw a car pull up, and almost immediately afterward, a second car pulled into Bob’s drive. I stood. “I think that’s the Smiths, and your wife.”

  He stood, peering out. “Oh, yes indeed.”

  He hurried to the door and opened it to his wife. She was large and comfortable, the way a sofa would be large and comfortable if it could cook chocolate brownies. She looked at us in surprise while her husband explained our presence, and seemed distressed that we were leaving.

  “Do come again,” she said, “if you think we can be of any help. I’ll see what I can remember!”

  Outside, Jenny was going through the door. Peter had stopped on the steps, with the listless drizzle speckling his face. He watched us approach, frowning. I guess he had also noticed our lack of physical interaction. We showed him our badges, and he said, “What’s this about?”

  Dehan answered, “It’s about the arms you found in your lockup twelve years ago, Mr. Smith. Could we come inside and talk to you?”

  I added, “We won’t take up more than a couple of minutes of your time.”

  He seemed to snap out of his frown and said, “Of course! Of course! Come in…”

  Jenny was standing in the hallway looking anxious. She was pretty, about thirty-six, well groomed, with intelligent blue eyes. She was saying, “What is it, honey?” addressing her husband but looking at us.

  “Well, I don’t know yet, sweetheart, do I? Let’s find out.” To us he said, “Will you have some coffee?”

  We said we would, and he sent his wife to make coffee while he sat us down. “Has there been some development, Detective Stone?”

  “We periodically review cold cases, Mr. Smith. Sometimes a fresh perspective, a new set of eyes, can make a difference. I know it was twelve years ago, and I know you went over it all with the detectives at the time, but I was hoping you could talk me through exactly what happened that weekend.”

  He spread his hands and kind of shrugged with his face, like he thought we were wasting his time and ours, but he had to be polite.

  “I can spare you ten minutes, Detectives, but I have work to do.”

  Dehan smiled sweetly and said, “We appreciate any time you can spare us, Mr. Smith.”

  He sighed and seemed to gather his thoughts. Outside, the trees swayed, and a sudden squall threw a handful of rain at the window.

  “I’d been away the week before. I got back on the Friday. I was pretty tired and spent the weekend relaxing, doing some shopping…” He smiled. It was almost reproachful, like we had somehow been responsible for what happened. He said, “The kind of thing you wouldn’t normally remember twelve years later, unless you found a couple of severed arms in your lockup!”

  From the kitchen, Jenny said, “Oh, Bob!”

  He turned to stare at her with a rigid face, but he didn’t say anything. She came and sat next to Dehan with a tray of coffee.

  “It was horrible,” she said. “We’d had such a nice weekend. It was lovely to have him back…”

  She smiled at him. He didn’t smile back.

  “Do you want to take over, honey? You want to tell the story?” Her cheeks colored, and she handed Dehan a cup. As she handed me mine, he continued talking. “Sunday we did things in the house, started getting Christmas decorations out. I was going away again on the Wednesday, so we had to get everything ready for when I got back. Jenny can’t do that kind of thing on her own.”

  I glanced at Dehan. I could see her jaw muscle pumping. Peter spread his hands.

  “Nothing else happened Sunday. Monday morning, I went to the lockup to get a box of baubles and paper chains, lights, that kind of stuff. And there, on top of the boxes…” His eyes seemed to glaze, and he shook his head. “At first I thought they were part of a manikin, and I was wondering how the hell a manikin had got into my lockup. Then I looked closer and it dawned on me, they were real. I actually fell down.”

  He stared at me. I could imagine him in a counseling session, looking at his therapist in the same way.

  “I ran. I vomited at the end of the alley. Poor Jenny had to come and clean it up.”

  She simpered at us.

  He ignored her. “Naturally, I immediately called the police.” He shrugged. “I’m sorry. That is really all I can tell you.”

  Dehan cleared her throat. She had a notebook on her knee, where she had been scribbling things. She was looking at it now. “You said you were away the week before… What work did you do at the time, and how long were you away?”

  He seemed to grow, like he was about to tell us he was a special advisor to the White House.

  “I represent the CAC Corporation—Canadian American Chemicals. Back then I was a representative, and I had to do a great deal of traveling…”

  Dehan smiled. “You mean you were a sales rep? Were you traveling by car or by plane, Mr. Smith?”

  His face hardened. “Is it relevant?”

  “We don’t know.”

  “I started out as a sales representative, that is correct. All my traveling was by car, and very exhausting it was, too. I put in my hours and was rapidly promoted to area sales manager, and now I work mostly from home. Which reminds me…” He glanced at his watch.

  Dehan was still smiling. “So how long were you away on that occasion?”

  “I seem to recall it was a week.”

  “Where had you been?”

  He thought for a moment, looking up at the ceiling. “Michigan.”

  “And you were off again th
e following Wednesday, to…?”

  “Ohio and Indiana. Now, if there is nothing else…”

  I said, “Yes, there is. I would like to see the lockup.”

  “Now?”

  “No. If it’s not a problem, I would like to borrow a key and come back later to have a look at it. I don’t need you to be there. If you have no objection, of course.”

  He looked put out but got up and went to find the key. He pulled it from a drawer and handed it to me. “I don’t know what you hope to find there after twelve years, Detective.”

  “Neither do I, Mr. Smith. But you’ll be the first to know when I find it.”

  The door closed behind us, and we stood on his porch. Dehan zipped up her jacket, and I looked across the road. The drizzle had turned to steady rain. Bob was watching us and raised a hand to wave. I didn’t wave back. I hunched my shoulders and ran to the car.

  We sat for a moment, listening to the hollow drumming on the roof.

  “Impressions?”

  “Why do women put up with guys like that?”

  “That may, or may not, be relevant, little grasshopper.”

  She sighed. “I know.” She gazed out at the rain making ever expanding rings in the puddles. I watched her with the dull light on her face. “I’d like to believe he got home, chopped somebody’s arms off, stuck them in his lockup, and then called the cops. But I have to admit it’s highly improbable. Plus, I feel he was telling the truth.”

  I turned the key in the ignition and pulled away into the road. “Feelings are notoriously unreliable. Even women’s feelings. Whatever our mythology may say about your intuition, it is highly fallible. That may be exactly what he did. You want to know what I saw?”

  She looked at me. “You didn’t feel, you saw. You are such a guy.”

  “I saw him go rigid every time his wife spoke. I also saw her cowering every time he addressed her. And I saw that he only ever addressed her to put her down.”

  I turned into Lafayette. She was nodding, like I didn’t “get” her. “See?” she said. “That, all that, is what I felt.”

  “Quit making excuses. You want to be a psychic, feel. You want to be a cop, translate those feelings into analysis. That means pictures and words.”