Let Us Prey Read online

  “That’s the million-dollar question.”

  Her face flushed. “And you’re going to answer it by talking to an antiques dealer on Madison Avenue?”

  I watched her a moment, aware that we had lost our rapport for some reason and not sure why, or how to get it back. The damn heat wasn’t helping.

  “I don’t know. Maybe.”

  “You going to keep tailing her?”

  “For now, yeah.”

  “You going to do it alone?”

  I frowned. “No. But when I talk to her, for now, I’ll do it alone.”

  “Right.” She sighed again. She was beginning to look really mad. “Maybe I should go back to Frisco and talk to Peter. I could ask the local PD to bring him in for questioning.” I nodded but didn’t answer. She pointed at me with her pen. “You better be thinking with your brain, Stone, and not with your fucking dick. Because if you’re not, I am going to hit you so hard your head is going to be spinning for a week! You’re going to have corkscrew fucking neck syndrome.”

  I attempted a smile. She didn’t respond.

  “I hear you, Dehan.”

  “Don’t fucking patronize me.”

  I sighed. “Okay, you’re mad at me, and I am not sure why. Here is what we do. We have enough with his trip to New York and ballistics to request that he be taken in and transferred to New York for questioning. Whether he came to kill Stephen or to deliver the gun, we still need to talk to him as a material witness. Will that satisfy you?”

  She nodded. “At least now it sounds like you’re thinking with your brain. What’s she like, anyway?”

  I made a “you got this all wrong” face. “You are letting your imagination run away with you, Dehan.”

  “Hey! It makes no odds to me, Stone. It would do you good to get laid. I just don’t want this dame fogging your thinking.”

  “Fogging my thinking? I spoke to her for five minutes.”

  “It takes a person six seconds to decide they want to get in another person’s pants. I read that somewhere.”

  “Well, I don’t want to get in her pants. I just want to know why Baxter is interested in her, and I will find that out tomorrow. End of story. Are we cool?”

  She curled her lip and grunted. That was the best I was going to get.

  “Come on, let’s go talk to the captain.”

  SIXTEEN

  That afternoon, we took care of the paperwork and the formalities and made the arrangements for Peter Gunthersen to be taken into custody as a material witness and transferred to the 43rd Precinct. San Mateo PD told us they would be in touch as soon as they had made the arrangements.

  In the evening, I dropped Dehan at her apartment and told her I wouldn’t pick her up in the morning. I was going to go straight to Madison Avenue. She said, “Sure,” slammed the door, and was gone.

  Next morning, I got up late, breakfasted toast and coffee, showered, and slapped on my most expensive aftershave. Then, I selected my most expensive suit. It wasn’t really expensive, but it was better than what I wore to work every day. At ten o’clock, I set off at a leisurely pace for Madison Avenue.

  I parked across the road and strolled in at half past ten. She smiled and looked pleased to see me. “Mr. Stone…”

  “John. Hello, Emma.”

  “Did you make up your mind about the table?”

  I went and stood really close to her. She didn’t step back. I said, “Did you?”

  She gave a small laugh and looked at the buttons on my shirt. “What do you want, Mr… John?”

  I sighed and went to look at the Queen Anne table. It was exquisite. It probably cost more than my car. “I’m looking for something special.”

  “Can you be a little more precise?”

  “Not really. I’ll know it when I see it.” I turned to face her. “But I am pretty sure that you are the person to find it for me.”

  She was thoughtful for a moment. “What gives you that idea?”

  I shrugged. “Well, Emma, you’re pretty special yourself.” She smiled, but there was a certain caution in her eyes. “Also…” I ran my fingers over the high polish on the tabletop. I was going to take a risk, and I was only 90 percent sure of what I was doing. “I have searched high and low, far and wide…” I turned to look her in the eye so there would be no mistake. “I have been as far as San Francisco, searching… and something tells me I have finally found the right person.”

  She was shaken. She went pale, but she hid it well. “Who do you work for, John?”

  I planted a smile on the left side of my face; that’s where it looks most rueful. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  “Really? Then tell me so that I can think of you as a liar.”

  “I’m a cop.”

  She frowned. For a fraction of a second, I could see her reviewing everything I had said and done since the day before.

  Then, I added, “But I work for myself.”

  She cooled noticeably. “Mr. Stone, I don’t know what you think you are onto, or what you think you are doing, but you have obviously made a mistake.”

  I switched my smile to the other side of my face, which is where it looks ironic.

  “Really? Now I’m the one who’s thinking of you as a liar.”

  “Mr. Stone…”

  “John.”

  “I really don’t need to stand here and be insulted.”

  “You can sit if you like. Why don’t you tell me about Baxter?”

  Her face went rigid. “Who?”

  “You heard me, Emma. Karl Baxter, private investigator. He was in here yesterday just before I came in. He gave you a card and left. You went to see him at lunchtime.”

  Her cheeks colored and her eyes were bright. “Have you been spying on me?”

  “What if I have?”

  “Why, I should…!”

  “Call the cops? I am the cops, remember?” I pulled out my badge and showed it to her. As she stared at it, I said, “But I’m a bad cop.”

  “What do you want from me?”

  “I told you, something special.”

  “Are you trying to blackmail me?”

  I narrowed my eyes at her and considered her for a long while. Finally, I said, “You want to explain to me what it is exactly that I have on you that I could use for blackmail?”

  “Stop playing games with me.”

  “You have no idea how much I know, Emma, do you?” I waited, and she just kept staring, with flushed cheeks and eyes bright with threatened tears. And I kept thinking I had never seen a woman quite so beautiful. “I know about Tammy.” I studied her face for a reaction. “I know about Peter and Steve, and about Danny. And I know about Hugh. I know everything.”

  “You can’t…”

  “I can’t what? I told you, I’m a cop. Digging up shit is what I do for a living.”

  “All right, you have my attention! So why don’t you tell me for once and for all what it is you want?”

  I walked back to her and stood really close so we were touching. I felt her tremble and took hold of her arms, pressing her closer. “I want in. I want to be a part of it.”

  Her voice was a harsh whisper. “I don’t know what you’re talking about…”

  I took out one of my cards and slipped it into the low-cut neckline of her dress. I heard her breath shudder and smiled at her.

  “I can help you, baby. That schmuck of a husband of yours ain’t going to cut it. You need me, and you know it. You knew it the minute I walked through that door.”

  She shook her head. “No…”

  “Think about it. Call me tonight.”

  I walked out and crossed the road. As I climbed in my car, I could see her staring through the glass at me.

  When I got back to the station, Dehan was at the desk writing up her notes on the case. She glanced at me as I sat down, and carried on writing.

  “San Mateo PD called. They pulled Peter in last night. They’ll be here by five.”

  “Good.”

/>   She continued writing. “You got something to report, or is it private?”

  “No, it’s not private, Dehan. Will you stop saying that already? I just don’t know what it is.”

  She gave half a nod. She wrote in silence for a bit. After a while, she said, “Well, if you ever find out what it is, or decide you’d like to work with a partner, you let me know.”

  “Dehan, what is eating you?”

  She threw down her pen hard enough to make it bounce. “What is eating me? Seriously? You open up a whole new angle on this investigation. You completely exclude me from it. And all you have to tell me is that you don’t know ‘what it is.’ Well, from where I am sitting, it looks like it’s enough to have you most of yesterday afternoon on a stakeout. And it’s enough to have you all this morning doing whatever you’ve been doing in your best suit and your most expensive aftershave. But it’s not enough for you to tell your partner about. It’s enough for you—” She poked her finger at me. “To conduct your own private investigation, but it’s not enough for you to keep me in the loop about it.”

  “I’m sorry, Dehan.”

  She spread her hands. “So, what is this angle on the investigation that is enough to keep you so busy, but is not enough for me to be kept informed about it?”

  “You’re right. I should have kept you in the loop. But it’s hard to explain.” She raised an eyebrow at me. I tried to ignore her and pressed on. “It’s just a hunch. Well, it’s a bit more than a hunch now.”

  “So, what is it?”

  “I told you Baxter went to see this woman, then she went to see him.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “So I went in to talk to her. She’s young, attractive, and she’s married to the owner of the antiques shop, who is almost three times her age and one of the best-known experts in antiques in New York.”

  “So?”

  “Give me a break, Dehan, I’m explaining. So I went in this morning and made a play.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “You made a play? What does that mean?”

  “It means I came on to her, but I played the bent cop, told her I knew what she was about. I knew about Peter, Tammy, Steve, and Ernesto, and also about Hugh. I didn’t use any of their surnames, just their first names. She knew what I was talking about.”

  She frowned. “How do you know?”

  I gave a small shrug. “She was cagey, but she didn’t look at me as though I was crazy. She asked me if I was blackmailing her, and what I wanted.”

  “What did you tell her?”

  I gave a small laugh. “It wasn’t easy. Fact is, I don’t know. I don’t know what part she plays in this, but I am sure as hell she has some part to play. And so is Baxter. I gave her my card and told her to call me tonight.”

  She stared out the window at a street suffering from heat exhaustion. “You should have told me about this.”

  I spread my hands and shrugged. “Told you what? I had a hunch she had something to do with it. That was it.”

  She sighed.

  I sighed too. “I think, I feel, she has some connection with Tamara. She even looks a bit like her. But I have no idea what that connection is. That’s what I hope to find out tonight.”

  She stared at me. “Stone, look me in the eye and tell me you are not getting emotionally involved with this woman.”

  I looked at her like she was an idiot, held her eye, and said, “Stop worrying, Dehan. I am not getting emotionally involved with this woman. Satisfied?”

  She watched me a moment, then said, “No. Let’s get some lunch.”

  SEVENTEEN

  Peter Gunthersen was brought in at six p.m. We signed for him, and Sergeant Henderson took him to interview room three, upstairs. Dehan and I gathered our notes and went up to talk to him. He was perspiring and didn’t look pleased to see us. As we sat opposite him, he said, “Am I under arrest?”

  I shook my head. “No, you’re being held as a material witness. But I can tell you, in light of recent developments in the case, that it is in your best interest to cooperate fully with us.”

  “Do I need a lawyer?”

  “No, but it’s your right to have one if you want one. I am not planning on charging you with anything, Peter. I just want to ask you some questions.”

  He stared at Dehan a moment, then said, “Okay.”

  I scratched my chin, organizing my thoughts.

  “You want to tell me again about your relationship with Tamara, and when you last saw her?”

  He closed his eyes, puffed out his cheeks, and blew.

  “I just got so damn sick of her.” He opened his eyes and stared at me, as though he had given me some kind of cogent explanation. “She was—” He took a moment, looking around the room to find words that could express his feelings. “Heavenly. You know what I mean? She was like no woman I ever met, and she made me happy like no other woman. But when she changed, at first I couldn’t handle it and I didn’t want to let her go. So I refused to give her a divorce, like I told you.”

  Dehan said, “But…?”

  He sighed and shook his head and looked sad, really regretful. “In the end, she was so full of shit, I agreed. I met Sally—I fell in love with a real woman, who was loyal and true and wasn’t playing fucking games all the time—and I agreed to give Tammy a divorce. But she turns around now and says no.”

  “When was this?”

  “About the time she disappeared. About the time she got that crazy gig she was going on about, that was going to change her life.”

  I glanced at Dehan to see if she was going to ask. She was watching me. I said, “So did she put any kind of condition on giving you your divorce?”

  He nodded. “I guess you know she did. The condition was that I give her my revolver. I told her I would not, and I asked the crazy bitch what she wanted it for. She said she was in the Bronx in New York; it was a dangerous place to be alone, and she wanted protection.”

  Dehan frowned. “She said she was alone?”

  “That’s what she said. I asked her if she wasn’t with Steve, and she said things weren’t working out like she’d hoped. She was alone and scared and just needed the revolver for protection. She told me if I would just bring it to her, she would grant me the divorce and bring it back to me when she returned to San Francisco.”

  “So that’s what you did.”

  “You know I did, or I wouldn’t be here.”

  I said, “Where did you meet? Did you go to her place?”

  “She had an apartment on…” He paused to think. “Intervale Avenue, opposite the church there. I gave her the gun and begged her not to do anything stupid. And that was it.”

  Dehan gave him a “not really” smile. “You booked your return for three days.”

  He gave a snort. “To be honest, I was hoping I could convince her to come back to San Francisco with me. I gave myself an extra day hoping we could meet and talk and maybe I could persuade her to stop being such a crazy bitch. But I never had a hope in hell. I spent most of my time in Central Park feeding the ducks. Then I went home. I’ve been waiting ever since for the divorce papers. Is she dead? Was she killed with my gun? Is that why I’m here?”

  He had gone a pale gray color.

  Dehan shook her head. “No, Peter, we are no longer convinced that Tammy is dead. We don’t know what has happened to her. Does the name Danny Schultz mean anything to you?”

  “No. Should it?”

  “How about Ernesto Sanchez?”

  He squinted at her like she was crazy. “No. Why?”

  I leaned forward. “Peter, while you were in New York, did you at any time go and see Stephen Springfellow?”

  He looked genuinely astonished. “Are you kidding me? Why would I want to go and see that son of a bitch?”

  I pulled a face. “Maybe to shoot and kill him?”

  “What?”

  “Stephen’s body was found two years back, while you were still in New York. He had been shot with your gun.”

 
He went white and slumped back in his chair, shaking his head. “Oh, no, no! No, I did not! I would not! No, no way, man…”

  Dehan cut across him. “Can you think of any reason why Tammy would want to kill Stephen?”

  He did a double take. “What? No! Of course not!”

  Dehan pressed on. “Would it surprise you to know that Tammy was also engaged to be married to Hugh Duffy?”

  He gaped at her for a moment and then burst out laughing. He stared from Dehan to me and then back again. “What? Are you trying to drive me crazy? Is this some new kind of interrogation technique? Make me lose my sense of reality?”

  We both watched him without smiling.

  He stopped laughing and became serious. “You mean it? Hugh Duffy? The Hugh Duffy…?”

  I nodded. “Yes. That was the gig.”

  He narrowed his eyes at me, like he was struggling to understand. “Who the hell was I married to, Detective Stone?”

  I sucked my teeth and nodded. “That is what we would like to know, Peter. One last question…” I glanced at Dehan. “Unless…?” She shook her head, so I went on. “There is a woman we are interested in talking to. She is best described as a southern belle type. Alabama, Louisiana, strong accent. Black hair, probably cut short. Green eyes. A lot of class and elegance. Very attractive. Ring any bells?”

  He frowned, staring at me like he thought I was setting a trap for him. After a moment, he said, “No. I don’t know anybody like that.”

  I nodded. “We’ll keep you overnight, Peter, but unless something comes up, I am pretty sure we can send you home tomorrow.”

  I called the sergeant, and she led him away down to the holding cells. Dehan stood and walked around the room, staring at the walls, like there were invisible pictures there only she could see. “You were right.” She said it to the wall. “He was delivering the gun.”

  “It made sense. It was the most likely explanation.”

  She turned to face me. “So who are all these other women? And how do they tie in with Geronimo dos Santos? What has he got, some kind of female league of assassins?”

  I laughed. “Maybe. I plan to find out tonight.”

  “Your hot date.”