Would she open her door to a complete stranger? Probably not. As harmless as this street seemed, this is the big city after all. I called from the car. I was answered by the voice from the message on the machine.
“Miss Wanda Beauvoir?”
“Who wants to know?”
I put on my friendliest voice. “I understand you were a friend of Rick Malone?”
She gasped.
“This is a terrible time for all of us. Maybe he mentioned me, Erica Donato? I’d love to talk to you.”
“What do you want?”
“I’d just like to talk to you,” I repeated. “He was like a member of my family, my father’s best friend, and I am supposed to speak at his service. Could I come by and ask you a few questions? He was such a special person.”
“No! Don’t come here, don’t call me.”
The phone slammed down so hard it hurt my ear. I pulled into her driveway behind that flashy car, and went to ring her doorbell. I almost heard Rick’s voice, telling me once again I had to be less impulsive. I responded that he got me into this and he should blame himself.
I leaned hard on the doorbell and added an assertive fist on her door. She was home; she was damn well going to respond
.
She finally looked through the door panes and shouted from behind the closed door, “Who the hell are you?”
“Erica Donato, and I’m not going away,” I shouted back. “If you don’t want your neighbors noticing, you better open the door.”
The locks clicked and the door opened. She was a voluptuous brunette with a lot of curls, tight jeans, high-heeled sandals, and a glittery crocheted top. The boys in Queens were right about everything, but she was not actually as young as she wanted people to think.
“Why won’t you talk to me?” I said quickly. “I loved Rick. I’m not trying to harm you.”
She did not ask me in. She kept me in the doorway, asking, “How the hell did you find me?”
I was baffled by her reaction. “Someone told me about Rick’s visitor with the catchy license plate. It wasn’t that hard.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Her words were tough, but her eyes were nervously straying to her car in the driveway. “You bitch, you blocked me in. I’ve got to leave!”
“I’ll move my car right after you tell me about Rick.” Anger made it easier for me to stand firm. “He was practically family. I knew him all my life. Now he’s gone and I’m wondering if I knew him at all. I never even met you, and I only live a few miles from here.”
She shrugged. “I never met you either. So what? But he did mention you a couple times. You’re like a goddaughter? We were together a few years. More than a few. We had a lot of laughs. It was good times all the way. Then he disappeared for some days, not for the first time, mind you. Then he was found.” She shivered.
“Who told you? Did detectives talk to you?”
“They tried. Me and cops aren’t the best of friends.” My astonished look stopped her in her tracks. “Rick was an exception and,” she added with heat, “I would have never given him the time of day if I’d have known he was a cop in the beginning.”
“Did you tell them anything useful? Did they tell you anything? I really want to know.”
“Can’t help you, honey, any more than I helped them, and now if you’ll get out of my way, I have a plane to catch.”
“You’re running out? Don’t you care what happened to him? Don’t you want to help?”
She flushed, but stared back at me without another word. I held my ground.
“You do know something. I can see it. What was going on? My car stays right where it is until you talk to me, dammit.”
She suddenly looked smaller, older, not as pretty. She sighed. “I actually do not know. And yes, I care. So what? He never told me anything, and I never saw anything, either. Yeah, he was a gambler but it never seemed like he was in too deep. He, maybe, had friends who were, maybe, not quite what they should be. Maybe, but I dunno. They were only his buddies, played poker, went out on a boat. It never seemed like he was in business with them, if you know what I mean.”
She nervously licked her lips and then added, “Until now.”
She darted a glance out the window. “But if it was those guys—if!— I don’t want to be around. Listen, honey, you must know someone is real mad at him. I want to be as far away as possible.”
“Where are you going?”
“What, do I look dumb? You think I’m telling anyone, even a cupcake like you?”
“You changed the plates on your car.” It wasn’t a question
She shrugged again. “Hang out with a cop for awhile, you pick up a few tricks. Now step out of my way, and go get your damn car out of my driveway. You could lend a hand with these bags, too, having held me up like you did.”
She opened the door, and said, “Ah, shit.” No one was going anywhere. There was another car parked across the end of her driveway and two burly men were getting out. My quick glance took in one oldish, one youngish. Windbreakers, sneakers. They looked ordinary enough, except for the guns at their waists.
We ducked back inside but they were at her door before we had time to lock it, go out the back, call 911 or any of the other possibilities that occurred to me.
Instead, Wanda abruptly screamed, “Peter! Down here right now!” Thundering footsteps sounded on the floor upstairs and then pounded down the stairs, followed by the appearance of a very young, tousled looking man in a sweat suit. A very large young man.
He eyed the two men who had forced their way in past Wanda and they eyed him. Wanda and I, terrified, eyed each other, and backed a few steps into the hallway.
“What the fuck are you doing in my house?” the young man said, ignoring the guns and moving right into the other men’s space, chest to chest.
“We came to discuss something with her. None of your business.”
“She’s my sister, and you’re in MY house with weapons and your car is in MY driveway and you think it’s not MY business?” He stepped in close.
“My sister needs to leave for a trip.” He said it very slowly, as if talking to the mentally impaired. “You car happens to be in the way. You need to move it so she can leave as planned. She has no interest in talking to you. Understood?”
“We’re cops, you idiot. Step back and I’ll get my shield.”
“Wanda,” he said without moving. “Get over here and see if there’s a shield.”
There was, and he let them go.
“Uh, no hard feelings? You should have said.”
“Yeah, yeah. We could have but Ms. Beauvoir here hasn’t been exactly making herself available to talk to us.”
I was trying to disappear into the background as quickly and quietly as I could. I hoped they would forget I was there. I wanted to see and hear everything. This had to be about Rick.
Wanda and Peter mirrored each other now, arms crossed, faces grim.
“I got a plane to catch!”
“You noticed our car is in your driveway. You’re not going anywhere right now.”
“Sis,” Peter said, “want me to call a cab?”
The detective shook his head. “Don’t bother. No driver is going to pick her up if we say no with a shield in hand. So come on, why don’t we talk?”
“I don’t have to say one freakin’ word to you,” she said, belligerent words in a shaky voice.
“Yes, she doesn’t,” Peter echoed.
“Actually,” one of the detectives said politely, “she does. You know perfectly well we are investigating the murder of a cop. She talks here, or she can talk at the station.”
The other added, “We could arrest her.”
“Arrest me? You’re crazy. I had nothing to do with…you have absolutely no reason…”
“Think we couldn’t find one? Don’t underestimate us.”
The first cop added, “Wouldn’t you rather talk here, in the comfort of your own home, than in an interrogation room?”
She turned pale.
“But my plane…”
“Well now, lady, if you hadn’t been giving us the runaround we could have been done with this days ago.” That was the second cop. I could see there was a tag team going on here. “We’ve been surveilling this house and your job, calling all your numbers. Where have you been?” When she didn’t answer, he said, “Seems to me you’d want to help us. Someone killed Rick Malone. Don’t you care?”
Peter turned red and stepped forward as if he was ready to argue up close and personal, but Wanda just looked ten years older. “Yeah, I’ve been making myself scarce. Not just to you, to everyone. I had my reasons. Let’s get this over.” She dropped abruptly onto the bottom step of the hall stairway. “What do you want to know? And nothing about me—I know my rights.”
One of them glanced around at Peter and me. “Would you prefer to have some privacy?”
I tried to appear harmless and dumb, even as both cops and Peter looked me up and down.
Wanda looked alarmed, “No way. I want Peter right here with me. Her, too. The more witnesses the better, just in case you try something.”
The older cop sighed. “Lady, we just we want to talk. And shouldn’t we move someplace where we can be more comfortable?”
“This isn’t a social visit. I’m fine here on the step. You can stand.”
While they asked questions I listened hard, making mental notes and hoping to finally have some answers, but she hardly told them anything she had not told me. She acknowledged Rick liked to live on the wild side from time to time, that maybe he knew questionable persons. She parted, under pressure, with a couple of names that had the detectives raising their eyebrows and looking at each other.
A voice said, “I don’t believe any of this.” It was my own voice. I could not play the silent, invisible mouse any more. “I’ve known him my whole life. He was a great cop all those years. I saw citations, for God’s sake! And he never really got hurt and then he got involved in whatever it is you think got him killed? Not Rick.” I glared at Wanda. “How come you don’t know better?”
“Who the hell are you anyway?” Peter said.
“Peter, she’s a friend of Rick’s. She came to talk to me, that’s all.”
“Rick’s friend, huh? He was a good enough guy but seems like he got sis here involved in some trouble. I don’t want her involved, and that includes involved with you.”
“But I don’t understand anything about this!”
“Big deal. I don’t. Wanda doesn’t, either, but we don’t like it and no offense, but that means we don’t like you.”
Wanda put a gentle hand on his arm, turned to me, her eyes full of tears and said, “Because I got a phone call. That’s why.”
Three voices said “What?” Loudly. Peter silently moved in to hold her hand.
“Someone called,” she whispered. “A few nights ago. They said Rick’s body would be found, soon, at the park near his house. And they suggested I get out of town, like yesterday, cause they didn’t want me to ask questions, or answer any, or whatever. Like, they said I shouldn’t be a loose end. I’m not stupid. Ya know? I drew my own conclusions and started packing.”
The detectives were asking a torrent of questions. Did she know the voices? No. Had she used her phone to identify the caller? She said, “Do I look like an idiot? I know how to work a modern phone. Or you think the guy was stupid enough to make it that easy? It was an unknown cell number. You wanna bet he didn’t toss it right after?”
They didn’t say anything, but their faces told me they agreed.
A few more unanswerable questions and they stood up saying, “This is useful, Ms. Beauvoir. Thank you. Tell us how to reach you later, and you can go.”
She jumped up. “If I wanted to be reachable, do you think I’d be leaving now? And don’t talk to me about confidential! There are people who love to run their mouths, including plenty in the high and mighty NYPD. Not to mention the ones who can be bought with this or that. Peter, get my bags, would you? While I hit the toilet?”
“Have you forgotten our car is in the way?”
Peter, trapped, said, “She’s going to Montréal. Outside, up in the country. We got family there.” He stood up. “That’s all you get. You’re getting the car out of the way right now, right?”
They left to move their car while Wanda came out clutching a coat in one hand and purse in the other, and Peter picked up her bags. I was still numb.
“You, whatever your name is,” Peter snapped. “You got to move your car too.”
I obeyed, and watched them tear down the street. One of the cops stayed in the car, now at the curb, writing madly in a notebook, but the other got out and knocked on my window.
“If you were such an old friend, we need to talk to you too. Who are you?”
“Erica Donato. And I’ve been interviewed already. Detective, um, Simms, I think. I have her card somewhere.” I scrambled through my purse.
“Wait right here.” He made a brief call. “Good. Simms is the boss. We don’t need to do it again. But be careful yourself,” he added. “Doesn’t look like this has anything to do with you, but call us if anything at all happens. Simms, me, my partner, whoever. Got it?”
I got it.
I drove home with my hands glued to the steering wheel, my eyes glued to my rearview mirror, my mind in a whirlwind of emotions mixed with a jumble of questions.