Shaded Light: The Case of the Tactless Trophy Wife: A Paul Manziuk and Jacquie Ryan Mystery (The Manziuk and Ryan Mysteries Book 1) (2 page)

Why’d he want to keep this lousy job, anyway? Twenty-nine years a cop, ever since he graduated from grade twelve as a fresh-faced idealist of eighteen. Going to set the world straight.

He looked at his watch. It was now 8:40 Friday morning. He’d spent all day yesterday following up on the teenager’s body, and all night following up the last lead on the homicide he’d been dealing with for eight, no, nearly nine, weeks. But that lead had gone the way of every other lead they’d had.

There was nothing more he could do here. And he was tired. So tired.

He turned abruptly and went to his desk. For a long moment, he stared at it. Papers littered the top, spilling onto the garbage can and carpet. The picture of his wife and him on their twenty-fifth anniversary was on its back, partially hidden by the accumulation of files. The triple-frame holding pictures of his daughter and two sons had fared better. It stood there in its U with a cloth handkerchief draped unevenly over the faces.

Manziuk remembered using the handkerchief to mop his sweating face and neck half an hour before. He leaned his bulk forward to set his wife and himself up, in the process letting more papers tumble onto the floor. He swore under his breath and picked up the handkerchief. Before he put it back into his pocket, he mopped his face and neck again. This stupid weather! Air-conditioning was fine until the day it malfunctioned; then you were helpless; not used to the heat anymore. Soft. You drove to your air-conditioned office in your air-conditioned car and you went home to your air-conditioned house and the only time you were out in the weather was when you took a day off to see a ball game or relax with a drink in your backyard.

Unless, of course, you had to do leg work on a case. Like the one he’d just been on.

He went back to his door and opened it. Instantaneous quiet dropped like a shroud onto the outer office. One treaded softly when Manziuk was in a bad mood, and he’d been in one for the past three weeks. “Craig,” he barked.

A lined face peered over a terminal.

“I need you,” he said brusquely, leaving the door open as he went back inside his office.

Detective Sergeant Woodward Craig, age fifty-nine, hot, tired, and overworked, hoisted his sweaty body out of the chair he’d been dozing in and followed Manziuk.

Manziuk, at six-five, 230 pounds, wasn’t easily ignored. But more than that, the two men had worked together often over the years, and had developed mutual respect. They each knew that when they were together, the other’s back would be adequately covered. No words had ever been spoken on the subject. They were no more and no less than good cops who played by the rules and who would retire with a small pension and the knowledge that in a troubled world they’d done a little bit of good.

“Your reports done?” Manziuk asked as Craig entered the office and shut the door.

“Took them down an hour ago.”

“So what are you hanging around here for?” Manziuk barked.

“Didn’t know if you’d want anything else.” Woody stared at the chair in front of the desk.

Manziuk noticed. “You need my permission to sit down?”

Woody tried a grin, but his face was too tired to hold it for long. “It
is
your office.”

“So it is. All right.” With exaggerated politeness, Manziuk pointed to a chair. “Sit down, won’t you?”

Detective Sergeant Craig ignored the chair and leaned, half-sitting, half standing, against the edge of the desk, as if ready to move at a second’s notice.

Manziuk turned and walked to the window.

“This Matheson case is dead-ended. We thought we had a lead and we’ve busted our behinds following it up, but you know what happened. Not a blasted thing! We’ve searched every inch of the grounds where she was found, talked to everybody who lived in the area, suspected everyone who knew her. And we’ve got absolutely nothing! Not one more lousy lead to work on! So now we put it on a back burner and hope some guy confesses when we catch him for something else. And we hope to God he doesn’t do it again. Fat chance! If he gets away this time, he’ll do it again all right. Anyway, we’re off it for now.”

He turned to face Craig. “I know it’s hard to leave it as a red mark, but we don’t have enough men to keep the good ones running in circles chasing their tails. We can’t do any more than we’ve already done. Maybe we’ll think of something later. So we’ll take a little break. Here it is, July long weekend. We’ve got nothing to do from now until Tuesday morning, so go home and get a tan or something. All right?”

Craig smiled. “All right.” There was a moment’s pause. “And you? Are you going home to get a tan?”

Manziuk glared at his sergeant for a moment, gray eyes meeting brown in understanding. “Yes. Soon as I get these blasted files out of here, I’m gone.”

Craig slipped off the desk and began picking up the personal effects that were strewn among the papers. “I’ll take these downstairs on my way out.” He found the bag they belonged in and replaced the items—comb, keys, wallet, Kleenex, pen, notebook. He picked up the small chamois drawstring bag that held the marbles and put them back inside. As he was about to close the bag, Manziuk reached over and dropped in the marble he’d been clenching.

Manziuk’s voice was tinged with the frustration he still felt. “I wish there was something else these things could tell us.”

Craig walked to the door, then paused. “See you Tuesday, then.”

“And not a minute before. No matter who gets it.”

“Yes, sir.” He went out.

Manziuk spent twenty minutes sorting and filing papers. At last, he took his battered hat from its hook (straw for summer—he hated to wear it, but the small bald spot on the top of his head had been burned by the sun once, and once was one time too many) and barged out of his office through the adjoining room. As before, the atmosphere became quiet and efficient.

When he reached the elevator on the wall opposite his office, he pressed the down button, waited until the doors slid apart, and then turned to the people in the office. “It’s all right,” he spoke gruffly. “You’re allowed to breathe again.”

On the second floor of the recently refurbished but still old police headquarters, newly promoted Jacqueline Ryan sat in the center of a desk swinging both shapely brown legs and laughing with her friend, Constable Beverly Champion, Vice Squad, a ten-year veteran and mother of two young sons. “So, what do you think, Bev? Should I celebrate by a night on the town or a new outfit?”

Bev laughed. “How about a new outfit to wear for a night on the town?”

“Mmm. Not a bad idea.”

“Have you told your family yet?”

“Yep. Told them at supper last night.”

“They must have been so pleased!”

“They think I’m nuts!” Jacquie’s normally musical alto changed to a shrill soprano, “What girl in her right mind would want to go around investigating murders?” A mezzo-soprano, “Why don’t you just find a good man and settle down?” A firm contralto, “What do you think you’ll do if you have to go after a murderer?” A threatening bass, “And what will you do if the murderer goes after you?”

“It must be fun having your aunts and grandmother and cousins all living close by.”

“Fun? You think it’s fun? Girl, you need to see more of life!” In one swift, graceful motion, Jacquie jumped off the desk and began to pace the small cubicle. “But, seriously, I do have one very real concern. Manziuk.”

“Detective Inspector Manziuk?”

“I hear he’s a terror to work with.” Jacquie’s mobile face twisted into a scowl.

Bev’s reply was cautious. “I’ve heard he doesn’t miss anything. He hates laziness.”

Jacquie continued to pace the tiny area, using her hands to punctuate each sentence. “What I’ve heard is he comes down like a ton of bricks on anybody who makes a mistake. And you know what else? He reminds me of a teacher I had in grade six. Big man, stomach the size of an oven, never so much as a hint of a smile. Hey, we thought if he ever did smile, he might literally crack his face. Well, that’s who Manziuk reminds me of.” Jacquie paused to arrange her features into a deadpan, chin thrust out, lips in a thin line, eyes cold and hard.

Bev laughed, then became serious. “But Manziuk’s good, Jacquie. Everybody says so.”

Jacquie’s face relaxed, but she resumed pacing. “He’s one of the best. But I’m still nervous when I think about having to work with him. Who knows what he’ll think of me?”

“What’s to think? You’re a good cop. You graduated near the top of your class in criminology. You paid your dues in narcotics and juvenile. You just spent a year in vice.”

“But he’s old school. Worked his way up step by step. And the word is he doesn’t have any time for cops who learn the business at university. And then there’s my age. I’m only twenty-eight. How many homicide detectives are that young? Not to mention the fact I’m a woman. And black. And we both know that’s why I got the promotion.”

“Jacquie, that’s not true!”

“Grow up, Bev! I’m not complaining. But I know perfectly well the police force has a mandate to promote more blacks and more women. So here I am—two for the price of one!”

“But you’re a good cop!”

“Sure I am, honey. I just have to keep proving it to everybody.”

“Well, don’t get in a knot over it. He works with Detective Sergeant Craig all the time. Maybe you’ll never even have to go near Manziuk.”

“I sure hope not. Maybe in a year or two when I know my way around.”

Part I

Half light, half shade,

She stood, a sight to make

an old man young.

—ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON

ONE

You self-righteous liar! But then you never think of anyone but yourself!”

As Peter Martin stepped into the front hallway of his penthouse in an exclusive residential area of downtown Toronto, he was surprised to hear his wife’s angry voice. The voice he’d been hearing a lot lately. The one he hadn’t realized she possessed until several months ago. But this time she wasn’t speaking to him.

He’d come home early from the office to pack for their weekend trip, expecting to find his young wife in the midst of deciding what clothes she should take to dazzle their friends. Instead, she appeared to be telling someone off. Unless by some miracle she was annoyed with herself. “Yeah, right,” Peter said softly.

“But, Jillian, I wrote you weeks ago, and I asked you to let me know if this weekend wasn’t convenient.” The answering voice was soft and apologetic. Peter recognized it as belonging to his wife’s older sister, Shauna.

Peter crossed the tiny front hallway into the living room.

Jillian Martin, Peter’s wife, was seated on the sofa. Tone-on-tone embroidered ivory cushions served as a perfect backdrop for her flowing golden hair and tangerine lounging pajamas. As was inevitable when Peter saw her, he found his eyes caught and held by the smoothness of her tanned skin and the perfection of her delicate features.

But today he had to shift his glance to Shauna, Jillian’s opposite—tall, gangly, mousy-haired, and pale—standing awkwardly before Jillian like a child on the carpet, her hands clasped, shoulders hunched. The small suitcase at her feet only served to make her position even more embarrassing.

Jillian’s voice dropped to a purr. “Peter, darling, I’m so glad you’re home. Shauna has just arrived on the doorstep. She says I knew she was coming, but I didn’t, Peter. I’m sure I didn’t!”

“Hello, Shauna.” Peter held out his hand as he walked toward her. “It’s good to see you even if there is a mix-up.”

In spite of the thick lenses of her black-rimmed glasses, he could see relief in her eyes as she put her hand into his. The hand was limp and cold, and he held it for only an instant before moving to the sofa beside Jillian and inviting Shauna to sit down and make herself at home. Simultaneously, a part of his mind wrestled with the question of what to do with her.

“I’ve told Shauna I’m sorry, but we just won’t be here, will we, Petey?” Jillian’s clear blue eyes, big as saucers, gazed at him with a studied helplessness he was getting to know well.

“She’s right, Shauna. We’re going to one of my partner’s homes for the weekend. A house party. But perhaps we can work something out.”