Tom’s Impala was parked at the curb. I could see my relatively new Honda Civic in the parking lot along the side of the building. The passenger door was open, and there were two cops standing sentry next to it.
I looked back over toward the front of the building. All the people who’d been outside earlier had been herded inside for questioning, and the only ones left were Frank, the coroner, and a couple cops. Ralph’s body still lay where it had fallen.
"Can I call my lawyer?" I asked as Tom opened the car door for me.
He handed me his cell phone. "Go ahead."
Shit.
"Dammit, Tom," I said when we were both securely in the car. "Tell me what’s going on."
"Call your mother. You’re going to need her."
My mother doubled as my lawyer. I stared at him, holding my breath.
Tom’s hands gripped the steering wheel, his eyes boring into mine as if he was trying to read my mind. "We found four shell casings in the street. A .22."
The bottom of my stomach dropped out. Okay, so I owned a .22. But it wasn’t a secret.
"I went to your car, Annie," Tom said as he started the Impala.
"Yeah?" I tried to keep my voice light, but my throat was dry and it came out as a sort of croak.
The engine purred as we sat idling.
Tom’s next question didn’t surprise me, considering. "Why did you bring your gun out tonight?"
I didn’t answer.
Tom sighed. "Your flip-flops were on the floor, like you said, but one was stuck a little under the seat. When I reached in to pull it out, I felt it."
I’d fucked up. I knew I should never have asked him to get my flip-flops. But my feet had been killing me; I took that risk.
"Dammit, Annie. What was your gun doing on the floor under the seat on the front passenger side? There were six bullets in the magazine."
Even I could do the math. The magazine held ten bullets. If there were only six left, where were the other four?
On the ground near Ralph’s body, he seemed to think.
Chapter 4
I woke up my mother. At least I hoped I woke her and didn’t interrupt anything. Her voice was a little groggy, and I heard a baritone in the background. Bill Bennett. Publisher of the
New Haven Herald
. My boss. He was living in my house now. Well, it wasn’t officially my house anymore, but my childhood shit was still there, my room with the Jim Morrison poster and Elton John albums. It was bad enough my mother had started dating him last year, but to know that he was living there now—must have been in my old room at some point, seeing more of me than any boss should see of his employee—well, that sucked. I couldn’t do a damn thing about it.
"Annie, do you know what time it is?" my mother asked.
"About eleven?" I ventured.
"Why are you calling?"
"Well, I’m in sort of a jam, and I need you to meet me at the police station." Understatement of the year.
"What sort of jam?" My mother was wide-awake now; her voice was clear, crisp.
"Well, do you remember Ralph?"
A second passed before she said, "Your Ralph?"
"Jesus, Mother, he hasn’t been
my
Ralph for fifteen years. But yes, that Ralph." I paused. "Well, he’s dead, and it looks like he may have been shot with a .22 and Tom found a gun in my car, and now he’s taking me to the police station for some sort of interrogation and he suggested that I give you a call. Nice of him, wasn’t it?" The sarcasm dripped off my lips and from the way Tom pursed his, it had not gone unnoticed.
"I’ll be there in half an hour. Don’t say a word," my mother instructed, ending the call.
I looked sideways at Tom. "Since I’ve got the phone, can I call the paper?" It was worth a shot.
"I already talked to Dick Whitfield," he said flatly.
Fuck.
"I didn’t give him the victim’s name, and he doesn’t know about the gun or that I’m taking you in," he continued.
"Taking me in? Am I really a suspect?" I stared at him.
We were stopped at a light on Chapel Street, and Tom just looked straight ahead. I squirmed a little in the seat; the black skirt shimmied up my thighs. As I tried to straighten it, I saw Tom watching. I covered up my legs as best I could with my hands, arms, and little purse.
"No, you don’t," I said.
"Don’t what?"
"You don’t get to look at my legs anymore. You think I’m a murderer."
"Doesn’t matter if you’re a murderer or not. They’re still nice legs," he said with a small smile as the light turned green and he hit the accelerator.
"Can you at least stop at my apartment so I can change? I can’t stand the thought of wearing this getup much longer," I said.
Tom’s expression indicated he didn’t think I should change, and he paused a few seconds. I figured he’d say no, but then, "Two minutes. That’s all I’m giving you. I shouldn’t even be doing that."
I knew he could get in trouble for this, and I really did appreciate it. I told him as much.
"Just keep your mouth shut about it, okay?" He gave me a sidelong glance. "Although I know how hard that can be."
"Fuck you," I said grimly.
He chuckled.
"What do you think happened tonight?" I asked after a few seconds.
Tom stared straight ahead into the headlights of a passing car. "I don’t know," he said softly.
My mother had instructed me to say nothing, and while I don’t normally take her advice on things, the situation at hand might call for it.
The Impala pulled up in front of my brownstone minutes later. I scrambled out with Tom hot on my heels. "Hot" being the operative word. I could feel drops of sweat trickling down between my shoulder blades, under my arms, and between my breasts. I’d have to reapply the deodorant.
Once we got into my apartment on the second floor, I made a beeline for the bedroom, but that didn’t deter Tom. I stopped him at the door by raising my hand.
"No, you don’t," I said.
Tom took my hand and walked around me, around the bed, and to the side table. I took a deep breath as he pulled open the drawer.
I knew what was in there without even looking. A couple of paperbacks, a package of bubble gum, and an empty box of Trojans.
I also knew what wasn’t there.
The drawer was where my gun should be. It usually wasn’t loaded; the ammunition was next to the gun box in the closet. I kept the .22 here just in case I needed to scare the shit out of an intruder. Both Tom and Vinny told me it was stupid, but it made me feel secure.
I realized that Tom had not agreed to come back here just so I could change my clothes. He wanted to see if my gun was here; if it was, the gun in my car couldn’t be my gun. Then I’d be off the hook. Maybe.
He didn’t even ask if I’d put it somewhere else. That’s what I get for being a creature of habit.
"I’m going to need your clothes," he said softly, indicating the camisole and the skirt. I wasn’t stupid. I knew he wanted to make sure there was no blood or gun residue on them.
I couldn’t argue. "There are plastic bags under the sink."
He nodded as he slipped out of the room.
My eyes wandered back to the bedside table. I stared at the drawer’s contents for a few seconds, wondering in a complete non sequitur if I shouldn’t restock the Trojans, but then realized, what the hell, if I’m in prison, I won’t be having sex anyway, so why spend the money?
I shut the drawer and pulled the damp camisole over my head, wondering what I should wear to be "taken in." I couldn’t imagine there would be a dress code for this. What would Stacy and Clinton of
What Not to Wear
say? I doubted that a tasteful sleeveless blouse, knee-length skirt, and kitten heels would make a difference. To hell with any fashion rules. So I put on my black Sturgis bike-rally sleeveless T-shirt with the skull on it and a pair of black yoga capris. I was in a black mood. And it could be a long night. I needed to be comfortable.
I was about to go back into the living room when I noticed my answering machine winking at me. My heart began to pound.
I glanced at the door—Tom hadn’t come back with the bag yet—turned the volume down a little, held my breath, and clicked PLAY.
"Where are you, Annie?" It was Vinny, and that was all he said before the message ended. I let out a sigh of relief.
Another look at the door, and I shouted out to Tom, "I need to use the bathroom."
"Just make it quick," came his muffled response, and his tone told me his patience was wearing thin.
"There’s beer in the fridge," I offered. I could’ve used one, too.
"Yeah, right."
So much for that idea.
I grabbed the phone’s handset and went into the bathroom, turning on the water so if Tom wandered into the bedroom, he wouldn’t hear the beeps as I touched the keys to call Vinny.
"Annie?"
"Vinny, I don’t have much time." Quickly, and as quietly as I could, I explained what was going down.
"Why—"
I cut him off. "My mother’s meeting me at the station. I have to go." My voice was flat; I was becoming resigned to spending the rest of my days with Bubba and the gang. Wouldn’t you know it would be Ralph who’d be the cause of it?
I stepped out of the bathroom to see Tom glaring at me, the plastic bag containing my slut outfit dangling from his right hand. Jesus, he’d even put the shoes in there.
"We’re. Leaving. Now," he growled.
I dropped the phone back into its cradle, slipped on a pair of lime green flip-flops—I own about five pairs; they’re cheap at Old Navy—and stumbled out of my apartment, Tom holding on to my arm like I was going to try to make a run for it. Okay, so I thought about it, and since he knew me pretty well, he probably figured I’d try it.
My mother hadn’t yet gotten to the police station when we arrived. Without a word, Tom pulled me through the concrete lobby, through the glass doors, and into the elevator. When the doors opened on the second floor, his hand tightened further around my arm and we went down the hall to a small interrogation room. I’d been here before.
The table was still wobbly, the plastic chair just a little off-kilter as I sat. I wished I’d thought to wear sneakers—the air-conditioning was blasting and my feet were cold. I hugged my chest, rubbing my arm where Tom had held me. Maybe it wasn’t cold so much as it was foreboding.
"Stay here," Tom ordered, like I had a choice. And then he left, closing the door.
I let my mind wander back a few hours, when I’d seen Ralph at the Rouge Lounge. Ralph. Who was the root of all this.
I didn’t always hate Ralph Seymour. I’d kept his name, hadn’t I? Well, that was more common sense than anything else, since I didn’t want to be associated with my father, Joe Giametti, casino manager and at times shady character, or my mother, Alexandra Giametti, who was Super Lawyer and had a High Profile in the city.
I leaned back in the plastic chair and remembered Ralph the day I met him, in my first journalism class at Southern Connecticut State University. He wasn’t good-looking, but rather geeky. Vinny had been geeky, too, in high school, but this was a different geeky. Vinny was chess club and science class. Ralph was bohemian geeky, wanting to find injustices in the world and fix them by writing about them. He was tall and too skinny, his face mirroring the rest of him, as it was long and thin, his nose too small, his lips pretty nonexistent. He wore his hair back in a ponytail, which I found incredibly sexy at the time, but in retrospect it was all part of the game. His eyes were the only remarkable physical thing about him. They were a soft green that hadn’t changed over the years—the first thing I’d noticed when I saw him again—and I wondered how, after everything that had happened, they could still look the same.
Shit, I knew why. Because Ralph was a con artist back then and he was still one now. No. Strike that. He had been one, until tonight.
I got up and peered through the little window in the door, my hand on the knob, knowing before I tried it that I was locked in. I wandered over to the windows and stared through the darkness down to the lights at the train station across the street. A train must have just come in; two taxis pulled out of the driveway in front and a few people made their way furtively down the sidewalk, casting eerie shadows along the roadway.
Ralph and I had cast shadows on the wall of his dorm room that first night as the full moon washed us with its glow. I tugged at the recesses of my memories, conjuring up the faint scent of incense, bedsprings hard against my spine. The mattress was too thin, but it hadn’t mattered. I’d fallen for him immediately, a take-no-prisoners sort of emotion that ignored his odd looks and focused on his passion, both for me and his dream of being executive editor at the
New York Times
someday.
I snorted. He fucked up both of those big-time. And now look where he was.
But instead of the anger I usually felt, a sadness rushed through me, a sadness because Ralph really did have talent. To squander that in the way he did, well, that was the ultimate waste.
A knock at the door startled me, and I jumped as my mother stepped into the room. Tom was not with her. She shut the door behind her and handed me a Dunkin’ Donuts latte.
"I’m sorry," she said as she gave me a quick hug, and I knew what she meant. She was sorry for Ralph, sorry that I was back in his clutches even though he was dead now. She’d never liked him. Which, I admit, was one of the reasons why I did—at first, at least.
I took the coffee and sat again, my fingers toying with the top of the cup; she sat across from me, taking my other hand in hers. I had to give her credit for not saying anything about my outfit as she forced herself not to stare at the skull on my shirt.
"You have to tell me everything," she said.
So I did.
Chapter 5
It was dawn when I finally walked out of the New Haven police station with my mother. I half expected to see Vinny waiting for me, but he wasn’t. When I mentioned it, my mother clicked her tongue.