The Wrong Man: A Novel of Suspense (6 page)

“You’d be able to confirm whether or not it’s the man who misled you. We have to solve this case, and you’re one of the few leads we have. The ME’s office is just fifteen minutes from the airport.”

She scrambled for a response. The way the detective had phrased the request made it sound as if there was no actual requirement for Kit to acquiesce. But something told her it would be smart to be helpful, to appear willing to cooperate.

“I was thinking of flying down Thursday or Friday,” she said after a moment. “Would that work for you?”

“Could you make it tomorrow instead?”

“
Tomorrow?
”

“We need to move quickly.”

“Uh, okay,” she stammered. “Let me see about flights and get back to you shortly.”

Before signing off, Molinari provided her contact info.

The call over, Kit just sat there, too stunned to move. X was dead, possibly murdered. And the whole ugly mess seemed to be blowing back on her.

After a minute, she forced herself out of her chair and into the galley kitchen, where Baby and Dara were leaning against the counter, silently sipping their cappuccinos.

“Dara, could you give Baby and me a minute,” she said.

“Sure,” Dara replied, agreeably, but Kit could tell she was wigged out about what was happening. As soon as Dara had closed the kitchen door behind her, Baby grasped one of Kit’s hands.

“What’s going on?” she asked. Her pale blue eyes had darkened in worry.

Kit spilled out the story, her voice catching at moments.

“Do you think the body they found is definitely the man you met in Florida?” Baby asked.

“The description fits and the only other man I gave a card to was a sixty-something shop owner who wasn’t an inch over five foot four. And my infamous one-night stand said he was headed toward Miami. Of course, now I have no reason to believe that detail, but I suppose even liars tell the truth sometimes.” She covered her face with her hands. “I can’t believe what I’ve gotten myself into.”

“They can’t
force
you to identify the body, can they? It’s not like you’re a relative of the man’s.”

Kit sighed.

“I just don’t want the cops mistakenly thinking that I played a role in anything he was up to, especially if he was killed on purpose. Talking to them in person should help them see me for who I am.”

“You may be right,” Baby said. She tapped her nails on the countertop a few times. “And once you’ve met with them, you can put this crazy thing behind you.”

“Yes, hopefully.”

“I know this is going to sound awful—and as my mother always advised, one should never speak ill of the dead—but I’ll say it anyway.” That was another thing Kit loved about Baby, even though it occasionally caught her off guard, Baby told it like it was. “At least now you won’t have to worry anymore that this man could turn up again. I know that concerned you.”

Baby was right. If X had been killed, there’d be no worry that he would surface once more in her life. And yet the thought of him dead rattled her.

After they both returned to the main room, Kit phoned Avery and asked if she could arrange for her to survey the aunt’s home as early as Wednesday. No problem, she was told. The aunt was now in an assisted living facility but a neighbor would be able to show her the house. After checking flights, Kit called Detective Molinari back and made arrangements to meet her at the Dade County Medical Examiner’s at one o’clock the next day. She could hardly believe it. She
would
have a chance to set eyes again on X, but she’d be staring at a photo of his corpse.

By nine the next morning she was air bound. Being on the plane felt totally surreal. She thought suddenly of the Magritte painting of a pipe with the words “
Ceci n’est pas une pipe
”
—
this is not a pipe—written below the image. This was Tuesday but nothing about it
seemed
like Tuesday. Underneath her anxiety and dread, she felt a dull, aching sadness.

As promised, the Medical Examiner’s Building turned out to be only a short drive from the airport. The cabbie pulled into the driveway and dropped her in front of the large brick building. As he hoisted her roller bag out of the trunk, he eyed the structure with a slight grimace, as if fearful of being exposed to something contagious. She thanked him, shrugged off her trench coat, and draped it over one arm. She’d worn leggings, thinking they’d be a good transition outfit from New York to Florida, but the temperature was in the mid-eighties and the leggings had begun to stick obnoxiously to her thighs. Dragging her roller bag, she ascended a long ramp and spoke her name into an intercom. She was buzzed into the lobby by a woman sitting at a desk behind a glass barricade.

The reception area caught her by surprise. She’d expected something grim with a ghastly smell seeping through the walls or ducts. But there was deep blue carpeting and upholstered furniture in a cheery yellow fabric, the kind of look you’d expect at a dental center. No bad smell either, just icy cold air from the AC. Who were they trying to kid? Somewhere, probably in the bowels of the building, were rows of steels drawers with dead bodies lying inside.

There was no sign of Molinari at first, but then suddenly a woman came along beside her, wearing a buff-colored pant-suit and matching the description the detective had provided—fortyish, short, dark haired with streaks of gray. A badge, secured to her waistband, peeked out from just past the opening of the blazer. And there was a bulge further along the waist, where Kit realized her gun must be.

“Ms. Finn?”

Kit nodded.

“Thank you for coming all this way,” Molinari said, putting her hand out. Friendly enough but clearly, Kit saw, the no-nonsense type.

Kit shifted her coat from her right arm to her left, and shook the detective’s hand. She wondered if Molinari noticed how sweaty her palm was.

“We can speak afterward,” the detective said, “but I wanted you to view the photos first. That way we’ll know if we’re on the same page.”

In a moment they were joined by an African American woman who identified herself as an investigator with the ME’s office and led them to a “family viewing” room just off the lobby. The lights were low and there were just a few pieces of furniture—a small couch, a coffee table, and a couple of pleather-covered chairs. Baby, Kit thought ruefully, would have flinched at the sight of them. She claimed that she was allergic to pleather and her tongue swelled if she found herself within twenty feet of it.

“Why don’t you have a seat?” the investigator said, directing her to the sofa. Kit did as asked, lowering herself onto the hard surface. She wondered how many millions of tears had been shed in the room.

While Molinari stood just to the right, the investigator joined Kit on the couch. For the first time Kit noticed that the woman carried a manila-colored envelope. She laid the envelope on the table and slid the flap open with her thumb.

“There are two photos,” the investigator said. “One face forward and the other a profile.”

Please
,
no
, Kit thought, I don’t want to see this. Her whole body felt limp, as if her bones had begun to melt. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the investigator slide two photos from the envelope and lay them on the table.

“Ms. Finn?” Molinari said. “Why don’t you take a look now.”

She grabbed a breath and directed her full attention to the first photo. Only the head was visible, surrounded tightly with blue draping paper, so that it looked like a stage performer popping
his head out between the curtains for a pre-show peek at the audience. Her hand flew to her mouth in shock.

“Omigod,” she exclaimed.

“It’s him?” Molinari asked.

“No,” Kit said, her voice sounding nearly strangled. “It—it’s Matt Healy. The
real
Matt Healy. The one I met in New York.”

Molinari stared at Kit, her lips parted in confusion.

“Wait,” she said. “Are you saying this is the man whose wallet was stolen, the one working at the hedge fund?”

Kit glanced briefly at Molinari and then wrenched her attention back to the photo, still struggling to grasp the truth. There was no mistake. Though Healy’s eyes were closed and his skin almost clay-like in color, she was certain it was him. But it made no sense. What had he been doing in Miami—with her business card in his pocket?

“Yes,” she said, bewildered.

“You’re certain it’s not the other man?”

“The other man had red hair but a brownish red, not strawberry blond. And some facial scruff. It never occurred to me when you described the victim that it might be Mr. Healy.”

“And you gave him a card, too?” Molinari asked.

She shook her head. “Uh, no. I gave a card to the man in Florida but not to Matt Healy.”

Molinari studied her for a moment, questioningly. An alarm buzzed in Kit’s brain. Did the detective think she was lying?

“Why don’t we stop by my office so we can sit down and talk, okay?” the detective said.

“My flight—it’s at four.”

“I’ll be sure you make it. This is important.”

Kit nodded in consent. Better to cooperate, she realized. She’d somehow stumbled into a horror show and she needed to be careful, make Molinari grasp that she was an unwitting bystander who knew absolutely nothing and had played no role.

They returned to the lobby. Molinari suggested Kit wait there, where it would be cooler, while she retrieved the car. Kit stood by the window, watching the detective put her phone to her ear as she hurried across the parking lot, probably filling a colleague in on the body I.D. Someone would surely be designated to get in touch with Matt Healy’s family and the higher-ups at Ithaka while Molinari was busy questioning her.

The lobby was empty and utterly silent now, but Kit could hear her heart thumping in her chest. She was still struggling to come to terms with what had just happened in that sad little room. She’d stood there dreading the sight of X’s body, and then suddenly she was staring at a photo of Healy’s face, his mouth parted in a terrible grimace. It was like plunging your hand into what you think is ice-cold water, knowing it’s going to sting, and then finally realizing it’s scalding hot instead. She barely knew Healy but she felt shaken by his death.

What exactly had he revealed to her about the trip he was taking? Just that he was headed out of town on business but he’d never said where. She wracked her brain for more. Suddenly she recalled that at the bar in the Italian restaurant she’d told Healy about X’s plans to visit Miami.

And then another memory: she’d handed her business card to Ungaro at one point. Based on what Healy had said about not being able to join the meeting, she’d assumed he was going right away, but he might not have taken off until later, and Ungaro could have turned the card over to him.

What if instead of leaving town on business, Healy had actually hightailed it to Miami in search of X, and managed to find
him? Could X have murdered Healy? If that was the case, Kit had unwittingly set off a grisly chain reaction.

Kit felt fear snake its away around her ankles. If X had killed Healy, that shifted everything about the past days. It meant that the man she’d been to bed with—and been so charmed by—wasn’t just a thief, he was a killer. In the Ithaka meeting, Ungaro had suggested X could have purposely targeted her, and Kit had wondered if he might have been after her wallet, too. But maybe he’d been after something more, something she wasn’t even aware of.

I have nothing for you
, she wanted to scream.

She laid her coat on her roller bag and walked the length of the window, trying to quell her thoughts. She was leaping way too ahead of things. There was no proof yet that Healy had even been murdered. His business trip could have very well been to Miami and this was all a bizarre coincidence. But these assurances did nothing to ease her distress.

It took Molinari a few minutes to pull up the car, a dark Ford Taurus. She leaned across the seat and eased the passenger door open for Kit.

“You doing okay?” Molinari asked as she maneuvered out of the parking lot. Though the AC was now blasting, the car was hot as hell inside from sitting in the sun and Kit wished she could rip off her sweaty leggings and heave them out the window.

“It’s just hard to make sense of it,” she said. “But I remembered a couple of things you need to be aware of.”

She related Healy’s mention of a business trip, and her memory of handing over her business card that day at Ithaka.

“I thought you said you hadn’t given him a card,” Molinari declared.

“Well, I hadn’t given
Healy
a card,” Kit said, wishing it hadn’t come out so defensively. She didn’t want to seem in any way suspicious. “But I gave one to that Mr. Ungaro, the security
chief I mentioned to you on the phone. And maybe he passed it on to Matt Healy.”

“We’ll need contact information for him and Healy’s boss.”

“I just have their names and the main number for Ithaka, but I’ll give you that.”

“It could be that Healy’s business dealings were in Miami and his death is a standard hit and run,” Molinari said, reiterating Kit’s own thought. “But it’s the kind of coincidence I don’t like. When you spoke to Healy, did he ever indicate he might try to track down the person who’d stolen his wallet?”

“No, not at all. Needless to say, he was upset about the possibility of his identity being stolen, but he made a big point of wanting me to talk to Ungaro, like it would be the security chief’s responsibility to look into it—not his.”

“And this meeting was Friday, you said?”

“Uh huh. At noon.”

“Let’s finish discussing this at the office,” she said. “I’d like my partner to join us for the interview, and it’s important for me to get some notes down.”

That would make the experience so
official
, Kit thought anxiously. She told herself that she would have to summon a way to chill. If she acted flustered, the cops might suspect that her nerves were due to the fact that she was concealing the truth.

The drive to the station took about ten minutes. They rode in silence, past endless white buildings that seemed to pulse in the bright sunlight. Minutes later, as they stepped off the elevator onto Molinari’s floor, Kit couldn’t shake the false sense that she
was
guilty of something.

Molinari offered her a chair in a bullpen area of desks, all belonging, Kit assumed, to detectives—several talking on their phones, others typing or confabbing with colleagues. The mix was about thirty percent female. Kit was introduced to Molinari’s partner, Detective Todd, who had just ended a call. He
was nice looking, maybe late thirties, wearing a short-sleeved white linen shirt. He seemed like the kind of guy who coached kids’ soccer on the weekends.

“What can I get you to drink?” Todd asked. “Coffee?”

“Just water, thanks,” she said. As he rose to fetch it, she suddenly felt overwhelmed with fatigue.

“Give me a sec, too, will you?” Molinari asked. She crossed the room and spoke quietly to an older man at the far end. Probably, Kit figured, a boss who was eager for an update. She glanced worriedly at her watch. If she wasn’t out of there in thirty minutes, she would surely miss her flight.

The two detectives returned almost simultaneously. After handing Kit a plastic glass of water, Todd perched on the edge of his own desk and Molinari sat at hers, typing notes on the computer. She asked Kit to start from the very beginning and describe X as best as she could and anything that he said or did that might be pertinent.

She shared everything she recalled about X personally, including his supposed plan to head to Miami. She mentioned the dinner, just as she had with Ungaro, but nothing about visiting his room. As far as she was concerned, it was totally irrelevant. Matt Healy’s death had zero to do with her getting butt naked with X.

“Did you see what kind of car he was driving?” Todd asked.

“No, and I’m not sure if it was his own or a rental.”

“Any other details about his background that might be pertinent?”

“What difference would it make?” Kit asked. “It would probably all be a lie.”

“You’d be surprised,” Molinari said. “Humans have a crazy need to reveal themselves, and sometimes even con artists slip in facts that are real.”

Kit shook her head. “There’s nothing more than I’ve told
you. Except that he said he had a sister who lived in Miami. But he never said where.”

Molinari then mentioned that the New York City police would most likely be in touch with her in the near future.

Great
, she thought. It just goes on and on.

Surreptitiously Kit checked her watch again, and saw that she was out of time. When she glanced back toward the two detectives, she caught them exchanging a look and wondered what it could mean. Molinari leaned forward.

“You’ve been very helpful,” Molinari said. “But we need a bit more of your time.”

Oh God, Kit thought. Was this going to explode somehow? She stared at Molinari, waiting in dread.

“We’d like you to work with a sketch artist for us.”

“But I’ll miss the flight,” Kit exclaimed.

“Why don’t you give us your info and we can see if there’s another option available tonight. And Detective Todd will drive you to the airport.”

Kit nodded wearily in consent.

“Are you thinking that the man I met could have actually killed Matt Healy?” she asked. By chance, the buzz in the room had quieted almost instantly and her words carried across the bullpen.

“We don’t know,” Molinari said. “At this point we’re still determining if the hit and run was premeditated. But as I told you earlier, I don’t like coincidences.”

“Do you think
I
have anything to worry about?” Kit asked.

Molinari toggled her head back and forth, as if she were weighing the question.

“Right now there’s no indication this man is after you,” she said, “but it wouldn’t do any harm to be cautious.”

And what did cautious mean? Kit thought glumly. Was she supposed to look over her shoulder every place she went?

They managed to find another flight for her, an hour and a half later, and so she sat down with the sketch artist, describing X. It wasn’t hard. He was still strangely vivid in her mind, as if she’d stood looking into his eyes just moments ago.

When the artist finally showed her the results, she caught her breath in surprise. It was
him
, staring straight at her. This time, though, there was no charm to his eyes, only a hint of malevolence. Had the artist interpreted that from something she’d said? She nodded and slowly let out a ragged breath.

Even with the ride from Detective Todd, she was running about ten minutes late when she reached the airport, and the security line seemed to snake forever. She desperately wanted to call Baby and fill her in, but she had to put all her energy and attention into reaching the gate in time.

It wasn’t until the plane was in the air that she finally sank farther back into her seat and allowed a little of the tension to seep from her body. But she knew she couldn’t fully let go. There were still so many unknowns, an ugly nest of them, and her emotions seemed all bunched up, too. If it turned out X had indeed killed Healy, his dark shadow would loom even larger in her life.

How stupid she’d been to say yes to that dinner, to say yes to the crazy lust that had left her weak in the knees. She grimaced at the memory of her foolishness. And how ironic in the end, she thought. X had suggested that the night would have to be one with no strings attached, but since then there’d been nothing
but
strings. No matter what she did, she couldn’t untangle herself from them.

Once Kit was finally in Key West and ensconced in her hotel room, she called Baby, who’d already left two worried messages.

“This is perfectly mind-boggling,” Baby said after Kit poured out the story. “Why would this fellow Matt Healy take
the risk of trailing a criminal, especially when he had a security person at his disposal?”

“There’s still a chance he was in Miami purely on business. And his death was just a horrible accident.”

“Can’t you ask that security chief you spoke to whether Healy was supposed to be in Florida?”

“The police will get in touch with Ithaka, and it wouldn’t be smart for me to interfere. Besides, I want to distance myself from this whole nightmare as much as possible.”

“Good point.”

“Baby, one thing I can’t ignore. This story is bound to end up in the New York papers, at least in the tabloids. There’s a chance it might even mention me and the firm. I’m really sorry.”

“Oh don’t worry about that, dear. As my mother used to say, ‘Bad breath is better than no breath at all.’”

Kit managed to laugh, despite how agitated she still felt.

“You’re back tomorrow, right?” Baby asked.

“Yes. I’m going to check out Avery’s aunt’s house first thing in the morning and then be on a plane early. The sooner I launch my butt out of this state, the better. Plus, I’m meeting that doctor at seven tomorrow night.”