The Wrong Man: A Novel of Suspense (9 page)

“That’s a shame,” Sasha said. Reaching into her woven black leather handbag without even looking down, she pulled out a silver business card case. “Why don’t you at least take my card? If your schedule opens up, give me a call.”

Again not wanting to be rude, Kit accepted the card.

“Of course. Have a nice evening.”

Kit headed toward the rear exhibition room, eager to find Chuck. The encounter had creeped her out. It was clear that the woman must have tried to ferret out information from Wainwright
about why Kit had gone in to speak to him that Friday. And tonight she’d been trolling for even more info.

Two rooms later, there was still no sign of Chuck. Kit texted him: “Where r u?”

“Sry, mens rm,” came the reply. “C u up front.”

She weaved through the crowd back to the front of the gallery and Chuck was already standing there. Sasha was nowhere in sight.

“Want to try to grab a seat at the bar at Cookshop?” he said. “I’ve got a ferocious craving for that fried kale they serve as a snack.”

“That works for me.”

They double-checked for the cross street of the restaurant on her iPhone and set off by foot in that direction.

“Was that a client I saw you talking to at the gallery?” Chuck asked after they’d reached the restaurant and seated themselves at the bar.

“No, just some woman I met briefly the other day.” For a split second she thought of coming clean about what had happened to her recently. She’d trusted Chuck with more than a few secrets over the years, including her growing qualms about her relationship with Jeremy, and his advice was always wise. But she sensed that sharing the story would cast a pall over the evening. Besides, discussing the drama was not going to help put it behind her.

“And not someone I’d ever want as a client,” she added.

“I wouldn’t want to have a nonfat
latte
with that chick, let alone decorate her apartment. She looks way too high maintenance. But speaking of work, how’s it going?”

Kit tapped the bar a couple of times with her knuckles.

“Knock on wood, business has been strong. I’ve begun to get some nice word-of-mouth referrals—there was one just this
week. By the way, I brought my iPad to show you that one project you’d asked me about.”

“Great. I’m so freaking envious of you.”

Chuck, four years younger than Kit, had just begun plotting how to go out on his own one day.

“Are you doing plenty of networking? You want to use this time to develop as many leads as possible so they’ll be there when you start your own firm.”

“I’m trying, but you know how it is at McCaverty-Swain. I’m working twenty-four–seven. They think nothing of calling you at eleven o’clock at night and asking, “What do you think of a pop of canary yellow in the kitchen?”

“How’s Mavis, by the way?” she asked. Mavis Swain was one of the firm’s senior partners, a grande dame in the old-school style. “Is she under control these days?”

“Absolutely
not
. You should have heard her last week. We’ve signed these new clients, a fiftyish couple wanting to upgrade the look of their apartment. They’ve got dough, needless to say, but they’re hardly major league. Mavis is having me shop the project so I’ve been in tow at the sessions so far. Last Thursday we met the husband for the first time. When he heard that the window treatments were going to cost thirty grand, he got all red in the face and started blustering about how outrageous that sounded. Mavis leaned back in her chair, said nothing for a second, and then finally asked him, ‘Mr. Hartley, do you remember what you paid for your current window treatments?’ He shrugged and said he couldn’t recall the exact amount but he was sure it wasn’t more than five grand. You know what Mavis said in response? ‘It
shows
.’”

“Omigod,” Kit exclaimed, laughing. “I’ve seen Baby come close to biting a contractor’s head off on a few occasions, but she’d never treat a client disrespectfully. How did the guy respond?”

“Let’s just say he didn’t look pleased and they took off a few
minutes later. I had to fight the urge to grab the woman by the ankles and restrain her from leaving. I need projects so I don’t end up downsized out of there. But two hours later, the wife called and announced that Mavis could spend what she wanted on the drapes.”

That was the thing with Mavis, Kit thought. She had this way of reading clients and knowing just how far she could take it with her behavior. But she also had family money and could afford to let a client go. For a moment, Kit reflected on her own parents, now living in their tiny condo in Oxford, Maryland.

“But enough about Mavis the Maleficent,” Chuck announced. “Tell me about Florida. How did the trip work out?”

It felt as if she’d been poked in the chest. No matter how hard she tried to avoid it, everything seemed to circle back to Islamorada and to X.

“Lovely,” she said. Again, she felt tempted to spill but caught herself. “A great little hotel. Gorgeous scenery.”

“Did you ever wish Jeremy was there with you?”

Kit sighed.

“No, and I feel guilty admitting that. The poor guy. I kind of wasted a couple of years of his life.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Kit. First of all his apartment looked a billion times better after you helped him with it. I mean, his toilet seat had its own
hoodie
when you first started dating him.”

“Don’t blame him for that. His mother stuck it on there, and he didn’t want to hurt her feelings by taking it off.”

“He should have incinerated that thing. Beyond that, he just wasn’t right for you.”

“I tell myself I want some totally gutsy guy but isn’t that asking for trouble in the long run?” Kit smiled ruefully, thinking of X. “I mean, can you ever really trust that kind of man? Maybe I should call up the Poppin’ Fresh Doughboy and see if he’s available.”

“Trust me, Kit Kat, I’m no man genius but I know there’s a guy out there who’s perfect for you, who’s in between Poppin’ Fresh and a real bad boy, someone who’s thrilling to be around but isn’t going to knock up the housekeeper or end up with a ton of D.W.I’s.”

The kind of man she’d thought X might be. But so much for that.

“I intend to hold you to that prediction,” she told Chuck. “What about your new honey? Is he a keeper?”

“Not really. He’s like twenty-six and fun to hang with, but he seems kind of clueless. He actually told me that the way to get frozen French fries extra crispy is to set the oven to ‘clean.’ That’s why I’m skeptical he’s home doing his taxes tonight!”

They ordered dinner and chatted for the next two hours about clients, show houses they’d seen recently, and what former colleagues were up to. Kit also gave him a look at the project he’d asked to see.

It was after nine by the time they left. A brisk wind had come up and they both buttoned their coats against it before hugging goodbye. Chuck, who lived in the Village, headed off on foot and Kit grabbed a cab going east. As Manhattan rushed by in a blur, she found her thoughts dragged back to Sasha Glen and the way they’d bumped into each other, seemingly out of the blue. She thought, too, of a comment Detective Molinari had made about coincidences, that there were some she just didn’t like. Had running into Sasha been simply a coincidence? Or could Wainwright and Ungaro have arranged for their employee to keep tabs on her?

The idea pissed her off. She’d told them everything she knew so what would be gained by spying on her? Did they think she knew more than she’d let on?

It
had
to be coincidental, she reassured herself. Occurrences like that happened, even in a city as big as New York. And
if they were going to tail her, they’d hardly put a woman in Louboutins on the case.

Moments later, Kit let herself into her building and rode the elevator to the fifth floor. Talked out from her night with Chuck, she looked forward to crawling into bed with a book and just drifting off to sleep mid-page.

But as she stepped closer to her apartment, she jerked to a halt. There was something pinkish brown poking out on the right side of the doorframe. Cautiously she forced herself a step closer. She saw then that the pinkish color was shards of raw wood and that the frame was gouged and splintered, as if someone had wacked at it with a sharp object. Then she saw the door. It was ajar, by a couple of inches, and there was a huge, ugly dent where the lock was.

Her skin pricked with fear. Someone had broken into her apartment. And she realized that they might still be inside.

Run
, she commanded her legs. She spun around and nearly hurled herself down the hall toward the elevator. No, there wasn’t time, she realized as she started to jab the call button. She kept going, to the stairwell entrance. After yanking open the door, she jerked quickly to a stop and listened, wondering if the intruder could be lurking below. It was silent. She flew down the stairs, her feet barely touching the steps and her palm skimming over the handrail at light speed.

By the time she reached the lobby, her heart was beating so hard that the sound filled her head, like a piston churning. She pushed open the main door and frantically glanced up and down the street. There were a half-dozen people at various points along the block, but they seemed
ordinary
, people just going about their business.

She dashed ten yards up the street and ducked into the entranceway of another building. Her hands had begun to shake and for a few seconds she fumbled uselessly in her purse until she finally found her phone. She called 911.

“What is your emergency?” the operator asked.

“Someone’s broken into my apartment,” Kit blurted out. “They—they might still be inside.”

The operator asked for the address and apartment number. She also wanted to know where Kit was at that moment.

“Outside. Um, on the street.”

“Do not attempt to reenter the residence. Wait outside. The police will be there shortly.”

As soon as the call ended, Kit could feel a sob catch in her throat. Her
home
, all her lovely things. She couldn’t stand the idea of a stranger in there, pawing over her possessions, stealing what she’d worked so hard for. Instinctively, she let her hand brush the outside of her tote bag, remembering gratefully that she’d lugged her iPad with her tonight. And her Samsung camera was tucked in her purse. Thank God for small favors, she thought grimly.

Burglary, she knew, was always a possibility in New York, particularly in a non-doorman building. But she’d taken precautions: the best locks she could afford for both her apartment and the office. The
office
. In dismay she remembered that she’d left the inner door—the one from her apartment—ajar, so that meant the burglar would have had easy access to her workplace. Fists clenched, she kept her eyes riveted to the front of her building, waiting to see if anyone suspicious looking emerged.

And then a thought poked through her brain, sharp as a stick. What if it wasn’t just a regular burglary
?
From the moment Matt Healy had opened his door and explained to her about the theft of his wallet, she’d worried that X might have another card to play with her. And he knew where she lived.

But what could he possibly want from her apartment? He’d stolen Healy’s identity so maybe he’d hatched a plan to steal hers, too, and market it to someone else. She pressed her hands to her cheeks in alarm, realizing that if she’d shown up earlier, she might have come face to face with him.

The local precinct was super close to her, and it took under ten minutes for the squad car to arrive. Two uniformed cops
emerged, one a male Hispanic, and the other a thirtyish white woman, with a brown ponytail sticking out from the back of her cap. Kit hurried from the doorway to greet them and then explained what had happened, words tumbling out of her mouth.

“And you think someone might still be in there?” the male cop asked her. His badge read Tirado.

“I couldn’t tell,” Kit said. “The door was open a couple of inches, but I didn’t hear any noise. And no one’s come out of the building.”

“What’s the apartment floor plan like?”

“It’s just a one bedroom with an open kitchen. But I rent the studio next door—to the left—as an office. There’s an inner door to it from my living room.”

“How long had you been out tonight?”

“Um, about six hours.”

“All right,” the female cop told her. “We need you to stay down here for a few more minutes. Once we clear the apartment, we’ll have you come back up to the floor.”

Kit nodded, and watched the cops stride purposely into the building. Part of her wished she could accompany them. As much as she dreaded confronting whatever havoc awaited her inside, not knowing what had happened was even worse.

She retreated once more to the doorway of the nearby building. The temperature had dropped, and the wind was even choppier now, but inside her coat, her top was damp with sweat.

With the cops gone, she felt vulnerable again. She kept her eyes on the street, on anyone passing by. A small crowd began to mill around the squad car, curious, even as jaded New Yorkers, to discover what was brewing inside the building. If it
was
X who had broken into her apartment, she wondered anxiously if he might be still hovering nearby. Again, questions ping-ponged
back and forth in her brain: What would he have been looking for? Was he some kind of sociopath? She was just lucky she hadn’t been home.

It was about ten minutes before the female cop emerged from the building. Kit hurried from the doorway to meet her halfway, her pulse racing in anticipation of news.

“Whoever was in your apartment is gone now, so you can reenter the building,” the cop told her. “But you’ll have to wait in the hall. CSU needs to go through your place first and dust for prints.”

“Was it a burglary?” Kit asked anxiously.

“It appears that way. I should warn you, though, it’s a mess in there.”

Kit’s heart sank. She dreaded the thought of seeing her home violated that way. But a crazy part of her felt relieved by the fact that it might be a standard-issue break-in after all.

“What about my office?” she asked. “Were they in there, too?”

The cop nodded solemnly.

“But it doesn’t look like they bothered with much in that room. You’ll know better when you take a look.”

Her
laptop
, she thought suddenly, fighting the urge to wail. She’d left it on her desk. Everything of importance was stored on Dropbox—but that offered only minor consolation. As for her co-workers’ laptops, she was pretty sure Baby had taken hers home on Thursday, and she just prayed Dara had done the same with her own today.

“I—I should call my super,” Kit said, as she accompanied the cop into the building. “The door will have to be replaced.”

“He has a set of keys I assume?”

“Yes, but he lives in a different building, not far from here.”

“Who else is a lawful key holder?”

Kit explained that two people worked with her, and as they
rode the elevator to five, she provided Baby and Dara’s contact info.

Stepping from the elevator into the corridor, Kit saw Officer Tirado standing just outside the apartment. She forced herself to take in the splintered doorframe again. She had a sudden, horrible image of an intruder bashing away at it.

She took a few steps closer to her apartment.

“Ms. Finn, please,” the female officer said, lightly raising a hand, “we need you to remain out here for a while.”

But the door was fully open now and Kit was close enough to glimpse the inside of her apartment, at least the first ten feet or so. Her heart sank. The drawer from the small table in the entranceway had been yanked out and lay upside down on the area rug, the contents scattered. A floor lamp, which had been next to the table, was now on its side, the lampshade askew. It looked as if there’d been a minor explosion, spewing objects pell-mell around the room.

“Understood,” Kit said, beginning to retreat. “But—can you just tell me how they got in?”

“Most likely with a crowbar,” Tirado said. “It’s a typical approach. Burglars just wedge it in there a few times and pull. If the door is kind of flimsy, like this one, it only takes a couple of minutes.”

She’d paid all that money for a good lock, never realizing the door was lame. Reluctantly, Kit retreated farther down the hall near the door to her office, which was still closed.

While the two cops murmured to each other, occasionally pausing to speak into their walkie-talkies, Kit called the super and told him the news. Clearly upset, he promised to show within the hour. Next she phoned Baby. Though she’d kept her cool while talking with the super, Kit’s voice trembled as she broke the news to her partner.

“Dear lord,” Baby said. “But you’re okay?”

“Yes, though I’m afraid once I get in there, I might burst into tears. I hope you and Dara took your laptops home with you.”

“I did, and I assume Dara must have because she can’t live without hers. Kit, do you want me to come down? I could probably be there in twenty minutes or so.”

“Thanks, but there’s really nothing you can do. I don’t even know what I’m dealing with yet, and I won’t until they let me inside.”

There was a long pause, and Kit glanced quickly at the screen, wondering if the call might have been dropped.

“I’ve got to ask this question,” Baby said finally. “Do you think this could be related to what else has been going on, with that nasty man from Florida?”

“They’re saying right now it looks like a run-of-the-mill burglary and I’m just hoping that’s the case. Look, I’d better go. I need to contact one of my girlfriends and see if I can crash on her couch tonight. But I’ll call you after I’ve been in the office and assessed the damage.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Baby said. “You’re staying with me. I have a perfectly lovely guest room, and the sheets in there probably make anyone else’s feel like horsehair.”

“Baby, I couldn’t impose.” Yet even as she said the words she knew that’s where she wanted to be. Baby’s Park Avenue apartment building was like a fortress and she’d feel totally safe there tonight, to say nothing of it being far more comfortable than bunking down on someone’s pullout sofa with a mattress as thin as a cheese singlet.

“I won’t discuss it another moment. Just give me a heads-up when you’re due to arrive.”

“Thank you, Baby.”

About ten minutes later, she heard the elevator begin to groan and two men in lightweight overcoats spilled out along with a man and woman in CSU jackets. One of the overcoated guys
introduced himself as Detective O’Callaghan while the other three people disappeared into the apartment. He was about fifty and from his weary, lined face, it looked like he’d probably witnessed the aftermath of a million bust-ins, but he at least seemed sympathetic as Kit described her discovery.

“I see you’ve got four apartments on the floor,” O’Callaghan said. “Do you know if your neighbors are around?”

“The first door here is actually to an adjoining office of mine. The neighbors in apartment A go away every weekend and the ones in B are on vacation.”

O’Callaghan shook his head, frustated on her behalf.

“The intruder either got lucky or he’d done his homework. You see anyone suspicious in the building lately or notice any unusual occurrences?”

“Occurrences?” Kit asked, not sure what he meant.

“Burglars often case a building before they attempt to break in,” he said. “They might leave a pizza flyer tucked into your door and then wait to see how long it’s there for. That gives them a hint to your schedule.”

“Nothing like that,” Kit said. “But there’s something I need to tell you.”

O’Callaghan’s ears practically pricked up as she spoke. Kit shared what had happened to her over the past week, including Healy’s death. Though she’d told the story several times already, she still cringed as she described how X had tricked her.

“Wait, you kind of lost me in Miami,” the detective said. “You’re saying you think the break-in might have something to do with this guy down there?”

“I have no way of knowing. It just seems like such a freaky coincidence.”

“Okay, why don’t I get all this down a little later,” he said. “Right now I want to take a look inside with my partner, and then we’ll have you make an inventory of what’s missing.”

He plucked a pair of latex gloves from his coat pocket, snapped them on, and entered the apartment. It was another fifteen minutes before he reemerged, with the CSU pair trooping out behind him. Before the team departed, O’Callaghan had one of them take a set of her fingerprints for comparison.

“You ready to go inside now?” O’Callaghan asked.

“Yup,” Kit said. By this point she felt totally drained, but she was also desperate to learn what was missing. Taking a breath, she followed O’Callaghan down the hall and into the apartment. The other detective met them at the entrance and conveyed that he was headed to the other floors to canvass the building while at least some people were still awake.

It was a total shambles inside: cabinet doors flung open, cushions from the sofa and armchairs upended, contents from drawers flung every which way. And there was an eerie black coating of fingerprint dust over many areas.

In an instant, Kit felt her despondency morph into outrage.
Damn
them, she thought.

“I know it’s tough, but try to take a close look,” O’Callaghan said. “You’ll need to make an inventory of what’s gone.”

Nodding, she grabbed a pad and pen from her purse and began taking stock.

She started with the kitchen area. Her iPhone speakers were gone, she realized. And so was the jar she kept spare change in. It
did
look like a burglary, she thought. Maybe a junkie desperate for drug money.