The Spellmans Strike Again (36 page)

Henry threw the dishtowel over his shoulder, approached me, and said, “Have a nice day.”

“Whatever,” I replied.

Then he kissed me again. I was super-fast pushing him away this time. I even followed it up with a solid punch in the arm.

“Ow,” he said.

“Knock it off,” I said.

Henry reached into his pocket and handed me a piece of paper with a phone number on it.

“This is Andrew Fishman’s cell phone number. He’ll talk to you and he has something to say.”

“You should have led with that,” I said, snatching the number out of his hand. “Thank you,” I reluctantly added.

“You’re welcome,” Henry replied.

I left Henry in my apartment. I had thinking and work to do. And frankly, I thought there was a good chance that if I left him alone, I’d come home to a clean apartment.

FREE MERRIWEATHER—

CHAPTER 6

Lieutenant Fishman met me at a coffee shop south of Market. It was neutral territory where both of us would go unnoticed. We agreed that everything was off the record, so that I couldn’t go around quoting him, and if I happened to mention something that might incriminate me, he couldn’t follow up with an arrest.

Once we’d agreed upon the terms, I told him everything. I told him what I knew about Harkey’s methods as a PI. I told him I had evidence that Harkey was illegally recording conversations. I also had to admit how I acquired that evidence.

Then I told him about Demetrius. About how the evidence in the case didn’t match up. How Harkey ignored a solid witness, who may have also been a drunk. If a guy in prison can be a rat for the prosecution, why can’t an alcoholic on the street be a witness for the defense? Harkey buried that witness so the defense wouldn’t get their hands on him. The witness was in the police file but not the defense counsel’s papers. I mentioned the jacket Demetrius wore all the time and the photos from the crime scene. I mentioned that all of the physical evidence had conveniently disappeared around the time DNA testing became widely available. I told him point-blank that Merriweather was innocent and that Harkey probably knew it.

Then I told him about the other cases I’d looked into.

Harkey would choose his prime suspect and never waver. These prime suspects usually had a couple of things in common—they were African-American or Hispanic and had a criminal record.

Then I asked Fishman about the last case he worked with Harkey. After reviewing the file, I knew I was missing something. It was a murder investigation that looked like it was going somewhere and then it went nowhere. They had a suspect, he was indicted, charges were dropped, and then Harkey retired. Five years later, Fishman revisited the old case and found a new suspect and the charges stuck.

This was when Fishman talked.

“I was young. I had only been in homicide for two years and Harkey was my first partner. I noticed things and let them slide, but as they continued I couldn’t let them slide anymore. Witnesses pushed to identify suspects, improper search-and-seizures . . . but the last case, Harkey took it too far. Both victim and suspect were dealers. Harkey had been after this guy Rollins for a while. The victim, Marcus Turner, also had a rap sheet. Not a nice guy. Shot with one of his own unregistered guns. Word on the street was that Rollins had threatened Turner. But that happens all the time. There was no evidence beyond that. Nothing that tied Rollins to the murder. Not until Harkey removed Turner’s Rolex from the crime scene and conveniently found it after getting a court order to search Rollins’s home.

“I had been watching Harkey for a while. Nothing he did slipped past me, although I pretended like it did. I documented everything. Just in case it came to that. But back then if you snitched on another cop, your career or your life was over. It’s better now, but still. I had a family to support. I did what I thought was best.”

“You blackmailed him into retiring?” I blurted out.

Fishman checked the restaurant to make sure no one had heard my exclamation.

“That’s one way to put it,” Fishman quietly replied.

“Did you ever think about all the suspects before Rollins? How many times Harkey might have tampered with evidence to get the result he wanted? I checked—he had the highest clearance rate on the force for five years.”

“I thought about all of it,” Fishman soberly replied.

The waitress refilled our coffee; we remained silent. She was the friendly kind of waitress who requires interaction. Our lack of interaction with her and each other apparently needed commenting on.

“I sure hope this isn’t a date. You two seem to have nothing in common,” she said as she sashayed away.

She was very wrong.

“I thought about it. But at the time, there was only so much I could prove. So I thought about the men and women who would come later. And I still have to think I did some good.”

“So now what?” I asked.

“Do you know what you’re getting yourself into?”

“A little bit,” I replied. It was the truth, at least.

“I want you to think about it for a few days. Consider every angle. You might not want to touch this mess, Ms. Spellman.”

“What if I do?” I asked.

“I’ll be in touch.”

Before Fishman left, I gave him a copy of the Merriweather file.

“We could free him now if only the physical evidence would turn up,” I said.

Fishman took the file and nodded his head. Our conversation was over. At least for now it was.

I needed to clear my head, so I went to the one place that gave me peace in those days: the community garden. On this particular afternoon, I picked up a cup of coffee and sat on the bench where I’d discovered the best view. The other bench perk was that Rae could see me watching her, which I knew she found utterly unnerving. Once she even dug the shovel into her own shoe. Good times.

This afternoon, Rae approached the chain-link fence and glared at me.

“Don’t you have anything better to do?” she asked.

“Absolutely not,” I replied.

She rolled her eyes, shrugged her shoulders, and got back to work.

Once my body was caffeinated and my head was clear, Henry approached the park bench to muddle everything all up again.

“Haven’t I seen you enough for one day?” I asked.

“I don’t know. Have you?” he said, then he handed me a bag with a chocolate croissant inside.

“Is this from _____?” I asked.

“Yes,” Henry replied.

There’s this French bakery on None of Your Business Street. I won’t tell you the name because then you’ll go there and the lines are already long enough. Suffice it to say, you can’t find a better croissant on this side of the Atlantic.
¹

“Thanks, but I’m all out of coffee.”

Henry pulled a thermos out of nowhere, it seemed. I uncapped my to-go cup and Henry poured the piping-hot brew.

“You think you’re so smart,” I said with as much attitude as I could muster under the circumstances.

“I like to come here myself sometimes. I find it relaxing,” Henry said in his own defense.

Then nothing was said for a while. I drank more coffee and ate that croissant from the place I’m
so
not going to tell you about. And we watched Rae dig and give us dirty looks. It was like Shakespeare in the park, I bet. When I was done with my afternoon coffee break, I scrunched up the bag and gave my garbage to Henry.

“I’ll walk you to your car,” he said.

Henry tossed my trash into the appropriate recycling bins and followed me to my vehicle. I tried to pretend he wasn’t there, but it was more of a performance piece.

“Thanks for the croissant,” I said, trying to sound not all that thankful.

“You’re welcome,” he replied.

“Well, I’ll be seeing you around,” I said, unlocking my car door.

“There’s been something I’ve been meaning to tell you,” Henry said.

“What’s that?” I said.

“You know this whole community-gardening probation?”

“Yes?” I said, turning around.

“My idea,” Henry said.

You can only fight your feelings for so long. A hot cup of coffee and a pastry might warm your heart, but you can cool it down with memories of rejection and embarrassment. But there are some gifts that are too perfect to ignore, gifts that tell you that someone knows you deep down in your core. I could pretend for years that I didn’t still love Henry Stone and I could tell myself every day that he was all wrong for me and I was all wrong for him—and we were most definitely wrong for each other. But I’m the sort of person who’s always embraced wrong. So why not embrace it now?

This time I threw my arms around Henry and kissed him; this time, nobody broke away; this time, we accepted what lay ahead. We knew we were doomed. The kiss was a warm acceptance of years of bickering, years of me consuming foods that I found barely edible and Henry tidying up after someone who already thought she had tidied up. When I kissed Henry I wasn’t imagining Ex-boyfriend #13; I was picturing Husband #1.

What ended the kiss was not any desire to end it but a hazy sense of being watched. At the same time, Henry and I broke away and looked toward the garden fence. Rae had her cell phone out and was shooting pictures. No doubt they were already being e-mailed to the unit.

Henry sighed and looked at me sheepishly. “I always imagined that we would tell them.”

I quickly walked toward the entrance to the garden. Henry followed after me.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“Oh, there’s just something I need to do.”

I found Rae’s bike and let the air out of the tires. When I was almost done, Rae caught me.

“Hey, what are you doing!” she shouted through the fence.

“Consequences, Rae. Consequences.”

CONSEQUENCES

A flurry of events, negotiations, and family meals transpired over the next several days. In the interim, all of the doorknobs, light fixtures, and other transportable household necessities were returned to their proper places. What was odd about their sudden reappearance was the adjustment period required in returning to the norm. In fact, my dad had so gotten used to carrying around an extra doorknob that I caught him a few times, doorknob in hand, realizing that he could use the one that was already in its place.

As anticipated, Rae disseminated the photos of me and Henry to every relevant person in her address book, including Grammy Spellman, who found the whole thing quite sordid. The next time I saw my mother and Henry in the same room, I could’ve sworn she tried to give him a high five. In his defense, he shook his head scornfully at her. It got me thinking that maybe my mother was the ultimate puppet master. I had to admit, I really didn’t care anymore.

If you know me at all, and you should probably know something by now, you know that I don’t like beginnings. They feel awkward, strange, and unnatural to me. I understand the status quo; it’s getting there I have trouble with. While I had shared many meals with Henry and been to his house on numerous occasions, we had never been on an official date. Neither of us quite knew how to proceed.

He phoned me the afternoon after the garden kiss.

“What are you doing later?” he asked.

“I have no plans,” I replied.
¹

“I’ll see you at eight,” he said.

At eightish (I’m not a timely person) I arrived at Henry’s house. At eight o’clock sharp, Henry arrived at my place. He waited patiently inside my foyer for ten minutes, then phoned my cell.

“Where are you?” I asked.

“Where are you?” he asked.

“At your place,” I replied.

“I’m at your place too,” he said.

“I thought you didn’t like my place,” I said.

“I thought you didn’t like my place.”

“I like your place fine. I just don’t like the food there and since there’s no food in my place, it doesn’t make any difference, does it?” I said.

“Here’s the plan—”

“It needs to involve food, because I’m starving,” I said.

“I’ll go to the store.”

“Listen to me very carefully: I’m
not
eating tofu!”

“Calm down, Isabel.”

See, beginnings suck. But as the night progressed, matters improved. Henry keeps a hide-a-key in a slot in his doormat.
²
Once I got a neighbor to let me into his building, I was able to get into his apartment, where I promptly ordered Chinese food before he could protest.

After dinner, there was a knock at the door. Henry quickly muted the television set and dimmed the lights. We sat in silence for ten minutes until we were certain that the person behind the door (Rae) had vanished. Then Henry cleaned up, because he likes cleaning up and I don’t, although he did mention that if I was thinking this relationship was going to involve permanent maid service, I was very wrong. I didn’t mention that I had a feeling he was very wrong.

Of course, other things happened during the evening and I did stay the night, but most of that stuff is none of your business. Henry claims I’m a blanket stealer, and he snores (on occasion), but in my experience they all snore at least a little bit. In the morning, he made the bed with me still in it.

“What are you doing?” I asked as he straightened out the blanket on top of me.

“Now all you have to do is slip out of your side and tuck in the covers.”

“You’re insane,” I replied as he tucked in the covers on my side of the bed. He kissed my forehead while I was freeing my arms from the bedding trap.

“I’ll make coffee,” he said, leaving the room.

I slid out of bed when the mug was ready for me. I made toast and watched Henry eyeing the crumbs that sprinkled onto the kitchen table. When I was done eating, he wiped the table clean with a sponge.

“I was going to clean that up,” I said.

“No, you weren’t,” he replied.

He was right. I wasn’t. I had a feeling fights would come frequently and would last indefinitely, but that morning I got a glimpse of something very different than the list entries that preceded Henry.