“I know.” Mary took Judy’s arm. “Honey, you don’t have to go see. I’ll wait here with you. Anthony and Bennie can go.”
“I want to!” Judy cried, blowing her nose again.
“They’re not gonna let us through the barricade anyway,” Mary said, trying to convince her. She’d come here wanting to see as much as possible, as she would have on any murder case before, but now that she was here, she realized how different John’s murder was from any other. This wasn’t a case, this was John.
Judy shook her head, stuffing her Kleenex in her pocket. “I want to go. They’ll let us pass.”
Bennie turned, heading toward the scene. “You’re damn right they will. Also Anne and Lou are on the way. We didn’t wait.”
“How did Anne take the news?”
“Not well.”
“Poor thing.” Mary felt a wave of sympathy, knowing that Anne’s grief would be complicated, given that she had worked closely with John and they had parted on bad terms. Mary had never experienced complicated grief. She had lost her first husband, and her grief had been uncomplicated, which had been unbearable enough.
“I wasn’t able to find out anything new since we spoke. All I know is that John was found murdered inside his apartment. I don’t know how he was killed, time of death, or who found him. I don’t know if they have any suspects.” Bennie’s gaze stayed riveted on the action, and Mary could see her assessing critically what was going on. Bennie had practiced criminal law for decades, specializing in murder cases, and she had defaulted to professional mode.
“Did you call anybody in the Homicide Division? You know a few detectives, don’t you?”
“I’m not exactly beloved here. We’re defense lawyers, did you forget?” Bennie’s mouth went tight. “They must know where he worked, that’s easily discoverable. Besides, we’re probably among the last people who saw him alive.”
“Oh, of course. So the police will want to interview us.” Mary realized she might end the night at the Roundhouse, Philly’s police administration headquarters. Judy was wiping her eyes, and Mary assumed she and Bennie had already discussed this, so Mary was the one playing catch-up. When she’d left the house, she had been too upset about John’s murder to consider the implications.
“I called Roger, and he’s en route, but he won’t be here for a while. I caught him on his way to D.C.”
“Yo, Mare!” came a shout, and they looked over to see Lou, signaling that he’d meet them across the street.
“Let’s go,” Bennie said, and they crossed to meet him, gathering at the periphery of the noisy crowd. Spectators were craning their necks to try to see what was going on, and an acrid cloud of smoke wafted into Mary’s face. One of the onlookers held a beer bottle, and a female anchorperson from TV was getting ready for a video shoot, a paper towel tucked in her collar so she didn’t get makeup on her dress.
“Ladies, I’m so sorry about John,” Lou said, hugging Mary and Judy briefly. “This is a cryin’ shame, just a cryin’ shame.”
Bennie turned to him. “I don’t even know what happened. Nobody would tell me anything. Can you call anybody?”
“I tried, but I don’t know anything.” Lou stood on tiptoe, scanning the other side of the barricade. “Yo, I see one of the cops I used to know over there.”
Bennie nodded. “Go see what you can find out. I’m going to see if I can talk us past this barricade.”
“Good luck.” Lou waded into the crowd, heading to the left, and Bennie charged to the right with Judy on her heels, followed by Mary and Anthony.
“Lady with a baby,” Mary called out, but nobody even turned around, so they wedged their way to the front of the crowd. She could see the townhouse, which she knew since she had been there. The front door hung open, and John had a two-bedroom apartment on the second floor, living above his landlord. The black van from the Medical Examiner’s Office sat parked in front, and mobile crime techs in booties and gloves came and went from the house.
Finally Bennie got the attention of one of the cops and tried to fast-talk them through the barricade. “Officer, we worked with the victim, John Foxman. I’m his boss, and we need to get through.”
“Sorry, lady.” The cop shook his head, but it was too dark for Mary to see much of his expression. “I got orders. Nobody gets through.”
“But we’re close—”
“Close but no cigars. Stay back.”
“But we’re his friends, we’re coworkers—”
“Gimme a break, lady.” The cop moved on, shifting sideways, and just then Mary saw a familiar redhead in the crowd. It was Anne, making her way toward the front of the barricade.
“Anne, Anne!” Mary called out, waving, and Anne turned, waving back. Anne threaded her way through the crowd to them, her face a mask of sorrow, and mascara smudged under her lovely eyes. She reached Judy first and threw open her arms, beginning to cry.
“Judy, he’s … gone?” Anne asked, between sobs. “Can he really be gone? I feel so awful! I was so mean to him!”
“It’s okay,” Judy said, tearing up again, and Mary came over, giving a stricken Anne a warm hug.
“You weren’t mean to him, Anne. We had a fight, and we all were a part of it, not just you.”
“Oh no.” Anne shook her head, hugging Mary back. “I just never thought anything like this could ever happen. I feel so terrible.”
“I know, it’s horrible.” Mary patted Anne’s back, and she seemed to rally, wiping her eyes and streaking her mascara even more.
“What do we know about how it happened?” Anne asked, trying to compose herself. “Do we know anything?”
“Not yet, unless Lou does. Here he comes.” Mary squinted over her shoulder to see Lou making his way back to them, and he hugged Anne when he got there.
“I’m so sorry about John, honey.”
“Lou, it’s so awful, I was so awful to him.”
“No, no, don’t think about that now. You guys were buddies, and he knew it. Now listen, I tried to get information.” Lou released Anne from his embrace, and Bennie pressed closer.
“Lou, what did you find out?” she asked, urgent.
“So I talked to my buddy, Oscar. He knows me from way back, like when I worked security at Blackstone, back in the day, and I used to go fishing with his cousin and—”
“Lou, please,” Bennie interrupted, impatient.
“He doesn’t know anything. I got bupkis.”
“Anybody see or hear anything?”
“Don’t know. I know they got uniforms canvassing.”
“Time of death?”
“Oscar doesn’t know but he was called in an hour ago.”
Bennie checked her phone. “So, eleven thirty. Who found the body?”
“He doesn’t know that either.”
Bennie frowned in thought. “Somebody had to see or hear something. This is a city neighborhood on a Saturday night. Apartments cheek by jowl, restaurants, galleries, foot traffic.”
“But it’s late, and it’s Philly. You know the joke. I was asleep already.”
“How about street cameras? Did they start looking for them yet?” Bennie squinted at the traffic light in the darkness. “I can’t see a damn thing, but there has to be video.”
Suddenly the spectators erupted in chatter and motion. People held up their cell phones, reporters with microphones surged to the barricade, and photographers hoisted still cameras, their motor drives clicking away. Mary and the others turned to see what was going on.
At the sight, Mary’s hand flew to her mouth. Uniformed assistants from the Medical Examiner’s Office were coming down the front steps, carrying a stainless-steel gurney that held a black-vinyl body bag.
“Oh no!” Judy cried out, covering her face, and Anne emitted a horrified gasp. Anthony held on to the three women as best he could, and only Bennie and Lou remained stoic, watching as the assistants loaded the gurney into the back of the van, then closed its doors.
“I got the bag shot!” said a gleeful photographer.
Lou gave the photographer a dirty look, and Anne burst into new tears. Judy did the same, and Mary tried to comfort them, with Anthony’s help. Bennie kept her gaze on the scene, her expression grim.
And in the next moment, she ducked under the barricade.