“I have some time free in the early afternoon tomorrow.”
“Tonight. He got in from Brazil a few hours ago and would like to discuss his granddaughter with you. He’s at the Schiller Street address.”
“I’ve had a very long day, Ms. Balfour, which actually started with a summons to Schiller Street. I’m not responding to those anymore. I found Arielle locked in the trunk of a car, and rescued a couple of other girls, and in return, the Salanter family has refused even to let me know Arielle’s status. I’ve driven a hundred miles in the heat and bad traffic, and I don’t have a PA to organize my life for me. I’m taking a bath and going to bed.”
“But—”
“Good night, Ms. Balfour.” I hung up and climbed stiffly out of the car.
The s’mores party was hard at it in the backyard. The Soongs, the family on the second floor with a new baby, had a boy around Lucy’s age; Mr. Soong had set up a badminton net for them. The kids and Petra were playing, while Mitch chased the shuttlecock, barking as he went. He’d shed the babydoll pajamas, I was thankful to see. The Soongs were talking with Mr. Contreras, the new baby asleep between them. Other neighbors were out on their porches, enjoying the party atmosphere happy children create. I felt better already.
I smiled and waved, told them I’d be down in a bit, and went up to soak the tension out of my shoulders and legs. I lay in the tub, sipping whisky, watching the water turn dark from the day’s dirt.
I’d been planning on sleeping in Jake’s place, letting the girls use my bed, but I decided it would be better to do it the other way around. A lot of people knew I was asking questions. Whether Jana Shatka or Vernon Mulliner—or even Chaim Salanter—was behind the murders of Xavier and Wuchnik, I didn’t want any bears who might come hunting me to find the Dudek girls sleeping in my bed.
For that reason, too, when I finally climbed out of the tub, I went to the safe in my bedroom and got out my Smith & Wesson. There are no bears on Hemlock Mountain, I murmured. But on Racine Avenue, that was a different story.
36.
ENTER A BILLIONAIRE
THE COALS FROM MR. CONTRERAS’S GRILL GLOWED SOFTLY in the dark backyard. I sat on the ground-floor porch with Mr. Contreras and some of our other neighbors, watching as Petra and Kira toasted s’mores. Even the medical resident from the first floor, who is usually vituperative about the dogs’ and my noise, had put on blue jeans and brought out a six-pack.
All my play clothes were filthy, I’d realized when I got out of the bath. I had carried a load of jeans and T’s down to the basement laundry, and put on my gold cotton dress for the party. Lucy Dudek then smeared marshmallow onto the skirt, but somehow that didn’t bother me.
Lucy and Alan, the Soongs’ seven-year-old, were asleep at our feet, their arms twined around the dogs. It had taken an hour and another whisky, drunk with a bowl of Ms. Soong’s vegetable-rice salad, before I stopped feeling the porch rolling as if it were the interstate. Now I leaned against one of the stairwell posts, drowsing contentedly. Mr. Contreras’s desultory comments were as soothing as a lullaby; I needed only to grunt in reply whenever he paused for air.
Mitch’s short, sharp bark roused me from my torpor. He extricated himself from the sleeping children, the hairs on his neck high. When Peppy joined him, tail low like his, I brought my gun from the folds of my dress and followed them around the side of the building. I was barefoot, and the concrete dug into the blisters on my feet.
“What is it, doll?” Mr. Contreras had come after us.
“I don’t know,” I murmured. “Stay here with the girls, okay, and holler if someone comes in at the alley.”
Before he could huff about not needing to holler for my help, I undid the side gate and followed the dogs to the front of the building. A Mercedes sedan was idling at the curb.
A tall woman stood at the front door, pressing doorbells. She spoke into her cell phone. “No one’s answering. Do you want to go over to Dr. Herschel’s?”
I tried to signal the dogs to stay next to me, but Mitch bounded to the front door. The woman screamed as Mitch pinned her against the building. Peppy and I jogged after him. I kept one hand on my gun but pulled Mitch away with the other.
“Who are you, and what do you want with Dr. Herschel?” I demanded.
The driver’s door of the Mercedes opened. I stepped back so that I could cover both the woman and the driver. I had to let go of Mitch, who promptly returned to the woman.
“Is that you, Warshawski?” the driver shouted. “Call off your dogs!”
It was Gabe Eycks, the Salanters’ houseman, doubling as a chauffeur. I lowered the Smith & Wesson and ordered the dogs to sit. Peppy quickly obeyed. After a reluctant moment, Mitch agreed, but he kept his hackles up, and the muscles in his haunches were quivering.
I looked sourly at the woman. “Wren Balfour, I presume?”