He chuckled and looked at me. “I guess you can imagine what I said.”
I took the high road and didn’t say a word.
“Jesus, you’re slow on the uptake. What do you think I said? ‘Unwrap the present, and let’s find out.’”
I took a sideways glance at Kylie. Her face was stone cold, but I knew that just below the stoic exterior, she was inflamed with disgust and rage.
“And then,” he went on, “this is a hoot—it was like one of those soft-core pornos. She opens the coat wide, and all she’s wearing is a bra, panties, and a pair of stilettos. Can you figure out what I did next, Detective Jordan?”
“Yes, Your Honor. I saw the video.”
“Go to the head of the class. So now the bitch wants to blackmail me? Well, fuck her. I’m seventy-five years old, my wife is dead, I’ve got six months left on the bench, and if she thinks I give a shit about a video on YouTube of me getting it on with a woman half my age, she’s wrong. I’ll send the link to my friends. They’ll all be jealous.”
“She’s dead, Your Honor,” I said. “Murdered.”
That stopped him. But not for long. “So who the hell is putting the squeeze on me for a hundred thousand dollars?”
“We don’t know, sir. It could be someone who stumbled on the video and decided to go into business for himself. Or it could be the person who killed her.”
“Well, I’m not paying him a red cent.”
“District Attorney Wilson is willing to front the money.”
“I don’t care whose money it is. You can tell Mick Wilson that Michael J. Rafferty doesn’t negotiate with terrorists.”
“Sir, you may not be the only victim.”
“Really? Are you saying there are more horny bastards out there who got caught with their dicks in their hands? That’s their problem, not mine. So stop confusing me with someone who gives a shit. Are we clear?”
“Yes, Your Honor.”
“Good. Now go back and tell your commanding officer—never mind. You’re an idiot.” He turned to Kylie. “You. You’ve got to be smarter than your partner. You be the messenger.”
“Yes, sir.”
“What are you going to tell them?” he said.
“I’ll tell them that you have no issues being immortalized on YouTube for accepting free sex for Christmas, but you’re far too principled to help NYPD catch a murderer.”
Rafferty didn’t have a gavel, but that didn’t stop him from jumping out of his chair and pounding his fist down on the desk.
“And what the hell is your name?” Rafferty bellowed.
“Detective First Grade Kylie MacDonald, NYPD Red, Your Honor.”
“You realize I could hold you in contempt, MacDonald.”
“I’m trying to solve a homicide, Your Honor, not make friends with the court. I apologize if I offended you, but I believe what I just said is an accurate replay of this meeting.”
He eased himself back down into his chair. A faint smile crossed his lips, morphed into a grin, and then erupted into a full-blown laugh.
“Your partner certainly has got a pair there, doesn’t she, Jordan?”
“You don’t know the half of it, Your Honor.”
He shook his head. “I’m sure you’re aware that I’m not the most beloved magistrate in the shire,” he said. “I’ve got one of the best legal minds in the business, but people will remember me as a lecherous old curmudgeon with no patience, no tact, and absolutely no humility. And now you want me to wrap up forty-one years on the bench by being your bagman?”
“Without you, sir, we don’t have a prayer,” Kylie said. “Will you do it?”
“I’m wavering, Detective MacDonald.”
“What’ll it take to put you over the top?”
He rested his chin on one hand and whispered, “Dinner.”
“It would be an honor, Your Honor,” Kylie said, turning on a smile that can transform glaciers into puddles. “Dinner. Just the three of us.”
“Hold on. You seriously don’t think I invited this bozo to tag along,” he said, pointing at me.
“No, sir. That’s not the threesome I had in mind.”
His eyes popped. “What were you thinking?”
“Just you, me, and my friend Mr. Glock,” she said, patting the 9mm automatic on her right hip.
“You won’t need it,” he said. “I’m taking you to the Harvard Club. You’ll get a damn good dinner out of it, and I’ll get to drive every other man in the room batshit crazy.”
CHAPTER 31
Kylie’s dinner date with the judge was at seven. I didn’t hear from her until eleven. “Rafferty’s on board,” she said.
“It took long enough,” I said. “How was dinner at the Harvard Club?”
“We decided to skip dinner and rented a hotel room. I’ll send you a link to the video.”
“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?” I said.
“Yes. And I’m guessing you’re not, because it’s never fun for the bozo who didn’t get to tag along. I’ll see you at seven a.m. Get some sleep.”
It was good advice, but my head was too filled with crap, and C. J. Berringer was at the top of the pile. I searched the internet for any skeletons that might have escaped the law enforcement databases, but after an hour all I had learned was that C.J. was a professional gambler who won some, lost some, and photographed devilishly handsome no matter what the outcome.
At midnight I turned off the computer and sat down to meditate. It helped, although I was struck by the irony of using a meditation app to do what people without iPhones have done for thousands of years.
I drifted off about twelve thirty. The phone jolted me awake at three. I pawed it off the night table and grumbled my name into it.
“Zach, it’s Danny Corcoran.”
“What’s up, Danny?”
“I got through to Malique. He’s willing to talk to you.”
“Nice work, Danny, but Jesus, did you have to call me in the middle of the night?”
“Yeah, I kind of did, Zach. Malique just called. You have until four a.m. to meet him in Brooklyn.”
I sat up in bed. “You’re serious.”
“It’s a power play. He knows you’re not charging him, so it’s his rules, his turf. He’ll give you ten minutes of his time. Take it or leave it.”
I took it. I rousted Kylie, dressed, and was in front of my building in five minutes. She picked me up three minutes later, and we made the hour-long trip to the Canarsie section of Brooklyn in thirty-seven minutes.
The Karayib Makèt on Rockaway Parkway was a half-block-long supermarket catering to the largest Haitian population in America outside Florida. Kylie pulled up to the front at 3:54 a.m. We were greeted by a welcoming committee of four men, all large, all tattooed, and all in need of dental work. The store was closed, but a fifth man opened the front door, and we were ushered past aisles of produce, meats, and groceries you don’t find on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.
We walked through a steel door into a vast cold room. There was a second door on the opposite side. One of our escorts tapped out a code on a keypad. The door was opened from the inside, and we were led in.
The far wall was covered with a large flag: two horizontal bands, one blue, one red, resting on top of large gray letters that spelled out Zoe Pound. The final letter, d, was spattered with the same blood-red color as the bottom band. In the center was a white panel bearing a multicolored coat of arms proclaiming L’UNION FAIT LA FORCE. I didn’t know Haitian Creole, but I spoke enough French to understand: Unity makes strength.
In the center of the room was an oversize scarred wooden desk. Six armed men stood at key points around it. A seventh sat behind it.
“I am Malique La Grande,” he said.
“I’m Detective Zach—”
“I know who you are, and I know why you’re here,” La Grande said. “You think Zoe Pound is responsible for the deaths of Fairfax and Zimmer. I am delighted that they are dead, but Zoe does not blow people up.”
“So you’re saying you didn’t kill them,” I said.
“Trust me, Detective. If we had killed them, it would have taken them a lot longer to die.”