Beach Road Read online

  “That’s a relief.”

  The end is swift but not particularly merciful, and like always, it reminds me of some Latin rumba—check, check, check, checkmate.

  I pry open my wallet and hand Zeke a twenty and still feel better than I have in weeks—because I finally got an idea about who might have killed Manny Rodriguez.

  Chapter 65

  Raiborne

  I HATE CALLING “Corpseman” Krauss on a weekend, but not so much that I don’t do it. He agrees to drive in from Queens, and when I pull into the fenced-in lot behind the morgue, he’s already there, sitting cross-legged on the hood of his Volvo. Except for the burning ciggie hanging from his mouth, Krauss looks like a little Buddha.

  “Thanks for coming in,” I tell him.

  “Keep your thanks, Connie. The in-laws have been over since Friday night. I was praying you’d call.”

  We trade the sun-filled parking lot for beige linoleum corridors, which are even quieter than usual. We head to Krauss’s office, where he reads me the ballistics report on Rodriguez.

  When he’s finished, I say, “Now do me a favor, Kraussie, and call up Michael Walker’s report.”

  Walker is the teenager we found murdered in his bed three blocks away, about a month before. I’m thinking that maybe the two are connected. I know there are superficial similarities between the two, but I’m after something more specific and telling than the fact that both were essentially executed at close range at night in the same neighborhood.

  But as Kraussie reads off the two lists of bullet calibers, bore size, etc., nothing matches up. Even the style and make of the silencers are different.

  “The logic is different too,” says Krauss. “I mean, it’s not that hard to understand why Walker, prime suspect in a triple homicide, might get his ticket punched. But a messenger who had never been in any kind of trouble? That’s some domestic thing, or who knows what.”

  “Or maybe they’re so different they have to be connected.”

  We each grab a report and read through them again in the deep, depressing silence you’d be hard-pressed to find anywhere other than a morgue on a Sunday afternoon.

  Neither of us can find a damn thing worth discussing, and finally it’s the ocean-floor silence, so deep it’s deafening, that drives us back out into the sunshine and our so-called lives.

  Chapter 66

  Tom

  ON MONDAY EVENING Kate and I go to Barnes Pharmacy to check out the new January mags. Like any media-savvy couple, we grab copies of Vanity Fair, New York, and The New Yorker and hustle them back to my car.

  At Sam’s we get a table in the back room and spread out our glossy booty, the luxe, shiny covers sparkling like showroom sheet metal. Kate grabs New York and slides Vanity Fair to me. On page 188, Dante looks up at me through prison bars. It’s a devastating photograph, capturing Dante’s youth and fear, and also the false bravado that attempts to conceal it.

  In all of the magazines, his face has been lit to make his skin appear darker. Race and the Hamptons are a winning newsstand combination, and they’re milking it for all it’s worth.

  On top of everything else, it’s kind of nice to be here with Kate. Almost like a date. For the next hour, we read our mags and slide them back and forth, stopping only for a bite of artichoke-and-bacon pie or a gulp of cold beer. The New Yorker piece, accompanied by a stark black-and-white photograph that makes Dante look like a dancer or a pop star, is quite short, but Dominick Dunne’s, in Vanity Fair, and Pete Hamill’s, in New York, are ten thousand words easy, and both are fair, even sympathetic, to Dante. Every major theme Kate planted on the phone, from racism to an overzealous prosecution team to the rumored drug use of the victims, has bloomed into stylish, glossy print. To see it all spread out on the table, particularly since so much of it is little more than rumor, is a bit overwhelming.

  Even more so is the amount of space given to the “courageous pair of young Montauk-born-and-raised attorneys” who have made the brave decision to represent the accused killer of their old friends.

  I had no idea Kate and I were going to be such a big part of the story.

  Dunne describes us as “a red-haired Jackie and a burlier JFK” and writes that “even Dunleavy’s Boston terrier, Wingo, is ridiculously photogenic.” According to Hamill, “their chemistry is not imagined. In their teens and early twenties, the two were a couple for more than five years.” Both Vanity Fair and New York run the same snapshot of us taken after a St. John’s victory in 1992.

  “It’s a good thing everyone in town hates us already,” I say. “Because this is beyond embarrassing.”

  We pay up and untie Wingo from the bench out front. Wingo seems to be adjusting quite well to sudden fame but is bothered by a foul burning smell in the air. As we walk to the lot behind the restaurant, a pumper truck from the East Hampton Fire Department races by.

  The smell gets stronger, and when we round the corner of the white stone building, we see that what the local firemen have just put out was my car. Or what’s left of it.

  All the windows have been smashed, the roof ripped off, and on the passenger seat is a soggy, charred stack of glossy magazines.

  Chapter 67

  Tom

  WHETHER IN DOWNTOWN Baghdad or downtown East Hampton, a burned-out shell of a car is a riveting sight, even if the smoking remains are yours. For a while, Kate, Wingo, and I stare at it, transfixed. When it gets chilly, we retreat to Sam’s again, where we have a pair of Maker’s Marks on the rocks, and I give Clarence a call.

  “A bunch of rednecks out here,” says Clarence when we return to the scene and he sees what’s left of my once-trendy convertible.

  Then we all pile into his big yellow wagon, and he gives us a lift to Mack’s place in Montauk.

  “Tom loved that old car,” Kate says to him, “but he hardly seems fazed at all. I’ve got to admit, I’m almost impressed.”

  “Hey, it’s just a car. A thing,” I say, pandering for a little more of Kate’s respect.

  The truth is, even I’m surprised by how little I care about the car. More than that, seeing it smoking in the lot made me feel kind of righteous.

  Once we’re on the road, Clarence is somber, and his face and posture still bear the terrible effect of Dante’s arrest and the upcoming trial.

  “Clarence, it may not look like it,” I say, “but things are turning our way.”

  “How you figure that?”

  “Those magazines burning on my front seat are filled with stories that are going to help us win this case. Even my car is going to make a great picture and will open people’s eyes to what’s happening out here.”

  But nothing I say registers on Clarence’s face. It’s as if whatever optimism he has been able to muster and cling to over the course of a hard lifetime has been exposed as bunk.

  On this Monday night in January, the Ditch Plains neighborhood is quiet and dark. Not Mack’s place, though! It’s lit up like a Christmas tree, and when we pull up, Mack stands in the doorway in his raggy plaid bathrobe. Two police cars are just leaving.

  “Oh, no!” cries Kate, and jumps out of the car. But Mack, who’s got his walking stick in one hand and a scotch in the other, won’t hear of it.

  “It’s nothing at all, darling girl,” he says. “Just a pebble through the window. At my age, I’m grateful for whatever attention I can get.”

  Despite Mack’s protests, I insist on leaving Wingo with the two of them. A sweet-natured pooch who hasn’t met a face he didn’t want to lick isn’t much of a watchdog, but at least he’ll make some noise.

  Then I get back into the car with Clarence. “You hear that shite Mack was saying to Kate on the porch,” I say with my best Irish brogue. “No big deal, darlin’ girl. Just a pebble. It’s the same shameless tripe I was saying about my car ten minutes ago. That son of a bitch is after my girl, Clarence, and we’ve got the same strategy.”

  “You better keep an eye on the old goat,” says Clarence, almost smiling. “I
hear he’s been stockpiling Viagra. Buys it over the Internet in bulk.”

  “That’s not even close to being funny.”

  Chapter 68

  Tom

  I DON’T LIKE leaving Kate at Mack’s, but she insisted she’ll be okay, that they’ll be okay. The thing is, I wish that Kate would stay with me tonight. I’ve felt that way for a while, and it’s driving me a little crazy, but especially after what’s just happened.

  It feels strange to enter my house and not hear Wingo scamper on down the long, dark hallway, to not hear the jangle of his collar against his metal bowl or his tongue slurping up water.

  Along with the dogless quiet is a faint metallic odor I can’t quite identify. Unpleasant, like dried sweat. Maybe it’s me. It’s been a long day.

  I follow the hallway into the kitchen, grab a beer, and stare through the sliding glass doors at my backyard. I still don’t care that much about my car, but the intensity of the town’s hatred toward Kate and me is getting me down, particularly because I realize it’s never going away.

  I’ve got two choices: the couch and some cathode rays, or the vertical pleasures of a hot shower. I opt for the shower, and as I walk back to my bedroom, that same metallic scent stops me in the hall.

  This time it’s even stronger, so I guess it can’t be me.

  Then I realize what it is. It’s the smell of fear, and then a floorboard creaks, there’s an urgent rustle of fabric and a rush of movement, and a large fist hits me square in the face.

  Blood pours out of my nose, and the force of the punch throws me into whoever is standing behind me. He hits me too. My elbow digs a grunt out of the bastard, and the next half minute is the red-hot chaos of flying fists, elbows, and knees. This is my house, my hall, and even outnumbered, I like my chances, right up till the moment I start to go down.

  I’m on the ground taking kicks to the head and ribs when a voice cuts through the pain. “That’s enough, I said! That’s enough.”

  But I can’t say for sure if I’m hearing it, or thinking it, or praying it.

  Chapter 69

  Kate

  WITH THE RUCKUS Wingo is raising in my car, it’s hardly necessary, but I grab the wrought-iron ring and deliver three hard raps to Tom’s front door.

  It’s eight in the morning, so Tom has to be in the house, but neither Wingo’s barking nor my steady banging gets a response. I’m guessing he’s in the shower.

  A towing service has dropped off what’s left of Tom’s car in the driveway, and Wingo and I walk around the burned-out shell to the backyard.

  The sliding doors off the patio are locked, but I can see inside the house well enough. A living room chair has been knocked over. So has a bookcase.

  I dial Tom’s cell and get his voice mail, and I’m starting to panic, when on the far side of the house, Wingo barks as if he’s treed a fox.

  I race over and find him howling at a small shed off the kitchen.

  The door has been left open. Inside are two tattered folding chairs and a musty beach umbrella. I call Tom’s cell again, with no more luck than the first time.

  I hadn’t told Tom I was going to pick him up, so instead of breaking in, or calling the police just yet, I cling to the hope that he arranged a ride with Clarence. I shove Wingo back in the car and race toward our office in Montauk.

  With everything going on in my head, and the steep early morning sun in my eyes, I very nearly hit a cyclist pedaling furiously along the shoulder of the road.

  Only when Wingo yelps deliriously and tugs at my sleeve do I see in the rearview mirror that the man on the bike is Tom. I brake to a stop, then back up in a hurry.

  My relief is enormous, but it only lasts as long as it takes me to see his face. One eye is completely shut, the other raw purple. There are welts and cuts on his neck and ear, and a jagged gash over one eyebrow.

  “Two guys were waiting for me when I got home,” says Tom. “I mean, four guys.”

  “You call the police?”

  “Didn’t see the point. Like Mack said, it was more symbolic than anything.”

  “It’s not a good idea to get hit in the head like this every couple of months. Concussions can be dangerous, Tom.”

  “Tom? Is that my name?”

  “That’s not funny.”

  “No, it’s pretty funny.”

  “It is pretty funny actually.”

  “I’m getting better with age, Kate, admit it.”

  “You left yourself a lot of room for improvement.”

  I stop at Barnes Pharmacy for disinfectants and sterile pads, tape and bandages. Back at the office, we clean the cuts. I do my best to remind myself that this is a slippery slope and that I didn’t take this case to hook up with Tom Dunleavy one more time. But beneath it all, I guess I’m just a sap, because I’m also wondering how smart it is to hold a grudge against someone based on how they acted when they were twenty-two, and if there isn’t a statute of limitations on bad behavior.

  Chapter 70

  Tom

  AT THE OFFICE the next day, Kate writes up some interviews we did around the apartment where Dante was hiding out in New York City. Meanwhile, I pull the file on the .45-caliber semiautomatic pistol found behind the diner the night Dante turned himself in. In some ways, it’s the prosecution’s most persuasive piece of evidence.

  So how can we use it?

  The file includes five black-and-white, eight-by-ten photographs of the weapon, and I lay them on the table. According to Suffolk County Forensics, there was one set of prints on the handle, and they’re a perfect match for Michael Walker; ballistics tests prove the weapon was used to kill all four victims. But Dante swears he’s never seen the gun before.

  “It’s not even close,” Dante told me in that first long, grueling session in Riverhead. “Michael’s gun was small, cheap, a Saturday-night special. This is a real gun. Twice the size and a different color. You were there, bro.”

  It’s true. I was standing right next to Walker as he held the gun to Feif’s head, and if anyone could accurately describe the revolver, it should be me. But I never looked at it, made a point of not looking at it actually, and that’s why I was able to get him to put the thing down. I pretended the gun didn’t exist, that we were just two reasonable guys having a conversation on a Saturday morning.

  But it’s the circumstances by which the gun was found that are particularly suspect. “If Dante kills Michael in Brooklyn when they say he does,” I say, half to Kate, half to myself, “he had plenty of time to get rid of the murder weapon. He can dump it in Bed-Stuy somewhere, or toss it in the East River. Instead he hangs on to it so he can throw it away at the last minute behind a diner in Southampton?”

  “What’s the name on the police report?” asks Kate.

  “I don’t recognize it,” I say, trying to read the signature on the bottom. “Looks like Lincoln. The first name begins with an h. Harry, maybe.”

  Chapter 71

  Tom

  THE DESK SERGEANT tells me the officer’s name is Lindgren, not Lincoln, first name Hugo, and he’s working nights this week.

  After locking up our office, Kate and I head to the barracklike station house and loiter by the back door, hoping to catch Lindgren as he arrives for his shift.

  After being up for the last twenty hours, there’s not much left in me. Actually, I’m burned to a crisp, but I’m still not sharing that info with my partner.

  “After we’re through here,” I say, stretching my legs and glancing at my Casio, “I think old Wingo and I are going to take ourselves a little run. Help us fall asleep.”

  “Tom, you’re so full of shit it’s frightening.”

  “Nothing ambitious, an easy fifteen, sixteen miles in the sand with boots on.”

  An old Jeep rolls in, and a former friend of mine named John Poulis hops out. Then Mike Caruso, another former friend, shows up on his Honda. At this point “former” describes most of my friends, and both cops stare through us as if we’re made of glass. />
  The next car into the lot is a shiny silver Datsun Z.

  “Pretty sporty for thirty-four grand a year,” I say.

  “How do you know how much he makes?” asks Kate.

  “Let’s just say that if the admissions director of St. John’s Law School hadn’t been a hoops fan, I might be arriving for work myself right now.

  “Officer Lindgren?” I call out, and the stocky brown-haired man stops in his tracks. “Could we talk to you a couple minutes?”

  “That’s all I got. I’m late already.”

  I do the introductions, and then Kate takes over.

  “That anonymous call that came in about the gun,” asks Kate, “did it go directly to you or the main switchboard?”

  “Directly to me,” says Lindgren.

  “Is that normal? For an anonymous tip to be directed at a specific officer?”

  “How should I know what’s normal? What are you getting at?”

  “I’m trying to prepare a case for my client, Officer Lindgren. It’s pretty standard stuff. Why are you getting all defensive? What’s the problem here? Am I missing something?”

  Watching Kate effortlessly rattle Lindgren’s cage will definitely go on our highlight film for today.

  “What I mean is,” she continues, “isn’t it odd that a caller who knows who he’s talking to would be so anxious to conceal his identity?”

  Lindgren adjusts his tone from combative to condescending. “Not at all. The caller is doing something frightening—getting involved in a murder case and potentially making dangerous enemies. That’s why every police department in America has an anonymous hotline.”

  “But the caller didn’t use the anonymous hotline. He called you directly.”