“Oh, please! You just don’t have the balls to leave! You’ve been miserable for years, but it’s easy to stay! It’s simple! You’re just settling! You don’t know what real love is!”
“Don’t lecture me about love, Marc! Love is stickin’ by somebody, no matter what! Good times, bad times! You bailed on Linda when it got tough! Just like you bailed on me!”
“Mary? Mary!” Baker said, and the next minute his mustachioed face popped underneath the table, where she was on all fours with her cell phone. His eyes narrowed in professional anger. “Mary! Get off the phone and talk to your client! He’s out of control!”
“Shhh!” Mary said, hushing him with an index finger to her lips, and both lawyers fell silent for a minute.
“I didn’t bail on you, Jeff! You bailed on me! You’re the one who wants to dissolve the partnership! You sent me the termination letter!”
“Only because you’re never around! You showed no interest! I was carrying you! It was always her and the trips to Tortola! What, can’t the broad stay home for one second?”
“It’s Tortuga!”
“Same difference. Anyway I thought it was Tobago. You said Tobago.”
“Oh right.” A pause. The decibel level lowered above the table. “You’re right. It is Tobago.” An uncomfortable laugh emanated from the plaintiff’s side, followed by one from the defendant’s side.
“If it ain’t Jersey, I’m lost.”
“Me, too.” They both laughed again.
Awww. Mary came out from under the table, slipped her cell back into her purse, and straightened up on her side at the same time that Baker straightened up on his side. “Joe,” she said, “are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
“Yes,” he answered, and his handlebar twitched in a way that suggested he was smiling. “Off the record,” he said to the court stenographer, who lifted his hands from the keys.
Mary put a gentle hand on Eisen’s shoulder. “Jeff, I think this marriage can be saved. Why don’t we end this deposition, and Joe and I drop out for a while? I think you and Marc should go to dinner and see if you can settle this thing. Go to that French restaurant you took me to. Smoke yourself silly.”
“Maybe,” Eisen said uncertainly, and across the table, Joe was nodding at his client.
“I agree. It’s a good idea, Marc. You two can resolve this thing without us. If you don’t, we can always continue the dep. You’re the plaintiff, it’s your call.”
Schimmel frowned so deeply that fissures appeared in his tan forehead like cracks in dry clay. Mary read his eyes. It wasn’t going to be that easy. He wasn’t sure, but she was. She had to get to Eighteenth & Walnut. Ten blocks in ten minutes. Keisha could be in trouble.
“Marc,” she said, talking across the table, “you’re the one who came to the deposition, when you weren’t going to. I think you did that because you were mad. So go out and yell at each other. Get it out of your system. Even a lawyer knows that peace is better than war, if you don’t make a habit of it.”
Marc looked at Eisen. Joe looked at Mary. Mary looked at her watch. 4:49. She had to go. Ten blocks in ten minutes, at rush hour.
In the next minute, Schimmel smiled and said, “So. You smokin’ again, Jeff?”
Mary grabbed her exhibits and ran.
Thirty-Five
Mary hit the humid air outside with her purse swinging from her shoulder. Her briefcase weighed down her arm; she’d packed it for a deposition, not a sprint. She launched herself into the rush-hour crowds of businesspeople, salesclerks, and students heading for the trains at Suburban Station, SEPTA buses, and the subway line. She’d been going with the flow in the down elevator, now she was swimming upstream. And she still couldn’t swim.
“Excuse me! Excuse me, please!” she said, wedging sideways through a sea of loosened ties, damp oxford shirts, sweaty silk dresses, briefcases, laptops, backpacks, bulging shopping bags, and a rolling Samsonite overnighter that she tripped over. She checked her watch on the fly. 5:10. “Excuse me, please!” she said, pressing forward to Chestnut Street.
She reached the corner of Fifteenth & Chestnut just as the traffic light turned red and stepped off the curb anyway. A bus headed straight for her, and she jumped back on, almost side-swiped by a poster of J. Lo in the shower. 5:16. Fifteen minutes late. Would Keisha wait? Could she wait? The light stayed red for so long it seemed intentional. So many buses roared down the street Mary couldn’t slip across. She waited on the corner, sweated though her navy jacket, breathed in acrid diesel exhaust, cigarette smoke, and fading Shalimar. It took a long business day to kill Shalimar. Go! She took off at the very next break in traffic, sprinting into the street against the light and hitting a wall of people at the other side.
“Excuse me! May I get through!” she kept saying, plowing through the crowd. 5:23. Hurry!
Mary hustled her way to the curb and barreled ahead, still going against the grain, bonking her briefcase on a cab driving the other way on an always-congested Fifteenth. She grabbed it back, ran across Sansom, then headed through the crowds for Walnut. Only one block more to go, then a few more uptown. You could walk the entire business district in Philly in half an hour. Mary was trying to fly it. 5:34. The crowd was noisy, laughing and talking, many yapping on cell phones as they hurried along. The air was thick with noise, heat, and smoke, and somewhere Mary heard her cell phone ringing. She reached for her purse, grabbed the phone, and opened it:
help me! keisha
Mary felt her heart leap into her throat. Keisha was in danger. Go, go, go! She bolted full-tilt through the crowd, shoving people aside with her shoulder. Her thoughts raced her footsteps, outstripping them. Why didn’t Keisha call the cops? Mary couldn’t think of a reason, but she wouldn’t take a chance. She raced to the corner of Walnut Street, flipped open the phone on the run, and pressed speed dial for emergency. The dispatcher answered, and Mary shouted, “Please help! There’s a woman being attacked at Eighteenth & Walnut!”
“Eighteenth & Walnut?” The woman’s voice was calm and even. “Does the attacker have a gun?”
“I don’t know! I’m not an eyewitness!” Mary huffed, almost out of breath. “She just messaged me on my cell! She may not be able to talk!”
“How do you know she’s being attacked?”
“She said she needs help, on the cell. Send a squad car! I’m on my way there now!”
“You’re in a car?”
“No, I’m running. Please!”
“Eighteenth & Walnut, that’s Rittenhouse Square. How do you know where she is?” The dispatcher asked, but her question got lost when Mary banged into a businessman.
“Watch it!” he yelled. “Hang up and walk!”
“I was supposed to meet her there, on the corner at five! I think somebody got to her first because I was late! Ask Detective Gomez from Homicide! He knows all about it!” Mary was only using his name to bolster her credibility. She knew the two departments couldn’t be more separate, and there wasn’t time for a referral.
“Okay, stay on with me. Can you stay on with me?”
“Sure, yes. Thank you! Please hurry! Send a car!” Mary sprinted past Burberrys, rounded an overflowing wire trash can in front of McDonald’s, and jumped over a smashed Big Mac wrapper, scattering a trio of pigeons. She was only two blocks away. Go, go, go! “Are you sending a car?”
“I’m seeing if I can locate one close to the Square. There usually is one. It’s a busy time of day. Where are you now?”
“I’m there!” Mary tore down Walnut and finally hit Eighteenth, cell phone in hand. She stopped when she reached the intersection, thronging with businesspeople. Buses, cars, and cabs clogged the street. Keisha was nowhere in sight. It was the busiest time of day in the busiest corner in town. That must have been why Keisha had wanted to meet her here. It was where she felt safe, with so many people around. Mary looked wildly around, panting. “I’m at the Square, but I don’t see her!”
“I have a car on the way. I’ve locat
ed one three blocks south.”
“Please, hurry! Hurry! God, where is she?” Mary saw everyone but Keisha. Secretaries, businessmen, students, moms, kids, even poodles crammed the Square. “I don’t see her!”
“Stay calm and keep looking.”
“Okay, okay,” Mary said, her voice jittery from panic and exertion; Keisha wasn’t on this corner, if she ever had been. She took off when the light turned green, loping around the Square, lapping a real jogger in running shorts. She searched the crowd for Keisha but didn’t see her. Anybody who wanted to hurt Keisha would have to take her away from witnesses. Stick a gun in her ribs, threaten her so she wouldn’t scream. Where would he take her? To a car? No way. He couldn’t get a parking space around the Square. And if he double-parked, a cop car would be on his ass sooner than if he committed murder. So most likely, he was walking Keisha somewhere away from the crowd or to a waiting car. Right now.
Mary picked up the pace, her breath coming in ragged bursts. Her arm hurt from carrying the briefcase and purse. She looked frantically around for Keisha. Passers-by looked at her like she was nuts. In the next instant she heard the distant blare of a police siren. The cavalry! “Is that siren the squad car?” she asked into the phone.
“Should be. The car’s on Spruce, heading toward you. Did your friend message you again?”
“No.” Mary ran harder.
“You’re sure you’re for real? I’m comin’ after you myself, if you aren’t.”
“I swear it!” Mary turned left onto the west side of the Square, thinking again. West or south were the residential sections, with less traffic than the business district. And they had parking. A bad guy’s dream.
The thought gave Mary her second wind and she veered around the corner at a streak. The Square was lined with the swanky restaurants, the busiest branch of the Free Library, therapists’ and plastic surgeons’ offices, and a ritzy art gallery.
Think! Then the answer popped into Mary’s head. Where else in a city did nobody ever go? A church! The Church of the Holy Trinity was right on the Square! She whirled around and doubled back. The police siren blared closer now. Help was on its way! She bolted across the street between cabs and sprinted toward the church, a huge brown sandstone edifice with a castlelike Norman tower, on the northwest corner of the Square. She shot toward its red doors.
“Keisha! Keisha!” Mary shouted as she ran up the church steps toward the door and yanked on the iron handles. It was locked! The church was closed! Police sirens screamed closer. They were almost here. Mary looked around, frantic. The Rittenhouse hotel sat beside the church, and cars drove in and out of the hotel’s circular entrance. Then she noticed a narrow concrete driveway tucked between The Rittenhouse and the church. An iron gate covered the entrance but the doors hung open, half-painted brown.
“Keisha!” Mary yelled. She ran for the driveway and grabbed the iron gate to stop her momentum, leaving rust-colored paint on her hand. A padlock and chain hung uselessly from the gate, which had been left open. A white painting truck was parked in the narrow driveway and beside it was darkness, where The Rittenhouse completely blocked the sun. Midway down the driveway was Tiffany’s stained-glass depiction of St. Paul, his palms open in appeal. Mary looked directly underneath it, in the shadow between the truck and the wall.
“No!” she screamed. Keisha, in a dark T-shirt and jeans, had collapsed in a sitting position. Beyond her was the silhouette of a man, running for the end of the driveway and the side door to the church. The man was large and thick. Chico.
“STOP!” Mary yelled, but Chico escaped through the door. She wanted to chase him, but she had to see about Keisha. She dropped her briefcase and purse and flew toward the fallen woman, throwing herself down on the concrete. Keisha slumped against the stone wall, her head tilted forward like a broken doll and her legs splayed out next to a few paint cans. Her eyes were closed and her mouth slack, but her lips moved as if she were trying to speak. Then Mary looked again, in horror. Keisha’s T-shirt wasn’t dark, it was drenched with blood. Blood bathed her neck and bubbled like a gruesome freshet from under her chin. Her throat had just been slit.
“HELP!” Mary screamed at the top of her lungs. She fought panic long enough to raise the cell phone and start talking.
Thirty-Six
Access Hollywood played on a TV mounted in the corner, and fluorescent lights glared harshly overhead, behind pebbled panels recessed in a white tile ceiling. Outdated copies of Cosmo, Time, and Car & Driver lay in a glossy fan on a low wooden table, and in the corner stood a Formica cabinet holding a Bunn coffeemaker. An orange-handled pot of coffee burned in its hot plate, filling the room with the odor of stale decaf. The small waiting room, reserved for families of patients in the intensive care OR, had been painted an allegedly calming blue and adorned with gauzy landscapes in forgettable hues. Its blue padded chairs sat empty except for Mary, who was in a sort of shock.
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.
Drying blood stained Mary’s white silk shirt and navy suit, stiffening its light wool in patches. She had managed to wash most of it from her hands, but fine dark lines etched the network of wrinkles on her palm. She should wash again, but Keisha had been taken to the OR half an hour ago, and Mary didn’t want to be in the bathroom when everybody got here, especially Bill.
Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen.
The words struck home. Mary prayed it wasn’t the hour of Keisha’s death. It couldn’t be. Not because of Saracone or Amadeo or even Frank, or anything logical or tangible. Just because it could not be. There had been too much death and it had to be over. Keisha had to live. Mary willed it to be so, the only way she knew how. She started the rosary over again.
Bill arrived a half an hour later and sat slumped in the chair as Mary recounted a sanitized version of how she had found Keisha. He sank deeper and deeper into his clothes, flipping up the collar of his jean jacket as if to ward off a winter wind. Judy, her face a mask of well-scrubbed worry, arrived right after, and she couldn’t take her stricken gaze from the blood drying on Mary’s suit. “You okay, girl?” she asked, her tone hushed.
“I’m fine. Keisha’s in the OR still. She lost a lot of blood.” For Bill’s benefit, Mary didn’t add the details about the slicing of the carotid. Evidently, Chico had known what he was doing. “The doctors said we’ll know more later.”
“They’re great doctors here,” Judy said to Bill, and he nodded.
When Detective Gomez and his partner arrived, Bill listened only idly, all over again, as Mary filled them in. Gomez’s partner, Matt Wahlberg, was a grayish blond detective of about forty-five years who was as tall as Gomez was thick. His blue eyes seemed sunken in a gaunt face that Mary understood when she spotted his triathlete’s watch. Insanely fit, he wore a light tan jacket and khaki slacks, and sat back in the padded chair, legs crossed and arms folded, while Mary leaned toward Gomez.
“I’m telling you, it was Chico,” Mary said as she finished. “He left her for dead in the driveway. He must have gotten out through the church.”
“Did you see his face?” Gomez looked at her directly, and her mouth went dry.
“If I said I had, would you arrest him?” Mary was so tempted to lie.
“We’d question him.”
“Would you question him anyway? I mean, how many people does he have to kill? He killed Frank and now he tried to kill Keisha!”
“In other words, you didn’t see his face.” Even Gomez sounded regretful. His soft mouth had formed a deep frown and his thick eyebrows sloped unhappily.
“No, not really. But I saw him. His back, his shoulders, his outline. I know it was him. At least go out and question him.”
Wahlberg snorted. “An outline isn’t probable cause.”
“Who are you kidding?” Judy interjected. “What do you call a racial profile?”
 
; Mary wanted to get back on track. “Didn’t anyone in Rittenhouse Square see Keisha with Chico? There had to be a hundred witnesses. She may have walked with him from Eighteenth & Walnut to the church.”
“We got uniforms canvassing right now. If they find anybody who can ID this Chico, we’ll haul him in for a lineup.”
“Detective Gomez, I know it was him. It makes sense it was him. Chico is a violent man, Saracone’s muscle, and he was there the night I accused his boss of Amadeo’s murder.” Mary felt a deep pang of guilt. If she hadn’t burst into Saracone’s bedroom that night, Keisha wouldn’t be in the OR right now. “I’ll swear out an affidavit, I’ll do whatever it takes. I’m making a formal complaint. He assaulted me. Please, please, please, at least go out there and question Chico.”
Gomez frowned. “Where does he live, do you know?’
“I don’t know, but I think on the Saracone property.”
“But didn’t Saracone just die? The funeral should be when?”
“Today, this morning.” Mary didn’t add that she was moonlighting as a funeral planner. Gomez was already frowning deeply.
“I’m not going out there tonight. They buried the man today.” Next to Gomez, Wahlberg nodded in agreement. “And anyway, your theory that it was Chico, or connected to Saracone, doesn’t make sense. What would be the motive for an attempt on Keisha? Saracone is dead, so what’s the reason for it?”
“Honestly, I’m not sure.” Mary wracked her brain. “I accused Saracone of killing Amadeo and maybe Saracone confessed to Keisha. Or said something that admitted it. Something that the Saracones don’t want to come out.”
“So what if Saracone confessed to Brandolini’s murder? Both men are dead. What can they be hiding?”
“I don’t know, they have lots of money and I have no idea how they got it. Maybe illegally. Drugs, money laundering, whatever.” Mary thought of the investments in the drawers in Saracone’s office, but she couldn’t tell Gomez that. “Maybe stocks and bonds, something corporate, with IPOs. It could be anything. What if Saracone was going to call the cops and confess? What if the wife or the son had to kill him to stop him?”