Free Fall

42

Bright and early Monday morning, Ceepak and I are in his office sipping bad coffee from mugs we poured out of the desk sergeant’s congealed pot and working the phones.

It doesn’t get any more detective-y than that.

Ceepak’s in his blazer and khaki cargo pants. I think there’s a zipper near the knees if he wants to turn them into shorts later in the afternoon. He seldom does.

I’m in cargo shorts and my favorite FDNY Engine 23 T-shirt. It’s been lucky for me in the past. Both of us are carrying sidearms.

We have a busy day ahead of us.

My first call of the morning is to Christine. I tag her on her cell because my apartment doesn’t have a landline. Landlines are like e-mail: so two thousand and late.

I go over the list of all the elderly patients she’s taken care of since losing her job at Mainland Medical.

“They’re all dead, Danny,” she tells me. “But that doesn’t mean I killed them.”

It also doesn’t mean I won’t be making a few more phone calls to the families of the deceased to see if any of Christine’s other patients died suddenly or under suspicious circumstances.

Ceepak spends his coffee and phone time with Bill Botzong at the Major Crimes Unit.

They’re trying to track down and trace any shipments of potassium cyanide into Sea Haven. Botzong and his team will be doing some serious data mining with all the known suppliers of the chemical compound, cross-referencing their records against the names and addresses of all our suspects, including Joy Kochman up in Lavallette, whom we will be visiting just as soon as we finish up our phone calls and hit the head.

Bad coffee? It’s like beer. You can’t buy it. You can only rent it.

We hop into Ceepak’s Batmobile and cruise up the Garden State Parkway toward Seaside Heights.

“Fascinating,” mumbles Ceepak, somewhat randomly, seeing how we’re basically humming up a generic highway filled with generic cars surrounded by garden-variety Garden State evergreen trees.

“You and I have dealt with several murderers in the past, Danny. In all those instances, the killer had to brutally confront their victim. They possessed strength, skill, or, at the very least, a warped sense of courage.”

“But in this case,” I say, “all the killer had to do was plop a pill into a plastic box and wait.”

“Precisely. It is the easiest murder to execute, perhaps the most difficult to solve.”

Because there’s not much evidence. When you use your strength, skill, or warped courage, you leave clues. When you plop a single pill into a slot, not so much.

Unless, of course, our killer was foolish enough to order a pound of cyanide on the Internet and have it shipped to his or her home.

“What about jewelry stores?” I say. “Should we see if any of our suspects have a connection with a business with a legitimate use for the cyanide?”

“Indeed so.”

Maybe we’ll get lucky. Maybe one of the cyanide buyers will be the store where Judith’s sister Shona buys all her clunky gold bracelets and baubles.

323 Bayview Drive in Lavallette is a two-story townhouse in a New England-looking condo complex on the bay side of the Barnegat Peninsula.

I read somewhere that young people with kids like the beach and surf side of any island; older folks like the calmer waters and boat docks on the bay side. In Lavallette, that’s the side where the sun sets, too. Makes sense, I guess. You probably watch more sunsets when you’re in your twilight years.

Joy Kochman is working as a live-in home health aide for a cranky couple called the Silberblatts.

“They both have Alzheimer’s,” she explains when we join her in the kitchen where she’s toweling up a mess that might’ve been breakfast. Lumpy puddles are splattered all over the kitchen table. I’m thinking oatmeal and bananas. “Mr. Silberblatt likes to sleep on the floor. His wife? She likes to wander. We had to pin her name and address on her blouse, like she was in pre-school.”

“Do you have a moment to answer a few questions?”

“Yeah. The meds kicked in. They’re taking naps in front of the TV. Let’s Make A Deal is good for that.”

Nurse Kochman looks to be forty, maybe fifty. Then again, she could be a lot younger. I have a feeling living full-time with the Silberblatts puts bags under your eyes. Her hair is cut short and combed to the side. Some streaks are brighter than others but you can tell she doesn’t have much time to fuss with it. She’s dressed in dark blue scrubs, the better to hide oatmeal splotches.

“As you may know,” says Ceepak, “your former employer, Dr. Arnold Rosen, passed away this weekend.”

“Yes. I read about that. Sorry I couldn’t make it to the services.” She opens up her arms in a gesture that takes in the enormity of her task as the Silberblatts’ caregiver.

“Understandable,” says Ceepak. “But you visited Dr. Rosen late last week?”

“Thursday. It’s my night off. One of the Silberblatts’ kids comes over, relieves me. They’re great. Five sons who live in the area. They all really love their parents even though their parents hardly even recognize them any more. We’re all starting to think Mom and Dad might be better off in a nursing home. But well, the boys want to keep them here, in familiar surroundings, for as long as possible.”

“How do the Silberblatt children compare to Dr. Rosen’s?” asks Ceepak, smoothly steering the interview in the direction he wants it to go.

Nurse Kochman makes a lip fart noise.

Sorry. She does.

“Night and day. These kids? They’re kind and respectful. To me and their parents. Those Rosens? What a nasty pair of vipers.”

Up goes Ceepak’s quizzical eyebrow. “How so?”

“David wanted me to spy on his dad. Feed him medical information. I refused. Michael? He just flashed a lot of cash. Showered his father with gifts he either didn’t want or couldn’t use. Michael’s filthy rich. Does all those ‘Crime And Punishment’ shows. ‘Crime And Punishment New York,’ ‘Crime And Punishment Chicago, Hawaii, San Francisco, Wherever.’ He makes like fifty million dollars a year. I saw it in People magazine. He’s the one who sent Monae to Dr. Rosen’s house. Apparently, he owed her sister, a woman named Raven …”

“Revae,” I say.

Kochman shrugs. “Whatever. Michael owed this Revae a favor so he insisted that Dr. Rosen hire Monae to work the night shift.”

“Let’s go back to David and his wife, Judith,” says Ceepak. “What happened after you refused to feed them information?”

“They accused me of stealing Dr. Rosen’s solid gold cufflinks.”

“Did you?”

“Of course not.” She holds up her arms. “I wear a uniform every day. No cuffs. Look, guys, Dr. Rosen was still with-it, but he was also old and cufflinks are small. He forgets where he put things.”

“Did you protest the accusations?”

“I said I didn’t do it, if that’s what you mean. But let’s be honest here: When you’re a home health aide, it’s not like you’re in a union or even a regular employee. Don’t call the IRS, but a lot of these families pay us off the books. When the person paying you says you’re fired, trust me, detectives, you’re fired.”

“So Dr. Rosen fired you?”

“That’s what David said. Dr. Rosen, himself, was taking a nap at the time.”

“Did you meet your replacement?” I ask. “Christine Lemonopolous.”

“Nope. And I didn’t want to. I figured the only reason she was hired was because she said yes to everything I’d said no to. Later, after I landed this job with the Silberblatts, I asked around. Talked to a few friends. Got a pretty good picture of who this Lemonopolous girl was and what she’d do to make money.”

“Care to enlighten us?” says Ceepak.

“Word is, she went nuts. Quit her high-paying job in the emergency room at Mainland Medical. She’s been scrounging around ever since, getting by with home health aide work. My friend Beatrice told me that this Lemonopolous gal worked for some sick rich kid at night in exchange for room and board. For cash, she did days with whatever old person she could bamboozle into thinking she was a sweetie-pie. Maybe it’s a coincidence, but all the old people who hired this Christine Lemonopolous didn’t live too long after she went to work in their homes. Most made it two months, maybe three. Just long enough to write her into their will.”

“Dr. Rosen did that,” I mumble. “Bequeathed her fifty thousand dollars.”

“I rest my case. I’m surprised you guys caught her. Nobody else ever asked any questions because, from what I heard, she only takes jobs that are, basically, death watches. It’s a pretty nifty little plan, if, you know, you don’t have any scruples or a conscience.”

Ceepak and I both nod grimly. Because, face it, neither one of us really, truly knows what makes Christine Lemonopolous tick. What kind of thoughts she harbors in her heart. We just wanted to help her when she was in a jam.

We might’ve also helped her get away with murder.