French Kiss

Chapter 5

One month later. It’s another sweltering summer day in Manhattan.

A year ago I was working in the detective room at the precinct on rue Achille-Martinet in Paris. Today I’m working in the detective room at the precinct on East 51st Street in Manhattan.

But the crime is absolutely the same. In both cities, men, women, and children sell drugs, kill for drugs, and all too often die for drugs.

My desk faces Maria Martinez’s scruffy desk. She’s not in yet. Uh-oh. She may be picking up my bad habits. Pas possible. Not Maria.

I drink my coffee and begin reading the blotter reports of last night’s arrests. No murders, no drug busts. So much for interesting blotter reports.

I call my coolest, hippest, chicest New York contact-Patrick, one of the doormen at 15 Central Park West, where I live with Dalia. Patrick is trying to score me a dinner reservation at Rao’s, the impossible-to-get-into restaurant in East Harlem.

Merde. I am on my cell phone when my boss, Inspector Nick Elliott, the chief inspector for my division, stops by. I hold up my “just a minute” index finger. Since the Taylor Antiquities drug bust I have a little money in the bank with my boss, but it won’t last forever, and this hand gesture certainly won’t help.

At last I sigh. No tables. Maybe next month. When I hang up the phone I say, “I’m sorry, Inspector. I was just negotiating a favor with a friend who might be able to score me a table at Rao’s next week.”

Elliott scowls and says, “Far be it from me to interrupt your off-duty life, Moncrief, but you may have noticed that your partner isn’t at her desk.”

“I noticed. Don’t forget, I’m a detective.”

He ignores my little joke.

“In case you’re wondering, Detective Martinez is on loan to Vice for two days.”

“Why didn’t you or Detective Martinez tell me this earlier? You must have known before today.”

“Yeah, I knew about it yesterday, but I told Martinez to hold off telling you. That it would just piss you off to be left out, and I was in no rush to listen to you get pissed off,” Elliott says.

“So why wasn’t I included?” I ask.

“You weren’t necessary. They just needed a woman. Though I don’t owe you any explanations about assignments.”

The detective room has grown quieter. I’m sure that a few of my colleagues-especially the men-are enjoying seeing Elliott put me in my place.

Fact is, I like Elliott; he’s a pretty straight-arrow guy, but I have been developing a small case of paranoia about being excluded from hot assignments.

“What can Maria do that I can’t do?” I ask.

“If you can’t answer that, then that pretty-boy face of yours isn’t doing you much good,” Elliott says with a laugh. Then his tone of voice turns serious.

“Anyway, we got something going on up the road a piece. They got a situation at Brioni. That’s a fancy men’s store just off Fifth Avenue. Get a squad car driver to take you there. Right now.”

“Which Brioni?” I ask.

“I just told you-Brioni on Fifth Avenue.”

“There are two Brionis: 57 East 57th Street and 55 East 52nd Street,” I say.

Elliott begins to walk away. He stops. He turns to me. He speaks.

“You would know something like that.”