In for the Kill

40

New York, the present

After Ella left the Pepper Tree, Pearl walked over and joined Jeb at his table near the front of the restaurant, where it was brighter and there was a view of the street.

He took a sip of his draft beer, which was in a tall, graceful glass he'd lifted from a round coaster that had the green outline of a tree on it with the name of the restaurant.

"You spooked my friend," Pearl said, settling into the chair opposite Jeb.

He smiled. "Your witness?"

"Not technically, as she didn't witness the murder, but she knew the victim."

"She thought she knew me, too. I assume that's what you mean by my having spooked her. I get that stuff all the time, people thinking I'm somebody else. It must be something about my face. I should have been a spy."

"I like your face," Pearl said.

A skinny waitress who tended to act shy and clasp her hands together came over and Pearl told her she wasn't eating but would have another glass of Pellegrino. Pearl knew it was politically insensitive to think of the woman as a waitress, but in the restaurant's white blouse and yellow-checked apron uniform, she looked as if she'd stepped out of a fifties Norman Rockwell painting. As she was watching the aproned woman walk away, something outside, across the street, caught her eye.

"Excuse me," she told Jeb. "I'll be right back."

He watched her leave the restaurant and walk directly across the street to a girl in a baggy red shirt and jeans. The girl saw her approach and looked for a second as if she might bolt, then she seemed to change her mind and stood facing Pearl with her arms crossed, cupping her elbows as if she were cold.

They talked for a few minutes, then Pearl turned away and weaved and timed her way through traffic to cross the street back toward the restaurant. The girl followed, though it didn't appear that Pearl was aware of her.

Pearl remained unaware until she'd sat back down at the table with Jeb. Lauri was standing over her, looking not exactly angry, but determined in a way that reminded Pearl of Quinn.

"I asked you not to follow me," Pearl said, "and specifically not back in here."

"I only want to make sure you understand I wasn't spying on you," Lauri said.

Pearl looked at Jeb, the man who should have been a spy. "She's been shadowing me all day, staying out of sight while she observes me. Would you call that spying?"

Jeb looked up at the girl-young, attractive, short blond hair, a tiny diamond stud in her nose. "I'd have to say you were spying," he told her with a smile. "Unless you're selling magazine subscriptions."

"I'm not."

"Then what are you doing?"

"You could call it a learning process."

"She wants to be a cop," Pearl explained. She introduced Lauri and Jeb, who shook hands.

The skinny waitress returned with the Pellegrino. After placing glass and bottle on the table, she looked at Lauri and clasped her hands.

"Nothing for me," Lauri said. "I'm just intruding."

The waitress gawked.

"Sit down," Pearl said to Lauri. She didn't want a scene. She wasn't used to dealing with teenage girls and had a feeling this situation could get out of hand within seconds.

Lauri sat down next to her and looked up at the waitress, who was still gawking and pressing her hands together. "I've changed my mind. I'll have whatever she's drinking."

The waitress broke a jittery smile and retreated.

Jeb was grinning.

"You seem amused," Pearl said, feeling simultaneously irritated and helpless.

"You should be flattered someone like this is following you," Jeb said.

Lauri smiled at him.

"Why do you want to be a cop?" he asked her, obviously charmed. Lauri could spread bullshit almost as skillfully as her father.

"My dad's a cop, and Pearl is. Was. Is again. I guess they're two people I admire."

Now Pearl couldn't help but feel flattered. And like some kind of Grinch because she'd tried to discourage Lauri.

Jeb still wore the amused smile. Pearl thought it was amazing how fast he and Lauri had developed a mutual admiration. Or was it all for show? For her benefit? Two adventurers, chiding the cautious, professional Pearl. Maybe silently laughing at her. Pearl wasn't sure if she liked that.

"Is she breaking any laws?" Jeb asked.

"She's interfering with a police officer," Pearl said. "A homicide detective at that."

"Jeez!" Lauri said. "I only followed you to lunch,"

"Where I went to interview a potential suspect."

"He's awful good-looking for a suspect," Lauri said, grinning at Jeb.

"Not Jeb, the woman I came here to meet first. The woman you saw leave. And she's not a suspect. He's not a suspect. Unfortunately, nobody's a suspect."

"So now you're at lunch? This is just social?"

Pearl sighed. "You could say that."

"Why don't you join us?" Jeb said.

"Love to. If it's okay with Pearl."

"Of course," Pearl said, defeated. "I give up. I can't fight both of you when you gang up on me."

"Ever think of being a journalist?" Jeb asked Lauri.

"Now and then, I have to admit." She gave a little shiver. "It seems romantic."

Pearl thought she might be troweling it on too thick, but Jeb didn't seem to notice.

A lesson here. Unless he's just trying to get my goat.

The waitress returned with a second bottle of Pellegrino. Lauri ordered a vegetable omelet, then ice cream for dessert. Throughout the meal she continued to charm Jeb, knowing he was the way to get Pearl to agree to be her mentor. Or so she thought. Pearl knew better. These two people didn't understand police work and its dangers.

Or its subtleties.

She didn't mention to either of them the presence of Wormy slouching bonelessly in a doorway across the street, waiting for them to emerge from the restaurant. Apparently he'd been following Lauri while she tailed Pearl. Maybe he was trying to protect Lauri. Or assuring himself of her fidelity.

Either way, Pearl wasn't going to confront him. She decided to let the situation ride for a while. She didn't want to get Lauri into trouble by telling Quinn about her persistence in shadowing her. Also, if Quinn learned about this, he'd learn about her assignations with Jeb, and Pearl wasn't quite ready for that to happen. And if Lauri was secretly hanging around Pearl, what harm could Wormy do? The two kids were apparently in love-at least Wormy was, judging by the way he was mooning around. Maybe he should be the one to convince Lauri to pursue something other than a cop's career.

Pearl had to admit there was something about this that amused her, Lauri inexpertly tailing her and not noticing Wormy inexpertly tailing her. A procession of incompetents.

When the time was right, Pearl would tell Quinn about this and he'd find it immensely amusing. They'd share a big laugh.

When the time was right.

That night Pearl lay in bed unable to sleep, listening to the window air conditioner humming away in its mechanical battle with the heat. Its low monotone was punctuated by night sounds of the city, muted and diminished in number by the late hour.

Rather, the early hour. Pearl knew it would start to get light outside pretty soon. The dark between the blind slats would become gray, then the gray at the edges of the windows would brighten, and warm sunlight would find its way inside. Pearl, who felt as if she'd had two minutes of sleep though she'd gone to bed at eleven o'clock, would have to get up, shower, and dress.

She wanted to remain comfortably in bed. She asked herself why it was necessary to struggle upright, trudge into the bathroom, and stand nude under running water. Why did people do that? How did that kind of thing ever get started?

Surely there must be a better way.

She rolled onto her stomach, punched her pillow with gusto, and tried to enjoy what little time she had left in bed, but her head began to pound.

She knew what might really have disturbed her sleep. It was the way Ella Oaklie had thought she recognized Jeb when he walked into the Pepper Tree.

Ella had seemed so sure Jeb was the man she'd met with Marilyn Nelson not long before Marilyn's death. And Pearl didn't agree with Jeb that he had the type of face that would cause him often to be mistaken for someone else. Of course, that could be because of the way she felt about him.

Might Jeb actually be the man Ella had met? Jeb using the name Joe Grant?

Pearl punched her pillow again and told herself she was being too cynical. That was why she'd quit the department and become a guard in a quiet, efficient bank where everyone was polite and almost everything worth stealing was locked away in a vault with walls three feet thick. Banks were orderly islands of calm.

Not like the outside mad world where people died horrible deaths for no apparent reason, where questions evoked more questions instead of answers, where a teenage kid followed a burnt-out cop on a dangerous job and was in turn followed by a human worm.

Where a killer might change identities as easily and consciencelessly as if he were changing clothes.

Pearl decided it was time to turn off her mind and turn on the shower. As she climbed out of bed and padded barefoot toward the apartment's tiny bathroom, she wondered if it actually was possible to be too cynical.

She told herself the answer had to be yes. That Jeb Jones and Joe Grant were simply two different people.

The answer had to be yes.