Inherit the Dead

19 MARK BILLINGHAM

Coffee and doughnuts…

Police stations smelled of coffee and doughnuts, that’s the way Perry remembered it anyway… whenever he found himself sitting up late with a drink in his hand and thinking about these big, ugly buildings he’d once spent so long in. The dingy corners and the crowded hallways and the squad rooms that had made his blood pump just a little bit faster as he walked into them every day, until six years ago when everything… changed.

That’s the way he dreamed it.

Rose-tinted spectacles. Didn’t sound right when you were talking about the way a place smelled, but it was the best he could come up with sitting there now and breathing it in.

“Somebody taking care of you, buddy?” A young cop — one whom Perry didn’t know, and who didn’t know him. He was glad.

“I’m good, thanks.”

Piss and puke was more like it, and something else that was hard to put into words but that all cops recognized the moment they caught a whiff of it.

Police stations smelled of fear.

Perry sat on the edge of a scarred, wooden bench on the second floor of the 19th Precinct Station House. Twenty feet to his left was the small, brown door to an interview room, which he had glanced at every twenty seconds or so since he had been asked to leave and the Lokis had been ushered back into for a second round of questioning.

“You sure?”

Perry looked up again at the uniformed cop standing over him. The man had a shaved head and a face like a forgotten potato in the bottom of the refrigerator. “Yeah, like I said.” He sniffed and leaned back. “Just waiting on somebody.”

The cop sucked his teeth and straightened his belt, and as soon as he had turned away, Perry stole another glance at the door to his left. He rolled his head around on his neck. He let out a long, slow breath and dropped his gaze to the patch of scuffed gray marble beneath his feet.

“Yeah, well, that’s bullshit!”

“Try telling someone who cares.”

“I know my rights.”

“Good for you… ”

He might have been wrong about the smell of the place, but it was every bit as noisy as he remembered. While the argument echoed up from the floor below, a radio was playing somewhere and raucous laughter drifted toward him from a room at the other end of the hallway. There were high ceilings in here. There was plenty of air. Sound carried in a place like this, and you could hear a whispered plea or a muttered curse from fifty yards away.

He remembered a cop saying once, “Don’t even think out loud in here.”

Once or twice in the last few minutes he had thought he’d heard voices coming from the interview room. Not raised voices, just the gentle to and fro of a conversation, but even so he had struggled to resist marching across and pressing an ear to that small, brown door. Struggled, until he’d drawn the attention of the potato-faced sergeant and thought better of it. He looked up now, and the cop was still watching him, making a bad job of pretending he wasn’t and looking away just a second too late. For a moment or two, Perry wondered if the cop did know who he was.

He looked at the door again.

Cigarettes, too, back in the day. A station was always thick with the fug and stink of cigarettes, and, even though it seemed like a lifetime ago, he suddenly found himself wanting one.

No, not suddenly.

Ever since he’d stood looking down at Julia Drusilla, at what was left of her.

It was guilt as much as disgust, he knew that. After all, it didn’t seem like five minutes since he had been thinking that the woman might have been trying to kill her own daughter, to kill him, and now they were hosing her off the sidewalk. Scraping bits into a bag. How could he have gotten it so wrong? When it came to trusting people, he had always been slow off the mark and with damn good reason, but up until now he’d always been able to trust himself at least, to have faith in his own judgment. Whatever else happened, he’d always been able to count on that.

He put a hand on his knee and pressed, tried to stop the tremor in his leg.

Now, Perry wasn’t so sure.

A door opened a little way down the hall, and Perry looked up to see Athena Williams stepping out of what he guessed to be the ladies’ restroom. He watched the nanny straighten her skirt and softly dab a hand against her hair before moving toward the stairs.

Perry stood up and hurried to catch up with her.

“May I speak to you, Ms. Williams?”

The woman glanced at him, kept on walking. “You were rude to Angel back there, Mr. Christo. I have nothing to say to you.”

“I just want the truth,” Perry said. “Isn’t that what we all want?”

“Some things are better off left alone, Mr. Christo.”

“What kinds of things?”

“You don’t know this family.”

“Oh, I think I’m starting to… ”

The nanny began walking a little faster suddenly. Perry kept pace with her and dropped a hand onto her shoulder. She stopped and looked at him, waited for him to remove his hand. “I love Angel,” she said. “Do you understand?”

“That’s very touching.”

“I’ve got nothing else to say.”

“Do you love her enough to lie for her?”

“Good-bye, Mr. Christo… ”

Perry could do nothing but watch her leave, before he turned and walked back the way he’d come. The nanny’s face right before she’d marched away certainly suggested that he’d touched a nerve.

He was good at that, but it didn’t seem to be getting him anywhere.

He was a few feet away from the door to the interview room when it opened and Angel and Norman Loki stepped out into the hall. They waited for a few seconds, their heads bowed, until Detective Henry Watson followed them, closing the door behind him.

The argument downstairs had petered out, and it was quiet suddenly.

Perry was pleased that his old friend had called them back for a second round. There were certainly a few questions—more than a few — that needed answering, and Watson rarely gave anyone an easy ride, least of all when there was a body involved.

Watson cleared his throat and reached out to shake hands with Norman Loki. He said, “Once again, I’m sorry for your loss. And for having to put you through this.”

“Thank you,” Loki said.

“We won’t need to bother you again.”

“It’s really no trouble.”

“You need a ride anywhere?”

Angel laid a hand on Watson’s arm, the fingernails bloodred. “That’s sweet of you,” she said. “But we’ll be fine.”

“You’re kidding me, right?”

They all turned to look at Perry, who was shaking his head in disbelief. He had been talking to himself as much as anything, but his words had carried, and he was fine with that.

After returning Perry’s stare for a second or two longer than anyone else would find comfortable, Angel turned back to Henry Watson. “Well, then… ”

Loki nodded. “Thanks again for being so thorough.”

Perry had to fight the laugh that rose up, foul-tasting, in his throat.

Angel linked arms with her father, and the two of them turned away from Henry Watson. They paused for a few moments, each taking a deep breath. Then, at a pace that was nicely pitched between funereal and unseemly, and taking care to keep their eyes on the floor directly ahead of them, they began walking down the hall toward Perry.

With her hair tied back and now with an oversize pair of very dark sunglasses, she looks every inch the grieving daughter, Perry thought, watching her. Or an actress playing the role of grieving daughter. She leaned against her father, who looked equally stricken, and, as they walked, Norman Loki appeared to be getting as much support from his daughter as she was from him.

It was all very convincing. But the two of them were playing at… something.

What was it Angel had said before that had flipped a switch in the back of Perry’s brain, that had convinced him she was lying?

When they were only a few feet from him, Angel’s heels click-clacking against the marble floor, he watched her raise a hand and delicately push fingers behind the lenses of her dark glasses. It was a simple enough gesture, an obvious one. It was the way somebody would oh-so-subtly wipe away tears, but short of dashing across and snatching those expensive sunglasses from her face, there was no way to be sure there were actually tears there to begin with.

Perry would not have been surprised to find that she could manufacture them at will.

It was clear that neither Angel nor her father had any intention of acknowledging Perry’s presence. With Norman Loki it made sense, but why the sudden change in Angel? Clearly, she had not liked his questions, but he wasn’t going to stop till he had all the answers.

They began to walk just a little faster and looked the other way, returning the uniformed sergeant’s respectful nod with thin and grateful smiles. Perry waited a few seconds, then stepped casually forward. He fell into step and walked alongside them.

“It’s funny,” he said. “Julia told me she was going to die the first time I met her, but I really don’t think she thought it would be quite so soon.”

There was no visible reaction from Angel or her father.

“I mean, even if she was dying, and you know I’m really not convinced that’s true… she didn’t strike me as the type to kill herself.” Perry shrugged, pretended to think about it. “Maybe it was an accident.” He looked sideways at Angel and her father, who were now moving a little quicker than before. “Maybe… ”

Now, Norman Loki stopped and snapped his head around to look at him. “What’s the matter, Christo? You worried that now your client’s dead, you aren’t going to get your fee? I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that your services are no longer required. We’ll send a check to you next week — you needn’t worry.”

Perry saw a smile flicker briefly at the corners of Angel’s mouth.

“Why should I be worried?” Perry said. “I know there’s still plenty of money around. I mean, Angel stands to inherit a bundle.” He looked at Angel, then turned back to Loki. “And as you’re the executor, I’m sure there’ll be a few dollars coming your way, too. Maybe a lot more.”

“You know nothing about it,” Loki said.

“You said earlier that you wrote the terms of this weird inheritance. And we both know that everything hinges on Angel’s twenty-first birthday, which is just a couple of days away now.” He widened his eyes, as if he had only just been struck by something that he’d actually been thinking ever since Julia Drusilla’s so-called suicide. “Whatever the hell happened to Julia, the timing’s awfully convenient, don’t you think?”

“Are you making some kind of accusation?”

“Just talking things through.”

“Good,” Loki said, looking around. “Just keep talking nice and loud, okay, because when I sue your ass for slander, I want there to be plenty of witnesses.”

“Shame there were no witnesses around when your ex-wife took that dive from the twenty-fourth floor,” Perry said. “Maybe if there had been, you two wouldn’t be walking out of here.”

“How dare you!” Loki took a step toward him. Angel made a show of trying to hold her father back. “Where d’you get off saying things like that? Julia has just died, for Christ’s sake.”

Perry raised his hands and nodded, mock-impressed. “It’s nice to see that you’re so upset. I’m a little surprised, though, tell you the truth. It’s not like you and Julia had a… conventional relationship, is it?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Come on, Loki. You forget telling me all about it when you were drunk — you really want to get into that here and now? We can talk about your pool boy and bathhouses and underground nightclubs if that’s what you want, but in front of your daughter? I mean, isn’t she upset enough already?”

Loki glared, and Angel tugged at her father’s arm. “Let’s go, Daddy.”

Loki was breathing heavily, and the bones in his jaw pulsed against the skin as he clenched his teeth. He managed the thinnest of smiles then turned and began to lead Angel away toward the stairs. Was he running the show now? Had he been all along?

Perry followed, a step or two behind. “I mean, you are upset, aren’t you, Angel?” She kept walking, but he could see the tension in her shoulders. “You certainly look upset, but it’s so hard to tell with you. I mean, I thought you were upset when you told me about why you ran away, when you told me how scared you were. But you also told me that you knew about your inheritance, that the stakes were high, remember? You know, I’m thinking that maybe you’re pretty damn good at getting people to think all sorts of things. The boyfriends who all think they’re special. That politician who seems to think you’re worth cheating on his wife for.” Perry’s voice was raised now, and people in the corridor were staring as the three of them marched toward the top of the stairs. “All of them happy to believe whatever the hell you want them to believe… ” Perry needed to get a rise out of her. He wanted her to prove to him she was innocent. He needed her to, and yet…

A few steps farther on, Angel stopped suddenly. Loki kept walking, then stopped to wait for her when he reached the stairs.

“Me, too,” Perry said. “That’s the stupid thing.” He walked slowly toward her. “You had me believing… all sorts of things.” Damn it, what was it she’d said that he was trying to remember? “For a while, anyway.”

Angel moved toward him until they were only inches apart. She removed her sunglasses, and he could see that her eyes were wet. Then that smile flickered again, just for a second, before she raised her arm and slapped him hard across the face.

Perry closed his eyes for a few seconds against the pain, and when he opened them again, he could see the potato-faced sergeant bearing down on him, shouting.

“Everything okay, here?”

“Everything’s fine,” Angel said, her face set hard, the sunglasses already back in place.

As the sergeant took a firm hold of Perry’s arm, he could only watch as Norman and Angel Loki turned and walked casually away down the stairs without looking back. He tried to yank his arm from the cop’s grip, and just as the struggle threatened to become something Perry might easily have been arrested for, a familiar figure appeared at the sergeant’s shoulder.

“I got this, Jimmy,” Watson said.

Spud-Face nodded and reluctantly let go of Perry’s arm. He walked away, seemingly frustrated at not being given an excuse to throw a punch. Perry watched him go, equally disappointed.

“In there.” Watson hissed in his ear, and pointed back along the corridor toward the interview room with the brown door. “Now!”

“What the hell do you think you’re playing at?”

Perry dropped into a chair and undid a button on his shirt. Cold as it was outside, the interview room was hot and stuffy. There were no windows. “What am I playing at?”

Watson folded his arms, eyes narrowed. “Okay then, let’s hear it. It’s not like you can make yourself any less popular.”

“Why did you let them go?”

“No reason to keep them.”

“Come on, Henry, you really think Julia Drusilla killed herself?”

“For Christ’s sake, Perry, we already went through this. The woman was sick.”

“You got any proof of that? A doctor’s letter? Hospital records?”

“You got any proof of anything? You got any reason at all to be harassing these people. They make a complaint, I’m not going to think twice about busting you.”

“Sounds like they did quite a job on you,” Perry said. “Father and daughter. Angel sitting where I am now, drying her big doll’s eyes and wrapping you round her little finger. Jesus… ”

“You need to drop this,” Watson said. Steel inside the whisper.

“I can’t.”

“That wasn’t advice, Perry.”

Perry blinked. “You ask them where they were when she died?”

“You think I’m a moron? You heard her, she was with her nanny — and the nanny confirmed it.”

“And Loki?”

“He was on Long Island, remember?”

“Who says? His pool boy? Come on, Henry… ”

“He’s vouching for her, and she’s vouching for him.”

“That’s convenient.”

“Doesn’t mean it isn’t the truth.”

“None of these people are telling the truth — you need to know that.” Perry leaned across the small table. “I have a feeling Julia was lying about being sick, her old man’s lying about who he likes sleeping with, and you can tell Angel’s lying because she’s breathing. I swear to you, Henry, it’s like that entire family has DNA that’s ninety percent bullshit.”

“And you know this because—”

“Because… ” Because of the way both Angel and her father kept changing their stories: she didn’t know about her inheritance, then she did; Loki didn’t write the trust papers, then he did. The way Angel shifted so easily between wrath and seduction. The way Loki shifted between drunken fool and savvy lawyer. They were up to something. Maybe together. Maybe each of them alone. Perry couldn’t say. He just knew it, felt it in his gut.

“I can’t arrest people for lying,” Watson said.

“You don’t seem that keen to arrest anyone for murder, either.”

“Don’t push it—”

“It’s about the money—”

“What’s that thing they tell us about at the police academy? It’s on the tip of my tongue… oh yeah, evidence.”

“So… find some.”

“Find some, that what you’re saying? Or invent some? You’re really the last person who should be talking to cops about cutting corners, all things considered.”

Perry pushed his chair back hard. “You got something to say, Henry?”

“Just that you don’t have too many people on your side anymore.” Henry stabbed a finger against his own chest. “Maybe just this idiot. So if you want to lose the only friend you’ve got around here, go right ahead and continue doing what you’re doing. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Neither of them spoke for a long few seconds, and the only sound in the room was the gentle shushing of hot water in the radiator pipes.

Perry stood up and walked to the door. “Your client dies, and you’ve got an obligation,” he said. “That’s how it works. I need to know how Julia Drusilla died and who was responsible. I care about that, okay? Even if you don’t.”

“Get out, Perry… ” Watson let out a long sigh, the breath rattling in his chest. He lowered his head and began scratching at the edge of the table.

Perry did as he was told.

The city lights turned the night sky slate gray above, the sullen gray smear of the river away to his right, and the dirty gray trunk of the Buick that stayed just a few feet ahead as Perry crawled slowly through the traffic on the FDR.

His frustration quickly blossomed into anger. He muttered curses then shouted them. He slammed his palms against the wheel and leaned on his horn, but it did nothing to speed his progress and only tightened the knot of guilt and confusion in his gut.

There was only one way to unravel it. One place to go, if he ever got there.

He leaned on his horn one more time, for the hell of it.

It was like he’d told Watson; they were all lying, but somebody was telling lies a damn sight less white than the rest of them. It was time to find out who that was. And to find out how Julia Drusilla had died and why.

Was Norman Loki hiding more than just his sex life?

Was Angel really capable of setting up her own mother’s murder?

Were they in it together? Was this whole thing a ruse?

He’d been a cop and a PI long enough to know when the pieces didn’t fit, and these didn’t even come close.

As the gray Buick accelerated away from him and the traffic began to move a little faster, he thought, too, about his argument with Henry Watson. His friend had been angry, obviously. Perry had pushed all his buttons and had known damn well he was pushing them.

It was more than anger, though, or impatience.

Maybe just this idiot…

Sitting there in that sad and stuffy interview room, shoulders slumped on the other side of the table, Henry had looked… disappointed. Convinced that Perry was out of line. That he was being stubborn only because the case had got away from him, that he had everything the wrong way up.

Perry put his foot down.

He decided that he would prove Henry Watson wrong. That he would prove them all wrong. He had to.

He was still in the outside lane when saw the sign for the Queens — Midtown Tunnel. He sped forward, only inches from the car ahead then swerved hard and fast across two lanes. An old man at the wheel of a Subaru sounded his horn.

Perry gave him the finger as he hit the off-ramp.