Rolling Thunder

21

Two NJ State Police guys show up to lock down the shower stall.

“Botzong’s up in Hamilton,” says the one named Reynolds (but we can call him “Spuddie”). He and his partner, a guy named Malone (no known nickname), have unrolled enough Crime Scene Do Not Cross tape to wrap a dozen yellow mummies.

“We’re gonna preemptively lock down the house,” adds Spuddie. “You guys working on warrants?”

“Roger that,” says Ceepak, who is crouching in front of the open shower door, playing his light against the wall of the stall. I notice that, every now and then, it hits a splotch of white that doesn’t quite match the surrounding white wall.

Like somebody painted over a stain they didn’t want us to see.

A bloodstain.

“We should have no problem obtaining warrants for the shower,” says Ceepak. “But we might have to push the judge to gain access to the house.”

“Big shots own the place?” asks Malone, gesturing at the boxy McMansion.

Ceepak nods. “Two of the town’s leading citizens.”

“Your judge one of ’em?”

“No.” Ceepak gets up from his crouch. “How long do you estimate that it will it take Detective Botzong to arrive?”

“It’s a long haul from Hamilton,” says Spuddie. “Maybe fifty, sixty miles. I’m guessing Bill and his crew will show up around eight thirty, nine o’clock.”

“Danny, you and I should head back to the house, talk to Mike Charzuk. We’ll circle back in forty-five minutes, catch up with Detective Botzong.”

“Cool,” I say.

The two state cops glare at me. The Staties always shave the sides of their heads and wear their hats so the crimped brim practically touches the tip of their noses. They also wear riding pants and black boots like they’re working for a dictator in some tiny country where the women have to wear sacks over their heads. They’re very scary military-looking dudes. More so than Ceepak-who really was military.

So I add, “Ten-four.” They seem to like that better.

“No one in or out,” Ceepak says to Spuddie and Malone, giving them a two-finger salute off the tip of his cap.

“Roger that,” says Spuddie, saluting back.

“We’re on it,” adds Malone.

“Appreciate it,” I say.

They glare at me again. Probably wonder how I ever became a cop. Yeah. I wonder that sometimes, too. I used to round up shopping carts in the parking lot at Wal-Mart. Then I met Ceepak and life’s been one big roller coaster ride ever since.

Mike Charzuk is waiting for us in the lobby of the stationhouse, on the other side of the short railing that separates the police from those we’re sworn to protect. Makes us feel safer.

Charzuk is not alone. Peter O’Malley, the gay son, is sitting next to the personal trainer in one of our scoop-bottomed plastic seats.

Does this mean Charzuk is gay, too?

If so, why were he and Gail talking about hooking up?

Am I looking at another potential three-way here? The two-guys-one-girl kind I never actually wanted to include in my personal fantasy files?

“Mr. Charzuk?” says Ceepak.

“Yes, sir,” says Charzuk, standing up. Smoothing out his sweatpants.

“I’m just here as a friend,” says Peter O’Malley.

“I was kind of nervous about coming alone,” says Mike.

Ceepak nods. “Understandable. We just want to ask you a few questions. Is Mr. O’Malley your lawyer?”

“No. Just … a friend.”

O’Malley blinks-silently daring us to ask “what kind of friend?” But we don’t.

“I work for Peter’s landscaping company,” Charzuk explains, “when I’m not at the gym.”

Oh. That kind of friend.

“Would you like a lawyer present while we talk to you?” asks Ceepak.

“Do I need one?”

“That is entirely your call. If you cannot afford one-”

“No. That’s okay. I want to help you guys catch whoever did this to Gail.”

“May I come with Mike?” asks Peter O’Malley.

“Are you a lawyer?” asks Ceepak.

“No.”

“Then you will need to wait out here.”

We sit down in the interview room. Charzuk has a bottle of water. I grabbed a cup of bad coffee because this figures to be a long night. The coffee has been on the Bunn burner so long, it smells like gym sock soup.

Ceepak? He’s on whatever natural fuel Zen masters tap into. I think he could go seventy-two hours without sleep and stay totally alert. I think he had to over in Iraq.

“Were you and Ms. Baker romantically involved?” Wow. First question out of the box. Ceepak’s on a tight schedule.

“Is that important?”

“Yes.”

“Now and then.”

“How about this week?” I ask.

He shakes his head.

“Really?” I press on. “Then why were you two talking about hooking up last Sunday at the gym?”

“Huh?”

“I overheard your conversation.”

“You work out?” He sounds surprised. I guess he caught a glimpse of my physique. “At Beach Bods?”

“Yeah.”

“Sorry. I didn’t recognize you.”

“She told you she was free for the week.”

“That’s right.”

“You offered to give her a ‘deep tissue’ massage afterwards.”

Charzuk sits back in his chair. Rubs his tattooed arms like he’s cold. “You heard all that?”

“Yeah.”

I think I’m freaking him out.

“Look, we weren’t romantically involved. We just liked to, you know, help each other out from time to time. Physically.”

I nod like I know how that goes.

Yeah. Right.

Ceepak’s eyebrows, however, are arched halfway up his forehead. This whole friends-with-benefits, sex buddy stuff is new to him. I think it became an American tradition while he was overseas serving his country instead of back here making booty calls.

“Gail really couldn’t afford to get, you know, serious about me or any guy her own age.”

“Pardon?” says Ceepak.

“She … her money … to earn a living … the tips at The Rusty Scupper aren’t great … she wasn’t a prostitute or anything.…’

“But?” Ceepak says for him.

“She was more like a geisha girl. Made rich men happy. They, you know, said thanks. Gave her stuff.”

The bling the dentist told us about.

“They paid for her clothes, her gym dues and training sessions. All she had to do was, well, keep looking amazingly hot.”

“Who are these wealthy men?” asks Ceepak.

“She never named names. Called them her sugar daddies.”

Making her a sugar baby. The tiny T-shirt was either her little joke or her Hooters-style uniform.

“Where would she rendezvous with these gentlemen?”

“I’m not sure. I know it wasn’t a cheesy hotel like the Smuggler’s Cove or anything. They had really classy parties all the time. Champagne. All the lobster and prime rib she could eat, which wasn’t much, because she had to keep the weight off to keep her men happy.”

“Did she ever talk about a house on Tangerine Street?”

“No. I think it was some place on the beach, though. She’d call it the Sugar Shack or the Beach Boys Clubhouse.”

“Thursday night, right before she was murdered, Ms. Baker called you.”

“That was right before?” He takes a long drink out of his water bottle.

“Do you remember the content of your conversation?”

“Some. Sure. Yeah. She’d been to the party house. Said she had wanted to just hang and chill with her ‘sorority sisters’ but one of the ‘gentlemen’ at the house wanted to, you know, get busy with her. But this guy wasn’t her guy.”

“They had assignments?” I ask.

“You could call it that. Each girl had their main man. Marny might know more.”

“Ms. Minsky?”

“Right. She’s the one who got Gail into the whole scene. Recruited her. Told her she’d have some laughs, meet some amazingly rich men. Gail even got to hang with the mayor.”

“Mr. Sinclair?”

“Yeah. He was at the house a bunch of times. She met some state senators, too and could get you tickets to any concert or game or anything. Gail’s old guy had some urgent family business to deal with this week so that’s why she told me on Sunday that maybe we could hook up while he dealt with whatever. But, like I said, it didn’t pan out.”

“Why the late night call on Thursday?”

“She was in a jam, didn’t know what to do. I guess this drunk jerk at the house grabbed her and sucked on her neck so hard he gave her a hickey, like they were in high school.”

I remember seeing the neck hickey.

“She booked, hopped in her car, went speeding out of there, like fifty in a fifteen zone.”

Remember that, too.

“A couple of cops pulled her over. Gave her a warning.”

Ceepak and I are both nodding now.

“She thought the guy who’d been groping her might cause trouble. Kick her out of the club. And that would mean losing everything!”

He pauses. Realizes that, in the end, Gail lost a whole lot more.

“Anyway, I told her she should call her guy. Tell him what this other guy had tried to do. I figured her sugar daddy would protect his …”

He wants to say property.

“… investment. Gail thought that was a great idea. Said she was going to text him right away. I reminded her it was nearly midnight. She told me she didn’t care.”

It all lines up with what we already know.

Big Paddy O’Malley had to be Gail Baker’s sugar daddy.

That’s who she texted after she called Charzuk.

“She’d gone to that house to celebrate,” he adds, shaking his head.

“Celebrate what?”

“I think this is why she didn’t want to fool around with me anymore. She had convinced herself she had a shot at actually marrying her guy. ‘Becoming the next Mrs. Moneybags,’ is what she said when we went out dancing Tuesday night. I guess her guy had just dumped his wife-something they all say but never really do.”

“How well do you know Peter O’Malley?” says Ceepak.

“He’s my boss. He designs the landscapes, hires me and a couple other guys to do the installations. The heavy lifting.”

“And how does Peter O’Malley feel about his father?” asks Ceepak.

“Big Paddy?”

“Right.”

“They’re not very close.”

“Would Peter be happy to see his father go to jail?”

“I don’t know. You’d have to ask him.”

“I’m interested in your opinion.”

“Well, I know he doesn’t like his old man, but he doesn’t hate him like he hated his mother. I think she tried to send him to a camp in Texas to cure him of being gay or something.”

“Did Peter O’Malley in any way coach you on what to tell us tonight?”

“Peter? Why would he do that?”

“Did he?”

“No. I just didn’t want to come down here alone. I called a couple people. Peter was the only one willing to come with me.”

“Commendable,” says Ceepak. “He must be a very good boss.”

“Yeah.”

Ceepak stands up. “You’ll be in town for the foreseeable future?”

“Yes, sir.”

“We may need to talk to you again.”

Now I stand, and Mike Charzuk takes the hint. We’re done. He’s free to go. He can stand, too.

“I hope you guys catch whoever killed Gail,” he says, sliding his chair under the table.

“Rest assured, Mr. Charzuk,” says Ceepak. “We will.”

Yeah, even if it was one of the town’s big dogs.

Like Big Paddy or-even bigger-our mayor.