What Doesn’t Kill Her

Chapter Eight

After his encounter with Basil Havoc, Mark would have to play things much closer to the vest. No one besides his partner Pence and Captain Kelley himself knew of Mark’s investigation into the apparently related “family” murders.

Yet somehow Havoc had made him. Had either Pence or Kelley told somebody else, a trusted reporter or another cop maybe, about Mark’s homicide-investigation hobby? That seemed unlikely, but either the guy got tipped off or he maybe was even smarter than Mark had imagined.

And Mark didn’t take this man lightly. If Havoc was the killer, that made him one resourceful son of a buck. You couldn’t kill as many people as Havoc apparently had, over all those years and jurisdictions, and avoid capture without a Mensa-level IQ and a certain jungle cunning.

At work, Mark stayed focused and intense, as always. He and Pence had been busy as heck trying to track down a burglary ring, where the clues and witness interviews just wouldn’t mesh. After some digging, it became clear two somewhat similar such rings were operating in the same area.

Either one or both of these crews had been at it for the better part of a year now. Sooner or later their luck would go south, and either somebody would be home, or would walk in on them. Then what? Home invasions, no matter how carefully planned, could erupt into violence.

Or as Pence colorfully said, “What if these crews find out about each other? I mean, we did. And suppose they don’t cotton to havin’ competition? Further suppose they turn up to burgle the same building, the same time? All of a sudden, we got two simple robberies turnin’ into one great big fuckin’ O.K. Corral.”

How serious was the situation? Serious enough for purse-string pincher Kelley to green-light overtime. In this economy, that put these burglaries on a par with bank robbers.

Or maybe a serial killer.

Nearing midnight, they would normally have still been at HQ, pushing papers, sifting for clues; but Pence had gotten a lead from a snitch of his. Right now they were sitting surveillance outside the back door of Gold Medal Pawn, a rundown shop in an equally rundown neighborhood.

The snitch had told Pence that Robert Slowenski, owner of Gold Medal, was up to his old fencing ways and clearing goods for a burglary ring. This would appear to be one of the two such rings the Pence and Pryor team were seeking to bust.

In his seventies, darn near wide as he was tall, the nearly bald Slowenski was known by his colleagues (and the cops) as “Slowhand,” a nickname the pawnbroker claimed dated back to when he’d once sold a Stratocaster guitar to Eric Clapton. While Clapton had indeed performed in Cleveland from time to time, the story was likely fanciful, because the nickname actually related to Robert Slowenski’s reputation for being slow to pay.

Though the front of the store was dark, a dim bulb extended over the back door in the alley, with Slowhand’s dodgy-looking Lincoln Town Car parked not far away, barely allowing passage for any other vehicle.

Farther down the darkened alley, Pence and Mark (behind the wheel) sat in their unmarked Crown Victoria, right where they had been for the last three hours. Mark had wanted to be a detective for a very long time, but he wondered if he’d have gone into this line of work had he known about the dulling boredom of a stakeout.

Each detective had a penlight in one hand — Pence had a newspaper in his lap, the light shining on a Sudoku puzzle that was a mystery the seasoned detective would never solve, while Mark examined a clipped newspaper story about Brittany Sully and the dust-up she had caused at Strongsville High School when she asked another girl to the prom.

Pence grunted, “How the hell are you supposed to work these dumb things? My old man helped beat the Japs. Is this their fuckin’ revenge?”

Mark said, “It’s all logic.”

Pence threw him a look. “And I’m not logical? You think I broke all those cases by bein’ not logical?”

“You’re logical enough, but you’re trying to do one square at a time. You need to see the whole puzzle.”

They stayed at their individual tasks for a while, each occasionally glancing toward the pawnshop’s dimly lighted back door to make sure Slowhand wasn’t going anywhere. In Mark’s mind, the old song “I Shot the Sheriff” kept playing, unbidden.

Finally, Pence doused the penlight, tossed the newspaper onto the dash, and announced, “Fuck it! They win. First they sink the Arizona, now my ancient ass.”

Mark grinned, shook his head, but kept going over the newspaper story.

“What the fuck are you up to?” Pence asked. “Readin’ the clippings of all your triumphs on the force? Oh. I forgot. You haven’t had any.”

Sticking his newspaper above the visor, Mark clicked out his penlight, and said, “Not doing anything.”

“Don’t shit a shitter,” Pence said. “I saw that story when it first came out. About that gay girl, who got murdered in Strongsville. Her and her whole fam-damly.”

“Actually she wasn’t gay,” Mark said. “And the whole family wasn’t killed.”

“No? Could’ve fooled me, all those dead bodies.”

“Her brother is gay, and she was just showing some solidarity. And he’s still alive, overseas, in the military.”

“Like you care.”

Mark glanced at the older cop sharply. “What?”

“You don’t care about that family any more than I do. Don’t know them from Adam. Or Eve or my hairy left ball. This is about you still moonin’ over that chick from high school days, right? The one you never even dated?”

Mark said nothing. He tried to keep the irritation from crawling up his neck in a red rash. He knew Pence liked to pull his chain, and he also knew there was no real malice behind it.

“Marky Mark, ain’t you never gonna let that go? Why don’t you do what I do, when I wake up at night, thinkin’ about Betty Lou Miller who wouldn’t look at me sideways in high school?”

“What do you do?”

“I get out of bed real quiet, so as not to wake the wife, and pad down the hall into the john and beat my meat, hummin’ the old school song.”

“Must you be so crude?”

“No, it’s a lifestyle choice. You do know we’re a couple of Cleveland detectives, and not Mormon missionaries goin’ door-to-door, right?”

Tightly, Mark said, “She deserves justice.”

“The Jordan girl? Sure she does. But that doesn’t mean she’s going to get any.”

“She might. She may.”

Pence sighed, like Atlas switching shoulders. “You know, kid, every cop’s got that one case that nags him, way after he’s put in his papers. So I get where you’re comin’ from.”

“Do you?”

“Yup. But you had your white whale before you ever got to be a cop. You don’t learn to let that shit go, my son, it will eat your ass alive.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Pence looked sad suddenly. “No you won’t.”

Then they both saw headlights coming down the alley toward them. A van.

Why should a van, a simple ordinary vehicle, make his sphincter tighten and his mouth go immediately dry? When he had first teamed with Pence, the older cop had told him that the job was ninety-five percent boredom and five percent sheer freaking terror.

Tonight Mark was getting the full one hundred percent...

Working to keep his breathing regular, Mark waited. Next to him, Pence was doing the same thing. They slouched in their seats down far enough that no one in the van might spot them. At least not from a distance. Maybe a half a block away, the van’s headlights switched off as it pulled in.

Without really thinking about it, Mark let his hand rest on the butt of his pistol on his hip.

The van stopped on the other side of the pawnshop’s back door, beyond Slowhand’s parked Lincoln. That gave Mark and Pence a slight advantage. They had Slowhand’s car between the van and their own.

“You remember to click the dome light off?” Pence whispered.

“Yeah,” Mark whispered back. “I’m not an idiot.”

“We’ll discuss that later.”

The van’s front doors opened and two African-American males climbed out. In the dark it was hard to see much, and the dim bulb over the pawnshop door was little help. The guy on the passenger side was a head taller than the driver, and they wore jeans and cutoff sweatshirts; but from this distance, Mark could determine little else.

The African-Americans walked to the back of the van and opened its rear doors. While the pair was back there, blocked by the vehicle, Mark and Pence slipped out of the Crown Vic, neither shutting his door tight. Using Slowhand’s car for cover, they crept closer.

Mark stayed on the driver’s side, hanging back by the Lincoln’s bumper, just in case the two guys came around the van’s passenger side.

On the other side of the Lincoln, Pence — despite his bulk — was all but invisible in the alley’s inky shadows. Grunts came from the back of the van, where the doors closed, and then the two men shuffled around the driver’s side, lugging something awkwardly between them.

As the pair got closer to the light above the door, Mark could see that they carried a massive flat-screen TV, fifty-inch screen anyway. The shorter man, the driver, led the way, going backward, his taller associate bringing up the rear.

Mark already had his gun out and at his side, barrel pointed straight down, ready to come up fast.

When the pair got to the door, the driver used his foot to give it a couple of solid kicks.

Then they waited.

Mark and Pence, staying low, edged alongside the Lincoln.

After a moment, the taller guy hissed, “Where the fuck he at? He slow keepin’ time, too?”

Still cradling his end of the TV, the driver managed a tiny shrug. “Fuck do I know? Maybe he’s takin’ a dump. Do I look like that John Edward dude?”

Then he kicked the door three more times, rattling it, making his partner almost lose his grip. More general profane bitching followed for maybe thirty seconds, then the door swung open and bald squat Slowhand himself filled the frame.

“You’re late,” he said to them in a low, gruff growl, small dark eyes darting up and down the alley, like bugs looking for a place to land.

“We late?” the driver said. “We been knockin’ for half an hour, man! You slow in the hand or the head?”

“Just get that fucking thing in here,” Slowhand said, stepping out into the alley to clear the doorway.

Pence popped up next to him. “Raise ’em, Robert!”

Mark stood and, in a voice much calmer than he felt, said, “Hold it right there, fellas.”

The driver did so, but his taller pal dropped his end of the TV and took off down the alley like a sprinter after the starting gun.

Unable to juggle the big TV from one end, its weight and awkwardness conspiring against him, the driver watched with wide helpless eyes as the expensive electronics item tumbled from his grasp and smashed onto the concrete alley, bits of the screen shattering and scattering everywhere, like ice breaking up.

“Fuck it!” the driver said, and put his hands up.

“You goin’ after him?” Pence asked, nodding toward the tall guy, who was already nearing the alley’s mouth.

“No,” Mark said, then eased toward the driver. He wasn’t going to leave Pence with two suspects to deal with. He told the driver, “Grab some wall.”

The driver assumed the position, hands flat on brick, feet spread. He’d been frisked before.

Patting the driver down, Mark asked, “Care to tell me the name of your homey? Cooperation is a beautiful thing.”

“Snitches get stitches,” the driver said, not even bothering to look over his shoulder.

“If that’s the way you want it,” Mark said, and read him his rights.

As he cuffed the man, Mark looked over and saw that Pence already had Slowhand cuffed, as well. The cop may have been old and fat, but he could still handle himself — with an equally old and fat perp, anyway.

Soon patrol cars rolled into the alley and the detectives loaded in the two suspects, who both wore the glum resignation of the career criminal who knew such indignities would occasionally occur.

Then Mark and Pence went in through the pawnshop’s open back door. The interior was only slightly better illuminated than the alley. Three of the back-room walls were lined with shelves, most of the two-by-four and plywood variety, filled with every kind of cheap merchandise imaginable. The fourth was home to a desk, atop that a computer whose screen saver consisted of beautiful naked women (this would seem as close to them as Slowhand was likely to get), and next to the desk a tiny table supported a small flat-screen TV. Whatever Slowhand was up to back here, it wasn’t immediately apparent. The crime scene team would be combing through this junk for days, and that didn’t include the stuff in the shop’s larger front end.

While Pence thumbed through the messy stacks of paper on the desk, Mark strolled along the shelves, shining his penlight into the darkness. Televisions, computers, portable hard drives, Blu-ray and DVD players, stacks of DVDs (predominantly porn), power tools, musical instruments, and one shelf’s worth of piled clothing.

The latter turned out to be costumes — Indian chief, firefighter, policeman, power worker, leather guy. Had the Village People hocked their wardrobe? This was apparently the inventory of a costume shop. He just shook his head. Pawnshops were amazing places — people would pawn anything, from a screwdriver to a samurai sword.

“Take a gander,” Pence said, and Mark left the shelves and crossed to the desk.

Pence pointed to the computer monitor, where Slowhand’s eBay page was displayed. The pawnbroker was selling a lot of stuff online. Not unusual, this day and age.

“There was a screen saver going,” Mark said. “You touch something? Crime scene unit wouldn’t appreciate that.”

His partner shook his head innocently. “You stompin’ around must have vibrated the desk or something.”

“Oh-kay.”

Ignoring Mark’s skepticism, Pence said, “Item here you might like to add to your eBay watch list.”

Mark leaned in. “That’s the Lladró sculpture from the Mohican Avenue job. In Collinwood.”

Pence nodded. “How about this one? Catch your fancy?”

“Hah. That upscale grill from the North Royalton burglary.”

“Yeah. Which tells us what?”

They had already determined that while the two robbery crews overlapped, some territory appeared unique to each.

Mark gave his partner half a grin. “Either this bunch of turds is invading the other ring’s turf or...”

Pence said, “Slowhand is fencing shit from both rings.”

“Detective Pence — nice going.”

The bigger man puffed up. “Back atcha, Detective Pryor. Now, shall we go interview a certain scumbag pawnshop owner?”

Mark gave him the rest of the grin. “We shall indeed.”

As they were walking out, Pence asked, “Turds? Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?”

Mark’s grin turned silly and embarrassed.

“Are you blushin’, kid?” Pence grunted a laugh. “You are one of a fuckin’ kind, my boy, one of a freakin’, fuckin’ kind.”

In the interview room, they found Slowhand sitting at the scarred table, drumming his fingers — nerves or boredom? In any case, the pawnbroker said nothing when they entered. In fact, he didn’t look at either cop, as Mark took the chair opposite him and Pence remained standing, prowling like a big anxious cat. Up in the corner, a video camera captured everything, and Mark knew Captain Kelley was on the other side of the one-way glass behind him.

Pence took the first swing at the little round pawnbroker. “In all my many years on the force, I have had the misfortune of dealing with some dumb sorry fucks, Robert my man, but you might well be king of the dumb sorry fucks. My apologies we ain’t got no throne available for your royal ass.” He shook his head, then leaned in, getting right in Slowhand’s face. “eBay, for shit’s sake?”

The truth of that hit Slowhand hard enough to make him cringe; but he said nothing.

Prowling again, Pence added, “And fencing for two burglary crews at the same time? Two competing crews, workin’ the same basic area, who probably like each other the way a couple of street gangs would? Bold, imaginative thinking, Robert... or maybe the kind of greedy shit that could get you fucked up if one crew thought they were getting the short end of the stick.”

His fingertips making small circles, Slowhand massaged his forehead. If this was a nervous habit, maybe it explained his baldness: he’d simply rubbed his hair off.

Pence’s comment had struck a jarring chord not only with the pawnbroker, but with Mark, too. Slowhand was just one of many fences for high-end goods in a city the size of Cleveland. Dealing with two competing crews put him seriously in harm’s way, not wise for a man not as fast on his feet — or with a gun — as he once was.

Why would an experienced crook like Slowhand risk courting this kind of trouble?

Unless...

“You weren’t just fencing for them,” Mark blurted. “You were running both crews.”

Slowhand’s cool evaporated, and he sat there gaping at the young cop. Pence gaped at Mark, too.

“That’s why you could risk working with two crews, working the same territory,” Mark said, running with his theory. “They were working for you.”

Slowhand shook his head, no, no, no, and his trembling hand seemed about to rub away the flesh above his eyebrow.

“We have two suspects in custody,” Mark said. “One of them is going to get a heck of a deal tonight. The other isn’t. But this is your lucky night, Slowhand, because we talked to you first. You get first shot.”

Pence, keeping up, smiling to himself, no longer pacing, said, “Your lucky fuckin’ night, Robert. What say? Or should we go talk to the mope next door?”

Slowhand sat there twitching like a dog with fleas, but he did not respond, did not look at either detective.

“Looks like it’s somebody else’s lucky night,” Mark said, and started out, Pence falling in behind. The second Mark’s hand touched the doorknob, Slowhand said, his voice firm and loud: “All right! All right.”

Pence turned and said casually, “All right what, Robert?”

“...All right, I’ll talk.”

The two detectives returned to the table. Mark took his chair opposite Slowhand, and now Pence sat as well, next to the pawnbroker.

Slowhand said nothing for a while.

Mark said, “We’re listening.”

Finally Slowhand said, “It was about... retirement.”

Pence frowned in confusion. “Retirement?”

Frowning back but in irritation, Slowhand said, “I’m seventy-eight years old, you dumb cluck — y’think I wanna work forever? I meet these kids, they’re already into the burglary thing, but they’re strictly smalltime.” He used his thumb to tap himself in the chest. “I taught ’em how to make some real dough. How to choose where they hit, and what kind of swag to score.”

“Fagin,” Mark said.

“Hey, fuck you, I’m straight!” Slowhand yelped. “Watch your mouth, kid.”

Mark started to explain but Pence waved him to quiet. Slowhand seemed about to continue.

“Me, I figured to bank some dough,” Slowhand said. “Take my ass down to Florida to live out my golden years. Learn to play fuckin’ shuffleboard, maybe.”

Pence said, “I’d pay to see that, Robert.”

Shaking his head slowly, painting a picture in the air with two hands, Slowhand said, “I had this place all picked out. Little town on the gulf side, where the water’s warm... not like the Atlantic, where you freeze your nuts off even in August.”

Pence couldn’t resist. “Where is this little piece of heaven, Robert?”

“Place called Yankeetown.”

Mark said, “You almost made it.”

“Huh?”

“You’ll be going to Youngstown.”

Home of Ohio State Penitentiary, where Robert Slowenski would really spend his golden years...

Between Slowhand and the van driver — from whom words spilled like a rapper who didn’t know how to rhyme, once he knew ratting out his pals might pay off — Mark and Pence got the names of the members of both burglary rings. The day shift would stay busy, rounding ’em all up, but Pence and Mark were through for the night. They got pats on the back from Captain Kelley, which were harder to earn than Medals of Valor, then went their separate ways. Pence would head for some all-night fast food joint, no doubt. Mark had a date with some cool, clean sheets.

When Mark walked out to his Equinox, a middle-aged African-American male was leaning against the vehicle. This was no robbery suspect, not hardly.

This well-dressed goateed detective was Sergeant Morris Grant, “Mo” to his friends, which Mark was not. The big-time homicide specialist hadn’t deigned to pronounce ten words in Mark’s presence since the younger man had earned his gold shield.

As Mark neared, Grant said in his resonant baritone, “I hear you did some nice work tonight, Pryor. Did some real good out there tonight.”

“Thank you,” Mark said, leaning against the fender next to Grant. “I appreciate that. Really thoughtful of you to hang around to tell me that at three thirty in the morning.”

Grant smiled, his teeth very white under the nearby streetlight, glowing, feral. “I heard that about you from people.”

“What?”

“That you weren’t dumb.”

Looking around, Mark said, “Which people? Point ’em out, and I’ll set ’em right.”

Grant’s chuckle was almost a growl. “I like you, Pryor. People also say you’re a good detective, who’s going to be working homicide one day. That where you think you’re heading? Office next to mine?”

“Why not?” Mark said, maybe a little too eagerly.

The homicide cop was sizing him up, testing him; but for what, Mark had no idea.

“What would you rather do, Detective Pryor? Catch bad guys all your life for no credit, or become police commissioner?”

“Is that a trick question?”

“You tell me.”

“Well, I don’t want to ride a desk, no matter how big or important it is. I want to be a cop.”

“Like a kid wants to be a fireman?”

“Like a man who wants to take bad guys off the street.”

The homicide detective’s gaze remained appraising. He laughed softly, then said, “All right, here’s the deal. My partner and I are looking at a cold case that has some vague similarities to another case we’re working on.”

“Yeah?”

“There’s a witness in that cold case that we need to talk to. She’s not cooperating.”

What was this about?

Grant was saying, “We need you to talk to her and pave our way, or even just talk to her for us.”

“Well, of course,” Mark said. “Captain Kelley’s still inside — he’s been working these hellacious hours, too. We can clear it with him now.” He stepped away from his Equinox, but Grant’s arm stopped him.

“If we go to the cap,” Grant said, “it’s a damn near certainty he won’t let you in.”

Mark frowned. “Why?”

“He’ll say you’re too close,” Grant said.

As if Grant had dialed the last number of the combination of a safe, the tumblers falling in line, the door swung open for Mark.

Mark said, “You mean Jordan Rivera.”

Grant gave a curt nod. “I mean Jordan Rivera.”

Somewhere a siren screamed. A long ways off, but distinct.

“I knew her in high school,” Mark said. “Ten years ago. I doubt she remembers me. Anyway, she’s been in St. Dimpna’s for ten years and she’s not talking to anyone about anything. She’s some kind of catatonic or something. Detective Grant, I wouldn’t do any better than you would.”

“Call me Mo.” He smiled again and it was awful. “She’s out. And she’s talking. Just not to us.”

The words slapped Mark. “What? What?”

“Been out for a while now. Month or so. She’s got an apartment not far from that mental hospital.”

Somehow he always thought he would know when she got out, or be informed about it or something. But that was a ridiculous notion. Why would anyone do that?

He said, “You’ve tried to interview her?”

“And failed,” Grant said. “Lynch and me, outside her apartment. She wouldn’t talk to us, said it was ‘too painful.’ Pretty much told us to fuck off.”

“I see.”

“We thought... I thought... maybe you, having known her, could reach out to her. Get her to sit down for an interview with us. If not us, then maybe she’d talk to you. Old school friend kind of deal.”

Emotions roiled within the young detective. “You’re asking me to do this behind Kelley’s back?”

Grant said nothing, which spoke volumes.

Of course, the homicide man had no way of knowing that Mark was already looking into the Rivera murders on a sub-rosa basis with the captain’s blessing. And he wasn’t about to reveal it.

What would seeing her again be like, after all these years, and so much pain?

Suppose she did consent to talk to him, and had some small sense of who he was, who he’d been, back in high school days. After she found out what he really wanted to talk about... well... then what? Would she still talk to him? Or would she tell him to ef off, too? And, if she did, could he stand it?

He sighed. Only one way to find out. He looked at the other detective with a steady, unintimidated gaze. “Captain Kelley finds out, you step up, understand? You don’t leave me with my tail hanging out with my boss.”

Grant’s nod was solemn.

Then he offered a hand and Mark shook it.

The older detective and his partner were drifting off and Mark had his car door open when Grant turned and called, “Oh. One other thing...”

The pecking order meant Mark would have to close his car door and walk over to Grant. He did.

“We caught a homicide,” Grant said, reaching in his inside suit coat pocket, “a brutal thing in the Rivera girl’s neighborhood. Waitress. She got around, did some hooking.”

Grant handed Mark the photo, a morgue shot. She’d been a nice-looking woman, a little hard maybe, dark hair.

Mark asked, “How was she killed?”

“Multiple stab wounds. We’re looking at a married guy she was seeing. She had an abortion not long ago. Maybe it was his, or maybe it was one of half a dozen other guys’.”

“And?”

“You think our dead waitress looks familiar?”

Mark studied the photo. “Maybe... vaguely like Jordan. It’s not striking.”

“Her part of town. Could there be a connection?”

Not his man’s style. Not even vaguely the MO.

“No,” Mark said, handed it back, and went on his way.