Little Deaths(20)

Fifteen minutes in the archives got Pete a few cuttings about three of Devlin’s previous cases. One of them came with a photo: it was the big guy with the jowls who’d taken Mrs. Malone to see her daughter’s body. As he headed for the door, Pete stared down at him, wondering what went on in the mind of a guy who could do something like that to a woman, wondering why he’d done it. And as he stared, he ran into Horowitz and dropped the cuttings.

“Shit . . . sorry man, I didn’t see you . . .”

They bent down at the same time. Horowitz got there first, glanced at the picture before handing it back.

“You got something interesting there?” Nodding at the pages.

“Sure hope so.”

Pete made to move away, but Horowitz patted his pockets and asked, “Got a smoke, kid?”

Horowitz smoked Camels; heavy, unfiltered, and eye-watering. And now he wanted one of Pete’s skinny-ass filter tips.

Pete pulled out the pack, angled it toward him, took one for himself. Stifled a laugh when he saw the face the other guy pulled.

Then Horowitz nodded at the cuttings again.

“So what’s the story?”

Suspicion slithered to the top of Pete’s spine. He’d worked and waited for this break, and now Horowitz wanted in? Well, too fucking bad. The old guy had his white-collar fraud case, and Friedmann had gift-wrapped this one and labeled it his. He was as short with Horowitz as he knew how to be.

“Murder in Queens. Yesterday. One kid dead, another missing.”

Horowitz’s head came up fast and he looked Pete right in the eye for the first time since they’d collided in the doorway.

“Murder!” He grinned. “Well, now. Ain’t that a thing. Your first one, huh?”

Pete smiled back uncertainly, nodded.

Horowitz clapped him on the shoulder.

“Your first big story. Congratulations, kid.”

He gave a quick glance downward and said casually, “That the lead detective?”

Pete nodded again and Horowitz straightened up and walked on. Pete was halfway to the parking lot before he thought to wonder how Horowitz knew that the grainy close-up of a guy in a suit was a picture of a cop.


Pete spent a couple of hours in the Malones’ neighborhood: knocking on doors, fishing for quotes about the kids, the parents. Then he made his way to the station house. Five bucks and a pack of smokes to the desk sergeant got him the name of the coffee shop where the senior detectives ate lunch.

Tony’s Diner turned out to be a noisy, brightly lit place on Queens Boulevard. Pete gave the waitress his full college-boy grin and asked her to seat him in back and leave him alone for a while. She rolled her eyes but brought him a chocolate malt and a slice of pie and left him to it.

The photos first. Most of the pictures of Ruth Malone were still on Friedmann’s desk and Pete was left with one shot of her walking to the car, her head turned toward the line of cops. There was a guy in the middle who was listening to the cop next to him but watching Ruth. His mouth was set in a thin line and he looked oddly satisfied. Pete made a note.

Then the shots of the building. The women. The baby carriage with the box on top that Mrs. Burke’s daughter had pointed out. Pete spent a moment longer looking at that, made another note, then spread out the rest of his papers.

He didn’t have much: the discovery of the girl’s body, his impressions of the street where the mother lived with her kids, and interviews with the neighbors—the three from yesterday, and two more this morning. That was it.

The kids were angels. That was the word everyone used. He wondered if that was the word that was always used in cases like this.

But their mother wasn’t too popular, even with the other mothers. She’d separated from the husband: the consensus was that she’d kicked him out, but no one knew why. He was a nice guy, apparently—better liked than her, anyway. He had a good job—worked nights as a mechanic at the airport. Didn’t drink, didn’t knock her around, didn’t even raise his voice. This last from a lady with a bruise on her cheek that her makeup didn’t quite hide.

Pete looked at the photograph he’d taken of Frank Malone as he’d emerged from the doorway behind his wife. He studied the fleshy, set face. Saw again the fear he’d noticed the day before.

Then Pete heard voices and looked up to see two men approaching. He recognized one of them right away and stuffed the photographs back into their folder just as the men took a seat in a booth across from him.

Devlin walked like he was on parade, and then sat straight with his hands clasped in front of him. The other guy was younger, with sandy hair and pink freckled skin, like he’d been out in the sun for too long.

The diner was half-full and there was a buzz of voices in the background, but Pete was close enough to overhear. The men ordered and when the waitress left, Devlin was silent for a moment, lining up the cutlery, the salt shaker, the sugar bowl. Then he looked up, pointed a thick forefinger at the other man’s wrinkled shirt.

“That’s sloppy, Quinn. I want to see an improvement tomorrow. Don’t let me catch you showing up for a shift like that again.”

“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir. The case . . .”

Devlin’s eyes flickered sideways. Pete tried to look invisible in his booth.

“We don’t talk about the case, Quinn. Not here. Not anywhere public. Got that?”