The Death Artist Read online

  “Kate! Richard!” Amy Schwartz, director of the Contemporary, in one of her oversized tent dresses—this one sky blue with tiny white polka dots—kissed Kate’s cheek.

  “Where did you get that dress?” asked Kate. “The blue matches your eyes perfectly.”

  “Broke into the mortuary the night Mama Cass died. Ripped it right off the bitch!”

  Kate laughed. “God, I’m glad to see you. What are you here to see?”

  “Who knows? Roberta got the tickets. I think it’s one of those dark Scandinavian pieces. A kind of postmodern love triangle: man, woman, dog.”

  “Oh, great.” Kate looked at Richard. “Is that what we’re seeing?”

  “Don’t blame me. I don’t read Danish.”

  Amy waved to a woman with short steel-gray hair. “Roberta, over here.”

  “I’ve got to pee. Maybe it’s just raging PMS, but I feel ready to explode.” Kate turned away, and somehow the crowd parted, creating a clear open channel. But then she stopped. Because there he was, right at the end of the pathway, nodding by the espresso bar, eating a croissant. And he’d seen her, too. For a moment it looked as if he might bolt, but no, he just stood there, smiling.

  Kate wasn’t sure what she’d do when she got there, but those were judgments, and at the moment, that part of her psyche had shut down. Right now, she was all instinct. All the noise—talking, laughing, loudspeaker announcements of movies beginning—surrounded her, but she just kept on moving, now only a few feet away from Damien Trip, who met her eyes, smiled his rotten-sweet smile, and rubbed his finger across the scar on his chin.

  “Well well well . . . isn’t this a surprise,” he said, popping the last of the croissant into his mouth, then licking a long buttery index finger. His baby blues did a slow take up and down Kate’s body. “Can’t stay away from me, that it, Kate?”

  “Oh, you are going to wish I stayed away—”

  And then he was saying something else and she said something else, but the words sounded as if they were coming from far away, the blood was pumping so loud in her ears. All she could see was his pink tongue licking his bony finger, and his grin—the same one that he fixed on the camera—and that was it. Her arm stretched back and sprang forward, fast. But Trip was fast, too. He swiveled and ducked. Kate’s fist connected with a framed poster—La Mort aux Tousses—the French version of Hitchcock’s North by Northwest. Her blood streaked across the glass, staining Gary Grant’s dimpled chin and Eva Marie Saint’s perfect white teeth.

  Trip howled. “Are you crazy?”

  Kate did not feel the pain in her hand, or see the blood. She was blind. Here it was: that part of herself that was terrifying; what she discovered the very first time she ever strapped on a gun to right a wrong.

  Trip saw it in her eyes. He used what he could, what he’d been relying on, for years: the smile, the dimples. “Calm down, Kate,” he said, laying a hand on her shoulder, practically massaging it.

  “Oh,” she said, barely above a whisper. “You . . . are . . . a . . . dead . . . man.”

  Trip spun around, quickly merging into the crowd. But the glint of his blond hair reemerged for a second at the narrow hallway leading to the Angelika’s tiny unisex bathrooms.

  “Trip!” Kate was shouting over the crowd. “Stop right there!”

  A scream—“She’s got a gun!”—and the crowd scattered.

  Kate did not remember retrieving her Glock, but there it was, clenched in her fist.

  Richard broke through the crowd, saw his wife tearing across the theater lobby, gun in hand, fury in her eyes. He called her name. But she couldn’t hear him. She was charging toward that narrow hallway.

  Her foot connected with the bathroom door. Hinges tore from plaster. Wood splintered.

  “Jesus! Help!” Trip was bellowing. “This bitch is crazy!”

  The force of her kick propelled Kate into the tiny bathroom where Trip was literally cowering between the toilet and the sink.

  A voice was screaming Elena’s name, harsh and unfamiliar. But it was not until Richard was there, pushing between them, that Kate realized it was her own voice, and that she had one hand around Trip’s throat, the other holding the gun to his temple.

  “Break it up!” Two cops, pistols in the air, charged down the narrow corridor. Two more followed.

  An overweight cop, huffing as if he’d just run the marathon, shoved Richard out of the way. He planted his gun in Kate’s face.

  “I’m with NYPD,” she said. “This creep resisted arrest.”

  “Holy shit!” Amy Schwartz pushed past the crowd, got a good look at the shattered bathroom door, the uniforms, Kate, breathing hard, still pumped up on adrenaline. “Wonder Woman lives Forget the movie. Talk about getting your money’s worth! Whoa, Mama! If you think I’m ever again going to relax in the can when you’re around . . . !”

  Kate touched her cheek, suddenly aware of an intense throbbing, looked at her hand, saw that her knuckles were bleeding, and when she took a step, she was off-balance. “Three-hundred-dollar shoes shot to shit,” she grumbled, scanning the corridor floor. “Anyone see my heel anywhere?”

  Richard gave Kate a look she couldn’t quite grasp.

  It was nearly midnight. Two uniforms were dragging a teen who was screaming about demons and devils past Kate’s tiny cubicle.

  Damien Trip was put in lockup after an intern checked him over. The same intern who cleaned Kate’s knuckles and bandaged her hand.

  “Are you okay?” Richard asked.

  “I’ll live.”

  “Well, that’s good. I’m going to find some coffee. You want any?”

  “You’ll be sorry,” said Kate, shaking her head. “I mean, about the coffee. It’s awful.”

  Now that the adrenaline had drained away, Kate felt like curling up on the floor.

  Floyd Brown was wearing gray sweatpants on his legs, Nikes on his feet, and a none-to-happy look on his face. “Had yourself quite a night, didn’t you, McKinnon?”

  “I’ve had better,” she said, touching her cheek with her bruised knuckles.

  “I had an APB out on Trip. I would have appreciated a call.”

  “I know. I sort of lost it.”

  “Sort of? Do I need to go through the book with you? List all the things you did wrong? Like no backup, no ‘reasonable nondeadly.’ You want me to go on?” But Brown knew what had set her off. He sighed. “So we got Trip. Any witnesses to his supposedly resisting arrest?”

  “Only if we can get the sink and toilet to testify—”

  “This isn’t a joke, McKinnon. We’ve got to build a case.”

  “I know that,” said Kate. “We’ve got the drugs—”

  “But no way to tie him to any of the murders without prints or DNA.”

  “What about a polygraph?”

  “Only if his lawyer will agree to one.”

  “Grab one of these,” said Richard, entering the room with a steaming styrofoam cup in each hand. “They’re burning my fingers off.” He looked up. “Oh—”

  Kate took a cup. “Floyd Brown. My husband, Richard Rothstein.”

  The two men assessed each other for a moment before shaking hands.

  “Detective Brown’s been reading me the riot act.”

  “Not a bad idea,” said Richard.

  “You got quite a wife here,” said Brown.

  “No shit,” said Richard.

  Kate looked from one to the other.

  “Okay,” said Brown, looking uncomfortable. “Tomorrow, McKinnon. Early. We’ve got to work on Trip, fast.” He shook his head. “Funny, I can’t seem to find that quarter Trip needs to call his—” He stopped short, eyed Richard.

  “Don’t worry about me,” said Richard. “I’m not going to represent him.”

  “You realize,” said Brown, “that Trip could press charges against you, McKinnon.”

  “I don’t think Kate will have to worry about that,” said Richard. “The man was obviously resisting arrest. Kate was acting
on information gleaned through a legitimate police investigation. It was a standard 101 arrest.”

  “You her lawyer?”

  “If she needs one.”

  “Thanks for stepping in,” said Kate, after Brown had gone. “I wasn’t quite up to another fight.”

  “It was pure legalese bullshit, but what the hell.” He tossed his coffee cup into the trash. “So what exactly is the deal with this Trip character?”

  “He was Elena’s boyfriend. A pornographer and drug dealer.”

  “Are you kidding me?”

  “I wish I were.”

  “When did you find all this out?”

  “Just.”

  “Maybe you should have killed him. I haven’t had a murder case in a long time.”

  “I can just see it,” said Kate. “ ‘Husband Defends Lunatic Wife.’ ”

  “And I always will.” He smiled.

  Kate laced her fingers through his. It helped for a minute. But her adrenaline was totally gone. All she could think of was sleep.

  28

  The uniform deposited a thick stack of papers onto the table beside Kate and Brown. “Mead said you should look through these.”

  Kate flipped the first few pages. “William Pruitt’s financials. His stock portfolio.” She slid a sheet out, tried to skim it, though she was so tired her vision was blurring. She’d had less than four hours sleep. She ached all over. “Stocks, bank account receipts.” She dropped the sheets back onto the stack. “I’m too tired to read it. I’m going to ask one of the detectives in General to check all these over, cross-reference with any of our vics and suspects, see what they come up with.”

  “Good idea,” said Brown. “You feeling up to this, McKinnon? To interrogating Trip?”

  Kate nailed Brown with a sober look. “Absolutely.”

  “Oh. And you should know, it was Pruitt in the video. The Yale ring, Rolex watch. Both confirmed.”

  Kate nodded.

  “I went through it all with Mead. He’s going to overlook your somewhat unorthodox arrest procedure. He’s glad you got the guy.” He offered Kate a warm smile. “Mead wanted me to do the interrogation, but I told him it was your kill. So don’t screw this up, okay? Because you may only get one shot at him.”

  Kate nodded again. “According to Trip’s rap sheet, he got off with a slap on the wrist for that interstate charge. I don’t get it.”

  “Good lawyer, I guess,” said Brown. “Fact is, if Trip is involved with both porn and drags, he’s probably got himself a real good lawyer—one who specializes.” Brown tapped his fingers along the edge of his desk. “In fact, it’s time. Overdue. I gotta let Trip make that call before you talk to him.”

  Janine Cook was feeling bad, and nothing seemed to help.

  She’d already snorted a little coke, and yeah, it took the edge off, but not nearly enough. Now she tore through her dresser drawers, pushing lace panties, garter belts, and Wonderbras aside. From under her supply of tank tops she retrieved a Ziploc bag. It yielded a couple of reefers. She lit one, held the smoke in her lungs. The act helped calm her. But not enough. One look at the photo—two young girls in plaid skirts, white shirts, knee-high socks—and Janine was reeling.

  Damn. It was just a snapshot. A little blurry, even, colors fading. Janine remembered the day it was taken by her brother, Germaine, who was dead now going on six years, shot to death in that very same playground.

  Another long hit of marijuana.

  Janine studied herself in the photo—the way her lips formed an innocent smile—and wondered where it had gone, all that innocence. Perhaps it had never really existed. Elena, beside her, was laughing, tugging at Janine’s corn-rows. Elena, who was always getting her out of one jam or another all the way through school.

  She turned the picture over for the umpteenth time. There, in her neat, very particular handwriting, Elena had written “Me and Janine. 1984.”

  It was just getting light out, the city coming to life for another day. Thank God, Janine thought, the night was finally over.

  * * *

  Interrogation Room 4 was like all the others: a small gray cube with an eleven-by-sixteen-inch pane of one-way mirror in the door. Two fluorescent tubes were suspended from the ceiling like large glowworms. They washed the room with an unhealthy blue-white glare. The only furniture was a rectangular metal table and a few intentionally stiff wooden chairs. It had been a long time since Kate had been in a room like this, but not so long that she’d forgotten. She checked the two chairs—sure enough, one was slightly higher than the other—and moved them into position. She got a pack of Marlboros out of her bag—only three left—bought another pack from the cigarette machine in the hall.

  In the ladies’ room, she splashed her face with cold water. Not quite enough to revive her after the rough night, but enough to wash the Estée Lauder pancake makeup off her cheek and expose the bruise she had gotten when she slammed through the Angelika’s bathroom. She shouldn’t have looked in the mirror. It was reflecting a very tired forty-one-year-old woman who should very possibly consider listening to her husband and friends, or anyone else, for that matter, and go back to planning charity benefits or writing her next art book.

  Too late for that now. Kate patted her face with a rough paper towel. Fuck the makeup. She was ready.

  The living room was growing lighter, but Janine pulled the shades down, watched the tiny orange glow of the second reefer go pale yellow, then burn out.

  Eight A.M. All over the city, people were getting up, getting dressed, going to their regular, normal jobs. She pulled herself off the velvet couch, bare feet on deep-pile rugs, wooden hallway floors, bedroom carpet. She turned on the television for company, flipped past that sickeningly chipper Today show with that annoying Miss White Bread, Katie Whatever-the-Fuck-Her-Name-Is. She settled on VH-1, stretched out on her king-size canopied bed, ran her hands along satin sheets, listened to Vanessa Williams croon a love song, hummed along, distracted, thinking Vanessa was one smart black bitch—though she was not too sure just how black the ex-Miss America, the ex-skin star, really was.

  Her head throbbed.

  She just wanted to sleep.

  She beat the overstuffed pillows, pushed, pulled at them, finally flung them to the floor.

  Trip was bruised, moving slowly. Kate could see she had hurt him a lot more than he had hurt her. She offered him the lower chair. He stared at it before sitting. He’d been through this before, knew the drill.

  Kate circled the room once, twice, the action helping to pump her up. Trip watched her through swollen eyes. “I assume you’ve been read your rights?” she said.

  “I’ve got nothing to hide.” Trip played with a loose button on his cotton shirt.

  “That’s good.” Kate folded herself into the higher chair. She towered over Trip. She took her time lighting a Marlboro, then slid a sheet of paper across the table. “List of what we took out of your place—particularly from under the sink in the bathroom.” She exhaled a plume of smoke. “You might want to check the last items—the heroin and coke. From what they tell me, there’s enough there to put your ass in the stir for quite a while. And your sweet little ass, Damien?” She tsked. “It’ll be real popular.”

  “Go to hell,” said Trip. “And don’t think I’m not pressing charges against you.”

  “You do that. Meantime, let me tell you a story.” Kate sat back, folded her arms across her chest. “Once upon a time there was a boy named Damien Trip who met a girl named Elena Solana—”

  “Hey—you want a story?” Trip shook a cigarette out of her pack, stuck it between his lips, his hand shaking as he lit it. “Well, I got one you’re not going to like.”

  “Go ahead. Entertain me.”

  Under the bad light Damien’s skin looked sallow, the dimples more like cuts. “Okay. The story of Damien and Elena.” He offered Kate a tight-lipped grin.

  She wanted to hurt him all over again.

  “Men in porn?” said Trip, his head
cocked, the cigarette hanging from the corner of his mouth as if he were some French movie star. “A dime a dozen. Not that I wasn’t good in my day. I was a timid kid, you know, Kate. But damn, get me in front of those cameras and . . . well, I don’t want to brag, but—”

  “So you were going to be a star.”

  “No, Kate. You’ve got it all wrong. I was pretty much finished with performing. Not that I can’t still get the wood up on command.”

  “Oh, I’m very impressed. But it’s a funny thing. I always think it’s the braggarts who have a problem in that department.” She shook her head slowly. “You couldn’t perform. That what happened?”

  “No way.”

  “There was no semen, Damien. No penetration.” Kate leaned across the table. “You couldn’t manage it, could you?” She stopped, tried for some compassion in her voice. “Look, I understand. It’s a pride thing. Elena laughed. You cracked. It’s embarrassing. You had to shut her up. You couldn’t have her telling people. Not in your line of work.”

  “You got it all wrong, Kate. Elena was a performer, remember? Excuse me, performance artist.” Trip laughed. “What a fucking crock. But I got her to perform, all right—and she was damn good.” He paused, eyes on Kate’s. “You saw her, didn’t you? She had the stuff.”

  Kate’s muscles were twitching. Trip had no idea how lucky he was to be in the safety of a police station.

  “We were going to be big. Really big. And Elena, she was something different.”

  “Maybe a whole lot different than you thought, Damien.”

  “Maybe a whole lot different than you thought, Kate.”

  Kate narrowed her eyes, regarded him closely. “You don’t like me very much, do you?”

  “Why would I even give a shit about you?”

  “Oh, the way Elena talked about me—the great mother. And then there’s you, the sad, motherless boy. It didn’t feel so good, did it? I saw those foster-home statistics. Seven homes in eight years. Not pretty.”

  “That’s one way to put it.” He rolled up his sleeve, displayed a variety of scars. “You ever have a cigarette put out on your flesh, Kate? How about scalding water poured over you because you asked for something to eat?”