Neptune Avenue Read online

  MOST OF THE PEOPLE who traveled to Coney Island in search of a little summer fun had no idea what the neighborhood was like just a couple of blocks away from the amusement parks and the beach. Here, where the year-round residents lived, there was very little public fun—it was a gritty little working-class backwater, a reminder that the nearby resort had fallen on tough times. Mermaid Avenue, the main shopping strip, had a busy street scene, populated by hard-faced, hard-drinking skels in bleached denim, do-rags, tractor caps, unlaced sneakers. Next to the elevated subway tracks that traversed the neighborhood stood an abandoned little building with a fitting name: Terminal Hotel. (It was easy to imagine some boozer or junkie settling in there to die.)

  As if matching the general tone, the sky was overcast today; the clouds looked like dirty mattress stuffing. Jack glanced up at a second-floor sign advertising the Salt and Sea Mission, a Bowery-like project for the redemption of those whom the street had not entirely claimed. As he drove, he kept picturing Daniel’s face, so animated in the rehab gym; in the morgue, a lifeless lump of clay. They hadn’t kept in touch for long after they left the hospital: a few trips to the Brighton boardwalk (to walk together for physical therapy), a few afternoons sharing a couple of beers. And then things had petered out. They didn’t really have enough in common, beyond their shootings. It was like being comrades with someone in the army; for a while you were intensely close, but after you got back to your old surroundings, you drifted apart.

  A block north, on Neptune Avenue, the street carnival thinned out, and the smells of salt air and fried food gave way to that of spilled motor oil. Along this industrial stretch, Neptune was home to automotive shops, gas stations, and—just up the way—a big repair facility and storage yard for subway trains. Jack parked in front of a Chinese takeout place and stepped out into a cool morning. Across the street, in front of a block presided over by a body shop, an auto glass place, and an auto parts emporium, scraps of yellow crime scene tape fluttered in the breeze. The car Daniel had been driving when he was killed was already gone, hauled off to the NYPD’s vehicle facility for further inspection.

  Jack got out and crossed the busy avenue to the far corner, where a broken umbrella lay sprawled across the curb and scraps of paper littered the sidewalk—and his Homicide colleague Linda Vargas stood waiting. She was a short, wry Puerto Rican. The first thing that men tended to notice about her was that she had soccer-ball-sized breasts. If they made a pass, though, or condescended to her in any way, she could swiftly make them feel as if they were staring up at her from the curb. Underestimating her was not a mistake that anyone—perps or fellow cops—was likely to make twice.

  Vargas’s finely plucked eyebrows went up. “You trying to steal my case?”

  Jack shook his head. “Nope. It’s just that I met the vic a few times. Back in the hospital, after I got shot.” (Having some familiarity with a victim wouldn’t automatically disqualify him from helping with a case, not unless there was some sort of major connection that might foul up later legal proceedings, but he didn’t want to seem unprofessional in his interest.) “Who caught the case for the Six-oh?”

  Linda pulled out a cigarette and lit up. “His name’s Scott DeHaven.”

  “How’s he doing?”

  She blew a puff of smoke over her shoulder, in consideration of the fact that Jack had stopped smoking since the hospital. “He’s all right. He’s over at BCI.” The Bureau of Criminal Information.

  Jack nodded. He had to wonder whether the precinct detective might find Daniel’s name in any records over there.

  Vargas moved into brisk business mode. “So: the vehicle was found here in the right lane—evidently it drifted into the curb after the deceased was capped. The angle made it look like a shitty parking job, which is probably why nobody called it in right away.”

  Jack frowned. “How long was the body sitting here?” It felt a little weird calling a friend the body, but he knew he’d have to keep his feelings out of this.

  Vargas shrugged. “The M.E. says maybe a couple of hours.”

  Given the steady flow of passing cars, it seemed incredible that no one would have noticed, but Jack knew that they were looking at a time of death of midnight or 1 A.M. The avenue would have looked a lot different at that hour. All of the security shutters in front of the auto shops would have been rolled down. And the Chinese takeout place and the pizza parlor? Closed. He glanced at the red and yellow awnings of the nearby businesses; their bright colors would have been muted in the night. In the dark, all cats are gray. In front of a big liquor store on the next block, three life-size statues of pirates stood sentinel. Jack wished that they could talk.

  “What’cha thinkin’?” said Linda Vargas.

  Jack scratched his cheek. “The guy was shot at very close range, so where would the shooter have been?” He answered his own question. “In the car next to Lelo, or right outside his window. Did Crime Scene find powder on the seat next to him?”

  Vargas shook her head. “Not much. It looks like the shooter was outside.”

  Jack nodded. “I guess he couldn’t have just driven up next to the vic, because he would have been on the left side of the other car. Unless there were two of them … Or maybe he was on foot and walked up from across the street when the car was stopped at a red light? Maybe an attempted robbery?”

  Vargas nodded. “Sounds good, only we found his wallet still in his pocket, and his cell phone on the seat next to him. I mean, it could’ve been a robbery gone bad, and the perp freaked out and took off before he grabbed the dough, but that doesn’t seem likely. …”

  “Have you gotten the cell phone records yet?”

  “They’re on the way.”

  Jack stared into the empty space where the car would have been stopped. “Hold on,” he said. “Maybe there’s another option. Instead of being on foot or in a car, what if the shooter came up right beside him on a motorcycle or a bike?”

  Vargas nodded. “I can see that.”

  “Any bullet casings?”

  “Nope. He cleaned up after himself.”

  “Witnesses?”

  She shook her head. “He picked a nice spot for a quiet killing.” She pointed up the avenue. “The only open business within sight would have been that gas station down there, and it’s a bit too far for a real I.D., even if someone had been standing out front. And there are only a couple of residences within the sight lines.” She pointed across the street, at a couple of little apartments above the Chinese takeout place and the pizza parlor. “We’ve got an old guy says he heard a pop in the middle of the night, but he didn’t get up or even look at a clock. That’s it. No other drivers, no foot traffic, no calls to nine-one-one.”

  Jack frowned. What did they have? No leads, as yet. Not a robbery. A random shooting, perhaps, but the odds of that were highly unlikely, especially considering the fact that Daniel had already been caught in one such incident. No, this had the earmarks of a premeditated, execution-style murder.

  Oh, Daniel, he thought, shaking his head. Who did you get yourself tangled up with?

  He looked at his watch, thinking that he really ought to return to Crown Heights, but then—picturing some silky, feathered blond hair, picturing a sexy scar—he couldn’t help making one more personal stop.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  EVEN MORE THAN THE back of Coney Island, Brighton Beach was a separate pocket of Brooklyn, and a self-enclosed universe.

  If you continued east from the crime scene, moving along the shore, you’d see the old Parachute Jump rising up over the boardwalk, a defunct ride that looked like the skeleton of a giant steel mushroom. Then a couple of small amusement parks, just a grubby reminder of the resort’s former glory, but still crowded in the summertime. The Coney boardwalk was an incredible melting pot, all kinds of working-class New Yorkers coming out to the beach as they had for decades, seeking relief from the broiling concrete and asphalt of the city. Hip-hoppers and salsa enthusiasts, Pakistani car service drivers an
d big Mexican families, Italian-American deli countermen in bleached jean shorts and wifebeater shirts—they thronged the boardwalk in a pulsing river of city life.

  Walk fifteen minutes along the weathered gray boardwalk, though, and everything changed.

  As a boy, Jack had come to Brighton Beach several times a year to visit his uncle Leon, who always had a box of saltwater taffy ready for his nephews. Back then the neighborhood had been different, filled with European immigrants. In the past few decades the Russians had taken over. You heard the language everywhere, as Jack did when he emerged from his car on Brighton Beach Avenue, the neighborhood’s main shopping artery. It was like passing through some kind of Star Trek transporter machine. The place was known as Little Odessa, because so many people from that region had emigrated here, and they had done their best to re-create a world of seaside cafés and glitzy nightclubs. They filled the avenue, buying foods from home and cheap, flashy clothes. There was something elemental and doughy about them; they had grown up on meat and potatoes, and potatoes alone when there was no meat. The old women looked like little plump doves, their men like bare-knuckles boxers who hadn’t been very good at protecting their faces.

  The sun had broken through the clouds now, and the day was warming up. Jack turned onto a quiet side street, where he passed a row of old apartment buildings designed like Tudor castles—if Tudor castles had fire escapes running down the fronts. Ahead stood the boardwalk, and beyond that, a bright blue strip of ocean.

  Up on that boardwalk, Jack remembered, were a couple of cafés, where a line of sun-leathered old women sat on benches facing the sea, hands folded over round bellies. Some of them might mill around a wizened little woman selling knockoff designer scarves out of a shopping cart. Another might offer something else, little packages that disappeared rapidly into the shoppers’ bags.

  “Medicines from Russia,” Daniel Lelo had explained once, smiling at his cop friend’s suspicion. “For foot care, for headache. They miss the things from home.”

  Daniel had led him a little farther down the boardwalk, where a bunch of men sat playing chess. Each pair was surrounded by a huddle of spectators, old guys in sporty caps who stood with their hands behinds their backs, watching intently and offering advice—kibitzing. No one spoke English. Daniel could become completely absorbed in some strangers’ match. And when he sat down to play, he surveyed the board with impressive cool, made his moves rapidly—and won. “I am not an addict to vodka, cigarettes, or coffee,” he had said. “But every day I must have my chess.”

  Jack had asked if the NYPD was having any luck finding the shooter who had put him in the hospital. The Russian shook his head. “I hev mostly bad luck. My family is famous for this. Half of my relatives was killed by Stalin. Of the ones still alive, half was killed by the Nazis. We are specialists in being in wrong place in wrong time.” He smiled at Jack. “Do you like jokes?”

  Jack had shrugged. This seemed like an odd segue, but as a cop he knew that humor was one of the only ways to deal with the worst things in life.

  “Okay,” Daniel said. “A communist, a fascist, and a Jew is walking down a road. From sky comes voice of God: ‘For each of you, I give one wish.’

  “The communist says: ‘I wish all fascists will be destroyed from face of earth.’

  “The fascist says: ‘I wish all communists will be destroyed from face of earth.’

  “‘And you?’ God says to the Jew.

  The Jew thinks a minute, then he says, ‘If you will give their wishes, then I will just hev a nice cup coffee.’”

  Jack smiled grimly at the memory as he marched toward a big brick apartment building.

  THE FOURTEENTH-FLOOR HALLWAY WAS a pale minty green that reminded him of the ruffled tuxedo shirt he had rented for his high school prom. He had been nervous then, gearing up to meet his date’s parents, but that was nothing compared to the unsettled feeling he had now. He reached out and rang the bell.

  The door opened. Eugenia Lelo stood there in a black dress; she looked as if she hadn’t slept since her husband’s body had been found.

  He quickly stuck out his hand. “Mrs. Lelo, I’m Jack Leightner. You might not remember me, but I was in the hospital with your husband a while back.” He cleared his throat. “I don’t know if your husband told you, but I’m with the New York Police Department.”

  Eugenia—or Zhenya, as Daniel had called her—brushed a wisp of hair from her eyes. As always, there was a distance to her, a willed remove. New York was full of attractive, haughty women, but her somber face was that of someone who had grown up in a harder world, and her recent news had certainly compounded that gravity. Today, though, Jack sensed something vulnerable about her. She looked faintly bedraggled, like a cat caught out in a light rain, and he found himself oddly moved by a little gap between her front teeth.

  He took a step forward. “Would you mind if I come in?”

  The woman frowned. “Other police come already. Yesterday.”

  Jack nodded. “I know. I’m just here to help them, and it would help me if I could talk to you.”

  She stared at him thoughtfully for a moment, with pale green cat eyes. She seemed to decide that there was no point in arguing, and stepped aside. Jack had been here before, to pick up his friend for their walks together, but he’d never seen the inside of Daniel’s apartment, and he figured that Eugenia had likely been responsible for this lack of hospitality—she had never shared her husband’s decision to open up and relax.

  Though small, the place was lavishly decorated. A chandelier hung above the front hallway, which was lined with shelves of ornate porcelain figurines: little lords and ladies, shepherds, swans. The woman’s taste was over the top, in Jack’s opinion, but he told her it was a beautiful apartment—he was trying to melt the frost.

  She led him quickly through the dining room. A black cloth was draped above the mantelpiece; Jack figured that it probably covered a mirror. He didn’t know much about what these new immigrants did when they were alive, but he knew about their funeral practices—and those of the Chinese, Yemenites, Pakistanis, and other groups who had swelled Brooklyn’s population. A Jewish death would be followed by a week of sitting shiva, a time when mourners would be comforted by visits from family friends. He felt a twinge of hurt that he had not been invited, but shrugged it off.

  Several sandwich platters sat on the dining table, along with piles of cookies and cakes. The only visitor at the moment was a squat little woman with an ancient, sun-dried face. She bustled around rearranging the food; with her air of grave authority, she reminded Jack of a little bishop.

  He nodded hello as Eugenia led him on, into the living room, where the walls were covered with bookcases. Daniel, Jack remembered, had been a voracious reader: novels, science, history, poetry. A sectional white leather sofa faced a big picture window and a balcony overlooking the beach. Eugenia waved her hand, inviting Jack to take a seat.

  “I’m very sorry about Daniel,” he said.

  Eugenia didn’t respond. “Would you like some tea?” she said instead. It sounded like she was reciting from a phrase-book.

  Jack nodded—maybe this little act of hospitality might relax her stiff façade.

  While she was gone, he stepped out onto the balcony and raised a hand to shade his eyes. Way down on the beach, the late morning sun glinted off a lounge chair; farther on, heads bobbed out in the choppy ocean. A steady stream of old-timers shuffled along the boardwalk. Directly below stood a big fat man who looked stark naked; as he moved away, Jack was relieved to see that his giant belly overhung a tiny bathing suit.

  Across the way, a swanky new condo complex dominated a huge plot of beachfront property. For most of the century, the site had been home to the Brighton Beach Baths, a private club where members could swim, whack a handball, play a round of canasta. Jack’s family would never have been able to afford the membership. When he was little, at home in Red Hook, he didn’t know they were poor, but he remembered coming here to
visit his uncle; he would stand on the boardwalk and look on wistfully as the club’s laughing families drank pink lemonade and relaxed under shady umbrellas. Maybe that was when he had first learned that the wealth of the world was not equally shared.

  Daniel’s wife came out and set down a teapot and two glass cups in filigreed metal holders. As she bent over to pour the tea, he glanced at the scar on her jaw and noticed a bit of soft blond down at the back of her neck. It puzzled him that his outgoing friend had married someone so glum, but if he had learned one thing in life, it was that marriages were often difficult to understand from the outside.

  Eugenia’s body shifted under the black silk of her dress; even with its conservative cut, it was clear that she had a fine figure. Maybe sex had provided her marriage bond. There was something very appealing about her sulky face, her pouting lips. Jack blinked: it had been a long time since he had felt any real attraction to another woman, after the way his last relationship had ended. … He looked away. Get a grip, he told himself. This is a murder victim’s wife you’re looking at. Your dead friend’s widow.

  He sat in a rattan armchair, and the woman handed him a cup of tea. He blew across the top to cool it, then took a sip: it was very strong. Eugenia sat too, though she perched on the edge of her chair, uneasy.

  “How are you doing?” Jack said.

  She looked at him as if he had just inquired about the weather on Pluto. “My husband is dead.”

  He cleared his throat again—evidently, she was not in the market for comforting. Not from him, anyhow … “Could you pass me the sugar?” he said. The bowl was just a couple of feet away, and he could easily have picked it up himself, but he wanted her to pass it. It was a technique he had used many times when questioning recalcitrant people: getting her to cooperate in such a small way might subconsciously lower her resistance to his questions.

  Eugenia complied.

  He leaned forward. “I’m sorry to have to ask about this, but we really could use your help. Do you have any idea why someone would have done this to your husband?”