John Lutz - Urge to Kill

“Concentrating,” Quinn said.

Fedderman looked at him and shook his head slightly. He had antennae, did Feds.

“Something I’m missing?” Pearl asked.

“Not a chance,” Fedderman said.

Pearl didn’t answer. Gave him a look. Quinn could feel the old chemistry returning to the team of detectives. There was tension here, almost all the time, but it tended to lead to results.

“What we have is a dead ex-cop,” Quinn said.

“There’s no such thing as an ex-cop,” Fedderman said.

“Me,” Pearl said. “From time to time.”

“We still have a dead ex-cop,” Quinn said. “For him, time’s over.” He looked at Fedderman. “You know Galin when he was on the job?”

“Knew of him,” Fedderman said. He was wearing a gray suit like Galin’s, only Galin’s fit him better, even dead.

Gangly, paunchy Fedderman was one of those people who mystified tailors. Not that Fedderman ever went to one. He always looked as if he’d just shaken straw out of his sleeves and come from scaring away crows in a cornfield. His body parts didn’t quite match, and nothing fit him well. Often one of his shirt cuffs was unbuttoned and flapping as he walked. Quinn wondered how that happened. It was usually after Fedderman had written something down. Quinn thought it might be because he dragged his hand a certain way when he used a pen or pencil and it worked the cuff button loose.

Fedderman ran his long, pianist’s fingers through what was left of his light-colored hair. That seemed to remind him he was getting balder by the day. He lowered his hand and glanced at it as if he might find errant hair. “Galin was a guy kinda kept to himself,” he said. “Seemed friendly enough, just…I dunno, private.”

“I was in the two-oh doing a report a long time ago,” Pearl said. “Galin walked past and pretended he’d pinched me on the ass. Made a big thing of it. It got him some laughs.”

“Sure,” Fedderman said.

“But he didn’t really pinch you?” Quinn asked.

“I said he didn’t.”

“What’d you do?” Fedderman asked.

“Shoved him into a desk anyway. He had to wave his arms around to keep from falling. That got the biggest laugh. I heard the two-oh guys called him ‘Windmill Galin’ for a while after that.”

“I take it you didn’t like him,” Quinn said.

Pearl shrugged. “He was no worse than most. They get kinda wild sometimes, the guys doing undercover. No way some of that shit doesn’t rub off on you. You do that kinda work, you better have some…”

“Moral equilibrium,” Fedderman suggested.

Pearl looked at him as if he were a lesser primate that had spoken. “That’s exactly right, Feds. Good boy!”

She sat up straighter, making her large breasts strain the fabric of her white blouse. She clapped once, as if to suggest they return to business, then rubbed her hands together as if to warm them. “I guess we rule out suicide.”

“No gun in the car,” Quinn said, “other than the nine-millimeter in Galin’s holster, and it hadn’t been fired.”

“Holster strap wasn’t even unsnapped,” Fedderman said. “Galin either knew who shot him, or he was taken completely by surprise.”

“Our guy do this?” Pearl asked Quinn.

“I don’t doubt it,” Quinn said. “Nothing seems to have been stolen from Galin. His wallet had over ninety dollars in it and wasn’t touched. He was still wearing his wristwatch.”

“Piece of crap,” Fedderman said. “Galin liked to shop down on Canal Street, buy imitation name-brand watches. His watch said Movado, but it was probably worth about ten bucks.”

“Free to the shooter,” Quinn said “and he still left it.” He leaned back in his desk chair, swiveled an inch or two this way and that. The chair’s mechanism made a tiny squeak each time it moved clockwise. “That inside-out pocket in his suit coat. Something was snatched out of that pocket fast, probably after Galin was dead.”

The desk phone jangled. The sudden noise made Fedderman jump. Pearl didn’t move. Both detectives watched Quinn as he picked up the receiver, then said “yeah” six times and hung up.

“That was Renz,” he said. “They got the slug out of Galin’s head. Twenty-five caliber. Ballistics said it doesn’t match either of the bullets removed from the two previous victims.”

“It was a warm night,” Fedderman said, “and with gas high as it is, it costs a bundle to sit in a parked car with the engine idling and the air conditioner running. Lots of retired cops live on the cheap. Galin might have been sitting there with his window down, taking what breeze there was, and the shooter just worked in close and shot him in the head.”

“Then he raised the window?” Pearl said.

“Maybe. Before he died.”

Quinn wasn’t buying it, about the window. “More likely the shooter approached the car, yanked open the door, and shot him. Then slammed the door shut and left.”

“More likely,” Fedderman admitted. “But who the hell’d walk up on him and shoot him?”

“Somebody who knew how to move,” Pearl said. “Galin spent time on the streets. It’d take somebody with skill to work in on him unseen and unheard, open his car door, and fire a bullet into his brain. The way the car was parked in that alley, the shooter couldn’t have approached at much of an angle.”

“Maybe he just walked up to the car,” Fedderman said. “Maybe Galin went there to meet him and didn’t suspect he was gonna get popped. Opened the door to get out of his car, then bang.”

Pearl nodded. “We don’t know what we’re talking about. Not at this point. We’re just wagging our jaws making noise.”

“That’s okay,” Quinn said, “as long as we don’t make up our minds about anything important yet.”

“Galin’s dead” Pearl said. “That’s important.”

“Not to him,” Fedderman said. “Not anymore.”

“He had a wife,” Quinn said. “He was important to her. Still is.”

“Maybe,” Fedderman said.

“Either way,” Quinn said “we’re gonna talk to her.”

Her name was June.

Joe Galin’s widow was in her forties and looked as if she’d had drastic cosmetic surgery done to her eyes. They were dark brown and slanted like a cat’s, and would have been beautiful if she hadn’t been sobbing most of the day. Though short, she had a high-fashion model’s anorexic figure, and even wearing an oversized T-shirt, baggy brown shorts, and flip-flops, it was easy to imagine her strutting along a runway. The widow would have been stunning if she hadn’t had a nose that appeared as though it belonged on a much larger face.

Do the nose next, Pearl thought, when she, Quinn, and Fedderman had introduced themselves. She took in the widow’s eyes, the possibly collagened lips, the probably uplifted boobs, and wondered about June’s priorities.

June invited them all the way into a surprisingly well-furnished and tastefully decorated home that was on a middle-class street of single-story houses with vinyl siding.

Quinn had noticed that the Galin home was the only brick-fronted house on the block. He also was noticing the way Pearl was sizing up June, figuring that when the interview was over, Pearl would have something to say.

June offered them tea or coffee, and after the offer was declined motioned for them to sit. She sat down herself in a flower-patterned chair with wooden arms. Pearl took a more comfortable gray leather recliner, thinking it had probably been Joe Galin’s favorite chair, the point from which he’d observed the narrowing world of the retired cop. Quinn and Fedderman remained standing.

“We’re sorry for your loss, dear,” Quinn began.

‘Dear.’ Starting with the phony Irish charm, Pearl thought. So obvious. But that was his talent, how he got people to confide in him. Pearl could see right through Quinn, and wondered why the suspects and witnesses he laid his phony bullshit on couldn’t.