Dave Zeltserman - Blood Crimes Book One

I think it was past nine o’clock the next morning when I met with the District Attorney. He looked uncomfortable as he told me about Cheryl. It was the first I heard of it and it took a moment for it to register. When I finally made sense of what he was saying, I just started sobbing. I couldn’t help it and I couldn’t stop myself. I just sat there sobbing uncontrollably, sobbing until it felt like my chest was going to break apart.

In the end the District Attorney decided not to press charges against me. While I acted criminally in trying to defraud the Nigerians, it was hard to muster much sympathy towards them. He was also convinced that I didn’t intend for any harm to come to Cheryl. When the Nigerians were arrested they had confessed fully and bitterly, explaining why they had hacked my wife to pieces. The D.A. decided not to hold me criminally negligent, even though in his opinion I acted stupidly. We agreed that I would turn over the seventy-two thousand dollars to a local youth group. I think it really got to him the way I reacted when I heard about Cheryl. He knew my reaction was genuine, he knew I wasn’t faking it, but he completely misunderstood the reason behind it.

I was lucky to pass the lie detector. I was lucky that all they were trying to do was verify my statement, and I had been completely truthful with my statement. If they had had some imagination I would’ve been sunk. To be honest I never expected the Nigerians to send me any money. Up until the point where they told me they were mailing me the money, I was just playing around. But from that point on I guess my mind was spinning with different ideas of how I could make it more than a scam. I knew that they wanted to send a check instead of wiring funds to my bank so that they would be able to follow me when I picked up the money. And I saw the Nigerians watching my mailbox when I picked up the check. I saw them when they were following me home; I even slowed down several times so I wouldn’t lose them. And I had no intention of spending any of that seventy-two thousand dollars on a mink coat for Cheryl. I told them that to infuriate them, to give them ideas. And I found reasons to stay late at work to give them time to do what they were going to do.

The thing of it was Cheryl and I had drifted apart over the years. We didn’t really talk much any more, and we didn’t really like being with each other. It had been over a year since we’d had sex, and even longer since I cared about it. A divorce would’ve been costly and unpleasant. So while I had to give up the seventy-two thousand dollars, I was paid six hundred thousand dollars from her life insurance policy. Her parents are now suing me for it, claiming I negligently contributed to her death, but my lawyer doesn’t think they have much of a case. I’m not worried about losing the money.

No, the D.A. wasn’t even close to understanding why I broke down the way I did. It had nothing to do with Cheryl’s death. It just hit me all of a sudden as to what I had done and what I had become. It took me a while to get used to it. But I’m fine now.

Fast Lane (Chapter 1)

If I was lucky Debra Singer was still in Denver, and if she was, East Colfax would be a good bet. East Colfax was always a good bet for runaway teenagers.

Every major city’s got its East Colfax. In Los Angeles it’s Hollywood Boulevard, in New York it’s Times Square. In Denver it’s East Colfax. As I drove down it, I spotted Rude at the corner of Nineteenth Street smoking a cigarette and staring into the distance. Rude works as a bouncer at a strip club a few doors down. He also pimps for a couple of the dancers. When he was in Vietnam he was assigned to an elite unit where he’d be let loose into the jungle to return two or three months later with a bunch of Vietcong ears tied to a rope. Now he can’t stay cooped up for too long, needs to get out every half hour or so for some fresh air. I once tried arguing that the air inside his strip club was a hell of a lot fresher than the smog around Denver, but he failed to see the logic of it.

I pulled up alongside him. He looked past me, inhaled deeply on his cigarette, held the smoke in, and let it out slowly through his nose. “If it isn’t the famous celebrity detective, Johnny Lane,” he said in a soft, menacing growl. “Read your piece in the Examiner. Used it to mop up some coffee.”

“Well now, everyone’s a critic these days.”

I parked and got out of the car. As I approached him, I noticed his handlebar mustache had gotten thicker and grayer, looking more like a steel brush than ever. He took in another lungful of smoke and swallowed it down.

“I hear there’s dissension in the ranks,” he said. “One of the private dicks you hire was bitching to me. Thinks you’re taking advantage of him.”

I waited for him to go on but he was finished. He spat on the sidewalk before turning back to me. His face had the hard, dispassionate look of a granite block.

“I got to tell you,” I said, “that’s just not true. I’m upfront with everyone I hire. And you know, Rude, it’s really just generosity on my part that I subcontract my overflow cases. But you’re always going to have your complainers no matter how good you are to people.”

“He told me you take sixty percent off the top. That’s not very generous, Lane.”

“Yeah, well, I disagree.” I was starting to feel a little hot under the collar. “Look, I don’t put a gun to anyone, understand? If your guy can do better, let him.”

A thin smile cracked Rude’s face. “Hey man, don’t get excited. Just telling you what was said. You don’t have to convince me of anything.”

“Who’s complaining about me?”

“I’m not going to betray a confidence.” He took a final deep drag and flicked his cigarette away, his eyes half-closed and peering off into the distance.

“Sure. Anyway, that’s not why I’m here.” I handed him a photo of Debra Singer. “Know her?”

Rude studied it slowly. “Fresh meat,” he said, nodding. “In a few months, though, there’ll be maggots coursing through her flesh.” His eyes shifted to meet mine and for the first time in all the years I’d known him I saw a glint of life in them. “That’s a hell of a lot better prose than the crud you write,” he added sourly.

“I won’t disagree with you.”

“Maybe I should talk to your editor. If he’s going to publish crap like ‘Fast Lane’, maybe he’d be interested in something good. Something real. The Rude Streets, stories of the Hardluck.”

“Won’t sell,” I said. “You need a sympathetic hero. Someone for the reader to relate to. Not too many folks are going to relate to a sociopathic, sleazebag pimp.”

“But they relate to you, huh?”

A blond teenage girl wearing a belly shirt and hot pants walked out of a massage parlor across the street. I made sure she wasn’t Debra Singer before turning back to Rude. “Look,” I said. “I’m not making up the rules. Just telling you what they are.”

“I’m a war hero, godammit!”

“Yeah, you’re a fine, upstanding citizen.” I took Debra Singer’s photo from him. “How about the girl? Where can I find her?”

Rude pressed his eyes shut. Lines of concentration ran down his forehead like grooves running down granite. “She’s working at a peep show across from the Cabaret Club,” he said after a while. “Fresh meat’s working the private booths. For a buck she’ll take her panties off. After that, a buck a minute and she’ll play with herself so you can jerk off.”

I felt a little sick hearing it, but it could’ve been worse. At least she wasn’t working the streets. I thanked Rude and handed him forty bucks. He looked at his watch.

“Tanya’s on stage in five minutes,” he said. “You should come in for the show, Lane. This girl’s really something. She can pick up a roll of quarters and count the change.”