Linda Fairstein - Bad blood

“And Brendan?”

“Boys didn’t understand him-him being afraid of the tunnels and the sandhog jobs and all. Liking books so much, inside doing homework most nights while kids were playing on the street. Girls? Well, some of them get kind of stupid around guys like him. He was good-looking-even with the bum eye-and popular with all the fancy girls. From the time he started high school at Regis, he always dressed better and talked smoother than the neighborhood kids. He was something special.”

“Your friends, Trish, did he hang out with them?”

She dismissed that thought with a snort. “You must be kidding. Six, seven years difference at that age? I think he liked the attention, liked the girls fawning all over him. But he didn’t have any interest in none of them. Just a nuisance, that’s all they were to him.”

Mike took his time making his approach. “How about Bex?”

“Yeah? What do you want to know about her now?”

“Well, you said she was at your house all the time, am I right?”

“Practically living there. Part of the family. My very best friend.”

“And Brendan. Did they get along?”

There was no sign of tension in her face or movements as she answered Mike. She didn’t seem to get the significance of his questions.

“I’d say they got along fine. He was good to Bex. Helped her with her homework, even. Things like that. Especially in those few months after her father was killed in that accident-right before Brendan got married-he was trying to be a big brother to her, help her through it.”

“They spent time together?”

Trish cocked her head and looked at Mike. “I’ve just told you what kind of things they did. Family stuff. Schoolwork. Even took her out driving a few times when she got her permit. In old Mr. Keating’s car, if I’m not mistaken. He was being good to her, if you don’t mind. You’re not making something else of it, are you? Sticking Brendan with something else?”

“Not anything-”

“We were kids, Bex and me, Detective. Sixteen years old when he got married to that snooty dame. She hated to lose him, same as I did. Like a brother.”

“Think of those last few months, Trish, before the wedding. Was Brendan around?”

“In the city? Sure. He and Amanda had to do Pre-Cana. They had to go to Amanda’s church, not ours.”

I knew that Pre-Cana was a requirement before Catholic weddings, couples meeting in sessions with a priest to discuss the responsibilities of their marriage, a reminder that it was considered a sacrament of the church.

“Were he and Amanda living together?”

“Before the wedding? Not like you mean. He stayed in the Keatings’ home, in the guest room from time to time,” Trish said. “My mother used to tell me-like it was the only good example she could draw from the Keatings-what a fine thing it was that Amanda had been raised with such important religious values. She liked that Amanda insisted on keeping herself pure till they were married-that’s what Mother called it. ‘Pure.’ Brendan told her that, she used to say.”

I closed my eyes, thinking of Amanda Keating guarding her virginity until her wedding night, while Brendan Quillian found a naive but willing sexual partner in a lost teenager who idolized him.

“So when Bex was angry and upset after the wedding, you didn’t think it was because Brendan-like, Brendan had something going on with her?”

“Trust me, Detective. I would have known about something like that. One of them would have told me, I’m sure of it.”

Mike sat up straight and Trish Quillian crossed her legs and rubbed her hands together.

“I’d like to trust you, Trish. I’d like to believe what you tell me, but I’m having a hard time with it.”

She looked up at Mike’s face and pursed her lips. “Why is that?”

“’Cause my damn ankle hurts like hell. I can’t concentrate on what you’re trying to feed me,” he said, ruffling the hair at the back of his neck.

“That’s not my fault.”

“You Quillians, you’re a tough bunch. I’d say it’s completely your fault. Wouldn’t be this way if I hadn’t chased you halfway across the elysian fields yesterday.”

“The what?”

“The cemetery, Trish. You were there when we went to-to-uh, to Bex’s grave.”

The slightest bit of color rose to her sunken cheeks. She looked up at the mirror and then glanced over at the closed door of the room. She began rocking again.

“Now, how did you know that I was going to be at Woodlawn in the morning?”

“It must have been a coincidence. I go there a lot,” she said defiantly. “I go there to talk to Bex pretty often. I didn’t know any of you was going to be there.”

“You ought to bring flowers next time you go. Looks pretty bare next to that little headstone. Aren’t you curious about why we had to dig-to disturb her grave?”

“I’m not a curious person, Detective. Since I called you the first time, I’m finding out it’s safer to mind my own business.” Trish leaned back in the chair and crossed her arms.

“I thought maybe Brendan told you why. I thought maybe Brendan explained the reason we had to take that poor girl back to the morgue and-”

“I don’t want to know anything about that part of it. Don’t you get that Brendan has nothing to do with this?” She waved a bony hand in front of her face. “I’ve only seen him at the wake. At the funeral. Brendan and I don’t talk.”

“Ow!” Mike said, letting out a fake yelp and bending over to grab his ankle. “Every time you tell a lie, my leg just throbs.”

“What lie?” She looked again at the door, as if trying to get the nerve to walk out.

Mike leaned in close to Trish Quillian. “Brendan called you on Tuesday. Brendan phoned you after he shot his way out of the courthouse.”

Her eyes opened wide and she sat upright. She was speechless.

“What did he tell you, Trish? Bet he didn’t mention that there’ll be no one left to take care of your mother if you get yourself wound up in helping Brendan get away. You’ll be an accessory to this murder. Don’t let him drag you into this.”

She was looking straight into the mirror now. “There’s someone on the other side of that glass, isn’t there? Someone watching us and listening.”

“You’re talking to me,” Mike said. “That’s all that matters at this point.”

“You’ve tapped my phone then, have you?”

“No, we haven’t done that. I wouldn’t be needing to ask you what Brendan told you if we had. I wouldn’t be asking you where he is.”

“Well, I’m not interested in helping you, Detective. You didn’t do nothing to help me when I came to you. You haven’t done a single damn thing to find who killed Duke.”

She stood up. “I can go, can’t I? You’re not holding me?”

“Yeah, you can go,” he said, giving her a card with his cell phone number on it as he got to his feet, too. “But you call me if you get smart about Brendan. And there’s one more thing I’d like to ask you for, Trish.”

“What’s that?”

Mike took a small manila envelope from the pocket of his blazer and removed a Q-tip from it. “Could you just put this inside your cheek for me, dab it around to get some saliva on it?”

The woman appeared to be as taken aback as I was. She shoved Mike’s arm away. “What are you looking for now?” she asked, raising her voice. “You making me some kind of guinea pig, are you? Is this that DNA stuff you’re trying to get from me, using me against my own brother? Is that what you’re up to?”

Mike was thinking of the speck of blood-with the genetic markers of a woman-that was on the zipper of Rebecca Hassett’s sweater.

The Q-tip had dropped to the floor and Trish Quillian had her hand on the doorknob. “You want my saliva, Detective? You and your high-handed girlfriend from the District Attorney’s Office, that’s what you’re after? Like I’m a killer or a criminal?”