Hey, Ange, long time no see.
You too, Chris.
What brings you by my building?
Visiting a friend.
Yeah? Aren’t you working that missing girl case?
Why do you have a gun pointed at me, Chris?
9:20.
I glanced across Washington to the corner of School Street.
Poole met my eyes, shook his head very deliberately.
Maybe she had reached the lobby but was being harassed by the security guard.
Miss, hold on. I don’t remember seeing you in here before.
I’m new.
I don’t think so. His hand goes to the phone, dials 911….
But she’d be out the door by then.
9:22.
I took a step toward the building. Took another one. Then stopped.
If nothing had gone wrong, if Angie had simply turned off her walkie-talkie so the squawk wouldn’t alert anyone to her presence and was, as I stood there, standing on the other side of a fifteenth-floor exit door, watching Mullen’s apartment door through a small square of glass, and I stepped in front of the entrance just as Mullen walked out, recognized me…
I leaned back against the wall.
9:24.
Fourteen minutes since Mullen had shoved me into the wall and entered the building.
The walkie-talkie in my jacket purred against my chest. I pulled it out and there was a quick low bleat, followed by: “He’s coming back down.”
Angie’s voice.
“Where are you?”
“Thank God for fifty-inch TVs, is all I can say.”
“You’re inside?” Broussard said.
“’Course. Nice place, but easy locks, man, I swear.”
“What brought him back?”
“His suit. It’s a long story. Tell you later. He should be reaching the street any second.”
Mullen exited the building wearing a blue suit instead of the black one he’d worn on the way in. His tie was different, too. I was staring at the knot when the head above it swung my way and I glanced down at my shoes without moving my head. Quick movements are the first thing your paranoid drug dealer types notice in a crowd, so I wasn’t about to turn away.
I counted down from ten very slowly, thumbed down the volume on the walkie-talkie in my pocket, and barely heard Broussard’s voice. “He’s moving again. I got him.”
I looked up as Mullen’s shoulders moved in front of a young girl in a bright yellow jacket, and I turned my head slightly and picked up Broussard sliding through the crowd where Court became State Street as Mullen turned right before the Old State House and cut through the alley again.
I turned back to the window of Eddie Bauer, met my reflection.
“Whew,” I said.
15
An hour later, Angie opened the passenger door of the Crown Victoria and said, “Wired for sound, man. Wired for sound.”
I’d moved the car to the fourth story of the Pi Alley garage and pointed it toward Devonshire Place.
“You bugged every room?”
She lit a cigarette. “The phones, too.”
I looked at my watch. She’d been in there an hour flat. “What’re you, CIA?”
She smiled around her cigarette. “I tell you, I might have to kill you later, babe.”
“So what was up with the suit?”
She had a far-off look in her eyes as she stared through the windshield at the facade of Devonshire Place. Then she shook her head slightly.
“The suits. Right. He talks to himself.”
“Mullen?”
She nodded. “In the third person.”
“Must have picked it up from Cheese.”
“He comes in the door going, ‘Great fucking choice, Mullen. A black suit on a Friday. You out of your fucking mind?’ Like that.”
“I’d like Inane Superstitions for three hundred, Alex.”
She chuckled. “Exactly. So then he goes in his bedroom and he’s thrashing around in there, ripping his suit off, slamming hangers together in the closet, ya ya ya. Anyway, it takes him a few minutes, and then he selects a new suit and he puts it on, and I’m thinking, Good, he’s outa here, because I’m getting real cramped behind that TV, piles of cables back there like snakes….”
“And?”
Angie can get lost in moments like these, so sometimes a gentle prodding helps.
She scowled at me. “Mister Cut-to-the-Chase, over here. So...then suddenly I hear him talking again. He’s going, ‘Fuckhead. Hey, fuckhead! Yeah, you!”
“What?” I leaned forward.
“Interested again, are we?” She winked. “Yeah, so I think he’s spotted me. I think I’m bagged. Cooked. Right?” Her large brown eyes had grown huge.
“Right.”
She took a drag off her cigarette. “Nah. Talking to himself again.”
“He calls himself ‘fuckhead’?”
“When the mood strikes him, apparently. ‘Hey, fuckhead, you’re going to wear a yellow tie with this suit? That’s good. Real good, fuck face.”
“Fuck face.”
“I swear to God. A bit limited on the vocabulary, I’d say. So then there’s more thrashing around as he gets another tie, puts it on, mumbles under his breath the whole way. And I’m thinking, He’ll get the tie right, be halfway out the door, and decide the shirt’s wrong. I’ll be so cramped, I’ll need traction to get out from behind his TV.”
“And?”
“He left. I called you guys.” She flicked her cigarette out the window. “End of story.”
“Were you in the apartment when Broussard walkie-talkied he was on his way back?”
She shook her head. “At Mullen’s door with picks in hand.”
“You kidding me?”
“What?”
“You broke in after you knew he was coming back?”
She shrugged. “Something came over me.”
“You’re nuts.”
She gave me a throaty chuckle. “Nuts enough to keep you interested, Slick. That’s all I need.”
I couldn’t decide whether I wanted to kiss her or kill her.
The walkie-talkie squawked on the seat between us, and Broussard’s voice popped through the speaker. “Poole, you got him?”
“Affirm. Taxi moving south on Purchase, heading for the expressway.”
“Kenzie.”
“Yeah?”
“Miss Gennaro with you?”
“Affirm,” I said in my deepest voice. Angie punched my arm.
“Stand by. Let’s see where he’s going. I’m going to start walking back.”