Matter of Trust Read online

  David remembered too – not just the anger Chris had shown toward Lorraine Stankovic after she’d threatened Marilyn, but also the beating he had given Mike when Mike took him to task for lashing out at Lorraine.

  Mike shook his head. ‘Look, I’m probably way off the mark here. There is no evidence to suggest Chris was going to dump her. I know he was under a lot of pressure to cut her loose, but he’d been under that pressure for years, DC, and he’d always resisted it, so that he could keep Marilyn in his life.’

  ‘He broke up with her,’ said a devastated David.

  ‘He what?’

  ‘He broke up with her, the morning of her death.’

  A pause until, ‘I don’t believe this,’ said Mike.

  ‘It’s true,’ said David.

  ‘Then you need to ask him. Straight out.’

  ‘If you are right, do you think he’d tell me?’

  Mike hung his head. ‘Probably not.’

  They sat motionless for a while, enveloped by the silence around them.

  ‘I need to know what she told you, Mike,’ said David after a pause. He dreaded Mike’s response, but knew there was no going back from here. ‘I need to know what she said to you, word for word.’

  A defeated Mike nodded. ‘She said she believed that if she threatened to expose their affair, that he would want to kill her – that he would kill her, and that Gloria would cover it up.’

  ‘She predicted her death?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘At the hands of our best friend?’

  ‘Yes,’ confirmed Mike. ‘I’m sorry, DC, for telling you this. But in the end, after days of thinking of nothing else, I suppose I realised that, as much as Chris is our friend, Marilyn was . . .’

  ‘. . . our friend too,’ finished David.

  ‘Yes,’ Mike said for the third time. ‘Yes.’

  43

  When Chris Kincaid was a boy he used to suffer from panic attacks. He never told anyone about them, in fact for a long time he hadn’t even known what they were. He remembered one time in elementary school when he was elected sports captain and was required to make a speech in front of the entire assembly. His mother had sat in the very front row, her expression a combination of satisfaction and fear that her son would screw things up.

  He didn’t, he spoke beautifully – even gained himself a standing ovation for his efforts. But later, backstage, after his mother had given him a curt nod of approval and the principal had said something about him being a gifted orator, Chris had run to the bathroom and thrown up. Somehow he’d managed to inhale the vomit into his windpipe and had come close to fainting as oxygen struggled to reach his lungs.

  Over the years he’d realised the attacks had something to do with his need for approval, his fear that he was way short of the mark, which was probably why the bile was rising in his throat right now – here, in this four-by-four hellhole that smelled of disinfectant and tobacco and urine.

  His anxiety was threefold. First there was his mother’s visit – and her arrogance, her rudeness to the guards, and even more concerning, despite Chris’s insistence that she not interfere, her promise that she would ‘fix this mess’ one way or another.

  Then there were Rebecca and Connor. Their support of him was enough to make Chris feel rotten to his core. He may not be a murderer, but he sure as hell was guilty of ruining his family’s lives.

  Third, it sprang from David’s failure to make contact. Rebecca and Connor had left over an hour ago – and they said that David would be coming to see him later on this afternoon. But visiting hours were almost over and David had failed to show.

  The last time they’d spoken was when Chris was being hauled from the courtroom after that horrendous arraignment – when he’d seen the look of shock and disappointment on his old friend’s face. Chris feared, despite Rebecca’s assurances of David’s support, that certain doubts were entering his mind. Could it be that, after his finding out about Lorraine’s death and Chris’s lies to hide it, his friend had finally had enough?

  But Chris had little time to contemplate these matters, for seconds later one of the guards gave him a heads-up that he had another visitor – or as the guard had put it: ‘Some kid in a school uniform who’s insisting on seeing you urgently’.

  The guard said the boy was alone, which meant Connor had somehow made an excuse to his mother so he could come back and see his father solo, and he knew what Connor was going to ask him, for he had seen the uncertainty, the anxiety, the possibility, in his only son’s eyes.

  He thinks there’s a chance I did this, thought Chris. And while his heart ached that Connor could think he was capable of such an atrocity, he was also at a loss as to how he could explain to his only son why he had cheated on his mother for all of these years.

  But his thought was cut short, as the guard used the base of his palm to push open the thick grey door and lead the boy into the room, which was when Chris was hit with yet another dose of anxiety, in the form of an unexpected arrival – the boy named Will.

  ‘Senator,’ said Will, extending his large right hand.

  ‘Will,’ said Chris, shaking it then. ‘I am afraid Connor just left. Were you supposed to meet up with him?’

  ‘It’s good to see you, Sir.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Chris gestured for Will to take a seat – an action that was force of habit given the millions of meetings Chris had chaired as senator. ‘It’s good of you to come. Did Connor tell you I could have visitors?’ Chris thought that must be it.

  ‘Connor has no idea I am here, Sir,’ said Will, his voice echoing ever so slightly off the white cinderblock walls. ‘Coming to see you was my idea. You’ve been good to me Senator, so I felt that . . . well, I had an obligation to speak to you, to ask your opinion, before I decide what to do.’

  Chris was speechless, his mind trying desperately to fathom exactly what the broad-shouldered boy was trying to tell him. ‘I’m sorry son, but I’m not sure how . . . ?’

  ‘Did you know that my father was dirty?’ asked Will.

  Chris shook his head, not knowing what to say.

  ‘It’s true. He was on the take. I knew it, my mom knew it, and chances are Internal Affairs probably knew it too. But then my pop did us all a favour by making himself redundant so . . . no harm, no foul.’

  Silence.

  ‘If what you say is true, I am sorry, Will,’ responded a stunned Chris. ‘But . . . I still don’t understand what you mean by a decision, and needing my opinion.’ He was trying to put it together. ‘Is this about your choice of colleges? Is it about my offer to give Jack a reference and . . .’ Chris shook his head. ‘I’m sorry son, you know I would if I could but,’ Chris lifted his hands at his surroundings, ‘in case you haven’t noticed, my standing in this community has taken a bit of a dive.’

  ‘But that’s exactly why I am here, Mr K – because of your situation.’ The boy scratched his head as if deciding how to continue. ‘That night, when the woman was killed . . . me and Jack, we . . . we came over to see Connor. I know he was meant to be studying but we left it until late – a bit before eleven – and by that time, all the lights in your house were off, bar the one in Connor’s room and the green-coloured desk lamp in your study.’ Will hesitated, as if it was extremely difficult for him to continue. ‘We didn’t want to ring the bell – or knock, in case we woke Mrs Kincaid, or the twins, so I told Jack I’d go round to the study and knock on the window so that you could let us in.’

  ‘You knocked on the study window?’ asked a shell-shocked Chris – afraid of where this was going.

  ‘Yes. I knocked, and I cupped my hands against the glass but . . .’ the boy swallowed. ‘I couldn’t see you, Senator – I couldn’t see you anywhere.’ His brow furrowed as if in anguish. ‘Do you see my dilemma?’

  And sadly, Chris did, but he had no idea how to respond. ‘I was there, Will – by that time sleeping on the sofa.’ But then Chris realised that his study sofa sat directly across from
the window. ‘Perhaps I was in the shadows. It was dark and . . .’

  But the look in Will’s eyes told Chris that he hadn’t come here to be convinced.

  ‘What makes this so hard,’ Will continued, ‘is the fact that, after my dad died, people like you and Mrs Delgado, you kind of gave me a moral compass to follow, a compass I’d never been exposed to before – which is not that surprising, considering the example I had to follow. But you and Mrs D – you went to pains to set me straight. You always told me that honesty should form the backbone of a young man’s character – and you were right, no question – which means that I have a serious fucking quandary on my hands, wouldn’t you say?’

  Silence.

  Nothing.

  Chris met the boy’s stare head on – and Will Cusack did not flinch, his dark eyes focused, his intent becoming clear.

  ‘Why did you come here, Will?’ asked Chris at last.

  ‘Like I said, Senator, I wanted your opinion.’

  ‘Just my opinion?’

  The kid shook his head. ‘The truth is, Senator, and without meaning to sound callous, whether you threw that woman into the Passaic or not doesn’t affect me one way or the other. If you did, then of course I don’t condone it. But I can see how it happened – understand it even. The woman was causing you trouble, and you acted – and perhaps that means more power to you. But to be brutally honest, if you did, Sir, you fucked up – because from what I, and everyone else in this savvy state, have heard, the cops have built an ironclad case against you. And that means guilty or not guilty, you are headed for the slammer for a very, very, very long time.

  ‘So when you think about it, when you weigh things up as you politicians inevitably tend to do, the only way you’re going to survive this is if you give that jury as many reasons to believe you as you can. They need to be convinced that you were holed up in your study all night – and I would be thrilled to help make that happen, which I am willing to do, Senator, no question about that.’

  Chris took a breath. The space between them was loaded, with anticipation, with anger, with disappointment. ‘Are you trying to bribe me, Will?’

  ‘I’m offering you an opportunity.’

  ‘But I was in that study.’

  ‘And I say you weren’t.’

  Chris opened his mouth to refute him, but then realised that no matter how he used to feel about this boy, the time for redemption had passed. ‘How much?’ he asked instead.

  ‘One hundred thousand.’

  Ah, thought Chris, the figure that will haunt me for the rest of my life. It would be so easy, the thought continued, to pay this kid off and guarantee whatever slim chance I have of a ‘not guilty’ verdict.

  But then Chris remembered the commitment he’d made to his family – the promise he’d made to his friend.

  ‘I need you to listen to me, Will, and I need you to take in every word that I am about to say. It’s over, okay – all the lies, the subterfuge, the sneaking around behind my family’s back. I did not kill Marilyn Maloney, but that does not mean I am free of guilt.

  ‘I know you have suffered in your life, Will, and therefore I shall try not to think too ill of you – even promise never to speak of this conversation ever again after you stand up and walk away from this room empty-handed.

  ‘In the end you will do what you feel you need to do, and no matter what your decision, I will continue to fight this thing with the one virtue I have shunned with cowardice for all these years. I’m going to fight it with integrity, Will. I’m going to fight it with the truth.’

  44

  The super was on the top floor when he found him. He was knocking hard on the door to the only apartment on this level, calling out for a woman named Chesnokov. McNally had been driving for the better part of the morning – driving, thinking, ignoring the ring of his cell. There was something about this case that wasn’t gelling – and he figured the only way to find out what it was was to go back to the beginning – to where it all began.

  ‘Mr Sacramoni,’ said McNally, extending his hand. ‘Detective Harry McNally, Newark PD. We met the other day when I came to search Ms Maloney’s apartment. I am sorry I let myself in, but I caught somebody leaving so . . .’

  ‘Sure, no problem, Detective,’ said the super, wiping his hand on his plaid shirt before shaking with McNally. ‘Sorry about that,’ he said pointing to the closed door before him. ‘Been trying to raise the building owner’s wife.’

  ‘The Russian,’ remembered McNally.

  ‘That’s her. Her husband moves about, but he often leaves her here to collect his rent – which I get nervous holding onto.’ He held up a bag full of envelopes obviously containing the tenants’ monthly payments. ‘Not to worry,’ he said, turning away from the door. ‘Her husband is an ass, but at least she gets to drown her sorrows in the Hamptons.’

  McNally smiled. ‘I’ve drowned my sorrows in worse places.’

  ‘You’re telling me,’ said Sacramoni, before gesturing for McNally to follow him back down the corridor. ‘So what can I do you for, Detective? You need to get into Monroe’s apartment again?’

  ‘Monroe?’ asked McNally.

  ‘Sorry, Marilyn. I’ve called her Monroe since she was a kid. You know – the blonde hair and all. Her dad used to rent the apartment and she kept it on when he passed.’

  McNally nodded. ‘Actually, I wanted to talk to you today, if that’s okay?’

  ‘Sure,’ said Sacramoni once again as they reached the elevators and he pushed the arrow for down. ‘Talk away.’

  ‘Well,’ began McNally, as the elevator dinged and they entered it together. ‘Like you said, you knew Ms Maloney for a long time – and I know you told me that Senator Kincaid wasn’t a regular visitor here and she never spoke about their relationship.’

  ‘That’s right,’ confirmed Sacramoni, who had sent the elevator back down to the ground floor. ‘Monroe was tight-lipped about who she was seeing. Despite what others might have thought, she didn’t sleep around. She was a one-man woman, Detective, but she liked to keep those things private – had done since she was a kid.’

  ‘So were you aware that Ms Maloney dated Chris Kincaid as a young woman?’

  ‘I knew she had a boyfriend from uptown, but she didn’t talk about him and she never brought him here. She was ashamed of the place, her old man was a drunk, and I gathered she wanted to keep the two worlds separate.’

  ‘So when Chris Kincaid turned up here last week, to ask you to open Ms Maloney’s apartment, did you put two and two together?’

  Sacramoni just shook his head and smiled. ‘I’m a building super, Detective, not a mathematician. But I suppose you could say I made the assumption.’

  McNally nodded. ‘And the senator – I know you told the police who questioned you that his demeanour was one of concern.’ McNally had read the super’s original statement at least twenty times. ‘But is there anything else you remember, anything about his conduct, his general state of mind?’

  Paul Sacramoni scratched at his three-day growth before going on. ‘The thing is, Detective, I kind of felt sorry for him. He looked genuinely worried – you know – which made me more than a little concerned as well, considering how drunk Monroe was the last time I saw her. If you’re asking me if the guy looked guilty, I’d have to say no, but then again, he is a politician and you’ve arrested him so I guess you have the evidence to back it up.’

  McNally flinched, just a little. ‘How would you describe Ms Maloney’s mood on the night of her murder, Mr Sacramoni? I mean, I know she was intoxicated but—’

  ‘She was resolute,’ said the super, now scratching his temple as if the memory was forming in his brain.

  ‘Excuse me?’

  ‘Resolute – you know, like she had reassessed things and was going to make a change. Alcohol is a great motivator for false confidence, Detective – I’ve drunk enough to know.’

  Sacramoni hadn’t mentioned this in his original statement, which wasn’t su
rprising given plenty of witnesses recalled further details weeks after the event.

  ‘Did she talk about what sort of changes she wanted to make?’ asked a now intrigued McNally, wanting the super to go on.

  ‘She mentioned making a fresh start. Said something about Matt Dillon the actor waiting for her at the Airport Hilton.’ Sacramoni smiled at the memory. ‘She could be a drama queen, that Monroe. She looked at her watch, said Dillon could wait all he wanted.’ The super smiled again. ‘But like I said, Detective, she was as smashed as a sailor on leave so . . .’

  McNally nodded. ‘So the money she talked about,’ he said after a pause. ‘Did she mention intending to use it to make this fresh start?’ After the satchel was found in Maloney’s apartment, McNally had asked Sacramoni specifically if she had mentioned coming into any cash – and the super had repeated Marilyn’s comments about finally being able to afford things.

  ‘No, Sir,’ said the super. ‘Like I said, she said she wouldn’t touch it, no matter what.’

  ‘Did she say why she preferred not to use it?’

  Sacramoni paused to think. ‘She said something about being too proud.’ He shook his head. ‘But like I told you, Detective, she was pretty sauced.’

  McNally nodded once again just as they reached the ground floor and Sacramoni walked him toward the lobby.

  ‘Nice mutt,’ said McNally, pointing at the sleeping Doberman in the corner.

  ‘He’s not much of a guard dog, I’m afraid,’ said the super, ‘especially when he’s depressed. He took a liking to the building owner’s wife.’

  ‘The one drowning her sorrows in the Hamptons?’

  ‘That’s the one,’ said Sacramoni, extending his hand to the detective once again. ‘If there is anything else I can do,’ he said. ‘Monroe was a good kid, Detective, I miss her.’

  ‘I understand,’ said McNally, a final thought occurring to him just as he was about to leave. ‘Actually, there is one other thing, Mr Sacramoni.’