Blood Relations (31 page)

There was a trellis overhead that filtered out the sun.

Frank’s mood was improved slightly by knowing that as soon as the apartment building was sold his association with Marty Cassie would be over. He pulled up a chair and sat down.

“You’ve got a great place here, Frank. What a view.

This condo must 1@e worth half a million now.” The trellis reflected in Marty’s sunglasses, white grid and yellow flowers. “You wouldn’t have some coke around? Share with a friend?”

Frank said, “Caitlin and I are going out to lunch. How about showing me the offer?”

Marty said, “I live in a one-bedroom condo that I paid fifty grand for, six blocks off the water, and you’ve got all this. Why is it that some people have the luck, Frank?”

He smiled. “Too bad you didn’t get Klaus Ruffini’s signature. Maybe you should’ve offered to blow him.” The grin under the sunglasses vanished. “That incident about you kissing his ass is making the rounds, but don’t worry.

Most people don’t believe it.”

“Hey, Frank.” Marty raised his middle finger.

Frank gestured toward the leather portfolio that Marty had dropped on the patio table. “The contract.”

Just then Caitlin came out with a glass of iced orange juice for Marty, who had his grin back on, telling her she looked like a million. The ponytail stuck out from the back of his head like the letter S. Frank wanted to rip it off.

His mistake-Frank knew this now-had been to take a partner. Marty Cassie, being in real estate, had the contacts, but Frank had put up the money; Marty was all mouth.

Frank should have known better. His father had been in the oil business in West Texas. Never made much, but he had done all right, till he let some other men invest with him. He died of a heart attack a few months after losing it all. He had told Frank to join the army and get some GI benefits, since there was nothing he could pass on to him.

Except one piece of advice: Assume people are going to screw you, because they will if you let them.

Frank had found this to be true. His partners in the law office were always fighting among themselves. He would go over the books at night, keeping them honest. The secretaries would run up personal phone calls, steal the office supplies, and take two hours for lunch if they could get away with it. Frank’s first wife had cheated on him when he’d been away in the army. The second stayed married to him till he made some money, then hired a son-of-a-bitch divorce lawyer to take it away. Later she had the nerve to come after him for an increase in alimony. He had her followed, caught some interesting photographs of her with a married man. She dropped her claim. Frank’s kids were another disappointment. None of them wrote or called except as a prelude to asking for money. He generally ignored them.

Frank said, “Sweetheart, Marty and I have business to discuss. You want to close the door, please?” He tossed the portfolio into Marty’s lap.

Caitlin gave him a look and slid the door shut harder than she needed to.

Marty took out what looked like several copies of a standard form contract. He leaned over and handed the paper ‘ s to Frank. “Four-seventy-five, all cash above the mortgage, which nets us about two hundred thousand.”

Frank tossed the contract back at him. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

“We won’t get better in this market. Sign it,” Marty said. “I’m not asking, I’m telling. And we’re going to work out our shares. I want fifty percent, Frank. That’s one hundred thousand. And I want it net.”

Frank gave a slow smile, not believing this. “Marty, I don’t know whether to laugh or to toss you over the side.”

“Yeah, Frank. Laugh. You’ve screwed me too long.

Four years. We were supposed to be partners, fifty-fifty.

We signed our partnership agreement, if you recall, giving you ninety percent on paper because I was having problems with the IRS. Four years, you’ve taken ninety percent of the rent. The building has doubled in value and now you want ninety percent of the profit. No way.”

“And I paid ninety percent of the operating expenses,” Frank said.

“No. Not true. I put in my time. Now I want my share.

Sign the contract.”

“Fuck the contract,” Frank said. “And fuck you. I don’t need to sell the property. You want out, I’ll give you twenty grand, right now.”

“One hundred. Cash. You’ve got two weeks. After that, I’m going to the police.”

Frank stared at him.

Marty sipped his orange juice.

The buzzing behind Frank’s eyes got worse. He said, “You’re out of your mind. That was four years ago.”

“Is there a statute of limitations on murder?”

“It was an accident.”

“Tell that to Detective Eugene Ryabin. It was his sisterin-law that burned.”

Frank came out of his chair so fast Marty spilled his juice down his silk jacket. The insulated plastic glass hit the terrace with a clatter.

“You’re in this too, Marty.”

Marty slid out of the lounge chair and around the table.

“I didn’t pay the guy. You did. He knows who you are.

And I know where he is. I saw his name in the paper. He’s been arrested for armed robbery on South Beach. You think he won’t turn you over to save himself some time in prison? The police would love to get your ass, big attorney like you. This is no bullshit, Frank. You screw me, I’m taking you down.”

Marty’s shit-eating smile had turned into the rictus of a man who wasn’t sure if he had the other guy by the balls or if he would get his hand chewed off.

They were eight floors up. Frank thought of seizing Marty Cassie by his neck, pitching him over. Watch him get smaller and smaller, bounce on the landscaped lawn below, then lie still.

“I want what’s mine,” Marty was saying. He sounded strangled. “Do that, I’ll never contact you again. Okay?

Fifty thousand in two weeks, the rest within a month. No arguments.” He sidled around to the glass door. “I’ll give you twenty-four hours to decide.” He slid the door open, went through it, then quickly shoved it closed.

Dizzy with rage, Frank went over to the railing and looked down. After a while he saw Marty Cassie’s foreshortened figure walk quickly across the parking lot and then out toward the street. The tops of the trees seemed to tremble in the wind. His thoughts were murderous. The blood gurgled and boiled in his head.

It took him a minute to realize someone was saying his name. He looked around.

It was Caitlin, frowning. Standing there in her white shorts and pullover, hair shining, looking cool, as if this were any other day and he’d only been having a nightmare.

“Frank, you’re pale as a ghost. What’s wrong?”

He wanted to bury his face between her breasts. He dropped into a chair, breathing hard. “Come here.” He pulled her down to sit on his lap.

“What on earth is the matter with you?”

He clung to her, his head on her shoulder, then told her he was in trouble. Marty Cassie was trying to extort a hundred grand.

Four years ago, Marty had come to him with a deal on an apartment building on South Beach. The Englander, where Caitlin lived now. A rundown place in a borderline area, but the Beach was hot, and prices were going up fast. The owner couldn’t make up her mind.

“Marty wanted to burn the place because the land was worth more than the building. Not destroy it, just do enough to make the owner want to sell. I told him it was a crazy idea,” Frank said. “He did it anyway, paid an illiterate Marielito to start a fire in the trash area, make it look like kids or crack addicts had done it. The man was drunk, who knows, and the fire got out of hand. The owner died.

A woman.”

Caitlin said, “She died?”

“It was an accident. The trash area was outside her apartment. She was asleep, and the smoke got her before anyone knew she was still in there.” Frank rolled his forehead back and forth on Caitlin’s shoulder as if he could rub the pain out. “Marty’s asking for money. The son of a bitch is trying to blackmail me for something I didn’t do!”

Caitlin’s arms fell away. “My God. Rivka. Wasn’t that her name? Some of the old tenants still talk about her, How she died in the fire.”

“It was an accident,” Frank said. “It wasn’t supposed to happen.”

Caitlin got off Frank’s lap and went over to stand at the railing of the terrace, leaning her elbows on it, eyes closed. Her mouth moved. Oh my God. Oh my God.

Frank stood beside her. “When I found out, I wanted to call the police. Someone had to arrest this guy. But Marty said I’d be charged as an accessory to murder. He had me boxed in.”

“Frank, you have to go to the police.”

“I can’t do that.”

“You weren’t there. You didn’t know!” She took his shoulders. “What can Marty do to you? He can’t prove you were involved.”

“I wasn’t involved.” Frustration was clawing at his throat.

“If you let him do this, it’s like admitting guilt, Frank.”

“No. It’ll be okay. I’ll pay him. I have to, then it will be okay.” Frank threw his arms around her. “Oh, Catie. I’m so glad you’re here.”

She drew away. “What happened four years ago? Did the police question you? I mean, they knew you wanted to buy the building, didn’t they?”

“No. Marty never told the owner I was interested. He had a listing on the property. After the fire, the relatives inherited the building, and they decided to sell. I made an offer. That’s all anyone knows.”

“Why did you do it? Why did you buy the building?”

He looked at her blankly.

Caitlin said, “Why, Frank? After someone died.”

After a second, he said, “It was terrible, what happened, Catie, but there was nothing I could do.”

“I guess it was still a good deal,” she said. The breeze came up and lifted her hair. The shadows from the trellis played on her face.

He reached out a hand and touched her arm. “Catie.

Come on. This wasn’t my doing. It was Marty. He pulled me into this, and now I’ve got to pay for it.”

She glanced around at the plates and glasses on the table, then started picking them up. “Tell me it’s true, Frank. Tell me that’s how it was.” She leaned down to pick up the glass Marty had knocked to the terrace.

“It is, I swear to you.” He took the juice glasses out of her hand and put them on the table. He slid his arms around her waist and breathed in the scent of her hair.

“Oh, Catie. How can you even ask? After what I went through, living with this, sick about it.”

She seemed to be watching the sailboats out on the water. Finally she said, “Let’s not talk about it now.”

He followed her into the house. “I wouldn’t lie to you.

Is that what you think? That I’m lying?”

“No. I don’t know.” She held up her hands as if warding him off. “Please, Frank.”

His living room was a wide expanse of ivory carpet and modern furniture. Her photographs lay in rows on the carpet. Enlargements. Color, blackand-white. Fifty or more.

She had laid them out in the order she wanted them to be hung in the gallery. Now she started picking them up.

“What are you doing?”

“I should go,” she said. “I have a lot to do for my show next week.”

Frank felt like somebody had rammed a fist in his gut.

“Damn it, I wouldn’t lie to you. What’s the matter? Why don’t you believe me?”

She spun around. “All right. You didn’t know what Marty was doing. That’s not it. You bought the building. I remember what you said at the time. You told me what a good deal you were getting. You were happy.”

“I wasn’t happy she died.”

“No, it didn’t affect you at all, did it?”

“We’re not going to argue. Not now.” He took the photos and dropped them back on the floor. “Catie, let’s forget this for a while.” He pulled her close, tried to kiss her.

“Please, sweetheart.”

She knocked his arms away. “Don’t.” She started picking up her pictures again. There were eight-by-tens on the floor, and bigger prints, many of them mounted. She had told him it had cost her nearly a thousand dollars for the processing. She expected him to pay for it, which he had done without protest, wanting her to be happy.

He laughed. “I ask for some understanding, and you turn into an ice cube. You wouldn’t be having a gallery show if it weren’t for me.”

“I know that.” She bent to her photos, lifting them carefully, placing them in a pile. “Frank, I mean it. If we talk about this now, we’re both going to be sorry.”

He lifted his hands. “Okay. Off limits. Gotta find another topic. Can’t talk about that one.”

On the floor were photos of a skinny black woman taking a bath with a green garden hose. More of Caidin’s candid camera shit. A damned high-priced hobby, he thought to himself. Models and people on the street. And a blackand-white series. Old men and women. Kids. And nudes, some of Matthew Hagen, ” A pretty boy. He looks like Dina,” Frank said. “Her eyes and mouth.” He walked along as Caidin stacked the photos. “I’ve seen too much of Matthew Hagen lately. His mother brought me two boxes full of memorabilia. She made me sit through every photo, report card, and crayon drawing he ever made. I’ve heard things I didn’t want to know.”

“You shouldn’t have taken that case,” Caitlin said.

Frank smiled. “Dina used to go into his room when he was asleep and sit by his bed and watch him. I’m serious.

She likes to talk about how her perfect little boy was destroyed by the forces of evil. It’s very Freudian, if you ask me.”

He was her child,” Caitlin said. “She loved him.”

‘Oh, Catie.” Her back was turned. He closed his eyes and put his arms around her waist, his forehead on her shoulder. “Marry me. Don’t just move in. Let’s get married. We can adopt a baby. Is that what you want?”

‘Don’t, Frank.” She put the photos on the coffee table.

would, for you,” he said. “Marry me. I’m going crazy without you. Wouldn’t that be nice? To have a child of our own?”

She smoothed her hair down, then knelt to stack the last of the photographs.

Two more of Matthew. Sam Hagen’s kid in the buff, leaning on his hands, looking out a window. Back view, tight ass, every muscle defined. A perfect, nineteen-year-old body.

Frank said, I need an answer.”

She frowned. “It wouldn’t work. Leave me alone, Frank. I want to go home.”