Some Like It Hot-Buttered (9 page)

“Sorry.” I shook his hand. “I wasn’t aware there were national security issues at stake.”

“You’d be amazed what a chief can’t share,” he said. “In some ways, even the uniformed officers have more freedom to talk than I do. Now, if you don’t mind, I have to meet with the mayor about keeping my job when he is replaced by someone hopefully a little less obvious in his corruption.”

We nodded at each other, and I walked out, more confused than I was when I walked in. The very definition of municipal government.

Luckily, when I closed Dutton’s office door, I walked almost directly into Officer Leslie Levant, who was making her way toward me, having spotted me first.

“Elliot,” she said, “did the chief call you about Anthony already?”

“Actually, I was here to see . . .” I almost said, “I was here to see
you
,” but instead I finished the sentence with, “if there was any way for me to help Anthony out.” Okay, I’m a coward. Now you know.

“It doesn’t look good right now,” she answered. “When they find him, I bet he’ll be charged, and piracy can be a federal rap if they prove he sold any outside the state.”

Well, if officers could be more open than the chief . . . “What changed between this morning and now?” I asked.

“All they have are some boxes of DVDs in the basement.”

Leslie looked confused. “Didn’t the chief tell you?”

“Tell me
what
?”

She pulled me to one side of the corridor to stand closer, a move to which I did not object strenuously. There are some forms of police brutality that are not entirely offensive.

Leslie spoke very quietly, but with urgency, especially since Dutton chose that moment to walk out of his office. Luckily, he didn’t look in our direction as he walked down the corridor away from us. “What’s changed is that the search warrant for Anthony’s apartment came through this afternoon.”

“And?”

“And when they searched the place, they found duplication equipment and empty jewel cases. Not to mention DVDs of four more titles: all the new movies that you’ve shown in your theatre for the past month.”

9

Leslie walked me outside, clearly concerned that the top of my head might blow off or that I might actually give myself a stroke through sheer will.

“It doesn’t make sense! I don’t believe that kid would do all this. He never talked about money; he wasn’t the type to rail against the system. He wanted to make his own movies, not copy someone else’s illegally.”

“You can’t argue with the evidence,” Leslie said in her best police officer voice. “What doesn’t make sense is that he’d have all that stuff in his apartment and all those copies in the theatre and
not
be pirating copies. You can’t explain it any other way.”

“Not yet, I can’t. But give me a little more time—”

We both stood and stared for a long moment. Chained to a rack outside the local police station, a few yards from uniformed and gun-toting people sworn to uphold the laws of the state of New Jersey, was my sole mode of transportation. My bicycle.

Missing its front wheel.

“That’s . . . that’s . . .” I said. Sure,
now
I’d be able to think of something witty to say, but at the time, that was the best I could do.

“Is that yours?” Leslie asked. “Where’s the front wheel?”

“That’s . . . that’s . . .”

“Did you leave it out here so you wouldn’t look like a dork carrying it around in a police station? That’s so cute.”

Not as cute as it might have been.

Although I wanted to file an incident report, Leslie convinced me that finding one bicycle wheel might be a little unlikely, even for as crack an outfit as the Midland Heights Police Department, and besides, I had no way to identify the wheel. She offered, since it was the end of her shift, to drive me home in her personal car, a brand-new Toyota that she kept impeccably clean, which I considered evidence of an unbalanced mind. Without its front wheel, the remaining part of my bike just fit in the trunk, which was lucky, as Leslie informed me in no uncertain terms that she wasn’t “about to put that greasy thing on my brand-new seats.”

We didn’t talk much during the ride. I was overwhelmed, I’ll admit, by the whole day—I’d started out with a vague feeling that the Ansella thing would get worse (although not for Mr. Ansella, who had it about as bad as it gets), and it had. I’d gotten myself into a funk by comparing my life to that of a man so well loved someone had poisoned his popcorn, and then my most trusted employee (which, admittedly, wasn’t a hard-won title) seemed to be getting deeper and deeper into trouble over a crime that, on top of all the other implications, could ruin my relationship with film distributors and put my fledgling business into more jeopardy.

And now I had a unicycle where this morning I had a fully functioning mode of transportation. I do not ride unicycles. Clearly, things were on a downward spiral.

Leslie parked the car in front of my (very, very green) front door, and got out of the car as I removed the carcass of my bicycle from her trunk.

“I really don’t need help, you know,” I said.

For a split second she looked like I’d punched her, but that expression was immediately replaced with a smile. “Of course not,” she answered. “I didn’t think so.”

She followed me as I carried the bike up and we stood on the stoop, looking at each other like two junior high kids doing their best to maintain eye contact when there were so many more interesting places to look. I heard myself exhale.

“You don’t have to see me inside the town house,” I continued. “I realize you’re a police officer and everything, but I’ve been making it into my house unchaperoned for some time now.”

“You sure? You don’t need me to look in the bedroom closet for monsters?” There was a shy smile attempting to make itself known on her lips.

“Are you flirting with me?” I decided I’d ask. Best to get these things out in the open.

“No,” Leslie replied immediately. Oops. I’d overstepped.

“Oh. Um, sorry . . .”

“I’m not flirting with you.
You’re
flirting with
me
.” And she grinned. “I don’t mind.”

More awkward silence. I should point out that this is my normal approach to romance, which makes it all the more remarkable that I’ve ever been on a date, let alone been married for six years. Until eighteen months ago. But I’m not bitter.

“Well.” Smooth, huh? “Then you won’t mind if I keep flirting.” I had no idea what I was talking about.

“I might even flirt back,” Leslie said. I began to wonder how I’d know when she did, but that was something to think about another time.

Believe me, Leslie Levant was an attractive woman. Hell, I was willing to bet that without the baton, the walkie-talkie, and, let’s face it, the gun, she was a beautiful woman. But I was so far out of practice it was hard to remember what I was supposed to do. Marriage does many things to a man, one of which is to screw up his dating techniques. Mine had never been in the top 70 percent to begin with.

Before my brain started to ponder whether she just liked me, or
liked
me liked me, I plunged in. “Would you like to have dinner?” I said. I would have asked her to a movie, but my theatre was closed.

Her face lit up, which was what I had hoped for, but really hadn’t expected. “I’m really not dressed for it, but I’d love to,” Leslie said.

I hadn’t actually meant
now
, but what the hell.

As it turned out, my refrigerator held exactly one onion, a pint of half-and-half of dubious freshness, two packages of AA batteries, and a six-pack of Rolling Rock (the freezer had two empty ice cube trays and a quart of Edy’s ice cream). So we decided to go to the Harvest Moon Brewery, a microbrewery and restaurant on George Street, which was within walking distance of my town house.

Leslie cut quite the figure in her Midland Heights cop outfit, but I don’t think that’s why so many of the men in the room were watching her so closely. I started to realize exactly how unlikely it was for me to be sitting with this woman in this place on this night.

My dating history would indicate that this would be where I’d find a way to screw up the situation, so I forged ahead.

“So. Who are you, anyway?” I asked. You have to learn to ease into a sensitive topic if you want to get anywhere with women. Naturally, I had no expectation of getting anywhere with Leslie, and wasn’t sure whether I was ready for her anyway. I figured my first date after the divorce should be with someone I found only mildly attractive, so when it didn’t work out, I wouldn’t be devastated. I was operating here without a safety net.

“Why, aren’t I who I think I am?”

Clearly, I was doing well. “I really don’t know anything about you. That’s what I meant.”

Leslie looked blank. “Do you ask out every woman you don’t know anything about? That must be very time-consuming. ”

“I mean, I know your name, and that you’re divorced, and that you’re a police officer.”

“Well, that’s not nothing, is it? All I know about you is that you own a movie theatre, half a bicycle, and a smooth line with the ladies.”

I ignored that last part, since I felt that emphasizing my shortcomings would not create a strategic advantage. “So what happened to your marriage?” I asked.

“He was transferred to Salt Lake City and I didn’t want to go. We were already drifting apart. I was a cop, and he wasn’t crazy about that. I wanted to take some night courses at Rutgers, and he was pissed that I’d be spending even more time away from him. Not to mention, I can’t cook.”

“Neither can I.”

“Well, you choose a fine microbrewery,” she said. “So what about you? You were married. What happened to that?”

“How did you know that?”

“We ran a check on you. Your records indicated a divorce. ”

I scowled. “What, Big Brother doesn’t know why my wife left me?”

“Don’t get mad. You weren’t a suspect. You didn’t hand Ansella the popcorn, and as far as anyone knows, you never even met him, so you had no motive. The DVDs are a problem, but you’re not the one who disappeared as soon as they were discovered. There’s no indication you were making a dime from that operation. You don’t own duplicating equipment.”

“It’s nice to know I wasn’t a suspect,” I said.

“We have to check on everybody.”

I had downed two beers (and one earlier today), which is two more than I typically drink, and it was having the usual effect on me: I stifled a burp. “Since you asked,” I said, “my wife is a doctor, and I wasn’t. She decided she wanted to be married to someone who could share her whole life, and not just the personal part.”

“Divorce sucks, doesn’t it?”

I thought about that. “It has its upside. If I were still married, you wouldn’t be here with me.”

“Maybe I would,” she said.

I shook my head. “No, you wouldn’t. I didn’t cheat on her.”

“Another difference between you and my ex,” she said.

“Is there any chance Anthony isn’t involved in this piracy thing?” I asked.

She shot her eyes around the room, as if looking for the direction in which the conversation had gone. A lot of blondes are in the blue-eyed family, but Leslie’s were closer to green. “Nice segue, there, Elliot.” She thought for a moment. “I don’t know. We’re not supposed to say that someone’s guilty until they’re convicted, but . . .”

“It’s all circumstantial.”

“Sometimes circumstances lead you to the truth,” she said.

I didn’t like the way the conversation was going. I switched gears again. “So, what kind of first date am I?” I asked.

She grinned. “I’ve had worse.”

10

The memorial service for Vincent Ansella had a few surprises attached to it. First of all, the guest of honor was indeed present, so the medical examiner must have released the body just in time.

Given the circumstances, the mood at the service was not as somber as one might expect: Ansella’s mother, eschewing the traditional widow’s weeds some Italian-American ladies of a “certain age” might favor at such a hideous occasion, wore a well-tailored black suit and carried a white handkerchief she rarely seemed to need; and Ansella’s wife, Amy, didn’t weep at all throughout the service, although she didn’t look thrilled to be there, either.

It was also a little surprising that Amy had been Vincent Ansella’s wife. She was small and slim, and strikingly beautiful, not the kind of woman you’d have expected to be married to a rather ordinary-looking insurance man. Then again, you wouldn’t have expected to find me sharing a beer sampler with a Midland Heights cop last night, so what you’d expect isn’t always relevant.

In the end, I’d chickened out, and hadn’t even kissed Leslie. She didn’t seem offended or disappointed, which was a little worrisome, but we had made vague references to what we would do “next time.” I had stuck a toe in the dating pond, and it hadn’t been bitten off by a crocodile. That’s the Elliot Freed version of “progress.”

I wasn’t surprised to see Marcy Resnick in attendance at the service, along with a group of people whom I assumed were from Ansella’s office. We didn’t have time to talk before the service began, as I arrived late, but we smiled and nodded at each other from across the room.

It was also a small surprise that Ansella’s service was held in the funeral home, and not a church, but I attribute that to my own preconceived notions. There would be no mass, no priest, no obvious religion of any sort. People who wanted to speak were encouraged to do so, but aside from a brief announcement by the funeral director, there was no one who seemed to be in charge of running the show.

Perhaps the biggest surprise was that I was in attendance at all, seeing as how I’d never met the man. I’d had to stand out on Edison Avenue in a jacket and tie to catch the bus, and had arrived just in time. But there was an eerie connection between Ansella and me, and in some twisted way, I felt that this would be as close to attending my own funeral as I could ever come while really being able to enjoy it. So to speak.