Too Quiet in Brooklyn (35 page)

I hugged my inner child. “I’ll have the butternut tart and the cast iron chicken, and bring them together,” I said and breathed in twice. I felt Denny’s hand on my knee, saving me from the depths.

“The usual,” the waiter said, eyeing me and scribbling on his pad.

“And a side of asparagus.”

Before the waiter left, Denny asked if he’d bring a couple of starters. “Surprise us, whatever you think we’d like.”

“No fish,” Willoughby added.

“And bring us two bottles of Cabernet, a white and a red.”

Willoughby and Denny started talking baseball.

“I say the Yankees sweep the subway series this year,” Willoughby said.

“You’re nuts.”

“Cookie, how was your stay in the hospital?” Jane asked.

“Worse than being in Ralph’s arms.” She changed the subject. “While he was strangling me, I noticed you’d rearranged your books. How come? I liked them the old way. Hit or miss. Shows a mind that’s—”

“Don’t say it,” I said.

“With the Yankee offense?” Willoughby asked. “Their pitching is fantastic. The score will be embarrassing. Poor Mets.”

They weren’t even paying attention to us. I told Cookie I’d called for one of Lucy’s crews to clean the study. “They’ll make it spotless, like a newborn before it makes bad choices.”

“And because you won’t be doing the cleaning, you won’t disturb your mojo. Clever.”

Leave it to Cookie. Some superstitions are worth keeping, thank you very much.

And speaking of rearranged shelves, I remembered something. “Was Ralph the one you saw in the service area?”

Cookie nodded. In her mind, Ralph was over and done with. The case was finished. I wished I wasn’t so clingy.

Denny drank his wine and speared the last asparagus from my plate. He stuck his chin out at Willoughby. “I say they squeak through, but they’re going to take all four. The weight of history is on the side of the Mets this year, all that pent-up motivation. It’s our time.”

Two waiters brought our entrées and all conversation stopped while we let the steam and the rich odors engulf us.

“I could use a good cleaning service,” Jane said and took a bite of her trout, piling the fork with potatoes and turnips dripping with smoked butter. “Does Lucy’s do apartments?” she asked.

I chewed my chicken. “Except for the smell, the study looked really clean when I walked in this evening. The CSU doesn’t clean up after they’re finished, do they?”

“Are you kidding?” Jane rolled her eyes and paid closer attention to her trout. “Can we eat already?”

“Denny must have swiped up the dust.”

Hearing his name, Denny broke up with Willoughby long enough to say through his spaghetti
alle vongole
that he’d never touch the study.

“Who did? I swear I’ve never cleaned it,” I said.

Jane smirked. “Some things are best left unknown.” She cleaned butter from her face.

“I’ll drink to that,” Cookie said, and raised her glass, her hand on her throat.

A perfect segue to Nanette. I told Jane and Cookie about my trip to New Jersey with Lorraine, about Nanette’s battered soul, and how she bonded with Lorraine. “Surprised me like crazy,” I said. “But Lorraine has a way with people.”

Cookie’s eyes slid over to Denny, but he and Willoughby were still into baseball.

“I’m tempted to take a look at Ralph’s birth certificate.”

“Why?”

“Because I have the feeling that she might be Ralph’s mother in a previous life.”

“You’re joking. You’re not one of those mystical witches, are you?”

“No, I mean in an earlier part of her life, before she met Arrowsmith. Say her first husband died and she left maybe, or got amnesia or maybe she was beaten by her husband. Something bad happened.”

“More than something,” Jane said.

“So go ahead, look,” Cookie said. “What would it hurt?”

“And if I don’t look and she does something bad to herself because I didn’t reach out to her …” I looked at Jane.

“You need another case,” she said. “And I’ve got the perfect one for you.”

“You’re crazy,” Willoughby said, wiping pappardelle from his tie. But I’m not sure who he was talking to—Denny, I think, not to me.

“Give me stats, show me where I’m crazy,” Denny said.

I know Denny, he’d never give up, not on the Mets.

“I can’t quote chapter and verse, but I feel it. The way Mariano’s been closing this year. Besides, I got a bet going, a big one. Yankees going to sweep.”

So that was it. I looked at Denny and smiled.

I kissed him on the cheek and whispered, “Where’s my dessert?” Whatever happened, life was good. Better to keep my mouth shut, I wouldn’t want to spoil it.

The waiter brought dessert menus.

“I know what I want—the strawberries over olive oil ice cream.”

Nods around the table except for Cookie who chose the chocolate sundae with dandelions and gooseberries.

“I might even sell the Beretta,” I said. “Mom’s car,” I told Jane by way of explanation.

“That was your mother’s car? Don’t you dare touch it! I’ll call you tomorrow or better yet, give me the keys now. And speaking of a new case, I got the name of someone who needs a good PI. The woman’s hysterical. She can’t find her daughter and she keeps screaming at us that we’re not doing anything.”

“How old is she?”

All talking stopped while the waiter delivered our desserts.

“If you mean the daughter, she’s thirteen,” Jane said through her strawberries. “If you mean the case, we got it late this afternoon. I’ve given her Lucy’s phone number. We work so well together, don’t you think? Feds going to be all over my rear on this one, too, and I’ve got my team on it. I have to go over there after dinner.”

I nodded and asked her for the woman’s address, thinking I might just take a walk later if she hadn’t left a message on Lucy’s answering machine. “But I still want to get into Barbara’s apartment. I have to find out if she recommended Arrowsmith and Ralph to her mother.”

“Forgot about that case,” Jane said.

Denny smiled. “Not Fina. She doesn’t forget.” He whispered to me, “The offer still stands. Got the ring waiting.”

Characters & Places

Fina Fitzgibbons
, twenty-two-year-old private investigator (protagonist)

Carmela Fitzgibbons
, Fina’s mother (deceased)

Fina’s father
, unnamed and estranged

Fina’s Gran
, unnamed and deceased

Denny McDuffy
, her boyfriend, NYPD patrolman

Jane Templeton
, NYPD detective

Willoughby
, Jane’s partner, also NYPD detective

Cookie
, Fina’s lifelong friend and sidekick

Mr. Baggins
, Fina’s cat

Minnie
, office manager at Lucy’s

Mary Ward Simon
, the deceased

Barbara Simon
, her daughter

Frank Alvarez
, her husband (divorced)

Charlie Alvarez
, the abducted, 4-year old grandson of deceased

Ralph
, Handyman & Gardener

Arrow
, aka James S. Arrowsmith, Handyman & Gardener

Nanette Arrowsmith
, his mother

Donald Arrowsmith
, his younger brother attending Rutgers

David Arrowsmith
, his father (deceased)

Winston Connors
, former president of Heights Federal Bank

Marie Connors
, his wife

Ken Connors
, his son

Lorraine McDuffy
, Denny’s mother

Robert McDuffy
, Denny’s father

Ashot Smith
, Mary Ward Simon’s attorney

Tig Able
, FBI agent and Fina’s friend

Molly, lawyer
who helps her mother run a roadside stand in Allentown

Phoebe Daligan, Hector Pool, Stan Eppers
, neighbors

Places

Packer Collegiate
, Fina’s & Cookie’s K thru 12, Brooklyn Heights

Vinegar Hill
, a neighborhood in Brooklyn where Fina & Denny live

Brooklyn Heights
, a neighborhood in Brooklyn where the deceased lived

The Promenade
, Brooklyn Heights overlook

Cobble Hill
, a neighborhood in Brooklyn where Barbara Simon lives

Carroll Gardens
, a neighborhood in Brooklyn where Denny’s parents live

84th Precinct
, Gold Street, Downtown Brooklyn

Lucy’s Cleaning Service
, Fina’s fictional cleaning establishment in Brooklyn Heights

Heights Federal
, fictional defunct bank where Fina’s mother was a vice president

Smith, Jarvis & O’Leary
, Fictional Law Firm on Court Street, Brooklyn

Faramond, Whitlock, Walker & Quentin
, Fictional Law Firm, Wall Street area, New York

St. John The Baptist Church
, Allentown, NJ

La Piazza
, a restaurant in Allentown, NJ

Woodies
, a cafe in Allentown, NJ

A Roadside Stand
near Allentown, NJ

Allentown Auto Body
, Allentown, NJ

Alf’s Auto & Towing
, fictitious body shop in Allentown, NJ

Blue Eagle Farm
, fictitious horse farm near Cream Ridge, NJ

Henry’s End
, a restaurant in Brooklyn Heights

Vinegar Hill House
, a restaurant in Vinegar Hill

Teresa’s
, a coffee shop in Brooklyn Heights

Clark Street Station
, a subway station in Brooklyn Heights

About the Author

Susan Russo Anderson is a writer, a mother, a widow, a graduate of Marquette University, a member of Sisters In Crime, a member of the Historical Novel Society. She has taught language arts and creative writing, worked for a publisher, an airline, an opera company. Like Faulkner’s Dilsey, she’s seen the best and the worst, the first and the last. Through it all, and to understand it somewhat, she writes.

Dear Reader,

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Too Quiet In Brooklyn
! I realize there are hundreds of thousands of books available for you to choose from, and since I’m a relatively unknown author, I’m especially honored that you chose to read one of mine.

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Susan Russo Anderson

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susanrussoanderson.com