Trap (9781476793177) (16 page)

Dirty Warren peered up at him through his thick, smudged glasses with his weak blue eyes. “Hey got one for you . . . whoop?”

Karp sighed and shook his head. He and Bennett had been playing a movie trivia game for years and the little man had yet to stump him. “I don't know if I'm in the mood, Warren.”

“Yeah, well, this one . . . son of a bitch whoop whoop fuck me . . . won't take long, it's about a reporter who gets it wrong and . . . oh boy ohhhh boy . . . an innocent man goes to prison for murder.”

Karp furrowed his brow. Sometimes Dirty Warren seemed to know more about what went on in his office than some of his assistant district attorneys. “You wouldn't be talking about
Stranger on the Third Floor
, circa 1940. Peter Lorre's the killer, and John McGuire is the reporter who testifies against the wrong man, Elisha Cook Jr., and gets him sent to prison.” He smiled. “You trying to tell me something, Warren?”

The news vendor grinned. “Nah, I ain't the one with the . . . fuck this oh boy tits . . . law degree. But sometimes the obvious guy . . . whoop whoop . . . ain't the guilty guy, am I right?”

Karp had looked sideways at him. “You sure you aren't a Harvard Law grad?”

“Nah, why would I . . . fuck you whoop oh boy asswipe whoop whoop . . . want to waste my money at Harvard?”

“Good point,” Karp had said, and he had left the news vendor laughing and cursing.

The morning had been consumed by the usual activities of the district attorney of New York County, which encompassed the island of Manhattan, and meant dealing with some four hundred homicides, fifteen hundred rapes, seventeen thousand robberies, twenty thousand felony assaults, sixteen thousand burglaries, and forty thousand grand larceny cases every year. And that didn't include many times that number of misdemeanors. Under his supervision were six trial bureaus and a number of specialized bureaus encompassing rackets, frauds, appeals, and homicide, all with their bureau chiefs, assistant chiefs, and some five hundred assistant district attorneys, plus their support staff.

During the lunch break, Karp decided to head uptown to see how Moishe and Goldie Sobelman were holding up at Il Buon Pane. He found Moishe inside sweeping up glass as workmen installed plywood to cover up the shattered window spaces. He noted blood on some of the glass in the pile his friend had created.

Moishe stopped his sweeping and leaned on his broom. He looked at the pile of glass. “It seems that we Jews are always sweeping up glass and wiping up blood,” he said quietly. “And then burying our dead.”

The old man's head had dipped and his shoulders began to shake. Karp realized he was crying and walked over to put a hand on his shoulder. “I'm so tired of this, Butch, sometimes I just want to give up, quit fighting.”

Karp patted him on the back. “I know you're tired. You've had to put up with broken glass and blood far more than most can even imagine. But if you give up, they win, and you can't allow that, not after everything you've been through. Rose wouldn't want that.”

“Now you sound like my wife,” Moishe said with a small chuckle as he wiped at his eyes. “And she says she is only mimicking what the man she married told her.”

“A wise woman, that Goldie.”

“
Yes,
” Moishe replied. He shook his head. “I just can't believe that Rose is gone. I've known her for most of my adult life. I always knew that her past as one of the lost children haunted her. Now, just as she was purging herself of the guilt with her book, this happens. It seems so unfair.”

“How's Simon?”

“Devastated, of course. He told me at the hospital that Rose had a premonition yesterday that something bad was going to happen. Now he blames himself for not protecting her.”

“Obviously there's nothing he could have done,” Karp said. “You can't act on premonitions. But when you see him, tell him we're going to do everything we can to get the person, or persons, who did this.”

“Do you think it was that Nazi son of a bitch?”

Karp had hesitated, not sure how to answer, still mulling his conversation with Forsling and questions that had been boiling around in his head all morning. “He's a suspect,” he replied after a moment, “but there may be other suspects as well. I can't talk about it right now because you may be called as a witness at a future trial.”

Moishe had, of course, understood, and Karp had gone back to work after checking in on Goldie who was upstairs, quietly mourning her murdered friend. The afternoon was getting late when Fulton dropped by to update him on the Lubinsky murder investigation.

“I just got off the phone with the bomb squad guys,” he said. “It was a fairly sophisticated device triggered by a cell phone call that set it off.”

“Military?”

Fulton shrugged. “Maybe. But while it was not your run-of-the-mill Molotov cocktail, anyone with a computer who knows how to find such things could have put it together. No, the tough part was the bomb material: C-4 plastic explosive. Not easy stuff to get, though not impossible either. It was in a small container—probably no bigger than four inches by six inches—and attached to the gas tank.”

“Any way of telling how long it had been there?”

Fulton shook his head. “Not really. The container had strong magnets—one was still attached to a piece of the tank—and it could have been placed earlier in the day, or when it was parked outside the bakery.”

Karp sat for a moment tapping a pencil on a yellow legal pad he'd been making notes on all day. He furrowed his brow as he looked at the list of items on the pad, including what his lead investigator had just told him.

“All right, boss, what gives?” Fulton asked, and settled into the leather chair across the desk from Karp.

Looking up at his longtime friend and colleague, Karp tapped the pad one more time. “A friend reminded me this morning that the obvious suspect isn't necessarily the best one,” he said. “Forsling's a racist son of a bitch, but something tells me he's the wrong guy for this.”

“Not disagreeing, but why do you say that?”

“Well, for one thing, he was in custody and didn't have his cell phone when the bomb went off.”

The big detective shrugged again. “Could have been one of his pals,” he said. “He was arrested walking down the street where the car was parked. It wouldn't have taken but a few seconds for him to reach down and slap the bomb up under the gas tank.”

“Why take a chance on doing it there?” Karp countered. “Take a chance on getting caught?”

“These guys aren't rocket scientists. Besides, they like getting in the news; it's all about the publicity and their egos.”

“Maybe most of them aren't the brightest bulbs,” Karp said. “But Forsling isn't stupid, and I don't think he was looking for publicity or he'd have taken credit. He doesn't have much of a record either. A few disorderly conducts, a vandalism-criminal mischief misdemeanor from November. It's quite a jump from there to planting a ‘somewhat sophisticated' bomb that kills three people.”

“They all get started somewhere.”

Karp looked back down at his pad. “Yeah, maybe,” he said. “I know some bombers like to stick around and watch. They enjoy seeing the suffering and fear. But they usually blend in with the crowd and don't draw attention to themselves. Not like some guy with Nazi facial tattoos, wearing a swastika armband, and leading a noisy group of protesters. He might as well have rented a spotlight and stood under it. Something just doesn't add up.”

Fulton nodded. “Again, I'm not disagreeing, but we're running it to the ground either way. In fact, Guma was on his way to check out some bar over in Hell's Kitchen that's a hangout for the white supremacist crowd, see if anybody there has anything to say or knows Forsling.”

“Not likely to talk much,” Karp noted.

“No, but part of crossing T's and dotting I's,” Fulton replied. “Might help us eliminate him. Or maybe turn up somebody who would blow up a car and kill three women. So you got anybody else in mind?”

“What about the guy Forsling told us about?”

“The dude with the skin condition and red shoes,” Fulton said. “There was nothing on the dash cams of the police cruisers, but Guma was going to check in with some woman he knows at one of the television stations that was there and see if they'll cooperate. He was going to go to the bar after that.”

“You saw the guy?”

“Yeah, I saw somebody who fit the description,” Fulton acknowledged. “But maybe Forsling picked him out of the crowd and tossed him out there like a red-shoed herring. No one saw him over by the car, except Forsling . . . allegedly. Besides, what's his motivation?”

Karp drew a line around a series of words on his pad. “Nazis weren't the only people who weren't fond of Rose,” he said.

Fulton raised an eyebrow. “The charter school bill? The union? That's pretty drastic politics.”

“Agreed,” Karp said. “But tempers are pretty hot about the topic right now.”

“So some union teacher with a mental problem goes off the deep end.”

“Maybe. Or maybe, like the bomb, it's more sophisticated than that.”

“The union brass?” Fulton whistled. “That would take some brass. Blowing up the opposition to defeat a bill. Why not just pay a few politicians?”

Before Karp could answer, his intercom buzzed. Darla Milquetost, sounding only slightly annoyed, announced, “There's a Detective Parker here who says he needs to speak to Mr. Fulton.”

Fulton got up from the chair. “Parker's one of the guys assigned to this case,” he said, walking across the room and opening the door. A young man appeared on the other side and said something to Fulton, who cast a worried look back over his shoulder at Karp. “Let's find out where he went,” Fulton said, and then shut the door.

Karp could tell by the look on his big brown craggy face that the news wasn't good. “There was a fire early this morning up in East Harlem. One fatality.”

“And?”

“The deceased was one Ms. Greta Forsling.”

“The mother,” Karp said, a feeling of disquiet growing in the pit of his stomach.

“Yeah,” Fulton replied. “Apparently, Lars Forsling showed up this afternoon after the fire was out and the victim's body had been removed. He spoke to a fire department captain, Bo Loselle—good guy, I've known him almost as long as I've known you. Apparently, Lars thinks we had something to do with the fire.”

“Us?”

“Yeah, mentioned you by name and your nigger cop sidekick, me,” Fulton said. “Said he was going to get even.”

“We know where he went?”

“Nope. He took off before Loselle could do anything about it.”

Again whatever Karp was about to say was interrupted by the intercom buzzer and Darla Milquetost announcing that Marlene was on the telephone line again. “Butch, I'm going to head over to Il Buon Pane to pick up the boys. Anything new on the case?”

He quickly told Marlene about Forsling and the threats. “I don't know what this guy's going to do. I've got some more work to do, and I'm waiting to hear from Guma, who is trying to find some of Forsling's associates.”

“Good to know,” Marlene answered. “I just spoke to Alejandro. He's planning to stop by your office with another guy named Micah Gallo, who works for the teachers union but used to be one of Rose's favorites. 'Jandro wouldn't say much on the phone and doesn't trust cops—as we know—but says you'll be interested in what they have to say. So am I, so take good notes.”

Hanging up with his wife, Karp looked over at Fulton, who said, “Think I'll go make a few calls and see if we can't find Forsling before he does something stupid. And I better get in touch with Guma and tell him to keep an eye out in case our favorite Nazi decides to drown his sorrows at that bar.”

“S
O WHAT DID YOU WANT
to see me about?”

District Attorney Olivia Stone sat back in her chair and waited for Tommy Monroe to tell her why he'd called in a panic, saying they needed to talk “immediately.” She'd never liked him much, found him to be crude and unattractive, with a bad habit of fixating on her cleavage when they talked. Early on in their relationship, when she was an underpaid Legal Aid attorney trying to get a cushy job with the union, she'd used her physical assets to her advantage. But after she got the position, and established herself as more valuable in their mutual quest for power and money, she'd made it clear that he needed to keep his hands and eyes to himself.

A few months after she was hired, they'd gone on a trip to Las Vegas for a convention of teachers unions, and after buying her numerous drinks had tried putting the moves on her. That's when she'd spelled it out. “It's not part of the deal.” She'd expected him to respond with anger, but instead he'd laughed and said, “That's okay, sweet cheeks, I can get sex anytime; finding a smart, crooked lawyer is a little tougher.”

Every once in a while he'd say something to let her know that he was still entertaining amorous thoughts. But as district attorney, she'd been even more unambiguous that the power dynamic had changed; she was the power now.

Yet, it wasn't just his oafish leers or suggestive remarks that formed her low opinion of him. While he could be clever in his dishonesty, and certainly knew how to wield power to achieve their shared goals, the years of being the top dog of a politically powerful organization had made him arrogant and careless. As she continued to set her aspirations at ever higher levels, such as a seat on the federal bench, or even governor, she'd worried that he was becoming a liability. However, she still needed the backing of his union, and so for the time being their fates were tied together.