“In L.A., of course. You’re Matt’s sister,” Danny said kindly.
“Right. Have you heard any news from him?”
This brought Danny up short. Why would Claire be asking him such a question? Wasn’t Matt staying at her house?
To be honest, the last thing Danny McGuire wanted to think about right then was Matt Daley. After stumbling across Lyle Renalto’s picture—Frankie Mancini’s picture—in the Beeches’ yearbook earlier that day, he had hunted down Carole Bingham in high excitement. The director had introduced him to Marian Waites, one of the facility’s catering staff and the only individual still on payroll who had been around in Mancini’s day.
Danny hadn’t expected much from Mrs. Waites, but it turned out the old lady had an encyclopedic memory, and was able to point out another face from the yearbook, a face that belonged to someone who had known Mancini well. “Thick as thieves, they were, those two.” His name was Victor Dublenko. A quick call to the NYPD revealed that they knew Dublenko well, as a pimp and occasional dealer, still alive, currently out of jail and living in Queens, not six blocks from the Beeches, where Danny was standing at that very moment. Danny had been about to head off to Dublenko’s apartment when Claire called.
Reluctantly, he turned his attention back to Matt Daley. “No. I haven’t heard a word from him since I saw him at your place. He’s not there with you?”
“If he were here with me, I wouldn’t be calling, would I?” snapped Claire. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to take it out on you. But I’m worried about him. He left me a voice mail last night that literally made no sense.”
“Did he say where he was?”
“Yeah. He’s in Italy.”
“Italy?”
“Uh-huh. The Amalfi coast. He said he had some lead about the man who may have abducted Lisa. To be frank with you, I’m surprised he had the money for a plane ticket. God knows how he’s surviving out there.”
Danny’s heart sank. Matt had sworn to him that he’d let it go, that he wouldn’t go chasing down this maniac on his own. Now that the powers that be at Interpol had officially sanctioned Operation Azrael, the last thing Danny needed was a mentally unstable Matt Daley crashing through his case like a bull elephant, interfering with potential witnesses and, for all he knew, withholding key evidence. He’d made no mention of an Italian “lead” when he and Danny met.
“Did he say anything else?”
“He said a lot of things, but like I said, he was rambling. He said Lisa’s lover wasn’t her lover. He was gay. He said that she knew him before she knew Miles, which for some reason he thought was important, but that he ‘couldn’t be Azrael,’ that you and the other officers were on the wrong track. Who the hell is Azrael?”
“No one,” said Danny. “It’s a code name. Don’t worry about it.”
He too was worried about Matt, personally as well as professionally. “I appreciate your calling me,” he told Claire. “I’m on my way to an important meeting right now, but afterward I’ll try to contact your brother again. In the meantime, if you hear anything else, anything at all…”
“I’ll let you know. He’s not…he’s not in any danger, is he?”
Danny could hear the anxiety in her voice.
“No,” he lied. “I don’t think so. I’ll put a call in to the local police in Amalfi, just in case. Ask them to keep an eye out for him.”
The conversation with Claire Michaels was bothering him. Had Matt Daley really gotten a useful lead on Lisa’s lover? Without talking to him, it was impossible to figure out how much of what he’d told his sister was real, and how much a figment of his fevered, anxiety-racked imagination. By the time Danny reached Dublenko’s apartment, his train of thought was hopelessly muddled.
Lyle Renalto. Frankie Mancini. What connection could the boy in the yearbook photograph possibly have to Italy and Lisa Baring? Why was Danny even here?
Five minutes later Victor Dublenko appeared to be asking himself the same question, glaring at Danny from his grimy, vinyl La-Z-Boy recliner.
“I got nothing to say.”
Dublenko’s living room was disgusting, a fetid dump littered with stained cushions, needles, dead marijuana plants and half-eaten plates of food. Down the hallway, the two bedrooms were cleaner. Clients expected a certain standard of hygiene, and Victor Dublenko made sure he provided it. Bedrooms were for business. But for himself, Victor was quite happy to live in shit.
“I don’t like cops.”
Danny McGuire shrugged amiably. “I don’t like pimps. But hey, what
are you gonna do? We’re each an occupational hazard of the other.”
Victor Dublenko laughed, a phlegmy, guttural sound that quickly morphed into a hacking cough. Pulling a handkerchief out of his pocket, he spat something vile into it and stuffed it back into the pocket.
“So we don’t like each other. But we can still do business, right? You pay, I talk.”
Just then a very young, very skinny girl in shorts and a vest wandered into the room looking disoriented. Victor Dublenko snarled at her and she scurried out like a frightened beetle. Poor kid, thought Danny. She couldn’t have been more than fifteen. Scum like Dublenko made him want to puke. But he reminded himself why he was here, how many lives might depend on Dublenko’s information, and bit his tongue. Pulling a wad of fifties out of his jacket pocket, he licked his fingers and made a show of counting them before carefully putting them back.