In the Shadows, page 2
“I’ll call Martin. Dad would want both his sons there. He’ll go directly to the hospital – I’ll get the purse and car. I’ll use Uber.”
“What if your father …” Pamela could not utter the worst possibility.
“Then we’ll both drive to the hospital and get the other stuff later. Just wait, Mom.”
Pamela sat down and went quiet. She saw the evening in fast jerky motions, like in silent films. Pamela hated hospital waiting rooms where tired, worried people sat for hours, fragile and alone, thinking the worst, reminded of their mortality. A simmering anger rose and drained what color was left in her cheeks. It began with the catfish and found its source in Richard. He should have retired three years ago. She wrapped her arms around her chest and dropped her head. If Richard survives, he’s not ever, not ever going back to work. She looked down at her yellow dress, smudged and crumpled.
Your detectives can hold down the fort for one weekend shift.
Chapter Two
[9:40 p.m.]
Montreal
Dylan Kane and Matthew Allen sat together on red stools in the legendary Montreal Pool Room behind the front window, people watching. Soon after, Dylan with rapt attention listened to Matthew’s glacier story, head in his hand, never interrupting, while he picked at his hot dog steamé and fries. They were an odd couple that night. Matthew usually dressed down, and was pushing fifty. Dylan appeared younger than thirty, lean as a teenager. He wore tight black slacks, black sneakers with silver zippers on the side, topped by a luxury casual slim-fit shirt with epaulettes that gave it a military look. Dylan had a classic beauty that immediately prompted assumptions that he was gay. In fact, he was. Matthew was straight, a rock and glacier climber, a fearless adventurer, photographer and all-round idiosyncratic individual. Dylan had found a friend, a guy who wanted nothing from him and taught him about a different kind of life. Dylan learned to listen. He was in a bad place when he turned up at Café Cleo four months ago. His life had been on a downturn. His relationship had fallen apart. He wasn’t looking for a hookup – he needed a refuge, and time to regroup. Matthew’s hair-gripping stories, told with such detail, kept Dylan wide-eyed and far away from himself.
“Once I was doing an ice climb with my partner. We call it a mind-bender, about three hundred feet from the ground.”
Dylan’s mouth opened in awe.
“My friend had tied us to two massive icicles in a hanging belay, an anchor hook. I had to shift around a bit because my left leg was going numb. One of the icicles shattered. There’s no time for nerves. With adrenaline pumping, I swung over to the remaining icicle that looked no more solid than the one that had just disintegrated. I didn’t look down, and steadied my body. Fate was with us, and we got out of that one. Remember the ice axe that saved me when that ice bridge broke? I’d wandered off course in the storm and onto an ice bridge over a crevasse. When the bridge collapsed under me, I managed to lodge my ice axe into the far edge, which I clung to as I reached over and dug myself a hold in the snow. Laymen can’t understand that high – the euphoria – you have to take those risks to feel it. You’re on the edge, in the seconds between life and death. Ordinary life can’t compare.”
Dylan’s awe bent into a why. “Do you have a death wish?”
“No, that’s adventure. I don’t scare like most friends I know. I have a high tolerance to pain. Once when I had surgery, the anesthesiologist had a hell of a time putting me out. Other days, like now, here I am eating a classic Montreal Pool Room hot dog. What’s with you tonight? You bought the dogs for us. Looks like you found some cash.” Matthew noticed the clothes. “You’re what – up for a night as well?”
“Got’em on eBay. I kinda knew where I could find a few bucks. After Cleo’s performance tonight, I just might have a second chance.”
“Going back to an ex?”
“Maybe. But no more questions. You’ve really lived, Matthew.”
“And you haven’t?”
“No comparison. Gotta protect this face and body – it’s what pays for me. I can’t afford your kind of adventures.”
“Really? That’s not a life. I see other guys at Cleo’s like you, going nowhere.”
Dylan’s eyes hardened. “I’m not those other guys. I like older men, or maybe it’s that they like me, and they take care of me. Gut honest – work has never appealed to me. Yeah, it’s been quiet for the past two weeks, but if I play the game right tonight, I’m back.”
“You’re wasting your life, Dylan!”
“I’ll have to buckle down at some point, but as long as this body works for me, I’m hanging on to that icicle. It’s a different kind of high.”
“Not funny. You staying for the show tonight?”
“Yeah, yeah, late date. If things work out, I might text you. I will.” Dylan looked hopeful, camouflaging a hint of desperation.
Dylan and Matthew left the Montreal Pool Room and crossed the street to the Café and took in the performance in silence. The music was so loud you had to shout to be heard. Matthew took photos and videos of the acts for his blog. He had a ringside table that he shared with Dylan and two photographers. That night after their dogs and talk, Dylan sat lost, planning his own performance.
Café Cleopatra, in the center of what was once Montreal’s red-light district, is one hundred and five years old, an institution situated on St-Laurent Boulevard below Ste-Catherine Street, known as the Lower Main, an entertainment landmark since the founding of Montreal. Developers wanted to tear down the building to ‘revitalize’ the area. Cleo put her foot down and boasted that she had been vitalizing the area for ten decades. Her clientele was francophones, anglophones, nationalities from all backgrounds, celebrities and the artistic crowd. People in the ‘know’ had been to the Café. Cleo’s wasn’t simply an aged strip joint. Still today, it produced reborn burlesque – festivals and burlesque shows of years gone by. The Café belonged on the Lower Main, and the city ultimately agreed. The owner fought the developers, campaigned against them and won.
A little after midnight the performers at Café Cleopatra, the stage kittens, makeup, sound technicians and the show’s director surged onto the stage in a boisterous after-party for “The 30s Show” they had just concluded. The enthusiastic audience, some with face paint, one hundred and forty strong, six photographers, the doorman, and the candy box girl, all rushed to the edges of the stage to join the revelry. Music thumped, costume bits flew, cards littered the floor, and cameras flashed in the crowd. The commingling was virtually tribal in rhythm. At Cleo’s, the Candyass Cabaret presented a show on the third Friday of every month. The audience who came back month after month, and the performers, were ferociously loyal. The nominal cachet the troupe received was not a factor – the performers worked for their love of expression, and perhaps for escape from the tedium of their lives.
No one noticed that Dylan had slipped away, or saw him climb the side stairs toward the dressing rooms. The performers were partying and had come down another staircase that opened onto the stage. Dylan reached the second floor and hurried into the dressing room on his right against the back wall. The closed doors to the roof were on the left side of the room. The person he was waiting for hadn’t come. Well, maybe he wanted Dylan to wait for him. Dylan checked himself in a mirror. The inner door wasn’t locked. He turned the door handle and gently opened it. He’d be barred from Cleo’s if he was caught on the second floor, off limits to everyone but the performers. Matthew himself would have to answer to Velma for bringing him up to meet the actors in the first place. Dylan listened to the celebratory noise downstairs. It would smother the grinding sounds of the iron bar latches on the heavy steel safety door leading to the roof. He pulled the first bar back then, slowly, the second. He looked back into the dressing room, still hoping to see his friend appear. He’d forgotten to close the inside door and he ran back and pushed it shut.
When he was on the roof, he leaned in and carefully lifted and forced the steel door closed. The latched door could only be locked from the inside. They could easily sneak back into the dressing room and slip down the stairs without being noticed. The party usually went on till two in the morning. Dylan turned his attention to the roof. Even with the city lights, it was dark, but he could see the lazy graffiti on the walls and the rotting wood piled by the side wall, debris that must have been there for years. He walked over to a padlocked, spiked iron fence, a fire exit that overlooked a side street. No one was on the metal fire stairs, but they had been pulled down. He felt a twitch that he was alone in the darkness. His spirits fell. But that changed.
“I’m over here, Dylan.”
Dylan walked around a second inner wall on the roof and smiled. “How the hell? Ah, the fire escape on the other side of the fence, right?” Dylan saw what he thought was an umbrella. “You used that to hook the bottom stairs and pull them down to the ground. You scoped the fire escape then. Cool!” Why hadn’t he taken the stairs to the right of the stage as they had planned? Dylan felt a shiver of unease, but he had to discard it. He couldn’t risk questioning. He needed the night to work out.
“It’s more private back here. No one can see us.”
“You’re right. I’m glad you came. I thought maybe you wouldn’t. Wow! You’re in a hurry.” Dylan turned to the wall and began to fumble with his pants.
“I swore I was finished with you, but it gets lonely.” He was breathless and eager. “We’re here now. That’s all that matters.”
Dylan relaxed, absorbing the whispers, the impatient need of him and the warmth and strength from the arm that went around his neck. He slapped both hands against the wall, waiting, but they collapsed with him when his windpipe snapped. He thrashed about for a few seconds, all in vain. Dylan died so quickly, he never had the chance to be surprised.
Chapter Three
[2:31 a.m.]
Laval
Carmen DiMaggio was still on the service road of Highway 440 when she realized her mistake. All parking on Favreau was closed until the sewer and road work were completed. She’d have to find other spot to park, and her neighbors, tucked in for the night, had taken the closest spots. She wasn’t crazy about walking alone on the dark streets to get to her place. She should have spent the night in Westmount at Caitlin’s. “Get a grip,” she said loudly to herself in the car. Carmen talked to herself when cooking, packing, even cleaning, when that last rare occasion occurred. She was a talker. The community where she lived was mostly Greek, hard-working families, who kept decent hours, except for their Christmas and Easter celebrations that always happened on a Sunday night. Then, they danced on heavy heels well into the early hours. Carmen knew this because her landlord and his family lived directly above her.
She finally found a spot one street from her home on Goyer, but a few blocks up the road. After locking the car, she looked around. It was dark and quiet. Her gang had clubbed too late. It would have been so much easier if she lived downtown. She quickened her pace catching her heel in a crack on the sidewalk. It didn’t break. She thought of running. “I’m a klutz – I’d bet odds I’d trip in these shoes. That’s all I need, a face plant. I’m thirty-four years old! Just chill! I’m not the first woman who stayed out late.” The pep talk didn’t work. Fear jumped into her legs and they stiffened and felt heavy. “I’ve lost nine pounds. I’m in pretty good shape. I should try to run.” But she didn’t. She’d read of the recent fatal shooting, not that far from where she was, and remembered the young woman stabbed to death on Curé Labelle years before in broad daylight. Nobody stopped to help. “Why am I doing this to myself? Just walk!”
Finally, it seemed forever, she reached the parking lot behind an apartment building that fronted boulevard St-Martin. She climbed the three feet of clay and small rocks and took a few steps onto the elevated parking lot. Without warning, or any sound, perhaps because she had been too much in her head, a runner streaked up the mound and knocked her down as he ran past her. She hit her knee when she fell between two parked cars, and bit hard into her tongue, tasting her salty blood. Dazed and gripped with fear, Carmen crawled back up to her knees in time to see a cop in hot pursuit. She didn’t move or cry out. She couldn’t. Even in the dark, she saw the cop’s gun because he stopped only about five feet across from her on an angle from the runner. He held the gun in both hands, straight-armed, feet apart.
“Arrête!” he shouted. “Arrête, Jacques!”
An apartment still had its lights on and Carmen could see the runner’s sweats and his long-sleeved cotton shirt. He began to turn around with arms raised towards the cop. Without warning, the cop shot three times – shot the runner three times. Carmen’s ears exploded. She covered them with her hands and would never remember why she rose to her feet and stepped out. The cop turned, eyeballing her, and she him. He levelled the gun at her.
Lights in the building to their right snapped on, windows flew open, and shouting began. As the cop momentarily looked over at the lights and the voices. Carmen ran for her life. She never felt her knee or tripped, spitting blood as she ran while perspiration swept across her body. Carmen never looked back. She just ran and did not stumble on her heels.
When the cop looked up he had lost her. He rushed to the fallen body, bending over it. He reached into the side of his boot, extracted a plastic glove, put it on and dug out his throwaway gun. With his back as cover against the onlookers from the apartment, he pressed it into the victim’s hand and made certain he’d left the victim’s prints on the handle. He felt for a pulse. Then, clearing his throat, he swallowed and called in the incident. He was off duty and outside his own division. He’d have hell to pay for that. Vigilante, that’s the word the media would latch onto. The only positive he could think of was that he’d worn his uniform. It suggested that he was acting as an officer. He had to get his story straight, the SQ, the Sûreté du Québec, might be looking to hang him up. The practice was de rigueur in the current political climate as a means of restoring public trust. The provincial police investigated all incidents of Montreal police interventions causing death.
Small cliques of curious tenants, phones held above their heads taking pictures, appeared at the back door of the building and began to edge towards the fallen man. The cop stood up rigidly and forced them back by shouting that this was a crime scene. He tried to inhale deeply, but his heart hammered. He heard the pulse in his neck. There was a witness. He had a wife and two children. He also had one count of excessive force a year ago. There was a witness. He had to get to her.
He’d seen her. She must live in the area. He’d find her. Had she heard him call out Jacques’ name? Didn’t matter, he couldn’t take the chance that she hadn’t. He had to find her.
Five police cars with lights and sirens screeched to a halt on rue Goyer. Ten officers jumped the embankment and ran up to the lone cop on the scene. Two began marking off the area with orange tape, waiting for the SPVM Crime van, the Poste de Commandement. Others kept the growing crowd from any clear view of the victim or the cop. The remaining officers packed the area with their presence. One officer knelt down beside the victim, then stood and checked out the cop he didn’t know. The guy was a cop or he wouldn’t have called it in. “Don’t answer any questions without a union rep. Don’t even talk to any of us. FYI, we know the vic. Deals crack and heroin. He’s a sub-contractor. I saw he wasn’t carrying a drop when you caught up with him.”
The cop opened his mouth to speak.
“Forget that. Shut it down. Get your facts straight with the rep. I don’t want to be called to testify. It’s best for you to keep your account simple. I know what I’m talking about. Try to calm down. It’s all I can offer.”
Further north on Goyer, Carmen reached her car in full panic. Any idea of running down her street and locking herself inside her apartment was out. She had a hard time with the remote car key because it was wet with sweat. She froze inside the car. “He’s seen me – he knows I can identify him. It was murder. I witnessed a murder!” Was that sirens already? She had to leave. It was a tight park. Pulling out, she grazed the left side of her bumper and the car in front of her. “Dammit!” Going to her mother’s was out. She couldn’t put her mother through the nightmare. “He’s going to find me. I know it. He will. He has all the resources and he’ll have to do it soon. Cops protect each other. I have no chance.” Carmen didn’t see the road or the passing streets, didn’t realize she was speeding. Just drove and screamed, punching the steering wheel until her hand hurt. Every thought set up a blizzard of threats. “He’ll canvass my area. He saw me. He knows what I look like. One of the neighbors will give me up, or my name. He will find me. How can anyone report another cop? He has to find me.” Carmen blew her third stop and slammed on the brakes and pulled over to the side of the road. “I am so fucked!” Her knee throbbed and blood dripped out the side of her mouth. Her tongue was burning. She didn’t feel either one.
“I have no clothes for work. Thank God, I have my bag. I’ll call my landlord and beg him not to give my name to the police. I can’t call him now, but early tomorrow morning. He can’t offer my mother’s name either. The cop never saw my car, but he can have a composite made of me. Some neighbor will remember me and my car – I’ve lived there for sixteen years.” Carmen tried to bite some loose skin from her thumb, but her teeth were chattering, and her tongue began to hurt. The sobs began again when she pulled out and headed for Westmount, wiping her eyes to see the road. “WHY DID THIS HAVE TO HAPPEN TO ME?”
The traffic light turned red, but by the time she braked and slid, her car was halfway across Greene Avenue in Westmount. She drove through it with no flashing red lights behind her and took the next right. She hadn’t caught a ticket and she found the last parking spot just past Caitlin’s home. Her whole body ached as she climbed the few stairs to Caitlin’s front porch. Darkness hid the lovely cosiness of the home. It was three-thirty in the morning when she rang the doorbell.
