Blood on the Street (A Smith and Wetzon Mystery, #4)

stubbornly held on to Sixth Avenue instead of the ostentatious Avenue of the Americas. For years, the Sussex House had stood on Central Park South, its seedy splendor a throwback to more elegant days.
    Having been acquired by a Japanese company in the mid-’8os, it was royally renamed, its exterior sandblasted, the interior refurbished. A three-star restaurant serving haute cuisine in the French manner replaced a spotty, vaguely continental kitchen.
    Many of the longtime residents on the three upper floors, which were condos, who had bought their suites years earlier, took attractive offers from the new management and sold. The suites had then been renovated and resold.
    It was in one of these suites that Dr. Jerry Gordon had an office.
    Wetzon walked briskly into the rear lobby from the Fifty-eighth Street entrance, passing a series of leather chairs and coffee tables. Not seeing Smith, she settled herself on the last available leather chair, partially hidden by a column. She was early, which was good, because she needed time to think. And for thinking she needed brain food. Out came the remnants of a dark-chocolate Lindt bar. She bit off a chunk and wrapped the rest in its cover, replacing it in her briefcase.
    She let it melt in her mouth. Chewing destroyed the wonder of it. Now she could try to pick her way through the confusion of events since Brian’s murder.
    Even if what Tony Maglia had told her about Penny Ann Boyd and her daughter was true, Wetzon still had trouble understanding why they had come to Smith and Wetzon for help, and furthermore, why Smith and Wetzon were helping. This was between mother and daughter and had nothing whatever to do with the expertise Smith and Wetzon had in the brokerage business. So what was it? Smith’s greed had once again gotten them involved. But why them?
    Now, a tragic, but simple, case of murder during a mugging had turned into first-degree murder and by someone Brian knew, and mousy Penny Ann Boyd ups and confesses she done it. Just like that. When they’d met her, hadn’t Penny Ann said she was worried that her daughter was involved? Or could it be she had been more worried about herself?
    There was a missing piece here somewhere.
    Wetzon looked at her watch. Twenty of six. She took the diary out of her bag. She’d fallen asleep over it when she’d tried to read it the night before. Now she tried again, starting at the beginning, mentally translating as she went along. It began, it seemed, just after the father’s death and was not a daily record. Wetzon read about ten pages of tiny scrunched-up script that was so full of raw pain and confusion, she felt like a voyeur. The first reference to Penny Ann’s drinking problem popped up on page twelve. On page thirteen, Tabby mentioned talking to the family therapist, referred to as Octorday Erryjay, about it.
    “Octorday Erryjay,” she said out loud.
    “Ah, there you are.” Smith had burst through the revolving door and was bearing down on her. Wetzon checked the time. Ten after six. Late as usual.
    Tucking the diary away again, she rose to meet Smith, who, flushed and beautiful, was turning heads in her wake. Ah, to be tall, Wetzon thought enviously. To have just two or three more inches in the leg. “What floor are we going to?”
    “I don’t know. We’ll ask at the desk.”
    The desk clerk looked like Mick Jagger, but his accent was a vowelly Aussie. “Nineteen E,” he said.
    “How did it go?” Smith asked as they headed for the private elevators reserved for the condo owners. Hotel guests had separate, public elevators.
    “He’s a pig.”
    “They’re all pigs.”
    “No, Maglia gives pigs a bad name. I wouldn’t tar them all with the same brush. I hope we never have to work with him. He clipped his nails the whole time I was there.”
    “He what?”
    Wetzon mimed the act, making snapping motions with her fingers.
    “Disgusting. Does he have her?”
    “I think so. He claims Penny Ann is a drunk and a child abuser. What do you think?”
    “Nothing would surprise me. Passive aggressive.” Smith pursed her lips, thinking. “Definitely.”
    “He also told me that Tabby Ann testified against her mother in the arbitration.”
    “Oh ho!” Smith ran the tip of her tongue between her teeth. “I love it!”
    “And he says the only reason she got anything out of the settlement is that the correspondence file that would have proved Brian innocent is missing. He claims that all the bad strategies