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

swinging doors to the kitchen had been open when she came in and closed when she left. Someone had been in the apartment and overheard Rona’s call.

36.
    B ECAUSE IT WAS only four-thirty and the bar at the Four Seasons was not yet teaming with the usual end-of-the-day crowd, Wetzon chose one of the banquettes along the west wall and ordered a club soda with lime from the bartender. After five, waiters began servicing the area around the bar.
    Stu Beck had been a confidential referral from another broker, and Wetzon had been talking to him every other month for the past seven or eight months. Her first call had been a cold call and she’d told him she’d heard that he was dynamite and had always wanted to talk to him. Flattering, but also true.
    The bartender slapped the glass of club soda on the bar for Wetzon and went on to serve a tall man with silvery hair wearing a beautifully tailored dark blue suit. Something told her he was not a solitary drinker but was waiting for someone.
    She got up and collected her club soda and sat down again on the banquette. The Four Seasons at this time of day was quiet, conducive to thought. She unleashed her mind and let it wander. Whoever had been in Dr. Jerry’s office had rushed up to Lincoln Center and killed Tabitha. It couldn’t have been Rona.
    Picking at the dish of salted nuts, Wetzon found an elegant Brazil nut and placed it in her mouth.
    Stu Beck was easy enough to spot when he came up the stairs. Short and chubby, his suit was not quite conservative, the knot of his tie not quite pristine, the collar of his white shirt a bit too wide. His hair was also a bit too long and too curly. He was just a little off all around. And he was round. When he looked in her direction, she waved to him and he wove his way through three women and two men, who were standing at the bar drinking beer, talking loudly enough for Wetzon to discern that the firm they were with was First B-O.
    Stu set his overstuffed briefcase on the end of the banquette and grinned at her. His thick slash of brown mustache jiggled, didn’t look real. She wondered, was it pasted on with spirit gum? He beckoned to a tall man with sandy hair in a charcoal pinstripe on the stairs.
    “So, Wetzon, we finally meet.” He caught the bartender’s eye and raised his voice. “Gimme two Becks.” Grinned at her again. “Have to keep the money in the family.”
    “Very funny, Stu.” She knew there was no connection.
    The man in the charcoal pinstripe was suddenly seating himself in the chair opposite the banquette. He was younger close up, perhaps late twenties, early thirties, with boy-next-door looks. Younger than Stu. “I’m Larry Sellica,” he said, shaking Wetzon’s hand. “You look surprised. Didn’t Stu tell you I was coming?”
    “No, but it’s okay. Are you two partners?” Two! She tasted a very nice fee here.
    “We’re keeping our own numbers and sharing a number on some accounts when we bring them in together. We’re going after the big pension funds,” Larry said, taking one of the beers, which Stu had set on the small cocktail table.
    “Yeah, Larry is a great asset gatherer and not a bad stock jockey, and I’m the expert in fixed income.”
    “So you’d like to move together?” Larry was the exact opposite of Stu in appearance. He was almost a mannequin, with a perfect haircut, perfect shave, buffed and square-cut nails on beautiful hands with long tapered fingers. Just the right amount of white French cuff visible with the classic gold cuff links from Tiffany’s. “If I take both of you, Maglia will put out a contract on me.”
    Stu snorted. “We want the biggest deal on the Street. Together we do well over a mil—”
    “More.” Larry overrode him, as New Yorkers tend to override one another when they talk in tandem. “I just picked up two accounts from Dov Berkowitz.”
    Wetzon knew Berkowitz was a young rookie, a great account opener. A bundle of energy, he was itching to get into a cold-calling situation. She’d advised him to sit tight until he had a full year in production under his belt. Had he jumped somewhere without her?
    She asked, “What happened to Dov? Did he jump ship?”
    “Yeah, right out of the business.” Stu scratched his mustache and dispelled the foam from the beer that had settled there. “He couldn’t hack it.”
    “That’s right,” Larry agreed. He had that clear, steady gaze that spelled honesty, and he looked you right in the eye when he