The Groaning Board

closet
door in the bedroom. When she came back to the living room, they stopped
talking.
    Silvestri picked up Izz and Wetzon
hooked the leash to the collar. “Be right back,” he said.
    She closed the door behind him, then
turned to Bill. “What were you two talking about?”
    “You.” Veeder fenced her in at the
door. She breathed his scent. When he kissed her she tasted toothpaste and
coffee. “Mmmmmm.”
    “I don’t think you should go anywhere
alone.”
    “Right. How can anyone be anywhere
alone in this City? “Call me when you get to the office. I’m going to stop by
to see Evelyn around seven and I’ll be home afterward. I was supposed to have
dinner with Hem and Min, but I’ll cancel... unless you feel up to coming
along.”
    “Where?”
    “Their place. They’re having a few
people over, Hem said, which means at least twenty-five, so it won t matter if
I’m not there.”
    “It’s not business?”
    “Hell, no.”
    “Then maybe I’ll go with you. I can
come home, take care of Izz, put on my basic black... if my manservant packed
it...”
    He grinned at her. “He did.”
    She thought: Both Hem and Min have
motives for Mick-lynn’s death. Means and opportunity too. But how did
Mick-lynn’s death connect to Sheila?
     
    In a coffee shop near the Police Academy, while Wetzon nibbled at her bagel with cream cheese, Silvestri had two eggs
over easy, sausages, hash browns, and four slices of buttered toast.
    “You okay?” he said, wiping up the
egg yolk with his toast. “You’re not eating.”
    “I’m okay, just not hungry.”
    “That’ll be the day. Wrap this up for
her,” he told the waitress.
    “Silvestri, I saw an agreement
between Hem and Min Barron to adopt the child that Ellen Moore is carrying.“
    “Oh, yeah?” He was taking change out
of his pocket. “You’re not surprised?”
    “I’m listening. I’m not going to ask
you how you know that. You’re an unreconstructed snoop. I’m not going to tell
you how to live your life...”
    “But?”
    “Who says there’s a but?”
    “There always is, Silvestri. Just say
it right out.”
    “But don’t confide in Veeder.”
    “He’s a cop, Silvestri, just like
you.”
    “Not like me, Les. Now he works for
the other side.” The waitress handed her the foil-wrapped bagel and she slipped
it into her briefcase while Silvestri paid the bill. “Where are we going?” she
asked.
    “I want you to hear what we got from
Sheila’s tape and I want the lab guys to see if this”—he patted the pocket into
which he’d dropped the cassette—“is the same voice.”
    At the Academy, Wetzon was given an
ID badge, then they went up to the lab, where Silvestri introduced her and
turned the tape over to Detective Montebello. “See if it’s the same as the
other one. I also want you to play what you got for her. Maybe she’ll recognize
the voice.”
    The lab looked like an old-fashioned
recording studio. Montebello’s thin, dark hair was in a low-slung ponytail. His
eyes were intense behind horn-rimmed glasses, his irises black. He explained,
“Once we know the process used to distort, we can undistort.” He put the tape
on the spool. “Ready?” Wetzon nodded.
    The tape began as she’d heard it on
both Sheila’s and her machines. Her fists clenched. At first the voice was
drawn out like a whine, then it altered. The words made her shudder, but the
voice was unmistakable. Wetzon had heard that voice only yesterday. And for
that reason it was doubly shocking. It was the voice of the Honorable Douglas
Cameron.

Chapter Fifty-Eight

     
     
     
    “I can’t
figure Veeder. Why the hell did he let you in on the meeting? He made you a sitting duck.”
    “I insisted, Silvestri.”
    “Yeah, I’ll bet. I can almost
sympathize with the poor bastard.” He stopped for the light on Forty-ninth Street, only half a block from Wetzon’s office.
    “I think I’m going to take offense.”
    He cocked an eyebrow at her. “Don’t
say anything to him about Judge Cameron. Leave it to us. If you tell Veeder,
he’s going to use it and it’ll come back in our face.”
    “Silvestri, you’re wrong about Bill.”
    “We’ll see. I want to hear you
promise me you won’t say anything.”
    “Okay, I promise. You always think
you know better—“
    “I do.”
    “I’m getting out here...“ Wetzon
paused because his attention had gone to the woman making a call at the pay
phone on the corner. Her skirt barely covered her ass. “That’s our