Sex Crimes Unit, created three decades earlier, was one of the jewels in his crown. Battaglia was not a micromanager. He left daily details of running investigations in the hands of me and my staff of dedicated lawyers, but he insisted on being kept up to speed on any high-profile matters that would affect his standing in the community or his political base.
“You’re running late.” My secretary of many years, Laura Wilkie, knew when not to waste words. I rounded the corner into my office and she followed with a handful of phone messages.
“Sorry. I thought I told you Keets had a dental emergency to deal with.”
“You did. But I didn’t know you’d be out with my boyfriend half the night.”
Laura had an unrequited crush on Mike Chapman. There were days I think she came to work just in order to talk with him on the phone, or be dazzled by his broad grin when he perched on the edge of her desk to flirt.
“He ratted me out already?” I untied my cashmere scarf and hung it with my coat behind the door.
“Nope. But Mercer did,” Laura said, reading from a list on her steno pad. “Told me to keep Mike’s calls away from you so you could get done what you needed to do in front of Keets.”
“Okay.”
“Nice thought, but I’ve already had to scratch the idea of giving you space. Battaglia skipped his meeting at City Hall to get in early. He wants you to brief him on the murder.”
“He picked up from the news that I was out on that? I didn’t think they made me.”
“No again. Some guy named Wilbur Gaskin called him to complain about how you were all browbeating a bunch of kids at his church. Gaskin’s on some charity board with the boss.”
“The guy was more upset about our questioning trespassers than finding a headless corpse on his doorstep?” I took the messages from her and flipped through them. “Have you Googled Gaskin for me?”
Laura handed me a two-page printout. She’d never let me see Battaglia unprepared, if she could help it. “The profile I found reads a tad self-serving. Doesn’t say what the man eats for breakfast, but gives you the rest.”
“Sound legit?” I brushed my hair and reapplied some lipstick in the small mirror above the coat hook.
“Banker. Family man. Do-gooder. Moved here from Atlanta a few years ago. I’ll run a broader search.”
“I’m looking for an ax murderer, Laura. See if you can find me one before the end of the day.”
“Got it. And Mercer told me to check with the press office. Tell them to let us know about calls coming in through the switchboard on the news reports.”
“Any yet?”
“Minor flood. Not a tsunami, so far.” Laura read from her notes. “Some of these missing girls go back months. Who’s going to vet the callers?”
“I’ll look these over. Can you find Nan Toth?” She was one of the most experienced lawyers in the unit with plenty of homicide experience, as well as one of my closest friends. Nan could be the liaison to the squad for the remainder of the day. “Maybe she’ll have time to take it from here.”
I grabbed a legal pad from my desk to list the things Battaglia would tell me to do. If the pastor of Mount Neboh had pulled out votes for his last election, I’d be reporting to the boss with updates four times a day and ordered not to step on the toes of any more parishioners.
“On the lighter side, Alex,” Laura said, checking off her notes, “am I confirming that reservation for four at Patroon Saturday evening ? You still expecting Luc for the weekend?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said. The owner of the restuaurant, Ken Aretsky, was a great friend to Luc and me, and Joan Stafford was one of my closest confidantes. She moved between homes in Washington, D.C., and Manhattan, and I was looking forward to spending time with her at dinner. “Fingers crossed. And will you ask Ken if we can dine in the wine cellar? It’s a surprise I’d like to arrange for Joan.”
“I thought I could make you smile. You’ll have your appetite back by then. If not, well, you can always just drink, right?”
Luc was a restaurateur whose father had been one of the most prominent men in that business on both sides of the Atlantic. While his main outpost was a destination spot for fine dining in Mougins, Luc’s plan was to reestablish Lutèce,