Isolated Judgment Read online

  “No,” Fish croaked, his throat a raw and sour tunnel.

  “And the hairpin?”

  “What?”

  “The hairpin, you goddamned vulture. The matching hairpin.”

  “I don’t know what that is.”

  The pompadoured man straightened, drew back and delivered another vicious kick, this time aimed at Fish’s head. Fish managed to wince away so that the blow glanced across his temple, and not into his nose. A strobe of pain flashed behind his eyes and he cried out.

  “Alright,” his attacker said. “Alright. Okay. Sorry about the last one. I shouldn’t have gone after your face. You don’t ruin a man’s face. That was my temper, you know? I try and watch it. I do. Look, you and me, we can get this sorted out fast. I won’t try and ugly up your face again if you get straight with me. Yeah?”

  Fish clawed weakly at the floor, finding no purchase, and not knowing where his hands meant to drag him even if they could. Pain ran through him wildly, making him as weak as an infant. His glasses were askew, leaving half the world lost in blurry incoherence. The man with the white pompadour and caterpillar eyebrows was framed in the lens he could still see out of. His hands were balled up, the knuckles white and angry, ready to break Fish some more.

  “Yeah?” the pompadoured man repeated, an undercurrent of threat riding the question mark.

  “Yes,” Fish blubbered. “God, yes.”

  “Good. Dandy. Where’s the brooch, Chief?”

  Fish drew a ragged breath in through his nose and blurted, “Down the basement. In a metal tackle box. On the workbench.” The man didn’t move right away, so Fish drew in another breath and whispered, “I’m sor...I’m sorry. Whatever this is. I’m sorry I did this. I didn’t mean to do whatever this is.”

  “Uh-huh,” the pompadoured man answered, crouching down. He patted along the length of Fish’s body, and his eyes moved around the foyer, searching. He stood again, still looking around.

  “I guess your gun is somewhere else,” he mused. “You keep it in a safe or just throw your duty belt on the couch when you get home?”

  Fish pictured his gun. It was on the nightstand beside his bed upstairs, which might as well have been the other side of the world for all the good it would do him now. He couldn’t have made it up the stairs on his own, even if the stranger was willing to let him try.

  “Yeah, don’t think about some lie to sell me,” the pompadoured man said. “I can kick you ’til you tell me, Chief. I’m getting tired. But I ain’t so worn out I can’t turn your guts to mush. Tuning guys up, it’s what you’d call a job skill, you know? Like a carpenter building a house. You’re just another nail.”

  “Upstairs,” Fish admitted. “On the nightstand.”

  Without a word, the pompadoured man stepped over him and was gone. He heard footfalls up the stairs, and movement above him in his bedroom.

  “A six-shooter?” the man shouted down through the depths of the house, his tone incredulous and amused. “What’re you, some old-timey sheriff? Who the hell packs a revolver nowadays?”

  Someone who hasn’t pulled it out of its holster for a cleaning in seven years, Fish thought, and almost laughed. But laughter would bring convulsions, so he just lay where he was and hoped the beating was over.

  More footfalls upstairs. The sound of drawers being opened, and closet doors banging wide.

  “You sure you ain’t got maybe another gun around?” the pompadoured man shouted down. Something shattered, and Fish guessed it was his bedside lamp. His room was being ransacked.

  As he lay there in the splash of muck he’d vomited onto the floor, a single image formed in his mind as clearly as a precious memory, though it had never actually happened. He was dressed in formal black, among a sea of fashionable well-to-dos on the grounds of the Higgins Estate. The lawn where they all mingled was a vast, lush slope. They held champagne glasses lightly, and white-gloved young men unobtrusively presented the gala-goers with trays full of gourmet finger foods. Ice sculptures of leaping dolphins and swooshing mermaids rose up out of the grass, flashing and running under the summer sun. High up on the slope, in the shadow of the Higgins mansion, a tuxedoed orchestra worked a lilting magic. Amid it all, Fish moved easily, casually, an amused and self-satisfied smile touching his lips. He wasn’t wearing his glasses now, and he was tan from afternoons idled away on the water. He shared in the chatter, slipping from one throng of gala-goers to the next. Mixing. Someone laughed at a sharp observation he made—some pithy, charming remark that was just saucy enough without being crude or boorish. People’s eyes brightened with interest when he dropped in to their gatherings, and their eyes lingered on him as he danced away again before the conversation could grow stale. Men hurried to hold out a hand to shake with him. A dazzling young woman touched his elbow lightly, looking up at him with an unguarded smile. She had auburn hair and eyes that shone like emeralds in the pristine sunlight. He said something to her, and her smile became a chime of laughter. She touched his arm again, and a flush bloomed on her cheeks.

  He watched her blossoming smile, and a heady thrill of ecstasy washed over him as she opened her mouth to speak to him.

  “Asshole.”

  Fish blinked. He was staring at two running shoes planted on the floor in front of him.

  “You passing out on me? Don’t go doing that.”

  The man had Fish’s revolver in one hand, held loose at his side. His white pompadour was a mess, several lengths of hair hanging askew. A thin film of sweat stood out on his forehead and upper lip.

  “I’m gonna go get that box you say is down there,” the pompadoured man said. “So you stay here. Just don’t go growing a spine. You going to grow a spine, Chief? Do I have to worry about you getting brave on me?”

  Fish let his head fall back to the floor. The puddle of vomit was thickening in front of him as his grandfather’s flooring soaked it in between the boards. Fish knew he was supposed to have cared for the wood. Waxed it? Sealed it? He didn’t know. He had never bothered.

  “It’s okay,” the man said. “You don’t gotta answer. I can see it all over you.”

  The running shoes disappeared, and soon he heard the man with the caterpillar eyebrows plunging down the basement stairs. Fish remained curled on the floor, sick with pain. He tried to remember what the woman in his fantasy of the Higgins Gala looked like, but she was gone.

  * * *

  When Issabella passed by the first-floor bathroom of Darren’s apartment, he called to her from inside.

  “How much longer, kid?”

  “Fifteen minutes,” she said, and poked her head in the door. Darren was submerged in the sunken marble tub. Steam filled the room, and it rushed over her as she opened the door wider. He smiled impishly at her from across the room.

  “You know, you could help me wash. That might be entertaining for both of us.”

  Issabella walked to the edge of the bath and set a glass of ice water on the ledge near his elbow. She straightened and considered his suggestion for a moment.

  “Yuck,” she said.

  “Yuck?”

  “Fifteen more minutes,” she said, “and you won’t have garbage hands anymore. Then it won’t be yuck. You’re not touching me until the garbage hands are gone.”

  “The water will be cold by then.”

  “Fifteen minutes.”

  Later, they stood shoulder to shoulder on Darren’s terrace, looking down over the half wall at the winking lights of the night-shrouded downtown. Farther away, the Ambassador Bridge was lit from one end to the other, a gleaming arrow shooting off to Canada. She sighed and cocked her head to peer up at him.

  “Michael Shore,” she said.

  “Our mystery killer,” Darren agreed. “Sort of disappointing, isn’t it? Anyone whose weapon of choice is an antique sword should be named
Sigmund or Arthur or something. Definitely not Mike. Mike isn’t a sword-guy name. Sigmund Blackbane. That’s a sword-guy name. Just hearing it, you know he’s steely-eyed and deadly and rides a mighty steed. Mike Shore probably drives a Volvo and has asthma. This case is getting more and more disappointing.”

  Issabella folded her arms in front of her to ward off the autumn chill. She frowned in the darkness.

  “So you think Tony was telling the truth,” she said.

  “Yeah.”

  It hadn’t taken much prodding at all, once the three of them went inside and Darren tossed the hoodie with the dried blood on the living room coffee table. Tony had stared boggle-eyed at it for a second, and then the answers started coming.

  Michael Shore was Rebecca’s boyfriend. They lived together up in Fenton. Michael bumped around from job to job, and Rebecca waited tables. They were Tony’s age, and had met when Tony, Michael and a handful of other friends—including Daniel Prosner—had gone to the Michigan Medieval Festival three years ago. Since then, Michael and Rebecca had shacked up and worked the festival every year as performers.

  “And Michael found out what Daniel did to Rebecca,” Issabella had prodded Tony.

  “Yeah. We all knew,” he admitted. “She told Mike, and he told us. He wanted us to find Daniel. Like he was going to find him and beat the shit out of him. I don’t know what happened, you know? I just knew that was when Daniel was suddenly gone. Just split town and not answering his phone. Then his number came back disconnected, and I just kind of forgot about the whole thing. I, you know, I wasn’t involved in it. I’m still not involved in it. Whatever it is.”

  Darren’s answering grin was crooked but humorless.

  “It involves blood, Tony. And two lawyers. Not the cops, though. Not yet, anyway.”

  “Oh Jesus,” Tony moaned, and collapsed on the couch. He stared at the hoodie like it might lash out at him. Without his sinister goatee, he looked even younger now. Issabella thought he looked like a kid desperately trying to wish away the consequences of some mistake.

  “Why is his hoodie in your trash?” she said.

  “He called me yesterday. Said he needed a change of clothes while he waited for Rebecca to come get him,” Tony answered. “He came in, and he had this hoodie on inside out. I kinda asked him about it, but he just said it was a mess and didn’t want to talk about it. I don’t know. I didn’t think it was blood, or anything crazy. I figured he got mud on it, you know? Or spilled a milk shake all over himself. He went upstairs and got a T-shirt of mine. When he came down, he had a garbage bag in his hand. I asked him why he was putting it out in the can, and he says I don’t want to smell it, so then I figure he...you know, had an accident. Right? Like, he was embarrassed and just wanted to hide it and not tell me the specifics. So, I was like ‘cool.’ I don’t want to hear about him pooping himself and using his shirt to clean up, right? So he took it to the curb and we had a couple of beers and then Rebecca picked him up. I went to my night class, went to bed and then you guys show up today. That’s it, man. That’s everything. I am not part of whatever this is.”

  There hadn’t been much else to gather. Tony knew Michael’s last name, but not Rebecca’s. He’d only met her a couple of times, and Michael had pulled away from his friends in Ann Arbor once he had a serious girlfriend.

  As they turned to leave, Tony said, “What...um, what about this?”

  He was pointing at the bloodstained hoodie. Darren gave a disinterested shrug of his shoulders.

  “That’s up to you,” he replied, as he held the door for Issabella. “Maybe call Michael. See if he wants it back.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Usually. Pity about the goatee. It looked good on you.”

  Now Darren was wrapped in a heavy robe, his hair still damp from the bath she’d mandated. He was staring silently off into the depths stretching out from the little terrace, and she knew he was deciding what next to do.

  “Let’s drop it,” she said. “Seriously. We have his name. Let’s just see the Judge and tell him what we know and make a graceful exit.”

  Darren was silent. He had switched from ice water to Crown and Seven after his bath. As she watched him beside her, he plucked his glass off the terrace wall and took a sip. A brooding solemnity hung over him.

  Issabella sighed and sat down on one of the black wrought-iron chairs.

  “We’re not quitting,” she said.

  “Nope.”

  “And you have a convoluted reason why.”

  Darren took another sip, his back to her. “There are only two types of men in the world, Izzy.”

  “Okie-dokie.”

  “One kind follows other people’s voices. The other kind follows their own voice.”

  “Hmmm. That seems a bit too pat. I think there might be people who do both. I’m pretty sure there are. Is this a brand-new theory? You shouldn’t roll out brand-new ones. Let them simmer a little first.”

  Darren turned away from the expanse of night to sit in the chair next to her. He sipped, smiled and said, “Okay. Maybe not just two. But...hmmm. Okay, I know what I’m trying to say.”

  “It doesn’t seem so.”

  “No, listen. There are two types of guys—”

  “Ugh. I want to quit this case. Stop trying to tell me why we can’t.”

  Darren persisted. “There are people who follow the letter of the law. And there are people who follow their own sense of right and wrong.”

  “Yes,” she agreed. “And those people are called criminals. I’m calling the Judge in the morning and we’re getting out of this.”

  “I have to know if Daniel really assaulted this Rebecca girl, Izzy.”

  She heard the finality in his voice, and understood. She saw him tangled with another lawyer at her awards banquet, a terrible anger in his eyes. She saw him extending his arm in front of her, creating a barrier between her and the wrestler on Tony’s lawn. She remembered the way he’d rushed out to confront a man named Solomon White, months ago, when he learned that Issabella was in danger. And she saw him kneeling on the hotel room floor, lost in the past, pleading with the memory of a dead girl he had failed.

  She understood.

  “Ivanhoe,” she said. “You think Michael was avenging the woman he loves. He’s Ivanhoe.”

  “He might be,” he agreed. “If it’s true. If Daniel really did that to Rebecca, then who are we to deliver Michael to the Judge?”

  “We’re the lawyers getting paid to do exactly that,” she insisted, but it was halfhearted. The quilt of images she’d sewn in her mind of Darren just then was a comforting one, and there was little about it that she didn’t want to pull around her and keep close. Maybe there were only two types of men in the world—after you stripped away the little, unimportant qualities.

  There were men who could love a woman and who were compelled to protect them personally. And there were men who...just didn’t. They didn’t see themselves in that way. And the latter group wasn’t necessarily bad. They were, what? Modern? Civilized?

  She didn’t know. But she knew what Darren was trying to get at. If Michael had killed the man who raped the woman he loved, Darren wasn’t going to deliver him to the Judge, much less the authorities. It wasn’t about the law. It was about Darren’s inner idea of right and wrong.

  Darren drained his drink.

  “I want to meet Rebecca,” he said softly. “And Michael. I want to hear what happened before we make any decisions, Izzy. Okay?”

  “So my opinion does still factor into this somewhere? Even among all the guy-code hullabaloo?”

  Darren managed a fond smile, but she could see that he was still brooding inside. A young woman he had never met had reportedly been preyed upon, and the notion of it wouldn’t let him go. Her insistence on quitting the case was moot no
w, she realized. Darren wasn’t working for the Judge anymore. He was working for a girl who lived in Fenton, named Rebecca.

  “Knights and knaves,” she whispered.

  He arched a brow. “Hmm?”

  She didn’t answer. Instead, she rose to her feet, leaned over him and planted a lingering kiss on his forehead. “Stay here, Sigmund Blackbane. I’ll get us a snack.”

  Chapter Nine

  When the morning sun crept up high enough to get in through the living room slider door, Chief Fish woke up and found he was still handcuffed on the floor. He yawned, wincing against the line of pain it sent running along the side of his head, where the pompadoured man had kicked him the night before.

  He shifted, and woke more of the slumbering points of agony buried under bruises along his body. His stomach felt like pounded hamburger. His left thigh was an angry cramp, as if an invisible hand had reached into it and made a fist.

  Fish’s arms were stretched out above his head. Before telling him to “shut up, Chief. We’re snoozing from here on out,” the pompadoured man had taken Fish’s handcuffs and cuffed his wrists around one leg of the living room sofa. Utterly unconcerned that his prisoner might pose some threat in the darkness of night, the man promptly fell asleep on the sofa above Fish, pealing out long, shuddering snores and occasional explosions of gas. He sounded unhealthy to Fish—an older man with a big belly who breathed harder than he should, and was always mopping at the sweat above his eyebrows.

  Still, unhealthy or not, Chief Fish hadn’t considered trying anything once the man was asleep. His tormentor had two guns, now that he’d pocketed the six-shooter. He thought about those two guns and the substantial weight of the antique, oak-framed sofa, and eventually fell asleep on the hardwood floor.

  He looked around in the half light of morning. The pompadoured man wasn’t on the sofa. A needle of fear pushed its way into his mind, and he was suddenly, fully awake.