Entombed by Linda Fairstein Page B

else."
    "But I mean my
fingerprints must be everywhere in Emily's apartment. I tried to see if
she was alive, I untied her hands, I… I even held the handle of the
knife. I wrote it all out for you, just like you asked." Teddy thrust
several pieces of paper at Mike.
    "First thing you're
gonna do is go into the men's room and wash up. You're no good to me if
you don't calm down. This is Alexandra Cooper. She's from the DA's
office. I'd like to go over everything with you again, so Ms. Cooper
can hear it."
    Kroon closed his eyes
and breathed deeply before he stood up and left the small room.
    "See what I mean? Too
light in the loafers for a job like this murder."
    The political
correctness of the nineties had not even been a blip on Mike's radar
screen. "Please stop with that kind of talk. You know it drives me
crazy. And what if I'm right that Emily wasn't raped?"
    "I realize you're
tired but you're never gonna change my spots, kid. It's just my bad
mouth-inside you know I'm like butter."
    "Yes, but it's your
mouth that makes such an indelible impression."
    "My cousin Sean-did I
tell you he's getting married in June? I'm the best man. The bride's a
guy he met playing soccer in Ireland. I got twenty-two first cousins,
and if you don't think the odds are that at least five of them are gay,
then you can sit there praying with my aunt Bridget and her rosary
beads, trying to pretend it only happens in other people's families.
Now I have to take Teddy seriously as a suspect-that's what you're
telling me?"
    "Is it all right for
me to come in?" Teddy said, pushing open the door.
    Mike put a hand on
Teddy's shoulder and steadied him as he walked back to the lieutenant's
chair. We seated ourselves across the desk from him.
    I opened the coffee I
needed to keep myself going and the bag of bagels that I had stopped to
pick up for the detectives and witnesses. Mike asked Teddy Kroon to
tell us about himself.
    "I was born
forty-eight years ago in Bangor, Maine. My parents-"
    "How about we
fast-forward and start from this end. What do you do?"
    "Retail, Mr. Chapman.
I own a shop in TriBeCa that sells highend cooking utensils-pots and
pans, table toppings-"
    "Carving knives?"
    "Yes, sir. The
one-um-the one that's in Emily's back? I gave her that set for her
birthday last year." He shook his head and tried to open a packet of
sugar with his shaking hands.
    "You work in the shop,
too?"
    "Six days a week. I
get down there at eight before we open and stay late most nights to do
all the paperwork. We're closed on Sundays."
    "And Emily Upshaw,
what's your relationship been with her?"
    "She's my best friend,
Detective." Teddy's eyes welled up with tears again. "She's been my
very dearest friend for almost a decade."
    "How'd you meet?"
    He paused. "Fifteen
years ago. At an AA meeting."
    "Alcoholics Anonymous?
Since when did they start holding sessions in a bar on York Avenue?"
    Teddy flashed a glare
at Mike. "I didn't make it, Mr. Chapman. Neither did Emily. That's why
we got along so well."
    "Take me through it."
    "I was new to the
whole twelve-step-program idea. We were a small group, meeting in a
church basement on Lexington Avenue late in the evening so those of us
who worked long hours could keep up. Emily was doing really well then.
She had a steady job at a woman's magazine doing some editing, in
addition to her writing."
    "Did you see her
outside the meetings?"
    "Not at first. We'd
sometimes walk home together. She was very smart and I liked to listen
to her talk about her work. She was always interviewing someone
interesting."
    "You bonded right
away?"
    "It was just a few
months and then her schedule changed completely. She had a good offer
from a travel magazine. The only problem was that it required her to be
on the road a great deal of time. She started to miss meetings. Lots of
them."
    "There's hardly a
place you can go that doesn't have a branch of AA," I said.
    "True. But the reality
was that Emily couldn't manage it. She assured