Night Work by Steve Hamilton Page B

The two of you were intimate at that point?”
    “Yes.”
    “Mrs. Hornbeck says she went back to sleep at that point, but that she woke up again after two o’clock. Somebody was going down the back stairs.”
    “No, I was out of there by one thirty,” I said. “I’m sure of it.”
    “She was quite adamant about the time. She said she made a note of it, the fact that it was two fourteen and here she was, getting woken up again. She said whoever was going down the stairs was making a real racket this time.”
    “When I left, Marlene asked me to be as quiet as possible.”
    “And you’re sure it was before two o’clock?”
    “Around one thirty. I’m positive.”
    He wrote this down in his notebook, then tapped the page with his pen. “So she may not have heard you leaving at all,” he said. “Maybe Marlene left later, for whatever reason, and Mrs. Hornbeck woke up then.”
    “But Marlene would have known to be as quiet as I was.”
    “You’re right. So now we have another story altogether. You leave, and shortly after, another person goes up the stairs. While Mrs. Hornbeck’s still sleeping. She doesn’t wake up until this second person leaves, making a lot of noise.”
    “The second person being …”
    “Whoever killed her, most likely. Odds are that person took Marlene down the stairs at that time, too. Which reminds me.”
    He flipped the page in his notebook.
    “When we opened her apartment, we found a large number of beads all over her floor …”
    “Jewelry beads,” I said. “That was me.”
    “I don’t think you mentioned that to the chief last night.”
    “No, I just remembered. I knocked over a container of beads, all over the place. I started picking them up, but she told me to leave them, that she’d do it.”
    “I guess she never got the chance.”
    “No, I guess not.” I was starting to feel sick again. I sat back in my chair and rubbed my eyes.
    “I didn’t ask you about your hands before,” he said, “but now I’m curious.”
    “I had to go look at a woman’s dead body last night. Somebody I had just been with the night before. I do a lot of boxing, so I should have known better than to take it out on my hands.”
    “You’re a boxer, eh?”
    “Not for real. It’s just something I do to stay in shape.”
    “Looks like it works.”
    “Should I be asking you if I’m being considered as a suspect at this point?”
    “Joe, you know the law. You know I’d have to tell you if you were.”
    “I understand that can be kind of a gray area.”
    He shook his head. “In the state of New York, you’re officially a peace officer, am I right?”
    “Officially, yes.”
    “Okay, so we’re talking one officer to another here. Obviously, you know my first job is to evaluate your standing in this case and to eliminate you as a suspect if that’s the way things add up. Beyond the fact that you were with her last night, there’s nothing else to make me believe you’d have anything to do with her death. The chief himself certainly vouches for you, so as far as I’m concerned, you’re just our best source of information on this case, and maybe the only person who can really help us right now. Will you do that?”
    “Of course,” I said. “I’m sorry. It’s just…”
    “Don’t worry about it. I know this isn’t easy. So tell me, did she mention anything to you at all? Any bad blood with anybody? Or any reason to think that somebody was after her?”
    “No. Although, when we were talking … I think she said something about things being a little crazy down in the city, and her wanting to get away …”
    “What else?”
    “That’s really all she said about that.”
    “Think about it. She didn’t say anything else?”
    “I don’t think so.”
    “I’d like you to try something,” he said, taking out a pad of legal paper. “Instead of you talking and me writing it down, I want you to write it down yourself.”
    “Why?”
    “Because you’ll remember it better