It was just after midnight. The wind was howling through the ironwork, blowing in off the river, and it was snowing, almost a blizzard, small flakes flying fast, horizontal. I was cold. I pulled my collar up around my ears, leaned over the parapet, and stared down into the darkness. The lights from the aquarium and the Market Street Bridge sparkled on the surface of the water.
Whitecaps on a river? I remember thinking. What the hell am I doing here?
A good question, and one for which I had no good answer. I’d spent the hours before midnight at the Sorbonne, a fancy name for a dump of ill repute, one of Chattanooga’s sleaziest bars. I frequented it more often than I probably should, mostly to keep an eye on the lowlifes that inhabit the place. It’s what I do.
Yes, I’d had a couple of drinks. Yes, really, it was only two, and no, I wasn’t drunk. If you want to know the truth, I was bored, bored out of my brains watching the drunken idiots hitting on women they didn’t know were hookers. At first it was kind of funny, then just pathetic. Finally, I’d had enough. I left the Sorbonne a little before twelve. The company had been bad, the liquor terrible, and the music… well… How do they listen to that stuff?
Late as it was, I wasn’t ready to go home. So I figured I’d take a walk, wander the streets a little, then grab a cab and go to bed. It was a stupid thing to do. Chattanooga isn’t the friendliest town at midnight in winter, but there I was on the Walnut Street Bridge, freezing my ass off, staring down into the water, and… I was a little nervous.
I wasn’t worried I might get mugged. Far from it. I’m a big guy, an ex-cop, and I was carrying a concealed weapon in a shoulder rig under my left arm. But there was something in the air that night, something other than the driving snow, and I could feel it. Something I couldn’t put my finger on. It made my skin crawl.
I’d walked the few yards north on Broad, turned right on Fifth, then left on Walnut, and from there to the bridge, a pedestrian-only walkway across the Tennessee River to North Shore.
I was still on the south side, on the second span, leaning on the parapet looking west along Riverfront Parkway. I must have been standing there shivering for more than thirty minutes when I saw her. Well, I heard her first. She was on Walnut, running toward me, her heels clicking on the sidewalk. I recognized her. I’d seen her earlier, in the Sorbonne.
She’d been sitting at the bar with two men, two tough-looking creeps, one tall and black with slicked back hair, the other one not so black, better dressed, smaller, and obviously the alpha. They were both wearing those shiny, quilted jackets. I’d wondered at the time what the hell she was doing there with them. She was out of their league by a mile: a classy, good-looking woman who looked as if she’d be more at home at the country club than at Benny Hinkle’s sleazy dive.
She was maybe twenty-six or twenty-seven years old and wearing one of those little black dresses that cling and stick to every curve. She had red hair. Not that gaudy, fiery orange kids seem to go for these days—a muted amber that was either her own or had cost more than most people earned in a week. But it was her face that grabbed you. She might have been right out of one of those glossy fashion mags, a face that could only have come from good breeding—wow, there’s an old-fashioned term—and I remember thinking, She’s probably the wife or daughter of one of the movers and shakers up on the mountain. Add the pair of four-inch black stilettoes and the white cashmere parka that could only have come from 5th Avenue or Rodeo Drive, and I knew immediately that she was no ordinary, working-class pickup.
So what’s she doing here arguing with those two? I remember thinking. I also remembered how I shook my head and stared at her legs. They seemed to go all the way up to her ears, and then some.
But I didn’t dwell on her for long. I was too wrapped up in my own workaday problems to give a damn, but there was something about her that caught my interest and wouldn’t let go.
Now here she was in the wind and snow, running, frightened, looking back over her shoulder as if she were being chased. Then she tripped, stumbled, almost fell. I started toward her, but as soon as she saw me, she stopped. She put her hands to her mouth, looked desperately about her, then turned, ran to the rail, and started to climb.
“No!” I shouted as I sprinted the few yards that separated us, but I was too late. She was on the rail before I could reach her.
She looked wildly around, first along Walnut and then at me… and then she jumped.
I dove the last couple of yards, my arms outstretched, and managed to grab the collar of that fancy parka with both hands. I slammed into the rail. Man, she was heavy. I hung onto the fabric, hauled on it as hard as I could, but it wasn’t enough. She simply threw her arms over her head, slipped out of it, and fell. I barely heard the splash over the noise of the wind howling through the ironwork overhead. I leaned over the rail and looked down. Nothing, just the white caps on the river some eighty feet below. She wouldn’t last more than a few minutes in those icy waters, supposing she’d even survived the fall.
I took out my cell and dialed 911. There was nothing else I could do. I told the operator what had happened, gave her my name and location, and sat down on one of the bench seats to wait, the parka folded over my lap. Then I lifted it up. It was heavy.
Okay, okay. I’m a nosy son of a bitch. But I’m a private detective, and the temptation was just too much. I searched the pockets. I didn’t find much. There was a set of keys to a BMW in one, and a pair of white cashmere gloves and an iPhone 6 in the other. I pulled down the zipper at the front, looked at the tag and inside of the collar: Neiman Marcus. In the inside pocket I found a leather clutch, pale blue, with a snap closure at the top. It was unusual, obviously expensive, and a little larger than those handy little accessories most trendy young women like to carry. I opened it and rifled through the contents. Geez. $2,300 in hundreds, and God knows how much in fifties and twenties.
I put the money back, fiddled some more, found three business cards—also expensive—and a key. An ordinary key, as far as I could tell. The cards read “Tabitha Willard.” Her address? Her occupation? Nada. There was nothing on it other than the name and a phone number. I searched the purse and all of her pockets again, but again found no driver’s license, no ID. Keys to a Beemer, but no license. That’s strange.
By now, I could hear sirens, so I returned everything to the purse… well, everything except one of the cards, which I slipped into my own overcoat pocket, and returned the purse to the inside pocket of the parka.
“What the hell have you done now, Starke?”
I might have known. It took only my name and a 911 call to attract the attention of the CPD in general, and Sergeant Lonnie Guest in particular. That bastard hated my guts and didn’t care who knew it. He had since we were at the police academy together. He couldn’t get his head around how tough it had been for him, and how easy for me. I always wondered how he’d made it through at all, much less passed the final exam.
Then I’d found out: the SOB was a cousin to the mayor. Hah, even that didn’t help him much. As soon as the cousin lost the election, Lonnie lost his support. He made sergeant eight years ago, just before the mayor left office. It was His Honor’s last official act, his way of getting back at the city for not supporting him. Lonnie’s going nowhere in the department, has no chance of promotion. The dumbass can’t pass the lieutenant’s exam.
I looked up at him and smiled the smile I knew chapped his jaw.
“Not a thing, Lonnie. I just made the call. She went over the rail into the water. I managed to save her coat. Here you go.” I tossed it to him.
He caught it and scowled, first at the coat, then at me.
“You’re trouble, Starke. Nothin’ but trouble. You may have the rest of ’em flimflammed, but not me. We shoulda locked you away years ago. Tell me what happened.”
“Nah. I’ll wait till someone who knows what they’re doing gets here. No point in spilling it all twice.”
“You’ll tell me, you arrogant son of a bitch. I’m first officer on the scene.”
“So you are, Lonnie, so you are. Is that soup you have on your shirt?”
He looked down.
I laughed. “Gotcha.”
“Screw you, Starke, you piece of shit.”
I looked at my watch, took out my phone, texted Lieutenant Gazzara, and asked her to come on down. She would not be pleased.
“Suicide, Lonnie. She ran along Walnut like the devil was after her, spotted me, and hopped over the rail. Gone, Lonnie. Into the river. Suicide.”
The phone vibrated in my pants pocket. I pulled it out, unlocked it, and read the text.
“Now look, Lonnie, Kate Gazzara will be here in just a few, so why don’t you go back to your cruiser where it’s nice and warm, maybe take a nap, and I’ll just hang out on this bench until she arrives.”
“One of these days she ain’t gonna be around to save your ass, Starke, an’ I wanna be there when that happens.”
“Yeah, well. In the meantime, you probably should make some calls, get some boats down there, and divers too. Not that they’ll find anything in this mess.” I looked up into the swirling snowstorm. It must have been blowing twenty miles an hour at least.
“Who the hell d’you think you are, Starke, givin’ me orders? You just keep your trap shut and let us do our job, okay?” Then he did as he was told. He got on the phone and requested help from the Tennessee Wildlife river patrol and a dive team. Hah!
I grinned and settled down to wait, but not for long. Kate arrived less than five minutes later in an unmarked car, and I was right; she didn’t look happy.
“This had better be good, Harry, bringing me out in this weather. I’d been home less than ten minutes when you texted. I was on my way to bed.” She sat down on the bench beside me.
I turned to look at her. She always amazed me. No matter what time of day or night, Kate always looked good: almost six feet tall, slender figure—ripped, I suppose is how you would describe it—because she works out a lot. When she’s at work, she keeps her long tawny hair tied back, but it was down just then, cascading around her shoulders, whipped by the wind. She has huge hazel eyes and a high forehead. She was wearing jeans tucked into high-heeled boots that came almost up to her knees, and a white turtleneck sweater under a short, tan leather jacket. Even at one o’clock in the morning in the middle of a snowstorm, she looked stunning.
“So tell me what happened.”
And I did. I told her the events of the past forty minutes, culminating with the girl taking a dive from the bridge. She didn’t interrupt. She listened carefully to every word, nodding every now and then, and then she started asking questions.
“So, Harry…” She looked me in the eye. “Slumming again, huh? Why do you do it? Why do you go to places like the Sorbonne?”
“Just keeping my ear to the ground. It’s in places like the Sorbonne where you learn things, not the fancy bars and restaurants.”
“So… what did you find in her pockets?”
“Kate!” I tried to sound indignant, as if going through the woman’s clothing was something I would never even think of doing, but she knows me better than I know myself. She tilted her head sideways and raised her eyebrows, an unspoken question.
“Okay.” I sighed and shook my head. “Yes, I glanced through her stuff.”
She rolled her eyes. Of course I had.
“I hung onto this.” I handed her the card. “There are two more just like it in her purse, wallet, whatever the hell it is. There’s also a wad of cash, and a fob for a late-model BMW, the keyless type. No driver’s license, though. Strange, huh?”
She nodded, fingered the card, turned it over, and looked at the back. “Hey! Sergeant Guest.” She had to shout to be heard over the wind. “Bring that coat over here, will you please?”
Please? I’d have told the creep to get his fat ass over here, and quick, but I guess she’s more lady than she is cop… Nope, that isn’t true. The lady’s a lady, but she’s all cop.
We both watched as the big sergeant leaned inside his cruiser and retrieved the parka.
He backed out of the car, then sauntered over. The look on his face was a treat to behold too, when he dropped the coat on her lap. He looked like he’d just bitten into a lemon.
“Might be a good idea to search this light-fingered piece of garbage while you’re at it, LT,” he said with a smirk. “There’s a whole lot o’ cash in the wallet. Some of it might o’ stuck to Starke here.” He nodded down at me.
I grinned back up at him.
“That’s enough of that talk, Sergeant. How long before Wildlife and the divers get here?”
“They’re on their way. Shouldn’t be too much longer. I’ll go wait in the cruiser, if it’s okay with you.”
“Yeah, go on. I’ll call if I need you.” She waited until he was back inside his car before she handed me the card. “I didn’t give you that. If anyone asks, you stole it, right?”
I nodded. “Kate, the girl was frightened out of her mind. She seemed fine when I saw her earlier in the bar with two nasty-looking creeps. What the hell could have scared her like that? And what was she doing with those two? I’ve seen them around, but I don’t know who they are. She was a lovely kid, Kate. I want to know what happened.”
She didn’t answer. She got to her feet, unfolded the parka, and let out a low whistle. “Whoa, cashmere, Neiman Marcus. This little number must have set her back at least four grand, maybe more. What I wouldn’t give for one of these.” She tucked the coat under her arm and opened the clutch.
“How much money is in here, Harry?” She rifled through the wad of bills.
“I’m not sure.”
“Twenty-three hundreds, along with nine fifties and eight twenties: $2,910 in all. That’s a lot of cash to be carrying around loose, especially into a place like the Sorbonne. What could she have been thinking?”
I nodded, but I didn’t say anything. The divers were arriving on Riverfront Parkway, and there were blue lights flashing on the river; Tennessee Wildlife was there, too.
“Okay, Harry. You’d better take off and go home. Oh, and, Harry, I know you’re going to be looking into this; you can’t help yourself. This time, though, that’s probably a good thing, because we can’t. It’s a suicide, plain and simple; you said so yourself. We’ll try to identify her, contact her next of kin, and… well, you know how it goes. When we do, I’ll call you, but you’re right; from what you saw in the bar, there may be something more going on. If so, we need to know about it. That’s on you, Harry. I’ll help, if I can, but stay out of trouble, and keep that damn gun in its holster. One more incident like the last one, and I won’t be able to save you. You got that?”
She was talking about something I’d done a couple of months ago. I had to pull my weapon on a suspect. Turned out the guy was innocent. He didn’t press charges, but the police weren’t too happy about it. It wasn’t the first time they didn’t like something I did, though, and it surely wouldn’t be the last.
“Got it. I’ll start first thing in the morning.” I looked at my watch. “Damn, it already is morning.”
“Harry, if you find anything, anything at all, call me, please. Otherwise, we’ll stay in touch by text, right?”
I agreed. She folded the Neiman Marcus and walked slowly, head down, back to her car. As she passed Guest’s patrol unit, she stopped, leaned in the window, and said something I didn’t hear. Two minutes later, she hit the starter, did a three-point turn, sped off along Walnut, then turned left on East 4th, heading toward the hospital, going home, I supposed.
I didn’t wait until morning. I walked off the bridge onto Walnut, then turned right and found a bench outside the aquarium. I took the card out of my pocket and punched the number into my phone.
“Yeah?” A male voice.
“Tabitha Willard, please?”
Click.
Son of a bitch. He hung up. I tried again, but there was no answer.
Okay, so it would have to wait until the city was awake. Bed seemed like a good idea.
I checked my watch. 1:15. I called a cab, then hunkered down in a doorway, out of the wind, and waited.
It was no more than a fifteen-minute ride to my place at that time in the morning. I paid the cabbie, slipped him an extra ten and wished him goodnight, what was left of it.
I threw my coat down on a chair in the kitchen, poured myself a stiff measure of Laphroaig Quarter Cask scotch and flung myself down on the sofa in front of the picture window. The wind and snow had slacked off almost to nothing, just a light breeze and a few flurries. A light mist covered the surface of the river, a soft gray blanket that swirled and undulated, turning the mighty Tennessee into a living thing. The view from my window was, as always, spectacular.
I lay there, staring out over the water, savoring the ten-year-old malt. My brain was in overdrive. The events of the past few hours came flooding back. Time after time, I saw the horrified look on the girl’s face when she spotted me. I kept remembering the way she dropped, slowly turning end over end, splashing into the murky water far below. Was there anything else I could have done to save her? I was sure the question would haunt me for the rest of my days… and nights. There’d be no sleep for me that night.
Geez, what a way to go.
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