Gavin picked up his phone again and tapped the screen a few times. Then he handed the phone to Jackson. “That’s Ms. Haufman.”
Jackson took the phone and looked the photo over. It showed a blonde woman in her early twentieswearing a very shiny green dress and posing on a red carpet somewhere.
“Met Ball last year,” said Gavin. “Figured you’d like that since you love fashion so much.”
“Okay.” Jackson handed back the phone. “I mean, her dress is hideous, but I don’t see the relevance.”
Gavin tapped on the screen a few more times and handed the phone back. “There’s your new client looking quite cozy withZoe Kaufman. Are you really going to sit there and swear he doesn’t know her?”
Gavin handed the phone back. It displayed a photo of Park with his arm around the same blonde woman, smiling broadly.
“Shit,” Jackson said. “Can you send me a copy of this?”
“Yeah, I’ll text it to you. Hang on.” Gavin took his phone back and fiddled with it.
“How did you find this?”
“The Internet.All we had to do was google Parker Livingston. It was in a Style section story in theTimesabout some party in the Hamptons.”
Jackson grunted. He cursed himself for not thinking to do that himself. Park was undoubtedly a distraction. He thought for about the five hundredth time that day that taking this case was a profoundly terrible idea. He swallowed. “The investigation seems to be movingalong, then.”
“High-profile murder. The chief of police wants to solve this one quickly. Nothing worse than the media reporting that the NYPD is twiddling their thumbs while a murderer goes unpunished.”
That photo was bad news, and Jackson’s stomach went sour. But he didn’t think Gavin was done. “What else?”
“I’ve got a medical examiner report, but I don’t think anything is enlightening.Her last meal was pretty fancy, but her phone calendar showed a reservation at Eleven Madison Park at six. She definitely ate there. A waiter recognized her. She seems to have been on a date, but she and her gentleman caller parted ways after dinner. Her whereabouts after that are unclear, but somehow she got uptown, and got herself killed, between when she left at seven and ten o’clock. Thewaiter thought he saw her grab a cab, but who knows?”
“Park left for the fund-raiser at four. Literally hundreds of witnesses.”
“Doesn’t mean he didn’t leave the party.” Gavin looked back at his notes. “Cause of death was a series of stab wounds, from which she bled out, but that’s not a surprise to you. Murder occurred in Livingston’s apartment, given how much blood was at the scene.That’s all I got so far. We’re still waiting for some crime scene unit reports. I just emailed you the details.”
“Right.” Jackson made a show of clicking around on his computer to call up the email, though he didn’t intend to read it just yet. Mostly he was stalling. “Someone other than Park was in that apartment.”
“Says you.”
“It’s his apartment, so his DNA is going to be all overeverything. But surely someone else was there and left evidence. It doesn’t make sense for him to have left the party to run uptown to murder a woman, then go back to the party as if nothing happened.”
Gavin shrugged. “I don’t have that report yet. I’m not ready to conclude anything.”
“He’s not guilty.”
“Again, says you. He flat-out lied about knowing Zoe Haufman. I don’t have a bettersuspect. Do you have a plausible alternate theory of the crime?”
“No.” Although Jackson wanted to argue, because everything in him wanted to fiercely defend Park.
“I’m under a tremendous amount of pressure, so I’m running with the theory I have. Even if he didn’t do the deed himself, something really odd is happening here, and I intend to find out what it is.” Gavin stood. “I hope foryour sake that he’s not guilty, but I don’t think either of us is going to be that lucky.” He glanced at his watch. “I gotta go. I have a meeting at One Police Plaza in a half hour. I just wanted to run that by you. I’ll see you later, Jack.”
After Gavin left, Jackson picked up his phone and stared at the photo. He seethed, angry and frustrated both that this evidence existed and that Parkhad lied to him.
He glanced at the file folders on his desk, all the work that waited for him, the tremendous amount of billable hours he had to put in this week. He tried pushing Park and the case aside, but within a half hour, he knew he’d be able to think about nothing else that day. So instead, he sent Reed a quick text explaining his absence, grabbed his stuff, and headed back out again.
* * *
Park didn’t think it was possible to be as exhausted as he felt. He lay sideways on the bed, looking at the TV, which displayed some superhero show he was too brain-dead to follow. When someone in a red suit and cape slid across the screen, his phone rang.
“Jackson Kane is here,” said Dee.
Park sighed. He was going to have to do something about the bodyguards. They took shiftsat night, one of them on door patrol for a few hours while the other one slept, but Park wasn’t certain they needed to be there at all times. He didn’t think his own life was in danger. On the other hand, a member of the press had gotten past the gauntlet on the first floor and had been caught roaming the hallways of the hotel earlier, trying to figure out which room Park had been stashed in.Dee and Dum bothered Park, but he was not entirely ready to dismiss them both yet.
