She relaxes a tiny fraction. “I think I got something.”
“I definitely got something,” he says. “What’s your thing?”
“A list of Galetti’s properties, including the ones he wants rezoned. What’s your thing?”
He holds up the May edition of the society page ofThe New York Times, which has a group photo of the Axedale family at a gala benefit concert. “Jeremy is Gloria Axedale’s youngest son.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
October 1987, Friday
Nomi wishes Simon were more annoying so she’d feel more justified being irritated and angry, but the truth is that he’s only annoying occasionally, so she can’t sustain it. She curses herself for becoming too accustomed to him: her goddamn serial-killer neighbor.
Now he’s here with useful information, and it’s not as if she can afford to throw it back in his face. She’s like a shrimp lured in by a deep-sea anglerfish, compelled by the tiny light ...
She leaves her key in the door to come closer, grab the newspaper. “Well, shit.”
“David Jeremy Axedale.” Simon nods toward the picture she’s examining. “It’s right there, in the caption.”
“Well,shit.”
“Did you visit Solange?”
Nomi pulls off her beanie and shoves it in her jacket pocket, still peering at the photo in the dim yellow light of the tenement corridor. “Her roommate said she hasn’t been home for three days, that she’s at Jeremy’s apartment. How did you find this?”
“Cevolatti’s newspapers, from the post office box. I took them with me by mistake when I grabbed my file.” Simon takes another step downthe stairs; she appreciates that he’s no longer towering over her. “You said you got a list of Galetti’s properties?”
“I went to Tenth to make a report, and Captain Balter made himself feel good by giving me a nice bawling out in his office.”
Simon frowns. “Doesn’t sound great.”
“Show me the other articles,” Nomi says, and she sits down on the second-bottom riser. Simon sits to match her, hands over another news article. She squints at it as she talks. “Yeah, Balter—what a jerk. He called me a bunch of names, then directed me to Calvin Gaffney to file the report. Calvin wasn’t at his desk when I rocked up, but he had a pile of paperwork just sitting there, including a photocopied list of Galetti’s properties—I mean, my ex-partner said there was a list floating around. Anyway, I took it and walked out of the station.”
“You stole from apolice station.”
“I stole fromCalvin.” Nomi closes the broadsheet momentarily and dips into her inside jacket pocket, flashes Noone a glimpse of a folded photocopy, before opening the newspaper again. “If he even realizes it’s missing, he’ll just go get another copy. He really shouldn’t leave shit lying around.”
Simon looks like he’s trying very hard to keep a straight face. “Should I feel bad about pouring coffee down Calvin Gaffney’s shirt?”
“You should not. Calvin’s an asshole.”
“And disorganized with his paperwork.”
“Every now and then, you get a win.” Nomi finishes with the newspaper and sets it in her lap. “All I had to do for this one was to humiliate myself in front of my old police captain for twenty minutes. As far as cost-benefit ratios go, it was worth it. So now we have a list of potential locations,andwe know who Jeremy is.”
“‘We’?” Simon is being painfully nonchalant.
“I said what I said.” She stands up—she’s not going to clarify beyond that, she doesn’t have time—and gestures for the newspapers he’s still holding. “Give me that stuff.”
“What do we do now?”
“We get moving on everything first thing tomorrow. I’m just putting it all inside before I go out again.” She returns to the key she left in the door, opens up enough to dump the pile of newspapers and the photocopy from her jacket pocket inside the entryway to her apartment, closes up the door and relocks it.
“You’re going out again?” Simon has stood up as well.
“Just to the Riverview. Mischa will be there, and he said he’d look for info for me on the dealer delivery angle. If we can find out the name of the new dealer, and where they’re collecting their supplies from, it might help narrow those properties down.”
“Do you want me to come with you?”
