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“I want you to meet someone.”
We go up the stairs of the third apartment building to our left. The hallway is dimly lit and surprisingly cool as opposed to the rising temperatures outside. It’s quiet, and it smells musty. There must be at least five apartments per floor. We take a dingy elevator all the way to the top. We get out and stop outside apartment number 54. Kendric knocks three times.
“Who am I meeting?” I ask.
The door opens.
A man in his late sixties appears in the doorway. His grey hair is cut short, and a thick white beard in desperate need of a trim covers most of his face. His blue eyes scan both of us with fierce suspicion while I try to figure out whether that stain on his tee shirt is mustard or some kind of shrimp sauce.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” the man says. “Were you followed?”
“No,” Kendric assures him. “We need to talk.”
“Here? What’s wrong with our usual meeting spot?”
“This couldn’t wait.”
The man shakes his head in heavy dismay, then looks at me again, a twinkle of recognition prompting his jaw to practically drop. “Kendric, you dumb son of a bitch. What is she doing here?”
“Okay, I’m officially in the dark,” I say. “Who are you?” I ask the man before looking at Kendric. “Whois he?”
“This is retired Detective Roderick Amstaff,” he replies.
“And you’re Rose Parker’s daughter,” Amstaff says to me, his gaze fixed on my face. “You take after her.”
The words hit me like a punch in the gut. “You knew my mother?”
He nods once, then takes a couple of steps back, motioning for us to go in. “Come on. We don’t want anybody seeing you.”
“How did you know my mother?” I ask Amstaff.
Kendric and I sit on the sofa while he takes the armchair, letting out a dry cough every once in a while. Smoker’s lungs, by the sound of it.
“I met her when she was still working for The Globe, long before she won that Peabody for her investigative pieces,” Amstaff says. “That girl was a force to be reckoned with. Strong and curious, resilient and determined. Once she caught the scent of something, that was it. There would be no stopping Rose Parker until she got to the truth.”
“Her investigative reports put a lot of people away,” I say, smiling slightly. “Yeah, my dad told me. I’ve read all of them, too. He kept copies of every publication.”
Amstaff gives me a hard look. “Don’t even mention his name in this house. That fucker destroyed my career. I ended up on desk duty, languishing away in a swivel chair until my pension came through.”
“I don’t understand.”
Kendric takes a deep breath, calmly placing his hand on my jittery knee. “Detective Amstaff was in charge of investigating your mother’s death.”
“It was an accident,” I say, confused. “Some fault of the braking system. I thought the insurance company investigated that.”
“She was murdered, Miss David,” Amstaff says matter-of-factly.
It may not be the first time today that I feel a pound of lead swelling in the pit of my stomach, but this one feels worse than the last. “What are you talking about?”
“Your father and his Black Hand buddies covered it up. They went to great lengths to discredit me, to stop me from doing my job. Some mook from the insurance company was brought in to ‘investigate,’ just like you said. It wasn’t an accident, Miss David. Those brakes were tampered with, and I have the report to prove it.”
“Show her,” Kendric replies.
Cursing under his breath, Amstaff gets up and walks over to a credenza on the other side of the room. Using a small key, he opens one of the doors and takes out a thick folder from the bottom shelf. He sets it on the coffee table, giving me a few minutes to peruse it.
“I had an out-of-state expert come in when I noticed my captain trying to get me to close the case quickly,” Amstaff says. “People were lookingover my shoulder. Calls were coming in from David’s office. There were shady fuckers following me at night. I got threatening calls, too. They were determined to shut me up, so I knew something was going on here that they didn’t want me meddling with.”
“Her brakes were sabotaged?” I whisper, tears stinging my eyes again.
