Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #2: Books 5-8 (A Dead Cold Box Set), Blake Banner [readnow TXT] 📗

might have seen him. You, and possibly Ahmed. Have you still got Ahmed’s contact details?”

She nodded, got to her feet and moved over to a large, pine dresser. She pulled an old phone book from a packed drawer and leafed through it. Then she copied down a number and an address onto a piece of paper and brought it over to me before sitting down again.

“He is no longer involved with the church. He returned to Islam.”

I studied the piece of paper a moment and then put it in my pocket. “Sylvie, you said Reverend Truelove was here earlier in the day to discuss Ahmed’s roster. What time would that have been around? Before lunch, after lunch…?”

She gazed over at the church again. She looked distressed. “After. After lunch. They came over together and then Ahmed set to work on the fruit trees, the plums and the apples, collecting the harvest. And Paul and I talked and had coffee. Then he left, about six I guess. He had to go, to…”

She frowned.

“To what, Sylvie?”

“I don’t recall.” She gave a small laugh. “I suppose he had to get ready to go and have dinner with Elizabeth Cavendish.”

I nodded. “No doubt.”

I stood. Dehan was watching me with narrowed eyes. “Thank you, Sylvie. You have been very helpful.”

Dehan stood and we left.

As we drove away, I could see her standing in the doorway, watching us.

Six

Dehan sat watching me and frowned. I glanced at her a couple of times as we moved from Pierce Avenue onto Bronxdale. All I could see was the street passing behind her head and my own reflection duplicated in her shades. Finally, she said, “There is something on your mind you are not sharing. What have I missed?”

I made a face. She was right. “I’m not sure. It may be nothing. I need to check it out first. I want you to contact the insurance company and find out if they have any correspondence on file between themselves and Sylvie from before the 5th September, 1999. Let’s see if she’s telling the truth.”

“Meanwhile…?”

“I’m going to talk to Ahmed and see if his story tallies with hers.”

“You think she’s lying?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. The way she kept staring out the window at the church, I just got a hunch.” I looked at her again. She was waiting. “I had the feeling she was remembering more than she was telling us about.”

She nodded. “Yeah. I had that feeling, too.”

“When you’re done with the insurance company, see if you can get any information on Humberto. But I don’t want the reverend to know we are looking. See if you can get a Social Security Number or something. You know what to do.”

“Sure.”

“Then what do you say we get together for a beer this evening and compare notes? I’ll buy you a steak at 900 Park.”

She looked embarrassed. “I can’t.”

My face said I was surprised. “Oh?”

“My uncle has invited me to dinner at his house.”

“Oh, sure. So we can catch up in the morning.”

“Yeah. Well, anyway, I’ll call you if anything important comes up.”

“Sure.” I smiled. “Likewise.”

I dropped Dehan at the precinct and took White Plains Road north to Morris Park Avenue, then ducked left and right into Uniport Road, by the railway lines. It was a place designed according to the Who-Gives-a-Fuck school of architecture, by people who didn’t care, for people they thought didn’t matter. Ahmed had a gray, featureless two-story house with iron rails on the front door and the windows. There was a lot of shouting going on inside in a language I didn’t understand, and there seemed to be men, women and children involved. I rang the bell and wondered if they’d heard it over their massed voices.

Somebody had, because a small man in his mid-thirties opened the door after a while, dressed in a vest, pajama pants and slippers. He had a couple of day’s stubble and large, vaguely amused brown eyes. He said, “What?” but not in a hostile way.

I showed him my badge and told him who I was.

He took the badge and examined it. Then handed it back and shrugged. “What I can do for you?” He gestured with both hands into his house. “Everybody has got papers. We have a simple life. Why NYPD?”

“Are you Ahmed Abadi?”

“Yes. That me.” He shrugged, spread his hands. “We simple family…”

“Cut the act, Ahmed. I know you’ve been here since you were a kid and I know your English is just fine. Can I come in? I need to talk to you.”

He grinned. “Okay. What about? I keep my nose clean, Detective Stone.”

“It is not about you, and it has nothing to do with immigration. You may have unwittingly been a witness in a crime a long time ago. I just need to ask you a couple of simple questions…” I paused. “Can I come in?”

He led me into a narrow hallway carpeted in an orange patterned fabric designed to give you chronic depression while simultaneously curing you with static electric shock treatment. He pushed into a cramped living room, hollering a stream of what sounded like obscenities. Two women in burkas and six kids of varying ages fled the room, giggling. He gestured with both hands at a sofa that was a mistake in the 1970s and was still a mistake today and said, “Please, sit, can I give you some tea?”

I sat. “No, thank you, Ahmed. This won’t take long.”

He did the whole shrugging and spreading his hands thing again, like I was missing out on a once in a lifetime chance, and sat down smiling with his eyes.

“How can I help you?”

“About eighteen years back, you used to work for Simon Martin, over on Bogart Avenue, and for the