21
After she said good-bye to Kendra, Laurie left Otto and started down Fifth Avenue in the direction of Washington Square Park. The sun was out on the first warm day of spring, which was license for New Yorkers to treat the park like the city equivalent of a public beach, with young women still in their work clothes reclined on the grass and a few brave, shirtless guys tossing around a Frisbee. Crowds gathered to take in the park’s spectacles, from the piano man playing Chopin under the arch to the break-dancers who spun and flipped by the fountain, their massive speakers drowning out the grand piano. Spring in the city felt like a reawakening, and everyone came out from the dark winter to breathe fresh air.
As she made her way into the heart of the East Village, Laurie prepared herself for the Beehive, which, regardless of season, probably didn’t see much sun. She had clocked her fair share of time in tomb-like bars with sticky floors and graffitied bathrooms in college, but it had been a while since she’d spent her evenings underground.
She pushed open a heavy door at the bottom of a steep staircase and stepped into the bar. The familiar scent of spilled beer thinly disguised by Lysol washed over her. It was nearing happy hour, but the place was empty. An LED sign that said “The Beehive” in honeycomb lettering flickered above the bar, and alcohol-inspired neon lights decorated the walls, casting colorful shadows throughout the lair. She had a hard time picturing Kendra kicking back with a drink at the bar or lining up for a game of pinball in the back.
“Just a minute,” said an unconcerned voice from beneath the bar. A moment later, a young woman with partially shaven hair emerged. As Laurie approached, she noticed the bartender’s eyebrow and lip piercings shift slightly as her expression changed from indifference to surprise upon seeing her. Clearly Laurie didn’t fit the mold of the usual customer.
Laurie gave her a friendly smile. “I’m hoping to speak to someone who worked here five years ago.”
The bartender looked at her blankly. “Five years?” Her tone implied that nothing of import could have happened so long ago. Laurie got the impression she would have still been in high school.
She opened a door with an EMPLOYEES ONLY sign and called out. Turning back toward Laurie, she said, “Deb has been here for, like, forever.”
An older woman with deep wrinkles and a messy bun stepped out from behind the door. Her haggard face did seem to reflect a sort of dive bar “forever,” which turned out to be eight years. Good enough for Laurie.
“Did you know a woman named Kendra Bell?” Laurie asked, cutting to the chase and placing a fifty-dollar bill on the counter.
Deb smiled, clearly remembering. “Always liked her. Sad what happened, huh?”
“You knew who she was at the time? With her husband Martin being a public figure?”
“Oh, definitely not. She was just a regular by appearance. We’d shoot the breeze, but I didn’t even know her name. She was always railing about how horrible her husband was, though. That he was fake, cruel. Cheating on her.” Deb motioned to the liquor, but Laurie shook her head. “Suit yourself,” she said, grabbing a bottle of Old Crow whiskey off the shelf and pouring herself a glass.
“And you’re positive it was Kendra Bell?” Laurie continued.
“Definitely. Even told me once about how she’d gone to medical school but never became a doctor. I didn’t even believe her at the time. Didn’t exactly strike me as a dedicated student type. I chalked it up to drunk babbling.”
Laurie surveyed the establishment again, taking in the shag carpet hanging on the wall by the pool table. The young bartender had gone back to doing something beneath the bar. “Did she always come in alone?” she asked Deb.
“Usually.” She gazed at the ceiling and squinted, trying to remember. “But there were a few times when I noticed her hanging around with a rough-looking guy. Shaved head with really mean eyes. It seemed like he was humoring her. Maybe hitting her up to pay his bar bill at the end of the day in exchange for listening to her blow off steam about the husband.”
Laurie fished her phone out of her purse and pulled up a picture of Steven Carter, Kendra’s former med school boyfriend and current employer. The fact that Kendra, five years a widow, was still merely Steven’s friend and employee, not a girlfriend or wife, suggested that she was not involved with him romantically, but she wanted to make sure she wasn’t missing anything.
Deb let out a cackle when she saw the photo. “Definitely not him. That guy’s like Mister Rogers compared to the dude I’m talking about.”
Laurie nodded, getting a better sense of the character she should be envisioning. “Have you seen him since Martin Bell’s murder?”
“Never saw Mr. Tough Guy or Kendra again. When the murder first happened and I saw her wedding picture in the paper, I barely recognized her. The lady really went downhill. I was going to give her my sympathies the next time I saw her, but she never came back in. Him neither.” She took a swig of whiskey and paused. “You know her or something?”
Laurie explained the Under Suspicion series and the reinvestigation of the Martin Bell case. “I’m collecting as much information about Kendra Bell as I can.”
“You’re not the only one who thinks something was weird with her. I called the police tip line. Told them how she’d complain and complain about the marriage. Mentioned the Tough Guy, too. There was a reward, and I wasn’t going to leave money on the table. And justice,” she added. “I liked her and all, but if she did it, she should be locked up.”
“Any chance you’d be willing to let us film in here? Maybe sit down with my show’s host and repeat what you just told me?”
A broad grin settled across her tired face. “That would be pretty cool.”
Laurie thanked Deb and the younger bartender, and left the bar. As she climbed the steps back into the sunlight, she was overcome by the eerie feeling of being watched. Maybe the description of the mystery man with the mean eyes got to me, she thought.
But as she walked down Bowery toward the Lafayette Street subway station, she could not shake the thought of someone following her. She ducked into a handbag shop to monitor the flow of pedestrians outside. Her heart jumped at the sight of a tall man with a shaved head, waiting at the crosswalk at 3rd Street, heading in her direction on Bowery. He was wearing aviator sunglasses, so she couldn’t tell if his eyes were “mean,” as Deb had described.
She looked away from the glass store window quickly to smile apologetically to the clerk. She got her cell phone out of her purse, ready to call 911 if necessary, and left the store.
She glanced over her shoulder. The tall man was half a block behind her. They exchanged glances and he quickened his pace.
Laurie darted into another shop a few feet away. Standing inside, she watched to see if the man would follow her into the shop this time. But, again, he did not. Instead he crossed the street, his gait determined. Laurie felt her heart pounding in her chest, even though she’d been walking slowly. He was tailing me and knows I made him, Laurie thought. Where is he heading now?
Peering through the shop window, she briefly lost sight of him as a white SUV that had been parked behind a large truck pulled onto Bowery. Struggling to see past the SUV, she thought she spotted the tall man bend down and then stand again before vanishing once again from her view. She could feel her cell phone shaking in her hand and forced herself to manipulate the digital keypad—9, 1, 1. Her thumb lingered over the enter button as she wondered how long it would take the police to respond.
Only after the light changed and the SUV made a left turn onto 2nd Street did she realize why the man had seemed so purposeful in his movements. On the other side of Bowery, the tall man was now holding hands with a young woman who had a giggling baby strapped to her belly. With an unobstructed view, Laurie could even see that the big, scary man who’d had her so shaken was wearing an Angry Birds T-shirt similar to one Timmy had outgrown two years earlier.
Laurie laughed at herself for letting her imagination run wild. Feeling foolish, she nevertheless waited a full minute before thanking the shop clerk and stepping back onto the sidewalk. And when she saw the dome light of an available taxi, she raised her hand on instinct. Better safe than sorry, she thought.
Once she was settled into the back of the cab, she processed everything she had learned this afternoon. She wanted to learn more about Steven Carter and the lawsuits against Martin Bell, but her thoughts kept returning to the Beehive. Having spoken to both Deb and Kendra, she was absolutely certain that Kendra was in fact the same woman Deb remembered. Maybe Kendra needed an escape from her house and unhappy marriage, but why would she lie? Laurie was certain that it all came back to the mystery man, and then she felt a chill return to her spine.
She was so busy thinking about the case that she did not notice that the white SUV had circled back onto Bowery to blend into traffic behind her cab.