Monument to Murder - Margaret Truman [7]
Brixton stood in her bathroom and took in his image in the mirror, turning left and right to present more-flattering perspectives. He was in decent shape for a fifty-year-old man. Despite his aches and pains, he exercised regularly at his apartment and at a local gym. A shade under six feet tall, he’d managed to keep excess weight off his midsection and to maintain muscle tone in his upper arms and chest. He knew one thing: no matter how he deteriorated as he grew older, he’d always have his wiry, gunmetal-silver hair, which he kept closely cropped.
When Brixton was a cop he had a reputation as a tough guy, not mean or bullying but someone you wanted at your back when the situation went downhill. He was also known as a tough kid while growing up in the Red Hook section of Brooklyn; plenty of scraps had sent him home with a bloody nose or black eye. That pleased his father. The old man worked nights as a bartender in some of the borough’s rougher neighborhoods and wouldn’t have stood for his only son backing away from a fight.
His decision to pursue a career in law enforcement was accepted by both his father and mother. Although Mrs. Brixton quietly hoped that her son would go to college and become an accountant or a lawyer, or at least land a white-collar job, that route had no appeal for Robert, although he did go to college, CCNY, and graduated with a degree in business administration. But the thought of spending his adult life behind a desk was anathema and he queried the NYPD. No jobs available. A friend said he’d heard that the Washington MPD was hiring, so Robert applied there and was hired. It took four years to decide that he and the nation’s capital weren’t made for each other.
That’s when he headed for Savannah, one of the nation’s first planned cities. James Oglethorpe had arrived there in 1732 with 114 colonists and had laid out the new city according to a plan he’d used in England. Brixton had to admit that Savannah was a pretty city, and the people were friendly for the most part. There was, of course, that entrenched genteel, aristocratic set that Wayne St. Pierre had grown up in and that Brixton found too precious for his liking. But in the main he’d enjoyed his twenty-four years there—except every summer.
He showered and dressed, kissed Flo on the forehead, and swung by his own place to change into fresh underwear and a clean shirt. He called a number on his cell phone that was answered by Joe Cleland, the retired detective who’d taken Louise Watkins’s confession twenty years earlier. Brixton and Cleland had partnered for a while and he liked the beefy, African-American cop with the booming voice and ready smile.
“Joe, Bob Brixton.”
“Hello, Robert. I figured you might be calling. Wayne said you were working the Louise Watkins case.”
“Seems like it, Joe. Spare me an hour?”
“Anytime, my man.”
Brixton got directions to Cleland’s house and headed there in his 2004 Subaru Outback.
Cleland lived in a small one-story redbrick home set on a lovingly maintained piece of property. Brixton noted as he got out of his car that behind the house was a preserve of sorts that afforded plenty of privacy. Cleland heard his arrival and opened the front door before Brixton reached it. They shook hands, gave each other a quick hug, and went inside where Cleland had laid out coffee and a platter of Danish pastries. “Good coffee,” he said. “I guarantee it. I’m particular about my coffee after all those years of drinking station-house motor oil.”
“It was pretty bad, wasn’t it?” Brixton agreed as he took a chair at the dining room table, poured himself a cup, and plucked a raspberry cheese Danish from the platter. “How’s retirement treating you?” he asked.
“Just fine,” Cleland replied, joining him. “I keep busy with the garden, grow the best damn lettuce and tomatoes in Chatham County. Of course, it gets a little lonely