The Rock 'N Roll Detective's Greatest Hits - a Spike Berenger Anthology Read Online Free Page A

had planned to go back to LA after a few days, but when Flame died I decided to stay longer until after his memorial service. Now it looks like I’ll be here even longer.” She gave a small, sarcastic laugh.
    Patterson took over the story. “The police came to Adrian’s apartment last night around 7:30 and had a warrant for his arrest. They hustled him out and took him downtown to the Sixth Precinct. The Sixth covers West Greenwich Village, where Flame’s townhouse is.”
    “Had Adrian been questioned or anything before that?”
    “Oh yeah,” Gina said. “Me too. The police talked to everybody in New York that knew Flame. It was being treated as a suicide until, I don’t know, a couple of days ago.”
    “Actually I have a feeling that foul play was suspected within a day or two after the discovery of the corpse,” Patterson said. “The DA is being very quiet about it.”
    “Who’s in charge of the investigation?” Berenger asked.
    Patterson looked at his notes. “A detective downtown… here it is, Lieutenant Detective Billy McTiernan.”
    Berenger nodded and smirked.
    “You know him?”
    “Yeah,” Berenger answered. “We’ve had some dealings with each other. Total jerk. Did you notice he can’t say a sentence without inserting the F-word or the GD-word?”
    Patterson smiled. “I did notice that.”
    Berenger made his voice go low and gravelly in a perfect imitation of Detective McTiernan and said, “And he fucking sounds like this , goddammit!”
    Everyone laughed and Berenger enjoyed his little moment before Patterson continued. “So anyway they took Adrian to the Sixth Precinct and booked him. They had him there in a holding cell all night where he was questioned intensely by the detectives. Adrian said nothing except that he was innocent. The one phone call he made was to his mother.”
    “Then I got hold of Mister Patterson,” Gina said.
    “The DA had his court appearance expedited and he was in front of a judge at 11:30 this morning. I had maybe ten minutes to talk to him before that. It was all very irregular, but given that it’s such a high profile crime—” Patterson shrugged. “They’re supposed to take him away to Rikers right after lunch today.”
    “What did Adrian tell you?” Berenger asked.
    “That he didn’t do it. That the last time he saw his father was backstage at the Beacon Theater two weeks ago, the night he died.”
    “What can you tell me about that night? You were at the show, right?” Berenger asked Gina.
    “Yeah, Adrian and I went together. Al Patton had sent me a couple of tickets. And you know, I felt funny about it all evening, before and during the show. I knew something bad was going to happen. You know me, Spike, it was one of those funny premonitions I get. I could smell death in the air and I even mentioned that to Kenny, you know, Flame’s tour manager?”
    “I know him.”
    “Anyway,” she continued, “Adrian was being his usual curmudgeonly self, slumped in his seat and doing his best to show that he wasn’t enjoying the music. Everyone else in the theater was on their feet, clapping, hollering, and whistling. Granted, it had taken them a while to warm up to Flame’s, uhm, newer material. I don’t understand Flame. It was obvious that the audience only wanted to hear his old stuff. When the band segued from one of the newer ‘religious’ songs into ‘Keep On Rollin’ to Me’ the crowd went wild. It was amazing what difference a choice of song makes. The audience put up with Flame’s conversion to hardcore religious cult rock just for a chance to hear one measly song that Hay Fever or Flame’s Heat recorded.”
    Berenger needed to steer her back on track. “You saw Flame before the show?” he asked.
    “Uh huh. He wasn’t just cool to us—he was cold as ice. But what else is new? Did I expect anything else? After all, I’m only the rock star’s first wife, the one discarded long ago with a young son to show for our four years