Free The Man Who Loved Women to Death by David Handler

his head, disgusted. “School me, why do they always fall for jerks?”
    “Because that’s all that’s out there, Lieutenant.”
    “Name’s Tibor Farkas. He’s a model. Does beer commercials, shit like that. One of those tall, cut-up gees with white teeth and no waist that women are all the time giving some to. I hate him. Although he was pretty broken up when he got the news.”
    “Where was he Friday night?”
    “You mean, could he be the answer man?”
    “They do keep saying our man looks familiar. And Tibor is a model.”
    “Claims he was out bar-hopping that night,” said Very. “Gave us a bunch of places and names to check out. Plus he’s offered to take a lie detector test.”
    “Is that typical in this kind of case?”
    “Dude, there’s no such thing as typical in this kind of case.
    I stared down at the remains of my lunch. I had lost interest in it. Our waiter came to take our bowls away. We ordered tea.
    Very said, “We’re keeping Tibor under surveillance. If he is our man we got to connect him up with Diane Shavelson, who he says he never heard of. We’re looking for some way they might have hooked up. Like did they ever go to the same eye doctor or bank at the same bank. We look for a link. Any link.”
    “And if there isn’t one?”
    “We try to link up the two victims. What did they have in common? We break down their address books, their credit card records. We talk to their neighbors, their families, their friends. Like, say this film class at The New School Laurie was in. That’s for real. I just spoke to the guy who teaches it—big claim to fame is he did a book on latent homoeroticism in the films of Laurel and Hardy. What a dickhead.”
    “What a surprise.”
    “He gave me a list of her classmates. A dozen people. We check to see if one of them is a hello.”
    “A hello?”
    “Y’know, like one of them pops up in Diane’s address book— hello. Or one of them recently bought a big blue garment bag from Hold Everything— hello.”
    “And if there’s no hello? If the answer man kills totally at random? What then?”
    Very didn’t answer me. He didn’t want to. His eyes turned to the letter. “I can’t believe he was watching us at Barney Greengrass. That’s twisted.”
    “Twisted.”
    “Kind of makes you wonder if he’s watching us right now.” He shot a glance over his shoulder.
    “Kind of.”
    “But this is good that he wants you to contact him. This we can do something with. Only, a fucking personal ad. That is so retro.”
    I said nothing.
    Very peered at me suspiciously. “Why’d you suddenly go quiet on me?”
    “I wasn’t aware that I had.”
    “Dude, you wouldn’t hold out on me, would you?”
    “Why would you say that, Lieutenant?”
    “The fact that you always do, for starters.”
    “Believe me, if I knew anything I’d tell you.”
    He stared at me doubtfully a moment, then gave a short nod and sat back in his chair. “Me, I keep thinking this guy’s got himself some serious chops. Check it out, these two women were both lookers, the kind who get hit on all the time. They weren’t naive. They weren’t dumb. Yet they both fell for his line. Diane went home with him. Laurie invited him up—even though he was a total stranger. You know any women who would do that? I don’t. They’d be a helluva lot more careful. That means we’re talking about someone who can really play the game. He’s got to be charming. He’s got to be good-looking—”
    “Not necessarily good-looking. Laurie was a would-be actress, don’t forget.”
    “So?”
    “So she’d invite a two-hundred-pound dung beetle into her home if she thought he could help her career.”
    “Who is this guy, dude?”
    “He’s someone who can be whomever they want him to be, Lieutenant.” Our tea came. I sipped mine, wrapping my icy hands around the cup. I still felt chilled to the bone. It was a feeling I couldn’t seem to shake. “So tell me, does the answer man qualify as a