Soon she was breezing along in the convertible at close to ninety. God, she was free—and it felt good. This was the best thing that had happened to her. She’d hang out at Connor’s house for a few days, finally sell off all the furniture there, then plan her next move.
Funny, she was thinking, maybe it’s even time for me to settle down. Marry somebody for real, have a kid or two. The idea made her laugh, but she didn’t dismiss it. Stranger things happened—like her getting out of jail.
Before she knew it, the Benz was pulling up in front of Connor’s—the scene of the crime, as it were. How strange, and delicious, this was. She was totally free; she’d gotten away with murder. And her few days in jail, at the famous Riker’s Island near La Guardia Airport, actually made this all the more special. Extraordinary, really.
Nora got out of the car, thought she heard a sound—and it reminded her of Craig, of O’Hara. What had all that been about? She still didn’t know, except that the attraction had been huge and real and very emotional for her.
But she was over Craig now, right?
You’re over him.
Nora let herself inside, and the house was a little musty, and definitely dusty, but not too bad. She’d be there for only a short while anyway. She could deal with a little hardship, right?
She went into the kitchen and swung open the door to the fridge, the Traulsen. Oh God, what a disaster! Rotting vegetables—and cheeses!
She grabbed a bottle of Evian that was sitting in front, then quickly shut the refrigerator door before she gagged.
“Gross me out, would you, please.”
She wiped off the bottle with a clean towel, twisted it open, and drank nearly half.
Now what? Maybe a hot bath? A swim in the pool? A sauna?
Her mouth remained open, but there were no more words.
Just a moan.
Then a scream.
And incredible pain!
Suddenly Nora was holding her stomach. She could barely stand.
My stomach is burning up, she thought as she looked around the kitchen—but no one else was there.
The pain exploded into her throat, and Nora felt as if she couldn’t breathe. She wanted to throw up, but she couldn’t do that, either. Everything was spinning until down she went, helpless to break her own fall.
She might have hit the tile floor face-first, but she didn’t even care. Nothing mattered except this incredible fire eating her from the inside out. Her vision was fuzzy. The worst pain in her entire life was taking over her body, inhabiting her.
Then Nora heard something—footsteps approaching the kitchen.
Someone else was in the house.
Chapter 115
NORA DESPERATELY NEEDED to find out who was there. Who is it? She couldn’t see very well. Everything so blurry. A feeling that her body was disintegrating.
“O’Hara?” she called out. “Is that you? O’Hara?”
Then she could see someone walking into the kitchen. It wasn’t O’Hara. Who, though?
A blond woman. Tall. Something familiar about her. What? Finally she was standing over Nora.
“Who are you?” Nora whispered as terrible heat seared her throat and chest.
The woman reached up—and she took off her head. No—it was her hair, a wig that she’d removed.
“That help, Nora?” she asked. “Recognize me now?”
She had short, sandy blond hair underneath—and then Nora knew who it was. “You!” she gasped.
“Yes, me.”
Elizabeth Brown—Connor’s sister. Lizzie.
“I followed you for a long time, Nora. Just to make sure about what you did. Murderer! I wasn’t even sure if you’d remember me,” she said. “Sometimes I don’t make much of an impression.”
“Help me,” Nora whispered. The terrible burning was in her head now, on her face—everywhere—and it was horrible, the worst pain she could imagine.
“Please help me,” she begged. “Please, Lizzie?”
Nora couldn’t make out Connor’s sister’s face anymore, but she heard her words.
“Not a chance in hell, which is where you’re going, Nora.”
Chapter 116
SOMEONE HAD CALLED in a mysterious message to the Briarcliff Manor police: “I caught Connor Brown’s murderer for you. She’s at his house now. Come and get her.”
The police contacted me in New York City, and I got up to Westchester in record time, about forty minutes of daredevil driving through the city, then the Saw Mill Parkway, and finally treacherous Route 9A.
There were half a dozen local police and state trooper cars parked in the circular driveway at the Brown house. Also an EMS van from the Westchester Medical Center. I took a deep breath, let it out slowly, then hurried inside. Man, I was shaking like a leaf.
I had to show my badge to a patrolman in the foyer. “They’re in the kitchen. It’s straight—”
“I know where it is,” I said.
I realized that I wasn’t ready for this as I walked past the living room and formal dining area on the way to the kitchen. Everything in the room was familiar to me, and maybe that made it harder, I don’t really know. I was there but I kind of wasn’t, like watching yourself in a bad, bad dream.
The forensic technicians were already at work, which meant that the investigators were finished. I recognized Stringer and Shaw from the White Plains field office. I’d worked with them briefly when we set up the insurance scam to get Nora.
Her body was still there, lying beside the kitchen counter. A broken water bottle was near it, shards of glass all over the floor. A police photographer was starting to take pictures, and the flashes seemed like explosions to me.
“Well, somebody got to her.” Shaw came up and stood next to me. “She was poisoned. Have any bright ideas?”
I shook my head. I didn’t have anything close to a bright idea. “I don’t. But somehow I don’t think we’ll look too hard to try and solve this one.”
“Got what she deserved, eh?”
“Something like that. Bad way to go, though.”
I walked away from Shaw because I was feeling a need to shove him, or maybe punch out his lights, which he didn’t really deserve.
Then I went to see Nora.
I waved off the photographer. “Give me a minute here.”
I crouched down, readied myself as best I could, and looked at her face. She had suffered at the end, that much was clear, but she was still beautiful, still Nora. I even recognized the white linen blouse she was wearing, and a favorite diamond bracelet on her wrist.
I don’t know what I was supposed to feel, but I was incredibly sad for her and I was starting to choke up. I was also a little sad for myself, and for Susan, and our kids. How the hell had all of this happened? I don’t know how long I stared down at Nora’s body, but when I finally stood up again I saw that the kitchen had gone quiet, and everybody was watching me.
Inappropriate, I knew. Ought to be my middle name.
Chapter 117
I DROVE BACK to Manhattan that afternoon. The radio was on pretty loud, but it didn’t much matter. My mind was someplace else. I knew exactly what I wanted to do now, what I needed to do. Nora’s death had brought things into clear focus for me. I was even certain that I had never loved her. We’d used each other, and the result had been just terrible.
I returned to my office and stayed there just long enough to grab a file. There was another office I had to visit right away. Upstairs, where the big boys roam.
“He’ll see you now,” said Frank Walsh’s secretary.
I walked in and took a seat in front of Walsh’s imposing oak desk.
“John, to what do I owe the pleasure?” he asked.
“I need to talk to you about some things. Nora Sinclair is dead, by the way.”
Walsh looked surprised and I wondered if it was genuine. Not much got past him, which was probably how he’d survived all these years with the Manhattan Bureau.
“Simplifie
s things, I guess,” he said. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine, Frank.”
He tented his thin, gnarled fingers. “But not too fine, am I right? What’s up?”
“I want a leave of absence. With pay, Frank. I’ve been working too hard. Double shifts and all that.”
Well, at least something could still surprise Frank Walsh.
“Wow,” he finally said. “Before I deny your request, John, is there anything else you’d like to tell me?”
I nodded. “I made a copy,” I said.
Then I pushed the file forward.
“You want to tell me what’s inside?”
“Contents of a well-traveled suitcase, Frank. There was also some clothing, which I guess was just there for padding, or maybe in case the wrong person opened up the suitcase.”
Walsh nodded. “Looks like the wrong person opened it.”
“Or maybe the right person. Susan said that this was all about making the world safe. Monitoring terrorist funds in and out of the country, checking out illegal offshore accounts. That was how we accidentally found out about Nora. She transferred a lot of money, all at one time, and we caught her.”
Walsh nodded, then smiled. It was the greasy smile that gave him away. Kind of insincere, definitely nervous. “That’s what happened, John.”
“Sort of,” I said, “but not exactly. Susan believed your story, Frank, but I had some trouble with it. So what if the FBI and Homeland Security were tracking terrorist funds and bending the law here and there? John Q. Public would probably understand.”
Frank Walsh wasn’t smiling anymore, but he was listening intently.
“So, yeah, I looked inside the suitcase. When I did it, I thought I might need some leverage someday, and maybe what was inside might help me. Purely self-serving. I had no fucking idea. Open the manila envelope, Frank. Take a look. Get ready to have your mind blown. Or maybe not.”
He sighed heavily, but then opened it.
What he found was about the size of a forefinger. It was a small flash drive. My copy of the original.
“There’s a printout in the file, too. Funny thing, though. It’s not terrorist funds, Frank.”
“No?” said Walsh, and calmly shook his head. “What is it, John?”
Finally I had to smile. “You know, I’m not entirely sure, and I have to preface this by saying that I’m not a huge fan of either political party. I’ve sort of liked presidents along the way, on both sides. Don’t know what that makes me. Agnostic?”
“What’s on the printout, John?”
“What I think it is, somebody in the Bureau tracked money coming and going to several offshore accounts. People trying to hide cash, lots of it, close to a billion and a half dollars. And as best I can tell, Frank, everyone on the printout is a contributor or ‘friend’ of the political party not currently in power. How about them apples?
“Now that would be embarrassing to the Bureau, and the administration, if it had come out during Nora Sinclair’s murder trial. That would be considered very unlawful, highly unethical too. Even worse than screwing Nora Sinclair, which I’m incredibly ashamed of, by the way.”
I stood up and noticed that my legs were a little shaky now. For some odd reason, I reached out and shook Frank Walsh’s hand, maybe because we both knew I was saying good-bye.
“Leave of absence, with pay,” he said. “You’ve got it, John. You deserve it.”
Then I walked out the door and headed home—to Riverside.
To Max, John Jr., and Susan—if she’d have me. And I’ll tell you what, the whole ride to Connecticut, I prayed that she would.
And that Susan, that incredible, wonderful Susan—eventually she did.
He’s made a living saving others, but what’s he going to do when he’s the one in deep water?
For an excerpt, turn the page.
“DON’T MOVE,” I said to Tess, sweaty and out of breath. “Don’t even blink. If you so much as breathe, I know I’m gonna wake up, and I’ll be back lugging chaise longues at poolside, staring at this gorgeous girl that I know something incredible could happen with. This will all have been a dream.”
Tess McAuliffe smiled, and in those deep blue eyes I saw what I found so irresistible about her. It wasn’t just that she was the proverbial ten and a half. She was more than beautiful. She was lean and athletic with thick auburn hair plaited into a long French braid, and a laugh that made you want to laugh, too. We liked the same movies, Memento, The Royal Tenenbaums, Casablanca. We pretty much laughed at the same jokes. Since I’d met her I’d been unable to think about anything else.
Sympathy appeared in Tess’s eyes. “Sorry about the fantasy, Ned, but we’ll have to take that chance. You’re crushing my arm.”
She pushed me, and I rolled onto my back. The sleek cotton sheets in her fancy hotel suite were tousled and wet. My jeans, her leopard-print sarong, and a black bikini bottom were somewhere on the floor. Only half an hour earlier, we had been sitting across from each other at Palm Beach’s tony Café Boulud, picking at DB burgers—$30 apiece—ground sirloin stuffed with foie gras and truffles.
At some point her leg brushed against mine. We just made it to the bed.
“Aahhh,” Tess sighed, rolling up onto her elbow, “that feels better.” Three gold Cartier bracelets jangled loosely on her wrist. “And look who’s still here.”
I took a breath. I patted the sheets around me. I slapped at my chest and legs, as if to make sure. “Yeah,” I said, grinning.
The afternoon sun slanted across the Bogart Suite at the Brazilian Court hotel, a place I could barely have afforded a drink at, forget about the two lavishly appointed rooms overlooking the courtyard that Tess had rented for the past two months.
“I hope you know, Ned, this sort of thing doesn’t happen very often,” Tess said, a little embarrassed, her chin resting on my chest.
“What sort of thing is that?” I stared into those blue eyes of hers.
“Oh, whatever could I mean? Agreeing to meet someone I’d seen just twice on the beach, for lunch. Coming here with him in the middle of the day.”
“Oh, that…” I shrugged. “Seems to happen to me at least once a week.”
“It does, huh?”” She dug her chin sharply into my ribs.
We kissed, and I felt something between us begin to rise again. The sweat was warm on Tess’s breasts, and delicious, and my palm traveled up her long, smooth legs and over her bottom. Something magical was happening here. I couldn’t stop touching Tess. I’d almost forgotten what it was like to feel this way.
Split aces, they call it, back where I’m from. South of Boston, Brockton actually. Taking a doubleheader from the Yankees. Finding a forgotten hundred-dollar bill in an old pair of jeans. Hitting the lottery.
The perfect score.
“You’re smiling.” Tess looked at me, propped up on an elbow. “Want to let me in on it?”
“It’s nothing. Just being here with you. You know what they say: for a while now, the only luck I’ve had has been bad luck.”
Tess rocked her hips ever so slightly, and as if we had done this countless times, I found myself smoothly inside her again. I just stared into those baby blues for a second, in this posh suite, in the middle of the day, with this incredible woman who only a few days before hadn’t been conceivable in my life.
“Well, congratulations, Ned Kelly.” Tess put a finger to my lips. “I think your luck’s beginning to change.”
AS SOON AS Ned left, Tess threw herself back on the bed with an exhalation of joy and disbelief. “You must be crazy, Tess! You are crazy, Tess.”
Crazy, to be opening herself to someone like Ned, especially with everything else going on in her life.
But something about Ned wouldn’t let her stop. Maybe his eyes, his charm, his boyish good looks. His innocence. The way he had just come up to her on the beach like that, like she was a damsel in distress. It had been a long time since anyone had treated her that way. Wanted. And she liked it
. What woman didn’t? If only he knew.
She was still cozied up on the sheets, reliving every detail of the delicious afternoon, when she heard the voice.
“Next.” He stood there—leaning, smirking—against the bedroom door.
Tess almost jumped out of her skin. She never even heard the key open the door to the suite.
“You scared me,” she said, then covered herself up.
“Poor Tess.” He shook his head and tossed the room key in an ashtray on the desk. “I can see the lunches at Boulud and Ta-boó have started to bore you. You’ve taken to going around to the high schools, picking up guys after SAT practice.”
“You were watching?” Tess shot up. That would be just like the bastard. Thinking he could do that. “It just happened,” she said, backing off, a little ashamed. And a lot ashamed that she had to justify herself. “He thinks I’m something. Not like you…”
“Just happened.” He stepped into the bedroom and took off his Brioni sport jacket. “Just happened, like, you met on the beach. And then you went back a second time. And you both just happened to meet at lunch at Boulud. A lifeguard. How very romantic, Tess.”
She sat up, angry. “You were following me? Go fuck yourself.”
“I thought you knew,” he said, ignoring her response. “I’m the jealous type.” He started to remove his polo shirt. Tess’s skin broke out in goose bumps. She was sure he could sense her alarm as he began to unbuckle his pants.
“And about fucking myself”—he stepped out of his slacks, smiling—“sorry, Tess, not a chance. Why do you think I buy you all that expensive jewelry?”
“Look,” Tess said, wrapping herself into the sheet. “Let’s not today. Let’s just talk….”
“We can talk,” he said with a shrug, folding his shirt neatly on the edge of the bed, slipping off his shorts. “That’s okay with me. Let’s talk about how I treat you like some kind of society princess, how I bought the rings on your fingers, bracelets on your wrist, that diamond lariat around your neck. Hell, I know the girls at Tiffany’s by their first names—Carla, Janet, Katy.”