Jon jumped and with a cry of jubilation came down with the ball. Putting a move on Peter, he shook him and then sprinted up the street, yelling for Chuck to "block him, block him, block him," meaning Durbin.
But Durbin feinted right, left, right again and broke around Chuck, then got enough in front of Jon to slow him down a step, which in turn allowed Peter to come up from behind Jon and get him just as Durbin reached him, too. Even though they were playing touch football, Durbin threw his arms around his beloved son and held him in a hug for a full second, maybe two.
Contact. All the kids having dispersed to the television room at the other end of the house, the adults found themselves sitting around the Novios' now-cleared dining room table, everyone drinking Frangelico out of snifters.
"You really think he still cares?" Chuck was asking.
"He's done ten years in the slammer," Michael said. "That's a long time to think about getting back at who put you there."
Chuck sipped and nodded. "It's also a hell of a long time to hold a grudge, don't you think?"
Michael shrugged. "I don't think there's a statute of limitations on grudges."
"Yes, but," Kathy said, "it seems to me that these Curtlees did what they did back when all this was fresh in their minds and Ro just recently convicted, but now that he's out of prison, who cares about anybody who helped send him there? You're not a threat to him anymore."
Janice threw a look at her husband across the table. "That's what I told him, too."
Michael looked from one sister to the other. "And I hope you're both right. But even if you are right about his parents, there's still Ro himself."
Chuck was shaking his head. "I don't see that. He's not going to do anything except be a good boy while he waits for his new trial."
Michael swirled the liqueur in his glass. "I don't think so. He can't be a good boy. He doesn't know how."
"Michael," his wife said, "how can you know that?"
"I can know it because I heard him testify at his trial. I mean, here's this serial rapist on the witness stand trying to convince us that he was in fact in a normal relationship with the woman he killed. They were having consensual sex. What was the big deal?"
"Maybe they were," Kathy said.
"They were not, I promise. She's eighteen, just off the boat, scared to death, and she's living under his roof on a work visa that the Curtlees can pull anytime they want. Then Ro wants to have sex with her? So whatever it was, it wasn't consensual."
"Still," Chuck said, "it might not necessarily have been rape, right? I mean, she could have been coerced, but felt she had to."
"Chuck," Kathy said, "that's still rape."
"I'm just saying, maybe not technically, legally."
Michael nodded. "Don't tell that to the other two ex-housekeepers who testified. Who said that Ro had a thing about them keeping their shoes on."
"That's just weird," Kathy said.
"Why did he have them do that?" Chuck asked.
Michael shook his head. "Nobody knows. He's a nutcase. But they both said it."
"And this means?" Chuck asked.
"It means Ro's guilty as hell if Dolores Sandoval was naked except for her shoes. And she was. So it wasn't consensual sex. It was a rape and then when she started screaming, he had to shut her up. There's no other way to interpret it."
"What about the other two women?" Kathy asked. "The ones who did testify?"
"What about them?"
"I mean, what did he say about them, their testimony?"
"He just said they were lying. He'd never had sex with either of them, much less raped them. He was just being set up. Why? Who knew? By whom? He didn't know. There was just a lot of prejudice out there in the world against people who had money."
"But," Chuck came in again, "my point is, Michael, this guy Ro isn't going to come after you. You're no part of his new trial, right?"
"Right. If the new trial ever happens."
"Well, even if it doesn't, what kind of threat are you to him?"
Michael nodded. "Maybe you're right."
"I think I am. Why would he come after you? You've been put in your place after last time. You're not trying to get him thrown back in jail. I'd be surprised if he knew or cared if you were still alive."
Janice added, "I think Chuck's right, here, Michael. We don't have to worry about them anymore. They took their best shot at you, and it wasn't enough."
"But pretty darn close," Michael said. "Pretty darn close."
4
At 5:05 on a Friday afternoon almost three weeks later, the man who ran San Francisco's homicide detail picked up the telephone at his desk within the first half of the first ring. At the same time, he pulled his pad over in front of him, tucked the phone at his ear, and grabbed a pen. "Glitsky."
"Lieutenant." The female voice was metallic and without inflection. "We've got a female body at a probable arson fire scene at four twenty Baker, nearest cross street is Oak. Apartment number six. Fire is contained. Arson's taking jurisdiction, but local squad units, precinct captain, CSI, and paramedics are en route."
"Roger that." Glitsky was writing down the essentials. "I'll get a team rolling out there. Four twenty Baker, number six."
"That's it."
Hanging up, Glitsky pushed back from his desk.
Fifty-seven years old, he stood six foot two and weighed 210 pounds. During college, he had been a tight end for San Jose State at the same weight. Though his eyes were blue, his skin was dark, his nose prominent and slightly hooked. His father, Nat, was Jewish; his mother, Emma, long deceased, had been African American. His short Afro had by now gone mostly gray. A thick scar bisected his lips top to bottom at an acute angle. Today, as most days on the job, he wore civilian clothes-black cop shoes, dark blue khaki slacks with a thin black belt, a light brown ironed shirt, and black tie. No one had ever called him a snappy dresser.
On a whiteboard hanging on the wall directly across from his chair, he daily kept track of the twelve inspectors in the detail-their assignments and active cases. Today, that board was filled. It had been a busy winter for homicides in San Francisco.
Glitsky was around his desk, heading for the door out to the large room that held the inspectors' desks, when he stopped for a moment to glance at the whiteboard. He knew it by heart, of course, but now it struck him anew. Each of Glitsky's six homicide teams and his one solo inspector were currently working at least two murders. He needed more people, but what with budget issues, he knew he was lucky to not have had his staff cut by the morons, sycophants, and cretins who controlled these things.
His second wife, Treya, had worked since she'd met him, to no avail, to persuade Glitsky to try to temper somewhat his default expression, a flat, deathless, and menacing stare. He wasn't interested; the look had served him well at work, even if it sometimes terrified small children, even his own. Glitsky thought this was a reasonable trade-besides, it didn't hurt children to have a bit of a healthy fear of their father. Glitsky's large intelligent brow jutted over intense blue eyes. When he was thinking or daydreaming or actively scowling-all regular occurrences-the scar between his lips stood out in relief.
When people weren't calling him a snappy dresser, they often at the same time weren't calling him a sweetheart. By the time Glitsky made it out to the fire scene through rush hour traffic, dusk had just about settled into night. This is not to say that it was dark in the immediate vicinity. Between the flashing red and blue police-car lights, the lamps on the firemen's helmets, the streetlights, and the kliegs from the several TV vans that had converged on the block, the place was lit up like a movie shoot.
Glitsky parked in the middle of Baker Street next to one of the fire trucks. Getting out of his city-issued car, he caught a gust of bitter, cold wind, heavily laden with the smell of smoke. He flashed his badge and signed into the scene with the cop who was controlling access to the area.