“Rachel,” I asked, cautious, tentative. “Were these just momentary indiscretions, or did Conrad have a steady girlfriend?”
She stared into her vodka and tonic. Her knuckles were white; condensation from the side of the glass leaked through her fingers and ran down her hands like tears.
“I don’t know,” she said slowly. “I know there was more than one. But I don’t know how many, and I don’t know how serious.”
I wanted to comfort her. Her marriage to Conrad may not have been successful, but it was obvious she still cared for him in some way. And it was equally obvious that with her husband’s death, there was a great deal of pain in Rachel Fletcher’s life that would never be resolved.
“Rachel, I’m so sorry,” I said. I scooted over next to her on the couch, set my drink down on the table in front of us, and put my arm across the back of the couch. She stared at me blankly for perhaps thirty seconds, our eyes meeting over the two feet or so separating us. Then she put her glass back down and came into my arms again.
I held her there, her head nestled in the crook of my shoulder for a long time. We were very still, very quiet, with only the ticking of the grandfather clock in the living room to remind us that time was still passing.
“I’d forgotten how good you feel,” she whispered. She brought her arms around me and pulled herself even closer. My arms were around her shoulders, my hands buried in blond hair. Okay, so maybe there was something besides comforting going on here. But it was late at night; it had been a long time for both of us. Who can blame two people for grabbing what comfort they can in the world?
She pulled herself away from me for a beat, then raised her head with a look in her eyes I hadn’t seen since we were in college together, involved with each other, young and inexperienced and passionate and still untouched by the worst surrounding us.
I wanted to kiss her, wanted that more than anything else in the world. But I knew if I kissed her once, I was in over my head.
“This’s not a good idea,” I said. Words never had to work harder to get out of my mouth.
“Why?”
I pulled myself away from her while I still could. “Not now, Rachel. Not with all this going on. Maybe after it’s over, after things settle down.”
“Harry, I’d forgotten what a noble old fool you were.”
I grinned at her. “Noble old fool is right.”
I finished my drink, and we talked a little while longer. Finally, I was exhausted. It was nearly one in the morning, and it had been a very long day.
“Yeah, I need to get up early, too,” she said. “If I’m going to get in my usual three miles before all this craziness starts, I’d better do it early.”
“Oh, you run?” I asked.
“Well, not professionally, you understand. But yeah, I took up running back when I was a med school widow. Oh, God, I can’t believe I said that.”
“Med school widow?”
“That’s what med students’ wives call themselves. We used to joke about it, call Code Blue when our husbands came home. The shock would nearly kill us.”
“Shock would nearly kill you, huh?” I smiled, glad she was able to joke. That was, I thought, a good sign.
“Go on, my brave white knight, who’s suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune to protect the one he used to love.” She put her arm around my waist and steered me down the hall.
“Yeah, well. I’m getting paid pretty good for it,” I kidded.
“Cheap at the price. It’s hard to get good help these days.”
“Hey, can I see your living room?” I asked, following an impulse. She stopped, reached in, turned on a light. Rows of framed pictures on a baby grand, furniture so expensive and cultured I didn’t even recognize it, art on the walls that wasn’t bought at the hotel starving artists’ sale. About what I expected.
There were lots of pictures-family, friends-in a cabinet in the corner as well. I stopped, stepped into the room, scanned everything out of curiosity more than anything else.
“I used to jog a lot,” I said, continuing the small talk until I got to the door. “Maybe we’ll go trot a few sometime.”
“That sounds great,” she said. “Call me.”
She stood on tiptoe and pecked me on the lips. A buddy kiss, not the one I was stupid enough to turn down in the other room. But a nice one, anyway.
Rachel felt good. There was still something there between us. I’m a detective; I can tell these things.
As I pulled slowly down the driveway, headed at long last to my grungy little apartment on the other side of town, the thought occurred to me that with all the family pictures, the homey little displays of friends, nephews, nieces, parents, grandparents, pets, and old school pictures, one thing was missing.
I couldn’t remember seeing a single picture of Conrad.
13
It was eleven the next morning before I wandered into the office. There were definite advantages, I’d discovered, to self-employment, despite never knowing where your next paycheck was coming from.
The swelling in my leg was diminishing. In fact, a decent night’s sleep had left it almost painless. I could make my ankle hurt if I twisted it a certain way, so I made a mental note not to do that. What little residual swelling was left on the back of my head was gone now, and I even managed to cover most of the bandage by combing my hair back over it. I was determined to spend the day as normally as possible.
I made a pot of coffee and settled back to sift through the mail. Nothing exciting, certainly nothing even potentially lucrative. No messages on the answering machine, either. I appreciated the chance to kick back, but I knew Rachel’s money wasn’t going to last forever. Pretty soon, I guessed, I’d be repo’ing cars with Lonnie again.
I drank coffee and stared out the window for the better part of an hour. I was feeling as flat as a two-day-old open can of beer. Outside, through the yellow film that had coagulated on the window from years of interior cigarette smoke and exterior pollution, the traffic drifted by in a never-ending spasmodic flow of belching smoke, color, and noise. The stream was more choked than usual, thanks to some fool in a long black Lincoln stopped in a loading zone down Seventh Avenue from Church. Inconsiderate jerk.
I watched the drama of honking horns and middle fingers while, in the back of my mind, I tried to figure my next move. Every place I’d looked, I’d been stymied. If Bubba Hayes didn’t smoke Connie Fletcher, then who did? And why?
I needed answers. I also needed lunch. I glanced down at my watch, realized it was 11:55, and that I was a twelve-minute walk away from my noon lunch with Walt Quinlan.
Some creative jaywalking and a little luck got me to Satsuma’s on Union Street just in time to join a line of lawyers waiting to get in. Walter was third in the group, and I stepped ahead of a group of high rollers in gray suits to join him.
“Hey, guy, sorry I’m late.”
“No problem, fella,” Walter said, in good spirits. “Today’s white bean soup and turkey supreme. Nothing can ruin that kind of day.”
“You seem unusually happy.”
Walt smiled deeply over the top of his silk paisley tie. “I decided that making partner’s not the world’s most important goal, that’s all.”
This from a lawyer? I thought.
“My God, don’t let these other suits hear you say that,” I said, looking around at the crowd. “They’ll have you committed.”
“Not to worry. The situation is well under control. If things work out as planned, I’m going to be set up. For good …”
“For good? What are you up to?”
The mischievous smile continued. The crowd moved forward four people. We were next in line for a table.
“Okay,” I said after a moment, “forget it.”
He folded his arms in front of him, the black sleeves of his Armani suit wrinkling loosely over his forearms.