Dan moved past her. “I know this is kind of weird after what happened to Gordon,” he said. “But we should do something to celebrate, maybe go out to dinner.”
“Thirty-two thousand dollars,” she repeated softly to herself.
“Thank God. I was sure we were going to lose the house. But we can’t go out. You have your phone interview at seven.”
Dan made a face as if he had forgotten about it. “Yeah, well, why don’t I blow that off? I’ve already got a contract.”
“It can’t hurt to have another one lined up.”
She was still studying him, still trying to read something in his expression.
“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” he admitted. “Well, let’s at least have a drink.”
The only alcohol left in the liquor cabinet was a bottle of Kahlua that they had brought back from Mexico years ago. Dan opened it, filled two glasses halfway, then added some ice and milk. As Carol sipped hers, the increasingly familiar tense expression returned to her face.
“You don’t think Gordon could’ve been involved in the bank robbery?” she asked.
Dan almost coughed up his drink. Damn, she was intuitive! He knew she wanted to ask more than that.
“You’re kidding, right?” he said. “This is Gordon we’re talking about. How in the world would he get himself involved in a bank robbery? Come on, let’s be serious here.”
Her soft blue eyes were holding steady on his, still searching, still trying to uncover something. Finally she looked away. “I don’t know,” she said. “I guess it was a crazy thought.”
“Yeah, it was.” Dan finished his drink. Without looking at Carol, he told her he had better go prepare for his interview. He could feel her eyes on him as he left the room. As he sat in his study, he felt shakier than ever. If she was suspecting Gordon of being involved in the robbery, then what else was she suspecting? He already knew the answer to that. He had been able to see it in her eyes. A cold chill went through him. He could imagine what she must be thinking – about his phone calls, his meetings with Joel and Shrini, the rash he had had the other day – and how she must be trying to make sense of all of it. Trying to understand how it could be related to Gordon being killed and that bank being robbed.
He felt both drained and anxious. Like he couldn’t move a muscle, but at the same time couldn’t sit still. He tried playing back the phone conversations he’d been having, trying to figure out if she could’ve overheard anything incriminating. He was still doing that when Carol opened the door, her face flushed with relief.
“They caught the person behind the bank robbery,” she said. “They just had the story on the news.”
“Who was it?” Dan asked. He could feel his heart racing wildly in his chest.
“I can’t remember his name,” Carol said, a big smile breaking over her face. “Someone connected to the mafia. I think from Revere.”
As Dan looked at his wife, he could see all doubt was gone. At that moment her smile looked brighter than any Christmas tree.
Th ank God, he thought, thank fucking God.
*
Petrenko had sent three of his men to snatch Craig Brown and was pacing impatiently while waiting for them to return. One way or another he was going to get to the bottom of what happened. If it meant skinning another man alive, so be it.
The television set was on in the background. Petrenko was only half paying attention to the news when the story broke about Lombardo’s arrest. Slowly, he made the connection between what the reporter was saying and what it meant to him. For a good twenty minutes he stood completely still, the wheels spinning in his head, his eyes as dull and lifeless as sand. In his mind he played out the possible steps he could take next, from kidnapping members of Lombardo’s family to having an all-out war with the Boston Mafia. He couldn’t see any of them working. The money and diamonds were lost. Dispassionately he accepted that. The best he could do to salvage the situation was to make a deal for the documents that he had lost.
There was a knock on the door. He looked over to see Yuri Tolkov enter the room.
“Did you get him?” Petrenko asked.
Yuri shook his head, his expression blank. In Russian, he said, “A cop was watching him.”
“Which one, the zhid?”
“No, the other one, his partner, the dumb-looking one. The only way to grab the bank manager is to take care of this cop first. What do you want me to do?”
Petrenko thought about it, frowning heavily. “We’ll do it another time. Right now we have more important matters to deal with.”
Yuri nodded matter-of-factly. “I heard the news on the radio.”
“We’ll have to make a deal with the Italians,” Petrenko said.
“Are you sure? There are other ways we could handle this.”
“None would do us any good.”
“I don’t know, we could try to-”
“There is no point,” Petrenko interrupted, his voice low but edged with violence. “We will do what we need to for now, but later we will pay them back. Don’t worry about that.”
Dan waited until seven thirty to tell Carol that the hiring manager must be blowing him off.
“He probably found someone cheaper. Son of a bitch couldn’t even show me the courtesy of calling me back,” he complained.
“These things happen,” Carol said.
She seemed a little disappointed, but not too much, probably happy enough that he had gotten his other contract. He knew she was also relieved to think that her suspicions about the bank robbery had been unfounded.
The kids had been home for over an hour. Carol had made a tuna casserole for dinner which none of them really cared for. Still, the mood was better than it had been for the past couple of days, even with the occasional comments Carol made about Gordon. Susie couldn’t help smiling a few times at Dan’s bland, innocuous jokes and Gary was buzzing about the Sox winning streak. Halfway through dinner Dan had found he was able to look at his kids without being overwhelmed by guilt.
It was now thirty minutes since they’d finished dinner, and the kids were upstairs, Susie plugged into her music and Gary watching the Sox game. Dan sat on the living room sofa scribbling notes for his book proposal. Carol was next to him, leaning against him while she read the paper. He checked his watch again and saw that it was now seven thirty-three. “The guy’s not going to call,” he repeated. “Why don’t we splurge and take the kids out for some ice cream?”
Carol twisted herself around. Turning his face with her hand, she kissed him hard on the mouth. “That’s a wonderful idea,” she said. “If we can talk the kids into it.”
Susie gave her typical whatever response, but her sullen act was half-hearted at best and she joined them without too much of an argument. Gary groused a bit about being torn away from the Sox game, but agreed as long as he could listen to the game in the car. It was the first time they had gone out for ice cream that summer. Since Dan had lost his job they had stopped doing little things like that.
Dan could tell the kids enjoyed the outing. Susie stood close by him, her body at times bumping into his. Gary was his typical good-natured self, happier than usual since it looked like the Sox were on their way to winning an eighth straight game. While they stood eating their ice cream, Carol moved close to Dan and held his hand.
When they returned home there were two messages waiting for him. One from Shrini, another from Peyton Hanes.
“Why don’t you call them back tomorrow?” Carol asked.
Dan dreaded calling either of them. “They probably want to talk about Gordon,” he said. “I’ll call them quickly and get it over with.”
“If you have to. Don’t spend too long.”
Dan nodded. When he got to his study, he stared at the phone for several minutes before calling Peyton. One of Peyton’s kids answered and left Dan waiting. After a while, Peyton picked up.
“Hey, hey, Dan,” Peyton said. “Man, it’s been a while. Can you believe what happened to Gordon?”