I slipped a smaller box out of the stocking with his name on it. "Something else?" This time he ripped at the red bow tied around the shiny white paper to reveal a black leather case. Inside was a pair of antique Edwardian cuff links, powder-blue enamel baked over eighteen-karat gold. "They're so handsome."
"I thought they'd show nicely when you're on air. When you're traveling without me and you wear them to do a story, I'll know you're thinking of me."
"Move in and you can stick them in my cuffs every morning yourself, just to make sure I do."
"You are hopelessly persistent." I poured another glass of champagne.
Jake walked to the tree and came back with the toy store package. "This one's for you."
I sat up and crossed my legs, undoing the green ribbon. When I got the box open, I lifted a giant stuffed teddy bear out and sat him next to me on the floor. I grinned. "Now why would I even need you when I've got a cuddly guy like this to come home to? I'm sure he's a much better listener than you are. No cross-examinations about my day, no complaints about the competition."
I turned to the bear and opened my mouth to speak. The words stuck in my throat when I saw what was gleaming on his furry chest. Pinned right where his heart should be was a magnificent sparkling diamond bird perched atop a large aquamarine stone. "That's just breathtaking, Jake." I threw my arms around his neck and hugged him to me.
"Let go of me and put it on."
"I'd rather let the bear wear it. That way I can look at it all the time."
"Bird on a rock. Your friend at the Schlumberger salon said you've been eyeing it for years. Hold still." He unhooked it from the animal's plush stuffing and attached it to my pale silk pajama shirt. "That's why I had to get this outfit to go with the brooch."
I stood up and headed for the bedroom. "I've got to see how it looks. It's the most beautiful thing I've ever owned." Jake followed me in and watched me preen in front of the full-length mirror. "I'm never taking it off."
"Except when you go to work every day, and right at this very moment." He unbuttoned my top and laid it carefully across the chaise at the foot of the bed, the facets of my elegant bird catching every glimmer of light from the candles on the bedside tables. "That's how I want you to think of us, always. You're the exquisite, delicate bird, and you've always got me to land on, to be your bedrock. Merry Christmas, my angel."
We finished undressing and got under the covers, making love again before we drifted off in each other's arms.
Our internal alarm clocks each went off as usual at about six-thirty, as the morning sky was attempting to brighten. We ignored the signals and decided to sleep late, reveling in the fact that neither of us had a deadline or a decision to make the entire day. It was eleven o'clock by the time I was up and dressed and had brewed the first pot of coffee. After calling our families and friends, we bundled up in thermal underwear and heavy jackets and set out on a hike to Squibnocket Beach. For more than a mile, packed snow crunching beneath our boots, we walked along the ocean, hand in gloved hand, talking about things we had never explored with each other before.
Jake asked me questions about my relationship with Adam, and about my slow recovery from the nightmare of his death. He spoke about his broken engagement, when the woman he had dated for four years moved out and married one of his closest friends, tired of the instability of his life on the road and anxious to start a family.
The only people we passed were several of my neighbors, walking dogs along the vast expanse of Atlantic beachfront. Back at the house, we converted the remains of our dinner into a lobster salad, and then spent the afternoon in front of the fireplace with our books. My Fitzgerald novel was constantly interrupted by Jake's discovery of something in his new Keats that he wanted to read aloud to me.
After a simple supper of chowder and some greens, we watched a DVD of The Thirty-Nine Steps and put ourselves to bed early. We were up before dawn, on a seven o'clock flight to Boston, connected to an eight-thirty shuttle back to La Guardia. Jake's car service picked us up in front of the terminal and we drove into Manhattan. I dropped him at the NBC studios at Rockefeller Center and we kissed good-bye.
"I'm expecting you at my apartment tonight. Till you get confirmation that your window has been replaced and that your pistol-packing victim isn't waiting by the front door, we're doing a test run of my proposition. See you later."
The driver took me down to Hogan Place and let me off in front of the entrance. It was after ten, and the place seemed like a ghost town. Only a skeleton staff would be at work today and tomorrow, and I expected to be able to get a lot done.
Laura had taken the day off, so I signed for the packet myself when the FedEx deliveryman appeared with an overnight letter from the New Jersey telephone company.
I opened the envelope to study the jumble of digits that comprised the incoming and outgoing calls made to and from Lola Dakota's temporary shelter at her sister Lily's. It could take hours for a detective, using a reverse directory, to put the numbers together with the subscriber to whose home or office the calls had been placed. Each was coded with the date, hour, and minute the connection was made, as well as its duration.
I scanned the pages until I found the day, one week earlier, of Lola's murder. I ran my finger down the rows of figures. There had been dozens of calls in the morning, when people had been coming and going to arrange the faked homicide performance. Then the activity had slowed to a standstill.
Lily had heard Lola make the call presumably to be picked up by a cab company. And then Lily had medicated herself and gone to bed.
I stopped at 1:36 P.M. A single call, made to a local Jersey number from Lily's home. Maybe I wouldn't need a detective to help decipher and track the telephone connection. The number looked familiar. What if Lola hadn't called a stranger to transport her safely to Manhattan, but had reached out for a friend instead?
I dialed the exchange and waited while the phone rang three times.
An operator answered. "Office of the District Attorney, may I help you?"
I swallowed hard. "Perhaps you can. I'm not sure if I dialed the right number. Is this Mr. Sinnelesi's office?"
"It's his office. But it's not his direct line."
"The extension I dialed," I said, looking down at the printed record, "is 8484. Can you tell me whose number that is?"
"Who are you trying to reach, ma'am?"
The last person to see Lola Dakota alive, I thought to myself. I stammered. "I, uh, I've got a message to call this number. I just can't make out the name my secretary took down."
"Oh, okay. This is Bartholomew Frankel's office. He's the executive assistant district attorney, Mr. Sinnelesi's number two man. Mr. Frankel stepped away for a bit. Shall I put you through to his secretary?"
17
"You saved me from a miserable afternoon with my mother." Mike had been at his desk in the squad when I called, and instantly agreed that we should drive out to Sinnelesi's office to confront Bart Frankel with our new information. The secretary had assured me he would be around all afternoon, so we were soon on our way through the Holland Tunnel.
"Mom's been begging me to help her plan her funeral. Pick out the coffin, go to-"
"Has she been ill?" I had known his mother for years and had no idea that anything was wrong. Perhaps that's why Mike had been delayed at the hospital on Monday morning.
"Fit as a horse. But at Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve, she got me to promise I would take her to get everything arranged. Peace of mind and all that. She's so excited you'd think she was going to Disney World with John Elway, for chrissakes. Told her I was breaking the date 'cause of you. That's the only way I could get a reprieve."