At the counter, he popped an olive from the tray into his mouth, then topped off her wine. And when her back was turned, tossed a slice of pepperoni to Bert.
By the time she’d boiled the pasta, drained it, the signal came through.
Onetime payment. Come after more, I’ll take my chances with the Volkovs. Spend it fast, because I’m coming after you.
“Big talk.”
“You understand him very well,” Abigail noted.
“Part of the job. You have to understand bad guys to catch bad guys. Where were you figuring to have him wire the money?”
“I have an account set up. Once he’s transferred the funds, I’ll distribute it to a charity for children of fallen police officers.”
“That’s commendable, and I don’t like denying kids, but …”
“You have another recipient in mind?”
“Keegan. Can you transfer Cosgrove’s payment to Keegan’s account?”
“Oh.” Her face lit up as a woman’s might when given rubies. “Oh, that’s brilliant.”
“I have my moments.”
“More than moments. It implicates both of them. It gives the FBI cause to bring them both in for questioning.”
“Honey, it fucks them both inside out.”
“Yes. It really does. And yes, I can do it. It’ll take me a few minutes.”
“Take your time. Bert and I will go for a little walk while you work.”
He snagged a couple more slices of pepperoni on the way out—one for him, one for the dog. A nice evening for a stroll around, he thought, with time to check out the progress of the garden, think about what he might do around the place on his next day off.
“This is our place,” he said to the dog. “She was meant to come here, and I was meant to find her here. I know what she’d say to that.” He laid a hand on Bert’s head, rubbed lightly. “But she’s wrong.”
When Bert leaned against his leg, as he often did with Abigail, Brooks smiled. “Yeah, we know what we know, don’t we?”
As they circled around, he saw Abigail come to the door, smile.
“It’s done. Dinner’s ready.”
Look at her, he thought, standing there with a gun on her hip, a smile on her face and pasta on the table.
Oh, yeah, he knew what he knew.
“Come on, Bert. Let’s go eat.”
Brooks spent a chunk of his morning—too big a chunk, in his opinion—meeting with the prosecutor on the Blake cases.
“The kid’s crying for a deal.” Big John Simpson, slick as they came and with one eye on a political future, made himself at home in Brooks’s office. Maybe a little too much at home.
“And you’re giving him one?”
“Save the taxpayers’ money. Let him plead guilty to assaulting an officer, resisting, the trespass. Got him locked on the vandalism at the hotel, the assaults there. All we give him is a buy on the deadly weapon. We’d never make attempted murder stick. He gets five to seven inside, with mandatory counseling.”
“And serves two and a half, maybe three.”
Big John crossed his ankles above his mirror-shined shoes. “If he behaves himself, and meets the requirements. Can you live with that?”
“Does it matter?”
Big John lifted a shoulder, sipped at his coffee. “I’m asking.”
No, they’d never make the attempted murder stick, Brooks admitted. A couple years inside would do one of two things, he calculated. It would either make Justin Blake into a halfway decent human being, or it would finish his ruination.
Either way, Bickford would be free of him for a couple years.
“I can live with it. What about his old man?”
“Big-city lawyers doing their big-city shuffle, but the fact is, we’ve got a lock there. We got the phone records proving he called Tybal Crew. Got three separate witnesses saw Crew’s truck outside the house on the day in question. Got the cash money turned in, and Blake’s fingerprints are on a number of the bills.”
He paused a moment, recrossed his ankles. “He’s claiming he hired Ty to do some work around the place, paid him in advance ’cause Ty needed the money.”
“Kosseh sher.”
“Say what?”
“Bullshit in Farsi.”
“Don’t that beat all?” Big John let out a chuckle. “Yeah, it’s bullshit in any language. We can bring in a couple dozen witnesses who’d swear Blake never pays in advance, never pays cash, always gets a signed receipt. True enough Ty was pretty damn impaired by the end of it, but he hasn’t changed his story by an inch. So.”
He shrugged, drank more coffee. “If Lincoln Blake wants to push it to trial, it won’t hurt my feelings. Make a nice splash. He’s charged with solicitation of murder for hire of a police officer. They’re going to want to deal before it’s done. Any way it’s sliced, he’ll do time.”
“I can live with that, too.”
“Good enough.” He unfolded his six-foot-six-inch frame. “I’ll make the deal with the boy’s lawyer. You did good, clean work with both these arrests.”
“Good, clean work’s the way it’s supposed to be.”
“Supposed to and is aren’t always the same. I’ll be in touch.”
No, they weren’t always the same, Brooks thought. But he’d like to get back to that good, clean work. Just that. He wanted the rest over and done, however intriguing parts of it were.
The everyday, Abigail called it. It surprised him how much he’d learned to value the everyday.
He stepped out of his office. There was Alma at dispatch, a pencil behind her ear, a pink tumbler of sweet tea at her elbow. Ash at his desk, brows knitted as he pecked away at the keyboard, Boyd’s voice over the radio reporting a minor traffic accident off Rabbit Run at Mill’s Head.
He’d take this, Brooks realized. Yeah, he’d take just this. Every day.
Abigail walked in.
He knew her, so he saw the tension, though she kept her face impassive.
Alma spotted her. “Well, hey, there. I heard the news. I want to say best wishes to you, Abigail, as you’re family now. You’ve got yourself a good man there.”
“Thank you. Yes, I do. A very good man. Hello, Deputy Hyderman.”
“Aw, it’s Ash, ma’am. Nice to see you.”
“It’s Abigail. It’s Abigail now. I’m sorry to interrupt, but do you have a moment?” she asked Brooks.
“Or two. Come on in.”
He took her hand, kept it after he closed the door to his office. “What happened?”
“It’s good, what happened.” The good made her a little breathless. “Garrison contacted me. Her report was very brief, considering, but inclusive.”
“Abigail, spill it.”
“I’m—oh. Yes. They’ve picked up Cosgrove and Keegan. They’re interrogating, and that may take some time. She didn’t mention the blackmail, but I’ve followed some of the communications in-house, so to speak. Naturally, they believe Keegan blackmailed Cosgrove, and they’ll use that to pressure each of them. More. More important. They’ve arrested Korotkii and Ilya Volkov. They’ve arrested Korotkii for the murders of Julie and Alexi, and Ilya as accessory after the fact.”
“Sit down, honey.”
“I can’t. It’s happening. It’s actually happening. They’ve asked me to meet with the federal prosecutor and his team to prepare me for testifying.”
“When?”
“Right away. I have a plan.” She took both his hands now, held tight. “I need you to trust me.”
“Tell me.”
On a bright July morning, one month and twelve years from the day she’d witnessed the murders, Elizabeth Fitch entered the courtroom. She wore a simple black suit and white shirt, and what appeared to be minimal makeup. A pair of pretty dangling earrings were her only jewelry.
She took the stand, swore to tell the truth. And looked directly into Ilya Volkov’s eyes.
How little he’d changed, really, she thought. A bit fuller in face and body, his hair more expertly styled. But still so handsome, so smooth.