Ellen Hart - Jane Lawless 18 - The Cruel Ever After p.03

26
The next morning dawned gray and rainy. Shortly after ten, Jane left her house, backing her car out of the driveway in a dreary downpour. She wasn’t
positive, but at first she thought she was being followed. A van had been parked just up the street. As she passed it, the driver pulled away from the curb.
It disappeared in traffic before she turned onto the freeway. When she sped off onto the Lexington Avenue exit, nobody came off after her. She figured
she was safe. Even so, it reminded her of an ant crawling up her leg at a picnic. Even when she looked and knew nothing was there, she still felt it.
Parking across the street from the gallery, Jane grabbed her umbrella and slid out. The clouds were starting to break up. Perhaps a change in the
weather would give her mood a lift.
Halfway up the front walk, she saw a sign in the front window that said CLOSED. Perfect. She should have called before she drove over, but she hadn’t
because she’d been itching for movement. She wanted to look at the gallery, maybe meet Irina Nelson, ask if she knew Chess personally, if she thought
he had anything to do with her mother’s murder.
Jane was studying the turret that jutted off the east side of the house when a man’s voice said, “Can I help you?” Turning around, she found a darkskinned,
Arabic-looking man with a trimmed beard, sultry brown eyes, and a serene expression standing a few feet behind her.
“Oh, hi. The gallery’s closed.” Always good to start a conversation by stating the obvious.
“We’ll be open again tomorrow.”
She was surprised by the broad Texas accent. “Do you work here?”
“I’m the manager. Majid Farrow.”
“I was sorry to hear about—”
“Morgana? Yeah. It was a blow to all of us.”
“Do the police know who did it?”
“Not that I’ve heard.” He stared at her for a few seconds. “You look kinda familiar. Have we met?”
Her dad’s run for governor had splashed her face across way too many news reports. “Jane Lawless.”
“Oh, sure. You’re Raymond Lawless’s daughter. He lost.”
He sounded awfully chipper about it.
“Yes, he did.”
“I liked him,” he continued, “but when it came right down to it, I couldn’t bring myself to vote for him.”
“That’s okay. I forgive you.”
He seemed to like that and grinned.
“Do you give appraisals?”
“Are you a collector?”
Honesty might be the best policy, but it didn’t always get you the information you wanted. “I am.”
“Sure, we do appraisals. May I ask what you have?”
Might as well shoot the moon. She showed him the snapshot of the bull.
“This is quite beautiful.”
“It’s called the Winged Bull of Nimrud.”
“Are we talking the Nimrud gold?”
How the hell did she know? “Of course.”
“As far as I know, all of the Nimrud gold is in a vault in Baghdad. Are you sure what you have is authentic?”
“That’s what I need to find out—before I buy it.”
“So it’s not in your possession.”
“Not at the moment.”
He nodded. “Well, sure. Bring it by.” He took out his billfold and handed her a card. “Give me a call and we can set up a time. I’d love to take a look.”
“I’ll do that. You’ve been very helpful.”
“We aim to please.” His Texas accent implied, although he didn’t actually add, little lady.
* * *
“Married, huh?” Nolan eyed her with amusement.
“It’s not funny.”
“It’s kind of funny.”
“Not if Chess comes after me and demands half of what I’m worth before he’ll grant me a divorce.”
“And you found this out after he was arrested?” He blew on his coffee before he took a sip.
“My dad gave me the good news last night.”
He whistled. “Bet that’s a conversation you’ll never forget.”
Wiping up a spill off the Formica-topped table with a paper napkin, she didn’t answer.
“You’re about as tightly wound as I’ve ever seen you,” said Nolan, “and that’s saying something.”
Nolan had called her as she was leaving the gallery, said he had a few minutes and why didn’t they meet at the coffee shop, the only one he ever went
to these days—Anodyne on Forty-third and Nicollet. He’d more or less made it his official office away from his home office. He didn’t care about the
organic coffee, or the grungy chic ambience; it was the cold meat loaf sandwiches that had won his heart.
“I got a lead on why those men are trying to find Chess.” She removed the snapshot of the bull from her shirt pocket and handed it to him.
“What’s this?”
“The Winged Bull of Nimrud. It’s an ancient artifact. Apparently, it’s worth over a million dollars. Chess has it. He’s trying to sell it to my friend Julia
Martinsen. I got jumped on Saturday night by one of the guys watching the restaurant.”
“You what? Is that why your nose is bruised?”
“Yeah, but listen. The first question the attacker asked me was did I know where Chess was. I lied, told him he was in Chicago. Then he said, ‘What
about the bull?’ I had no idea what he was talking about until I went over to Julia’s place last night for dinner. She gave me the snapshot, told me Chess
wanted to sell it to her. The more I think about it, the more sure I am that everything that’s happened has been related to this bull. Somebody wants it, and
they’re willing to kill for it.”
Nolan handed the photo back. He removed his mirrored sunglasses and began to clean the lenses with a paper napkin. “You think Dial’s death and
Beck’s are related?”
“Yeah, I do. That’s why I’ve got to talk to Chess. I called over to the jail this morning, and they said he can’t have any visitors.”
“Not until he’s charged. And if and when he is charged, unless you’re on his visitor’s list, you won’t get in. ’Course, sometimes those lists are kind of
slow getting to the right desk.”
Her attention was drawn abruptly to the front windows. A long-haired blond man stood outside looking in. When their eyes met, he turned and took off.
“That’s one of them,” said Jane.
Nolan glanced over his shoulder.
“The blond guy with the long hair.”
Nolan unsnapped his shoulder holster strap with a flick of his thumb and rushed outside. Jane waited a couple of seconds, not sure she wanted to
come face-to-face with the guy again, but decided that if Nolan caught up to him, he might need her help. She pushed back her chair and raced out after
them. She made it to the next block before she realized she’d taken a wrong turn. She retraced her steps, listening and looking, trying to determine where
they’d gone. When she reached the alley behind the coffeehouse, she stopped. Nolan was about fifty yards in, but instead of beating the crap out of the
guy, he was crouched down, talking to him.
She sprinted toward them. “Hey.”
As Nolan rose, she saw that it wasn’t the blond guy he’d been talking to but Lee. He was sitting on the ground, his back against a garbage can, rubbing
his jaw and swearing.
“The asswipe clipped me,” he said, moving into a crouch and then standing up. “I shoulda had him. I would have, too, except I tripped.” He kicked a rock
into the garage on the other side of the alley.
“You know this guy?” asked Nolan, still breathing hard from the chase. He was in good shape for a sixty-year-old, but he wasn’t as young as he used to
be.
“A. J. Nolan,” said Jane. “Meet Lee. Don’t know if that’s a first or last name.”
“Lee Northcutt.” He stuck out his hand, and Nolan shook it.
“How did you know that man was following me?” asked Jane.
“Because I’ve been following both of you,” said Lee, a red welt appearing just above his jawline. “I had nothing better to do. Actually, it was kind of fun,
and I thought it might help you.”
“I never saw you.”
“You wouldn’t. I’m a lot better at what I do than those idiots.”
“Will someone explain to me what’s going on?” asked Nolan, hands rising to his hips.
“This is the guy I told you about,” said Jane. “The preacher who noticed the restaurant was being staked out. Let’s go back to Anodyne. I’ll buy you each
a round coffee and we can talk.”
“I’d rather have a beer,” said Lee.
“Me, too,” said Nolan.
The rainy morning had given way to a muggy midday. It was days like this, especially the humid early summer, when Jane felt the entire world was about
to mold and rot.
“Fine, beer it is.”
They walked over to the Driftwood, where Jane stood at the bar and paid for the brews, then snaked her way back to the table.
They all clicked bottles and took thirsty swallows.
“Lee’s an ex-cop,” said Jane. “Ex-seminarian. Ex–security consultant.”
“At the moment, I’m living on my severance pay. I’m also an ex–army brat. Lived all over the country. I guess I’d like to find a place to settle.” He turned
the longneck around in his hand.
“Maybe you should become an anti-preacher,” said Jane.
“Probably wouldn’t pay very well. Besides, at the end of the day, nobody ever changes anybody else’s mind.”
“I use to be a cop,” said Nolan. “Worked homicide.”
“I worked mostly vice. In Chicago.”
“You know Dwayne Tateum?”
“Sure. I know him well. I was married back then. My wife and me and Dwayne and Ann used to bowl together. We even joined a league one year.”
“Small world,” said Jane.
“Yup,” said Nolan, tipping back his bottle. “You know Al Bruns?”
“Not well. He transferred from vice to narcotics just after I transferred in.”
“Where’d you work as a security consultant?” asked Nolan.
“Atlanta. Mears 香 Hallick. Ever heard of them?”
“Good group.”
“But I got sick of it. The pay was okay, but it bored the hell out of me. I guess I need a little more action.”
“Ever thought of doing PI work?”
Jane turned and looked at Nolan.
“I knew a few PIs in Chicago. All they did was chase husbands around to see if they were cheating, or sometimes they’d wait in a hotel parking lot all
night to get photos of the wife and her lover.”
“I don’t do that sort of thing,” said Nolan. “I only take cases that interest me.”
“How do you survive?”
“Very well. I’ve got one of the best reps in town.”
“Huh. Never actually thought a PI could survive being selective.”
“Team up with me,” said Nolan.
Jane’s look turned into a stare. Was he doing this to bait her, to make the point that she wasn’t the only game in town?
“Just until we figure out what’s going on with Jane,” continued Nolan. “I could use your help, and so could she. If you like it, you can stick around, work
with me on another case. No strings.”
Lee touched the bruise on his jaw. “Hell, I suppose I’m already involved. I’d love to get another crack at that guy.” Smiling his gap-toothed smile at Jane
and then at Nolan, he said, “Count me in.”
27
Jane was prepping the ingredients for the old-fashioneds, getting out the glasses, the maraschino cherry juice, an orange, a lemon, and a lime, finding the
rock candy swizzle sticks, and opening up a new bottle of rye, when her landline rang.
“It’s me,” came Cordelia’s excited voice. “I’m outside. Let me in, let me in.”
“Is the doorbell broken?”
“Don’t joke, not at a time like this.”
“Use the keypad. I’m in the kitchen cutting up citrus fruit.”
“How can you even think about vitamin C when—”
“Sigrid is stopping by in a few minutes.”
Cordelia barreled into the kitchen, cell phone still attached to her ear. “I was in the ’hood. Thought I’d stop.” She grabbed Jane and gave her what she
probably thought of as a sustaining hug. To Jane it felt more like being mugged. “You need moi at a time like this, not Sigrid.” She reached down and
gave Mouse a friendly rub.
“Steal something new from the theater’s costume department?” asked Jane, nodding to a silk confection that had come straight out of Maxfield
Parrish’s drawing of Ali Baba. Red robe over white tunic. Lots of gold braid. All that was missing was the Arabian sword.
“Come,” she said, dragging Jane by the scruff of her sweatshirt into the living room and dropping her down on the couch. “Now,” she said, pacing back
and forth in front of the cold fireplace, “we have to talk.”
Mouse hunkered down a few feet away to watch.
“How Chester could have failed me so I will never understand.”
“Failed you?”
“I’m afraid I come with more bad news.” She all but fell onto the couch. “Mel phoned a few minutes ago. Seems the cops finally arrested Chester—
officially—and charged him with Dial’s murder. Mel said the reports coming across the wire were reporting that you were once married to him. She thinks
the story is about to break in a big way.”
“Define ‘in a big way.’ ”
“It will make the nightly news, the newspapers, and you might even see a few reporters camped on your doorstep.”
Jane put her head in her hands and groaned.
“It’s just the kind of juicy personal story people love. Prominent Lesbian Once Married to Murder Suspect. Details at Ten. But now, see, it’s going to
be, Prominent Lesbian Adoring Wife of Murder Suspect. Lesbian Daughter of Onetime Candidate for Governor, Raymond Lawless, Murder Suspect’s
Better Half.”
“You can stop. I get the picture.”
“Mel thinks the police leaked the marriage stuff.”
“Why?”
“To put pressure on you to cooperate.”
“But I have cooperated. More or less.”
“They must think you have information you’re keeping quiet about.”
Everyone, it seemed, had come to the same conclusion.
“This next bit may seem like a parasitic request from a member of the fourth estate, but it’s not. It’s an offer to help. Mel thinks you should get the truth
out there before everybody starts to play fast and loose with the facts. She wants to do an interview with you, to be published in the Daily TwinCitian in the
next couple of days.”
The doorbell rang.
“That must be Sigrid,” said Jane, getting up, more eager than ever to get to those old-fashioneds. “Don’t say anything about this to her, okay?”
“My luscious lips are zipped, but let’s get rid of her fast.”
Jane held up a finger for quiet as she hit the OFF button on the security pad and drew back the door. She didn’t always engage the security system
these days, but since Chess left, she’d had it on constantly.
“Hey, there,” said Sigrid, grinning, standing with her hands on the shoulders of her daughter.
“Mia,” said Jane, “I didn’t know you were coming.”
Mia kept her eyes on the ground, twisting her mouth from one side to the other, looking thoroughly disgruntled.
“Julia canceled her meeting with Peter, so he dropped Mia and me off while he takes care of some business in Uptown. We’ve got about an hour.”
“Why’d she cancel the meeting?”
“Not feeling well, I guess.”
“Is something wrong with—” Jane nodded to Mia.
“She’s monumentally pissed at Peter and me.” Sigrid shuffled into the foyer behind her daughter.
Mouse trotted into the room, dropped a bone at Mia’s feet, and licked her hand until she petted him. Still Mia didn’t smile or look up.
“We found a therapist who can sign,” continued Sigrid, checking out Cordelia’s getup as she entered from the living room. “I assume the Forty Thieves
will be along any minute.”
Cordelia gave her a wan smile.
“Anyway, Mia had her second meeting with the therapist this afternoon.”
“Not going well, I take it,” said Jane, bending down to run her hand gently along Mia’s arm. “Hi,” she said. “I’m glad you could come. I have an art book
for you. I’ll give it to you before you go.”
Mia nodded, then looked over at Cordelia.
“Wanna play with that chalk in the drive again?” asked Cordelia, signing to Mia as she spoke.
Mia gave a halfhearted shrug.
“Would you rather watch TV?” asked Jane.
Again the girl shrugged. At the moment, shrugs seemed to be her only form of communication.
“Come on,” signed Cordelia. “I might even be able to scare us up a black cherry soda if that ogre of a mother of yours doesn’t object.”
That drew a slight smile.
Sigrid drifted around the kitchen as Jane loaded the cocktail shaker with fruit.
“I didn’t expect Cordelia to be here,” said Sigrid.
“She stopped by a few minutes ago. If you don’t want to talk in front of her—”
“She’s family. Besides, she’ll pry it out of you, one way or the other. To be honest, there’s not much to tell. Peter and I finally worked out our differences.
For now, divorce is off the table.”
Jane had just finished crushing the fruit in the bottom of the shaker when Cordelia breezed in through the back door.
“Got her all set up with a nice can of pop and the chalk. That Mia is one pissed-off puppy.”
“Tell me about it,” said Sigrid.
Jane added a generous portion of the rye, a touch of maraschino cherry juice, bitters, and ice and shook it all up together, straining the liquid into three
tumblers. She dropped a rock candy swizzle stick in each glass and passed them out.
Mouse, a bone gripped in his teeth, curled up on the rug by the back door. For him, at least, all was well with the world.
“So, you and Peter are back together, riding the happily-ever-after train?” asked Cordelia, sitting down at the kitchen table, pushing out the other chairs
with her foot, inviting everyone to join her.
“Pretty much,” said Sigrid.
“But at the birthday party,” said Jane, “when I asked you if everything was okay, you said ‘yes and no.’ ”
“Oh, I was just angry at him that night. He was being a butt-head.”
“What about school?” said Jane. “You wanted to go back and get another master’s, and then go on for a doctorate.”
“That documentary Peter did of your father’s campaign got some real buzz going for him. The finished film will be making the rounds of independent
festivals this summer and next fall. He’s already had a couple of good offers to work on other documentaries. It may mean that he’s out of town more than
he’d like, but we’ll work it out. I’ll go to school part-time. Mia’s our number one focus at the moment.”
Jane had a sense that there was more to the story, but whether it was because Sigrid didn’t feel comfortable talking about the details of her marriage in
front of Cordelia, or she simply didn’t want to get into it, Jane had no way of knowing. “I’ve never understood how love can die,” she said, sipping her
drink. “I know it does. It’s happened to me. I still don’t understand it. I get even less how you could ever restore love once it’s gone.”
“Maybe you can’t if it’s really gone for good,” said Sigrid, “but if the spark is still there—”
“I thought you and Peter were finished. That’s what you told me. You wanted different things. He wanted kids, a white picket fence, and a conventional
life.”
“He’s got Mia now, which has gone a long way toward filling his need for a child. And he’s changed,” she said, sucking on her swizzle stick. “After that
mess last fall, he’s a different man. I can’t explain it, except to say that he’s willing to take risks now, willing to rock the boat. I can’t say we’ll be together
forever, but for now, our life together is good. More than good.”
“It happened for Mel and me,” said Cordelia. “We were apart for years before we got back together.”
Jane turned her drink around in her hand. “It’s still a mystery to me.”
“That’s exactly what love is,” said Cordelia. “Read the philosophers, the romantic poets. Read the biography of my life, once it’s written.”
“The world is definitely waiting for that book,” said Sigrid, stifling a yawn.
They talked—and argued—companionably through the first round of drinks and then a second.
“I guess I’d better go get Mia,” said Sigrid, tipping the glass back and finishing the last few drops. “Peter should be back any minute. We’re having
dinner tonight with a documentary director, a woman Peter is hoping to work with. She’s in town on business, lives in New York.”
Jane and Cordelia remained at the table as Sigrid got up and left through the back door.
“Returning to the subject of the death of love,” said Cordelia, dipping her swizzle stick back into the drink. “You weren’t thinking about Julia, were you?”
“Yeah, I guess I was. Julia and Kenzie.”
“You can do better.”
“To be honest, I’m exhausted by the entire subject.”
“ ‘The course of true love never did run smooth;’ ” Willy Shakespeare wrote that.”
“A wise man.”
Sigrid burst back into the room. “I can’t find her.”
“Mia?” said Jane, getting up.
“She knows the rules. She’s not supposed to go anywhere unless she tells me.”
“We’ll help you find her,” said Jane.
Just as they got outside, Peter drove up. He parked his Mustang in front of the house and hopped out, a big grin on his face. “Thought I might be in time
for one of those old-fashioneds.” When he saw Sigrid running toward him through the grass, his expression sobered. “What’s wrong?”
“Mia. We can’t find her.”
“She was drawing with chalk in the drive,” said Cordelia, nodding to the artwork.
“Here, too,” said Jane, seeing a half-finished hopscotch grid drawn in blue and pink chalk right next to the front steps.
“She was so angry at me,” said Sigrid, stepping out into the street and looking both ways.
“You think she took off?” said Peter.
“I think,” said Jane, “that we’re wasting time. We need to spread out.”
“You’ve all got your cell phones?” asked Cordelia. When everyone answered in the affirmative, she headed toward Sheridan and the lake.
“I’ll take the alley,” said Peter, dashing off.
Sigrid and Jane went in opposite directions down the street.
Jane didn’t like the look of that unfinished hopscotch court. Why would a kid start one and not finish it?
As she was passing in front of Sebastian Joe’s ice cream parlor a few minutes later, her phone trilled. Digging it out of her back pocket, she said hello.
“Janey, it’s Dad.”
Her heart sank. She’d been hoping it would be good news about Mia.
“Chess was charged with Dial’s murder a few hours ago. He’ll be arraigned first thing tomorrow morning. I just got out of the judge’s chambers. The
bail’s going to be set at a million. Not unusual in a case like this. He mentioned that two-hundred-and-fifty-thousand-dollar check again, that he needs to
cash it.”
“He sold an artifact to Julia. She told me last night that she was calling her bank this morning to cancel it. She’s not even sure what he sold her was
real.”
“Oh, Lord. He won’t be happy when he hears that. Anyway, I just wanted to keep you in the loop. Oh, and I talked to a divorce lawyer last night, an old
friend. She said that a judge most likely would not allow Chess access to your assets in order to make bail. You’re still legally married, but you haven’t
been in contact with him in decades. In Minnesota, judges rule, in cases like this, on what is reasonable. If we were in, say, Arizona, a judge would more
likely stick to the letter of the law and allow him access. That means, unless you allow him access, he can’t use your money to get out.”
“Why on earth would I want to help him get out of jail?”
“I don’t know. I do know he’s going to try hard to convince you he’s innocent. I don’t have a crystal ball, Janey, but given his record when it comes to
telling the truth, you’d be crazy to trust him. I’ll represent him, for now, but in my opinion, you’re safer with him in jail rather than out.”
“I couldn’t agree more.”
“The bad news is, when it comes time for a divorce, Chess is entitled to half of your assets. He might not ask for it, but it’s his if he wants it.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“Maybe we can make a deal with him. I’m one of the best criminal defense lawyers in the state, and he knows it. I’ll tell him that I’ll represent him if he
agrees to keep his hands off your estate. We’ll get it in writing.”
If only it could be that easy.
“You’re being careful, right?” asked her dad.
She wasn’t sure if she should tell him about Mia. She made a quick decision to call him later, hopefully with good news. “You don’t need to worry.”
“Yes, I do, honey. When it comes to my kids, it’s my job.”
An hour later, Jane trudged up the sidewalk to her front door. Cordelia was already back, sitting on the steps, her turban askew, her robes drooping
from the heat and humidity.
“Nothing?” asked Cordelia, fanning her face with a copy of the Southwest Journal.
Jane sat down next to her. “Nothing. It’s so frustrating that she can’t hear if we call her name.”
“Tell me about it.”
“I just talked to Sigrid. She and Peter are going to stay at it a while longer. I told them we’d stick around the house in case Mia comes back. Apparently,
Mia’s run away from them before. Twice. She came home on her own the first time. The second time, the cops found her in a park, hauled her back.”
“If she wants to get lost, it’s not hard.”
“What did Mia say to you while you were setting her up with the chalk?”
“Not a lot,” said Cordelia. “Just that she was really angry at her mom. She wished things could go back to the way they were last fall, with Peter living on
one side of a double bungalow and Sigrid on the other. She said it wasn’t Peter’s idea for her to see a therapist, it was her mom’s. She doesn’t
understand why she has to talk about things that are painful. She wants to live with Peter. She wishes her mom would move out.”
Jane looked up at the cloudless summer sky, wiping sweat off her forehead with the back of her arm. “I suppose she could’ve gone for a walk and
gotten lost. She’s not familiar with this neighborhood.”
“I suppose.”
“Or—”
“What other options are there? She got lost or she took off.”
Jane was so frightened by one other possibility, she couldn’t even bring herself to say it out loud.
28
Irina glanced to her right, anxious to make sure Dusty was okay in his car seat. She hated that her mother’s car didn’t have a backseat, but she had to
make do. She sped through the dark streets toward the River Bay Marina south of Hastings, where her mother’s houseboat was docked in a rented slip.
Her little boy’s brown eyes were open, and he seemed to be alternately looking out the window at the lights whizzing past and playing with his toes. He’d
sneezed once, just as she was getting him strapped into his seat, which concerned her. She wasn’t sure if the windows should be open or closed. She
couldn’t bear to think he was breathing in bacteria, microorganisms, or viruses that could hurt him. She’d finally decided on keeping the windows closed,
with the air-conditioning running. Mothers had a sixth sense about their own kids, and that’s what Irina had to trust.
This was the second time she’d taken Dusty out in the last few days. She thought about Steve’s comment, that babies needed to be exposed to germs
to help them develop their immune systems. Conflicting information, especially when it came to children’s health, seemed to be the norm. It was probably
just something Steve had made up because he wanted to go to a restaurant and wolf down a steak while he tried to convince her to come back home.
Not only was it impossible for her to return to Apple Valley, but she couldn’t stay at the old family house another minute. Earlier in the evening, Irina had
seen the same truck drive past the house three times in the space of ten minutes. She called to Misty, told her come look, but as luck would have it, once
Misty had joined her at the window, the truck never came by again. She eventually gave up trying to convince her sister that they weren’t safe, that they
should both leave, and instead she’d gone into the bedroom and packed up her suitcase and Dusty’s diaper bag, then crept out the back door. She’d
lifted her mom’s key fob from Misty’s purse on the way out. Misty’s rattletrap Cougar, with the ashtray filled to overflowing and the ripped, dirty seats, was
the least hygienic place in the northern hemisphere. Her sister would be angry when she learned what Irina had done, but in a few days she’d be able to
buy five Audi Roadsters if she wanted them.
Arriving at the marina shortly before ten, Irina drove through the security gate and then began her search for a parking space. Her mother rented a
liveaboard slip, which meant that the boat was moored on one of the outer fingers. After finding a spot reasonably close to the walkway, she unstrapped
Dusty’s car seat and lifted the entire seat onto the pavement next to her. Then she grabbed her suitcase, hung the diaper bag over her shoulder, and
lugged everything—and everyone—to the far side of the marina.
Under a starry sky on the aft deck, she unlocked the door to the first-floor salon. A night-light that her mom always kept on in the galley burned at the
back of the large, open room. She loved the feel of being on the water, although this wasn’t exactly a normal boat. The two-story floating mansion was
sixty-two feet long, custom-made to her mother’s specifications, using only the finest-quality materials—teak, ebony, mahogany, leather, glass block, and
polished marble. She wasn’t sure how much it was worth, but she would learn tomorrow when she and her sister met at the lawyer’s office to go over the
trust documents. She couldn’t stand the idea of having the boat trashed by Misty and her sleazy friends. She intended to buy her sister out. Misty would
inherit stocks and the house in Merriam Park. Irina would get the gallery, more stocks, some bonds, and her mother’s condo in Woodbury. Misty had been
the black sheep in the family forever, but still, Irina thought the bequests were generous.
Irina spent a few seconds checking the refrigerator to see if there was any food on board. Her mom normally spent the weekends here. It struck her as
achingly sad that her mom would never come here again, a place she’d loved so much. Tears formed, but she fought them. She would have the rest of her
life to mourn her mother’s passing. For now, she had to stay focused on keeping herself—and Dusty—safe. Finding that the refrigerator shelves were
stocked with cheeses, fruit, champagne, and even a slice of pâté and a paper carton of crab and corn chowder from Surdyk’s, she turned back to her son.
“Let’s get you upstairs to bed,” she said, carrying him and everything she’d brought with her up the staircase. She moved quietly down a hall lit by more
tiny night-lights, bumping the wall with the suitcase, past the guest cabin and one of the four bathrooms. Standing at last in the master suite, she wondered
for a moment if she should run back downstairs and find the cleaning supplies, scrub the room down before they spent the night. It seemed too much,
even to her. One night in a room she hadn’t inspected from top to bottom, but one that she knew was cleaned regularly by a professional service, would
probably be okay. She could open the sliding glass doors that led out to the foredeck if she wanted fresh air.
Irina set Dusty’s car seat in a chair and pulled it over next to the bed, where she sat down with a tired thump. It was times like this that she truly loathed
the people in her life. Where was their support for a young mother with a sick baby? If it took a village to raise a child, her village was full of nothing but
slackers and critics.
Irina gave Dusty a quick bath in the master bathroom. She dressed him in a clean Onesie and then gave him his bottle. He fell asleep on her shoulder
as she walked around the darkened room, patting his back and humming softly. She held him in her arms for a long time, just looking down at him,
smelling him, kissing his cheek, marveling at how beautiful and sweet he was, and how grateful she was that she’d finally been able to cary a child to term.
After getting him settled back in the car seat and tucking a blanket around him, she stretched out on the bed, feeling another wave of sadness wash
over her—this time, for Chess. He would never know the joy of having a son, and Dusty would never know his father. It seemed pretty clear to Irina that
Chess had taken off. She’d been afraid he’d do something like that all along. He hadn’t returned any of her calls. Unless he was lying dead in an alley
somewhere, a victim of whoever was searching for the bull, there was no other reasonable explanation for his silence. He was gone. In many ways, she
didn’t blame him. They’d gotten in way over their heads, with no exit strategy. She didn’t have a gun anymore, but she did have an ace in the hole if the
thugs came after her again. She intended to stand her ground, refusing to flee as Chess had done, but she wouldn’t allow herself to be a sitting duck, as
she had the other night.
Had she ever really loved Chess, she wondered, or had he simply represented a way out of an unworkable life with Steve? She might be greedy, and
she might have been attracted to the idea of a secret romance, but she was also a practical person—maybe too practical for her own good. She was a
little surprised that she could think this clearly at such a stressful time. Yes, as she mulled it over, she did want to marry Chess, but not at any price. The
fact that he’d run off without so much as a phone call meant she was expendable. The biggest error she’d made was not telling him about Dusty. If she
could do it all over again, she wouldn’t make the same mistake.
Back in the galley, Irina removed the champagne from the refrigerator, noting that it was French and expensive. She found some crackers in the
cupboard and returned to the master cabin, where she disrobed, opened up the sliding doors to the foredeck, removed the hot tub cover, and climbed in.
The heat felt good against her chilled skin. Above her, a yellow half-moon floated peacefully in the night sky. She drank directly from the champagne
bottle, feeling the alcohol ease the knots in her tired muscles.
It had been a long day. She’d spent most of the morning arranging the funeral. She’d driven to the funeral home, picked out a casket, arranged for
flowers, and contacted the church and talked to the minister who would officiate at the service. He was a man she’d never met before, but he seemed to
understand her desire to keep things simple. There would be two eulogies, one delivered by her uncle, her mother’s brother, who would be flying in with
his family from Pittsburgh, and the other by her mother’s best friend, a woman who lived in town.
In the afternoon, Irina had called all the relatives and friends her mother would have wanted to come. For some on the list, she’d left messages. Those
were the easy calls. Many of the others had wanted to talk. It seemed to Irina that they were, tacitly but unmistakably, asking her to make them feel better
instead of offering her comfort. The entire day had been exhausting and confusing.
Misty, of course, felt she deserved time off for good behavior because she’d babysat Dusty for several hours while Irina was off taking care of the
funeral business. And frankly, it was fine with Irina if Misty left the house. When she was around, so were her friends. Irina planned to confront her sister
and Steve about their cozy embrace last night, but not until after the funeral. Her emotions were already on overload, and at the moment, it was more than
she wanted to know.
Lying in the tub, with the jets turned off, drifting to sounds of the quiet lapping of the waves against the hull, Irina began to wonder about mold. Boats
were in contact with water, which was a perfect environment for mold to grow. It didn’t smell moldy inside the houseboat. If anything, it smelled like lemon
oil and eucalyptus. Still, it might not have been the best idea to bring Dusty here. With every decision she made, she was compromising his health. She
pushed up out of the water and sat on the edge of the tub, naked, alone, half drunk. She was a miserable excuse for a mother. She didn’t deserve such a
wonderful son. She started to cry, unable to stop herself this time.
An odd feeling—perhaps a sensation of movement or a shifting in the boat’s balance, something almost but not quite perceptible—caused her to look
back into the cabin. She climbed out of the water as quietly as she could manage and grabbed her bathrobe from the bed, sure as she could be that she
was no longer alone on the boat. Standing in the darkness, with moonlight streaming in through the sliding glass doors, she listened, hoping with all her
might that she was wrong.
Creeping to the edge of the door, she looked down the hall. A light snapped on in the salon, throwing a shadow against the stairway.
She backed up and looked around for something to use as a weapon, but unless she wanted to smother the intruder with a pillow, or smack him with a
lamp, she was out of luck. That’s when she remembered her knitting needles. She’d brought along the tiny blue sweater she was making for Dusty.
Easing over to her suitcase, she dug through her clothes until she found them. She pulled several free and tested them by poking them into her palm. It
was a puny effort, but if she could get close enough without being seen, she could do some damage.
Standing behind the door, she waited, taking shallow breaths, praying that Dusty wouldn’t wake and start to cry. The wood stairs creaked under the
weight of heavy footsteps. A second later he was in the hall moving toward her. She couldn’t see him, but she had the sense that he was big. And then he
stopped. Just stopped.
She pulled her head back as a light burst on in the bathroom. A slice of brightness slid across the cabin rug. She watched, feeling eerily calm, as the
shadow moved into the doorway. Her hand tightened around the knitting needles. She was sure of only one thing. She would kill to protect her son.
The shadow hovered.
She could hear his breathing, feel his nearness.
Without warning, the door slammed back at her, driving the needles against her stomach. She cried out in pain, lost her balance, and fell back against
the wall.
The overhead light flipped on. She found herself staring up at Majid. “What … what are you doing here?”
His black eyes swept over her, taking in the cabin, the open suitcase, her clothes tossed over the bed. He zeroed in on the car seat. His expression
was inscrutable.
“Here,” he said, extending his hand. “Let me help you.”
Continuing to hold the knitting needles in her fist, she righted herself and stood up. “How did you get in? Did you break the lock?” She would call the
police, have him arrested.
“No,” he said, scrutinizing her face. “I have a key.”
“You stole it?”
“No, of course not. Your mother gave it to me.”
“Why would she do that?”
“Someone got into my apartment this afternoon, tossed it good and proper. Probably the same people who murdered Morgana and ransacked the
gallery. The police told me I couldn’t stay there, so I drove out here thinking I’d spend the night.”
“The police?”
“I called them, reported what happened. It’s a crime scene now.”
“But why would my mother give you a key to her houseboat?”
He walked over to Dusty and stood looking down at him.
“Answer me.”
“Did you happen to look in the closet?”
“The closet?”
“I stay here a lot. Your mama and me, we were lovers. More than that. We loved each other. Check out the closet, you’ll find my bathrobe, my shirts and
slacks. My shaving kit is in the bathroom.”
She gripped the knitting needles tighter. “Get away from him.”
He turned, a look of pain crossing his face. “I’m grieving, too, Irina. You’re not the only person who lost someone important.”
“You should be ashamed of yourself. Seducing a woman so many years older than you.”
“It wasn’t like that. It happened so slowly that we almost didn’t realize it until one night when we were working late and … we had to face our feelings.”
“That’s disgusting. She was old.”
“Not to me.”
A thought seized her. “Do you expect to be included in the trust?”
“Why do you hate me?”
“Get out. Get out of here or I’ll call the police.”
Holding up his hands as if she were pointing a gun at him, he moved toward the door. “Just calm down, okay?”
“I’m very calm.”
“Great. Fine. I’m leaving,” he said.
“Give me the key.”
“What?”
“The key to the downstairs door. I want it. I don’t want you coming back in here in the middle of the night.”
“To do what?”
“I’ve never trusted you.” She held out her left hand, her right hand holding the needles like a dagger.
“I’d never hurt you. You must know that.” He dipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out a key ring. Unscrewing the end, he took off several keys until
he came to the right one.
Irina recognized it and took it from him. “Now, get off the boat and don’t come back.”
With one last glance at the baby, he turned and walked back down the hall.
Irina stepped out on the foredeck and watched him move silently back up the walkway to the parking area. When he was out of sight, she ran back
down to check that he’d locked the door. Throwing the double lock, something she should have done right away, she went into the kitchen and began
removing the Lysol, the Ajax, the 409, the rags and scrub brushes. She’d never get to sleep now. She might as well clean.
29
At the Hennepin County jail the next morning, Jane sat down across from Chess at the far end of an institutional anteroom, a new, unwelcome hardness in
the center of her stomach. She didn’t want to be here. She never wanted to see Chess again, and yet she had to come.
Separated by a Plexiglas wall, speaking to each other via phones attached to the side walls, they worked their way through the formalities. Jane
touched the Plexiglas, saw where others had left fingerprints behind. The surface was hard, practical, oppressive. It was, of course, meant to protect the
visitor from the visited. In this case, however, it was the other way around.
Chess looked awful, his face puffy, his hair disheveled. He tried gamely to smile, to shrug off his current condition, even to make light of it, but they both
knew it was an act. The odd thing was, he did seem happy to see her.
“I tried to phone you right away, he said, but they told me I couldn’t make any calls.”
“Now that you’ve been charged and arraigned you can.” She tried with little success to drain the coldness from her voice.
“It’s so good to see you. What happened to your nose? It’s all bruised.”
The comment made her appreciate how utterly removed he was from what his sudden reappearance had done to her life. “You have no clue what it’s
been like for me the last couple of days.”
“For you?”
“I was attacked in the Lyme House parking lot on Saturday night. Two guys have been staking out the place. I didn’t find out why until I got jumped. The
man wanted me to tell him where my husband was.”
Both eyebrows shot up. “I never thought—”
“What? That the people who are after you would come after me? What are you mixed up in?”
“Jane, look—” He ran a hand over his unshaven face. “I’m not even sure where to start.”
The anger inside her exploded. “Let me help. Why did you send me fake divorce papers?”
“I didn’t know they were fake, I swear. Not until years later, when I was thinking about marrying someone. I gave the divorce decree to my lawyer, and he
told me they were no good.”
“And you didn’t think it might be nice to let me know?”
“Why? I never intended to come back.”
“Do you ever think about anyone but you? All that talk about solidarity—gays and lesbians sticking together. I felt sorry for you, thought you’d been
wronged by your parents. Sure I wanted the money you offered, but that’s not why I agreed to marry you. For all I know, you’re not even gay.”
His eyes skirted away.
What he’d just said finally penetrated. “You were going to get married? To a woman? It was all a lie? What did I ever do to you, Chess?” It took every
ounce of her self-control not to stand up and scream at him. “The cops think you not only killed Dial but Morgana Beck. It’s all about that gold artifact, right?
You turn my entire life upside down by showing up and you have the nerve to sit there and smile at me? Who the hell are you?”
“You know who I am. Jane, please—”
“We made today’s Star Tribune, in case you’re interested. It wasn’t the headline, but the article was on the front page. Want to know the lead?”
“Don’t.”
“Daughter of Raymond Lawless Once Married to Accused Killer. Don’t you just love that? Has a nice titillating ring, don’t you think? I wonder what
they’ll do when they find out we’re still married? Why did you have to come back here, Chess? Why couldn’t you just leave me alone?”
“If you’ll just give me a chance, I can explain.”
“You must think I’m pathetic. Stupid, wide-eyed, gullible Jane.”
“I don’t.”
“Well, I think I’m pathetic. Why did I allow myself to be taken in by someone like you? What’s wrong with me that I could be so credulous?” She felt
gutted, like her insides had been clawed out and tossed on the floor. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice … that’s where we’re at. I invited you
into my home again, even asked you to come to my father’s birthday party. What did you do? You spent the evening trying to swindle my friends with that
crap you sell.”
“I did no such thing.”
“Julia? The cylinder seal?”
“She was the only person I talked to about it—and it’s worth every penny.”
“And we know that because? Because you said so? Because you showed her some fake provenance papers? We all know what your word is worth.”
“Stop.”
“The first time around, you bribed me with money. This time, you gave me a ring.” She pulled the gold snake off her index finger and held it up. “Get it in
a Cracker Jack box, Chess?” She turned and hurled it against the concrete wall behind her.
“You’re angry. I don’t blame you. But the ring is real. So is the cylinder seal.”
“I don’t believe you,” she said, barely controlling her fury. “Not that it matters. Julia stopped payment on the check yesterday morning.”
His lips thinned, tightened. “She shouldn’t have done that. I need to get out of here, and fast.”
“Why? So you can hightail it out of Dodge?”
He put his hand up to the Plexiglas and spoke softly, but with more feeling. “I swear to you on everything I love, I didn’t kill Dial or Morgana Beck. I’m
innocent. I may bend the truth more than I should. I’m not proud of that. But I’m not a murderer.”
“Then who did kill them? What’s going on? Why are those men following you?”
He rested his head against his hand. “They want the bull.”
Something she already knew. She just wanted to see if he would feed her another lie. “Who are they?”
“At first, I thought maybe Dial’s next-door neighbor might have had something to do with it. Something about him struck me as phony. His name’s
Smith. He said he’d lost his job, that he and his wife were having a tough time financially. The problem is, he saw me coming out of Dial’s door last
Wednesday around noon. I’d just found Dial dead in the living room and tried to leave without anybody seeing me.”
“Wait, wait, wait. You told me that you went back to Dial’s house on Wednesday because you realized you’d left your passport there. Nobody was
around, but the door was unlocked.”
“I, ah, bent the truth a little there. I had to. I thought if I told you what really happened, you wouldn’t believe me, and you wouldn’t ask your father to
represent me.”
This guy was unbelievable. “Go on.”
“Like I said, we played poker on Tuesday night. I got drunk and ended up outside, in the backyard. I must have been trying to get into the hot tub, but
keeled over right next to it and fell asleep. I woke up on the concrete walk next to the tub on Wednesday about noon, went into the house, and found that it
had been ransacked. Dial was on the floor in the living room. He’d been knifed. I would have been killed, too, I’m sure of it, if whoever got in had found me.
It was just a stroke of luck that I’d wandered outside. I thought that maybe I could get away from the house without anybody knowing I’d been there. I left by
the front door. About the same time, the neighbor, Smith, came out on his front steps to get his newspaper.”
“Are you saying you thought he’d killed Dial?”
“I don’t know, but something about him seemed off. Not that it matters. After thinking about it for the last few days, I came to the conclusion that
someone else is after me. Three people to be exact. There’s a story that’s been making the rounds of antiquities dealers for almost a year. Three people,
an Englishwoman living in Italy, an Egyptian professor of ancient history, and an ex-major in the Iraqi army, have formed a cabal to hunt down the
antiquities stolen from the Baghdad Museum, and the thieves who did the stealing. Dealers and buyers have been killed mysteriously all over the world—
in alleys, pushed off buildings, drowned in swimming pools. These people are ruthless, single-minded, and apparently have money.”
“Go back for a second. You stole the bull?”
“No, not me. But yes, it was taken illegally. I knew that when I bought it. I hoped I could keep it. It felt—you’re going to think I’m crazy—but it was like I’d
owned it before in a previous life. Like I had a right to it.”
“You are a world-class liar, even to yourself.”
“Maybe I am, but I’ve always been drawn to the past, to the Middle East and Egypt. Particularly to Babylon. That’s where I first landed on this earth, took
my first breath. You don’t believe me, I can see that. It’s fine. There’s no reason you should. But haven’t you ever been drawn to something not entirely
rational?”
“This isn’t about me.”
“No, it’s not. It’s about me, what I did to you that I never intended. I’m sorry, Jane.”
That was too easy. “You came to the Twin Cities to sell the bull.”
“To Dial, yeah.”
“Did he know it was stolen?”
Chess gave a noncommittal shrug. “We weren’t doing anything others haven’t been doing for millennia. But he was killed before we could make the
exchange, the money for the statue. I assume that whoever is searching for it thought Morgana must know something about it, too. She didn’t.”
“So you tried to sell it to Julia.”
“I’d sell it to anybody for the right price.”
“Okay, let’s talk about that. The ‘right’ price, as you put it.”
This was the moment of truth. She removed a piece of yellow legal paper from her back pocket. “Yesterday, my brother’s little girl went missing. Her
name is Mia. She’s eleven. We thought she’d run away. She’d done it before. But this morning I found this.” She unfolded it, held it up to the Plexiglas so
he could read it.
“I don’t have my glasses. What’s it say?”
With a trembling hand, she spread it out on the small counter in front of her. The note was written in black ink, all caps. “ ‘Mrs. Garrity,’ ” she read,
clearing her throat, trying to tamp back the tears burning her eyes. “ ‘We have your little girl. We will not hurt her if you give us what we want. An even trade.
The girl for the bull. If you contact the police, you will never see the girl again. We are not unreasonable, but we will tolerate no interference. You have fortyeight
hours. We will contact you about the exchange. We are not amateurs. If we feel our safety is compromised, you will not hear from us again.’ ”
Jane looked up.
Chess’s face had turned ashen.
“You have to give them what they want.”
“I can’t.”
She felt her anger heat up again, like a boiling wave crashing over her. “Even you can’t be that callous.”
“I don’t know where it is. I gave it to Irina to keep it safe.”
“Irina Nelson? Morgana Beck’s daughter? She was in on this?”
“She put it in a safety deposit box, but for some reason, she removed it and hid it in the basement of the gallery. We went to get it on Saturday night and
it was gone.”
Jane’s skin felt suddenly too tight.
“The only person who had access to the basement, other than Irina and her mother, was a man named Majid Farrow. It has to be him. He works there. I
was planning to talk to him on Sunday afternoon, offer to cut him into the deal—or beat the crap out of him until he told me where he’d hidden it—but I was
arrested.”
She struggled to compose herself. “Majid? The manager?”
“You know him?”
“We’ve met.”
“But see, your niece … that’s even more reason why you have to help me get out of here.”
She knew it would come down to this. “You’ll leave if I do.”
“I won’t leave, Jane. I promise you. I’ll stay and do everything I can to help find the bull.”
“And then you’ll leave with it.”
“I won’t!”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Jane, please. I’m the only one who can find it.”
“I’ve got two days.” She hung up the phone, pushed away from the table, and got up.
When Chess began pounding on the Plexiglas, a man came out of a side door and grabbed his arms, yanking him out of his chair. He was still yelling,
still waving at her to come back, when she turned and left the room.
30
Chess bent over the telephone, keeping his voice low. The guard had made it clear that he couldn’t talk long.
“Irina, it’s me.” He could hear a gasp.
“I thought you’d left. Why didn’t you return any of my calls?”
“I was arrested. For Dial’s murder.”
“I haven’t seen a news broadcast in days, or read a newspaper. Oh, Chess, that’s awful, but it’s so good to hear your voice.”
“Have you made any progress finding the … you know?”
“Sorry, no. Oh, baby, where are you?”
“The Hennepin County jail.”
“Are you okay?”
“The bail was set at a million dollars. I need to put up one hundred thousand to get out. You’ve got to help me. Did your inheritance come through yet?
You could put up the gallery for collateral.”
She didn’t say anything for several seconds. “I’m in the waiting room at my mother’s lawyer’s office. We’re going over the trust documents this morning.
I don’t know how long it will take for my mom’s assets to be transferred to me, but as soon as I have the money, I’ll get you out.”
“I’m dying to see you.”
“Oh,” she said, sighing into the phone, “I’m so glad you called. Wait.”
He heard some rustling, a door closing. “What’s going on?”
“I left the office because I didn’t want Misty to overhear. I found out something important. Remember we thought Majid was the only other person with a
key to the gallery? Misty has one. Mom gave it to her because she wanted her to start working there part-time. She’s had it for at least a week.”
This was a major break. “And she needs money badly. Sure, that makes sense. Maybe she went down to the basement to look around. She found the
statue and took it.”
“Or gave it to one of her slimy friends. If that’s the case, we may never see it again.”
Chess refused to give up that easily.
“You have no idea how crazy these last few days have been for me. I left Steve, moved in with Misty, but I couldn’t stay there. I’ll tell you about it when we
have more time. I’m living on my mom’s houseboat at the moment. I’m terrified those people who killed Dial and my mom will find me. Plus I have Dusty to
protect. I’ve been so careful about his environment ever since he was born. Now I’ve had to move him twice in two days.”
“Is he doing okay?”
“He sneezed last night. I think he may have sneezed again this morning when I was getting out of the shower. I’m worried about the mold on the boat.”
A sneeze. Right. Potentially deadly in anybody’s book. “Is Steve taking care of him today?” He didn’t really care; he was just making conversation.
“Absolutely not.”
“If Misty’s with you—”
“I left him back at the houseboat.”
“With a friend?”
“I don’t know anybody out there. No, he’ll be fine. I’m only going to be gone for a couple hours.”
“You left him alone? Irina, he’s only a few months old.”
“I spent half the night cleaning the master cabin. It’s the safest place for him right now. I couldn’t exactly leave him in the car. It’s going up to ninety today.
And I refuse to bring him into this huge office building.”
Had he heard her right? Sure, he’d joked about her mental health when it came to her son, but now he was beginning to think she actually had gone
over the edge.
“Misty’s calling me,” said Irina. “Time to meet with Zeller.”
“Come see me as soon as you can.”
“Maybe I’ll swing by after the meeting.”
“But what about Dusty?”
“It means a lot to me that you’re so concerned about him. If I’m gone an extra hour, it’s not a problem. He’s all strapped into his car seat. He’ll be fine.”
“Really, though—”
“I’ll see you soon.”
* * *
Inside Leonard Zeller’s office, Irina sat next to Misty, hands in her lap, acting patient even though she felt as if she had an engine revving inside her chest.
Zeller was a fussy old man, which was why they were here. He insisted on meeting with them in person, probably intended to do a formal reading. It was
the kind of folderol she didn’t need in her life, especially with everything else on her plate.
Misty tugged on her too-tight Diesel jeans. Since last night, she’d cut her hair even shorter, dyed it black, and painted her fingernails and toenails a
matching black, no doubt in preparation for the big day. If she was trying to impress Zeller with her sense of style, she couldn’t have made worse choices.
Zeller was old-school. A gentleman. White-haired, with round Harry Potter glasses, three-piece tweed suits, French cuffs peeking just the right amount
from the sleeves of his jacket. Next to him, Misty looked crude, the Rolls-Royce of tacky.
Zeller studied the papers in front of him. When his intercom buzzed, he picked up the phone. “Thank you, Janet. Yes, please send him in.”
Irina turned to find Majid coming through the door. “What’s he doing here?”
“Since he’s mentioned in the trust, I asked him to come by,” said Zeller. He motioned Majid to a chair.
Looking uncharacteristically subdued, Majid sat down and crossed his legs without so much as a nod to either Irina or Misty.
Leaning toward them, Zeller passed out copies of the trust agreement. “Morgana made several changes a few weeks ago.”
This was the first Irina had heard about changes. “Such as?”
“The disposition of some of her assets.”
Misty stopped chewing her gum. “Huh?”
“Just cut to the chase,” said Irina. If Majid was going to ignore her, she could play the same game.
“All right,” said Zeller, leaning back against his buttery brown leather chair. “You can all take your copies home and read them at your leisure. If you have
questions, you can, of course, call for clarification. Cutting to the chase, as you put it, here are the changes: The gallery—the building, the name, the stock,
all debt and all bank accounts associated with it—has been given to Majid Farrow.”
Irina’s eyes opened wide. “That gallery is mine.”
“You are to receive your mother’s condo in Woodbury, the houseboat, and financial assets in the amount of approximately nine hundred thousand
dollars.”
“What about me?” said Misty indignantly.
Zeller checked his copy of the trust. “You are to receive your mother’s car—an Audi Roadster—the house in Merriam Park, and approximately four
hundred thousand dollars in various securities.”
“What’s all this ‘approximately’ stuff?” demanded Misty.
While Zeller explained that stocks and bonds fluctuated in value, Irina seethed. She couldn’t believe her mother had taken away her inheritance and
given it to her boy toy. The gallery had always been the major part of her inheritance. She glared at Majid, but he refused to meet her eyes.
“I think I deserve some sort of explanation,” said Irina, giving Zeller a fierce look. “Did my mother state a reason why she made the decision to leave the
gallery to Majid instead of me?”
“We’ve been together for years,” said Majid, keeping his voice low. “It was a show of her love for me, and her trust in my ability and dedication.”
“Bullshit,” said Irina. “You played her.”
Through clenched teeth, Majid said, “I know this is hard for you, but for once in your life, just shut the fuck up.”
Fussing with his French cuffs, Zeller rolled his chair closer to his desk. “There is another provision I need to explain to you, Irina. I won’t mince words.
Your mother was deeply concerned about the state of your mental health. Rest assured, your inheritance is secure. I have been named the executor of that
inheritance. According to the terms of the trust, nothing will transfer to you until you’ve been diagnosed by a licensed psychologist, and are in some sort of
treatment—either in-patient within a mental health care facility, or in outpatient care. I have been given full discretion on this. I will release funds to you so
that you can get the help you need. However, until I receive a report that you have made sufficient strides toward recovery, I cannot release the balance of
the estate to you. Do you understand?”
Irina sat in her chair, her face flushed a deep red. Her body felt suddenly swollen, decaying, like a forgotten tomato that had been left out in the garden
to rot. “I don’t believe this.”
“I know it’s a blow,” said Zeller, his voice kindly, “but there was no way to sugarcoat the terms of the trust. You must face facts.”
“It’s what I’ve been saying for months,” said Misty. “You think we all hate you, that we’re trying to make your life miserable, but it’s not true. You’ve gone
off the tracks. Every day you get a little bit worse.”
“This is all about Dustin,” whispered Irina.
“Of course it’s about Dustin,” said her sister.
“I have to go,” said Irina, rising abruptly. “I can’t stay.”
“Irina, please,” said Zeller, holding out his hand to her. “I thought perhaps you could stay after everyone else had left. We could talk this over. I have
some suggestions for you.”
“I don’t need any suggestions.” What she needed was to tell Chess that he had a son. Once he knew, once he understood the kind of care Dusty
needed, he’d back her up. They would sell the bull, bank the money, and go off somewhere to live happily ever after.
31
Standing just inside the swinging kitchen doors, Jane looked out one of the round windows into the main dining room. She spotted Lee sitting at a table
near the windows, eating breakfast and reading the morning paper. She waited for one of the waiters to come through the door, then walked out, crossed
through the room, and pulled out the chair opposite him. It was centering to feel the familiar hum of the restaurant breathing around her.
“Morning,” she said, sitting down. “Another wonderful day in paradise.”
Setting the paper down next to a book titled Early Christian Scriptures, Lee replied, “Ain’t that the Bible truth.”
If she told Nolan about the ransom note, he’d tell her to ignore the part about not calling the police. She figured Lee would be of the same opinion, so
instead of telling him about it and getting a lecture, she asked, “You or Nolan learn anything new?”
“As a matter of fact, yes.” He fiddled with his cell phone for a few seconds and then handed it to her. “You recognize that guy?”
She stared at the image. “I can’t really see his face.” It was a picture of a man on a motorcycle riding past her house.
“Here,” said Lee, reaching over to flip to the next picture. “Keep pressing the right arrow. This guy drove past your place at least three times yesterday
afternoon.”
Jane studied the images. “He looks Middle Eastern.” Then it struck her. “I met this guy over at the Morgana Beck Gallery in St. Paul. He’s the manager.
Here, I’ve got his card.” She pulled it out of the pocket of her jeans and handed it to him, recalling that Chess had just told her that Majid might have taken
the bull from the basement of the gallery. “What do you think he was doing?”
“Casing your place.”
If the statue was in his possession, why would he care? “Was he one of the men staking out my restaurant?”
“Never seen him before.”
“Did you show this picture to Nolan?”
“He agrees with me. This bozo on the motorcycle is connected in some way. We’ll follow up on it.”
She would, too, privately. “You like working with Nolan?”
“Yeah, I do. He showed me some of his old cases last night. He’s a smart guy.”
“Think you’ll stick around, work with him a while longer?”
“I just might. He’s looking for a partner.”
“I’d heard that.” She glanced around the room. “Well, I have a meeting I need to get to.”
“You go,” he said, picking up his coffee cup and taking a swallow.
As she stood, she said, “You doing any preaching today?”
“That’s on hold now that I’ve got something more interesting to do with my time.”
“Glad I could provide you with a little diversion.”
“Go on, get out of here. I’ll call if I learn anything more.”
On her way back into the kitchen, Jane talked to one of the waiters and told him not to charge Lee for breakfast. She grabbed a bowl of meat scraps for
Mouse and then went back down to her office.
After paging though the St. Paul white pages and not finding a listing for Majid Farrow, Jane called the gallery. She figured she’d have to leave a
message but was surprised when a male voice answered, “Morgana Beck Gallery of Antiquities.”
“Is this Majid Farrow?” she asked.
“Speaking.”
She would have preferred to talk to him in person, but because she was hoping for something to tell Peter and Sigrid when they arrived, she pressed
on. “This is Jane Lawless. We met yesterday morning in front of the gallery.”
“Of course. You showed me that picture of the Nimrud bull.”
As far as she could see, there were three possibilities. He didn’t have the bull. Or he had it, but wasn’t part of the murderous group sent here to find it.
Or he was part of the group, and might or might not have it. The only thing that really mattered at the moment was whether or not the bull was in his
possession.
“You wanted me to appraise that statue before you bought it.”
“That’s right. I could bring it by this afternoon.”
“Wonderful,” he said eagerly. “I would be delighted to take a look. Let me grab my appointment book.”
He hadn’t hesitated for even a millisecond. That told her everything she needed to know. Someone had the bull, but it wasn’t him.
“I could do three o’clock.”
“I have to be somewhere at three,” said Jane.
“This evening might work. Say around seven.”
“Let me call you back.”
“May I ask you something? How much do you know about the Nimrud gold?”
“Not a lot.”
“I hope you don’t mind if I speak plainly. It’s generally conceded that the Nimrud gold belongs to the Iraqi government. Or perhaps the Iraqi people.
Questions about who owns history and how culture is preserved are large and difficult, but it’s my opinion that if your statue is part of the Nimrud gold, you
may be buying it illegally. It’s something to consider. I myself wouldn’t want to be any part of that.”
“You’ve been very helpful.” She thanked him and hung up, realizing she’d hit another dead end. Majid might be a good actor, but he didn’t sound like a
kidnapper or a killer.
Cordelia arrived early for the meeting, looking subdued in her black capri-length leggings, red satin tunic, and yellow flip-flops. “Show me the note.”
Jane handed it to her and watched as she sank down on the couch, stroking Mouse’s head as she read.
“How can people like this exist?” she asked, leaning back and draping herself over the cushions. “I mean, they abduct a living, breathing child just to get
some stupid statue back?”
“That stupid statue is worth a whole hell of a lot to the people involved.”
“Yeah, well.” She muttered a few X-rated words under her breath. “What did that snake in the grass Chester have to say?” She stared straight ahead
and listened as Jane filled her in.
With so much hope riding on her talk with Chess, Jane had felt utterly demoralized as she walked out of the jail. He’d given her virtually nothing to go on,
although he had verified the seriousness of the situation. The only way out was to find the bull, a task that could take days, weeks—a lifetime. She tried to
banish all thoughts of what Mia was going through from her mind, but somehow, the fear found the back of her throat and lodged there, a lump that
wouldn’t go away.
The food arrived as they were talking the situation over. Juice, a coffee carafe, a covered chafing dish filled with scrambled eggs, sausage, and bacon,
a plate of cut fruit, and a tray of pastries. Jane pushed the cart back against the wall. She couldn’t do much, but at least she could feed her family.
“Where’s Hattie this morning?” she asked after thanking the waiter.
“She’s supposed to be at Y Camp,” said Cordelia, “Except for the duration, until Mia is home safe and sound, Hattie’s staying inside. Mel took some
time off to be with her.”
“Not going to hire that ex-nurse?”
Cordelia shivered. “My loft will not be used as a way station for ex–sheep ranchers.”
Peter and Sigrid arrived a few minutes later. They both looked exhausted. Sigrid’s eyes were red and puffy, her expression tight. She demanded to see
the note, just as Cordelia had. Peter stood behind her, reading over her shoulder.
“What’s this bull stuff about?” asked Peter, sitting down on the couch next to Cordelia. He moved like an arthritic old man, as if his whole body hurt.
Jane had been dreading the question. Her relationship with Chess was like a nightmare octopus with ever-growing tentacles. Each time she thought
she’d seen them all, a new one would appear. She started in, talking about Chess, about her marriage to him. When she faltered, Cordelia picked up the
story, explaining everything that had happened. Jane was grateful. Once again, her problems had leaked over onto her brother’s life. She started to
apologize, but Peter cut her off.
“It’s not your fault, any more than what happened last fall was your fault. You saved my life, Janey. I wouldn’t be here today if it weren’t for you.”
She supposed it was one way of looking at it. There were others.
“So this bull was stolen?” asked Sigrid, wiping tears away from her face.
“From the Baghdad Museum,” said Cordelia. “Chess showed up here because he had a buyer for it, but then the buyer was murdered.”
“We have to call the cops,” said Peter.
“No we don’t.” Sigrid stood rigidly next to the fireplace.
He glanced up. “I thought we agreed.”
“I’m her mother. I should get the final say in what we do or don’t do.”
“Meaning what? Since I’m not her biological dad, I don’t have any say in the matter?”
“Let’s not start in on ourselves,” said Cordelia with a sigh. “We’re all we’ve got.” She rose and dished herself up some food. When she realized
everyone was staring at her, she said, “What? I don’t think well on an empty stomach.”
“If we’re voting, I’m with Peter,” said Jane.
“And I’m with Sigrid,” said Cordelia.
“We’re not voting,” said Sigrid. “It’s my call. No police.”
“Then what do we do?” Peter’s face had grown flushed. He perched on the edge of the couch. “How the hell are we supposed to find this bull all by
ourselves?”
“Any way we can,” said Sigrid.
“What about Nolan?” asked Peter, looking over at Jane.
“He’d tell us to bring the police in.”
“Does that mean he won’t help?”
She’d been thinking about that ever since she found the note. “I can pretty much tell you what he’d say. Start contacting antiquities dealers in the area.
Ask if anyone has called or stopped by wanting to sell them a gold statue. See if they have any connections with private collectors who buy antiquities.
When we’ve exhausted the local market, we start calling galleries around the country.”
“That could take forever,” said Peter.
“Unless we catch a break, it’s all we’ve got.”
Cordelia held her fork in the air, thinking out loud “There are four of us. And we’ve got”—she glanced at her watch—“forty-five hours.”
“What about Chess?” asked Sigrid. “Can he help us?”
Jane shook her head. “He says he doesn’t know where the bull is.”
“Do you believe him?”
“He’s lied to me so many times, I have no way of knowing.”
“We should call Dad,” said Peter.
Jane tapped a pencil against her desktop. “There’s nothing he can do. Why worry him?”
“He and Elizabeth would make two more people to make phone calls,” said Cordelia.
“She’s right,” said Peter. “I’ll phone him.”
A heavy silence descended as they each weighed the impossibility of the task.
“If we don’t get Mia back, I’ll hunt those people down and kill them with my bare hands,” said Peter. “I mean it.”
Just what the world needed, thought Jane. Another vendetta. Except she felt the same way. If anything happened to Mia, she’d be right there with him.
32
Irina looked down at the chair, then up at the Plexiglas partition. There was a time in her life when filth hadn’t bothered her. She might not even have seen
the grimy, greasy fingerprints, the dried spit, the dark red lipstick imprint where some silly woman had kissed the Plexiglas. Yet now, inside this narrow,
airless room, she struggled to breathe. She would make the meeting quick. She’d made a decision on the way over and couldn’t wait to break the news
to Chess.
Sitting down on the edge of the chair, she gazed anxiously at the phone hanging from the wall, imagining the crawling bacteria, the slithering microbes,
knowing that in just a few moments, she would need to touch the cold black plastic with her bare hand. She would be strong—for Dusty’s sake. For
Chess’s sake. And for her own. She would get through this and then go back to the houseboat and stand in the shower for as long as it took her to feel
clean again.
The door at the back of the room opened, and Chess walked out. He was smiling, his hand reaching to touch the Plexiglas separating them as he sat
down. Her heart twisted inside when she saw how tired he looked, but she couldn’t bring herself to press her hand to his. She lifted her arm, tried to force
her hand forward, but she couldn’t do it.
He seemed to understand and picked up the phone.
She hesitated before she did the same. “I’ve missed you so much,” she whispered.
“I’ve missed you, too,” he said, still smiling. “You look wonderful.”
She looked strung out and knew it, but she appreciated his hopefulness, the yearning in his eyes. It meant more to her than anything he’d ever said or
done before—because it was real.
“What did the lawyer say?” he asked. “When do you get the money? When can you get me out of here?”
“It’s not going to happen. My mother tied up all the funds. The trust states that I have to see a shrink before I get any of it.”
“So go see one. Today. This afternoon. Call a psychiatrist and make an appointment.”
“I don’t need to. We’ll sell the bull, get the money that way.”
His eyes darted around the room. He gave his head a tight shake. “You mean that beautiful little bullfrog figurine you bought in China last year? Sure, I
can help you sell that, once I get out of here.” He flashed his eyes at her.
She got the message. This wasn’t a safe place to talk.
“But you lost the bullfrog,” he said casually.
“I did, but then I found it again. Last night.”
His eyes registered shock. “You found it?”
“I’ll explain it to you later. I thought you’d be happy.”
“I’m thrilled. But … you’re sure about this now. You’re not just pulling my leg, telling me what you think I want to hear.”
“No, I have it. It’s safe and sound.”
He sat back, tapped his fingers on the counter, studied her for a few seconds. “You know, I may have a buyer for you.”
“Of course we have a buyer. Julia Martinsen.”
“She’s, ah, no longer interested. This is someone else. Someone who’d pay top dollar. You remember I told you about that friend of mine, Jane
Lawless? She’d love to own it.”
“No way. I don’t like her.”
“You don’t even know her. Besides, right now, we can’t be choosy. I’ll call her. I’m pretty sure I can persuade her to post the bond. Maybe she can still
get it done today. If not, I’ll be out tomorrow for sure. You said you were staying at your mom’s houseboat, right? Where is it?”
She didn’t like this. She didn’t want that woman involved. “The River Bay Marina.”
“Okay, here’s what we do.”
“No,” she said, sitting up straight. “The bullfrog belongs to me. I get to say how this goes down.”
“I have to get out of here.”
“I understand that, but I don’t want to sell it to that woman. Go ahead and phone her. If she agrees to put up your bail money, great. You can ditch her
once you’re free.”
“How am I supposed to do that?”
“You’re clever. Figure it out. If you have to bring her out to the marina, fine. We’ll handle things there. I’ll rent a car this afternoon. I’ll swab it down with
disinfectant and get it all ready for a nice drive with you and me and Dusty. You know, out in the country. Maybe we can even have a picnic.”
“A picnic sounds good.”
She would miss her mom’s funeral if they left the state, but that couldn’t be helped. “Take a cab to the marina. Or if you have to come with her, I’ll meet
you on the foredeck.” She explained where the boat was moored. “I’ve got a surprise for you.”
“A surprise?”
“No hints. I’ll need you to bag all your clothes before you come aboard, and then I want you to shower, get all the grime from the jail off you. I’ll buy you
some clean clothes at Target this afternoon. We’ll dump your old clothes before we leave for our drive.”
“You’re going to the store now?”
“As soon as I leave.”
“What about Dusty?” He glanced at his watch. “When did you leave the marina?”
“Around eleven.”
“That’s almost four hours ago. You need to get back there.”
“He’ll be okay. It won’t take me that much longer.”
“But the poor little guy. What if he starts to cry? What if he’s scared?”
“He’ll be fine.” She wished people would stop telling her what was best for her son. “We’ll make this work, Chess. You’re with me, right?”
“All the way.”
She felt exhilarated, ready for action. “Call me when you know what time you’re getting out.” She finally understood the desire to put her hand on the
partition. She wanted to touch him, even if it wasn’t for real—but her revulsion caused her better judgment to kick in. They could touch all they wanted later,
under the immaculately clean sheets in her mom’s cabin. She would hold that thought—until he could hold her in his arms.
* * *
Jane searched through the local yellow pages before her family left her office. She wanted to divide up their investigative work but quickly learned that the
only gallery of ancient art in all of Minnesota was the Morgana Beck Gallery of Antiquities.
“What do we do now?” asked Peter, dropping down on a chair.
Jane logged on to the Internet and began a wider search. She clicked around until she found an article from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “Says here
that there are lots of ancient art galleries associated with museums of fine arts, like California’s Getty and New York’s Metropolitan, but fewer private
galleries, where people can actually buy the artifacts.”
“Maybe that makes it easier for us,” said Cordelia.
Jane read on. “Get this. Most reputable museums actually own stolen artifacts. The concept of ‘provenance’ appears to be tricky—and murky—when
you’re dealing with something that ancient. Museums are generally wary of tighter laws because they feel those laws would drive art antiquities
underground—into the hands of private collectors. Cultural sensitivity notwithstanding, the black market is booming.”
“Great,” said Peter. “Private collectors aren’t going to list themselves on Google.”
“Maybe we can get to them through some of the more reputable galleries,” said Jane.
“How?” said Sigrid.
“Come at it generally. First ask about Babylonian art. Then ask about any gold artifacts they may have from that time period. If they bring up the Nimrud
gold, run with it. If they don’t, maybe we should act dumb—like we’ve heard about it but don’t know a lot, whether it’s for sale or not.”
“Makes sense,” said Peter.
“I think we should also ask if they know any private collectors who have a collection from that period.”
Jane made a printout of a list of private galleries around the world. They each took a chunk. Once again, she could see in everyone’s eyes how
overwhelmed they were by the impossibility of the task, and yet they all knew they had to do something.
With assignments in hand, and a feeling that the next few hours would be critical, everyone left the office except for Jane and Mouse. They would all use
landlines to make the calls, leaving their cell phones free to phone each other with updates.
Supplying herself with a pot of coffee, Jane sat behind her desk and began to call galleries in northern Europe. She spoke a little French, enough to ask
some basic questions.
Two hours later, she tossed her pencil down and ran her hands through her hair. She’d talked to dozens of people and gotten exactly nothing. This felt
worse than trying to find a needle in a haystack. At least with the needle, you knew it was in the haystack. Jane wasn’t at all sure where the statue was. It
could easily be in somebody’s trunk.
“Mouse, come on. We’ve got someplace we need to be.” She felt a little guilty as she clipped the leash to his collar. She should be spending every
waking minute calling galleries, but she had an idea and wanted to follow up on it.
She drove by her house on the way to her destination, seeing two men sitting on the front steps and a WTWN-TV truck parked by the curb. Had to be
reporters. She wondered how long they’d stick around.
She pulled up a few minutes later across the street from Melvin Dial’s house, a stately redbrick Colonial with tan shutters, white trim, and a dark green
door. The house on the south side was less palatial—a one-and-a-half-story Craftsman-style bungalow with a FOR SALE sign in the front yard. The neighbor
Chess had talked about, a Mr. Smith, lived there. Jane wasn’t surprised to see that the house was for sale. Chess had mentioned that the man and his
wife were having financial problems due to a lost job. Chess had also thought there was something off about the guy, so Jane figured it made sense to
check it out. It would probably lead nowhere, but she didn’t want to leave any loose ends.
Opening the door of her Mini, she flipped the seat forward, and Mouse jumped out. She secured the leash to his collar, then walked him across the
quiet, sun-dappled street to a box attached to the underside of the FOR SALE sign. The real estate company had stocked it with brochures about the house,
so she might as well take a look. As she reached inside, a gray-haired woman came out of the house next door to move the yard sprinkler from one side
of the grass to the other. When she saw Mouse, she stopped and smiled.
“Nice dog,” she said, raising a hand to shield her eyes from the sun.
“Thanks,” said Jane.
“I used to have a Lab. He was black, not brown. His name was Thaddeus.”
“This is Mouse.”
The woman laughed at the name, walked a few paces closer, and held her hand out for him to sniff. “He friendly?”
“He loves people.”
Mouse sat down and held up his paw for her to shake.
“He’s showing off,” said Jane.
“He’s a charmer,” said the woman, taking hold of his paw and pumping it a couple of times. “You looking to buy a house?”
“Actually, yeah. Has this one been on the market long?”
“The sign went up yesterday.”
“You know the owners?”
“Just one owner. A single guy. He’s only been living there a month or so. I knew the old owners really well—an older couple. They moved to Baltimore to
be closer to their kids.”
“Do you know why he’s selling?”
She shrugged, folded her arms over her stomach. “He’s not around much. Seems friendly enough when he’s outside working on the yard.” She moved
a little closer. “The weird thing is, he’s living in there without any furniture.”
“You’re sure about that?”
“There was never any moving van, not even a U-Haul. I’m not the only one who noticed. Sometimes I see him leave at night and he doesn’t come back
for days. There’s a chandelier in the dining room. He keeps that on when he’s gone. That’s how I know. When he’s around, it’s off. He’s been around a lot
the last few days.”
“What’s he do for a living?”
Before she could answer, a white Ford pickup pulled into the driveway behind the house. A bald, portly man in cargo shorts and a New York Yankees Tshirt
got out carrying what looked like a sack of groceries. He hustled up the back sidewalk and disappeared inside.
“That’s him,” said the neighbor.
Either Chess was lying to Jane, or this guy had lied to Chess. Whatever the case, something wasn’t right.
Speaking a little more softly, the woman said, “He says he’s a music teacher.”
“High school? College?”
“He may have told my husband, but he never said anything to me.”
Jane glanced down at the brochure in her hand. “I guess I’ll have to take a look.”
The woman gave Mouse’s head a couple of quick strokes. “Nice to meet you, big guy.” To Jane, she added, “Good luck with your house search.”
Jane sat in her car for the next few minutes, watching the bungalow and wondering what it all meant. Who was this guy? Why buy a house and never
move any furniture in, and then turn around a month later and put it back on the market? Was it just a coincidence that this man had moved in next to
Melvin Dial? Why had Chess found this guy’s behavior odd? She wished now that she’d pressed him about it, but at the time it hadn’t seemed important.
She went back and forth, deciding that it was an almost complete leap in the dark to even entertain the idea that this man was connected to the people
who were searching for the bull. Still, if Smith was one of them, it was possible he was also connected to Mia’s abduction. Had she stumbled over the
place where Mia was being held captive? Was she building a scenario that had no basis in reality? Whatever the case, there was no way she could walk
away and not check it out.
Flipping her cell phone open, she tapped in Cordelia’s number. Three rings later, Cordelia’s voice answered breathlessly, “Did you find the bull?”
“No.”
“Me neither. This is a frickin’ waste of time. But I know, I know. Mel and I will keep calling.”
“I need your help with something else.”
“Of course you do. Like what?”
“Tonight. I’ll call and let you know what time.”
“You discovered something?”
“I don’t want to get anybody’s hopes up if what I have turns out to be a dead end. We have to check this out.”
“Now you’re talking. You’re finally back in the saddle, Janey, right where you belong. Me and you. Jane and Cordelia ride again!”
33
Chess sat on his mattress, his back against the cold concrete block. He’d made a mistake, pissed off a guard. Who knew the guy would be so sensitive
about his weight. Chess was hardly one to cast stones, but if he could joke about his girth, why couldn’t the guard? Some people had no sense of humor.
Chess needed to make another phone call, but the guard had to call someone to take him, and at the moment, he was standing inside the guard box in
the main part of the cell block, talking about “them fuck-tastic Twins” to one of the other guards. Chess couldn’t stand it anymore and so came back into
his cell to get away from being ignored.
The harsh fluorescent lights irritated his eyes. He was used to the smell of unwashed bodies, but not the nervous sweat that came along with the
sometimes furtive but more often hard looks he got from other prisoners. He had the perfect “get out of jail” card, but that tubby pissant wasn’t going to let
him play it.
After another four-star jailhouse dinner, accompanied by a generous glass of complex, subtle, yet full-bodied Minneapolis tap water, Chess strolled
around the main room. Most of the men were watching TV. The asshole guard had left and didn’t seem to be coming back.
“I need to use the phone,” he said to a different guard who had just come on duty. Chess had met the man the day before. He seemed nice enough.
“Yeah?”
“It’s about my bail.”
“You want out of here? Why, I thought you liked our ambience.” He mispronounced the last word.
It was a slap at Chess’s cultured bearing, but it didn’t matter. Chess would suck anything up, become one of the guys, spit on the floor, scratch his
crotch, or be sophistication itself—whatever it took to get what he wanted.
The guard sat down behind the desk and tapped in a couple of numbers. He spoke quickly, said what he needed, and then joked for a couple of
minutes with the person on the other end of the line.
After what seemed like hours, Chess was moved to another room, where he sat on a folding chair and called Jane’s cell. He closed his eyes as the
phone began to ring. “Pick up,” he whispered. “Please, pick up.”
“Hello?”
“Jane, it’s Chess.” When she didn’t respond, he said, “Are you there?”
“What do you want?”
“I’ve got great news. I know where the bull is. I mean, I know who has it.”
“Who?”
“Irina Nelson.”
“I thought you said she lost it.”
“I think she may have been lying to me. She’s in love with me. The sale of the bull was going to finance our life together, but she didn’t trust me to stick
around once it was sold.”
“That I believe.”
“Just listen. She’s gone into hiding. She’s sure that the people who murdered her mother and Melvin Dial are after her now. I told her you’d get me out,
that you’d do it in exchange for the bull.”
“She agreed?”
“She thinks the plan is to double-cross you. She’s rented a car. She wants to ditch you and take off as soon as I get out.”
“Where is she now?”
“She’ll never talk to you without me. I swear to you, as soon as I get my hands on the bull, it’s yours.”
“You’re a real piece of work, you know that? You actually expect me to believe you? You pile one lie on another, build a house with them, and then turn
around and point at it as if it’s evidence of something real.”
“I’m not lying. Not this time.”
“Ever hear about the boy who cried wolf?”
“One hundred thousand dollars. If you write a check, you don’t have to talk to a bail bond service and put up collateral for the rest of the money. Go to
your bank tomorrow morning. Put the money in your checking account or get a cashier’s check. Then come down and get me out of here. It won’t take
long. You can come with me to where Irina is hiding. Bring a gun for all I care. I’ll get you the statue if it’s the last thing I do. Everything that’s happened is
my fault. I take full responsibility.”
“That’s big of you.”
The anger in her voice irritated him. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but a little gratitude might be nice. “Do you have a hundred thousand
liquid?”
“Maybe.”
“Will you do it?”
“You really think you can play me like this?”
“You told me you had forty-eight hours. The clock is ticking, Jane. I may be your last hope.”
34
Just after ten that night, Cordelia slipped into the front seat of Jane’s Mini. She was dressed in black jeans and a black turtleneck and had on an
oversized pair of dark glasses.
“I see you still have your breaking-and-entering gear,” said Jane, drinking from a can of Mountain Dew.
“You never go wrong with basic black. Works for every occasion.”
“It would have been so much easier if I could’ve arranged for a real estate agent to show us the house tonight, but I couldn’t make it happen. Apparently,
the owner wanted the sign put up to start generating interest, but he won’t allow any showings until the end of the week.”
“Weird.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Hey, I talked to Peter before I left the mother ship,” said Cordelia, pulling out a Snickers bar and tearing off the wrapping with her teeth. “He’d just
phoned your dad. Nobody has been able to shake anything loose about the bull. Mel and I covered most of the calls you didn’t make.”
“If I’m right and Mia is in that house, we won’t need to make any more calls. We’ll have her back and the kidnappers can go to hell.”
Cordelia offered Jane the first bite of the candy bar. “It’s good for you. It has peanuts.”
“Eat it fast,” said Jane. She tipped her can back and finished the soda. “Smith came out around eight and drove off. The chandelier is on in the dining
room, so I’m hoping that means he won’t be back.”
Chewing maniacally, Cordelia asked about Nolan.
“I called him earlier, gave him the license plate number for Smith’s truck. Maybe he can chase something down.” She waited until Cordelia had
swallowed the last bite of her Snickers and then said, “Are you ready?”
“I’m about to hyperventilate. That must mean something.”
“Lose the glasses.”
“Really?”
“Do you see any sunlight out there?”
“It’s all about my look, Janey. The idiom I’m trying to project.”
“Off.”
“You have no sense of style.”
Jane removed an athletic bag and a car blanket from her trunk. After Smith had left the house, she’d driven to a hardware store to buy everything she
figured she’d need.
“I think I can get us in,” she said, glad that it was a hot night. Most people had their windows closed and their air-conditioning running, thus muting any
loud outside noises.
Cordelia stuck close to Jane as they pushed through a privacy gate into Smith’s backyard. They didn’t need to worry about anybody seeing them on the
side of the house that faced Dial’s place.
“Hey, Janey?”
“Keep your voice down.”
“I just remembered something.”
“What?”
“I don’t like breaking and entering.”
Jane crouched next to one of the basement windows. Thick white peony bushes by the fence sweetened the night air around them. The peonies actually
smelled a lot like roses. It had never occurred to her before that the two smelled similar. How she could allow a thought like that to flit through her mind at a
time like this truly amazed her. She dug in the bag for a hammer and a retractable-blade metal scraper.
“You going to break the window?” whispered Cordelia.
“No, I’m going to build a garage.” Folding the towel, she added, “We’re lucky. This is a single pane. No bars or security system. Shouldn’t be too hard to
get inside.”
“Janey, I’m just spitballing here, to quote one of my favorite Jack Nicholson movies, but have you looked at the narrowness of that window and then
taken a good look at me?”
“Your point?”
“When I was ten years old, I couldn’t fit through it. I certainly can’t now.”
“I thought I’d let you shinny up the side of the house and come down the chimney.”
“Drop the sarcasm.”
“I’ll climb in, and then I’ll let you in the back door.”
“I like it. Always good to have a Plan B.”
Jane tapped at the window through the blanket to mute the sound of breaking glass. Handing Cordelia a small flashlight, she said, “I need to make sure
I chip off all the broken edges before I climb in.” After a few minutes’ work with the hammer and a pair of pliers, finished off by the metal scraper, the
remainder of the jagged glass was gone. To protect her skin from any shards she’d missed, she pulled a leather jacket and a pair of heavy leather work
gloves out of the bag and put everything on. She’d already tucked her long hair up under a baseball cap. With Cordelia’s help, she lowered herself through
the opening; Her feet dangled for a few seconds and finally hit the floor. “Now pass me down the flashlight.”
“What’s it look like in there?”
“Empty,” said Jane, aiming the beam around the open, unfinished space. It was clean but dank, one long room with a concrete floor and water-stained
walls. A freezer stood at one end. On the other end was a small laundry area. She remained still and listened, but no sound stood out, nobody moving
around upstairs, no TV, no music.
She was about to head up when she looked once again at the freezer. The image forming in her mind was too vile to even consider, and yet she had to.
She walked over, stood next to it with her hand on the lid, telling herself that she’d seen way too many horror movies in her life. She flipped the top back.
“Empty,” she breathed. Thank God.
Wiping sweat off her forehead, she crept up the stairs into a narrow hall that led to the back door. Cordelia was standing outside.
“What took you so long?”
Jane held a finger to her lips.
The house was a typical bungalow. Most likely two bedrooms downstairs and an attic or possibly a finished room upstairs. On the kitchen counter was
a fifth of vodka, a half-eaten bag of tortilla chips, and a Hershey’s bar.
“He’s well fed,” whispered Cordelia. “Every essential food group is represented, except for one.”
They checked inside all the cupboards and one tall broom closet, then passed into a long room that was probably meant to be both a living and dining
room, completely empty of furniture. Entering a hallway, they stood in front of a bathroom. On either side were the bedrooms. One door was open, one
closed. Shining the flashlight in through the open door, Jane found nothing but another empty room. The closet door was open, no clothes inside.
Cordelia opened the other door. “Mia?” she whispered.
Jane came over and stood behind her. On the floor, tucked into the far corner, were a sleeping bag, a digital clock radio, a stack of newspapers, a sixpack
of bottled water, and two cans of Jolt.
“There’s the last food group,” said Cordelia. “Caffeine.”
Again the closet door was open and empty.
“He stays here occasionally,” said Jane, “but you could hardly say he lives here.”
She led the way up the stairs to the second floor. Rounding the top of the steps, she walked into a large finished space with a deeply slanted ceiling,
one that rose to a peak in the center of the room. The walls were wallpapered with tiny yellow and purple violets on a cream-colored background.
“Doesn’t look promising,” said Cordelia, creeping in behind her.
Jane felt flattened. Ever since she’d learned about Smith earlier in the day, she’d been so amped up she could hardly sit still. She’d been sure they
were going to find the little girl.
“Hey, here’s another closet,” said Cordelia. “A big one.”
Jane held her breath and pointed the flashlight at the sliding door as Cordelia drew it back.
“Empty as a piggy bank with a hole in it,” she said, stepping inside and looking around.
For the next few minutes, they drifted through the room, tapping the walls.
“There could be a secret panel,” said Cordelia.
They inspected every imperfection in the wall but once again found nothing.
“Where do you suppose that little door leads?” asked Cordelia, nodding to one next to a couple of windows. “Lilliput?”
“Has to open onto the flat roof above the sunroom.” Jane recalled seeing it from the front yard.
“I’m glad we didn’t say anything to Sigrid and Peter,” muttered Cordelia.
Jane felt a sick swirl inside her stomach.
“Then again, you can’t say we didn’t try.”
Hearing an engine and seeing a burst of brightness outside three small windows facing the backyard, both Jane and Cordelia rushed over to get a
look.
“He’s back,” said Jane.
“Yikes! We gotta get out of here.”
Smith was already out of his truck and making his way up the back walk.
“We’ll never make it to the front door in time,” said Jane.
“We need another Plan B.”
“I don’t have one.”
The back door opened.
Jane rushed to the small door, flipped back the lock, ducked, and pushed out onto the roof. Cordelia became wedged when she tried to move through
the small opening. She held out a hand for Jane to help yank her through.
When they were finally outside, Jane stepped carefully over to the edge of the sunroom roof. “We’ve got to jump.”
“In the dark? Are you crazy?”
“It’s only one story. If we can manage to hoist ourselves over the side and hang on for a few seconds, the drop should only be five feet or so. Piece of
cake.”
Jane began to lower herself over the side. When Cordelia hesitated, she whispered, “It’s either this or we try to explain to Mr. Smith what we’re doing in
his house.”
“I’ll take my chances with Mr. Smith.”
“Really? We’ve illegally entered the home of a man who is mostly likely entirely innocent. We can’t tell the police why we did what we did because Sigrid
said no cops. You really want to stick around and try to talk your way out of that?” Jane dangled from the roof and then dropped into a bed of juniper
bushes. Disentangling herself, she brushed off her pants and then repositioned her cap. “Come on.”
“I am not a Navy SEAL.”
“I never said you were.”
Gingerly, she dropped one leg over the side.
“That’s right. Good job.”
She hoisted the other leg over and sat for a few seconds on the edge.
“The jump wasn’t bad. There are some bushes right underneath you. Do it slow and you’ll be fine.”
“I can’t.”
“Don’t be a baby.”
“I’m not a baby. I am Humpty Dumpty about to have a great fall.”
“Cordelia!”
She turned around and, inching downward, her feet trying to find purchase on the wood siding, attempted to swing away from the wall.
“No, no. Just drop straight down.”
Pushing off, she fell to the grass like a sack of bricks.
“Oh Lord,” she groaned, doubling over, grabbing her ankle.
Jane bent down to take a look. “Think you sprained it?”
“I’ll never walk again.”
“You have to.” With both hands, she tugged her up. “Lean on me. I’ll get you back to the car.”
“What if Smith is watching from one of the windows?”
“Then we’re toast. Just hang on and take it slow.”
“It’s ballooning, Janey. Even in the dark, it looks like I have a grapefruit attached to my ankle.”
“We’ll put some ice on it.”
“Ice? You think ice will help when all the king’s horses and all the king’s men—”
“Quiet down. We’re almost home free.”
35
Jane’s eyes panned across the waiting room at the front of the Hennepin County Public Safety Facility, otherwise known as the downtown Minneapolis
jail. She was waiting for Chess to come out. She’d done all the paperwork, handed over the check, but for some reason it was taking longer for him to be
released than she’d expected. She was about to ask the cop behind the reception desk what was going on when she saw Chess come through a door.
The smile of relief on his face was a sharp contrast to the frown on her own. She watched him rush forward, as if he intended to hug her.
Backing away, she said, “Where are we going?”
He seemed miffed. “I’ll tell you in the car.”
“No, now.”
He looked around him. Speaking more softly, he said, “The River Bay Marina south of Hastings. You know where it is?”
“On the Mississippi? Why a marina?”
“Irina’s mother has a houseboat. That’s where it’s moored.”
She stared hard into his eyes. “If you’re lying to me—”
“If you spend all your time second-guessing me, we’re never going to get anywhere.”
They trotted down the outside steps and headed for Jane’s car.
“Did you call Irina? She’s expecting us? She’s got the statue?”
“Everything’s set.”
“You said she expects you to double-cross me. What’s that mean?”
“She wants to leave you tied up on the boat. Once we’re well out of town, we would call someone and tell them where we left you.”
Jane hadn’t told a soul about getting Chess out of jail. After what happened last night, she didn’t want to raise anyone’s hopes about finding Mia—not
even Cordelia’s. She stopped before she unlocked the car door. Now that he was out, the power balance had shifted in his favor. She felt a wave of
helplessness break over her. She was being asked to trust a man who lied as easily as he breathed. “If you screw this up, if you don’t keep your word—”
“I said I’d get the bull for you, and I will—but you’ve got to promise me something in return. You have to let Irina and me go. I told you she rented a car.
What you don’t know is that she has a baby. A little boy named Dustin.”
“What’s that got to do with anything?”
“She’s been acting strangely. It’s got to be all the stress she’s been under. Her mom’s death. The breakup of her marriage. I’m worried about the kid. I
don’t think she’s caring for him the way she should be. I know you don’t think I have a conscience, but I do. I feel like I owe her for seeing me through this
mess—the same way I owe you. If Irina and I and the baby all disappear, it will mean that you’ll forfeit the hundred thousand you just paid the county
treasurer, but I figure it’s a small price to pay for getting your niece back, right? And I’ll be gone from your life forever.”
“Like you were last time?”
“You’re worried about the divorce. I don’t want anything of yours. Honestly.”
“Just the hundred thousand.”
“Yeah, just that. Come on, Jane. We’re wasting time.”
She was on her own this time. No Nolan with his gun and his years of experience. No Cordelia cracking jokes to relieve the pressure. Just Jane, with
the instincts Nolan found so impressive. Crazy as it sounded, her instincts told her she could trust Chess this time. Her brain told her she didn’t have a
choice.
* * *
Chess was a convincing talker, a good salesman. Still, it took every ounce of the persuasion he could muster to get Jane to stay on the pier while he went
in to talk to Irina. As he stepped onto the open aft portion of the houseboat, he could see Jane about twenty yards away, sitting on a bench overlooking the
river. The clouds were a few shades lighter than the water, with the blue-green trees at the horizon line breaking up the unremitting gray. Jane had on a
pair of sunglasses, which hid the strain in her eyes. It hardly mattered. He knew it was there.
Angry as he was at her for the way she’d treated him, he couldn’t let her down. Not this time. As far as he was concerned, he was done with his
precious Winged Bull of Nimrud. He might have owned it, even loved it, now and in an earlier life, but in this one, hanging on to it would be nothing short of
a death sentence. He wanted out—out of jail, out of the Twin Cities, and out of the country. What he’d told Jane was true. He was worried about Dustin. It
was more than that, though. Much to his continuing amazement, he was concerned for Irina, too. Maybe he felt sorry for her. That was more palatable than
thinking that he cared for her.
He knocked on the door. Irina appeared a few seconds later, all smiles and eagerness, but then her face turned wary.
“Take off your clothes,” she ordered, looking as if she weren’t quite sure she wanted to let him come aboard. “We’ll toss them in the garbage. I bought
you new socks, underwear, slacks, and a shirt. We can buy more when we’re on the road. You have to shower right away. I’ve scrubbed the entire boat.”
“Irina, no.” She retreated to the center of the room as he pushed inside. “I’m not going to shower.”
“But Dustin—”
“He’ll be fine. I won’t hurt him, you must know that.”
Her eyes softened.
“Where’s the bull?”
“It’s here.”
He looked around the salon. It was one of the nicer houseboats he’d been on. He could smell coffee, but the smell was mixed with pine cleaner. It turned
his stomach. “Show me,” he said.
“First things first.”
“Irina—”
“At least take off your shoes.”
He gave a frustrated sigh as he kicked them off.
“Now the sport coat.”
“I need to see the bull.”
“Please. Just that. And go back to the kitchen and wash your hands and face.”
He charged past her and did as she asked. Before he turned around, he opened the refrigerator and grabbed himself a beer. Twisting off the cap, he
took a couple of thirsty swallows.
“Follow me upstairs,” said Irina.
“Why?”
“There’s someone I want you to meet.” She gave him an impish smile.
The only other person on the boat was Dustin. Why make such a big deal out of meeting him? Especially now.
Standing in front of a closed door on the upper story, Irina turned around and took his hand in hers. She seemed both solemn, and bursting with
excitement.
“You know that Dusty is a special little boy.”
“Of course he is.”
“But do you know why?”
If he played along with this for a few minutes, then he could demand that they get down to business. “I don’t.”
“Do the math,” she said, pressing her lips together to keep them from trembling.
“Math?”
“I told you that he was born four weeks premature. That was late April. Count back eight months and what do you have?”
“Please don’t make me play games.”
She looked crestfallen.
He closed his eyes, did the mental calculation. “August.”
“He was conceived during the week I spent with you in Istanbul.”
He wasn’t sure if he should laugh or take her seriously. “You’re saying I’m his father?”
“You have a beautiful little son, Chess. Now that you know who he is, I want you to meet him. I’ve been looking forward to this day since I found out I was
pregnant.”
“What about your husband?”
“What about him?”
“I thought Dusty was his child.”
“He doesn’t look a thing like him.”
“That’s your proof? The way he looks?”
“Here, put this mask on.” She handed him one and then put one on herself. “Come on,” she said, opening the door to the master cabin and tugging him
inside.
The smell of bleach was even stronger up here.
Irina walked over to a chair, where a child’s car seat sat facing sliding glass doors that led out to the foredeck. “Come meet him,” she said, holding out
her hand. “See who you think he looks like.”
He slipped the mask on as he walked over to the chair. The sight that met his eyes took a few moments to fully register.
“Isn’t he beautiful?”
“This is Dusty?”
“Our little baby. He has your brown eyes. Every time I look at him, I see you.”
“Irina—” He swallowed, looked up.
“Our precious little boy.”
“It’s … a teddy bear.”
“I don’t know why everyone keeps saying that. It’s incredibly mean and I won’t allow it.”
It wasn’t just any teddy bear. This one had on a diaper and was caked with layers of white baby powder. But what really made the hairs at the back of
Chess’s neck stand up straight was that the fur had been scrubbed off in patches. The bear looked diseased.
“He’s sleeping now, but when he wakes up, you can see what a wonderful smile he has.”
Whatever part of his brain was supposed to rise to the occasion and figure out something to say had been stunned into silence.
“Stop looking at me like that.”
He pulled off his mask, let it dangle from his hand. “Honey … sweetheart, we need to talk.”
“I can see what you’re thinking. You’re just like everyone else. I thought you’d be different, but obviously I was wrong. You don’t understand what it’s like
to have a child with a compromised immune system. I have to keep his environment immaculate. When I try to scrub him off after he’s been playing,
sometimes he cries and fights me. I hate it. But I have to keep him clean. A mother knows what’s best.”
“Sure she does. I completely agree.”
“There are people in my life who think I’ve gone off the deep end with all this concern over germs.”
“You’re a wonderful mother. Dedicated. Self-sacrificing. Anyone can see that.”
She felt inside Dustin’s diaper. “He’s wet. I should change him.”
“Let him sleep,” said Chess. “He looks so peaceful. Why don’t we take a look at the bull, figure out what we’re going to do with Jane.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Did she come with you?”
“She’s outside sitting on one of the benches. We owe her something. She did put up the money so I could get out of jail.” He pulled her into his arms.
“Just show me where you’ve hidden the bull.” When he tried to kiss her, she pulled away. “You need to brush your teeth. You stink.”
He smiled and ground his teeth at the same time. “Tell me where there’s a toothbrush and some toothpaste.”
“No,” she said backing farther away. “You can’t use mine.” She gave a shiver of revulsion.
“Irina, what’s wrong? It’s me. I’m not going to hurt you or Dusty. Surely you know that.”
She closed her eyes, pressed her arms to her stomach. “I want you to go.”
“But the statue.”
“That’s all you ever think about.”
“Irina, where is it?”
“Do you realize that you lower your voice when you try to act like you’re in charge? It doesn’t work on me anymore.”
This time he almost screamed. “Where is the bull?” He grabbed her by her shoulders. “Tell me.”
“I don’t have it.”
“But you said—”
“I lied. People lie all the time.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Okay, I do have it, but it’s not here.”
“Then we’ll go to wherever it is.”
“I don’t think so.” She picked up the teddy bear and cradled it in her arms. Walking around the room, she began humming “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.”
“Actually, it is here, on the houseboat. But you’ll never find it.”
He was inside a carnival fun house. This was Irina’s mind.
“Maybe I’ll give it to you.”
“Will you?” he said. “When?”
“I’ll have to think about that.” As she sat down on the bed, she inadvertently knocked a thin sliver of the caked baby powder off the bear’s paw. “Give me
a few minutes. You’ve upset me.”
“I didn’t mean to.”
She caressed the bear’s ravaged head. “Go outside. When I’m ready to show it to you, I’ll call for you.”
“Then it is here.”
“Of course it’s here.”
He didn’t have a choice. He couldn’t exactly beat the truth out of her.
What he was going to tell Jane was another matter. His credibility with her was already shot. She was never, in a million years, going to believe this.
36
Jane paced back and forth in front of the houseboat, waiting for Chess to come back out. All she’d done all morning was wait—first at the bank, then at
the jail, and now on the pier. Time was ticking away. She’d already received three phone messages from Cordelia on her cell, two from Peter, and one
from her father. They had to be wondering where she was and why she hadn’t called back.
Hearing a door open, she turned and saw Chess hop back onto the pier and come toward her.
“Where’s the bull?”
He stopped a few feet away and sank his hands into his pockets. “I don’t know where to start.”
“She doesn’t have it?”
He looked across the river toward the far shore. “Honestly? I don’t have a clue.”
“Either she has it or she doesn’t.”
“She’s sick. Mentally ill. She’s got a teddy bear in there that she thinks is our baby. It’s grotesque. Jesus, I need a cigarette.” He felt inside the pocket of
his sport coat but came up empty.
This was starting to sound like a bad joke. “So this how you two are planning to play me? Your girlfriend has suddenly gone crazy? Sorry, I don’t buy it.”
Chess bent over, hands on his knees, as if he’d just run a marathon. “If I were you, I wouldn’t believe it either.”
“I’m going in,” said Jane.
“No.” As he stepped in front of her, his eyes darted over her shoulder. “What the hell’s a cop doing here?”
She turned to see a uniformed officer jogging toward them.
“Shit. I knew it,” muttered Chess. “That’s Smith. Dial’s neighbor. This is bad news.”
She supposed he could be Smith. He had the right girth, but he was wearing a hat, which covered his head.
“We gotta get out of here,” said Chess, tugging at her arm.
They didn’t have any good options. They could jump into the river or they could climb aboard one of the houseboats and try to play hide-and-seek.
Chess was halfway to the end of the pier when the officer pulled his gun and ordered him to stop.
“I mean it, Garrity,” called the officer. “Back here. Now.”
Chess came to a halt. Without turning around, he called, “What do you want?”
“We both know the answer to that.”
“I don’t have it.”
“Where’s Mia?” demanded Jane. “I’ll give you anything I have. Just let her go.”
“Shut up,” ordered Smith. “Garrity, you give me what I want and I let you and your wife here live.”
Chess turned to face him. “I told you. I don’t have it.”
“You’re pissing me off.”
“I can’t produce it out of thin air.”
“That’s it.” He motioned for Chess to stand next to Jane, then ordered them to move back down the pier.
Halfway up the hill to the parking lot, Chess said, “Are you really a cop?”
“It’s as good a disguise as any.”
They stopped when they reached the same white Ford pickup Jane had seen in Smith’s driveway the night before.
Smith tossed the keys to Chess. “You drive. Wifey sits next to you.”
It was an extended cab. Smith sat in the back and directed Chess.
Staring out the front window, Jane watched the names of the streets as they passed. They were heading south on back roads away from the marina.
Chess kept the needle at a steady forty miles an hour, five miles under the speed limit.
“Tell me where my niece is,” said Jane. “I’ll do anything you want, just let her go.”
“Shut up.”
“Or what? You’ll shoot me?”
He cracked her on the head with the butt of the gun. “There’s a lot I can do to you short of killing you. When I say shut the fuck up, I mean it.”
She gripped the door handle and waited for the pain to subside.
* * *
A while later, Smith touched the barrel of the gun to the back of Chess’s neck. “You see that red and white sign on the left about a hundred feet ahead?”
“Yeah?” said Chess.
“Turn there.”
They headed into the woods, bumping down a dirt road until they came to a dead-end about fifty yards from a lake. Jane had a headache the size of
Texas, and she was lost. Even if she tried, she doubted she could give anyone directions to their position.
“Get out,” said Smith, opening the back door and jumping out ahead of them. He motioned for them to stand by the front fender. “Now,” he said, backing
up a few paces, his heavy boots breaking the dry twigs. “I’m giving you one more chance. You tell me where the bull is. I’ll send someone to get it. Once
it’s in our hands, I’ll leave.”
“We’re supposed to believe that?” said Chess. “After what you did to Dial and Morgana Beck?”
“Please let Mia go,” said Jane. “She’s got nothing to do with any of this.”
“I’ve been paid to do a job. Your husband’s the one who started it all by stealing an artifact that didn’t belong to him. If you want to blame someone,
blame him.”
She saw only coldness in the man’s eyes. No compassion. Not even a sliver of pity. “I’m going to tell him the truth,” said Jane, turning to Chess. “The
statue, it’s at one of my restaurants. The Lyme House. In my office in the back of my black filing cabinet.”
Scared as he was, Chess’s face betrayed only the faintest tremor. But Jane caught it. She glanced back at Smith and saw that he had, too.
“No it’s not,” said Smith. “Nice try.”
“Irina Nelson’s sister has it,” said Chess, as if he were finally giving in. “She took it from the storage room in the basement of the gallery. Irina and I were
trying to get it back when I was arrested.”
“Nope. No cigar.”
“How could you possibly—”
“I know,” he said flatly.
“Look,” said Chess, sweat dripping off his forehead, “if I had it, wouldn’t I tell you?”
“People are funny. I stopped trying to figure humanity out a long time ago.” His cell rang.
Out in the woods, the ring seemed out of place, a reminder that the world they lived in was far away.
“What?” Smith asked, stepping back another couple of paces. Rubbing the stubble under his chin, he said, “Nah, we’re not going to get it. I hear you,
but we get paid either way. I want everyone packed and ready to leave by six. Pass that on. And pass the word to get rid of the girl. You know where to
dump the body.”
Something hard and cold clenched in the center of Jane’s chest. She lunged at him. “No,” she screamed.
He trained the gun on her, his eyes inviting her to keep coming.
Seeing the grin playing on his lips, she finally understood. Her death meant nothing to him. Shooting her would be like swatting a fly.
Folding the phone closed, Smith said, “Makes no difference to me what you do. I was sent to find the bull. If I don’t get it back, you don’t walk out of here.
It’s that simple.”
Chess stared at the ground. With a voice empty of emotion, he said, “Then I guess we don’t walk out.”
“How can you be like that?” demanded Jane. “She’s a little girl. She never hurt anybody.”
Smith shrugged. “Nothing personal.” Motioning with the gun, he said, “Both of you, move toward the lake. When you get to the shore, kneel down.”
So this was it, thought Jane. This was what her last day on earth looked like. Her skin felt clammy, and she wasn’t sure that her legs would support her.
As she stepped cautiously away from the truck, she felt Chess take hold of her arm. His touch buoyed her, if only briefly. She looked up and saw a hawk
riding the thermals. Two squirrels chased each other around the trunk of an oak. She was terrified, and yet it all seemed suddenly so beautiful.
They knelt down together by the water, their arms around each other’s waists.
Jane looked at Chess, saw that he was crying.
“Can you ever forgive me?” he whispered.
She heard a burst. In that instant, her mind disconnected. Chess fell forward, his face pressed into the sand, a small hole ripped in the center of his
sport coat. A red oozing stain in the sand spread out beneath his body. She leaned toward him, her hand finding his. Holding her breath, she looked up,
trying to find the hawk one last time.
Two blasts broke the stillness. They sounded farther away, with a higher pitch. She waited for impact, refusing to shut her eyes.
“Drop the gun,” shouted a familiar voice.
She spun around.
Smith was down on one knee, blood spouting from a wound in his shoulder. His eyes were fixed on the woods to his right. He fired three quick rounds
as he scrambled behind a broken tree trunk. Crouching there, he fired another shot, then curled up and began to moan.
Jane half stumbled, half ran toward the woods. “Nolan?” she called, jumping over rocks and brambles. She felt light, graceful, her mind disengaged
from her body. She floated from tree to tree, her eyes scrutinizing, sifting, scanning until she found him. He was on the ground, his legs spread out in front
of him, propped up on one elbow. She assumed that he was staying low, but as she came closer, she realized that he, too, had been hit. She skidded into
the dirt next to him. “Are you okay?”
It was a stomach wound. Bleeding like crazy. He held his hand over it, but the blood seeped through his fingers and soaked into his shirt.
“Take my Glock,” he said, forcing it into her hand. “I’ve got my cell. I’ll call for the police and the EMTs. You go make sure Smith is out of commission. If
he’s still moving, hold the gun on him until the cops get here.”
“I shouldn’t leave you.”
“Move,” he ordered. “And be careful.”
She pushed to her feet and ran back through the woods. Instead of coming out where she’d entered, she doubled around behind where Smith had gone
down. Crouching behind a tree, she saw that he was still there. That was when it hit. A feeling she’d never experienced before. She thought of Peter, when
he’d murdered that man last fall. Was this what it had been like for him? She thought of Mia. She looked toward the lake, saw Chess’s body sprawled on
the shore. Melvin Dial was dead. Morgana Beck. At that moment her hatred surged so hot that it bordered on physical pain. Something deep, a feeling
beyond words, broke like a thunderstorm inside her.
Holding the gun in both hands, she walked up to the man who had become, in the space of a few seconds, the center of her fury. He was bleeding from
the shoulder wound, but also from a hole in his chest. His skin had gone deathly white, and his breathing was labored. His eyes cracked open as she
moved in close to kick the gun away from his hand.
“Don’t,” he said weakly. “Please don’t.”
She was overwhelmed by disgust. This guy thought he had the right to beg for mercy when he’d shown none to others.
“Tell me where Mia is.”
He coughed a couple of times. “It’s hard to kill, ain’t it.”
“Not for you. Of course, like you said, there’s a lot I can do to you short of killing you. The thing is, I’ve never fired a gun before. I would imagine I’m not a
very good shot.”
His eyes registered caution.
“Tell me where you’re keeping Mia.”
“Doesn’t matter. She’s dead by now.”
She aimed for his foot, pulled the trigger. The recoil thrust her hand up into the air.
Smith screamed.
When she looked down, she saw that she’d hit his thigh. He was grinding his hands into the dirt, swearing and groaning.
“You probably won’t die from that, but I’ll bet it hurts. Too bad. Nothing personal. Tell me where you’re holding my niece. If you do, I’ll call and get the
paramedics out here for you.”
He looked up at her, made a guttural sound in his throat—and then his mouth opened and blood drained down his chin. He watched her with a kind of
animal terror in his eyes. A few seconds more and the expression faded. He was still looking at her, but his eyes had grown dull and vacant. In that instant,
her emotions thudded back to earth. He’d been her last link to Mia, and now he was gone.
Slowly, with the immense weight of loss pressing down on her, she picked up his weapon and walked back into the woods. Nolan was unconscious
when she reached him.
“No,” she cried, crouching down next to him. “Can you hear me?” His cell was open. “Hello?” she said, pressing it to her ear.
“This is 911 dispatch. Who am I talking to?”
“I’m a friend of the man who called you. He’s unconscious, and he’s lost a lot of blood.”
“We have a unit on the way.”
“How long?”
“A few minutes.”
“Tell them to hurry.”
She tossed the cell onto the dirt, moved up next to him, and cradled his head in her lap. “Hold on,” she whispered, bending over him, kissing his
forehead, her cheek pressed to his. She smoothed back his wiry gray hair. “Please, God,” she whispered, her voice shaking, “help him hold on.”
37
The next few hours were a blur. When the paramedics arrived, sirens wailing, they immediately called for a medevac helicopter to transfer Nolan to
Regions Hospital in St. Paul. Smith and Chess were pronounced dead. They started Nolan on an IV because he’d lost so much blood and moved him to
a stationary board before transferring him to the van. They drove him back to an open field, where the helicopter landed a few minutes later. Jane asked if
she could go with him, but the police had already arrived and wanted her to stay at the crime scene to answer questions.
Sitting in a police cruiser, talking to an officer from the Dakota County Sheriff’s Office, she’d explained everything she knew. Her first concern was Mia.
The officer radioed back to his dispatcher and gave him the information and told her an Amber Alert would be issued. Jane figured that it was probably
too late, but there was no reason now not to do it.
The more she talked, the more she realized how much she didn’t know. For example, she had no idea how Nolan had managed to find her. If someone
had been following the truck, she was positive a man like Smith, a professional assassin, would have noticed it. She also didn’t have Smith’s real name
or any credible information about who had hired him, other than Chess’s wild notion about a foreign cabal formed to hunt down antiquities stolen from the
Baghdad Museum—and the people who took them. Whatever the case, others were involved locally, specifically the men who had been staking out her
restaurant, but Smith had given an order to get ready to leave—and the order to get rid of Mia. If Smith was the head of the snake, with him gone, the rest
would scatter.
Sergeant Kevante Taylor from the Minneapolis homicide unit arrived half an hour after the Dakota County Medical Examiner truck had driven in. By
then, Jane was sitting alone with her back against a tree, watching the crime scene unit take pictures, gather evidence, draw maps, take blood samples
and generally investigate the scene. Taylor knew more of the story than anyone else. She spent another hour with him, filling in all the gaps in his
information, walking around the taped-off perimeter. He still wasn’t convinced that Chess hadn’t had a part in Dial’s and Beck’s murders, but by then,
Jane no longer cared.
Standing by the ME van a while later, Jane watched as Chess’s lifeless body was zipped into a body bag for transfer back to Regina Medical Center in
Hastings. Once he was gone, there was no reason for her to stick around. Taylor offered her a ride back to the marina, where she’d left her car. In
response to her question about Irina Nelson, he said that several officers had been dispatched to the houseboat. That was as much as he knew.
On her drive back to Minneapolis, Jane tried to determine if there was anything else she could do to find Mia. Was there a stone she hadn’t turned
over? Was there a question she hadn’t asked?
It was going on four in the afternoon when she passed through downtown Minneapolis heading for St. Louis Park and her brother’s house. Smith had
given the order to “get rid of the girl” three hours ago. There was no reason to believe that Mia was still alive, and yet Jane couldn’t let go. She had to think
of a way to break the news to her family without removing all hope. The Amber Alert was, to quote an oft-used cliché, like closing the barn door after the
horse was already gone, and yet it was something they could hang on to, at least for a little while. In the end, Mia might have been a loose end that, with
one quick comment, Smith had tied up, but Jane would never believe it until she was forced to.
She had won the race against the clock enough times before that she’d felt, deep down where she truly lived, that she’d be able to beat it again and
bring the little girl home. If Mia really was gone, it was too enormous to even contemplate, let alone believe. Yet she would, of necessity, need to become
the messenger of the worst news her brother and sister-in-law would ever receive. She turned on the radio, found some rock music, and turned the sound
up to ear-shattering, hoping to blast all thought from her mind.
Just before five, she pulled up to the house her brother and his wife had recently rented in St. Louis Park. She turned off the motor and sat for a few
minutes, her hands at the top of the steering wheel, her forehead resting against her hands. She wanted to be anywhere but here. Her emotional circuit
boards had been fried by the crises of the last few days. She could move around, walk and talk like a normal person, but underneath it all she felt dazed,
frozen. She prayed that the numbness would last a little while longer.
Before she got out of the car, she placed a call to Regions Hospital to see if she could find out any news on Nolan. She was told that his condition was
listed as critical and that he was in surgery.
Sigrid answered the front door and let her in.
“Where were you?” she asked, calling up the stairs for Peter to come down.
“Could I have a glass of water?” asked Jane.
Peter came into the living room as she was about to sit down. “We’ve been calling you all day. What the hell is going on?”
She waited for Sigrid to return to the room and then said, “I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news.” She’d practiced the line but could hardly get it out.
Sigrid dropped the glass. Water shot up all over Jane’s jeans.
“What?” said Peter. His face flushed.
“I don’t want to hear it,” said Sigrid, pressing her hands to her ears, twisting away from them.
Peter grabbed her, pulled her next to him. “Tell us.”
Woodenly, Jane sat down. She told them everything that had happened. She didn’t cry. Her voice was composed. She explained about the Amber Alert
—that the cops were looking for Mia. She tried to be a cheerleader for the idea that there was still something to hang on to. She was pretty sure that
Sigrid started screaming at one point, but she kept on talking, the words themselves feeling like a buffer. If she could explain, if she could make sense out
of it for them, everything would be okay … but the longer she talked—the harder she struggled to make sense of the senseless—the more confused she
became. Eventually, she just stopped. In the middle of a sentence. The words dried up, and the tears came pouring out.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I tried my best.”
By then, her audience of two was well past hearing.
38
Standing between the outer door and the inner door of the psych unit, feeling as if he were in an airlock on a space station, Steve Nelson waited for the
nurse to come in and talk to him. She would need to know why he was here before he would be allowed in. It was a locked facility. Rules were rules.
He explained that his wife was Irina Nelson and that she had just been admitted. He needed to see her. While he had little clout, or money, Irina’s
mother did—or had—and her lawyer had paved the way for him by calling one of the leading psychiatrists in Minnesota, Dr. Albert Darling, to head Irina’s
psychotherapy team.
At the mention of Dr. Darling’s name, the nurse’s voice turned creamy. Did he want to see Irina in her room? Yes, it was a private room. Yes, she’d
been served a late lunch, although she’d refused to eat. Of course, they would be happy to get him a cup of coffee. Make him a peanut butter sandwich.
Rub his feet. Press his slacks and shine his shoes while he waited.
“Is the doctor still here?” he asked.
“I believe he is,” said the nurse, walking him down the hall toward his wife’s room. “I saw him in the staff lounge. I’d be happy to get him for you.”
Before she could scamper off, a fat man in an expensive gray suit came out of a closed door.
“Dr. Darling,” said the nurse, tugging on a small pearl earring. “This is Steve Nelson, Irina Nelson’s husband.”
Darling stuck out his hand. It was as limp as the proverbial dishrag. Steve took an instant dislike to him.
“Let’s talk in the conference room.” Turning to the nurse, he said, “Will you get me that bag?” Without waiting for a response, he pivoted and strode
away.
Steve offered the nurse his thanks and walked erectly to a room across from the patient lounge. He didn’t like hospitals and he didn’t like doctors. Once
they were seated at a long rectangular table, he said, “How is she? Is she awake? Is she rational?”
“She was fairly agitated when she was admitted to the ER. I ordered a sedative. For the moment, I’d say she’s resting comfortably.”
Leonard Zeller had called Steve and explained that the police had found Irina on her mother’s houseboat a few hours earlier. He detailed the state she
was in, said that she’d been hugging a teddy bear, refused to give it up, and was making very little sense. The police had taken her to a mental health
facility. Steve could visit her there if he chose.
Darling nodded to Steve’s desert camo pants tucked into his hot-weather, steel-toed combat boots. “Are you in the military?”
“Ex-military.”
“I see.”
Steve wasn’t sure what he saw and had no interest in pursuing his preconceptions.
“Tell me about your wife’s pseudocyesis,” said Darling.
“Her what?”
“Her false pregnancy.” He smoothed his mustache hairs with the tips of his fingers.
“Look,” said Steve. “We talked about it, her family and me. At first, we all thought she was having a real baby. She’s been through a lot since we’ve
been married. I did three tours in Iraq. She’s been pregnant twice before. One ended in a miscarriage and one in a stillbirth. I was gone when she lost
them, so she had to deal with it pretty much on her own. I know it took a toll. But she’s always been so levelheaded, so unflappable. I just didn’t see this
coming.”
Darling continued to smooth his mustache. “Go on.”
“One day I came home and she’d bought this teddy bear, put it in the crib. She’d carry it around, diaper it. She acted like it was a real baby and got
pissed when I didn’t play along. I thought she’d gone nuts. She’d lose her mind and start yelling at me when I referred to it as Smokey. You know? Smokey
the Bear? Only you can prevent forest fires? I thought a little humor might break the ice, get her to see what she was doing. I get in trouble with my humor
sometimes. Maybe I went a little too far.”
Darling didn’t respond; he just sat there, hunched in his chair.
“Anyway, I kept telling her that she had to see a shrink, but that got me exactly nowhere. She wasn’t the crazy one, I was. And I was selfish. A terrible
dad. Uncaring. Mean. So I changed my approach. Started calling it marriage counseling. She still wouldn’t budge. This past Sunday, she told me that
she’s romantically involved with some antiquities dealer from Istanbul, an American who lives there. She says she loves him. That the baby is his. What
the hell was I supposed to think?”
“Do you want to participate in your wife’s psychotherapy?”
He sat up straighter. “I love Irina. I know that she doesn’t always believe that. I’ve had problems with her mother in the past, problems that have leaked
over into our marriage. I was planning to leave again, this time for Kabul. I’ve been offered a job with a private military contractor. You may not understand
this, but it occurred to me that if I went away, she’d be forced to get better, to deal realistically with the world around her. But I can’t leave. Not the way
things are. I have to stick by her if she’ll let me.”
There was a knock on the door.
“Come in,” called Darling. He stood up and took a diaper bag from the nurse. He never said thank you, he just sat back down and watched her leave.
He was either deeply preoccupied by weighty psychological issues, or he was a jackass. Steve favored the latter.
“Is that Irina’s?” he asked, recognizing the orange and fuchsia balloons.
“The officers who brought her to the ER said she refused to let go of it.” Darling set it on the table in front of him. “The bag was filled with diapers, toys,
baby wipes, the usual. They didn’t see any harm in letting her take it when they left the houseboat, but when she was admitted to the mental health unit,
she had to give it up. The unit doesn’t allow patients to bring personal items into their rooms. Someone on the staff makes a list of the items, and then
everything is locked away. When I got here, I was informed that the bag contained something unusual.” He removed a fleecy scarf that appeared to be
balled around something heavy. Removing the scarf, he set a statue on the table.
“Is it gold?” asked Steve.
“That would be my guess.”
It was a winged ox or maybe a bull, the size of a small kitten. The eyes were two iridescent blue gemstones. They looked like they might be sapphires.
The horns were a whitish brown. Could be stone, or ivory.
“It’s old,” said Steve. “Most likely something Irina took from her mother’s gallery.”
“I’d like to give it to the police, let them figure out what to do with it.”
“Fine with me,” said Steve with a shrug. “Look, I’m happy to talk you, answer any questions you have, but right now I want to see my wife.”
“That’s fine,” said Darling, glancing at his Rolex. “We can talk more tomorrow. Her recovery will take time, but with love and support, and the correct
therapy protocol, I believe she has a good chance of making it all the way back.”
* * *
Steve stood in the doorway, marveling at what a room on a psych ward didn’t contain. There was no bathroom. No clothes closet—no closet at all. The
bedside table had no drawers in it and was attached by bolts to the wall. One long curtain was drawn over a large window. Staring for a few seconds at a
square of metal mounted on the wall, trying to comprehend what it might be, he finally decided that it had to be a covered and locked thermostat. The
patients couldn’t even turn up the heat if they were cold.
Irina was lying in a single bed, on top of the white bedcovers, looking like a homeless waif, which, he supposed, in many ways she was. Her eyes were
closed, her arms at her sides. For a woman who was always in motion, always tensely focused, she seemed unusually peaceful. She wore teal-colored
scrubs and looked as if she’d lost even more weight. The bones in her cheeks protruded. She was without makeup, her hair unwashed. He wasn’t sure he
would have recognized her if he’d seen her on the street.
“Irina?” he whispered. The room was so dimly lit, so quiet, he figured his normal voice would be too jarring.
Her eyes opened. “Chess?”
“No, it’s Steve.” He walked over. “Can I sit on the bed with you?” There was one other piece of furniture in the room, a chair, but it was too low, too far
away. He wanted to be closer.
“I guess,” she said. As he sat down, she gripped his wrist. “Have you seen Dusty? Is he okay? Where are they keeping him? Why won’t they let me
have him?”
He pried her fingers off and held her hand. “He’s fine. I’ve got him.”
“What do you mean you’ve got him? You’re here. How could you be here and be taking care of him at the same time? Am I crazy? That’s a logical
question, isn’t it? Why am I here? They act like there’s something wrong with me. Mental. Up here.” She tapped her head. “Why won’t they let me go? One
of the other patients said the doors are locked. How can the doors be locked? I’m an American citizen. I have rights.”
“Of course you do.”
“Then why can’t I have my son? I need him. Nobody else knows what’s best for him.”
“Misty’s with Dusty. He’s fine. Everyone’s fine.”
“She’s not smoking around him, is she? Or drinking?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Are you sleeping with her? Tell me the truth.”
He started to laugh but stopped himself. “Where did you get that idea?”
“You can admit it. I’m tougher than you think.”
His smile turned tender. “She’s the last person on earth I’d want a relationship with. Give me a little credit.”
She lay back, exhausted by her outburst. “I’m tired.”
“I know you are. You need to rest. I heard you didn’t eat any lunch.”
“I’m not hungry. How can I be hungry when my son is God-knows-where.”
“I told you. He’s safe. You’re safe.”
“Did you call my mother? Tell her what happened?”
He hesitated. “Not yet.”
She turned her face away. “Why does everything keep spinning?”
“Is that what it feels like?”
“I don’t know what’s happening to me.”
“I’m here for you.”
“Are you? Are you really?”
“If you want me.”
She turned back to him, gazed up into his eyes. “I don’t know what I want.”
“That’s fine. It’s a starting place.”
“Aren’t you going back to Iraq?”
“I’m staying here with you. Until you’re feeling better.”
“Then what?”
“Then I’ll bring you home.”
Still gazing deep into his eyes, she said, “Where’s home, Steve?”
“With me.”
“And Dusty?”
He pressed his lips together, swallowed a couple of times. “And Dusty.”
“All I ever wanted was for us to be a family.”
“I know that now.”
“I still love you.”
In Steve’s lexicon of important human character traits, courage and steadfastness in the face of trouble were at the top of the list. A man without
courage was a man lost. “I love you, too,” he said, kissing her hand, holding it against his heart.
39
Jane felt like the angel of death passing through the land of Egypt. She drove from place to place, bringing the news about Mia to her family. She tried to
stay positive. She’d talked to one of the police officers working with Amber Alerts and been told that they already had several leads to follow up on. She
spent an hour in Cordelia’s living room. Melanie sat on the floor, holding her little dog, petting his head. Cordelia, reclining on the couch with her injured
ankle up on a pillow, alternately cried and scolded herself for crying. Only Hattie, unaware of the significance of what was happening, continued on with
what she was doing. She’d lined up the three felines that shared the loft with them and was instructing them on how to be better cats. At any other time it
would have been funny. This afternoon, it was just background noise.
Jane went to her father’s office and got her dad and Elizabeth out of a meeting. She didn’t stay long. Her dad offered to drive her home, but she said
she was okay. She said she’d monitor what the police learned from the alert and let them know.
She spent the rest of the evening at the hospital, sitting next to Nolan’s bed in the ICU. He finally opened his eyes around nine that evening. After the
nurses and doctors had been in to talk to him, to check his vital signs and make notes about all the monitors he was hooked up to, Jane was finally alone
with him for a few minutes.
Standing next to the bed, she said, “Welcome back.”
He looked around to get his bearings, then held up his right arm, glanced at the IV taped to his hand, and followed the tubes to where a bag was
hanging on a stand next to the bed.
“You saved my life,” said Jane.
“Water?”
“Ice chips,” said Jane. She spooned a couple into his mouth. “They put a tube down your throat. Is it sore?”
“Yeah.”
“How do you feel?”
“Like I was hit by the entire Vikings defensive line.” His voice was softer than normal, weaker. “But it looks like I’ll live.”
Jane fought back tears because she knew something he didn’t. The bullet that Smith had fired had lodged next to his spine. The doctors weren’t able to
remove it. There was a possibility that he might be paralyzed from the waist down.
“How long you been here?”
“A while.”
The new nurse came in to check his IV bag. Nolan winked at Jane, then introduced her as his daughter.
“Well,” said the nurse, glancing from face to face, taking in their different skin colors. “That’s really nice she could be here.”
“She’s that kind of daughter.”
“I’m Jane.”
“Lois. I’ll be your father’s nurse this evening. Do you live in town?”
“Minneapolis.”
She checked his blood pressure. “How’s the pain?” she asked. “On a scale of one to ten, ten being the worst.”
“Five,” he whispered.
“You’re due for more pain meds. I’ll go get them.”
After she’d left, Jane bent over and kissed his cheek. “Thanks, Dad.”
“Don’t mention it.”
“Do you feel up to a little conversation?”
“Thought that’s what we were having.”
“Do you remember what happened?”
Slowly, woozily, he said, “I got shot in the stomach, not the head.”
“How did you find me?”
“Tiny GPS unit. I put it on Redzig’s truck last night.”
“Who’s Redzig?”
“Eddy Redzig. I’m a PI, you know.” Another slow wink. “You knew him as Smith. Followed him to the marina this morning. Then the woods. More ice.”
She spooned more chips into his mouth.
He looked up at the TV, then over at the window. “I gotta close my eyes.”
“I’ll sit here a while longer.”
“No, go home. Come back tomorrow.” His eyes fluttered shut. A few seconds later, he was asleep.
* * *
On the way back to her house, Jane’s cell rang. Thinking it might be the police with an update, she answered without checking the caller ID.
“I just saw an Amber Alert on TV about a little girl named Mia Lawless,” came Julia’s excited voice. “Is it for real? Peter and Sigrid’s daughter?”
“I’m afraid so,” said Jane.
“Is there anything I can do? Anything at all—”
“I wish there was.”
“Do you have any idea who took her?”
Jane offered a few details but kept them general.
“I’m so sorry. If there’s anything I can do to help, you’ll let me know, right? If Sigrid needs a sedative to help her sleep? Of if you do, or Peter.”
“Thanks.”
“At a time like this, nothing else is important—but I thought I’d tell you that I took the cylinder seal I bought from Chess over to a curator at the Institute of
Arts. I gave them the provenance papers. I should know in a few days if it was stolen or not. I’ll let you know. If it wasn’t taken illegally, I suppose I’ll have to
write him another check. I canceled the one I gave him on Sunday.”
Jane simply couldn’t deal with it. “I suppose so.”
“Well, take care. And keep in touch.”
* * *
By eleven that night, Jane was sitting again on her back porch with a brandy, her dog’s head resting in her lap. Her mind was caught in familiar filaments
of thought. Sometimes her life felt more like a circle than a straight line, with issues and themes doubling back on themselves, never truly reaching a
conclusion or a sense of completion. Just hours ago a man had died within inches of her, one of her best friends was shot, and she’d been moments
away from her own death. She’d experienced the world in a way she never had before, and yet here she was, falling back into the same old grooves, with
the same questions swirling around inside her. Did a human have to look back in order to move forward? She remembered a favorite line from Alice in
Wonderland. “It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backward.” Yet that’s where she was stuck. She would be caught and held forever in the past until
she knew for sure what had happened to Mia.
Over the course of the afternoon and evening, she’d talked to the police half a dozen times. None of their leads had panned out. She could tell that the
man she’d last spoken to was trying, in an official yet gentle way, to prepare her for the worst. She decided to wait until morning before she talked to Peter
and Sigrid again. She had nothing new to add and didn’t want them to hear the pain in her voice.
By midnight, the numbness had, gratefully, returned. She remembered a line of scripture her mother sometimes quoted. “Sufficient unto the day is the
evil thereof.” Jane had always taken it to mean “Time for bed.” That was the way her mom used it. When enough bad things had happened, it was best to
call it a day and hope for a better tomorrow.
Headlights hitting the garage door alerted her to a car pulling into the driveway. She opened the screen for Mouse and then walked out after him.
Lee was just getting out of the driver’s seat of an older-model Chevy van. “Hey,” he said. “I just heard about Nolan.”
Mouse lunged for the fence.
“It’s okay, boy.” She grabbed his collar, ordered him to sit.
“Dogs and me don’t mix. Never have. Maybe they smell a cop. Look, I, ah … I decided that the Twin Cities isn’t for me after all.”
“You’re leaving?”
“Thought I’d come over, say my good-byes.”
“Where are you headed?” she asked, stepping up to the gate.
“Not sure. I was thinking about Seattle. Go west, young man, isn’t that what they say?”
“Planning to do more preaching?”
“Oh, I suppose. It’s cheap entertainment.” Covering the gatepost with his hand, he continued, “You okay?”
She took a deep breath. “Not so good. Those people who were staking out my restaurant, they not only shot Nolan, but they kidnapped and may have
murdered my niece.” The act of saying the words out loud gave them a reality she still resisted.
Lee’s eyes panned across the yard.
“I’ve never felt so helpless.”
“Yeah … about that.”
The hesitation in his voice caused her to look him squarely in the eye. “What? Do you know something?”
“I’m sorry for the part I played in this whole mess.”
“Your part? What are you saying?”
“I was part of the group hired to retrieve the bull. My job was to get to know you. Feel out the situation, see if you knew where it was.”
“Where is she?”
“Give me a minute, okay?”
She stood very still, almost afraid to breathe.
“There’s stuff I need to explain. I never worked with Redzig before. I mean, that guy was bat-shit crazy. A psychopath. The other groups I’ve been a part
of weren’t like this one. I was recruited two years ago by a friend I first met in seminary. He told me he was working for an ex-major in the old Iraqi army.
The more he talked, the more interested I became. I agreed that returning looted antiquities to the museum in Baghdad was a just cause. What I told you
is true. I’m not much of a Christian, but the Bible and the history it represents is important to me. And hell, I needed a job, something that required more
than pushing papers around a desk. So I signed on. But I never signed on for what happened here.”
“I don’t want your excuses, I want to know where my niece is.”
“I never expected to like you so much.”
“Where is she?”
He extracted an envelope from the back pocket of his jeans. “Here.”
She ripped it open. Inside was a page torn from a legal pad. She couldn’t make out the words, just that they were written in all caps. “What’s this?”
“It’s a list of all the people who are part of the operation—the ones I’ve come in contact with in the last few years. Down at the bottom, you’ll find info on
the three who run the show. They call themselves the Baghdad Union. Names, phone numbers, addresses, e-mails. Everything the FBI will need to track
them. Don’t ask me how I got it. Just take it and give it to the police. The cops will be the least of my worries if that’s ever traced back to me.”
“I don’t care about this. I want Mia. Is she alive? Dead?” She grabbed the front of his shirt, but he backed away. Walking around to the rear of the van,
he motioned for her to join him—and then he opened the doors.
The little girl was lying on her stomach atop a sleeping bag, one that had been spread over a bare, dirty mattress. Her eyes were closed. “Is she—”
“She’s alive.”
Jane lunged inside, lifted her into her arms, and pulled her out.
“She’s been sedated,” said Lee, following Jane through the back gate into the house. “I made sure she was treated well. I told her right off that I wasn’t
going to hurt her, that she’d be home in a couple of days. She was scared at first, sure, but she got over it. We watched movies together. I bought her all
her favorite fast foods. We played games. When Redzig gave the order to get rid of her, I slipped her out the back door and took off.”
Jane laid the little girl down on the couch in the living room. She sat down next to her, brushed the hair away from her forehead.
“She’ll wake up soon.”
She checked her breathing, looked for cuts or bruises, felt for a fever.
“She’s fine,” said Lee.
“She’s not fine!” She stood, coming face to face with him. “She was kidnapped. We thought she was dead. Do you have any idea what this has done to
my family? What it’s done to her? To me?”
“I brought her back. All I ask is that you let me go. If you can’t do that, at least give me a few hours. A day if possible. Please,” he said. “Twenty-four
hours.”
“Get out of here.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Get out.”
She walked with him to the front door. After he’d gone, she threw the bolt and turned the security system back on. Returning to the living room, she
eased down next to Mia, gazing at her niece’s impossibly young face. Her fury at Lee was white hot, and yet she knew he could easily have taken off and
never looked back. Instead, he’d saved Mia, brought her back. Right then and there she made a decision to give him his twenty-four hours. She owed him
that much.
“You’re home,” she whispered, pulling Mia into her arms, feeling her strong, steady heartbeat. Holding her tight, she stroked her hair and rocked her
until the reality of her return fully sank in. “You’re going to be okay. Everything’s going to be okay now that you’re back.” She prayed with all her might that
those words were true.
Holding her for a moment more, Jane finally relaxed and released Mia, laying her back down against the pillow. Then, with a heart fairly bursting, she
opened her cell phone to call her family.