LITMIR.BIZ

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      “Yeah, but this one really got to him. See, he’d always sort of assumed that it was just the kids of rich people who got snatched and held for ransom. But these kidnappers made a mistake. They got the wrong target. Instead of the rich kid they thought they were getting they got the maid’s son.” She shuddered. “When they discovered their mistake, they slit the boy’s throat.”

      Keller’s face darkened. “So it hit him. Anyone’s vulnerable.”

      She nodded. “It’s making him crazy. So…” She fell silent.

      “So you can’t say anything about the way you feel,”

      Keller said. “If you put up any resistance at all…”

      She finished the sentence for him. “If I put up any resistance at all, I feel like a complete selfish bitch.”

      “Well, you’re not,” Keller said.

      “Aren’t I?” she said, her voice bitter. “They’re his sons, Jack. He’s got every right to want to see them grow up. To see them grow up safe. And I’m supposed to stand in the way of that because I’m worried that I won’t be able to hack it? That I’ll be a lousy stepmother to them? Or that I just won’t be able to stand having teenage boys around my apartment?” There was another silence before she spoke again. “You know the last thing my husband said to me before he shot himself?” She paused, took a deep breath. “I was lying there on the rug, both legs broken, the house beginning to burn down around me. He dropped that fucking baseball bat he’d just beaten me bloody with and pulled out his gun. I thought he was going to shoot me. I was praying he’d shoot me so I wouldn’t have to burn to death. Instead, he looked at me and said, ‘None of this would have happened if you’d just agreed to have kids.’ ” She slammed her hand down on the counter. It made a sound like a gunshot in the silence. “Like I was going to bring a child into a house with that psychopath. I couldn’t protect myself. How was I going to protect—” She stopped, drew a deep shuddering breath as she got herself under control.

      Keller got out of his chair. He knelt by hers and took her scarred hand in his. “You need to tell him this, Angela,” he said softly. “He needs to know how you feel. Because it’ll come out. Somehow. No one knows that better than me.”

      She smiled down at him, ran her free hand through Keller’s hair before putting it on top of his hand. “Ahhh, Keller,” she said. “Why did I let you get away?” She let go and waved off the response. “Don’t answer that. I know why.” She smiled sadly. “And now it’s too late. We’ve got other people in our lives.” She glanced up at the clock on the wall. “And speaking of late,” she said, “you’d better get a move on if you’re going to make it to Fayetteville in time to see Marie.”

      He stood up slowly. “Yeah,” he said. “But remember what I said.”

      “I will,” she said. “I’ll talk to him.” She stood up. “Things easier between you two now?”

      “A little,” Keller said. He didn’t elaborate.

      “How’s her new business going?” she said.

      “Picking up,” Keller replied. “She said she needed my help on something. I’ll call if I’m going to be gone long.”

      “No worries,” Angela said. “Most of our clients have been pretty well behaved lately. Maybe it’s your reputation, since you’ve been on TV and all.”

      He made a face. “Great. Thanks to TV, I have a reputation as a total wacko.”

      She laughed. “Yeah, but damn few people want a total wacko like you coming after them. Hey, you use what you’ve got.” She gave Keller a kiss on the cheek. “Say hey to Marie for me.”

CHAPTER TWO

      Keller pulled the Crown Victoria into one of the angled parking spaces along Hay Street. The broad sidewalks near the Cumberland County Courthouse were lined with older buildings. The Hay Street area had been populated with strip clubs and streetwalkers catering to horny soldiers far from home for the first time until a city cleanup program in the 1980s closed the venerable fleshpots like Rick’s Lounge and the Seven Dwarfs. But that didn’t eradicate vice in Fayetteville so much as relocate it. The strip joints had moved out to Bragg Boulevard and turned into upscale “gentleman’s clubs.” The hookers had moved indoors and into the Yellow Pages, where they euphemistically called themselves escorts. Now Hay Street was more friendly to “legitimate” business, but those businesses seemed slow to get the word. Some of the storefronts were deserted, but various civic organizations had brightened them up with brightly colored designs painted on the empty windows. Other storefronts held small law offices, clothing stores offering “urban wear,” and a pair of hair and nail salons.

      Keller got out of the car. He stopped in front of another storefront. The lettering on this front window read JONES INVESTIGATONS. A bell attached to the door rang as Keller entered.

      There was a pressed-wood reception desk with a phone and a computer in the front office. Keller had helped assemble the desk when Marie opened the office. It was empty; so far, there was no money to pay anyone to man it. He and Marie had also spent a weekend constructing the thin wall that separated the single office from the reception area. Behind the desk, the door was open. Keller could hear voices coming from inside.

      Marie was seated behind another cheap desk. The wall behind her was sparsely decorated: her newly framed PI license, a couple of pictures of her in her police uniform, and a picture of her with her father that Keller remembered last seeing at her house. A picture of Marie’s son, Ben, smiled at her from a frame on the desk.

      The woman seated across from Marie stood up and extended a hand to Keller. She was tall and broad-shouldered. She looked to be in her early forties, but there was a single broad streak of pure white in her wavy dark brown hair. “Tamara Healy,” she said. Her voice was a contralto roughened by tobacco and whiskey. “I’m with Black, Diamond, and Healy.”

      Keller took the hand. Her handshake was firm, like a man’s: straight up and down, one pump, two pumps, release. She sat back down. Keller took the other chair.

      “You’re a lawyer,” he said.

      She gave a short laugh. “I thought Miss Jones was the detective,” she said.

      Keller began to feel a vague sense of unease. He looked at Marie and cocked an eyebrow.

      “Ms. Healy…” Marie began.

      “Tammy,” the woman broke in.

      Marie forced a smile. “Tammy has a client who’s involved in a custody dispute.”

      Keller tried not to grimace. He knew Marie hated domestic cases. He didn’t blame her. They usually involved surveillance of husbands or wives suspected of fooling around. The suspicions proved true with depressing regularity.

      “I’ll wait in the lobby,” Keller said.

      “Pull the door shut as you leave, will you?” Marie said.

      Keller did so. He took a seat at the empty reception desk. He looked around for something to read. There was nothing. Then Keller realized that he could hear the conversation on the other side of the cheap paneling almost as clearly as if he were in the same room.

      “Problem is,” Healy was saying, “Dad’s run off with the kid.”

      Keller grimaced. He didn’t really want to hear this. He got up and went to the window. No good. He could still hear the voices.

      “Did you call the police?” Marie was saying.

      “No,” Healy said. “Dad made his move before there was a custody order. With no court order, either parent has a right to the kid. No court order, no crime.”

      “So get a court order.”

      “We got one. But

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