Chương 6
Then a man inhaled.
“Elliot, don’t call Catherine.”
My knees weakened.
David.
Not somebody who sounded like David.
Not a memory filling in what I wanted to hear.
David.
His voice was rougher than I remembered, but the slight drag on the first syllable of my name was exactly the same.
He always said Catherine carefully when he was afraid.
The message continued.
“If Romano gets hit, assume Peter knows.”
A noise interrupted him.
Something metallic.
David spoke faster.
“Tell Cat the blue cup was mine.”
The recording ended.
Nobody said anything.
I stared at the phone.
Sergeant Hall looked at me.
“Does that phrase mean something?”
My mouth had gone dry.
“Yes.”
Marco stepped closer.
“What?”
I did not answer.
“Catherine.”
I looked through the glass at Logan.
He was sitting cross-legged in the chair while Renee folded a paper glove wrapper into something that looked vaguely like a boat.
“The blue cup was mine,” I said.
Marco waited.
“That’s it?”
“No.”
I swallowed.
“When David and I first moved in together, we had four plastic cups from a dollar store.”
Vance watched me carefully.
“One blue, one red, two green.”
Marco’s impatience showed.
“And?”
“David hated the blue one.”
“That’s the message?”
“No.”
I closed my eyes for a second.
The memory arrived in pieces.
Our first apartment.
A kitchen drawer that never closed correctly.
David standing at the sink in boxer shorts while I accused him of leaving coffee grounds everywhere.
The blue cup on the counter.
A stupid argument.
A stupid, ordinary argument from nine years ago.
“He broke it.”
Marco frowned.
“What?”
“He knocked the blue cup off the counter and broke it.”
I looked at Vance.
“He blamed me.”
Vance’s expression did not change.
“He blamed you?”
“For six years.”
Despite everything, a laugh escaped me.
It sounded almost hysterical.
“Every time we broke a glass after that, he’d say, ‘At least it wasn’t the blue cup.’”
Sergeant Hall’s mouth twitched.
“That sounds irritating.”
“It was incredibly irritating.”
I looked at the silent phone again.
“On our sixth anniversary he admitted he broke it.”
Marco stared at me.
“So what does it mean now?”
“It means the message is real.”
Vance nodded.
“Exactly.”
“No.”
I looked at him.
“It means David wanted me to know he was speaking freely.”
Vance’s eyebrows rose.
I could almost see him reassessing me.
“When he admitted it,” I continued, “he said if he ever needed to prove something without using one of our normal passwords, he’d tell me the blue cup was his.”
Marco said, “You had emergency passwords?”
“We watched too many spy movies when we were broke.”
The words came out before I could stop them.
For a second, nobody knew what to do with that.
Then Sergeant Hall asked, “Who is Peter?”
Vance looked at Marco.
Marco looked at Vance.
The silence between them carried more information than either man wanted to give me.
I stepped away from Sergeant Hall.
“Who is Peter?”
Marco said, “You don’t need—”
I laughed.
He stopped.
“You really have not learned anything about me in the last twenty minutes.”
His nostrils flared.
Vance said, “Peter Romano.”
The name landed differently because I knew Alessandro had no brother by that name.
At least, nobody in Baltimore newspapers ever mentioned one.
“Related?”
Vance nodded.
“Cousin.”
Marco’s voice was flat.
“Second cousin.”
“Important distinction?”
“To Italians.”
Under any other circumstances, the dryness might have been funny.
Nobody laughed.
Vance continued.
“Peter Romano runs logistics for Alessandro.”
Marco’s eyes sharpened.
“Ran.”
Vance glanced at him.
“That’s new.”
“It became new tonight.”
“What happened?”
Marco looked at Sergeant Hall.
“I’m not discussing internal matters.”
She gave him a tired stare.
“Six armed men have turned a hospital into a private checkpoint, your employer was shot three times, and a potentially dead man left a message naming someone connected to your organization.”
She nodded toward the younger officer.
“You lost the privilege of calling that internal.”
Marco folded his arms.
“Then arrest me.”
The younger officer looked as though he might enjoy that.
Sergeant Hall did not take the bait.
“Where is Peter Romano?”
Marco remained silent.
My phone arrived in the hands of a frightened housekeeping aide named Luis.
He held it out to me without entering the circle.
“Your locker was open.”
I frowned.
“No, it wasn’t.”
Luis stopped.
“What?”
“I locked it.”
He looked toward the hallway.
“It was open when I got there.”
Marco took the phone before I could.
“Hey.”
He turned it over in his hand.
“Passcode?”
“You don’t get my passcode.”
He held it out to Sergeant Hall.
“You should bag this.”
She looked annoyed.
“Why?”
“Someone opened her locker.”
The officer’s expression changed.
Luis lifted both hands.
“I didn’t touch anything else.”
“I know,” I said.
He looked grateful.
Then I noticed something.
“My purse.”
Luis blinked.
“What?”
“My purse was in the locker.”
“I didn’t see one.”
My chest tightened.
There had been nothing valuable inside.
Six dollars.
A pharmacy receipt.
Logan’s spare mittens even though it was April because I never cleaned my purse properly.
And my apartment keys.
“Someone took my purse.”
Marco swore.
Sergeant Hall asked, “Home address on your employee file?”
“Yes.”
“Childcare records?”
“My babysitter has my address.”
Vance’s face had lost its calm.
“Get them out of here.”
Marco turned on him.
“You said the floor was safer.”
“It was.”
“Was?”
“If Peter has someone inside the hospital, it isn’t.”
I looked at Vance.
“You don’t get to scare me and then stand there like you’re helping.”
“I’m not trying to scare you.”
“You tracked my schedule.”
“To protect you.”
“People keep doing terrible things to me for my protection.”
That silenced him.
Renee opened the consultation-room door.
“Catherine?”
I turned.
Logan stood beside her holding Captain Bear by one leg.
He had heard enough voices to know something was wrong.
“Mommy, can we go home?”
My throat closed.
May you like
Home suddenly meant an apartment whose keys were missing.
A bedroom with dinosaur sheets.
