Farrell was in good shape; he walked briskly for the better part of half an hour. Reese wished he’d had Bear with him; might as well kill two birds with one stone.
Finally Reese saw water ahead of them. They were coming up on the East River. Farrell saw it, too, and he broke into a trot. “Damn,” Reese said. He began to run, closing the distance between them. It was way too cold for a dip. He didn’t want to have to go in after the man. But when Farrell got to the railing next to the bank, he stopped.
Reese slowed to a walk and turned just a little, so he wasn’t approaching the man directly. Farrell didn’t notice him. He stood very still, looking at the water. Reese stopped twenty feet from the man and waited. A minute passed, then two, then three.
Finally, Farrell took the strap of the duffle bag off his shoulder and set it on the ground. From the sound and apparent weight of the bag, it held all the weapons. The man climbed over the railing, then reached back for the bag. Reese started to move again. But Farrell didn’t move any closer to the water. Instead, he swung the bag by the strap, built up some inertia, and flung it.
The bag, and presumably the weapons, hit the water ten feet out and sank immediately.
Farrell climbed back over the railing, He looked around, but scarcely noticed Reese. Then he walked the other direction.
“Mr. Reese?” Finch said. “Everything alright?”
John was already following the man again. “We’re going to need Carter,” he said.
“Why? Is someone dead?”
“No. And I’m going to keep it that way.”
***
Greg Farrell stopped in the nearest alley. He went behind the dumpster and pulled out his phone. He hit speed dial, waited while it rang and went to voice mail. “Hey, Susie,” he said. His voice was shaky. He cleared his throat. “Hey, I, um … I just wanted to tell you. I wanted to … I’m really sorry. Really sorry, Susie. I just want you to know, I love you. I’ve always loved you. Even when I didn’t treat you like I did. I’m sorry about that most of all. I wish …” He stopped. Struggled for words. None came. Finally he just pressed the button to end the call.
He put the phone away and pulled out the gun. It was a .38, a cheap little piece of crap, but it would do the job.
“Hey, pal, you got a smoke?”
Farrell turned, startled. He ran squarely into a fist, and his world went black.
***
It was too cold to be patient. Carter walked over to one of the remaining piles of snow ” everything had melted except the piles left by the snowplows ” and scooped up a small handful. It was crunchy, mostly ice. She walked back to the man slumped on the bench and slapped the ice on the back of Farrell’s neck.
He woke up with an audible ‘whoosh’ of breath. “What the …”
“Hey, there,” Carter said. She sat down next to him and flashed her badge. “I’m Carter. Homicide.”
The man blinked, licked his lips, swallowed. “I didn’t kill anybody.”
“I know. But you thought about it.”
“I … I threw all the weapons away. I’m not going to kill anybody.”
Carter tilted her head. “Yeah. I’d like to believe that. Thing is, both of those things are only mostly true. Right?”
“I …” He kept looking at her, but his hand patted his coat pocket. Then he dropped it to his side. “Am I … am I under arrest?”
“Haven’t decided yet.”
He swallowed again. “Maybe … it would be best. If you …”
“If I took you in? Could be. Or maybe we should get you some help instead.”
“I don’t think anybody can help me.”
“Oh.” Carter sat back. “I get it. You think you’re the only one that got a little lost, huh? All those men and women serving in Iraq, Afghanistan, and you’re the only one who couldn’t quite fit in when you got back?”
His eyes flashed with sudden anger, and he looked away. “You don’t know anything about it.”
“I know everything about it,” Carter snapped. “I was there.”
He looked at her. Then he looked away again. “I’m angry,” he said quietly.
“You have some right to be.”
“No, you don’t understand. I’m always angry. All the time. It’s like I can’t turn it off. I can’t sleep, and when I do I wake up and I’m … angry.”
Carter nodded. “We can get you help for that, Greg.”
“My wife. She’s been so good, but … she’s scared to death of me. Everything she does, she just, she tries so hard not to upset me. She’s on eggshells all the time. And I … I get angry about that. That she’s trying so hard, that she’s tiptoeing around. She’s scared. And I’m scared.”
He turned and looked her squarely in the eyes. “I was going to kill everybody. Her and everybody she works with. As many people as I could.”
“But you threw the guns away,” Carter prompted quietly.
“I had to. I had to. I don’t want to hurt anybody …” Tears filled his eyes. “Can they really … can somebody really help me?”
“Yes. But you’ve got to do something for yourself first.”
“What?”
Carter brought the .38 out. “You told me you threw all the weapons away. But you forgot this one.” She held it out to him. “Take it. Throw it in the river. And then we’ll get started on making the second part true. The part about not killing anyone.”
He stared at her like she’d lost her mind. “Go on,” Carter said. “Take it.”
“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can. You’ve done much braver things than this. Just take it and throw it in the river.”
“I …” Farrell reached out suddenly and grabbed it from her hand. He strode to the railing and looked out at the water. Then he stopped and looked down at the gun. Then he looked back at her.
Carter sat very still, silent, and waited.
After a very long moment, he cocked his arm back and hurled the gun into the river.
Then he walked back to the bench. “You took all the rounds out, didn’t you?”
Carter smiled wryly. “Damn right I did.”
Farrell found a sad little smile of his own. “Thank you.”
“Come on.” She stood up, nodded toward her car. “They’ve got a bed waiting for you.”
“They can really help?”
“I promise.”
He followed her to the car. Then he hesitated again. “Should I …” He gestured toward the back seat.
Carter shrugged. “You can sit up front if you want. You’re not under arrest.”
“I should be.”
“Yeah, we don’t usually book people for littering, and that’s all I’ve seen you do.”
“But you know …” He stopped, looked at her again. “How did you know?”
“I have a source.”
“But then you know …”
“I know,” Carter answered. “And you need to hear this, Farrell. You do to this program, you stay there, you work hard, you get well, and nobody else knows what I know about today. But you take one step off the path, you drop out, you screw around ” you so much as look at a gun dealer, and I swear, I will throw your ass in jail in a hot second. And I will be keeping an eye on you. Every step of the way. We clear?”
His eyes gleamed again with tears ” and gratitude. “Clear.”
“Get in the car.”
Farrell did. She closed the door behind him, walked around to the driver’s side. She checked rearview mirror. There was a dark sedan there, idling. She knew it would follow her all the way to the hospital. “Every step of the way,” she said again. She glanced over at Farrell. He looked tired.
He had a right to be.
When she’d gotten him checked in, she went back to her car and looked around. The sedan was gone. But the minute she was behind the wheel, her phone rang. “John.”
“Thank you, Carter.”
“You’re welcome. Feels kinda good to help a live one once in a while.”
“I know.”
“You’re gonna keep an eye on him, right? I don’t want to be looking at a dozen bodies six months from now.”
“We’ll watch him. I promise.” He didn’t add that if Farrell went astray, Reese would take care of him personally. He didn’t need to. Carter wasn’t sure she approved, but it was still reassuring.
She smiled to herself and put her phone away.
***
Will Ingram look up from his plate of ortiki “ quail grilled in spinach “ and frowned. “Uncle Harold?”
“Hmmm?” Finch shook himself and returned his attention to the young man. “I’m sorry. North Dakota.”
Will looked the direction his uncle had been looking. At the other side of the restaurant, three men and a young woman was having lunch together. The men all wore suits; two were late middle-aged, the third younger and evidently angry. The woman was a little more casual, in a skirt and sweater. It was the third time he’d seen his uncle watching them. “Do you know them?”
“Yes.” Finch glanced that way again. “Sorry.”
It seemed to Ingram that his uncle’s cheeks were just a little pink. He looked again. “She’s pretty,” he ventured. The woman was pretty, in a sort of understated, fresh-scrubbed way. She was also about his age, rather young for his uncle. But Will shrugged that off immediately. If Harold wasn’t alone for a change, he didn’t really care who he was not alone with.
“Yes,” Harold agreed. “Very.”
Direct hit, Ingram thought, surprised. “Who is she?”
“Just a … business associate.”
“Oh. Okay, then. Don’t tell me.”
His uncle smiled briefly. “Her name is Christine Fitzgerald. She’s the owner of a company called Cassandra Consulting. She conducts independent information security audits for various companies throughout the city.”
“Independent … ?”
“She hacks computer networks, and then tells the companies where their vulnerabilities are.”
“Oh.” Will frowned. So it wasn’t a romantic relationship after all. That was a little disappointing. “So how do you know her? You don’t know anything about computers.”
“No, I don’t. And that’s why I frequently employee Miss Fitzgerald’s services.” Harold took another bite of his lunch. He’d opted for the shrimp saganaki. “Aside from the pharmaceutical companies we insure, the largest liability risk for nearly all of our clients is information exposure.” He waved his fork. “Financial firms, like Bender Warren there, are particularly vulnerable to exposure of confidential client data. And it all goes back to computer security.”
“Oh.”
“So our underwriters frequently base our rates on the results of independent security audits. A thorough audit can provide the basis for a …” He stopped, smiled wryly. “Shop talk. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.” Will grinned. “I was almost following you this time.”
“Nobody follows it, except other insurance people. And every they’re bored by it.”
Will glanced at the girl again. “The guy with her looks upset.”
“I noticed.” As they watched, the agitated man grew steadily louder. They had a computer tablet on the table, and he poked it with his finger repeatedly. The other men spoke to him, trying to calm him. The woman sat back, subtly leaning away from the table and the conflict. They were all pretending it was a civilized conversation, but Will could tell it was getting less polite by the minute.
“You think she caught something?” he asked.
“I would say so,” Harold answered. “Something major, by the look of it.”
“Are they your client?”
Harold sighed. “Yes. Obviously I need to review their account.” He shrugged. “After lunch. This is really excellent.”
“I almost forgot how much good food there was in New York,” Will agreed.
“I have a whole list of new places I’d like to try. If you’re here long enough, we’ll hit them all.”
Will grinned. “I’m in.”
The angry man at the other table stood up and hurled the tablet against the wall. It broke and fell in pieces to the floor. The waiter moved toward the table, but the man was already striding toward the front door.
The restaurant hushed and then murmured. The waiter gingerly retrieved the pieces of the tablet and brought them back to the table. Fitzgerald took them graciously and dumped them into her shoulder bag. She and the remaining men spoke quietly.
Harold stirred. “Would you mind, Will, if I asked her to join us for a few minutes?”
“What?” It was a rather startling request, and Will wondered again if his uncle’s interest in the young woman was more than professional. He was very curious. “No, that’d be great. I’d like to meet her.”
Harold pulled out a business card and scrawled a brief message on the back, then gestured for their waiter and gave it to him with a whisper and a nod. The man nodded and moved away.
They ate and waited.
When the party at the other table broke up a few minutes later, the waiter moved discretely and slipped the young woman the card. She glanced at it, then looked around, surprised. She caught Harold’s glance and smiled, nodded briefly, then turned and spoke to her lunch companions. They left; she waited until they were out the door before she came over to their table.
Harold stood up, and Will followed his example. The woman greeted the older man first, with a warm kiss on each cheek. Ingram reconsidered his first theory about their relationship; he’d certainly never seen his uncle allow that kind of closeness with any other associate. He was usually very careful to keep his physical distance from people.
“Miss Fitzgerald,” Harold said formally, “this is my nephew, Doctor Will Ingram. Will, Christine Fitzgerald.”
She turned, and Will gave her his best smile, shook her hand gently. ”It’s very nice to meet you,” he said.
The woman hesitated, just for a second, her hand still in his. “You, too. I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“Nonsense,” Harold said firmly. “We invited you. Please, join us.” He gestured to the waiter as they sat down again.
The waiter smiled at her. “The usual?”
“Please,” she answered.
He took dessert orders from the men and moved away.
Harold raised one eyebrow at her. “Come here often, do you?”
“I do, actually, but I have a standing dessert order at every good restaurant in the city. Triple espresso and whatever’s most chocolate.”
“Ah, a fellow caffeine addict,” Will said. “Good to know.”
“She owns a coffee shop,” his uncle answered.
She smiled brightly. She got a lot prettier when she smiled. “I have a private barista.”
“Wait,” Will said, looking between them. “I thought you said she was some kind of computer, um …”
“Hacker,” Christine provided. “And I’m that, too. Hence the need for the caffeine.” She gave him a business card. It had a fake coffee ring stain.
“The Chaos Café,” Will read slowly. He glanced at his uncle again. The romantic angle melted away for a second time. “That sounds interesting.”
“It’s appropriately named,” Harold assured him.
“You should stop by,” Christine invited. “But not tonight. It’s karaoke night.”
“Is that bad?”
She made a face. “Talentless drunken karaoke in a noisy bar is sad. Stone-sober, highly caffeinated geek karaoke is just tragic.”
“I’ll consider myself warned.”
The waiter returned with coffee for the men, pie for Will, a scoop of ice cream with a drop of chocolate syrup for Harold, espresso and chocolate cake for the woman.
“Your client didn’t seem particularly happy,” Harold commented when he was gone.
The woman sighed. “No. That one’s bad.”
“Beyond incompetence?”
“They’re going to bring in a forensic accountant this afternoon.”
Harold frowned. “You think there’s embezzlement involved?”
“I can’t certify it, but I’m pretty damn sure.”
“You did …” Harold hesitated “… whatever it is you do to be sure the angry gentleman can’t do any more damage, haven’t you?”
“Oh, yes,” the woman answered. “Before we told him he was busted.” She chewed a bite of cake thoughtfully. “Oh, God, that’s good. Are they one of yours?”
“Yes.”
“You’re gonna take a hit on this one. Sorry.”
Harold shrugged heavily. “It is the nature of the business.”
“On the bright side, we caught this early.”
“That will help.”
She gestured to her plate. “You should try this.”
There is no way in hell, Will thought. And his uncle reached his spoon over and took a small portion of the cake off her plate and ate it.
“That is good,” Harold agreed.
Christine looked to him. “Here. Try.”
“I’m not really a cake person.”
“It’s chocolate.”
He considered the most polite response. There didn’t seem to be one. Either refuse a genuinely generous offer, or share food off someone else’s a plate in an upscale restaurant. But Harold had done it, so it was probably okay. He extended his fork and took a tiny piece. It was insanely rich. “You’re going to be vibrating like a hummingbird,” he warned.
“That’s the plan.” She smiled, studying him. “We’ve met before, you know.”
“We have?” Will asked, surprised. “I’m pretty sure I’d remember that.”
“I’m going to take it as a compliment that you don’t.” She reached down into her bag, brought out her tablet ” evidently the shattered one had belonged to the company she’d hacked ” and scrolled through several screens. “Hang on.” After thirty seconds or so, she handed the tablet over. “Here.”
Will looked at the picture. He remembered it right away. It was one of those awful posed group photos. He was standing next to his father in the center of it. He was about fifteen, and was wearing a faded black t-shirt. Nathan was wearing a dark suit, a conservative plain tie, and his habitual charming smile. They were surrounded by twenty kids around Will’s age, all in dark red polo shirts with the IFT logo on them.
“Oh, God,” Will said, “you were a Red Shirt.”
Harold leaned to look, and Will shared the tablet with him. “When was this taken?” he asked.
“It must have been the very first year,” Will answered. “That was the only time I got roped into meeting them.” He glanced up. “Sorry.”
Christine chuckled. “You do not look like you were happy to be there. That was 1998. The very first class of Red Shirts.”
“He hated it, that everybody called you that,” Will remembered. He studied the picture. “I still don’t see you.”
“Bless you,” she answered warmly. She reached across the table and pointed. “I’m right there.”
“You’re her?” Will remembered the girl she’d pointed to. She’d been tiny and painfully quiet, and her looks could be described as plain at best. She had blunt-cut hair and thick, bent glasses and pasty skin. But his father had put her in the center of the picture, directly in front of him and Will, and he had his hand on her shoulder. “You’re Chrissy?”
“Nobody calls me that anymore.”
“My dad thought you were a genius.”
“He did?”
“He thought you were going to be a rock star. That you were going to make IFT huge. I mean, even bigger than it was … what happened to you?”
“Will …” Harold began.
But Ingram had already caught himself. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that the way it came out. But you disappeared after that year. You never came back to the program. What happened?”
Christine hesitated. “My life went all kinda pear-shaped that fall.”
“He looked for you. He called the school, I think he even hired some private investigator. They couldn’t find you.”
“He hired a PI?”
“Did you leave town or something?”
“Or something.” Christine shook her head. “He came looking for me? Really?”
“Rock star,” Will confirmed. “He talked about you all the time.”
“Huh.”
She glanced at Harold. He shrugged. “We had an agreement. I didn’t talk about underwriting, and he didn’t talk about computers.”
“Then what did you talk about?”
He gestured toward Will. “Him, mostly.”
“Ahhh.”
“It’s really nice to meet you.” Will handed the tablet back. “My dad would be glad you’re well.”
Christine tucked the tablet away. “I’m so sorry you lost him.”
“Thanks.” Will reached across the table and took another, bigger bite of her cake.
“And now we’re family,” she commented dryly.
“Apparently,” Harold agreed. He took another small bite, too.
She smiled, sat back with her little coffee cup. “So where are you doctoring these days, Doctor?”
“Will,” he corrected. “And nowhere, at the moment. I was with MSF ”Doctors Without Borders ” but that’s kind of up in the air right now.”
“You could finish your residency,” Harold suggested, very quietly.
Will rolled his eyes. “Are you ever going to stop saying that?” he teased.
“Maybe,” his uncle answered, “if you finish your residency.”
Christine’s phone rang. She reached into her purse and silenced it without looking.
“Anyhow,” Will said, “I’m just going to have around the city until the holidays, and then we’ll see.” He glanced at his uncle. “I expect things to change by the new year, one way or another.”
The young woman nodded as if she understood. “If you need anything, let me know.”
“Thank you.”
Her phone rang again. She grumbled, reached for it, and silenced it again.
Thirty seconds later the waiter approached the table and whispered in her ear apologetically. Christine rolled her eyes, but nodded. “Thank you.” As he left, she said, “I’m sorry, I have to run.”
“Bender Warren?” Harold asked.
“Yes.”
“By all means, go. The faster you get there, the less it costs me.”
She threw back the rest of her espresso, pushed what was left of her cake across the table. “You guys should finish this. It’s wonderful.”
She stood up. The men rose with her, and after some hurried farewells she left. As they sat back down, Will said, “Interesting girl.”
Harold nodded. “I wasn’t aware that she’d known your father.” He took a bite of the cake. “I suppose I should have checked her background more thoroughly.”
“She was just a kid then,” Will countered. “I don’t even remember her, honestly. Just my dad talking about her. He thought she was talented. That she was a genius.” He shrugged. “I was jealous.”
“Will, even if your father admired her gifts, he loved you.”
“I know, Uncle Harold. But she understood the computer stuff, you know? Knew what he was talking about. I tried, but I always got lost.”
“He was proud of you exactly as you were.”
Will sat back, put his fork down. “I don’t know, Uncle Harold. It seemed like the more I find out about him, the less I understand.”
“This woman that was murdered.” Harold wiped his mouth carefully. “Corwin? That’s truly bothering you, isn’t it?”
“It probably has nothing to do with my father. I mean, this is New York City. People get murdered here every day.”
“Actually, the crime rate is way down.” Harold answered.
“I guess if the police had solved it, if they just said it was a mugging or it wasn’t, something like that … I don’t know. I don’t know what I want.”
Harold smiled at him. “Yes, you do.”
Julie Carson. “Yes, I do,” Will admitted. “But since I can’t have her, I’m just … flailing.”
“Since you can’t have her yet.”
“And maybe not ever.”
“Will.”
“Please, will you tell me where she is?”
“Will …”
“No, don’t. You’re right. I know you’re right.” Will ran his hand through his hair. “I’m going to be a wreck for the next three weeks, aren’t I?”
Harold nodded solemnly. “I think we’d better switch you to decaf.” Then he smiled, gestured for the check. “How about a movie?”
***
q95;
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