by Nora Roberts
“She is. We are—friends.”
Reena watched him slide his hands into his pockets, the way a man did when he was miserably uncomfortable and didn’t know what else to do with them.
“And she—Mandy—was twisted up because she just found out her ex-husband’s getting married. Fucking jerk. Sorry. The divorce was tough on her, and it was only final, like, two weeks ago. This hit her hard.”
Reena leaned back against the counter, sipped her wine and let him rush through his explanation. And thought, Poor guy, caught between two emotional women on a hot rainy night. “I’m getting a little drunk. Do you want?”
“No, but thanks. Reena—”
“First, I’m a trained observer. I didn’t mistake the scene in your doorway as a lovers’ embrace. I saw her with you at your grandmother’s funeral and recognized what she is to you.”
“We’re just—”
“Family,” she interrupted. “She’s your family. She’s your family, Bo.”
Some of the tension in his face dissolved. “Yeah. Yeah, she is.”
“And what I saw tonight was a woman in serious distress, and imagined she didn’t need, or want, a stranger being part of all that. I wouldn’t have. Second, if we’re keeping score, you get points for not being so self-involved you’d brush off a friend in serious distress so you could roll between the sheets with me. Where is she?”
“Asleep. Cried herself out, and I put her to bed. I saw your light come on out here, so I wanted to . . . I wanted to explain.”
“And you did. I’m not mad.” Not only not mad, she realized, but not lonely any longer either. “I’m not the jealous type, and we haven’t established any ground rules. Or even if we’re going to require them. We were going to have sex, we didn’t.” She lifted her glass. “There’s always another time.”
“You’re not mad,” he said with a nod. “But you’re upset.”
“It’s not you.” To give herself something to do, she picked up a spoon to stir the soup. “Not just you,” she corrected. “It’s the past. It’s a sweet lost boy.”
“Josh. You were involved with him?”
“He was my first in this small, horrible world.” But there weren’t any tears left inside her, not now, to shed for him. “Oddly enough, I was with him the night you saw me at that party. I left with him, went with him. It was my first time.”
“I met him.”
Her spoon clanged against the pot as her head whipped around. “You knew Josh?”
“No. I met him. I met him the day he died. Same day I met Mandy. Blind date—double date with my friend Brad and that girl he was seeing. When we picked her up, Josh was coming down the stairs. Going to a wedding.”
“Oh God, Bella’s wedding.” Maybe she had a few tears left after all. They were pressing hot on the back of her eyes. “My sister’s wedding.”
“Yeah. He couldn’t get his tie right. Mandy fixed it.”
A tear slipped out, plopped in the soup. “He was a sweet boy.”
“He changed my life.”
Reena wiped at the tears, faced Bo again. His eyes weren’t dreamy green now but very intense. “I don’t understand.”
“I partied a lot back then. Well, who didn’t? I was drifting. Making plans for someday. Yeah, I’ll get around to doing that someday. Clean myself up, get my shit together. I woke up that morning, after going out with Mandy—and hitting a party after I dropped her off—with a hangover of biblical proportions. Woke up in the dump of my apartment. I decided to clean it up. I’d do that about every six months when I couldn’t stand myself anymore. Told myself I’d straighten up, but I told myself that every six months or so, too. Then Brad came by, told me about the kid we’d seen in Mandy’s apartment building. What happened to him.”
“But you didn’t know him.”
“No, I didn’t know him. But . . .” He trailed off, then shook his head, obviously struggling to find the right way to make her understand. “But he was my age, and he was dead. I’d just met him—watched Mandy fix his tie, and now he was dead. He’d never have the chance to get his act together, if he needed to. One minute he’s heading out to a wedding in his best suit, and the next . . .”
“He’s gone,” Reena whispered.
“His life was over, out of the blue, and what was I doing with mine? Pissing it away, like my father did his.”
He stopped, blew out a breath. “So, it was epiphany time for me. Instead of thinking about someday, I got my contractor’s license. I talked Brad into buying a house with me. A dump. My grandmother fronted us some of the money. I never worked harder in my life than I did on that place. When I—damn, this sounds stupid and self-involved.”
“No, it doesn’t. Keep going.”
“Well, whenever I got to the point where I was disgusted or discouraged or wondered why the hell I’d gotten into that mess, working ten, twelve hours a day, I’d think of Josh, how he never got the chance. And I found out what I could do, if I stuck. Maybe I’d have done it anyway, I don’t know. But I’ve never forgotten him, or that his dying turned my life around.”
Reena put the wine down, stirred the soup. “Fate’s a kick in the ass, isn’t it?”
“I don’t want to lose the chance I have with you, Reena.”
“You haven’t lost anything.” After turning the burner off, she faced him. “It’s no prize standing here in front of you, let me tell you. I have a long line of short-term or messed-up relationships leading from Josh to you. Bad judgment, bad timing or just bad luck.”
“I’ll risk it.” He stepped to her, lowered his head to press his lips to hers. “I can’t leave her over there alone tonight.”
“No, you can’t. That’s one of the reasons you haven’t lost anything. Here, take some soup. If she wakes up, there’s nothing like my mother’s minestrone to chase away the blues.”
“Thanks. Seriously.” Thoughtfully, he brushed his thumb over the little mole above her lip. “Why don’t I fix you dinner tomorrow?”
She got out a container for the soup, and her lips curved. “Why don’t you?”
His living room light was still on when she prepared for bed. Watching his mammoth TV? she wondered. Letting his friend have his bed in her hour of need.
She hoped they’d shared a little minestrone, a little TLC.
She’d never had a male friend, a contemporary, who would have done that for her, she realized. The men in her life who weren’t family were teachers like John, partners and associates. Or lovers.
It was interesting, and different, she decided, to feel like friends with a man before you took him to bed, or allowed yourself to be taken.
She turned off her light, closed her eyes and hoped sleep would smooth out the rougher edges of her day.
It was just before three A.M. when her phone rang. She came alert quickly, switching on the light before grabbing the phone. Even with her job, middle-of-the-night phone calls always rammed her heart in her throat. Thoughts of family, accidents and death to loved ones came first.
“Yes, hello.”
“I got a surprise for you.”
Part of her mind registered the number on the Caller ID as unfamiliar, another focused on the voice. Low, a little harsh, male. “What? What number are you calling?”
“Big surprise for you. Coming soon. When you get it, I’ll be jerking off—and imagining your mouth on my cock.”
“Oh, for God’s sake. If you’re going to wake somebody up with a lame obscene call, don’t call a cop.”
She hung up, took the time to write down the number, the time of the call.
And switching off the light again, went back to sleep and forgot about it.
17
It had been a long time since Reena had reviewed Joshua Bolton’s case file. She didn’t know why she did so now. There was nothing new to see there. The matter had been closed for years, with the investigators, the ME, the lab all signing off on accidental death.
There was no reason to see anything else
. No forced entry, head trauma consistent with a fall, no burglary, no vandalism, no motive. Just a young man falling asleep while smoking in bed.
Except she’d never known him to smoke.
Still, the team had recovered a pack of cigarettes, a book of matches—both with his fingerprints. That had weighed against the fact that the girl he’d been sleeping with had insisted the victim didn’t smoke.
She’d have weighed it the same, Reena admitted, as she read over the reports. She probably would have weighed it the same, come to the same conclusions. Closed the file.
But she’d never completely accepted it, and couldn’t now.
She was still reading the reports, with the crime-scene photos spread over her desk, when her phone rang.
“Arson Unit, Detective Hale.”
“Reena? This is Amanda Greenburg. Mandy? We met—in a moment of humiliation last night at Bo’s.”
“Sure. I remember.” She stared at what the fire had done to the boy she’d known.
“How could you forget? Listen, I just wanted to apologize.”
“No need. Really.” She touched her fingers to the photo of Josh. “But I wonder if you’ve got time to meet me. I’d like to talk to you, if you can manage it.”
“Sure. When?”
“How about now?”
Since the day was fine, Reena snagged an outdoor table at a little coffeehouse a five-minute walk from the station house. She’d barely settled in when she saw Mandy jogging up the sidewalk, a large square shoulder bag bumping against her hip.
Her hair was an explosion of screaming red, her face as foxy as a terrier’s. She wore Jackie O–style sunglasses that, inexplicably, suited her.
“Hi.” Mandy dropped into a chair.
“Thanks for meeting me.”
“No problem. Coffee,” she said when the waiter came out. “And keep it coming.”
“Diet Pepsi.”
“Okay, I just want to get this off my chest. I was really messed up last night, and Bo’s not just my best friend, he handles hysterical females pretty well for a guy. We don’t sleep together.”
“Anymore,” Reena finished.
“Anymore. Haven’t been down that road for years. We’re like, you know, Jerry and Elaine. Seinfeld? Except Bo’s not as cynical. My ex . . .”
Mandy paused, waited until their drinks were served. “We lived together for over a year, Mark and me. Eloped to Vegas on a whim. Things got shaky almost from the minute we got back, I don’t know why. It’s easier if you know, don’t you think?”
“Yes. It’s always best to know.”
“I didn’t. Then he comes to me one night, tells me he’s sorry—and he was—he’s sorry but this isn’t working for him, and he’s met somebody. He thinks he’s in love. He’s standing there, looking pitiful and telling me—his wife—that he’s sorry, but he thinks he’s in love with somebody else. Didn’t want to cheat on me, so he figures we need to get a divorce.”
“Hard hit.”
“Yeah, it was.” She picked up her coffee, and the wide silver band she wore on her left thumb winked in the sunlight. “Naturally, I got pissed off. Big scene, big fight. I ended up crying all over Bo then, too. But what am I going to do? Jerk doesn’t want me anymore. Then yesterday I find out he’s marrying her, and it hits all over again.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, well, screw it. And them. But the thing is, I don’t want to mess things up for Bo because I needed a shoulder. I’m an old pal. But you’re Dream Girl.”
Reena winced. “Do you know how hard it is to live up to that title?”
Mandy grinned. “Never been anybody’s Dream Girl, but I can imagine. Still, you’re stuck with it. Brad and I would rag on him about you sometimes.”
“What are friends for?”
“You got it. But it’s wild, isn’t it? You moving in right next door. Now he’s got little hearts in his eyes . . . and I’m making it worse.”
“Just a little.”
“Let me change the subject real quick.” Mandy motioned the waiter for a top off on her cup. “De Wanna Johnson.”
“How do you know about her?”
“I work for The Sun.”
“You’re a reporter?”
“Photographer. You gave a statement on the case yesterday, and I know they’ll want a follow-up. I thought if I could get a photo—”
“Jamal Earl Gregg has been charged with murder in the second in the matter of the death of DeWanna Johnson. If you want a follow-up, you’ll need to talk to the DA’s office.”
“You’re a local girl, strong local ties. And being a girl, whether we like it or not, gives the story a meaty angle.”
“My partner’s not a girl, and we apprehended the suspect together. You’re going to want to go through the press rep, Mandy. It’s cleared, I’ve got no problem with a photo. And actually, I asked you to meet me because I wanted to talk to you about another fire. Josh.”
“Okay.” Mandy looked down at her coffee, which Reena noted she drank black—and like water. “I was pretty wrecked over that. We all were. Reporter came to talk to me after. I was interning for The Sun back then. Went to New York for about six months after I graduated and found out I’m a small-town girl. Came back to Baltimore. I talked to his mother once after he died, when they came to get his stuff. It was dark.”
“The investigators talked to you? The fire investigator, the police?”
“Sure. They talked to everyone in the building as far as I know, some of the kids he had classes with, his friends. They must’ve talked to you, too.”
“Yes, they talked to me. I was probably the last to see him alive. I was with him that evening.”
“Oh.” Sympathy raced over her face as she shoved the sunglasses on top of her head. “God, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. I’d been out, blind date with Bo—our first. Doubled with Brad and this friend of mine he was stuck on back then.”
“You got home between ten-thirty and eleven.”
Mandy lifted her eyebrows as she drank more coffee. “Did I?”
“That’s what you said in your statement.”
“That’s about right, best I can remember. Bo dropped me off at the door. I thought about asking him in, figured I’d play it cool, see what happened. My roommate was gone for the weekend, so I had the place to myself. I turned on some music, and I had a joint. Something I left out of my statement, and indulged in, occasionally, during my college days. I watched SNL until about midnight, went to bed. Next thing I knew, alarms are going off, people are running in the hall, shouting.”
“You knew most of the kids in the building.”
“Sure. By face if not name.”
“Did Josh have a problem with any of them?”
“No. You know how he was, Reena. Sweet guy.”
“Yeah, but even sweet guys have problems with some people. Maybe a girl.” Bedroom fires, she thought. A more typical female method. More personal, more emotional. I’ll get you where you sleep, you bastard.
As she thought back, Mandy twiddled with one of several silver necklaces she wore. “He dated, he hung out. Off-campus buildings like that were little hives of drama and sex and excessive partying. And abject fear around finals. But there was the changeover. Semester ending in May, a lot of the kids went home for the summer, or graduated. New ones coming in. We weren’t full up yet, that early in June. And Josh was pretty focused on you once you started dating. I honestly don’t remember him having any dramatic breakups, no serious issues with anybody. In the building or on campus. People liked Josh. He was easy to like.”
“Yes, he was. Did you ever see him smoke?”
“He must’ve. I remember drawing blank on that back then. A lot of us smoked socially—or toked recreationally. You had a few smoke nazis—and those I remember. He wasn’t one of them. He got along.”
“And you didn’t hear or see anything off the night of the fire?”