Heart of the Night: A Novel

by Barbara Delinsky

  With a soft moan, she turned her head on the pillow in an attempt to blot out the noise.

  “Meggie?”

  Frightened by the voice that was so much more real, so much nearer than the others, she quickly opened her eyes and saw Will. He was sitting close by the side of the bed and was the only person in the room.

  “You were moaning,” he said. “Is the pain worse? Should I call a nurse?”

  Oh yes, the pain was worse. Each time she looked at him it intensified. Her heart ached. She loved Will. But he looked awful. He had been home for a little while, she knew, and had come back showered, shaved, and wearing fresh clothes. But the shave had only accentuated the pallor of his skin, and in contrast to the fresh clothes, he looked more tired than ever. He was forty-nine years old. In the six years they had been married, she had prided herself on keeping him young. Now, though, he looked every bit his age. He looked worn—and it was all her fault.

  What had she done to him?

  She had fallen in love and married him, which was just fine for her, but not for him. He could have done better. If he’d married someone from his own social station, he would have had the support he needed. If he’d married a wealthy woman, none of this would have happened.

  She was a liability.

  “Meggie?” His voice wavered. Very lightly, tentatively, he took her hand, and she let him, not because she was doing him a favor, or because she deserved the comfort, but because she needed his touch.

  Selfish. She was selfish. And dirty. The bruises on her body were stains that would never go away.

  “What can I get you, sweetheart?”

  Closing her eyes, she shook her head, then turned it away on the pillow. Will continued to hold her hand, but he didn’t speak, and she was glad. What could he say? What could she say back? She needed time to figure out what to do.

  Savannah hadn’t talked much, either. She had been in to visit earlier, standing by the bed for several minutes. She had softly called her name, but Megan hadn’t opened her eyes or answered. She was a coward. After all Savannah had done, not only in the past three days but over the years, Megan had betrayed her. How could she look her in the eye?

  She didn’t deserve Will or Savannah—or Susan, either. Susan had waited at the house with Will during the entire three days. Although it had must have been an ordeal for her, she had done it. And what had Megan done in return?

  She should have stayed on the wrong side of the tracks. That was where she belonged.

  With another moan, she turned onto her side. In the process, her hand came free of Will’s, but she barely noticed. Her sole focus was on finding that blank spot in her mind where she could hide, forget, vanish.

  * * *

  Savannah strode boldly back from the conference room. The press conference had been over for several hours, but she had been waylaid by reporters who had lingered in hopes of learning something more than what she had said publicly. When she’d finally freed herself, she’d gone straight into a meeting with lawyers who hoped to plea-bargain their clients’ way out of the trial on Monday. Her case was strong, which was why the defense was getting nervous. In good conscience, though, she could not deal—at least, not to the tune the defense wanted. She had little sympathy for intelligent men who used arson as a means to collect insurance money on buildings that were heavily overinsured, particularly when those fires resulted in adding scores of people to the ranks of the homeless.

  Arnie Watts was with her during the meeting, as was Katherine Trask. Both would be assisting her during the trial. Both agreed that the defense was asking for gifts the prosecution simply could not grant.

  So the meeting had ended in a stalemate, with the trial still set for Monday. Wondering how she was going to get herself together for that, when she was still so shaky about Megan, she left for her office. Just beyond the conference-room door, though, she was ambushed by another local reporter.

  “A minute, counselor?”

  Her step didn’t falter. “If you can keep up with me, you’ve got it.” The reporter was young, new to the newspaper, and female. Particularly in light of the last, Savannah was willing to cooperate. She steeled herself for more questions on the kidnapping, but instead, the reporter asked, “Can you tell me about the Cat?”

  Savannah turned a corner. “The Cat?” She hesitated. “What do you want to know?”

  “I hear he struck again.”

  “Where did you hear that?”

  The reporter shrugged. “Is it true?”

  “I don’t know. Most everything to do with the Cat is speculation.”

  “But there was a break-in Tuesday night in Cranston, and the MO was the same.”

  “There are break-ins every night of the week.”

  “Not on that large a scale. I understand that your office has been questioning Matty Stavanovich for years. Is that true?”

  Savannah didn’t see any point denying it, since the number of times the man had been brought in was a matter of record. “It’s true.”

  “Have you taken any special measures to apprehend him?”

  Savannah sent her a wry half-smile. “Now, if I told you that, I’d be tipping my hand to the Cat, wouldn’t I?”

  “Then you are?”

  “I won’t say one way or the other. I will say that this office is working in conjunction with police all over the state to solve house-breaks of the type that happened last Tuesday.”

  “But are you zeroing in on Stavanovich?”

  “We’re zeroing in on whoever the evidence points to.”

  “Who does the evidence point to?”

  Lips pursed, Savannah sent her a chiding look. She passed Janie, closing her hand around a pile of pink slips as though they were a baton in a relay race, and went on to her office door. There she stopped. “What’s your name?”

  “Beth Tocci.”

  “Well, Beth Tocci, there’s something you have to understand. In our system of justice, a man is innocent until proven guilty. It would be unethical of me to earmark the Cat, or any other thief, for that Cranston break-in, before an arrest is made—unethical, and unwise. You’d go back to your paper and print what I said, and that would throw a wrench into the investigation, not to mention make it impossible to gather an unbiased jury if the case ever came to trial. This is one of those instances where your job is to report the news, not alter it.”

  “Is it true that Matty Stavanovich is a legitimate businessman?”

  “That’s a matter of public record.”

  “Is it true that the IRS audits him every year and can’t find anything wrong?”

  “You’d have to check with the IRS on that.”

  “What about the allegation that Matty Stavanovich is the alias for a man named Joseph Stevens, who served time in a California prison and was released and given a new identity after he testified to crimes he heard about while he was there?”

  “You’d have to check with the FBI on that.”

  “I have. They say they’ve never heard of either man.”

  Savannah shrugged, then held up an apologetic hand and said softly, “I have to run. Sorry.” She went into her office, smoothly but firmly closed the door, then felt her pulse trip and her heart lift.

  Jared was there. He was standing by the window wearing a navy sweater, taupe slacks, and loafers. Though his hair still fell rakishly over his brow, he was newly shaved and showered. A tweed topcoat was looped over his arm, held there by the hand resting in his pocket. He looked different than he had in jeans, more formal but not a bit less gorgeous.

  It was a minute before she caught her breath, a minute after that before she inhaled and spoke. “Janie must be wondering who you really are.”

  “I told her.”

  “Your whole name?”

  He nodded.

  “Did she recognize it?”

  “Her eyes went wide for a minute. But she didn’t fall over in a faint. She’s a nice girl. Let me in without a word.”

  Savan
nah could understand that. Jared Snow had a way of making women forget to breathe, let alone speak. He was doing it to her right then, with nothing more than the light in those blue eyes of his.

  Jared was no less entranced. He was acutely aware of the fact that the last time he had seen Savannah, she had been wearing a nightgown in bed. Now she was wearing a calf-length skirt with a silk overblouse belted at the hip, and a long blazer over that. Her hair was pulled back into its knot, and her skin was lightly made up. She looked very together, very professional. Still, she looked sexy.

  “How are you?” he asked, his voice a bit softer and more husky.

  She took a shallow breath. “Okay.”

  “Did you sleep?”

  She wrinkled her nose. “A little. I had lots on my mind.”

  “How’s Megan?”

  “I saw her for a minute late this morning. I’m not sure if she was sleeping, but she didn’t respond when I spoke. She still looks awful. I haven’t had a chance to get back to the hospital. Things have been a little hairy here.”

  Jared could imagine. “Are you pleased with the way the press conference went?”

  The Evening Bulletin would have hit the stands by then and she assumed he’d seen it. Eying him warily, she asked, “How did they portray us?”

  “I don’t know about the paper. I overheard talk downstairs.”

  “Good or bad?”

  “Nonjudgmental. It centered more on the kidnapping itself than on the efforts to solve it. I think you’re off the hook for a while.”

  “Not for long. People get impatient when arrests aren’t forthcoming, and in this case, arrests are about as far from forthcoming as in any case I’ve ever had.”

  There was a knock on the door. “Yes?” Savannah called.

  Janie Woo stuck her head in. “I’m ready to leave. Is there anything you want before I go?” Her gaze wandered to Jared with a nonchalance Savannah found to be sweet.

  “I’m all set, Janie. Have a good weekend.”

  “You too,” Janie said. With a final glance at Jared, she closed the door.

  Savannah looked at the floor, then at Jared. “You do know that she’d normally buzz me to say she’s leaving.”

  The image of innocence, he shrugged. Then he asked, ‘Who’s the Cat?”

  For the second time in less than an hour, the Cat took her oy surprise—until she realized that Jared had overheard the last part of her conversation with Beth Tocci. She sighed resignedly and crossed the room. “The Cat is Matty Stavanovich.” She deposited both the handful of pink slips and her briefcase on the desk. “He’s the kind of character who gives law enforcement officials ulcers. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he owned blocks of Maalox stock.”

  “Does he?”

  “No. Then again, he might, but under an alias we’ve never heard.”

  “So he does use them?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Is he that man from the California prison?”

  “No, but he inspires plenty of stories like that. Years ago, ne spent a brief period of time in a California prison. Unfortunately, he’s never been a protected witness. If he had been, we’d have a little more control over his comings and goings.”

  “Why is he called the Cat?”

  “He’s a cat burglar.”

  Intrigued, Jared gave a curious grin. “A real cat burglar? Smart and silent and quick-fingered—scaling the walls of buildings, falling great distances, and landing on his feet?”

  Savannah had to admit that there was a certain romance to it, which was why she indulged Jared his interest. “Yes, a real cat burglar. He’s done time for heists in Oklahoma and Kansas, too. Now he’s here, having learned from his mistakes and perfected the art. We’ve had a rash of robberies that have his pawprints all over them—that is, there are no clues at all. He gets in and gets out, snaps his fingers, and bingo, he and the stolen goods disappear. When he resurfaces, he always has an airtight alibi. Beyond that, he never even tries to put together a defense, because he knows that we don’t have enough evidence to indict him.”

  “How many robberies has he committed?”

  She looked at the ceiling and put her tongue in her cheek. “Oh, in the five years he’s been in the state, he’s probably pulled off eight or nine big ones.”

  Jared whistled. “And you can’t nab him?”

  She shook her head. “As far as we can figure it, he carries out the heist on his own. But he has to have help disposing of the goods, so we’ve been concentrating on that. Six months ago, we found some of the stolen artwork in a Manhattan gallery, and for a while we thought we were this close”—she put her thumb and forefinger a fraction of an inch apart—“to catching the fence.”

  “What happened?”

  She dropped her hand. “He vanished into thin air. Just like the Cat does.”

  “When was the last robbery?”

  “Tuesday night.”

  “And you can’t find Stavanovich?”

  “Nope. But he’ll be back in a day or two, whistling his way to work, as carefree as you please.”

  “Is his business legitimate?”

  “Oh, yes. He has an automotive repair shop.” Her lips twitched. “He services luxury imports—Jaguars, BMWs, and Mercedes. Have you ever heard anything so obvious? He comes into contact with the wealthiest people in Rhode Island. He has their keys in his possession long enough to make as many copies as he wants. He knows just when they’re going south for the winter, just when they’re going north for the summer, just when they’re staying right here. And you know what?”

  Jared arched both brows in question.

  Savannah slapped a hand against the desk. “He has never once robbed a customer of his. He takes the expected and does the opposite. It’s like he’s standing there thumbing his nose at us, because we’d like nothing more than to be able to say, ‘See, that’s how he knew that so-and-so was out of town and that’s how he got into the house.’ It is,” she said slowly, “the most exasperating thing in the world.”

  Jared was trying not to grin.

  She was about to chide him when another knock came at the door. This time, she didn’t have a chance to speak before the door opened and in walked Anthony Alt.

  “You did okay,” he told her, rapping his fingers against the doorjamb. “The coverage wasn’t as bad as it could have been.” He gave Jared a once-over. “The early TV reports are stressing the fact that the AG’s office is coordinating a wide-scale investigation.” He looked back at her. “We sound in control. That’s good. As soon as you solve the case, it’ll be even better.”

  “I’m not the one who’ll solve it. We have detectives to do things like that.”

  “But you’ll direct them.”

  “Unless you’d like to,” she offered. “If you have your heart set on it—”

  “I don’t have the time.” He shot another, more curious glance at Jared. “Have we met?”

  Jared complacently shook his head. “I don’t think so.” He made no move to volunteer anything else. Nor did Savannah.

  Anthony stuck out his hand. “Anthony Alt. I’m Paul DeBarr’s first assistant.”

  Jared’s hand met his in a grip that was firm, authoritative in its way. He nodded. But he didn’t say a word.

  Nor did Savannah.

  Anthony tried staring harder, as though the force of his gaze could cow the man before him. It might have worked on others, but it didn’t touch Jared. At last, with his forefinger beating against his trousers, he said, “You are…”

  “A friend,” Jared said.

  “Of hers,” he cocked his head toward Savannah, “or the state?”

  “Is there a difference?”

  “My God,” Savannah muttered, “you make this sound like a dictatorship. Don’t worry about my being distracted, Anthony. I’ve worked hard enough long enough to prove my dedication. Paul gets his money’s worth out of me.”

  Anthony looked her up and down. “Ah, an admission, at last. I’ve
always had my suspicions.”

  The insult was too blatant to miss, too absurd to acknowledge. So Savannah smiled. “You’re a sweetheart to come down and tell me about the press reports.” She went to the door and opened it. “I’ll be working on Sunday. If you hear anything else, give me a call.”

  Anthony apparently decided to quit while he was ahead. Without so much as a backward glance at Jared, he gave Savannah a salute and left the office. No sooner had she closed the door when Jared said, “You shouldn’t let him get away with comments like that.”

  “It’s okay. I zinged him one earlier, so we’re even.”

  “He’s a creep.”

  “I won’t argue with you there.” She watched his face, could almost see him debating whether there was, or ever had been, something between Paul and her. To his credit, he didn’t ask.

  “Is he uptight about all your work, or only the big stuff?”

  “He’s uptight, period. Never stands still. But he’s worse when I’m around. We get on each other’s nerves. Not that this case helps.” She grew thoughtful for a minute and whispered a laugh. “It makes the Cat seem like child’s play. I mean, Stavanovich is taking things, not people. And no one is harmed. Aside from a few hefty insurance claims, life goes on.”

  “Still, the law is being broken,” Jared maintained in an attempt to justify her investment in seeing the Cat caught.

  “True. More, though, Matty Stavanovich is an embarrassment. Talk about political liabilities, he’s a prime one. Elected officials around here rely on a relatively small, but wealthy group of contributors. Those are precisely the people who wonder if they’re slated to be the Cat’s next target. The longer they wonder, the more nervous they get, and the more angry. And when they’re angry, they don’t open their wallets as freely.

  “At least,” she qualified herself, “that’s Paul’s dilemma. Mine is a little more mundane. I just want Stavanovich caught. He’s become an obsession among law enforcement officials and a cult figure among their secretaries. The guy is brilliant. He hits where and when we least expect it. There are a number of us who would love to trip him up, if only to prove to ourselves that we’re smarter than he is.”