by Tami Hoag
“I don't know,” he said quietly. “Is it stupid to wish for small mercies? Crime is one thing, expecting ordinary people to be decent to each other is something else. If we can't even hope for that . . .”
“It gives me the creeps that that call came from here,” Megan admitted. “I keep thinking about some of the people in that state hospital and my skin crawls. Sexual psychopaths, the criminally insane . . .”
“But they're in the hospital,” Mitch said. “Not out. The county sheriff checked with the administration. They had no reports of anyone missing. They had no day passes issued to anyone we would have to worry about. That the call came from here and the hospital is here is just a coincidence. One thing we know for certain,” Mitch continued. “Olie Swain didn't make the call. No less than fifty people can swear he was at the ice rink at the time the call came in.”
“That doesn't mean he's not involved,” Megan said stubbornly. “It means he might not be in this thing alone. We've considered that option—that he was at the rink at the time of the kidnapping and someone else was driving his van.”
“Helen didn't ID the van,” he reminded her.
“Helen is confused and upset and couldn't tell a Ford from a Volkswagen if the fate of the nation depended upon it.”
The heater kicked in with an angry growl and blasted hot, dry air, recirculating the aroma of stale smoke.
“It could have been a tape recording,” Megan offered. They had been over this ground enough to wear a trench into it. All afternoon and half the evening, while the St. Peter cops did a sweep of their city streets and the boys from the BCA mobile lab went over the phone booth with a fine-tooth comb, they had speculated and hoped and muttered threats they would never make good on. And still there was a need to chew that same bone with the hope of getting something out of it.
The choppers had been called out again. The original search area had been widened to include portions of Nicollet, Le Sueur, and Blue Earth counties. Search teams of county and municipal law enforcement agencies and local volunteers began a new ground search. Fliers with Josh's photo went up everywhere, in every store, on every light pole, on every bulletin board in every restaurant and bar.
The press had been there to record it all for the evening news. The frantic rush to grab the new lead. The desperate hope that limned every face of every cop and edged every question asked. A fresh lead brought a fresh rush, like speed in the bloodstream. It sent expectations soaring up from the depths of despair. It deepened the cold, it amplified the ticking of the clock that marked the hours a child had been gone from his family. And in the end it left them lost, struggling and wondering.
“Hannah said it was a bad connection. McCaskill told me it could have been a tape,” Megan said. “The boys in the sound lab will be able to tell. They're the best.”
“And if it was a tape,” Mitch mumbled, “the question is, why?”
They both knew the answer. Neither of them would say it. If the perp used a tape of Josh's voice, it was likely because he couldn't use Josh himself. Mitch dug a roll of Maalox tablets out of his shirt pocket and thumbed off three.
“Why call at all if not to make a ransom demand?” Megan asked.
The threat of a migraine had settled in behind her right eye like a hot coal, stubbornly defying the Cafergot she'd taken half an hour earlier. She needed something stronger, but anything stronger would knock her out, and she needed to think. She rubbed her forehead and stared down at the mess on her plate until it blurred into a mosaic of earth-toned colors.
“If this was the perp calling and all he did was play a tape of Josh asking to come home . . . That's taunting. That's just pure cruelty. And it's personal. He's jerking Hannah and Paul around for kicks. That seems personal.”
Mitch shrugged. “Or it's power. Part of his game—like leaving that notebook on the hood of my truck. He's the kind of guy who pulls the wings and legs off flies and thinks it's funny.”
“A game,” Megan whispered. She didn't want to think that was the mentality of the person they were dealing with, because if it was, things were likely to get worse. “Why would anyone pick on Hannah and Paul? They don't seem to have an enemy in the world.”
“What difference does that make?” Mitch snapped, too tired to keep the bitterness from his voice. “You think bad things don't happen to good people?”
Megan winced. “That's not what I meant.”
She thought of reaching out to touch his hand. A simple gesture that was against her nature. She never reached out. If she did, she could be pushed away. It was smarter to keep feelings buried deeply. She had let her guard down last night, but last night was over. The new day brought a fresh vow: no cops, no chiefs of police.
“We should call it a night,” she said, pushing to her feet.
Mitch watched as she fluttered around the table like a hummingbird, gathering the dirty plates and plastic silverware. The woman who burned like fire in his arms last night had transformed at dawn. All the passion, all the softness, had been zipped back up inside this woman with the slicked-back hair and unsmiling mouth. This woman of the baggy corduroy slacks and baggier sweater, who hid her femininity like a guilty secret.
He watched her as she stuffed the garbage into a wastebasket the size of a shoebox, her movements jerky and quick, her body language snapping that she didn't want his scrutiny. She was the first woman he'd slept with in two years who hadn't wanted to cling to him when it was over. He almost smiled at the irony. He had spent the last two years ducking the attentions of women who wanted more from him than he had to give. Megan wanted nothing from him, and his strongest urge at the moment was to pull her into his arms and make love to her. A curious puzzle, but for once he had no desire to take it apart and figure out the mystery.
“. . . and I thought, if nothing goes down tonight,” she rattled on, “I'd go up to St. Paul tomorrow. I should look in on my dad and I could stop at headquarters and see if I can't grease some wheels with the sound guys. Ken Kutsatsu likes to work Sundays. If he's in, maybe I can talk him into listening to our tape. And I could see if they've turned anything up on the notebook, though I'm not too hopeful. I also thought I'd try to see Jayne Millard—she does our suspect profiles. Maybe she can give us an edge somewhere.”
“You talk about your father,” Mitch said casually, rising from his chair, slowly twisting sideways to stretch the tightness out of his back. “You never mention your mother. Is she around?”
Wrong question. Her face closed down defensively. “I wouldn't know. She left when I was six. I never saw her again.”
She threw the pronouncement between them like a gauntlet, as if she dared him to make something of it. Mitch frowned. “I didn't mean to pry. I just . . .”
Just what? Wanted to know more about you. Wanted to know what makes you tick. Wanted to get close to you on a level I have no business thinking about. Even as he told himself that, another part of his mind was busy fitting this new piece into the Megan O'Malley puzzle. He could picture her too easily—small and alone, too serious, trying not to draw any attention to herself; a little girl with big green eyes and long dark hair, trailing after her father the cop. The way Jessie trailed him.
“You and your dad must be close.”
She smiled. Not the warm smile of pride and affection; the brittle smile at a bad joke. “It's late. Let's call it a day.”
He caught her arm as she tried to walk past him. “I'm sorry if I said the wrong thing.”
“You didn't,” she lied, knowing the truth would be far too complicated and too messy to deal with tonight. “I'm tired, that's all.” In a cool voice, she added, “I believe your room is across the hall, Chief.”
She tried to pull away, but Mitch held on, annoyed with her for trying to give him the brushoff, annoyed with himself for wanting to break down her defenses. If he had any sense, he would take their one night of great sex and let the rest go. He didn't need the headache of a relationship, especially now. And he didn't need a woman with a chip
on her shoulder the size of New Zealand.
But he didn't let her go.
“I know where my room is,” he murmured. “I'd rather stay here.”
“And I'd rather you didn't.”
He narrowed his eyes in speculation. “Do you mean that, or is this more of the tough-cookie act?”
“It's not an act,” she snapped, glaring at him, praying he wouldn't see the lie through the defiance.
“You can't pretend we haven't already crossed the line, Megan,” he said softly.
“Maybe it would be best if we did.”
“Why? What are you so afraid of?”
The answer came readily, but she refused to give it to him. She was too good at protecting herself to make that mistake.
This time he let her go when she stepped back from him, though she felt his narrow gaze on her as tangibly as his touch.
“Look . . .” Glancing down at her sweater, she scraped at a spot of dried garlic sauce with her thumb. “It just complicates things, that's all. I mean, I can't be effective at my job if you don't respect me—”
“I respect your authority on the job—”
She strolled around behind the table with her hands on her hips, casually putting distance and furniture between them. “Really? You've had a funny way of showing it.”
“I don't treat you any differently than I treat any of my men,” he said, stalking her.
“You try to get Noogie to go to bed with you? That's an . . . adventuresome lifestyle for a small-town cop.”
“Goddammit, don't be flip,” he growled, rounding the table. “You know what I mean.”
Megan stepped away from him. “Sure I do. Just like I know that if I have an affair with you, when it's over, everything will be awkward and there'll be resentment to deal with and my reputation will be damaged—”
“You're making some pretty ugly assumptions about my character.”
She stopped and held her ground, looking him in the eye, jaded and tough because that was how she had survived. “I can't afford not to.”
“And why is that?” he asked, his mouth twisting with derision. “Is the job that important to you—that you don't trust anyone, that you give your whole life to it? Jesus, what kind of life is that?”
“It's all I have.”
The instant the words were out, she wanted them back. She bit her tongue, but it was too late. They were out there, hanging in the air to be absorbed and digested by Mitch Holt. She felt as if she had torn a chunk out of her soul and tossed it to him, and she knew she could never get it back.
God, how stupid. How could you be so careless, O'Malley?
Appalled at her blunder, she turned her back to him and hoped he would have the good grace to simply leave. She didn't want his pity or his ridicule. She wanted him gone. She wanted to turn the world around and start this damned week over. Pain cut through her head like the blade of an ax, sharp enough to bring tears to her eyes. The last thing she would do was cry in front of him. And so she held her breath against the need to cry and held her muscles stiff against the aching weariness that pulled at her.
Mitch stared at the back of her head, at the uncompromising, rigid set of her slender shoulders. He called himself a bastard for picking a fight with her. The job came with its own kit for building walls of isolationism. He knew. He had walls of his own and he'd seen plenty of other cops put them up brick by brick. He understood the protection they afforded. He of all people should have respected them, but he didn't want walls between him and Megan. He wanted what they had found last night—mind-numbing passion . . . the comfort of holding each other.
She tensed even more as he settled his hands on her shoulders. He stood close behind her, bent his head down close to hers, close enough that he could catch just the faintest hint of perfume on her skin. The scent was so soft, so thin, it seemed almost imagined, as if she put on just enough that only she would know, as if it were only for that secret self she kept so carefully locked inside—the soft Megan, the feminine Megan, the Megan who liked pink walls and flowered sheets and little china statues of cats.
He let his hands slide down from her shoulders and slipped his arms around her. She held herself as straight as a post, unforgiving, unyielding, unwilling to surrender any more of her pride.
“The job is the job,” he murmured, his lips brushing the side of her neck. “What goes on between us in bed has nothing to do with it. It's a rotten night, a rotten case, a rotten motel—why can't we at least have this? Hmm? Why can't we give each other a little pleasure?” He flattened his hands against her belly, his fingertips massaging subtly, awakening the fire inside her.
“Just go,” Megan said. She didn't want his tenderness. Anything else she could have fought off, but she had no defense against tenderness. God help her, she couldn't defend against something she'd craved all her life.
“Go,” she said on a trembling breath.
“No,” he murmured, tracing the tip of his tongue behind her ear.
She called on anger to save her. “Go!” she shouted. “Get out!”
“No.” He pulled her so close against him she couldn't hurt him and she couldn't escape him. “Not now. Not like this.”
“Damn you,” she mumbled against his chest, her voice breaking as the tears fought for release and the frustration choked her. She struggled against him, tried to kick him, but her heart wasn't in it.
He tipped her chin up so she had no real choice but to look at him. “Look me in the eye and tell me you don't want this,” he said darkly, his breath coming harder as desire pooled warm and heavy in his groin.
Megan glared at him, hating the way her body was heating and humming with awareness pressed to his. “I don't want this,” she said defiantly.
His nostrils flared. Amber fire flashed in his eyes. “Liar,” he said, but he let her go.
Megan stood at the foot of the bed for a long while after the door clicked shut, knowing what he'd said was too true for comfort.
DAY 5
12:11 P.M. 16°
Mick says he'll make a hundred thou this year.”
“Good for Mick.” And did you ask your loving son why he never sends you a dime of it when he knows you eat beans and wieners twice a week because your pension check doesn't stretch and your daughter—who pays half your bills—is just a cop and doesn't get paid shit compared to a hotshot investment broker from L.A.?
Megan didn't ask the question. She knew better. They had played out that scenario more than once. It didn't ease her own resentment. It only got Neil's blood pressure up. Yet it never ceased to amaze her that the child her father still doted on and bragged about could care so little, while she, the unwanted reminder of the faithless Maureen, the child who could have grown up alone in an alley somewhere for all Neil O'Malley cared, was the one who remained behind, chained to memories she hated by a man who had never loved her.
As if it would take her mind away from the memories, she looked around the tiny kitchen with the garish turquoise walls and the checked curtain that was stiff with the starch of age and airborne grease. She hated this room with its cheap, chipped white tin cupboards and enormous old dingy cast-iron sink. She hated the smell of lard and cigarettes, hated the gray linoleum and the chrome-legged table and chairs where her father sat. It was an ugly place, stripped bare of life and warmth—not unlike her father himself in some ways.
Not that Neil O'Malley was physically ugly. His features were sharp—had once been handsome—and his eyes were a brilliant blue. But time and bitterness had stolen their sheen as they had stolen the color from his hair and the vigor from his body. The man she remembered as a small block of muscle in a cop's blue uniform had shrunk and sagged. His right hand quaked as he raised his drink to his lips.
Megan stirred the thick roux in the Dutch oven on the old gas stove. Lamb stew. The same thing she always made when she came to visit on Sundays—not because she liked it, but because Neil would grouse about anything else. God forbid she should do so
mething to displease him. She sniffed at that. She had never in her life done anything that pleased him.
“Have you talked to Mick lately?” she asked. Of course not. Mick doesn't call you, even though he knows what it would mean to you. He hasn't visited since the year the NCAA basketball tournament finals were held in the Metrodome and he managed to weasel a ticket out of a wealthy client from L.A.
“Aw, no.” Neil waved it off as if her question were nothing more than a cloud of bad gas. “He's busy, you know. He damn near runs that outfit he works for. Probably would if it weren't for the goddamn Jews—”
“You want a refill on that beer, Pop?” She had no desire to hear for the millionth time his anti-Semitic diatribe or his anti-Black diatribe or his anti-English diatribe.
He lifted the bottle of nonalcoholic brew and grimaced at it while he hacked up a rattling glob of phlegm. “Christ, no. This stuff tastes like shit. Why don't you bring me something decent to drink?”
“Because your doctor doesn't want you drinking at all.”
“Fuck him. He's a fucking fascist. He's not even American, y'know.” He pulled a cigarette from the pack of Kents on the table and shook it at her. “That's half of what's wrong with this country. They let in too many goddamn foreigners.”
“And where did your father come from?” The sarcasm slipped out against her better judgment, but she couldn't help herself. If she held it all in, she figured she would die of something akin to uremic poisoning.
“Don't get smart with me,” Neil warned. “My da was Irish and proud of it. He'd'a stayed in Connemara if it weren't for the goddamn Brits.”
He lit the cigarette, sucked in a lungful of smoke, and went through the ritual choking and hacking. Megan shook her head in disgust. His arteries were in worse shape than the seventy-year-old water pipes in the house—clogged with the crud of sixty-some years of fat, cholesterol, tar, and nicotine. It was a pure wonder a drop of blood made it to his brain—which, she supposed, could explain a lot. He had already suffered one small stroke, and his doctor warned that the big one was imminent if Neil didn't change his lifestyle. The doctor could have saved his breath on the antismoking speech as well. Despite the warning signs of lung disease, Neil went on with his habit as if he thought the congestion and shortness of breath were merely incidental to his smoking.