by Alex Kava
Maggie kicked off her shoes, took off her jacket and hung it on the back of the desk chair. She unbuckled her shoulder holster and laid it next to her cell phone. It was the only reason she continued to wear a jacket in the July heat. People talked differently to a woman with a gun strapped to her side. Sometimes it was advantageous, but most of the time it was annoying.
She keyed open the minibar, suddenly too thirsty and too tired to search for a vending machine. She started to grab a bottle of water when she saw the miniature bottle of Chivas. She sat back on her feet, staring at it, and suddenly her thirst wasn’t quite as great as before. She plucked the miniature bottle out of the fridge, immediately noticing how tiny it felt between her fingers. The bottle was so small it could hardly be worth it. Yet she set it and the bottled water on the small table in the corner and decided if she had the Chivas on the rocks it would be okay.
She grabbed the ice bucket, made sure she had her room’s key card and left in stocking feet to search for the ice machine, realizing that only seconds earlier she had been too tired to even search for a vending machine. Amazing what a phone call from a child-murdering priest, a confession from an abuse victim and a reminder of Albert Stucky could do for the sight of a bottle of Chivas. And what an appropriate combination.
She found the ice machine at the other end of the hallway and started filling the bucket, when she heard someone walk by the small alcove but then stop and come back.
She turned to find Nick Morrelli in a T-shirt, khaki shorts and bare feet, a newspaper tucked under his arm and a hotel key card in his hand.
“Of all the hotels in this city, they had to put you in this one.”
CHAPTER 63
The Embassy Suites
Omaha, Nebraska
Nick knew he should apologize. He had felt it even during their earlier meeting, that he was out of line, acting defensive…well, this morning he needed to act defensive on Tony’s behalf, but now…now it was ridiculous.
“I’m not the one suspecting your friend,” she said. Nick thought she looked exhausted, her eyes searching around. Was she hoping for an escape route? “A friendly piece of advice, tell him to stop being so evasive and answer the OPD’s questions. He’s only hurting himself by making them believe he has something to hide.”
Nick leaned against the wall, a bit exhausted himself, and crossed his arms over his chest, the newspaper still tucked. “I’ve told him,” he said, letting down his guard and allowing his frustration to show. “I’ve told him exactly that. He won’t listen to me, either.”
For the first time her eyes met his and for a brief moment he was reminded of that time four years ago when they were working the Platte City case. Why was it that whenever he slipped and showed her he wasn’t quite in control, she seemed to connect with him most?
“Do you think he has something to hide?”
“I don’t know, but I’ve known Tony Gallagher since we were both five years old. He can be stubborn and he can talk his way out of just about anything. But I know he couldn’t kill someone.”
“Even if he thought it was the right thing?”
“What do you mean?”
Nick waited while Maggie set the ice bucket at her stocking feet and leaned against the wall, crossing her arms to mirror him. He noticed that she had shed her jacket and wore only a white knit blouse still tucked into the waistband of her suit trousers. She looked good, better than ever. Despite looking exhausted at the moment, Nick sensed there was something about her that seemed…content. Had she finally put the demons of her past behind her?
“I’m convinced,” she said, “that this killer thinks he’s doing the right thing. Maybe even that he’s doing the work of the Lord.”
A chill slid down Nick’s back, enough of a chill to make him admit that maybe he was wrong. He had been thinking about what Tony had said earlier—off the record, friend to friend—about his confrontation with Monsignor O’Sullivan. Tony said he had told him—no, he had warned him—that if the allegations were true, he wouldn’t sit back and be quiet. But what did that mean?
Before Nick could say anything another guest came down the hall, ice bucket in hand, and Maggie moved out of the alcove’s doorway. The woman smiled at the two of them, and they made small talk about the weather while she filled her ice bucket. Then she walked between them again with another smile. Nick wondered if she thought she was interrupting a lovers’ spat. She took her time walking down the hall, and when she turned the corner he realized both he and Maggie were listening for the woman’s hotel-room door to open and shut.
“Not the best place to have a serious conversation,” he said with a smile and wanted to offer that they continue it in his suite, but a gentleman waited for the woman to make that offer. Maybe he was hoping she would offer. What would he do then?
He had the suite to himself tonight. Jill was going to be out late with her mother and maid of honor doing something or other. She’d be spending the night at her mom’s. And why was he even worrying about this? Was he that much of an idiot? It was ridiculous. He was ridiculous.
“I need to go. I have some phone calls to make,” she finally said, picking up the ice bucket, but not making a move to leave.
“Yeah, me too,” he lied.
“Well, good night.” And she started down the hall.
“Good night.”
He tried not to watch her and didn’t want to follow, but then he realized she was going in the same direction he needed to go. God had a weird sense of humor, he thought as he watched her unlock and enter a suite only two doors down and across the hall from his.
CHAPTER 64
Omaha, Nebraska
Gibson told his mom he wasn’t feeling good. No, it wasn’t any big hairy deal, an upset stomach, maybe a touch of the flu or something. No, she didn’t need to call the doctor, but he didn’t want any dinner.
He really did feel sick to his stomach, but it wasn’t from the flu. It was that Darth Vader guy almost poking him into the wall. Now he wanted to stay in his room and not be bothered. He wondered if he could stay home for a few days. He wasn’t so sure he even wanted to go to Explorers tomorrow. His mom wouldn’t notice. She left for work before him and came home after him. If he could keep Tyler’s big fat mouth shut it wouldn’t be a problem. He’d need to think of a bribe. Usually Tyler’s silence could be bought. It was just a matter of figuring out what lame thing he was into this week.
He sat in front of his computer, wondering if surfing the Net might help. He hadn’t played the game since…since Monsignor O’Sullivan and the airport. How many days ago was that? He clicked the computer on and waited for Windows to boot up. In the meantime he grabbed his backpack from the floor and started going through it. There had to be a candy bar or granola bar or something inside. He dug his hand to the bottom and started feeling around so he wouldn’t need to dump everything out. His fingers found the seam of a wrapper—success! He pulled out a Snickers bar and noticed an e-mail flashing, waiting at the corner of his computer screen.
He and Timmy had exchanged e-mail addresses. He was probably wondering why Gibson didn’t wait for him this afternoon. He clicked on his e-mail and sure enough there were two from Timmy, one with the subject line that read:
WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU?
There was also an e-mail from The Sin Eater, and Gibson’s stomach started to churn again. The subject line read: CAUTION!!!! He clicked it open before it managed to paralyze him. It looked like a list of instructions. At the top in caps and bold letters it read:
YOU’RE SAFE AS LONG AS YOU HAVE THE LEATHER PORTFOLIO. DON’T WORRY. I WON’T LET ANYONE HURT YOU.
Downstairs the front doorbell rang. He ignored it. His mom hadn’t gone to her evening class yet.
The portfolio. How the hell did The Sin Eater know about it? Gibson left the computer and rummaged through the back of his closet until he found it. When he first discovered it stashed inside his backpack, he had opened it enough to find Monsignor O’Sullivan
’s name on the top paper. He should have known it was something important, something from that afternoon. That’s how The Sin Eater knew he was at the airport. He was there, too. Did he see who put the portfolio into his backpack? Or did The Sin Eater put it there? If it was Monsignor O’Sullivan’s and The Sin Eater took it from him, then did he see who murdered him?
Gibson stopped and sat on the edge of his bed. How stupid was he? The game. He had submitted Monsignor O’Sullivan’s name as a character to be eliminated. The Sin Eater was supposedly the only one who knew and recorded the name. The Sin Eater had to have killed Monsignor O’Sullivan. Or was it all just a coincidence that both Gibson and The Sin Eater were there at the airport and happened to see the priest dead?
He could hear his mom calling for him from the bottom of the stairs. Why didn’t she come up? Could he ignore her? No, ’ cause then she would come up.
Gibson made himself get up off the bed and go to his door.
“What?”
“Come down for a few minutes, sweetie. There’s someone here who would like to talk to you.”
Was it Timmy?
“Give me a couple of minutes. I need to close down something on my computer.” He shut his door with a bit of slam, then very slowly and quietly opened it so he could tiptoe out far enough to see who it might be. He could hear his mom’s voice, now a worried whisper. “I’m sure you must be wrong, Brother Sebastian.” And the rest was muddled up the stairwell, but Gibson thought she said something about drugs.
Now he could see a slice of who she was talking to, who Brother Sebastian was. He had his back to the staircase, but Gibson recognized him anyway. It was the Darth Vader guy.
He could barely control his panic as he tried to get back to his room quietly. He closed and locked the door and then his eyes raced around his room. He had to get out. He shut down his laptop, snapping off cables and wrapping the power cord around it then shoving it into his backpack. He pulled off the gadget he had duct-taped to the underside of his headboard, worked it open and took out the folded-up cash he had hidden. It went into the backpack’s side pocket. He grabbed the portfolio and slipped it in last.
He slid open the window and could immediately feel the blast of warm, sticky night air hit him in the face. He double-checked to make sure no one was out on the sidewalk. The sun had just started going down behind the trees but only the fanatics would be out walking on a night like this.
It had been over a year since he had used this exit, which required sliding down onto the porch roof and then jumping off into the grass. He hadn’t needed to sneak out because his mom was hardly ever home. He hoped they couldn’t see him when he dropped off the porch. He’d have to go more toward the left and then use the back alley. And damn, he’d have to leave behind his bike. It was on the porch.
He pulled on the backpack and readjusted the straps so it’d stay tight on his back. He couldn’t risk smashing his laptop. He had no idea where he would go or when he could come back.
Gibson took one last look around his room, the one place he had felt safe. Then he left.
CHAPTER 65
Omaha, Nebraska
Tommy Pakula came in the back door, catching Clare at the kitchen sink. Before he could find a place to put down the two pizza boxes, he stopped and kissed the back of her neck, getting a satisfactory stroke of his cheek in return.
“You taste good,” he said. “Maybe we don’t need the pizzas.”
“The girls are starved.” She turned and smiled at him, but there was something sad in her smile. Something was wrong.
“What’s happened?”
When she put a finger to his lips to hush him, he knew it wasn’t good.
“Angie’s pretty upset,” she told him, keeping her voice low and her eyes watching out over the counter that separated the kitchen from the dining room.
“Is she hurt?”
“No, no. It’s nothing like that. She received a letter from Creighton today. She’ll show it to you later. We should eat first, okay? Let her tell you about it in her own way. Don’t push her.”
“What kind of a letter?” But he already knew and there was a lump gathering in the pit of his stomach.
“They’re rescinding her scholarship. Something about insufficient funds that they’ve only now become aware of.”
“Insufficient funds. That’s bullshit.”
“Tommy.” This time she placed a finger against her own lips.
He obeyed and kept his voice down, but the anger was still there. “You know what this is.”
“We don’t know that for certain.”
His cell phone interrupted them and he wanted to rip it off his belt and throw it across the room, but he was expecting a call from Chief Ramsey.
“I’ve got to get this,” he told her and she nodded, taking the pizza boxes to the dining room where he saw the table was already set. “Pakula,” he grunted into the phone.
“I got your message,” Chief Ramsey said without a greeting. “I’m talking to Cunningham in an hour. Do you have any idea what this Father Michael Keller has for us?”
“He said he had the list of the priests being offed. Supposedly he thinks he has something else that could lead us to the killer, but he wouldn’t spell it out to O’Dell until he knew he had a deal and until he was here in the States.”
“She thinks he’s on the level?”
“She thinks he’s scared. He’s on the list.”
Ramsey was quiet and Pakula waited it out, watching Clare put ice in their glasses and pour the tea. There was something about the way she moved that had a calming effect on him.
“The shit is starting to hit the fan,” Ramsey finally said, and it wasn’t at all what Pakula had expected him to say. “My wife found out today that her grant for the hospital got canceled. She says it’s a coincidence. I don’t think so.”
Pakula turned his back to Clare and the dining room and walked across the kitchen as far out of her hearing as possible. “My daughter’s scholarship just got pulled. Insufficient funds.”
“Jesus! You’re kidding.” There was a pause. “Well, we both knew this could happen.”
“Yep, we did.” Pakula kept it to himself that he didn’t think the asshole would be able to do stuff like this or at least not this quickly. “He’ll be shitting bullets if he hears what I found out this afternoon.”
“What’s that?”
“Seems the monsignor had a thing for little boys after all, and the archbishop knew all about it.”
“Figures,” Chief Ramsey said.
“Look, about this Keller guy making a deal with O’Dell. You think your buddy Cunningham is gonna have a hernia?”
“Not when I tell him we have five dead priests.”
“Five?”
“Deputy Sheriff down in Santa Rosa County, Florida, just found one in the wetlands,” Chief Ramsey explained. “May have been there for over a week. I’ll have a copy of the autopsy report in the morning.”
“And the fifth?”
“North Boston.” This time Ramsey paused and Pakula could hear him shuffling papers. “Information’s still coming in. Details are sketchy. If I understand correctly, it happened earlier today. This one’s freaky, Pakula, and I can’t help wondering if the killer is not only escalating but that he’s starting to lose it.”
“How freaky?”
“The victim was a Father Paul Conley at Blessed Sacrament. His head was found on the altar.”
CHAPTER 66
Omaha, Nebraska
Gibson had managed to get a dark corner booth in Goldberg’s Bar and Grill on Fiftieth and Dodge Streets. He didn’t think he had an appetite, but he had ordered a cheeseburger and fries so that the waitress wouldn’t mind him taking up a whole booth. Then it smelled so good that he started taking nibbles, and before he realized it he had it devoured, probably eating out of nervous energy more than hunger.
When he called his mom from the restaurant’s pay phone she sounded hysterical, not becaus
e he had slipped out on her but because Brother Sebastian had convinced her Gibson was on drugs. He couldn’t believe it and told her so. How could she believe some stranger over him? He tried his best to reassure her that he wasn’t taking or selling drugs.
He couldn’t tell her about the portfolio even though he was pretty sure that’s what Brother Sebastian wanted from him. Instead, he told her Sebastian was a bad guy and she needed to stay away from him. But that’s when she laughed, a nervous, slightly hysterical laugh. “Now you sound paranoid, Gibson. Isn’t that something that happens when you take drugs?”
“Mom, I’m not taking drugs. You gotta believe me.”
But then he did lie and told her he’d be staying with a friend for a few nights. Truth was, he hadn’t asked Timmy yet. It didn’t make her happy that he wasn’t coming right home, but she didn’t argue with him. She wanted the friend’s name and phone number, and when he told her he didn’t know the number she insisted he call as soon as he got there. If she was this worried and suspicious from some made-up story that he might be using drugs, what would she be like if she knew he had gotten a priest killed?
He brought the mangled phone book from the pay phone back to his table. If he couldn’t find Timmy’s phone number or Timmy’s mom wouldn’t let him spend the night, Gibson wasn’t sure what he’d do. There wasn’t anyone else he could call. No one he could trust. No one, except maybe Sister Kate. She had sort of saved him once before though he really didn’t like thinking about that day. He couldn’t remember if it was the fourth or fifth time Monsignor O’Sullivan had called him into his office. Everything was such a blur every time he left. But one time Gibson stumbled into the hallway and ran right into Sister Kate. He was so embarrassed because his fly was still down. Geez! He could still feel the burn up his neck.