by Dee Holmes
“I thought you were fixing food.”
“It’s heating. You can’t eat in here. I set the table in the kitchen.”
He cursed again. Another step and she’d see the contents. So much for trying to break the news gently. Now the choice was made for him.
“Tell you what. Why don’t we go into the living room. There’s something I need to explain to you.”
“All right, but first what did you find?” She nodded toward the three T-shirts that Hunt had tossed aside. “Besides those.”
She came closer to the bed, handed him the bottle, and when he tried to steer her away, dodged his hand. Hunt braced himself. The gun and money were in plain view and the 827 BOS was nakedly exposed on the spread.
He closed the pocketknife and tried to take Molly’s arm and turn her away. “Molly, there’s something I haven’t told you,” he began. But it was too late.
She gasped at the sight of the gun. “My God! No wonder he had it locked.”
He closed his eyes wearily. Just say it. Don’t mince words. Tell her.
“Molly, your brother worked—”
“And all that money. Is it stolen? Did he use the gun to steal it?” Her eyes were glued to the contents of the attaché case.
Hunt said, “I don’t think he stole it. At least not in the way you’re thinking.”
“I don’t like guns….” She paused. “Why would my brother bring one when he came to visit me? And what about the money?”
“Did he say anything to you about where he worked or what he did for a living?”
“A little, but it didn’t involve guns.”
“How do you know?”
She laughed a little self-consciously. “Don’t be ridiculous. He was an ordinary man, not a criminal.”
“You told me he was belligerent and waved a knife around so the McCullochs would take you and not him. Didn’t you ever think that behavior could lead to even more dangerous actions?”
“He was thirteen years old, for God’s sake. You even said it sounded like bull and bluster.”
Hunt shoved his hand through his hair. “Yeah, I did say that, didn’t I? What did he tell you he did for a living?”
“He told me he was an investment analyst.”
“Whatever the hell that means,” Hunt muttered.
Molly swallowed. “I know one thing. There has to be a good explanation for all this.”
“Like he owned the gun and someone paid him a lot of money for something,” Hunt said with dry logic.
“Maybe the money and the gun belong to someone else. Maybe he was taking them to someone. Or maybe he was delivering money to one of his clients and brought the gun for protection.”
Hunt shook his head. He knew she was trying to cling to her image of Vern any way she could, but he also knew she was doomed to disappointment.
“How do you know? You don’t. You’re just assuming the worst because you’re a cop.”
“Ex-cop. And I’m assuming the worst, because the worst is obvious.”
She reached out to close the case, as if by doing so, she could put the contents from her mind. Hunt knew he had to say something, and say it now. He grabbed her wrist and turned her toward him. He saw knowledge in her eyes. Oh, not the whole truth, perhaps, but a sense that whatever the contents of the case meant, it didn’t reflect well on her brother. He also saw her desperate need to escape that knowledge.
“Let me go.”
“You can’t ignore this.”
“I can! I don’t want to hear any more.” She tried to twist free, but he held her fast. “You’re hurting me.”
“I’m not hurting you, and you’re going to listen to me,” he snapped, and then let out a long breath, easing his hold on her. This wasn’t the way he wanted to tell her, and in fact by stalling, he’d made telling the truth twice as difficult.
She stood rigidly, glaring at him.
In a much quieter tone, he said, “I need to tell you something I should have told you yesterday.”
He felt her stiffen in resistance. He took a deep breath, guided her around to the other side of the bed and made her sit down. “Tell me again exactly what your brother said about what he did for a living.”
“Very little. He said he was an investment analyst and that he had clients. I asked him some questions, and he kept saying it was too complicated.”
“Let me ask you this. At the hospital, I recall you said you found your brother through a search service. The kind that works with children looking for birth parents?”
“Sort of. This one specializes in siblings that have been separated either at birth or through adoption. They needed four basic things to search. Name, date of birth, last known address and social security number. Unfortunately I didn’t have the last one, so the process took much longer. They used all sorts of reference materials and directories to see how many Vernon Wallaces served in the military.”
“How many?”
“Quite a few, but none matched his birth date.”
Hunt folded his arms and leaned against the dresser. “Go on.”
“It was a slow, arduous process. It almost seemed as if he didn’t want to be found. They used a database. They ran the name Vernon Wallace and checked and cross-checked birth dates. There were a lot of Vernon Wallaces, but none of them was my brother. They even went through a database of obituaries, but thankfully he wasn’t there, either.
“I was so frustrated, I decided I must have made a mistake on his birth date. I was sure I hadn’t, but at that point a mistake was better than never finding him. I checked at the office of vital statistics, and guess what?”
“You’d made a mistake.”
“No, they’d misspelled Wallace. So once we used the correct spelling along with the birth date I had, Vern was located in Fernwood.”
“So then, out of the blue, you just called him up and said, ‘Hi, this is your sister, Molly’?”
“Actually, I did.”
Hunt sighed. “Why doesn’t that surprise me?” he mumbled.
“At first he denied he was my brother, but I had enough information about our shared past that I finally convinced him.”
Hunt was skeptical. Wallace was no fool, and what better way for his enemies to get to him than to. find out he’d once had a sister and then set him up?
“How did you convince him?”
“I told him I still had the four-leaf clover he found for me just before I was adopted. Actually, he found two. I saved mine because he’d told me that if I kept it and never lost it, I’d have a happy future.”
“And when you reminded him of that, he knew it was you?”
“Yes.”
It boggled Hunt’s mind that a pro like Wallace would cave in over a four-leaf clover, but then again, it was a convincing detail no one but the real Molly would know. Maybe the guy had needed to find his sister just as much as she had needed to find him.
She glanced back at the open attaché case as if she hoped it had magically emptied or was now filled with innocent business papers.
Hunt said, “Despite the fact that I keep hoping I’ll come up with an easier way, there isn’t one.”
Suddenly she looked queasy, as if the dark side of her brother had flashed before her in ghostly form. She rose, her tone one of closure. “I know enough.”
Hunt straightened. No way was he going to delay this any longer. “Do you think this is easy for me to tell you? My God, Molly, I’ve been wrestling with it since I first saw you in his arms. I wish I’d been mistaken.”
She drew herself up as if she’d found some deep inner strength.
Hunt knew it was now or never. “Your brother was a hit man for the mob. He killed for a living.”
The truth writhed between them like a nest of disturbed rattlesnakes. Her face drained of color and her. legs wobbled. Hunt reached out to steady her, and she swung her arms to avoid him.
“That’s a lie!” she cried. “He was my brother. I loved him and he loved me.”
>
“That’s not the issue, nor is it in dispute.”
“You’re wrong. He hated killing, He couldn’t even set a mousetrap without getting squeamish.”
Hunt tried to draw her into his arms as he’d done the previous night “Sweetheart, I’m sorry.”
She backed away, then went perfectly still, her eyes nakedly perceptive. “All of this, all that you did…all of it was to set up my brother, wasn’t it? That’s why you’ve been so nice to me.” Her words gathered speed and intensity. “It’s why you took me to the hospital, stayed in the bedroom with me and asked me all those questions. It’s why you were so willing to help with Vern’s things. Damn you!” She flung herself toward the doorway, making a wide sweep -away from the money and the gun.
Then she whirled around, and Hunt winced at her pain and disappointment. “I despise you, Hunt Gresham. I want you out of here.”
“Molly…”
“Get out!” she shouted, then ran to her bedroom and slammed the door.
Hunt looked at the contents of the attaché case, his earlier enthusiasm gone. He, too, wished like hell that Wallace had been just transporting the items. Or even better, he wished that Vern “the Spider” Wallace had been an investment analyst.
For Molly’s sake.
CHAPTER SIX
“YOU WERE THERE when the bastard croaked?”
“I was with his sister.”
“Didn’t know he had one. Tough telling her, huh?”
“A bitch,” Hunt said.
He was back in his apartment and on the phone with Sean Sullivan, his old partner in the Boston Police Department. After Molly’s outburst, Hunt put the contents back into the attache case and took it home with him. A risky move, but no way was he leaving it, considering Molly’s anger. For all he knew, she might get rid of it as a final way to protect her brother.
Hunt grimaced, disgruntled by the turn of events. He should have come up with some other way of telling her. The entire debacle was his fault. What made it worse was that he didn’t have a clue what the long-run payoff concerning Wallace would be. Then again, what alternative had he had? Saying nothing to her meant that she might learn the truth from some jerk making a move on her for information she didn’t have. Either way spelled disaster.
He’d looked in on her before making his exit. She’d stood, staring out the window at the falling rain. With her back to him, her demeanor was stiff and straight, as if allowing herself to slump would be an admission that Hunt was right. When he said her name, she swung around to present him with a chilling glare, telling him if he didn’t leave, she would call the police. That had struck him as ironic, but he hadn’t argued and returned to his own apartment.
Now he was sprawled on his couch, shoes off, feet on the coffee table and using his nonportable phone. What he was telling Sean was too sensitive to be heard by anyone; a real drawback to cell and portable phones, which presented a greater security risk.
Wallace’s case was open beside him, the 827 BOS note staring back at him.
Sean Sullivan asked, “So who all knows about Wallace?”
“Hospital, of course, and Molly’s friends here, but they don’t know who Wallace really was. Denise said Molly made funeral arrangements for Friday in Fernwood.”
“Damn. We could have used more time. Word’s probably already out that he’s dead. Why in hell didn’t you call when it first happened?”
“Dying isn’t a crime, and I didn’t know about the contents of the briefcase until now,” Hunt said succinctly, restraining himself from commenting that Sean should be damn happy Hunt had made this call. Technically, an unloaded gun and a lot of cash in a briefcase wasn’t a crime, either. If Hunt hadn’t known who Wallace was, he might have bought some innocent explanation. Hell, who was he kidding?
“Besides,” Hunt continued, “There were extenuating circumstances. Molly was naturally upset—close to shock, actually. It didn’t seem appropriate to say, ‘Handle this yourself, kid. I gotta call my old partner and fill him in.’“
“Didn’t seem appropriate!” Sullivan exploded. “What in hell kind of reaction is that? You’ve gotten soft, old buddy. All that nose rubbing with the college types has turned you into some kind of bleeding heart.”
“Knock it off, Sean. If I’d done it your way, I wouldn’t have gotten within shouting distance of the briefcase. By the way, I can get as soft as marshmallows if I want to. I’m not a cop anymore.”
Ignoring that, Sean said, “I get it. You stalled to get a fatter rabbit.”
Hunt sighed. “Let’s put it this way, I got lucky.” Not lucky for Molly, though. He’d found some questionable stuff on Wallace, but at what price? Molly’s broken dreams about her brother? Hunt tried to tell himself it didn’t matter, since he wasn’t interested in Molly in a personal way, but he knew it would be a long time before he forgot the look of hurt and horror in her eyes.
“Listen,” Hunt said. “Besides the gun and the money, there’s this coded note. If you guys can decode it, you might have an opportunity to make a move on some major mob figures.”
“Yeah, I’ll get to the note in a sec. You said she made funeral arrangements in Fernwood. Is she going?”
“I assume so.”
“Excellent. I want you to go with her, and on your way, stop by here with the case—”
“Now wait a minute.
“I’ll make some arrangements for an overnight in Fernwood. A friend up that way has a house he’s been trying to rent. It will be perfect. This is Tuesday. If you get up here by tomorrow afternoon, all the pieces should be in place.”
“You’re not serious.”
“Hell, yes, I’m serious.”
“Then get unserious. At least about me getting involved. I’m in deep enough just making this call. Send someone from the organized crime unit. Anyway, I haven’t got any authority to deal with this.”
“You’re a citizen, aren’t you? Citizens cooperating with the cops was always one of your mantras, wasn’t it? In this case, you’re a concerned citizen who just happens to have the instincts and insight of an ex-cop. I’d be nuts not take advantage of that.”
“And I’d be nuts to get involved. I’m doing a nice, safe, unstressful lecture series, not playing cop looking for a collar. Doing surveillance for you isn’t part of my retirement plan. And even if I were interested, it’s not going to work.”
“Why not?”
“Molly wouldn’t walk down the same street with me. No way would she want me at her brother’s funeral.”
“Come on, Gresham. That’s a phony excuse and you know it. Tell her what’s going on and she’ll be begging you to go with her. And there’s this—if she goes alone and something happens to her, will you be able to live with yourself?”
“You’re a son of a bitch, you know that?”
“So the boys in Southie tell me when they’re not calling me other things.” Then Sean lowered his voice, his tone near pleading. “I need this, man. The chief has been pushing for some major breaks in the open mob cases. Let me toss some names out to remind you. Pascale. Solozi. Crackston. And those are just for starters. If Wallace’s pals are at the funeral, you being there as a mourner would be ideal. Stay with her, keep your ears and eyes open and keep me posted on anything suspicious. I mean, hell, you could do this without breaking a sweat. And the mourning sister will provide great cover.”
Sean’s last words hit Hunt like a hard fist A great cover? He could just imagine Molly’s reaction if Hunt said that to her.
“It’s not like I’m asking you to grill the attendees,” Sean continued over Hunt’s silence. “All you have to do is go and observe.”
“Look, even if I agreed to it—which I have not—I told you she hates me right now.”
“She’ll get over it,” Sean said dismissively.
“I hurt, her badly, Sean. She’s not going to forget that.”
“Then play the friendly neighbor who happens to be an ex-cop. That’s what you did yesterday an
d last night. What’s so different about today?”
Good question, but there was a difference. Before at least his intentions had been honorable. Now calculation and design and ulterior motives ruled. Hunt swore.
Sean cursed right back.
Hunt scowled. Sean’s chilling attitude was one of the reasons Hunt was glad he was no longer a cop. His old partner was so married to his job that he would have climbed over his own dead mother to get results. In police work that wasn’t necessarily a bad trait, but it was damn hard to live with, over time. Hunt had seen those characteristics in himself.
Then he’d lost Kristin.
Guilt plagued him. Deep, cutting regret for neglecting Kristin and their marriage had wrapped around him with suffocating intensity. He had screwed up a big investigation, and Sean had saved his butt. Still, he had decided to move on to something where his responsibility was only to himself. He’d handed in his resignation.
Now getting involved, even to help out an old partner, unnerved him. Molly was an innocent bystander, but beyond that, he admired her grit and determination in finding her lost brother. Now, instead of having only to deal with his loss, she’d been presented with Wallace’s dark side. And Hunt had been presented with a very angry Molly.
Sean again lowered his voice, sounding more like an old friend needing a favor. “Hunt, you gotta do this for me. Remember how we always swore we’d never let each other down? That promotion I want is gonna be history if I don’t come up with gold real soon. Just a few days of observation from you, that’s all I need. No hold-down, no collar. Remember how I helped you out when Kristin was sick? I mean, that was months, old buddy. This is a few goddamn days.”
Hunt closed his eyes wearily. In some deep part of himself he did want to do this. Perhaps to make up for the case he’d screwed up before he retired. And Sean had been there for him. The real source of his conflict was Molly. Getting back in her good graces wasn’t going to be a walk in the park.
Hunt finally said. “On one condition. Molly comes first. If it comes down to her or Wallace’s pals, she gets the nod.”
“Sure, sure.” Then, as if that was all settled, he said, “Let’s go over the note.”