Say No More

by Hank Phillippi Ryan

  Jane, unsteady on her cramping legs, stumbled to her almost-numb feet. Turned to Isabel, who cowered against the linen-stacked shelves, eyes wide.

  “Jane!”

  “They’re okay,” Jane reassured her. “Hostage Rescue. That’s us, sister—we are out of here.” She extended her hand, and Isabel grabbed it. “You did great,” Jane said. “You’re brave as they come.” Then into the phone, “Wu? Anyone? We’ve got to—”

  “Get off that phone!” one uniform ordered. “Now!”

  “Jane?” In her ear.

  “Situation, Wu,” she said. “Gotta go. They’re taking us out. I’ll call you soon as I can.”

  “But—”

  A buzz-cut hulk in black, Velcroed with radios and blocky gadgets, snatched her phone. Clicked it. “I said now.”

  He handed the now-powered-off phone back to her, one insistent hand clamped around her upper arm, propelling her forward. Jane’s toes almost dragged over the floor tiles as she and Isabel were hustled toward the main entrance.

  “Is it over?” Jane had to know, had to ask. He had to tell her.

  “Yes,” the officer said. “Ma’am. You both okay?”

  They were halfway there. She saw daylight, and the relief on Isabel’s face, and the whirl of blue lights through the expanse of wide glass doors. Jane tried to imprint the whole terrifying episode: the sounds, the fear, the uncertainty. This would be a story she could tell on the air. Soon she’d know every detail. But she needed to hear one thing right now.

  “Yeah, but is anyone else hurt?” The guy didn’t know she was a reporter—good, maybe he’d give her the scoop without making her call some public relations department.

  “No injuries,” the officer said.

  “Were any police involved?” Jane tried to sound neutral. “What about the suspect? And the hostage?”

  “Two in custody,” the officer said. “And that’s all I’m gonna say, Miz Ryland.”

  The glass door wheezed shut behind them, leaving Jane and Isabel alive, and free, and savoring the morning sunlight and shockingly fresh air.

  58

  WILLOW GALT

  She wasn’t imagining this. She wasn’t. She clutched Tom’s arm, moved even closer to him on the couch. They’d arrived at police headquarters, been sent here to the third floor, told to ask for Detectives Brogan and DeLuca. The same two who’d come to their house, Willow remembered. The girl at the desk was nice enough, informed them Detective Brogan would return soon, and would they wait?

  Of course they would. Willow tried reading one of the People magazines on the scuffed and battered coffee table, trying to make the time go by faster, but too many pages had been ripped out for the articles to make sense, and the tattered ones that remained threatened to escape the weakened staples at the slightest touch.

  But it was fine. They could wait. The couch, lumpy and unforgiving, was the only place they could sit together.

  “It will all work out,” Tom had told her. “We’ll take it together, one step at a time. And.” He kissed her on the top of her head, the way he always did. “Avery would be proud of you.”

  “Of us.” She was doing the right thing, she was sure of it.

  It seemed like hours they’d sat there, and a silly clock on the wall, unplugged, was no help. But Tom’s watch proved it had been only fifteen minutes.

  The outer door opened. Her heart leaped. It had to be Brogan, and soon this would all be over.

  But it wasn’t Brogan. It was the crosswalk man. The blue-blazered sidewalk man. The one she’d decided this morning was no one. Wrong.

  She grabbed Tom’s arm, wondering if everything she’d feared, everything, was true, and he’d followed her—them—here!

  “Tom,” she whispered. “That man.”

  But she couldn’t say anything more. Not with him right there! But why would a bad guy—a hit man? an assassin?—come to the police station? It seemed impossible. Dangerous. Ridiculous.

  She hadn’t told Tom about him. Why should she, it was too silly. Now, she realized, maybe it wasn’t silly.

  “What?” Tom asked.

  But there was nothing she could say. Not without that man hearing. Did she have a pencil and paper in her handbag? Maybe she could write a note.

  Willow burrowed herself closer to Tom. The man barely gave them a glance. Nothing could happen to her inside this police station, anyway. She was safe. And once Detective Brogan came back they’d be even safer. So strange—she’d once hoped Brogan would leave her alone. Now she couldn’t wait to see him.

  The man approached the receptionist. “I’m here to see Detective Brogan,” he said.

  She and Tom exchanged glances. Tom smiled, took her hand. “This is Brogan’s office,” he whispered. “Where else would a person come?”

  “I’m Edward Tarrant,” the man said. “I know he’ll want to see me. Tell him it’s about Avery Morgan.”

  Willow couldn’t stifle her gasp. She saw the look on Tom’s face. Still, agonizingly, she couldn’t explain anything to him. But there it was, and she was right, totally right, and maybe the man had only pretended not to recognize her. Maybe it was a code, what he’d said to the receptionist. She could not bear it, and what if …

  It was all she could do not to cry, to break down completely and cry.

  EDWARD TARRANT

  “Any minute now” was long gone.

  Edward paced, impatient, calculating, revising. Assessing. A youngish couple, inappropriately intertwined in each other, sat on the supposedly-brown couch of the waiting room outside the police homicide offices. Edward could not bear to sit. The risk he was about to take, the tightrope he was about to walk, made staying still impossible.

  “Tarrant the supplicant” was hardly his usual role. He was used to people coming to him, after all. But this was necessary. If he was going to extinguish this particularly dangerous fire, he needed to make a big move.

  And now, according to the dismissive receptionist, he was on hold. She’d given him a mere pretense of interest, a terse “Detective Brogan will be back any minute now if you care to wait?” then returned to her crossword puzzle. Where the other one was, DeLuca, she insisted she didn’t know.

  He steeled his temper, knowing this would only work with patience and skill. Playing the right cards at the right time. And maybe—a smile crossed his face—Avery Morgan would thank him for it. It was justice, after all. And wasn’t that what he was all about?

  Ten steps across the seedy beige carpet, wall to wall, and ten back the other way. He eyed the peeling wallpaper, some fading stripe, the brown patches of stains under the half-empty water cooler. The battered magazines splayed on the too-small coffee table. The black-framed clock on the wall, its frayed power cord unplugged from the greasy outlet. Time had stopped. He didn’t need some appliance to tell him that.

  The best part, which he’d figured out last night—Brinn breathing next to him, her scrawny little body taking up more than its share of space in the bed—was that in reality, he’d done nothing wrong. In his role as student advisor, he used his best judgment, drawn from his experience, offered solutions and long-term benefits. That’s all. If any parents or students had wanted to pursue their complaints, he’d agreed.

  He’d blinked at the pale gray bedroom ceiling, approving of his argument. And there was proof he was right. Some parents had complained, and those cases—one supposed assault, and a drug deal, or two or three—had proceeded through the system. Not quickly, but proceeded. He could point to those. There was no cover-up, or any persuasion, or any quid pro quo, or any other distasteful word. There was process. Conversation. And decisions made in the best interests of all.

  He had never, ever, asked for anything.

  He was blameless in every way. Why he had let those girls browbeat him … He shook his head, understanding his inescapable vulnerability. Avery. Their dalliance. Fine. Affair. Now he’d never been more aware of Brinn’s existence. Her power. Her anger. Her father. That was his A
chilles’ heel. But one obstacle at a time.

  He’d tossed that idiotic spiral notebook into the trash. It was already covered with the shoeprints and filth of uncaring pedestrians. He could hardly bear to touch it, but he’d gone downstairs to get it, and looked at it only long enough to seethe at the pages. He’d fallen for it, the silliest trap imaginable, choked by his fear.

  Still pacing, he was aware that the couple on the couch, the woman at least, was talking about him. Hopefully they hadn’t recognized him, though on second thought what if they had? He was a fine, upstanding citizen, and about to make a deal to prove it.

  As soon as Detective Brogan returned.

  Any minute now.

  59

  JANE RYLAND

  “Isabel?” Jane knew her next request was a lot to ask, and she wouldn’t be surprised if the poor girl never went outside again. But right now, in the rear parking lot of Boston City Hospital, a major league story was unfolding. The HRT guy had ordered them to “vacate the premises.”

  No chance of that.

  As she and Isabel had walked across the parking lot, Jane saw two police transport vans, idling, rear doors open. The bad guy was going to be brought out this way, that was clear. The hostage, too, maybe, if he was being taken away by the cops for questioning. The promised crew from Channel 2 had not shown up. Because of that, she needed Isabel’s help.

  “Do you have a cell phone?” Jane asked. They’d arrived at Jane’s car, but this was no time to leave.

  “Cell phone? Sure.” Isabel dug into her little messenger bag, still strapped cross-body over her now-even-more-rumpled white T-shirt. “Are your batteries dead?”

  “Nope. All good. But listen.” Jane pointed across a row of parked cars. “Turn on your phone. Walk with me.”

  No one else in the lot. Empty cars. No cops by the vans. Back door to the hospital dead ahead.

  “See that white BPD van? The one on the right? With the open back doors?”

  “Yes, sure.” Isabel was powering up her phone.

  “You’re now an official TV reporter,” Jane said. “The minute anyone comes near that van, especially cops or HRTs with a person in handcuffs, I’m gonna roll my video. But I can’t shoot two places at the same time. So if a second guy is brought out, handcuffs or not, you roll like crazy on that. Whatever it is. Just stay wide, nothing fancy. Take a deep breath, stay calm, make sure your camera is taping. In that case, I’ll stay with the van on the left. You and I are gonna shoot the hell out of this.”

  Isabel smiled, a delighted grin that warmed Jane’s heart. This girl was a superstar.

  “Got it,” Isabel said. “Vincerò.”

  “Exactly.” Jane recognized the aria, Puccini’s anthem to victory. “Vincerò, sister.”

  JAKE BROGAN

  Room 422 was a shitshow. A circus. And crowded with more law enforcement guys than any one hospital room could handle.

  Grady Houlihan, half drugged and half outraged, lay handcuffed to one iron side-railing of his narrow hospital bed. “I didn’t kill anyone!” he yelled. “Come on, Ja—”

  “You shut up,” Jake yelled back, weapon still pointed.

  HRT had handled Rourke Devane, one officer snapping the handcuffs, the other patting him down. They’d found ID, two blunts, and a .22 stashed in the kid’s tube sock.

  “What’s this, buster?” one said.

  Devane proclaimed, repeatedly, that he’d been there only to talk, that he hadn’t been fooling with the IV and that the nurse was an “effing moron.”

  “Why’d you pull a gun?” Jake asked.

  The kid’s face glowed red, even his ears, as he blustered an answer. “I was only showing it to Grady. And she came in, scared the effing hell out of me, and I just turned and she saw it, and bolted before I could say a fricking word.”

  “That’s not true.” Grady’s voice was a croak. “He threatened me with—”

  “You. Shut up,” Jake said.

  “Next thing I know,” Devane went on, “I’m like some crazy shooter, for chrissake. Trapped in this frickin’ room with no way to—”

  “You hit my effin’ Gormay van, you asshole,” Grady broke in. “I saw you in the rearview, you asshole. I’m not going down for Violet Sholto. You know perfectly well that—”

  “Not one more word, Houlihan,” Jake ordered. “And you, Devane, if you’re such a monument to innocence, why were you here in the first place?”

  Grady’s monitor, still safely plugged in, beeped once, then again. An alarm pinged, then stopped. The public address robo-voice in the hall had gone silent the minute HRT arrived. Suddenly, bizarrely, the room was still.

  Jake, three HRTs, and the bedridden, handcuffed Grady waited for Rourke Devane to come up with an answer.

  “I demand a lawyer,” he said, pouting as only a guilty punk can do. “Call Randolph Hix. Call Molly Obele. I am not saying another word.”

  “Sholto’s mouthpieces,” Jake said. “Our pleasure.”

  Devane, the moron, with brusque assistance from the HRTs, turned his back on Jake and Grady, his feet almost dragging the ground as he was ushered out of 422. Now it was just the two of them. Jake, and his informant. Who, as far as the Sholto crew would hear and believe, was merely another lawbreaking creep, and under arrest for Violet Sholto’s murder.

  “Jake!” Grady whispered. “You’re wrong, you’re really freakin’ wrong. He threatened to shoot me, but couldn’t, you know, not after the damn nurse ratted him out and he knew you guys’d nail him. But he knows I saw Sholto in town when his wife was hit. Sholto even did it, maybe. Devane said he was just the messenger, making sure I shut up. But I would never—”

  “I know.” Jake reached for his key ring. “And now you’re officially un-arrested. I’ll have the handcuffs off in a sec.”

  “But—”

  “Hang on, Grady.” One twist, then another. With a click and a snap, the cuffs were off. Grady was safe for now. “Sorry for the bull, but I had to get that moron out of here without him finding out you and I were connected.”

  “But—” Grady still looked confused.

  “You get well, dude.” Grady had risked his life. For justice, sure. But for Jake. And Jake had almost failed him. “We’ll get you protection. I promise.”

  60

  JANE RYLAND

  “Police sources tell us Rourke Devane is now in custody,” Jane said into the studio camera lens, lights full up, floor director counting her down to the commercial break. Three, two …

  “And we’ll have more for you on this breaking story as details become available. For now, I’m Jane Ryland, News 2.” She’d barely had a moment to comb her hair as she and Isabel had raced to Channel 2, Jane Bluetoothing info and instructions to Fiola as she drove. While Jane slapped on makeup, Fiola honchoed the video edit, banging out two usable minutes of Devane’s unceremonious handcuffed exit from the hospital parking lot, semi-dragged by two bigger-than-life HRT guys in black. Devane had provided some extra TV juice by yelling “Call my lawyer” the entire way. Jane had rolled on every bit of it.

  Isabel, apparently a news natural, had gotten video of Jane taking video.

  “And we’re clear.” The floor director slashed a finger across her neck. “Great story, Ryland,” she said. “Way to hustle.”

  Jane swiveled out of the anchor chair. It had been pretty great. Now that it was over. “Thanks,” she said.

  “So that was cool.” Isabel stood, smiling, hovering behind her. “My video, on actual TV.”

  Isabel had watched Jane’s live report from a nearby desk in the newsroom. “Hospital Hostage Showdown,” Channel 2 had branded it. That victory allowed Jane to turn her harrowing morning into good copy, and the other stations would have to play catch-up. Always an antidote. Isabel seemed to be thriving on the same news adrenaline.

  “You rocked it.” Jane crumpled her notes, tossed the wad of paper toward a metal wastebasket. Made the shot. She would rework her script, type it into the prompter for the six o�
�clock show. Grabbing her tote bag from under a writer’s desk, she checked her phone, perplexed. Nothing from Jake. Where was he?

  “Seriously, Isabel,” she said. “Thanks. Not everyone could have handled that. You okay, though?”

  “Sure,” Isabel said. “So what do you do next? Is there like, the next broadcast?”

  “Let’s go up to my office.” Jane pointed to the metal stairway in front of them. “We need to call Ja—Detective Brogan. About Trey Welliver. Maybe it’s even better if we go to the police station.”

  Jane watched Isabel’s mood deflate, her eyes lower, as they started up the stairs.

  “I guess.” She stopped, one hand on the banister, turned to Jane. “I’d almost … forgotten.”

  “We’re having quite the day,” Jane said.

  “Understatement of the century.” A voice from the top of the stairs. Fiola.

  “Hey, thanks, Fee,” Jane said. They were an okay team. They’d make it work. Maybe even do bigger stories together. She and Isabel started up the stairs again. “Great job on the—”

  “Frank McCusker’s arrived to see you,” Fiola cut her off, her voice telegraphing a message Jane couldn’t quite catch. A dark silhouette, then another, appeared behind her, two shapes backlit by the fluorescent lights of the Special Projects corridor. “Marsh is up here, too.”

  The Assistant DA and the news director. Together?

  Three minutes later, with Isabel and Fiola waiting in Jane’s office, Jane faced McCusker across the oval newsroom conference table. Though the dialogue couldn’t be heard, glass walls allowed everyone in the newsroom to watch whatever dramas unfolded. So much for privacy.

  “So, Jane,” McCusker said. “Detective Jake Brogan called my office, soon as they made the Devane arrest.”

  “Oh, so…” Jane felt her heart relax. Then tried to figure out how to phrase her question to get more details without seeming overly interested. Marsh knew of their relationship, but McCusker didn’t. “He’s okay? Detective Brogan? And the hostage?”

  “Yeah.” McCusker was frowning.