EVE’S CELL PHONE RANG AS SOON as she walked off the jetway in Milwaukee.
“Go to the Avis rental pickup,” John Gallo said. “A tan Toyota Camry has been rented for you. I’ll see you soon.” He hung up.
Short and to the point, Eve thought as she moved down the aisle. Evidently, he was taking no chances on their conversation being bugged. Not that she could blame him. His home had been burned to the ground a little more than twenty-four hours ago. But where was she supposed to go after she went to the Avis lot?
And when she got into the Camry, there was no note on the seat to help her. What was she supposed to do. Just sit and wait for-
The GPS.
She activated it. An address was on the bottom of the GPS. Marriott Hotel. Downtown, Milwaukee.
She drove out of the lot.
Marriott Hotel.
It had been to a Marriott that she had gone with John when her mother had been in trouble. Some sort of puckish whimsy?
But John had never had that kind of humor. He had always had a reason for every action.
She glanced at the rearview mirror.
Was she being followed?
“EVE DUNCAN JUST PULLED UP in front of the Marriott, Colonel,” Brandell said. “She’s going up to the front desk and registering. Shall I follow?”
“Not yet. Any sign of Gallo?”
“No.”
“Then park and go inside. Find out what room she’s been given.”
“How?”
“I don’t give a damn. Bribery is usually good.” He hung up. He was surrounded by idiots and incompetents.
Brandell called back ten minutes later. “Room 1502.”
“Keep watch outside and make sure you know when she leaves the hotel.”
Queen hesitated a moment, then dialed another number. “Marriott Hotel. Room 1502.”
“How very accommodating of you,” Black said.
“Accommodating? I’ve practically drawn you a picture,” Queen said. “Just get me what I need.”
“Gallo’s head and the ledger,” Black said. “I’ll probably have to take out the woman, too. It would be dangerous to leave a witness.”
“Then she has to just disappear. She has contacts with the Atlanta PD.”
“Disappear. No problem. Do you think that I’d still be free if I wasn’t an expert?” he said mockingly. “One can’t just leave bodies lying about. Actually, it’s rather fitting, isn’t it? Her daughter disappeared, and now poor Eve Duncan herself.”
“As far as I know, Duncan is still hale and hearty and able to cause me trouble. I don’t care what you do to any of them. Just get me what I need. It shouldn’t be hard now that I’ve done your groundwork.”
“You don’t know anything about it. I may not even choose to use your precious information. I’ll have to decide. It’s sometimes better to go for a fresh, unexpected approach. It’s certainly more enjoyable.”
“I’m not interested in what’s enjoyable for you.”
“You may be very interested at some point, Queen.”
Back off. That last remark was aimed at him, and Black’s malice might also be changed to include Queen. He didn’t want to have to deal with Black until he had done his job and retrieved the ledger. He’d already lined up a hit man to take care of Black after he had no use for him. “All I’m saying is that nothing should get in the way of what’s important.”
“I thought that was what you meant.” Black sounded amused. “I’m certain you wouldn’t deliberately be rude.” He hung up.
Queen expelled the breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. Everything was in motion. All he had to do was sit back and watch and pick up the spoils.
BLACK LOOKED DOWN AT THE pad on which he’d scrawled the room number in Milwaukee.
Eve Duncan’s room number.
He remembered her well. How could he forget?
And how well and in what ways did Gallo remember Eve Duncan? Queen had said she’d been with him in the house in the mountains.
Is it time to take your toy from you, Gallo?
He felt a surge of fierce pleasure at the thought. Not only the death of Gallo, but making him watch the death of someone he cared about.
But how to do it in the most pleasurable way for himself?
He thought he knew what path he wanted to take. He reached in his pocket and pulled out another note he had made.
San Cecilia.
EVE TOOK OUT THE PLASTIC key the clerk had given her and pushed it into the slot.
“No, my room.”
She stiffened and turned to see John Gallo standing behind her. He was wearing a black shirt and khaki pants and looked dark, lean, and completely casual and confident. “All of this cloak-and-dagger stuff is annoying, John. I feel as if I’ve joined the CIA like Catherine.”
He shook his head. “Nary a cloak or dagger in sight.” He nodded at an open door down the hall. “My room. It’s safer. I’ve ordered dinner.” He took her carry-on and rolled it down the hall. “You were followed from the airport.”
“How do you know?”
“I hired an old friend, Peter Chakon, to watch the Toyota and report to me.” He smiled. “Would I let you take a chance on being intercepted on your way here?”
“I don’t know what you’d do. Was it one of Queen’s people?”
“Maybe.” He stepped aside for her to enter the room. “Probably.”
She glanced around the room. Typical hotel room, blue synthetic-silk spread on a king-size bed, a desk and chair across the room. A small damask-covered room-service table was pushed against the wall.
“Not as nice as the last Marriott we were in together,” John said. “But then there are Marriotts and Marriotts.”
She looked at him. “That wasn’t a pleasant memory, either.”
“I know. But I couldn’t resist the temptation to repeat history on some level.” He shut the door and gestured to the table. “Sit down and eat. I don’t know how long we’ll have before we’re interrupted.”
She sat down in the chair. “You think someone is going to come. Then why are we still here?”
“Because I want to see who it is.” He uncovered the plates to reveal sandwiches and soup. “Ham okay?”
She nodded. “You said you were curious. I don’t think you’re this curious.”
He sat down across from her. “It’s important that I know who may be knocking on the door.”
“Queen.” She took a sip of soup. “Who else?”
He didn’t answer.
She studied him. “Who else?” she whispered. “Black?”
“It’s possible that Queen decided to bring him in on a job that he considered important. I worked very hard at being a thorn in his side to bring that about.” He poured coffee into her cup. “At least, I hope he did.”
“Bring him in?” Her grip tightened on her spoon. “Stop this. I have to know what you’re talking about. Start at the beginning. What do you have on Queen?”
He made a face. “The beginning? I try to avoid thinking of the beginning.” He leaned back in his chair. “But I’ll try to skirt around the really nasty parts. Korea. Five months after I left Atlanta. Fresh out of Ranger school. I was good and cocky and one of the chosen ones. I met Queen and his subordinate, Jacobs, at a meeting in Tokyo. Queen was a major at that time, and Jacobs was a corporal. Jacobs seemed to be some kind of assistant to Queen. They were officers in Army Intelligence and had requested special assistance from my unit. They said Washington had information that North Korea was buying nuclear raw materials to start their own program. They wanted proof but didn’t want to disturb diplomatic relations to get it. So they sent me, Ron Capshaw, and Larry Silak in to find it.”
“What kind of proof?”
“A ledger of transactions between the North Koreans and arms dealers of various countries. It was described as a slender leather-bound book and easily portable. The ledger was in the possession of General Tai Sen. He kept it at his country home near Pyongyang. Our orders were to go in and grab the ledger and head for the coast to get picked up. The theft went slick as glass.” He grimaced. “But everything went wrong from the time that we stole the ledger. We knew the chances were that we all weren’t going to make it to the coast. We hid the ledger and separated and took off on our own.”
“And you were caught.”
“Capshaw and Silak were shot and killed. I was taken to prison and questioned. They wanted to know what happened to the ledger. I told them that I was only a noncom and that Capshaw as the commanding officer had taken it with him when we separated. I thought they believed me, maybe they did for a while. The Koreans have an almost slavish obedience and respect for their officers.” He lifted his cup to his lips. “But General Tai Sen decided they had to be sure when they still couldn’t find the ledger.” He looked at her and his lips twisted. “And this is where I start to skip a few years, if you don’t mind.”
She shook her head. No, she didn’t want to hear about the years of torture and starvation. It hurt her to think of them. “But you didn’t tell them where to find the ledger?”
“No, first I thought I was being a patriot. Then I was angry; and then I just endured.” He shook his head as if to clear it. “I told you about escaping and the Tokyo hospital and going to Atlanta.”
“Queen visited you in the hospital. He told Joe and Catherine that you were raving and that Army Intelligence was afraid you might give away top secret information.”
He shrugged. “I was raving at the time. And I was probably even more unbalanced than I was later. I’d completely blocked out most of the things that happened. The only thing I remember about Queen’s visits were his questions about the ledger. He kept at me.”
“You’d forgotten that, too?”
“It was the one question they kept asking in the prison. I blocked it so thoroughly that there was no way it was going to come back without a hell of a lot of time and therapy. That was why Queen got me dismissed from the hospital. He didn’t want me talking to any therapist.”
She shook her head. “You must have been in terrible shape.”
He nodded. “I didn’t work my way through the worst of it for years after Queen sent me off to try to get me killed.”
“You knew they were suicide missions?”
“Not at first. I was still in a haze for a long while. I was operating on automatic.”
And that automatic had clearly been lethal if it had kept him alive. “You said you came back to the U.S. some years later.”
He nodded. “Because I’d become clearheaded enough to realize that I was a target. I started to wonder why Queen was so determined to rid himself of me in a way that wouldn’t be questioned. Oh, they were very determined.” He paused. “And it all came back to the ledger.”
“Which you couldn’t remember.”
“By that time I’d worked my way through the haze enough to start to remember some details.” His lips tightened. “And I’d realized that it probably wasn’t dedication to home and country that had driven Queen. Some of the missions they sent me on were a revelation. They appeared to have nothing to do with protecting home and country. Dirty. Queen was definitely dirty. So I decided to go back to Korea and retrieve the ledger.”
“That must have been-I’d think that you’d have avoided that place like the plague.”
“It wasn’t easy. The North Koreans had become even more belligerent, and I was on their most wanted list. I was in a cold sweat most of the time I was there.” He paused. “But I found the ledger and I took it to Tokyo and had it translated.”
She tilted her head. “No nuclear secrets?”
“Drugs and stolen ancient artifacts. General Tai Sen was a joint partner with Queen. He received the merchandise and saw that it was sent to Tokyo to Queen for distribution and sale. The ledger belonged to the general and listed all the transactions in detail, naming names. The most prominent of which were Queen and Jacobs. The general was trying to cut them out of the business and threatening to send the ledger to their superiors if they caused any trouble.”
“So they had to have the ledger.”
“And didn’t mind throwing me into a hellhole and killing two of my buddies to get it.” His hand tightened on his cup. “You might say I was a little angry. If I’d found out a year earlier, I would have set up a prison like the one I called home for all those years and done a few experiments on Queen. Maybe I would have hired a North Korean to help. They know the way it’s done.”
There was such savagery in his face that Eve inhaled sharply. “But you didn’t do it. Why not?”
“I found out Queen’s connection to Paul Black.”
She stiffened. “What?”
“For years, Paul Black has been engaged as an assassin by Queen. When I left the hospital in Tokyo, they hired Black to follow me and to terminate me at the earliest opportunity.” He looked down into his cup. “He must have been following me when I came that day to see you and Bonnie. It had to have been obvious as hell what I was feeling when I was staring at Bonnie and you. It was one of the most powerful moments of my life. From what I’ve learned about him, Black appears to be very thorough and takes his time. Evidently, he didn’t find the right time and place to kill me while I was in Atlanta.”
“Bonnie,” she whispered.
He shook his head. “Queen sent me to Pakistan, and Black followed me. He attacked at the same time I was dealing with the terrorists Queen had assigned me to get. I didn’t even realize that Black wasn’t one of them.” He smiled tightly. “He didn’t find me an easy target. As I told you, I was really crazy during those days. He went after me with a knife, and I took it away from him and stabbed him in the belly. At the time I thought he was dead, but he crawled away.”
“To recover and go after Bonnie,” she said dully.
“Do you think I haven’t thought about that every day since I found out Bonnie had been murdered?” he said harshly. “I’d found after searching through his pockets after I stabbed him that he had a U.S. passport under the name of Paul Black. I was lucky he wasn’t traveling under an assumed name. I found out later that was common with him. He was so arrogant he thought no one could touch him. But that was all I knew about him. Nothing more. Maybe I should have tried to find out something else, but it didn’t seem to matter to me at the time. Hell, I didn’t realize that it would concern anyone but me, and most of the time I didn’t give a damn whether I lived or died. I didn’t know what a monster the son of a bitch was.”
“And when did you find that out?” Eve asked jerkily.
“Drink your coffee,” Gallo said. “You’re too pale.”
“I shouldn’t be. I’ve dealt with monsters before.” She took a sip of coffee. It was hot and strong and braced her a little. “But it never does any good. Not when I think about those monsters with Bonnie.”
“The time Bonnie was taken was too shortly after I came to Atlanta. Just one month. I tried to see if I could find any connection. God knows I didn’t want to find one.”
“But you did.”
“I was already suspecting Queen of trying to kill me. That led me back to Paul Black. Hired by Queen? Maybe. But what connection to Bonnie’s kidnapping? I started to work on finding out much more about Paul Black. I bribed and threatened and stole records. It took me over a year, but I put together his picture. He was born in Metaire, Louisiana, and he was in a mental hospital by the time he was twelve. He’d stabbed one of his classmates. The kid lived, and they released Black a year later. After that, Black was more careful and began to move about the country doing what he liked best.”
“Montalvo told me the records show he was born in Macon, Georgia.”
“Queen altered the records. He was protecting his pet cobra. It was part of the arrangement they had together. Queen protected, and Black did all his killings.” He held her eyes. “But he didn’t only do Queen’s killings. There are all kinds of indications that he was a serial killer before Queen took him under his wing. Very clever, very bloodthirsty. He liked it, and he wanted to keep on doing it. The only way he could see himself staying alive to appease his appetite was to find someone like Queen, who didn’t care what he did as long as he performed well for him. According to all the books and reports I’ve read, a serial killer of that magnitude has a tremendous ego. He has to be all-powerful.”
“The terrible thing is that they usually are,” Eve said. “They don’t stop. They just keep on killing.”
“I must have damaged Black’s ego badly when I managed to escape him and stabbed him in the belly. I told you that he had a tremendous opinion of himself. He would have wanted to hurt me. In any way he could.”
A little red-haired girl in a Bugs Bunny T-shirt.
Eve nodded slowly. “But why didn’t he go after you again?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know how he thinks. It might be that ego. He might have felt vulnerable after I almost killed him and convinced himself that he didn’t have to murder me to inflict the most hurt. He may not have known she was my daughter. Though it would not surprise me that he’d found that out. But anyone looking at me the day I came to see her would know how much I loved her.”
“Are you sure he killed her?”
“Do I have proof? No, and I won’t know until I hear it from his lips. But I believe he killed her. I’ve been tracking him over Asia and half of Europe, and there’s no question in my mind that he’s killed at least a dozen people in that time.” He paused. “Though he’s very smart. He’s like a phantom, moving in and out and away. I think when the police do come too close, he calls on Queen to help him.”
“Then he’s just as guilty of those murders as Black.”
“Yes.” He met her eyes. “But then I’m guilty of them, too.”
“What?”
“Oh, I wasn’t an accessory, but I wasn’t able to stop him. That should qualify.”
“That’s nuts,” she said flatly.
He smiled faintly. “I’m not going to address that statement. It would be redundant.”
“In all these years, you haven’t gotten close enough to catch him?”
“I got close a couple times but he slipped away.” He put his cup back on the saucer. “So I put Queen on the job.”
“What?”
“I told him that I’d give him his ledger if they gave me Black. He was pretending that he’d had nothing to do with him. I knew they were using him. It was only a matter of time until he decided that getting the ledger was more important to him than an assassin who probably knew too much about him anyway.”
Excitement was beginning to build. “Then you can get Queen to tell us where he is? Or do you know already?”
“I knew a few days ago. I’d traced him on my own to Samoa and was going to go after him myself. But I didn’t get the chance. His house was blown up, and his housekeeper and an unknown man were incinerated.”
“Then Black could be dead?”
He shook his head. “I doubt it. They’re checking the dental records, but the height and bone structure aren’t right. I think Queen sent someone to kill Black, and it went wrong. Which for me wasn’t all that bad. It meant that Black would be stirred into action against Queen.” He inclined his head. “And probably me. I can’t imagine Queen not throwing me under the bus at the earliest opportunity. When he burned my place, he was behaving with a recklessness that wasn’t characteristic.”
“Black will be coming after you.”
“He’s probably breathing down my neck right now.” He looked her in the eye. “Which makes me criminally irresponsible to be here with you.”
“You can’t be responsible for an act I committed myself.” She pushed back her chair. “That’s not possible. Now I think it’s time I went to my room and took a shower and unpacked. Unless we’re going to be leaving here soon?”
“Not soon.” He got to his feet. “But it’s probably not wise to unpack.” He added, “Nor to go to your room. I want you to stay here tonight.”
She stiffened, her gaze flying to his face. “Why?”
“In another life, you wouldn’t even have to ask.”
She felt a rush of heat that surprised her. It was as if her body had memories of him that triggered responses that were purely instinctive. “But that was another life.”
“Have you ever considered reincarnation?”
“No.” She started for the door. “I’ll call you after I shower and we’ll discuss-”
“I meant it about staying,” he said. “And it wasn’t for the most obvious and pleasant reason. I just couldn’t resist giving the answer that I-” He shook his head ruefully. “I know that it would only make things more difficult, but I’m finding I don’t have much control. I’m reacting instinctively.”
As I have been doing, she thought. Evidently, they were both being ambushed by memories. “Then I think it’s best to think before you act.” She had to be honest. “This is strange for me, too.” She changed the subject. “Why do you want me to stay?”
“Because I set you up. And I don’t want you to be alone.”
“Set me… What the hell are you talking about?”
“I told you once that you couldn’t trust me. Not if it was something I really wanted.” He smiled crookedly. “I really want to get Paul Black.”
“Well, so do I. What does that have to do with anything?”
“I was trying to be so damn noble and all that crap. I was going to keep you from being hurt. I was going to try to make up for all I did to you.” He shrugged. “But I’m not noble. I’m worse than the kid who screwed you and left you alone and pregnant. You were right to tell me to keep to the plan and get out of your life.”
“You’re making me sound like a victim. I wasn’t one then, and I’m certainly not one now. I made sure I was in control of keeping myself from getting pregnant and I blew it. Now will you stop reminiscing and tell me what you’re talking about?”
“Reminiscing? That sounds almost sentimental. Neither one of us was ever that,” he said. “And I’m talking about the reason I gave in and brought you here. Insurance. It was clear for whatever reason that Black wasn’t eager to confront me. I needed a goad. He figured he’d hurt me before by killing Bonnie. Now he’s coming back to revisit the situation, and, lo and behold, you’re back in my life.” He paused. “As I arranged.”
“You’re saying I’m bait?” She shook her head. “Don’t flatter yourself. I wouldn’t be that passive. If you’d said that was what you intended, do you think that I wouldn’t have come? The only difference would have been that we might have gotten together a plan that was mutually agreeable.”
He stared at her and smiled slowly. “I thought I remembered everything about you, but some details must have slipped away.”
She looked at the door. “You think that Queen or Black will know I’m in Room 1502? No one knows you’re here?”
“I made sure that they wouldn’t. I bribed the clerk to give you 1502 and set up a signal alarm so that I’d know if anyone entered the room. I went in earlier and mussed up the bed and made it look occupied.” He paused. “And I set up a camera to record any visitors.”
Her brows rose. “My, you were thorough.”
“I’m a good hunter,” he said simply. “I’ve been well trained. Ask Queen.”
“I don’t want to ask him anything. From what I’ve heard of him, I’d just as soon not make his acquaintance.” She added grimly, “Unless it was to try to throw him into jail.” She turned away from the door. “It appears that I stay here.” She took her carry-on case and threw it on the bed. “How fast do you think Black will move?”
He shook his head. “I have no idea. But Queen will be pushing hard.”
She opened the case and pulled out her toiletries and a change of clothes. She headed for the bathroom. “Then we’ll be ready to move, too.”
His question stopped her at the bathroom door. “Did you tell Quinn you were coming?”
She didn’t look at him. “I wouldn’t have left without letting him know what I was doing. Did I give him details? No.”
“So we’re in this alone.”
“Yes.” She closed the door behind her.
Alone.
She did feel poignantly alone and vulnerable at that moment. She was used to Joe being there, a presence that was both exciting and comforting. But she was dealing with John Gallo, who was not at all comforting. Exciting? As exciting as falling off a cliff into the darkness. She didn’t know what he was going to do next or even whether he was telling her the truth. She was going on instinct and memory, and the latter could have been twisted by the passage of time. And obeying instinct would be skipping through landmines.
She stripped and stepped under the spray.
I wish you were here, Joe.
“MILWAUKEE,” JOE TOLD CATHERINE when he called her from the airport. “Eve took the two forty flight on Delta.”
“And you’re on your way.”
“I will be in another hour. It’s the first flight out. But finding out where she was going is going to be a hell of a lot easier than tracing her once she gets off the plane. What did you find out?”
“Hanks may be in Denver,” she said. “He owns a condo there. I’ve called the number, but there’s no answer.”
“And Judy Clark?”
“Judy has a mother, Stella Kamski, in St. Louis. It’s a possibility. Judy lived with her until she was married. And after Judy’s divorce, she moved back in with her until she went to work for Gallo. Her mother even took care of her kid for a while. I spoke to the mother, and she said she hadn’t heard from her daughter in months. She seemed… stiff.”
“You think she was lying?”
“As I said, I think she’s a possibility. Judy Clark may be with her, or she might know where she is. I’m on my way there now. She lives in a subdivision in Webster Groves. It’s about a four-hour drive from where I am now.”
“Call me if you can get anything out of her.”
“You know it.” Catherine hung up.
But even if Judy Clark was with her mother, Catherine might not be able to get her to talk. She had been close-mouthed and obstinately loyal in her encounter with her. Hell, she might not even know where he was. It was clear that Gallo was very careful about confiding anything to anyone.
But there was always a chance, and it was all Catherine could think to do. The chances were pretty slim.
She just hoped Joe would be able to trace Eve when he reached Milwaukee.
“WHY DOESN’T SOMEONE COME?” Eve’s hand clenched on the gray drapes as she gazed from the window down at the lights of the traffic spearing the darkness. “I can’t say much for your trap, John.”
“I’ve never seen any bait more eager to spring the teeth shut.” He smiled across at her from where he was lying on the bed. “You’ve not been here more than five or six hours. Are you always this impatient?”
“We’re close. I want it over.”
“It’s like the watched kettle that never boils. Come to bed, and that alarm in 1502 will probably go off in five minutes.”
She didn’t answer, her gaze fixed on the street.
“Come to bed, Eve,” he said quietly. “I’m not going to jump you. If you like, I’ll curl up on the floor. I’ve learned to sleep anywhere.”
“I’m not afraid of you.” She turned to look at him. “I can take care of myself. That’s one of the first things that Joe taught me.”
“Good for him. Though, as I remember, you were pretty effective when I knew you.”
She nodded. “But Joe says technique always carries the day. I learned that the night you saved little Manuel… and me.”
“How is Manuel?”
“Well, I hope. I lost track of Rosa and her son. She married and left for San Diego a year after I moved out of the housing development.” She shook her head. “It’s sad that it’s so easy to lose touch with people. They come in and out of your life, then they’re gone. A lot of it is my fault. I’m so busy most of the time that I don’t make the effort.”
“What about your mother?”
She shrugged. “We were fine while Bonnie was alive, but afterward we gradually drew apart. Bonnie was the magic that held us together. But even after Bonnie was taken some of the magic lingered. Sandra never went back on drugs. Just the fact that Bonnie came into our lives and stayed for a little while made an impression that never went away.” She gazed at him inquiringly. “Any more questions?”
“There will probably be a few as they occur to me. That curiosity…” He reached over and turned out the lamp on the nightstand. The room was plunged into darkness. “You’re tired. Come and lie down. I won’t touch you. You’ve convinced me I’d be putty in your hands.”
She hesitated, then left the window and moved toward the bed. “I have to admit I do know a lot about putty.” She lay down on the far side of the bed and tried to relax. It was difficult. Even though there were several inches between them, it felt strange to be in a bed with a man other than Joe. How many years had it been?
“I know you do. You told me about the forensic process at dinner. Your hands aren’t quite the same as they were when you were younger. They were always shaped well, but now they look stronger, knowing.” He was silent a few moments. “Are you going to tell Joe about this?”
“Yes. Why not? Nothing is going to happen.”
“I have a vivid imagination. I think I’d want you to lie to me.”
“Joe would not. Which shows how different you are from him. And how similar Joe and I are.”
“Two straight arrows. He doesn’t bore you?”
“Joe? Not likely. And he wouldn’t bore you either, John. There’s a razor-sharp edge to that straight arrow.”
“I gathered so from talking to Hanks after their encounter the other night. He told me that Quinn wanted me very badly and to be careful. Should I be careful, Eve?”
“Yes, Joe doesn’t trust anything you’ve told me. He might act before I could stop him.”
“Would you protect me from him? I’m touched.”
“I’d protect him from himself. He has a conscience, and guilt can be a terrible thing.”
He was silent. “I know.”
The only sound in the dark room was the resonance of their breathing against the backdrop of the traffic down in the street.
“What are we going to do, Eve?”
“We’re going to find Bonnie’s murderer.”
“No, what about us?”
“There is no us. We put a period to that a long time ago.”
“You can’t put a period to anything between us,” he said quietly. “It might have been possible if you hadn’t had Bonnie. But the moment she appeared in our lives, she changed the dynamics. You have to accept and admit that to yourself and to me. Otherwise, we’re not going to be able to fight our way through this.”
“She was my daughter, John.”
“That may have been the way you wanted it, but Bonnie evidently didn’t agree with you. She came looking for me, Eve. She came into that hot box of filth and pain, and she found me. And I thank God for it every day of my life.”
She could feel the tears rise to her eyes as she had when he had first told her that story.
She came looking for me.
That simple sentence was enough to break her heart. The miracle of Bonnie, who had come into both their lives and changed them beyond belief.
“Don’t fight me, Eve. I don’t want to cause you any trouble. I’m just saying that we have to come to terms with a way of handling it that will make both of us content. Not happy. I don’t know if we can get to that level. But content would be good.”
“I can’t… you’re out of my life. I have Joe now. He’s all I want.”
“And my first reaction is to try to change your mind. We were so damn good together that sex seems a natural part of any relationship that we could have.” He added before she could speak, “But that’s the kid, John Gallo, thinking. I know we can’t go back. We’ve both moved on. Well, you’ve moved on. I’m still struggling.”
She was struggling, too. It seemed so right to have him in the bed next to her. It wasn’t right. She loved Joe. But there was that strong bond that wouldn’t be banished.
“Okay,” he said. “So I can’t have sex with you. What’s left? We were never friends, but that doesn’t mean we can’t work on it. I admire the person you’ve become. You can’t say the same about me, but I might provide amusement value. Friendships can be based on a lot of weird things.”
“There are things about you I admire,” she said jerkily. “You’re a survivor, and what you’ve endured would have broken almost anyone else. You thought you were being tortured to protect your country. I admire your patriotism. Most of the time, I think you’re honest with me. That’s important, too.”
He chuckled. “You had to really dig for that list.”
“What do you expect? I don’t know you.”
“I believe we’re going to have to rectify that.” He suddenly reached over and touched her cheek. “Don’t stiffen up on me. I’m not making a move on you. I just want to show you I can touch you with affection that has nothing to do with sex.” He stroked the line of her cheekbone. “Because the affection will always be there. Do you know why?”
“No.”
“Because you gave me Bonnie,” he said simply. “Because together we created something more wonderful than anything I could accomplish by myself if I live to be a hundred.” He felt the moisture of her tears on his fingers. “Hey, I don’t want this. I just want you to know that no matter what we have to overcome, it’s going to be worth it. I think we have to be together some way, somehow.” He added awkwardly, “I think maybe… she wants it.”
“Bonnie?” Eve whispered.
“I’ve thought a lot about why she came to me in that prison. She was a part of both of us, Eve. The three of us are bound together. I’ll never be able to look at you without feeling that closeness with her. Will you be able to look at me without feeling her love?”
She had been trying to shut out every facet of feeling toward him, but his words were tearing down the walls and revealing the truth. He was right. This wasn’t going to go away because it was all about Bonnie. For her, Bonnie had been the center of her being. She was beginning to think that Bonnie had been equally important to John. If that was true, then they had no option but to accept and try to find a way to live with it. She said unevenly, “No, I don’t think I will.”
“Good.” He bent down and kissed her forehead, then was gone again. “I just had to get that much established. I was feeling very much alone. I’ve always been the outsider.”
Alone. Outsider.
Yes, John had always been the outsider as far as Bonnie was concerned. Eve had seen to that. She had never told him, never wanted him to know he had a child. She had chosen to bear the responsibility, but she had also garnered the joy. John Gallo had not been permitted either.
“Go to sleep,” John said. “If we have an intruder in Room 1502, the alarm will wake us.”
Outsider.
“I’m not sleepy. I wonder if you…” She started again. “I wonder if you’d like me to tell you about Bonnie?”
She could feel his sudden stillness. “You don’t have to do that. I know it might be painful.”
“Some of it, but most of it is pure joy. I think… I want to share her with you, John. If that’s what you want, too.”
“Oh, my God.”
She didn’t speak for a moment, trying to put her thoughts, her memories together. He had missed so much. Where to start on the story of Bonnie?
The beginning.
“The first time the nurse brought me Bonnie, she said she was magic…”