But that didn’t stop me from fantasizing. And then her marriage crumbled. Still, I held back. I told myself she needed time to adjust, but I think it all went back to my first impression—she was totally out of my league.
Apparently Cheryl didn’t agree, and three months ago she invited me to go to the opera with her. It was a magical evening, and even before the fat lady sang, it was clear that the door to a serious relationship was wide open. But I wasn’t ready to commit. That very same week, my ex-girlfriend joined Red as my new partner, and despite the fact that Kylie was happily married, I was still pitifully hung up on her.
For the next three months, Kylie and Cheryl and I all lived together. The three of us shared cramped, unsafe quarters inside my twisted brain. I wanted them both, even though I was sure neither of them wanted me.
Had I manned up and told Cheryl what I was going through, I’m sure she would have diagnosed me as certifiably bonkers, but I kept my feelings buried, which is a basic tenet of my white Anglo-Saxon Protestant upbringing.
But when I woke up that morning after dinner at Paola’s, everything had changed. I felt different. Good different. Fantastic different. It was more than the morning-after euphoria that warms you when a night that looked as if it were going to crash and burn ends in heart-pounding sex.
I felt something I hadn’t felt in months. Centered. I finally knew what I wanted, and what I wanted was the bright, funny, incredibly hot, sexually adventurous woman lying next to me in bed, her thick black hair cascading over her smooth bronze shoulders.
I headed for the shower. Two minutes later, Cheryl, wearing nothing but a mischievous grin, joined me. One thing led to another, and I didn’t question how lucky I was. I just accepted it.
Two hours later, I was in Matt Smith’s office with Kylie.
“I pulled together a list of people Parker-Steele called on her cell phone, her landline, and her office phone,” Smith said, “and I cross-checked to see if any of them owned black SUVs. A lot of her contacts live in Manhattan and don’t even own cars, and of the thirty-seven who do, one drives a ten-year-old black Jeep Patriot. Her dentist.”
“What’s his name?” Kylie asked.
“Her name is Jo Ann Kinane,” Matt said. “We’re not looking for a female, and besides, the way the victim’s teeth were mangled, do you really think her dentist would—”
Cates opened the door.
“Captain,” Smith said, “we were just—”
“Save it,” she said. “You people all know who Rachael O’Keefe is? She was accused of murdering her daughter, and the jury acquitted her?”
She didn’t wait for an answer. Half the world knew who Rachael O’Keefe was.
“She was kidnapped last night at gunpoint. She was in Jersey with her sister. Two masked men stormed in at about three a.m. and took Rachael. They tied up the sister, and it was five hours before she managed to get loose. She was smart enough to call the Manhattan DA instead of the local cops. The DA called the commissioner, who called the chief of D’s, who called me. We could be dealing with Hazmat. This one is different from the first four kidnappings—the other victims weren’t taken by force, but if anyone sounds like a candidate for a couple of days of torture and a video confession, it’s Rachael O’Keefe. I want you to get out to Jersey and interview her sister.”
“It’s not our jurisdiction,” Kylie said. “You think we’ll piss off the locals or the Feds? It’s a little early to be crashing their party.”
“Well, well, well,” Cates said, “look who suddenly wants to play by the rules. Do you think I have time to ask some police chief in Leonia, New Jersey, if I can trample through his sandbox? It’s my job to worry about the political bullshit. It’s your job to get out there before the locals or the Feds have it on their radar. I already have a CSI team on the way. I want you two to dig up anything you can that relates to the Hazmat case, then get the hell out fast.”
“Who knew where Rachael was going once she was released?” Kylie said.
“Just a handful of people, but it was on a need-to-know basis. It was supposed to be a well-guarded secret, but secrets have a habit of leaking.”
“Maybe the sister told someone.”
“I don’t think she’d be that dumb, but if she did, find out who and track them down.”
Kylie and I headed for the door.
“And just in case preventing another homicide isn’t enough incentive for you two,” Cates said, “let me remind you that Election Day is only six days away.”
Chapter 48