Unlucky 13(77)

I slapped my right-hand jacket pocket, going for my phone. But my phone wasn’t there. It wasn’t in any of my pockets. What the hell? I slapped my pockets again.

Damn it. Was my phone in the stroller?

And then I remembered taking the picture of Julie, then putting down the phone as I got her ready to go.

Julie. How long had it been since I left her? One minute? Five?

I trotted a half-block to the corner of 10th, checking out people with such a fierce look that many pulled back as if I were crazy. Meanwhile, a lot of people were dressed in jeans and hoodies. Christ, it was practically a uniform for kids of a certain age.

I crossed Clement and doubled back toward 11th.

After five minutes of searching for Morales, the heartstrings that connected me to my daughter like a bungee cord yanked me back to Rosalie’s Fanfare.

I ran like a 49er with the ball, goalposts in sight, in the last seconds of the game.

I dodged and I wove and I sped down the street, homing in on the fashion boutique where my little girl was waiting. I stiff-armed the door—and ran right into Cindy.

She was holding Julie in her arms, staring out the window, waiting for me.

“Cindy. How—?”

“I saw you leaving your place. I called out to you, but you didn’t hear me.”

I hugged Cindy and the baby together, tears coming.

“I followed you,” Cindy said, hanging on to me. “I do that sometimes. Don’t be mad, okay?”

“Mad? She’s out there, damn it. Did you see her? You were right.”

“I didn’t want to be right.”

“Thank you, Cindy.”

We were safe for now—and I had been warned.





CHAPTER 106


ROSALIE’S FANFARE WAS two blocks from my apartment, and Cindy had parked her Honda just up the street from my front door. No cab and no cruiser would get to us in the five minutes it would take us to trot home.

Cindy stayed with Julie inside the boutique while I looked long and hard at the foot traffic outside. Then, I signaled to my friend and we all started out toward Lake Street at a very quick clip.

Cindy and I were both paranoid, but Julie was enjoying herself. Maybe it was the swiftness of her little stroller and the two of us hovering over her, or maybe her stars had suddenly aligned.

All I knew for sure was that Party Girl Molinari was laughing.

Our little group of three cut through lunch-hour pedestrians on 12th and a block later, when we crossed California, I almost began to breathe normally.

The residential block between California and Lake was humming sweetly. The street was wide and homey, dotted with trees. Ground-level garages had SUVs in the driveways, retirees walked dogs, and a woman in pink sweats was sweeping her walk while talking to her neighbor, who was unloading groceries from her car.

Cindy was saying, “So, what now? You’ll get out an all points bulletin?”

“Too bad I can’t make a positive ID, but anyway, the FBI is going to want to talk to us.”

I was doing my own APB, checking out everything that moved. Dogs barked from a doorway. A man slid out from under his car and got on his phone. He wore a sweatshirt with the sleeves ripped off. He was a man’s man, not a slim-hipped psycho killer.

Cindy was saying, “Until Mackie Morales is in jail, I’m not going to be able to think about anything else, or even sleep. Or even eat. You think I’m obsessed?”

I laughed.

Cindy said, “So, that’s a yes.”

And then we both stopped talking until we arrived safely at the sunny corner of 12th and Lake. My apartment building was directly to my right, and Cindy had parked her car just a few doors to our left. I checked out the moderate two-way traffic, the cars parked on both sides, and the trees between the cars and the storefronts.

Then Cindy and I grabbed each other over the stroller and kissed cheeks.

She said, “I’m calling Yuki. I need to see her.”

We blew kisses and waved good-bye, and then I said to Julie, “Ride’s over, baby girl. Daddy is probably home already, and I think he’s going to put you down for a nap.”

I walked toward the front door of our building with my keys in hand, and that’s when something I’d half seen, a peripheral flicker, or an instinct, gave me a chill.

I jerked my head toward the mailbox on the corner.

There was a woman there, wearing a long white skirt, a white drapy sweater jacket, and a straw hat with a band around it.

She had been crossing Lake when her image imprinted itself in my mind. Now she had her back to me and was closing the letter slot on the mailbox. It made a dull, metallic clang.

I was on high alert, but I was just scaring myself.

Mackie Morales didn’t dress like that.

That couldn’t be her.





CHAPTER 107