A Cruel Season for Dying (46 page)

Pig in a suit.
That’s what Zoe thought Chief of Detectives Lincoln McCauley looked like today. His tiny porcine eyes all full of self-congratulation,
if still wary. Whistling in the dark. If pork could whistle. He was up there now at the podium, patting himself on the back,
taking the credit that “the terror was over.” He should try for a job writing headlines.

She shot a quick look at Johnny, standing in the background with Sakura and other members of the task force on the stage.
She’d caught him glancing her way early on, and pretended not to notice, preening in her turquoise suit that was going to
shoot great on TV.

Television.
That was her goal, the reason she’d held back from the paper on that little gem she’d picked up from the Mancuso girl. For
all the high energy in this room today, what had come to be called the “Death Angel” story was basically dead. As dead as
Thomas Graff. Oh, the media were all full of his being ID’d in the lineup and the dramatic discovery of the locket in the
rectory basement. And everybody was digging for backstory on the Gil Avery connection. But it was really all over but the
shouting. Unless another body turned up. Or little Zoe managed to shake things.

Which was just what little Zoe had in mind. A couple of appearances on cable had picked up some good feedback, but unless
this story got new legs, unless the terror
wasn’t
over, she would no longer be such a hot commodity.

On the stage McCauley had finished his statement. He was turning over the podium to Lieutenant James Sakura. The lieutenant
would answer their questions.

Sakura looked less than thrilled. In fact, he didn’t look a whole lot better than he had the other day in his office. Did
he know the sharks
were circling? Did he suspect that they had the wrong man? She felt a little sorry she was about to make things worse, tossing
in the red meat at feeding time.

She raised her hand, but he went to the
Times,
courting the respectable papers.

“How specific was the suicide note?” Henry Jacobs wanted to know, echoing the rumors that they’d all heard, that Graff’s supposed
confession had been very vague indeed.

“The note is just one piece of the evidence against Father Graff.” Sakura did a side step. “And his suicide, one might have
to conclude, is as viable an expression of his guilt as anything he might have written.”

The next questions went to local TV. The reporters nibbling at the edges, pulling at threads—loose ends that were intriguing,
but nothing that seriously threatened to unravel the picture of Graff as the killer. Like a tennis match. Serve and volley.
Sakura more than holding his own.

“Ms. Kahn …” He recognized her.

She stood. She’d made sure to get an end seat so that the pool camera in the aisle could get a good angle. She had thought
a lot about her question, how to phrase it for the greatest impact, to sow the most doubt. She remembered to look elegantly
grave. This was going out on cable.

“Lieutenant Sakura,” she began, “I think it’s fair to say that your most damning piece of evidence against Father Graff, the
only real
physical
evidence that points to his committing any of these murders, is the necklace that was found in the rectory basement.”

She saw him tense, thought for a moment that he might confirm the hypothesis in her statement, but he avoided that trap at
least. She went on speaking, conscious of the camera zooming in, of all the eyes in the room.

“Chief McCauley confirmed for us today”—pin it on the pig if she could—“that the necklace found in the rectory was Lucia Mancuso’s.”
She stared at Sakura. “But that’s wrong.”

She had thought her bald statement might have elicited an audible reaction from the gathering. It was better than that. Dead
silence.

“
Wrong,
Ms. Kahn?” This time Sakura walked into her opening, fatalism in his eyes. It almost seemed that he relished this.

She took a breath.
Forgive me, Celia.
“Lucia Mancuso never wore that necklace,” she said. “It belongs to her sister. It was the sister who lost the necklace in
the rectory basement. She told me so herself.”

Now the crowd breathed and murmured. Everybody making notes.

Sakura was cool. “We’ll follow up on that.” He smiled at her. “But it is, as you yourself suggested, only one piece of the
case against Father Graff. We’re still waiting for other evidence from that basement, including DNA.”

It was as good a save as was possible. Especially the DNA bluff. She hoped the sharks appreciated it. As for her, it was mission
accomplished.

Willie and Darius were waiting for him when Sakura returned to his office. They looked like conspirators. He didn’t know what
he’d expected when he’d brought them together, but it wasn’t exactly this. He felt a small prick of jealousy at their alliance.

He greeted them both, sat down behind his desk, littered with surveillance photos from last week’s funerals. “I didn’t expect
to see you here today,” he said to Michael.

Darius remained silent. It was Willie who spoke. “It was pretty rough out there at the end. What do you think about this thing
with the locket?”

“Ms. Kahn generally has her facts straight,” he answered. “Johnson’s headed to the Mancusos’ to check if the sister lied.”

Willie frowned. “Losing the physical evidence is tough,” she said, “but it’s not our whole case. We still have the bartender
and—”

“And Graff’s still dead.” Sakura was aware of how he sounded. “No need now for probable cause.”

“He did leave a confession.”

“‘I’m sorry.’” He quoted the note. “Graff didn’t say for what.”

“Would an innocent man kill himself?” She was playing devil’s advocate.

“Maybe if he couldn’t see a way out,” he answered. “Circumstantial evidence piling up. He photos a guy whose roommate turns
up among the dead. Gets ID’d by a witness who’s seen some guy with glasses and a hat for two minutes in a bar. Not to mention
he’s been publicly outed and basically screwed with the Church.”

“Might make me depressed.” Michael had finally said something.

Willie shook her head. “I can’t pretend that losing the necklace wouldn’t be a real blow, and aspects of the profile still
bother me….”

“Nothing fits, Willie,” Sakura said. “We’ve made it fit.”

“I know,” she conceded. “There’s always been something wrong with how we’ve looked at this case. It’s like one of those Magic
Eye pictures, where the surface pattern hides the 3-D image. If we could change our normal focus somehow … look through the
surface. That’s where the real meaning is, in a place we haven’t begun to imagine.”

He had nothing to say to that.

“I had this idea the other night,” she went on, “that maybe the killer is selecting the victims by their appearance, not their
sexual orientation. Lucia could fit then, if you grant that she was something of a tomboy. And the men were all fairly effeminate….”
She let it die, thinking no doubt what they were all thinking. That time was running out for Jimmy. That the fiasco of the
necklace would demand a scapegoat.

Willie stood. “I want to get some of my notes…. I’ll meet you in the squad room.” She looked at Michael.

He watched Darius watching her leave. “You and Willie seem to be getting along.”

Darius turned to him, tilted back in the chair. “Yeah.”

“‘Yeah’ …?” he repeated the monosyllable.

“What do you want to hear, Sakura? That my intentions are honorable?”

“Willie can take care of herself,” he said. “Maybe you should be careful.”

Darius ignored the comment. Let the chair fall flat. “He’s still out there.”

They were back to that. He swiveled in his own chair now. A Kabuki dance. “Do you think I fucking don’t know it?”

Darius’s eyes narrowed. He reached in his pocket for his cigarettes, then seemed to think better of it. “I’d like to go through
the files.”

This was another surprise. “Give Kelly a call first. I’m leaving this afternoon. I’ve got a conference in Baltimore tomorrow.”

Darius nodded and stood. “If I figure anything out—”

“You have my cell phone number.”

The snow came down as it had long threatened, in tiny needlepoint flakes that blew in misty swirls through the plaza. The
man stood his ground, not far from the ramp going down into the headquarters garage. He had been in this particular spot for
a while now, watching the cars that drove in and out. He’d have to move on again soon. He didn’t want the guard in the booth
to spot him and wonder what he was doing.

He had gotten to Police Plaza as quickly as he could, searching for the man he’d seen on TV. Since he’d arrived, he’d remained
outside the building, dividing his time between the ramp and the main entrance. Occasionally he’d gone indoors to look around,
his camera bag at his shoulder, reprising his role as photojournalist.

The force of the wind increased, blowing stinging flurries in his face. He took it as a sign to move on, and pulling the drawstring
of his hood tighter, he began walking around the building. A reporter, whom he recognized, started up the stairs as he approached.
He slowed, glancing around at the crowds of bundled people moving toward the doors. He heard the reporter’s voice ahead of
him, calling to someone. Reflexively he turned and looked up at the man who was coming out of the building with the dark-haired
woman at his side.

“Sergeant Darius.” The reporter was backpedaling slowly down the stairs ahead of him, dancing in front of the man, attempting
to stop his forward progress. “You back on the force, Sergeant?”

“No, I’m not. Just a private citizen.” The man took the woman’s arm, pushed forward and free, passing only feet from where
he was standing. The light moved with him and lit the windblown snow, a blazing glow of milky incandescence.

Sakura leaned back in his chair, closing his eyes. Darkness lay beyond the darkness, a thick debilitating blackness that sucked
air from his lungs, drained blood from his veins until he was no more than the vacated shell, surrendered by the locust he’d
once kept as a child. Even now, he could see into the deserted bamboo cage, could hear the crackle as his seven-year-old fingers
crushed the brittle
exoskeleton into brown dust. The locust had escaped its old life. A perfect reincarnation that had left him sad and bewildered.

“I might be getting drunk after what happened at that press conference.” Faith Baldwin stood in the threshold of his office,
backlit by the squad room chaos. She closed the door.

“Where were you?” He brought up the fact that she had not shared the stage with the rest of the higher-ups.

“I was delayed, but arrived in time to hear Ms. Kahn’s news. Quite the bitch, but I admire her tenaciousness….” She had moved
next to his chair and was looking down at him.

He felt himself straighten, the earlier darkness transforming itself into a liquid heaviness resettling in his gut. “One piece
of evidence doesn’t make a case. Or lose it.”

She walked away toward the glass window separating his office from the squad room. “No, but I wouldn’t have enjoyed prosecuting
the good priest and having that locket bite me in the ass.” She toyed with the blinds, finally closing them. “But it’s all
moot since Thomas Graff bailed out on us.”