Leary was there, unwisely eating everything in sight. We had fit some missing pieces together while he was in the hospital—he instantly recognized the two thugs in custody as the men who had invaded his apartment—and now he was eager to see where it had all started. To my surprise, he and my father hit it off instantly, trading stories about Brooklyn in the old days.
Chris had come back from camp a few days before, again starving and begging for a hot bath, with the results of her classes carefully packed into a portfolio. There were sketches and watercolor studies and a series of pictures she had taken in photography class, forest scenes after a rain. In one, the sun hitting the drops created a dazzling, multi-colored prism, a rainbow. I had the perfect place for it.
From deep in the duffle bag a turquoise bracelet emerged for me, agate earrings for all of her old friends, and a list of new friends who had to be invited to the party
.
At the party they immediately disappeared downstairs into the garden, and one of them was a cute boy who never left Chris’ side. Was this a new parenting abyss opening up? Tonight I was too busy as hostess to think about it much, but I’d have to ask some questions tomorrow.
In the fall, Chris and I went back to school at the same time. By putting in killer hours I was able to finish my project at the museum, write my report and get my credit. They offered me a part-time job for the fall semester. A real paycheck would be involved. Of course I said yes.
Chris talked to the boy from camp every night. He lived in Riverdale, the other end of the city. He was a two-hour subway ride away, which was fine with me.
As the fall moved along, it became clear that there would be no trial of anyone involved in Chris’ abduction, or the attack on Leary, or the various ways I had been harassed. The two men who had done it told everything they knew, to cut a deal for reduced jail time, just as Russo predicted. And when some small pieces of evidence they had overlooked put them in Rick’s house, they owned up to that too, desperately insisting his death had been an accident. They were only there to make threats, they said, but Rick had objected to their presence and threatened them. They had the nerve to claim it was self-defense. They would spend some serious time in jail, even with their deal.
And no, they did not know why they were threatening him, it was Mr. McLeod’s orders. They’d moved the body, tried to hide it, but in case it was ever investigated, they’d planted the bag of money to create confusion. Again, McLeod’s orders, they claimed, though I thought it sounded stupid enough to be their own idea.
In the meantime, McLeod calmly asserted there was no proof whatever that he even knew them, let alone was involved with any of their activities. He kept asserting it, and though Russo cursed when he told me, it looked like he was correct, and he was going to walk.
Steven, however, would not. With the best legal counsel money could buy, he was only able to bargain down to a minimum sentence. He insisted he had nothing to do with Chris’ kidnapping, he learned about it after the fact and was only there to see she was not harmed. Russo did not believe a word of that. I almost did—almost—sometimes—but I truly did not care.
All those years ago, when my husband was killed, I thought the worst thing possible had already happened to me, and there was nothing left to fear. Of course any parent knows that wasn’t true, and having Chris in danger brought that home again with a smack on the head. I would never forgive Steven.
We finally had that memorial for Rick and as he directed, it was a party. The soundtrack was Sinatra and Ellington and Rosemary Clooney, and old cops took turns with the mike, telling stories both funny and touching. We all lifted a glass of Jameson’s to the man we remembered.
The last piece of the story fell into place that day. Wanda showed up, escorted by her huge, silent brother. Her hair was a different color but her clothes were as eye catching as ever and she caught quite a few eyes. She mingled with old friends, joined in the toasting, and wept a little, but the story she most wanted to tell was not for the mike. It was for my father and me, no one else, and she told it in an empty adjoining room.
It was about a young, ambitious cop who took a bribe for the only time in his career. It wasn’t money but a promise of introductions going way up the ladder, in return for abandoning an investigation on a drug-ridden block of Park Slope. It was a long shot anyway—the parents from out of town, the runaway daughter, and the few clues they had that led to that neighborhood. He knew the places to look but someone made it worthwhile for him to say he didn’t, to not ask questions about the young people who had suddenly disappeared from an especially shady house, to make sure the parents went home to Minnesota without learning anything.
That was all it was. He had buried it in his memory until that missing girl turned up in a way that threatened someone he loved.
“He told me he told them he would never let you get hurt and they told him he still owed them and to keep his mouth shut after all these years. He didn’t respond well to threats, so.” Wanda shrugged, but there were tears in her eyes. “So they shut his mouth for him.” Her brother came into the room, tapping his watch. “I gotta go now. Plane to catch. Anyways thought you’d like to know.”
Dad and I went back into the reception, where someone was proposing another round to Rick.
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