Pretend You Don't See Her (10 page)

 
          
As
she drove along Route 4 she debated how much she would tell them about what was
going on. Everything, I guess, she finally decided. If Mom or Kit
call
me at the office and I’m not there, they’ll have to
know why.

 
          
Jack
Regan is a good lawyer, she assured herself as she turned onto Route 17. He’ll
straighten this out.

 
          
She
glanced in her rearview mirror. Was that car following her?
she
wondered, as she exited onto Sheridan Avenue. Stop it, she warned herself.
You’re getting paranoid.

 
          
Kit
and Jay lived on a quiet street in a section of pricey homes. Lacey pulled up
to the curb in front of their house, got out of the car, and started up the
walk.

 
          
“She’s
here,” Bonnie called out joyously, “Lacey’s here!” She ran for the door.

 
          
“About
time,” Jay grunted.

 
          
“Thank
God,” Mona Farrell murmured. She knew that despite Alex Carbine’s presence, Jay
was about to explode with irritation.

 
          
Bonnie
tugged at the door and opened it. As she raised her arms for Lacey’s hug, there
was the sound of shots, and bullets whistled past them. A flash of pain coursed
through her head, and Lacey threw herself forward, her body covering Bonnie’s.
It sounded as though the screams were coming from inside the house, but at that
moment Lacey’s whole mind seemed to be screaming.

 
          
In
the sudden quiet that followed the shots, she quickly ran a mental check of the
situation. The pain she felt was real, but she realized with a stab of anguish
that the gush of blood against her neck was coming from the small body of her
niece.

 
          
IN
THE WAITING ROOM ON THE PEDIATRICS FLOOR OF Hackensack Medical Center, a doctor
smiled reassuringly at Lacey. “Bonnie had a close call, but she’ll make it. And
she’s very insistent, Ms. Farrell, that she wants to see you.”

 
          
Lacey
was with Alex Carbine. After Bonnie was wheeled out of the operating room,
Mona, Kit, and Jay had followed her crib to her room. Lacey had not gone with
them.

 
          
My
fault, my fault—it was all she could think. She was only vaguely aware of the
headache caused by the bullet that had creased her skull. In fact, her whole
mind and body seemed numb, floating in a kind of unreality, not yet fully
comprehending the horror of all that was happening.

 
          
The
doctor, understanding her concern and aware that she was blaming herself, said,
“Ms. Farrell, trust me, it will take a while for that arm and shoulder to mend,
but eventually she’ll be as good as new. Children heal fast. And they forget
fast too.”

 
          
As
good as new, Lacey thought bitterly, staring straight ahead. She was rushing to
open the door for me—that’s all she was doing. Bonnie was just waiting for me.
And it almost cost her
her
life. Can anything ever be
“good as new” again?

 
          
“Lacey,
go on in and see Bonnie,” Alex Carbine urged.

 
          
Lacey
turned to look at him, remembering with gratitude how Alex had dialed 911 while
her mother tried to stem the blood that was spurting from Bonnie’s shoulder.

 
          
In
her niece’s room, Lacey found Jay and Kit sitting on either side of the crib.
Her mother was at the foot, now icy calm,
her
trained
nurse’s eyes observant.

 
          
Bonnie’s
shoulder and upper arm were heavily bandaged. In a sleepy voice she was
protesting, “I’m not a baby. I don’t want to
he
in a crib.” Then she spotted Lacey and her face
brightened. “Lacey!”

 
          
Lacey
tried to smile. “Snazzy-looking bandage, girlfriend. Where do I sign it?”

 
          
Bonnie
smiled back at her. “Did you get hurt too?”

 
          
Lacey
bent over the crib. Bonnie’s arm was resting on a pillow.

 
          
As
she died, Isabelle Waring’s arm had been reaching under a pillow, pulling out
the bloodied pages. It’s because I was there two days ago that Bonnie is here
tonight, Lacey thought. We could be planning her funeral right now.

 
          
“She
really is going to be all right, Lacey,” Kit said softly.

 
          
“Didn’t
you have any sense that you were being followed?” Jay asked.

 
          
“For
God’s sake, Jay, are you crazy?” Kit snapped. “Of course she didn’t.”

 
          
Bonnie
is hurt and they’re at each other’s throats because of me, Lacey thought. I
can’t let this happen.

 
          
Bonnie’s
eyelids were drooping. Lacey leaned down and kissed her cheek.

 
          
“Come
back tomorrow, please,” Bonnie begged.

 
          
“I
have some stuff to do first, but I’ll be back real soon,” Lacey promised her.

 
          
Her
lips lingered for a moment on Bonnie’s cheek. I’ll never expose you to danger
again, she vowed.

 
          
Back
in the waiting area, Lacey found detectives from the Bergen County prosecutor’s
office waiting for her. “We’ve been contacted by New York,” they told her.

 
          
“Detective
Sloane?” she asked.

 
          
“No.
The U.S. Attorney’s office, Miss Farrell.
We’ve been
asked to see that you get home safely.”

 
          
GARY
BALDWIN, UNITED STATES ATTORNEY FOR THE Southern District of the state,
generally wore a benign expression that seemed incongruous to anyone who had
ever seen him in action at a trial. Rimless glasses enhanced the scholarly look
of his thin face. Of medium height and slender build, and soft-spoken in his
demeanor, he nevertheless could annihilate a witness during cross-examination
and accomplish it without even raising his voice. Forty-three years old, he was
known to have national political ambitions and clearly would like to crown his
career in the U.S. Attorney’s office with a major, headline-grabbing case.

 
          
That
case might have just landed in his lap. It certainly had all the proper
ingredients: A young woman happens on a murder scene in an apartment on Manhattan’s
expensive Upper East Side, the victim the ex-wife of a prominent restaurateur.
Most important, the woman has seen the assailant and can identify him.

 
          
Baldwin
knew that if Sandy Savarano had come out of hiding to do this job, it had to be
tied to drugs. Thought to be dead for the past two years, Savarano had made a
career of being an enforcer who eliminated anyone who got in the way of the
drug cartel he worked for. He was about as ruthless as they get.

 
          
But
when the police had shown Lacey Farrell the mug shots they had of Savarano, she
had not recognized him. Either her memory was faulty, or Savarano had had
enough plastic surgery to successfully disguise his identity. Chances are it’s
the latter, Baldwin thought, and if so, then it means that Lacey Farrell is
just about the only person who can actually identify him.

 
          
Gary
Baldwin’s dream was to arrest and prosecute Savarano, or better yet, get him to
plea-bargain and give evidence against the real bosses.

 
          
But
the call he had just received from Detective Eddie Sloane had infuriated him.
The journal that seemed to be a key part of this case had been stolen from the
precinct. “I was keeping it in my cubby in the squad room—locked, of
course—while Nick Mars and I read it to see if there was anything useful in
it,” Sloane explained. “It disappeared sometime last night. We’re turning the
station house upside down to find out who lifted it.”

 
          
Then
Sloane had added, “Jimmy Landi has the copy Farrell gave him. I’m on my way to
get it from him.”

 
          
“Make
sure you get it before that disappears too,” Baldwin said.

 
          
He
slammed the phone down. Lacey Farrell was due in his office, and he had a lot
of questions for her.

 
          
Lacey
knew that she was being naïve in hoping that turning over Heather Landi’s
journal to the police would end her involvement in the case. When she finally
got home from New Jersey the night before, it was almost dawn, but still she
was unable to sleep, alternating between self-recrimination that she had put
Bonnie in mortal
danger,
and a sense of bewilderment
at the way that her whole life seemed to be falling apart. She felt like a
pariah, knowing that because she could identify the man she knew as Curtis
Caldwell, not only was she in danger, but anyone close to her was as well.

 
          
I
can’t go to visit Mom or Kit or the kids, she thought. I can’t have them visit
me. I’m afraid to go out on the street. How long is this going to last? And
what will make it end?

 
          
Jack
Regan had joined her in the waiting room outside the U.S. Attorney’s office. He
gave her a reassuring smile when a secretary said, “You can go in now.”

 
          
I
t was Baldwin’s habit to keep people waiting once inside his office while he
ostensibly completed making notes in a folder. Under lowered eyelids, he
studied Lacey Farrell and her lawyer as they took seats. Farrell looked like a
woman under severe stress, he decided. Not surprising given the fact that only
last night, in a spray of gunfire, a bullet had grazed her skull and another
had seriously injured a four-year-old child. It was a miracle that no one had
been killed in the shooting, Baldwin added to himself as he finally
acknowledged their presence.

 
          
He
did not mince words. “Ms. Farrell,” he said, “I am very sorry for the problems
you’ve been having, but the fact is you seriously impaired a major criminal
investigation by removing evidence from a crime scene. For all we know, you may
have destroyed some of that evidence. What you did turn over is now missing,
which is a stunning sign of its significance.”

 
          
“I
did not destroy—” Lacey began in heated protest, just as Jack Regan snapped,
“You have no right to accuse my client—”

 
          
They
were interrupted by Baldwin, who held up his hand for silence. Ignoring Regan,
his voice icy, he said, “Ms. Farrell, we have only your word for that. But you
have my word for this: The man you know as Curtis Caldwell is a ruthless
killer. We need your testimony to help convict him, and we intend to make sure
that nothing happens to prevent that.”

 
          
He
paused and stared at her. “Ms. Farrell, it is within my power to hold you as a
material witness. I promise you it won’t be pleasant. It would mean that you’d
be kept under twenty-four-hour guard in a special facility.”

 
          
“How
long a time are you talking about?” Lacey demanded.

 
          
“We
don’t know, Ms. Farrell. It would be however long it takes to apprehend and,
with your help, convict the murderer. I do know that until Isabelle Waring’s
killer is arrested, your life isn’t worth a plugged nickel, and until now we’ve
never had a case against this man where we thought we’d be able to prosecute
him successfully.”

 
          
“Would
I be safe after I testify against him?” Lacey asked. As she sat facing the U.S.
Attorney, she had a sudden sense of being in a car that was hurtling down a
steep hill, out of control, about to crash.

 
          
“No,
you wouldn’t be,” Jack Regan said firmly.

 
          
“On
the contrary,” Baldwin told them. “He’s claustrophobic. He will do anything to
avoid going to prison. Now that we can link him to a murder, he may well be
persuaded to turn state’s evidence once we’ve got him, in which case we would
not even bring him to trial. But until that happens we must keep you safe, Ms.
Farrell.”