Jessica moved through the living room, down the short hallway to the kitchen. She poured herself a few inches of coffee, tried the back door for the tenth time. It was an old habit, and died accordingly.
She’d gotten a call from Byrne telling her that the house in the Pocket was clear. There was no sign of Michael Farren. Byrne and Bình Ngô were on the way back.
She stepped into the small bathroom, closed the door. She splashed some cold water on her face, toweled off. Then she walked back down the short hallway leading to the front room.
At first she thought it was some kind of mannequin, a tailor’s model perhaps. The figure was petite almost to the point of being childlike. Her face was deeply lined, but her skin was clear, almost translucent. She wore a white gauze dress that draped off her slight shoulders.
But the shock of seeing this stranger in this house – a house with which Jessica had become quite familiar in the past few hours, even to the point of moving furniture to create clear paths to the doors and windows – nearly paled in comparison to the sight of the woman’s hair. It was long and surprisingly silken for a woman who had to be in her eighties.
Jessica knew that she had just encountered a threat. She knew this as deeply and completely as she had ever sensed a threat on the street, both in her time in uniform and as a detective.
But still she did not draw her weapon.
Just as the spell was broken and Jessica reached for her Beretta, the woman began to sing. At first it was a low, keening sound that quickly grew to a melodious song. It only stopped Jessica for a few seconds, but a few seconds was long enough.
‘I’ll have that,’ came the low voice.
Before she could turn around, ADA Jessica Balzano felt the cold steel barrel of the Makarov touch the side of her head.
Standing in front of Anjelica Leary’s house, Byrne checked and rechecked the action on his weapon, then chided himself for the redundancy. He walked the perimeter of the block, around the side of the row houses, through the back alley, every so often testing doors, windows.
If a car slowed down near the Leary house, he would slip his hand onto the grip of his weapon until the vehicle passed.
It was on his second perimeter check that the call came over the radio.
He clicked his handset. ‘Byrne.’
‘Kevin, it’s Josh. K-9 has a hit. I’m in the building next to Mrs. Leary’s house.’
Byrne felt his skin go damp.
‘Explosives?’
‘No,’ Bontrager said. ‘The search dogs. They hit for Farren’s clothing.’
When Byrne rounded the corner, Josh Bontrager was standing next to a K-9 officer named Brad Summers. At his feet was a two-year-old male German Shepherd named Calhoun.
They stood at the entry to the corner unit next to the Leary house. It was a shuttered store. An old sign over the door read
Tully’s
.
‘Officer Summers,’ Byrne said. ‘What do we have?’
‘Calhoun was working his way around the second floor and alerted me to the stairs leading to the attic. We went up the stairs and he sat in front of this half-door built into the adjoining wall.’
‘That’s how he alerts you?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘And he is alerting to Michael Farren?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Show me.’
With Calhoun anxiously taking the lead, they walked to the second floor, then took the stairway to the attic. The ceiling was low and sloped, so Byrne had to bend over. The room was crowded with boxes and old furniture.
The dog sat in front of a half-door built into the adjoining wall. Byrne slipped on a glove, reached out, gently pushed on the door. It gave only an inch or so before touching something. Because of the Farren family’s history with explosive ordnance, Byrne decided not to push it any further.
‘Kevin,’ Bontrager said in a loud whisper. Byrne looked over. Josh had his Maglite pointed at a piece of paper next to the door, a handwritten note.
The note read:
There is a motion detector alarm in the room on the other side of this door. You will not disarm it before I hear it. If I hear it, everyone will die.
Byrne recalled what Emily Carson had said to him:
He told me he bought a motion detector.
‘Can you see anything?’ he whispered.
Bontrager got on his knees, slowly edged his face toward the opening. It was only a half-inch or so. Byrne could make out dim light.
‘I see it,’ Bontrager said. ‘It’s one of those portable battery-operated types. I’ve seen this model. You can’t get anywhere near it without triggering it, and they are loud as heck.’
‘Are there any lights on it?’
Bontrager got in a better position. ‘There is one. A red light in the center. It’s armed.’
Michael Farren was inside Anjelica Leary’s house.
And so was Jessica.
Jessica sat on a dining room chair in the middle of the living room. To her right sat Anjelica Leary.
Michael Farren stood near the front door. Being this close to him, she marveled not for the first time just how ordinary people could appear, especially those you knew to have committed monstrous acts of cruelty.
Although he appeared ragged, and in need of sleep, he was an average-looking man in his thirties – slender but muscular, with long, unkempt hair to his shoulders. He wore a black leather coat, black T-shirt, muddy jeans, black work boots. The pistol in his hand was immaculate, pristinely maintained.
Jessica’s Beretta was now stuck into the waistband of Michael Farren’s jeans.
On the wall next to the front door were pinned about a dozen photographs. One was clearly of the older woman, perhaps taken when she was in her fifties. Set off to the right was a picture of Anjelica Leary.
In front of the fireplace were stacked five birth certificates, with Anjelica Leary’s on top.
The curtains over the front window were sheer. There were no other drapes. Even with the low light – the television was the only light in the room; it was tuned to a news channel showing a live shot from the block, alternating between street level and helicopter footage – Jessica knew that SWAT, with their sophisticated weaponry and scopes, could see anyone and anything that passed in front of the window.
When the house phone rang, Jessica looked at Michael Farren. He nodded, tapped one of his ears. She knew what he meant. She slowly got to her feet, crossed over to the phone, which was on a small table at the foot of the stairs. She pressed the speakerphone button.
‘This is Jessica Balzano.’
‘Jess, are you on speaker?’
It was Byrne.
‘Yes.’
‘Everyone okay in there?’
She again looked at Farren, who nodded. She kept her eyes on the man as she said:
‘Yes. All four of us are okay.’
Farren didn’t react. It was a risk, but Byrne had to know there were four people inside. She couldn’t yet think of a way to tell him that the fourth person was an old woman. Plus, it was a way to let him know that there were at
least
four people. Jessica really didn’t know if there was anyone else in the house.
‘Billy? I just want you to know that nothing bad is going to happen,’ Byrne said. ‘There’s no reason for anyone to get hurt.’
Farren crossed the room.
‘Call back later,’ he said. ‘We have business.’
He hit the button, ending the call. He pointed at the empty chair.
Jessica sat down again.
Finally Anjelica Leary spoke.
‘How many years has it been, Mrs Farren?’
The old woman raised a delicate hand, as if to brush away a spider web. ‘It’s been so many years that you needn’t call me that any longer. It’s Máire.’ She spoke with a deep Irish accent.
‘
Mrs Farren
will suit, thank you,’ Anjelica said.
The old woman nodded, said: ‘It was a grand time, wasn’t it? Back then?’
‘For some,’ Anjelica said. ‘Not for all.’
‘I’ve buried my husband, two of my three boys,’ Máire said. ‘One of my grandsons.’
‘This is the life you chose, Máire Farren.’
The old woman shrugged. ‘We all serve somebody. I chose my God. You chose yours.’
Anjelica pointed at Michael. ‘Yours has a gun.’
‘Sometimes it is necessary to protect your own.’
‘The men can take care of themselves.’
‘Really?’ Máire asked. ‘Like my Desmond?’
‘He killed my Catriona.’
‘He did not.’
‘He was seen with her.’
‘How do you know this?’ Máire asked.
‘A mother knows.’
‘Yes,’ the old woman said. ‘A mother does.’
‘What do you know of it?’
‘I know the pain of loss. When my Desmond was shot down like a dog in the street, and thrown into the river, my husband was already in the ground. Danny and Patrick wanted to take a match to the entire Pocket, but I said no.’
‘And why is that?’ Anjelica asked. ‘Because you knew what Desmond had done?’
‘Because we live in each other’s shelter, do we not? Where do you think the police would have come if Devil’s Pocket ran red with Irish blood? Your house? No.
Mine
.’
Anjelica waved a dismissive hand. ‘You Farrens are a cancer. It all ends here and now. You’ve lived these many years, and your life ends in shame.’
‘I’m not dead yet.’
‘No, not yet,’ Anjelica said. ‘That will come in a cold jail cell. Just like your husband. An old woman in a stone coffin. Fitting.’
Jessica wanted to enter this conversation – it seemed to be escalating. She looked to the side window, next to the fireplace. Although she could not be sure, she thought she saw a thin cable rise into the lower-right corner, just below the bottom slat of the venetian blinds. If she was right, this would be an endoscope camera deployed by SWAT.
She glanced at Michael Farren. He had not seen it.
‘Or maybe it will all end here, in this room,’ Anjelica said. She gestured to the window. ‘The police are everywhere. Do you think you will just rise from that chair and walk away? You may think yourself the
sídhe
, but you are delusional. You always were.’
The old woman smiled, but did not respond. Instead she reached into her bag on the floor, pulled out a white linen handkerchief. She spread it on the table in front of her. Then she took out a small cruet, deep amber in color, took off the top, tilted it to a finger and made a line on the handkerchief, all the while singing softly.
My God, Jessica thought. She is writing the last line in blood.
Before long, Máire Farren put the cruet away, left the handkerchief on the table to dry. She had written:
ROTAS
.
The phone rang again. No one moved.
‘They’re going to come storming in here if I don’t answer,’ Jessica said.
‘No they won’t,’ Michael said.
After ten rings it stopped.
The old woman pointed at Anjelica, then looked at Jessica. ‘She is the only one left. The Farren curse will be lifted tonight. You can’t harm us.’
‘It doesn’t matter what you do to me,’ Anjelica said. ‘Your place in hell has been reserved for years.’
Michael Farren crossed the room, put the barrel of the Makarov to Anjelica Leary’s head. Anjelica closed her eyes.
‘Not one more word from you, woman,’ Farren said. ‘Not one.’
Byrne watched the shadows move on the sheer curtains. He turned around to see the two SWAT marksmen on the roof of the building across the street.
He walked to the tech van, stepped inside.
The endoscope camera on the west side of the row house showed two walls. Jessica, Anjelica Leary and an old woman with long white hair. It was Máire Farren.
Byrne could see part of the wall that led from the front door to the kitchen. Farren had pinned the photographs to the wall next to the door. He needed to look at them to know who was whom.
While Byrne was watching, he saw Michael Farren cross the room, turn off the television.
He got on the radio to the two SWAT officers.
They did not have a shot.
Byrne found Maria Caruso in the crowd. He caught her eye, beckoned her over. When he told her what he wanted her to do, she only hesitated a split second. Moments later she was in a patrol car with a uniformed officer. They left the scene code two, no lights, no siren.
The three media vans were parked just beyond the police cordon at the corner of 23rd and Bainbridge. In addition to the reporters who were waiting to do their stand-ups, and the camera personnel, a crowd of more than a hundred people had gathered.
Byrne searched the crowd, found a face he recognized, a veteran field reporter for the local CBS affiliate named Howard Kelly. Although Byrne didn’t often deal with the media – the brass preferred to leave those things to the media relations officer – he had been cleared to give an interview a few years earlier after the resolution of a string of gruesome murders in the Badlands. To whatever degree a law enforcement officer could have a professional relationship with a member of the media, Byrne felt he had a foundation for asking what he was going to ask.
He ducked under the tape, approached Kelly.
‘Detective,’ Kelly said, extending a hand.
‘Good to see you, Howard.’
They shook.
‘It doesn’t look like you’re getting ready to give a statement,’ Kelly said.
‘Not just yet,’ Byrne said. ‘But I need to ask a favor.’
Rare was the depth and breadth of the silence that followed a statement like that from a police officer to a member of the broadcast media.
‘I’m all ears,’ Kelly said.
‘This has to be off the record for now.’
‘Understood.’
‘Do you have a cameraman you can trust?’
Kelly pointed at a man leaning against a van. At his feet was a hand-held HD camera with the station’s logo on the side. ‘I trust that man with my life,’ Kelly said. ‘Literally. We work North Philly.’
Byrne laid out his plan. Kelly listened, rapt.
‘Is this something you can do?’ Byrne asked.
‘It is.’
‘And to answer your next question, yes, when this is all over, I will give you an exclusive.’
Kelly smiled. ‘Hadn’t crossed my mind.’
The two men shook again.
‘What do you want to do first?’ Kelly asked.
‘Your tie,’ Byrne said.
‘What about it?’
‘Is it blue or black?’
Five minutes later, Maria Caruso returned. She had with her the item Byrne had requested. He returned to the tech van, put on a headset, called Anjelica Leary’s landline again. After five rings, it was answered. No one said anything.
‘This is Kevin. I’m with the police department. Who am I speaking to?’
A pause. Then: ‘This is Billy.’
‘Good. Billy. Is everything all right in there?’
‘Everything is fine.’
Byrne had twice visited Quantico, had twice attended a seminar that addressed hostage negotiation techniques. He knew the five steps: active listening, empathy, rapport, influence and behavioral change.
Right now, he couldn’t remember a thing. He knew that a highly trained agent was en route from the FBI’s Philadelphia field office, but he was not there yet. And Jessica was inside.
‘How do we make this better?’ he asked.
‘There is only one way.’
‘Okay. I’m listening. What can I do?’
‘You can pack up your guns and your badges and go home.’
‘Well, that will be a tough sell to my boss, I’m afraid. Is there another way?’
‘There is not.’
Byrne had to think. He reached into his pocket. He had no choice.
‘I have something for you,’ he said.
A long pause. ‘What do you have?’
‘It’s kind of hard to describe,’ Byrne said. ‘I can send it to your cell phone. Do you have one?’
‘No.’
‘Okay,’ Byrne said. ‘Tell you what. Jessica has an iPhone. Have her give it to you, and I’ll send it over.’
Byrne closed his eyes, waiting for it all to fall apart.
‘Send it,’ Farren said.