in the background was breaking his heart.
“P.O., no, no,” the old man shouted. “P.O., no, no!”
“Put him on the phone,” said Jack.
“I can’t. We’re restraining him.”
“What? I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
He hung up and ran to his car. He was speeding down the ramps from the roof of the garage when his phone rang again. This time, however, the word PRIVATE appeared on the caller-ID display, and the timing brought a much needed sense of calm.
“Andie?” he said, answering.
“Hi, babe,” she said.
Andie Henning was Jack’s fiancee. He’d popped the question at the surprise birthday party she’d thrown for him last month. Andie had accepted on the spot-and disappeared eight days later. When people asked him what it felt like to be engaged, Jack honestly couldn’t tell them. He didn’t know where Andie was, didn’t know when she was coming back, and had no idea when she would call next. She made him promise not to come looking for her, refused to share her new cell number, and wouldn’t tell him who she was living with. He didn’t know what she looked like anymore, though he was certain that the gorgeous long hair that had once splayed across his pillow had changed entirely. Jack didn’t even know her new name.
Andie was unlike any woman Jack had ever known-and not just because she was an FBI agent who worked undercover. Jack loved that she wasn’t afraid to cave dive in Florida’s aquifers, that in her training at the FBI Academy she’d nailed a perfect score on one of the toughest shooting ranges in the world, that as a teenager she’d been a Junior Olympic mogul skier-something Jack didn’t even know about her until she rolled him out of bed one hot August morning and said, “Let’s go skiing in Argentina.” He loved the green eyes she’d gotten from her Anglo father and the raven-black hair from her Native American mother, a mix that made for such exotic beauty.
He hated being away from her.
“When are you coming back?” he asked.
“You know I can’t answer that,” she said.
He knew. But on days like today, he couldn’t help but ask. Funny, he’d been divorced for years, perfectly fine with living alone. But Andie’s enthusiastic “yes” had been like the flip of an emotional light switch. The thought of being away from her tonight was almost too painful.
“I can’t talk long,” she said. “Just wanted to check in, say I love you.”
“Love you, too.”
“And Jack?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m not at liberty to say much about this, especially over the phone. But…”
He waited, then prodded. “But what?”
“Do yourself a favor,” she said. “Stay away from the Jamal Wakefield murder case.”
Jack gripped the phone. It had been one of their express understandings-a solemn pact to ensure a happy marriage between a criminal defense lawyer and an FBI agent. He didn’t tell her how to do her job-whether to take this undercover assignment or that one-and she didn’t tell him what cases to handle. He knew it wasn’t a rule she would have broken lightly.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” he said.
“Good,” she said. “I’ll call again when I can.”
One more “I love you,” and she hung up.
Jack tucked the phone away and stopped the car to pay the teller at the exit to the Flipper-flamingo, string- bikini, pina-colada-whatever-garage. He tried to take Andie’s advice in the spirit in which it had been given. It was eating at him so badly, however, that he almost missed his exit for the Dolphin-what else?-Expressway. A cabdriver gave him the horn and the finger as Jack cut across two lanes. His train of thought switched to his grandfather shouting out random letters while trying to break out of the Alzheimer’s bed restraints, but he was also thinking about Andie’s advice. Warning. Whatever it was.
“Stay away from the Jamal Wakefield murder case.”
He knew her concern had nothing to do with the fact that the accused was a former Gitmo detainee, or that the victim was a sixteen-year-old girl. It wasn’t even the fact that the attempted murder charge involved the blinding of a cop named Vincent Paulo. It was the fact that Jack knew Vince. Not only knew him, but owed him. He and Theo both were indebted to Sergeant Paulo, big time. And now Jack represented Jamal Wakefield of Miami, Florida, aka Khaled al-Jawar of Somalia.
Sorry, Andie. Sorry, Vince.
P.O., no no.
Coming, Grandpa.
Why is nothing ever simple?
Chapter Six
I should have held at sixteen,” said Vince.
He was back at home in the comfort of his bed. Sam lay quietly on the rug beside the dresser. His wife was at his side, still awake.
“What did you say, honey?” asked Alicia.
“In Dr. Feldman’s office today,” he said. “I was sitting on a king and the six of clubs, and like an idiot, I say, Hit me. Of course I busted. He dealt me a seven.”
Vince felt the gentle caress of her hand at his chin, then the warmth of her kiss at the side of his mouth.
“I’m so happy for you,” she whispered.
Vince smiled as she rolled back to her side of the mattress. It was late and he needed rest after such a full day, but he was too excited to sleep.
The Brainport session had lasted two hours. The first hurdle was to understand that it wasn’t like seeing with your eyes. “It’s more akin to a language in that you develop a skill,” Dr. Feldman had told him. After five minutes he was able to operate the device. Within an hour he was recognizing sensations on his tongue and reaching out for a ball as it rolled in front of him. By the end of the session he was playing blackjack-not with Braille cards, but with regular ones. The next goal was to get him through an obstacle course, and from there the sky was the limit. Unfortunately, he couldn’t take it home. Brainport was experimental. But it gave him hope. Today had been a great day, and nothing was going to spoil it.
Not even Jamal Wakefield.
“Vince?” asked Alicia. “Do you think… Will you have to testify at the trial?”
Jamal Wakefield, the three-year-old unsolved murder of McKenna Mays, and “the horrible price Miami police officer Vincent Paulo paid trying to bring the alleged killer to justice,” had been the lead story on the local evening news. Vince had received a heads-up that morning from the assistant state attorney. He and Alicia had skirted the topic all night long, talking nonstop about Brainport. It had become the elephant in the room.
“I’m meeting with the assistant state attorney tomorrow. It’ll be fine. Don’t worry about it.”
Vince peeled back the bedsheet to feel the night air on his chest. All of Florida was basking in glorious January weather, perfect for sleeping with the window open. Then, slowly but surely, Vince could almost feel a 101 -degree cloud coming over him-a cloud so noxious that it probably violated several articles of the Geneva Conventions. Sam was a terror when there was fallen fruit in the backyard.
“Damn, Sammy,” he said as he pulled the sheet up over his head. “Can you lay off the avocados?”
The cloud evaporated, cool air rustled the window sheers-and Vince could all but hear the wheels still turning in Alicia’s head.
“Vince?” she asked in a tentative voice. “What do you think the prosecutor will tell you tomorrow?”
He lowered the bedsheet and sighed. Even after three years, it wasn’t easy to talk about it. “I’m sure I’ll have to testify.”
“But they didn’t call you before the grand jury.”
