“Giles seemed so upset when I first met him. Now, he’s totally caught up in himself. The more I think about what his kids have said, the more I wonder if that initial grief was all an act.”
“But connecting him to a guy like Parrish—”
“Parrish was his neighbor for a while.”
“That doesn’t mean he knew what Parrish was up to. Parrish isn’t a hit man; he kills for his own pleasure.”
“Maybe he’s done both. I’m going to talk to Phil Newly,” I said. “Maybe he’ll know if Parrish was in touch with anyone else, thought of anyone as a friend.”
“Phil may have helped me to find you,” he said, “but good luck getting him to take attorney-client privilege that lightly.”
I called Phil Newly’s number several times on Sunday afternoon and evening. No answer. I figured he might be away for the weekend.
That was one of my worries over the next few days — Phil Newly’s phone ringing unanswered. I should have been more worried than I was.
48
MONDAY MORNING, SEPTEMBER 18
Las Piernas
On Monday morning, while Jack was my sitter, we were able to pick up the van from the impound yard. I washed it more thoroughly than I have ever washed any vehicle. We took the Jeep back to Ben, who was able to use it in time to get to his first class. He seemed amazed that it came back to him in one piece.
I called Jo Robinson to complain about the hours she had arranged, and she told me that she had not expected that Wrigley would come up with this schedule. She was angry about it, but her calls to the
I kept calling Newly.
Travis called. He had been good about keeping in touch, although he was clearly having the time of his life with Stinger Dalton and as far as I could tell, was in no hurry to come back to Las Piernas. He had already soloed in small helicopters, and ecstatically related to me that Stinger was now teaching him to fly the big Sikorsky.
“So, are you still off work?” he asked me.
“No, in fact, I’m working tomorrow night.” I told him about my unique working hours.
“That really sucks,” he said, making me think he had spent a little too much time with Stinger.
“It’s only temporary,” I said.
“Maybe I’ll come and visit you soon. I miss the dogs.”
“Thanks.” I laughed.
“That’s not what I meant!”
“I know, I know. We all look forward to seeing you whenever you get a chance to come by.”
I was approaching the first night shift with some trepidation. Normally, I wouldn’t mind driving alone on deserted streets after midnight or working alone in an office on a graveyard shift, but nothing in my life was normal then. I had no doubt that Parrish would be stalking me on those streets, that Parrish would come to hunt me down in those empty hallways.
He’ll hunt you wherever you are, I told myself. I couldn’t hole up in the house forever. A life spent cowering was no life at all.
I was in that frame of mind when Frank told me he wanted to make sure that I was never unaccompanied at the newspaper on night shifts. I flatly refused to take a sitter into work with me. That argument livened things up for a few hours. He drove off, came back an hour later and handed me a cell phone.
“What’s this?”
“My peace of mind.”
“You expect me to carry this around with me—”
“And to have it on. Yes.”
“Can we afford this?”
“It’s cheaper than a funeral.”
“Frank!”
“Okay, okay. Just carry it around for my peace of mind, please?”
I gave in.
I didn’t do much of anything in connection with the Sayre case for the next week; I was too busy adjusting my sleep schedule and catching up with the paperwork that had piled up on my desk at the
Frank tested me a few times, making sure I had the cell phone turned on, until I finally told him that if he didn’t quit making me jump out of my skin by making the damned phone chirp, I was going to roll the thing between a couple of presses. That took care of that.
I tried calling Newly at eleven-thirty. No answer.
The newsroom was empty and quiet.
