“Susan,” Hawk said, “we let somebody kill us, it our fault.”
“You know what I mean,” Susan said.
Rachel Wallace said, “It’s the way they live. If it weren’t your situation, it would be someone else’s. A few years ago it was mine.”
Susan nodded without speaking. But there was something in her face. I walked from the window, around the counter, and put my arms around her. She pressed her face into my neck and neither of us said anything.
The phone rang. Hawk picked it up and listened.
I murmured to Susan, “Sure we’re in this particolar thing because of things that you did. But that’s not why you did them.”
On the phone Hawk said, “Sure.”
“You did what you had to do,” I said. “The year before you left wasn’t good. So you did something to change it.”
Hawk said, “We be there.”
“I did nothing,” I said. “You took the step. Maybe not the best step. But a better step than I took. You do the best you can and you deal with the consequences. It’s all there is.”
Hawk said, “Un huh,” and put the phone back in the cradle.
Susan rubbed her face against my neck.
“Fish pier at noon,” Hawk said.
I let Susan go and walked back into the living room.
“This place is no good anymore,” I said. I looked at Susan. “Would Russell try to take you back?”
“He’d want me back. He may think you’ve taken me.”
“Would he force you?”
“No. But his father would.”
“So it could be to juke us away from you so they can take you back.”
Hawk said, “Yes.”
“What does Russell think you want,” I said.
“Time to be with myself and become someone who can decide for herself.”
“He understand that?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“Me either,” I said.
“Now not the time,” Hawk said.
I nodded and went to the phone and dialed Martin Quirk.
“I need to put two women in a safe place,” I said. “One of them is Susan.”
“Congratulations,” Quirk said. “What about the government safe house in Charlestown?”
“Not safe anymore. Some of Ives’s people appear to have talked. Maybe Ives himself, for all I know.”
“Tsk, tsk,” Quirk said. “How quick.”
“Next half hour,” I said.
“Belson will come by in a car in about ten minutes.
“Where will he take them?”
“He and I will figure that out after he picks them up,” Quirk said.
“Okay,” I said. “Thanks.”
“Oh shit,” Quirk said. “No need for thanks. The entire City of Boston Police Department is at your disposal. We’ve decided to give up crime-stopping altogether.”
“Probably just as well,” I said. “You weren’t making that much progress anyway.”
“And you, hot shot?”
“Less,” I said.
CHAPTER 42
THE FISH PIER FINGERS OUT INTO BOSTON HARbor about opposite Logan Airport. You get to it by going out Northern Avenue past Pier Four, which squats at the harbor edge like some vaguely Mayan temple to expense accounts, and is to restaurants what the Grand Canyon is to valleys. Most of Northern Ave. is seedy and barren with piers in various stages of disrepute and warehouses designed for function rather than beauty. There were a number of seafood restaurants in addition to Pier Four, and just before you got to one of them, Jimmy’s Harborside, you found the fish pier.
The pier was lined on either side with fish-packing facilities that were undergoing restoration. The brick was getting sandblasted, the trim was getting painted. Two shirtless body-builders were retarring a section of the roof, and pausing every few minutes for a pose-off. There were probably going to be ferns hanging in macrame holders by next tourist season.
