“I have to have them,” she said.
“What else is on there you don’t want known?” I said. She began, quite forcefully, to cry.
“Is this good?” she said as she cried. “You like to see women cry?”
I didn’t see any light at the end of that tunnel so I didn’t say anything.
“It will ruin my life if you won’t give them to me.”
I shook my head.
“Stop it,” I said. “You’re embarrassing us both to no avail. If you want to talk about how your life will be ruined, maybe I can help you avoid it. But this is pointless.”
“What,” she said. “If it’s not money, what? Sex? Is it sex?
You can have sex if you want. Just give me the tapes.”
“I’m certainly fl attered,” I said. “But no thanks.”
“I do want to have sex with you,” she said around the sobbing.
“You’re very desirable. Really, just give me the tapes, honestly, I would enjoy it.”
“Stop it,” I said.
“I’m very good. I know how to do everything.”
“Stop it,” I said again. Harder.
She took a deep breath and I was afraid for a moment that she was going to run down a catalogue of what she was good at. But she didn’t. She stared at me with the tears running down her face and her chest heaving and let the breath out without speaking, and dropped her head. We sat for a minute. Then she stood up abruptly and headed for the door, with her head still down.
“I’ll get them,” she said without looking up. “Goddamn you, I will get them.”
She left without closing the door. I stood in the window looking down until I saw her come out of the building. Across the street Vinnie took a look at her and glanced up at me. I turned my palms up and shrugged. Vinnie strolled after her as she headed up Boylston Street on foot.
I walked over and closed my office door and walked back to my desk and sat. I wondered if she knew how to do anything I didn’t know how to do? The options weren’t limitless. Maybe Susan would have a thought.
16 .
It was a bright morning. Early November and people were strolling past my corner as if it were still summer. I was reading the paper, celebrating the return of
“I threw her out,” he said.
“Jordan,” I said.
“Yeah, I threw her out of the fucking house.”
“You hurt her?” I said.
“No, I mean I didn’t touch her. I told her to get out and she went.”
“She say where she was going?”
“No,” he said. “It’s over. Gimme your fi nal bill.”
“She take anything with her?”
“I let her pack a suitcase. Gimme your bill.”
“You don’t want me to fi nd Alderson?”
“Fuck him,” he said. “It’s over. I don’t care where he is.”
“It would be a bad idea,” I said, “to go after him.”
Doherty’s face was pale except for redness around his eyes. He nodded.
“I know,” he said.
“There’s life after death,” I said.
“I know that, too,” Doherty said. “I’m going to survive this; I won’t kill him.”
“Good.”
“I’ll always regret it, though,” Doherty said.
“Not killing him?”
“Yeah.”
“Nice to think about,” I said, “on cold winter evenings.”
“Yeah.”
“You might want to talk with someone,” I said.
