Yes, she did. That’s why she had fought so desperately to get away from that life so it wouldn’t taint Bonnie. “You didn’t notice anything different about him when he came back from overseas when he was discharged?”
“No.” He thought about it. “It’s hard to remember. No, maybe he seemed a little quieter. But I was a teenager, and I was self-centered like most kids and might not have noticed. There wasn’t anything weird about him. He was a good guy, Eve.”
She didn’t answer.
His lips thinned. “It’s true. He was the best-”
Eve’s phone rang and she glanced at the ID. “Joe.” She punched the button. “What did you find out, Joe?”
“I found out that the people here who know Donnelly aren’t willing to talk about him. I talked to a nurse and two doctors on staff. The head nurse was wary about giving out any information at all. She said he was an exceptional doctor and had a great rapport with his patients. She knew nothing about any court case.”
“Good, then there’s a chance that Danner bonded with him,” Eve said. “Did you get an address?”
“No, she hasn’t heard from him in several years.” He paused. “According to her, the reason he quit was that he was suffering severe burnout. He was going to take a rest before he opened his own practice.”
“Where did he go? Can we trace him?”
“We can try. He was going to visit a cousin, James O’Leary, who lived in Ireland.”
“Ireland? What city?”
“Dublin. The cousin might know something. I’ve already placed a few calls, and Catherine is having Venable do some checking. We should know soon.” He paused. “Are you okay, Eve?”
“Fine. Confused, a little scared. But I’ll get through it.”
“You always do.” He didn’t speak again for a moment. “I don’t like the way this is playing out. I want to come to you.”
“Not yet.” She wanted to see him, too. It didn’t seem right that she wasn’t working beside him toward finding Bonnie. Yet it had been her choice, and she had to stick with it. But it was damn difficult.
“There’s no reason,” Joe said roughly. “Tell Gallo that we’re going to find his uncle no matter what he does. I’m not going to let him find him first, so that he can decide whether or not he wants to keep him away from us. Danner is a prime suspect, and there’s not going to be a cover-up.”
“You know I wouldn’t let that happen.” She was watching Gallo’s face. All the torment and uncertainty had faded, and his face was hard and without expression. What was he thinking? Whatever it was, she had to find out. “I have to go, Joe. Let me know what you learn from Donnelly’s cousin.”
“Eve, I mean it. I don’t trust Gallo, and you shouldn’t either. I need to be there with you.”
“You will be. I love you.” She hung up the phone. She studied Gallo for a moment. He had closed himself away from her, and she wasn’t sure how to reach him. “Joe seems to have hopes of a breakthrough if he finds out where Donnelly is right now. Do you think that your uncle would have confided in this psychiatrist?”
“How can I be sure?” Gallo shrugged. “The man you tell me he’s become isn’t the Ted Danner I know. You’re looking at this with an objectivity that I don’t possess.”
“Objectivity?” She shook her head. “What the hell do you mean? This is about Bonnie. There’s no way I could ever be objective about Bonnie’s murderer.”
“Listen to you, you’ve already convicted him,” he said fiercely. “You’re wrong. He wouldn’t have killed a child.”
“I hope not, for your sake.” She glanced away from him. “But we have to figure out a few things before we can even delve into what he’d do or not do. How did he make a connection with Jacobs and Queen? Did you write to him and tell him that you’d been contacted by them to go into North Korea on a special mission?”
“No. As you know, Jacobs and Queen were in Army Intelligence, and they told me it was top secret.” His lips twisted. “I had no idea what a dirty secret it was going to turn out to be. Drugs and smuggling instead of saving the world from nuclear proliferation. I was a fool.”
“How could you know Jacobs and Queen were criminals? They deceived the Army for years.” She went back to the main subject. “If you didn’t tell him about Jacobs, how did he find out about them?”
“I don’t know. My uncle was sharp. He’d been a Ranger for years, and he had contacts with all kinds of brass in different departments of the Army. People liked him, trusted him. Maybe he found out that Jacobs and Queen sent me on that mission.”
“And that would make him angry. He was very protective of you, wasn’t he?”
“Of course he was,” Gallo said curtly. “He got used to trying to keep me safe from my dad. But that doesn’t mean he’d go after a superior officer just for sending me on a dangerous mission. Why would he? He knew being a Ranger was risky. When I told him I wanted to join the service, he tried to talk me out of it.”
“But you wanted to follow in his footsteps. He must have felt terribly responsible when he thought you’d been killed on your first mission.”
“And you’re saying that sent him off his rocker?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe not. I remember when Danner told me that you’d been killed, he was very bitter against the Army and anyone else who might have been guilty of contributing to sending you to your death. So he might not have been as philosophical as you think about accepting the risks of your being a Ranger.”
Gallo was shaking his head.
Lord, he was stubborn. But how could she blame him when she was forcing him to look at his uncle in a completely different way than he ever had before. Tough. “It’s true. He loved you, and he was bitter. That’s all I know. I thought it was perfectly natural. I had no idea he had a mental problem.” She had a sudden chilling memory of Danner smiling down at Bonnie and telling Eve that her daughter looked like Gallo. She had not looked any deeper than the obvious in any of Danner’s actions. She had felt sorry for him. But had there been something ugly and twisted of which she hadn’t been aware in that contact with Bonnie? “All we’re doing is guessing. We have to get Donnelly’s records of his therapy sessions with Danner.”
“And we have to find Donnelly before we can do that.” He turned away. “And I’m not going to wait around for Quinn or Venable to locate this cousin in Dublin. I’m going to start making phone calls myself.”
“Because you want to be two steps ahead of them?”
He gave her a cool glance. “Does that surprise you?”
“No, right now for you it’s all about getting to Ted Danner before any of the rest of us do. But it’s not going to happen. I’m sticking with you all the way. I’m not letting you out of my sight, John.”
“Really?” He tilted his head. “You’re still so sure that Bonnie wants us to be together?”
“Yes.” She met his eyes. “I thought it was because she knew you were in pain and needed to be here when we found out what happened to her.”
His smile was twisted. “And you don’t feel like that any longer?”
“Another reason occurred to me. Perhaps she wanted me to be with you to make sure that everything went as it was supposed to go. That you didn’t try to stop me from finding Bonnie and the man who killed her.”
“You believe I’d do that?”
She couldn’t read his expression. There was hardness in the curve of his lips, and his dark eyes were glittering with a hint of recklessness. Yet she was still aware of the underlying pain that lay beneath that hardness. In which direction was he headed? Eve knew that he loved Bonnie. But he also loved his uncle and was very grateful to him for years of protection and affection in a barren world. “I don’t know what I believe right now. But I’m not going to take a chance. We’re joined at the hip until we find your uncle.” She smiled wearily. “So you can call information in Dublin and see if we can locate Donnelly’s cousin if you like. Do you know how many O’Learys there will be in that city? I’m going to call Catherine back and see if Venable or Joe can narrow down the odds. We’ll see which method will get us what we need the quickest.”
IT TOOK OVER AN HOUR for Catherine to get back to Eve about O’Leary’s phone and address.
“I found him,” Catherine said. “O’Leary owns a pub outside Dublin.”
“What’s his phone number?”
Catherine rattled off the number. “But you don’t need it. I talked to him. He was belligerent as hell and drunk as a skunk, but he did finally answer a few questions. He hasn’t seen Donnelly since he visited him after he left the
