The Face of Death

feels. 'So what's the problem?' he asks.

'Aside from the slight chance I'm wrong about this? No evidence, sir,' I say. 'No one besides Cabrera has seen his face. None of the scenes we're aware of have turned up anything probative or useful. Short of a confession, we have nothing to tie him to a crime.' I point to Callie and Gene. 'I'm going to have them scour this place from top to bottom, and hope something turns up.'

AD Jones shakes his head in frustration. 'Dammit.' He points a finger at me. 'Find something, Smoky. Enough is enough. End this.'

He turns and gets back into his car, leaving me nonplussed by his outburst. A moment later, it heads toward the gate and the growing throng of reporters.

'Well,' Callie says to Brady, 'I suppose you and I will have to continue this later. There will be a later?'

He tips an imaginary hat.

'That's affirmative.'

He saunters off. Callie ogles his backside as he goes.

'Ah, lust.' She sighs. She turns toward the house, winks at me. Callie is doing what Callie does: trying to lift the inexorable grimness of things, like the boom box and sunlight in my bedroom a lifetime ago. 'Are you ready to go to work, Gene?'

They go off together. I watch her reach into her pocket, pop a Vicodin.

I empathize right now. I want nothing more than a single shot of tequila.

Just one.

I wait. It's making me crazy.

Everything I can do is done. Gibbs is under surveillance. Cabrera is in custody. Theresa and Jessica are in a hospital, being examined. Bonnie, Elaina, and Sarah are safe. Alan is on the phone with Elaina, delivering the news about Theresa so that Elaina can pass it on to Sarah. Callie and Gene are inside, trying to balance speed with thoroughness. Thoroughness is winning. All I can do now is wait.

Alan walks over to me. 'Elaina's going to let Sarah know. At least we can give her that.'

'What do you think, Alan? Even when we catch Juan, is there a happy ending? Or does he get what he wanted all along?'

I'm not sure why I ask him these questions. Maybe because he's my friend. Maybe because of all the people on my team, Alan is the one I feel I can look up to, subordinate or not.

He's quiet for a long moment. 'I think when we catch him, we're doing our job. We're keeping him from doing more damage. We're giving Sarah a chance. That's all. It may not be the best answer, but it's all we've got.' He looks at me, gives me a kind smile. 'It's all we're responsible for, Smoky. You want to know if Sarah's already dead inside, if he's murdered her spirit. The truth is, I don't know. The bigger truth is, Sarah doesn't know. The final truth is, we're giving her the chance to find out. And that's not everything, and it might not be enough, but it's not nothing, either.'

'And him? What about Juan?'

Alan's face becomes sober. 'He's a perp now. His days as a victim are long gone.'

I think about what he's said, and it comforts me and then doesn't, comforts me and then doesn't. My spirit tosses and turns, trying to sleep on a bed that's only soft in certain places. This is not a new feeling, and I let it wash over me. Justice for the dead. It's not nothing. It's far from nothing. But it's not resurrection, either. The dead stay dead even after their killers are captured. The truth of this, the sadness of it, makes the job neither pointless nor fulfilling.

Acceptance and disquiet. Acceptance and disquiet. Two waves that roll me gently, one following the other inside my heart forever. I wait.

During my waiting, Tommy calls. I feel guilty and elated, two new waves. Guilty that I had not called him to check on him. Elated at the sound of his voice, at the truth that he is alive.

'How are you?' I ask.

'I'm okay. No major damage to the muscle. Cracked my clavicle, which hurts like hell, but I won't end up on disability. I'm fine.'

'I'm sorry I didn't call.'

'I'm not. You're doing your job. There'll be times I'll get caught up too. Nature of the beast. If we start keeping score, we'll be over before we begin.'

His words warm me inside. 'Where are you now?'

'Home. I wanted to call you before I took my pain pills. They can make me a little goofy.'

'Really? Maybe I'll have to come over and take advantage of you while you're all loopy.'

'Nurse Smoky giving me a sponge bath? I'll have to get blown up more often.'

The pressure inside causes me to react with a giggle. I clap a hand over my mouth, mortified.

'Anyway,' Tommy says. 'Get back to it. We'll talk tomorrow.'

'Bye,' I say, and hang up.

Alan glances over at me. 'Did you just giggle?'

I frown. 'Of course not. I don't giggle.'

'Ah.'

We wait.

Callie and Gene are done with half of the home. They have a set of elimination prints taken from Cabrera that they're using for comparisons as they go. So far, nothing. It's 3:00 A.M. The reporters and their helicopters are gone, maneuvered away by a skillful AD Jones. He'd made himself the source of information and they'd followed him like a herd of hungry vampires. I imagine that the story we want told has now been splashed across television screens and Web sites, and will show up in the newspaper headlines of tomorrow. Cabrera found. Suspect dead. Case closed. We wait.

My phone rings at 4:30 A.M.

'It's Kirby.'

The simple fact that her voice is serious and no wisecracks follow starts the alarm bells ringing.

'What is it?' I ask.

'Sarah's gone.'

60

I'M ALMOST SHOUTING AT KIRBY. IT'S ANGER DRIVEN BY FEAR.

'What do you mean she's gone? You were supposed to be guarding her.'

Kirby's voice is calm without being defensive. 'I know. I was worried about people on the outside trying to get in, not her trying to get out. She wasn't snatched, Smoky. She left. I went to the bathroom. She walked out the door. She left a note, said, There's something I have to do. '

I pull the phone away from my ear. 'Son of a bitch!' I yell into the sky. Alan's been inside the house. He comes running out.

'Do you know where she might be going?' Kirby asks. I stop, poleaxed.

Do I?

The voice in my head replies, accusing.

Of course you do. If you'd been listening, you would have been ready for this. But you were too busy with yourself, weren't you?

The truth I'm trying to reveal to myself appears. Sarah, memorizing him. The way he talks. Saying she'd never forget his voice.

Sarah, taking a phone call from Gibbs the other day, supposedly to 'verify'

she was fine with us going into the home.

I grip my temples with one hand. My head is spinning and my heart is racing.

He talked to her recently, the day he killed the Kingsleys. Then, he talked to her on the phone, in the hospital, as Gibbs. She knew the moment she heard his voice. He probably wanted her to know.