me, Nick.”
She suddenly looked very tired, and flattened, yes, defeated. She looked desperately alone.
Very slowly, he pulled her against him. He felt the panic rise in her, but he didn’t do anything at all but hold her, give her what comfort he could. He said against her damp hair, which smelled just like his, since they both had used the hotel shampoo, which had a girlie-girl smell, floral and soft, “You’ve seen firsthand that there’s lots of bad stuff and bad people in the world. But you know what? Some of it we can actually do something about. We’re going to catch the man who killed all those people, my brother included.” He stopped. If and when she was ready to tell him about herself, then she would. Maybe it was all a matter of trust. So be it. No more pushing. He said only, “I’m here for you, Nick.”
“Yes, and so is the murderer, and he’s already tried to have me killed. I want to leave, Dane. You don’t need me anymore.”
“It’s too late, Nick.” He raised his finger and lightly touched it to the Band-Aid that covered the bullet graze. “That’s the whole point. Milton failed so the guy who hired him will try again, count on it. You need me, if for nothing else, as a bodyguard.”
“Everything is rotten,” she said. “All of it, just plain rotten.”
“I know. But we’ll take care of things. Trust me on that. Hey, rotten is my stock-in-trade. I get a paycheck because of rotten. It gives me motivation.”
She fell silent. She didn’t move either, just let him pull her close and hold her. She felt the core of steadiness in him, felt how solid he was, physically, and his heart, that was solid, too. She knew he was a rock, that once this man gave his word, you could bet the bank on it.
She thought of Father Michael Joseph, his face identical to Dane’s, but he was dead now. She knew Dane was alone with that and she knew he was battling each hour, each day, just to get through. Here she was leaning on him, and he was comforting her. Who did he lean on?
“I’m all right,” she said, slowly pulling away from him. She looked at him then and lightly laid her palm against his cheek. “You are an estimable man, Dane. I am so very sorry about your brother.”
He closed down, and his face went blank, because he had to hold himself together.
“I would appreciate it,” she said, standing, straightening the sweater he’d picked out for her the previous Friday, a lovely V-necked sweater, deep red, that she was wearing over a white blouse, “if you wouldn’t try to find out who I was speaking to.”
She saw in his eyes that he wasn’t going to ask the front desk. At least he was still willing to give her some leeway. He said, “I will find out sooner or later, Nick.”
“Later,” she said.
He said nothing to that, just shrugged back at her. “Are you ready? We’re all meeting for dinner to exchange information.”
“I’m ready,” she said, and picked up the wool coat he’d bought her. He’d done too much for her, far too much, and he was offering to do more. It was hard to bear. She ran her hands over the soft wool. It felt wonderful. She kept stroking it even as she said over her shoulder, “I was always scared. I’d lie in one of the small cots on the second floor of the shelter, the allotted one blanket pulled to my ears, and I’d listen to people moving about downstairs. Sometimes there’d be yelling, fighting, screaming, and always, I huddled down and was afraid because violence seemed to be part of the despair, and the two always went together. Sometimes they’d bring their fights upstairs and they’d throw stuff or hit each other until some of the shelter staff managed to get things back under control.
“There were drug users, alcoholics, people who were mentally ill, people just ground down by circumstance, all mixed together. There was so much despair, it was pervasive, but the thing was-everyone wanted to survive.”
“And then there was you.”
“Yes, but I suppose you could say I was one of those who’d been ground down by circumstance.”
She stopped, looked down at her left hand, still stroking her wool coat. “The alcoholics and the addicts-they were self-destructive. It’s not that I didn’t feel sorry for them, but they were different from the other homeless people because they’d brought their misery on themselves. And they never seemed to blame themselves for what they’d become. It was the strangest thing. One of the shelter counselors said it was because if they ever had to face what they really were in the mirror, they wouldn’t be able to bear it. Everyone there had so little. But they were the ones responsible for what had become of them, responsible for where they were. And because they wouldn’t face the truth, there was no hope for them.
“The mentally ill people-they were the worst off. I truly can’t understand how we as a society allow people who are so ill they can’t even remember to take their medications or even know that they need medication, to just roam the streets. They suffer the most because they’re the most helpless.”
Dane said, “I remember when one of the New York mayors wanted to get the sick people off the streets and into safe houses, but the ACLU went nuts.”
Nick said, “I remember. The ACLU cleaned up this poor woman, dressed her like a normal person, fed her meds so she could pass muster, and they won. Except that poor woman lost. Within days she was back on the street, off her meds, cursing and spitting at people, vulnerable and helpless. I wonder if any of the lawyers at the ACLU lost a bit of sleep over that.”
“Who are you, Nick?”
She grew very still, didn’t move, just stood there when he opened the door to the Grand Am. She said, “My name is Nick, short for Nicola. I don’t want to tell you my real last name. All right?”
“You mean, if you tell me your real name I would have heard of it?”
“No. It means that you have a computer and access to information.”
So there was something on her, something to be found, something other than just who she was. What had happened to her?
When he was seated in the driver’s seat, the key in the ignition, he turned to her and said, “I want to know who you are, not just your name.”
She looked straight ahead, saying nothing, until he pulled out of the Holiday Inn parking lot onto the street.
She said, “I’m a woman who could be dead before the first day of spring.”
His hands tightened around the steering wheel. “Bullshit. You’re just being dramatic, and you’re wrong. I think by the first of spring, you’ll be doing what you were doing last month. What were you doing in December, Nick?”
“I was teaching medieval history.” She didn’t know why she said that. Well, he already knew she had a Ph.D., this much more wouldn’t tell him anything.
“Are you by any chance Dr. Nick?”
“Yes, but you already guessed that. You know that your brother loved history.”
“My brother was an impressive man, he was a very good man,” Dane said, and shut up, really fast. He could feel himself breaking apart, deep inside, where his brother’s blood and Dane’s own pain flowed together. He remembered Archbishop Lugano at Michael’s service, his hand on Dane’s shoulder, telling him to take it just one day at a time.
He concentrated on driving. He was momentarily distracted by a girl on roller skates, wearing shorts that showed half her butt cheeks, and she was waving to him, grinning and blowing him kisses over her shoulder. He waved back, grinned a bit, and said, “That’s some presentation.”
“Yes indeed, you’re right,” Nick said. “I agree, she does skate very well.”
Dane jerked around, surprised. “That was funny, Nick.”
She smiled. It was a small smile, but a smile nonetheless.
“Where are we going?”
“We’re all meeting at The Green Apple, over on Melrose.”
Nick sighed. “Doesn’t sound like they’ll have tacos, does it?”
“I just hope they don’t serve fried green apples. I’m an American, I love fat, but you know-my belly rebels fast if I eat even two pieces of KFC. It’s a bummer.”
“Don’t whine. It means you won’t ever have to worry about your weight.”
He smiled at her, then said, “I sure hope someone has found out something useful. The bottom line is that
