"What?"
"You heard me. You know, it's sometimes handy to talk out loud like this. It helps get the thoughts out of your head so you can hold them up and look at them. You work for Torres, don't you? I mean, I know you used to, like Rivera did, but you still do. You always have."
"Did you have another one of those pills?"
"You wish. You know a guy named Ricky? Works for Torres?"
"No."
"You shouldn't have said that. You were busted with him last year. See, that's another thing I did after I left Rivera's. I stuck around town, asking questions. That's how I found you in the first place, after all. So I just did the same thing in reverse. I got curious. If Rivera was just living in a dreamworld, then why did the Torres people-specifically, Ricky-send me over to Rivera, claiming he'd stolen Torres's route? What was in it for them? The answer was they wanted their mole-you-to see what I had to offer. I came out of nowhere, thinking I would be good for Johnny, but in fact-stupid me-I was actually perfect for you and Ricky and Torres's whole bunch."
That was all pretty accurate, except that she hadn't discovered it in the street. She'd dropped by the Holyoke PD and consulted their computers and their drug unit.
"That doesn't make any sense. Maybe you're drunk," he said, but she could tell he wasn't putting any effort into it anymore.
She was actually getting excited telling her story seeing it in sharp detail at last, ignoring the danger looming ahead. She leaned forward in her chair. "No, hear me out. It was perfect. You were Torres's mole. You'd just killed Hollowell-Rivera's only man up here-and you were probably working on a way to get to Johnny next, if you could lure him outside of his fortress, when all of a sudden Bill Dancer and I walk in. Very quick thinking on your part. Well, Ricky's part, since the guy we'd talked to first, Carlos, was clueless. Carlos had just heard that Rivera had made a play and was now considered a bad guy, but he didn't have any details, and he sure didn't know you were involved. Bill and I, on the other hand, thought Ricky was just the doorman-Don Juan with the fast hands. He fed me all I needed to go to Johnny, and he was perfect. How would I know he was just taking a break downstairs, that he's in fact number two in the Torres organization? Right up there with a consigliere in the Mafia? He must've figured what the hell? Send this broad and her big ideas over to Rivera. She might draw him outside somehow. And if not, maybe she'll do what she says she will and create something from nothing-a crackerjack organization that you can inherit after Johnny's met his maker. You two must've killed yourself laughing when he called you to say I was heading over."
But there was still something wrong, something escaping her. She got up and began pacing the room.
"It could make an okay movie," Manuel humored her. "A TV movie, maybe, since it doesn't make sense, but some people might like it."
"What's wrong with it?" she challenged him, hoping to draw him out.
"Why hang Hollowell? If I was making an example of him, who was I making it to? You say Rivera had nobody to impress-he had nobody out here except Hollowell."
She burst out laughing, the last piece falling into place. "Exactly. You were making a point to Torres's people. Hollowell worked for Torres once, too, like you all did." She slapped her forehead. "So dumb."
"Greta. You can't just change your mind to make it fit. This whole story is make-believe." His face suddenly got serious. "Are you okay?"
She waved that off. "Spare me. Hollowell worked for Torres. That should be easy to find out. But he must've gone over to Rivera-for real. Johnny's got all those gunmen on his side, after all. It's not like he's a total loony-just guilty of false advertising with me. But he wanted to get this done, and until you killed Hollowell, Hollowell was the means. That's why you hanged him. It was a double message. I mean, yeah, it made a point with Rivera, but it really hit home with the boys in the 'hood, right? 'This is what happens to traitors.' Why the hell didn't I get it sooner? What a moron."
Manuel straightened, ran his hand through his hair, and then stood to his full height. "You shouldn't be so hard on yourself."
She froze in her pacing. "I'm right?"
"Very good." He took one step away from the couch, in her direction.
"Why did you kill the girl?" Furtively, Sam began looking around, thinking tactically, knowing things were about to get dangerous.
He furrowed his eyebrows momentarily, as if trying to remember. "She was in the way. I didn't know she'd be there."
"But you made it look like a drug overdose."
"I didn't need two murders." He stopped and studied her closely. "How did you know it wasn't an overdose? That wasn't in the news."
She opened her mouth, but nothing came out. It was like having cold water thrown in her face-the startling revelation that she'd made a crucial mistake.
"I heard it somewhere."
His hand shifted to the small of his back, where he kept his gun.
Sam ran at him, head down, taking him totally by surprise. He staggered back, tried pulling his gun, but she collided into him before he could, sending them both sprawling backward over the couch behind him, and onto the floor in a tangled, thrashing embrace. She grappled blindly at his arms, swatted his face, did all she could to keep him on the defensive until she could control the gun.
But he was fast and not easily distracted, and he eventually threw her off, pushing at her with his feet. He rolled away, came up in a crouch, and aimed the gun between her eyes, all in one fluid movement.
In the distance, approaching fast, sirens were wailing.
"I'm a cop," she said breathlessly, still crumpled on the floor. "This whole place is rigged with video. That's why they're coming now. Everything's being recorded."
He rose slowly, the gun steady, not reacting to her outburst. "You slipped, saying the girl didn't overdose."
"Give it up, Manuel. You can make a deal. Shut down Torres, maybe more. Witness protection, even."
He smiled, but there was a lover's betrayal in his eyes. The sirens were almost on top of them, filling the room.
"I don't think that's how it would turn out. I am sorry, though," he added sadly. "I liked Greta Novak. I would have enjoyed cooking for her more."
He paused for a split moment, as they exchanged a lingering glance, no words left, before turning quickly and vanishing from the room.
She scrambled to her feet, blue lights already reflecting off the ceiling, and followed him outside into a swirl of strobes, dust, the sound of cars skidding to a halt.
"Stop where you are. Put your hands in the air."
"The guy with the gun," she shouted, bathed in a cross-hatch of headlights. "Did you see the guy running out of here?"
Nobody had.
Chapter 22
"Nice job on the Rutland case," Gail said.
Joe merely shook his head. They were in his car on Canal Street. He'd just picked her up from the hospital. His voice was almost bitter when he spoke. "I shouldn't complain, since we ducked a bullet, but this was nothing to brag about. When you get down to it, we were pulled in to make the governor look good, and screwed it up. He made it happen anyhow, of course. Instead of presenting somebody's head to Roger Lapierre for Sharon Lapierre's murder as planned, Reynolds substituted the surveillance video of manuel Ruiz admitting to it, just before he got away. And it worked. Apparently, Lapierre was satisfied with the promise that 'we'-whoever that is-will nail the guy in the long run. Makes you wonder why we bothered."
"You shut down a couple of drug rings,"she countered. "That's what the paper said this morning: 'Rutland Drug Lords Stopped in their Tracks.'"