The cop looked uncomfortable. Obviously, this wasn’t going the way he’d planned. “You mind showing me some current ID?”
“Not at all.” He drew his wallet from his sports jacket and handed it over.
Cronin inspected it, starting with the Maryland driver’s license. Glanced up at him. Pulled out a small spiral-bound notepad and a gold pen and jotted down some details. “I’m wondering if the Chevy Chase address on this license is valid,” he asked.
“You might find me there. Sometimes.”
“Where else might I find you?”
Hunter spread his hands. “Here. There.”
“Give me your Social.”
He rattled off the number. “For what good it will do you.”
Cronin stopped writing, raised his cold blue eyes from the pad. “You mean it’s a phony?”
“Oh, it’s real, all right. But it won’t help you go back more than about two years, either.”
“You mind telling me why?”
Hunter sighed. “Okay. Maybe once you hear it, you’ll understand. And get off my back.” He repeated what he had told Annie-about being a young investigative journalist in Ohio, falling afoul of the Mob, having to get out of state and change his identity.
Cronin listened, keeping a poker face. When Hunter finished, he could tell something was still bugging the cop.
“You say you changed your name legally to Dylan Lee Hunter. But you still didn’t explain why I won’t get your real name when I run your Social. Nobody ever gets a new SSN,” he said. Then his expression changed. “Unless-”
“Bingo. WITSEC.” He used the insider acronym.
“You’re telling me you’re in the Witness Protection program? So you testified against the Mob, then.”
“No. I just shared my information with the feds. I never got into court. But they were kind enough to enter me into the program, anyway. New identity, with a new SSN. So if you run the number, you’ll find it on file at the Social Security Administration. But that’s all you’ll get from them.”
Cronin regarded him for a moment, then rested an elbow on the table. “You want me to believe this wild story, but you still don’t want to tell me who you really are.”
He slammed his palm on the table. “Come on, Cronin! You’ve already admitted you’re under orders to dig up dirt on me for the people holding your leash, dirt they’ll use to try to muzzle me. So, I’m supposed to trust you to keep my real identity secret? While there’s still a standing Mob contract out on me? Don’t make me laugh.”
Cronin’s face softened. “Look, Hunter-whoever the hell you are. I meant it last time, when I said that a lot of us like what you’ve been doing.”
“I don’t like what you’ve been doing to me in return.”
“This isn’t my idea. Anyway, why didn’t you just tell me all this stuff last time? Save us all a lot of misunderstandings?”
Time to toss him a bone. He sighed, lowered his voice.
“Look. I do appreciate your position, Detective Cronin. But you see how I make enemies. And if you keep poking around and asking questions about me, the people I’ve been trying to avoid all these years might hear about it. And put two and two together. And then I could wind up dead.”
Cronin watched him, unblinking, for a long time. Then nodded. “Okay. I’ll try to tread lightly in the future.”
Hunter nodded, stood, and offered his hand. “I’d appreciate that. So would some far-off relatives. They don’t like me much, but they’d feel obligated to show up at my funeral.”
Cronin smiled and shook his hand.
Falls Church, Virginia
Tuesday, November 18, 6:10 p.m.
“Okay, I talked to him,” was the first sentence out of Cronin’s mouth.
She tightened her grip on the phone. “Go ahead.”
He told her. It surprised her. Then disturbed her.
“I don’t understand. He never said a thing about being in the federal Witness Security program. He told me that other story-about consulting a skip tracer, then doing it all himself.”
“Maybe he was trying to protect you in some way. Or himself. I don’t know. Maybe he thought telling you that the feds were hiding him might scare you off.”
“Why would being in Witness Protection be any scarier than what he told me?”
“Yeah, you’re right. That doesn’t make a lot of sense, does it.”
How could he lie to her?
She began to pace in front of her fireplace. “Tell me honestly, Detective,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady. “Do you believe him?”
He was silent a moment. She heard a ringing phone and voices in the background.
“Ms. Woods, I deal in facts. I can only tell you what I know. I know his SSN is real, and that it’s issued to his current name-I confirmed that with Social Security in Baltimore. His IDs-driver’s license, credit cards-they’re all real, too, just as you thought. And all the dates of issue conform to his story.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
She heard him sigh. “Okay, let me put it this way: Nothing so far contradicts him being in Witness Protection. But, could he be conning us? Sure. It’s possible. He’s very smart. Very cagey.”
Not what she wanted to hear. “Can’t you check out his story with the feds?”
“I can try. Maybe get somebody in the U.S. Marshals to talk. They run Witness Protection. But I’m not optimistic. It would take a court order to force them to open up his records. And to get court paper, I’d need to give the judge a damned good reason. Right now, I’ve got jack.”
“I understand.”
Her eyes tracked around her living room, pausing on furnishings that she and Frank had picked out and purchased years before. She suddenly felt as she did in the days after he left. Small. Exposed.
“I’m sorry I can’t tell you something definitive,” Cronin was saying. “Ms. Woods, in my experience, everybody has baggage. But your guy-he’s carrying more than Amtrak.”
She had to laugh. “All right. Thanks for telling me what you’ve found out, Detective. It’s a relief to know this much.”
He was silent.
“Is there something else?” she prompted.
He took his time before replying. “You’re on the job this many years, you get feelings about things. This somehow doesn’t feel right.”
“I know.” Her throat felt tight.
“So, you feel it, too… Okay, tell you what: I’m going to stay on this. And I suggest you try to keep an eye on him, too. Jot down notes of his comings and goings. You never know when a timeline might come in handy.”
“Yes,” she said, trying to ignore the quivering knot in the pit of her stomach. “You never know.”
“I haven’t asked you before. But it would help if you told me where he lives.”
She took a slow breath. “I’m not ready to do that,” she said. Then added: “Not yet.”
Bethesda, Maryland
Tuesday, November 18, 8:25 p.m.
“Hi, you,” he said.
She stood in his doorway with an overnight bag and a little smile. “Hi, you.”
He searched her eyes for an instant, then drew her close and kissed her.
“Missed you last night,” he murmured.
“Me, too.” She squeezed him.
He took the bag from her, then her coat. “Feeling better today?”
“Much. Thanks.”
His eyes followed her as she wandered into the living room, then stopped to pet Luna, who was sprawled on the sofa. She wore a brown pantsuit. It was the first time she had dressed in anything other than a skirt or dress in his presence.
“Have you eaten?” he asked, hanging the coat in the entryway closet.
She tossed her purse on the sofa and sat. “Yes… No. I mean, I’m not hungry. Some wine would be nice, though.”
“Relax there and I’ll fetch some.”
He observed her out of the corner of his eye from the kitchen while he pulled a Chardonnay from the refrigerator, uncorked, then poured it. She was stroking the cat, but watching his reflected image in the dark window of the balcony’s sliding door.
He felt the tension.