RAY BROOK FEDERAL Correction Institution was about a six-hour drive from the city. Sean and Mick had both volunteered to make the trip with her, but she knew Mick had been enduring the week from hell with his daughter sneaking around and his ex-wife threatening to take Katie back to Europe.
As for Sean…She’d declined his company because she wasn’t sure she wanted any witnesses if she fell apart after seeing Sergio. Not that she had any warmhearted feelings left for the man who’d lied to her more ways than she could count. She just worried that seeing him would chink away—okay, sledgehammer away—at the self-esteem she’d busted her hump to build. And she’d rather Sean continue to see her through the lens of her police work than as the poor sap teenager who’d let a gangster play savior for her.
Therefore, she’d navigated her way through the Adirondack Mountains on her own, sliding off the road once on a hairy turn in Lake Placid and then winding her way over Route 86 to Ray Brook, a medium security lockup for male offenders.
Now, as she stood unmoving for the metal detector hand wand as part of visitor in-processing, Donata told herself she wasn’t immature enough to rejoice over the depressingly austere setting of her ex’s current home despite the idyllic mountain setting outside the gray walls. Still, she couldn’t deny feeling relieved to see how securely locked away he’d been for the last four years.
Not that she’d ever thought doing time in a federal pen was a picnic, but every now and then she saw those shows on TV suggesting wealthy criminals could buy their way into cushy facilities. If that was true in some cases, it sure as hell hadn’t happened for Sergio Alteri, judging by the stern expressions of the prison guards outside the visiting room.
She would have received a slightly warmer reception if she’d admitted to being a cop, but since this wasn’t an official inquiry, she hadn’t wanted to wait around for court approval to see him. Besides, Sergio would definitely snub her completely if she showed up in an official capacity. This way—taking him up on his long-ago offer for a visit—she might be able to learn something useful. Of course, first she’d have to listen to him rant and whine about all the ways she’d screwed him over by turning evidence against him. That was the only reason he’d added her to his visitor list after arriving here. But maybe after that she would be able to find out who had access to his old photographs or who he might have entrusted to make her life hell.
She stood behind a woman with a baby in one arm and a toddler in the other as she waited in line to have her hand imprinted with a black-light stamp, the last step in the process to enter the visiting room. Donata wondered how the lady in front of her managed raising two kids with her significant other in jail. As it was, the overwhelmed mama could barely convince the guards to let her bring baby supplies into the visiting area, since apparently the number of diapers allowed was regulated.
Finally, she was admitted to the room that looked sort of like a high school cafeteria. Institutional tables were scattered around an open space with two guards to oversee the visitors. There were no telephones and bulletproof glass the way they liked to show in the movies. Just a small assortment of visitors and inmates in white T-shirts, trousers, belts and prison issue shoes.
None of the prisoners were Sergio, but then she’d read that the visitors were usually escorted into the room before the inmate they wanted to see. Donata chose a table in the corner, far away from the other groups scattered around the room, and waited.
A minute later, Sergio strutted in.
He didn’t see her at first, his gaze sweeping the room. She noted he wasn’t as big as she remembered. Prison food had made him thinner, his skin hanging a little looser on his tall frame.
But then, he probably seemed bigger in her dreams because—good or bad—he’d been an integral part of her life and he loomed large on the horizon of her memories. His hair was neatly combed, short and dark with more gray at the temples than she remembered. He had to be nearing fifty. He wasn’t wearing his glasses today, but then he didn’t actually need them. The wire-rimmed lenses she remembered had been more for show and they had worked like a charm on her as a teenager. She’d looked up into his bespectacled face and pegged him as a smart guy. A reader.
Only later did she find out he’d never even read a whole newspaper, let alone a book.
He spotted her then and his placid expression changed. She’d been expecting anger and resentment but she could swear he looked almost pleased as he strolled past a couple of families toward her table.
“Hey, babe. You couldn’t stay away, could you?” He swooped down to kiss her on the mouth under the guards’ watchful eyes.
The kiss was too quick and unexpected to shove him away. Not that she really could have since starting a fight with Sergio might mean she’d be asked to leave.
He looked quite satisfied with himself as he folded his tall body into the bench alongside the table, taking up too much room near her.
“I had to get the kiss in right away since the guards only go for physical contact at the start and at the end of a visit. Even then, you have to be careful not to open your mouth or they’ll bust it up. Lots of drugs get passed along with the tongue, you know.” He folded his hands on the table like a model prisoner and looked her up and down. “I figured my need to kiss a woman—any woman—outweighs the fact that you’re a cop and the bitch who turned me in.”
Smiling, he stared openly at her breasts and waited for her to speak.
Lucky for him she needed his cooperation today or she’d show him how much of a bitch she’d like to be. His words didn’t begin to touch her since she’d long ago learned that a bitch was just a Babe In Total Control of Herself. Some men didn’t appreciate women like that.
“Who told you I’m a cop?” She kept her voice down and was grateful he had, too. “You still keep in contact with your old friends?”
He shrugged. “Going to prison lets a guy know who his real friends are. The people who keep in touch have my back. The others who don’t reply to my letters for months on end…” He moved his gaze up from her chest long enough to glare at her. “They don’t mean anything to me anymore.”
In a different environment, she would have been relieved to know she never crossed this man’s mind. But right now, she had a game to play if she wanted to find out anything.
Pouting like a woman who knows how to get her own way, she told herself she could be an actress for half an hour if it meant closing a case.
“What about your chick on the side? You remember, the one you screwed ten ways to Sunday until I decided to screw you in return? Does she still write to you?” Until that moment, Donata hadn’t really considered her old rival as a possible suspect since illegal porn was more often a man’s crime. But now that she thought about it, she supposed Rosario Gillespie had every reason to hate her.
“Rosie?” Sergio smiled, probably enjoying the thought that he’d cheated on the woman who helped send him to prison. “Her old man is too much of a hard-ass to let her write to me after he found out about us. Last I heard, he moved Rosie to the sticks to keep her out of trouble.”
He turned to watch a fight break out between the mother of two and her inmate husband, an argument quickly halted by prison guards who removed the man from the visiting room and escorted the crying woman and her two kids out the other door. Poor kids.
“How do you know?” she prompted, remembering how difficult it could be to keep Serg on track. She’d always suspected he had ADHD. “Who’s writing to you if not dear sweet Rosie?”
“Don’t dear sweet Rosie me when you propositioned my own nephew.”
“Only because he was suspected of shady things.” She’d hated that part of her informant gig. The FBI had directed her movements with a heavy hand and while she didn’t owe Serg any great loyalty, she’d never liked the idea of cozying up to the nephew.
Thank God Alec Messina had been a much more upstanding guy than his uncle.
Serg snorted, disbelieving.
“Seriously, Sergio, who’s taking care of things back home while you’re in here? I noticed the Southampton property looks like hell.” She focused narrowly on the conversation to help tune out the smell of sweat and institutional food.
“No shit?” He straightened, predictably image-conscious.
“By Southampton standards anyway. You don’t have one of your boys swinging by now and then to check on it?” She studied her nails like the answer didn’t matter, amazed how easily she could lapse into old conversational patterns since it wouldn’t be the first time she’d had to work him around to get answers.
The task hadn’t been too difficult since Serg wasn’t the sharpest tack, but the old trick made her realize how much she wanted a relationship where honesty and forthright discussion won out over manipulation.
“Big Joey goes over there sometimes. He’s supposed to contract with the lawn guys and keep the place rented until I get back.”
“You cleaned out the Southampton house?”
“We’re renting it furnished. Joey put all my other stuff in storage.”
Giving the guy free access to old photos of Donata? She still couldn’t imagine why Big Joey would want to target her personally, unless he ran the illegal porn ring and only used the photos for blackmail purposes when she took the case.
Still, that didn’t explain why the photos had been given to some crappy online site for free viewing.
“What about the New York house? I know the feds seized it, but did you get to move your things out first?”
“Are you kidding? They took everything that wasn’t nailed down for evidence. You want to tell me how my big-screen TV was evidence?”
“What about your computer?” She knew his prints had been on the equipment installed on her PC. “Where did that go?”
“How would I know?” He smacked his hand on the table, drawing the attention of a guard across the room. “Why don’t you ask your friends the feds? They probably planted evidence on it before they confiscated it.”
The visit pretty much deteriorated from there with Donata asking leading questions that went nowhere and Sergio growing more and more belligerent.
Finally, convinced she wouldn’t find out anything else by being nice, Donata switched tactics.
“Look, Serg, I did you a favor today by coming to see you without the benefit of my law enforcement status.” She kept her voice low, knowing that inmates were apt to make life hell for any of their own they suspected of cooperating with the police.
“It’s true then?” He grinned like a kid with a secret. “Can I call you next time I get stopped for speeding?”
She knew he was kidding, but for a moment, she remembered what it had been like when they first met, before he’d taken up the family business of crime. She’d never be attracted to him again, but she could remember what had charmed her as a teenager. His lame jokes and his willingness to be the guy who told goofy jokes had given her the false sense of security that he was a simple man. A safe man.
“Depends. Did you give one of your guys access to naked pictures of me?” She cut to the chase and studied his expression. She might not be an expert judge of people, but she’d lived with this man long enough to have learned when he was lying.
“Naked?” He adjusted his trousers. “Jesus, Donata. I’m doing a fifteen-year bid here and they sure as hell don’t allow conjugal visits. Don’t talk to me about naked anything.”
“This is important or, believe me, I wouldn’t be asking. Someone’s circulating photos that only you would have access to. If it’s not you, I need to know who would have those pictures.”
He remained silent for a long moment, his face unreadable. Hard. She wondered if prison had changed him.
“What’ll you do for me if I give you some ideas?”
Irritation flared along with the urge to show Sergio how much she’d learned in her physical training for this job. She’d love to kick his butt.
“Either you know or you don’t know. I’m not doing jack shit for you since you earned your trip here. As far as I’m concerned, if you can’t help me out now, I’ll be only too glad to see what else we can convict your sorry ass for to stretch that fifteen years out as long as possible.” She hadn’t ever really gotten the chance to lash out at him since she’d had to play a role as his girlfriend to be an informant.
It felt good to speak her mind now, even if it meant her visit to Ray Brook proved a bust.
“You’ve changed.” A hint of admiration lit his eyes.
“Thank God for small favors.”
He shook his head, shoulders slumping with weariness.
“I don’t know who would take those pictures. Hell, I don’t even remember where they were if I wanted to see them myself.” His eyes cruised slowly over her and she had the distinct impression he was recreating the scene in his mind.
“So you don’t know who’s blackmailing me.”
“Blackmail?” His shoulders perked up along with his expression.
“Someone doesn’t want me to bust an illegal porn ring and they’re using a blast from the past in the form of those stupid pictures to keep me quiet.”
“You?” Sergio rolled his eyes. “Good luck to those guys, eh? Although I wouldn’t mind a copy of that photo of you if you happen to have it handy. A man needs entertainment behind bars. The movies suck here.”
She waited, unwilling to be drawn into more inane conversation about his need for diversion, but slightly pleased that at least she’d left Sergio with a lasting impression that she wasn’t a woman to mess with.
“I don’t know about any illegal porn rings, but then, when I was on the outside, I was never the kind of guy to want a picture over the real thing.” He scratched his head and leaned back on the bench. “But if I had to guess who might go through my stuff when I’m not around, I’d say the list is pretty long. Besides Big Joey, who am I going to trust?”
“And no one’s asked you or Joey about access to your stuff recently?”
“Wait.” He frowned. “Joe did tell me one of his friends wanted a list of some…Well, shit, I can’t tell a cop what he wanted.”
“I’m not interested in some two-bit drug deal. Whoever is blackmailing me is taking pictures of half-naked little girls and passing it off as porn.”
The frown deepened, furrowing deep lines around his mouth. Thankfully, there was still a small amount of honor among criminals. Even if Sergio had taken her home with him when she was sixteen, she’d kept her age a secret for the first year because he truly wasn’t the kind of guy who would have hit on a kid.
“Bastards. The guy’s name was Ford. Richie Ford.” He eased back to peer around the visiting room, perhaps to make sure no one had overheard the conversation. “That must be worth a few bucks to you, right?”
“It might be, but then I happen to know you’re richer than Midas even after the feds took the Manhattan assets. So why don’t you just consider this your first act of kindness on your path to rehabilitation, okay?” She stood, grateful this chapter in her life was over and oddly relieved that her ex hadn’t been the one blackmailing her. She hadn’t realized how much she hoped the guy wasn’t behind an illegal porn operation until she took her first deep breath in a week.
Bad enough she’d lived with a gangster extortionist who’d threatened the life of an FBI agent. But if she’d lived with a man who took footage of unsuspecting teenagers…
Shudder.
“You’re gonna mention my generosity to the parole board, right?” He smoothed his shirt front and smoothed back his hair. The gesture reminded her what he’d said about only getting to kiss visitors at the beginning and end of a visit.
“If the tip is good, I’ll let them know.” She kept her voice low, maintaining her original intent not to let any of the other inmates know Sergio had been visiting with a cop.
Now, she hurried away just as he was reaching for her since she wanted nothing to do with another kiss. She had so much more with Sean now than she’d ever shared with Sergio.
“In your dreams, Serg.” She waved at him instead of letting him kiss her.
“Come back anytime,” he called as a guard stepped forward to escort him back to his cell. “Weekends are good for me.”
She had to smile. Not that she found anything humorous about Sergio’s jail time. No, she felt the smile come from deeper inside her after a visit that left her feeling a little less guilt-ridden about her past and more than ready to meet her future squarely. The stigma of a gangster boyfriend didn’t have to dog her forever.
The feeling of freedom amazed her and scared her at the same time since she realized she had no excuses to hold back with Sean any longer. At least, no excuses by way of her past. And that’s where the fear came in. She had a hot tip that could bring her case to a close and could end her time with Sean along with it.
The thought stung more than she would have guessed.
She didn’t know if her future would be one that Sean would want any part of, but for this one moment, she took a lot of satisfaction from knowing she’d done the best she could in her life considering the circumstances of her early years.
But before she could go out and discover what the future might hold, she had a pressing engagement with Richie Ford.