NINE

She answered on the third ring.

“Hello?”

Hastings said, “Hi, it’s me. Are you up?”

“Yeah. I just got out of the shower. What’s up?”

“I’ve got some time. I just wanted to see if you’d like to meet for a cup of coffee.”

“You mean before work?”

“Yeah, if you can.”

It was a little after seven in the morning. Hastings knew that Carol usually set her alarm at 6:15 A.M. during the week. Her reading glasses were always by the bed.

“I can,” she said. “I’ll see you in about fifteen minutes?”

*   *   *

Carol McGuire was an attorney whose primary clientele were criminals. She used to be a public defender, providing legal representation to those who could not afford an attorney. She was a good lawyer, tough and bright. When she met Hastings, they were both, so to speak, on the clock. He was trying to get information out of a witness while she was trying to protect the witness’s rights, and maybe something more. Voices were raised, fronts were presented, neither of them faking things or getting self-righteous. A couple of days later they had dinner together and confirmed that they shared a strong, mutual attraction. So they tentatively began working out something they never quite gave a name to. A long-term affair or a courtship or simply seeing each other. Being fairly wise people in this modern age, neither of them tried to define the relationship. Hastings was recently divorced and, in his way, relatively inexperienced at this sort of thing. He had hardly been monastic before he married Eileen, but things had been different then. Before his marriage, there had been no complications with children.

He had been involved with Carol McGuire for only a few months. They were around the same age and they appeared normal, as far as couples can appear normal. They were similar and different. In some ways they acknowledged their differences, and in some ways they did not. Hastings was, like most cops, of a fairly right-wing sensibility, while Carol could not contemplate ever voting Republican and had trouble understanding why anyone would. But they both had a healthy interest in sex and their conversation was rarely uncomfortable or forced. Carol McGuire was also divorced. She had no children. So far, she had not said much about having children.

*   *   *

A delivery truck rolled by on the cobblestoned road, a small noise of hammering wheels and stretching springs. Then it was gone and they could hear the murmur of people chatting while they stood in line to order their morning lattes. The coffee shop was on a corner in the Central West End, near Carol’s apartment.

Carol was dressed conservatively in a blue skirt and jacket and white blouse. Hastings imagined she had court today. She was not a sexy dresser, not a glamour dresser. But Hastings realized, with some comfort at this age, that that didn’t matter much to him. She was undoubtedly feminine and the garments beneath the business attire were more often than not lace. This morning, her hair was pulled back and she was wearing her glasses.

Hastings did not want to discuss the murder of Tom Myers or the abduction of Cordelia Penmark with her this morning. Not now. And without giving it much thought, he told her about his frustration with matters pertaining to his home life. In particular, his frustration with Eileen. He did not stop to ask himself if Carol wanted to hear about it. He did not think about that. It was with him and he needed to let it out.

Carol said, “Well, are you really surprised?”

“No, I suppose not.”

“This is not the first time you’ve told me something like this.”

“I know.” Hastings looked up, aware of her now. “I’m sorry. Is it getting old?”

“Well, yeah, a little.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You keep saying you’re sorry. But…”

“Well, what do you want me to do? She’s the mother of my daughter.”

“Divorce her.”

“I did divorce her.”

“I mean, divorce yourself from her.”

Hastings sighed. “Not this again,” he said.

Carol gave him a balanced smile. “I’m not accusing you, okay? I’m not accusing you of carrying a torch for Eileen. But it seems like every couple of weeks, I have to hear a bad Eileen story. Can you understand that I would be—well, I’m not going to say jealous, but, well, tired of it.”

“You have nothing to be jealous about. You know that.”

“I do know that. I know she’s not your lover. I do, George. But there’s an intimacy there.”

“No—”

“There’s—”

“No. There’s not.”

“There’s something there, George. A connection.”

“Yes, there is a connection. Her name is Amy. There’s nothing I can do about that.”

“Okay.”

“She’s our daughter. We have to—”

“Okay.”

Carol leaned back in her seat. A silence between them. Before it could stretch, she said, “You’ll work it out.”

“I know,” Hastings said. He took comfort in the contrast between her blouse and her neck. “This is my fault. I’m dumping my domestic squabbles on you.”

“It’s not your fault. Forget it.” She smiled. “I’m glad to see you.” Saying it and meaning it.

“I’m glad to see you too.”

“You’ve been up all night, haven’t you?”

“Yeah.”

Carol shook her head. “Shit,” she said, feeling bad now. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I don’t know.”

“Oh, George. It’s a homicide?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh, shit. I’m sorry.”

“What are you sorry for?”

“You’ve been up all night and you take time out to see me and then I give you heat about … I’m sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“You should’ve just come straight over this morning. We could have at least made love.”

“But you were already out of the shower when I called.”

She smiled almost sadly and gave a small shrug. “Maybe tonight,” she said.

“That’d be nice.” He said, “When do you leave for Chicago?” She was spending Christmas there with a sister.

“The day after tomorrow. My sister’s first Christmas with her second husband. It should be interesting.”

“Yeah,” Hastings said, “I imagine it will be.”

And he left it at that.

It could be weird, this business of dating. There was as much focus placed on what was not said as what was said. Hastings had never told Carol that he loved her. Nor had she said such a thing to him. He liked her very much and knew that she was not wily or adolescent in her dealings with him. He knew that when she had brought up her sister’s second marriage, she had not been angling for a marriage proposal herself. They never discussed marriage. Never had an occasion to. But she was a perceptive woman, and after she had let out the reference to her sister’s second husband, she was well aware of the effect it had. They were both of them cautious, always cautious. As if sensing the discomfort she had caused, Carol McGuire said, “I’ll miss you.”

Hastings said, “I’ll miss you too.”

“But we’ll see each other before that. Tonight?”

“Tonight sounds great.”

*   *   *

Matt Lauer was standing next to a young black man wearing baggy pants and thick black shoes, cap worn backward. Matt in a suit, the other guy in his uniform. Matt asking him a question about his refusal to change his shoes for the television show where celebrities waltzed around with professional dancers, the guy responding that his refusal to change his shoes somehow put him on the same level as Rosa Parks.

The interview was drowned out as a woman in her late thirties turned on the kitchen sink and rinsed milk and orange juice out of cups. She set the cups upside down on a towel, close to the small television set.

The woman was wearing sweats and a white T-shirt. She had blond hair, cut short, and she had an athletic build. Her name was Terry McGregor.

Outside, a Jaguar XJ6 rumbled to a stop. The rumbling cut off and Hastings got out. He walked to the front door of the house and knocked.

He was holding a bag of coffee. Terry McGregor came to the door and let him in.

“Hi,” Hastings said. “I brought this for you.”

“Oh,” Terry said. “You didn’t need to do that.”

“Well, I appreciated you taking Amy in. Especially on such short notice.”

“Forget about it. Anytime you need to drop her off, she’s welcome. Come on in and have a cup of coffee. The girls are upstairs getting ready.”

He followed her back to the kitchen and took a seat at the table.

Terry said, “You take anything in it?”

“A little milk.”

She poured enough milk in the bottom of his cup to cover the bottom. Then poured the coffee on top of it. She set the cup of coffee on the table in front of him.

Terry and Chet McGregor had moved to St. Louis a few months ago. They were from Knoxville, Tennessee. Chet was a big fellow, military-looking with his hair cut high and tight. Talked big too, and often. He was a sales engineer. Hastings did not like Chet much, when he gave it any thought. But he liked Terry well enough. She had been a teacher and a girls’ basketball coach for some time, but had given that up when she had Randi.

She went back to the kitchen sink, turning to George as she conversed with him.

“Were you out all night?” she said.

“Yes.”

“You must be exhausted.”

Hastings shrugged. “I’ll get a nap later today. Chet gone already?”

“Yes,” Terry said. She still had her Tennessee accent. Hastings thought it was pleasant. “He left at six thirty. He’s flying to Cleveland today. He should be back late tonight.”

Hastings felt some relief. Chet McGregor made more money than Hastings, had a sweet wife and a lovely daughter, and was not a bad-looking dude. But he was one of those guys who always had a need to compete with other men. He would speak often of his days as a champion football player. Not pro or college, but high school. And when Randi told him that Amy’s dad had played baseball for the college team, he had looked at Hastings and said, “Really?” Finding it funny that Hastings had never mentioned it. The close friendship between the men’s daughters made social contact unavoidable. Hastings found himself being very quiet when he was around Chet McGregor. Hastings found Chet not irritating so much as tiresome. Chet liked to talk a lot.

But Chet’s being a bore was a small thing to Hastings. Chet’s wife after all had been a great help to him and Amy. Her offer to put Amy up at any time had been entirely sincere. And the generosity had been extended without a moment’s thought as to whether it would inconvenience her. It was what people like Terry McGregor did.

Had the McGregors moved to St. Louis, say, one year earlier, a friendship with them would probably not have come about. Eileen was an unregenerate snob and the likelihood of her taking up a friendship with the McGregors would have been slim indeed. She would have found Chet an unbearable oaf and would have dismissed his wife as a southern sorority yokel. And this conclusion would likely have been based on a five-minute encounter. Or a quick look at the woman’s clothes.

Hastings himself was a bit of a snob. Indeed, that trait had in part drawn Eileen to him in the first place. But as Eileen would learn after marrying him, his snobbishness was of a different kind.

Terry McGregor said, “Amy says you have a girlfriend now?”

Hastings smiled. “Does she.”

“You been seeing the woman long?” Her tone was pitched just about right. Curious and friendly, though not prying.

“A few months.”

“That’s good,” Terry said.

That could have meant anything. Perhaps Amy had worried aloud that he was lonely. Or that it meant that he had stopped thinking, even in small ways, that Eileen would undergo a full-scale character change and come back to him. Maybe the woman was glad to know he had a lover and companion. She wouldn’t be the only one.

Hastings said, “I can drop the girls off at school.”

“You have time?” Terry said.

“Sure.”

*   *   *

A half hour later, Hastings was motoring down I-64 toward the police department, Forest Park on his right, downtown and the Arch coming into view in front of him. It was catching up with him now, the lack of sleep, and he decided that he would go to the cot room and get a quick nap as soon as he got in. It was that or set his head on his desk, because he could only fight it for so long.

But then his cell phone rang and he answered it, and it was Klosterman on the line, canceling that nap stat.

Klosterman said, “Now it’s official.”

Hastings said, “You mean an official kidnapping?”

“Yeah, we got a ransom note.”

“How?”

“It’s on television. The Internet, too.”

“I don’t understand.”

“The kidnappers gave a tape to a local news channel.”

“So the media got it before us?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh, shit,” Hastings said. Feeling really tired now. “Have you contacted the feds?”

“Yeah. Their ASAC—Assistant Special Agent in Charge—is coming here with a couple of special agents. Show us how this shit works.”

“Great,” Hastings said. He’d known it would come to this. FBI moving in, trying to take over, talking to all the metro cops as if they were shaved bears. You see this thing here? This is what we call a “recording device.” Can you say that? That sort of bullshit. Only this time, there would be additional axes to grind. Unless they had forgotten about what Hastings did. And feds aren’t high on forgetting. Few law enforcement officers are.

Hastings said, “What about the ransom note? Or message?”

“I gotta say,” Klosterman said, “it’s pretty well done.”