12th of Never (Women's Murder Club 12)

“Thank you.”

“Where is his father?”

“So you want me to tell you about the funniest thing that ever happened to me on the job?”

She grinned.

He said, “Come here.”

He pulled her into a hug, her hair tickling his nose, her arm going around him, both of them still sitting at the table. He kissed the top of her head and said, “We’ve got time to get into the deep stuff.”

“Yes,” she said. “I want this to take a lot of time.”

Richie held her, thought how good this felt, and that he couldn’t wait for more.

Chapter 92

IT WAS THE end of another torturous night in the Saint Francis pediatric oncology wing. As light slashed through the windows, Joe and I were still waiting for something good to happen. Dr. Sebetic and his colleagues had stuck pins and needles into our daughter, ran her small body through imaging machines, sent her fluids out to labs, but nothing had yet been concluded. I’m a good interrogator, but I got nothing from the medical staff.

And so two days after we checked Julie into Saint Francis, the death sentence that would not quit still hung over her precious head.

Right then, Joe was sleeping beside me in our private hospital room and Julie was dozing fitfully in her incubator, within arm’s reach of the bed.

Neither of them stirred when my phone rang.

Brady said, “How’re you all doing, Boxer?”

He actually said “ya’ll,” his voice sugared with a trace of drawl from his years in Florida.

I told him there was still no news and then asked, “You need something, Lieutenant?”

“Someone wants to talk to you. Here’s a hint. He’s with the FBI. A very big cheese. I’ve been told he’s got a private line to Washington in his pocket.”

Brady patched me through to Parker’s phone, after which Parker and I went a few rounds. As before, Parker told me that if I didn’t help him with this world-class dirtbag, Randy Fish, the case would always be half closed, half solved, and the remains of the dead girls would never be buried in their family plots.

That would be a crime, to be sure, and that’s the part that always got to me.

“I ran the new names he gave me through Missing Persons and they’re all Fish’s type. Every one of them is a dark-haired young female going to college on the West Coast. We’ve got another girl from San Francisco, Debra Andie Lane, eighteen. We had never connected her to Fish until he told me he’d killed her.”

“How exactly am I going to help you, Ron? You’ve got the FBI at your disposal. I’m a midlevel homicide cop. On leave. And all he’s done is mess with me.”

“The fish man asks for you. All the time. He has conversations with you when you’re nowhere around. You can help with the force of your personality. By withholding and giving praise. Dial it up, cut it off; that’ll work with him.”

“You believe that?”

“Yes, if there’s any chance in the world.”

“Well, thanks for your faith in me, but I’m done with the fish man. Please. Cross me off your call list until further notice.”

I told Parker that yes, I was sure, said good-bye, and flung myself back onto the bed.

Joe opened his eyes, ran his hand over his stubble. “Done with what?”

I told him.

He rolled toward me, put his arm over my waist. “Give it some thought.”

“No.”