Private #1 Suspect (Private 2)

I PUT THE phone down and tried to absorb the shock of my conversation with Noccia. I wondered if I was really safe. If Mickey Fescoe could keep my involvement in the DEA bust a secret. Or if it was just a matter of time before some Noccia hoods confronted me in a dark alley.

I wanted to call Justine.

I wanted to hear her voice. I wanted to fill her in on Noccia and on my twin brother, who was in lockup for grand-theft auto and suspicion of murder.

Justine’s number was first on my speed dial. I listened to the ring, imagined the call going through. I hoped she was at home, having a glass of wine out by her pool. I hoped she’d tell me to come over.

Justine answered the phone on the third ring.

“Don’t hang up, girly. I mean it.”

Justine laughed. “Okay. You got me.”

She said she’d been cleaning out her fridge. That it was her first evening off in about a month and she had a few chores to do.

“You mind taking a glass of wine out to the pool? It’s how I pictured you just now.”

She laughed again. “Let’s see. Yep. I happen to have an open bottle. Give me a second.”

I heard glassware clinking, her pit bull rescue, Rocky, barking. I heard sliding glass doors open, and then she said, “I’m all set. What’s on your mind, Jack?”

I started talking, surprised to hear what came out of my own mouth.

Maybe the phone gave us both the intimacy and the distance we needed to at last discuss what I had done and why.

“I want you to understand that I know I did a wrong thing. I can’t excuse myself, especially not to you, but you can believe me, Justine. I’m sorry. I couldn’t be sorrier.”

Justine said, “Stop blaming yourself for Colleen’s death, Jack. You did what you did, but you didn’t kill her.”

Justine told me how much she’d liked Colleen, that she understood my feelings for her.

“I thought that you two had broken up for good. And then you hadn’t. Not really or not yet. That hurt me, Jack. I think it would have hurt anyone, but I’m over it now.”

I thanked her, and when the silence dragged on for too long, I told Justine about Clay Harris, how Tommy had shot him and that Tommy was currently in jail.

“Knowing Tommy, they won’t be able to prove anything,” Justine said. “He’ll say he bought the car for Clay so that Clay wouldn’t have to pay taxes on a bonus. Something like that. He’ll say that he was taking it for a drive. I’ll bet Tommy did buy Harris that car. I can’t imagine Clay Harris walking into a Lexus showroom in Beverly Hills. I just can’t see it.

“Tommy will get off the murder charge too,” she went on. “The cops will know he killed Clay, but they’ll never find his gun. You can’t testify against him. He can’t testify against you. Stalemate.”

I sighed.

“Jack, I’m not angry at you anymore.”

I said, “Good.” I was on the very edge of saying I’d like to come over, when she said, “I’ve got to go, Jack. I’ve got a dog to walk, kitty litter to change, a freezer to scrub. I may even paint my nails. You should get some sleep. I’ll see you in the morning.”

I said, “I’ve got some critical life-or-death chores to do myself, Justine. I’m going to run a couple loads of wash.”

Justine laughed with me. “You do that,” she said.

I said good night.

What else could I do?

CHAPTER 127

JUSTINE TOOK ROCKY for a run. She needed the exercise more than he did, wanted to flat-out drive the tension right out of her body and mind.

A half hour later, she and her doggy were back on Wetherly Drive, going up the path to her wonderful old house. It had been built in the late 1930s as a carriage house and had terrific architectural details.