11th hour

Chapter 63

I swung my legs out of bed at six the next morning, left Joe snoozing as I got my running clothes from the hook behind the closet door.

Martha and I took a brisk and challenging run through the Presidio and when we got back, sunlight was splashing on the bedroom floor and Joe was still snoring, exactly as I’d left him.

I closed the bedroom door, showered, put on a pot of Blue Bottle roast, and booted up my laptop.

My mailbox was flooded with e-mail and spam. I mean flooded; I had mail in triple digits. It took me about fifteen minutes to clear my in-box and get to the day’s headlines. I clicked on the link to the Post and there was Jason Blayney’s front-page story about the Potrero Center shooting.

I skimmed the story quickly to see if Blayney, that rat, had come up with an angle I should be pursuing or denying, and son of a gun, his story linked to a piece about Joe Molinari.

When I clicked on the link, I expected to see a follow-up on the DEA task-force story, so I was nearly blown off my seat by the filthy piece of trash Blayney had run under the heading “Fed Takes the Night Off.”

Blayney was a snake and a liar, but there was no denying that the photo was real. And it was a killer.

It was a picture of Joe, my Joe, escorting a willowy brunette down a long flight of stone stairs. She was in a long, clingy black gown, her neck sparkling with diamonds, her arm threaded through the crook of Joe’s arm.

The photo seemed to have caught Joe saying something very charming to this woman. Her face was turned up toward his and a very private smile lit her features.

Joe looked just as adorable as could be.

The story read:

Joseph Molinari, former deputy to the director of Homeland Security, was seen with June Freundorfer Thursday evening at a benefit for cystic fibrosis at the Phillips Collection in Dupont Circle. FBI honcho June Freundorfer has long been a bright and glittering fixture at inner-circle Washington, DC, events, and last night’s fete was no exception.

I skipped down the page, found the sentence that brought it all back home.

Mr. Molinari is the husband of Sergeant Lindsay Boxer of the SFPD

…

That was all I could take.

I slammed down the lid on my laptop, but the afterimage of the photograph remained sharp and clear in my mind. I knew that June Freundorfer had been Joe’s partner for a couple of years and thought that maybe Joe’s relationship with her had been at the center of his divorce.

I understood that Joe had once been tight with June; I just hadn’t known he was tight with her still.

Were they involved?

Did Joe see her when he was in Washington every month or so? Were my hormonal surges making me paranoid? I knew what I was supposed to do about the mood swings: take naps, go for walks, spend time with my spouse, not be so hard on myself.

But was I thinking clearly? Jason Blayney’s mention that Joe was my husband was a direct and very personal message.

I went into the bathroom, threw up, took another shower, then went back to the kitchen. Joe had left his BlackBerry on the counter and it was buzzing.

I could read the faceplate from where I stood: June Freundorfer.

My hand hovered over the phone, my mind flashing like heat lightning; I had very little time to make this decision.

The phone rang for the third time.