Acts of Mercy

TWENTY-NINE

I think I want to drive back east,” Sam told Fiona. “There are some things I need to think about.”

“All right.”

“Do you mind?”

“Not at all,” she assured him.

So he’d taken Fiona to the airport and watched her board a plane to DC and felt empty inside the minute she was gone. But there were things he needed to sort out that would be much more difficult if she was there, and things that needed to be done that only he could do. He rented a car and headed east on I-80 through Council Bluffs and straight across Iowa into Illinois. At Rock Island, he dropped south and headed toward Indiana, where he made his way toward Terre Haute. There was something he had to do there.

He’d called his former boss and asked for a favor, which John, upon hearing what Sam had to say, immediately agreed to.

Several hours later, Sam DelVecchio sat in the visitor’s room and waited for the guards to bring in the prisoner he’d come to see.

The door opened and an older, thinner Don Holland shuffled in, his shackles restricting his movements. He sat in the chair provided for him, and stared at Sam for a long moment before asking, “What do you want?”

“I want to apologize.”

Holland’s laughter was as dry as leaves in late November.

“All right,” he said. “I’ll bite. Why?”

“Because I owe you one. Because you told the truth and I didn’t believe you.”

Holland’s laughter faded, then ceased altogether.

“What brought this about, this change of heart?” Holland asked.

“My wife’s killer confessed. He set it up so that I wouldn’t suspect…” Sam shook his head. “I guess it doesn’t matter why he did it. Suffice it to say that I’m sorry for blaming you for something you didn’t do.”

“I tried to tell you, man. You could have maybe caught him before, instead of letting him run free all this time.”

“No,” Sam shook his head, “if he hadn’t confessed, no one would have ever known.”

“Why’d he confess, then, if he’d never be caught?”

“Because he knew it would hurt me to know,” Sam told him.

“Like killing your wife didn’t hurt?” Holland scoffed. “What was gonna make that worse than it was?”

“He was an old friend,” Sam said simply.

Holland studied Sam’s face, then asked, “Did you pop him?”

“No. The FBI did.”

“I thought you were FBI.” Holland frowned.

“I was.”

“You was? You quit?”

When Sam nodded, Holland laughed. “Why’d you go and do that? You were good at what you did, my man. Brought me down, and I was the best at what I did.”

Sam rubbed the back of his neck, not wanting to think about what Holland had laid claim to being the best at.

“You should think about going back.” Holland stood, ready to return to his cell. “There are a lot of bad boys outside. A lot of bad, bad boys who need to be caught…”

Sam stood and watched Holland shuffle back out of the room. When he reached the door, he turned and said, “Thanks, man. That was decent of you. You didn’t have to do that.”

“Yeah, actually, I did.”

Holland’s comment stayed with Sam all the way to the Ohio border, where he had to decide which way to go: through Pennsylvania to Conroy and the Mercy Street Foundation, or through Virginia to Fiona and the FBI.

Once he made his choice, he felt lighter. He called both John and Robert and explained his position. Then he called Chris Coutinho, as he’d promised he’d do once the case had been solved. His last call-and by far, the toughest-was to Lynne Walker, who deserved an explanation of why her husband had to die, and at whose hands. To Sam’s everlasting gratitude, she’d not blamed him, but blessed him for bringing peace to her family, and justice to her husband.

The sun had already set when he pulled in the drive at the bungalow. There were no lights on inside and no car in sight, so he turned off the engine and got out and walked to the front steps, where he sat and waited.

It was after ten when she drove up. She slowed when she saw the strange car, but she parked next to it and walked with no apparent concern to the porch. She sat next to him on the step for a while before saying, “Nice night.”

“Umm-hmm.”

“How are you, Sam?” she asked softly.

“Better than I’ve been in a long time.”

“Good,” she said. “That’s good.”

“I stopped to see Don Holland on my way through Indiana,” he told her.

“Oh? How’d that go?”

“It went pretty well, all things considered.” He turned to her. “It wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be. Apologizing, that is.”

“You apologized to him?” Fiona frowned. “Have you lost your mind?”

“He’s done a lot of really nasty things, but he didn’t kill Carly. He told me that over and over, and I didn’t believe him. For that, I owed him.”

“You’re a better man than I am. I couldn’t have done it.”

“I wasn’t sure I could either, but it worked out all right. One thing he said, though…” Sam leaned back, his elbows resting on the steps behind him. “He said I should go back to the Bureau, that there were a lot of bad boys out there who needed to be caught.”

“Oh, there’s a news flash.” Fiona rolled her eyes. “I picked up a case today-boy howdy, it’s a killer. Pun intended.”

“There’s no end to it, you know?” He exhaled deeply. “I left the Bureau because I had enough of the Don Hollands of this world. I’d seen them all, I’d studied them all. I wanted out so I got out. I used Carly’s death as an excuse to walk away.”

“Don’t you think you’re being a little hard on yourself? Sam, your wife was murdered in your home, and at the time you believed she was killed by someone you were tracking. I think you were entitled to take a walk.”

When he didn’t respond, she said, “Did your travels help to clear your head?”

“Some.” He nodded. “It was good to get away, to leave everything behind me. I thought going to all those places, most of them for the first time, would help me to feel again.”

“Did it?”

“Mostly I felt responsible. That I’d let Carly down. That’s pretty much all I felt,” he said. “The best part of the trip was when I got to Italy and spent some time with my parents. They’re happy in their lives and with each other, and it was a very good visit. My mom invited a neighbor-a divorcée-to dinner one night to meet me, and I was not very happy with my mother for doing that.”

“Why? Was she awful?”

“No, she was lovely, she was a very nice woman. But I felt like I was being unfaithful to Carly. Like I’d be betraying her memory if I let myself be attracted to someone else. After dinner was over, I couldn’t wait to drive her home. I dropped her off and came straight back to my parents’ place and Mom and I had a few words over the whole thing. I told her I didn’t appreciate her trying to set me up, and she told me she didn’t appreciate the fact that I was rolling over and playing dead, that I couldn’t spend the rest of my life alone, that there was still light and music to be had.” Sam smiled. “Her words: light and music.” He added, “I was certain she was wrong. I’d just finished traveling through a dozen countries, and there’d been no one I’d felt a connection to. Until now.”

He sat up and put an arm around her shoulders. “I hadn’t felt the light or heard the music until now.”

“So are you saying you’re feeling connected, Sam?”

“Yeah. I guess I am.”

Fiona smiled. “There now. That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

Sam laughed softly.

She leaned against him and rested her forehead against the side of his head, and they sat together on the steps for a while.

Finally, Fiona said, “So what are you going to do, Sam? Are you sticking with the new job, or are you coming back to the Bureau?”

“I like the Mercy Street Foundation. I like the concept. I like and admire Robert Magellan and the fact that he’s willing to use his fortune for the greater good. You know, he’d offered a million-dollar reward for information leading to Ian’s return. He’s splitting it between the Sisters of St. Anthony and Barbara Cooper, the woman who owned the cabin. He’s a man of his word, and I respect him for that. The world could use more people like him.”

“I hear a but in there somewhere.”

“But-I think I belong with the Bureau.”

“John will be happy to hear that,” she told him. “He’ll take you back like that.” She snapped her fingers.

“He already has.”

“Seriously? You’re coming back?”

“After I talk to the others there in Conroy, yeah. I’m coming back.”

“Good.” She nodded. “That’s good.”

“So I thought maybe we should do something to celebrate,” he told her. “I picked up a bottle of champagne on the way over.” He reached behind him on the porch and held up a tall bag.

“That’s a good start.” She stood and took his hand. She pulled him to his feet and wrapped her arms around him. “Why don’t we go inside and break it open, and dance a little to that music your mama was telling you about…”