Dead Sleep

8

I’m sitting on St. Charles Avenue in my rented Mustang, trying to work up the courage to knock on my brother-in-law’s door. I parked a little way up from the house in case my niece and nephew are watching through the windows. My female bodyguard is standing thirty yards away, beneath a spreading oak, her hands hanging loosely at her sides. Agent Wendy has turned out to be all right, and I feel safer than I have in years. Wendy would think Jane was a lightweight for running only three miles a day. It’s not hard to imagine her standing on a shooting range next to 250-pound men annoyed that a “goddamn girl” is outshooting them. She entered the FBI Academy in 1992, which tells me she’s probably one of the “Starlings” who signed up for the Bureau after seeing Jodie Foster’s inspiring portrayal of a fictional agent trainee in The Silence of the Lambs. I’m not knocking her. After I saw Annie Hall, I walked around in floppy pants, a man’s necktie, and a hat for three weeks. At least Wendy picked something worthwhile to emulate.

She also kindly followed me around town while I searched for presents for my niece and nephew. Henry is eight, and named after the father of my brother-in-law, Marc Lacour. Lyn is six, and named after my mother. I’ve only seen them once since I left New Orleans eleven months ago. I promised myself I would visit more often, but that was a hard promise to keep. The reason is simple: I look exactly like their missing mother. And no matter what their father says to prepare them for my visits, they end up confused and crying.

Wendy is staring at the Mustang, willing me to get out. She knows I’m nervous about the visit. An hour ago I persuaded her to take me to a funky little bar on Magazine. She didn’t drink, but I had two gin-and-tonics. To keep my mind off what was coming, I asked her about the New Orleans field office. She started with SAC Bowles, who initially found the ambiguities of Louisiana crime and politics – at one time virtually the same industry – a bit slippery. But now he has trials pending against a former governor and assorted other luminaries. The interesting thing was the way Wendy talked about John Kaiser. She didn’t volunteer information; I had to ask. And her self-conscious glances told me she was trying to gauge the nature and level of my interest.

Kaiser, it seems, is the resident hunk of the office. All the assistants and secretaries flirt shamelessly with him, but he has never asked one for a date, patted a rump, or even squeezed a shoulder, which impresses Agent Wendy to no end. Kaiser’s biography is interesting, too. He was sheriff in Idaho when Daniel Baxter was called in by a neighboring sheriff to consult on a string of murders that overlapped Kaiser’s county. With Baxter’s help, Kaiser ultimately caught the killer, proving exceptionally adept at interrogating suspects and extracting a confession. Duly impressed, Baxter encouraged the young sheriff to apply to the FBI Academy. Against the odds, the country boy from Idaho won admission, and after serving in the Spokane, Detroit, and Baltimore field offices, Kaiser was tapped by Baxter for the Investigative Support Unit. His record there was stellar until he snapped under the pressure. When I told Wendy I knew that part of the story, she couldn’t hide her suspicion. How, she wondered, had I learned something in one day that it had taken her weeks to discover?

“His wife left him,” she said. “Did he tell you that?”

“No.”

A satisfied smile. “She couldn’t take the hours he put in. That’s pretty common. We’re getting more and more intra-Bureau marriages now. But he didn’t even stop working then, to sort it out. He just let her go.”

“Kids?” I asked.

She shook her head.

“He told me he served in Vietnam. Do you know anything about that?”

“He doesn’t talk about it. But Bowles told my SWAT commander that he’d seen John’s service record, and that he has a bagful of medals. Bowles thought we ought to try to get John on the SWAT team. My commander approached him, but he wasn’t interested. What do you think about that?”

“It doesn’t surprise me. Men who’ve seen a lot of combat don’t have many illusions about solving problems with weapons.”

Wendy bit her lip and wondered if that was an insult. “You’ve seen it?” she asked. “Combat, I mean? You’ve taken pictures of it and all?”

“Yes.”

“You ever get shot?”

“Yes.”

I instantly went up two notches in her estimation. “Did it hurt?”

“I don’t recommend it. I took a piece of shrapnel in the rear end once, too. That hurt a lot worse than the bullet did. Talk about hot.”

Wendy laughed, I laughed with her, and by the time we finished talking, I knew she was more than half in love with John Kaiser and that, though she liked me, she viewed me as an interloper of the first order.

Now the gin is wearing off, and if I don’t get out of the Mustang immediately, I never will.

I sense Wendy’s relief as I climb out with my gift-wrapped packages and walk up the block to my brother-in-law’s house. House is actually a misnomer. Jane and her husband settled in one of those massive St. Charles Avenue homes that would be called a mansion anywhere else. On this part of St. Charles, the wrought-iron fences cost more than houses in the rest of the city. I mount the porch and swing the brass knocker against the knurled oak door. The resounding bang announces the acres of space that lie behind the door. I expect the knock to be answered by Annabelle, the Lacour family maid, now inherited by the scion, but it’s Marc himself who opens the door.

You’d think people would be blessed with money or looks, not both, but Marc Lacour shatters that assumption. He has sandy blond hair, blue eyes, a chiseled face, and a muscular frame that looks ten years younger than its forty-one years. After the kids were born, he put on twenty pounds, but Jane’s disappearance knocked them back off, as he manically exercised to combat depression. Tonight he’s wearing blue wool trousers, cordovan wing tips, and a Brooks Brothers shirt. He smiles when he sees me, then pulls me to him for a hug, which I return. He smells faintly of cologne.

“Jordan,” he says as I draw back. “I’m glad you’re here.”

He pulls me into the huge central hall, then closes the door and leads me to a formal living room that looks like a layout from Architectural Digest. There’s not a cast-aside toy or empty pizza box in sight. I feel almost guilty setting my presents on the floor, as though I’m disturbing some hidden plan. Jane kept things looser. I suppose the life of the house has begun to revert to the patterns Marc knew in childhood. He has no other map, of course, but the sterility of the environment makes my heart hurt for the kids.

“Are Henry and Lyn upstairs?” I ask, perching on a wing chair that looks like it should have a braided museum rope tied across its arms.

“They’re at my parents’ house.” Marc sits opposite me on a sofa.

“Oh. When will they be back?”

“My folks bought a place down the street. They’ll bring the kids as soon as I call.”

Okay. “What’s going on, Marc?”

“I wanted to talk to you before you see them.”

“Is something wrong?”

“No. But there’s something you need to know.”

“What?”

He takes a lawyerly pause, then speaks in the deepest voice he can muster. “The kids know Jane is dead, Jordan.”

“What?”

“I had to tell them. I had no choice.”

It’s amazing, really, the degree to which we deceive ourselves. For months I’ve been telling myself that I’ve mourned and buried my sister in my heart. But now, confronted with a concrete act based on that assumption, I want to scream denial. The voice that emerges from my mouth sounds like a stunned four-year-old’s. “But… you don’t know she’s dead.”

Marc shakes his head. “How long are you going to wait before you accept it? Your father’s been dead almost thirty years, and you’re still looking for him. I have to raise these kids, and they can’t wait that long.”

“It’s not right, Marc.”

“What is, then? They thought Jane was out there suffering somewhere, at the mercy of some ‘bad person.’ That she couldn’t get away or find her way back home. It was driving them crazy. They couldn’t do their schoolwork, couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat. All they did was sit at the window, waiting for Jane to come home. I finally told them that God had taken Mama to heaven to be with Him. She wasn’t with any bad person, she was with God and his angels.”

“How did you say she died? They must have asked.”

“I told them she went to sleep and didn’t wake up.”

Jesus. “What did they say?”

“Did it hurt?”

I can’t even respond to this.

Marc’s face is resolute. “It’s for the best, Jordan. And I don’t want you saying anything to them about what’s going on now. The paintings, the investigation, none of it. Nothing to give them some crazy hope that she might come back. Because you know she won’t. Those women are dead. Every one of them.”

Maybe it’s that I have no kids of my own. Maybe the daily demands of raising children simply can’t be handled with a giant question mark hanging over everything.

“I want you to be part of their lives,” Marc says. “But you have to understand the ground rules. In this family, Jane has passed away. We had a memorial service for her.”

“What? You never called me.”

“You were in Asia, no one knew where.”

“My agency could have found me.”

“I thought it would be less confusing if their mother’s mirror image didn’t suddenly fly in from parts unknown to be at her funeral.”

“I can’t believe this.” Suddenly a decision I made months ago seems like a bad one. “There’s something I never told you, Marc. I got a phone call eight months ago, from Thailand. There was a lot of static, and I could have been mistaken, but I thought it might be Jane.”

“What?”

“She said she needed help, but that Daddy couldn’t help her. Then a man came on the phone and said something in French. Then in English he said, ‘It’s just a dream,’ and hung up the phone.”

“And you thought that was Jane? Calling from Thailand?”

“I wasn’t sure. Not at the time. But now that I’ve found these paintings in Hong Kong… I mean, don’t you think that puts it in a new light?”

“Why didn’t you tell me about this call before?”

“I didn’t want to upset you.”

“When did the call come? Daytime? Or the middle of the night?”

“Why?”

“Because eight months ago was when you couldn’t get out of bed, wasn’t it? Your little prescription vacation?”

My anger flares, but I press it down. “Yes, but I had the FBI check with the phone company. I really did get a call from Thailand in the middle of the night. From a train station.”

Marc looks at me a bit longer, then turns to a portrait of his parents on the wall. They look wealthy and distant. “You do what you have to, Jordan. That’s what we all do. But I don’t want to know about it. Not unless you get positive evidence that Jane or one of the other women is alive. Anything short of that is all pain, no gain.”

“Spoken like a true lawyer.”

His cheeks color. “You think I don’t miss her? I’ve suffered more-” He stops, takes a cell phone from his pocket, and hits a speed-dial number. “It’s me… I’ll meet you at the door.” He hangs up and stands from the sofa.

“I’m surprised you’re letting me see them at all.”

“I told you, I want you to be part of this family. That’s why I asked you to stay with us. You’re a great person. And you’re a terrific role model for Lyn.”

“Do you really believe that?”

“Look, let’s forget the other stuff and concentrate on the kids.”

The “other stuff being his missing wife. ”I’ll wait in here.“

Marc sighs and leaves the room.

The truth is, I really don’t know much about Jane and Marc’s relationship. Jane liked to project an image of perfection. They married young, but Marc wanted to postpone having children until he’d put in the years of hundred-hour weeks required for making partner. That worried Jane, who wanted kids almost immediately, more to cement the relationship, I feared at the time, than for the children themselves. But when she finally got them, she proved a wonderful mother, creating the warm, secure environment that she and I had never known.

The sound of the front door opening reaches me, then subdued voices. A society matron’s cigarette-parched drawl rises above the others. “I just don’t think it’s the proper thing to do. They’ve been through too much already.” The muted drone of Marc’s lawyer voice assures his mother that he knows exactly what he’s doing. Then, God help me, comes the patter of small shoes on the hardwood floor, followed by the percussive clack of Marc’s wing tips. I feel more acute anxiety than I have waiting to meet heads of state. The steps grow louder, then stop, but the doorway remains empty.

“Go ahead,” says Marc from somewhere in the hall. “It’s okay.”

Nothing happens.

“She brought pres-ents,” he says in a singsong voice.

A small face appears from behind the door post. Lyn’s face. A physical echo of my own. With her large dark eyes, she looks like a fawn peeking from behind a tree. As her mouth falls open, Henry’s blond hair and blue eyes appear above her. Henry blinks, then disappears. I smile as broadly as I can and hold out my arms. Lyn looks behind her -presumably at her father – then steps into the open and runs to me.

It takes a supreme effort to keep from crying as her little arms wrap around my neck like a drowning child’s and she says, “Mama, mama,” in my ear.

I gently pull her back and look into her wet eyes. “I’m Jordan, sweetie. I’m-”

“She knows,” says Marc, ushering Henry toward me with his hands on the boy’s shoulders.

“She said ‘Mama.’”

“Lyn, do you know who this lady is?”

She nods solemnly at me. “You’re Aunt Jordan. I’ve seen your pictures in books.”

“But you said ‘Mama.’”

“You remind me of my mom. She’s gone to heaven to be with God.”

I put my hand over my mouth to hold my composure, and Marc helps out by pushing Henry forward. “This big guy here is Henry, Aunt Jordan.”

“I know that. Hello, Henry.”

“I got a first-place trophy in soccer,” he announces.

“You did?”

“You want to see it?”

“Of course I do. But I brought you a present. Would you like to see that first?”

He looks back at his father for permission.

“Let’s see it,” Marc says.

I point to the wrapped package by the door. “Are you big enough to open that, Henry?”

“YEAH!”

He practically attacks the package, and in seconds exposes a hardcover book-sized box that says “Panasonic.”

“It’s a DVD player, Dad! Look! One for the car!”

“A little extravagant, isn’t it?” says Marc, arching an eyebrow at me.

“That’s a maiden aunt’s privilege.”

“Looks that way.”

Lyn is standing quietly at my knee, watching me. She doesn’t even ask if I got her anything.

“And this is for you,” I tell her, handing her the smaller box from the foot of the chair.

“What is it?”

“Look inside.”

She carefully removes the bow and sets it aside, and by this simple act breaks my heart again. She learned that frugal habit from Jane, as Jane learned it from our mother. My sister lives on in ways large and small. At last the box becomes visible, and Lyn studies it intently.

“What is it?”

“Let’s see if you can figure it out. Can you read the box?”

“Nick on? Nikon? Coolpix. Nine-nine-zero.”

“Perfect! Let me get it out for you.” I open the box, remove the foam from the odd-shaped plastic housing, and hand it to her. “What do you think it is?”

She studies the two-piece body, then focuses on the small lens.

“Is it a camera?”

“Yes.”

Her lips pucker in an unreadable expression. “Is it a kid’s camera, or a grown-up camera?”

“It’s a grown-up camera. A very good one. You have to be careful while you learn to use it. Wear the strap so you don’t drop it. But don’t be too careful. It’s only a tool. What’s important is your eyes, and what you see in your head. The camera just helps you show other people what you see. Do you understand?”

She nods slowly, her eyes bright.

“Dad!” cries Henry. “There’s two DVDs in here! Iron Giant and El Dorado!”

“Are you really spending the night with us tonight?” asks Lyn.

“I am.”

“Will you teach me how to use this?”

“I sure will. The pictures from this camera go into a computer before they go onto paper. I’ll bet you have a computer.”

“My dad has one.”

“We’ll just borrow his until he gets you your own. Right, Dad?”

Marc shakes his head, but he’s smiling. “Right. Okay, who’s ready for supper?”

“Did you actually cook?”

“Are you kidding? Annabelle!”

After thirty seconds or so, the clicking of heels comes up the hallway, followed by an elderly black woman’s voice. “What you hollerin‘ about, Mr. Lacour?”

“How’s supper coming?”

“Almost ready.”

Annabelle appears in the doorway, not heavy and slow like I pictured her, but thin and tall and efficient. She has a warm smile on her face until her eyes settle on me. It fades instantly, replaced by a mix of wonder and fear.

“Annabelle, this is Jordan,” says Marc.

“Lord, I see that,” she says softly. “Child, you the spittin‘ image of…” She glances at the kids and trails off. As though impelled against her will, Annabelle advances across the room until she’s standing over me. I reach up and take her hand, and she squeezes mine with remarkable strength. “God bless you,” she says. Then she goes to Henry and Lyn, bends nearly double, gives each a hug, and walks back to the door.

“You can go on when supper’s done,” Marc says. “Have a good night.”

“Soon as I get the biscuits out the oven,” she says in a faraway voice, “I’ll be gone home.”

When she disappears, I say, “I didn’t think they still made them like that.”

“You’ve been out of the South too long,” Marc replies. “Annabelle’s the best. This family couldn’t function without her. I think you gave her a shock, though.”

By the time we reach the dining room, the table is laden with food. A pork loin with what smells like honey-and-brown-sugar glaze, cheese grits, cat-head biscuits, and a token salad. After months of Asian food, these smells from childhood nearly overwhelm my senses. Jane is everywhere around me. She and I were raised knowing nothing of fine china, so naturally she spent months deciding on the fine old Royal Doulton pattern that sits before me now. Same with the Waterford crystal and Reed amp; Barton silver.

“It looks terrific, doesn’t it?” I tell Henry. “Here, come sit by me. Lyn, you sit on this side.”

“But your setting’s at the end of the table,” she says, pointing.

“I’d rather sit by you.”

Lyn’s smile could split the world. She and Henry take the chairs on either side of mine, and we all dig in. It’s surprising how quickly we fall into a natural rhythm of conversation, and the only awkward moments come in the silences. The children look at me as though they’ve lost all sense of time, and I know they are reliving hours spent at this table with their mother. Once, even Marc’s eyes seem to glaze over, as he slips into the same dimension the kids visit so much more easily. I can’t blame them. Thirteen months ago a divine hand reached into the Norman Rockwell painting of their life together and rubbed out the mother figure, leaving a painful, puzzling space. Now, magically, that space has been filled again, by a woman who looks exactly like the one who was erased.

“It’s getting close to bedtime,” Marc says.

“No!” the children cry in unison.

“How about cutting them a little slack this first night?”

Marc looks like he’s getting tired of my interference, but he agrees. We retire to the living room, and I give Lyn an introductory lesson on the digital Nikon while Henry loads El Dorado into his portable DVD player. Lyn is deft with her hands, and a proprietary glow of pride takes me by surprise. After she shoots a few test shots, I load them into Marc’s notebook computer. The results are good, and Lyn practically bursts with pleasure. Marc tries again to get the kids to bed, but they refuse, crawling into my lap for me to argue their case. I oblige, and before long Henry is zonked out and both my legs are asleep. Marc sits in a chair across the room, his legs draped over an ottoman as he half-watches a stock market report on CNBC, so he doesn’t notice when I look down and see Lyn staring up at me, her chin quivering.

“What is it, honey?” I whisper.

She closes her eyes tight, squeezing out tears as she turns her face into my breast and sobs. “I miss my mama.”

This time there’s no stopping my tears. I have never known a protective instinct as powerful as the one that suffuses me now. Not even when I was practically raising Jane in Oxford. I would kill to protect these children. But who can I kill to protect them from the loss of their mother? All I can do is caress Lyn’s forehead and reassure her about the future.

“I know you do, baby. I do, too. But I’m here for you now. Think about happy times.”

“Are you going to stay with us?”

“I sure am.”

“How long?” Her eyes are wide and fragile as bubbles.

“As long as you need me. As long as it takes.” Marc looks over at us, his eyes suddenly alert. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing a little hugging won’t fix,” I tell him, rocking Lyn as best I can with Henry weighing me down. But what I’m hearing in my mind is the voice on the telephone eight months ago. God, let that have been Jane, I pray silently. These children need more than I can ever give them.

A half hour later, Marc and I carry the kids to their beds. They’ve slept together since Jane disappeared, insisting on the room next to Marc’s rather than the larger but more isolated ones upstairs. When we get back to the living room, he opens a second bottle of wine, and we methodically drink most of it while reminiscing about Jane. Marc wasn’t lying when he said he missed her. As he drains the last of the bottle, his eyes mist over.

“I know you think I’m a bastard for telling them she’s dead. I’m just trying to make things as easy on them as I can.”

I give him a conciliatory nod. “Now that I see them, I understand better why you did what you did. But what will you do if it turns out you’re wrong?”

He snorts. “You don’t really think those women are alive, do you?”

“I honestly don’t know. I had convinced myself that Jane was dead. But now I won’t give up until I see her body.”

“Just like with your father,” he mumbles. “You never give up.”

“I wish you wouldn’t either. In your heart, at least.”

“My heart?” He gestures toward his chest with the goblet, and wine sloshes onto his shirt. “For the last thirteen months, my life has been shit. If it weren’t for those kids, I might not even be here.”

“Marc-”

“I know, I know. Self-pitying slob.”

“That’s not what I was thinking.”

He’s not listening anymore. He has covered his eyes and begun sobbing. Alcohol and depression definitely don’t mix. I feel a little awkward, but I get up, walk over to him, and lay my hand on his shoulder.

“I know it’s hard. I’ve had a tough time myself.”

He shakes his head violently, as though to deny the tears, then sits up and wipes his face on his shirtsleeve. “Goddamn it! I’m sorry I got like this.”

I sit on the ottoman and put my hands on his shoulders. “Hey. You’ve been through one of the worst things anyone can go through. You’re allowed.”

His bloodshot eyes seek out mine. “I just can’t seem to get it together.”

“Maybe you need a break. Have you taken a vacation since it happened?”

“No. Work helps me deal with it.”

“Maybe work helps you not deal with it. Have you thought of that?”

He laughs like he doesn’t need or appreciate amateur psychology. Privileged men are masters of ironic distance. “I’m just glad you came,” he says. “I can’t believe how the kids responded to you.”

“I can’t believe how I responded to them. I almost feel like they’re mine.”

“I know.” His smile vanishes. “Just… thanks for coming.” He leans forward and embraces me. The hug does me good, too, I must admit. I haven’t had many these past months. But suddenly a current of shock shoots through me. There’s something moist against my neck. He’s kissing my neck. And there’s nothing brotherly about it.

I go stiff in spite of my desire not to overreact. “Marc?”

He takes his lips away, but before I can gather my thoughts, he’s kissing my mouth. I jerk back and put my hands on his arms to restrain him.

His eyes plead silently with me. “You don’t know what it’s been like without her. It’s not the same for you. I can’t even make myself look at another woman. All I see is Jane. But watching you tonight, at the table, with the kids… you almost are her.”

“I’m not Jane.”

“I know that. But if I let my mind drift just a little, it’s like you are. You even feel like her.” He pulls his arms free and squeezes my hands. “Your hands are the same, your eyes, your breasts, everything.” His blue eyes fix mine with a monk’s intensity. “Do you know what it would mean to me to have one night with you? Just one night. It would be like Jane had come back. It would-”

“Stop!” I hiss, afraid the children will wake. “Do you hear yourself? I’m not Jane, and I can’t pretend to be! Not to ease your grief. Not for the kids, and especially not in your bed. In her bed. My God.”

He looks at the floor, then back up at me, and his eyes shine with an unpleasant light. “It wouldn’t be the first time you pretended to be her, would it?”

It’s as though he flushed liquid nitrogen through my veins. I am speechless, unable to move. Only when he squeezes my hands do I yank them away in reflex.

“What are you talking about?”

He smirks like a little boy with a secret. “You know.”

Without knowing how I got there, I find myself standing three feet away from him with my arms crossed over my breasts. “I’m leaving. I’m going to stay at a hotel. Tell the kids I’ll be back during the day.”

He blinks, then seems to come to his senses a bit, or at least to feel some sense of shame. “Don’t do that. I didn’t mean to upset you. You’re just so damn beautiful.” He stumbles over the ottoman as he comes toward me. My instinct is to jump forward and help him, but I don’t. I don’t want things to get any worse than they already are.

“I’m going upstairs to get my bags. You stay here while I do it.”

“Don’t be melodramatic. You don’t have anything to worry about.”

“I mean it, Marc.”

Without waiting for a reply, I run up the stairs and grab my suitcase, thanking God I didn’t unpack yet. When I go back down, he’s waiting at the foot of the stairs.

“What am I supposed to tell the kids?” he asks.

“Don’t you dare use them against me like that. Tell them I got called away to a photo shoot. I’ll be back to see them. I just won’t be spending the night.”

He looks penitent now, but the sense of entitlement I heard in his voice only moments ago still haunts me. Before he sinks into drunken apologies, I push past him and leave without a word.

As I hit the sidewalk, a car door opens a few yards away and a dark figure floats onto the sidewalk.

“Jordan?” says a female voice. “What’s the matter?”

“I’m fine, Wendy. I’m just staying elsewhere.”

“What happened?”

My joke to Kaiser about Wendy making a pass at me comes back to me like instant karma. Someone made a pass tonight, all right. But I could never have imagined it would come from my sister’s husband. “Men problems,” I murmur.

“Gotcha. Where are we going?”

“A hotel, I guess.”

She takes my suitcase and starts toward the Mustang, then pauses. “Um, look… I don’t know how you feel about hotels, but I’ve got an extra bedroom at my apartment. I’ve got to stay with you no matter where you go, so, you know. It’s up to you. But that way we’d have food and coffee, toiletries, whatever you need.”

There have been nights I would have killed for a hotel room. I’ve slept in shell craters and been grateful for them. But tonight I don’t want a sterile, empty place… I want real things around me, a humanly messy kitchen and CDs and a crocheted comforter on the couch. I hope Wendy isn’t a compulsive cleaner. “That sounds great. Let’s go.”

I’m about to start the Mustang when a soft beeping sounds in it. “What’s that?” I ask, looking around in confusion.

“Cell phone,” she announces. “A Nokia. I recognize the ring. We use some at the office.”

“Oh.” I grab my fanny pack from the backseat, unzip it, and remove the phone Kaiser gave me back at the FBI office. “Hello?”

“Ms. Glass? Daniel Baxter.”

“What’s up?”

“I’ve been negotiating with Monsieur de Becque of the Cayman Islands.”

“And?”

“He says you can go on our plane, and you can bring one assistant to help with lighting, et cetera.”

“Great. When do I leave?”

“Tomorrow. A few of us have spent the last half hour arguing over who your assistant should be. I’m backing a member of the Hostage Rescue Team. If things take a nasty turn, he’d have the best chance of getting you out of there alive.”

“Is someone arguing with your choice?”

“Agent Kaiser has a different opinion.”

I smile to myself. “Who does the sheriff want to send?”

Baxter’s hand covers the mouthpiece, but despite his effort I hear him say, “She just called you ‘the sheriff.’” When the ISU chief removes his hand, he says, “The sheriff doesn’t want to send anybody. He wants to go himself.”

“You should let him go, then.”

“Is that who you want?”

“Absolutely. I feel safer already.”

“Okay. You’ll probably leave tomorrow afternoon. I’ll call you in the morning to give you the travel details.”

“I’ll talk to you then. And Wendy’s taking good care of me.”

“Good. See you tomorrow.”

“What’s happening?” Wendy asks after I hang up.

“I’m going to the Cayman Islands.”

“Oh.” She shifts in her seat. “What was that about a sheriff?”

“A joke. I was talking about Kaiser.”

She guessed as much. “He’s going with you?”

“It looks that way. For security.”

She looks out her window. “Lucky you,” she says finally.

The eternal plight of women. A minute ago we were fast friends. Now she’d like to revoke her offer to share her apartment. But her manners are far too good for that. I’d like to reassure Agent Wendy that she has nothing to worry about, but I don’t want to insult her intelligence. I start the engine and pull into St. Charles Avenue.

“Give me some directions. It’s time to get some sleep.”

“Straight,” she says. “I’ll tell you where to turn.”

I start down the tree-lined avenue, the streetcar tracks gleaming silver under the lights as the Mustang swallows them. The leaves on the trees look gray, but only a small part of my brain registers this. The rest is rerunning Marc Lacour’s remark again and again: It wouldn’t be the first time you pretended to be her, would it? And then Dr. Lenz’s voice, out of the dark: What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done?

If only you could plead the fifth with your conscience.