Final judgment

FIFTY-ONE

Mason followed Rachel from the booth back to the bar. Myles Cartwright and the rest of the trio, sans the sax player, were back onstage, easing into a gentle number that would pull the crowd along like a lazy current before shooting the rapids. Chatter receded into the background as the music swept the room.

Rachel raised her arm, waving toward the entrance. Mason couldn’t see who she was waving at but assumed it was her friend. He was glad she’d finally arrived because now he could gracefully bow out. The day had been so long that he would have to check the fossil record to reconstruct what had happened before lunch.

He glanced around for Blues to tell him he was leaving, not paying attention as Rachel and her friend embraced. When he looked back at them, Abby was standing next to Rachel, her cheeks flushed, her eyes wet from the wind, and her mouth an expectant half-moon.

“Hey,” he said, instinctively taking her hand.

“Hey, you,” she answered, covering his with hers.

It was what they’d said the first time they’d met. He’d taken her hand then as well, not giving it back until she told him he’d have to feed her if he didn’t. Since then, it had become their special way of greeting one another reserved for the end of a hard day, or after they’d been apart or had a fight. It was code for Let’s pick up where we started.

“Whew,” Rachel said. “I didn’t realize how late it was. I’m sorry, but I’ve got an early day tomorrow. I’ve got to get going.”

Mason and Abby traded grins. Mason looked at Rachel, about to apologize for questioning her loyalty. He opened his mouth and she shook her head, telling him to forget about it.

“Okay, then,” Rachel said, clapping her hands. “Am I good or what?”

“Very good,” Mason answered.

“The best,” Abby said.

Mason led Abby through the crowd, up the back stairs and to his office. He closed the door and turned on the light. Abby turned it off, leaving them bathed in the glow of yellow streetlights and purple neon shimmering through the large window overlooking Broadway. She slipped her arms around his back, her face against his chest.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured.

“Me too,” she said.

“Overs?” he asked, invoking the playground plea for second chances.

“Over and over,” she said, nudging him to the sofa, knocking files and a crumpled sweatshirt and sweatpants to the floor.

They made love and, afterwards, lay tangled together as much by the narrow reach of the sofa as by their fear of letting the other go. They whispered more apologies and explanations.

Abby said that she had told Rachel what had happened Saturday night at the Republican Party dinner and about Mason’s phone message that morning. Rachel said that Mason would probably end up at Blues on Broadway if he was working late and offered to go with her so she wouldn’t look desperate if he didn’t show up.

She told him that Senator Seeley fooled around, that his wife knew it and was suspicious of all the women on his staff, especially her after she’d made the mistake of hugging Seeley on camera on election night. Since then she had kept her boss at arm’s length, telling herself that nobody was perfect, that the work was important and she needed a job. None of the excuses made her proud, she admitted.

She had invited Mason to the dinner to discourage Seeley and reassure his wife and should have told him so. More than that, she should have told him how much she missed him-that though she didn’t want to live in his violent and desperate world, she didn’t want to live in her world, where he was only a distant image.

Mason stroked her face, lacing her hair around his fingers. He wanted to tell her that he had until Friday to stop a blackmailer from destroying his career and Vanessa Carter’s; that he wished he’d stayed at the dinner so that he and Lari Prillman wouldn’t have been shot at; and that if he lost her again he wouldn’t care about blackmail or bullets. He was afraid that if he pulled her back into his world her love would finally drown in his dark water. Instead he told her he was sorry about everything, cloaking his sins in vague regret.

“Rachel told me about your client, the one named Fish,” she said.

He laid on his back, cradling her to his side, her head on his chest, his arms tense even as he held her. “It’s complicated, but I’ll get it worked out.”

“You’re in it, aren’t you?”

“I’m his lawyer.”

“But you’re in it like your other cases. You’re in trouble. I can tell by the way you hold me, like you’re afraid to let go.” She raised her head, searching his face.

He breathed deeply, letting it out slowly. “It’s complicated,” he repeated, watching her reaction, waiting for her to pull away.

She put her head down again. He felt a tear on his chest. “I called Mickey after I got your message. He’ll be here in the morning. He’ll help.”

Mickey Shanahan had worked for Mason until Abby took him with her to Washington. He had been part office manager, part scam artist, and part wingman, covering Mason’s flank while Blues took Mason’s back. Abby had recruited Mickey by appealing to his ambition to work in politics. Her pitch disguised her maternal instinct to protect him from the dangers of working for Mason. Now, she had brought Mickey home.

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“You had a hole in your heart,” she told him, pressing her palm over the scar on his chest. “The surgeon fixed it. Now I have one,” she said, moving his hand to her heart. “I need you to fix mine.”

He answered her with a kiss that promised to fix them both. They slept under an afghan he kept in the closet for those nights when he couldn’t make it home. He rose before dawn, stiff from their close quarters, careful to cover her as she curled into the space he’d left. He picked his sweats off the floor, slipped them on, and sat behind his desk, watching her sleep.

Confession soothed her soul. Making love eased her heart. Commitment bound her to him. It may be enough for her, but it wouldn’t be enough for both of them unless he could give the same to her. Overs. A clean slate, he said to himself. He couldn’t keep his promise to Abby as long as he and Judge Carter were exposed to a blackmailer. Time was running out and he was not close to a solution.

Confession might be his least bad and only option. A blackmailer depended on the victim’s fear of exposure. Take that away, and the blackmailer is out of business. Could he do that? he wondered. Could he sacrifice Judge Carter and himself? What if he could protect the judge, take the fall himself? Would he do that? He found the answer in the gentle rhythms of Abby’s sleepy breathing.

Abby stirred, rolling onto her back and pulling herself up on her elbows. Groggy, she swept her hair off her face, focusing on him across the room.

“Is that you or the boogeyman?”

“Just me. I gave the boogeyman the night off.”

“What time is it?”

Mason looked at the clock on his desk. “Five-thirty.”

“Ugh. I hate five-thirty. Make it go away.”

He reached for the lamp on his desk, the light enough to make them both blink. “It worked. It’s five thirty-one.”

“Swell. I’ve got a breakfast meeting with the senator.”

She gathered her clothes, dressing with nonchalance as though they were an old married couple, and kissed him, neither noticing their sour morning breath.

“Tonight,” she said. “Dinner, enchanting conversation, and a real bed.”

“I’ll bring the conversation. You bring the bed.”

“Deal. I love you,” she said and left.

He turned on the rest of the lights and saw his calendar for the day. Dinner-Samantha Greer-birthday.

“Shit!” he said, snatching a dart off his desk and flinging it at the board hanging on the back of his door, missing the bull’s-eye by a wide margin.

He shoved his chair away from the desk, swiveling and stopping in front of the fax machine sitting on the credenza behind him. A five-page fax from Lari Prillman lay in the tray. It was her telephone records, the call made from her office Saturday night circled and starred. Next to it she’d written a note. Cell phone. Stolen. What now?