I Shall Not Want

THE TRANSFIGURATION OF OUR LORD
August 6

Amy Nguyen was leaving Russ's hospital room as Clare arrived. "Amy! Hi. Are you here on business?"

"Catching him up on the Christie/Punta Diablos prosecution." The assistant district attorney pointed to Clare's BDUs. "You recruiting, or what?"

"Oh, this? I'm in the Guard. I just got back from Latham. I serve off-weekend so I can get in more flying time."

Nguyen smiled behind her hand. "You're a very unusual priest."

"I get that a lot, yeah."

Inside, Russ was propped up, shuffling through the papers spread across his bed. He smiled. "Hey, darlin'. How was training?"

"They squeezed the truth about my day job out of me."

"And?"

"And now everyone on the crew calls me Preacher." She made a face. "Better than my nickname when I was regular army. Charlie Foxtrot."

"For… Clare Fergusson?"

"A different C.F." She ignored his grin. "What's all this?"

"A paper trail. Or what we've been able to make of one." He held up a sheet. "Donald Christie did time in Plattsburgh. Along with Alejandro Santiago, a member of the Punta Diablos. Apparently, they struck a deal while behind bars. Donald and his brother would dispose of the PD's business rivals, underper-forming sales representatives, et cetera, for ten grand a pop. The idea being that no one would find the bodies up here in the Adirondacks."

"Not an incorrect assumption."

"No." He picked up another paper. "The agreement held for two years. Then a truckload of pot arrives on the scene. Very valuable. High THC level."

Clare rubbed the palm of her hand against her forehead. "Don't remind me."

He snickered. "We don't know exactly what went down. Did the PDs want to store it up here because things were getting hot in the city? Did the Christies turn the driver? Whichever, they were suddenly in possession of ten million dollars' worth of weed. And a load of trouble. The PDs started cruising around, taking potshots, breaking into Bruce's trailer. I suspect they didn't move more directly because they didn't know if their driver had taken off with the goods or if the Christies had stolen the shipment. They sent their accountant up here to check it out. Neil Christie whacked him."

"That was the first body?"

"Yeah. Isabel was out with some of the family, searching that night, and saw the whole thing. She took the guy's bag and hid it, thinking to protect her brother. Then, of course, the PDs got desperate. The merchandise was one thing, but they'd lost their distribution list."

"So what did Amy Nguyen say?"

"Alejandro Santiago and his compadres will be going away for a long, long time." He grinned, showing his canines.

"And the Christies?"

His grin fell away. "We don't have anything on Bruce. He claims he had no idea about any of it and was shocked-shocked!-when his brothers revealed their stash in the barn that day."

"Maybe-"

He shook his head. "Donald and Neil between them only had half a brain. Just look at how they died. No, he was behind it. We just can't prove it."

"That's not right."

He smiled a little. "We've had this talk before." He held out his hand. She took it. He tugged her closer. "When I get out of here-"

"You're going to the Rehabilitation Center at the Glens Falls Hospital. Maybe you can have Sister Lucia's old room. She's been released."

"Okay, when I get out of rehab-" He stopped. "You know, you were right."

"I was?"

"About it taking time. It's going to take five months of hard work to come back from this." He rested his free hand on his bandaged chest. "Losing Linda was worse. It hurt me more than this did. I do need to give it time. A year's not too long." He tightened his grip on her hand. "So when I get out of the hospital, and when I get out of rehab, and when I make it through the anniversary-"

She smiled. "What?"

"We'll have a talk."