Mister X

67

"He lives in Detroit and uses the name Edward Archer," Erin said. She elevated her chin slightly. "We have very little contact."

Quinn and Fedderman were in the office, along with Helen Iman, the NYPD profiler and psychologist Renz had insisted sit in for Addie, who was with Renz today, helping him prepare for his regular briefing of the press. She was becoming something of a media consultant to him. Helen was a lanky six feet tall with choppy red hair and looked like a natural basketball center. She was also the best at this kind of thing, and the only profiler Quinn trusted.

Erin was seated in a chair angled toward Quinn's desk. Her long auburn hair was neatly combed, and she was wearing a light beige pantsuit, tan high heels, and a dainty silver and pearl necklace inside the V-neck of her white blouse. She was a compact package next to Helen. Quinn could detect the subtle scent of her perfume. It made him think of the flowers Pearl had taken to Lisa Bolt.

"But you do know how to contact him?" he said.

"Not directly," Erin said. "I'd have to make a few phone calls." She smiled in that secretive way of hers, as if she was a move ahead of him. "But why should I? He has no interest in either me or Chrissie now. I haven't seen him since Christmas three years ago, when he dropped by unexpectedly. I think he'd been drinking."

"What does your husband do in Detroit?" Quinn asked.

She crossed her legs so her calves were close together. "Former husband. He's in the insurance business, has his own agency. Doing quite well. I was told that he has political ambitions."

"Political?" Quinn sensed a vulnerability.

"He wants to run for city council or some such thing. Maybe alderman. Whatever they have in Detroit." She absently fished about in her matching tan purse and then stopped and looked around. "Mind if I smoke?"

"Yes," Pearl said, from where she sat behind her desk.

Erin shrugged and snapped the purse closed. "Why are you asking me about Ed?"

Quinn told her what they had in mind, touching on the regular molestation of Tiffany, witnessed by Chrissie. Not asking if Erin had known about it.

But the question remained in the air, unasked.

Erin reached again for her purse, opened it, and snapped it shut. She sat thinking, neither confirming nor denying that she'd been aware of the molestations and beatings that had dominated her children's young lives. The truth was a beast better kept caged.

She addressed Quinn calmly. "You want Ed to come to New York and let you make it known that he's here."

"Yes. Under his real name: Keller."

Erin crossed her legs even tighter. "To avoid unfavorable publicity, he might agree to do that. He's an ambitious bastard. But I can't believe Chrissie-"

"I know," Quinn said. "But you must consider that you're the poor girl's mother. And she's not been thinking straight. Our psychologist"-he nodded toward Helen, all strung-out six feet of her leaning casually on a wall-"believes that if she knows he's in town, Chrissie might break cover and go after her father."

"You mean try to kill him."

"Perhaps. Though that might be putting it too dramatically. She might at least want to see him and have it out with him."

"At which point the police will step out from behind the curtains and Chrissie will be arrested."

"Melodrama again. But yes. I'm being honest with you. Your daughter is a murder suspect. That's not to say she's guilty."

"But you think she is."

"Not necessarily. What I think is that we can't find her, and nothing else seems to be working. You do want her found?"

"Of course I do. Found and not hurt."

"That would be our objective. I promise you that none of us wants to see the slightest harm come to Chrissie."

"And you want me to talk Ed into this."

"If that's what it takes, yes."

Erin rearranged her legs and stood up. "I need to think about this."

"Of course." Quinn stood also. "But can you let us know as soon as possible?"

"I'll do that," Erin said.

She glanced around at everyone, gave a tentative nod, and left the office.

"Best follow her," Quinn said to Fedderman.

Fedderman snatched up his suit coat and shrugged into it. Buttoning his shirt cuff on the run, he hurried from the office.

Nobody said anything for a while.

Then Pearl said, "Do you think she'll go for it?"

"I don't have a clue," Quinn said. He looked over at Helen.

"You handled her very well," Helen said, pushing away from the wall. "Odds are she'll do what you asked. One way or the other, she does want her daughter found."

"We don't need her to do this," Pearl said. "Now that we know Edward Keller is Edward Archer, he should be easy enough to find. We can make him cooperate."

"Erin can be far more persuasive," Helen said. "We need her to pull him back into the past and pressure him into cooperating. He knows she can blow his cover any time, make public the fact that he beat and molested his own daughters. With a few words she can ruin him in his new life as Edward Archer."

"The past can be a son of a bitch," Pearl said, maybe thinking of Yancy.

Helen nodded. "Even though Erin professes to hate Keller, he's her former husband. She's got a difficult phone call to make. It won't be easy for her to put him in a vise and squeeze."

"Oh, it might be," said Pearl.

"Do you think she will squeeze?" Quinn asked.

"I think she's a woman who can," Helen said.

Half an hour later, Fedderman called.

"When Erin left the office she got into a cab," he told Quinn. "She went to Fifth Avenue and did some window-shopping, and then hailed another cab. She just went into her hotel."

"Window shopping," Quinn said. "That's interesting."

"Maybe it helps her think."

"Hang around a while longer," Quinn told Fedderman. "Make sure she doesn't come back out, but if she does, tail her."

"Done," Fedderman said, and broke the connection.

Quinn slowly hung up the phone. "She's going to make us wait for her answer," he said. "In her own way, our Erin's something of a control freak."

"You think?" Helen said. She was smiling.

"Those twins," Quinn said, shaking his head. "They must have gone through hell when they were kids."

"One of them's still in hell," Helen said.

"How long do you figure it'll be before Erin makes up her mind?"

Helen shrugged. "You might think in terms of hours or days. It depends on what Erin wants and how much she wants it."

Twenty minutes later Erin called Quinn and gave him Edward Archer's cell phone number.

"See how he reacts to your proposition," she said. "Then I'll talk to him."

Quinn told her he thought that was reasonable.