The winter of Frankie Machine

86

“They have Jill,” she says.

“What?”

“I’m sorry, Frank,” she says. “They have Jill.”

Frank’s barely listening as she tells him the deal. He hears her words, he’s taking them in, but all that’s really running through his head are the wordsThey have Jill. They have Jill. They have Jill. They have Jill. They have Jill.

Your faith.

Your trust.

Your love.

Your life.

Your child.

“Tomorrow morning,” she says. “Four a.m. Beneath Ocean Beach Pier. You come unarmed, but with a certain package they want. Do you know what they’re talking about, Frank?”

“Yes.”

“You give them the package, they’ll release Jill to me,” Donna says. “You go withthem, Frank.”

He nods. “How long,” he asks, “have you been with them?”

“Forever,” she says. “Since I was fifteen years old. My father was a drunk. He used to beat me up. It wasn’t the worst thing he did. Tony Jacks stopped him; he took me out of there. He saved me, Frank.”

When he was done with her, he found her a job and a husband, she tells Frank.

“When Jay left,” Donna says, “I was sad, but I wasn’t heartbroken. I didn’t really love him. I never went back to Tony, but I stillowed him, Frank. You have to understand that. I kept an eye on things in San Diego for him, that’s all.”

“You gave them my daughter.”

“I didn’t know,” Donna says, crying now. “I just thought they wanted to talk to her, Frank. I didn’t know they were going to do…this.”

“Tell them I’ll be there,” Frank says. “With the package. And I’ll go with them. If I see Jill, see her safe.”

He knows they won’t let her go. Knows that they’ll kill her. Please God, please let her not be dead already.

Please give me even a small chance to save her.