Yours, Mine, and Ours Read online

  “I’m looking forward to seeing Shiro later.” Emma Jan was still talking, which, if I didn’t think she was such a weirdo, normally wouldn’t bother me. “Not that I don’t like spending time with you,” she added hastily, seeing my expression, “but Shiro and I had such a fun dinner. What with all the competitive betting and shouting. And tonight’s the range! Sorry about the upcoming overused word, but I’m psyched. I’m … I’m so psyched it’s awesome. It’s totally, totally … give me some more eighties slang.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Emma Jan…”

  “I’m new; I don’t really know anybody up here. We couldn’t believe it … we thought we’d been only talking for about half an hour, but it was past eleven! Did you try the leftovers? She said she was bringing home the doggie bag for you.”

  So she was Shiro’s mystery date!

  Ah. A glamorous evening out for Shiro, dog-rescuing antics for Adrienne, and I had meetings. And, probably, dog poop to clean up. Of the three of us, I was the one who’d clearly lost a bet with God. And he was a vindictive entity if there ever was one.

  “Just don’t be upset if she can’t make it to the … where’d you say you were going?”

  “The gun range.”

  “Right, for your little contest.” Hmph. A perfect date for Shiro, unless she stumbled across a combat dojo and took on all comers. She was scary-accurate with a gun. With anything.

  Michaela stalked past us carrying a stack of files and gripping the handle of a cleaver in the other, so much so that I could see how white her knuckles were. Wüsthof, I thought. Maybe Shun. She was a huge knife snob. She was into knives the way some people were into antiques, or breathing.

  “Cadence, go talk to Gallo and then get back as quick as you can. When you’re back, meet me in my other office. JBJ briefing. Go,” she ordered, and I heard and obeyed.

  It … it was wrong that I was so interesting in seeing Dr. Gallo again, wasn’t it?

  It’s for the job, dummy, I reassured myself. And I was sprinting through the building toward the parking garage for the job. Yep.

  Sure.

  chapter thirty-six

  “Official capacity?”

  “Yes, well … I couldn’t really get into it at the time.” I was once again hooked up to another machine designed to deprive me of my bodily fluids. I reasoned that I might as well donate while I was here, and let Shiro whine about it as much as she liked. They were my platelets, drat it all. “Stuff about the case … we’re keeping the media out of it as much as we can … and confidentiality issues…”

  “Not much confidentially anymore,” Dr. Gallo said sorrowfully. He was dressed yet again in scrubs that were so soft they were almost tattered. When he frowned, as he was now, the planes of his face really stood out. Was there an American Indian somewhere in the family woodpile? He was lean, but not geek-skinny. I’d never seen cheekbones you could cut yourself on, on a guy. And I had the feeling the small laugh lines near his eyes were stress lines, or grief lines. It made me want to fix him a meal and offer him a shoulder to cry on. Or a mouth to— Whoa. Whoa! I was happily involved with Little De—uh, Patrick. I had a boyfriend.

  Was that it? Was I so unused to having a serious relationship that I was compelled to smash it once I’d had it? Or was I so sure I’d be dumped any second I was always on the prowl for a new guy? Shiro would say it was pathetic, that both reasons were pathetic, and she’d be right.

  “Pathetic!” I said aloud, apropos to nothing, and bless his heart, Dr. Gallo didn’t so much as raise his black eyebrows.

  The donating area was almost deserted except for another patient across the room, donating whole blood and chatting with her nurse. She’d been tucked in with a couple of Red Cross blankets. Oooh, lucky girl, I could feel ’em now. They kept them in a special dryer, so the blankets were always piping warm and snuggly. Donating blood was the closest I ever got to being tucked in by a mom.

  Ohhhhh, boy. I just heard that. I mean, really heard that. Behold, my sinister motive for selflessly donating blood all these years: because I missed my mommy! As Adrienne would say, “The wheels on the bus go boo fucking hoo.” Then she’d find a bus. Then she’d blow it up. Then I’d get sued by the bus company. Round and round, my big flabby tuchus.

  I’d trailed after the doc and gotten settled for yet another donation … but I wasn’t taking any warm blankets this time, thank you very much! They weren’t going to trick me with their fake mothering and soft snuggly blankets and warm chocolate chip cookies that they pretended were homemade but which anyone dating a baker knew were store bought. Fascists.

  Dr. Gallo and I had relative privacy—as much as anyone could have, I s’pose—so while I donated and fumed, I also bugged the poor guy.

  “Here comes a dim one,” I said in an apologetic tone, “but how’s your family taking it?”

  “They’ve turned into total fucking basket cases, that’s how.” His black eyes were narrow slits of dark fury. You know how some people are like oatmeal? They take a long time to boil over but when they do, it’s a big old mess? Dr. Gallo was the opposite of that. On short acquaintance, he seemed like one of those people who always had a reservoir of rage to draw on. I grew up with one; I know of what I speak. “They’ve lost it in pretty much every way possible: emotionally, financially, religiously … their world turned to shit in half a second. Their world turned to shit when they were looking away—just for a few hours. They took their eyes off their boy for a few hours. And why not? He was fourteen, not two. And now they have to live with that. They also have to live with my nephew’s death.” He blinked, and seemed to really see me for the first time. “I don’t usually drop the F-bomb with patients.”

  “I’m an FBI agent.”

  “Good.”

  “I’m so s—”

  Dr. Gallo stepped on my platitude. “They’re taking pills to wake up and more pills to go down. They’re drinking to forget and forgetting to drink. They are, to sum up, as dead as my poor nephew … they just don’t have the sense to find a goddamned cemetery plot to nap in for the rest of their miserable fucking lives.”

  I couldn’t think of a thing except, “I’m so sorry.”

  “Me, too. Sorry about the language, again. None of this is your fault. I’m … I’m kind of relieved to hear you guys are still working the case.”

  I hid my smile. Dr. Gallo had watched too many episodes of Law & Order. Nobody in the biz said “working the case.” We also didn’t talk about “collaring perps,” or “taking the death penalty off the table.”

  “Of course we are! Shame on you for thinking otherwise, Dr. Gallo. We are working the heck out of your nephew’s case. We are working that case morning, noon, and night. Dr. Gallo, believe me—”

  “Max.”

  “Ah … yes. Max.” Mmmmm … Max! Mad Max? Maximum damage? (I should have definitely been paying more attention to this interview.) I won’t deny it; I really liked his name. Max Gallo! He sounded like a cartoon superhero. Or a real-life underwear model. “We want this guy, Dr. G— Max. We want him so bad—we want him so bad.” Just the thought of what Shiro daily fantasized about doing to JBK once we got him was enough to make me run for a toilet, both hands clapped over my mouth. “We want him almost as badly as you do.”

  He nodded and sat on the bed across from me. “So what can I tell you?”

  Little enough, as it turned out. His nephew, Chris Glazier, had been alone in the house. His sister and brother-in-law had found their son’s body when they returned from a fishing trip. They were now thoroughly addicted to Ambien, the sleeping pill, which seemed like a thoroughly sensible response.

  Their son had been beaten to death. They wished it had been them. They went over everything in their minds again and again and again. They’ve thought up a dozen different scenarios where their son wasn’t murdered. They’ve come up with a hundred revenge fantasies about their son’s killer. They wished it had been them, oh God, they wished it had been them.

  Dear God:
You’re fired. Sincerely, the Glaziers.

  The usual, in other words. His family was going through the usual. It was almost textbook, and who wanted to hear that about their grieving process? So sorry, and did you know what you’re feeling is so common it’s been documented all over the world?

  “You said you were glad to hear we were still working the case. Does that mean you were going to try and do some detective work yourself?”

  “It meant I was going to try and find the guy and then shoot him in the fucking face,” Dr. Gallo replied crisply.

  He looked capable of it. Of that, and more. His fists were clenched and the veins in his arms stood out like garter snakes. His eyes were gleaming with … with terrible, wonderful things. Yes indeed, “capable” was putting it mildly. And why was that turning me on? There was no room for horniness in an FBI interrogation. Or while I was donating platelets.

  Still: the question. Why was that turning me on? Because I was still a virgin, so all sorts of odd conversations turned me on? Because I couldn’t picture safe, sane Patrick doing such a thing? Sick, sick, sick!

  “Sorry again about the language.”

  “Don’t be sorry. You don’t have anything to apologize for, unless it’s loving your family and wanting to take away their pain. And we’re on it, Dr. Gallo, my partner and I are on it until JBK is dead, or in custody, or dead.”

  “Good. Because so am I.” He stuck out his hand. We shook. I could feel his strength of purpose; I could feel his anger—it practically slammed up into my arm from his. I wasn’t quite sure what we were shaking on, but it seemed the thing to do. And I could always be counted on for stepping up and taking care of the right thing. You know, when I was in the driver’s seat.

  And I was a bad enough person to be glad Dr. Gallo’s thoughts were only of his slain nephew, and not of my chart and (on paper, at least) spotty medical history. I’d dodged crucial questions … again.

  Sick, sick, sick!

  Beyond the usual, even.

  chapter thirty-seven

  I had nothing to show for my meeting with Dr. Gallo except inappropriate tingling. Which I was going to try to keep out of my report. Meanwhile, I’d raced back to BOFFO just in time for Michaela to spot me (uncanny how she always showed up wherever we were … she must have cameras stashed everywhere, including our molars), stick one of her Wüstofs back in its sheath on her hip (which did not and never would go with her very pretty suit), and bark, “My other office. JBJ briefing. Five minutes.”

  “Always a pleasure, Michaela!” I called after her, panting only a little. At least I wasn’t late for the briefing. That was something, right?

  “Gulp.”

  I turned to Emma Jan, who’d been standing by our desks for who knew how long. “Did you just say ‘gulp’? Instead of actually gulping? Why would you do that?” Unspoken: You are very weird, and I’m just not warming up to you. Also, Shiro only likes you because you can give her a challenge. Also: I’m just not warming up to you.

  “What the hell was that all about?” Emma Jan was staring after our boss with a combination of wariness and interest. “Does she just … just walk around up here carrying huge knives?”

  “No,” I said, stung into defending Michaela. “Sometimes she carries paring knives.”

  “And you don’t find that extremely weird?”

  “Look where you are, Emma Jan,” I said patiently. I watched her glance around the large cubicle-filled room. A room that looked like any office in any city, except …

  Brian was acting out his last T-group session, which appeared to have gotten violent, due to the stabbing motions he was making, and the Psycho squeal: “Ree-ree-ree! Ree-ree-ree! So then she said, ‘Stop bleeding all over my linen placemats!’ And I said, ‘You’re the one who hit me in the first place,’ and she said—”

  Sara was working on her laptop from underneath her desk. She occasionally thought the fluorescent lighting was shooting rays into her brain.

  Don’t judge: sometimes I wondered about that, too, with all the weird things that happened at work. She offered to make me a tinfoil hat, but Shiro and Adrienne would never have let me live it down. I won’t deny being tempted, though … nope. Never knock the healing power of shiny hats.

  Karen was handing out paperwork, resplendent in her flannel pajamas (pink background, with poodles).

  And let’s not forget George’s tie du jour: a tasteful piece with broken-winged birds against a lime green background.

  Taken separately, maybe not so unusual (okay, except for Sara), but as a whole … yeah.

  “Why would Michaela bring a knife to a meeting?”

  “Depends on the meeting. I know she’s been working on the budget with a bunch of the suits.”

  “Why would Michaela bring a knife to a budget meeting?” Emma Jan was like a dog with a bone. Let it go, woman! Don’t question; it takes longer.

  “Why wouldn’t she bring a knife to a budget meeting?”

  Emma Jan giggled.

  “Hi, Emma Jan. Hi, Cadence. How’s it going?”

  Pam Weinberg, my boss’s administrative assistant, was handing out the mail. That wasn’t her usual job; someone must have called in sick, or been carted off for a Thorazine injection.

  “Good, Pam. How’s by you?”

  “SSDD.” She handed out a small pile of mail. Emma Jan was trying, and failing, not to stare. I knew what the problem was. So did Pam.

  “You’re wondering how old I am,” she said, handing Emma Jan some memos.

  “Well … it’s just … you look…”

  “Seventeen.”

  Her eyes widened. “Our boss’s right-hand woman isn’t a legal adult? How does that work? Aren’t there child labor laws in this state? Did you come as an intern and they just never let you leave?”

  “Long story, and I come off really emancipated in it. You know about the briefing in…” She glanced at the clock on the wall in front of us. “… three minutes?”

  “Yeah, thanks, Pam.”

  We watched her walk off. I understood Emma Jan’s confusion. In a building filled with mysterious government operatives, Eyes Only/Classified documents, and doctor/patient privilege, the biggest puzzle was how seventeen-year-old Pam Weinberg not only worked sixty hours a week, but no one ever heard a peep from family members or the foster care system (most of us didn’t even know if she had family or not, though, of course, Michaela did). I didn’t know if it was a good thing that no one seemed to notice she was missing, or a bad thing.

  I didn’t even want to think about the circumstances that landed her in the middle of the FBI’s very own cuckoo’s nest.

  Pam knew everything, too. It was uncanny and scary. She always knew who was in, who was sick, who was faking sick, who was foaming at the mouth, who was late, who was early, who was behind on their payroll sheets, who blew off their weekly shrink session, and who had moved into the waiting room and secretly brushed their teeth in Michaela’s private bathroom.

  I only had to live there for a few days, so don’t judge. It was Adrienne’s fault, anyway.

  So anyway, Pam almost never left the office. Which suited her fine … and us, too. She also typed 140 wpm, never had to be told something twice, kept Michaela’s staggering schedule updated, knew who’d been naughty and who’d been nice, and only needed about four hours of sleep a night (I was soooo jealous of that one). In other words, she was the perfect palace guard. The fact that she wasn’t yet a legal adult was the least important thing about her.

  “Just think, in a couple of months this will all seem totally normal to you.”

  Emma Jan didn’t look especially soothed. “Then God help me.”

  “God’s out sick.”

  I looked down at my mail. Memo, memo, sale at Staples (why was I on their mailing list at all?), and a plain white #10 business envelope. It had a number three where the return address should have been. And it was addressed to me.

  And Shiro.

  And Adrienne.

&nbs
p; chapter thirty-eight

  Cadence had, quite rightly, left this mess for me.

  Could it be a hoax? Or was it a missive, doubtless stuffed with anthrax, from the remaining members of the ThreeFer triplets? Since they had nearly killed us, I did not blame Cadence for fleeing the premises.

  “George,” I said.

  “Busy,” he replied. “I gotta bid on this or eBay’s gonna let somebody else have it.”

  I did not want to know what had George so enchanted he’d barely spoken. “George!”

  “Whaaaat?” He looked up and saw I was pulling on a pair of evidence-handling gloves (we kept several pairs in our desks). “Wow. That’s never a good sign with you, Shiro. Unless you’re up for some really sick sexual shenanigans. Or, wait. Is that dumb dog Adrienne kidnapped on her way? If that animal drops one load near my workspace, I’ll—”

  “Take a look,” I invited, snapping first the right, then the left glove in place.

  He ambled around to my desk and looked down at the envelope. “Baaaad shit,” was his very accurate comment. “You think it’s from them?”

  “Them” being Tracy Carr and Jeremy Scherzo, two-thirds of the ThreeFer Killer, triplet serial killers who had used the Cities as their own private killing pen. Opus, the third one, had been fatally shot by Michaela. They left their slow-witted brother to certain death while they fled to save their unworthy hides. They were quite high on the FBI’s Most Wanted list—spots one and two, respectively.

  And on my list, too.

  I spent too much of my time irritated with Adrienne and Cadence, there was no doubt.

  But I would never abandon them.

  That made me think of Dr. Gallo, oddly. I knew what he had told Cadence. I could understand the rage he was keeping locked down. I will not deny it made me even more curious. There was something compelling about the new physician in town; he seemed to walk around with his own internal temperature gauge always on simmer and, now and again, on boil. Ummm. It might be something to see if he truly let go, if he …