Cloaked in Blood (10 page)

“I see.  Still no Jeremy Noel. 
Huh.  I’m not sure what to make of that either, sir. 
Since the video is a dead end, I’d imagine we’ll never know who
this character really was.”

The ankle monitor around my leg distracted
me for a moment.  There were answers I needed, answers I
couldn’t slip away and get as long as Johnny kept constant tabs on
me.  What if we were wrong?  What if Sanderfield was the
last of the human trafficking conspirators?  We had no
evidence that Lyle Henderson was really involved.  And even if
Melissa Sherman was somehow the default leader now that everyone
else was dead, she was behind bars, probably wouldn’t see freedom
in her lifetime.  Was it really necessary for me to
essentially endure house arrest now that the most immediate threat
was gone?

And then there was Dad.  If he was
convinced that Henderson posed a threat to anyone, I suspected that
he’d simply die of old age in his sleep, no questions asked.

It was the one bit in the Sanderfield
assassination that made me certain Dad had nothing to do with
it.  It wasn’t subtle at all.  An unexpected death might
raise red flags, but if it happened within the realm of
possibility, people could accept it.

The caliber of ammunition used on
Sanderfield left no room for doubt – or much left above the stump
of his neck.  Not Dad’s style.  So who did it?  Did
it really matter?

“Yo,” Devlin poked my arm.  “You want
to talk to Levine?”

I grabbed the phone.  He was already
chuckling.

“Devlin said that you drifted into the room
about the time that he updated me on your condition today,
Helen.  He said you looked half asleep.”

“Just thinking about Sanderfield,” I
said.  I hadn’t actually had much of an opportunity to talk to
David about any of this.

He sighed.  “You know as well as I do
that we’re not going to find much by way of smoking guns or red-hot
leads, Helen.  This isn’t some long distance serial killer
about to unleash his psychopathy on Darkwater Bay either. 
Think of it as a political assassination, which is exactly what it
was.”

I frowned, picked at the cuticle of my right
thumb with the phone tucked between ear and shoulder.  “Yeah,
but whose political career really got killed when Sanderfield died,
David?  Sanderfield’s or Collangelo’s?”

“I thought that was rather obvious.”

“And perhaps it was designed to be
obvious.”

“Helen, how could this possibly hurt Joe
Collangelo?”

“Because now that Sanderfield is dead, he
reopened the very unpopular-in-Montgomery OSI to investigate the
murder.  And I don’t mean to cast my husband’s skills in a
negative light, but you know as well as I do how this will
play.  Johnny and his men won’t catch the killer.  So Joe
fails again.  His law enforcement experiment is more of the
epic failure that Sanderfield said it was.  In death, he
proves that he was right all along.”

“And whoever replaces Sanderfield now has a
ready-made platform,” David said.  “Jesus, are we really
suggesting that his own party stands to gain the most by
Sanderfield’s death?”

“It wouldn’t be the first time,” I said
dryly.  “The fact that Sanderfield wasn’t popular in Darkwater
Bay is meaningless.  More than this city elects the next
governor.  I’m not saying that they had their own candidate
killed, but hell, they’d be idiots not to milk this for all the
sympathy they can.”

“You can bet they’re scouring the state
looking for some unimpeachable candidate to replace Sanderfield,”
David said.  “Speaking of he with impeccable morals, where
is
your husband today?”

“Off running some errand.  He was gone
when I woke up, Devlin was here, and I haven’t exactly had time to
interrogate anybody yet.”

Devlin shrugged.

“And apparently, Dev has no idea where he
is.  I found a note when I woke.  He’s out, will be back
later.  Hugs and kisses and all that nonsense.  David,
while I’ve got you on the phone, how are things going with the
Marcos emergency that hauled you back home?”

He sighed.  “Franchetta.  What a
nightmare that man is becoming.”

“Has he changed his story yet again?”

“No,” David snorted.  “He’s adding to
it now.  He claims that he has no idea how the gun got into
Sully’s waste management facility.  He’s certain that your
ex-committed suicide, but says that Sully didn’t order him to keep
tabs on the man, that it was basically a freebie, that he figured
there were no missing funds, that the master somehow managed to
persuade the puppet to hide a huge chunk of cash for a rainy
day.  He
also
said that he was contacted by someone who
questioned him with Mark Seleeby who insinuated that it would be in
his best interests to continue to point the finger of guilt at you
for Rick’s death and claim that you simply disposed of the weapon
in the Potomac River.”

My heart seized for a painful ten-count in
my chest.  “And?”

“We’re looking into it.  He gave us
specific locations of bars and convenience stores where these calls
were prearranged, names of the people who delivered the messages to
him of where to be and when so he’d intercept the calls.  Of
course, Sully’s legal team was somehow made aware of all of this
and they’re screaming that Franchetta’s lies are adapted to the
needs of the federal prosecutor.”

“I see.  And why is my name being
dragged into the matter again?”

“Reasonable doubt, I’d imagine.  If
Marcos can point the finger at a bitter ex-wife in Rick’s death,
insinuate that perhaps you planted that gun in his waste management
facility, that you were present when his nephew was murdered –”

I groaned.

“Yeah, you see where all of this is
going.  Not that Franchetta’s new details aren’t helpful,
Helen, but it does rather offer the defense a compelling point in
that his story has changed a number of times.”

Yet this time, he was probably telling the
truth.  Well, certainly honest regarding how that gun came to
be in Sully’s possession – at least indirectly.  “Is there any
hope of tracking where his calls came from, that he actually had
phone calls from a yet unknown person who wanted him to implicate
me?”

David hesitated.

“Don’t do this to me.  You can’t tease
me with a little bit of information and not divulge the most
important piece, David.”

“We’ve already verified that he did receive
messages to wait for calls in a couple of locations in New Jersey,
Helen.  And the phone records indicated that calls came in at
the times Franchetta claims, for the duration he cited.”

“But?”

“Well, that’s the problem.  He said the
person who conveyed information to him since he became a guest of
the hospitality of the federal prosecutor is one of us.”

“FBI?”

“At least that was his assumption, since the
first time he met the man, he was in the company of Seleeby.”

I groaned again.  “This means you’re
bringing Seleeby back into the fold.”

David chuckled.  “Not really, but sort
of.  He’s been summoned back to Washington for a
barbecue.”

“A –”

“Figurative, my dear, and perhaps
roasting
would be a better word, since there was never an
official report made on this conversation he had with
Franchetta.  Of course old Eddie claims that was because
Seleeby promised him it was off the record.”

“And this was the conversation where
Franchetta said I was present at the crime scene, yes?”

“Well, Helen, you
were
there when
Rick killed himself.”

“And now you’re going to need my deposition
about what happened that night.”

“Possibly.  As I said, the defense
wants to force a jury to impeach any testimony given by
Franchetta.”

And now my perjury would be required to give
credence to the word of a mass murderer.  Fabulous.  My
day just kept getting better and better.

“The good news is that Franchetta is, at
least for now, sticking to his story that you were nowhere near the
national park that night.”

Ah, paranoia, my constant companion. 
Why in the hell would Franchetta protect me?

Chapter 10

Saint Agnes parish was one of the smallest
in metro Darkwater.  Johnny supposed he always liked the place
because it reminded him of his favorite nun, Sister Agnes Marie, as
a child attending school at the Sisters of Mercy Academy.  It
wasn’t in the nicest part of Downey, but he’d grown up in that
parish, and for some inexplicable reason, he woke with a need to
feel closer to his roots this morning.

Not that he’d actually felt connected to his
past or his parents for a long time.  Or the old parish.

Perhaps it was the early morning visit to
his parent’s old bungalow before dawn that stirred the
nostalgia.  If Crevan hadn’t begged him to give them the
option of housing Kathleen Conall in the house rather than the
penthouse, this odd mood wouldn’t have settled over him. 

Yet finding his mother’s rosary that morning
while packing up a few items and preparing the master bedroom for a
guest had done the trick.

He fisted the very old beads that had once
belonged to Christine Orion’s grandmother.  Prayer wouldn’t
help him now – at least that’s what Helen would tell him. 
After less than a year of chasing Helen’s shadow, he didn’t doubt
anymore how she lived a life without faith.  Hell, most of the
time, Helen’s way made a lot of sense.  It was a lot easier to
let man bear the responsibility for his crimes than it was to
imagine an invisible source of evil trying to erode the good
instilled in man by God.

Which was exactly why he sat outside Saint
Agnes parish clenching a rosary hard enough to leave a deep imprint
in his fleshy palm.  No, Johnny couldn’t discard his faith
that good
should
overcome evil every time.  He couldn’t
let it go, wouldn’t let all the lessons Sister Agnes Marie taught
him die by strangulation from a bitter and harsh reality.

Sometimes the bad guys won.

It was the crux of his current crisis of
faith, after all.  How could a loving God let Helen and their
unborn sons be in so much danger?  How could he allow so many
truly evil men escape justice?

It was inexplicable.

Johnny walked slowly up the crumbling stairs
to the church.  Inside, he lit a candle, made the sign of the
cross and found a way to a pew to pray for guidance.  The
sense of peace that usually accompanied his prayers eluded him this
morning.

With a sigh of resignation, Johnny rose to
leave.  The sight of an elderly woman exiting the confessional
weeping gave him pause.  Perhaps that was part of the
problem.  God didn’t hear his prayers, because there was too
much Johnny refused to confess, couldn’t regret.

His chin dipped low.  Maybe that was
the whole problem, not just part.

He slipped into the confessional and sat,
waiting for the screen to open.  When it did, he murmured his
first confession, that it had been nearly a year since he’d
darkened the doorway of the church, that he felt his faith in God
slipping away from him.

The priest’s low voice drifted through the
screen.  “God accepts all of your burdens if you’ll let him
carry them.”

“I know,” he said.  “It’s just been…
unusual lately.”

“Since your last visit to the church?”

Johnny nodded.  “I don’t really know
what happened.  Well, I do, but she hasn’t discouraged me from
coming here or believing what I believe.  In fact, we rarely
discuss my religion.”

“She?”

“My wife,” Johnny said.  “And honestly,
Father, I understand why she doesn’t believe in any of this. 
Nobody taught her about God.  Sometimes I wonder how she has a
moral compass at all, given how she was raised.”

“Are you saying your wife grew up without
love?”

“No, no,” Johnny said quickly.  “Well,
a mother’s love, certainly, but her father… he compensated so
much.”

“Then perhaps her sense of morality comes
from him, yes?”

Johnny laughed.  “Yes, that would be an
accurate statement.  Seems like I’m learning a little more
every day about his sense of right and wrong.  Maybe that’s
why I feel so conflicted about my faith now.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, because he didn’t believe in God, yet
in many ways, Wendell looked at the world exactly the way I
do.  Or maybe it’s the other way around.  I’m starting to
see why he did some of the things he did.  And the more I
learn about him, the more I can relate.  He protected his
daughter, and I feel this unbelievable compulsion to do the same
thing, no matter the cost.”

“Is she in danger?”

“Oh Father, if you only knew.”

“I’m listening.”

“Helen’s like a magnet for it.  I don’t
understand why.  I’m not sure if it’s always been this way
with her, or if it’s simply because from the very beginning,
someone didn’t want her in Darkwater Bay, but the threats have been
one after another since she came here.”

“I see.”

“You can’t possibly,” Johnny
sighed. 

“I see that it causes you immeasurable
concern.  Clearly you love your wife very much, as you should
the woman who you have made vows to God with.  Whether the
danger is literal or more of a metaphoric concern for her eternal
soul, it really doesn’t matter in the eyes of God.  Yet at the
same time, we must trust that God’s will, will always supersede our
own.  We don’t always understand his ways, or the methods he
uses to accomplish what he wants.”

“Are you saying it’s God’s will that my wife
is murdered or worse?”

“Of course not,” the priest said.  “I
simply mean that you may not be the tool God has in mind for her
deliverance or her safety.  Perhaps he has brought these
trials into her life – whatever they are – to bring her to him, to
teach her to trust that his hand will guide and protect her as it
has you.  He led you back to the church this morning, after
all.”