Promise Me (Myron Bolitar 8)

“No, a library book. Yes, cash. Apparently, Aimee Biel picked up a thousand dollars at an ATM machine a few minutes before she called you.”

“Anything else?”

“Like?”

“They’re linking this to another disappearance. A girl named Katie Rochester.”

“Two girls disappearing from the same area. Of course they’re going to link them.”

Myron frowned. “I think there’s something else.”

Win opened one eye. “Trouble.”

“What?”

Win said nothing, just kept staring. Myron turned and followed his gaze and felt his stomach drop.

It was Erik and Claire.

For a moment no one moved.

Win said, “You’re blocking my sun again.”

Myron saw Erik’s face. There was rage there. Myron started toward them, but something made him stop. Claire put her hand on her husband’s arm. She whispered something in his ear. Erik closed his eyes. She stepped toward Myron, her head high. Erik stayed back.

Claire walked toward Myron’s door. He slid toward her.

Myron said, “You know I didn’t—”

“Inside.” Claire kept walking toward his front door. “I want you to tell me everything when we’re inside.”

Essex County prosecutor Ed Steinberg, Loren’s boss, was waiting for her when she got back to the office.

“Well?”

She filled him in. Steinberg was a big man, soft in the middle, but he had that wanna-squeeze-him, teddy-bear thing going on. Of course he was married. It had been so long since Loren had met a desirable man who wasn’t.

When she finished, Steinberg said, “I did a little more checking up on Bolitar. Did you know he and his friend Win used to do some work with the feds?”

“There were rumors,” she said.

“I spoke to Joan Thurston.” Thurston was the U.S. Attorney for the State of New Jersey. “A lot of it is hush-hush, I guess, but in sum, everyone thinks Win is several fries short of a Happy Meal—but that Bolitar is pretty straight.”

“That’s the vibe I got too,” Loren said.

“You believe his story?”

“Overall, yeah, I guess I do. It’s just too crazy. Plus, as he sort of pointed out himself, would a guy with his experience be dumb enough to leave so many clues behind?”

“You think he’s being framed?”

Loren made a face. “That doesn’t jibe much either. Aimee Biel called him herself. She’d have to be in on it, I guess.”

Steinberg folded his hands on his desk. His sleeves were rolled up. His forearms were big and covered with enough hair to count as fur. “Then odds are, what, she’s a runaway?”

“Odds are,” Loren said.

“And the fact that she used the same ATM as Katie Rochester?”

She shrugged. “I don’t think it’s a coincidence.”

“Maybe they know each other.”

“Not according to either set of parents.”

“That doesn’t mean anything,” Steinberg said. “Parents don’t know bupkus about their kids. Trust me here, I had teenage daughters. The moms and dads who claim they know everything about their kids usually know the least.” He shifted in his chair. “Nothing found in the search of Bolitar’s home or car?”

“They’re still going through it,” Loren said. “But what can they find? We know she was in the house and in the car.”

“The locals handled the search?”

She nodded.

“Then let’s let the locals handle the rest of it. We really don’t even have a case yet anyway—the girl is of age, right?”

“Right.”

“Good, then it’s settled. Give it to the locals. I want you concentrating on these homicides in East Orange.”

Steinberg told her more about the case. She listened and tried to focus. This was a biggie, no doubt about it. A double murder. Maybe a major hit man back in the area. It was the kind of case she loved. It would take up all her time. She knew that. And she knew the odds. Aimee Biel had withdrawn cash before she called Myron. That meant that she had probably not been abducted, that she was probably just fine—and that either way, Loren Muse really shouldn’t be involved anymore.

They say worrying and grief makes you age, but with Claire Biel it was almost the opposite. Her skin was drawn tight around her cheekbones—so tight the blood seemed to stop flowing. There were no lines on her face. She was pale and almost skeletal.

Myron flashed back to an ordinary memory. Study hall, senior year. They would sit and talk and he would make her laugh. Claire was normally quiet, often subdued. She spoke with a soft voice. But when he got her going, when he worked in all her favorite routines from stupid movies, Claire would laugh so hard she’d start to cry. Myron wouldn’t stop. He loved her laugh. He loved to see the pure joy when she let go like that.

Claire stared at him. Every once in a while you try to trace your life back to a time like that, when everything was so good. You try to go back and figure out how it started and the path you’d taken and how you ended up here, if there was a moment you could go back to and somehow alter and poof, you wouldn’t be here, you’d be someplace better.

“Tell me,” Claire said.

He did. He started with the party at his house, overhearing Aimee and Erin in the basement, the promise, the late-night phone call. He went through it all. He told her about the stop at the gas station. He even told her about Aimee talking about how things weren’t great with her parents.

Claire’s posture stayed rigid. She said nothing. There was a quake near her lips. Every once in a while she would close her eyes. There would be a slight wince, as if she spotted a coming blow but was unwilling to defend herself from it.

Neither spoke when he finished. Claire did not ask any follow-up questions. She just stood there and looked very frail. Myron took a step toward her, but he could see right away it was the wrong move.

“You know I’d never hurt her,” he said.

She did not reply.

“Claire?”

“Do you remember that time we met up at Little Park by the circle?”

Myron waited a beat. “We met up there a lot, Claire.”

“At the playground. Aimee was three years old. The Good Humor truck came along. You bought her a Toasted Almond Fudge.”

“Which she hated.”

Claire smiled. “You remember?”

“I do.”

“Do you remember what I was like that day?”