Just One Look

“What rules? You kill people. You make up these so-called rules because you need the illusion of being human.”

Scanlon seemed to consider that. “Perhaps,” he allowed, “but the men I’ve killed were scum. I was hired by scum to kill scum. I am no more than a weapon.”

“A weapon?” Scott repeated.

“Yes.”

“A weapon doesn’t care who it kills, Monte. Men, women, grannies, little kids. A weapon doesn’t differentiate.”

Scanlon smiled. “Touché.”

Scott rubbed his palms on his pant legs. “You didn’t call me here for an ethics class. What do you want?”

“You’re divorced, aren’t you, Scott?”

He said nothing.

“No children, amicable split, still friendly with the ex.”

“What do you want?”

“To explain.”

“To explain what?”

He lowered his eyes but only for a moment. “What I did to you.”

“I don’t even know you.”

“But I know you. I’ve known you for a long time.”

Scott let the silence in. He glanced at the mirror. Linda Morgan would be behind the glass, wondering what they were talking about. She wanted information. He wondered if they had the room bugged. Probably. Either way, it would pay to keep Scanlon talking.

“You are Scott Duncan. Thirty-nine years old. You graduated from Columbia Law School. You could be making a great deal more money in private practice, but that bores you. You’ve been with the U.S. attorney’s office six months. Your mother and father moved to Miami last year. You had a sister, but she died in college.”

Scott shifted in his seat. Scanlon studied him.

“You finished?”

“Do you know how my business operates?”

Change of subject. Scott waited a beat. Scanlon was playing a head game, trying to keep him off balance or some such nonsense. Scott was not about to fall for it. Nothing he had “revealed” about Scott’s family was surprising. A person could pick up most of that info with a few well-placed keystrokes and phone calls.

“Why don’t you tell me,” Scott said.

“Let’s pretend,” Scanlon began, “that you wanted someone dead.”

“Okay.”

“You would contact a friend, who knows a friend, who knows a friend, who can reach me.”

“And only that last friend would know you?”

“Something like that. I had only one go-between man, but I was careful even with him. We never met face to face. We used code names. The payments always went to offshore accounts. I would open a new account for every, shall we say, transaction, and I closed it as soon as the transaction was completed. You still with me?”

“It’s not that complicated,” Scott said.

“No, I guess not. But you see, nowadays we communicate by e-mail. I’ll set up a temporary e-mail account with Hotmail or Yahoo! or whatever, with fake names. Nothing that can be traced back. But even if it could, even if you could find out who sent it, where would it lead you? All e-mails were sent and read at libraries or public places. We were totally covered.”

Scott was about to mention that this total coverage had eventually landed Scanlon’s ass in jail, but he decided to save it. “What does this have to do with me?”

“I’m getting to that.” Scott could see that Scanlon was warming up to his own tale. “In the old days—when I say old days, I mean, eight, ten years ago—we did it mostly with pay phones. I’d never see the name written. The guy would just tell me over the phone.”

Scanlon stopped and made sure that he had Scott’s full attention. His tone softened a bit, became less matter-of-fact. “That’s the key, Scott. It was by phone. I’d only hear the name on the phone, not see it.”

He looked at Scott expectantly. Scott had no idea what he was trying to say, so he went, “Uh huh.”

“Do you understand why I’m stressing that it was done by phone?”

“No.”

“Because a person like me, a person with rules, could make a mistake with the phone.”

Scott thought about that. “I still don’t get it.”

“I never kill women. That was rule number one.”

“So you said.”

“So if you wanted to put a hit on someone named Billy Smith, I’d figure Billy was a man. You know, with a y. I’d never think Billy would be a woman. With an ie at the end. You understand?”

Scott went very still. Scanlon saw it. He dropped the smile. His voice was very soft.

“We talked before about your sister, didn’t we, Scott?”

Scott did not respond.

“Her name was Geri, am I right?”

Silence.

“You see the problem, Scott? Geri is one of those names. If you heard it on the phone, you’d assume it would be with a J in the front and a y at the end. So fifteen years ago, I got a phone call. From that go-between man I told you about. . . .”

Scott shook his head.

“I was given an address. I was told exactly what time ‘Jerry’ ”—Scanlon made quote marks with his fingers—“would be home.”

Scott’s own voice seemed to come from very far away. “It was ruled an accident.”

“Most arsons are, if you know what you’re doing.”

“I don’t believe you.”

But Scott looked at the eyes again and felt his world teeter. The images flooded in: Geri’s contagious smile, the unruly hair, the braces, the way she stuck her tongue out at him during family gatherings. He remembered her first real boyfriend (a dork named Brad), her not getting a date to the junior prom, the gung-ho speech she made when she ran for student council treasurer, her first rock band (they were awful), her college acceptance letter.

Scott felt his eyes well up. “She was only twenty-one.”

No response.

“Why?”

“I don’t get into the whys, Scott. I’m just a hired hand—”

“No, not that.” Scott looked up. “Why are you telling me this now?”

Scanlon studied his reflection in the mirror. His voice was very quiet. “Maybe you were right.”

“Right about what?”

“What you said before.” He turned back toward Scott. “Maybe after all is said and done, I need the illusion of being human.”

three months later

chapter 1

There are sudden rips. There are tears in your life, deep knife wounds that slash through your flesh. Your life is one thing, then it is shredded into another. It comes apart as though gutted in a belly slit. And then there are those moments when your life simply unravels. A loose thread pulled. A seam gives way. The change is slow at first, nearly imperceptible.