The Innocent
“Yeah, but, I don’t know, she’s a little wild. I heard St. Margaret’s in East Orange is supposed to be good.”
Matt looked out the window.
“You know anything about it?”
“About Catholic school?”
“Yeah. Or St. Margaret’s.”
“No.”
Lance had both hands on the wheel again. “Say, do you know who went there?”
“Went where?”
“St. Margaret’s.”
“No.”
“Remember Loren Muse?”
Matt did. It was that way with people you went to elementary school with, even if you never saw them after graduation. You recall the name and face instantly. “Sure. Tomboy, hung out with us for a while. Then she kinda faded away. Her father died when we were kids, right?”
“You don’t know?”
“Know what?”
“Her old man committed suicide. Blew his brains out in their garage when she was in like eighth grade. They kept it a secret.”
“God, that’s awful.”
“Yeah, but she’s doing okay. She works in the prosecutor’s office in Newark now.”
“She’s a lawyer?”
Lance shook his head. “An investigator. But after what happened with her father, well, Loren hit a rough patch too. St. Margaret’s helped, I think.”
Matt said nothing.
“But you don’t know anybody who went to St. Margaret’s?”
“Lance?”
“Yeah.”
“This subtlety act. It’s not really playing. What are you trying to ask me here?”
“I’m asking if you know anything about St. Margaret’s.”
“You want me to write your daughter a letter of recommendation?”
“No.”
“Then why are you asking me these questions?”
“How about a Sister Mary Rose? Taught social studies there. Do you know her?”
Matt shifted so that he faced Lance full on. “Am I a suspect in some kind of crime?”
“What? We’re just having a friendly conversation here.”
“I don’t hear a no, Lance.”
“You have a very guilty conscience.”
“And you’re still evading my question.”
“You don’t want to tell how you knew Sister Mary Rose?”
Matt closed his eyes. They weren’t far from Irvington now. He leaned his head back against the headrest. “Tell me more about your kids, Lance.”
Lance did not reply. Matt closed his eyes and listened to the rain. It brought him back to what he’d been thinking before Lance Banner showed up. He needed to call Cingle as soon as he could.
Because, strangely enough, the rain could hold the key to what Olivia was doing in that hotel room.
Chapter 22
MATT THANKED LANCE for the ride and watched him pull away.
As soon as the minivan was out of sight, he headed inside, grabbed his phone, and started dialing Cingle’s cell. He checked the time. It was nearly eleven o’clock. He hoped that she was awake, but even if she wasn’t, well, once he explained, she’d understand.
The phone rang four times and then went into Cingle’s simple voice mail message:
“Me. You. Tone.”
Damn.
He left Cingle a message: “Call me back, it’s urgent.” He hit the button for “other options” and plugged in his home number. Maybe she’d get the page.
He wanted to download the images from his camera phone onto his hard drive, but like a dummy he’d left the USB cord at work. He searched the computer room for the cord that came with Olivia’s phone, but he couldn’t find it.
It was then that he noticed the phone’s message light was blinking. He picked it up and hit play. There was only one message and after the day he’d had, it hardly surprised him.
“Matt, this is Loren Muse. I’m an investigator with the Essex County prosecutor’s office. We knew each other a lifetime ago, at Burnet Hill. Could you give me a call as soon as possible?”
She left two numbers—office and cell.
Matt put the phone back in its cradle. So Lance was trying to get a jump on his county counterpart. Or they were working together. Whatever. He wondered what it could be about. Lance had said something about St. Margaret’s in East Orange. Something about a nun there.
What could it possibly have to do with him?
Whatever, it couldn’t be good.
He didn’t want to speculate. He also didn’t want to get caught unawares. So he headed into the computer room and ran a classic Google search. He searched for St. Margaret’s in East Orange and got too many hits. He tried to remember the nun’s name. Sister Mary Something. He added that into the mix. “Sister Mary” “St. Margaret’s” “East Orange.”
No relevant hits.
He sat back and thought it through. Nothing came to him. He wouldn’t call Loren back. Not yet. It could wait until morning. He could say that he was out drinking—Lance would back that up—and forgot to check his messages.
His head started clearing. He thought about his next move. Even though he was alone in the house, Matt checked the corridor and closed the door. Then he opened the closet door, reached toward the back, and pulled out the lockbox. The combination was 878 because those numbers had absolutely no link to his life. He’d just made them up on the spot.
Inside the lockbox was a gun.
He stared at it. The semiautomatic was a Mauser M2. Matt had bought it off the streets—it’s not hard to do—when he got out of jail. He’d told no one—not Bernie, not Olivia, not Sonya McGrath. He was not sure how to explain why he owned it. One would again think that his past would have taught him the danger of such actions. It had, he supposed, but with a twist. Now that Olivia was having a baby, yes, he’d have to get rid of the gun. But he wasn’t sure that he’d be able to go through with it.
The prison system has its share of critics. Most problems are obvious and, to some extent, organic, what with the fact that you are, for the most part, caging bad people with other bad people. But the one thing that was definitely true was that prison taught you all the wrong skills. You survive by being aloof, by isolating yourself, by fearing any alliance. You are not shown how to assimilate or become productive—just the opposite. You learn that no one can be trusted, that the only person you can truly count on is yourself, that you must be ready to protect yourself at all times.
Having the gun gave Matt a strange feeling of comfort.