City Dark(61)

He studied it for a long moment, then whispered the name to himself.

Except this time he said, “Mom.”

It was a newspaper photograph of a living, breathing, healthy-looking Lois DeSantos—she was still using her married name—with a group of women outside a church. A local section of the Sacramento Bee had covered an event that took place at the Tahoe Park Grace Lutheran Church on a Sunday in 2013. A group of women “living and working” at the church had started a community garden and were raising vegetables and herbs for the area’s needy population. In the photo, six women stood around the freshly planted garden on a bright, sunny day. The women were a mix of ages and races. All but one was smiling.

The woman on the left was their minister, Pastor Suzanne Nelson, the caption stated, with a white clerical collar above a long black dress. Second to the end on the right was a pale, tired-looking old woman with a thin mouth, a slightly crooked nose, and flat hair parted neatly in the middle. She was not smiling, but she looked content. Even a little self-satisfied. The names of the women were listed under the photo, which was how Aideen pinpointed the image in the first place.

“I enhanced the photo and compared it to the crime scene and ME photos,” she said. “I won’t be sharing this with the prosecution, but that’s her.”

“She does look content,” he said, “Not happy, exactly, but content.”

“I agree, but I think she also thought she had one very important thing left to do. As far as I can tell, it was soon after this that she decided to come back. I think she hoped to find you, Joe. Maybe Robbie too.”

“Nothing more recent on her, though?” he asked. “Nothing in New York?”

“Just what the police found. She was in and out of a shelter in Coney Island the last few weeks. She might have also gotten services from another women’s shelter in Brooklyn. Most women in her circumstances move around. I couldn’t find anything, though.”

“So she was here,” Joe said, shaking his head. “Maybe I ran into her in Brooklyn someplace. I mean, I don’t know. Maybe she tried to talk to me? Maybe I was . . . mean to her?” He looked at Aideen, tears forming in his eyes. He was shocked at them. It had been decades since he’d cried about her. Decades.

“You wouldn’t have been that way,” she said, her mouth firm. “That’s not you.”

“When I was drinking? I mean, really drinking? I have no idea who I was.”

“I think I do,” she said. “I know a little about alcoholism. You don’t do things drunk that you wouldn’t do sober. You’re not a murderer. Whatever happens, I’ll never believe that.”

“DNA says otherwise.”

“I know, but . . . let me ask you something. This talk you were supposed to have with your uncle—I know it didn’t happen, but did you ever go through his papers after he died? Did you save anything?”

“Almost nothing,” Joe said, picturing the square box of childhood memories that he assumed was now in an evidence locker somewhere with Zochi’s name on it. “I was a kid, just floating in the middle of it all. I signed a few things just before he died. Everything about the cremation and the service was already taken care of. Mike knew he was dying long before I did. He set up a trust for me. It carried me through law school.”

“Right. And Robbie was bitter about it. We know that. What happened to your uncle’s house?”

“No idea,” Joe said. “Someone on my mother’s side of the family swooped in. They sold it at some point. There was no money in it, though. My uncle was mostly broke. He had borrowed against it. Some of that was medical bills, but it was mostly for me.”

“Was there anyone else around? After the blackout, when you were living there? Other than Robbie, I mean.”

“There was one man, yeah,” Joe said. He felt a sudden rush of memory, colors, sensations, darkness. He had to shake his head to clear it. “We met him the night of the blackout, before we reached my uncle. I haven’t thought about him in years, but . . . he helped us when we were stuck in the city.”

“Helped you? How?”

“We were able to call my uncle at one point. He had a friend who lived in the city and was willing to help. Mike had us meet him at a coffee shop. Things went a little sideways, but . . . in the end, he followed through. He brought me all the way to Staten Island.”

“Okay, so a friend of your uncle’s.”

“Actually, he was more than that. I just didn’t know it then.”

“What was his name?”

“Nate, but that’s all I remember.” He closed his eyes, picturing him again. “Black, about my uncle’s age. Tall, lanky. Great voice, like a DJ. Anyway, he was a godsend. He got me to the ferry and rode with me to the other side, that morning of the fourteenth. The lights were still out, but the ferry was running. God, it was hot.”

“Where was Robbie?” Her brow knitted, she reached for a yellow notepad and began to scribble. “You said, ‘He got me to the ferry.’” Joe wasn’t sure that he had noticed this about her before. She was a marvelous listener.

“Robbie disappeared late that night. We got into a situation and . . .” He trailed off and sighed. “It’s a lot to go into, but Robbie ultimately blamed Nate for it, and he left us in the city. Robbie showed up at my uncle’s a day or two later, but he didn’t stay long.”