Shattered (Michael Bennett #14)(59)

Mary Catherine said, “How are you doing today?”

“Trying to get things done. How about you?” I waited during a long pause on the other end of the line. Every second made me more apprehensive about what was coming.

Finally, Mary Catherine said, “I don’t know. I guess I’m lonely. I’m a lonely newlywed. Aren’t you lonely too?”

“When I stop for a moment, yes, I get down and lonely. But in the spirit of always speaking honestly with each other, most of the time things happen so fast here I can’t think of much. I’m on the move and concentrating.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to remind you.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Just hearing your voice cheers me up. Even if your voice sounds a little sleepy and scratchy this morning. Are you okay?”

“Just tired. Glad the kids are all at school. I will say I was a little queasy earlier. Now I’m fine.”

“Are you sure?” My mind started to race with all the possibilities.

Mary Catherine said, “I ate some kind of breakfast sandwich Seamus brought over. It didn’t agree with me.”

“What did that old codger want?”

Mary Catherine giggled on the other end of the line. I could picture her beautiful smile. Dimples in both cheeks. Blue eyes flashing. God, did I miss her.

Mary Catherine said, “All Seamus needed was some sandpaper and a pair of your locking pliers for his project with Shawna.”

“Any idea what this super-secret project is?”

“None at all. And I don’t ask questions. It’s nice that your grandfather can get so committed to a kid’s project. We are really blessed to have him in our lives.” Mary Catherine sighed, and I could hear the exhaustion in the exhale.

I said, “Are you sure you’re okay? Say the word and I’ll be home in a few hours. I’ll come back home for good.”

“Really? You’d do that for me?”

“Of course I would.” I waited in silence to give Mary Catherine plenty of time to think about my offer.

Eventually, Mary Catherine said, “I know you’d come home. I know the kind of man I married. I also know you’d never hold it against me. But it’s important to do the right thing. Finding Emily’s killer is the right thing to do.” She paused for a moment and added, “As long as you don’t forget Trent’s ceremony with the mayor.”

“There is no way I’ll miss it.”

Mary Catherine said, “You stay in DC. I’ve got it nailed down up here.”

I had to smile. I knew she had it nailed down. I doubted if there was anything that could defeat Mary Catherine. And through it all, she was still supporting me. Supporting a job I didn’t have to be doing.

What a woman.





Chapter 77



I lay on my hotel bed, thinking of Mary Catherine. Wearing all my clothes, including my shoes, with my feet dangling. It was a loser’s pose, taken when everything had gone to shit. And it felt like one, accomplishing nothing except making me realize I could barely move.

I felt like a lovesick teenager. I missed her so much. But I couldn’t see her. All the threats and commands to return home had made little impact on me. But hearing the loneliness in my wife’s voice almost broke me. I considered giving up. Going home. Living my life.

My stomach roiled in acid, in part due to stress. I had to consciously unclench my jaw. This was not my usual state of existence. I forced myself off the bed. I plodded to the tiny writing desk under the wall-mounted TV. I plopped down in the chair and grabbed a random file folder.

Was it fate that a four-by-six print of Emily’s FBI identification photo fell onto the desk? It forced me to stare down at her pretty and solemn face. The FBI didn’t care much for agents smiling for their ID photos. That’s when I realized I was going to keep trying to find her killer. Until I had no other options. As far as I knew that could be in a day or two. Fate or not, Emily’s photo stiffened my resolve.

Then my phone rang. It was a blocked number, but I was confident it was William Patel from the NYPD tech division.

William jumped right into it without even a greeting. “I just talked to a buddy at Google. You had narrowed down things so much that he could check it quickly and easily. There was one hit.”

William gave me the number and I immediately recognized it as Beth Banks’s phone.

“Could he go into any details about the hit?”

William said, “He explained to me that Maps and some of the other Google programs randomly interface with satellites. It’s a way to keep the GPS as accurate as possible. He couldn’t narrow down the exact location of the phone on that date but knew that it had been in Baltimore. He said that it accessed several programs in the evening of the date you gave me. He couldn’t go into much else.”

I made some notes in my main notebook. Maybe I’d stumbled on a good suspect. Frankly, Beth Banks was about my only suspect now. This was a case we had to get exactly right. A jury would be sympathetic to a Stanford-educated woman who was the chief of staff for a Supreme Court justice. There could be no doubt. That’s why I needed a DNA sample. And she wasn’t going to give it to me. Not voluntarily, anyway.

William said, “My buddy says that if you’re going to use any of that information in a report, we have to send him a signed court order.”