Killer Instinct (Instinct #2)(83)

The call came right after another hospital visit, this one to Eli. After two hours of surgery and one slug of lead removed from his abdomen, he continued to be recovering nicely.

“Give my regards to Eagle,” he told me with a wink. He never asked if it was my father who delivered the kill shot to the Mudir. Nor did he have to.

“Is that really you?” I asked, answering the phone. It was Tracy calling.

“Meet me in the park in an hour,” he said. “You know where.”

I did. I knew exactly where.

An hour later, I arrived at Cleopatra’s Needle in Central Park, Tracy’s favorite place to think. He hugged me, but there was no smile.

“Where’s Annabelle?” I asked.

“I dropped her off at Lucinda’s,” he said.

As much as I missed our little girl and was desperate to see her, I understood why Tracy had asked our babysitter to watch her while we talked.

“So you saw the video, huh?”

“Yes, and I read the Grimes article, too,” he said. “If you’re not careful, you’re going to win that guy a Pulitzer.”

I’d promised Allen Grimes that he’d look like a hero. Not only did he get to break the story of the bomb scare at Penn Station, he was able to detail his “patriotic role” in originally keeping the story under wraps. Forget the Pulitzer, though. If I knew Grimes, he was angling for his own cable show. Grimes on Crimes, only now on TV.

“When did you get back?” I asked Tracy.

I assumed he’d left the city with Annabelle, and I was right. He’d gone to visit his sister in Providence. I assumed, as well, that what brought him back was the video. But I was wrong.

“Before I left I checked the mail. There was a letter from Mosa,” he said. “I took it with me, but I only just opened it yesterday.”

The adoption agency had originally advised us not to be in contact with Annabelle’s mother in South Africa, but Tracy and I thought otherwise. Mosa should know that her daughter was well taken care of and loved, and that her decision to give Annabelle up for adoption, so she might have a better life, should never be regretted. Exchanging letters every few months was our way of doing that.

“What did she write?” I asked.

Tracy stared up for a moment at the large obelisk towering over us. “It’s what she didn’t write,” he said. “It’s what she never writes. Mosa never complains or even mentions how hard she has it. She’s always just thankful that Annabelle is with us in America.”

Tracy looked at me. I knew what he was trying to say.

“You had every right to be mad as hell at me,” I said.

“Maybe at first. But without sounding too corny, I didn’t stop to think about the danger you were obviously in, and how you weren’t doing it for yourself. For that alone, I’m a fool if I can’t forgive you.”

I hugged Tracy. He was smiling now. “Thank you,” I said.

“Shall we go get our daughter?”

“Absolutely.”

We walked away from Cleopatra’s Needle, the sun high over a beautiful June day. Our city had been rocked, once again the target of terrorism. People were on edge, fearful that there were more attacks to come. But no one was hiding. The park was bustling. There were joggers, bikers, sunbathers, couples on benches, parents and kids—anyone and everyone. They were all enjoying themselves. They were all busy living. Because that’s what we do.

In three words, I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life: it goes on.

Well put, Robert Frost.

“It’s pretty cool, in a way,” said Tracy as we continued to walk.

“What is?”

“That I’m married to someone who once worked for the CIA. I mean, it sounds so wild. My husband, the ex-CIA guy.”

Oh, boy. Here we go again. About that ex part …

“Funny you should mention that,” I said.





Read on for a sneak preview of the next thrilling

instalment in the Women’s Murder Club series



Coming October 2019





JULIAN LAMBERT was an ex-con in his midthirties, sweet faced, with thinning, light-colored hair, wearing a red down jacket.

As he sat on a bench in Union Square waiting for his phone call, he took in the view of the Christmas tree at the center of the square. The tree was really something: an eighty-three-foottall cone of green lights with a star on top, ringed by pots of pointy red flowers, surrounded by a red-painted picket fence.

That tree was secure. It wasn’t going anywhere.

It was lunchtime, and all around him consumers hurried out of stores weighed down with shopping bags, evidence of money pissed away in an orgy of spending. Julian wondered idly how these dummies were going to pay for their commercially fabricated gifting spree. Almost catching him by surprise, Julian’s phone vibrated.

He fished it out of his pocket, connected, and said his name, and Mr. Loman, the boss, said, “Hello.”

Julian knew that he was meant only to listen, and that was fine with him. He felt both excited and soothed as Loman explained just enough of the plan to allow Julian to salivate at the possibilities.

A heist.

A huge one.

The plan had many moving parts, Loman said, but if it went off as designed, by this time next year Julian would be living in the Caribbean, or Medellín, or Saint-Tropez. He was picturing a life of blue skies and sunshine, with a side of leggy young things in string bikinis, when Loman asked if he had any questions.