Private: #1 Suspect

by James Patterson; Maxine Paetro

  If I couldn’t sleep in my bedroom, fuck it, I would sell the house.

  So I tried it out.

  I went into my bedroom, checked the perimeter once more, and dropped my gaze to the bed. I looked at it for a long minute and still saw just a bed, not a bad image of Colleen lying there dead.

  In my mind, at least, Colleen was at rest.

  I turned down the covers and turned on the TV.

  I flipped around the dial, found twenty-four-hour cable news, and when I saw a talking head standing in front of a lot of flashing red-and-blue lights, I put down the remote.

  The reporter’s name and the station call letters were on the screen, “Matt Galaburri, CNN.” There was a headline in small type under that: “DEA busts organized-crime drug haul worth $30 million in Renton, Washington. Four men arrested.”

  I jacked up the sound.

  It had happened as I hoped it would, but I wanted to hear the details to be sure that Private was in the clear.

  The reporter was excited, kept turning his head as he talked, so that half his words were lost. He was looking at a white panel van surrounded by law enforcement, both unmarked cars and those with the initials DEA on their sides.

  The location was a parking lot outside a warehouse that, judging from the camera angle, looked to be on a highway. The warehouse was one of those unremarkable square buildings you drove past on your way to somewhere and never thought a thing about.

  The reporter said, “What you see behind me is mop-up of one of the largest drug busts in recent history. A spokesman for the Drug Enforcement Agency has told CNN that narcotics valued in the tens of millions have been confiscated and four men were arrested, men who are known to have strong ties to organized crime.”

  He then filled in the backstory, how the van had stopped to transfer the cargo at a warehouse just south of Seattle that had been under surveillance for the past year.

  There was a cutaway to a video shot earlier by a dash cam mounted inside a DEA vehicle. The scene was illuminated by headlights.

  Four men were shown briefly unloading a white transport van with a vegetable decal on the side. A split second later, cars screamed into the lot.

  There were loud shouts, and cops rushed the four men on foot. Two of the men ran, two put up their hands. Law enforcement agents brought all of the men down, cuffed them on the asphalt.

  The video cut away again, this time to a man in a suit standing behind a podium marked with an official insignia. The lettering in the lower portion of the screen identified the man as Brian Nelson, director of the DEA.

  Nelson said to the cameras, “The officers involved in this operation saved a lot of lives today—”

  My phone rang and I dragged my eyes from the screen, saw Fescoe’s name on the caller ID. I thought, What the hell is this now? as I picked up the call.

  CHAPTER 125

  MY OLD FAIR-WEATHER friend, chief of police Mickey Fescoe, said, “Jack. Turn on the TV. Something you’re going to want to see.”

  “I’ve got it on,” I told Fescoe. “Looks like the DEA took a lot of illegally obtained drugs off the street.”

  “That’s right, buddy. I didn’t say anything about your role in this. That’s what you wanted, right?”

  “Right. I don’t want any credit. Don’t say anything to anyone, ever.”

  “I hear you, Jack. The DEA is elated. All that van needed was a red bow on top. Didn’t even need that. Noccia family fingerprints are all over this deal. Can we get Carmine? I don’t know, but this bust isn’t going to help him any. Maybe he’ll have a heart attack. Maybe someone will whack him. We can hope.”

  We exchanged a few more words about the good outcome for America, and then Mickey said, “By the way, I’m glad you’re free of the Colleen Molloy murder rap. I kept my eye on Tandy and Ziegler throughout. I don’t want any credit either,” Fescoe said, “but I hope you feel that the LAPD treated you fairly.”

  I said, “I have no complaints.”

  There was a beep in my ear and I checked the caller ID.

  Just when I thought there wasn’t a drop of adrenaline left in my body, I got a rush of panic as I saw that Carmine Noccia was on the line.

  Noccia’s drugs were gone. His customers were going to go crazy, and the DEA had Noccia’s men in custody.

  I told Fescoe I had incoming fire and congratulated him on his part in the DEA score.

  Then I switched to the second line.

  As I said hello to Carmine Noccia, I was hoping to heaven that he didn’t know I was behind the DEA bust. If he did, he was calling to tell me to put my affairs in order.

  Noccia said to me, “You heard about our unfortunate run-in with the DEA.” His tone of voice told me nothing.

  “I just saw it on CNN. That’s rough, Carmine.”

  “You had nothing to do with that, right, Jack?”

  “No. Of course not.”

  “I had to ask.”

  There was a long pause as I listened to my blood hum a very nervous tune. Then Noccia started speaking again.

  “The Feds say they’ve been watching our transfer station. Shit, maybe someone said something and the Marzullos found out. Called in a tip.

  “Either way, I’ve got no one to blame but myself. I should have arranged a transfer at another point, but we own that place, never dirtied it. We could get in and out fast, it being right on the highway like that. Hide the van until we could chop it up. Or so I thought.

  “Anyway, it’s my problem, Jack. I’m calling to tell you to keep the fee.”

  Was it safe to draw a breath?

  I said, “You want me to keep the six-million-dollar fee?”

  “You got the van out of the warehouse without incident, right? You handed it off to us. You gave us the names of the guys who took it. You executed the mission and so I’m paying you. That’s how it works between us.”

  Crap.

  Classic case of good news, bad news.

  Noccia trusted me. He was saying we were like brothers. That there was honor among thieves—and US Marines. The six million dollars in Private’s bank account meant that Carmine and I were friends.

  I never wanted to hear from Noccia again, but I didn’t think I was going to be that lucky.

  He hung up the way he always did—suddenly.

  He didn’t say good-bye.

  CHAPTER 126

  I PUT THE phone down and tried to absorb the shock of my conversation with Noccia. I wondered if I was really safe. If Mickey Fescoe could keep my involvement in the DEA bust a secret. Or if it was just a matter of time before some Noccia hoods confronted me in a dark alley.

  I wanted to call Justine.

  I wanted to hear her voice. I wanted to fill her in on Noccia and on my twin brother, who was in lockup for grand-theft auto and suspicion of murder.

  Justine’s number was first on my speed dial. I listened to the ring, imagined the call going through. I hoped she was at home, having a glass of wine out by her pool. I hoped she’d tell me to come over.

  Justine answered the phone on the third ring.

  “Don’t hang up, girly. I mean it.”

  Justine laughed. “Okay. You got me.”

  She said she’d been cleaning out her fridge. That it was her first evening off in about a month and she had a few chores to do.

  “You mind taking a glass of wine out to the pool? It’s how I pictured you just now.”

  She laughed again. “Let’s see. Yep. I happen to have an open bottle. Give me a second.”

  I heard glassware clinking, her pit bull rescue, Rocky, barking. I heard sliding glass doors open, and then she said, “I’m all set. What’s on your mind, Jack?”

  I started talking, surprised to hear what came out of my own mouth.

  Maybe the phone gave us both the intimacy and the distance we needed to at last discuss what I had done and why.

  “I want you to understand that I know I did a wrong thing. I can’t excuse myself, especially not to you, but you can
believe me, Justine. I’m sorry. I couldn’t be sorrier.”

  Justine said, “Stop blaming yourself for Colleen’s death, Jack. You did what you did, but you didn’t kill her.”

  Justine told me how much she’d liked Colleen, that she understood my feelings for her.

  “I thought that you two had broken up for good. And then you hadn’t. Not really or not yet. That hurt me, Jack. I think it would have hurt anyone, but I’m over it now.”

  I thanked her, and when the silence dragged on for too long, I told Justine about Clay Harris, how Tommy had shot him and that Tommy was currently in jail.

  “Knowing Tommy, they won’t be able to prove anything,” Justine said. “He’ll say he bought the car for Clay so that Clay wouldn’t have to pay taxes on a bonus. Something like that. He’ll say that he was taking it for a drive. I’ll bet Tommy did buy Harris that car. I can’t imagine Clay Harris walking into a Lexus showroom in Beverly Hills. I just can’t see it.

  “Tommy will get off the murder charge too,” she went on. “The cops will know he killed Clay, but they’ll never find his gun. You can’t testify against him. He can’t testify against you. Stalemate.”

  I sighed.

  “Jack, I’m not angry at you anymore.”

  I said, “Good.” I was on the very edge of saying I’d like to come over, when she said, “I’ve got to go, Jack. I’ve got a dog to walk, kitty litter to change, a freezer to scrub. I may even paint my nails. You should get some sleep. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  I said, “I’ve got some critical life-or-death chores to do myself, Justine. I’m going to run a couple loads of wash.”

  Justine laughed with me. “You do that,” she said.

  I said good night.

  What else could I do?

  CHAPTER 127

  JUSTINE TOOK ROCKY for a run. She needed the exercise more than he did, wanted to flat-out drive the tension right out of her body and mind.

  A half hour later, she and her doggy were back on Wetherly Drive, going up the path to her wonderful old house. It had been built in the late 1930s as a carriage house and had terrific architectural details.

  More than that, the house gave off a sense of permanence, very different from the modern place she’d bought a couple of years ago with Jack.

  There was no ocean to hush her to sleep here, but there were other sounds she liked as much: kids biking on the sidewalks, sprinklers chunking out spray over the close-cropped lawns, TV laughter coming from living rooms on her street. This all felt cozy and right to her.

  Inside the kitchen, Justine fed Nefertiti and Rocky, and went to close the cabinet doors she had opened when Jack had called and cajoled her into having a drink and a conversation.

  The ten sets of cabinet doors in her kitchen had been written on inside from top to bottom. Different pens had been used and different hands had penned little notations that told the family history of the Franks, who had lived here for three generations, right up until the time she had bought the house.

  The door she was looking at now had notations from the 1940s: a baby had been born, Eleanor Louise Frank. There were stars around the little girl’s name. A year later, there was a new Packard in the garage. John and Julie got engaged. Saul got polio at the age of ten. Puppies were born in a closet. There was a wedding in the backyard. And a cousin, Roy Lloyd Frank, had gone off to war.

  Justine closed the cabinet door.

  She had a good life. No question about it. She had a home of her own and a good job, and her life was the way she wanted it.

  Just today, she’d brought in a new case: a twenty-four-year-old fashion model had inherited a fortune from her now-dead eighty-year-old billionaire boyfriend. And the dead man’s family wanted Private to investigate the woman.

  This was a plum job, a nine-to-five kind of case. There would be no shooting. No mobsters. No one would get shoved off a cliff. She was going to enjoy this case and until she had the time to rest, work would fill her days in a fine and satisfying way.

  When the doorbell rang, Justine angrily jerked her head toward the front door. Rocky ran to the living room, threw his front legs up against the door, and whined.

  He knew who was ringing the bell and she did too.

  It was after ten. It was a weeknight. The man at her door couldn’t open up and he couldn’t settle down. He was a good boss, but in every other way, he was a waste of her time.

  Damn it.

  Her phone rang.

  She said, “What is it, Jack?”

  “Let me in, Justine. Please.”

  She clicked the phone off, went to the living room, and shouted through the door, “Jack. Go home. I mean it. I don’t want to see you.”

  Her phone rang again.

  She pressed the button and held the phone to her ear, slid down the wall, and sat on the floor. And she listened to him telling her what she already knew.

  “Two weeks ago we were on track, Justine. I made a bad mistake, a backslide, that I deeply regret. But we were making our way back to each other after a long time apart. We were building on all of it, everything we know about each other. There is nothing we can’t work out. You can’t turn your back on love, Justine, not ours. Please, sweetheart. It’s just me. Let me in.”

  “Oh, Jack,” she said into the phone.

  He loved her. Jack still loved her.

  And damn it, damn it, damn it. She still loved him.

  Acknowledgments

  We’re grateful to Captain Richard Conklin of the Stamford, Connecticut, PD and Elaine M. Pagliaro, forensic science consultant, MS, JD, for sharing their valuable time and expertise. Thanks too to our researcher, Ingrid Taylar, and to Lynn Colomello and Mary Jordan for their unflagging support.

  LET THE KILLING BEGIN.

  FOR AN EXCERPT,

  TURN THE PAGE.

  WEDNESDAY, JULY 25, 2012, 11:25 P.M.

  THERE ARE SUPERMEN and superwomen who walk this earth.

  I’m quite serious about that, and you can take me literally. Jesus Christ, for example, was a spiritual superman, as was Martin Luther, and Gandhi. Julius Caesar was superhuman as well. So were Genghis Khan, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Adolph Hitler.

  Think scientists like Aristotle, Galileo, Albert Einstein, and J. Robert Oppenheimer. Consider artists like da Vinci, Michelangelo, and Vincent van Gogh, my favorite, who was so superior it drove him insane. And above all, don’t forget athletically superior beings like Jim Thorpe, Babe Didrikson Zaharias, and Jesse Owens, Larisa Latynina, and Muhammad Ali, Mark Spitz, and Jackie Joyner-Kersee.

  Humbly, I include myself on this superhuman spectrum as well, and deservedly so, as you shall soon see.

  In short, people like me are born for great things. We seek adversity. We seek to conquer. We seek to break through all limits, spiritually, politically, artistically, scientifically, and physically. We seek to right wrongs in the face of monumental odds. And we’re willing to suffer for greatness, willing to embrace dogged effort and endless preparation with the fervor of a martyr, which to my mind are exceptional traits in any human being from any age.

  At the moment I have to admit that I’m certainly feeling exceptional, standing here in the garden of Sir Denton Marshall, a sniveling, corrupt old bastard if there ever was one.

  Look at him on his knees, his back to me, and my knife at his throat.

  Why, he trembles and shakes as if a stone has just clipped his head. Can you smell it? Fear? It surrounds him, as rank as the air after a bomb explodes.

  “Why?” he gasps.

  “You’ve angered me, monster,” I snarl at him, feeling a rage deeper than primal split my mind and seethe through every cell. “You’ve helped ruin the games, made them a mockery and an abomination of their intent.”

  “What?” he cries, acting bewildered. “What are you talking about?”

  I deliver the evidence against him in three damning sentences that turn the skin of his neck livid and his carotid artery a sickening, pulsing pur
ple.

  “No!” he sputters. “That’s…that’s not true. You can’t do this. Have you gone utterly mad?”

  “Mad? Me?” I say. “Hardly. I’m the sanest person I know.”

  “Please,” he says, tears rolling down his face. “Have mercy. I’m to be married on Christmas Eve.”

  My laugh is as caustic as battery acid: “In another life, Denton, I ate my own children. You’ll get no mercy from me or my sisters.”

  As his confusion and horror become complete, I look up into the night sky, feeling storms rising in my head and understanding once again that I am superior, a superhuman imbued by forces that go back thousands of years.

  “For all true Olympians,” I vow, “this act of sacrifice marks the beginning of the end of the modern games.”

  Then I wrench the old man’s head so his back arches.

  And before he can scream, I furiously rip the blade with such force that his head comes free of his neck all the way to his spine.

  THURSDAY, JULY 26, 2012, 9:24 A.M.

  IT WAS MAD-DOG hot for London. Peter Knight’s shirt and jacket were drenched with sweat as he sprinted north on Chesham Street past the Diplomat Hotel and skidded around the corner toward Lyall Mews in the heart of Belgravia, some of the most expensive real estate in the world.

  Don’t let it be true, Knight screamed internally as he entered the mews. Dear God, don’t let it be true.

  Then he saw a pack of Fleet Street jackals gathering at the yellow tape of a London Metropolitan Police barricade that blocked the road in front of a cream-colored Georgian townhome. Knight lurched to a stop, feeling like he was going to retch up the eggs and bacon he’d had for breakfast.

  What would he ever tell Amanda?

  Before Knight could compose his thoughts or still his stomach, his cell phone rang and he snatched it from his pocket without looking at the caller ID.

  “Knight,” he managed to choke. “That you, Jack?”