“Did you tell Jenna where Mr. Scarpelli was located?” Sam asked.
“I did not. Why would I sabotage my own case, let alone my career? I had a goal in mind that didn’t have anything to do with work.”
“I take it you were trying to seduce your paralegal,” John said, which she realized did not paint her in the best light. “Could you have been trying to impress her by sharing this confidential information you had?”
Peg scoffed. “I’m not a teenager, John. I can manage to engage women without using props.” That might not have been the best way to word it. She guessed visions of dildos were dancing in both agents’ heads.
“What did you talk about other than the Lanzito case?” Sam was still hunched over his notebook, but now he leaned forward in his chair. He looked like a cub reporter. “Please be as specific as you can.”
Peg looked at John. “I don’t see how that could possibly be relevant.”
“Relevance is something you argue about in court. We’re investigating. Everything’s relevant. Answer the question.”
She paused for only a second. To protest further would just make her look suspicious. But since she didn’t remember what they talked about other than work, and not much of that, she had to make something up. It seemed impossible that Jenna wouldn’t say something different when they interviewed her.
“We didn’t talk about much, really. Small talk. Where’d you get your boots, what are you reading, why won’t you come home with me tonight?”
“You mean she didn’t go home with you?” John asked. He looked surprised.
This was stupid. She was committing to a scenario where Jenna didn’t come home with her, only because she didn’t want people to know she’d slept with her. She had to talk to Jenna before the agents did. “I left the bar with Jenna at about nine thirty and walked her to the subway.”
“That’s surprising. You don’t go home alone very often, from what I hear.” John didn’t sound particularly friendly now.
“We all have our off days, John.” She forced herself to meet his eyes.
They went over her movements of the following two days, particularly the day she met with Scarpelli. She was on safer ground there. She’d been sober during the day, and drunk in the safety of her home during the night.
John closed his notebook and stood. “Any idea how this may have happened?”
Peg walked to the door and held it open for them. “Absolutely none, but I’ll keep my ears and eyes open. This has completely killed our case. We’ll have to dismiss, you know.”
“Oh, we know. That’s all we’ve been hearing since we got in this morning. We’ll talk to you again, Peg.”
She watched them walk down the hall before closing her office door and collapsing in her chair. She was shattered by the realization she had so casually given up information that could easily have led to Scarpelli’s death. She had only the haziest of recollection of the conversation with Jenna, but she knew she was showing off, trying to impress her. She felt sick. She thought of the wounded deputy marshal and she felt sicker still.
For the first time, Peg feared her drinking was out of control. She’d always been a person of clearly defined principles and goals, and now it seemed she had few principles and even fewer goals. Some nights, she could drink and remember the evening clearly and generally stay out of trouble. Other nights, and she never knew which they would be, she drank the same amount but remembered nothing. It was as if an invader occupied her body during the blackout, behaved in ways Peg would never dream of, and then returned her badly abused body just in time for a bone-crushing hangover.
She held her hand out in front of her and watched it tremble. She needed alcohol. The shakes weren’t from emotional turmoil, but from withdrawal. She knew she couldn’t keep putting herself through this time after time. She was living in an emotional graveyard, where everything pleasant in life went to die. She couldn’t see the rest of her life with alcohol, yet she couldn’t imagine life without it.
Her first concern was the present disaster. She got Jenna’s address from the office administrator and headed out to Queens. If Jenna had turned over the witness information to anyone, Peg would immediately confess her part in the leak. But she couldn’t imagine that it was Jenna. The idea that Jenna would have contact with the mob was ludicrous. She didn’t want to confess her indiscretion if it meant Jenna would be prosecuted.
As Peg walked through the building lobby toward the street, she saw Jim Braddock loitering at the other end of the huge space. He hustled over and followed her out the revolving door.
“Can I talk to you?” he said. He was working hard to keep up with her long stride.
“Now’s not a great time,” she said. She plunged into the crowded sidewalk. Braddock stuck close to her side.
“Yeah, I imagine not. You’re probably pretty spooked.”
She turned sharply and glared at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“That the FBI’s going to interview you about the Scarpelli leak, if they haven’t already.”
Peg stopped. “How did you know about that?”
“Come on, Peg. Do you think something like the Scarpelli hit’s not going to race through the office? The team’s already planning their spring vacations now that the case will be dismissed.”
“Wonderful.”
Braddock took hold of her elbow and led her away from the crowded sidewalks to a building plaza. Peg yanked her arm free.
“What the hell are you doing?” The fact that it was Braddock pestering her changed her remorse into irritation. It wasn’t possible for anything more to go wrong, and yet she was sure Braddock was bringing her more trouble. A group of students started playing hacky sack next to them.
“You need to listen to me, Peg.”
“Why? I’ve never found listening to you a good idea.” She started to walk away, and he grabbed her arm again.
“You’ll listen because for once I have you by the balls. I heard you tell Jenna Clark where Tad Scarpelli was located. It couldn’t have been clearer if you’d drawn her a map. There’s only one Popeye’s in Guilderland. I checked. And there’s only one house next to the Popeye’s.”
Peg stood stock-still. Braddock knew more of the details of what she told Jenna than she did. The mention of Popeye’s brought most of the rest back to her. He wasn’t making this up.
“Are you implying that Jenna took the information to the Lanzitos? Doesn’t that seem preposterous to you? It seems more likely that you’d do that, Jim. You had the same information. Who’s to say you weren’t the source of the leak?”
Braddock lit a cigarette and shook his head, as if he were talking to a teenager making up a crazy excuse for stealing the family car and driving it into a lake. “Did you tell anyone other than Jenna where he was?”
Peg was incredulous. “Of course not.” At least she didn’t think she had.
“Then it looks pretty bad for Jenna. If you tell the FBI that I overheard your conversation and may be a suspect, you’d have a couple problems. One—you’d be confessing to your own crime, and two—we’d all end up doing lie detector tests. I can guarantee you my test will be clean. Can you say the same of Jenna?”
Peg stared into the distance. She felt disconnected from her body, as if she were hovering above the corporeal Peg Ryan, wondering what she was going to do next.
“What do you want?” she asked.
“That’s more like it,” he said. Peg thought about hitting him. “You’re basically fucked unless you do what I ask.” He was standing in his crumpled coat, rocking from side to side. He seemed over-animated. His excitement at having Peg under his thumb was evident.
“I’m listening.”
“Let’s consider what would happen if I told the boss what I heard. You’d lose your license for sure. And I figure the criminal charges would include obstruction of a court order, tampering with a witness, and maybe some others we don’t even know about. You add on all the enhancements
to the sentence because there was a death involved and you’re looking at a max of thirty years. I checked on that, too.”
“For fuck’s sake. Will you tell me what the hell you’re asking for? If you’re going to blackmail me, get on with it.” The desire to hit him was almost overwhelming. She was sure she could break that bulbous nose of his.
Braddock laughed at her. “God, this is fun. Seeing you squirm? It’s like a dream come true. Okay, here it is. I want you to resign and recommend me as your replacement.”
Peg was confused. “That’s it?”
“That’s almost enough. I get rid of you, get the job I wanted, and get to revel in the knowledge that I have the power to destroy you. But I also want one hundred thousand dollars by five o’clock tomorrow.”
Peg took in a breath. “I don’t have that kind of money.”
“You don’t? You must be shitty with your money, Peg. We’re not paid that badly.”
Peg was shitty with her money. She had almost no savings, her credit card debt was considerable, and she had absolutely nothing to show for it. Drinking in Manhattan was expensive. “I can’t give you what I don’t have.”
“Not my problem. Get the money to me by tomorrow or I tell Shuman what I know.”
“Didn’t it occur to you that you’ll be in trouble too? You’ve known this for a couple days now and haven’t told anyone,” she said.
He grinned. “Don’t worry about me.”
Peg was silent for some time. She wouldn’t meet his eyes. “I need some time to think about this.”
“What’s to think about? You don’t have any options.”
Peg turned her back and started to walk away as she said, “I always have options.”
He watched her go. “Five o’clock tomorrow, Peg.”
She could practically hear him gloating.
*
Peg rented a car and drove out to Queens. It was early afternoon, the traffic not as insane as it usually was. She found Jenna’s address in an old, blue-collar neighborhood. She pulled up in front of a modest two-family building. There was a cockeyed awning over the front door and a sagging gutter. Peg rang the buzzer for the top floor apartment.
“Who is it?” came the cautious reply. Peg could tell it was Jenna’s voice through the crackly intercom.
“It’s Peg Ryan. I need to speak with you, Jenna.”
There was silence. Then, “Can’t this wait until I see you at the office tomorrow?”
Peg thought it was obvious it couldn’t wait. Why else would she drive out to the middle of Queens? “It’s important. May I come up?”
Another pause. “I’ll buzz you in.”
Peg walked through the foyer littered with circulars and pizza menus. Jenna met her at the top of the stairs, blocking the partially opened door to her apartment.
“What are you doing here?” Jenna sounded more annoyed than curious.
Peg looked past Jenna to a slice of the apartment behind her. An older woman opened the door wider and peered out at Peg. “Is everything okay, Jenna?”
“It’s fine, Nana. Would you check on Sam, please?”
The woman walked away, but Jenna kept the door open. “Let’s go in.”
The door opened onto a living room. Weak sunlight came through the old windows. Peg noticed a box of toys tucked into a corner, but the room was clean and uncluttered. Jenna sat on one end of the sofa, crossing both arms and legs.
“I didn’t realize you had a child,” Peg said. She sat as far away from Jenna as she could. There’d be no sliding across for a kiss.
“That’s funny. The other night I told you I have a son, and we talked about it for some time. Apparently, there was nothing about me that night the least bit memorable.”
Peg tried not to cringe. She didn’t remember a thing about that conversation. “I’m afraid we don’t have time for me to apologize for all the ways I’m an ass.” She turned to Jenna and leaned forward. “Do you remember the other night at Halliday’s when we talked about my witness prep with Tad Scarpelli?”
“Of course. I’m not the one with the memory problem.”
Peg sighed. “It’s a problem, all right. I don’t remember telling you about where I was going to meet with him. And I don’t remember you telling me about your son and, worst of all, I don’t remember us making love.” She ached for a drink.
“We didn’t make love,” Jenna said quietly. “You fell asleep almost as soon as we got into bed.”
“Jesus.” Peg put her head in her hands and rubbed her face. “Obviously, I had too much to drink that night and I apologize. I’m embarrassed and a little worried. You’re a member of my staff.”
“I’m not going to bring sexual harassment charges, Peg. I wanted to be with you. But I wasn’t really with you, was I?”
“No, I guess you weren’t. But there’s a bigger problem that’s come up, something that concerns you as well.”
Peg turned at the sound of a child pounding down the hallway. He careened into the living room, a boy of about six who hurdled into Jenna’s arms, shrieking with laughter. He was terribly thin, completely bald, and quite serious when he scrambled from Jenna’s lap and offered his hand to her.
“My name’s Evan,” he said, pumping up and down. “Are you a friend of Mommy’s?”
Peg’s heart was breaking, but she shook his hand gravely. “I’d like to think so.” She smiled down at the guileless and friendly face. She wasn’t good with things like this. The misfortune of others made her unbearably sad.
“Evan, why don’t you go play Legos for a bit?” Jenna said. “I’ll be done here shortly and we can go to the park.” She looked pointedly at Peg. He gave a small salute and ran back down the hall.
“Wow. The manners on that kid,” Peg said.
Jenna smiled wanly. “Evan’s had a lot of time indoors with adults, either here or at the hospital. Sometimes he acts like an old man.”
“What’s wrong with him?”
“It’s leukemia. He just finished a course of chemo and seems to be in some form of remission. He had a good checkup today.”
“I’m sure he’ll…Well, I’m sure he’s a lucky boy to have you looking out for him.” She wondered if it were possible to feel more uncomfortable. Probably, since she hadn’t even told her about Scarpelli.
Jenna looked calmly at Peg. “Why did you come out here, Peg?”
“Tad Scarpelli was murdered last night at his safe house. It looks like it was a hit.” She carefully watched Jenna’s face. Her blank expression took on a frown.
“That means we’re screwed on the Lanzito prosecution, right?” Jenna didn’t sound particularly shocked. A hit on a mob witness wasn’t unheard of.
“Yes. We’ll have to dismiss. It also means there was a leak of the information on his whereabouts. As far as I know, I was the only one in the office who had that information. Until I drunkenly told you.”
Jenna’s eyes widened. “You don’t seriously think I had anything to do with it, do you?”
“No, I don’t, but the FBI are already investigating. They just got done interviewing me. I didn’t tell them that I’d leaked the story to you. I don’t want them to make you a scapegoat. If they knew about our conversation and didn’t find any other source for the leak, I’m afraid that’s what they’d do.”
Jenna stood up. “Christ! Because you’re a drunk, I might be hung out to dry. What about Evan? My grandmother? Would the FBI really think I handed off the information to someone in the mob?”
“They wouldn’t discount it. We work in the organized crime division. It’s assumed we know a lot of the players in the different families.”
Jenna was pacing, and Peg watched for a moment. “Also, Jim Braddock knows we spoke about the location. He overheard our conversation.”
Jenna swung back to Peg. “Are you fucking kidding me? He’s a complete ass. He could turn us in!”
“Don’t worry about Braddock. I’ll make sure he doesn’t say a word. But be careful what you
say around him.”
Peg stood and faced Jenna. “You’re going to get a call any minute from the FBI, and they’ll insist on coming out here to ask you questions. If I thought it would help you, I wouldn’t hesitate to confess my part in this. But I’m afraid that’s the very thing that would cause you trouble. When the FBI are here, don’t say a word about that part of our conversation. I told them we briefly discussed the case and then went on to talking about this and that. Books, but I didn’t mention any specific titles. I said something to them about asking where you got your boots. I also told them that I was trying to get you into bed, but that we left the bar and went our separate ways after I walked you to the subway.”
“Okay,” Jenna said. She was looking around for paper and pen.
“It’s probably best if you don’t write anything down.”
Jenna picked up her phone. “There’s a few calls here from a number I don’t know.” She dialed into voicemail, her brow furrowing as she listened. “They’re on their way here. This message is from fifteen minutes ago and they said they were still in Manhattan.”
“I better get out of here, then. I can’t tell you how sorry I am I’ve brought this on you. But if we stick together, I know you’ll be fine.”
Jenna held the door open and looked Peg in the eye. “It was a fucked up thing to do, but I know you’re a good person. You need to take a hard look at your drinking, Peg.”
The door closed on her, and Peg felt like it’d hit her in the face. She flew down the stairs, not to avoid the FBI seeing her, but to run from a terrible fear. No one had ever said anything to her about her drinking, and hearing it out loud made it so much harder to deny. She could never unring that bell.
When she got back to her office, she called Braddock in and agreed to his terms. She spent the next few hours getting loans from her parents, from the bank, from the quick loan place down the street, and maxing out her credit cards. She raised fifty thousand dollars. That’d have to do, and if not, she had the one ultimate option to fall back on. She still had the .22 that her father gave her and the bullets to load it with.
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