The 19th Christmas

by James Patterson

  My attention was drawn to a harpsichord in the window. It was a meticulously crafted piece, with a mosaic of inlaid wood. How much was this doggy, anyway?

  I stepped in and read the card on a pedestal beside it. I learned that it had been made by an unknown Italian artist in the mid-fifteenth century; the red dot beside the two-million-dollar price tag told me that it had been sold.

  I shifted my eyes to other instruments displayed around the large, open room, each presented like one of the queen’s crown jewels. Red dots marked many of the cards, telling me that the money was flowing along with the champagne.

  I was beginning to understand. Compared with armored trucks and banks, compared even with the de Young Museum, the Soigne Gallery was vulnerable and as sweet a hit as a chocolate cake with icing roses.

  All Loman would need was a half a dozen guys with a couple of vans parked at the rear of the building. And he’d have to have a fence with international connections who could sell this pricey, unusual loot to collectors, a fence with an underground gallery and the ability to keep an illegal haul to him- or herself.

  My thoughts were broken by a handsome man in his midthirties wearing a professional smile and an expensive suit calling out, “May I help you?” He came over to us. “I’m Charles Linden,” he said, “operations manager. Has someone left their car lights on?”

  If only. I gave him our names and told him our business, after which he reluctantly called over to Soigne’s owner, Renata Fabiano.

  Ms. Fabiano, standing to my left in the center of the gallery, was a stunning fifty-something woman in black, buffed and polished to a high shine. She’d been showing off her knowledge of fifteenth-century strings to a rapt couple of richies.

  She didn’t like the interruption. She scowled at her manager and then, even though I was a couple of inches taller than her, managed to look down on me as though I were tracking dog dirt onto her carpet.

  I apologized, steered Ms. Fabiano to a dead spot in the gallery, and told her that we’d received a tip that her gallery was a target of an armed robbery.

  For a moment I had her complete attention. She didn’t even give Conklin a glance. First time I could remember a female failing to take a long look at Inspector Hottie.

  But her attention to me was fleeting. “Talk to Charles,” Fabiano said. “He knows all about our security systems.” Then she returned to her prospects.

  The manager took his cue and led Conklin and me to his office just behind the gallery display space. After we all sat down, he said, “How do you know about this impending robbery?”

  Conklin said, “Mr. Linden, how we know isn’t important. What we know is that the party who may be targeting this gallery is a pro. When he stages a hit, he gets what he came for. And he has a signature. He leaves dead bodies behind.”

  Chapter 36

  “We have amazing security,” Charles Linden told us. “Cameras at the exits, vibration sensors on paintings, and many of the sculptures and alarms are connected to a central station. Our employees have been vetted and their pass cards are registered.”

  I said, “You’re not checking packages and bags at the door. You don’t have screening apparatus.”

  Linden shrugged. “Our patrons wouldn’t stand for it. You can see that, can’t you?”

  Conklin said, “I’d like to look at a list of your employees.”

  “Why do you need that?”

  “Often big-ticket robberies are inside jobs,” said Conklin. “I can’t force you, but you should let me have that list and the names of anyone who left your employ in the past year.”

  Linden gave Conklin a cold look, then tapped on his keyboard. The printer on his credenza came to life.

  I said, “What other security measures do you have, Mr. Linden? Saturation motion detectors?”

  “Yes, in the main gallery, but not in the other wings. I don’t see how we could rewire the place every time we have a new exhibit.”

  Conklin walked over to the printer. “Okay for me to take this?”

  Linden said, “Be my guest.”

  I thought, What a jerk, but didn’t say it.

  Conklin took the list of employee names from the tray and said to me, “I’ll be back.”

  While Conklin was running the list through our car’s computer, I told Linden, “Here’s what I think. You’ve got a good system, but it won’t withstand a serious professional assault. If I were you, I’d call your security company, have them place three or four guards on premises twenty-four/seven for the next couple of days. And if they have canines, bring them in overnight.”

  “Uh, I’ll talk to Renata.”

  “Also, since you don’t know who is coming in or what they’re carrying, I’d close up shop now.”

  “Our customers, clients, they’re making big purchases. We could sell more before Christmas than we will in the next six months.”

  I wanted to get up, muss his hair, flip his tie, and tell him, What if someone brings in a smoke bomb? And automatic weapons? What if that person opens the back door for the rest of the crew?

  But I didn’t do that.

  I said, “Please pass our recommendations on to Ms. Fabiano. I’m putting them in my report.”

  I got up from my seat feeling almost as tired as I had some months ago. Right before I was given doctor’s orders to take time off to rest. I needed to go home.

  I returned to the main gallery just as Conklin came back in from the street. He signaled to me.

  I said, “Whatcha got?”

  He showed me his phone.

  “I’ll take this,” I said.

  I walked over to Ms. Fabiano, who was talking to another pair of 1 percenters, all three of them admiring a rare violin. I apologized for interrupting and said, “I need a moment.”

  Again she looked at me like I’d crawled out of a storm drain, and I gave her a similar look—the homicide-inspector version.

  “Are you still in touch with your ex-husband?” I asked.

  “Royce? Occasionally. Why?”

  “Did you know that three years ago he was arrested for robbing a jewelry store? He flipped on his partner and after six months was released on probation. He lives in San Francisco. Works at the Ritz-Carlton.”

  I was thinking Renata Fabiano’s ex was just the type of bit player Loman considered disposable. If Mr. Fabiano knew the gallery’s vulnerabilities, he could be setting it up for Loman’s big score.

  “Not Royce. I don’t believe it. That’s a mistake.”

  But the look in her eyes told me that she was reviewing what she knew about her husband. And I had another thought: Possibly Renata Fabiano was collaborating in the hit. I’d heard weirder things.

  I gave her my card and then Conklin and I split. I called Brady from the car.

  “Soigne could be the target,” I said.

  I told him about Mr. Royce Fabiano, about his record, and that he could be a Loman tool. I suggested that cars be stationed in front of the gallery and out by the loading dock.

  “Even cruising by could be a deterrent.”

  Brady said, “I’ll do what I can.”

  “Okay. I’m signing off. Merry Christmas, Brady.”

  I said it emphatically. I wanted him to hear that I was going home, and no one had better try to stop me.

  Chapter 37

  Conklin and I had parked our cars on Harriet Street, convenient to the Hall’s rear entrance, a half block off Bryant. It was sevenish when I said good night to Richie under the overpass. We hugged, patted each other’s backs, and got into our respective cars.

  In twenty minutes, tops, I’d be home. Home. A beautiful word, calling up clean clothes, hugs and kisses, shared news of the day over dinner, and then blessed sleep.

  As Richie drove off, I realized I hadn’t asked what he’d gotten Cindy for Christmas. Our shopping trip to Union Square had careened off the rails when Julian Lambert ran past us shouting, “Merry flippin’ Christmas.”

  Had it been only sixty hours a
go? And now he was dead.

  I called Joe, told him I was on my way. I kissed at the phone, clicked off, put my key in the ignition, and turned it. The engine coughed. I swore and tried to start her up again.

  I’m a fair auto mechanic in a pinch, but not without tools and in a dark alley.

  I called Joe back. “Joe,” I said into my phone. “My battery’s dead. Car battery.”

  “Oh, crap,” he said. “Stove malfunctioned. I don’t know. The chicken is raw.”

  “I’ll get a uniform to drive me home. I can pick up some noodles—”

  “Just stay in the car,” he said. I heard him say, “Jules? Want to go for a ride?”

  She screamed, “Noooooooo!” Martha woofed along with her. Joe said, “Lindsay. Stay put. We’re on the way.”

  The entire expedition took an hour, including picking up take-out noodle-shop dinners. Julie cried in the car, and by the time we made it through the front door, she was having a full-fledged, all-about-me meltdown. She didn’t like the Christmas tree. She wanted something different. And she didn’t like me.

  “You’re bad, Mommy.”

  “What do you mean, bad?” I asked her.

  She rolled onto her belly, kicked her feet, and cried.

  Joe looked at me and mouthed, I don’t know.

  I said, “Julie. This is our tree. I love it. If you don’t, I’m sorry you’re mad at me, but it’s time for bed.”

  “Nooooooooooo.”

  Her favorite word.

  Joe said, “Yes. Would you like mac and cheese instead of the take-out noodles?”

  “Nooooooooo.”

  Joe said, “That’s it, then.” He picked her up and headed with her to her room, saying over his shoulder, “Take a shower, Linds. I’ll set the table.”

  I poured wine for Joe and kibble for Martha. I locked up my gun, kicked off my shoes, and stripped off my clothes.

  Standing under the shower felt like being reborn. The whole day dissolved under the hot spray—the staff meeting, the trip out to the de Young Museum and the talk with Karp and Jacobi, the security review of Soigne, and the certain feeling that I’d be hearing tomorrow that the gallery had been hit.

  Joe was plating the beef and noodles when I reappeared in the kitchen and heard my phone calling me from the hallway. Joe said. “No. Lindsay, no. Don’t do it.”

  I got to the phone, glanced at the screen. Thank God. It wasn’t Brady.

  I called out to Joe, “It’s okay. It’s Mrs. Rose.”

  Joe said, “I forgot to tell you. Mrs. Rose is stopping over tonight to drop off our gifts. What did we get her?”

  “Oh, my God,” I said. “Joe, I was doing Christmas shopping when that freaking crime happened in front of me.”

  “It will be okay. You can tell her that.”

  The phone buzzed in my hand and I answered, laughing, “Gloria. Our stove malfunctioned…”

  Chapter 38

  There was a lot of background noise—a siren? A voice I didn’t recognize said, “Mrs. Molinari?”

  “Yes. Who is this?”

  “Doris Dillon. I’m an EMT.”

  I felt a cold shock of fear as I understood the siren. How did the EMT get Mrs. Rose’s phone?

  “A woman took a fall at Whole Foods. We’re taking her to Metro. She must have been trying to call you. I accidentally hit ‘send’ when I picked up her phone.”

  “What’s wrong? Can I speak with her?”

  Doris said, “She’s unconscious. I have to go now.”

  “Wait. What happened?”

  The line went dead.

  I shouted, “Hello. Hello?” And I pressed Redial. There was no answer. I pictured Mrs. Rose falling down. Hitting her head. Or having a heart attack and falling. I saw her inside the bus, strapped to a stretcher, lines in her arms, mask over her face. Alone.

  She had been there for us whenever we needed her since Julie was born.

  Joe was in the kitchen trying to fix the stove. I yelled, “Joe. Gloria fell. She’s unconscious and on the way to the hospital. I’d better go.”

  “Oh, no. But wait, Linds. What can you do for her?” Joe asked.

  “Whatever she would do for me. I’ll try to reach her daughter. Becky lives in New York. You think she could get a flight out tonight?”

  “You stay and I’ll go,” he said.

  Since driving me home from Harriet Street, Joe had had a couple of drinks. I had not. I was in pajamas. He was not. I’d been working for the past twenty hours. He’d been home for a while.

  We were batting this all back and forth when Julie woke up and started screaming. I wanted to scream, too.

  In the end, there were no good solutions, but we decided on one.

  We were all going.

  Joe took the noodles out of the microwave and forced me to eat some. Then I got dressed and went into Julie’s pale yellow bedroom. She was still fussing in her new big-girl bed.

  “Julie, want to go for a ride?”

  “Noooooooooooooo.”

  “We can watch planes and stuff.”

  My three-year-old gave me a dubious look, as if she were in Interview 2 and I had asked her if she wanted to waive her rights. She lifted her arms.

  Leaving our senior dog in charge of the apartment, the Molinaris locked up and drove to Metro.

  Chapter 39

  The waiting room outside the emergency department at Metropolitan Hospital was packed, standing room only.

  A wrong-way car accident on the Bay Bridge had resulted in fatalities, many injuries, and all lanes blocked with burning wreckage. It was some kind of miracle that ambulances had gotten in and then out to Metro.

  I learned from a harried, tight-lipped ER nurse that some of the injured were still in the emergency room, others were in surgery, and more were in critical condition in the ICU.

  The stricken faces of the friends and families ripped from Christmas parties or beds spoke without words of the devastation.

  Joe stood with his back against a wall hung with children’s Christmas drawings. I sat a few feet away in a row of attached chairs, holding Julie in my lap. The woman sitting beside me was a few years older than me. Her arm was around the shoulders of a young teen, her son, who was cut and bruised and waiting to see a doctor.

  The woman turned her stunned face to me.

  “My oldest, Jeffrey, went through the windshield. He’s…they’re operating…it was bad…” She started to cry. Her younger son threw his arms around her and said, sobbing, “He has to be okay. He has to be okay.”

  Sitting in this waiting room was like being wrapped in sheets of broken glass. I felt for the parents and their children whose lives had been tragically altered. I was also flooded with horrific memories of my own, spanning decades.

  I pictured Joe and me sleeping in these chairs, holding hands in this very room when Julie was an infant with a rare disease, not knowing if our tiny baby would survive to see her first birthday.

  I flashed back to waiting-room vigils for cops who’d been shot, the death of a partner. And I’d waited in one on that horrifying day, not long ago, when Joe was brought to San Francisco General with a life-threatening head injury after the bombing of the science museum.

  How quickly a romantic dinner had changed to what could have been the worst day of my life and the end of his. I felt his presence behind me now and thanked God for his life.

  Julie didn’t have any memories like these. She was big-eyed, bubbling with questions that I couldn’t answer. How could I explain to her why so many people were sobbing, keening, holding on to one another?

  I turned to face Joe and we exchanged looks. On a bad-parenting scale of one to ten, bringing Julie here had sent the needle off the dial. And yet how could we leave without knowing what had happened to Mrs. Rose?

  Short of an assault on the ER, I had done my best to find out her condition. I had badgered the head nurse, who had explained that since I wasn’t a relative, she was forbidden by law to tell me anything about the
patient.

  I persisted. I produced my badge. I told her that a paramedic had called me from the ambulance, for God’s sake, to say Mrs. Rose was being taken to Metro. I told her I was as good as Mrs. Rose’s closest relative, that she had no one else in San Francisco.

  The nurse shook her head no. But then she relented.

  She scribbled on a pad of paper and turned it around so I could see the word Stroke. After I read it, she ripped the page from the pad, balled it up, and threw it into the trash.

  I told Joe I’d be right back, took my phone out to the street, and looked up emergency treatment for stroke victims. Mrs. Rose was probably having a CT scan right now. Whatever was learned would determine her course of treatment over the next few hours or days.

  If she lived.

  I had stored her daughter’s number, and I punched it in, expecting to get Becky’s outgoing message again. But instead I heard her actual voice, a breathless, frantic “Oh, thank God. I tried to reach you so many times. How’s my mother?”

  I filled her in, telling her I’d hit a bureaucratic wall but that she could get information on her mother’s condition. “I have the keys to your mom’s apartment,” I said. “Let me know your plans. And tell me what I can do to help.”

  Just after ten, as Joe, Julie, and I were headed back home to Lake Street, my phone buzzed.

  It was Conklin.

  “I’m outside your door,” he said. “Where are you?”

  “About ten minutes out. What’s wrong?”

  “I’ll wait,” he said. “A hot Loman tip just came in. We’re catching.”

  Chapter 40

  Megan Rafferty was too smart for this, yet here she was.

  Six years ago she’d graduated from high school having been voted most likely to become rich and famous. She’d spent the two years after that in college. Then two years in rehab.