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“I can’t tell you that,” the second woman said. “Please be safe. Goodbye.”
A few words stuck out. He’d heard them before. He’d heard this woman saying them before. Then it clicked into place in his mind. “Be safe,” he said. “It’s what Noni Feldman says when she ends the news every night.”
And he never missed Noni Feldman. She was almost as pretty as Bella Butler.
Val snapped her fingers. “That’s who it is. Noni Feldman. She signs off every newscast with ‘Be safe, New Orleans.’ ”
“I think you’re right, Jace.” Cardozo turned to Holmes. “Does this help you?”
“You bet it does,” Holmes muttered. “Thank you, Jace. You’ve been an amazing help.”
Jace couldn’t stop his grin. “That’s a relief.” Then he wondered again what was going on. Bella had sounded scared. And why would Noni Feldman ask her not to jeopardize them? Who was “them”? But he didn’t dare ask. It wasn’t any of his business. At all.
Cardozo walked Holmes to the door. “We’ll talk soon,” Holmes called before he left.
“He scares me,” Jace admitted as Cardozo was flipping the deadbolt lock.
Val ran her hand over his hair, like she did with Elijah. “André wouldn’t hurt you unless you were threatening someone else, which I don’t think you plan to do.”
“No, ma’am.” It felt nice, having his hair stroked. No one had touched him nicely in a very long time. Dianne did, at the beginning, before Liam got sick. His mom had, of course, before she’d died.
He missed his mom. So much.
“You okay?” Val asked, like she really was concerned.
He shrugged one shoulder. “My mom used to touch my hair like that.”
Val stroked his hair again. “My mom used to, too.”
“Did she die?”
“No. But my brother did, and she was never quite the same after that. I miss my old mom.” She smiled, but it looked forced. “Let’s get the sofa made up for you. Burke, is Molly coming over soon? I’m about to fall over.”
“In an hour. I’ll take care of making up the sofa for Jace and I’ll wait until Molly gets here. You get some shut-eye.” Burke pointed to his eyes. “Bags. You look pretty awful.”
“Gee thanks, boss.” She gave Jace’s arm a final pat. “Try to sleep, hon. I’m going to look in on Elijah, then I’m off to sleep.”
“Good night, Val,” Jace said, and then he turned to Cardozo. Burke was getting the sheets and blankets, so it was just him and Cardozo in the quiet living room. “Thank you, sir.”
Cardozo gave him a long look, but it wasn’t mean. “For what?”
“For not sending me to jail.”
“I can’t promise what will happen when all of this is over,” Cardozo said, and he sounded like he felt bad about it. “But I’ll make sure the DA knows how helpful you’ve been. That’ll go a long way toward leniency. That means they’ll go easy on you.” Cardozo started for the stairs, but he stopped and turned. “Hopefully we’ll be able to remove the cuffs real soon.”
That would be very nice.
Burke made up the sofa, then transferred the cuffs on one of Jace’s wrists to his own. “Let’s go up so you can brush your teeth and use the head before Molly gets here.”
Burke unlocked the cuff so that Jace could take care of business and wash his hands, recuffing him once they got downstairs. He lay on the sofa, but a worry popped into his head. “Is anyone watching outside?”
Burke stilled, his voice going cold. “Why? You plannin’ to run?”
“No, sir,” Jace said. “I ain’t got nowhere to go. This is the best I’ve been treated in a long while, even with the cuffs. I was worried about Elijah. What if someone tries to come in?”
Burke hesitated, then finally said, “Antoine and Phin installed a perimeter alarm. If anyone comes close without letting us know, the alarm will make a god-awful racket.”
“Good. He’s a nice kid. I don’t want anyone to hurt him. Especially Corey. He shot up that safe house today. He’d... Well, you can’t let him get near Elijah.”
