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Yuki went into the kitchen, heated up the chicken soup, and poured out five mugs. Rich sat down at the table with his mug o’ magic healing soup, our bright red roses, and a big bowl of corn chips that he passed around.
“Music?” he asked.
“Got something reggae?”
He shook his head as if we were all crazy, but he dialed up Spotify on Cindy’s laptop and—suddenly we were at our booth at Susie’s. No beer, no margaritas, no pulled pork, but we were together and that was a blessing.
Claire fluffed up Cindy’s pillow and Yuki leaned in to say, “Here’s the scoop. Blackout aka Bryan Catton was arraigned on Monday, charged with seven murders and the abduction of you, Girl Reporter, attempted murder on you and Lindsay, plus a charge of aggravated assault for good measure.”
Cindy whispered, “When’s his trial?”
Yuki said, “It’s in the works. Len will want to be lead prosecutor. I’ll be second chair.”
Cindy smiled and made a V for victory sign with her fingers. Then she asked, “Catton on suicide watch?”
Richie said, “You bet.”
Cindy reached for a pad and pen on the coffee table, wrote in big letters: HEADLINE NEWS. ME = STAR WITNESS.
“For sure,” said Yuki, fist-bumping her.
I dished up the ice cream, everyone’s individual favorite flavor, and when the music came to an end, we unanimously agreed that for now, it was time to hug Cindy goodbye. As we were leaving, Cindy waved me over again.
I bent to hear her.
“You and Richie saved my life.”
“He saved mine, too.”
“Will you be my maid of honor?”
“Aww Cindy. You know I will.”
“Shhhh,” she said. “He doesn’t know.”
I buttoned down a smile and said, “I promise. It’s off therecord.” I hugged her again, kissed her cheek, and as we’d come in, we swept out of the apartment, got into the big black Escalade SUV. Claire let me drive. Yuki stretched out in the back seat and we headed back to the Hall.
Speaking for myself, I was elated.
CHAPTER 104
ALVAREZ, CONKLIN, AND I were at our desks that morning talking over coffee about last night’s spring training game. We were in agreement that the Giants had been cheated of a win by a bad call that video replay should have overturned. Rich was vehement.
He was saying, “It was clear from that second angle that the kid leaned over and prevented Wade from making the catch. Bang. Fan interference. You saw it, right, Alvarez? Pure and simple, we was robbed.”
Alvarez said, “So kick it to Robbery.”
I laughed. We didn’t have a Robbery division anymore. But Central Station had one.
I said, “Central would love complaints from sixty thousand PO’d fans.”
Rich said, “It would please me, no end.”
We were all emotionally tapped out and had been hoping for a win. Blackout was in jail awaiting trial and forcibly retired from the snuff video business, but he’d left dread behind. Icouldn’t open an email without fear that a murder-in-progress as seen through the sick eyes of the killer could jump out of the screen.
I cut the thought off at the knees and replaced it with the advice from Dr. Greene.Take some time off.I planned to put it to Brady this afternoon.
And then, there he was, coming down the aisle toward us. He stopped just short of our pod and I shrank back a little bit. It was involuntary. I just didn’t want another case. Not yet.
