Blood Ties (51 page)

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Authors: S. J. Rozan

Tags: #Crime Fiction, #General, #Crime, #Fiction, #Intrigue, #Murder, #Mystery & Detective, #Suspense, #Thriller

BOOK: Blood Ties
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“Hel-
lo
?” I heard in my ear. “Earth to detective. Come in, detective.”
“Sorry,” I said. “Did you say something?”
“The Gettysburg Address. Your phone run out of batteries?”
“No, I did.”
“Well, welcome back. The question was, do you think I can talk to Gary?”
“I . . . that's your call, Stacie.”
“Okay,” she said, and for a moment neither of us said anything else.
“And then,” I started again, “you call Macpherson and let him deny it all, and publish whatever
he
says.”
“Can he do anything to you?” she asked, sounding a worried note. “Get you in trouble?”
“Let him try. But he could sue the paper, so you have to be really careful how you write it. You and Stuart.”
“Stuart?”
“Isn't that his name? Your rival at the
Gazette
?”
“Stuart Early? You think I'm giving any of this to him?”
“You have to. Most of it. The byline, if he'll take it.”
“What?”
“You're the one who got beat up. This can't read like some wild revenge fantasy. It's got to look like you're trying to help out Ryder and Macpherson by giving them a chance to deny all these rumors, going back years.”
“My story!” she wailed.
“Justice,” I said.
“Not really,” she said. “So we embarrass them. So what? It's not enough.”
“You don't know what'll come of it. For one thing, if enough people believe the coach beat you up and Macpherson started that firefight, it'll ruin them. For another, you don't know who'll remember what from those days, stop telling himself he didn't know. This could change your town, Stacie.”
“Is that what we're hoping for?”
“I am.”
“It's still not enough. I don't see how you can call it justice.”
“That's the problem with justice. There's no such thing.”
We talked for a little longer, going over facts, times, dates. Then she hung up; she had a story to write.
I lit a cigarette, leaned back in the chair, shut my eyes. A few minutes later I sat up again, killed the cigarette, checked the voice mail. I listened to Sullivan's messages, and Linus's, and Stacie's. I erased them.
And there was one from Lydia: “Call me.”
I stared at the phone, then walked over to the piano, lifted the lid off the keyboard. I didn't sit down. I fingered the keys, a few tentative chords. I used no strength, no serious muscle, but still the sound was too strident, the harmonies false and the notes unsustainable.
I closed the keyboard, stood looking around this place where I'd lived for so long. Outside, I heard a man shout to another. The steel shutter of the loading dock groaned and clanked as it lifted, ready to begin another day.
I picked up my jacket, went out to walk along the river.

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