Midnight by Kevin Egan

Author:Kevin Egan
Language: eng
Format: azw3, mobi, epub
ISBN: 9781466822115
Publisher: Macmillan
Published: 2013-07-02T07:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 17

The room was small and warm, thickly carpeted, painted in earthtones, furnished in rich leather and deep mahogany. On a desk in a corner, six TVs were stacked three on three. Five of the screens were blank.

Bobby stared over Vuksanaj’s shoulder. The single live screen showed a high-angle view of a brightly lit room. Carol sat in a chair, her red coat still buttoned around her and her hands thrust into the pockets. Tom paced, foreshortening dramatically as he passed beneath the camera.

“They’re talking,” said Vuksanaj. He pressed a button, and static crackled. “It’s not the best audio.”

“I’ll be sure to share your opinion with my uncle,” said Bobby.

“Tom,” Carol said on-screen. “What do you think is going on?”

* * *

Carol’s words arrested Tom. It was not just the words themselves, the first she uttered since getting out of the car, but the slightly inflected stress on you that implied he knew more than she.

“I don’t know,” Tom answered. He spoke softly and slowly because he wanted her question to sink into silence rather than provoke any discussion. And in truth, Tom knew nothing about this turn of events.

“This is about the judge,” said Carol.

Tom shrugged, still not comfortable with her tone. Thoughts swirled through his head: Foxx’s visit to chambers early in the morning, Elliott taking them at gunpoint, this cold, antiseptic room with a camera in the ceiling. He felt they were being observed.

“You said no one saw us,” said Carol.

“Maybe I was wrong.”

He had been relatively calm until they crossed the Queensboro Bridge and descended into one of those gray, industrial sections he saw only from the other side of the East River. He tried to hold onto the trail, memorizing turns and noting street names. But he quickly became hopelessly lost. And then the street widened, and the warehouses and factories fell away, and Elliott swung into a parking lot behind a huge brick building with a façade like a Greek temple and the name O’Rourke cut into the stone pediment. He ordered them to get out and shepherded them to a side door where a freight elevator took them down to this room.

“Tom.” Carol stood up from the chair and opened her arms. “Hold me.”

Tom hugged her tentatively because his mind was distracted and his heart was disengaged. Carol squirmed herself free and took off her coat.

“Hold me like you mean it,” she said.

* * *

“Bring in Carroway,” Bobby told Vuksanaj.

He watched Vuksanaj leave the room, opened the desk drawer for one more look at each of the photos, then closed the drawer as Tom walked in. Tom immediately noticed the TV screen, which showed Carol pacing in the white room.

“My uncle’s a technology nut,” said Bobby. “Irish side of the family. Neddy O’Rourke. He buries ninety percent of the people who die north of Queens Boulevard, even the Greeks.”

“Why do we need a funeral home?” asked Tom.

“To help you and Carol keep your jobs.”

“We did that,” said Tom. “We got to midnight.”

“You might think you did,” said Bobby.

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