Джеймс Паттерсон - The 19th Christmas

The nurse on duty wasn’t forthcoming. “Says here his phone is off.”

“What’s his condition?”

“I don’t have that information,” she said.

“Can you take a message?”

“Sure.”

“Please tell him that Lindsay called.”

I hung up to see that Conklin was in his seat across from me.

He said, “Loman says his lawyer isn’t around. He left an outgoing message: ‘Mr. Doheny is away from the office until January second and cannot be reached. He’ll get back to you when he returns.’ Words to that effect.”

Good. This bought us some time.

Conklin said, “He’s insisting on talking to his wife. Not that he has any right to.”

I said, “You know what? We should go talk to her first.”

Chapter 90

Loman was lying across the narrow bench in his brightly lit holding cell at an unpopulated end of the line.

He jumped to his feet when we brought his wife, Imogene, into the jail. We set her up on a chair outside his cage.

Loman grabbed the bars and greeted her sorrowfully. “Bunny, are you okay? Are you okay?”

She, too, was wearing an orange jumpsuit. I’d woken Brady from REM sleep and filled him in in less than thirty seconds. What we were doing wasn’t illegal, but it was unorthodox. We needed our lieutenant/chief to help us make it happen. He had put in the call, and Mrs. Lomachenko had been transported pronto from the women’s jail a few blocks away.

She looked her husband directly in the eye. She didn’t bother with pleasantries, just got right to it.

“Willy, they said you killed Dick Russell. That’s a lie. That’s got to be a lie. You love him.”

Loman’s eyes watered up. He looked past his wife and directed angry looks at me and Conklin.

“Can we have some privacy?”

My partner and I stepped ten feet away and turned our backs. Cameras monitored by techs lined the cell block and one was pointing at the Lomachenkos.

Loman said, “I had to do it, Imogene. It was self-defense. He was going to shoot me.”

She responded in a strong, unmodulated voice, “William. The police are charging me as your coconspirator. Your accomplice to a murder. I must be dreaming. I must be having a very bad dream.”

“I’m sorry, Bunny,” he said. “Very sorry.”

“Sorry for what, exactly, Willy? I don’t understand any of this. What did you do?”

He told her a version of the story he’d told us, but this time it was a confession of involvement—and there was motive. It took all the restraint I had to keep my hands still and my eyes on the far end of the hallway.

“I wanted us to have a better life,” Lomachenko told his wife. “There was going to be a huge payday and no one was going to get hurt. No one. Believe me, Imogene. Please. I did this for us. I had a private jet waiting. You and I were going to fly to Switzerland. I bought a place there for us and filled it with modern art. A beautiful high-rise condo, three bedrooms, overlooking Lake Geneva.”

A mirror was angled at the juncture of two walls, giving a view of the block. I saw Mrs. Lomachenko shaking her head vigorously, displaying disbelief and anger.

Her husband went on. “This was your birthday surprise. We were going to be rich and have nothing but the best for the rest of our lives. You can thank Dick for screwing it up.”

“I don’t know you,” Imogene Lomachenko said. “Twenty years of marriage. A nice life. And you wanted to what? Take all of that away from me? You wanted me to live as a fugitive in a foreign country? Are you crazy?”

Imogene Lomachenko’s fury and indignation reverberated throughout the cellblock. Other prisoners laughed. They jeered.

Lomachenko’s head was down.

Imogene went on.

“And now what’s going to happen to me? I’m going to die in a high-rise cell in San Francisco with a view of a wall?”

“It was an accident,” he said. “A terrible accident. If Dick had done his research, we’d have—”

That was my cue.

I said, “Mr. Lomachenko, this just came in.”

I looked down at my phone and called up the video our computer specialist had just sent to me.

I said, “There was a camera above the doorway to Building Three.”

“What…and so what? I don’t believe you. I didn’t see a camera.”

I said, “It saw you. ”

Chapter 91

I’d previewed the video with Conklin a moment before, and now I held up the phone so that both Imogene and her husband could see the screen.

The visual quality was exceptional. And now that I could hear the audio, it, too, was clear. What you’d expect from a cutting-edge technology company.

Russell: “Willy, no, no, no.”

Willy: “I thought I could count on you, Dick.”

Lomachenko was on his feet, shaking the bars. He yelled at me and Conklin, “ Stop that. For God’s sake, stop the film.”

The video continued running, and I made sure that Imogene could see every bit of it: Loman pointing the gun at Russell and firing once, then again. The same overhead view showed David Bavar cowering beside the side door and Lomachenko standing over the body of Russell.

Imogene’s expression was of wide-eyed horror. She gasped loudly, then covered her mouth with her hands.

We all heard Russell’s dying moans and the third shot, the coup de grâce, followed by Lomachenko’s voice saying to Bavar, “Look into the scanner.”

We watched Lomachenko open the door, tell Bavar to get inside, then follow him in.

I stopped the recording and addressed the man doubled over on his bench, his hands clasped across the top of his head. “Mr. Lomachenko, this is what we call irrefutable proof. Rock solid. We’ve got you.”

When I was sure he’d absorbed that bombshell, I went on.

“Here’s your Christmas gift from my partner and me. You tell us right now where we can find David Bavar. You confess in writing to all of it—Richard Russell, Julian Lambert, Arnold Sloane, the airport scam, and the kidnapping.

“Do that, and when we have Mr. Bavar, I’ll call the DA and ask him to withdraw the charges against your wife. No promises, but I’ll call in favors, and he’s a friend.”

Lomachenko didn’t move, just stayed in his crouch. What was he thinking?

I said, “If you love your wife, Mr. Lomachenko, do the right thing. Let her go home.”

Part Six December 31

Chapter 92

The horns, kazoos, and steel drums playing a jazzy version of “Yellow Bird” could be heard halfway down the street from Susie’s Café.

It was New Year’s Eve.

Cindy, Yuki, and I, along with our spouses and significant others, had commandeered the Women’s Murder Club’s favorite booth in the back room. Another table had been pushed up for Claire and Edmund Washburn, who were on their way.

Cindy leaned across the table and asked me to pass the bread, her new emerald pendant sparkling.

I asked, “What bread?”

Cindy cracked up. “I said, ‘You look good in red. ’”

I fell apart laughing and Joe joined in, saying, “I keep telling her that a blonde in red is what used to be called a hot tomato.”

Now we were all laughing, Yuki spitting tequila, and I didn’t think it was because of my sweater or because I looked like a vegetable or because the joke was so funny.

It was just fantastic relief. Tonight the beer pitcher was bottomless, the spicy food had never been better, and everyone at the table had much to celebrate.

We were all finally off duty. Mayor Caputo had commended Conklin, Brady, and me for going above and beyond the call with Lomachenko and for locating Bavar, whom Lomachenko had bound with duct tape and then stashed in an air-conditioning closet on the main floor.