Tess Gerritsen - Keeper of the Bride

“We’re in the spotlight on this. So let’s not screw up.” It was Liddell’s parting shot, and the two cops took it in silence.

Only after Liddell had left the room did Gillis growl, “I’m gonna get that guy. I swear, I’m gonna get him.”

“Cool it, Gillis. He may be governor someday.”

“In which case, I’ll help Spectre plant the damn bomb myself.”

Sam took Nina’s arm and walked her out of the room. “Come on. I have my hands full today. I’ll introduce you to your new watchdog.”

Passing me off already, she thought. Was she such a nuisance to him?

“For now, we’re keeping you in a hotel,” he said.

“Officer Pressler’s been assigned to watch over you. He’s a sharp cop. I trust him.”

“Meaning I should, too?”

“Absolutely. I’ll call you if we turn up any suspects. We’ll need you to identify them.”

“So I may not be seeing you for a while.”

He stopped in the hallway and looked at her. “No. It may be a while.”

They faced each other for a moment. The hallway was hardly private; certainly this wasn’t the time or the place to confess how she felt about him. She wasn’t even sure how she felt about him. All she knew was that it hurt to say goodbye. What hurt even worse was to look in his eyes and see no regret, no distress. Just that flat, unemotional gaze.

So it was back to Mr. Civil Servant. She could deal with that. After the trauma of this last week, she could deal with anything, including the realization that she had, once again, gotten involved with the wrong man.

She met his gaze with one just as cool and said, “You find Spectre. I’ll identify him. Just do it soon, okay? So I can get on with my life.”

“We’re working on it round the clock. We’ll keep you informed.”

“Can I count on that?”

He answered with a curt dip of the head. “It’s part of my job.”

OFFICER LEON PRESSLER was not a conversationalist. In fact, whether he could converse at all was in question. For the past three hours, the muscular young cop had done a terrific sphinx imitation, saying nary a word as he roamed the hotel room, alternately checking the door and glancing out the third floor window. The most he would say was “Yes, ma’am,” or “No, ma’am,” and that was only in response to a direct question. Was the strong, silent bit some kind of cop thing? Nina wondered. Or was he under orders not to get too chatty with the witness?

She tried to read a novel she’d picked up in the hotel gift shop, but after a few chapters she gave up. His silence made her too nervous. It was simply not natural to spend a day in a hotel room with another person and not, at the very least, talk to each other. Lord knew, she tried to draw him out.

“Have you been a cop a long time, Leon?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Do you enjoy it?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Does it ever scare you?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Never?”

“Sometimes.”

Now they were getting somewhere, she thought.

But then Officer Pressler crossed the room and peered out the window, ignoring her.

She put her book aside and launched another attempt at conversation.

“Does this sort of assignment bore you?” she asked.

“No, ma’am.”

“It would bore me. Spending all day in a hotel room doing nothing.”

“Things could happen.”

“And I’m sure you’ll be ready for it.” Sighing, she reached for the remote and clicked on the TV. Five minutes of channel surfing turned up nothing of interest. She clicked it off again. “Can I make a phone call?” she asked.

“Sorry.”

“I just want to call my nursing supervisor at Maine Medical. To tell her I won’t be coming in next week.”

“Detective Navarro said no phone calls. It’s necessary for your safety. He was very specific on that.”

“What else did the good detective tell you?”

“I’m to keep a close eye. Not let my guard down for a minute. Because if anything happened to you…” He paused and gave a nervous cough.

“What?”

“He’d, uh, have my hide.”

“That’s quite an incentive.”

“He wanted to make sure I took special care. Not that I’d let anything happen. I owe him that much.”

She frowned at him. He was at the window again, peering down at the street. “What do you mean, you owe him?”

Officer Pressler didn’t move from the window. He stood looking out, as though unwilling to meet her gaze. “It was a few years back. I was on this domestic call. Husband didn’t much like me sticking my nose into his business. So he shot me.”

“My god.”

“I radioed for help. Navarro was first to respond.” Pressler turned and looked at her. “So you see, I do owe him.” Calmly he turned back to the window.

“How well do you know him?” she asked softly.

Pressler shrugged. “He’s a good cop. But real private. I’m not sure anyone knows him very well.”

Including me, she thought. Sighing, she clicked on the boob tube again and channel surfed past a jumble of daytime soaps, a TV court show and a golf tournament. She could almost feel another few brain cells collapse into mush.

What was Sam doing right now? she wondered.

And ruthlessly suppressed the thought. Sam Navarro was his own man. That much was perfectly clear.

She would have to be her own woman.

I WONDER WHAT Nina’s doing right now. At once Sam tried to suppress the thought, tried to concentrate instead on what was being said at the meeting, but his mind kept drifting back to the subject of Nina. Specifically, her safety. He had every reason to trust Leon Pressler. The young cop was sharp and reliable, and he owed his life to Sam. If anyone could be trusted to keep Nina out of harm’s way, it would be Pressler.

Still, he couldn’t shake that lingering sense of uneasiness. And fear. It was one more indication that he’d lost his objectivity, that his feelings were way out of control. To the point of affecting his work…

“…the best we can do? Sam?”

Sam suddenly focused on Abe Coopersmith. “Excuse me?”

Coopersmith sighed. “Where the hell are you, Navarro?”

“I’m sorry. I let my attention drift for a moment.”

Gillis said, “Chief asked if we’re following any other leads.”

“We’re following every lead we have,” Sam informed him. “The sketch of Spectre is circulating. We’ve checked all the hotels in Portland. So far, no employees with a missing finger. Problem is, we’re operating blind. We don’t know Spectre’s target, when he plans to strike, or where he plans to strike. All we have is a witness who’s seen his face.”

“And this bit about the bellhop’s uniform.”

“That’s right.”

“Have you shown all those uniforms to Miss Cormier? To help us identify which hotel we’re talking about?”

“We’re getting together a few more samples for her to look at,” said Gillis. “Also, we’ve interviewed that bicyclist. He doesn’t remember much about the man he hit. It happened so fast, he didn’t really pay attention to the face. But he does back up Miss Cormier’s recollection that the uniform jacket was green. Some shade of it, anyway. And he confirms that it happened on Congress Street, near Franklin Avenue.”

“We’ve combed that whole area,” said Sam. “Showed the sketch to every shopkeeper and clerk within a five-block radius. No one recognized the face.”

Coopersmith gave a grunt of frustration. “We’ve got the Governor arriving tomorrow afternoon. And a bomber somewhere in the city.”

“We don’t know if there’s a connection. Spectre could be targeting someone else entirely. It all depends on who hired him.”