John Lescroart - The Motive

Throughout this recital, Rosen sipped his Scotch and said nothing. After Cuneo stopped, he signaled the waitress for another round for both of them and said, "Don't get me wrong, Dan. There's nothing I'd like more than to be able to move on this. But you've got to admit that you don't have much in the way of evidence."

Cuneo was ready for this. "I didn't expect much. The fire burned it all up. But she denies being near Hanover's house when one of my witnesses put her there. Same day she got the gas around the corner. She did it, Chris. I swear to God."

"I'm not saying I don't believe you." He centered his empty glass on his napkin. "Last time you mentioned a motive, but we didn't get to it."

Cuneo spent a little time spinning it out. Aside from his work on the warrant and this morning's identifications, in the past two days, he'd spoken to all the other members of Paul Hanover's nuclear family except Catherine's husband, and no one denied that his coming marriage to Missy D'Amiens and the possible change to the inheritance was a very big concern to all of them.

What set Catherine apart from her other relatives was the fact that she'd gone to Paul's that day to "have it out" with him. "Her own words from the first night I talked to her at the fire-'have it out.' One sister and the mother-in-law both had heard her say it. And now we know she was at the house not just in the afternoon when she admitted it, but later, just before the fire."

"Anybody see her walk in there, with the gas?"

"Not yet, no."

"Or walk out with it?"

"She left it in the house. Arnie Becker's got the container with the other stuff from the house down at the station." One of an arson inspector's most tedious yet most important jobs after a fire was to go through the ash and debris in a three- or four-foot radius around a body and sort everything-the burned and destroyed remains of furniture, floors, walls, clothing, appliances, knickknacks, jewelry-until they had identified every item down to the size of a match head, to see if any of it might be relevant to their investigation. "No prints, if that's what you were thinking."

"Hoping." Rosen frowned. "Anything else?"

"Yeah. The day after the fire, after we'd had this talk at the scene…"

"Wait a minute. She was at the fire itself? I'm not sure I realized that."

"That's when I first talked to her." "Okay, go on."

"So she tells me-this is at the fire now-that she'd heard that Paul and Missy had been fighting, setting it up for the murder/suicide story. Then, next day, I go to talk to her at her house, and by now she realizes that we've ruled that out. Not only that, the other stuff she told me, she's implicated herself and she knows I know it. So what does she do?"

"Tell me."

"Calls Glitsky-you know Glitsky? Deputy chief?- anyway, she calls him and says I sexually harassed her." He held up a hand. "The answer is no, not a chance. But she told Glitsky she didn't want to talk to me anymore."

"So after Glitsky stopped laughing, what did he tell her?"

"Well, wait, this is getting to the good part." Their drinks arrived and both men lifted their glasses. "Glitsky comes and tells me that from now on, he's on the case with me…"

"What, you mean personally?"

"Personally. The mayor asked him."

Now Cuneo had Rosen's complete attention. "What?

Why?"

A nod. "It gives one pause, doesn't it? So he says from now on he'll be questioning Catherine Hanover. He's trying to protect me from the sex charge."

"So she filed?"

"Funny thing. She decided not to." Cuneo drank again. "Wait, it gets better. We've got Glitsky and Kathy West somehow connected to Catherine, right? So now I'm starting to wonder. They're pulling me off when she looks good to me. I come to you on Friday, get the warrant this weekend, do some digging. Finally, couple of hours ago, I call Glitsky to keep him in the loop as he's requested. I tell him what I got, the fucking gasoline, the motive, two positive IDs, Catherine's lying about where she was and when. She's it. I say we ought to bring it to you and get her in the grand jury before she blows town."

"And what was his response?"

"Bad idea, he says. Too soon. We really don't have anything on her. He says there's still a lot of questions. We don't want to rush to judgment. Plus, and we should know this, this is really my favorite…"

"What?"

"She hired herself a lawyer. You know Dismas

Hardy?"

"The name, yeah."

"Well, guess what? He's Glitsky's pal. They used to be cops together." He finished his drink and leaned back in satisfaction, tapping his toes to beat the band. "What we've got here, Chris, isn't just a sweet little double murder. There's some major conspiracy going on with these guys, going all the way up to the mayor. This city is lousy with politics, and these guys are smack-dab in the middle of it. And you want my opinion? Just between us. It doesn't start here, with Hanover. I'm betting it started back before Barry Gerson got killed."

"You mean Lieutenant Gerson?"

"My old boss, yeah. And a great guy."

"I thought… wasn't he killed at some shoot-out? I thought it was some Russian gang thing."

"Maybe. That's what they want you to believe. But the whole mess wasn't ever really investigated, not carefully enough anyway. And here's a factoid for you-one of the guys killed in the shoot-out with Gerson was a guy named John Holiday, wanted for murder at the time. And guess who his attorney was?"

"Got to be Hardy."

Cuneo made a gun with his fingers, pointed it at Rosen and pulled the trigger. "He and Glitsky both were all over that Holiday case. It's ugly as shit, Chris."

"So how does Catherine Hanover fit in? Or Paul?"

"I don't know yet, but I'll tell you one thing. She did him." He tipped up his glass and drank off the whole thing. Eyes shining, he came forward in his chair. "This is the biggest case you're ever going to be part of, and we've got to get this damned woman locked up before the whole thing blows away in the dust. Because believe me, these people can make it happen."

As soon as Hardy's children were out the door to school on Monday morning, he and Frannie unplugged the main telephone jack, turned off their own cell phones and repaired upstairs to their bedroom.

An hour later, Hardy climbed the stairs again, this time bearing two fresh cups of coffee. "It occurs to me," he said, "that carrying hot coffee in a state of undress might not be wise."

"No risk, no reward," Frannie said. "Besides, it's a good fantasy moment. Being waited on by a naked slave and all."

He bowed from the waist. "Your servant, madam." Handing her a mug, he slid in beside her, pulled a sheet over himself. "Your fantasy slave looks like me?"

"Who else would he look like?"

"I don't know. Brad Pitt, maybe. Who's that new guy Rebecca loves?"

"Orlando Bloom?" "Yeah, him."

"He's not that new, but why would I want either of them?"

"Well, we're talking fantasy, right? Your average fifty-something lawyer isn't exactly fantasy material."

"Who's talking average?" She lifted the sheet away, looked him up and down. "Yep. Works for me. Just did, in fact. Plus, the coffee's perfect, thank you. Brad and Orlando, those other guys, they'd probably burn it or something." She took another sip. "So speaking of fantasies…"

"What?"

She gave him a don't-kid-me look. "Have you decided what you're going to do with Catherine?"

"Well, first, Catherine is not my fantasy. You're my fantasy."

"All right, but you have to say that."

"I don't have to say anything like that."

"But I just did, so if you didn't, you'd be in trouble."

"That doesn't mean I don't mean it. Seriously. You don't think this is a fantasy? Monday morning, nobody home but us up here alone? Taking time out on a workday to make love? Do you know what we'd have done for this moment even a couple of years ago?"