Harlan Coben - Just One Look

She tried to shake it off, this feeling of cold. It wouldn’t happen. She managed to utter, “Fine.”

“Who was that?”

“You my social secretary now?”

“Easy.” He held up both hands. “Just asking.”

They headed inside the Crowne Plaza. Grace tried to process what she had just heard. A coincidence. That was all. A bizarre coincidence. Her husband had played in a bar band in college. So had a zillion other people. He happened to play on the same bill once as Jimmy X. Again so what? They were both in the same area at around the same time. This would have been at least a year, probably two, before the Boston Massacre. And Jack might not have mentioned it to her because he figured that it was irrelevant and might, in any case, upset his wife. A Jimmy X concert had traumatized her. It had left her partially crippled. So he maybe didn’t see a need to mention that slight connection.

No big deal, right?

Except that Jack had never even mentioned playing in a band. Except that the members of Allaw were all now either dead or missing.

She tried to gather some of the pieces. When exactly had Geri Duncan been murdered anyway? Grace had been undergoing physical therapy when she read about the fire. That meant it probably happened a few months after the massacre. Grace would need to check the exact date. She would need to check the entire time line because, let’s face it, there was no way the Allaw-Jimmy X connection was a coincidence.

But how did it work? Nothing about it made sense.

She ran it through one more time. Her husband plays in a band. One time the band plays at the same time as a band featuring Jimmy X. A year or two later – depending on if Jack had been a senior or a year postgrad – the now famous Jimmy X plays a concert that she, young Grace Sharpe, attends. She gets injured in a melee that night. Another three years pass. She meets Jack Lawson on an entirely different continent and they fall in love.

It didn’t mesh.

The elevator dinged on the ground level. Cram said, “You sure you’re okay?”

“Groovy,” she said.

“Still twenty minutes until the press conference begins. I figured it would be better if you went alone, try to grab your sister-in-law beforehand.”

“You’re a fount of ideas, Cram.”

The doors opened. “Third floor,” he said. Grace stepped inside and let the elevator swallow her whole. She was alone. There would not be much time. She took out her cell phone and the card Jimmy X had given her. She pressed in the number and hit send. It went immediately into his voice mail. Grace waited for the beep:

“I know about Still Night playing with Allaw. Call me.”

She left her number and hung up. The elevator came to a stop. When she stepped off, there was one of those black signs with the changeable white letters, the kind that tell you in what room the Ratzenberg’s bar mitzvah or Smith-Jones wedding is being held. This one read: “Burton-Crimstein Press Conference.” Advertising the firm. She followed the arrow to a door, took a deep breath, and pushed it open.

The whole thing was like one of those courthouse movie scenes – that pinnacle cinematic moment when the surprise witness bursts through the double doors. When Grace walked in, there was that sort of collective gasp. The room hushed. Grace felt lost. She glanced around and what she saw made her head spin. She took a step back. The faces of grief, older but no more at peace, swirled about her. There they were again – the Garrisons, the Reeds, the Weiders. She flashed back to the early days at the hospital. She had seen everything through the haze of Halcion, as if through a shower curtain. It felt the same today. They approached in silence. They hugged her. None of them said a word. They didn’t have to. Grace accepted the embraces. She could still feel the sadness emanating from them.

She saw the widow of Lieutenant Gordon MacKenzie. Some said that he had been responsible for pulling Grace to safety. Like most true heroes, Gordon MacKenzie rarely talked about it. He claimed not to remember what he did exactly, that yes, he opened doors and pulled people out, but that it was more out of reaction than anything approaching bravery.

Grace gave Mrs. MacKenzie an extra long hug.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Grace said.

“He found God.” Mrs. MacKenzie held on. “He’s with Him now.”

There was really nothing to say to that, so Grace just nodded. She let her go and looked over the woman’s shoulder. Sandra Koval had entered the room from the other side. She spotted Grace at almost the same moment and a strange thing happened. Her sister-in-law smiled, almost as if she’d expected this. Grace stepped away from Mrs. MacKenzie. Sandra tilted her head, signaling her to step forward. There was a velvet rope. A security guard stepped in her way.

“It’s okay, Frank,” Sandra said. He let Grace pass.

Sandra led the way. She hurried down a corridor. Grace limped behind, unable to catch up. No matter. Sandra stopped and opened a door. They stepped into a huge ballroom. Waiters busily laid out the silverware. Sandra led her to a corner. She grabbed two chairs and turned them so that they faced each other.

“You don’t seem surprised to see me,” Grace said.

Sandra shrugged. “I figured you were following the case in the news.”

“I wasn’t.”

“Doesn’t matter, I guess. Until two days ago you didn’t know who I was.”

“What’s going on, Sandra?”

She did not answer right away. The tinkling of the silverware provided background music. Sandra let her gaze wander toward the waiters in the center room.

“Why are you representing Wade Larue?”

“He was charged with a crime. I’m a criminal defense lawyer. It’s what I do.”

“Don’t patronize me.”

“You want to know how I stumbled upon this particular client, is that it?”

Grace said nothing.

“Isn’t it obvious?”

“Not to me.”

“You, Grace.” She smiled. “You’re the reason I represent Mr. Larue.”

Grace opened her mouth, closed it, started again. “What are you talking about?”

“You never really knew about me. You just knew that Jack had a sister. But I knew all about you.”

“I’m still not following.”

“It’s simple, Grace. You married my brother.”

“So?”

“When I learned you were going to be my sister-in-law, I was curious. I wanted to learn about you. Makes sense, right? So I had one of my investigators do a background check. Your paintings are wonderful, by the way. I bought two. Anonymously. They’re in my home out in Los Angeles. Spectacular stuff, really. My older daughter, Karen – she’s seventeen – loves them. She wants to be an artist.”

“I don’t see what this has to do with Wade Larue.”

“Really?” Her voice was strangely cheerful. “I’ve worked criminal defense since I graduated law school. I started by working with Burton and Crimstein in Boston. I lived there, Grace. I knew all about the Boston Massacre. And now my brother had fallen in love with one of the Massacre’s major players. It piqued my curiosity even more. I started reading up on the case – and guess what I realized?”

“What?”

“That Wade Larue had been railroaded by an incompetent lawyer.”

“Wade Larue was responsible for the death of eighteen people.”

“He fired a gun, Grace. He didn’t even hit anyone. The lights went out. People were screaming. He was under the influence of drugs and alcohol. He panicked. He believed – or at least, honestly imagined – that he was in imminent danger. There was no way, no way at all, that he could have known what the outcome would be. His first lawyer should have cut a deal. Probation, eighteen months away tops. But no one really wanted to work this case. Larue was sent to jail to rot. So yes, Grace, I read about him because of you. Wade Larue had been shafted. His old attorney screwed him and ran.”