Harlan Coben - Tell No One

Fein's hands tightened into fists. He gulped down a few breaths and made himself lean back. "Okay," he began slowly. "Assuming this alibi checks out-"

"Oh it will."

" Assuming it does, what do you want?"

"Well now, that's an awfully good question. You're in a bind, Lance. You arrest him, you look like an idiot. You call off the arrest, you look like an idiot. I'm not sure I see any way around it." Hester Crimstein stood, started pacing as though working a closing. "I've looked into this and I've thought about it and I think I've found a way to minimize the damage. Care to hear it?"

Fein glared some more. "I'm listening."

"You've done one thing smart in all this. Just one, but maybe it's enough. You've kept your mug away from the media. That's because, I imagine, it would be a tad embarrassing trying to explain how this doctor escaped your dragnet. But that's good. Everything that has been reported can be blamed on anonymous leaks. So here's what you do, Lance. You call a press conference. You tell them that the leaks are false, that Dr. Beck is being sought as a material witness, nothing more than that. You do not suspect him in this crime – in fact you're certain he didn't commit it – but you learned that he was one of the last people to see the victim alive and wanted to speak with him"

"That never fly."

"Oh it'll fly. Maybe not straight and true, but it'll stay aloft. The key will be me, Lance. I owe you one because my boy ran. So I, the enemy of the D.A.'s office, will back you up. I'll tell the media how you cooperated with us, how you made sure that my client's rights were not abused, that Dr. Beck and I wholeheartedly support your investigation and look forward to working with you."

Fein kept still.

"It's like I said before, Lance. I can spin for you or I can spin against you."

"And in return?"

"You drop all these silly assault and resisting charges."

"No way."

Hester motioned him toward the door. "See you in the funny pages."

Fein's shoulders slumped ever so slightly. His voice, when he spoke, was soft. "If we agree," he said, "your boy will cooperate? He'll answer all my questions?"

"Please, Lance, don't try to pretend you're in any condition to negotiate. I've laid out the deal. Take it – or take your chances with the press. Your choice. The clock is ticking." She bounced her index finger back and forth and made a tick-tock sound.

Fein looked at Dimonte. Dimonte chewed his toothpick some more. Krinsky got off the phone and nodded at Fein. Fein in turn nodded at Hester. "So how do we handle this?"

Iwoke up and lifted my head and almost screamed. My muscles were two steps beyond stiff and sore; I ached in parts of my body I didn't know I had. I tried to swing my legs out of bed. Swing was a bad idea. A very bad idea. Slow. That was the ticket this morning.

My legs hurt most, reminding me that despite my quasi marathon of yesterday, I was pathetically out of shape. I tried to roll over. The tender spots where the Asian guy had attacked felt as though I'd ripped sutures. My body longed for a couple of Percodans, but I knew that they would put me on Queer Street, and that's not where I wanted to be right now.

I checked my watch. Six A.M. It was time for me to call Hester back. She picked up on the first ring.

"It worked," she said. "You're free."

I felt only mild relief.

"What are you going to do?" she asked.

A hell of a question. "I'm not sure."

"Hold on a sec." I heard another voice in the background. "Shauna wants to talk to you."

There was a fumbling sound as the phone changed hands, and then Shauna said, "We need to talk."

Shauna, never one for idle pleasantries or subtleties, still sounded uncharacteristically strained and maybe even – hard to imagine – scared. My heart started doing a little giddyap.

"What is it?"

"This isn't for the phone," she said.

"I can be at your place in an hour."

"I haven't told Linda about, uh, you know."

"Maybe it's time to," I said.

"Yeah, okay." Then she added with surprising tenderness, "Love you, Beck."

"Love you too."

I half crouched, half crawled toward the shower. Furniture helped support my stiff-legged stumble and keep me upright. I stayed under the spray until the hot water ran out. It helped ease the soreness, but not a lot.

Tyrese found me a purple velour sweat suit from the Eighties Al Sharpton collection. I almost asked for a big gold medallion.

"Where you gonna go?" he asked me.

"To my sister's for now."

"And then?"

"To work, I guess."

Tyrese shook his head.

"What?" I asked.

"You up against some bad dudes, Doc."

"Yeah, I kinda put that together."

"Bruce Lee ain't gonna let this slide."

I thought about that. He was right. Even if I wanted to, I couldn't just go home and wait for Elizabeth to make contact again. In the first place, I'd had enough with the passive; gentle repose simply was not on the Beck agenda anymore. But equally important, the men in that van were not about to forget the matter and let me go merrily on my way.

"I watch your back, Doc. Brutus too. Till this is over."

I was about to say something brave like "I can't ask you to do that" or "You have your own life to lead," but when you thought about it, they could either do this or deal drugs. Tyrese wanted to help – perhaps even needed to help – and let's face it, I needed him. I could warn him off, remind him of the danger, but he understood these particular perils far better than I did. So in the end, I just accepted with a nod.

Carlson got the call from the National Tracing Center earlier than he expected.

"We were able to run it already," Donna said.

"How?"

"Heard of IBIS?"

"Yeah, a little." He knew that IBIS stood for Integrated Ballistic Identification System, a new computer program that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms used to store bullet and shell casings. Part of the ATF's new Ceasefire program.

"We don't even need the original bullet anymore," she went on. "They just had to send us the scanned images. We can digitize and match them right on the screen."

"And?"

"You were right, Nick," she said. "It's a match."

Carlson disconnected and placed another call. When the man on the other end picked up, he asked, "Where's Dr. Beck?"

Brutus hooked up with us on the sidewalk. I said, "Good morning." He said nothing. I still hadn't heard the man speak. I slid into the backseat. Tyrese sat next to me and grinned. Last night he had killed a man. True, he had done so in defense of my life, but from his casual demeanor, I wasn't even sure he remembered pulling the trigger. I more than anyone should understand what he was going through, but I didn't. I'm not big on moral absolutes. I see the grays. I make the calls. Elizabeth had a clearer view of her moral compass. She would be horrified that a life had been lost. It wouldn't have mattered to her that the man was trying to kidnap, torture, and probably kill me. Or maybe it would. I don't really know anymore. The hard truth is, I didn't know everything about her. And she certainly didn't know everything about me.

My medical training insists that I never make that sort of moral call. It's a simple rule of triage: The most seriously injured gets treated first. It doesn't matter who they are or what they've done. You treat the most grievously wounded. That's a nice theory, and I understand the need for such thinking. But if, say, my nephew Mark were rushed in with a stab wound and some serial pedophile who stabbed him came in at the same time with a life-threatening bullet in the brain, well, come on. You make the call, and in your heart of hearts, you know that the call is an easy one.