Scott Turow - Identical

‘Not a one,’ Tim had told her. Even at seven, Sofia, he realized, was too smart to fully believe him.

One of the games Sofia and Demetra played was doctor and nurse, Sofia the doctor, De the nurse and a bevy of dolls as the patients, and darn it, if that wasn’t exactly how it had turned out. De had done a PhD in nursing eventually and was chief nursing supervisor at Hutchinson out in Seattle. And Sofia had rocketed through med school and residencies and was now chief of plastic and reconstructive surgery at U Hospital.

Sofia also was one of two or three neighborhood girls who helped them with Kate when she turned sick. Sofia would come over and read to Kate, or babysit for an hour while Maria ran to the grocery at times when Tim’s daughters couldn’t be there. Sofie wouldn’t take any money, not that they didn’t need it in her house. You could just never forget a kid like that.

Tim always felt a tinge of parental pride in Sofia’s achievements. If you were anywhere in the US but Kindle County, Sofia was probably better known than her husband, after leading teams of reconstructive surgeons to Iraq. Tim had seen her several times on CNN, talking about the horrible toll IEDs were taking both on our soldiers and on many Iraqis. It was a horrible thing about humans that as much as we had achieved in helping people thrive-in medicine, and agriculture and technology-we’d so magnified the malevolent force of a single bad actor. Sofia and her colleagues helped turn that around miraculously, grafting burns, getting shredded limbs ready for prosthetics and crafting the missing pieces of faces out of silicone.

Tim rang the bell of the Gianis residence and could hear footfalls down the stairs. The door swung open and Sofia stood stock-still. He had no intention of reminding her who he was, but with a brain like that, she likely forgot no one, and given her profession she probably could reimagine any face she saw without the wear of time.

“Mr. Brodie?” she asked.

He couldn’t keep from smiling. She surged forward to hug him and held him for several seconds.

“It’s so wonderful to see you. Come in, please. Come in.”

He shook his head. “Wish I could, sweetie, but I’m here on business.”

“Well, come in anyway. How are Demetra and Marina?” Tim’s oldest daughter was a musician who played French horn in the Seattle symphony and taught the horn players at the U. She’d started out in rock ’n’ roll and collected her share of bummy fellas along the way before finding Richard, a bassoonist. They’d never married-Richard was against it in principal-but they had two terrific girls, including Stefanie, who’d ended up moving back here.

One thing you knew for sure about Sofia, even when she was little, was that she wasn’t going to have the looks to be Miss America. But she kept herself nicely, wearing makeup even for the surgical theater. Her black hair was still shoulder-length, and showed the smoothing hand of a professional. Her fingernails were bright red. And you could still swim in those eyes. Her nose remained too much for her face, but even that was an impressive statement of self-acceptance, given her line of work.

Tim refused to take off his coat, but he stood under the brass chandelier in the entry and they talked a solid ten minutes about his family and hers. Behind Sofia a baronial central staircase with a beautiful walnut balustrade rose to a window of stained glass on the landing. A dog penned up in the kitchen was barking forlornly and scratching the finish off a door. Sofia knew about Maria-in fact, she tried to remind Tim that she’d been to the wake, but that whole time to Tim had been like getting dragged under a tide, hoping you lasted long enough to get back to the air.

“And you say you’re working?” she asked. “I thought you retired ages ago.”

“I did. But I work some as a private investigator. Do some things for ZP, I’m afraid.”

“Oh dear,” Sofia answered. She laughed. “Now I understand why you didn’t want to come in.”

“Sorry to say it. I’ve got a subpoena for Cass. Just to get his fingerprints for the present. DNA later, if the judge ever allows it.”

“I’m so sorry, Mr. Brodie,” she answered, “but that’s for the lawyers.”

“Well, if you tell me he lives here,” he said, “I can just drop this and we can be done with it.” He’d drawn the papers out of the pocket of his overcoat.

She smiled with the same warmth but shook her head.

“I can’t say anything, Mr. Brodie. I hope you understand.”

“Course I do. Here’s my card. If you happen to see him, maybe he can give me a call.”

“I’ll keep the card,” she said, “but only so I know where you are.”

She asked him for Demetra’s current e-mail address before he left.

The next morning, he was outside the house by 5:30 a.m. The garage door went up no later than six. There was only one car now, and Sofia, in scrubs again, got in it. She backed out and zoomed down the street, then jammed on the brakes just as her older gold Lexus went past him. She backed up so she was abreast of him. Her window went down, and he lowered his.

“There’s still hot coffee in the house,” she said. “Can I get you a cup?”

“You were always too nice,” he answered. “I’m fine here. You go put some people back together.”

She waved, happy as a schoolgirl, and drove off. He knew for sure Cass was gone.

Today is the turning point,” Crully told him. It was 9:15 and the morning throng, many transported by earbuds to some electronic wonderland, stomped through the winter streets of Center City.

Mark and he were on the way back from a breakfast with the Fraternal Order of Police Leadership Council. The cops were going to endorse Paul eventually. They had nowhere else to go, but Tonsun Kim, the newly elected union chief, wanted to dance a minuet to the tune of his standard demands. More cops. Bigger raises. Larger pensions. Less oversight. But they liked Paul. As a former PA, he understood what it was like out there, and he reflected a natural affinity for these audiences. He was one of those kids who said from the age of six that he wanted to become a police officer. As a result, they heard him when he preached that street justice only made their jobs harder. If there was less hostility in the black and Latin communities, the police would hear less bullshit and more applause and get more assistance. He loved selling people on win-win approaches.

“With the cops?” he asked in response to Crully’s remark.

“No, with the lawsuit.” They were walking toward the Temple now. Afterward, he was going to have a long day on the phone, dialing for dollars. Hal’s ads had definitely slowed the flow of contributions. At some point, he also had to sneak off to call Beata about meeting him at the apartment tonight.

In the midst of a campaign, when you were like a tin duck in a shooting gallery, vexations were often shelved for a while, as if they were an itch you didn’t even feel until you had time to scratch it. But he remembered what was bothering him now that Mark mentioned court. The Trib headline this morning read, “Fingerprint Report Clears Gianis.” The story detailed Dickerman’s findings, which were not supposed to be public until Mo announced them to Judge Lands today. The hard spin on the facts would signal to anybody who knew about this stuff where the report had come from.

“I didn’t like the Trib headline,” he said.

Crully smirked. He thought Paul was posturing. Almost certainly, Crully had leaked the report, in order to produce two days of favorable headlines rather than one. But he’d done it without asking, because he wanted Paul to be able to say, ‘I had nothing to do with it.’