The 8th Circle (10 page)

D
anny spotted Andy and then the framed caricature of himself hanging on the wall when he entered the Palm. The restaurant sat inside the Bellevue Hotel and featured good steak and caricatures of noted local celebrities and politicians. It used to give him a rush to see himself on the wall positioned between Andy and the mayor. Now it gave him a queasy sense of his overinflated ego.

God is watching you, boy
.

He ignored the curious stares and made his way to Andy’s table.

Andy shook his hand. “You’ll have a drink today.” He looked at the waiter. “Bourbon for my friend, bring the wine list, and I’ll take another.”

Danny didn’t argue. He could still see that heart, the dark blood oozing into the beige leather upholstery.

“I’d like to say you look better,” Andy said. “You got a decent haircut at least, but you look like hell. Maybe you should try sleeping at night instead of stealing hearts.”

Danny forced a smile. “Thanks for getting me out.”

“You want to tell me about it?”

He wasn’t sure how much he wanted to tell Andy. Yet. He took the coward’s way out. “You and Linda all right?”

“How do you think?” Andy finished his scotch. “I sent her to New York for one of those women’s trips. Shopping. Whatever they do. Well, she deserves it. This week’s been hell enough.”

“I’m sorry.”

“But you’re going to make my day, aren’t you? I’m going to hype the shit out of you.”

“Maybe no one cares about a washed-up columnist.”

“By the time the PR department’s done, they will. We still get your fan mail, you know. Besides, I’ve always had a soft spot in my heart for you. You know that, don’t you, Daniel? I’ve always thought of you like a son.”

It was true in as much as Andy looked at anyone as a son. Generally, Andy preferred the guys who tossed back the booze, did endless lines of coke, and chased long-legged blondes in short skirts. Every night was a fiesta in Andyland, and if you didn’t join the conga line, he always wondered about you. But Andy was there for him when it counted.

“I’ve always been grateful.”

Andy held up a sheaf of papers. “Good. We’ll sign your contract now.”

“Don’t I get to read it?”

Andy held out a pen. “Have I ever fucked you? You need to come back to the living, my friend. Sign the goddamn contract.”

“But I—”

“Didn’t I just haul your skinny ass out of jail? At a cost of nine hundred an hour, I might add. I’m getting soft in my old age. Sign it.”

Danny took the pen. He knew it was a test of loyalty. Everything with Andy was a test of some kind. He also knew Andy was a man whose word still counted for something. He signed the papers and handed them back. “You’re still insane.”

Andy slid the papers into his breast pocket. “Yeah? Well, only a Goy would sign a contract without having his lawyer check it out. I’ll send you copies.” He kissed Danny’s cheek and grinned. Danny wasn’t sure he liked the grin. “Welcome back. I’ve missed you.”

The waiter brought their drinks, and Andy scanned the wine list for a second. “You can bring the Dom ’98. We’re celebrating. Right? That was a good year, wasn’t it?”

“Yeah, it was.” Danny wondered how early Andy had started drinking today. It wasn’t quite noon, and he was already half in the bag.

“Here.” Andy shoved an envelope into Danny’s hand. “An invite to the holiday party. Didn’t think I’d forget, did you?”

“I guess not.” Danny stared at the silver envelope. The Cohens’ holiday bash was the stuff of legend, but Michael was barely in the ground.

“Is this a celebration?”

Danny shuddered at the familiar voice. When he looked up, he found himself staring into a pair of fathomless black eyes. Beth’s eyes. They always gave him a jolt staring out from Senator Robert Harlan’s face.

They were in turn warm and filled with charm when he was wooing a constituent or financial backer or bleak and forbidding when confronting an undesirable human specimen. Right now they were somewhere in between.

Danny forced himself to stand and reach out to grasp his ex-father-in-law’s hand. He did so only because Kate Reid stood at the senator’s side. Her hair was drawn off her face, and she gave him a quick look that was almost a warning.

“Daniel, this is an unexpected pleasure.” The senator’s voice was warm and rich like maple syrup. No one in politics had a voice like Robert Harlan. “You’ve been hard to find these days.”

“Have you been looking for me, Senator?”

The senator gave him a benevolent smile. “I think it’s time we mended some fences.”

Danny clenched his hands into fists. After the funeral, the senator had accused him of abusing Beth and had contested her will.

“We went through a terrible time a year ago, and I was hard on you. I can only say it was the grief talking. Beth was my only child. Just as Conor was yours.” The senator’s voice hit a dolorous note. “Grief does terrible things to a person.”

“Some more than others.” Danny knew he sounded harsh. Petty.

For a moment, the senator’s eyes grew hard, and then he blinked and the look passed. When he spoke, his voice shook. “We all bear our grief in different ways, Daniel. We both lost a child. Indeed, I lost a daughter and grandson. Isn’t our mutual loss something we can use to forge a new relationship?” He grasped Danny’s hand and pumped it as if television cameras hovered nearby.

Danny couldn’t answer. He fought for air.

“Daniel’s coming back to the fold. He just signed a contract.” Andy’s face was inscrutable. “You’ll have plenty of opportunity to forge a new relationship if you’re keen to do so.”

The senator dropped Danny’s hand. “He’s coming back?” His voice chilled a few degrees. “To write what?”

Andy waved his glass in the air. “I don’t give a damn what he writes as long as it sells papers. Fucking newspapers have gone to hell. We need to fight the twenty-four-hour news cycle. Right, Daniel?”

Danny nodded.

“It’ll be like old times.” Andy settled back in his seat. “You’re back on the hot seat, I’m afraid, Robert.” He chuckled. “Bad joke. You heard about the congressman, I presume? Damnedest thing.”

The senator’s lips pulled back against his teeth in a feral smile. It made spiders of unease crawl down Danny’s back.

They said it was an accident. A one-car accident. Right under the suicide bridge. Jesus, now he was getting paranoid.

“Poor Teddy,” the senator said, and the warmth crept back into his voice. “Such a loss.”

“Indeed.” Andy patted the chair. “Sit down, Robert. We’ll drink to Teddy. And Michael. And Daniel, of course. Where’re your fucking manners, anyway? You didn’t introduce the delicious Katie to my boy.” He blew a kiss to Kate. “Come here, my darling. You can sit on my lap.”

When Kate laughed, Danny could almost hear the senator’s teeth grind, but he managed to sustain his genial tone. “Daniel Ryan, my assistant, Kate Reid.” He turned back to Andy and sat.

“It’s a pleasure,” Danny said. No point in mentioning he’d already met Kate. It wouldn’t matter that the meeting had been innocent. The senator wouldn’t approve. Danny was the pariah who had stolen Beth and outlived her. Everything he touched turned rancid.

Kate smiled, and when he caught the faint aroma of lavender, he felt an odd sort of connection. Maybe it was the shared secret of their previous meeting, maybe something more.

Andy was already ordering more glasses and another bottle of champagne, and Danny knew it was going to be a long afternoon.

*

By four o’clock, half of the Palm had joined their table, and Danny decided to make an anonymous exit. He reached Broad Street when he heard the click of high heels behind him.

“Danny, wait!” Kate came running up to him, and it was a wonder she didn’t trip in those shoes.

He stood on the street and enjoyed the view. “Where the hell did you come from?”

“The bathroom. Even servants have their limits. You’re leaving?”

“All good things have to end sometime.”

She took a step closer. “You didn’t call.”

She was still breathing fast, and her perfume curled around her like lavender smoke. It had been a long time since he’d been with a woman, or since he even thought about it. The thought was vivid right now.

Kate touched his shoulder. “If I get my coat, will you walk me home? I don’t live far.”

The bourbon was already careening around his system, and Danny knew he’d pay for it soon. In his present state, it didn’t seem too smart to start hanging out with some protégée of Big Bob Harlan. He didn’t care. “Won’t the senator be annoyed that you left?”

“Probably. He won’t know I left with you.”

“In that case, I’d be happy to walk you home.”

T
he frigid air was a relief after the heat of the Palm. Still, pinpricks of light danced in front of him, and Danny could feel that ominous pressure in his right eye. He shouldn’t be here. Not with Big Bob’s lackey, no matter how good she looked. Yet her sorrow tugged at him. Someone had crushed this woman. He’d seen it in her eyes that day at Michael’s wake.

“How did you come to work for Senator Family Values?” he said.

“You don’t believe in family values?”

“Not his.”

“You married his daughter.”

He watched Kate’s eyes grow distressed when she realized what she’d said, and he knew he had to stop her before she apologized.

“You aren’t local,” he said.

Kate folded her arms around her chest like she was trying to enclose her body. “How do you know?”

“Just a guess. Where are you from?” He couldn’t place Kate’s flat, unaccented voice.

“Maine.”

Danny was curious now. That was no Maine accent. “What part of Maine? Beth and I—”

Kate scowled. “Is this an interview?”

“It’s a conversation.”

“Look, I left home young, and I don’t like to think about it. All right?”

“Fair enough.”

The thought of home almost brought Kate to tears. He could hear it in her shaking voice.

They continued in silence toward the Academy of Music, where a group of parents and children spilled out of a Nutcracker Tea. Little girls in their best winter coats and patent leather shoes clutched cardboard teapots as if they were fragile china while the little boys took the same teapots and made pretend guns out of them.

“I want to stay home with Dad.”

Conor in his khakis, turtleneck, and pint-sized Brooks Brothers blazer.

“Are you all right?” Kate said.

Danny flinched when he realized he had stopped walking and stood as if he had taken root on the sidewalk. “Sorry, I—I’m more tired than I thought.”

She turned away. “Look, you don’t have to walk me home.”

He caught her arm before she could take off. “It’s not you. I . . .”

What to say? I found a heart in my car. Someone killed my dog
.
I lost my wife and son last year
.
Maybe all three
.

“I’m sorry. My wife and son were going to a tea like this when they were killed.” Past tense. Danny hated the way his throat tightened.

Kate slid her hand into his. “I’m so sorry.”

He looked at her hand, grateful for its warmth as they started to walk again. “Don’t apologize.”

“You must miss your wife very much. Was it love at first sight?”

How did he explain that one when it was something he never quite understood? “I guess. I met Beth at a party. It was a strange time. I was having my fifteen minutes.”

“You mean you won a Pulitzer, and you were a big deal.”

“I was an asshole.” He shrugged at her skeptical look. She’d taken the trouble to look him up. He’d have to return the favor.

“I was a working-class Irish Catholic kid from South Philly. A nobody. All of a sudden, my picture was on the sides of buses. I was in my twenties. I guess it all went to my head.”

He told people that, and it was half-true. He was a big deal, and while he’d enjoyed the attention, he’d always had a weird sense that the clock was ticking away on the good times. Maybe he was just born with the Irish pessimism that nothing that good could possibly last, or maybe it was because his father told him he’d be sorry he made his living as a vulture.

He really had met Beth at a party, though it was more like a weekend orgy at the Cohens’ home in Palm Beach. She’d come with one of those hard-drinking, fast-rising political types who deserted her once the bar was open and the lines of coke drawn up.

He could still see her walking on the beach in that white dress, her dark hair blowing in the wind. The last rays of sun had caught her face and bathed it in luminous gold. When she’d asked him why he wasn’t inside getting drunk, he could only blurt he didn’t need to drink when the sight of her made him dizzy. She’d told him that was an awful line but a sweet one and then sat with him on the beach until the sun went down, the shadows grew purple and then black, the tide came in, and the air became heavy with the scent of salt, orange, and her. They had danced at the edge of the shore to the strains of Sinatra drifting down from the house with her hand pressed against his heart—the heart that was irrevocably hers.

“Danny?” Kate’s voice brought him back.

“It was a hell of a ride,” he said. Gone. He’d let it slip away from him. He was paid to notice things, people, and he’d been blind to his own life.

“And you’re getting back on the roller coaster because?”

“Because I owe Andy.”

Her fingers tightened against his. “Andy?”

“Andy opened the door for me.”

“Michael said you were close.”

How long had Kate known Michael? He’d never mentioned her, but they must have been friends for a while.

“How did you meet Michael?”

“He hung out with the political reporters, and to tell the truth, I felt sorry for him. He was kind of like a lost puppy.” Kate’s voice tightened, and Danny frowned. Michael had never hung with the political reporters, with the exception of Alex, who had tolerated him. Michael had latched onto other lost souls.

“Most women didn’t like Michael.”

“I’m not most women.”

“He had trouble relating to people,” Danny said.

She nodded. “He was very smart, but nobody knew it. No social skills. I used to be terrified of him until I realized he wanted to protect me.”

“Protect you?”

“Oh, yes. If you were the least bit kind to him, Michael was like a faithful guard dog. It could be unnerving. But I guess you know that.” They reached an old redbrick townhouse converted to apartments, and Kate inclined her head. “This is it.”

“I know what, Kate?”

“How much he wanted to protect you. He loved you.”

“I didn’t deserve it. I—”

Kate reached up to touch his mouth, her fingers lingering, and Danny’s breath hitched before he drew her against him. Her mouth tasted of champagne and raspberry, and something stung inside his chest, almost like a pinprick, but at the same time felt unbearably tender.

Light exploded like a flashbulb, and he pulled back as gracefully as he could. In the streetlight, he could see that her cheeks were flushed. “I have to go.”

“Is something wrong?”

“No, I just—I would like to see you again.” He sounded jerky, unnatural. He needed to leave before something embarrassing happened—like he vomited or his head exploded.

“I’d like to see you.”

“I’ll call.”

“Danny, there is one thing.” Kate caught his arm. “It’s about Michael. You can’t tell anyone. You have to promise.”

“I promise.” Danny’s right eye throbbed, and the pain tightened around his shoulder.

“I saw Michael the night he died. He was coming to see you. He wanted to give you something.”