Trophies (30 page)

I understood: if the Impala returned while we
were piling out of the car, we'd be lined up in the open like
targets on a range.

"Um, yes." Patricia dug in her purse, pulled
out the remote, and clicked it. The door of the two-car garage
hummed open. Uncle Hubert's old black Mercedes sedan, older than
me, was on the right, still gleaming as if polished only yesterday.
When he'd died, Aunt Edith learned to drive herself but she never
drove his beloved Mercedes. Instead she'd purchased the first of a
succession of Beamers, the latest of which was currently impounded
as evidence by Detective Wingate. And perhaps it was some old
British instinct that had kept her parking on the left side of the
garage.

Sherlock revved the Camaro and tucked it into
Aunt Edith's parking spot. We were taking over from her all around,
it seemed. But the idea that she would return and witness it didn't
leap from my subconscious by itself, although I waited. She really
was dead, and I was beginning to accept it.

Patty nearly dropped the remote back into her
purse, but Sherlock held out a hand. She looked at it as if
wondering what on earth it was. He leaned his head back and looked
at her in return. It wasn't his cobra stare — not for a pretty
woman his heavy guns — but it was still fairly intense. The moment
dragged, the engine vibrating the car about us. Then she gave him
the remote, passing the baton of leadership. Patricia was on
Sherlock's impromptu team for the duration.

Even if his occasional violent behavior
seemed to scare her to death. And even if their flirting was well
and truly finished.

Caren met us in the kitchen. Her reading
glasses were shoved up atop her head; her wonderful soft hair was
tied back in a bun, held with a pencil, escaping wisps trailing
down her neck and across her ears. In jeans and blue tee-shirt, she
looked truly dowdy and absolutely delectable. I pulled her close —
who cared if she held a gun in one hand? — and held her.

When I leaned back, she appeared rumpled but
serene as ever. The guilt I felt this time was real. She hadn't
seen that Impala casing the joint; she didn't know how horribly I'd
endangered her life, how close I'd come to truly failing her.

She examined my face as if her eyes contained
some medical monitoring device. "You don't look good."

I wasn't ready to talk about my day, not with
her, not with Sherlock, not with anyone. Without thinking, I tried
to gloss it over. "A nervous breakdown and my boss on my case, but
nothing too serious, I suppose."

"I can't believe I just heard you say that."
Sherlock set the computer case and backpack on the butcher block
table. I'd forgotten all about them. "I cannot
believe
you
had the nerve to actually say that in front of me." He glanced
around. "I take it everything's okay?" When speaking with Caren, he
cut the dramatics, but his stare still contained traces of
something even more predatory than a cobra.

Lindsay crowded beside him. Her head hadn't
ceased swiveling since she entered the house; she even peered up at
the pots over the stove.

Caren reddened under Sherlock's stare; the
effect on her coffee-in-cream skin was devastating, in my
admittedly biased opinion. "Perfectly. I'm just making a fresh pot
of coffee."

She glanced at Patricia, who nodded and took
over that chore. After all, I wasn't letting Caren get on with it;
I didn't want to let her go at all.

"Something has happened, hasn't it?" Caren's
voice was quiet.

Sherlock pushed the backpack toward me and
gave me a derisive look with it. "We just about lost buddy boy here
beneath the wheels of a Suburban."

"Again?"

"But I suppose we could all live with that."
He stretched and rotated his shoulders. "Any sign of Theresa?
Yet?"

"No one's showed up. But Bonnie called to say
she was on her way back and she should be here before six." Caren
slipped the glasses off her head and leaned sideways against me as
if to reassure herself of my presence. Or to keep tabs on me, like
I was a toddler on a leash. "She said you weren't answering your
cell?"

Sherlock glanced at me. "I was a little
busy."

I hadn't even heard his phone ring.

Caren yanked out the pencil and shook her
hair about her shoulders. I wanted nothing more than to run my
fingers through it and forget this day. Texture, doc, texture; he
did have a great point there.

"Okay, people," Sherlock said, and in his
voice I heard the overtones of assumed command, "organization.
We'll leave the computer for Bonnie. She knows more about them than
the rest of us combined."

He dumped the computer case on the countertop
near the coffeemaker. Beyond it, I glimpsed something odd, then
recognized it as the hat box we'd found in Aunt Edith's garret. For
the life of me, I couldn't remember how it got over there.

Lindsay shoved her hands into her jeans
pockets. For a fleeting moment, she reminded me of myself with her
braced legs and insolent stare. Then I blinked and she was herself
again.

"How do you know I'm not a hacker?" she
said.

"Doesn't matter. Trust me, Bonnie still knows
more. Besides, you aren't the type." Sherlock glanced her over. "A
mud wrestler, maybe. A hacker, never."

She grinned.

He turned to Patricia. "Can I convince you to
carry a pistol?"

"Never," she promised and switched on the
coffee pot.

"Then until further notice, you go nowhere
alone, and you go nowhere unarmed." That last was aimed at Caren.
"It seems our enemies are ratcheting up their offensiveness and I
don't want either of them to nab a hostage."

"I can shoot," Lindsay said. "Dad taught
me."

I interrupted. "Oh, no. I can just picture
your father's face should he receive a visit from Boston P.D.
asking why you were carrying one of my pistols. Not a chance."

Her face stilled during my tirade, her eyes
narrowed, and her chin stuck out.

But Sherlock spoke first. "Then if the
situation arises, you use mine. No, slow down, Robbie my Robber.
Both of those drivers saw her with us. Lindsay would make as
effective a hostage as Patricia or Caren."

He was right. We were stuck with her for the
duration. Patricia, of course, was horrified. "But—"

"Sorry, ma'am." There wasn't a trace of
apology in his voice.

She butted into his path. Her chin didn't
lower and her lips didn't roll together. "I promised her parents
I'd return her this evening."

I grabbed the butcher block and held on.
Lindsay's jaw sagged.

Wordlessly, Sherlock stared down at her. The
last of the cobra faded. For a moment he seemed confused. Then that
faded, too, and the consideration that next touched his face lifted
the hairs on the back of my neck.

He reached into her purse, pulled out her
cell phone, and handed it to her. She didn't look down and her
glare didn't waver. Neither did his and his respect was now
obvious. Finally she took the phone from his scarred hand,
accepting his orders once again.

"Given a choice," he said in the same quiet
tone he used to address Caren, "I'd rather keep Lindsay where I can
watch out for her. Same for you, same for Caren. My gang and I,
we're used to stuff like this. Even Robbie over there, although you
might not know it to watch him sometimes."

I sighed. He was not going to let that go,
which meant I would be hearing from him further shortly.

"We train for this. Y'all don't, so it's up
to us to keep an eye out for you. Okay?"

Lindsay's face was thrilled. Her choice was
obvious: to hell with sitting in hospital corridors.

Beaten, Patricia left the kitchen, scrolling
through her contacts. I wondered what she'd tell William and Linda;
I doubted it would be the truth, and that thought made me
smile.

I started to follow her — Aunt Edith kept the
schnapps in Uncle Hubert's old study, it would help that coffee
along tremendously, and now I remembered why I'd had a beer with
lunch — but Sherlock stopped me, as if there hadn't been any
interruption in our previous conversation.

"Do you remember Hoffmann's famous line, the
one about generals being chained dogs?"

I slumped. Briefly I considered taking the
offensive, then scrapped that. He'd warned me once. Enough
said.

"And he's some sort of ridiculous cross
between a Doberman pinscher and a rat terrier." I wished Sherlock
would just drop it, but knew better even as I stood in the kitchen
smelling the coffee. "Enough theory, boss. I've gotten the
message."

The look he gave me was devoid the barest
trace of respect. "I doubt it," he said, and said, and said,
"because I haven't made it yet. Robbie, I'm not riding you. Much.
There's just something that doctor didn't think about and I believe
it's germane to this discussion."

His words cut through my resistance. I'd
appreciated the way Sherlock stuck by me. But I had to admit, I'd
wondered why he'd done so. He wasn't the sort of officer to
endanger the rest of his team just to be supportive of the one weak
link. Whatever his reason, I wanted to hear it.

I leaned on the table beside him. "All right,
boss. I
am
listening. The general is a chained dog and the
government holds the leash."

He turned and faced me head on: no more
dramatics, no more derision; Sherlock was finally serious.
"Carrying that symbolization to a ridiculous degree makes special
forces types, like us, into something like Saint Bernards or search
and rescue dogs. We're the ones who go in during a crisis and save
the day, hopefully. You with me?"

"Yes."

"We're protectors. What happened to you
today, Robbie my Robber, is you ran out of people to protect. When
you had Lindsay and Patricia to worry over, you did fine.
Right?"

I shrugged.

"You gave them the luggage so your hands were
free. You had them walk across the parking lot to the car while you
stayed on the stairs, so that we had a field of fire around them
and could keep them safe. Right?"

"It was all I could think of."

"And it was a good, rational plan. But when
you were the target, then the pressures, the shocks, the whole
damned day overwhelmed you. You froze. Right?"

"I hate it when you are."

"
But
when you saw me stretched out on
the concrete and there was no way you could tell whether I was dead
or alive, do you remember how you responded?"

"No." I faced him. "No, I don't
remember."

"You drew your pistol." Those brown eyes,
usually sarcastic or cutting or sardonic, were proud. His voice
dropped to a croon; this was personal, just between us hound dogs.
"You were gone, mentally, I mean." He cocked his head. "What were
you thinking about, in any case?"

I shrugged. "I thought, he had to be hot in
that ski mask."

He shook his head. "Gone. But when you saw me
in danger, you pushed through whatever was holding you back and you
reacted appropriately. Your instincts are still there, Robbie, even
if they're diluted or buried or something. And that means you're
still valuable to the team." He grabbed the computer case from the
countertop and hefted it to his shoulder. "Thanks," he added,
astonishing me further, and left the kitchen.

I hadn't realized the room had cleared during
that little interlude. But when I glanced about, only Caren
remained, pouring two mugs of coffee at the pot. The Waterford
decanter stood nearby, stopper on the counter. I should have known
I could depend on her to read my mind.

"Cream? Sugar?"

I joined her, grabbed one mug, inhaled the
bracing aroma of spiked coffee, and slugged it black. It burned
going down and the schnapps kicked like a horse. "That helps."

She waited while I finished a first drink.
Then she leaned onto the counter beside me, so close I could smell
her lavender perfume. The similarity of her body language to
Sherlock's, from a moment ago, was impossible for even me to miss.
"Nothing too serious, huh?"

I met her gaze. On the surface she seemed
amused, but those crinkle lines were missing from around her eyes.
My neck and shoulders tightened again.

"Sure you want to be friends with a crazy
man?" I kept my voice light, but we both knew her answer mattered
much more to me than the words or tone implied.

Without answering, she added cream to her
mug. Her hair flowed across her neck and brushed her shoulders, a
cascade of unruly dark brown across her tee-shirt and about her
ears. I watched its swing and fall and so was caught staring when
she peered at me from the corner of her eyes. The crinkle lines
returned three heartbeats later.

She leaned and kissed me, oh so gently, just
the barest feather touch of her lips on mine. My pulse picked up
speed. Then she added more cream to her coffee and stirred that
instead.

"Are you certain you want a shrink hanging
around?"

We were so close my forearm brushed hers.
"You know, we're not going to be able to slip away for dinner
tonight, either."

"Figures."

current time

Sherlock and I went for a run, racing each
other across the Cambridge Common, circling the Yard where once I
pretended to study and touching the shoe of John Harvard's statue —
we could use all the luck we could get — before turning back. It
felt good to stretch my legs and resume contact with my body, even
if it did hurt. En route we examined every parked car, every person
loitering at a bus stop, each delivery of pizza and parcels. We
spotted nothing. The Casanovas' German shepherd ran with us for a
while, and I thought briefly of getting a dog; he made good
company. But if my negotiations were successful, Caren would be far
better.

There was still no sign of Theresa, so after
showering Sherlock grilled fajitas for six. Bonnie brought in the
groceries; Patricia had given her some cash from the house account,
so we were stocked for a few days' siege. Again we gathered in the
kitchen over bottles of Moosehead. Caren chopped onions and cried,
Bonnie sliced lettuce and tomatoes and kept a close eye on every
ingredient Sherlock added, Patricia set the dining room table, and
Lindsay and I grated Jack and cheddar. The scents wafting off the
stove top were awesome.