Never Alone (11 page)

sixteen

I tossed both halves
of the phone into the East River while thinking there was something about Detective McGinn I found familiar. And then I made the connection.

_____

Megan slid down to the floor against one of the kitchen cabinets,
but not without first lighting a cigarette. Her cell phone rang
again.

“Restricted.” She stared at the phone as it continued to ring, wondering if she should answer it. She pressed the green call button and slowly put the phone up to her ear. She didn't hear anything on the other end and waited a few seconds before speaking.

Nothing.

“Who the fuck is this?”

“Hey, kiddo—hello to you too.”

“Fucking hell, Brendan. You scared the shit out of me.” Megan covered her heart with a shaking hand, as if that would slow its pace. “Where are you calling from? The phone doesn't register a number.”

“I'm still at work in one of the conference rooms,” he said. “You sound like shit.”

Megan said, “Thanks,” followed by a long drag off the cigarette.

“Smoking again, I hear.”

She rolled her eyes. “Hey, trust me, it could be worse.” She tried to think back if she still had any pot left in her bedroom from the night the stockbroker slept over, although she'd already decided it was going to be an Ambien evening.

“Have you been to see Mom?”

“Yeah. She seems to have settled into the nursing home, but her condition is status quo.”

“Did she get the flowers I sent?” Brendan asked.

“Yes. And why did you send her flowers when you know she has no clue?”

“It made me feel good and it gives her something nice to stare at. Doesn't matter if she knows who they're from, does it?”

Megan couldn't argue with that. Guilt has a way of blackmailing you into doing anything to rid yourself of even the smallest amount of shame.

“We need to go over a few things about the house. I want to get it up for sale in the next couple of months, so we really need to start going through their things, maybe think about an estate sale before the weather gets too bad.”

“First of all, you don't mean
we
, you mean
me
. I'm working a case; how the fuck do
you think I'm going to be able to handle the house all by mysel
f
?”

“Aunt Maureen and Uncle Mike will help out, and I promised I'd come back.”

“You better keep that promise and not be a douche bag, Bren
dan.”

“I think I read a greeting card with the same sentiment,” he laughed, which made Megan laugh in return. He always could cut through her dark moods better than almost anyone else, with the exception of their father. “I've been going through dad's will. It's all pretty standard. I'm always handling the business end of things while you play one of Charlie's Angels.”

“Very funny.”

She heard a rustling at her door.

What the fuck? The doorman didn't call up?

She closed the phone with the force of a brick smashing through a Tiffany glass window. She reached for her gun next.

seventeen

“Fucking hell.” After checking
the peephole, Megan opened
the door to a slightly stunned Nappa.

“Don't shoot, I brought food.”

“Why didn't the security guard call me?”

Nappa shrugged. “He saw my badge and gun, and I guess just assumed.”

“What an ass.”

Nappa pretended to turn around to leave. “I can take this food elsewhere.”

“I didn't mean you. Get in here.” Megan double locked the
door, and then checked it a third time.

“Why are you answering the door with your gun drawn, Mc
Ginn?”

She shook her head. “I just was …” She was about to tell Nappa about the text she'd just received, but for some reason held back. Partly out of pride, partly out of not wanting to come off as a puking, smoking, trigger-happy hysteric.

“Just so you know, I would have shot you if you weren't bearing food.”

“Well, that's good to know. It's not particularly comforting, but it's good to know,” Nappa answered warily.

Megan took the bag from Nappa's hands. “Thai? Why are you at my apartment with my favorite food?” She asked with raised eyebrows and a suddenly ravenous appetite.

“I was in the area.” An expressionless stare followed.

“No, you weren't,” Megan returned with the same poker-face.

“No, I wasn't. I brought wine. Is white okay?”

Instead of protesting the change of subject, she kowtowed to her empty stomach. “Of course. If it's not in a box, the opener is over there.” Megan nodded toward one of the kitchen drawers.

Nappa stood staring down his partner as he opened the bottle of wine and let her fidgety behavior speak the volumes she was unable or unwilling to.

“Are you okay?”

“What do you mean?” She pulled plates and utensils out of drawers as if they were weeds invading her blue-ribbon vegetable garden.

“You're flying around the kitchen like Julia Child on crack.”

She waved him off. “Yeah, I'm fine … I just had a conversation with Brendan.” Shit, she'd have to call him back soon too.

He studied her a moment. He knew a long line at Starbucks could put Megan in this kind of mood, so he decided to let it be. “Well, here.” He handed her a glass of wine. “Maybe this will help.”

“Thanks. And thank you for the food. Go in the living room. I'll plate us up.”

He took his glass and did as ordered. “Ah, look, my favorite photo,” Nappa said. He looked back and forth between Megan and the photograph. “I still can't believe this is you,” he said, removing it from the armoire.

“I was a little pudgy when I was a kid.” She smiled, grateful for a light moment.

The photo was taken when Megan was ten. She and Brendan were sitting outside. He had his arm around his baby sister. Megan's mouth was covered with chocolate ice cream. Based on her Buddha belly, ice cream was consumed often. Though the picture wasn't terribly flattering for her, Megan loved the expressions on their faces.

“McGinn, pudgy is one thing. This is …” Nappa searched for the most politically correct description.

“Baby fat?” Megan interjected.

“You were no oil painting. Unless there was a call for cherub models, that is.”

“Okay, so I was a little on the round side.” Megan brought all the food into the living room. She moved the photographs and files to one side of the coffee table to make room for their dinner.

“I mean, look at you now. I would never have guessed you were such a fatty growing up.”

“Look at me now? What is that, a back-handed compliment?”

“Well, you don't crack mirrors anymore.” He tried to steer the conversation away from his flattery. “Can I get a copy of this, one for my wallet or maybe an eight-by-ten? Even better—poster-size?”

“Very funny.” She handed him his dinner. “Hey, something happ—”

“I need to cut to the chase before we start work.” Nappa's tone was suddenly very official. “Are you up for this case? You have had a hard
time of it. A really hard time. You haven't even had time to mourn your dad.”

“Wait, hold on.” Megan pointed her wine glass in his direction. “
You
were the one to call me with the McAllister scene. You!”

“I know, I feel responsible. As your partner, I need to check in.”

“No. You mean Walker needs to check in, and she asked
you
to see if I'm good for it.”

“Look. You've had to deal with your father passing, taking care of your mom. It's been a whirlwind.”

“She's in a nursing home now, Nappa. That doesn't really qualify me as caring for her.”

“McGinn, what else were you supposed to do? You work twelve-
, sometimes fourteen-hour days. There's nothing to feel guilty about. She's in an excellent facility. You couldn't have done it all on your own.”

Megan knew Nappa was right. But that didn't make it any easier. Things started to go wrong for Rose around her sixtieth birthday. The small incidents soon magnified into much larger situations
—leaving things on the stove or in the oven, which could have led to fires if Pat hadn't gotten home in time. It wasn't so much her forgetfulness that had Pat concerned but the change in her personality and her personal habits. Then it
all
began to change. Her thoughts became jumbled. She'd have emotional flare-ups for the smallest reasons. She started leaving the house disheveled—hair messy, no makeup, her clothes wrinkled. It became too much for Megan's father to deal with privately. They saw countless doctors and had scores of tests done. The professionals referred to it as an early onset of dementia or Alzheimer's. While her father was alive, he vowed to take care of her, and he did. But with Pat gone now, there was little she or Brendan could do but place her in the finest facility they could find. It was the hardest decision she ever had to make, but it was what was best for their mother, and that's all that mattered. Megan knew it would be a long time before she could accept that fact.

“I don't think anyone could hold up to that kind of pressure as well as you have. And now this case comes up.”

“Forget about that. Tell me the truth: Do
you
think I should be on this case?”

“I think you can handle anything that comes your way, but when you lose it with our lieutenant, I get worried.”

“Nappa, what do you want? You want me to apologize again?” She took a chug of her wine.

“No.” His voice deepened. “I want to know you can handle this. Both you and I know this is only the beginning.”

In that moment she knew she couldn't share the information about the text; she'd be taken off the case immediately, and she couldn't let that happen. “Yes. Got it?”

“Okay, okay.” They sat for the next few minutes eating in an uncomfortable silence. “Sorry,” Nappa offered.

“Shut up, Nappa.” Megan then nabbed a dumpling off his plate. “Hand me the remote.”

She turned on the CD player.

“Neil Diamond? You listen to Neil Diamond. You
like
Neil Dia
mond?”

“No, I
love
Neil Diamond. He's a god. I have every one of his albums, or CDs, whatever you want to call them now.”

“Okay, let me get this straight. Not only do you listen to, love, and think Neil Diamond is a god—which, by the way, is more than just a little scary to me—you own every single album?”

“Yep. I've seen him twelve times in concert. Sometimes I even
wear my Neil Diamond concert T-shirts to bed, not that you
needed that information.” Megan sipped from her wineglass before belting out a line from the song, at an unbearable volume. “Sweeeeet Caroline …”

“Well, now I know why you're single. Neil Diamond T-shirts to bed, not sexy.”

“Fuck off, Nappa!” Megan laughed at his shot.

“Yes, the Neil Diamond obsession and the mouth on you, that explains why you're single.”

_____

Over the course of the next few hours, they went through more wine as they worked on piecing together a case that had very few pieces to work with.

“I can't figure out how he did
so
much and left only two fibers behind.” Megan sighed. She went through some of the less-graphic crime-scene photographs. “Maybe we're wrong about this.” She handed Nappa the photo of how Shannon was found. “He could have just put her in this position for the hell of it.”

Nappa looked at the photo from every angle. “But the suturing. That wasn't just for the hell of it.”

Megan was tired and stiff from sitting on the wooden floor. She moved to the couch next to Nappa. “I can't look at that photo one more time tonight.” A photo of a sewn-tight vagina didn't mix well with Thai food. She turned the picture over and looked at Nappa. “So why are
you
single?”

“What?” He threw his head back on the couch, laughing at the odd timing of her question. “We move from talking about vaginas to my love life.”

“What, the two don't go together?”

“Not currently.”

“I know what you mean.”

“Yeah, our work doesn't bode well for lasting relationships.”

“I have a feeling you are a man with a few secrets, Sam Nappa.”

Nappa did have his secrets, and he knew he'd had enough wine to unwisely divulge some of them, so he switched gears and asked the questions instead of answering them. “You know, I've never asked—I assumed, but I never came out and asked—what made you become a cop?”

“Excellent ploy, Nappa, redirecting the conversation back to
me.”

“No, seriously, I'm curious.” Nappa's interest was sincere, but also a successful strategic move.

“What did you assume the reason was?”

“I figured because your father was a cop, he'd influenced you.”

“I prefer to look at it as
inspired
rather than influenced.
Influenced
feels ugly to me, like he pressured me. I was never pressured to become a cop, though I did enjoy how it sent my mother through the roof.” She smiled. “My mother would have definitely preferred a stockbroker or lawyer. A home in Westchester, two grandchildren, a golden retriever, and me volunteering for the Junior League.”

“Sure, I could see that.” Nappa conveyed his sarcasm with an eye-popping expression. He refilled their glasses before sitting back on the couch. The few times Nappa had met Rose before her health had gotten really bad recently, he took joy in watching the one person who could get under Megan's skin. But he also saw the love they had for one other. It was as deep as the Mariana Trench, and just like it, you couldn't touch the bottom, but you always knew it was there.

“So, because my mom wanted me to do all those things, that's exactly what I didn't do. As for my dad, well, you've heard all the stories about how great a detective he was. I don't think I'll reach that level, but …”

“You're wrong. You'll probably never see it, but you're wrong. You're a great detective.”

“Thanks.” She could feel her face redden.

“Oh my God. Detective Megan
The Meganator
McGinn is
blushing.”

“It's the wine.” She sipped from her glass, feeling her face turn even hotter.

He shook his head and whispered, “I don't think so.” He lightly stroked Megan's cheek. She closed her eyes trying hard to remember the last time she'd felt a man's gentle touch. Sex had been recent, and rough, but a soft caress—that hadn't happened for a very long time. She put her hand up to his, about to push it away; instead she leaned into him, allowing their lips to touch. It was a
light, tender kiss until Megan ran her fingers through his black
hair, pulling him closer. Their tongues met as she moved back on the couch, pulling him on top of her. His deep kisses moved from her lips down her neck. He stopped, straddled her while taking off his shirt, then removed hers button by button. He rubbed his palms over her chest, slowly moving each bra strap down her shoulders before unfastening it, tossing it to the floor. His mouth moved over each breast, sampling the taste and feel of her nipples in his mouth, softly between his teeth. She moved his hand toward her pants. He started to unbutton her jeans when their cell phones rang. He collapsed his head into her bosom in frustration.

“Shit.” Megan buried her face into his hair.
“Shit.”
The phones continued to ring. “We have to get that.” Megan moved photos, files, searching for her cell. Nappa checked his jacket. Nothing. He let it go to voicemail by the time Megan located hers.

“It's Rasmussen.” She answered, doing her best to calm her breathing, “McGinn.”

Megan knew fate had stepped in, but she was currently of the opinion that fate was a real bitch. She listened to the details from Rasmussen. “Yeah. Uh-huh.”

Nappa put his shirt back on and picked up Megan's bra. He stood behind her, brushed her hair to the side, slowly slipped the straps up each arm, moving the cups under her breasts, which moments ago he'd tasted.

“What's the address?” she asked. His soft fingers fastened each hook with delicate precision. His touch sent shocks up and down her body. “Hang on a second.” When she paused the conversation with Rasmussen, Nappa placed his forehead on her shoulder, his arm around her. She fell back into his touch, knowing that this could never happen again.