Third Degree (11 page)

It didn’t surprise me that Tony had the hots for Lydia, too. He was after almost every woman in town, even my neighbor Jane, who had stopped coming to the deli long ago for fear of being mauled by Tony and his meaty, cold-cut-covered hands. “Mrs. Wilmott comes here?”

Tony nodded. “At least once a week. She loves Lucia’s chicken cordon bleu.” He smiled at the thought of Lydia. “When the cook’s off, that’s what she gets because she loves it so much.”

I’m sure she did. Lucia was a complete lunatic but an exceptional cook. If I could stomach coming back here and getting pawed at, I would have to try the chicken cordon bleu. If I played my cards right, I could probably even pass it off as my own to Crawford. I thought about that as I pulled a few dollars from my purse and put them on the counter after Tony handed me my coffee. He looked nervously toward the back of the deli where I guessed Lucia dwelled, and when he saw that the coast was clear, he pushed the money back. “All I need is a kiss,” he said. “No money.”

“I’m a taken woman,” I said, laughing nervously.

“Please. Just one kiss,” he pleaded.

I pushed the money back across the counter. “I can’t, Tony. I’d never be able to explain to my boy … to Crawford.”

“It will be our secret,” he said.

I blew Tony a kiss. “That’s as close as it gets,” I said, and hurried from the store, grateful to be back out on the sidewalk, even if it was close to a hundred degrees. It couldn’t have been any hotter or more uncomfortable in the deli than it was outside.

I drank my coffee and mulled over my severe commitment issues as I maneuvered my car through town and toward the Saw Mill River Parkway. Could anyone blame me for not wanting to rush into marriage after what I had been through? Sure, my days of being married to a serial philanderer were long behind me, but the pain still resonated. And God knows, I hadn’t been in love with Ray when I married him; I knew that I had done it out of some kind of duty to my deceased mother who had made me promise that I wouldn’t die alone. Who would have thought that I’d be the only married woman in America who would indeed die alone, had I stayed with Ray? He was surrounded by a bevy of willing mistresses, yet I slogged away at school and at home, under the delusion that I was happily married to a man I thought I should love. That had been a mistake and delusion of colossal proportions.

And now I had Mr. Perfect. Sure, he had his shortcomings, not limited to his love of the Cheez Doodle or safe, German-engineered cars (which were now made in Mexico, I wanted to remind him), or his ability to stay incredibly calm under the most stressful of situations (which is extremely annoying, I guarantee you), and yet I was dragging my feet, my Ring Pop engagement ring now safely hidden in my underwear drawer so that I couldn’t gaze at it every day and night when I was in my bedroom. Crawford hadn’t mentioned its absence and I hadn’t brought it up. I knew I had to make a decision—and fast—and I figured I would eventually acquiesce, but was acquiescence an acceptable response to a marriage proposal from a man I truly loved? Maybe I’d be more excited after I acquiesced.

I decided that I couldn’t handle this on my own, so I decided to find Kevin the first chance I got and dump it all on him. He was my best friend and a priest; who would be a better dumpee?

I managed to get to school, and park without incident. The back steps would be another story so I sat in the car and went through my messenger bag to see what I could leave on the passenger seat and lighten my load for the day. I had rewrapped my wrist that morning and had done a pretty good job. It was immobile and didn’t hurt as much as it had the night before. My elbow was a little scraped up and my eye was more bluish purple than black. Things were looking up. Sort of.

I had a half hour or so until I needed to meet my first freshman of the day and decided that I would run up to Kevin’s residence, on the top floor of the dorm outside of which I park my car. I needed to get his opinion on my latest tale of woe. I had lived in this dorm for six weeks the previous semester and the smell of floor polish and teen spirit still lingered in my nose. I signed in with the resident director whom the dean of housing had thankfully hired to replace me and told him that I would be heading up to see Fr. McManus on the top floor. The new resident director, a young man who seemed really gung ho, sent me up and went back to reading his school manual as I waited for the hundred-year-old elevator to make its way down the shaft and to the first floor. When it arrived, I boarded it and pulled the gate closed, praying the entire time that it would take me to the sixth floor without incident.

I reached the top floor after a far longer journey than I should have had to endure and hung a right toward Kevin’s one-bedroom suite with the spectacular view. I reached the doorway and noticed that his name plate—
FATHER KEVIN MCMANUS
—was gone. All that remained was an unvarnished rectangle that had been covered by the brass-plated sign for the last several years. I knocked on the door, even though it was slightly ajar, and waited a few seconds. No answer. I pushed the door open and called Kevin’s name, hearing only silence.

As the door swung open, and the panoramic view of the campus greeted me from the floor-to-ceiling windows at the far end of the suite, it became obvious that no one would return my greeting.

The rooms were empty.

His face told me that he couldn’t conjure Kevin’s identity up immediately, but after a few seconds he seemed to recall the school chaplain. He laid down his reading material, the college rules and regulations handbook that all freshman received—and promptly discarded—and left it open on the desk. I noticed that he was reading the section entitled “Why Are We a Dry Campus?” with great interest. If he got the answer to that question, I sure wanted to know what it was, because right now? I needed a drink bad. I thought the head of the modern language department kept a bottle of Chambord in his desk drawer, and if he did, I was going to head down there immediately after finding Kevin.

“Have you seen him?”

“Not today.”

“Did a moving van come around either last night or this morning?”

“Oh! So that’s what woke me up!” he exclaimed, slapping his forehead with his hand. “I looked out the window and saw a white van, but I didn’t know what it was for.”

I took a deep breath; the dorm wasn’t going to be very safe with a guy who slept through an entire apartment of furniture being removed on his watch. “My name is Alison Bergeron and I teach in the English department. If you see Father McManus, would you please tell him that I need to speak to him right away?”

The new RD, far younger than I was when I did the job last spring, and probably more suited to the position as well, grabbed a notepad and jotted down the information, sticking it in the mail slot next to his desk that held the residents’ mail. “Sure thing.” A look of surprise crossed his face. “Oh, you’re Dr. Bergeron!” he said.

I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not. Around these parts, I’m never sure.

“I replaced you as RD!” he said, his demeanor changing. He stood up and shook my hand. “Cal Johnson,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you, too.” I wiped my hand across my brow, now in a complete sweat after running down the stairs. “Are you sure you haven’t seen Father McManus?”

“I haven’t. But I’ll let him know that you’re looking for him if I see him.” He smiled broadly. “Any secrets to doing this job well?” he asked, so sincere and earnest that it almost broke my heart. The job stunk; you were a combination babysitter slash house sitter slash den mother to a group of coeducational infants who were randy, horny, and loved to acquire booze any way they could to bring onto this “dry” campus. Oh, and don’t forget the pot. They loved that, too.

“Just …” I started, at a loss. But I came up with something quickly if only to give this guy the idea that he had just landed the best job on the planet. “Just make sure you keep all the doors locked and have everyone sign in and out, just like the handbook says.”

“I’m really psyched for this job. I was a psych major at Joliet and always loved this campus, so this is a great opportunity for me.”

“Calm down, Cal, you’ve already got the job,” I said, laughing.

He smiled. “Sorry. I am just really excited to have a job.” He quickly corrected himself. “
This
job.”

“Well, good luck.”

He held his hand out again to shake. “Hey, do you think you’d be able to grab a cup of coffee sometime so we can talk about the job? I’d love any additional insight you might have so that I can hit the ground running.”

You might think that I’ve lived in a cave my entire life but that isn’t the case. But Cal sure looked like it was when I looked at him sadly and said, “Oh, Cal, I have a boyfriend.” I probably have the least “game” of anyone I know, and that was woefully apparent as I took in Cal’s pitying face as he stared at me and stammered to come up with a response. It then dawned on me that, yes, Cal just wanted to have a cup of coffee to talk about the job. He wasn’t asking me on a date. I wasn’t a panther, or a lemur, or a gazelle—what was it they called older women with hot, younger men anyway?—but a pathetic excuse for a middle-aged college professor. I wanted to say, “You should have seen me yesterday in my ripped dress and dingy bra. Now, that’s some kind of sexy.”

“Dr. Bergeron—” he started.

I held up a hand. “Forget I said that. Yes, I would love to have coffee with you. To discuss the job.”

But I had scared Cal sufficiently and he backed off. “It’s okay. I’m sure I’ll learn as I go.” He picked up the handbook and returned to reviewing the rules regarding a dry campus.

I was so embarrassed that I forgot why I had even come to the dorm. Right. Kevin. I reminded Cal that I needed to talk to Kevin and I skulked back toward the front door. If I had a tail—and given the distaste on Cal’s gorgeous face, I wasn’t sure I didn’t—it would have been between my legs.

I went back to my office and sat dejectedly at my desk, worried about Kevin, wondering when my black eye would go away, and fiddling with my Ace bandage. The queasy feeling that I had been fighting for the past few days was back with a vengeance and I took a sip of water from the aluminum bottle on my desk and made a face; it was warm and made me feel queasier, if that was possible. Kevin was gone, his apartment was empty, and he hadn’t let me know where he was going. I thought back to our conversation the day before and remembered that he was going to see Etheridge after we caught up on our summers. Did I have the nerve to go upstairs and demand an explanation from the college president? I had visited the widow of a recently deceased man not forty-eight hours before, so probably. But before I could formulate my questions for Etheridge, I heard a knock at my door, and freshman number one had arrived.

I spent the rest of the day explaining the origins of my black eye, my Ace bandage, and the course requirements for freshmen entering the college and planning on an English major at some point in their academic careers. I had almost forgotten about Kevin.

Almost.

Once the last freshman had left, the sun starting its descent over the river, and I was safely in my car away from the prying eyes of Dottie, I pulled out my cell phone. Stored in the phone was the number of Kevin’s extremely handsome and single brother, Jack, a former almost paramour, who liked me way more than I could ever explain. He also possessed the most perfect set of teeth on a human being and they were his. None of these veneers or implants. I had checked. With my tongue.

He answered after a few rings, surprised that I was calling. “Alison? Hi!”

I cut to the chase. “Jack, where’s Kevin?”

“I’m fine. How are you?” he said, clearly not realizing my reason for calling.

“I’m serious. Where’s your brother?”

“I’m assuming he’s at school. You haven’t seen him?”

I decided not to alarm Jack until I knew more. “No. I was wondering if he was back from Paris?” This lying thing was working out well for me; I would just have to keep track of all of the half-truths that I had told in the last forty-eight hours.

“You’re his best friend, Alison. If you don’t know, then I surely don’t,” he said, chuckling.

That was concerning. I made a little more chitchat with Jack, talking about the New York Rangers—my favorite hockey team and Jack’s employer—and finagling two tickets to a game in December from him. Before we hung up, Jack asked me a question.

“You’re not concerned about him, are you, Alison?”

“No!” I said, a little too brightly.

Jack hesitated. “Well, okay. If you hear from him, tell him his brother wants to take him out to eat.”

I hung up and dropped the phone into my lap. I stared at the dashboard of my car, watching minute dust particles swirl around in the humid air, trying to figure out where to look next for my missing priest. The phone vibrated in my lap, scaring the heck out of me but giving me a sensation that wasn’t altogether unpleasant. “Hello?”

“It’s me,” Crawford said. “Are you still at school?” When he heard that I was, he asked, “Want to grab some dinner?”

I left school with a spring in my step; although I had suspected that he was a little peeved with me over the failure to answer the proposal question, he wanted to have dinner with me. How mad could he be? Ten minutes later, I met him at a pub close to school that had better food than its name—Poindexter’s—and ambiance—early fake medieval—would imply. That’s the beauty of dating a homicide detective who works in your precinct: we can be together in mere minutes if the planets align. Fortunately, he is not a picky eater since he eats at his filthy desk or in a car most of the time. I had to drive home and he was technically still on duty so we both had Diet Cokes, which we sipped in silence until we got a little caffeine rush after our long workdays. I started. We had a lot to talk about.

“George Miller was arraigned today in White Plains.” I had looked at the county paper on my computer before I had left school to see what the update was.

Crawford was unimpressed. He had probably been to a thousand arraignments, and more to the point, he didn’t really care about George Miller, black eye notwithstanding.

“What do you think will happen to him?”

“He’ll either have his bail set or be released on his own recognizance. I’d imagine it’s the latter if he doesn’t have a record. What did they get him on? I’m thinking manslaughter.”

“Manslaughter, it is then. You’re usually pretty accurate about these things.” I scanned the menu and decided on my dinner, snapping the leather-bound book shut. “And I thought the new resident director at Siena dorm asked me out today when, in fact, he just wanted to have a cup of coffee and talk about the job.”

Crawford winced.

“It gets worse.”

He raised an eyebrow.

“Kevin’s missing.”

That got his attention. “Missing?”

I explained how I went to his room and it had been cleaned out and how his cell phone kept going to voice mail. Crawford took this all in, watching me intently as I related the details of the story.

“Where do you think he is?” he asked.

I threw my hands up. “Not a clue. But the last thing he said to me was that he was going to Etheridge’s office to talk about something and he wasn’t sure what it was.”

Crawford drummed his fingers on the tabletop. I wasn’t sure what that meant, so I was overjoyed when he said, “Let me do a little poking around.”

“Thank you!” I said, and lunged across the table to kiss him, taking down my soda, his, and the bread basket with one fell swoop. The soda all went in his direction, soaking him from the solar plexus to his shoes, and several rolls ended up in his lap.

He stood. “I guess I won’t be going back to work,” he said, and sauntered off toward the men’s room.