“There was something I found, late last month, in a case file. It really freaked me out. I have no idea how it got there, but I think it was in my possession beforehand.”
“What?”
“A baseball card in a plastic bag. Not just any baseball card. It was a Reggie Jackson from 1977.” He explained its significance and what had become of it on the night of the blackout. How he had given it to Lois just before the car broke down. Aideen’s face scrunched up in confusion.
“Wait, are you sure it was the same card?”
“It’s been a very long time. I guess I can’t be sure. I remember having it, though. I remember it disappearing into my mother’s back pocket right before she herself disappeared.”
Aideen’s face smoothed. Now she seemed mystified.
“I know, it’s weird.”
“And . . . it was in an accordion file?”
“Yeah, just sitting in there.”
“No idea how it got there?”
“At some point I’m sure I dumped the file on a table, probably at home, to look through it. I was . . . ah, shit, I was probably bombed. It was the same week Lois’s body was found. If I did dump this file out on the table, and I was out of it, then other stuff on the table could have gotten mixed up with papers from the file. It’s happened before.”
“It’s happened to me too,” she said. “I’ve found my kids’ school papers in the occasional case file. It just means it was in your possession. So maybe you don’t remember digging it up from somewhere.”
“Yeah, but that’s the point. I didn’t have it! I hadn’t seen the damn thing in forty years!”
“That’s where you may be wrong,” she said. She tapped the side of her head. “Distorted thinking. That’s a thing, you know.”
“I don’t think my thinking on this is distorted. Then again, I haven’t been thinking very clearly.”
“No, you haven’t. Where’s that card now?”
“It’s in the box of stuff I brought home from the office. At the house someplace.”
“Okay. Look, you must have found it someplace. It would make sense. You had been reliving that night, especially around the fortieth anniversary. Maybe looking through old stuff. Combine that with binge drinking and who knows? For now, it’s a footnote.” An announcement came over a loudspeaker. Visitors needed to exit.
“Thanks for this,” Joe said as she gathered her materials. He waited until she made eye contact to be sure that sank in.
“Just stay with me.”
“I am. I’m not giving up yet. I could have refused to meet with you, then gone back to court next week and just told them I wanted to plea straight up. I’m a lawyer; they’d let me.”
“Yeah, well, you’d have a fool for a client. Anyway, I’m glad you didn’t do that. So, for now, the usual advice: keep quiet and let me do a few things.”
“Things like what? Please don’t tell me you’re going to talk to Hathorne.”
“I’m going to do my job. I was married to a cop most of my life. I’m plenty paranoid, and I’m well armed. Don’t worry; no one is coming to get me.”
“Be careful,” he said, standing up as a guard shouted out the second order. Around them, chairs screeched across the floor. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
CHAPTER 44
Thursday, August 17, 2017
Kings County District Attorney’s Office, Sex Crimes Unit Brooklyn
1:45 p.m.
“You’ll get full discovery,” Mimi said as Aideen looked over the final results page of the OCME report. In essence, she was looking at DNA results that perfectly matched Joe’s genetic profile to the blood found at both of the crime scenes. “The match is clean in both cases, I’m afraid.”
“You’re not the one who should be afraid,” Aideen said and raised her eyebrows. “So, to be clear, the biological material from both crime scenes was blood?”
“Yes. A spot was found on the bra that was wrapped around the neck of the first victim, his mother. For the second victim, Holly Rossi, an amount was found under a fingernail. She had some serious fingernails.”
“Brooklyn girl,” Aideen said, mostly to herself.
“Through and through,” Mimi said. “She seemed like a sweetheart, you know? The kind everyone loved. And her parents, oh my God. They’re devastated.”
“Joe loved her too,” Aideen said and sighed. “Of course, here we are.”