anything to go on, and a thin case could get tossed in minutes by the wrong judge. That’s it for now. I’ll let you know.”
That’s Peter. He never even asked why I needed to know about the investigation. He probably knew already. Arnowitz more than likely had sources inside Snapdragon, or a bug on my phone. If he did tap my phone, I hoped he didn’t listen to the tapes. Pete is way too valuable a source to bore him to death.
I sent him back a message, private like his to me, thanking him for his effort, and moved on. I called Sgt. Abrams in D.C.
He actually answered the phone despite knowing it was me on the line. “What do you need now, Tucker, a free pass to the White House tour?” It’s nice to know when people are happy to hear from you.
“I hear you guys expect to arrest Stephanie Gibson within the next few days,” I told him. “Can you confirm or deny?”
There was a long pause. When somebody thinks you’re a drooling idiot and you sucker punch him with competence, it creates a delicious moment. I savored this one.
“I have no comment.”
“That’s the best you can do? Despite being what you consider a bozo, I get this far this fast, and you can’t do any better than ‘no comment?’ Geez, Abrams, I thought more of you than that.”
Perhaps I laid it on a little thick, because Abrams did not take my comments in the jocular spirit with which they were intended. “Do you have anything else to ask, Tucker, or is this strictly a call to annoy me?”
“Let me ask you this: how can you possibly be thinking of charging Stephanie when all you have are hunches and circumstantial evidence?”
“No comment.”
“You’re no fun, Abrams.”
He hung up. I suppose I deserved that. I made a mental note to make it up to him the next time we spoke, assuming he’d take the call.
Meanwhile, there wasn’t much I could do today, so I got back to work on the third act of the mystery, and was in tantalizing proximity to the end when the door burst open and Ethan walked in, singing to himself.
“How’s it going, pal?” I said.
“Comme ci comme ça.” In sixth grade, you get French lessons.
“Bon,” I told him, and was about to attack the keyboard again when Leah came in, with a grump on her face, as had suddenly become usual.
Before I could ask her about it, I was saved by the phone. The voice on the other end was somewhat hushed, but I recognized it. I’d been talking to it three minutes earlier.
“This is Abrams.”
“Yeah, listen, Sergeant, I didn’t mean. . .”
He cut me off as my daughter hung up her book bag and slumped into the kitchen for a snack. “I’m on a cell phone outside the building. How did you know about the arrest?”
I stuttered for a second, trying to absorb what he said. “There really is going to be an arrest? You have enough to do that?”
“Soon. And I need to know your source.”
“I can’t do that, Abrams. You know I can’t.”
Abrams sighed. He did know I couldn’t. “This is from the top, Tucker. Nobody knows about it. I’m not even sure I know about it. How do you?”
“The fact of the matter is, Lieutenant, I’m not even sure where I got the information from. It was from a friend of a friend, if you know what I mean, and that’s all I’m going to say. But, how soon? And what do they have to use for. . .”
“Soon. And I can’t tell you anything about evidence. You know I can’t.” He was right about that, too.
“Thanks for the heads up,” I told him. We both hung up.
Stunned, I tried to call Stephanie, but got no answer at her hotel. At least she hadn’t checked out yet. I tried her cell phone, and got voice mail. I left a message telling her it was urgent she call me before she left town.
I’d like to say that Steph’s plight dominated my every thought for the rest of the evening, but the truth is that my mind is far too egocentric to allow such a thing. I concerned myself with making sure Leah fed the gecko (something that had immediately become a chore after the first time she’d done it). I chose not to watch, since leaving live worms on a little dish and then watching something that must, to them, look like