Aha. Kathryn gave a tight smile. That answer suggested that she had not been officially designated a target. Yet. They brought her in to shake the tree. To get a read on her. Would she stonewall, or would she cooperate? They would eventually dangle the poisoned apple of cooperation, whispering in her ear once they had her on the ropes. She knew all the things they would say, because she’d said them herself, to targets, in her day. We have the goods on you. We brought you here to prove there’s no way out. Your only hope is to join us. Free yourself. Turn on them before they turn on you. Take your revenge.
Brooke Lee would offer her full immunity and WITSEC in a heartbeat. All she had to do was fold. It would be tempting if not for the fact that she’d seen this dance play out in a hundred other cases. She knew how it would end. A tidy little house somewhere in a warm climate. A new name, plastic surgery, some hair dye. A mindless job eight hours a day to help her forget the dead she’d left behind. If she was lucky, she’d get to enjoy it for a year or two before a stranger walked up and put a bullet in her brain. No, cooperation was a false god. She’d disappear, all right, but on her own terms. Protect only herself and the ones she loved. Before she left this room, she would get as much information as possible. And tell no one, because you’d better believe they were waiting to see who she contacted once she hit the street.
“Given that you have no attorney present, I’d like to state for the record that you are free to leave at any time, and to refuse to answer any question that’s posed,” Lee said.
“And I’d like to state that, while I came here fully prepared to cooperate and answer questions, your duplicity has forced me to rethink that. I’ll stay to hear what you have to say. As for answering questions, that’s off the table, at least until I understand the scope of your investigation.”
Brooke looked taken aback. Shot yourself in the foot, didn’t you?
“Okay, um. Let’s start with your FBI background check.”
“That’s ancient history.”
“I’m not referring to the process you went through twenty years ago to become a prosecutor. It would be understandable if you don’t remember that. But the more recent one, the background check to become a federal judge.”
“That’s still, what, eight years ago? But sure. Whatever. Go ahead,” she said, crossing her arms, putting on a long-suffering expression.
“Do you recall speaking with Special Agent Justin Greco for your judicial background check?”
Greco. So, that’s where this started. Had he developed a conscience? Been arrested? Flipped? Greco could do some serious damage. They’d be going over every security clearance he’d ever worked on, not just Kathryn’s. And there were some big fish in that sea.
“Justin— Who?”
“Special Agent Justin Greco? He was in charge of your background check. You met with him on several occasions.”
Lee took a manila folder from a briefcase and shuffled through the contents. Kathryn wanted to rip it from her hands and see what the hell was in there. Eventually, Lee withdrew a photograph and placed it before Kathryn on the shiny conference table. Her heart skipped a beat. It was a surveillance photo, in living color but somewhat blurry, taken from some distance away, of Greco walking with a second man. She recognized Greco by his bulk and his shaved head. She recognized the second man from—well, her entire life. It was Charlie.
How much did they know? Was it possible to distance herself?
“Do you recognize these individuals?”
“Is that Greco?” she said, pointing to the bald man.
“So you recognize the gentleman with the shaved head as Justin Greco?”
“Not really. It’s just process of elimination, because I do recognize the other man, who’s not Greco. That’s Detective Wallace from the Boston PD.”
“Yes. How well do you know Wallace?”
“I worked cases with him when I was a prosecutor. Occasionally, he appears in my courtroom on cases for which I’m the assigned judge.”
“That’s how you know Charlie Wallace? From cases?” Lee said, raising her eyebrows.
It wouldn’t do to show emotion. Her strategy was working so far. Shrug nonchalantly, say nothing. Let them come to her with more information.
Brooke Lee went thumbing through her folder again.
“Take a look at this photo and tell me if you recognize anyone.”
Pinpricks of tiny stars swamped her field of vision. Eddie’s funeral. The past went through her like wind, and she was standing in that cemetery in her mind. The nineties. The women with their big hair and shoulder pads. The men in suspenders, shirts with contrasting collars like something out of Wall Street, though plenty of mobsters dressed like that to this day. And that explained why they had this old photo. The FBI had been taking surveillance pictures that day, hoping the mob would show up to pay their respects. They’d been his clients, after all. In her head, she could still see the people flipping off the guys with cameras who stood on the periphery of the cemetery. Hear their voices. Shame, for shame. Fucking vultures. It was all for naught. The mob was who whacked Eddie—for not listening, for being a pain in their ass. There wasn’t a wiseguy in sight at that funeral, only their lackey Ray Logue standing beside Kathy, his arm around her shoulders. And Mrs. Wallace, that witch, kind of a mobster in her own right, stone-faced in the front row with Charlie by her side. She didn’t look grief-stricken, because she wasn’t capable of love. Kathy’s cheek still burned from being slapped by her. Her mouth was full of spit. God, she hated that woman. Every night, she went down on her knees and prayed the bitch would just drop dead. But no. The good died young, the wicked flourished. And Mrs. Wallace was still in her life.
Her time would come.
“This appears to be a funeral,” Kathryn said, her voice steady.
“Who is, who are”—Lee leaned over, tracing a finger across the second row of mourners to the far side of the graveyard, until she came to a middle-aged man and a young girl, standing side by side—“those two people?” she asked.
Kathryn made a show of putting on her reading glasses and squinting at the photo.
“Is that you, Judge Conroy?”
“Hmm, that does look like me. Yes, I think that’s me.”
“What was your relationship to the man whose funeral this was?”
“I can’t answer that unless you tell me whose funeral it is.”
“Lieutenant Edward Wallace of the Boston PD? Also known as Fast Eddie or Eddie the Shark. A cop with a gambling addiction who was known to be an enforcer for the Boston mafia.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t recall who that was.”
“We believe you do,” Lee said.
“Don’t tell me what I remember from my own childhood.”
“If you don’t know Eddie Wallace, then why are you at his funeral?” Martin put in.
“It was common in my neighborhood to attend funerals. Also, christenings, confirmations, weddings, and so on. The Irish Catholic community in South Boston is very tight. You’re expected to show your face, even if you’re not that close to the family.”
“Who is the man standing beside you?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Did you know a Raymond Logue?”
“I know a Raymond Logue now. He’s a criminal defense attorney.”
“Did you know him when you were a child?”
“Are you saying that’s him next to me? The man in the photo is so much younger. Thinner. More hair. I can’t be sure.”
“That is him. How did you know Ray Logue?”
“My mother at one time worked in his office as a receptionist.”
“Your mother was Sylvia Conroy.”
“Yes.”
“And she passed away?”
She paused, marshaling her best poker face for the lie.
“Yes, a couple of years ago, of leukemia.”
“Mr. Logue was a friend of hers?”
“I wouldn’t say friends. He was her employer.”
“And is that her in the photo in the row behind you? The woman in dark sunglasses?”
“Um.”
Kathryn looked. Was it? Sylvia had returned to her life that same day, so many years ago, but she had not attended Eddie’s funeral as far as Kathryn knew. She held up the photo to the light. The woman in dark glasses didn’t look like Sylvia at all. It was somebody else.
“No.”
“No?”
“Definitely not. I know my own mother, and that’s not her.”
“Oh. Hmm. But— Okay. Did your mother have a relationship with Eddie Wallace?” Lee said, regrouping, coming back in for the attack.
“A relationship? You mean, a romantic one?”