It was stretching probability to assume that whoever had killed Alexandra Callas also had the foresight to hang around Finnegan’s pub on Broadway to wait for Kieran to leave so that she could be attacked on the street.
And still... Kieran found herself turning around and heading back into the pub.
Luckily, Declan was engaged in conversation with someone else at the bar. Mary Kathleen had moved on and wasn’t to be seen. Danny was walking through the dining room, and Kieran immediately grabbed his arm.
“Danny!”
“Kieran!”
“I need your help,” she told him. She looked at him earnestly, searching his eyes, wondering how much she could explain and how quickly. Danny had always been the most mischievous of their foursome of siblings. He would never hurt anyone, but he had done many foolish things over time in the defense of others.
Kieran had actually met Craig because Danny had tried to help out their very good friend Julie when she’d been at the worst end of a sad divorce—a situation that had led them into the realm of diamond heists and murder.
If anyone should understand now, it was Danny.
“Come with me—I need you. And I need you to be really careful,” she said.
“Kieran, I know that poor woman was murdered on the street, but—”
“There’s much more to it now. I’ll try to explain. Come with me.”
“Wait—you want me to get stabbed in the back?”
“No, of course not. But if there are two of us, we can keep a better watch of the people around. Come on. We’re not going far. Just a few blocks to the convent.”
“You need Craig for this.”
“He’s not here right now. I’ll fill him in just as soon as I see him.”
She really had to at this point. She was becoming ridiculously paranoid.
“Why are we going to a convent?” Danny asked.
“To see a nun.”
“Surely, you haven’t done anything that bad!”
“A nun, Danny, not a priest. I’m not going to confession. I’ll explain while we walk.” She hesitated. “Oh, and, um, just kind of keep your eyes open, okay?”
* * *
There was one interesting thing about the US and money: when it was time to freeze assets, it could be done quickly.
Everything was set in motion to freeze Jim Smith’s assets at the bank, and to allow federal agents access to his safe-deposit box.
The box, however, had been emptied. Whatever treasures it had held were gone.
As it happened, the number of men named James Smith in NYC was staggering; the FBI tech crews would work on figuring out which might have been the Jim Smith they were searching for, or where else the imposter might have struck.
For the moment, Craig was done. Wiped out, tired and done.
Mike made a point of reporting all that they had learned to their counterparts with the NYPD.
Craig drove and found street parking not far from Finnegan’s, and they headed into the pub to be greeted by Mary Kathleen.
“We’ve been waiting for you, Craig—aye, and you, too, Mike!” she added, seeing Mike enter the pub behind him. “Kieran was just starving, so she said, and she’s eaten, but we’ve roast put aside for you. Have a seat, lads—you look quite plumb tuckered!”
“Long day,” Mike told her.
“Dinner will be wonderful,” Craig said. “But where is Kieran?”
“Why, she just headed to the convent. Had to get something back from Sister Teresa. Amazing woman—she’s ninety-plus and moves like a bat out of hell!”
“We just missed her?”
“A minute or so ago,” Mary Kathleen assured him. Declan had come up behind her. She turned to look at him, “Right, luv?”
“Yep. Someone told me that she came back in—Danny is with her,” Declan said.
Kieran wasn’t alone. Craig wasn’t sure why he was so glad of that fact—especially since Danny Finnegan had a penchant for trouble like no one else he knew. Great guy, Danny—though sometimes his view on helping others was a little off. Especially when it came to the law.
“Seriously, just left? Maybe I can catch her,” Craig said.
“Just minutes,” Mary Kathleen assured her.
“Where does one go to find this nun?” Craig asked.
“Two turns!” Mary Kathleen said, rattling off the address. He knew it.
“Thanks,” he told her, and turned to Mike. “Take a seat—have your food. I’ll be right back.”
“And if you’re not, at least one of us will have eaten,” Mike said, sighing.
“Aye, Mike, have a seat. I’ll get your plate,” Mary Kathleen said.
Craig hurried from the pub and out to the street. It was about a five-or six-block walk to the convent where Sister Teresa lived—three long and a few short. He didn’t see Kieran and Danny ahead of him, but at least he’d walk back with them.
He was anxious to see Kieran after the day. So much had happened in a very few hours, and he knew the first forty-eight hours after a homicide were crucial to any investigation.
And now they knew that it was likely they were looking at more than one homicide. It was more than possible that the man responsible for stabbing their Jane Doe was the same man—or under the employ of the same man—who had caused the death of the young woman years before, the case that was still haunting Detectives Beard and Holmes. The operation had been going on for many years; he was certain that the real James Smith was dead and that his identity had been stolen. Most likely, this group was using the identities of other deceased persons. Whether they died of natural causes or were helped into their graves was yet to be seen.
He reached the convent without catching up to Kieran and Danny. Inside, he was met at a front desk by a nun who seemed to be holding the fort much like the desk sergeant at a police station. She was friendly and smiling, a giant penguin with bright green eyes and a quick smile.
“Ah, Sister Teresa is popular today—and always. Moves like a speeding bullet—and she’s well over the age of ninety! So much for the good dying young. Anyway, I just sent that young couple over there by our beautiful Pieta to wait. Sister Nan has gone for Teresa.”
He looked over at the young couple.
Yes, Kieran and Danny.
He headed over to them, smiling.
Kieran looked at him with pleasure—and a little wariness, he thought. A small tremor shook through him. He knew that look.
Just what exactly were they doing here, looking for a nun?
“You had a productive day?” she asked him anxiously.
“Yes, and you?”
Danny groaned, shook his head and rolled his eyes.
“Very productive,” Kieran murmured, trying to discreetly step on her brother’s toe. “I’m not even sure where to start, except that I don’t know how much of Sister Teresa’s time we can take, so as soon as we’ve seen her—”
She didn’t get to finish; she was interrupted when someone let out a blood-curdling scream.
Craig pushed ahead as they all raced down a hallway toward the sound of the scream, his hand on his Glock. The sister who had been sitting at the desk followed, as well.
He burst into one of the small rooms. It held nothing but a single bed, a wardrobe and a desk with a chair up against one wall.
There was a sister sitting in the chair. Her hands were folded on the desk in front of her. She leaned against the wall.
Her eyes were closed.
Her face was white.
Her lips held an equal pallor.
Dead.
He touched her throat, to be certain, checking for a pulse, for any sign of life.
She was cold as ice.
“No!”
He turned. Kieran stood in the doorway of the little room, gripping the doorframe. She cried with a wail of agony, rushing forward. “No!”
Craig caught her before she could reach the sister, pulling her tightly into his arms and crushing her face to his chest. He spoke over her head, feeling the tease of her hair against his chin. “No, Kieran, please, you can see, she’s gone, and you can’t touch her. The medical examiner will have to come out here, Kieran. She’s—gone. I’m sorry.”
She struggled in his arms. “They got to her! The King—the King and his men—they got to her!”
“Oh, dear Lord, dear Lord,” the sister who had greeted them at the desk said over and over, her fingers moving over her chest in the sign of the cross. “Dear Lord, dear Lord...”
“Go fetch the mother superior,” said Sister Nan—the nun who had gone to fetch Sister Teresa and found her as she was. She bustled the other sister out of the room. “Oh! Teresa was...so wonderful. We did think that she’d live forever.” She turned to look at Kieran, as if she’d realized what she had said. “My dear, no one did this. Teresa was blessed with an amazing long life. But she was in her nineties. And look how sweetly she died, just sitting here!”
Craig had to agree with the nun—the dead woman looked entirely peaceful and at rest.
“Kieran, why would someone come in and kill an old nun?” he whispered.
One way or the other, though, Sister Teresa had died alone. That could mean an autopsy, even if her regular doctor arrived to say she had suffered from a bad heart or some other ailment that could have taken her life. He doubted foul play.
Craig pulled his phone out, though.
He called Egan. Since they were already working with Dr. Andrews, Craig asked if there was any way they could get the medical examiner to come out for this.
Kieran was watching him. Her eyes seemed truly enormous, and she nodded. At the very least, he was pleasing her. At the worst, he was doing a good job of ruining the evening for Dr. Andrews. Then again, the weekend had already sucked, so...
“I have a medical examiner coming,” he told Sister Nan, who remained in the room.
Another nun arrived at the doorway; she appeared to be sixtysomething—and her look was stern, that of a formidable battle-ax.
“Ah, so the time has come. Our dear sister has gone on to join our Heavenly Father,” she said. “I’m sure you people were friends. But, please, if you could just leave now and let us handle the doctor and the details and arrangements, we’d be so appreciative.”
“I’m so sorry—Sister Teresa was alone. The medical examiner is on his way,” Craig said.
“What?” the battle-ax demanded. “I am Sister Margaret, Mother Superior here, and I won’t have you making a mountain out of this. Who are you, anyway?”
Craig produced his credentials.
“I’m sorry,” he told her again.
“Mother Superior,” Danny said, stepping up and smiling gently. “This is such a beautiful place. Sister Teresa must have led a wonderful life here with you all. But, please, understand—I know that you do—” He paused to cross himself. “There are God’s laws, and man’s laws, and Jesus did tell us that we must always deliver to Caesar what is Caesar’s—obey the laws of man.”
She studied Danny and seemed somewhat mollified. “And who are you?” she demanded.
“Um, a friend. A friend of a friend,” he said.
Kieran jumped in quickly. “I did not know Sister Teresa long, but long enough to know that she was a wonderful and giving woman who tried to help us—perhaps help others to the extent that she put herself in danger.”
“So it’s your fault they want to chop our dear sister to pieces,” Sister Nan said.
Kieran could be quite a power herself when she chose.
She spun on Nan.
“It’s my fault that I will see justice done—that if anyone harmed her in any way, they will face man’s laws, no matter what forgiveness they might find elsewhere!” she announced.
The mother superior turned on her heel and walked away.
So did Sister Nan.
Danny, Kieran and Craig were left alone with the body. They could hear sirens approaching.
“I guess we don’t have time for you two to tell me just exactly what is going on right now,” Craig said. “But you’re going to, right?”
“Hey—I just tagged along!” Danny said, shaking his head.
Craig stared at Kieran. “A lot has happened,” she said quietly.
“And you didn’t tell me?”
“I didn’t see you,” Kieran reminded him evenly.
Touché. He was off digging—it seems she found something right on the surface.
The sirens were growing louder. He was going to need a reason to explain why he had called for an autopsy on a ninety-plus-year-old woman who looked as peaceful as a babe.
He could hear people at the entrance.
“I need something!” Craig demanded.
“Two illegal immigrants terrified of some man they call the King found me through Sister Teresa and the soup kitchen. They talked to me and then became convinced that someone was after them. They ran, telling me that they’d find me again through the nun. I came to tell Sister Teresa that they would be trying to reach me again through her,” Kieran said quickly. “And to see if she knew anything else.”
“And that’s when we all arrived,” Danny said.
There were voices at the entry and then the sounds of people coming through.
The very irate mother superior led the way like a bulldozer.
Two officers came behind and then—to Craig’s incredulity and gratification—Dr. Andrews.
“So...you think you can special request who looks after your bodies, hmm?” Andrews asked him softy. He looked up at the large wooden crucifix on the wall of Sister Teresa’s tiny room and moved his fingers over his chest in the sign of the cross.
He glanced at Craig and flushed. “Habit—um, sorry, no pun intended. Anyway...let me see what I can see here. Then we’ll get her moved.”
“She was ninetysomething, right? That’s what we were told,” one of the cops was saying to the mother superior.
“Yes,” the mother superior said, casting Craig a glare that would have melted stone.
He was actually tempted to smile. He didn’t allow himself to do so. He glanced at Kieran instead; she stood straight and still and silent at Danny’s side.
The officers looked over at Craig skeptically; they had been informed he was FBI.
Maybe taking his work just a little too seriously.
Then, in a moment almost as miraculous as Dr. Andrews having arrived, Richard Egan came striding into the room.
Craig could have kissed him.
He stepped forward. “Sir!” he said to Egan. “Officers...detectives? Mother Superior, if you will listen, you’ll understand.” He kept speaking, explaining that Sister Teresa, being the essence of goodness and kindness, had befriended two truly lost—and terrified—souls who had confided in her that they needed help. They’d then dared to reach out to Kieran Finnegan, but ran again in fear when they thought that their one-time captors were upon them. They had told Kieran to find the nun, and thus Kieran had come tonight to let Sister Teresa know that the women would be contacting her again.
Only to find her thus. And so, with the possibility that truly heinous and experienced killers might have come upon her, he was asking that her death be investigated.
“Perfect call, Special Agent Frasier,” Egan said. “Thank you. Dr. Andrews, if you will see to the dear woman.”
There was more talk and some confusion. The room was too small for everyone at once. Dr. Andrews performed his initial examination, and asked that Sister Teresa be brought to the morgue. Crime scene technicians arrived, further horrifying the mother superior.
Then Mike Dalton arrived—Craig had been busy, but Egan had seen to it that he had been brought up to speed. Mike had let everyone at Finnegan’s know what had happened, though all they really knew was that Kieran and Danny had arrived to find the elderly nun deceased, and so natural confusion and speculation followed.
It wasn’t until eleven that they finally returned to Finnegan’s. The pub closed early on Sundays, and it was almost empty when they arrived—other than for Mary Kathleen, Declan and Kevin, who were all waiting anxiously for them to arrive.
“Your roast is a wee bit dried out,” Mary Kathleen told Craig. “But I can try heating it.”
Craig realized that he hadn’t eaten. Of course, Mary Kathleen had spoken like that in a somewhat sharp tone because she didn’t want to sound worried.
Food was always a good cover.
“Dried out will be fine,” he assured her. “Mike?”
“Buddy, I already ate. I was hungry. And it was delicious,” Mike said apologetically.
“Mr. Egan,” Declan said, “if you’re here, I’m assuming that we’re having a meeting in the pub. Glad that we’re just about closed, sir, and you can have your choice of meeting space.”
“Excellent. I’m going to suggest that span of cocktail tables between the entry and the bar, Declan, sir—and that we all share everything gleaned today.”
“Yes, that will be very interesting,” Craig said, looking at Kieran.
“Indeed it will,” she shot back.
“One moment,” Mary Kathleen murmured, smiling brilliantly as she walked to the front door, saying good evening and locking the last customer out.
As he heard the bolts clicking, Craig turned to Kieran. “So this was all new today? You just met Sister Teresa today?”
“Of course not! I helped out yesterday. I just met the immigrant women today,” she said.
“Shall we sit?” Egan said firmly.
“Yes, please. I’ll bring the coffee and the cups,” Declan announced.
In a matter of minutes, they were all around the tables—Egan, Mike, Craig and the Finnegan crew: Kieran, Danny, Declan, Kevin and Mary Kathleen.
“I’m going to need the gaps filled in,” Egan said. “But since they’re going to come from two sides, let me get started with the story up to now.” He looked around the table with the steely gray look in his eyes that had surely helped get him into his position. “Someone is dealing in human trafficking. Now, we all pretty much can imagine how that works. Most of the time, you pay a scam artist a fortune, they get you into the country with promises of a better life, but once you’ve arrived—illegally—you’re at their mercy. Then they use you for slave labor, prostitution, or both, I’m assuming. They’re probably using people in drug deals and gambling operations, as well. Those who come from war-torn countries, who were on the wrong side, who maybe had some kind of even minor skirmish with the law in their country might be terrified of going back. I’m not sure how they’d control them. Usually drugs—probably threats. This situation has been going on for a long time. There was a murder five years ago—a woman who had just given birth was found bleeding to death in an alley in Brooklyn, where Craig and Mike spent most of the day.”
“The woman who gave me the baby was trying to save her from an illegal adoption,” Kieran said. “She wasn’t wrenched from her mother the moment she was born, though. I believe the baby is about three months old.”
“Maybe after they lost the young woman a few years back,” Craig said, “they’ve started making the babies be a bit older for adoption. Maybe it was an unusual case.”
“I don’t know about that,” Kieran said quietly. “I do know that the woman who was killed was brought to the States and turned into slave labor. I believe she loved a lot of the girls that she was forced to look after—and their babies. I know that her name was Alexandra Callas—”
“You know her name?” Craig demanded, startled, his voice rough. “Sorry,” he added quickly, but he was afraid that even his apology was rough.
Kieran was silent just a moment, and then she nodded. “I know what the young women today told me. Or what the one told me. She is Irish and her name is Riley McDonnough. The other was Tanya—Tanya Petrofskya. Russian. They know the mother of the baby, too—Yulia Decebel, who is Romanian. They don’t know the name of the man running the whole thing, but he makes them call him the King. It is one man. They knew about the woman who died years ago,” she added. “Although, I believe that’s all they know. Riley hasn’t been in the United States that long. I’m not sure about Tanya. Her English is poor. And somehow Riley has learned enough Russian for the two of them to communicate, at any rate. The thing is, I was trying to get them to come in. They are really terrified. I don’t think that just one man can be running this whole thing, but there is a boss, or what have you—the man who they call King, or, sometimes, Riley told me, they even have to call him Your Majesty.”
“And now Sister Teresa has passed away,” Egan said. “Her passing tonight might, of course, be coincidence. Sad coincidence. I just looked up the dear lady a few moments back—she was ninety-six...four years short of a one hundredth birthday. We’ll see what Dr. Andrews discovers. That’s all beside the point.”
“These women saw you at the soup kitchen, right?” Craig asked. He hoped his voice sounded more normal.
“The soup kitchen is a very good place, and it shouldn’t be darkened by the likes of these people!” Mary Kathleen said.
“I always thought of the pub as a good place,” Declan said. “And that sure as hell didn’t stop criminals from meeting here—but, neither did it stop us from going on as we were. Lucky, of course,” he added, nodding toward Craig, “that the FBI was in on it.”
“Bad things happen in good places all the time,” Craig assured him. “And,” he added, glancing around the table, “good people do bad things because they think they’re doing the right thing or the right thing for the situation. That’s all beside the point. This time, we’re not letting go. The cops had a bad time when that poor girl was murdered in that Brooklyn warehouse—they hit some walls because they just didn’t have enough power behind them. Now, the FBI is in on it and there will be help from the US Marshals and Homeland Security, too. We won’t let these deaths—or this horrible example of man’s inhumanity to man—go on.”
“Kieran,” Egan said, “thanks to you, we have a great deal more to work with now.”
“Thanks to Mary Kathleen,” Kieran murmured.
“Ah, well, sister, no one wanted to come to me,” Mary Kathleen said. “They didn’t ask for anything—didn’t show themselves at all—until you came.”
“Just as the dead woman—Alexandra Callas—knew to come to you,” Craig said thoughtfully.
“It’s probably not that great a dilemma,” Mike said. “Kieran was in the news a while back, but she’s also been associated with the law and helping victims and other vulnerable people in distress.”
“What about you all?” Kieran demanded, turning to Craig.
“We’ve frozen the assets of a man we believe to be dead,” Craig told her. He looked at Egan and Egan nodded; he was free to share what they had discovered. Which wasn’t much.
Especially when compared with all the names Kieran had managed to acquire!
“We believe there’s an extensive network that’s been operating for quite some time. We are all but certain that the same man—this King—is head of it all. The whole operation is probably fairly large, and well funded, for this man to have gotten away with so much for so long. Anyone who looks as if they might speak at all probably winds up in the river. For this kind of enterprise, there have to be enforcers. Many levels of involvement. I believe that they’re bringing vulnerable young women in and then forcing them into prostitution. If they do become pregnant, the babies are sold in underground adoptions.”
“But, how many people would do that?” Kieran whispered. “Someone else’s baby—a baby stolen from the mother?”
“Kieran, no one is told, ‘Hey, I kidnapped an immigrant, held her prisoner, and made her give birth and, so, hey, cool, here you go, your perfect beautiful child,’” Craig said.
Kieran flushed. “Of course not, but wouldn’t they know something wasn’t quite right?” she asked in a whisper.
“They might know,” Egan said. “In their hearts, they might know. But the adoption process isn’t easy. For years, most Caucasian applicants wanted white infants—and there just weren’t enough to go around. And then, your whole life is checked out—background, income, all that. Legal adoption can be very intrusive—there are tons of older kids who need good homes, but people want infants. No baggage. Between red tape and supply and demand, it’s tough. People often have to travel abroad. When you want a baby badly enough, you’re probably willing to overlook a lot. They’re likely told that these babies were rescued from a foreign orphanage. The parents who might be receiving these babies want to believe that they’re making a better world for the infants, and that it’s all one big happy story.”
Mike reached across the table and took her hand. “Kieran, we’ve spoken with one of the officers—David Beard—who was originally on the case. His partner now is a young guy named Detective Holmes—”
“Detective Holmes?” Danny asked.
“As in...Sherlock Holmes?” Kevin asked skeptically.
“The dude’s first name is Randy, and I don’t guess you lie to become a cop, so his name is really Randy Holmes. But, that’s beside the point. He’s furious and avid about catching these guys and he’s among Brooklyn’s finest,” Mike said.
Kieran nodded. “That’s good to hear.”
“And we have a great undercover guy working in Brooklyn, too,” Craig said.
“From Major Crimes, we have Lance Kendall and now Larry McBride working with him,” Egan added. “We’re moving in the right direction. What we need now is...hell, we all need to call it a night and get some sleep.”
“But what about Riley McDonnough and Tanya Petrofskya?” Kieran asked.
“That’s a tough one,” Egan said quietly. “We can’t put their names or pictures out there, Kieran. We could lead the killers to them just as easily as we might find them ourselves.”
“So what do we do?” she asked. “Whether they—whoever ‘they’ are—killed Sister Teresa or not, she is dead. They won’t be able to come to her.”
“They knew her through the soup kitchen, just the same way they came to see you,” Craig reminded her.
“Yes, but they wouldn’t stay with me. They ran.”
“They will find a way,” Egan said.
“Or we’ll find their bodies,” she said morosely.
Craig didn’t correct her.
Neither did anyone else.
They all knew that it was possible.
* * *
Craig was quiet when they left Finnegan’s and headed for Kieran’s apartment.
He was aggravated with her—if not out-and-out furious.
She could always tell when he was the maddest—he was the quietest.
“You should just explode,” she said. “It’s not healthy to be so silent.”
The look he gave her, she was certain it would cause a hardened criminal to shiver.
She swallowed and tried again. “I don’t get it. I don’t understand why you’re so angry with me.”
“I love you,” he said simply.
“Yep, I can see it in your eyes!”
He didn’t respond.
“I didn’t do anything dangerous or anything—”
“What?”
It wasn’t exactly an explosion. It was a word stated so precisely with such vehemence that she paused and took a deep breath before she tried to speak again.
“I went to a soup kitchen!” Okay, so she was explosive. She shouted the words. She wanted to hit him—to thunder against him. To make him react.
He shook his head. “Yep. You just went to a soup kitchen. And all this happened, and you didn’t think it was important to tell me right away.”
“Kind of like you—I was waiting for something to say!”
He remained quiet.
“Look, this is the truth, the absolute truth, I swear it. I went there with Mary Kathleen yesterday just to be helpful. Okay, so the nun came to me and suggested that I come back today—so I did. But, you have to believe me, I didn’t know anything. There was nothing to tell you.”
“Except that you might have been in danger there—since evidently, people do know you.”
“Craig, any of us can be in danger walking down the street. Look how they killed Alexandra Callas! These people have to be found and stopped. They’ve been at this for years. God alone knows how many people they might have killed and how many lives they might have destroyed.”
He let out a long breath and looked over at her. “Yes, I know.”
And, of course, he did.
She didn’t say anything more.
They reached her place at last, parked and headed up the steps. She still wanted to hit him. She didn’t, of course.
“They killed her. I know it,” she said quietly opening the door. “They got to her. Somehow. Yes, she was very, very old. But to die so suddenly—right now? No way!”
She was stunned when Craig suddenly grabbed her and backed her against the wall. His hands were on her shoulders. His eyes seemed to gleam like fires from hell.
“Don’t you ever put yourself purposely into danger again—and keep it from me on top of all else!”
“You do it all the time!”
“It’s different, and you know that! I can’t handle you being involved in this if you’re going to act irresponsibly!” he warned her.
And she did hit him; she slapped her palms on his chest, and then leaned against him and said, “It’s just such a mess, and I’m so sorry, and I cared for Sister Teresa so very much, and...”
“Kieran, this really bothers me.” He tried a smile and said, “Hey. Come on. I’m scared. And when I’m scared, well...”
She had to smile back at him. She sagged into him with a sigh.
“It’s all right. We are going to get them. Especially if you start talking to me,” he told her.
She nodded. “I just...”
“There’s no just. Kieran, seriously, you’re not a trained agent. Or cop. Please.”
“Yes, yes,” she whispered.
They stared at each other for a moment.
He let out a breath of serious frustration.
Then he suddenly swept her up into his arms.
She smiled wider and held on tight.
Make-up sex after an argument seemed like a damned good way to make sure they’d really made up.