Public Secrets Part 82

"Yeah. Sure."

"I guess she doesn't get to do that much."

"What?"

"The little kid. Emma. I guess she doesn't get to go to McDonald's."

"No." Lou ruffled his boy's hair. "I guess not."

It took only a few minutes to get Michael settled in with a

cheeseburger, fries, and a shake. Lou left his son in the booth to call

in. From the phone outside the window he could see Michael dousing more

ketchup on the burger. "Kesselring," he said. "I'll be in the station

in an hour."

"I got some bad news for you, Lou."

"What else is new?"

"It's Fletcher, your pizza man."

"Didn't he make it into L.A.?"

"Yeah, he made it in. Sent a couple of uniforms to pick him up this

morning for questioning. Seems they were about six hours too late. He'd

been dead that long."

"s.h.i.t."

"Looks like a standard 0D. He had the works and some top-grade heroin.

We're waiting on the coroner's report."

"That's great. That's tucking great." He slammed a hand against the

wall of the booth, hard enough to make a mother hurry her three children

by. "Have the lab boys been over his hotel room?"

"Top to bottom."

"Give me the address." He fumbled for his notebook. "I have to drop my

kid at home, after that I'll have a look."

Lou noted it down, swore again, and banged the receiver. He opened the

door, then to give himself a moment, leaned against it. Through the

window he could see his son cheerfully plowing through the cheeseburger.

Saint Catherine's Academy, 1977

TWO MORE WEEKS, Emma thought.. "IWo more long, boring, rotten weeks, and

she'd be out for the summer. She'd be able to see her father, and

Johnno and the rest. She'd be able to breathe without being told she

was breathing for G.o.d. She'd be able to think without being warned

about impure thoughts.

As far as she could see, the nuns must be full of impure thoughts or

else they wouldn't be so sure everyone else had them.

She would be going back to the real world for a few precious weeks. New

York. Emma closed her eyes a moment, trying to bring its noise, its

smells, its life into her quiet room. With a sigh, she propped her

elbows on her desk, slouching in a way that would have made Sister Mary

Alice crack her ruler. She didn't bend over the French verbs she was

supposed to conjugate, but looked out over the green lawns to the high

stone walls that closed the school off from the sinful world.

Not all the sinful world, she thought. She was full of sin, and was

grateful her roommate, Marianne Carter, was equally blighted. Her days

at Saint Catherine's would have been torture without Marianne.

She grinned as she thought of her funny, freckled, redheaded roomie and

best friend. Marianne was sinful, all right, and was even now doing

penance for her latest transgression. The caricature Marianne had