Homeport

care.
    “It was nothing,” she said again, then stared helplessly as he tipped up her chin and touched his lips to each of her cheeks.
    “Don’t be kind to me.” A tear spilled over before she could blink it away. “I don’t handle it well.”
    “Learn.” He kissed her again, lightly, then brushed the tear away with his thumb. “Have you ever had trouble like that before around here?”
    “No, never.” She managed one hitching breath, then a steadier one. “That’s why I was so shocked, I guess, so unprepared. It’s a very low-crime area. The fact is this was such an aberration it played on the local news for days.”
    “They never caught him?”
    “No. I couldn’t give them a very detailed description. He wore a mask, so I could only give them his build.”
    “Give it to me.”
    She didn’t want to recall the incident, but knew he would push her until she relented. “White male, six four or five, two-fifty, two-sixty, brown eyes. Muddy brown. Long arms, big hands, left-handed, wide shoulders, short neck. No distinguishing scars or marks—that I could see.”
    “Seems like you gave them quite a bit, considering.”
    “Not enough. He never spoke, not a word. That was another thing that frightened me. He went about everything so quickly, so silently. And he took my passport, driver’s license. All my ID. It took me several days, even pulling strings, to arrange for new ones.”
    A pro, Ryan concluded. With an agenda.
    “Andrew was furious,” she remembered with a ghost of a smile. “He walked around the house every night for a week with a golf club—a nine iron, I think—hoping the man would come back so he could beat him to a pulp.”
    “I appreciate the sentiment.”
    “That’s a man’s reaction. I’d have preferred to handle it myself. It was humiliating to know that I hadn’t fought back, I just froze.”
    “Someone holds a knife to your throat, freezing is the intelligent choice.”
    “I was more frightened than hurt,” she murmured, and stared hard at the surface of the table.
    “I’m sorry you were either. He didn’t go for the house?”
    “No, just grabbed my purse, my briefcase, slugged me, and ran.”

    “Jewelry?”
    “No.”
    “Were you wearing any?”
    “Yes, I was wearing a gold chain and watch—the police wondered about that too. But I had my coat on. I don’t suppose he saw them.”
    “This watch?” He held up her wrist, examining the slim eighteen-karat Cartier. An idiot could fence it for a grand, minimum, he mused. “A hit and grab like that doesn’t sound like an amateur who’d miss this sort of easily liquidated asset. And he doesn’t force you into the house, steal any number of excellent and portable items.”
    “The police figured he was someone passing through, short of cash.”
    “He might figure you had a couple hundred on you if he was lucky. Not worth armed robbery.”
    “People kill for designer tennis shoes.”
    “Not this kind of deal. He was after your ID, darling, because someone didn’t want you to get to Florence too soon. They needed time to get to work on the copy, and couldn’t afford you underfoot until they had it under way. So they hired a pro. Someone who wouldn’t be messy or make stupid mistakes. And they paid him enough so he wouldn’t be greedy.”
    The explanation was so simple, so perfect, she only stared, wondering why she hadn’t made the connection herself. “But the police never suggested that.”
    “The cops didn’t have all the data. We do.”
    Slowly, she nodded, and slowly the anger began to inch up into her chest, into her throat. “He held a knife to my throat for my passport. It was all to delay me. To give them more time.”
    “I’d say the probability ratio is very high. Run through it again for me, step by step. It’s a long shot, but maybe some of my connections can tag your man.”
    “If they can,” she said soberly, “I don’t want to meet your connections.”
    “Don’t worry, Dr. Jones.” He turned her hand over and kissed her palm. “You won’t.”

    • • •
    There was no place to buy a bottle on Easter Sunday. When he caught himself driving around and around, looking for one, Andrew began to shake. It wasn’t that he needed one, he told himself. He wanted one, and that was different. He just wanted a couple of drinks to smooth out the edges.
    Damn it, everybody was on his back. Everything rested on him. He was sick to death of it. So fuck them, he decided, tapping