Again I nodded. “Yes. I knew that.”

“A lot of good that did him in the end, huh?”

Derrick was definitely right about his sister being tough, or maybe, like Courtney, she just compartmentalized very well. But what I was hearing more from her was anger. She was so angry, in fact, that some of it was spilling over onto Derrick.

“Anyway, that’s not what I wanted to talk with you about,” she continued. “It’s about something I found the other day, something belonging to my brother.”

She reached into her black purse, removing something. It was so small, though, I couldn’t see it in her clenched fist.

“What is it?” I had to ask.

“If you were ever in Derrick’s office, then you know he had this crazy thing for Post-it notes. Those little yellow stickies were everywhere around his desk.”

I remembered. “Yes, I know. I saw them when I visited Derrick in White Plains.”

“Well, they were all over his stupid apartment, too,” she said. “Last night I was over there going through some of his files, trying to find Derrick’s life insurance policy. That’s when I came across this.”

She opened her fist to reveal a small USB flash drive, the kind you can pick up at any computer supply store for about twelve bucks. It was barely over an inch long.

“What’s on it?” I asked.

“I have no idea. I didn’t look at it – but I’m pretty sure Derrick wanted you to have it.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because there was a yellow sticky on it. He’d written your name.” She extended her hand, placing the flash drive in mine. “Promise me one thing, though, okay? You have to promise. That’s the quid pro quo here.”

Hell, I’d pretty much promise her anything to see what was on that flash drive. How could I not think that it was what Derrick had wanted to tell me the night he’d died?

“Sure,” I said. “What is it?”

“Out of respect for my brother, could you not tell anyone you have this until you’ve had a chance to look at it?”

“Absolutely.”

“Good,” she said, but I could tell there was something else she wanted to say. She seemed unsure about it.

“Go ahead,” I said. “It’s okay. I owe your brother, and I feel like I owe you.”

“You don’t. It’s just that I was…”

She stopped. A tear formed in her eye, and she quickly wiped it away. “Everyone who worked with Derrick said all the right things, that he was really good at his job and was a great guy and all that. What I want to know, though, is that he didn’t die in vain. Can you promise me that, too?”

I reached out and took Monica’s hand, squeezing it tight. “Yes, I can promise you that, too. I’ll make sure of it,” I said.

If it’s the last thing I do.

Chapter 78

OFFICER KEVIN O’SHEA turned to his partner, Sam Brison, in the lobby of my apartment building as I looked on. “Heads or tails?” asked O’Shea, tossing a shiny quarter in the air.

“Tails,” said Brison.

Apparently, this was what my first shift did every morning when they arrived. Instead of taking turns standing guard in the lobby or outside my door, they flipped for it.

O’Shea caught the quarter and sneaked a peek. “Shit,” he muttered underneath his square, bushy mustache. Tails it is.

“Ha!” said Brison, heading for the comfortable couch in the lobby. Outside my door there was only a metal folding chair with no padding. Enough said.

I rode the elevator up with O’Shea, continuing with what I thought was my stellar acting job since the funeral. I didn’t want to seem overly anxious, but I absolutely couldn’t wait to get home so I could plug in that flash drive.

“Hey, are you okay?” O’Shea asked me, leaning against the back of the elevator. “You seem a little jumpy today. You jumpy? Something the matter, Nick?”

So much for my acting. Clearly I wasn’t the Second Coming of Sir Laurence Olivier.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” I said. “Rough morning, that’s all. I don’t like funerals much.”

“Nobody likes funerals,” O’Shea agreed, nodding but continuing to eye me as if his bullshit meter was ticking in the red zone. I was sure he was about to press the subject when I was saved by the bell of the elevator. We’d arrived at my floor.

O’Shea stuck his head out, peering left and right. “Okay,” he announced.

I fell in line behind him as we walked the beige and white wavy-striped carpeting of the hallway. The rug was kind of trippy. Staring at it was enough to give you some serious vertigo.

“What do you think you’re doing?” asked O’Shea as we reached my door. I’d taken out my key and made a move for the lock.

“Oh yeah, I forgot,” I said.

He shot me a look like a disapproving parent. “Sometimes that’s all it takes – forgetting one time, Nick.”

I handed him the key so he could scope out my apartment before I entered.

“Out of curiosity,” I said, “while you’re in there checking to make sure the coast is clear, who’s watching me here in the hallway?”

He didn’t hesitate. “That’s why Sam is in the lobby.”

“But what if, say, there’s someone waiting for me behind the door to the stairwell?”

O’Shea chuckled. He realized I was just busting his chops. “Would you like me to go check for you?” he asked slowly.

“No, that’s okay,” I said, and laughed lightly. We both did. O’Shea was a pretty good guy actually. I liked him and his partner, too. Hey, they were trying to keep me alive.

“Good. Now stay here,” he said with a grin as he unlocked my door. “Try not to get in any trouble.”

“Yeah, sure. That’ll be a first.”

Chapter 79

THE SECONDS OUTSIDE my door went by slowly, and I couldn’t help wishing that I could get back my old life, that none of this had happened. Except maybe Courtney breaking up with Ferramore.

“You better not be raiding my fridge!” I called to O’Shea from the hallway.

I’d been eating takeout for three days straight. With all the containers of Chinese, Japanese, Mexican, and Italian, I was just about housing the United Nations of leftovers.

“Hey, did you hear me?” I said.

O’Shea had been checking my apartment for about a minute, roughly a half minute longer than it usually took him or Brison to comb my twelve-hundred-square-foot one-bedroom apartment.

An uneasy feeling suddenly came over me, my mind starting to race.

Instinctively, I took a step forward to peek in around the doorway, only to catch myself. That was the last thing I should be doing, right?

Instead, I looked down at my striped tie, pushing it to the side. Behind it I could feel the outline of the alarm around my neck. Even underneath my dress shirt there was no mistaking the large panic button.

Shit, what do I do? Do I press it?

No. Not yet.

“Kevin?” I called out again, this time louder. No more joking around about my fridge. “Everything all right in there? Hey, Kevin?”

I heard nothing back. I heard nothing, period. My apartment, the hallway – everywhere was quiet.

Then, finally – thank God! – I heard him.

“Yeah, everything’s fine,” came O’Shea’s voice.

I couldn’t see him yet but I could tell he was walking toward me. He drew a deep sigh before explaining, “For a moment there, I thought I heard -”

Pffft! Pffft!

Before another sound came, I saw the blood, a bright red spray splattering across the hallway in front of the door. Then Officer Kevin O’Shea’s body came crashing down at my feet, the back of his head blown wide open.

Oh no! No! No! No!

I took a clumsy step backwards, nearly tripping over my own heel. My knees were beginning to buckle and I couldn’t think straight. My thought process felt completely fractured.

Run, Nick! Run now!

I turned, sprinting down the hallway as those crazy beige and white stripes of the carpet blurred before my eyes. I was ten feet from the stairwell. Could I make it?