Chapter 40

IT WAS ALMOST 4:00 A.M., and Sampson and I were riding back to the First District station house in his car. I was wide awake now, and wired. My nervous system felt like it was vibrating.

Maria's murderer? After all these years? Was it even a faint possibility that the killer could be caught more than ten years after my wife was shot down? The whole thing felt unreal to me. Back then, I'd been all over the case for a year, and I'd never completely given up the chase. And now we might suddenly find the killer? Was it possible?

We arrived at the station house on Fourth Street and hurried inside, neither of us talking. A precinct house during the night shift can be a lot like an emergency room: You never know what to expect when you step inside. This time, I didn't have a clue, but I couldn't wait to talk to Giametti.

It seemed unusually quiet when we walked in the front door – but that all changed in a hurry. It was obvious to both Sampson and me that something was wrong when we got down to the holding cells. Half a dozen detectives and uniforms were standing around. They looked way too alert and anxious for this time of morning. Something was definitely up.

Sampson's new partner, Marion Handler, spotted us and hustled over to John. Handler ignored me, and I did my best to pay him no mind, either. I'd talked to him a couple of times, and I thought the detective was a showy punk. I wondered why John put up with him the way he did.

Maybe he saw something in Handler that I didn't, or maybe Sampson was finally mellowing just a little.

"You're not gonna believe this shit. It's off the charts," he said to Sampson. "Somebody got to Giametti. I shit you not, Sampson. He's over there dead in his cell. Somebody got to him in here."

I was feeling numb all over as Handler led us back to the last holding cell on the block. I couldn't believe what I'd just heard. First we had a lead on Maria's killer's whereabouts, and then the man who gave us that lead was murdered? In here?

"He even had a private room," Handler said to Sampson. "How could they get to him in here? Right under our noses?"

Sampson and I ignored the question as we stepped inside the last cell on the right. There were two evidence techies working around the body, but I could see all I needed to. An ice pick had been driven right up Gino Giametti's nose. It looked like the pick had been used to gouge out his eyes first. "See no evil," said Sampson in his deep, flat voice. "Has to be the mob."

Chapter 41

WHEN I GOT HOME later that morning, I knew I wouldn't be able to sleep very well. So what was new about that? The kids were off at school, Nana was out; the house was quiet as a tomb.

Nana had put up another of her goofy "mistake" newspaper headlines on the fridge: Juvenile Court to Try Shooting Victim. Pretty funny, but I wasn't in the mood for smiles, even at the expense of journalists. I played the piano on the sunporch and drank a glass of red wine, but nothing seemed to help.

I could see Maria's face and hear her voice inside my head. I wondered, Why do we begin to forget, then sometimes remember with such clarity people we've lost? Everything about Maria, about our time together, seemed to have been stirred up inside me again.

Finally, around ten thirty, I made my way upstairs to my room. There had been too many days and nights like this. I would make my way up to bed and sleep there alone. What was that all about?

I lay down on the bed and shut my eyes, but I didn't really expect to sleep, just rest. I'd been thinking about Maria since I left the station house on Fourth Street. Some of the images I saw were of Maria and me when the kids were little – the good and the hard parts, too, not just selective memories of the sentimental stuff.

I tensed up in bed thinking about her, and I finally understood something useful about the present – that I wanted my life to make sense again. Simple enough, right? But could it still happen? Could I move on?

Well, maybe. There was somebody. Somebody I cared about enough to make some changes for. Or was I just fooling myself again? I finally drifted off into a restless, dreamless sleep, which was about as good as it got these days.

Chapter 42

ALL I HAD TO DO was move on, right? Make some intelligent changes in my life. I'd gotten rid of Maria's old junker and moved onward and upward to our cross-vehicle. What could be so hard about making some other changes? And why did I keep failing at it?

Alex has a big date, I told myself at various times during the following Friday. That's why I'd picked the New Heights Restaurant on Calvert Street over in Woodley Park. New Heights was a big-date sort of place. Dr. Kayla Coles was meeting me there after she finished work – early, by her standards anyway – at nine.

I took a seat at our table, partly because I was afraid they might give it away if Kayla showed up late – which she did, at around quarter after.

Her being late didn't matter to me. I was just happy to see her. Kayla was a pretty woman, with a radiant smile, but more important, I liked spending time with her. It seemed like we always had something to talk about. Just the opposite of a lot of couples I know.

" Wow," I said, and winked when I saw her gliding across the dining room. She had on flats, possibly because she's five foot ten without them, or maybe just because she's sane and can't stand the discomfort of heels.

"Wow, yourself! You look good too, Alex. And this view. I love this place."

I had asked to be seated at a bank of windows overlooking Rock Creek Park, and it was kind of spectacular, I had to admit. The same could be said for Kayla, who was decked out in a white silk jacket with a beige camisole, long black pants, and a pretty gold sash tied around her waist, gently falling off to the side.

We ordered a bottle of Pinot Noir and then had a terrific meal, highlighted by a black-bean-and-goat-cheese pate that we shared; her arctic char, my au poivre rib eye; and bittersweet chocolate praline crumble for two. Everything about the New Heights Restaurant worked great for us: the cherry trees out front, in bloom in the fall; some pretty interesting local art up on the walls; delicious cooking smells – fennel, roasted garlic – permeating the dining room; candlelight just about everywhere our eyes went. Mostly, though, my eyes were on Kayla, usually on her eyes, which were deep brown, beautiful, and intelligent.

After dinner, she and I took a walk across the Duke Ellington Bridge toward Adams Morgan and Columbia Road. We stopped at one of my favorite stores in Washington, Crooked Beat Records, and I bought some Alex Chilton and Coltrane for her from Neil Becton, one of the owners and an old friend who once wrote for the Post. Then Kayla and I wound up in Kabani Village, just a few steps from the street. We had mojitos and watched a theater workshop for the next hour.

On the walk back to my car we held hands and continued to talk up a storm. Then Kayla kissed me – on the cheek.

I didn't know what to make of that. "Thank you for the night," she said. "It was perfect, Alex. Just like you."

"It was nice, wasn't it?" I said, still reeling a little from the sisterly kiss.

She smiled. "I've never seen you so relaxed."

I think it was the best thing she could have said, and it sort of made up for the kiss on the cheek. Sort of.

Then Kayla kissed me on the mouth, and I kissed her back. That was much better, and so was the rest of the night at her apartment in Capitol Hill. For a few hours anyway, it felt like my life was starting to make some sense again.