The Liar’s Lullaby. Meg Gardiner

a single dad. His ex-girlfriend lived in the city but on the fringes of competence, and saw Sophie only twice a month. Gabe had gone to painful time and expense to modify his custody arrangement so that Sophie would live in San Francisco with his sister and her husband while he was deployed. Sophie wasn’t happy that he was going. But she knew it was his job. She’d been through it before.

      Jo hadn’t. But, holding him, she set that aside. She tried to stop the ticking in her head.

      He brushed her curls from her face. “You okay?”

      “Once I saw Tina, I was great.”

      His face looked sober. “It was only a close call. But I know that’s too close.”

      She suppressed thoughts about any dangers involved in his deploying to the Horn of Africa. And she knew she was far more head over heels for this man than she could ever have imagined.

      “What part of hell does your new case come from?” he said.

      “I’m going to perform a psychological autopsy on Tasia McFarland. It seems I’m going to ride the tiger.”

      His eyes widened. “Excited?”

      She had to think about it a moment. “Yes.”

      “Ready for the predators to come at you out of the tall grass?”

      “Undoubtedly not.”

      “You really are a thrill seeker, aren’t you?”

      Sharp guy, Gabe Quintana. She put her hands on his shoulders. “I am. How long can you stay?”

      He smiled and pulled her against him. And his cell phone rang.

      Jo leaned back. He answered the call.

      “Dave Rabin, what’s up?” he said, and within five seconds she knew that thrill seeking of a radically different kind was on his agenda.

      “Sixty minutes. I’ll be there.” He flipped his phone off. “Merchant tanker five hundred miles off the coast, reports a fire in the engine room. They’re adrift and down at the stern. Multiple casualties.”

      Jo reluctantly let him loose. A buzz seemed to radiate from him. He put a hand on her hip and kissed her again.

      “Bring ‘em back,” she said. “Be safe.”

      He ran down the steps toward his truck. She hung in the doorway and watched him go. She didn’t want to close the door, to turn back to Tasia McFarland and the unblinking certainties of death. She watched him go until he was out of sight.

       10

      NOEL MICHAEL PETTY THUDDED UP THE HOTEL STAIRS, SWEATY AND winded, cradling the artifact inside the fatigue jacket. The hallway was dank but empty. Petty rushed inside the hotel room, slammed the door, and leaned back against it, breathless. Nobody had followed. Nobody had even noticed. Not at the ballpark or anyplace along the route to the Tenderloin.

      That’s because, when you hover like an angel, you become invisible.

       Quick, latch the chain. Clear a space on the table. Shove aside the scissors and the news cuttings. Let the tabloid articles and glossy magazine photos flutter to the floor. Take a breath.

      Carefully, ceremoniously, Petty pulled open the fatigue jacket and removed the artifact. It was a piece of turf from the baseball field, a lump of grass and earth about the diameter of a compact disc. Petty set it on the table and ran a hand across it, stroking the grass like a baby’s soft hair.

       Victory is mine.

      Stepping back, Petty pulled off the green watch cap and turned on the television. Tonight’s events were historic. It was vital not to miss a moment, not one beautiful second.

      There—news. Images sparkled on the screen, familiar and thrilling. The smoke so black, the blood so messy, Tasia’s hair so thick, fanning around her head in a gold comet’s tail. People screaming, fleeing from her body. Tasia had terrified the crowd, dying like that. What a cow.

      Bursting through the crowd came Searle Lecroix. Petty grimaced.

      Too late, Searle. She’s gone. She can no longer suck the love from a man’s bones. We’re free.

      Free. Petty glanced at the artifact. It was a memento of deliverance, like a chunk of the Berlin Wall.

      Lecroix shoved his way past the ravenous onlookers on the field, gawky strangers who wanted a piece of Tasia McFarland, who wanted a chance to say, I was there. But they were only about celebrity and sentiment. They would never understand. Tasia’s death was not an accident. It was a triumph.

      On-screen, Lecroix dropped to his knees beside Tasia’s body. Petty cringed.

      “Searle, you fool.”

      The death of a cow should not affect a man so. It was a painful sight. It diminished the victory.

      If you believed the gossip, Tasia had lured Searle Lecroix into her bed. But he couldn’t have known her. He couldn’t have given himself to her and received back in turn. Not from an unhinged, half-lunatic fame-whore who had fucked the president to get where she was.

      Lecroix gripped Tasia’s hand. He begged, “Help her.”

      Smarting, Petty turned away. But Tasia’s face followed. She stared down from the walls of the hotel room. Hundreds of photos, her beautiful face, her filthy gaze, her dark inner light, staring, knowing.

      Petty stared back. “But you didn’t know what was coming. You refused to listen.”

      Tasia had snubbed NMP. Then ignored NMP. She’d had the gall to rebuke and disregard NMP.

      A smile squeezed Petty’s lips, full of pain.

      Stop that. You are not a fat, weak-kneed fan. You are a righteous guardian and protector of the truth and the Good Ones. Petty scratched an armpit.

      The hotel room smelled stale and fuggy, like a cheap costume for a stage play. But that’s what this Tenderloin dive was—a disguise. Nobody would look here for a hovering angel.

      The news switched to a White House press conference. Robert McFarland was praising Tasia. He was waxing melodic about her talent.

      The thrill of victory subsided. Petty sloughed off the fatigue jacket and sat heavily on the bed. Generosity of spirit…was McFarland joking? The president of the United States was beatifying Saint Tasia, the Holy Cow.

      Slut, thief, liar.

      A heart as big as the sky. Letting out a moan, Petty thundered to the table, grabbed the artifact, and threw it at the television.

      This was insane. It was…a spell. The vixen had bewitched even the leader of the free world.

      All Petty’s work had been in vain. The king rat of politicians, a man of the smoothest tongue, a hypnotist, was spreading the lie. People would buy it. Heart as big as the sky would become conventional wisdom. It would twist people’s minds, turn them into Tasia-lovers. It would burrow under the skin of people who needed protection. Tasia, thief of hearts, would steal yet again, just as she’d stolen from NMP, but this time from beyond the grave.

      Her death hadn’t ended the battle. It had only intensified it.

      Petty heard a voice, a whisper, a promise. Don’t tell. You’re my eternal love. Shh.

      Deep breath. It was time to slough off Noel Michael Petty. Time to put on the camouflage that kept the Protector safe and anonymous. It worked on the Net, where nobody knows you’re a dog. Now, offline, Petty needed to assume the guise. Full-time, with no slipups.

      Going into the bathroom, Petty faced the dingy mirror. From now on, you’re not Noel. You’re not a sweaty fan who follows