Sullivan's Last Stand. Harper Allen

faction in the mountains, wasn’t it, Sully?”

      “Thirty-eight,” Sullivan said, frowning slightly. “Or maybe thirty-nine. That last hour was pretty much a blur. I was beginning to think you and the boys had taken a vote and decided to wash your hands of me.”

      “When we finally showed up, I seem to recollect you were going through Al-Hamid’s family tree for him. It was hard to make out exactly what you were saying through a broken jaw and with the side of your face the approximate size of a football, but it appeared as though he was getting the gist. Something about a sheep, or was it a goat?”

      Sullivan grinned wryly. “Hell, all I was trying to do by then was make him mad enough to get careless. It would have worked, too, if you and McGuire hadn’t barged in just when I was getting to the good part.” He glanced over at Fitzgerald. “Anyway, it all worked out in the end. I got the troop strength and materiel figures we needed, didn’t I?”

      “Yeah, you did.” The faint amusement left the other man’s face, and his tone was quiet. “And you nearly got what you really wanted. Of course, that didn’t stop you from trying again.”

      “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Fitz.” Watching him, Bailey saw the blue eyes become instantly opaque, although there was no change in the easy good humor of his expression. “I got out alive—that time with Al-Hamid, and every other time.”

      The detective’s gaze was steady and unwavering, and under it Sullivan looked suddenly away. “Don’t lie to yourself, Sully.” There was an odd intensity in his tone. “Lie to everyone else if you have to, but not to yourself. You did get what you wanted in the end, didn’t you? You’re a dead man walking,” he said softly, his voice pitched so low that Bailey had to strain to hear him.

      The conference room was well lit and spacious, but all of a sudden she felt as if the walls were closing in on her and the lights had flickered and powered down. Dead man walking. What did Fitzgerald mean by that? Even as the question came into her mind, she knew it was unnecessary to voice it. The heavyset ex-soldier, with his deceptively stolid demeanor and his prosaically unimaginative manner, had simply put into words the impression that she had always told herself was too fanciful and melodramatic to consider. Fitz saw the same thing in Terrence Patrick Sullivan that she’d subconsciously seen the first time she’d laid eyes on him.

      He was good-looking, charming and seemingly invulnerable, Bailey thought. But something had a claim on his soul, and eventually that something would call in its claim.

      “Your Irish imagination is running away with you, boyo.”

      Sullivan’s wry grin looked so natural that Bailey felt a momentary doubt. Maybe both she and Fitzgerald were wrong. Maybe Sully was exactly what he appeared to be on the surface, and what he insisted he was—a risktaker, yes, but with no more ulterior motivation behind his actions than an innate tendency to push situations to their limits, simply for the thrill of it.

      “Next you’ll be taking a leaf from Quinn McGuire’s book of fairy tales and telling me that the wild geese have laid their mark on me. Is that what you think, Fitz—that they’re waiting to take me with them from some battlefield that still lies ahead? Because if you do, then you’re forgetting one thing.” His brogue thickened. “I’ve got no intention entirely of joining them in eternity. That’s why I walked away from the profession, isn’t it now? They can’t take me if I never go back, Fitz.”

      His words were gently mocking, but, glancing surreptitiously at the man he was directing them at, Bailey didn’t see an answering smile on Fitzgerald’s face. Instead his eyes closed for an instant, as if in pain. Then he opened them again and fixed Sullivan with an unwavering gaze.

      “They don’t have to. You’re already up there with them, Sully.”

      “I thought we were here on an investigation, Donny.” Straub’s interjection was harsh. “What’s all this crap about freakin’ geese and battlefields and fairy tales got to do with anything?”

      “Nothing at all, Detective.” Sullivan’s answer was just as harsh, but although he was apparently answering Straub, he didn’t take his eyes off Fitzgerald. “It’s a legend, that’s all. Your partner here likes to trot out his Irish fatalism once in a while. It’s all part of it, like the wearing of the green on St. Paddy’s Day, getting into drunken arguments with strangers over the Troubles and insisting that one day you’re going back to the old country for good. Like you so eloquently phrase it, it’s crap.”

      His grin was tight. “And to be sure, I’d love to get together and lift a pint to Erin go Bragh sometime with you, Fitz, but right now I’ve got a business to run. If your baby pit bull intends to take me in for questioning, let’s go. I’ll call my lawyer and tell him to meet us down at the station. If not, then let me get back to work. Jackson was supposed to be looking into a case of industrial espionage this week, and I’m going to have to get another operative to take over the file.”

      “All right, that’s it.” Straub’s fair skin was mottled with anger. He took a step toward the chair that Sullivan was lounging in. “Call your lawyer now, mister, because you’re under arrest—”

      “For God’s sake, Pete, put the cuffs away,” his partner cut in tiredly. “Until we know what he lied about, it’s hands off.” The big man looked at the toothpick he was holding with sudden distaste, and then he sighed. “You know, Straub, I’m just counting the days until Tarranova comes back from maternity leave and you get assigned as temporary partner to some other hapless soul.”

      “When she does, Fitz, come back and pay me another visit.” Rising easily from the chair he’d been straddling, Sullivan shoved it in under the table, the innocuous gesture clearly signifying that the meeting was over. “She’s a sweetheart, besides being a damn good cop, and I wouldn’t mind seeing Jennifer again. But from now on keep this rookie away from me and my people, understand?”

      “I understand, Sully.” Fitzgerald’s voice lost its weary tone and took on a harder edge. “Don’t worry, I won’t return unless I have to.” He stood in front of Sullivan, as if sizing him up. “Just seeing me brings it all back, and you can’t live with that, can you? You never could.”

      “See you around, Fitz,” Sullivan said shortly, walking to the doorway of the conference room and ignoring the other detective. “You know the way out.”

      “Yeah, I do.” As Straub shot a black glance at Sullivan and stalked out of the room, Fitz hesitated. For the first time his attention focused on Bailey, and she felt oddly off balance under his intent scrutiny.

      “You lied, too, Ms. Flowers,” he said softly. “You didn’t just come here on business. Take my advice and let him go, lady. He’s gone already.” The blue eyes narrowed on her searchingly. “But maybe you already knew that,” he said, so quietly that Bailey realized Sullivan, a few feet away, wouldn’t have heard him. “You can’t save him, you know. No one ever could.”

      “Maybe no one ever tried.” The words came from her mouth unthinkingly, and in just as low a tone as his. “Or maybe they just didn’t try hard enough.”

      The big detective shook his head slowly. “You’re as doomed as he is if you let yourself believe that. He can’t change the road he’s on. Don’t go down it with him.”

      As Sullivan glanced over impatiently from the doorway, Fitzgerald gave Bailey one last look, and then turned from her. Without another word, he strode past his ex-comrade and was gone, leaving behind him a sudden silence.

      Very carefully, Bailey walked over to the conference table. Pulling out a chair, she lowered herself into it, her movements slow and deliberate. The atmosphere in the room seemed close and heavy, but despite that she felt oddly chilled. She hugged herself for warmth and realized with a small shock that the fine hairs on her skin were standing up.

      She didn’t blame Straub for being confused. She had no idea what that conversation had been about. She didn’t even know what her part in it had meant.

      Why