Within an hour, Eddie arrived at his apartment. Eddie's presence seemed the most natural thing in the world.

They studied each other carefully, looking first for the familiar, then confronting the differences that had grown between them.

Drinking nothing but coffee, Nick talked while Eddie listened. From the very beginning. Eddie nodded, interrupted a few times. He had wondered about the sudden, reckless gambling. Attributed it to the loss of both Peter and Kathy, Nick's escape. Had never realized what a huge debt Nick had been carrying. Or why.

"But Jesus, Nick, why did the robbery at the restaurant have to be so d.a.m.n authentic? They got you on tape-Christ, didn't you know the DEA had it staked out?"

Nick nodded. He knew. He also knew that his grandfather had sources that would verify the reality, spot any fraud. Yes. He had put himself totally in the feds' hands. His uncle had told him he would be Nick's safeguard, should anything go wrong. But now, Nick wasn't even sure of that.

"Hey, if I louse up-make sure you compose a real funny memorial for me. h.e.l.l, name names, it'll make everyone go crazy."

Eddie reached out and tapped Nick's chin with his closed fist. "I'll write one in poetry. What rhymes with 'b.a.s.t.a.r.d'? I got it. How about 'outlasted'?"

Eddie's questions brought some light to dark places. "Yeah, too bad about Salvy and his nephew Vinny. But that was a done deal, right?"

"I guess, but. ..."

"Jesus, Nick, I'm sure you feel terrible about it. Wish you weren't the guy involved with Salvy. But, buddy, you were. And it probably saved your life in the long run. The guy was runnin' scared; he probably would have ratted you out in some way or other. Think about it." Eddie studied his friend's wounded face. "Ah, Nicky boy, don't tell me you really thought there are still good guys and bad guys? They do what they gotta do. We do what we gotta do."

Finally, Nick came to it. "Here's what I gotta do, Ed. I'm pulling out. I'm dumping the whole thing. I won't go to their f.u.c.king meeting wearing a f.u.c.king bug, won't write up reports, won't testify, won't name names. I'm bailing out."

Eddie Manganaro, the Irish poster boy, shook his head slightly and whistled between his teeth. It was a habit that indicated to Nick deep thought; a search for a solution to a tough problem.

"Is there anyone, at all, in the whole thing who you trust? Really trust?"

"Tom Caruso. I'm planning to tell him about the f.u.c.king agent-mole, Felix Rodriguiz. Christ, wouldn't you think they'd have run a check on their own guys? Just a basic background check on the guy's a.s.sets? He doesn't drive a Ferrari, for crying out loud, but he must have his dirty cash stashed away somewhere. Why the h.e.l.l didn't these guys check out their own?"

"Maybe they don't want to? Who the h.e.l.l knows. But look, Nicky. You've gone all this way. If not you-who? If not now-when?"

"That from an old song? Or a Boy Scout oath? Sounds familiar."

"Put it in perspective, partner. You're all they got to round these people up for RICO, for openers. And, sooner or later, there's always your big rat rushin' in to make the deal. Look at Gotti-Teflon Don, my a.s.s. I'm sure your cousin Richie has his very own Sammy the Bull."

Nick nodded. "Pauly the Playboy Pilotti would sell his sacred barbells to keep from going to prison. He knows where the bodies are buried, who put them there, when and why."

Eddie grimaced. "Pauly the Playboy?"

"Funny. Remember the old days? When we were kids, we'd hear about it-the vow of silence. We wouldn't even snitch on each other, even if we had to take a beating. Code of honor? No more. They've been selling each other out for years now."

"There'll be a big rush on-wait too long and you miss your opportunity. That's how it works. Nick, you're not thinking of bailing out because of your grandfather, are you? You two been getting close, right?"

Nick shook his head. "He's an old man. What the h.e.l.l could they do to him?"

Eddie shook his head. That wasn't what he meant and Nick knew it. He had told Eddie the whole story, starting with his own father's death and what had really led to Peter's murder. One way or another, it was all at his grandfather's feet.

"I want to look him in the eye, Eddie. I want him to know that I know the truth. I really want that minute between us. Everything else between me and my grandfather is bulls.h.i.t. Life and death, that's the real thing."

Eddie advised him to get in touch with Caruso as soon as possible. Get Rodriguiz out of the picture. Hang in; see the job through.

"If you bail now, Nick, don't count on anyone-not your uncle, or anyone-to take care of you."

Nick nodded. They rode down in the elevator together, looked at each other and grinned. There was that old reliability, that old trust and confidence. You watch my back, I'll watch yours. They'd been each other's safety.

"I just wish I could help you in some way. Up close, ya know."

"You've helped more than anyone could have, Ed. I mean that. That was your role in all of this, okay?"

Eddie had parked down the block and they walked along briskly in the light rain. What Nick didn't notice as it pa.s.sed them by, heading for the driveway to his apartment building, was Laura Santalvo's car.

She had been thinking about Nick. She had listened to the brief messages he had left on her machine, and she felt a hunger and a loss and a regret at the sound of his voice. She figured she'd surprise him; just show up. She wanted to touch him, to see him.

She watched the two men walk along, stop at a car. Watched them talk, then, finally, reach out and hug each other-not in the automatic, meaningless way men had been doing in her world for years, but in a way that meant something. Strong, meaningful, trusting. She sensed something about Nick. She could barely make out his expression as she drove slowly past, but it seemed to her that Nick looked relieved of some heavy burden.

She was starting down Queens Boulevard toward Manhattan when it hit her. That bright red hair: the Irish poster kid with the Sicilian parents. His former partner.

Why would Nick, at this stage of his life, be seeing his ex-partner, the detective?

It could be for any number of reasons. Nick had left the department under a dark cloud. He had severed ties with all his old friends when he joined up with the family, made a new life for himself. Which shouldn't include an old cop buddy.

Laura pulled off the boulevard, drove around for a while, then got on Grand Central Parkway and headed out to the Westwoods, to that private enclave in Westbury, Long Island.

PART 4.

ALL FALL DOWN.

CHAPTER 41.

PAPA VENTURA KNEW MORE about Laura Santalvo than anyone in her life had ever known. Yet there were certain things she kept hidden deep within herself, and that was the source of her strength. They sat across from each other in his library, she with her feet neatly crossed at the ankles the way she sat when she was a child and had confronted him at their very first meeting. He had been impressed by her courage, aware of her fear. She had thanked him properly when he had made arrangements with which her family could be happy. She had written him a beautiful, formal note, and along the sides were her drawings of lovely figures wearing beautiful clothing. He had saved it through all the years.

She took a sip from the lovely crystal gla.s.s of white wine, then put it on the small table beside her chair. He waited her out.

"Papa," she said finally, "I get so tired. I'm still jet-lagged, believe it or not, but I ... just wanted to see you." She held her chin cupped in her hand, her eyes, smoky, intent on his. "I always feel better when I see you."

He nodded. "So. You are upset. Is it about the boy? Or about Chen?"

She shook her head quickly. "Oh, no, no. Anthony's fine. He's spectacular. And Dennis, we have our understandings. You know. It's probably stupid that I came to see you. And so late at night. I apologize."

"Old people don't need much sleep. Don't worry about it."

"It's just a stupid, simple thing."

"Nothing about you could ever be stupid or simple, Laura. Is it about Nicholas, my grandson?"

She was silent for a moment, carefully weighing her words. Making some decision. Aware that he realized, at this moment, how her mind was working.

"We had a stupid argument. Last week. When I came home. I haven't answered his calls. Because he expects an explanation from me."

"And you give explanations to no one." He paused. "Even when you might be in the wrong."

She stood, picked up the winegla.s.s and drained it. She told him how they had come upon Richie Ventura in her apartment. How Richie tried to make Nick believe that they once had been lovers. She told him about the key.

"Did he have a key? To your place?" He caught the angry expression and smiled. "No. Of course not."

"He and his Playboy ape man strong-armed poor Luis to open the apartment door. Richie pulled a key of his own from his pocket, so that Nick would think-whatever he wanted Nick to think."

"Why didn't you tell Nick?" When she didn't reply, he said, "Because Nick should know better. He should trust you. Because he knows Richie and his mean games."

She came beside him on the couch, snuggled against him, played with his long fingers as he squeezed her arm rea.s.suringly.

"Maybe I expect too much."

"Well, from Nick's point of view ..."

"I know, I know." She turned away from him, walked about the room, hugging her elbows. She moved with an animal grace, a determined step, wary, yet at the same time certain of who she was. Taking her time. As she had when she was just nineteen and had completed her second year in the design school in Milan.

When Nicholas Ventura, after tending to some business in Rome, had traveled north to Milan to visit Laura, he stayed four days. He was her lover, her first, and thus her teacher. He had known many women, and had become a good, considerate, knowledgeable lover. There was an unexpected rapport between them over the dinner table at his hotel. It was immediate, electric. It was mutual. He was cautious; she was a virgin. He did not want her to romanticize anything that would happen between them. He wanted her to realize this had no place in their future: just now, just for this moment in time. And, he saw, she seemed able to isolate events in her life. It was the way she too wanted things between them.

Those four days in Milan were the only time they had been together, but neither of them ever forgot one single moment. Between them were nearly forty years, yet together they were ageless. Two ent.i.ties, dissolving and uniting; giving and taking; serious and frivolous. Lovers of the moment, without age, without definition beyond each other. For that time.

He taught her physically, but he also taught her from his own best instincts. "Never tell anyone where you learned what you know. That knowledge is yours. Throughout your life, you will learn-and teach-many things. They are yours, exclusively." He told her he would forever be a telephone call away, wherever in the world, or in whatever situation, she might find herself.

When she was ready, she told him, "I was going over tonight, to surprise Nick. I drove toward his apartment. I was planning to tell him about Richie and his stupid key and-"

"And?"

"And instead drove out to see you."

For the merest second, he caught her hesitation, but she regarded him steadily, leaned forward, and kissed him gently on the lips.

"I guess I can be stupid about things, like anyone else. I always feel better when I talk with you. I'm just ... I've been so tired lately, Papa."

Abruptly, he asked her, "Tired of what, Laura?"

It was not a casual question. She could not just brush it off. There were too many years of knowledge between them.

"Is there something else you wanted to tell me, Laura?"

She sat tensely at the edge of the chair, leaned forward toward him. Her eyes were bright, a darkening thunderstorm gray. "Maybe I'm just tired of my life. Maybe I want to settle down. Maybe I did a terrible thing, allowing my son to stay with his father. I think I might have wronged Su-Su, in a way. You know, Dennis found her for me. As a subst.i.tute for my own child."

"Have you been a good mother to her?"

"I think so. I love her very much. But how would she feel to know that she was shopped for? Like getting a puppy to replace the one that died."

"That might have been the motive in the beginning. But the girl is a beautiful, successful, self-a.s.sured young woman. Last year, I saw her at Christmas time. She and my great-grandson Peter, they were talking so seriously. I think maybe you need a vacation. Some rest; not to have to work so hard for a while. You have no problem with the girl?"

Laura shook her head. "G.o.d, no. She was accepted at Harvard, Yale-everywhere she applied. That's very unusual, you know. She was very concerned. She asked them, each one, flat out, at her interview, 'If I were accepted, would it be because I am a double minority? A woman and Chinese?'"

Papa Ventura laughed. "Sounds like she's got a streak in her just like you, Laura. How did they respond?"

"The man at Yale said, 'With a four point zero average for all four years of high school, with all your outside activities, political involvement, I wouldn't turn you down if you were a white, pale-faced young man from a family who came over on the Mayflower.'"

Papa Ventura didn't understand any of this. "Life is so funny," he said. "Times change; standards change; values change. That's why trust and honor are so important."

"I always feel better when I come to see you, Papa. I was wrong about Nick. I will get together with him. Again, I'm sorry I came here so late."

He rose and they embraced; kissed gently, as a grandfather would a beloved granddaughter. She stepped back from him and they regarded each other for a moment. He was not going to get anything more from her.

She walked from the room in her gliding pace, and in a tough, tomboy way, she waved good-bye over her head without turning to face him.

She might have been surprised, or concerned, or puzzled, by the expression on his face.

CHAPTER 42.

THOMAS CARUSO HAD SERVED two years in Vietnam as a member of a military intelligence unit. It was supposed that his law degree with specialization in const.i.tutional law would serve his country well. When he returned to America, he studied for vows in a strict, contemplative Catholic society. Before taking final vows, Tom Caruso realized that withdrawing from the world was not right for him. His Father Superior suggested he study for the active priesthood. But he soon realized that he did not want to be in the position of listening to the sins of others, relieving them of their individual guilts, freeing them from a sense of responsibility after being a.s.sured of their repentance. In effect, telling them that he had intervened, explained all to G.o.d, and had received an a.s.surance that a few prayers and rosaries would secure their purification.

He had known for a long time that no one else could secure your purity, your peace of mind. Some men could forget; justify; excuse the most disturbingly inhumane deeds. Others could not. For a while, Tom Caruso put his life on hold.

While teaching some courses in criminal justice, he was approached by a recruiter for the DEA. He was offered a position as a deep, undercover supervising agent, who would work from time to time as the only contact with a vulnerable informant who must trust him implicitly. At the same time, he could teach whatever courses he wanted at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice.

Through the years Caruso had felt satisfaction in teaching, but he was always uneasy running agents. He felt a heavy responsibility for each individual he took under his care. Nick O'Hara was functioning as a triple agent. He had seen in Nick the building tension, the growing confusion, the constant worry. He could imagine Nick asking himself, late at night, Did I do the right thing? Did I give the right information to the wrong person? Am I blown? Am I about to sink?

He shot a few baskets in the gym at John Jay. Nick had sounded quietly tense but insistent. He knew now that the murder of this guy, Salvy Grosso, and of his nephew, had shaken Nick. He had described the Polaroids vividly, repeating, "I should have known how scared he was, Tom. I should have known what it meant."

He hadn't tried to tell Nick that the death of these two men wasn't his fault. Nick would have to sort that out for himself. He hadn't commented on the lack of value in those two lives. Tom had seen too much casual death and killing; he had no words to offer. Nick would have to live with whatever degree of responsibility he felt.