Chapter 44.

Liz O'Keefe drove down the ramp from the George Washington Bridge, rolled down the window of her Honda CR-V, and inhaled deeply.

"You smell that, kiddo?" she said.

Her sister, Rachael, wrapped in an oversized gray sweat suit, slouched lower in the pa.s.senger seat. "Liz, it's Jersey," she said. "Close the window. I know what it smells like."

"Not tonight, honey. Tonight Jersey smells like freedom."

"Great," Rachael muttered. "Call Springsteen. Maybe he'll write a song about it."

"I thought that after eleven months in jail you might feel at least halfway good about getting out," Liz said, taking the Main Street exit toward Leonia.

"What should I feel good about? That Kimi is dead? That I'm the most hated mother in America? Or that the jury found me not guilty, but if I try to walk around like a free woman, someone from the NRA or the Christian Coalition or maybe Rush Limbaugh himself will try to kill me?"

"You want to go back to jail? You think you'll be safer there?"

Rachael broke into a smile. "h.e.l.l, Lizzie, at least half of those women wanted to kill me. They'd look at me with this att.i.tude like 'Hey, b.i.t.c.h, I might be a crack wh.o.r.e, but I was still a better mom than you.'"

"Well, guess what?" Liz said. "They're still in jail, and you're not. Another forty-five days and the judge will hand down his sentence on the endangerment charge, and you heard what Mr. Woloch said-it's probably going to be time served. Then you'll be free to really start getting on with your life."

"You mean my life without Kimi? Or you mean my life as a moving target every time I walk down the aisle in a supermarket?"

The Honda cruised along Fort Lee Road for less than a minute and turned left onto Broad Avenue.

"Look, the judge set down the rules. So whether you like it or not, you're going to be locked up in Aunt Pearl's house for the next forty-five days. After that, he'll probably cut you loose, and you can go where you want. But if I were you, I'd stay put till April when Pearl gets back from Florida."

"Are you serious? I'll go bats.h.i.t crazy just hanging around an empty house doing nothing for six months," Rachael said.

Liz jammed on the brakes, and the CR-V stopped hard.

She spun around in her seat and grabbed her sister by both shoulders. "I don't give a s.h.i.t how crazy you get. You're in hiding. You're a G.o.dd.a.m.n celebrity, Rachael, and not in a good way like Lady G.o.dd.a.m.n Gaga. How many death threats have you gotten in the past twenty-four hours? You think you'll be doing nothing? Staying alive isn't nothing. Besides, Mr. Woloch said he's already fielding book deal offers. You'll have plenty to do when you sit down with a writer every day and tell your story."

"Why bother? n.o.body will believe me. They all think I killed Kimi."

Liz didn't answer. She checked her rearview for the millionth time since she'd picked Rachael up. Broad Avenue was deserted. She had stopped the car directly across the street from BonChon Chicken.

"Have you ever had that spicy Korean chicken?" she asked Rachael, pointing at the dark storefront.

"No."

"I'll bring some home tonight. It's to die for."

Rachael slouched back down in her seat. "Can't wait."

Liz put the car in gear, drove another four blocks, and made a right onto Harold Avenue. Calling Harold an avenue was overly generous. It was a dead-end, tree-lined street with only sixteen houses on it. A quiet middle-cla.s.s patch of Bergen County, New Jersey, where one of America's most notorious accused child murderers could live in anonymity.

Aunt Pearl's house was the last one on the left. Liz pulled the car into the far side of the two-car garage, then keyed the door shut, and the two sisters walked through the breezeway into the kitchen.

"This place hasn't changed since I was a kid," Rachael said.

"Baby, this place hasn't changed since Aunt Pearl was a kid. It's all part of the joy of living in relative obscurity," Liz said, opening the refrigerator door. "I bought you a welcome-home snack-Mia Figlia Bella cheesecake and a bottle of Chardonnay."

"Sounds like you were expecting The Real Housewives of New Jersey. Give me a sliver of the cake and supersize the wine."

Liz grinned. Supersize the wine. That was the kid sister she knew and loved. She found the corkscrew and grabbed two cake plates and winegla.s.ses from an overhead cabinet.

"f.u.c.k them," Rachael said.

"f.u.c.k who, sweetie?" Liz asked, cutting the seal around the rim of the bottle.

"Did you read this?" Rachael asked, picking up a copy of that morning's New York Post from the kitchen table.

The two-word headline practically filled the front page: NOT GUILTY???.

Rachael opened to page three and read out loud. "'In a shocking turn of events in the Kimi O'Keefe murder trial, the jury brought back a verdict n.o.body expected. They found her mother, Rachael, not guilty. Judge Steven Levine sounded halfhearted and totally insincere when he thanked the jury for their service. It was as if His Honor, like virtually everyone else in this city, believed the jury got it wrong.' Well, that certainly sounds like fair and balanced journalism."

"Honey, a lot of people thought you were guilty," Liz said, turning the corkscrew so the wings spread to the sides. "Why do you think they snuck you out in the middle of the night? Whatever the verdict, there's always someone who says it's wrong. Look at O.J."

"O.J. was guilty," Rachael said. "I'm not."

Liz pulled out the cork.

"Did you hear me say I'm not guilty?" Rachael said.

"Of course," Liz said. "I was there when the jury brought in the verdict."

"d.a.m.n it, Lizzie, that's not what I'm asking. I said I'm not guilty, and you clammed up. Tell me the truth-do you believe I'm not guilty?"

"Rachael, I am so happy that you're free and not in jail," Liz said. "And that is the truth."

Rachael shook her head. "I don't believe it," she said. "My own sister. You think I'm guilty of murdering Kimi, don't you?"

"It's been a long day. A little wine will take the edge off," Liz said, removing the dead cork from the corkscrew and tossing it in the garbage. No sense saving it. The two sisters had never recorked a bottle in their lives.

"A little wine will not bring my daughter back," Rachael said, and she flung the newspaper across the room. "I asked you a question. Yes or no-do you think I'm guilty?"

The door between the kitchen and the breezeway crashed open, and two masked men stormed in, guns in hand.

"I do," one of them said. "Now get down on the floor. Both of you."

Chapter 45.

Liz still had the corkscrew in her hand. She lowered her arm and slowly let it drift behind her back.

"Drop it, b.i.t.c.h!" one screamed. "Do we look like f.u.c.king amateurs?"

The corkscrew clattered to the tile floor.

"Kick it across the room."

Liz studied the two men. They were dressed in black from head to toe. The one giving orders was about six two. His voice was slightly m.u.f.fled by the mask, but it sounded young, white, and deadly serious. Nothing about him said amateur.

Give in, but don't give up, she thought as she kicked the corkscrew to the far corner of the kitchen.

"Both of you. Face down. Hands behind your back. Now."

The women stretched out on the floor, their hands behind their backs. The man in charge holstered his gun, knelt beside Rachael, put a zip tie around her wrists, and yanked hard. She yelped in pain.

The second man was still standing, straddled over Liz. He holstered his gun and reached into his pocket for a zip tie. Liz made her move. In one swift, fluid motion, she rolled over onto her back and jammed her knee into his b.a.l.l.s.

He doubled over as Liz reached up, pulled him to the floor, and began scrambling for his gun. His partner sprang up and kicked at her hand. He missed, and Liz grabbed his leg, toppling him to the floor.

She clambered to her knees and pummeled the downed man with her fists, looking for a vulnerable point. His temple, his throat, anything.

A boot struck her on the back of the head, and she pitched forward. A pair of knees dug into her back. The man on top of her grabbed a handful of hair, yanked her head back, and wrapped his arm under her chin.

"Don't move or I'll snap your b.i.t.c.h neck like a twig!" he yelled.

She let her body go limp, but the man kept the pressure on, cutting off her air supply. She knew he had her in a death hold.

"Enough!" the other guy yelled. "She's not who we came for."

His partner relaxed his grip, and Liz sucked in greedy mouthfuls of air.

One of them grabbed her arms and the other her ankles, and they carried her to the bathroom. The one who had almost choked her held her head over the toilet bowl.

"Any more s.h.i.t from you, and I'll drown you right here, and my partner will p.i.s.s on you while you die."

They laid her facedown on the floor, duct-taped her mouth, wrapped her legs around the base of the toilet, and zip-tied her ankles. Then they stretched her hands over her head and zip-tied them to a pipe underneath the sink.

One of them turned on the water and began filling the bathtub. Five minutes later, the other was back with every phone in the house, including her cell, and dropped them all in the tub.

"We should kill you just for harboring a child killer," he said.

They turned off the lights and shut the bathroom door behind them.

Liz lay there on the cold tile floor, her arms and legs stretched painfully wide, the zip ties cutting into her skin, and she listened.

She could hear them carry Rachael out the back door.

Then a car door opened. Finally it shut, followed quickly by two more car doors opening and closing.

An engine roared to life, and the car pulled out.

And then silence. She heard nothing. Nothing except for the agonizing sobs that emanated from her battered body.

Chapter 46.

Bridget Sweeney, the housekeeper at St. Agnes's Church, was a large, robust woman with a bawdy sense of humor and an Irish brogue that was every bit as thick as it was the day she started working there forty-two years ago.

She had three responsibilities: cook for the priests, supervise the maintenance staff, and, most important, function as Father Spinelli's eyes and ears.

She was dusting the blinds in the rectory when she saw the black Cadillac Escalade pull up in front of the church. She hurried down the hallway to Father Spinelli's office. She didn't bother knocking.

"Father...," she said, winded from the brief journey, "you got company."

The priest took a quick look at his watch. "I have morning Ma.s.s in ten minutes. Who is it?"

"Eye-talian royalty," Sweeney said. "Take a gander."

She ushered Spinelli to a window, and the two of them watched as the driver of the Escalade got out and opened the rear door.

Joe Salvi stepped out. He was wearing a perfectly fitted dark gray double-breasted suit, white shirt, blue tie, and black wingtips.

"Will you just look at him now," Mrs. Sweeney said. "All dressed up spiffy like John Gotti and riding around in one of them big black SUVs like Tony Soprano. Is he thinking maybe we don't already know he's in the Mafia business?"

The priest shook his head. "Mrs. Sweeney, 'Thou shalt not go up and down as a dispenser of gossip and scandal among your people,'" he scolded. "Leviticus nineteen, verse sixteen."

She clasped her hands over her cheeks in mock penitence. "Mob boss Joe Salvi indicted on federal racketeering charges-Daily News, page one."

The priest chuckled. The old woman was incorrigible. But he'd be lost without her.

"It ain't Christmas nor Easter," she said, "so what in G.o.d's name is he doing here?"