Chapter 5: The Man in Bayonne
Tessa's sister's phone was a cracked Samsung with a purple case and a screen protector that had been peeling at the corners for what looked like years.
Tessa powered it on at her kitchen table while I sat across from her and watched it boot up.
Her apartment was small.
Third floor of a building in Jersey City, two windows facing a brick wall, a radiator that knocked every few minutes like someone politely requesting entry.
A stack of nursing textbooks on the counter.
A child's drawing held to the refrigerator with a magnet — a woman in a pink uniform, stick arms, enormous smile.
"Your sister's daughter?" I asked.
"Lily.
She's six." Tessa handed me the phone.
"She drew that the week I started your case.
She said I looked like a princess."
"In a pink uniform."
"She's six.
Everyone's a princess."
The phone had signal.
I dialed from memory.
Reyes picked up on the fourth ring.
"Yeah."
"It's Vincent."
Silence.
Not the silence of surprise.
The silence of a man who had been expecting a call and was now deciding how to answer it.
"Vincent." His voice was careful.
"How are you."
"I'm going to ask you one question," I said.
"I need you to answer it honestly.
Not loyally.
Honestly."
Another pause.
"Okay."
"Did you request the transfer to Bayonne?"
The pause this time was longer.
"No," he said.
"Did Dominic tell you to say you did?"
"He said if anyone asked, it was my idea.
He said it was better for everyone if the story was clean." Reyes exhaled slowly.
"He said you were going to be — that things were going to change.
That the old structure was done."
"What did he offer you?"
"Steady pay.
No questions.
A job that didn't require me to watch what was happening to you." His voice tightened.
"I took it because I couldn't watch it.
That was my mistake.
I thought stepping back was the same as not being involved."
"It wasn't."
"No.
It wasn't."
Tessa was watching me from across the table.
"The night I was shot," I said.
"The meeting in Newark.
Who told you about it?"
Reyes didn't answer immediately.
"Reyes."
"Dominic's assistant called me that afternoon," he said.
"Said you'd confirmed a meeting with the Hargrove people.
Said you wanted minimal security presence because Hargrove was nervous about optics." He stopped.
"I thought it was strange.
You never minimized security for a first meeting.
But the call came from inside the office.
I thought—"
"You thought it was legitimate."
"I should have called you directly to confirm."
"Yes," I said.
"You should have."
He was quiet.
"I'm not calling to assign blame," I said.
"I'm calling because I need to know if you're still my man or if you're Dominic's."
"I've been waiting six months for you to ask me that."
"Then answer it."
"I'm yours," Reyes said.
"I've always been yours.
I just didn't know how to come back."
I looked at Tessa.
She gave me nothing — no nod, no expression.
She was letting me decide.
"I need you in the city by Sunday night," I said.
"Not the mansion.
I'll send you an address."
"What's happening Sunday?"
"Monday morning, I have a medical evaluation.
Real physicians, my choosing.
I need the room secured and I need to know if anyone attempts to interfere with the physicians before they arrive."
"Dominic will find out you're moving."
"I know."
"He'll try to stop it."
"I know that too."
"Vincent—" Reyes stopped.
Started again.
"He's not the same as he was.
Whatever he was before, he's past that now.
He's not going to accept losing this quietly."
"I'm not asking him to accept anything quietly," I said.
"I'm asking you to be in the city by Sunday."
A long breath.
"I'll be there Saturday," Reyes said.
"I'll come early."
I ended the call and set the phone on the table.
Tessa poured two cups of coffee and pushed one toward me without asking.
"He'll do it?" she said.
"Yes."
"Do you trust him?"
I thought about it honestly.
About the six months of silence.
About the warehouse in Bayonne.
About the fact that he had answered the phone on the fourth ring and not let it go to voicemail.
"I trust that he's ashamed," I said.
"That's close enough."
Tessa wrapped both hands around her cup.
"There's something I need to tell you," she said.
"About last night, after we got back from Carver's."
I waited.
"Arya came to find me." She looked at the table.
"She said she'd heard I rescheduled your therapy without her approval.
She said the agency had a chain of command and I'd violated it." She paused.
"She said if it happened again, she'd have me removed."
"What did you say?"
"I apologized.
I told her I was overzealous.
I told her I just wanted to do my job well." Tessa looked up.
"She believed it.
Or she wanted to believe it.
She patted my arm and told me I was sweet."
"And then?"
"And then she went back to her room and made a phone call." Tessa set down her cup.
"I was still in the hallway.
I heard her say one sentence before she closed the door."
"What sentence?"
Tessa looked at me steadily.
"She said, 'The girl is fine.
She doesn't know anything.'"
The radiator knocked twice.
"She's reporting to Dominic," I said.
"Every conversation.
Every interaction.
Everything I do in that house goes back to him." Tessa's voice was even.
"Which means he knows I rescheduled your therapy.
He knows Arya spoke to me.
He may already be wondering why I'm still there."
"Are you afraid?"
She considered the question seriously.
"Yes," she said.
"But I'm more afraid of what happens if we stop."
I looked at the child's drawing on the refrigerator.
The stick-armed woman in the pink uniform with the enormous smile.
"Go back tonight," I said.
"Act normal.
Don't look for anything yet — wait until tomorrow when Dominic visits.
His visits follow a pattern.
He arrives, he spends time with Arya, and then he goes to the study alone for at least thirty minutes." I looked at her.
"That's your window."
"What am I looking for?"
"His briefcase.
He carries the same one every time — black, brass clasps, monogram on the front.
He leaves it in the study when he goes to find Arya." I paused.
"He's done it for years.
He never thought he needed to be careful in that house."
"Because it was your house," Tessa said.
"Because it was my house."
She nodded slowly.
"And if I find something?"
"Photograph it.
Don't take it.
Don't move it.
Just photograph it and leave everything exactly as it was."
She stood and carried both cups to the sink.
"Vincent," she said, her back to me.
"Yes."
"When this is over—" She stopped.
Turned the water on.
Turned it off.
"Never mind."
"Say it."
She turned around.
"When this is over, I'm going to need a new job," she said.
"Because I'll have either helped you win or helped you lose, and either way I won't be a caregiver in that house anymore."
It wasn't what she had started to say.
I knew that.
But I let it stand.
"When this is over," I said, "we'll figure it out."
She dried her hands on a dish towel and reached for her coat.
"Three tomorrow," she said.
"Three tomorrow," I said.
May you like
She left.
The radiator knocked once more, and then the apartment was quiet, and I sat alone with a cracked purple phone and the particular stillness of a man who has finally stopped waiting for something to happen to him.
