A Friend in the Glass (An Auden & O’Callaghan Mystery #3)

Chapter Thirty-Two

Rufus was pretty savvy when it came to obtaining obscure information. Even if his childhood had not allowed for his intelligence to be properly cultivated, Rufus had kept books around starting at a young age—to keep busy, to keep loneliness at bay—and what had begun as a defense mechanism had slowly blossomed into a passion, an obsession. For knowledge, for learning about the world beyond the island of Manhattan, for stoking the fires of curiosity because the rush felt so good, and that little hit of dopamine became more precious than gold once Rufus had gotten older and depression had settled over him like an ever-present shadow. So when he’d navigated the city’s massive and clunky website, and utilized the bug-ridden property records database in order to confirm Kenneth Nasta’s home address—all from his burner phone no less—Rufus wasn’t surprised. He did, however, preen a little. And demand a kiss for a job well done.

Kenneth and Jennifer Nasta were homeowners in both D.C. and New York City, it turned out. In New York, they’d purchased in the neighborhood of Yorkville—tree-lined East Eighty-Ninth Street, between York Avenue and East End, if Rufus were to be a technical little shit. The town house was a gorgeous, three-story, red-brick affair, with a wrought iron gate that opened onto what constituted a front yard in Manhattan: a paved four-by-four enclosure with an empty pot beside the front door that in the summer months was probably home to some annual flower that cost more than Rufus’s monthly rent.

“Guess how much they bought it for,” Rufus prompted while pointing toward the home from where he and Sam stood across the street.

“A couple million?”

“Hey, you’re getting pretty good at this,” Rufus said, giving Sam a nudge. “Five million.”

“Jesus.”

“Private garages aren’t free, Sam. That alone was probably a fifth of the cost.” Rufus looked back at the home before saying, “Speaking of… the automatic door isn’t all the way shut. See that? There’s no car parked inside, though, and the lights in the house are off.”

“That’s convenient. What’s the deal?”

Rufus shrugged. “Maybe it’s malfunctioning. Kenneth should have bought a six million dollar town house instead.”

“I guess so. Here we go.”

Rufus waited for two cars to pass before jaywalking. He kept his hands in his jacket pockets and chin tucked against his chest, looking like any other guy just freezing his nuts off while trying to get where he needed to be that night. Rufus walked past the Nastas’ garage while listening to Sam’s steps closing in from behind. He listened to the scrape and scuff as Sam deviated, slipped underneath the open door, and then Rufus spun on his heel, backtracked, and hastily crouched underneath as well.

Rufus wiped road salt from his jeans before straightening his posture. Their movements activated an overhead motion-sensor light. They both stood perfectly still, listened, and only when Rufus was certain he heard nothing, did he approach the side door that accessed the home. He tried the knob but wasn’t surprised to find it locked. Rufus retrieved his lockpicking tools, got down on one knee, and went to work.

It didn’t take long. Not because it was a shitty lock, but because Rufus was aces at breaking and entering. He eased the door open, stared into the dark interior until his eyes adjusted, then motioned for Sam.

Sam listened at the door for a moment, but he must not have heard anything because a moment later, he pushed inside.

A long hallway opened onto an eat-in kitchen. Everything was white and stainless steel. Rufus bet that no one had ever cooked in it, let alone sat in there to share a meal. Leaving his petty thoughts behind, Rufus followed on Sam’s heels, took a right out of the kitchen, and found a set of stairs. The Marash pattern of the stair runner would hide any evidence they might have tracked in on their shoes, at least to the naked eye, and so they quickly made their way to the second floor.

It was mostly what Rufus expected from a three-story town house lived in part-time by only two people: too many bedrooms and too many bathrooms. At least the Nastas hadn’t fashioned all the extra space into guest rooms that’d never see any use—two of the rooms were home offices. They looked high-end in style, with built-in shelving and all-in-one printers and even those mesh trays to sort incoming and outgoing documents—which seemed unnecessary for a home office—but what the fuck did Rufus know? He didn’t even file taxes.

Rufus took the first office while Sam checked the second farther down the hall. It’d turned out that Rufus scored Jennifer’s room. It had also turned out that the Congresswoman had an affinity for teddy bears, which felt really creepy, given the kind of human she’d presented herself to be yesterday. Rufus counted five teddy bears placed throughout the room while he waited for the laptop on the imposing desk to power up. And when the computer sounded a little welcome jingle, the desktop loaded a wallpaper of a teddy saying: I love you bear-y much!

Rufus gagged. He navigated the Start menu, chose File Explorer, and muttered, “Let’s see what Jenny’s been working on of late.”

A window loaded with all the recently opened files. Plenty were PDF documents with names that meant very little to Rufus—probably mundane government shit—but a few were audio files, which he found significantly more interesting. Unless Jennifer was also an audiobook junkie, why would she have that kind of stuff? Rufus double-clicked. A file was accessed on the small, external drive still plugged into the computer.

The speaker volume was low, but Rufus recognized Del’s voice, speaking fast, almost babbling, really, that there wouldn’t be an investigation, everything was under control because there’s a sergeant taking the blame for it all.

“Holy shit.” Rufus hissed, “Sam. Sam .” Pausing the recording, Rufus darted to the open door, poked his head into the hall, and whisper-yelled Sam’s name again. “Get your ass in here.”

Sam emerged from the second office, a silhouette against the ambient light, and padded down the hall.

Rufus waved him in before returning to the desk. “She’s got audio recordings.” He tapped Pause and Del began speaking again. “This one’s the most recently played. There’re lots more.”

After listening for several seconds, Sam said, “He’s talking about Stonefish.”

Rufus was nodding. “He mentioned a sergeant taking the heat.”

Sam didn’t move. He didn’t even seem to breathe. Finally he said, “Let me hear it.”

Rufus started the recording over and let it play in its entirety.

When it stopped, Sam stared into the middle distance. Then, slowly, he nodded. He adjusted his coat—a seam bothering him, probably. One of those reflexive Sam-isms that Rufus took for granted now. Then he said, “What about the rest of them?”

“She’s got them on this hard drive.” Rufus tapped the drive in question before sort of blurting out, “Sam, I’m sorry.”

“We knew. We already knew. It’s not any different—” He stopped and scrubbed his hands over his face. When he spoke again, his voice was low and rough. “We need to listen to the others.”

Rufus opened the drive and played half a dozen more recordings. They were all Del speaking. Del begging for help after Shareed contacted Evangeline, Del discussing the events that had transpired over the last few days at the Javits—events Rufus and Sam were neck-deep in—Del reporting on how the fallout surrounding Stonefish was being handled, Del incriminating Lew in the murder of Sergeant Went—

Rufus turned off the audio. He closed the file, yanked the plug from the laptop, and shoved the drive into his sweatshirt pocket before buttoning the jean jacket. “That’s enough, I think,” he said, glancing uneasily at Sam from the corner of his eye.

Sam still didn’t seem to be seeing anything. He gave his coat another tug, and when he spoke, his voice had a stripped-down quality. “She isn’t on any of them.”

“But Del’s talking to someone,” Rufus answered. “I think we could argue he’s talking to Jen, but maybe we can get Del to admit that himself. We can show him what we have—what she had. What do they say in those courtroom dramas: get him to flip?”

“So,” Sam said, “let’s get him to flip.”