I wanted to tell her. Sarah was my rock. When I was down or hurting or scared, she was always there for me, even when I was being the jerk of the century. But I was tired, and too weary to handle the hundred questions she’d be entitled to ask.

“Honey, I’ve really got to go,” I said. “I’ll tell you all about it later.”

She could sense I was holding back. She needed to ask just one question. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I’m okay.”

As I slipped the phone back into my jacket, I thought, I am so not okay. And I so did not want to go down this kind of road again. A road that led me, and those around me, to danger, and violence, and heartache.

I asked the cabby to give me a lift back to the doughnut shop where I’d left my car.

“I got the word,” the cabby said as we drove through the night. “It was ‘pooch.’ ”

Chapter 19

19

Back at the doughnut place, once again behind the wheel of my car, it occurred to me that, as a staffer with the biggest newspaper in the city, I had some obligation to notify the city desk about what was going on.

I got hold of Dan, working late on the city copy desk, who generally feels that I am a total fucking idiot, stemming back to an incident before I joined the paper. Because he mostly worked nights, our paths had rarely crossed since I’d started my new job.

“Hey, Dan,” I said.

“Zack. Sarah’s not here. She’s at that retreat where all the management types went.”

“I know, Dan. She’s my wife. She tells me things.”

“So, what can I do for you then? Pretend to fall down the stairs again?” Some things end up haunting you for a very long time.

“I thought you’d want to know that a Metropolitan employee, in the course of conducting his journalistic duties, found the subject of his feature nearly stabbed to death.”

I could hear Dan’s breath intake. “Which Metropolitan employee?”

“Me, Dan. Is there time to write anything for the replate?”

“It’s like, ten minutes to deadline. Best I could do would be to get a brief in or something.”

“What do you think? I’ve got a hell of a story here, about a private detective by the name of Lawrence Jones, who’s been investigating a series of robberies and ends up getting stabbed in his own apartment. I was doing a whole takeout on him.”

“You found him?”

“Yes.”

“And called the police?”

“Yes, Dan.”

“What’s the address? At the very least, we can get a photog out there so we have crime scene pics to run with a story for tomorrow.”