The Missing Piece by Kevin Egan Read Free Book Online

out of the building they needed to move fast. Sure enough, he heard the creak of a door swinging open, felt the slight change in pressure of the courtroom air. They’ll be gone in a second, he thought. Then came the loud, sickening pop of a gunshot.
    â€œGary?” someone said.
    Right in front of Foxx, Gary Martin’s hands slipped off the judge’s and Linda’s shoulders.
    â€œGary, are you all right?” Foxx cut in front of Gary and lifted his chin. Gary looked confused. His mouth moved, but no sound came out. His eyes focused, then drifted from Foxx.
    â€œYou hear me, Gary?”
    Gary began to sink. His knee, then his hip, then his shoulder settled on the floor as gently as lying on a bed. A red stain spread on the back of his uniform shirt.

 
    CHAPTER 5
    Foxx lit his sixth and last cigarette of the day and lifted his foot onto the low wall at the corner of Duane and Lafayette. The intersection was quiet, just a few cars stopped at the light before heading toward the ramp to the Brooklyn Bridge. There was no foot traffic, either. The last stragglers from the courthouses and office buildings bordering Foley Square were long gone. Foxx blew smoke skyward and pinched his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. In the unearthly quiet, he could almost hear music screeching out of the restaurant around the corner.
    Foxx opened his eyes and blinked them dry. The early October sky was a clear, luminous blue, while down at ground level the sidewalks were dark except for the faltering lamplight. Across the square, three huge lanterns hanging from thick iron chains lit the portico of 60 Centre Street.
    An arm slipped through his. He tensed until he heard her voice, angling downward from above his left ear.
    â€œHey, Foxx, whatcha thinking?”
    Ursula.
    â€œEver wonder how birds decide to migrate?” he said.
    â€œI don’t know. The weather? The color of the leaves?”
    â€œThe weather can be different year to year. Same with the colors of the leaves. But the one constant is the angle of the sunlight. That’s their cue. People react the same way.”
    â€œAre you about to take wing for Capistrano?” said Ursula.
    â€œI’m talking about memories. The angle of the sun cues intense memories from years past. I remember walking out of the hospital that night. The sky was exactly the same.”
    â€œI remember, too. I don’t need the sky to tell me.” She withdrew her arm and receded enough that the smell of her hair faded. “You have another one of those?”
    â€œI didn’t know you smoked.”
    â€œI don’t,” said Ursula.
    Foxx shook his pack, and Ursula pinched a cigarette with her fingernails. She was tall and big-boned, the type who looked dynamite in nursing scrubs but somehow raw in a pleated skirt and scoop-necked blouse. Foxx thought she cleaned up nice anyway.
    â€œMcQueen sent me to fetch you.” Ursula steadied his hand with hers as she drew on the flame from his lighter. “The band is on its last number.”
    The band, a group of court officers from Kings Supreme, was the reason Foxx had vacated the restaurant.
    â€œWhat’s next on the program?” he said.
    â€œLive auction.”
    â€œHow is he holding up?”
    â€œBetter than last year. You know how he hates to be the center of attention.” Ursula took a drag, and a tiny cough clicked in her throat. “But I worry about him. All he does is sit at that computer and search for new information about that damn treasure.”
    â€œI don’t know what I’d do in his place.”
    Ursula stubbed out her cigarette, then turned to leave. Foxx grabbed her arm.
    â€œNo,” she said.
    He wanted only to tell her how much he admired her, for coming back, for sticking around, for doing what lots of people always said they would but never did. But those words did not come.
    *   *   *
    The third annual fund-raiser for Gary