Deadly Decisions Read Online Free PDF Page B

living room. I chose CDs I hoped would cheer me, and placed them in the player. Then I tried reading. Birdie joined me again.
    No good. Same loop. Pat Conroy might as well have been printed in Nahuatl.
    I’d seen Ryan’s image on the screen, hands cuffed behind his back, uniformed cops on either side. I’d watched them angle his head forward as he bent to slide into the cruiser’s backseat. Still, my mind wouldn’t accept it.
    Andrew Ryan was selling drugs?
    How could I have been so wrong about him? Had Ryan been dealing the whole time I’d known him? Was there a side to the man that I’d never seen? Or was it all a terrible mistake?
    It had to be a mistake.
    The spaghetti cooled on the table. I had no stomach for food. I had no ear for music. Big Bad Voodoo Daddy and the Johnny Favourite band played swing that could make a gulag get up and dance, but it did nothing to brighten my mood.
    The rain fell steadily now, drumming the windows with a soft ticking sound. My Carolina spring seemed very far away.
    I twirled a forkful of pasta, but the smell made something in my stomach recoil.
    Andrew Ryan was a criminal.
    Emily Anne Toussaint was dead.
    My daughter was somewhere on the Indian Ocean.
    I often phone Katy when I’m feeling down, but for the past few months that had been difficult. She was spending her spring onSemester at Sea, circling the world aboard the S.S. Universe Explorer. The ship wouldn’t return for another five weeks.
    I took a glass of milk to my bedroom and cracked the window and stared out, thoughts swirling like five o’clock traffic.
    The trees and bushes looked like black shadows through the dark glistening mist. Beyond them I could see headlights and the shimmer of neon from the corner dépanneur. Now and then cars swooshed by, or pedestrians hurried past, their heels clicking on the wet sidewalk.
    So routine. So normal. Just another rainy night in April.
    I let the curtain fall back and crossed to my bed, doubting my world would return to normal for a very long time.
     
    •    •    •
     
    I spent the next day in constant activity. Unpacking. Cleaning. Shopping for food. I avoided radio and television, glanced only briefly at the paper.
    The Gazette featured the Toussaint murder: SCHOOLGIRL KILLED IN BLOODY SHOOT-OUT. Beside the headline was a blowup of Emily Anne’s fourth-grade photo. Her hair was braided and bowed at both ends with large pink ribbons. Her smile showed gaps that adult dentition would never have the chance to fill.
    The picture of Emily Anne’s mother was equally heartbreaking. The camera had caught a slim black woman with her head thrown back, mouth wide, lips curled inward in a cry of agony. Mrs. Toussaint’s knees were buckled, her hands clasped below her chin, and on either side, a large black woman supported her. Unspeakable grief screamed from the grainy image.
    The story gave few details. Emily Anne had two younger sisters, Cynthia Louise, age six, and Hannah Rose, age four. Mrs. Toussaint worked in a bakery. Mr. Toussaint had died in an industrial accident three years earlier. Born in Barbados, the couple had immigrated to Montreal, seeking a better life for their daughters.
    A funeral Mass would be celebrated Thursday at 8 A.M. at Our Lady of the Angels Catholic Church, followed by burial at the Notre-Dame-des-Neiges Cemetery.
    I refused to read or listen to reports about Ryan. I wanted tohear from him. All morning I left messages on his machine, but got no response. Ryan’s partner, Jean Bertrand, had also gone incommunicado. I could think of nothing else to do. I was certain no one at the CUM or SQ would talk about the situation, and I knew none of Ryan’s family or friends.
    After a trip to the gym, I cooked a dinner of chicken breasts with prune sauce, glazed carrots with mushrooms, and saffron rice. My feline companion would no doubt have preferred fish.
     
    •    •    •
     
    Monday morning I rose early, drove to the lab, and went