HEARTBREAKER Read Online Free PDF Page A

the question. “It’s been a long while, Agent. Apparently you’re going through a dry spell.”
    Nick laughed. “Is that right?”
    “One of these days you’ll meet the right woman, heaven help her.”
    “I’m not looking for the right woman.”
    Morganstern smiled a fatherly smile. “And that, you see, is exactly when you’ll find her. You won’t be looking, and she’ll blindside you, just like my Katie blindsided me. I never had a chance, and I predict you won’t either. She’s out there somewhere, just waiting for you.”
    “Then she’s going to have a hell of a long wait,” he replied. “In our line of work, marriage isn’t in the equation.”
    “Katie and I have managed for over twenty years.”
    “Katie’s a saint.”
    “You didn’t answer my question, Nick. Do you?”
    “Get sick every time I get on a plane? Hell, yes.”
    Morganstern chuckled. “Good luck getting home then.”
    “You know, Pete, most psychiatrists would try to get to the bottom of my phobia, but you get a kick out of it, don’t you?”
    He laughed again. “See you in a month,” he repeated as he strolled out of the office.
    Nick gathered up his files, made a couple of necessary calls to his Boston office and to Frank O’Leary at Quantico, and then hitched a ride to the airport with one of the local agents. Since there was no getting out of his forced vacation, he made some tentative plans. He really was going to try to kick back and relax, maybe go sailing with his oldest brother, Theo, if he could pry him away from his job for a couple of days, and then he was going to drive halfway across the country to Holy Oaks, Iowa, to see his best friend, Tommy, and get some serious fishing done. Morganstern hadn’t mentioned the promotion O’Leary had dropped on the table two weeks ago. While he was on vacation Nick planned to weigh the pros and cons of the new job. He was counting on Tommy for help with the decision. He was closer to him than he was to his own five brothers, and he trusted him implicitly. His friend would play his usual role of devil’s advocate, and hopefully by the time Nick returned to his job, he would know what he was going to do.
    He knew Tommy was worried about him. He’d been nagging him by E-mail for the past six months to come and see him. Like Morganstern, Tommy understood the stresses and the nightmares of Nick’s work, and he also believed that Nick needed time away.
    Tommy had his own battle to fight, and every three months when he checked into the Kansas Medical Center for tests, it was Nick who got the queasy feeling in the pit of his stomach that stayed there until Tommy E-mailed him with good news. So far, his friend had been lucky; the cancer had been contained. But it was always there, hovering, waiting to strike. Tommy had learned to deal with his illness. Nick hadn’t. If he could take the pain and suffering away from his friend, he would willingly give his right arm, but that wasn’t how it worked. As Tommy had said, this was a war he had to wage alone, and all Nick could do was be there for him when he needed him.
    Nick was suddenly anxious to see his friend again. He might even be able to talk him into taking off his priest collar for one night and getting roaring drunk with him the way they used to when they roomed together at Penn State.
    And he would finally get to meet Tommy’s only family, his baby sister, Laurant. She was eight years younger than her brother and had grown up with the nuns in a boarding school for wealthy young girls in the mountains near Geneva. Tommy had tried several times to bring her to America, but the conditions of the trust and the lawyers guarding the money convinced the judges to keep her sequestered until she was of age to make decisions for herself. Tommy had told Nick that it wasn’t as grim as it sounded and that by following the letter of the trust, the lawyers were, in fact, protecting the estate.
    Laurant had been of age for some time now