Free Before I Say Good-Bye by Mary Higgins Clark Page B

it,there’ll be a laundry list of people who might have wanted to get rid of him.
    “I’m home. Does that make anybody’s heart beat faster?” The voice came from the doorway just behind him.
    Jack looked around. “I didn’t hear the door open, honey. How was the movie?”
    “Wonderful—except for being about an hour too long and totally depressing.” Nancy dropped a kiss on her husband’s cheek as she passed the couch. Petite, with short blond hair and hazel eyes, she exuded warmth and energy. She glanced at the television screen and stopped as she recognized Brennan. “What’s George up to?”
    “The boat that blew up near the Statue of Liberty is in his bailiwick, although during this interview he must have been visiting the home of one of the apparent victims, out in Queens.” The segment was over, and Jack clicked off the set. Diesel fuel doesn’t cause explosions, he thought. I’ll bet anything that if that boat was turned into confetti, it was because somebody planted a bomb on it; you can bet on that.
    “Are the boys upstairs?” Nancy asked.
    “Watching some movie in their room. I’m ready to pack it in.”
    “Me too. Will you close up?”
    “Sure.” As Jack turned off lights and checked to be certain the front and back doors were securely locked, he continued to mull over the news of the boat explosion. If indeed it was confirmed that Sam Krause was on that boat, that the explosion was no accident would have to be considered a definite possibility. It was no wonder someone would want to get rid of him beforehe was brought in for questioning. Krause knew too much—and he wasn’t the kind of guy to view a long prison sentence as an option.
    Too bad, though, that four other people had to die just to get rid of Krause; surely whoever did it could have found a more economical way to waste him, Jack thought. Whoever did it must have been hard as nails. He knew of more than a few people who fit that description.

Wednesday, June 14

seventeen
    “N ELL, I can’t tell you how sorry I am. I still can’t believe any of this—it’s just inconceivable.”
    Peter Lang was seated opposite Nell in the living room of her apartment. His face was bruised and his lip swollen. He looked genuinely shaken, and his demeanor was far different from the supremely confident persona he usually projected. Nell realized that for the first time she actually felt some empathy for this man. In the past, she always had been put off by Peter’s manner. “Cock of the walk,” as Mac scornfully called it.
    “I was so banged up that when I got home that night, I just turned off the phone and went to bed. The media called down to Florida and reached my parents. It’s damn lucky my mother or father didn’t have a heart attack. Mom couldn’t stop crying when she realized I was okay. She still doesn’t believe it. She called me four times yesterday alone.”
    “I can understand that,” Nell said, as she considered what her own reaction might have been had Adam phoned and said that he hadn’t been on the boat, that something had delayed him and he had told Sam to run the meeting without him. Suppose . . .
    But that would never have happened. There was nothing to suppose. The others wouldn’t have gone out on Adam’s boat without him, she reminded herself. Adam’s boat—named after me. Something I never even wanted to set foot on that he named after me—and it became his casket, Nell thought.
    No, not his casket! Sunday they had found body parts that had been positively identified as being Jimmy Ryan’s. As of now, only he would have a funeral with a casket. The odds of finding and identifying any more bodies, or parts, were almost negligible. Adam, Sam Krause and Winifred must have been blown to bits or incinerated. Whatever pieces of them still existed probably had by now been swept by the strong tides past the Verrazano Bridge and out into the Atlantic.
    “Not incinerated; cremated, or buried at sea. Try to