Free The Tenderness of Thieves by Donna Freitas Page A

him, there was no one there at all. I stared at the corner awhile, willing him to reappear as if I might have that power, to no avail. Then I was left to heft open the door a second time, back at square one, trying to make myself go inside. I was saved the trouble by Michaela’s father, who appeared before me as if he’d somehow known I was here. Maybe he had. Maybe he’d seen me through one of those big windows.
    “Jane, let me get that for you,” he said, opening the door the rest of the way easily. He filled the entryway. Wide and tall and strong. A man who ate a lot of pasta at home that his Italian wife cooked.
    “Hi, Officer Connolly.”
    “Thanks for coming down,” he said. “Michaela told me you would, and I’m grateful. Follow me.” He started down the narrow hallway that would take us past the front desk and the big, open office where my father’s former colleagues would be sitting, cups of coffee clutched in their hands, brown paper lunch bags decorating their in-boxes like cake toppers, sitting on top of tall stacks of files that will never get inputted into a computer because the police here worked the old-fashioned way. Michaela’s dad was halfway to his office before I took my first step across the cheap tiled floor, grayed with age and years of scuff marks. He reached his door and realized I hadn’t made it very far. “Come on, Jane,” he called to me. “You don’t have to stay very long. I’m gonna take care of you, okay?”
    “Okay,” I said when I’d caught up to him. “Okay,” I said a second time, more to myself than to Officer Connolly.
    My mind was on my dad.
    I could see him so clearly, standing near the coffee machine, laughing with the other police. He was like a ghost within these walls, haunting me.
    Once again, Officer Connolly held the door so I could pass through to his office, and I did.
    He sat down in his big metal chair with the cracked red pleather upholstery, eyeing me, waiting for me to talk. He rolled it around his desk so we would be on the same side, the wheels squeaking and creaking in protest. His office was tiny and cluttered, too small for a man of his size and stature, his desk pushed against the left wall and littered with papers and pens and carbon copy forms that most places stopped using twenty years ago. The tall plastic shelves that went from floor to ceiling along the right wall were no different. Except for a few filing boxes, they were piled with paper that didn’t seem organized in any particular way, giving me the urge to start fixing up the place.
    Just like I used to for my father.
    I pulled my eyes away from the mess.
    His chair squeaked as he leaned forward. The freckles of youth had faded into tired lines on his face. “Can I get you anything? Water? A Coke?”
    “No, I’m okay,” I said, but I wasn’t. Michaela got her mother’s genes, except for her nose—she had her father’s nose. I could see it on him now. I had my father’s mouth. Could Officer Connolly see it on me, too?
    He took a sip of his coffee. The big mug in his hand was white with black lettering that said SUPPORT YOUR L OCAL POLICE . He leaned backward, and the chair shrieked in protest from the shift in weight. “Jane,” he began. “As I’m sure you know, we haven’t had any more breaks in this case.”
    I nodded. My eyes darted to the wall above his desk, where he had a series of tiny, framed pictures of Michaela. Her formal school photos going back to what looked to be second grade. One of her in a swan ballerina outfit.
    “Jane?”
    I forced myself to look at him. “Sorry.”
    “We’re sure the previous robberies are related to the one at the O’Connors’, even though things happened differently there. The only difference was—”
    “Me,” I finished for him.
    He let out a big breath, like he’d been holding it. “That’s correct.” His badge glinted in the harsh fluorescent light. “It’s well known that when someone experiences a trauma, it