“You know I don’t smoke.”
“Just do a little heroin?”
“I don’t know what you think you know,” David said, “but you’re wrong.”
“I know who you really are. I was with you when the EMTs arrived,” she said. “When they asked for your name, you told them you were Sal Cupertine. You asked them to call your wife, Jennifer. You told them your father was dead, that your mother, Arlene, lived in Arizona, and that you have a son named William. You gave them a home address and a phone number in Chicago.” Rachel exhaled a plume of smoke. Stopped and picked a fleck of tobacco from her teeth, looked at it on her pinky, wiped it on her hip. “Everything else I wanted to know is practically public record at this point. You’ve had quite the life, Mr. Cuperti—” David put his hand up between them.
“Rachel,” he said, quietly, “I am not your husband. I am the man who does what your husband won’t. So I’d urge you to choose your next words very carefully. They may be your last.”
Rachel Savone’s eyes were saucers, but she said, “You don’t scare me.”
“Good. Now. Tell me exactly what happened with the EMTs.”
David removed his hand.
“Jesus Christ, Rabbi, I covered for you! I told them you were speaking madness,” Rachel said. “That’s how I knew you were seriously injured. I don’t think they wrote anything down. They were too busy making sure you didn’t choke to death on your own blood. They were asking basic questions to keep you alert. It wasn’t to snitch you out to the FBI. The next thing they did was intubate you.”
“Are you sure?”
“David,” Rachel said, “are you in prison right now?”
“How do I know you’re not wired?”
“How do I know you’re not wired?” She took another drag on her cigarette, let out another huge plume of smoke, watched it disappear. “I have much more to lose than you.”
“You shouldn’t have come here today,” David said. “You should get in your car and drive away. Leave the country if you can. Take your children and go.”
“I know,” Rachel said. “Now you have to kill me and everyone who has ever loved me. I get it.” She took one of the burner phones from her purse and gave it to him. “I’ve been preparing for that eventuality. The only person who has this phone number is me. It rings, it’s me. I’ve programmed my number into it. You need me, you just hit star 1. But if I call, it’s not to talk about the weather, so please answer, okay?”
“Why do I need this?”
“Because I’m going to help you get out of here, Rabbi,” she said. “And you’re going to help me get out of here, too.” She stopped, the two of them in front of the funeral home and across the street from Temple Beth Israel. She reached over and adjusted David’s tie, swept lint from his coat. “Now, there’s about a hundred of your flock waiting inside the Temple, to surprise you. I heard talk of a clown making balloon art. There’s cookies and punch and everyone has brought you a dish, so be grateful and kind and accept every single kugel and brisket and trough of chicken noodle soup as the perfect kindness it is, understand? Because your congregants missed Rabbi David Cohen a great deal. To them, you are the very light of Hashem, and in your absence, Temple Beth Israel has been a very dark place. Do you understand, Rabbi?”
David didn’t answer, just started to make his way across the street, but then he stopped, looked back at Rachel standing on the sidewalk, watching him.
“Do you know where my wife is?”
“No,” Rachel said. “I’m sorry.”
A catering truck from the Bagel Café pulled up to the Temple. “Who’s paying for this?” David asked.
“My husband,” Rachel said. “Indirectly.” She pointed at his eyes. “They’re back. From the old photos I’ve seen. You don’t look so dead inside now.”
“Good,” David said. “Maybe my mother will recognize me.”
“I’ve only known David Cohen,” she said. “You still look enough like him. Half of Summerlin has had work done by the same plastic surgeon, so they’ll just recognize themselves.”
“I show up in Chicago unannounced. Stand on Michigan Avenue. What happens?”
“You’re a dead man,” Rachel said.
David nodded. Melanie Moss was standing beside Rachel, pointing at him. He was losing his fucking mind.
“What if I don’t help you?” David said.
“You will,” she said. “You’re a good man, somewhere.”
“I’m not,” David said. “If we were alone, you’d already be dead.”
“That’s your learned nature,” Rachel said. “But it’s not who you want to be. I know that now.”
There was an eruption of music from the Temple. Neil Diamond’s “Sweet Caroline.” It was going to be that kind of party.
“You shouldn’t have told me,” David said.
“I know,” Rachel said, “but I couldn’t have you gutting a bunch of children.”
“I meant the other thing,” David said.
“So did I,” Rachel said. She put out her cigarette, joined David in the middle of the street, put her arm through his again, walked him across the street to the Temple. “Light of Hashem,” she whispered into his ear, “Sal Cupertine, that’s you.”
SEVEN
MONDAY, APRIL 15, 2002
LAS VEGAS, NV
THAT NIGHT, AFTER OFFICER KIRALY DROPPED HIM OFF AT HOME, RABBI DAVID Cohen spent an hour working the tactical dummy, snapping jabs, sharp overhand rights, lefts to the kidneys, then worked his forearm mashes, did fifteen minutes of elbow strikes, pinpointing his elbow right between the dummy’s eyes each time. Next, he slipped on his father’s brass knuckles and pounded his palms, both sides getting ten punches, to toughen up his skin, the old scar tissue giving way a little with each concussion. By the time he was done, he was covered in a sheen of sweat and his knuckles were torn open and bleeding. He showered, pulled on a hooded sweatshirt, black sweatpants, and black tennis shoes, a nine on both ankles, hopped his back wall, and jogged the three miles to the shopping center on the corner of Sahara and Fort Apache, his wind for shit. Before the hospital, he could run ten miles on a summer day.
