Roses Are Red

"Ahh, the good life," Betsey said. "Moon over Miami and all that neat stuff."

"He only had to kill about a dozen people to get his place in the sun," I said.

Francis's cell phone rang around midnight. We listened to the call from the surveillance van. The call definitely got our attention. Betsey and I exchanged glances.

The caller sounded nervous. "Bernie, they're all over this place again. They're looking at staff now. They '

Francis cut in," It's late. I'll call you in the morning. ," '," ," call you. Don't call me here. I've told you that. Please, don't do it again."

Dr. Francis hung up angrily. He drained the rest of his brandy.

Betsey elbowed me. She was smiling for the first time since we'd been watching Francis. "Alex, you recognize the voice on the other end?" she asked.

I sure did. "The lovely and talented Kathleen McGuigan. Nurse McGuigan is part of this. It's all starting to come together, isn't it?"

Chapter One Hundred and Seventeen

It was really easy to loathe Dr. Bernard Francis. He was human scum, the worst of the worst, a killer who liked to make his victims suffer. It made the late-night-surveillance job easier, almost bearable. So did the idea that Francis was the Mastermind, and that we were close to nailing him to the walls of his pink stucco, Mediterranean-style condo.

Kathleen McGuigan didn't try to call Francis back that night. And he didn't call her. Around one o'clock, he went inside to bed and turned on his alarm system.

"Sweet dreams, you bastard, "Betsey said as the house lights went off.

"We know where he lives. We know he did it if not exactly how. But we can't bring him down?" one of the agents complained once Francis had turned in for the night.

"Patience, patience,” I said. "We just got here. We'll get Dr. Francis. We just want to watch him a little longer. We need to be absolutely sure this time. And, we want the money he stole."

Betsey and I finally left the surveillance van around two in the morning. We took one of the Bureau's sedans. She drove off Singer Island. Everyone else was staying at a Holiday I

"Is this okay?" she asked once we were on the interstate. She looked more vulnerable than I was used to seeing her. "There's a Hyatt Regency a few exits north."

"I like being with you, Betsey. Right from the first time we met," I told her.

"Yeah. I can tell, Alex. But not enough, huh?"

I looked over at her. I liked Betsey even more when she was a little unsure of herself. "You want candor and honesty at two-fifteen in the morning?" I joked.

"Absolutely, relentlessly."

"I know this is a little crazy, but '

She finally smiled. "I can handle crazy."

"I don't know exactly what's going on in my life right now. I'm floating with the tide a little bit. This isn't like me. Maybe that's a good thing."

"You're also still trying to get over Christine," she said. "I think you're doing it the right way. You're being brave."

"Or very foolish," I said and smiled.

"Probably a little of both. But proactive. You're untroubled and simple on the surface in a good way. But you're complex in a good way. You're probably thinking, I could say the same about you."

"Not really. Actually, I was thinking that I'm lucky to have met you."

"This doesn't have to go anywhere special, Alex. It's already special to me," she said. Her eyes were so beautiful, incandescent. "Anyway, will you come home with me tonight? Home away from home. My humble room at the Hyatt?"

"I'd love to, more than anything."

When we parked outside the hotel entrance, Betsey leaned in close and kissed me. I pulled her against my chest and held her tight. We stayed like that for a couple of minutes.

'I'm going to miss you so much," she whispered.

Chapter One Hundred and Eighteen

The rest of the night flew by and I think both of us hated to see it go. I kept thinking about what Betsey had said that she was going to miss me. She and I were back inside the FBI surveillance van by nine the following morning. The van already smelled badly. Dry ice sat in twin buckets in the corner, throwing off a vapor and making the cramped space almost livable.

"What's happening, gentlemen?" she asked the agents crowded into the van. "Did I miss any fun? Is the Masterprick up yet?"

We were told that Francis was up, and that he hadn't called Kathleen McGuigan yet. I had an idea and made a suggestion. Betsey liked it a lot. We called Kyle Craig and got him at home. Kyle liked the idea too.

Agents in Arlington, Virginia, arrested Nurse McGuigan at a little past ten that morning. She was questioned, and denied knowing anything about a relationship between Dr. Bernard Francis and Frederic Szabo. She also denied any involvement in the scheme herself. She said that the allegations against her were ridiculous. She hadn't called Francis the night before and we were welcome to check her phone records.

Agents, meanwhile, were searching McGuigan's house and yard. Around noon, they found one of the diamonds from the Metro-Hartford job. McGuigan panicked and she changed her story. She told the FBI what she knew about Dr. Francis, Frederic Szabo, and the robbery-murders.

"Yes, yes, yes, yes, "Betsey Cavalierre said and jumped around the back of the surveillance van when she heard the news. She bumped her head on the van roof. "That hurts. I don't care. We've got him! Dr. Francis is going down."

At a little past two that afternoon, she and I walked across the manicured front lawn and up the brick stairway into Francis's building. My heart was thudding in my chest. This was it. It had to be. We took the elevator up to the fifth floor the penthouse, the Mastermind's lair.

"We've earned the right to do this," I told her.

"I can't wait to see his face," Betsey said as she rang the bell. "Cold-blooded piece of shit. Ding-dong, guess who's at the front door? This is for Walsh and Doud."

"And the little Buccieri boy all the others he had killed."

Dr. Francis answered the door. He was tan, dressed in Florida Gators sweatpants, a Miami Dolphins T-shirt, no socks or shoes. He didn't look like a cold-blooded and heartless monster. So often, they don't.

Betsey identified who we were. She then told Dr. Francis we were part of the team investigating the Metro Hartford kidnapping and several bank robberies back East.