Desperate Measures (21 page)

Pete wrote steadily, his own brand of shorthand. He thanked his friend. He made calls right up till nine o'clock, when he called a detective named Jakes and made an appointment to meet with him at a deli on First Avenue. His next call was to Annie.

“I need a favor, Annie, a big one. I'm almost afraid to ask you, but here goes: Can you possibly take a leave of absence and come to New York and operate Fairy Tales? I'll make it worth your while, and if they fire you, I'll get you a job paying three times as much as you're making, or you can work for me. I need your answer now, Annie.”

“You got it. I'll be there early this evening.”

“Annie, I don't know how I can ever repay you. I swear, I'll make it up to you.”

“We're friends, Pete. You'd do it for me, wouldn't you?”

“Hell yes.”

“Any news?”

“I'm working on it. I filed two Missing Persons reports last night. I'm hiring a private dick. I'm doing everything I can think of. If you have any ideas, I'd like to hear them.”

“It almost sounds like ... like they were . . . this is going to sound silly, but it sounds like they were spirited away by someone.”

“I'm beginning to think the same thing. I'll see you this evening.”

Jesus, what a friend, he thought after hanging up.

Pete's next call was to his uncle Leo. Unlike all his hardworking lawyer friends, Leo didn't arrive at his office until ten-thirty or so. Pete called the house and was told Leo had an early morning breakfast appointment and would be in the office by ten. Pete was sitting in the waiting room when Leo entered through the huge plate-glass doors.

He looks slick, Pete thought. He felt the urge to finger the material of his uncle's suit. He was blow-drying his hair these days. He'd never noticed before. He also had clear polish on his nails, a manicure. The tie alone cost at least three hundred dollars, but his shoes looked scruffy and unshined. The shoes and the plastic briefcase were so at odds with the rest of Leo's look that Pete winced. Hell, everyone had quirks. He had a few himself.

Leo Sorenson's office was plush. There was no leather anywhere to be seen, not even on the priceless books stacked neatly on the shelf, all cloth-bound. The furniture was deep and comfortable, covered in a rich, textured, nubby material that caressed one's fingertips. The carpet was thick and deep, covering the tips of his shoes and somehow working upward to meet the drapes in a continual flow of eye color. Maddie would call it a symphony of color, but only because of the slashes of brilliant paint on the walls that were framed in stark aluminum. Now, the early morning sun turned the greenery into long-leafed emeralds. Directly in Leo's line of vision, if he was sitting at his desk, was a medium-size fish tank with tropical fish of every color.

If I were a client, Pete thought, as he sat down across from his uncle, this room would intimidate the hell out of me. And it would make me want to put a rubber band around my checkbook.

Leo settled himself in his padded, woolly chair. “To what do I owe this unexpected visit?” he asked carefully, not liking the look on his nephew's face.

“I need . . . a favor. If you don't like the word ‘favor,' help is what I need,” Pete said quietly.

“Correct me if I'm wrong, Peter, but I believe this is the first time you've ever come to me for . . . help. I've often wondered why you kept yourself so distant from me. I never pried into your affairs. I guess the time is passed when . . . we should have discussed your grudges, if you had any. As you know, I never had a child, didn't know the first thing about raising a boy. If I made mistakes, you didn't say anything.... Why are you here, Peter?”

He's nervous, Pete thought. He doesn't like me any more than I like him. Somewhere along the way, after those first years, their true attitudes toward each other had come out. Now, instead of answering his uncle's question, Pete asked one of his own: “Why don't you like me? Is it because I look like my father? I know you two didn't get along. I still have the surfboard,” he blurted. He felt childish, suddenly out of his depth.

“I know. I hope you get to use it someday.”

“Don't worry, I will.” He cleared his throat. “I know you have contacts all over this city, all over the world. I need you to ... what I would like to ask you is, will you help me find Maddie?”

“I can try, Peter. I only work half days in the summer. Will tomorrow be soon enough?”

“Can't you make some calls today? You're a personal friend of Morgenthau, aren't you?”

“Yes,” Leo said carefully.

“I filed Missing Persons reports for Maddie and her friend Janice. The detective I spoke with gave me the impression he wasn't going to bust his ass to go out there and scour the city. I was supposed to get married yesterday. Ask Morgenthau if he can come down on the detective, his name is Nester, and get some push behind him.”

“And I could come out of this looking like a fool if it turns out your girlfriend took off and left you high and dry. I don't like to be made a fool of, Peter.”

“She didn't leave me high and dry. She just opened a million-dollar business. Why would anyone in their right mind go off and leave that behind? You just don't close the doors and walk away from something like that. She would have left me a note. Maddie is an upfront person. I have this feeling she's been spirited away. Abducted is not out of the question here. She's goddamn gone, and I want her back, her friend too. The cat's gone too.”

“She called my office,” Leo said, “left her home phone number, and when I tried to return her call, the operator said her phone was disconnected. I was out of town for a few days when the message came in. She called a second time at my home, but I was out for the evening. She left the hotel number, but when I called it, the operator said no one was registered by that name.”

Leo rummaged in his desk drawer until he came up with a wad of pink message slips. He licked at his index finger as he flipped through the slips. “See, here it is!” He handed the slip over to Pete, who looked at it, with concern. “And here's my telephone log. See, I returned her call and made a notation that the phone was out of order.”

“So she was trying to get in touch with me through you. Now I'm more convinced than ever that something happened to her.”

“You might be right, Peter,” Leo said thoughtfully. “I'll call Robert this morning. I'm sorry about your wedding.” Pete nodded, his mouth a grim, tight line. “Is there anything else, Peter?”

“No. I assume you were satisfied with the deal I put through.”

“More than satisfied.”

“Then you'll understand if I put any future business on hold for a while. I need to devote all my time to finding Maddie, and I can't do that with business hanging over my head. Besides, I'm burned out. I need a break.”

“You take breaks and rest on your laurels when you're sixty-five, not when you're in the prime of your career. Business is business, Peter. A week off, but you're on call. The Midwest deal is heating up. You're needed. We've been working on this deal for three years. With your expertise, we might ace out the Japanese. You do have a contract, Peter.”

“It has four months to run and then I'm out. It's time I learned how to use that surfboard. Don't push me on this, Leo. I've given you my blood and sweat for the past seven years. I've made you so much money, you'll never be able to spend it even if you live to be a hundred. Jesus, I don't ever want to have to come into an office on Saturday and Sunday. I'm sick and tired of ninety-hour weeks. Half the time I forget what day it is or what city I'm in. I make lists. Lists, Leo. I can't function without lists. What the hell kind of life is that?”

“A life with lists that gives you a very nice living,” Leo replied, chuckling.

It was a nasty little apartment off A1A in Fort Lauder
dale, Florida. The ancient kitchen was loaded with roaches. The walls were a dingy eggshell color, the floor covered with cracked linoleum. The padding on the kitchen chairs was ripped and held together with gray electrical tape. Bits of dry egg yolk and purple jelly decorated the aluminum ridge around the Formica table. The one window was so grimy, Maddie had to wipe a circle with a wad of toilet tissue to see through it.

Days earlier she'd refused to eat anything that came out of the filthy, ugly refrigerator that was painted pink. At one time it had been blue, and another time a dingy beige. She'd amused herself one day by picking at the peeling paint. That and counting the roaches was her entertainment.

The tiny living room and even smaller bedroom were horrors she didn't want to think about. She'd demanded the marshal guarding her go down to the strip to bring back oversize beach towels because she refused to sit on the furniture, since it smelled of dry urine and decayed food. She absolutely refused to sleep in the sagging bed, with its thin mattress and ugly spread the color of charcoal. The tattered edge gave testimony to the fact that the spread was once a grayish-pink floral pattern. It too smelled of something Maddie couldn't identify until the marshal said it was a marijuana sex smell. She'd bolted from the bedroom, to the marshal's amusement.

She was nervous now, irritable with the lack of sleep and decent food. She felt dirty and knew she smelled, but there was no way she was going to use the filthy tub, which seemed to be growing some kind of fungus.

“Whoever owns this place should be put in jail,” Maddie muttered. “I've been here eight days. You said it was only going to be a matter of hours. When are we leaving here?”

“When we're told it's safe to leave. We've been through this a hundred times, Miss Stern.”

“It must be a hundred and ten degrees in this place. Look at my hair, it's frizzing up, and we're inside. I want to move to a decent place. I don't want to stay here. I want a bath in a clean tub. Is that too damn much to ask? You people didn't tell me it was going to be like this. You said hours, not days. I want out of here. You said I would be given my new identity and taken away within hours. Do you hear me? Listen to me, I'm talking to you,” Maddie shrilled.

“Miss Stern, I don't make the rules, I just obey them. You signed on, now you have to live with it. I'm sure it isn't going to be much longer.”

“That's what you said yesterday and the day before that and the day before that. I
demand
you take me out of this ... this fleabag. Oh God, there's a cockroach crawling up my leg. I want out of here,” she said, swatting at the roach. “If you don't get me out of here, I swear to God I'll ... I'll throw one of those kitchen chairs through that damn dirty window. Are you listening? You aren't keeping your promise. You said a few hours. It's now close to a hundred hours. I won't stand for it! You better listen to me,” Maddie said, hysteria creeping into her voice. “You have no right to take me out of my environment and put me in this . . . this hellhole. You call somebody, and you call them
now
!”

“It won't do any good, Miss Stern. This is all a process, and you can't hurry up this process. You have to be patient. Now, why don't you sit down and watch television.”

Maddie paced, wringing her hands, her eyes taking on a wild look. “Married people spend less time together than we do. Explain that to me.” She didn't like the way she sounded, didn't like the edge creeping into her voice. “I feel like killing you and walking out of here,” she blurted.

The marshal snorted, but his hands moved upward to touch his shoulder holster. Maddie saw the slight hand movement. Her shoulders slumped. She walked back to the kitchen to stare out of the window.

It was all going wrong. Nothing was the way Nester said it would be. Janny, if she wasn't in the same predicament, was probably following the plan they'd made and placing her ads in the paper and wondering why there were no ads from her. And Pete, where was Pete? What was he thinking, feeling? Did Adam Wagoner keep his promise to tell him where she was? There should have been word by now. Nothing was working out. She might as well be dead. Maddie Stern
was
dead. She tried to square her shoulders but failed miserably. She didn't even have a name anymore. If right now, this minute, she walked out onto the street and tried to buy something, she couldn't. Unless she had cash in her hand. She couldn't rent a car or drive it. Her birth certificate was gone. Maddie Stern didn't exist. Tears dripped down her cheeks.

Maddie stomped her way back to the living room. “You people are not keeping your end of the bargain. I did everything . . . gave up everything. I deserve better, and I damn well demand better. I don't believe anything you say. I'm leaving here, and don't try to stop me. Everything was a lie to get us to agree to go into this damn program.”

The marshal stood up. Would he dare attack her? Maddie wondered. A surge of adrenaline rushed through her. She eyed the grimy door with its peeling layers of paint. She was in shape, but then so was the marshal. The two locks might give her a bit of trouble and she could lose seconds. She had to get out of this place, that's all there was to it.

“I can't let you do that,” the marshal said, not liking the wild look in her eye. “Look, I'll make a call, sit down and let's discuss this.”

“It's too late to discuss this. We've been discussing for eight days. I can't stand it. I don't care. You people lie, you don't keep your word. I don't owe you anything. If you try and stop me, I'm going to scream my head off.”

The annoyance and frustration building over the past eight days erupted into anger so hot and scorching, Maddie felt light-headed. She started to mutter and curse under her breath as her pacing became frenzied, her sneaker-clad feet making slapping, shuffling sounds on the imitation wood floor.

She was in the kitchen doorway, her eyes on the round circle she'd cleaned with the toilet tissue that afforded her a view of traffic on A1A. The corroded toaster with its frayed cord and damaged plug drew her to the table. “Watch this, Marshal,” Maddie said, picking up the toaster and heaving it toward the clean circle on the dirty window. She laughed when it smashed the glass and sailed through the window. She was smoking now, her smoldering anger no longer subdued as she looked around for something else to heave through the broken window. “What do you think of that Mr. Marshal?”

He bolted forward and wrestled with her, trying to pull her out of the filthy kitchen. “I think you might have hurt someone is what I think,” he said as he struggled with her. “The police are going to be here pretty soon. Calm down.”

“I told you to take your hands off me!” she shouted, and he backed off as she straightened and glared at him. “There was so goddamn much testosterone from the feds that day, I could goddamn well
smell
it! And this is the fucking result. Get out of my way, Marshal, before I do something we're both going to regret!”

“Miss Stern—”

“Stop calling me Miss Stern. I'm not Miss Stern anymore. You people took away my name. You didn't give me a new name. You promised me, you damn well promised me a new name in twenty-four hours. Did you give it to me? No, you did not. You're liars. My fiance should be back by now, why hasn't someone brought him to me? Adam Wagoner gave me his word. All you people do is lie to me.”

The marshal backed away from Maddie, a look of stunned surprise on his face.

“Gave you his word about what?” the marshal asked.

“He promised he would allow Pete to get in touch with me. Like all your promises, it hasn't materialized, has it?”

“Didn't anyone tell you about Wagoner?” the marshal demanded, a stupid look on his face.

“Tell me what?” Maddie snarled.

“He had a stroke and isn't expected to live. I thought you knew. That's part of the reason you're here. Things got screwed up. Right now we're all in a holding pattern.”

“Maybe you are, but I'm not. Get out of my way. If you people are so damn inefficient, you don't have any business trying to protect me. Who in the damn hell is minding the store? Am I stuck here until Mr. Wagoner dies and they appoint a successor?”

“Look, sit down and I'll make a call. I can't let you leave here.”

Rage, unlike anything Maddie ever experienced, ripped through her. She lashed out, kicking, screaming, and shrieking at the top of her lungs. The television on its rickety stand fell to the floor, the legs of the spindly table shooting off in the opposite direction. Maddie scrambled for one of them. She waved it menacingly as she danced around the ugly, smelly chair she'd been forced to sit in for days.

“This makes it a little more even now, doesn't it?” she said, waving the table leg wildly. It occurred to her at that moment to wonder why no one called or knocked on the door to see what all the ruckus was about. She realized it was the kind of place no one would investigate unless gunshots were heard or blood oozed from under the door.

The gun was in the marshal's hand, his voice quiet and placating when he said, “I want you to sit down, and I'm going to call my chief. Will you do that?”

“No,” Maddie spat. “Call standing up. Do it now!” She swung the table leg, missing the gun in the marshal's hand by an inch. She stalked him in a crouch, her eyes murderous. She could see the worry in his eyes. “You aren't going to shoot me, so don't pretend you are. You people
need
me. You're supposed to be sucking up, doing what I want so I'll do what you want, but it isn't working that way. You have some major sucking up to do, Marshal, you and all those guys from the Big Apple, Justice, and the FBI.”

Maddie's rage, which had begun to abate, rivered through her again. “Go ahead, make that call and be quick about it.” She knew she was out of control and was going to do something terrible if her situation wasn't remedied immediately. She started to cry, her shoulders shaking, as the marshal made the call. Her grip on the table leg never wavered.

She started to scream again. “Tell that jackass you're talking to that it's at least a hundred and ten degrees in this cruddy room. I will not eat out of a paper bag again or drink out of a plastic cup. I want a bath and I want you out of my life. Get someone here or I swear to God, I'll break this leg over your head and then I'm going to get one of those
dull
knives in the filthy kitchen and slice off your balls! That gun doesn't scare me!” she shrilled.

Her tirade, she realized, had prevented her from hearing what the marshal was saying to the person on the other end of the phone. She whacked the cigarette-scarred end table with the table leg. The grimy lamp with its pleated shade teetered and then fell to the floor. The electrical outlet sparked as a puff of gray smoke eddied out to the center of the tiny room.

“Fire!” Maddie shrieked as she ran to the door. The marshal dropped the phone, stuck out his leg to trip her, and still somehow managed to rip the lamp cord from the wall socket. Maddie stumbled and went down to her knees, her hand still clutching the table leg. She tried to roll out of the way, but the marshal was too fast for her. She saw his arm snake out, knew he was going to hit her. She tried again to roll, but the marshal's chair prevented free movement. She took the blow high over her left ear and appeared to black out.

“I hit her! Jesus Christ, I hit a woman,” the marshal said into the mouthpiece. “You didn't say anything about hitting a woman.” Sweat dripped from his face. “Now what?” he demanded. He listened, his face screwing up in disgust. “Since when do we treat witnesses like this? This woman is on the verge of a nervous breakdown, and no one told her about Wagoner. That's not right. She has a right to expect everything we promised. I don't like this, Bennett.” He listened again. “I will not tie her up. I don't want a lawsuit. She's pissed, I can tell you that. I would be too if I was in her place. She's a goddamn human being. You want to sedate her, you come here and do it. The book doesn't say anything about tying people up and sedating them. I'll fucking quit before I do that!”

Maddie groaned, rolled over and puked on the floor. She tried to sit up, but fell backward. She tried shaking her head to clear her vision.

“Call me back,” the marshal said. “Jesus, Miss Stern, I'm sorry. I'm really sorry.”

“I told you, I'm not Miss Stern. You gave me a concussion. I belong in a hospital,” Maddie whimpered as her stomach heaved a second time.

“I didn't hit you that hard. Look, I panicked, and I'm sorry. Let me help you. You need to change your clothes, you vomited all over them.”

“It's all your fault. What did they say?”

“They're going to call me back.”

“When?”

“Any minute now.”

Maddie snorted to show what she thought of his response. “Get your hands off of me,” she said as she wobbled to the bathroom.

The water from the tap repulsed her. The cold water ran warm and was light brown in color. It seemed to match the rust stains in the sink. She used almost a whole roll of toilet paper drying her face, neck, and hands. She tossed her T-shirt in the scummy bathtub and pulled a clean, wrinkled one from her bag.

Trembling, she sat down on the edge of the bathtub to sort out her thoughts. What had she accomplished? Nothing. Was she prepared to walk out of this cruddy apartment? Yes. Was she afraid? Yes. Petrified. None of this was right. She thought about Pete and Janny and started to cry all over again. The awful, sick feeling was back in her stomach. She had to stop vacillating and do something. She could no longer talk about it, think about it, or pretend she was going to do something. She needed to do something. She felt suddenly calm, sure of herself. “Anything,” she muttered to herself, “is better than this.”