Ransom Beach (Stephanie Chalice Thrillers Book 2) (10 page)

"Good job," I said as I circled the hole in the target with my finger. "He'll never reproduce again."

Twain chuckled and then I showed him how to eject the clip and reload.

Herbert Ambler never started the day without a good hearty breakfast. He had removed his aviators which were lying on the table as he bit into the deli special: scrambled eggs, bacon, and American cheese on a Kaiser roll. His coffee was office brew. There was a setup in the corner, one of those coffee by the cup machines: the ones where you place a tin of ground coffee in the tiny press and presto, thirty seconds later you have a cup of horrendous, watery, tasteless coffee as if by magic—technology at its best.

Lido and I were brown bagging it too—a 7:00 AM start at 26 Federal Plaza doesn't allow time for eggs benedict. Ambler winked at us as he wolfed down his sandwich. Something was going on with Lido. He had been quiet all morning. He said that he hadn't slept well, but I had a feeling there was more to it than that. What was it, I wondered, that was eating at him?

It took Ambler no time to devour his morning repast. He was rolling his tin foil into a ball before I had a chance to open my yogurt. He put a ten-footer into the corner trash pail and then rubbed his hands together vigorously, ready to start his day.

"Got a foil tank,
G-
man?"

Ambler smacked his lips. "Breakfast of champions, darling—been eating the same thing, day in and day out for the better part of ten years."

"Ever have your cholesterol checked?" I asked.

"Religiously." He raised his eyebrows, daring me to ask what his serum cholesterol level was. I wasn't biting. He was probably one of the lucky ones that could eat sludge if he wanted to and not have his cholesterol jump one point. Probably brushes his teeth with
Hàagen-
Dazs
. Not to change the subject, but Ambler had a car catalogue open in front of him.

"Buying
a
car?" I asked.

Ambler turned the catalogue around for me, but he didn't need to. It was a cherry red Ford Mustang. I'd had my eye on it ever since it had been restyled to look like the old 1960's Mustang. "I love that car.”

"Yeah, me too," Ambler said. "You think an aging Fed can afford one of these? The old Firebird's rusting out."

"Go for it," I said.

"Just looking at it makes me feel like a teenager again," Ambler said. "That commercial with Steve McQueen drives me nuts."

"Me too. Thank God Ford changed their advertising campaign."

Ambler grinned. "You mean those ridiculous ads with preppy Bill Ford, Jr. preaching how his favorite car is a Mustang with a throaty V8 and a great sound system?"

"Exactly," I replied. "Do you think there's really an advertising exec dumb enough to think Bill Jr. was charismatic enough to sell cars? I'll bet that guy came out of the womb wearing wingtips."

Ambler chuckled.

"Let's get down to it," Lido said in a way that was less than cordial. "I didn't get up at the crack of dawn to discuss muscle cars."

Ambler's eyes were large with surprise. Mine mirrored his.

"Sure," Ambler said, closing the Mustang catalogue and pulling a folder in front of him. He was about to get into it when he stopped and turned to Lido. "You okay, Gus? Something wrong?"

"I just want to get started without the usual round of morning bullshit, alright? Can we just fucking get to work before this kid is halfway to Cairo?"

I put my hand on Gus' arm, but he didn't respond to the gesture. "Gus?" Still nothing. He didn't even turn toward me. I didn't know what I had done wrong, but clearly I had screwed up big time. I waited a moment and then gave Ambler the we'd-better-walk-on-eggshells expression.

"I had a forensic accountant go over the books of Thorne Cosmetics. The company's privately held, but it reports its financial results to D & B, Lexis Nexus and the like to obtain trade credit lines." Ambler turned a couple of pages, reviewing comments that I could see had been written in the margins. "The company is highly leveraged, major expenditures in R & D, marketing, especially celebrity endorsements."

"Is it in the red?" Lido asked.

"No, but it's been struggling for the last several years," Ambler replied. "Market analysis is that the company needs a large cash infusion. Revlon and Avon have both tendered offers over the last twelve months."

"Are you saying
Celia
Thorne needs money?" I asked.

"No," Ambler replied.
"Celia
Thorne's net worth is somewhere near half a billion dollars. The trouble is, most of it's in brick and mortar, not very liquid. She's got lots of secured debt."

"Does that make her a suspect?" Lido asked.

"I think it's a weak angle at best but one that has to be looked at anyway. In case neither of you have noticed, there hasn't been a ransom demand."

"It's looking more and more like Manny was taken for what he can predict and not his ransom value from
Celia
Thorne," Ambler said.

"Nonetheless, I'm meeting with Thorne at noon," I said. "I'll take a run at her and see how she reacts. My guess is she won't take kindly to an accusation like that."

"Take a flack jacket," Ambler said before turning to Lido. "What about you, going with her?"

"No," Lido answered, as if he had made up his mind in advance. "I think it's more important that I locate the van Manny was taken in. We can cover more ground if we split up."

I wasn't going to let this fester. Whatever was bothering Lido, it needed to be brought to a head right now. Although he was completely capable of flying solo, he rarely did so, opting instead to work side by side with me. What was going on? The last time I checked, I hadn't cheated on him. It was a short meeting, but it killed me to have to wait for Ambler to clear the room before finding out what the problem was.

"I'll work the databases," Ambler said. "Let's see who Manny is of the most value to as a prophet."

"Anything on that yet?" Lido asked.

"Zilch," Ambler said as he stood and gathered up his folders. "A world of possibilities but nothing solid to go on yet—I'll keep on it and check in with you later."

There really was no need or hurry for Ambler to leave the ready room and go to his desk, other than to give Lido and me a little privacy. He blew out of the room in a flash.

"Talk to me, Gus. What's wrong?" The words were out of my mouth as soon as the door closed behind Ambler.

Lido
was staring
down
at the table. His expression was somber. I touched his chin and tried to turn his face in my direction but he refused to make eye contact. "I know you're mad at me, what did I do?"

It was a long moment before he said anything and then just a single word. "Twain."

"Twain? That's it? You're mad because I took him to the range?"

"Screw the range," Lido said. "You're obsessed with him. You dream about him every night."

Now I've warned you about this before. No one, I repeat, no one has more vivid dreams than I do—night after night, vibrant, lucid dreams. One of them helped me solve my last case. Like most of us, many of them are utter fantasy, the mind's way of resolving conflicts we encounter during our conscious hours. To the best of my knowledge, I hadn't dreamt of Twain in a while. There was no denying that there was a certain something between us, but I had never acted on it. "Gus, honey, I don't know what you're talking about."

"Bullshit, Stephanie, I hear you every night. I purposely stayed awake last night to see if you'd mention his name after you spent the evening with him."

Was I talking in my sleep? The thought made me very uncomfortable. What else had I said? "Nigel Twain, I mention the name Nigel Twain while I'm unconscious and you're all up in arms? Gus, come on now, aren't you overreacting?"

"It's not Twain's name I hear you say, but I know that's what you mean. I saw it the first time the three of us were together, last spring, when Ma was in the hospital. I see the way he looks at you. Is that all he's doing, Stephanie? Is he still just looking?" Lido was making eye contact now, lots of it, exploring my face, searching for expressions, as he would if I were a suspect. "You came home hours after you left Ma's last night. She said you drove him home."

"I did drive him home, right after we spent an hour at Tommy Shipley's range. Nigel's always wanted to fire a gun. I let him go through a box of wad cutters." I was feeling lots of guilt. I knew there was a part of me that was strongly attracted to Twain and wanted to take a wild romp with him. That's part of being human. Even the most devoutly loyal has a fantasy lover. For most women, it's Brad Pitt or George Clooney. For me, it's Nigel Twain. The difference is that most women don't have a relationship with their fantasy man—I did. Was I cheating on Gus by taking Nigel to the range? It wasn't a date...or was it?

"C'mon, Gus, he's a good looking man, I admit it. He helps Ricky. He helped me find out who I really am. It's an important friendship, but I don't feel the same way about him that I feel about you."

"Then why do you dream about him every night?"

"I don't."

"You do!" Lido said emphatically. I could see a world of distance between us when I looked into his eyes. "You dream about Batman every night. You moan the name as if you're being made love to. I understand a little about dreams. Batman's tall. He's dark. He's mysterious. Batman is your mind's metaphor for Nigel Twain."

"It's what?" I appeared shocked. I even appeared to be insulted, but appearances are one thing and the truth is something else. I had never stopped to analyze the sudden rash of Batman fantasies, but in that instant, I knew Gus had hit it smack dab on the head. Every time Batman had smuggled me to the dark solitude of his cave, I was secretly making love with Nigel Twain. Gus took one look at my face and knew that he was right.

December rain is the worst. The wind drives it through you, stealing your body heat. It almost seems to permeate the skin, as if it's punching minute holes through you. Today in particular I was feeling less than whole—the unsolved abduction of an innocent autistic teen and the guilt of having hurt Gus weighing most heavily on my mind. I had never and would never give myself to Nigel Twain, but I knew now that deep down inside I wanted to. They say no good deed goes unpunished. Maybe that's because behind every good deed is a selfish motivation. I had Gus while I was awake and Twain while I slept—the best of both worlds—or was it? Certainly, I could not be held accountable for my dreams, but would the seed of deceit blossom from one of these fantasies? I was sure it wouldn't. Gus, on the other hand, was not convinced that it wouldn't or hadn't.

The lobby of Thorne Cosmetics was immense, thirty feet of glass and soaring ceilings. The two receptionists were both Cover Girl pretty. Posters from the company's current marketing campaign floated on glass panels before me, the most sought after faces in the world: Heidi Klum, Paris Hilton, and Tyra Banks. The campaign's theme was "Turning Heads Every Day." These were women that could turn heads without a stitch of makeup. Still, the message was clear: use Thorne makeup and you'll get the same results. Powerful advertising. It was a wonder they could keep the shelves stocked. Still, I remembered Ambler's information. The company was highly leveraged. Those pretty faces in the ads didn't come cheap.
Celia
Thorne was spending a ton on advertising to sell her wares.

Two etched glass doors slid apart and a young woman walked through them. "Detective Chalice," she said, "I'm Kendra
Dahl,
Ms. Thorne's personal assistant. Ms. Thorne can see you now." Kendra was attired for business in a black tailored suit. Her hair was pinned back in a bun and she wore glasses with dark frames, which I assume she wore for the sake of image only. Behind the glasses was yet another model's face. Kendra was at best a size two, five foot-ten in her high heels.

Thorne's office was bleached birch floor to ceiling, with black silk sofas and black lacquered Asian antiques throughout. Her desk had a glass top, supported with giant onyx chess pieces—queens of course. She was standing at the window, on the phone with her back to me. Kendra offered me a chair with a lilt of her hand and then glided out.
Celia
Thorne was selling fantasy—everything and everyone she surrounded herself with was an extension of the company's philosophy. We're all attracted to beauty. We're sold it or tempted by it everyday of our lives. I had been tempted by Nigel Twain. I hadn't touched him—well, maybe I had grazed his muscular shoulder and wrapped my hands around his to demonstrate how to fire a gun, but I hadn't been intimate with him. I hadn't betrayed my trust to Gus, yet the guilt was eating me up all the same. I focused on Manny to clear my head. I'd seen many pictures of the teen in his wheelchair. He had a thick mop of well cut, perpetually tussled hair. I had become caught up by the way he always stared off into the distance with his head cast to the side. It was the knowing that he wasn't "all there" that kept you from focusing on his features. Manny was extremely handsome, but you were too distracted by his demeanor to pay attention to his subtle good looks.

Celia
Thorne hung up and swung around to greet me. "What's going on, honey? You look like crap. Someone rain on your parade? Fuck ’em, don't let it get you down."

Thorne had read me in an instant. Realizing that the face is the mirror of the soul, I smiled at her to throw her off course. Gus and I weren't part of her business and I didn't want her to pry. She didn't.

"Twenty minutes," she snapped. "I've got a meeting to prepare for and I want my Manny home before he's geriatric. What've you got?"

Thorne had opined on my appearance as she would have any of her employees whose beauty wasn't up to snuff. In essence she was saying 'get it together or go home'—her only concern was appearance. Whatever lay at the core of my unhappiness was not of her concern.

Twenty minutes, okay. I wasn't buying the Bureau's angle on the company's financial woes. All the same I had to ask and get it out of the way. "Tell me about the financial condition of the company. Our sources tell us you're overleveraged."