The Finishing School (21 page)

Melanie turned to her sister abruptly. “Introduce me,” she snapped, gesturing toward Esposito.

“I don’t know him. But Fab D can hook us up.”

Fabulous Deon was busy hitting on the bodybuilder type standing next to him at the bar. Linda tapped Deon on the shoulder. He leaned over, lips pursed in an annoyed moue.

“Honeychild, I am otherwise engaged.”

“Fab D, are you blind?” Linda said. “That guy’s straight.”

“You think so?”

“Mos’ def. Come introduce us to Expo before you get the shit kicked out of you.”

“Oh, yes. I’m going to en
joy
this. Come along.”

Deon sashayed ahead, beckoning to them to follow. As they approached, Esposito caught sight of Deon and waved at him with a fat cigar held between thumb and forefinger.

“Deon,” Esposito said in a whiny voice, “why aren’t you working tonight?”

“Funny you should ask, sire. Perhaps because you didn’t
book
me and haven’t paid me for the last six times you
did
?”

“Yeah, well, whaddaya want, things’ve been slow. Maybe if you’d stop whining like a little bitch, I’d tell my booker to call you.” Esposito looked at Melanie and Linda appraisingly. “So introduce me to your friends.”

“This is Linda Vargas, from Channel Sixteen, and her friend…uh…what did you say your name was, precious?” Deon asked.

“Marilyn Corona,” Melanie said to Expo. “I just met these guys at another club, and they dragged me over here. They said Screen was way cool, and they’re right.”

As Esposito’s eyes raked over her body, Melanie imagined she saw a flicker of suspicion. “Yeah? What club were you just at?” he asked.

“Railroad Forty-seven,” Deon answered quickly, thank God, because Melanie couldn’t’ve come up with a club name to save her life.

“Yeah, that place is a fucking pit,” Esposito said, seeming mollified. “What’re you girls drinking?”

“Appletinis,” Linda replied.

“Cindy, apple martinis over here for my friends,” he called to one of the blond bartenders, who slapped fresh drinks on the bar for them instantly. At Esposito’s merest gesture, several patrons vacated their bar stools so Melanie and Linda could sit down.

“Thank you,” Melanie said.

“Don’t mention it.” He leaned across her and mashed out his cigar in the remnants of somebody’s drink. She caught a whiff of spicy cologne.

“Good crowd tonight, Expo,” Linda said loudly, arching her back so her chest stuck out. It worked, because Esposito started talking to her cleavage.

“Yeah, we’re busy this week. People still in town, but they’re celebratin’,” he said.

“You really come up with some hot locales. I’m crazy for this subway thing. In fact, I’d love to feature it in my nightlife segment.” Linda was looking up at Esposito from under perfectly mascaraed eyelashes. Melanie nearly laughed out loud at her sister’s blatantness. The girl
loved
to work the celebs.

“Nah, you know, I like press on my big clubs, but Screen I keep on the DL or else it loses its cachet.”

“Oh, sure, I get it.”

“You wanna cover the bash I’m doing down in Palm Beach on New Year’s Eve, though, I’ll get you on the list.” Something behind them seemed to catch his eye. “Hold on a second,” he said, and walked away.

Linda leaned over. “You think he likes me? He could really help my career, you know.”

“You’re not serious!” Melanie wrinkled her nose.

“
Chica
, that’s why God invented dimmer switches.”

“His looks aren’t bad, Lin. It’s the fact that he’s a major criminal that bothers me.”

“That’s just PR! He cultivates that image to promote his clubs.”

“Yeah, why do you think
I’m
here?” she said under her breath.

Melanie restrained herself from regaling Linda with tales of the evidence against Expo. Doing that while sitting in his bar was not a smart idea. She glanced around and spotted him, standing out like a beacon in his white suit. He was talking to an enormous guy with an angry, dimesize scar on his left cheek—presumably the bodyguard who’d been asking about the case in Judge Warner’s courtroom earlier today. As she watched, they both turned and looked directly at her. The little hairs on Melanie’s arms stood on end.

Calm down
, she told herself. Gabriel Colón had said nothing when those thugs visited the courthouse looking for information, and Melanie was using a false name. Esposito couldn’t possibly have a clue who she was. Granted, Linda had given her real name, and the two of them
did
look alike. But still…

The bodyguard seemed to melt away into the crowd. Esposito walked casually back to the bar and threw his arm around Melanie’s shoulder. Claustrophobia overwhelmed her instantly, but she steeled herself to accept his touch. A young girl was missing, and this might be a significant opportunity to find out more.

Copying Linda, Melanie smiled up at Esposito through flirtatious lashes.

“You’re back,” she said, in her most seductive voice, like she’d been waiting with bated breath.

“You’re set, the botha youse. I put your names on all my lists. Anything you want in my clubs, just ask.”

That must’ve been what he’d been talking to the bodyguard about. She breathed a small sigh of relief.

“Cool,” Linda said, nodding but looking at Melanie with obvious confusion.

Esposito’s thick fingers caressed Melanie’s exposed back. She forced herself not to pull away. She’d make conversation, see where it went. If he liked her, maybe he’d give her some private cell number they weren’t aware of or tell her some unknown address.

“It must be a lot of pressure, being a celebrity and all,” she said, looking up at him seductively.

“Fuckin’ A. But I love every second of it. You wanna know what my secret is?”

“You bet I do.”

“Work hard, play hard. Do business all day, party all night. Blows off the steam.”

“I’ll drink to that,” Melanie said, and took a swig of the appletini. It was going down easier with every minute that passed.

“Hey, if you like to have a good time, I can hook you up,” Expo said, his fingers inching down her back toward her derriere.

“Yeah? What’ve you got in mind?”

“What’s your pleasure? I have a little office in the back where I transact my private business. I can arrange whatever goodies you like. You name it, we got it.”

Esposito’s office, which was full of
drugs
? How tempting was
that
? But no, really, she’d promised Dan—no heroics. Well, maybe “promised” was too strong a word. Hadn’t it been more like a statement of intention? And here circumstances had changed and all….

“You interested or not?” Esposito demanded. “Because if not, plenty of others are.”

“I’m game,” Melanie said. She
had
to do this. Carmen was still missing.

“What about you?” Expo asked Linda, and then he winked, saying, “I can handle two girls at once.”

Nervous as Melanie was about being alone with this guy, no way was she exposing Linda to danger.

“I’m not into that,” Melanie said firmly. “She’s here with someone anyway, right?”

Linda’s eyes widened. Melanie couldn’t tell if her sister understood what was going on or not. “Ri-ight,” Linda said, hesitantly at first, then, “yeah, I’m with somebody.”

“What the hell, it was worth a shot. Catch you later, then. Come on, you,” Esposito said, yanking Melanie to her feet. The room swam. She’d been stupid to guzzle that drink, but it tasted so good going down. Man, she was pathetic at holding her liquor.

“Hey, Linda,” Melanie said, putting all the significance she could manage into her facial expression, “find my friends and tell them I’m hanging out with Expo, okay? Will you do that for me, so they know where I am?”

“Okay.”

Esposito took Melanie firmly by the arm and began to steer her toward the far end of the subway platform, where the tiled walls curved away into the blackness of the tunnel. Melanie threw a final, imploring glance over her shoulder to Linda, who had already turned away and was heading toward the dance floor. Melanie
thought
that Linda had understood, that she’d go find Bridget and give her a heads-up. God, she hoped so.

Esposito’s powerful fingers bit painfully into her wrist as he pulled her through the crowd. He leaned over, his lips grazing her ear. “I love to party with Spanish girls, you know.”

Oh, great, score one for
la raza
.

“Really?”

“Yeah. What’s your name again?”

“Marilyn.”

“You remind me of this old girlfriend of mine, Mirta. She was hot. Unbelievable blow jobs, this girl could give. She had no gag reflex. She died, though. Very sad.”

“How’d that happen?” Melanie asked, her antennae up. No gag reflex. Could come in handy for more than just blow jobs. But Esposito acted like he hadn’t heard her.

They had reached the far end of the platform. Esposito pulled a small flashlight from his pocket and shone it into the tunnel beyond. Melanie heard scurrying noises as the beam of light bounced off grimy walls, illuminating nothing. God, it was dark in there. As if from nowhere, the bodyguard with the bullet-hole scar materialized, nodded to Esposito, and took up a position at the edge of the tunnel. Even if somebody came looking for her now, Melanie had the sneaking suspicion Bulletface wouldn’t let them pass. Whether Esposito wanted sex or had something more sinister in mind, Melanie was forced to admit that this was shaping up into a pretty bad idea. She needed to get away from this guy. Now.

“I think I heard rats,” she said, stopping dead at the edge of the tunnel and beginning to backpedal. “I’m not going in there.”

Had Linda found Bridget or Dan? Where the hell were they? She turned frantically, her eyes searching the turbulent crowd to no avail. Melanie was running out of time. Esposito tightened his grip on her wrist just as another number-six train roared onto the curving tracks.

“Fuck the rats, hon,” Esposito said, yanking her practically off her feet. “I’ll take care a’ ya. Let’s go.”

CHELSEA PIERS WAS not a place he would normally choose to visit on a night like this, with a frigid wind blowing off the Hudson. Hell, there were icebergs bobbing in the river; he could see them from here. Fucking winters. Whatever happened to global warming? Urban renewal had turned the piers into a city kid’s sports paradise—bowling alleys, climbing walls, and the like housed in brightly painted buildings. The transvestites and drug dealers of years past were long gone, but it was still a no-man’s-land down here. Dimly lit, desolate. The perfect place to corner a vulnerable young girl. Which was exactly why he’d come.

There was so much information on the Internet if you had the first clue where to look. Like Lulu Reyes’s ice-skating schedule, for example. There for all to see, with minimal digging. The evening hours were cheapest, it turned out, and the girl ranked competitively in her age group. She came here all by herself. People were so careless, so arrogant. They assumed that nobody would ever want to hurt them or their children. They almost deserved it, when you thought about it.

To get to the Sky Rink, you had to pass through a cavernous, deserted parking garage. His shoes had soft soles; they didn’t make a sound on the concrete. Even if they did, the wind howling through the open rafters would mask the noise. Lulu would come this way when her ice time was over, huddled in her parka against the bitter night, and go wait alone at the bus stop. Nobody was around. It was very dark. Lulu was exhausted, grief-stricken, distracted. She wouldn’t notice anything until it was too late, and then the river was right there to dump the body. Not that he planned to do that tonight. He needed her alive, to ensure her sister’s cooperation. It was tempting, though. He had to admit, he was beginning to enjoy killing people, even though murder wasn’t in the original game plan.

The big metal elevator heaved and shimmied its way up to the Sky Rink. He came out into a large seating area that reeked of what he first thought was vomit and then realized was the soggy cheese on the pizzas at the concession stand. A bunch of janitors sat around watching the Islanders game on a wide-screen TV mounted high on the far wall. None of them gave him so much as a glance, which was lucky, because the place was lit up like the Fourth of July. Anybody looking would have no problem identifying him later. But he wasn’t worried. Like he always said, people were oblivious.

There were two rinks, one on either side of the seating area. He chose the one on the left. Got it on the first try. Lulu was immediately recognizable, nearly alone on the ice at this hour. She had the stringy limbs of a colt and an adolescent awkwardness, but you could tell she’d be really good with the proper coaching. A lot of the elements were already in place: impressive technical skill for her age, a ferocious energy in the way she attacked the moves. But she lacked artistry. He should really stop, though, shouldn’t he? It wouldn’t do to start thinking of Lulu as too much of a person. Better to keep his emotional distance and be free to take whatever action proved most…advantageous.

He climbed the aluminum bleachers and took a seat front and center. All she’d have to do was look up once and she’d see him. He had no doubt that Lulu would immediately understand why he was there. She wasn’t stupid, and she knew enough about what had happened to the other girls. She
must
, or else she would have told the cops by now how to find her sister. Because she’d definitely seen him the other night.

He sat there for a while, the cold seeping into his bones as Lulu skated and skated. Jumps and spins and arabesques. Eventually she turned and began gliding smoothly toward the half door that led off the ice. That was when she looked up and saw him—and instantly tripped over her skates, tumbling facefirst to the hard, gleaming surface.

ESPOSITO PULLED MELANIE along a narrow ledge above the tracks. Light poured into the tunnel, courtesy of the headlamp of the number-six train that sat spitting and heaving in the station like some prehistoric beast. She’d better be damned careful of her footing: In a second the train would roar by, ready to eviscerate anything—any
body
—in its path. The thought that Esposito knew who she was, that he might decide to push her onto the tracks, was farfetched. She tried to tell herself this but still couldn’t seem to shake the terrible image from her mind. Esposito just gave off that vibe. And besides, she was doing something completely reckless.