The Bestseller Job

by Greg Cox

  He treated her to a rare smile. “How could I forget?”

  Denise reclaimed her phone.

  “I’m still not happy about Sophie taking my place,” she said. “Why can’t I meet with Beria instead? I’m not just a ghostwriter, you know. I’m Tarantula. This used to be my world.”

  “Not anymore,” Eliot growled. “You worked too hard to get out of it.”

  “Right,” she said bitterly. “And look how that’s turned out.”

  Nate adopted a conciliatory tone. “Nobody doubts your abilities, or your determination, but if you want us to fix this, you need to let us do it our way. And that means using Sophie. You have to believe me when I tell you that she’s the right person for the job.”

  Sophie appreciated the show of support, but knew that there was more to it. Between Denise’s guilt over her past and Gavin’s death, the remorseful author was too emotionally involved. They couldn’t trust her to stick to the script—and not try to sacrifice herself for all the wrong reasons at the wrong time. Sophie knew better than to tell Denise that, however, so she tried another angle.

  “It’s simple,” she explained. “Nate is a control freak and he’s never worked with you before. He’s not going to be happy unless he’s calling the shots, and using his own crew.” She shot a preemptive look at Nate. “Well, am I wrong?”

  Nate scowled, feigning offense.

  Never fails, Sophie thought. When you can’t tell the truth, tell a truth.

  “But you have to let me do something,” Denise persisted.

  “You’ve already done enough,” Eliot assured her. “We could have never written that book without you.”

  “But…”

  “But nothing,” Eliot said firmly. “Look at me. Do you trust me?”

  She sighed. “Yes.”

  “Then trust that we know what we’re doing. We’re going to get Brad back, and see that Beria pays for Gavin’s murder. You have my word on that.”

  His promise, and the gruff sincerity with which it was delivered, seemed to appease Denise. “All right,” she said, giving in. “We’ll do it your way.” She gave Sophie a thumbs-up. “Good luck being me.”

  “Thanks,” Sophie said. Here’s hoping we don’t let you down.

  Nate checked his watch. “Okay, it’s twelve-thirty. We have two and a half hours before the meet. And you know what that means.”

  Time to squeeze in a nap? Sophie hoped. Her adrenaline rush was wearing off at an alarming pace. An adjacent bedroom called out to her.

  “We still have time to give the book one last polish.”

  Sophie contemplated murder.

  Nobody would ever miss an editor…

  Two-plus hours later, she and Eliot approached Trinity Church on foot. The towering Gothic Revival edifice, which had once been the tallest structure in Manhattan, was located at the corner of Broadway and Wall Street. Sleeping skyscrapers and office buildings lined the quiet streets of the financial district. It was nearly three A.M. in a part of lower Manhattan not exactly known for its nightlife and all the bars and restaurants were closed. The Wall Street crowd would be showing up in a few hours, but for now the sidewalks were deserted. A damp October fog reminded Sophie of home, shrouding the neighborhood in mist and reducing visibility to an ominous degree. She had to admire nature’s stagecraft; it was the perfect setting for the scene they were about to enact.

  Almost curtain time, she thought.

  Despite a bad case of sleep deprivation, she felt primed and ready. This was a part she was born to play: a glamorous ex-spy with a shady past and guilty conscience. What more could any self-respecting actress ask for?

  She was dressed for the part in a belted Burberry trench coat and black leather boots. A gloved hand held the handle of the same black leather briefcase she had confiscated from Brad mere days ago. A miniature button cam was discreetly pinned to the lapel of her coat, allowing Hardison and the others to see and hear everything she did in real time. She cupped a hand over her ear.

  “We’re almost there,” she said, checking in. “Are you still reading this?”

  “Everything’s copacetic at this end,” Hardison reported from “Lucille,” his mobile base of operations. “We’re good to go.”

  “Easy for you to say,” Eliot grumbled. He had put less thought into his wardrobe. A wool cap, leather jacket, flannel shirt, and jeans insulated him from the cold and damp while still serving to reinforce his intimidating persona. A second button cam, pinned to his cap, provided Hardison with an alternative view. Eliot strode beside Sophie, alert to his surroundings. His sharp eyes scanned the misty city streets. “I don’t see you walking into an obvious trap.”

  Nobody trusted Beria and his goons to carry out their side of the bargain. The elusive spymaster clearly didn’t like loose ends, as demonstrated by Gavin’s murder and Beria’s ruthless pursuit of the sequel. Some sort of double cross had to be in the offing; Sophie would have been willing to bet the Crown Jewels on it, assuming Parker hadn’t lifted them first.

  Good thing we’ve got our own plans, she thought.

  “Look at it this way,” Hardison told Eliot. “At least you’ll probably get to hit somebody. That always makes your day.”

  “Don’t tempt me.” Eliot started to say more, but then he whirled around and lunged into the fog behind him. A startled yelp escaped the mist as Eliot grabbed on to a lurking figure and threw him up against the sooty stone wall of an office building. “You really think you can sneak up on us, mister?” Eliot drew back his fist. “Think again.”

  It was the peeper. The one from Frankfurt and before.

  With all the drama surrounding Brad’s kidnapping, Sophie had almost forgotten about the nameless stranger who had been spying on her in Boston and Frankfurt, but she recognized the scrawny, bespectacled lurker at once. He had on his usual green hoodie. He clutched a leather-bound album of some sort to his chest. A backpack hung from his shoulders, padding his back as Eliot pinned him to the wall. His hood fell back, exposing a mop of greasy, black hair. He grimaced in discomfort.

  Sophie found herself thrown for a loop. She stared at the lurker.

  What was he doing here now, of all possible times?

  This was not part of the plan.

  “Please! Don’t hit me!” the man begged. “I don’t mean any harm! I never did! This is all just a big misunderstanding!”

  Eliot kept him pressed to the wall, practically lifting him off his feet. He got in the lurker’s face. Sophie watched from a safe distance, giving the crew a good view from her button cam.

  “Talk fast,” Eliot growled. “Who are you? How come you were following us… again?”

  “My name’s Larry… Larry Meeker.” The words spilled from him in a torrent as he desperately tried to spit them out before Eliot lost patience. “I just wanted to meet Ms. Devereaux.” He peered past Eliot at Sophie, his bulging eyes wide behind his Coke-bottle glasses. “That’s all, I swear!”

  Sophie flinched at her real name. Well, the name she currently went by, that is. How much did Meeker know about her, if that was indeed his actual name?

  “Why?” she asked. “Why me?”

  “I… I… I’m your biggest fan!”

  Eliot blinked in surprise. He lowered his fist. “Huh?”

  “Wait a sec,” Hardison chimed in via the coms. “Sophie has a fan?”

  “I can hear you,” she reminded them both. “You needn’t sound so surprised.”

  Truth be told, she didn’t know whether to be suspicious or flattered. She approached Larry cautiously, intrigued despite herself. “You know my work?”

  “Ohmigod, yes,” Larry said. “I’m a huge fan, have been ever since I caught you in that off-off-off-off-Broadway production of Death of a Salesman a few years back.” He practically glowed at the memory, enthusiasm overcoming his fear of Eliot. “You were the sexiest Willy Loman ever!”

  Sophie was pleased he remembered. She had put a lot of thought into that characterization. “Well, I
thought it was important to explore Willy’s innate sensuality…”

  “And I saw every single performance of your Sound of Music,” he raved. “Both of them!”

  Sophie sighed, wishing that particular production had run longer. “I’m not sure the critics truly understood my interpretation of Maria. It was very clear to me that she was secretly tone-deaf…”

  “The heck?” Hardison said.

  Sophie ignored him.

  “And I had the front row all to myself for your recent one-woman show in Boston,” Larry said. “It was incredibly moving. I wept when Madame Curie started glowing in the dark…”

  “That was you?” Sophie asked. She remembered a solitary figure sobbing uncontrollably in the front row, obscured by the glare of the footlights, but she had been too deeply in character to take note of his appearance.

  He nodded. “I went through an entire box of Kleenex. And I was your standing ovation!”

  “That’s it,” Hardison commented. “It’s official. There are fanboys for everything.”

  “Enough,” Nate said, shushing him. “Sophie. What’s your take on him?”

  She looked at Eliot while replying to Nate.

  “Believe it or not, I think he’s for real.”

  She gestured at Eliot, who backed off a bit. His baleful gaze and expression made it clear that Larry was still on probation as far as he was concerned.

  “Don’t try anything,” he warned. “I’m watching you.”

  “It’s all true, I swear,” Larry insisted. “Here! Let me show you my scrapbook.” He cast an apprehensive look at Eliot, who grudgingly allowed him to offer the album to Sophie. “It’s a true labor of love, you’ll see.”

  Sophie took the scrapbook. Flipping through it, she was surprised (and more than a little tickled) to find an impressive collection of playbills, head shots, theater listings, candid spy photos, and other Sophie Devereaux memorabilia. There only seemed to be one thing missing.

  “No reviews?” she asked.

  “I’m waiting for some good ones.” He blanched at his faux pas. “Ohmigod, please don’t take that the wrong way. It’s just that… the world doesn’t appreciate your acting like it should!”

  “I know!” Sophie agreed. “It’s baffling!”

  Eliot coughed, like something was stuck in his throat.

  Must be the fog, Sophie thought.

  “But I don’t understand,” she said. “Why have you been following me all over the world? Why didn’t you just approach me before?”

  “I’ve wanted to,” he confessed. “But I kept chickening out. I meant to in Frankfurt, but then you spotted me and I lost my nerve. I didn’t want you to think I was some sort of creepy stalker.”

  “God forbid,” Eliot muttered.

  Larry looked nervously at Eliot. “Then your bodyguard took off after me and I just panicked. And then there was that scary blonde in the dog costume…”

  “Scary?” Parker reacted, her indignation coming through Sophie’s earbud loud and clear. “I was adorable.”

  “My personal assistant,” Sophie explained. “She’s a furry.”

  “I’m still confused about one thing,” Larry said. “What exactly were you doing at the book fair anyway?”

  “Researching a role. Nothing I can talk about yet, of course.”

  “Oh,” Larry said, sounding disappointed. “Not even a hint?”

  “I’m afraid not.” She steered the conversation back to more immediate matters. “But you still haven’t explained what you’re doing here now, at three in the morning?”

  He blushed.

  “Hoping for your autograph?”

  “At three A.M.?”

  “I finally worked up my nerve. I was just about to speak up—really!—when your bodyguard grabbed me.” He winced, likely a bit bruised from his run-in with the wall. “Like I said, it was all a big misunderstanding!”

  Eliot snorted. “Yeah, right.”

  “His story checks out,” Hardison reported. “I just ran his name through my search engines. He’s a retired computer programmer from Seattle. Cashed out during the tech boom several years back. He’s single, lives alone, and apparently has way too much time and money on his hands, no offense to Sophie. His interests include theater, travel, and, apparently, a certain tragically undiscovered British actress. You should see the fan page he’s working on… or not.”

  “A fan page?” Sophie wanted to hear more. “I have to ask you, Larry, which of my various roles is your favorite? Feel free to elaborate.”

  “Well, it’s hard to choose. You’ve done so much great work.” He pondered the matter, giving it all due consideration. “But if I have to pick just one—”

  “Never mind that,” Nate said, staying on point. “We don’t have time for this. Get rid of him—quickly.”

  He was right, of course. As gratifying as it was to hear from a devoted fan, she had a job to do and Brad’s life was on the line.

  “On second thought,” she said, “I’m afraid now is not a good time. I’m running late for an appointment.”

  “Now?” Larry asked. “At almost three in the morning?”

  “Look who’s talking,” Eliot said.

  “What can I say?” Sophie said. “An actress is always on call, no matter the hour. I’m on my way to… a movie shoot.”

  “Wow!” Larry said. “Is it a big part?”

  “I’m not at liberty to discuss it. Confidentiality agreements, you know.” Eliot tugged impatiently on her arm. “Well, it was wonderful meeting you, but I must be going…”

  She started to return his scrapbook.

  “Your autograph?” he reminded her.

  “Right.” She rooted through her pockets. “I’m not sure I have a pen on me.”

  “Use mine.” He produced a premium brass fountain pen from his vest pocket and flipped the scrapbook open to the front page, where a gilt-edged sheet of high-quality vellum awaited her signature. “‘To Larry, my biggest fan,’” he suggested. “‘With love.’”

  Sophie fumbled with the scrapbook, looking about for a surface to write on. Time was ticking away and they needed to wrap this up.

  “Eliot, if you don’t mind…”

  “I don’t believe this,” he groused, turning his back to her. “Just hurry up, damn it.”

  Bracing the book against Eliot’s back, she hastily signed it.

  “‘With love,’” Larry prompted.

  Eliot snarled. “Don’t push your luck.”

  “There!” Sophie finished off her signature with a flourish, then handed the autographed scrapbook back to Larry, who accepted it as though he was receiving the keys to the city. She let Eliot drag her away. “Got to dash. Ta!”

  They left Larry on the sidewalk, admiring his prized new possession. Sophie glanced back over her shoulder, but swiftly lost sight of him in the fog.

  “Is he following us?” she asked.

  “Not if he knows what’s good for him.”

  Sophie consulted her watch. It was nearly three already. They had to sprint down the sidewalk, running late for their rendezvous. She shoved their encounter with Larry to the back of her mind in order to concentrate on the challenges ahead. Beria was waiting for Tarantula. They didn’t want to disappoint him.

  Trinity Churchyard appeared before them. The cemetery was located north and south of the church itself, an imposing Gothic pile whose soaring stone steeple and spires contrasted sharply with the looming temples of Mammon dominating Wall Street. Weathered gravestones and monuments rose from the mist-covered cemetery. Time had eaten away at many of the inscriptions, rendering them all but illegible. Rectangular stone sarcophagi, the size of benches, were scattered among the standing headstones. Skeletal sycamore trees had already shed their leaves, adding to the eerily autumnal atmosphere. Paved pathways wound through the historic grave sites, most of which were centuries old. Sophie had read up on the churchyard before setting forth tonight, so she knew that the oldest gravestone dated all the way back
to 1681, making it the oldest in New York City. There were no new graves; the churchyard had run out of vacancies more than a hundred and fifty years ago.

  A spiked metal fence surrounded the historic cemetery, but it struck Sophie as more symbolic than functional. Parker would snicker at the very idea of the low, cast-iron fence actually keeping anybody out. A sign posted the churchyard’s hours: WEEKDAYS, 8:30 TO 6; WEEKENDS, 8:30 TO 4. At the moment the dead were closed for business.

  Arriving at the western entrance on Trinity Place, they tried the gate and found that it had already been conveniently unlocked for them. It swung open at their touch. Oiled hinges didn’t even squeak.

  “We’re going in,” Sophie reported.

  “So I see,” Nate said. “Break a leg.”

  Eliot led the way as they cautiously entered the churchyard. The thick fog swirled among the weathered granite tombstones. Bony tree branches stretched overhead. Sophie was reminded of that low-budget horror movie the crew had hijacked in Eastern Europe a few years ago, only this time the fog was real. She hoped tonight’s performance proved just as memorable.

  Minus the Serbian gunrunners, of course.

  They found Beria sitting on a metal bench in the north yard, not far from the chapel entrance. A polished ebony cane rested across his lap. As agreed, he was accompanied by only a single bodyguard: a beefy, blond steroid case with a bandage across his nose. He glowered at Eliot, confirming Sophie’s suspicions that this was one of the thugs who had attempted to abduct Denise.

  “How’s the nose?” Eliot taunted him.

  The thug bristled. “Just you wait, pretty boy. I’m gonna pound your face into—”

  “Shush, Carl,” Beria said, silencing the goon. “Don’t let him bait you.”

  The scowling muscleman had custody of Brad, who looked distinctly worse for wear. A black eye and split lip testified to his brutal treatment. He was wearing the same blue tracksuit he’d had on when he was kidnapped; dried blood speckled the velour fabric, which clearly hadn’t been washed or ironed in days. Stubble carpeted Brad’s jowls. His thinning hair was a mess. His hands were bound behind his back. Sheer terror shone in his teary eyes, which bugged out when he recognized Sophie and Eliot. Confusion momentarily dispelled the petrified look on his face.