by Mike Brogan
“Walk to the edge!”
She hesitated, her lifelong fear of heights paralyzing her.
“Walk!”
She inched her way over to the cliff’s edge and glanced down. The slope dropped off steeply and was covered with small shrubs and partly exposed roots. The ravine floor, thirty-five feet down, was a carpet of sharp volcanic rocks.
“What’s this all about?” She knew it was about the $8.7 million, but she wanted him to talk so she could plan an escape.
“Your unfortunate hiking accident.”
“Like my bathroom incident almost was?”
Anger flashed in his eyes, and she realized she shouldn’t have mentioned his earlier failure.
“This time it’s different,” he said.
“Why?”
“You have no red emergency button to hit.”
“But I have money - ”
“Me, too.”
“If you have money, why are you doing this?”
He smiled, and she realized that for him, killing her produced the same moral angst as stepping on an ant.
“Mostly for Lori.”
“Who’s Lori?”
“Long story involving your irresponsible old man.”
“What do you mean?”
“No time now.”
She wondered what he was talking about .
He took another step toward her and she moved back, just inches from the cliff’s edge. She was blocked in by him, the thirty-five foot drop-off, and a tree with long, thick branches.
He tossed the shopping bag in front of her.
“What’s in the bag?”
“Look.”
She opened it and saw a brown outdoor shirt, a pair of tan hiking shorts, some boots and a camera with a strap.
“Put them on.” He grinned, his teeth like little white pearls in the jungle darkness.
“Why?”
“One doesn’t have a hiking accident in a blue business suit, does one? So put them on now, or I’ll put them on later. Actually that could be kinda fun.”
She wouldn’t give the bastard the pleasure.
His eyes narrowed as though he was already undressing her. She shivered, but realized that putting on the hiking clothes would at least give her time to think. Slowly, she began unbuttoning her jacket.
“Hurry along, Ms. McKean.”
Stall him!
“Just tell me one thing,” she said, placing her jacket on the grass beside the tree.
“What’s that?”
“Did you kill my father?”
“Suicide killed your father.”
“Did you assist with his suicide?”
“Like Dr. Kevorkian?”
“No, like a cold-blooded murderer?”
He smiled and pleasure registered in his eyes.
For the first time in her life she felt like killing another human being.
“Hurry, or I’ll help.”
She undid the blouse, took it off and placed it on her jacket.
His dark, brooding eyes focused on her breasts in the semi-transparent bra. Quickly, she put the hiking shirt on and buttoned it. Then, unzipping her dress, she stumbled a bit and steadied herself on a nearby branch. The branch, she realized, was strong – and amazingly flexible. Maybe ... she thought ... just maybe.
Madison slid her dress off and bent over to grab the hiking shorts. She felt his gaze on her near-naked butt. Balancing herself on the branch again, she stepped into the shorts, pulled them up and buttoned them slowly.
“The boots! Hurry!”
She took off her shoe and grabbed the hiking boot. Leaning on the branch, she purposely pulled it back farther and started to put the boot on.
“They’re too small,” she said, pretending her foot wouldn’t slide into the boot.
“I’ll make it fit!”
He took a step closer.
She shoved her foot in, then took the other boot and pretended to struggle with it.
“Hurry, goddammit!” The veins in his neck bulged in anger. He stepped closer.
“Time’s up!”
He lunged....
She let go of the branch. It whipsawed hard into his face, startling him and forcing him back.
She ran two steps - and felt his hand grab her wrist.
With amazing strength, he yanked her back and swung her over the side of the cliff – but without realizing that she’d grabbed his belt. Her weight was now pulling him over the cliff with her.
As they bounced down the slope, her shoulder landed hard on his chest, crushing the air from his lungs. His hands released her.
She reached for a passing shrub, missed. She grabbed another bush that slowed her just enough to lodge her boot on a protruding vine that stopped her fall.
Below, she heard a THUD!
Looking down, she saw he’d landed face down on a narrow stone ledge, still ten feet above the rocky ravine floor. He was sprawled out crucifixion style.
And he wasn’t moving.
Suddenly, her boot began to slip off the vine. Looking up, she saw a root two feet above her. She grabbed it and muscled herself up.
Below her, he moaned.
Her sweaty fingers began to slide down the root. She stretched her other hand up, gripped a bush and slowly inched her body up to it. Her muscles were burning, her pulse pounding in her ears.
The man moaned louder. He was waking up.
She was still two feet below the ledge of the cliff.
He was moving around now.
Suddenly, the bush she held began loosening in the soft soil ... pulling out....
Mustering every ounce of energy, she reached up, grabbed a pencil-thin banyan vine and pulled herself up higher. Gulping air, she threw a knee over the ledge, clawed herself up onto it, and collapsed face down in the ground.
She lay there, sucking dirt and hot air into her mouth. Then she looked down into the ravine.
The man wasn’t there.
Madison ran for her life.
Thirty Two
The EVP watched Harold Cummings walk into her office with his slight limp, smiling like always and chatting on his cell phone like the busy executive he was. He settled his gray, custom-tailored Armani suit into the chair opposite her desk and held up a finger to let her know he was winding up his call.
Cummings was a distinguished Turner Executive Vice President, a solid professional. He was smart, organized and dedicated to creating brilliant advertising for his clients. They respected him, his family adored him, and charities appreciated his generosity.
Even more impressive, he’d worked his way up from the mail room where he’d started twenty-four years ago. Today, he managed many of the agency’s major clients with consummate skill. And his thick, silver hair, handsome face and relaxed confidence further explained why people liked him.
She even liked him.
But Harold was a problem. He planned to vote against the ComGlobe merger. And nothing, it seemed, could change his mind.
Except what she had in her desk drawer.
Cummings closed his cell phone and flashed his high-voltage smile at her. “So what’s up?”
“The ComGlobe merger.”
“Yeah. We vote in just a few days.”
“The merger can make you a very wealthy man, Harold.”
“True. But, as you know, I agree with Madison. ComGlobe is not the best merger fit for us.”
“Because you’d have to resign some clients due to conflicts?”
He nodded. “These clients have helped us grow huge. They’ve been terrific clients, and loyal.”
“Loyalty in advertising, Harold? Please....”
“Hey, it still exists with some clients.”
She cut to the chase. “I’d like you to change your vote.”
Harold’s eyebrows rose. “Excuse me?”
“I want you to vote for the ComGlobe merger.”
“No can do.” The polite smile, a glance at his watch.
“Sure you can.�
��
“Give me one good reason.”
She waited until his eyes found hers. “Because I know, Harold.”
He stared back. Cool, composed. “You know what?”
She continued to stare at him, letting her words sink in. “I know about your ... other life.”
He acted puzzled, but recognition flickered in his eyes.
“What other life? Hell, I barely have time for this life.” Another executive grin.
“But you always find time for your ... exotic life.”
His body stiffened. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” The red creeping up his neck suggested otherwise.
She reached in her desk drawer and pulled out a large envelope. He began to squirm. Tiny beads of sweat appeared on his upper lip. She enjoyed making men sweat. She reached into the envelope and pulled out several eight-by-ten photographs.
“I’m talking about these!” She slid the photos across the desk to him.
His face went rigid and he refused to look at them. Then slowly, he glanced down at the top one and his head jerked up as though someone had yanked his hair. Quickly, he flipped through all seven photos, his face growing redder with each one.
“Please understand, Harold, I don’t like the fact that you screw underage girls. Maybe they need the money. But the law calls it a felony. Years in prison.”
A droplet of sweat trickled down Cummings’s neck onto his starched white collar.
“Imagine, Harold, the humiliation your wife and daughters would feel when they see these.”
He stared at the photos.
“Imagine what our board members here at Turner would think.”
Harold swallowed hard.
“Imagine what your fellow New York Athletic Club directors would whisper behind your back.”
Cummings looked like something had been ripped from his chest cavity. He studied the photos for several moments, a crushed man. Then, all of a sudden, his eyes sparked to life and his confidence seemed to roar back. Angrily, he shoved the photos back across the desk.
“I’ll say these are computer frauds! Our Macs can put any face on any body. Hell, our art directors here do it for fun all the time. These are fake photos. You’ve got nothing here!”
She smiled back at him.
He stood and turned toward the door.
“Sit down, Harold!”
“Screw you! I’ll tell everyone they’re fakes! They’ll believe me!”
“No. They’ll believe this!” She took a DVD from the drawer.
Harold slumped back down in the chair.
“I have three DVDs. Thirty minutes each. Digital quality. You and the twin Asian teens are my favorite.”
His eyes locked on the DVD.
“And, you’ll recognize these.” She slid a stapled report over to him. “All the porn sites you visited on your office computer this year. Who’s a naughty boy?”
Harold Cummings closed his eyes for several moments, then whispered, “What do you want?”
“Your vote. You will continue to say you’re voting against the merger, but on the day of the vote, you’ll vote for the merger. If you do, I’ll give you all this highly embarrassing material. If you do not, I’ll give it to your wife. I’ll also give it to our directors, the media and the Internet within an hour.”
Dead, unblinking eyes stared back at her.
“Any questions, Harold?”
Silence.
“I’ll plan on your vote.”
Defeated, Cummings nodded. He stood, shoulders slumped, and slowly walked out of her office. She could trust him.
Unlike the bastard who gave me this! she realized, looking at her Montblanc pen. She thought back to when she’d been given the expensive gold pen, a farewell gift from National Media, where she first worked after college. The man who presented the pen to her was none other than T. Remus Burdine, National Media’s debonair, charming, swashbuckling, empire-building, back-stabbing chairman.
She was twenty-two when she started at National Media. Within two years, she’d been promoted three times and Burdine had invited her to be his personal assistant. A month later, he invited her to his bed. She accepted. Soon, she grew infatuated with his massive power and wealth, estimated at nearly one billion dollars. And she’d grown infatuated with him, especially after he told her repeatedly that he loved her. A year later, when he asked her to abort their fetus, she’d done so willingly.
Then, four months later, everything changed. Burdine told her he’d fallen for someone younger in his Miami bureau. He also said he would not loan her the money he’d promised for her Aunt Sarah’s life-saving heart surgery. Four weeks later, unable to afford the costly, insurance-denied surgery, her aunt died.
To avenge his cruelty, she set up a secret consultant’s fee within National Media. Over the years, the fee had siphoned money from Burdine’s various corporate coffers into her offshore bank accounts. Burdine’s company had paid dearly.
And soon, Burdine would pay personally. She would send photos to Burdine’s wife of him in bed with his latest mistress, along with DNA proof that the woman bore him two children. The insanely jealous wife would sue him for divorce, and Burdine would have to fork over half of his billion dollar estate.
Now, she looked down at the last copy of the e-mail sent to Mark McKean and fed it into her document shredder. Even if Madison and Kevin had read the e-mail back-up copy, they could never trace it back to her.
And only two other people had ever seen it. Harry Burkett. And Mark McKean, who was quite dead.
Like his lovely daughter soon would be.
Thirty Three
Feeling better this morning, ma’am?” the desk manager asked as Madison limped gingerly on her sore leg into the lobby of Ottley’s Inn.
“Much better....” Despite bouncing down a cliff.
The manager nodded with obvious relief.
But she was still badly shaken by her near-death encounter with her tall attacker. After running from the cliff, she’d jumped on the red mountain bike she’d seen earlier and peddled furiously down bone-jarring jungle footpaths and roads for twenty minutes until she finally found Ottley’s Inn.
A detective from the Royal St. Kitts Police had interviewed her at length and assured her they would pull out all the stops to apprehend her attacker. But, as of three minutes ago, the detective said her attacker was still at large.
And her attacker knew she was at Ottley’s Inn, since she told him that in the taxi.
Last night, she considered switching to another hotel, but stayed when the manager placed an additional security guard near her room.
Madison heard a vehicle outside. Turning, she saw a dark blue taxi, identical to her attacker’s, pull up near the entrance. A tall male, facing the other way, stepped out on the far side. She froze, telling herself that her attacker would never come here in broad daylight!
The tall man turned around and Madison’s mouth fell open.
Kevin Jordan!
She couldn’t believe her eyes. She also couldn’t believe her heart. It was pounding like he’d come to ask her to the prom. Kevin walked into the lobby smiling, and greeted her with a hug.
“Just happen to be in the neighborhood?” she asked.
“Yep. I’m researching sea urchins for our cruise line client.”
They both laughed.
“And to assist my favorite CEO,” he said.
“In that case, you’re promoted.”
“To what?”
“Bodyguard.”
His brow tightened as he apparently noticed the scab and bruise on her cheek. “Jesus, Madison, what happened?”
She led him over near the window where they sat in facing chairs. She explained how her Manhattan attacker had tried to kill her on Mount Luiguima. When she finished, Kevin shook his head.
“So he’s still out there somewhere?”
“Yes.”
“You described him to the police?”
“Well, sorta. But
he looks different every time I see him. In the taxi he concealed his face with wraparound sunglasses, a mustache and a wide-rimmed straw hat. On the ferry, he wore different clothes, glasses, a baseball hat and maybe an brownish-red hairpiece. And in New York, he wore a mask.”
Kevin nodded.
“All I know is he’s tall and thin and has small teeth,” Madison said, realizing how much more secure she felt with Kevin beside her. “Let’s sign you in.”
She led him over to the reception desk. When he finished, the bellhop led them down to Kevin’s room, which she was relieved to see was just a few rooms from hers. After he unpacked, they sat at his desk.
“So what’s next?” he asked.
“Job One is to talk to the tight-lipped banker again. My brother suggests we tell him that the U.S. Senate Banking Committee and the Central Regional Bank here in the islands are considering looking into this account.”
“There’s another Job One.”
“What?”
“Staying alive.”
She agreed.
“We need some protection,” he said.
“Yes, but the detective told me tourists can’t buy firearms in St. Kitts.”
“We can visit a fishing store.”
“For what?”
“Knives,” he said.
Better than nothing, she thought.
“And about that banker...,” Kevin said.
“Yeah?”
“There might be a quicker way to loosen his tongue.”
“How?”
“I’m thinking we might scare him with the possibility of a big, bad PR nightmare for his very private little bank.”
She nodded and glanced at her watch. “I’m thinking we’ll miss the ferry to Nevis unless we hurry.”
* * *
In his rented Ford Escort, Eugene P. Smith put down his binoculars. Through the lobby window, he’d lip-read Madison McKean telling a tall, well-built man she referred to as Kevin about her escape yesterday. Now, Smith watched them get into a taxi and head off toward Basseterre.
Hanging back several cars, Smith followed them. He tossed two more Tylenol #4s with codeine into his mouth and washed them down with Glenfiddich. That made ten Tylenol #4s since the bitch yanked him into the ravine. The pills had reduced his back pain.
But not his anger.