Just in case.
She laid still, the box cutter resting on her stomach. She let her eyes close but didn’t dare sleep.
Chapter Thirty
Cat was wearing one of Fiermonte’s T-shirts, which fit her like a dress. Her head was buzzing, her brain a gyroscope that was spinning a little out of whack, but she was clean now, and that helped.
She enjoyed the feeling of being high, she had to admit that much. She drank to get numb, and she slept with men to numb desire whenever it rose to an intolerable level. Her career came first, so relationships and all their inevitable troubles and distractions were out of the question. But the fact that she found most men to be lacking, in one way or another, made that sacrifice easy enough to make.
Years ago a boyfriend of hers — back when she was still making occasional attempts at having boyfriends — had told her that no man stood a chance with her because she was so hung up on her father. She had thought about that, agreed with him, and sent him packing. There was, she knew, no point in denying the truth, or hiding from it. There wasn’t a day that she didn’t think of her father a dozen times, that she wasn’t reminded of him by some little thing or didn’t recall something he had taught her. There wasn’t a day that she didn’t mourn him, if only for a moment, or crave his presence, or quietly wish she could be next to him just one last time…
Even now, high on painkillers, her mind reeling, the man was in her head.
And she wouldn’t want it any other way.
Cat made it to Fiermonte’s bed just as the full effect of the painkiller took hold. She relished its grip on her and freely resigned to slipping in and out of consciousness. She was aware of little, but somehow she was able to keep track of Fiermonte’s comings and goings — he left once to get her prescription filled, then a second time to get a replacement battery for her phone, which, he told her upon his return, needed to be charged. He then made several phone calls, but she had a difficult time keeping track of what he was saying.
At one point she reached consciousness — it was like drifting upward through still water and breaking the surface — and heard a solemn silence. After a few moments she realized that Fiermonte must have left on yet another errand. She looked at the nightstand and saw her prescription bottle. She saw, too, that a battery had been connected to her cell phone, and that the phone was connected to a charger. The phone itself was powered down, but she didn’t feel any urgent need to turn it on yet.
The next thing she knew, she was being awakened by Fiermonte.
“You should take another pill,” he said.
“How long have I been out?”
“Almost six hours.”
He was holding out his hand. In it was a pill. She took it and swallowed it without any water, then laid down again.
Jeremy was seated on a stool at the window counter of a bagel shop on Bedford Avenue. He had downed several cups of coffee in hopes of fighting off the lethargy he knew so well. All he wanted was a place to lie down. He thought of heading back into Manhattan and crawling into his bed at the Gershwin Hotel, but he was afraid that in his stupor he wouldn’t hear his phone ring. He had left a message on Cat’s voice mail, asking her to call him back. He had tried to sound as lucid as he could, but he doubted he had pulled it off. He ended the message by telling her that it was important. His call had gone straight to her voice mail, and that meant her phone was shut off. Maybe she turned it off when she went to bed. Maybe today was her day off and she was sleeping in. Any minute now she’d wake up, get the message, and call him. He didn’t doubt that — couldn’t doubt that. He trusted her, and not because she was the only person left for him to trust.
He trusted her because she was Cat.
But hours passed and his cell phone did not ring. Eventually the owner of the bagel shop grew tired of the half-asleep kid with a freshly beat-up face slumped at his window counter and threw Jeremy out.
After wandering for a block, Jeremy found a bench and sat down. But he didn’t feel safe out in the open, so he walked till he found a pub that was opening up for lunch. The wide-screen TV suspended above the bar was tuned to a news program, the volume set higher than it needed to be. Jeremy sat in a booth in the back, and a waitress came to take his order, but she stopped short when she saw him. He knew by the look on her face that she was about to tell him to leave.
“Please,” he said softly. It was all he could say.
She glanced around quickly, then looked back at him. She was conflicted, obviously, and Jeremy was grateful for that much, at least, for this small amount of compassion being displayed by a stranger. He was grateful, yes, but it also made him miss Elizabeth. The waitress nodded and told him to order something and try to eat it.
“If you fall asleep in your food, my boss is going to be pissed at both of us.”
Jeremy thanked her, promised he wouldn’t let her down, and ordered a burger and fries. When the waitress left, he took out his cell phone and tried Cat’s number again.
Like before, his call went straight to her voice mail.
He ended the call without leaving a message but kept the phone in his hand. Once, not too long ago, a cell phone was his only connection with Elizabeth — not this phone, but the one it had replaced. Still, Jeremy remembered holding that phone as he lay in the dark of his father’s apartment, hearing her voice, telling her things he’d never told anyone. He remembered the night he had received the naked cell phone photo — she had decided finally to send him one, wanted him to have it, had even undressed as they spoke, but they needed to end their call so she could take the picture. He had lain still on his bed, the phone tight in his hand, waiting for the pic to come through.
A cell phone had become his only human connection.
Despite the heroin dulling every nerve, he felt a wave of sorrow rise inside him.
Elizabeth had not called him back, hadn’t even sent a text.
He was now alone.
Utterly alone.
Cat was pulled from a dream by the rising sensation inside her.
She opened her eyes, looked at the ceiling above, and knew by it where she was. She was coherent enough for that, but it still took her a moment to comprehend the source of the building pressure in her groin.
A fullness, and an overwhelming need to burst.
Someone’s mouth was on her. Her own mouth opened and she gasped slightly. Lifting her head off the pillow, she saw that Fiermonte’s head was between her parted thighs.
He was dressed, and the T-shirt she’d been wearing had been pulled up to expose her breasts. He had one finger inside her, was touching her nipples with the fingers of the other hand, and the motion of his tongue on her was soft but steady.
Her initial instinct was to pull away, but she didn’t move. She was simply, suddenly, too close to coming to tell him to stop.
Greed for relief — and pleasure — took over.
As she came, she clutched the back of his head with her one good hand and pulled herself up to a seated position. Her orgasm was long, and when it finally subsided Cat lingered upright for a moment before lying back down.
Her eyes were closed, she was adrift, half-conscious at best, but she could hear Fiermonte undressing himself. Her current state made it easy for her to surrender to what was next.
Fiermonte pulled the T-shirt off Cat and tossed it aside, then placed her left hand above her head and, balancing above her, held it with his right hand. Using his left Fiermonte guided himself inside her. Cat gasped again. He was large. Hey, if I’d known that, she thought jokingly. But it was a fleeting thought.
He moved slowly, which surprised her. He was teasing her with controlled, deliberate thrusts — just the tip, then the whole shaft at once, then just the tip again, then the whole shaft. Even when he was on the verge of coming his motion remained steady, the emphasis on mutual pleasure.
When she finally felt his heat filling her, she pulled him close with her one arm, wanted all his weight pressing down on her, wa
nted his body to cover hers from head to toe.
They stayed like that for a while. Then at some point Fiermonte was gone, and Cat, naked on his platform bed, drifted gradually into unconsciousness.
Jeremy was staring at his uneaten burger, struggling against a deepening stupor, when a news report came on the pub’s TV.
Three words caught his wavering attention.
Murder in Chappaqua.
He lifted his head, didn’t care who saw his beaten face, and looked at the TV mounted above the bar. He was holding his breath.
It took a long moment, but the female reporter finally got to what Jeremy was desperate not to hear.
A couple murdered in their home. The on-scene reporter was interviewing a neighbor. Jeremy didn’t care about that. He listened, forced himself to focus, waiting for the reporter to say what it was he needed right now to hear.
The names. Say the names.
But don’t say hers.
He knew this couldn’t be a coincidence. How could it be? But he had thought Elizabeth would be safe up in Chappaqua. He was certain of that. He had done everything he could to keep her safe, wouldn’t have gotten her involved if he wasn’t convinced his plan was foolproof. Thirty miles outside of the city, in a home equipped with a security system, nothing connecting them but his cell phone. The last-minute clue he had left Cat, just in case — could someone else have found it and understood it?
No. Not possible. So maybe a coincidence after all. Maybe just a strange coincidence. Elizabeth was fine. She was fine.
The prerecorded interview with the neighbor ended, and now the reporter was standing on the edge of a tree-lined street, talking to the camera. She was holding notes in one hand and a microphone in the other. A live report, with a banner at the bottom of the screen running those three words again.
Murder in Chappaqua.
Jeremy stood, took a few steps toward the bar. The bartender looked at him.
And then the reporter was about to come to what Jeremy was waiting for.
“You okay, man?” the bartender said.
Jeremy said nothing, just stared at the screen. The bartender turned to look at what was so captivating.
The police have now released the names of the murder victims…
Despite the heroin, a wave of dread rushed through Jeremy. Cold, gut-wrenching terror.
They are Jeffery and Elizabeth Hall.
Jeremy bolted past the long bar, heading for the door. He was wild, out of control, clipped an empty stool and knocked it over but kept going. The bartender called after him, told him to take it easy, then realized this crazy kid hadn’t paid his tab and called “Hey!” in a loud, stern voice. But Jeremy didn’t stop. He burst through the door and out into the late morning. The June sun hurt his eyes, but he ignored the bright light. He walked at first, then broke into a run.
Stumbling, lumbering, heading nowhere, toward no one, just away.
Rage and sorrow twisted together inside him. His heart was about to explode and his eyes were streaming hot tears.
Later, Cat and Fiermonte didn’t speak about their encounter — her word for it, spoken only in her head, but it seemed to sum the whole thing up for her because it implied that what happened was the kind of thing that happened between strangers. That, and that it was a one-time thing.
These were both situations that were familiar to her.
She woke after a few hours and, despite her growing pain, passed on another painkiller when Fiermonte offered it to her. He was more than happy to wait on her — hand her the T-shirt he had stripped from her, help her get out of bed and walk to the kitchen area, make her coffee and something to eat. He was clearly pleased with himself. Of course he is, she thought. He finally got to fuck me, after wanting to, apparently, for a long time. What was there for him to be unhappy about?
He was telling her that a composite artist would meet with them whenever she was ready, but all Cat could think about was being back in her apartment — washed, dressed in clean clothes, alone with four walls — her four walls — around her. Maybe then she would have a better idea what to feel about what had happened. Or better yet, maybe she wouldn’t have to do that at all, maybe her search for her brother — brothers, actually — would resume and she would just forget all about this.
Forget it, never speak of it, never reconcile it.
Surrender to distraction and run — the things she did best.
This was beginning to feel like the thing to do.
It was this chain of thought, however, that led Cat to remember that her cell phone was shut off. Walking to the bedside table, she grabbed the phone. The new battery was now fully charged, so she disconnected the charger, pressed the Power button, and laid the phone back on the table.
She was gathering her clothes with her one good arm when the phone beeped, indicating that a voice mail message had come through.
Returning to the table, she picked up the phone again and pressed Talk.
She was holding the phone to her ear when Fiermonte came out of the kitchen. He waited as she listened to the message.
Fiermonte drove. He had expressed concern that Jeremy wouldn’t be where Cat had told him to wait — Don’t be disappointed if we don’t find him — but when the sedan turned onto Bedford Avenue, Cat saw her kid brother through the windshield and said excitedly, “There he is!”
Cat kept her eyes on her brother as Fiermonte steered to the curb.
It was then that she saw that the kid had been beaten. His face was bruised and swollen. One eye was barely open, the other was so bloodshot she could see it from a few yards away.
Cat got out and helped her brother into the backseat. She sat beside him and put one arm around him. He slumped against her, laying his head on her shoulder. Whatever had kept him going for this long was gone now. He began to cry quietly; his body was trembling. Cat pulled him closer.
Fiermonte glanced at them in the rearview mirror as he drove. It wasn’t long before Jeremy’s shuddering suddenly ended. Cat looked closely at his face and saw that he was unconscious.
The sudden slumber of someone on heroin? Or passed out from exhaustion?
Cat almost didn’t want to know which.
“Check his arms,” Fiermonte said quietly.
She hesitated, then proceeded to inspect her brother’s arms — first his right, then his left. She found on his left forearm a single injection mark. It was obviously fresh.
“So much for him being clean,” Fiermonte said.
Cat ignored that. “Take us to the apartment.”
“Mine?”
“No. Our father’s.”
“I think my place might be better, don’t you? It’s bigger, and probably more private.”
Cat shook her head. “I want him to wake up there. I want him to know he’s safe.”
“Will it be safe, though?”
“I’ll be there. And you’ll pull some strings, get the PD to park a unit outside.” She looked at his eyes in the mirror. “You’ll do that for us, right?”
Fiermonte nodded once. “Yeah. Of course. That’ll make this official, though. You understand what that means, right? This might churn things up. Your father’s name will probably get dragged through the mud all over again. And people were just beginning to forget.”
She knew that by “people” Fiermonte really meant the FBI.
The men with whom she worked. For whom she worked. Who saw her as the daughter of a traitor, a betrayer.
All of it lies…
For all that to get brought up once more wouldn’t be good at all for her already-troubled career.
But she didn’t care about that. Let the bastards say what they wanted. Let them think what they wanted.
For that matter, let them do what they wanted.
Surrender was the thing she did best.
“I’ll risk it,” she said.
Fiermonte studied her for a moment. “Okay,” he said finally. “I’ll take care of it.”
Cat
held Jeremy close as the sedan carried them toward Manhattan.
With one brother retrieved, she was now able to think of the other still out there somewhere.
Why haven’t I heard from Johnny? By getting him involved, have I merely sacrificed one brother for another?
She diverted her mind from questions she could not answer to the one question she could.
The one action left for her to take.
How long do I wait before I contact Dickey McVicker again?
Chapter Thirty-One
Johnny woke to the sound of something being torn. He opened his eyes and saw that Haley was up and removing a cell phone from its packaging.
She cringed slightly when she saw that she had woken him. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay.” His mouth and throat were dry; it hurt to talk. He glanced at what was in her hands. “When did you get that?”
“While you were asleep. I got one for each of us.” She knew what he was going to say next, so before he could speak, she said assuredly, “I was careful. Everything’s fine. We’re safe.”
“Did you get the tape?”
“Yes. But you need to rest some more.”
“No, we need to get going.” He made an attempt to sit up but quickly abandoned it.
“I checked you while you were sleeping, and your bruise actually looks worse, Johnny. A lot worse.”
“I don’t care.” He forced himself to an upright position — it took everything he had — then swung his legs so he was seated on the edge of the bed.
He froze there, nearly blacking out from the agony.
Haley was suddenly seated beside him and holding him up.
“You’re going to hurt yourself even more than you already have. And then what good will you be? We’re safe right now. I got us food and water, so we can just sit tight for as long as it takes. Okay?”
There was pain one could ignore, and then there was pain one simply had no hope at all of arguing with. The pain shooting through him now was the latter.
The Betrayer Page 20