For the Love of Pete

by Julia Harper

  It was unfortunate that both babies had chosen to dirty their diapers at the same time, but fortunate that they had done so after the Gupta ladies had thought to buy a parcel of disposable diapers.

  “I am working as fast as I can,” Pratima panted as she wrestled a T-shirt onto the wiggling baby. The little girl’s clothes needed to be washed after her diaper change, and the T-shirt was the best available clothing for her, though it draped her like a tent.

  Abdul said something in his native language.

  Savita-di smiled widely at the man. “Yes! Yes!” She leaned to Pratima and whispered out of the corner of her mouth. “What do you think he is saying?”

  “How should I know, Savita-di?” Pratima shrugged. “I do not speak Farsi or whatever language he employs. Perhaps he is saying that we have had a nice visit but now it is time for us to leave.”

  “We cannot leave, as well you know, Pratima. That Terrible Man was at the restaurant. If I had not warned you to drive away in time—”

  “Pardon me, Savita-di, but was it not me who had the idea to change the so-large and very visible yellow Humvee for our nephew’s purple minivan?”

  “Yes—”

  “Then I believe I deserve equal share in the praise for eluding That Terrible Man.”

  “Humph,” was all Savita-di said, so Pratima knew that her sister-in-law had taken the point.

  Pratima smiled as Savita-di knelt to diaper the boy.

  Twenty minutes later, both ladies sat back on Abdul’s worn settee and contemplated the babies. The children crawled about the floor like miniature explorers, the boy hauling himself up the leg of the wooden table to stand swaying, the girl gnawing on a metal teaspoon she held in one hand as she crawled.

  “What are we to do with them, Savita-di?” Pratima asked wearily.

  Babies were very pretty, but such work! One forgot how terribly exhausting one baby was, let alone two. They were a job for younger women. Both sisters-in-law had reached the age when they should only have to play with babies on their knees, then hand them back to their frazzled mothers when the babies became stinky.

  “We cannot take them back to That Terrible Man,” Savita-di said with certainty.

  “No, no,” Pratima agreed. “These sweet innocents in the hands of such a man is an awful thought. But perhaps we can take them to a police station?”

  “And have the police arrest us at first sight?” Savita-di asked indignantly. “Have you no sense, Pratima?”

  “I have sense enough to know we cannot keep these babies.”

  “If your sense was so wonderful, would we have stolen the yellow Humvee in the first place?”

  “Pardon me, Savita-di, but the plan to steal the Humvee was yours, if you will recall.”

  “Ah!” Savita-di cried as if pinched. “Always you blame me! But what else can I expect from a woman who would flirt with her husband’s brother?”

  The babies had looked up at the sound of raised voices, and even Abdul stared, puzzled, from his tattered chair. Pratima pursed her lips shut. This was a very old, very painful argument, and one which both Gupta ladies usually avoided at all costs. Savita-di must be frightened indeed to bring it up now.

  Pratima inhaled deeply. “What do you suggest we do with these babies, then, Savita-di?”

  “I do not know!” Savita-di threw up her arms.

  “We cannot leave them with Abdul.”

  Both ladies watched as the elderly man giggled and poked a bony finger into the baby boy’s soft arm.

  “Nooo,” agreed Savita-di.

  “Your daughter Vinati will not be back from her wonderful vacation in Disney World for another week. And I do not think it wise to consult Saumya about this business, at least not yet. Remember, she was quite rude when we asked for the loan of her extra car.”

  “Hmm. And we’ve left the car at that petrol pump,” Savita-di mused. “No, no, best not to ask Saumya. Or my nephew Karan, for that matter.”

  Pratima pursed her lips judiciously. “In fact, I think all the nephews and nieces are far too busy for this matter.”

  “Very true, very true, Pratima,” Savita-di muttered. “Best not to bother the nieces and nephews.”

  Both ladies stared at the babies for a moment. Pratima felt weary to her bones. It had been a long day, first planning to steal back their kesar, then the actual theft, and then the unpleasant surprise that they’d stolen two babies, as well. She sighed and drew the thin cloth of her sari over her arm. Really, she wasn’t as young as she used to be.

  Next to her, Savita-di sighed, as well, and spoke. “But maybe there is one nephew whom we might contact.”

  Chapter Twelve

  Thursday, 8:49 p.m.

  For a chick who worked in a health-food co-op, Zoey sure liked her junk food.

  “Oh, my God! I’d forgotten how good these were!” she mumbled through a mouthful of ButterBurger. “I used to get these when I was a teenager—Culver’s was the only burger place I could bike to—and then I found how much fat was in one and quit.”

  They were eating in the car, which was parked in a dark lot in front of a bakery. There was a neon CLOSED sign over the bakery door, and a glow showed through the plate-glass windows—probably some kind of security light. Actually, it just now occurred to him that it was kind of romantic out here. Dante glanced at Zoey and wondered if the thought had occurred to her, too. Probably not. Most people didn’t think running for their lives was all that romantic.

  He sighed, took a bite of his Bacon ButterBurger Deluxe with extra cheese, and considered her last statement. “Just how much fat is there in these things?”

  Zoey shook her head sagely, her mouth full. She swallowed and took a long draw from her milkshake. “You don’t want to know. It’s unbelievable, but junk food was such forbidden fruit when I was a teenager.”

  “Why?”

  “Mom was way into whole foods.”

  He crumpled a napkin. “So where exactly did you grow up?”

  “Big farm.” She waved a hand as if conjuring the immensity of the space inside the BMW. “Out in the middle of nowhere, Indiana.”

  “But you had a Culver’s within biking distance?”

  “Thank God.” She swirled a french fry in ketchup and ate it. “My mom was the last of the back-to-earth hippies, only they didn’t call themselves hippies by the time she started. Anyway, we raised most of our food ourselves.”

  “Yeah?” He could totally see her as a girl on some whole-grains-and-turnips commune, running through fields of weeds, bare kid legs flashing, her red-blond hair streaming behind her, shining in the sun. He blinked and took another bite of sloppy burger.

  She hadn’t seemed to notice his brief reverie. “Yeah. We grew weird heirloom veggies, had apple and pear trees, a couple of beehives, and chickens. Lots of chickens. Oh, and goats.”

  He glanced at her. She was listing the ingredients to a natural paradise, but her voice was flat. “Sounds perfect.”

  She pulled a pickle out from her half-eaten burger and nibbled the edge. “You’d think so, wouldn’t you.”

  “Why wasn’t it?”

  She heaved a small, sad sigh. “Turns out that it takes a lot of work to run a farm, even a half-assed hippie farm. Mom spent all her time milking goats, canning tomatoes, feeding chickens, all that stuff. And she also did weird little crafts, because strangely enough, most shop owners won’t take a bushel of apples as payment for a kid’s shoes.”

  “And your father? You said he left when you were fourteen.”

  “Yeah. He took off with a girlfriend and started a new family. He and Mom really had nothing in common. He was this right-wing, suburban kind of guy, totally the opposite of Mom. It’s amazing what hormones will do to the brains of two otherwise perfectly sane humans. I think he was kind of embarrassed by me.”

  He looked at her.

  She shrugged. “Me and Mom didn’t really fit into his Middle America idea of happiness, you know? A marriage that didn’t work out. A teena
ged kid who didn’t listen and wasn’t as cute as his new babies. I think he sometimes wanted to just forget we even existed. We were a mistake in his otherwise perfect life.”

  “Huh.” He meditated on that as he ate the rest of his burger. “Did he have a job?”

  “Uh-huh.” She wadded her burger wrapper up into a tiny, tight ball and thrust it into the paper bag the food had come in. “He was a cop.”

  Dante had been about to turn the car on, and the keys jangled as his hand hit them clumsily. A cop. That might explain her barely concealed hostility at times. Maybe she had a thing about men in law enforcement. Baggage like that could make a relationship die an early death. Huh. Good thing he wasn’t interested in a relationship with Zoey.

  She was busy wiping her fingers on a napkin and apparently hadn’t noticed his distraction. “Mom and Dad met when he arrested her at some sit-in. Either that’s romantic or just sad, depending on how you look at it.”

  “How do you look at it?”

  Her fingers stilled. “Sad, I think. They should’ve never married, should’ve never had me.”

  She said it matter-of-factly, but an admission like that couldn’t be made unemotionally.

  He looked at his hands on the steering wheel, uncertain of what to say. “Well, I’m glad they had you.”

  He glanced at her as he turned the ignition and caught a fleeting emotion on her face. Uncertainty? Surprise? It might even be gratitude. He wasn’t sure, and it was gone as fast as it’d come. Zoey was the kind of girl who would keep a guy constantly on his toes, trying to figure out what she was thinking, watching to see which way her mood would swing. He suddenly wondered if any man had ever penetrated her goofy shell to find the real woman within. What would she do if a guy tried to get that close? Would she even let him?

  He put the car in gear, pulled over to a Dumpster, and got out briefly to throw away the trash from their meal.

  When he reentered the car she was looking at him. “Are we going to look for Pete now?”

  “I need to try my boss again first.”

  She pointedly fingered the hole in the BMW’s canopy. “Can you trust him? Someone sent the Chicago police on us.”

  “There’s more going on than you understand. Jack Headington is the Chicago SAC—Special Agent in Charge. If someone has set me up in the Chicago FBI office, it isn’t him. In fact, he’s the one guy I can trust in Chicago.”

  “Why?”

  There was no way he could answer that—without telling her about his undercover operation which he didn’t want to do. He ignored her question and pulled out the new cell he’d bought right before the burgers. He’d used most of his cash to get the cell, but it couldn’t be helped. He needed a clean phone.

  She kind of humphed and folded her arms across her chest.

  Dante flipped open the cell and punched in a private number.

  Three rings and then it picked up. “Headington.”

  He exhaled in relief. “It’s Torelli, sir.”

  A gentle sigh on the other end. “Bit of trouble, I hear, Dante.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Tell me what happened.”

  The SAC’s speaking voice was so quiet that Dante had to strain to hear. Dante had long suspected that the low tone was his boss’s way of exerting dominance in a conversation. The person Headington was speaking to had to pay perfect attention to understand what the man was saying. And few were bold enough to ask him to speak up.

  “As you know, there was a hit on the safe house,” Dante said now.

  “The agents assigned to the case are all dead, Dante. Why aren’t you?” The tone was curious rather than condemning.

  “I was late for my shift. Sir.”

  “Late.”

  Dante winced. “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, fortunate for you, I suppose. And for the agency. Do you think this mess is related to the problems we’ve been having in this office?”

  “I think it must be, sir.”

  “Any ideas?”

  Dante grimaced, hating to admit it. “Not at the moment, sir.”

  “Ah.” There was a silence from the other end, then, “Did you recover Spinoza’s daughter?”

  “No, sir.”

  Where another man would’ve sworn, Headington was merely silent. Dante glanced in the rearview mirror. He didn’t see any cars following them, but he didn’t like making this call anyway. Someone on the inside had already betrayed them, and a cell phone call could be traced.

  “Then the kidnapper got away.” Headington sighed. “I’m told that Spinoza hasn’t been contacted yet.”

  “Do you think the kidnapper will contact Ricky?”

  Another sigh. “It’s only a matter of time until they do. Are we working under the assumption that the kidnapper was in DiRosa’s employ?”

  “I think we have to, sir.”

  “With the child in DiRosa’s hands, there’s no way that Spinoza will testify on Monday.”

  “No, sir.” Dante pulled the car to a stop at a light and debated for a second. He hated telling him this over a phone, but there was no other way. “I’m not sure DiRosa actually has the baby, sir.”

  “What?” The word was so low that Dante almost missed it.

  “We saw the baby taken from the original kidnapper.”

  Dante braced himself for a slew of questions about the second kidnappers, but Headington surprised him as always by latching on to a different bit of information.

  “We?”

  Dante hesitated, eyes narrowed against the glare of oncoming cars. The Chicago office must already know that Zoey was with him. She’d left her car running right in front of the apartment building, and, if nothing else, the Chicago PD had seen her in his car. There was absolutely no reason not to tell Headington, even if they were being listened to.

  “Dante?”

  He shook his head, trying to clear his brain. “I’ve got a civilian with me, sir. Nikki Hernandez’s sister, Zoey Addler.”

  “Good God, son, what’re you thinking?”

  Dante winced. Headington had a point.

  “You need to get rid of her, you know that.”

  “Yes, sir, I do, but I’m worried for her safety.”

  “Safety? Why wouldn’t she . . .” Headington trailed away into a thoughtful silence. “Ah. I see what you mean.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You both need to come in.”

  “I—”

  “You’re a target, Dante,” Headington murmured. “Whoever this traitor in our office is, he’s powerful, and he’s setting you up. Kevin told me that Chicago cops shot at you this afternoon. That takes money and influence.”

  Dante glanced behind him as he changed lanes. “We already know it’s someone high in the office. His use of the Chicago PD is interesting, though. Have you been able to talk to the police? Call them off my tail?”

  “I have, but we have no way of knowing how high the corruption goes in the Chicago police department. I can’t guarantee that they won’t go after you again.”

  “Damn.” Dante grimaced. “We were getting close. Has Kevin gotten into Pearson’s financial records?” Pearson was the ASAC in Chicago, a tired, middle-aged man who was only hanging on for his retirement pension.

  “Kevin’s still going through Fred Pearson’s computer.” Headington sounded weary. “God, I hope it isn’t Fred. I’ve known him for twenty years.”

  “Yes, sir.” Dante didn’t point out that the traitor was bound to be someone Headington knew well.

  “In any case, you can’t fight this guy on your own.” The SAC’s voice was commanding again. “Come in. That’s an order. We’ll put you under guard and you can finish your investigation here.”

  Dante swallowed. Beside him, Zoey was watching with wide eyes. Dammit, he’d just promised her that they’d go after the kid.

  “I’m following a lead on the child, sir,” Dante said carefully. “I don’t believe anyone else is in a better position to do this right now. Not
anyone we can trust. If we can’t get that baby back by Monday, then Spinoza won’t testify and the judge will probably declare a mistrial.”

  “You’re forgetting that your first priority is the internal investigation,” Headington said without inflection. “That’s what Charlie Hessler sent you to Chicago to do. That’s what’s important. I want this rot in my department rooted out and exposed to the light of day. I want it destroyed.”

  “Yes, sir.” He knew the baby wasn’t his primary job. But on the other hand . . . “I’ve got a lead, though. Just twenty-four hours to see if it pans out. That’s all I’m asking.”

  “I don’t like this, Dante. We have no way of protecting you out there. We lost three of our finest agents today. What’s to stop the traitor from locating you—and killing you and Miss Addler?”

  “I know, sir.” Dante blew out a breath. “But the longer the baby stays out here, the higher the chance she’ll be found by DiRosa’s man first. Once that happens you know her life will be in danger.”

  Silence as Headington made his decision. Whatever he decided, Dante would have to follow his orders. The FBI wasn’t an organization that encouraged independent thought.

  Finally, the SAC cleared his throat, a sound like dry leaves rustling. “You have until ten hundred tomorrow morning. If you haven’t got the child by that time, you’re to abort and come in. And bring Ms. Addler with you. She’s not safe on the streets by herself. Do you understand, Dante?”

  “Yes, sir.” It wasn’t twenty-four hours, but the SAC giving him until tomorrow morning was better than nothing at all.

  “Good.”

  “Where can we meet?”

  “Do you know the Stevenson Expressway overpass just south of Chinatown? Where Canal Street runs under the expressway?”

  “I can find it, sir.”

  “Good. It’s out of the way enough not to attract attention, but still an open space. I’ll see you there, Dante.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Be careful, son.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The line clicked as Headington disconnected.

  Dante glanced over his shoulder and crossed two lanes to pull into an all-night drugstore parking lot. He palmed the cell and got out of the BMW. Two cars were sitting by the doors to the drugstore. One was a burgundy Buick with a wooden-bead seat cover over the driver’s seat. Dante tried the door handle and found it unlocked. He quickly opened the driver’s-side door and threw the cheap cell into the back seat.