“Holy crap,” Brenda said.
“What now?” Carter asked.
“Well, we find Massimo and I suspect we’ll find Georgia,” Skyler said. “The Mallard people are at Georgia’s house. And John and Anna’s boss is due to arrive this afternoon. Let’s go tell them what we know.”
“Perhaps they can convince the police to track Massimo’s phone somehow. That’d be a good place to start, right?” Sullivan asked. “They can run a check on his passport, too.”
“It’s the only thing we’ve got so far. It’s worth a try.” Skyler grabbed her coat and the group headed to the door leaving Matteo standing alone in the unfinished hotel lobby, quite literally confused.
* * *
Mallard Protection’s Challenger 604—recently purchased from an Oscar-winning client who traded up to a new Gulfstream—touched down at the Santa Fe Regional Airport and taxied to Advanced Aviation, the fixed-base operator that serviced private aircraft. After the engines were shut down, the cabin door was lowered, and handrails were locked into place by the co-pilot, Archibald Grey and three of his favorite, biggest bodyguards descended to the tarmac and piled into a dark blue Ford Expedition. The engine was idling and the interior was pleasantly heated.
Within minutes, they were traveling north-east on Route 599 towards Georgia Reece’s house with Archie at the wheel, controlled and steady, weaving expertly around cars and trucks at perilous speeds. He’d never before set foot in the state of New Mexico, but he did not trust G.P.S. navigation systems—one had failed him once when he got misdirected while transferring a very high-level V.I.P. client, and he vowed never to reply on the technology again. Instead, he studied Santa Fe-area street maps on the 45-minute flight from Aspen, committing his intended route to memory. It helped to pass the time and it got his mind off the fact that he was furious to be missing valuable snow skiing time with his wife and children—the entire family was only together a precious few days now that the kids were done with school and his wife refused to give up her job as a United Airlines flight attendant, despite the fact that they had more money than they knew what to do with—not to mention the cost of operating the jet and paying holiday double-time pay.
When they approached Georgia’s front gate, Archie lowered the driver’s side window and pressed the ‘call’ button. He identified himself and within seconds the gate swung open. He drove through and then immediately stopped the car. In the rearview mirror, he watched as the gate swung closed again before continuing up the driveway to the large house—it was a habit he tried to instill in all of his employees and clients. “Never take anything for granted,” he reminded the men in the car. “The time you don’t wait, the gate won’t close and someone will slip in behind you.”
John Sparks was standing alone in the driveway near the front porch. His hands were clutched together and he nervously shifted his weight. “Welcome to Santa Fe, boss,” he said sheepishly.
Archie got out of the S.U.V. and stared down the man he used to consider one of Mallard’s finest employees. “What. The. Living. Hell?”
“I am so sorry to drag you down here. Anna and I are absolutely horrified with ourselves and we won’t blame you if you decide to let us...”
“That’s enough, John.” He started walking toward the front door and the ex-policeman hurried to keep up. “What’s new since we last spoke?” Two of the bodyguards instinctively followed; the third was already out in front, opening the door. “Guys, do your thing,” Archie said to the bodyguards. They each took off in a different direction.
“What are they going to do?” John asked as he closed the front door and offered to take his boss’ coat.
“They’re going to assess this house and report back to me. Is there anyone else in the home who should be warned that I’m here to take over?”
“Just me at the moment,” Anna said as she entered the room from the kitchen. “Hello, Mr. Grey.”
“Anna.”
“Miss Reece has two houseguests, as well as one of the guest’s two large dogs. They’re out back. The dogs, not the ladies. The ladies are downtown, but they should be back shortly.”
“Remind me who these guests are.”
“Brenda Braxton of New York City. She’s a well-known chef and restaurant owner. And Skyler Moore. She does public relations based out of Washington, D.C. They were here in Santa Fe for the holidays, were invited guests at Miss Reece’s Christmas party this past weekend, and they have become very friendly with Miss Reece this past week.”
Archie took a seat on the living room sofa. “Who else has been in Georgia’s world since she moved to town?”
John cleared his throat and took a seat opposite his boss. “The hotel developers Carter and Sullivan Lowery. They are twin brothers and they are roughly the same age as Miss Reece. They are here in Santa Fe building a new property down near the Plaza. Franklin-Lowery is the name of the hotel.”
“I know it well, John,” Archie said. “There’s one across the street from our offices in New York. Go on.”
“By all accounts, the twins are very close friends with Miss Reece. I assume they became acquainted back in the city. And then there’s Miss Reece’s agent, an Italian citizen named Massimo Modena who…”
“Who we believe is still here in Santa Fe!” Brenda said as she bounded into the living room.
Archibald got to his feet and greeted Brenda, who was followed into the house by Skyler, Carter, and Sullivan.
“Miss Braxton,” Archie said, “Why should we be concerned that Miss Reece’s agent might still be in Santa Fe?”
Skyler stepped forward. “Because Massimo physically attacked Georgia last weekend. She filed a police report. She fired him as her agent. And as far as we were all aware at the time, he left the United States and flew home to Milan, Italy.”
“When did he supposedly leave Santa Fe?” Archie asked.
“Saturday. But his wife says that he did not return to Italy,” Sullivan said. He then told Archibald, John, and Anna all about the phone call with Ana.
“Suspect number one, fellas,” Carter said. “We just have to find him and we’ll find Georgia.”
Archie made some scratchings in a small notebook. He turned to Anna, “Call Berta back in New York and get her to check all the possible ways this Massimo fellow could fly commercial from Santa Fe—or Albuquerque, for that matter—to Milan or nearby international airports in Italy on December 16th. My guess is that he couldn’t have possibly arrived there until December 17th, at the earliest, given the time difference. Have her check all the passenger manifests. If anyone can find out if he flew to Italy, she can.”
Anna nodded and left the room.
Archie turned back to the twins. “Does Massimo have the means to fly private?”
Carter and Sullivan exchanged looks. “I don’t think so,” Carter said. Sullivan agreed. “Georgia is comfortable, but not private jet comfortable. And Massimo took a cut. She was his only client.”
“Too large of a cut,” Brenda added. “He was ripping her off.”
“Explain,” Archie said.
Carter let out air. “Georgia told me that Massimo was taking 40%. He was robbing her blind. She was very unhappy about it.”
“Yet she stayed with him for twenty years,” Sullivan said. “Why?”
“Besides the guests and service people who were here for the party last Friday,” Archie said, “Is there anyone else who has been in this house in the last week? Who fixed the damage from the bomb blast?”
“Diego Ferrera,” Skyler said. “He’s a very sweet local fellow. He was brought in after the original break-in to fix that plate glass window over there and then he came back to fix the wall on Monday. He was referred by the responding officer. Diego is the police officer’s brother-in-law.”
“And Diego is the brother of Matteo, the contractor who is overseeing the construction of our new hotel,” Sullivan added.
Archie’s eyebrows rose.
“Welcome to Santa Fe,�
�� Brenda said. “It’s a very small town.”
“Apparently.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
She was awake for a few moments before she was able to open her eyes—they just weren’t cooperating. The throbbing in her head was constant and overpowering, and the rest of her body wasn’t faring much better. Her legs felt like jelly, her torso sore. And her stomach was magnificently empty. She was aware that she was in some sort of enclosed space. She heard birds singing in the distance, but it was muffled. She seemed to be lying on some sort of upholstered surface. Her fingers traced the edge and then her right arm dropped down and she felt tight, thin carpet. And a coin.
When she finally willed her eyelids to open, she was staring up at the fabric covered roof of a car. She was alone in the back seat. There was a dim light outside. Early morning or late evening, she decided. She had no idea which. She’d lost all track of time, date, and place.
After a few long minutes of listening to her own labored breath, she sat up and slowly swung her legs to the floor. Blood rushed to, or out of, her head—she wasn’t sure which—and she nearly blacked out again, but she was determined to stay conscious. The car was sitting to the right side of a single lane dirt road with thick groves of trees on both sides. She checked the ignition; no keys. There was a large McDonald’s cup in the center console. Dehydrated, she took a sip from the straw without checking to see what was inside. It was relatively cold and virtually flavorless—day old, unsweetened iced tea, she surmised. She finished the beverage then searched the rest of the car, desperately trying to ignore the pain that seared through her body. All she found was a rental agreement from Avis. She opened it and saw that the car had been leased to Massimo a week earlier.
Had he run out of gas? Was he taking a leak in the woods? Would he be returning any moment? Did he get cold feet and abandon her? Georgia Reece was stunned and wounded but alive, and thankful for another chance to escape.
She scanned the perimeter and saw no sign of life, save a large black bird pecking at a small dead animal a few yards in front of the car. Wrapping the opera house window curtain around her, she opened the back door of the sedan and climbed out onto the dirt road. Startled, the black bird flew away and she was utterly alone. Shoeless, shirtless, lost, and utterly alone. But she was determined to save herself and see Massimo pay for what he had done.
It took a few long minutes, but she finally decided to go back the way the car had apparently come from, instead of going forward. She didn’t know why, but it seemed the right thing to do. She began to walk, alternating between scanning her surroundings and looking down at the road just ahead of her numb, bare feet, in order to avoid stepping on rocks and twigs and other obstacles. Her mind wandered between the growing fear that Massimo would pop out of the woods, or appear around the next bend in the road at any moment, to her pain, her hunger, the cold winter wind that was picking up, her mother’s ashes, her cozy new Santa Fe fireplace, her vintage Christmas ornaments back in New York City (where she wished she’d stayed), the lyrics to her favorite Italian opera, Sully’s penis…or was it Carter’s?
Are they different?
She walked for nearly an hour, she estimated, and it was now clear that the sun was setting instead of rising, somewhere behind the thick clouds that had rolled in. In another half hour, she’d be walking in the pitch-black December night. And that made her start thinking about coyotes and the inevitable newspaper headlines:
Internationally Acclaimed Opera Diva Found Dead, Eaten by Coyotes in New Mexican Desert
A Pack of Wild New Mexican Coyotes Devour the Once Breathtakingly Beautiful Face of Opera Singer Georgia Reece
Renowned Soprano Georgia Reece’s Throat Mangled and Her Shirt and Shoes Stolen by Rabid Coyotes Near Santa Fe, N.M.; Entertainment World Mourns; Flags to be Flown at Half Staff, President Orders
Georgia Reece may have been rightfully delirious, but she was wrong about two things; she wouldn’t be eaten by coyotes that night…and she wasn’t in New Mexico.
* * *
A command center had been set up in Georgia’s dining room. Fitted with a laptop, tablet, cell phone, and the most high-tech headset money could buy, Archibald Grey worked every possibility as fast as he could. He had two of his men canvasing the downtown retail area in a fruitless search for surveillance video that may have captured Georgia’s abductor and the getaway vehicle, if there was one. But most Santa Fe businesses didn’t feel the need for the extra expense of security cameras; companies in larger cities and towns were apt to spend money on those.
Despite coming up empty-handed at every turn, Archie’s team reported back regularly.
The third Mallard employee was at the police station filing the official missing persons report in order to get the much-needed, now official—since it had been two days since she had gone missing—attention from the authorities. Up until now, the police claimed their hands were tied despite the Christmas party bombing and Georgia’s ongoing harassment. Archie saw it as a rinky-dink, small town law enforcement cluster-fuck, and it made him frustrated beyond belief.
And still blaming themselves, John and Anna were trying to track down and speak to every single person, save for the Governor, who had been inside Georgia’s home since she purchased the house in early-December. This, too, was an arduous task, as many folks had left the state for the holidays.
Christmas Eve was a mere three days away, a fact that wasn’t lost on any of the Mallard team members; each wished they could locate Georgia and hightail it home. That prospect was unlikely though, and Archie, for one, feared this job could be the straw that finally broke his precarious marriage apart. His wife was furious about his absence and was texting her displeasure nearly nonstop; the distraction messing with the security man’s typical laser-focused concentration on the pressing matter at hand.
“Can I get you anything?” Brenda asked Archie. “Coffee? Something else? Have you eaten anything today?”
Archie considered the celebrity chef’s offer for a moment—he almost opened his mouth to order a glass of whiskey, but instead said, “You are too kind, Ms. Braxton. I’m fine, though, really. You shouldn’t trouble yourself with us.”
“Alright,” she said, “but the kitchen is very well stocked. Please help yourself.”
Brenda padded off to her suite, took a few moments to pet Mulder and Scully, then sat down on the loveseat with her cell phone. She found the contact information for Leonard Little and initiated a video call. It was nearly 10 o’clock on the east coast, but she suspected he’d still be awake.
“Wow,” he said when he picked up. “I don’t think you’ve ever FaceTimed me before. Is everything okay?”
“My goodness, that beard! I’ve never seen you with facial hair. What brought this on?”
“Laziness. And it keeps my face warm. It’s friggin’ cold here, Brenda. One of the coldest on record, they’re saying on the news. Global warming, my ass.” He lit a cigarette.
“A beard and you’re smoking again. Skyler would not be happy with either.”
Leonard exhaled a cloud of smoke and leaned in close to the camera. “What she doesn’t know won’t kill her. Keep your mouth shut, woman.”
“Listen,” Brenda said, “I’m calling because I have an idea. My Christmas present to Skyler.”
“Shit, I haven’t sent her anything yet. What do you have planned? Not that I could match it.”
“Shave off that muddled mess of hair, ditch the nasty cigarettes, and pack your bags. I want to wrap you up and deliver you to your girlfriend as a holiday surprise. Game?”
His eyes widened and his mouth slipped open. “Brenda. I’ve flown three times in my entire life. The flight up here, all by myself…that one almost killed me. I’m not sure I’m up for it again. Or ever, for that matter.”
“You are the biggest baby I know, Lenny,” Brenda said. “And it’s not like I’m going to subject you to a commercial flight, or anything. I’m sending a private jet. Can you be at Advan
ced Aviation at nine o’clock tomorrow morning? At the Portland Jetport?”
He took a long drag on the cigarette and then stubbed it out. As he exhaled, he said, “I guess Wabanaki can deal without their temporary sheriff for a few days. Porter Maddox should be able to keep things in check. And I guess if I have to fly, a private jet would soften the blow a bit.”
“Well, if you crash in a Gulfstream or a commercial 757, I still think you die either way.”
“What is wrong with you?! I thought you were trying to convince me to come.”
“While you’re packing your suitcase, make sure to locate your balls, okay? You are a police officer, Leonard Little. Jesus Christ.”
“Alright,” he said like a defensive little boy talking back to his mother, “Just shut up about planes crashing. I’ll come, I’ll come.”
“Perfect. Skyler is going to be thrilled. And, Leonard, I think we’d both feel better having you around. This place is on high alert. And there’s still no sign of Georgia.”
“I really don’t know why you haven’t cut and run. Let the authorities deal with it.”
“That’s the point,” Brenda said. “They aren’t dealing with it. They aren’t equipped for kidnappings around these parts.”
“Sounds familiar.”
“Right? Plus, with the Mallard Protection folks here, maybe you can learn a thing or two. Skyler told me that you’re interested in that field of work.”
“I’d like that, maybe. Maybe not. I Googled that Archibald fellow after I talked to Skyler. He does a lot of work in and out of New York City. But he’s not the best of the best, you know. He’s had more than a few negative stories written about his outfit. Has a pending lawsuit or two. And he just comes across as an arrogant bully—on paper anyway.”
“Geez. I didn’t know all of that, no. And to tell you the truth, he and his crew are coming up empty while trying to locate Georgia. So maybe you don’t want to emulate all of that.”
“This is all very scary.”
Brenda stood up and walked over to the window. “Okay. So, you’ll come here? Good. I’m very happy. Bring your gun, okay?”
The New Mexico Scoundrel Page 16