Landry scuttled as quickly as he could into the cavernous garage and spotted a tiny bathroom nearby. Dark brown stains lined the toilet bowl, but at least the thing had water in it. Landry fumbled with his belt and made it just in time.
Of all the times to come down with diarrhea, but then there was no such thing as a good time. Was it a flu bug? Or something he ate? He bent over as another wave of pain rolled through his insides.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
ROB SHOUTED THROUGH the front doorway into Dysart’s house. “You have to listen to me.”
Lesley was in there. He could hear her moving around but she was staying out of sight. He stormed inside and tore from room to room. Why couldn’t he find her? He heard a scuttling noise in one of the bedrooms and hurried in that direction.
No good. The room was empty except for Leo, who was curled up asleep on the bed. Lesley hated it when the cat got fur on the bedspread.
But how could Leo be here? He never left Lesley’s apartment. Had she moved in with Stan and Sheila? Rob’s head ached. He couldn’t think straight. Had to get to Lesley. Had to explain.
Leo lifted his head and looked at Rob.
“She doesn’t want to talk to you,” the cat said.
The absurdity forced Rob abruptly back to consciousness. He opened his eyes slowly and saw he was in a dingy office. The man with the bushy mustache sat watching him. The memory of how he had ended up here flooded back—the flash of an FBI badge, the car ride, his feeling of unease. Rob’s neck delivered a sharp jab of pain when he lifted his head from the position where it had been slumped. His hands were numb from being bound to the armrests. Apparently he should have listened to that feeling of unease.
Leo and everything else about the dream was gone. Except the immense headache. That was still with him and pounding like crazy. He looked around at the office furniture covered with a solid film of dust. The desolation of the place gave him the creeps.
“What—”
Rob’s throat was raspy. He swallowed and tried again.
“What’s going on?”
The agent sat with his hands folded in his lap, looking completely relaxed.
“We’re going to have a little chat,” he said, “you and me.”
Rob looked at the rope binding his wrists. His feet were immobilized as well. He shivered in the unheated office, despite still having his hoodie on. Man, this was really messed up.
“Why the ropes?” he said. “Afraid I might run off before Steeves gets here? Or is this standard FBI practice when you don’t get the answers you want the first time?”
“I have some bad news for you,” Landry said. “I’m not an FBI agent and Steeves isn’t coming. It’s just going to be the two of us.”
A trickle of fear ran down Rob’s throat.
“You upset a lot of people when you sabotaged the bank’s computers,” Landry said. “Powerful people. Rich folks who stand to lose plenty of money if First Malden goes out of business.” Landry shook his head. “The one thing you do not want to do is get between people like that and their money. You’d be better off kidnapping their children than impacting their income statements. So they hired me to fix it, and now you’re going to tell me the keyword so we can make everyone happy again.”
“But I don’t know the keyword,” Rob said.
“That’s what you’ve been telling people, but that’s not going to cut it with me.”
Landry pulled an automatic pistol out of his jacket as he spoke.
“You see, with the FBI you have the right to say nothing. You can call a lawyer.”
A silencer came out of a jacket pocket. Landry began screwing it slowly onto the pistol.
“You can insist that your lawyer must be present during all questioning. You have the right not to have someone beat you.”
A final twist completed the installation of the silencer.
“Or not to have a bullet planted in your knee-cap. But none of that applies here. In this room, I’m the only one with any rights.”
Landry set the pistol on a nearby desk. Rob couldn’t tear his eyes away from it. The trickle of fear was now a torrent.
“You don’t have the luxury of pretending anymore, son,” Landry said. “Either you tell me what I want to know, and soon, or you’re going to learn things about pain that nobody should have to know.”
Rob’s mouth was completely dry. He was having trouble convincing himself this was real. But the ropes biting into his forearms were real enough, and he couldn’t kid himself into thinking he was going to wake up and find that pistol gone.
“I’d tell you the keyword in a heartbeat if I knew it,” he said. “I’m not stupid. But you’ve got to believe me. I’m not the one who attacked the bank. Someone planted a bunch of evidence to make it look like it was me.”
Landry looked slightly amused. “Framed, huh?”
Rob nodded eagerly, his eyes wide.
“You mean I should be talking to someone else,” Landry said.
“Yes, but I don’t know who it is. I mean, I’ve been trying to figure it out. It must be someone who works at the bank, but I can’t think of anyone who would want to—”
Landry was out of his chair in a flash. He crossed over to Rob with one long stride and slapped him with a vicious open-handed blow to the side of the face. Rob’s head rocked back and a white flash of pain exploded in his head. The entire left side of his face stung as if pierced by thousands of needles.
“You’re wasting my time,” Landry shouted at him.
Rob scrunched his eyes shut and bent his head forward, trying to think through the angry buzz that filled his head. When he opened his eyes, Landry was still scowling at him.
“Don’t you think I’d tell you if I could?” Rob said. “I would have given the keyword to the FBI if I knew it. I don’t want to go to jail.”
Landry moved forward and Rob flinched.
“No, wait. I’m telling the—”
The left hand this time. It landed on the same spot the pistol had hit earlier. The side of his skull felt like it might cave in. Rob tasted bile in the back of his throat. He forced it back down with only the greatest of efforts.
“Talk to me, Rob, or it’s only going to get worse.”
* * *
Lesley grabbed several pairs of socks from the drawer and dropped them into the open suitcase on her bed. Leo immediately jumped into the suitcase and started wrestling with a pair of socks. He held them with his front paws and dug furiously with both back paws.
Her mother leaned against the side of the bedroom doorway, watching her pack.
“You really think this is a good idea?” Rose said.
A handful of panties landed on top of Leo. He rolled on his back to deal with the impudent newcomers.
“I have to, Mom. I’ll go crazy if I stay here.”
“You don’t have to go to Stan and Sheila’s place. Why don’t you come home with me?”
“I want to be here in town.”
“But you said you’re not going in to work for a while.”
Lesley held both palms up to her mother.
“Mom, I just can’t, okay?”
Rose shrugged. “Maybe the reporters will back off soon.”
“Are you kidding? One camera crew has already shown up at the door.”
“But how long is that likely to go on?”
“You have no idea how tenacious we newsies can be. As long as the public has an appetite, they’ll keep digging.”
Lesley deposited Leo on the floor and started adding sweaters and T-shirts to the suitcase.
“You saw how many messages are piled up on my machine.” Lesley leaned on her bed and looked at the digital display of the answering machine. “Twenty-eight, and that’s after I stopped answering the phone.”
“Shouldn’t you listen to the rest?”
“I can’t be bothered,” Lesley said. She headed for the closet to look for a pair of jeans that weren’t in her dresser. “The first bunch all w
anted interviews. I’m sure the rest will be no different.”
“But what if someone is trying to reach you?”
“The whole world wants to reach me.”
“No. I mean someone you want to talk to.”
She found the jeans under her yellow Forever 21 sweater. She grabbed both for good measure.
“I don’t want to talk to anybody,” Lesley said.
“Fine. I’ll listen to the messages.”
Rose sat down on the bed, hesitated for a moment, then found the correct button. Lesley continued to stuff the suitcase, only half listening when the messages started to roll. As she suspected, nothing but people wanting a piece of the cyberterrorist’s girlfriend.
Then one voice caused Lesley to stop with a pair of pajamas in her hand.
“Hi, it’s Tim. Dad said you called. Sorry I missed you. You can call me back at home.”
Lesley blinked. She didn’t remember calling Tim. Her mother gave her a triumphant look.
“See?” Rose said. “I told you they wouldn’t all be reporters.”
Lesley threw her mother a look of annoyance. “Do you have to be such a know-it-all?”
“I’m just trying to help.”
“You’ve been this way ever since Rob was arrested. Like you know exactly what I should do.”
Rose’s mouth pursed into a small rosebud. “Well, after all, you’re so happy. Who would need any help in your circumstances?”
Lesley threw the pajamas into the suitcase in an untidy ball.
“See?” she said. “You’ve got an answer for everything.”
“I thought mothers were supposed to help.”
“Like telling me to abandon Rob?”
“I never said you should—”
“That is what you think, right? I should just walk away, forget about him.”
Rose hesitated. She looked like she was trying to choose her words carefully. “You’ve been hurt badly,” she said after a moment. “You need to start healing.”
“Then you should be happy. Rob and I broke up this morning.”
Rose looked immediately at Lesley’s hand. “You’re not wearing the ring.”
“I gave it back to him.”
Rose’s face flooded with astonishment.
“Oh, Lesley.”
“Satisfied?”
“Why are you so angry at me?” Rose said. “I only want what’s best for you.”
“Meaning I shouldn’t make the same mistakes you did.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I need shampoo,” Lesley said. She headed for the hallway and the bathroom. Her mother followed.
“Don’t walk away from me like that,” Rose said. She cornered Lesley in the tiny bathroom. “What mistakes are you talking about?”
Lesley stopped rooting through the drawer next to the sink and let her head drop.
“I was there, remember?” she said. “I heard you and Dad fighting all the time.”
“What’s that got to do with anything?”
“It wasn’t just him. You had a role in it, too.”
“In what?”
Lesley began gathering up her toiletries but had to stop when her hands started to shake and her eyes brimmed with tears. She leaned on the bathroom counter for support and squeezed her eyes shut.
“I’ve always wondered,” she said with a small, quavery voice, “if he would have killed himself if we had … figured out what he needed or helped him or … something.”
Rose’s eyes grew wide and she stood with her mouth in a surprised “oh” shape for a few seconds. Finally she said, “You think it was my fault?”
Lesley couldn’t bring herself to look at her mother. “I don’t know.”
“Lesley, your father was—”
“Just like Rob. I know.”
“I wasn’t going to say that.”
“That’s what you think, though.”
“I think you’ve got some mixed-up ideas about what happened to your father.”
Lesley used some toilet paper to wipe her eyes and blow her nose.
“Most of what your father and I went through happened behind closed doors,” Rose said, “after you and Michael were in bed. You don’t know the demons he fought with and you have no idea how hard I tried to help him.”
“All I ever saw was you yelling at him.”
“I shielded you and your brother from most of it. And after he … well after he was gone, I did my best to help the two of you get through it.”
“What if all he needed was someone to understand what he was going through?”
“I tried that,” Rose said. “When that didn’t work I drew lines in the sand. I pleaded with him, insisted on counseling. None of it did any good.”
“But I didn’t do anything. I mean, on the day he died I went off to school like it was just a normal day.”
Rose was shaking her head. “You were just a kid.”
“I’m not a kid anymore,” Lesley said.
“No, but—”
“And I didn’t help Rob.”
Lesley looked plaintively at her mother. “How could I not know he was headed for trouble?” she said, her voice wavering again. “I didn’t notice anything. I … what if he needed me to … oh, God.”
Lesley’s face crumpled again. Rose bit her lip and tears started to leak silently from her eyes. She stepped forward and put her arms around her daughter. Lesley leaned in and they melted together.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
ROB’S INTERROGATION WAS well into the second hour before he figured it out. By then his brain was a fog of aches and pains. Blood ran down his chin. Both shoulders screamed from the repeated pounding and from his inability to shift position.
At times Landry’s voice bit into Rob’s consciousness as if he were shouting through a bullhorn, demanding information over and over again. There were also long periods when Rob’s body was so consumed with the agony that his overworked senses threatened to shut down and Landry faded into a distant drone. Rob might have passed out a time or two, he wasn’t sure.
At one point his thoughts cleared long enough for Rob to recognize the truth; he was going to die in that chair. Strangely enough, the thought gave him an edge, a growing resolve. If he only had a short time left, then he was going to wake up and pay attention. Even an existence filled with pain and misery can be precious when it’s all that’s left.
Landry sat in front of Rob, tapping the silenced pistol contemplatively in the palm of one hand. He seemed to be regarding Rob with all the sympathy of a boy in middle school dissecting a frog in biology class.
“We can stop any time you want,” Landry said. “You need to let go of your pride, son. There’s no other way out. You have to recognize that.”
Rob tried to clear his throat, which resulted in a spasm of coughing when he swallowed more blood from his nose.
“Have I mentioned you have an incredibly ugly mustache?” Rob said. Even this minor defiance made Rob feel better.
Landry didn’t seem perturbed by Rob’s words.
“Oh, he’s feeling tough. Well let me tell you how this is going to go if it drags on much longer.” Landry smirked at him. “Have you ever really been thirsty Rob? I’m talking so thirsty your throat starts to close in and your body goes hunting around for fluid reserves. I’ve been there. Believe me, it’s no fun. When you get like that, you’d sell your own mother for a drink of water. And I’ll be right here, sipping on a beer. You see, I figured we might be here a while so I came prepared.”
He gestured over Rob’s shoulder toward the parking area outside the building.
“I’ve got food and drinks in the car. Enough to last a couple of days if that’s what it takes. The beer’s probably warm by now, but I’m sure it’ll taste fine. What do you say? Tell me the keyword and it’ll be Miller time. I’ll go get us a couple of cans and we can each have one before we go on our merry ways.”
Rob’s throat had gone incredibly dry while Landry
was talking. He hadn’t felt thirsty before, but now his body cried out for a drink. Rob realized this was just one more tactic to make him miserable. He willed himself to stop thinking about water—and his throat grew drier still.
“It doesn’t matter what I say,” Rob said. “You’re going to kill me anyway.”
“You can’t talk to me if you’re dead.”
“So I stay alive as long as I keep my mouth shut.”
“Wrong. Your only way out of this is to tell me the keyword. I’ll let you go as soon as I confirm it’s the real deal.”
Right, Rob thought. As if the word of this goon meant anything. There was no sense getting his hopes up.
* * *
Stan Dysart hustled along the corridor toward his office, coming back from yet another after-hours crisis intervention meeting, this time with the branch managers. They were all bleeding customers and panicked that the worst was yet to come.
The phone in his pocket buzzed to life. Dysart felt a flash of resentment at the interruption as he answered it.
“Hi Stan, it’s Owen Donovan. I hope you don’t mind me bothering you at work like this. Sheila gave me your cell number.”
Dysart tried to hide his irritation. “What can I do for you?”
“This is probably a long shot,” Rob’s father said, “but I’m wondering if you know where Rob might be.”
Dysart stopped walking. “No, why?”
“Before we left Boston this morning, his mother made him promise to call at dinnertime, let us know how he’s doing. That was hours ago and we haven’t been able to track him down. That’s not like him.”
Dysart’s irritation vanished. Maybe Landry had him. Had to be. It was too much of a coincidence otherwise.
“We weren’t really all that worried,” Owen continued, “until an FBI agent called looking for him. They haven’t been able to track him down either. Fay’s beside herself. I called Lesley but there was no answer. So I phoned your place and Sheila said to try you at the office and … well, if you don’t know where he is …”
“I wish I could help,” Dysart said. “The last time I saw him was at the courthouse this morning.”
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