by Cathi Stoler
“He isn’t,” Laurel said. “Well, not exactly. I’ve been considering a new story idea for the magazine, and my original thought was to include Matt as the good guy. You know, the one with nothing to hide. I wouldn’t identify him by name, of course, but I’d use his background, work history, and behavior with me as what to look for when dating a new man. To keep it fair and honest, I planned to include the information you provided to verify he was who he said he was, a man whose background matched what he told me.”
“And now?” Helen asked. Laurel’s discomfort told her that something had changed.
“I’m not sure it’s such a good idea,” Laurel said.
“I don’t really know Matt very well,” Helen said. “Why don’t you tell me a little bit about him? I don’t think I even know how you two met.”
“I met Matt through Jenna,” Laurel said.
Helen nodded. She knew and liked Jenna.
“We were at a club downtown and he was there with some of Jenna’s friends from home. Jenna is originally from Prague, but she’s lived in New York for years.”
“And Matt?” Helen mentally sorted out if he had mentioned where he was from when she met him.
“He grew up in Switzerland,” Laurel said. “It’s all in the notes I made for you.”
Helen began to wonder where all this was leading. “What’s the problem?” she asked.
Laurel stared at Helen for a moment, taking a moment to decide whether to tell her everything. “It began this morning. Matt called from Siena; he’s there on business for his bank. He hung up abruptly in the middle of our conversation, right after I mentioned writing a story on hidden identities. He seemed angry. I know he’s a very private person and I didn’t want to tell him what I had in mind just yet because he wouldn’t like the attention, or me writing about him. I thought maybe I should talk it over with him and be straight about the story. So, later, I tried to reach him at several of the large hotels he’s stayed at on previous trips, but he’s not registered at any of the ones I phoned. I know he told me he’d be in Siena for at least another day, but I can’t find him.”
Laurel took a deep breath. “Maybe I’m losing my mind, but when I was walking here, the oddest thing happened. I thought I saw him getting into a waiting car in midtown. It couldn’t have been Matt. I must just be feeling suspicious because of Anne and David. Honestly, I don’t know what to think.”
There was always more than one explanation for any event, but Helen understood how devious people could be and how easily they could lie. If Laurel was suspicious of Matt, maybe she had reason to be. She wouldn’t tell Laurel that though, not yet.
“Matt could just be registered at a hotel you didn’t call. Maybe it was someone who looked like him getting into that car, especially since he’s on your mind.”
“You’re probably right, but there are some other things I’ve been thinking—”
Helen’s doorbell rang just then, startling them both. “Excuse me for a minute while I see who that is,” Helen said as she stood. “I’m not expecting anyone.”
I’ll bet it’s Joe. Helen walked down the hall to the front door. He wouldn’t be happy about her hanging up on him. He probably did some checking with the Organized Crime Unit and wanted to share the information with her. It really got under his skin when she was angry with him.
“So, you want to see the results of your assignment?” she asked, pulling open her door without looking through the peephole. With her wrapped hand in front of her, she was face-to-face with Mike Imperiole. Damn, what’s he doing here?
“Hi.” He gave her a little wave and hung his head sheepishly. He at least had the good grace to look embarrassed for not calling before coming to visit.
“Care to explain why you’re here?” she asked, leaning in toward him and giving him a kiss.
“Well, Laurel told me about that woman in Pennsylvania and I had an idea she might ask you to help her.” He shrugged. “I called her office and her assistant said she was meeting you at home.”
Helen backed up a little bit and stared at him. Confusion registered on his face at her less than enthusiastic reception. All he had done was ring the bell, and here she was freezing him out. How could he know she was almost run down by a car today and was a little on edge? Better not mention that, either. To smooth things over, she gave him another kiss and led him into the house. She’d also need a good excuse for her bandaged hand when he finally noticed it. The truth would only remind him of how “dangerous” her job could be.
When Helen walked back into the study followed by Mike, Laurel stood bolt upright. “What are you doing here? Are you following me?”
“No,” Mike said. “No. I’m just concerned. I thought you might be here.” He glanced over at Helen. “I thought you two might need my help.”
Laurel turned toward Helen with a look of exasperation. “What are we going to do with him? He thinks he’s Wyatt Earp coming to save Dodge City in a gunfight at high noon.”
“C’mon.” Mike reached out for his daughter’s hand. “I wanted to know what was going on. You got me all upset with that stuff about the woman in Pennsylvania. I knew you’d get her mixed up in it.” He cut his eyes over toward Helen. “What did you expect me to think?”
Laurel waved off her father’s hand and drew herself up to her full 5 feet 7 inches, which was just two inches shorter than her dad. Looking him in the eye, Laurel turned the force of her ire on him. “What I expect is for you to mind your own business and let me go about mine in my own way.”
Watching the exchange, Helen heard the anger in Laurel’s voice shift to a tone of affection even as she spoke those harsh words. Laurel, it appeared, could get over her annoyance quickly—in and out like a sudden squall that blew away everything in its path, and disappeared just as suddenly. The way she sighed at her father confirmed it. Laurel’s anger was already gone but she wasn’t ready to let her father off the hook just yet.
“How about we all sit down and cool off for a minute.” Helen gestured toward the easy chairs. “Want some coffee?”
“No,” Laurel answered for her father. “He won’t be staying long enough for coffee.”
“Yeah, that’d be great.” Mike said, ignoring his daughter’s refusal as he settled himself in one of Helen’s chairs.
“Let me just get a mug from the kitchen. Laurel, could you help me, please?” Helen stole a glance at Mike as he reached inside his jacket for his cigar case. He took out a cigar and chomped on it. “Be right back,” she told him.
Once they were in the kitchen, Helen raised her eyebrows as Laurel rolled her eyes heavenward.
“I’m so sorry. I had no idea he’d find out I was here,” Laurel said. She shook her head and smiled at Helen. “I get it. His interfering behavior is totally based on love, but it still makes me crazy.”
A much better motive than most people have for behaving badly, Helen thought. “Don’t worry about it,” she said, as she pulled coffee mugs out of a cupboard and arranged them onto a wicker tray. “I’ll go over the notes you made and start looking into things. You’ll let me know when you hear from Anne, won’t you? We have to talk about Matt, too. You’ll have to tell me everything if I’m going to do a good job for you. I’ll call you late tomorrow morning, when we can have some privacy.” As she poured the coffee, she looked toward the study and bit back a laugh. “Is that okay with you?”
“Sure,” Laurel agreed. “You can reach me at the office.”
“Now, let’s go give your father his coffee.” Helen smiled, waving at the tray in front of her.
Mike took his unlit cigar out of his mouth and stood up when the women entered the room. “I just wanted to—”
Helen cut him off with a smile and a wave of her hand. “We forgive you.” She looked at him affectionately as she handed him a mug of coffee. “This is Laurel’s business and she’s hiring me on behalf of the magazine. She’s the boss and if she doesn’t want me to discuss the case in front of you, I can’t.”
; He sighed and nervously opened and closed the Bulgari lighter in his hand. “You’re right. I guess I’d better be getting back to work.”
Mike put down the coffee he hadn’t touched, wrapped his arms around Helen and looked at her longingly. “I’m sorry I barged in like that. I was worried about Laurel getting into something she couldn’t handle.”
“I understand.” Helen hugged him back. “She’s your daughter and you can’t help it.”
Laurel cleared her throat to remind them that she was actually in the room. “I think I’ll leave, too. I know you’ve got other work to do. Let’s go, Dad. I’ll walk out with you and make sure you get back to the store in one piece.” She winked over her shoulder at Helen as she nudged her father out of the townhouse.
Helen picked up the mugs from the coffee table and placed them on her wicker tray to take into the kitchen. Mike hadn’t noticed her bandaged hand. Thank God for that, or he’d still be standing here reading me the riot act. She’d better have the bandage off when they went out for dinner tomorrow. No need to tell him of her stakeout of Suave Sal Santucci and the mob. She took the tray to the kitchen.
She needed to get moving if she was going to pick up Ralphie before he left his apartment. As she slipped into her tourist disguise, she decided to take her 9mm Beretta along with the maps and guidebooks of New York City she carried as props in her big tote bag. Helen hoped she’d never have to use the gun again—it had come in handy a few times in the past—but after the morning’s car episode, she wasn’t taking any chances.
Back in her study, she gathered up the papers Laurel left behind and decided she wouldn’t look at them until the morning. If she became immersed in their contents, she’d never leave the house.
She wondered what was waiting for her at the Three Aces this evening. If she was lucky, and played her cards right, her hand might turn into a full house.
Chapter 14
Wednesday, 6:12 a.m.
“Twenty minutes. Elliptical trainer,” Jenna barked into the phone Laurel had groped for automatically in her sleep. “Let’s go get ’em, girlfriend.”
Laurel yawned, recognizing her friend’s voice. “You’re up early,” she squinted at her bedside clock, which read 6:12 a.m. “I want to go back to sleep. Bye.” She hung up, turned over and snuggled under the covers.
The phone rang again. “Hello?” Laurel stifled another yawn.
“Rise and shine. We have to talk,” Jenna said.
“Go away, please.”
Jenna hung up.
Laurel placed the receiver back in its cradle and struggled out of bed. She was awake now. Sighing, she foraged for her gym clothes—an old pair of warm-up pants, a Barnard College T-shirt and well-worn sneakers. They were a little wrinkled, but they’d have to do. Laurel was in no mood for primping. After brushing her teeth and pulling her long auburn hair back into a ponytail, she was as ready as she’d ever be for the morning’s workout.
Ten minutes later, she was at Les Sports Center on Sixty-First Street, climbing the stairs to the aerobic loft, a gallery of StairMasters, elliptical trainers, treadmills and recumbent bicycles overlooking the free weights and weight machine area below. It was barely 6:30 and the gym was filled with the pre-work exercise crowd. Every machine was occupied, except the elliptical trainer next to Jenna. A towel was draped over it. Jenna always did that and then stared down anyone who dared to question her right to reserve a machine for someone who wasn’t there.
Laurel stepped up on the machine and punched in the program she preferred—an interval cardio workout set at a high level that always got her going. She never brought her earphones when she exercised with Jenna. Jenna was usually much more interesting than what was on the TV attached to the machine, anyway.
“What’s so important I had to give up my nice warm bed?” Laurel pedaled quickly and was already beginning to work up a sweat.
“You need the exercise.” Jenna stared at Laurel’s thighs.
“Why is this woman my friend?” Laurel muttered aloud to the gym at large, making a face at Jenna. “Must be her sweet personality. Or the fact that she’s so humble.”
“I thought you’d want to know about the party the other night.” Jenna pitched her voice low in a parody of intrigue, ignoring Laurel’s mock outburst. “It was fantastic and, of course, I looked just fabulous.”
“Of course you did,” Laurel said. She eyed the curvy Jenna in her sleek and sexy silver blue Nike work-out pants and cropped top. On top of believing in always being prepared, she took the Nike slogan to heart and then some, usually overdoing it.
“The new gallery we went to was just incredible. All the art was suspended from the ceiling and floated menacingly just above our heads like birds of prey. They looked a little precarious, and we kept wondering if they might come crashing down at any moment. Unfortunately there was nothing edgy about the paintings themselves; they were rather ordinary and so were the artists. The party afterward is what I want to tell you about. A group of gorgeous Europeans showed up around one-thirty. Tony knew one of them from Milan and he introduced us to the rest of the group. The oldest and most handsome, Sergio Stefano, was introduced as the director of the Monte di Paschi Bank in Siena. So, of course, I mentioned Matt at ZurichBank AG., but he didn’t know him. I was sure Sergio’s bank is the one Matt works with in Italy. It is, isn’t it?” Laurel stopped pedaling, but Jenna didn’t appear to notice. “The Italians had a lot to drink and I’m not even certain they realized they were in New York at that point. But they were molto attenti and I think poor Tony was just a tad jealous.”
Jenna finally paused for a breath and looked over at Laurel. “What is it? You’re pale as a ghost. You always overdo it. Get off that machine right now. Go sit down and have some water.”
Laurel made her way to the locker room and sipped the ice cold water Jenna brought to her. There was a large mirror over the dressing table. Color returned to her face. She might look normal enough on the outside, but inside she was anything but. She promised Jenna, who headed for the shower, that she’d sit for ten minutes and catch her breath.
It wasn’t the elliptical trainer that made Laurel dizzy and disoriented. It was the news about Jenna meeting Sergio Stefano. Drunk or not, how could he not remember Matt after all the meetings Matt had at his bank? Maybe Signore Stefano left that sort of thing to the bank’s junior officers or maybe Jenna misunderstood what he said.
She dreaded asking Jenna to help her find out the truth. It would only fuel her love for intrigue and drama and undoubtedly cause a problem with Tony. I could always call Tony and ask him to arrange a meeting with the Italian banker, although what reason I’d give for wanting an introduction I don’t know.
Laurel checked the clock over the marble vanity adjacent to her locker. Her ten minutes of rest were up. She retrieved her jacket from her locker, turned in her key and slipped out of the gym without saying goodbye to Jenna, who was probably in the sauna by now. Laurel would be sure to hear about that later. It was time to head home, shower, and get ready for work. She’d have to face John Dimitri, who had left several more messages for her since yesterday, all along the same lines. “What the hell is going on, darling? When are you coming back into the office?”
Her bottom had barely touched her ergonomically correct office chair when her desk phone rang.
“Could you join me in my office? Right now,” John said before she’d even had a chance to bring the receiver fully to her ear.
“Well, good morning to you, too, John,” Laurel cooed as she hung up. She gathered up her pen and notebook and headed for John’s office. On her way, she stopped in the tiny kitchen that served the staff of Women Now and poured a cup of coffee. She needed a few moments to think before she faced John.
She had to tell him about the story she wanted to write on hidden identity, about Anne and David, and about hiring Helen McCorkendale—if her dad hadn’t already. What about Matt? John would probably think she was imagining things. Better let it go a
nd stick to the story at hand.
Laurel pushed open the door to John’s office and nearly dropped her coffee. Standing by the floor-to-ceiling window that overlooked the city and admiring the view was Aaron Gerrard, head of New York’s Identity Theft Squad, and Laurel’s former boyfriend.
“So good of you to join—”
Laurel cut John off before he finished speaking. “What are you doing here?” Her words flew toward the detective like a heat-seeking missile to an enemy target. John arched one dark eyebrow at Laurel’s rudeness. “The detective is here for you. He was hoping to have a word.”
Laurel put her coffee down on John’s desk and crossed her arms defiantly over her chest as Aaron walked across the room toward her.
Laurel stared at the man she hadn’t spoken to or seen in about a year and was struck by his presence. In his late thirties, Aaron, at six feet, was several inches taller than she and his rangy build was well-outlined by a tailored sports jacket and slacks. Laurel recognized the jacket as the one she gave him on his birthday. What is his reason for wearing it today? she thought.
She tried to keep her emotions from registering on her face and hoped he couldn’t hear the pounding of her heart that seemed to fill her head. She knew she had blown it with Aaron and he’d never forgive her. Not that I care, she told herself. I’m long past all of this. I’m just as done with him as he is with me. Her flashback from yesterday crept into her mind and with it the guilt she’d felt. His sandy-colored hair surrounded a weathered face that always made her think of sailing.
He looked rather ordinary until you reached his eyes. Steel gray in color and just as steely in intent, their hard and impenetrable stare now focused on her. Her cheeks became warm. She stared a bit too long. It didn’t matter. He surprised her; that was all. Turning away, she caught John looking at her with a hint of a frown at the undercurrent he must have sensed flowing between them.
“Hello, Aaron. What is it you wanted to see me about?” Get right to it, she told herself. A wash of possibilities flooded through her mind that belied her level tone of voice.