‘As for the rest . . .’
I scanned the street around me, trying to guesstimate how long it would take them to catch up with me.
Then an idea occurred to me.
‘What? What about the rest?’ Rosie wanted to know.
‘The rest is going to take care of itself, I’m afraid. I don’t think you’ll have anything else to worry about. But if that scary thug-looking motherfucker comes in again, use Lenny’s gun on him.’
‘Lenny ain’t got no gun.’
‘Yes, he does.’
‘Nuh uh.’
‘Yuh uh. Top right-hand desk drawer. Key for it is in the middle drawer under the paper clips.’
I pictured Rosie trying to handle the .45 Magnum and gave a mental head shake. Probably it would knock her on her ass.
Probably she’d blow whomever she pointed it at to kingdom come before she went down.
Providing she could lift the thing to begin with.
‘Fine. But just so you know, I’m thinking I need my own.’
‘I’m thinking the same thing.’
‘Should I call you if anything else comes up?’
‘No. I’ll call you. I’m dumping this phone.’
A heartbeat of a pause and then, ‘What are you going to do?’
Honestly? I had no idea. But I was starting to form an idea.
‘Call you in twenty.’
‘OK. You know I knock off soon, right?’
‘I know you knock off soon.’
‘But you can call me on my cell after I get home. You know, if it’s an emergency.’
‘Thanks.’
‘No problem.’
I started the car.
‘Oh, and Sofie?’
‘Yeah?’
‘Be careful.’
‘Yeah. You, too.’
I disconnected and then popped the back off the cell phone, removing the battery. As I thought, it was old enough that it had one of those SIM cards inside. Take it out and it was virtually untraceable, solely because the phone was unidentifiable, all user information on the card and not in the phone itself.
Of course, it also meant I couldn’t make or receive calls on it, either.
I popped the thumbnail-sized card out and put the battery back in. I’d need to access the phone to get Waters’ and Pete’s phone numbers.
Question was, would I have a chance to use them before the next snatch and grab?
Twenty-Three
Oh, holy night, the skies are cloudy and threatening . . .
I drove like a madwoman to my parents’ house, parking around the block and nearly breaking my neck three times as I hopped fences and slid on ice trying to gain access to the back door. I pounded on it, looking through the window where Yiayia was tasting something from a pot at the stove. She appeared not to hear me.
Of course, not. She never heard me.
I pounded again.
Efi answered.
‘Thank God. I need my car,’ she said.
‘I heard. What’s the emergency?’ I dropped the keys in her hand and rounded her, gaining access to the house.
‘Sale at Sandra’s.’
I blinked at her. ‘Seriously? That’s the emergency?’
‘What? You prefer someone were dying?’
Someone was dying: me.
‘Where is it?’
‘It’s parked around the block.’
‘What? Why?’
I gave her a long look as I put my bags of gifts on the floor next to the pantry. Thankfully I’d had them all wrapped at the mall, so I didn’t have to worry about anyone seeing anything they shouldn’t.
‘I couldn’t find a spot out front.’
‘What’s the matter with the driveway?’
I ignored her as I grabbed the cordless phone from the kitchen table and dialed Waters’ number.
‘Where you been, woman? I’ve been trying to get a hold of you all day.’
‘I heard. What’s up?’
Efi stood in front of me. ‘Where, exactly, is it parked?’
I turned away, trying to listen to Waters.
Since he’d been made by Bubba, I switched him and Pete so he was now tailing Elizabeth Winston, and Pete Sara Canton.
I winced, recalling Rosie telling me earlier Pete had quit. I could only imagine what trouble he’d run into.
Waters was talking and I realized I wasn’t listening.
‘Anyway, that Winston lady, she left work early. Nearly missed her, ’cause she don’t strike me as the type to do anything that breaks routine. You know, in at nine, out at five, that kind of thing. Fine piece of ass, she is by the way. Not to say you aren’t—’
‘You plan on getting to the point sometime this year?’
‘Maybe. Hey, there’s not much more time left of this year anyway, is there?’
I knew whatever he had must be good or else he wouldn’t be so happy . . . or distracted.
‘Anyway, she usually takes the subway, just like us poor working stiffs . . .’
He didn’t take the subway and he wasn’t necessarily a working stiff. But I kept both thoughts to myself.
‘But instead she got this sweet-ass Mercedes coupé out of parking a block up from the Abramopoulos building. I had Rosie run the plates. Belongs to her.’
‘And?’
‘And I followed her.’
The mother of all tension headaches was beginning to build behind my eyes.
‘Where?’ I asked between clenched teeth.
Efi stepped into my line of vision again. ‘That’s what I’m waiting to hear. Where my car is parked.’
‘It’s around the corner!’ I snapped at her.
OK, I’d officially lost it. I never snapped at anyone. Much less my favorite younger sister. The fact that she was my only sister notwithstanding.
‘Damn, woman! Break a brother’s eardrum already,’ Waters said.
‘You, shut up and tell me where she went.’
‘Which is it?’
‘What?’
‘Do you want me to shut up or tell you where she went?’
‘Where?’
I felt a sharp snap against my backside. I looked to find Yiayia had just whacked me with a spoon. I stared at her. She whacked me again. I slid the spoon from her branch-like fingers and tossed it across the room.
Then stood there, mouth agape, shocked at what I’d done.
‘You’ll never guess,’ Waters said.
I rounded my sister who was as surprised as I was and walked into the other room, which is what I probably should have done in the first place.
Then again, maybe not.
As Waters told me Winston had gone to JFK Airport, switching on a light bulb in my head, and the kitchen door closed behind me and I saw what waited in the other room, I knew I was about to pay for every sin I’d ever committed.
All in one night.
OK, I was getting really tired of this snatch-and-grab bit. Probably I shouldn’t have taken Yiayia’s wooden spoon from her. Probably she could have showed them new things to do with it.
Of course, I was ignoring two facts: that this very well might be my last snatch and grab – literally; and neither my sister nor my grandmother likely had clue one I’d been snatched and grabbed. It had happened so fast, I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to Waters or scream for help.
Not that I would have done either.
‘You know, you guys are officially off my Christmas list,’ I grumbled from where I sat in the back seat of the familiar black sedan, two thugs on either side of me, another two in the front seats.
‘You’re lucky you’re still alive to have a list,’ Bruno said from the front passenger’s seat.
‘Right. Kidnapping to murder. Good one.’
‘It’s not murder if they don’t find the body.’
I disguised my neck-to-toe shudder by pulling my coat tighter around me. At least this time I had a coat and was wearing shoes.
Not that it mattered. Dead was dead,
no matter what you were wearing.
And I had a very bad feeling about this.
‘You know, the FBI pulled one of your numbers on me yesterday.’
That got Bruno’s attention.
I smiled at him.
‘You talked to the FBI?’
‘More like they talked to me.’
Even as I said the words, I realized I hadn’t done the one thing the agent had asked of me: I didn’t have my cell phone on me.
‘You’re working with them, anyway, so what’s it matter?’ I asked.
His turn to smile at me.
‘You know, Miss Metropolis, I might think I’ve underestimated you . . . if not for the fact that you’re sitting in the back of my car right now.’
‘Yeah, going to my parents’ house rates right up there with one of the worst ideas in the past decade. Right after accepting my ex’s marriage proposal.’
‘I’m curious. Why did you?’
‘What? Say yes to my ex?’
He remained smiling.
‘My sister needed her car. She had an . . . emergency.’
He laughed. Then laughed harder. The others joined in.
What I found stranger yet, I found myself laughing, too.
It was pretty dumb, my going back there. Even without knowing she’d needed it to get to a sale. Probably I should have just told Efi to take a taxi. Probably I should have ignored her altogether.
But when she’d asked for her car, it hadn’t even occurred to me not to take it back to her.
I really needed to work on my priorities.
Just think. I could be that minute sitting somewhere in Manhattan enjoying a nice, big frappé. Instead I was wrinkling my nose at the overwhelming stink of garlic from human pores in a too small car filled with four too big men.
Bruno hefted a briefcase over the seat and put it on my knees when I made no move to take it from him. He clicked it open.
‘There’s twenty million in bearer bonds in there—’
‘Why not cash? And why does it always have to be in a briefcase?’
He closed the case and clicked the catches. ‘Cash is traceable and it didn’t seem right to put it in a duffel bag.’
‘Twenty million? Thought it was two.’
I chalked one up in Rosie’s column.
Although she’d been wrong about the rest.
And just where in the hell was the FBI? If they were really working with Bruno, where were they? I should think they would be the ones orchestrating the drop. Why weren’t they?
Could it be that Abramopoulos had contacted them? But Bruno hadn’t? And the Bruno was acting as a free agent? Was that why I’d been pulled in by the FBI yesterday? To be kept in the loop in some way?
I felt the absence of my cell phone even more acutely now than I had five minutes ago.
‘Where’s the drop being made?’
‘You’ll see soon enough.’
‘Why not tell me? Not like I’m going anywhere. And we do have this time to fill.’
‘Flushing Meadows Corona Park.’
‘Big park.’
‘By the Unisphere.’
I looked out the windows at the snow that continued to fall. ‘Bad night for a ransom drop, wouldn’t you say?’
‘Good night for getting rid of people who bother you.’
It was only the second time I’d heard Bruno’s brother, Boris, speak. And his heavily accented voice sliced like a grater against my already frayed nerves.
I was pretty sure my rough swallow was audible in the suddenly silent car.
‘What about the girl?’ I asked.
‘Let us worry about that.’
‘And the kidnappers? Are you guys trying to catch them?’
I wondered if the park was crawling with Bruno’s people, including half the city-wide PIs he had working the case.
‘Let us worry about that.’
Fine. If that’s the way he wanted to play it, I’d keep my information to myself.
Ten minutes later we’d pulled to a stop on the far end of Flushing Meadows Corona Park.
‘OK, this is what you’re to do . . .’
Bruno spoke and I listened.
Then I was pushed out on to the sidewalk.
The sedan pulled away.
OK.
The snow was coming down harder now. Big, thick flakes that stung my eyes and clung to my hair. I tightly clutched the briefcase, knowing that if I lost it, it would mean my life.
What was I talking about? No one else was crazy enough to be out here in this weather after dark.
A pack of five teens speaking Spanish passed close by.
OK, I was wrong.
I clutched the briefcase even tighter and started walking.
Let’s see if I remembered correctly: I was supposed to walk to the other side of the large metal globe that had been erected in honor of the 1964 World’s Fair and featured in countless movies. Then I was to deposit the briefcase full of bearer bonds into a trash can there and then walk away.
Nothing more.
Nothing less.
Seemed simple enough.
Problem was, simple didn’t appear to be a part of my vocabulary. At least not the Webster’s version of it. I cringed whenever I heard it if only because I understood complicated – probably dangerously so – would end up hitting closer to the truth.
Off to my left I could make out the lights of the Terrace on the Park, a rental hall, which was funny because right now there was no real park. Only seemingly endless sheets of white.
My boots crunched against the snow-covered salt that had been spread to melt the ice on the walkway, but, after the teens moved on, even that sound emerged quiet.
Eerily so.
What I didn’t get was, how were the kidnappers going to get the money? And when would I get the girl?
I reached the twelve-story-high stainless steel Unisphere that looked like a snow globe that had just been turned over and righted again, flakes swirling in the empty middle.
I paused, looking up at it. As often as I’d driven by it, I’d never seen it this close. I was impressed. Especially with the freshly fallen snow coating it, falling around it and inside it.
I began to walk around it, keeping an eye out. All I had to do was drop the briefcase inside the garbage can and then walk back to the street where Bruno and his men would pick me up.
I spotted the can.
OK . . .
I looked around, for what exactly I was unsure. Another can, maybe?
I thought about kicking this one with my foot, to test whether or not it stood on top of one of those sewer outlets like I’d seen in a movie or three. But where would that get me?
I reluctantly moved toward it, lifted the lid to stare at what appeared to be nothing more than balled-up newspaper inside, then placed the briefcase inside. I refitted the lid then took a step back, looking around.
Hunh.
No one ran to tackle me.
No guns were drawn.
No one shouted for me to step away from the can.
All was as it had been a minute before. Except I was minus the weight of one heavy briefcase.
Somehow I’d expected the drop to be more interesting, momentous, somehow.
Instead, I felt like I’d just thrown out my trash.
I had an urge to scratch my head.
What did this mean for the kidnapped girl? Was little Jolie Abramopoulos being set free somewhere even as I dawdled?
Ignoring every last survival instinct I possessed, I lifted the lid and looked inside again. There sat the briefcase right where I’d left it.
Double hunh.
I put the lid back on then reluctantly started to make my way back toward the street, disappointed.
And that’s when I spotted the last thing I expected to see.
I stopped dead in my tracks ten feet from the street . . . and prayed the turn of phrase wouldn’t become literal.
Twenty-Four
There,
within touching distance, stood Rudy.
At this point, I think we both pretty much resembled deer caught in the headlights.
What were the chances? There I was on a ransom drop and here he was as if hoof-hitching a ride home.
What was that red light?
Was that his nose?
I caught the ridiculous notion. Probably it was just a reflection of something, maybe a vehicle’s brake lights on the nearby road. Of course, it couldn’t be coming from his nose.
Could it?
I ignored that there were no vehicles on the nearby road.
‘Here, Rudy, Rudy, Rudy,’ I said softly, holding my hand out, palm up.
What, was he a dog? Still, I was hoping the soothing sound of my voice would draw him near. Or, at the very least, not scare him away.
He blew a steamy breath through his nose and shook his head, looking prepared to bolt.
I paused. ‘It’s OK. I’m not going to hurt you.’ I smiled, looking at his antlers. He really was a reindeer. I mean, of course he was. I’d known that. I just had never seen one with my own two eyes up this close and personal outside a photograph before.
Beautiful . . .
There was somehow something quite magical about seeing him on this snowy night, alone in the park.
And I was alone, wasn’t I?
I glanced around. The dark sedan holding Bruno and his thugs was nowhere to be seen. No one had made a move on the garbage can that I could see. And there was no sign of little Jolie being dropped off.
I focused on Rudy again.
‘Your mama misses you,’ I told him. ‘Uh huh. Yes, she does.’
With each word, I moved infinitesimally closer, until I was within touching distance.
And touch him, I did.
His coat was soft, probably because it was thicker to protect him against the winter cold. I slowly stroked the top of his head, then smoothed my hand down over his snout, surprised when he licked my hand. I wished I had something to give him.
Then, without warning, he threw his head back and stepped away.
‘What? What’s the matter, boy?’
I spotted something in the wall of snow some fifty or so feet behind him. I squinted. It looked like a man. I squinted harder. Yes, it was very definitely a man, a bearded one wearing a blue parka, a red hat and . . . was that a pickaxe he was carrying?
Queens Ransom (Sofie Metropolis) Page 17