The Throwbacks

by Stephanie Queen

  “Here are the get-ups.” She tossed the bags on the lone bed in the room and looked around. “Shouldn’t those drapes be closed? Aren’t we running a clandestine operation here?” She folded her arms and alternated between tossing meaningful looks at Grace and David. Grace folded her arms in return.

  “This is serious business,” she said to Pixie as if she were a child. David, in the meantime, unceremoniously dumped the contents of the bags on the bed and began sorting.

  “This is your pile, Grace. I suggest you take these clothes into the bathroom—along with this pillow.” He picked up the small pillow he’d teased her with before. “And take your Pixie with you to assist in dressing. Make it as fast as you can—we’re on the clock now,” he said in a quiet, no-nonsense voice that even had Pixie moving. They both picked up the clothing, wig, makeup and pillow and carried them to the bathroom.

  “Won’t you need help with your disguise?” Grace asked. He merely shook his head. She closed the door, entombing her and Pixie in the bathroom. Now that the time had come to dress, she started shaking all over.

  “I hope I’m up to this, Pixie,” she said as she stripped off her dress.

  “Of course you are. David will do all the heavy lifting. You just do whatever he tells you—no matter what—you promise?” Pixie stared up at her, studying her face. Grace stood in her bra and pantyhose and held an oversized blouse in front of her.

  “I promise. What else would I do? This is exciting and scary, but mostly I want to make sure we get the man responsible—not just the goons doing the dirty work. And I want Theresa to be all right.” She heard her voice crack and slipped the blouse over her head.

  “Wait—let’s stick this pillow in your pantyhose. We’ll have to position it sideways so you look fat instead of pregnant,” Pixie said as she did the stuffing.

  “Since when did you get to be the expert at disguises?” Grace said to break her own tension. “You’re pretty surprising, my little friend,” she said in a warmer voice. Pixie didn’t look up from her work, and they finished the outfit with that all-business attitude since they had no more time for worrying.

  Grace checked her watch as she opened the door to present herself, pleased with their speed. She expected David to crack a smile, but what she saw was totally unexpected. He was unrecognizable.

  “Is that you?”

  “I might say the same thing,” he said, “except that I’d still know you anywhere.” Then he arched his gray-enhanced brow. She knew that gesture, and the warmth of familiarity infused her.

  “Your face is far too young and beautiful.” He sounded wistful. “And your neck. You’ll have to keep your hat low and the scarf high and whatever you do—don’t look at anyone or speak.” He was back to his clipped tones.

  “Yes, sir. I suppose I should be flattered,” she said and pushed Pixie forward.

  “Well, I’m not flattered,” Pixie said. “I went to a lot of trouble and—”

  “You did fabulously, honey, and that’s not what David meant. I’m sure he meant that you had an impossible task to accomplish to make me look like an old woman who might be seen with this old man.” Grace gestured in his direction as he walked briskly ahead of them toward the door. He turned and still looked terribly serious. It made her stomach flutter, and for a second, she wondered what the heck she was doing.

  “Don’t push your luck, Grace. You’ve already been seen with this old man often enough as it is.” He gestured for them to move ahead of him.

  “That’s not what I meant—I meant—” She couldn’t think what she meant now, except that she hadn’t planned to add fuel to his argument that he was too old for her.

  Pixie came to her rescue. “Give it up, Grace. He knows very well even if you were ninety years old, you’d look too good to be traveling around on his arm.” Grace stopped with her hands on her hips in front of David and short of where he wanted them—out the door—and wearing a stubborn set to her jaw.

  He sighed and looked upwards. “Pixie is right—you’re too beautiful for your own good. But that’s why you’re going to take my arm and not let go. I’m your protection. Lucky for you, I’m not as old as I look,” he said. She stepped up and took his arm.

  “Geesh,” Pixie said.

  “You stay here,” he told Pixie.

  “What? Why?”

  “We may need you to help run interference with the chief. I’ll let Rick know he can call you if he needs you. Besides, I don’t want to have to worry about you too. After all, you were in on the discovery of Lester’s body.” He looked at her meaningfully. It was such a theatrical look that Grace knew he was trying to scare Pixie and had to keep herself from laughing. But Pixie bought into it, probably because she’d been worried about the very same thing.

  “What about work?”

  “Consider it a day off for civic duty.” Grace hugged her friend before walking out the door. Once in the hall, she hooked her arm in David’s, determined to embrace the role. She especially decided to ignore all the fluttering in her gut.

  “Well, Grandpa, shall I drive or do we take a taxi?”

  “Can’t get your car, Granny. I’d bet your last pantaloon that the valet remembers the gorgeous young lady who owns your car.”

  “You’re going to trust me to play the old lady in front of the discerning audience of a cab driver, then?” She was teasing, but there was another flutter in her gut as they rode the elevator and it had nothing to do with their rapid descent to the lobby.

  “You’ll be fine.” He squeezed her hand before they exited to the lobby.

  She stopped short and looked at her hand now.

  “Oh no!” she whispered and looked around. He looked at her with a question, cool and unaffected by her alarm. “We forgot about wedding bands. We’re supposed to be an old married couple and we don’t have the most basic requirement. No one would believe we were here for an illicit affair at our age.”

  Of all the responses she might have expected, his laugh was the last, but he did just that. He took her hand and moved her along.

  “You’ll just have to hide your ring finger from here to the gallery then, Mother.” He shook his head, looking at her with a grin and a twinkle in his eye.

  “If you say so, Father.” They walked out the revolving door and turned right to the corner. David whistled for a taxi from the stand across the street. The cab pulled up in a flash, and he helped her in with perfect eighty-year-old gentlemanly form, slow and tortured movement and old-world elegance combined.

  “457 Newbury Street,” he told the cabbie, and they were off. Her jitters increased as she sat side-by-side and hand in hand with the man of her dreams—only it felt like they’d been fast-forwarded about thirty years.

  They looked at each other, and she relaxed back into the seat and against his shoulder. She wondered if he was thinking of the same thing she was—that this was how their future could be for real if they let it.

  “I hope they have that painting we’re looking for, Mother. It would be the perfect gift to celebrate our fiftieth anniversary.” David smiled at her with that same playful twinkle.

  “You don’t have to put on a show for me. I’m okay. The jitters are settling down,” she whispered. It was a lie. His kindness and her longing for their real fiftieth anniversary unnerved her more than anything else.

  The cab pulled up to a restaurant a few doors down from the gallery. David paid the fare and helped her from the cab. She didn’t have to act to have a hard time moving with the get-up she had on. He yanked her from the door and looked at her with one last twinkle before turning into the Scotland Yard pro she’d seen in action before.

  The cab pulled away and they stood on the sidewalk. She turned to walk to the gallery, but David grabbed her arm and pulled her back.

  “What?”

  “We’re not walking in the front door. It’s not open for business. There’s yellow police tape all over the place. We’d look rather conspicuous, especially in these clothes.�
� He gestured to each of them.

  “What do we do?”

  “We change our clothes. This way.” He took her by the arm and led her down an alley behind the building.

  “I didn’t bring a change of clothes, David!”

  “That’s okay. I brought the laundry bag. Put your wig, hat and scarf, and pillow in here,” he said and proceeded to remove his gray beard, spectacles, hat and small pillow while she stood and watched. She was sure she looked foolish with her mouth ajar, but she couldn’t help it.

  “If I take the pillow out my skirt will fall to my ankles,” she informed him.

  “What do you have underneath the skirt?” He was serious.

  “Panties. What else would I have under there?”

  “Oh. I thought you’d have your own skirt on. I thought you knew we weren’t going to grope around in the gallery basement in these clumsy get-ups. My fault.” He stood with a frown on his face and wearing a perfectly unclumsy outfit.

  “At least you’re dressed for skulking around. Maybe I can be the lookout.” She decided she could at least take off her hat and wig. She shook her hair out. She looked down at herself and laughed at the ridiculousness.

  “I’m not letting you out of my sight. You’re coming inside with me, clumsy outfit or not.” He took her by the wrist and led the way.

  “I liked it better when you escorted me with your hand at the small of my back.” She couldn’t believe she’d just said that out loud. He stopped immediately and looked at her, his usual cool control absent and a look of true concern on his face. She turned pink, feeling foolish at the revelation of her secret pleasure.

  “I’m sorry—you’re right, I’m man-handling you as if you were a policewoman on assignment and I’m expecting that you know what you’re supposed to do.” He placed his hand at the small of her back and escorted her to the back door of the gallery—or what she assumed was the back door of the gallery. There was yellow police crime scene tape across the door. She concentrated on the tingle of her skin under his hand and the caring in his voice and words. She would have kissed him if they were anywhere else, doing anything besides breaking into a crime scene. A shiver shook her, and she wasn’t sure what caused it.

  “The chief gave me this in case I needed it.” David pulled a key from his pocket, ripped the tape off the door and unlocked it. He opened it, looked around and gestured her inside. The room was dark and her nose itched immediately from the faint odor of dust, mold and a hint of decay. She shuddered. David pressed his hand at her back to move her forward and flipped on the light switch.

  “This room is at the back of the building behind closed doors. It’s safe to have the light on here. We may as well start our search in this mess.” He looked around with an alert, piercing eye. She was coming to know and admire that look. His absolute confidence steadied her like nothing else could. He noticed everything. She held back another shudder—although this one was more for pleasure.

  She didn’t care if her blind adoration showed on her face and in every movement she took and every syllable she uttered. She was in love and she was going for broke. Forget trying to play hard to get. That wasn’t her. At least he would know what he was missing if he turned her away in the end.

  She was suddenly impatient with herself after all these years. But she looked at him again and found herself wise to have been so patient—until now. He looked back at her with those piercing eyes, and with an instant assessment of her face, stopped in his tracks.

  “We need to move quickly. I don’t want Dan to come looking for us—and he’ll know where to look,” he said with a kind voice that belied the tightness of purpose evident in every cell of his body.

  “I know I should have asked this sooner, but what is it I’m looking for?” She remained in his line of sight with the same adoration on her face, communicating to him so much more than her words. At last she had an effect. His body softened as if he were a deflated blood pressure cuff.

  “You’ve been such a natural at investigating this crime I’d forgotten that you’re actually a decorator,” he said. His eyes had the unmistakable twinkle now. She swatted his arm in mock disapproval.

  “You’re a natural too,” she said. She started opening filing cabinet drawers labeled “inventory” and reading the locations. They were looking for any indication of the most likely warehouse where they would be keeping Theresa.

  There were some old boxes and a beat-up metal desk in the far corner, with the path to the desk littered with the debris of packing materials, old brochures and broken cardboard boxes. She watched David’s steady gaze on the desk as he picked his way there through the mess, not bothering with checking anything on his way. She stood and turned, noticing a calendar—the old-fashioned, black plastic kind with a ring through the loose-leaf pages. David leaned forward to inspect it without touching a thing, and before he reached for his glasses she went to his side.

  “It’s turned to October fourteenth—the day of the murder,” he said.

  “You noticed that from across the room, didn’t you?” Once again, she didn’t bother to hide the wonder in her voice. He smiled without taking his eyes off the page of the calendar. He adjusted his glasses and peered closer.

  “My problem has always been seeing close up. I’m an eagle from across a room,” he said in a murmur. “There are faint marks on the page.” He flipped back a page and they both saw the scrawl of very bad penmanship.

  “I don’t know how I know, but this is Lester’s writing. I’ve only seen it here and there on invoices and random notes,” she said, “But I know it’s his.” Sadness settled on her.

  “How long had you known him?” David asked. She looked up from the calendar and found him looking at her with that tenderness that melted her—and melted away some of the sadness.

  “I knew him since I started out—ten years ago.”

  “A lot of information sneaks into your subconscious over the course of time without you even realizing it,” he said. “Can you make out what it says?”

  “Sure. It’s the time and address of a warehouse pickup. And then it says something about emptying it out…because…lease is up…demolition next month or something.”

  “What’s the address?” he said in a too-casual voice. The shudder this time was about the possibility of finding some very bad people—who had Theresa.

  “240 East 15th Street.”

  “It’s on the list. Did you see any other addresses in the file cabinet?” he asked, but she could tell he wasn’t interested and only asking to divert her. For some reason he didn’t want her to be in on Theresa’s location.

  “Yeah, lots of them. At least seven different addresses all over the city. It’s like they were spreading their business around purposely and only renting small spaces at each location,” she said. He looked at her with a rare show of what was on his mind—he looked stunned. Then she realized what she’d said and turned pink with pleasure.

  “I guess I’m pretty observant after all.”

  “I guess. Maybe I should ask you if you’re an undercover law enforcement officer—or better yet, I should ask Oscar if you’re an undercover law enforcement officer.” He raised a brow. She almost thought he was serious, but laughed.

  “Think of me as Batman’s sidekick—Robinette.” She arched her brow back at him. He laughed, took her in his arms and kissed her in one of those robust, not-romantic-but-not-exactly-innocent kisses. He held back, but even so, her heart melted along with a good part of her insides.

  “The clock is ticking, sweetheart. We need to leave.” He pushed her in front of him, tore the page from the calendar and aimed for the back door where they came in.

  “What about our disguises?”

  “We’ll put them back on when we get outside,” he assured her as he opened the door a crack, looked through, and then stepped out in a smooth quick move.

  Once inside the cab, Grace couldn’t take her eyes off him and watched while he punched numbers into the phon
e and waited for an answer, holding it to his ear.

  “You know you could program the phone to speed dial the chief so you would only have to hit one number instead of the whole thing every time,” she said. “I could do it for you.”

  He gave her his neutral look. Then he leaned in for a gentle caress of a kiss with their lips barely touching but lingering to gather the feel. Her skin felt instantly hot, and she was breathless as she watched him talk into the phone. She felt like she would disintegrate with pleasure if they ever made love. Her longing threatened to overwhelm her every time she was near enough to inhale the scent of him. She took another deep breath, and desire pooled inside her.

  “I have a location. 240 East 15th Street. We need to check it out or find someone familiar with the area, get some plans of the building and then go in and get the girl,” he said into the phone.

  Grace’s stomach did a flip and her heart started beating hard and fast, but this was not pleasure. This was bald, primal fear like she remembered from long ago—only bigger. The fear that something indefinable and terrible might happen—and it was worse now because she was afraid it was going to happen to David.

  They caught a cab and drove back to the hotel in silence with their makeshift disguises not quite back in place enough to avoid curious glances from the taxi driver in the rearview mirror.

  If she let herself think about Theresa in that warehouse she’d panic, so Grace kept up a steady banter that David went along with, probably knowing the purpose was to settle her nerves. She knew he knew because when they jumped from the cab, swished through the revolving doors, and out into the lobby, he caught her around the shoulders and nearly carried her to the elevator. “As soon as we get back to our suite, remind me to get you a double shot of brandy to slow down your racing heart and then maybe do the same for your mouth too.”

  She giggled and then hiccupped but didn’t disagree.