Harlan Coben 3 Novel Collection

by Harlan Coben

  She checked her computer and yep, the stream had been downloaded. The office was quiet, so she figured, well, why not? She was about to hit the PLAY button when someone rapped lightly on her door.

  “Got a second, Chief?”

  Clarence Morrow stood outside her doorway and leaned his head in. He was nearing sixty, a black man with a coarse gray-white mustache and a face where everything looked a little swollen, as if he’d just gotten into a fight. There was gentleness to him and unlike every other guy in this division, he never swore or drank.

  “Sure, Clarence, what’s up?”

  “I almost called you at home last night.”

  “Oh?”

  “I thought I figured out the name of your Jane Doe.”

  That made Loren sit up. “But?”

  “We got a call from the Livingston PD about a Mr. Neil Cordova. He lives in town and owns a chain of barbershops. Married, two kids, no record. Anyway, he said his wife, Reba, was missing and, well, she roughly matched your Jane Doe’s description.”

  “But?” Muse said again.

  “But she disappeared yesterday—after we found the body.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Positive. The husband said he saw her that morning before he went to work.”

  “He could be lying.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Did anyone look into it?”

  “Not at first. But here’s the funny thing. Cordova knew someone on the police force in town. You know how it is out there. Everyone knows someone. They found her car. It was parked at the Ramada in East Hanover.”

  “Ah,” Muse said. “A hotel.”

  “Right.”

  “So Mrs. Cordova wasn’t really missing?”

  “Well,” Clarence said, stroking his chin, “that’s the funny thing.”

  “What is?”

  “Naturally the Livingston cop felt like you did. Mrs. Cordova hooked up with some lover and was late getting home or something. That’s when he called me—the Livingston cop, that is. He didn’t want to be the one to tell his friend, the husband, this news. So he calls me to do it. As a favor.”

  “Go on.”

  “So what do I know—I call Cordova. I explain that we found his wife’s car in a local hotel lot. He tells me that’s impossible. I tell him it’s there right now, if he wants to go see it.” He stopped. “Damn.”

  “What?”

  “Should I have told him that? I mean, thinking back on it. Might have been an invasion of her privacy to tell him. And suppose he showed up there with a gun or something? Man, I didn’t think that through.” Clarence frowned under his coarse mustache. “Should I have kept quiet about the car, Chief?”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Okay, whatever. Anyway, this Cordova refuses to believe what I’m suggesting.”

  “Like most men.”

  “Right, sure, but then he says something interesting. He says he first started to panic when she didn’t pick up their nine-year-old daughter from some special ice-skating class in Airmont. That wouldn’t be like her. He said she’d planned to spend some time at the Palisades Mall in Nyack—he said she likes to buy the kids basics at Target—and then head over to pick up the girl.”

  “And the mother never showed?”

  “Right. The ice rink called the father’s cell phone when they couldn’t reach the mother. Cordova drove up and picked the kid up. He figured that maybe his wife got stuck in traffic or something. There was an accident on 287 earlier in the day and she was bad about keeping her cell phone charged, so he was concerned but didn’t go into full panic when he didn’t reach her. As it got later and later, he got more and more worried.”

  Muse thought about it. “If Mrs. Cordova met up with a boyfriend at a hotel, she might have just forgotten to pick up the kid.”

  “I agree, except for one thing. Cordova already went online and checked his wife’s credit card records. She had been up at the Palisades Mall that afternoon. She did indeed buy stuff at Target. Spent forty-seven dollars and eighteen cents.”

  “Hmm.” Muse signaled for Clarence to take a seat. He did so. “So she goes way up to the Palisades Mall and then comes all the way back down to meet the lover, forgetting her kid who is getting skating lessons right near the mall.” She looked at him. “Does sound weird.”

  “You had to hear his voice, Chief. The husband’s, I mean. He was so distraught.”

  “I guess you could check with the Ramada, see if anybody recognizes her.”

  “I did. I had the husband scan a photo and e-mail it over. No one remembers seeing her.”

  “That doesn’t mean much. New people are probably on duty and she could have sneaked in after, I don’t know, her lover checked in. But her car is still there?”

  “Yep. And that’s weird, isn’t it? For the car to still be there? You have your affair, you get back in your car, you drive home, or whatever. So even if it was an affair, wouldn’t you think by now it’s an affair gone wrong? Like he grabbed her or there was some violence—”

  “—or she ran away with him.”

  “Right, that could be it too. But it’s a nice car. Acura MDX, four months old. Wouldn’t you take that?”

  Muse thought about it, shrugged.

  Clarence said, “I want to look into it, okay?”

  “Go for it.” She thought about it some more. “Do me a favor. Check and see if any other women have been reported missing in Livingston or that area. Even if just for a short while. Even if the cops didn’t take it too seriously.”

  “Already did it.”

  “And?”

  “None. Oh, but some woman called to report her husband and son were missing.” He checked his pad. “Her name is Tia Baye. Husband is Mike, son is Adam.”

  “The locals looking into it?”

  “I guess, I don’t really know.”

  “If it wasn’t for the missing kid too,” Muse said, “maybe this Baye guy ran off with Mrs. Cordova.”

  “You want me to look for a connection?”

  “If you want. If that’s the case, it’s not a criminal matter anyway. Two consenting adults are allowed to disappear together for a little while.”

  “Yeah, okay. But, Chief?”

  Muse loved that he called her that. Chief. “What?”

  “I got a feeling there’s something more here.”

  “Go with that then, Clarence. Keep me in the loop.”

  17

  IN a dream there is a beeping sound and then the words: “I’m so sorry, Dad. . . .”

  In reality Mike heard someone speaking Spanish in the dark.

  He spoke enough of it—you can’t work at a hospital on 168th Street and not speak at least medical Spanish—and so he recognized that the woman was praying furiously. Mike tried to turn his head, but it wouldn’t move. Didn’t matter. All was black. His head thudded at the temples as the woman in the dark repeated her prayer over and over.

  Meanwhile, Mike had his own mantra going on:

  Adam. Where is Adam?

  Mike slowly realized that his eyes were closed. He tried to open them. That wouldn’t happen right away. He listened some more and tried to focus on his eyelids, on the simple act of lifting them up. It took a little while but eventually they began to blink. The thudding in his temples grew into hammer pounds. He reached a hand up and pushed at the side of his head, as if he could contain the pain that way.

  He squinted at the fluorescent light on the white ceiling. The Spanish praying continued. The familiar smell filled the air, that combination of harsh cleaners, bodily functions, wilting fauna and absolutely no natural air circulation. Mike’s head dropped to the left. He saw the back of a woman hunched over a bed. Her fingers moved over the prayer beads. Her head seemed to be resting on a man’s chest. She alternated between sobs and prayers—and a blend of the two.

  He tried to reach his hand out and say something comforting to her. Ever the doctor. But there was an IV in his arm and it slow
ly dawned on him that he too was a patient. He tried to remember what had happened, how he could possibly have ended up here. It took a while. His brain was cloudy. He fought through it.

  There had been a terrible unease in him when he woke up. He had tried to push that away but for the sake of his memory he let it back in now. And as soon as he did, that mantra came back to him, this time just the one word:

  Adam.

  The rest flooded in. He had gone to look for Adam. He had talked to that bouncer, Anthony. He had gone down that alley. There had been that scary woman with the horrible wig. . . .

  There had been a knife.

  Had he been stabbed?

  He didn’t think so. He turned the other way. Another patient. A black man with his eyes closed. Mike looked for his family, but there was no one here for him. That shouldn’t surprise him—he might have only been out for a short time. They would have to contact Tia. She was in Boston. It would take time for her to arrive. Jill was at the Novaks’ house. And Adam . . . ?

  In the movies, when a patient wakes up like this, it’s in a private room and the doctor and nurse are already there, as though they’d been waiting all night, smiling down with lots of answers. There was no health professional in sight. Mike knew the routine. He searched for his call button, found it wrapped around the bed railings, and pressed for the nurse.

  It took some time. Hard to say how much. Time crawled by. The praying woman’s voice faded into silence. She stood up and wiped her eyes. Mike could see the man in the bed now. Considerably younger than the woman. Mother-son, he figured. He wondered what brought them here.

  He looked out the windows behind her. The shades were open and there was sunlight.

  Daytime.

  He had lost consciousness at night. Hours ago. Or maybe days. Who knew? He started pressing the call button even though he knew that it did no good. Panic began to take hold. The pain in his head steadily grew—someone was taking a jackhammer to his right temple.

  “Well, well.”

  He turned toward the doorway. The nurse, a heavy woman with reading glasses perched upon her huge bosom, strolled in. Her name tag read BERTHA BONDY. She looked down at him and frowned.

  “Welcome to the free world, sleepyhead. How are you feeling?”

  It took Mike a second or two to find his voice. “Like I kissed a Mac truck.”

  “Probably be more sanitary than what you were doing. Are you thirsty?”

  “Parched.”

  Bertha nodded, picked up a cup of ice. She tilted it to his lips. The ice tasted medicinal, but man it felt good in his mouth.

  “You’re at Bronx-Lebanon Hospital,” Bertha said. “Do you remember what happened?”

  “Someone jumped me. Bunch of guys, I guess.”

  “Hmm hmm. What’s your name?”

  “Mike Baye.”

  “Can you spell the last name for me?”

  He did, figuring this was a cognitive test, so he volunteered some information. “I’m a physician,” he said. “I do transplant surgery out of NewYork-Presbyterian.”

  She frowned some more, as though he’d given her the wrong answer. “For real?”

  “Yes.”

  More frowning.

  “Do I pass?” he asked.

  “Pass?”

  “The cognitive test.”

  “I’m not the doctor. He’ll be by in a little while. I asked your name because we don’t know who you are. You came in with no wallet, no cell phone, no keys, nothing. Whoever rolled you took it all.”

  Mike was about to say something else but a stab of pain ripped across his skull. He rode it out, bit down, counted in his head to ten. When it passed, he spoke again.

  “How long have I been out?”

  “All night. Six, seven hours.”

  “What time is it?”

  “Eight in the morning.”

  “So no one notified my family?”

  “I just told you. We didn’t know who you were.”

  “I need a phone. I need to call my wife.”

  “Your wife? You sure?”

  Mike’s head felt fuzzy. He was probably on some kind of medication, so maybe that was why he couldn’t figure out why she’d asked something so asinine.

  “Of course I’m sure.”

  Bertha shrugged. “The phone’s next to your bed, but I’ll have to ask them to hook it up. You’ll probably need help dialing, right?”

  “I guess.”

  “Oh, do you have medical insurance? We have some forms that need to be filled out.”

  Mike wanted to smile. First things first. “I do.”

  “I’ll send someone from admissions up to get your information. Your doctor should be by soon to talk about your injuries.”

  “How bad are they?”

  “You took a pretty solid beating and since you were out that long, there was obviously a concussion and head trauma. But I’d rather let the doctor give you the details, if that’s okay. I’ll see if I can hurry him along.”

  He understood. Floor nurses should not be giving him the diagnosis.

  “How’s the pain?” Bertha asked.

  “Medium.”

  “You’re on some pain meds now, so it’ll be getting worse before it gets better. I’ll hook up a morphine pump for you.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Back soon.”

  She started for the door. Mike thought of something else.

  “Nurse?”

  She turned back toward him.

  “Isn’t there a police officer who wants to talk to me or something?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I was assaulted and, from what you’re saying, robbed. Wouldn’t a cop be interested?”

  She folded her arms across her chest. “And you think, what, they’d just sit here and wait for you to wake up?”

  She had a point—like the doctor waiting on TV.

  Then Bertha added: “Most people don’t bother to report this kind of thing anyway.”

  “What kind of thing?”

  She frowned again. “You want me to call the police for you too?”

  “I better call my wife first.”

  “Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, I think that’s probably best.”

  He reached for the bed’s control button. Pain tore across his rib cage. His lungs stopped. He fumbled for the control and pushed the top button. His body curled up with the bed. He tried to squiggle more upright. He slowly reached now for the phone. He got it to his ear. It wasn’t hooked up yet.

  Tia must be in a panic.

  Was Adam home by now?

  Who the hell had jumped him?

  “Mr. Baye?”

  It was Nurse Bertha reappearing at the door.

  “Dr. Baye,” he corrected.

  “Oh, silly me, I forgot.”

  He hadn’t said it to be obnoxious, but letting a hospital know that you were a fellow physician had to be a good idea. If a cop is pulled over for speeding, he always lets the other cop know what he does for a living. File it under “Can’t Hurt.”

  “I found an officer here for another matter,” she said. “Do you want to talk to him?”

  “Yes, thanks, but could you also hook up the phone?”

  “Should be ready for you any minute now.”

  The uniformed officer entered the room. He was a small man, Latino with a thin mustache. Mike placed him in his mid-thirties. He introduced himself as Officer Guttierez.

  “Do you really want to file a report?” he asked.

  “Of course.”

  He frowned too.

  “What?”

  “I’m the officer who brought you in.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. Do you know where we found you?”

  Mike thought a second. “Probably in that alley by that club. I forget the street.”

  “Exactly.”

  He looked at Mike and waited. And Mike finally saw it.

  “It’s not what you think,” Mike said.
/>   “What do I think?”

  “That I was rolled by a hooker.”

  “Rolled?”

  Mike tried to shrug. “I watch a lot of TV.”

  “Well, I’m not big on jumping to conclusions, but here’s what I do know: You were found in an alley frequented by prostitutes. You’re a solid twenty or thirty years older than the average club goer in that area. You’re married. You got jumped and robbed and beaten in a way I’ve seen before, when a john gets”—he made quote marks with his fingers—“ ‘rolled by a hooker or her pimp.’ ”

  “I wasn’t there to solicit,” Mike said.

  “Uh-huh, no, no, I’m sure you were in that alley for the view. It’s pretty special. And don’t get me started on the delights of the aroma. Man, you don’t have to explain to me. I totally get the allure.”

  “I was looking for my son.”

  “In that alley?”

  “Yes. I saw a friend of his. . . .” The pain returned. He could see how this would go. It would take some time to explain. And then what? What would this cop find anyway?

  He needed to reach Tia.

  “I’m in a lot of pain right now,” Mike said.

  Guttierez nodded. “I understand. Look, here’s my card. Call if you want to talk some more or fill out a complaint, okay?”

  Guttierez put his card on the night table and left the room. Mike ignored it. He fought through the pain, reached for the phone, and dialed Tia’s cell phone.

  18

  LOREN Muse watched the street surveillance tape from near where her Jane Doe’s body was dumped. Nothing jumped out at her, but then again, what had she expected? Several dozen vehicles drove past that lot at that hour. You couldn’t really eliminate any. The body could be in the trunk of even the smallest car.

  Still she kept watching and hoping and when the tape rolled to the end, she had gotten a big fat goose egg for her trouble.

  Clarence knocked and stuck his head in again. “You’re not going to believe this, Chief.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “First off, forget that missing man. The Baye guy. Guess where he was?”

  “Where?”

  “A Bronx hospital. His wife goes away on business and he goes out and gets mugged by a hooker.”