Not a Moment Too Soon

by Linda O. Johnston

  “You’ve seen the news?” Hunter demanded without preamble.

  “Yes, we’ve been dealing with it for about an hour—the usual. People calling ’cause they’re afraid it’s their kid. Or claiming they saw something. We’re checking into every one.”

  “How’d it get out there so fast?” he asked. “We need to do damage control, make sure the guy who has Andee understands that we didn’t tell the media. That I’ll do anything to get her back. I’m hoping to have most of the money together by the end of the day.”

  “You want to schedule a press conference?” Banger’s voice faded a little, as if his cell phone signal was weakening.

  “Hell, no. But maybe we’d better.”

  “You talked to Margo yet?”

  “That’s next on my agenda.”

  It wasn’t a pleasant experience. He woke Margo virtually the same way as Simon had got him up, then had to deal with her screaming and crying over the phone.

  “Cool it,” he shouted at her. “No, I don’t know how—”

  “Please, Hunter, I can’t do this,” she cried. “What’s going to happen to our baby?”

  “She’ll be fine,” he insisted. She had to be. Margo pleaded with him to be with her. Being back in the neighborhood where Andee had been snatched might yet be the best place to be. Especially if the kidnapper called again—hopefully just to make threats. And not to report on what he’d already done to Hunter’s daughter…

  He turned on the shower to let it warm up a little. He no longer needed a cold one, even with Shauna still in bed.

  They’d had their farewell performance. He’d give her cab fare, send her to the airport, get her out of there.

  Yeah—and what if she is able to save more changes to her story now? She’d already written that the media got hold of the kidnapping and run with it, so this wasn’t new to her.

  Only the timing was damned inconvenient. But what timing wouldn’t be?

  Still, on the off chance she could do something, anything, with this new, miserable turn of events…

  He stomped into his room to see her standing by the bed, already dressed in a different outfit from yesterday—another T-shirt, black this time, and slim gray pants. She must have slipped out while he was uselessly talking to people behind his closed bathroom door.

  “Can we go back to Margo’s, Hunter?” she asked. “I just turned on my cell phone. Conrad Chiles finally called back and left a message. He’s demanding to know if Andee’s the child in the news. I need to talk to him.”

  On the drive from Hunter’s to Margo’s, Shauna gritted her teeth as Hunter kept flipping from one of L.A.’s all-news radio stations back to the other. The kidnapping wasn’t the only story on, but it was repeated frequently, with promises of more information when it became available.

  “Soon,” Hunter muttered after one of those hints of more to come.

  “Pardon?” Shauna turned toward him. She’d been staring out the GTO’s window at the city’s inevitable traffic, wishing she could speed the other vehicles up or get them out of the way.

  “Soon. The damned media carrion-eaters are going to love it when Margo and I hold a news conference later.”

  “Really?” That possibility startled Shauna.

  “Yeah. Margo doesn’t know it yet, but Banger thought it would be a good idea.”

  Shauna wasn’t sure how to react to the idea. For one thing, that hadn’t been in her story. For another… “Don’t you think that might make the kidnapper…edgy?”

  Shauna watched Hunter’s features, as rigid as if encapsulated in ice, as he stared at the road ahead. “He’ll be edgier if we don’t,” he muttered. He glanced toward her, his green eyes expressionless. “This way we can claim we don’t know how the information got out there, but we didn’t release it.” His voice lowered, and Shauna didn’t need one of her stories to sense the depth of his emotion. “Maybe he’ll buy it, not harm Andee despite his warnings.”

  He obviously didn’t want to talk about it anymore, for he turned up the radio’s volume. A while later, she turned her head away from Hunter as they drove up Margo’s street. She didn’t want him to see her alarm as she counted news vans. Obviously, even though no names had yet been given, they knew who the kidnapped child was.

  “Do you think it would be better to park somewhere else?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” Hunter agreed. He kept driving, slowly enough not to run down any milling reporters, though Shauna had little doubt that he’d like to have scattered them in as startling a way as possible without injuring any. He pulled around the corner and stopped on the street behind Margo’s. Near Conrad Chiles’s house.

  Shauna barely waited for Hunter to turn off the engine before she hopped out. “I’ll go talk to Conrad,” she told Hunter when he quickly joined her on the curb. “And then I’ll check on you at Margo’s before I call a taxi.”

  “Taxi? What taxi?”

  Shauna made herself ignore the glower he aimed down at her, even though it hurt, especially after last night. It was, after all, an expression she had come to know well…before.

  “We’ve already talked about my going home today,” she said softly, forcing herself to not even touch him, when what she wanted to do was to throw herself into his arms for one last time. “You’ll be busy, so I’ll need to get my things and—”

  “Yeah, well, I’ve been thinking. You have to stay here, at least until tonight.”

  “But—”

  “Don’t you get it? This changes things.” He closed his eyes, as if seeking some inner strength. And then he was the one to grasp her—by the arms. Keeping her, still, at a distance.

  “My story deals with what happens after the news reports on the kidnapping,” she reminded him, trying hard not to wince in reaction to his flinch of pain.

  “But nothing in it suggests a press conference,” he said slowly, as if she was a not-too-bright child to whom he was attempting to teach a complicated theorem. “It’ll add another dimension to that whole fiasco in your story about the media frenzy. It’ll show the kidnapper that we had nothing to do with the information leak, but it should get a message to him, let him know we stand ready to do whatever he wants.” Hunter’s expression turned momentarily pleading. “Won’t that be enough to change your story, Shauna? To get your computer to at least save the differences. I won’t even ask about it allowing for another ending…yet.”

  Shauna wanted so badly to take the single step that separated them. To replace his almost-impersonal grip on her arms with a tight and tender embrace. To reassure him that everything would turn out all right.

  That would be the woman who had never, really, stopped caring about him talking, though. It wouldn’t be the detached therapist who should be trying to help him.

  And it certainly wouldn’t be the poor fool who was blessed or cursed with the immutable O’Leary gift.

  One thing, though, was certain. She couldn’t leave him like this, when he wanted her to stay.

  She didn’t want to leave him, ever…

  But she would. If not before, then someday soon, when he would be unable to stand the sight of her.

  And though all she could give him now was false hope, she said, “Okay, Hunter. You know I can’t promise changes to my story. But if you want me to, I’ll stay.”

  “You’ll try tonight to change it, won’t you?”

  She kept her sigh deep down inside. “Of course,” she said.

  Chapter 11

  “I’ll meet you at Margo’s in about half an hour,” Shauna told Hunter. “You go ahead and get things set up.”

  “No way,” he said. “I’m coming with you to talk to our buddy Chiles.”

  Her going to talk to Conrad Chiles while the media descended on Margo’s sounded like a great idea. But not Hunter, too.

  “Conrad’s not your buddy,” Shauna reminded him, ignoring the obstinate expression that drew his mouth into an irritated line. The mouth that she had kissed all night. But now they both had
things to do. And she had to convince the stubborn man before her that she could handle her part just fine. “If you come along, he’s more likely to argue with you than tell us what we need to know. Besides, you can’t be two places at once. You need to be there for the press conference. With Margo.”

  His look segued to exasperation. “You’re right. All we need is for the drama queen to get in front of the cameras herself. You win. But make sure you tell me everything he says. And get to Margo’s as soon as you can.”

  “I will.” Shauna turned and headed for Conrad’s. She’d actually hoped to miss the news conference but couldn’t do that to Hunter. He wanted her there. They’d talked about it in the car. If her story was to change, she had to have knowledge of how reality differed from what she had written.

  Conrad’s house was a single story, gray stucco with white shutters. The path through the attractive rock garden was no-nonsense straight, from the sidewalk to the plain white panel of the front door.

  Shauna found the doorbell button near the jamb and pushed it. She heard nothing from inside but had the odd sensation that Conrad was assessing her through the peephole.

  The door swung open seconds later. “Tell me what really happened to Andee,” Conrad immediately demanded, as if they were still in the middle of yesterday’s conversation at Margo’s. He wore a red plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up to reveal bony forearms, blue jeans, brown felt bedroom slippers, and a fierce gaze behind the glasses perched on his out-sized nose.

  “I’ll be glad to tell you what I know—” Most, at least. “—if you’ll answer more questions. I’m still hoping someone in the neighborhood saw something to help us locate Andee, and I’ll bet it’ll be a person as caring and observant as you.”

  His smile slid up one half of his sunken cheek. “Nosy, you mean. Well, come in and let’s see.” He motioned with a gnarly forefinger for her to follow.

  The entry to his house consisted of a platform of yellow tile only a few feet square. The living room was beyond it, with white walls that needed a coat of paint, and shabby furniture that probably hadn’t looked much nicer even when new.

  “Have a seat.” He pointed toward a chair that had a gold slipcover with a stain on the arm. He sat on a rocking chair beside her. A couple of the spindles hooking the seat to the upper part of the back were missing.

  “Okay, Conrad.” Shauna leaned toward him conspiratorially. “Here’s what we know.” She gave a rundown of how Andee at first had seemed to have walked away from Margo’s yard, then the calls from the kidnapper warning the parents not to go to the police or let anyone know.

  “Did the guy demand ransom?” Conrad’s eyes narrowed sagely as if he knew the drill. Probably watched a lot of television, since the nicest thing in the entire room was a TV along one wall.

  “Yes. Hunter has been working on getting it together while he and others looked for Andee. He’s a private investigator, so his assistant has been helping, and the police and FBI, too—discreetly. Hunter told someone he trusted, and the investigation was kept quiet, at least till this morning.”

  “I get it.” Conrad leaned back and rocked contemplatively in the chair for a few moments.

  “Now, I’d like to ask you some questions,” Shauna said.

  “That’s the deal. You want a glass of something first—cola? Coffee? All I have is instant, though.”

  “No, thanks. What I really want is for you to describe what you remember about the morning Andee disappeared, two days ago. Tell me everything, in case there’s something that you don’t realize is significant.” Like the neighbor in her story.

  He did as she asked, droning on about how he’d planned to go to the auto-parts store because he thought his car needed oil. He checked it first, in the garage behind his house—in the alley that was also behind Margo’s.

  “Did you see Andee?”

  He shook his head. “No. In fact, I don’t think I saw anyone else in the alley. Not when I drove out, either.”

  Drat. How could he be the neighbor who’d seen something significant without realizing it if he hadn’t seen anything?

  She prompted him to keep talking about that morning a little longer, but he didn’t reveal anything helpful.

  Her dismay must have been obvious, for Conrad stopped speaking in the middle of a sentence. “This stuff isn’t what you want, is it?”

  She shook her head. “I appreciate your time, but I’d better go.” She rose. “You’ll let Hunter know, won’t you, if you remember anything else?”

  “I’ll tell Margo,” he emphasized. “She’s a nice lady. I like seeing her on TV now and then, in commercials and all. When I run into her in the alley, she tells me what she’s working on. She’s an actress, you know. Auditions for all kinds of roles. She sometimes throws parties for her acting friends and the neighbors. Invites some real famous people—ones I see on TV all the time, though I couldn’t tell you their names.” Bit-part actors, Shauna figured. “They put on funny skits. You know, she’s really good. I tell her she should try stand-up comedy. But she says she likes serious roles better.” He frowned. “I know she’s done some live theater, too, but I haven’t seen any of those plays.”

  It sounded to Shauna as if this older man had a crush on his neighborhood quasi-celebrity.

  “She’s invited me, though,” he went on. “Problem was, my asthma acts up now and then. But I’ve seen some of her friends—that John Aitken, for one. He visits her a lot, and I saw one of his plays, a drama. I told Margo how good I thought it was, since she obviously likes the guy, but I was just being nice. Me, I can’t stand him. His ego’s as huge as the Pacific. He always talks, in that too-too dramatic voice of his, about how he’ll make it big in the theater.” Conrad exaggerated the last word as if in imitation. “It would help if the guy could act.”

  “The important thing now,” Shauna said to bring him back to the subject, “is for Margo to get her daughter home safely.”

  “That’s for sure. Cute kid. I’ve seen her a lot when she stays with Margo. She plays sometimes with a little girl down the street, Sondra Nantes. Her dad Earl’s a friend of mine. And when Margo takes Andee for walks around here, she brings her to my place for a lollipop. Margo’s told me how much she misses Andee when she’s with her father, wishes she had her around all the time but had to give her ex-husband more custody so she could work as much as possible, since she had to give him money for Andee’s support. Should be the other way, don’t you think?”

  Shauna not only thought so but believed Margo had told him the opposite of reality—maybe so she wouldn’t look like a bad mother. What Shauna said, though, was, “I’m sorry, but since I really don’t know their situation, I won’t criticize it.”

  “You’re a friend of her ex-husband’s,” Conrad persisted. “You don’t think he staged this whole kidnapping thing to prevent poor Margo from seeing her daughter again, do you?

  “No,” she said firmly. “I’m certain he didn’t.” She moved toward the door. “Just please be sure to tell one of them or the police if you think of anything else that might be helpful. And thanks for all you told me. I’ll pass it along.”

  “Did I say anything helpful?” he asked dubiously, hurrying ahead of her to open the front door.

  “It’s hard to say what’ll be helpful,” she hedged.

  But as she went around the block toward Margo’s, Shauna felt dejected. She’d been so hopeful that her insight about the three neighbors rolled into one was Conrad Chiles.

  Yet this time, Conrad hadn’t been irritable, just nosy.

  And try as she might, she couldn’t extract anything from what he’d said that might fit the third criterion: the neighbor who’d actually seen something useful but didn’t realize it.

  “Any idea how the media glommed onto it?” Hunter demanded.

  Banger shrugged. “Like I warned you, keeping a mushrooming number of law-enforcement types invisible couldn’t last forever.”

  They stood inside Margo’s fr
ont door, along with Lou Tennyson, Banger’s trusted FBI crony.

  “You want a lot of press in a situation like this,” Tennyson said, as if delivering a revelation to the uninformed.

  “Not when we were told publicity would be hazardous to my daughter’s health,” Hunter hissed.

  Tennyson, a suit if there ever was one, wore his federal position like a crown. Hunter had disliked him on the spot. But he knew Banger. And if Banger vouched for this short, pompous Fibbie, then the guy probably couldn’t be all bad.

  Emphasis on the probably.

  Bad enough that Hunter had run the media gauntlet getting inside Margo’s. He’d been taped and photographed while microphones were thrust in his face and questions hurled at him.

  While he was the one who wanted answers.

  And now, the law-enforcement types were pretending all the attention was a good thing.

  In any event, they had to deal with it now.

  “Let’s prepare for the damned press conference,” Hunter said. “We’ve got—what? Fifteen minutes?”

  “Yeah, I told them nine-thirty,” Banger confirmed. “They were supposed to low-key it till then.”

  Hunter snorted. “If that’s low key…”

  “I’ve seen worse,” Tennyson said. Hunter shot him a glare that the guy countered with a wry smile—the first human glimpse Hunter had gotten of him. “But not a lot,” he finished. He looked in his late thirties, judging by the depth of the few wrinkles on his face, but his hair was white. Had his job done that to him?

  “Great,” Hunter snapped in response. “Okay, look, the spin to put on this is that I’m delivering a message to the kidnapper. I don’t know how the authorities got wind of this. I didn’t tell them. And I’ve got the money together—which is just as much a lie, though I’ve gathered enough to get his attention. I’ll—” He had to stop for a moment and swallow, because what came next was almost too hard to say. “I’ll do anything to get my daughter back safely. But I need proof she’s still alive.”