by A. C. Fuller
"That's what I've been wondering since I read it," Alex said. "There are two options. One is that they somehow hacked our e-mails or phones, or had a recording device in here."
"And they heard us talking about the story, then chased it down on their own?"
"Maybe, but that doesn't . . ." Alex didn't want to finish the thought.
"That doesn't explain how they got e-mails we don't have, sources we don't have."
Alex sighed. "Unless Bice himself fed them the whole damn thing."
James nodded. "But, according to the story, they also had the documents Bhootbhai uncovered. Which means—"
"Innerrva. Damnit, James! Did you tell her we'd decided not to run the data she dug up?"
"I did, but . . ."
"She leaked it."
"It could also have been Bice himself. He had all the same stuff, from Bhootbhai. But I guess The Times isn't running it either. And I doubt she would have leaked it to them, anyway."
They sat in silence for a minute, then Alex said, "I'm supposed to head home, spend the day with Greta. We have to talk about . . ."
"What?"
"Nothing. I'll cancel. We need to get to work. I'm gonna nap for a few hours, like our friend here." He waved at Lance, who was already snoring on the couch. "You should, too. Then we need to salvage what we can of this story."
54
Columbus and 71st Street
Greta moved her sunglasses from the top of her head to the bridge of her nose as she stepped out of the noodle house.
Behind her, Camila squinted in the evening sun, which was setting between two apartment buildings.
"Taxi or walk?" Greta asked.
Camila smiled. "Walk, if that's okay with you. I'm thinking that third Thai iced tea may have been a mistake. Alex always tells me that I might be a little more 'high energy' if I 'move my body in a manner that raises my heart rate.'"
"Yeah, he does say crap like that, doesn't he?"
"He does."
As they strolled side by side, Greta took her sunglasses off and caught Camila's eye. "But I'm glad we talked, you know? I mean, I'm not generally jealous, but with you, I found myself more jealous than usual. At least I know that, when he bailed on me today, it wasn't to sleep with you."
Camila offered a weak smile.
"Yeah, sorry, bad joke. But he does work like a madman sometimes, and I imagine he and James went nuts when they saw the story in The Times."
"They've rewriting it all day," Camila said.
At 73rd Street, Greta stopped to peer into a shoe store window. Three pairs took up the entire display, each presented on its own pedestal, surrounded by sawdust and shredded newspaper. "I've been trying to figure out why I'm obsessed with shoes. I just love them. Last week, I read an article in some pop psychology magazine that said the average woman owns twenty pairs."
"How many do you have?"
Greta started walking again and Camila followed.
"You think I counted?" Greta asked.
"I do."
"Fifteen," Greta said, smiling.
"What else did the article say?"
"Something about how women's shoe size doesn't change much, even as the rest of her body does. So, shoes are like a life companion. I get that, but another part pissed me off. It said shoes are an intimate extension of the body and tell the world about our attitudes, aesthetics, sexuality, and social status."
"What's wrong with that?" Camila asked.
"First of all, it's not just women. Shoes are becoming a thing for men as well. Old Air Jordans. Classic Converse. It's like the hipsters in Brooklyn collecting vinyl. They don't even wear them. Some of the athletes I work on have a hundred pairs. One guy built a showroom in his mansion in Jersey. For shoes. But that wasn't the main thing. I was pissed because it left off the part about art."
"Do you wear all your fancy shoes?"
Greta pointed at her feet. She had on a pair of bright-green three-inch heels studded with silver jewels, supported by tapered black stems. "Hell yeah, I wear them. The story talked about how some women get high—I mean, literally high, with dopamine, serotonin, and oxytocin—just thinking of buying shoes. And I'm like, screw that. They're art. Wearable art. I don't want them in my closet. I want them on my feet."
Camila studied her. "It's an expression of joy."
"Exactly. Some people think it's shallow. But to hell with them. Life is art."
"How does Alex feel about that?"
"Well, I think you know that Alex and I are opposites in most ways. He dresses like a journalist. It's like, 'How little effort can I put in and still get access to meetings and establishments so I can do my job?'"
"That's how I am, as well," Camila said.
"You guys are alike in a lot of ways."
"I know."
"Why weren't you interested in him, then, long term? And I'm not asking because I doubt you. I'm asking because I trust you. I mean, is there something wrong with him that you know, and I don't?"
Camila laughed. "Where should I start?"
"I'm serious."
Camila looked thoughtful as they crossed 80th Street and passed in front of the Museum of Natural History, where two women were pushing strollers up a ramp toward the side entrance.
Greta adjusted her sunglasses, looking at the babies. "I can't believe I'll be having one of my own in six months."
Camila eyed her belly. "Oh, now I get it. You've been talking around it all afternoon. You're scared, and you want to know what he'll be like long term."
"He didn't tell you?"
"No."
"Bice told him when he had him locked in that shed. I can't believe Alex didn't tell you that."
"He tends to keep things inside," Camila said. "But I'm the last person to ask about relationships. My longest one was just over a year. He was fifteen years older than me and ended up getting murdered."
"I know."
"You know what Des Moines means?"
"No."
"Monks. When I moved back, my mom joked that I was giving up on men and becoming a lady monk."
"Isn't a female monk a nun?"
"I guess. I'd prefer to be a solitary mystic. Skip the religious overtones."
"But you haven't answered my question about Alex."
At 86th Street, Greta sat down on a weathered wooden bench and took off her shoes. When Camila sat next to her, she swiveled around, lay back, and put her feet on Camila's lap.
"My parents weren't exactly the nurturing types," Greta said. "And they were opposites, too. But my mom said one thing that stuck with me. Every time I wondered why I was here, why I'd been born, what the hell they were doing together, I would think of it. You know, the crisis of faith moments when you just think—as the kids like to say these days—WTF?"
Camila laughed, looking for a place to put her hands, then rested them uncomfortably on the bench at her sides. "That's how I used to spend most of my time, actually. But what is it that she said?"
"Well, I asked her one day, point blank, why did you and Dad end up together? And picture a tall German woman, my mom—meaty and strong and probably holding a string of sausages, as she's been known to do—and she said, 'Because you wanted to be born.'" Greta tilted her head back and stared up at the gingko tree above her.
Camila said, "I don't know what that means, but it sounds about right."
Greta smiled. "That's what I've been thinking for years."
"You want to hear my new theory?" Camila moved her hands up and rested them on Greta's legs. "I don't know what you should do about Alex, but here's what I know about him. He's smart and he's basically good. When I first met him, I told him that inside he was relaxed and confident. And that it came from having an easy life, from having the privileges he had as a tall, straight, white guy in this country.
"But that was only the partial truth. The much bigger thing was that he had parents who loved him. He had a safe childhood, he wasn't abused, wasn't hit, wasn't made to feel small. And I've com
e to think that this is what matters more than anything. At his core, he feels that the world is good, because that's what he saw early on. And he treats people like they are part of the world that is good."
She paused and thought for a moment, then said, "I was reading this sermon the other day by some sixteenth-century priest. I forget his name. But he said something that I liked. He said that to those who have been giving much, much is expected. And that the way to live your life is to give everything you can, to anyone, at any time, without any expectation of a return."
"And you think Alex does that?"
"No, he's a selfish bastard."
They both laughed.
After a minute, Camila wiped away a tear. "I was just telling him the other day. He's the type of guy who wanders around, looking for his destiny, when really it's to be good at whatever arises." She gazed down at Greta, who was smiling. "But I think he'll be a great dad. It'll be a struggle for him, and you'll have to talk him off the ledge a few times, but—"
"Why are you crying?" Greta asked.
"You know how I said I was monk-like?"
"Yeah."
"Before he was killed, John and I were talking about having kids. I know now that I won't ever have them."
"Do you want kids?"
"No, but I'm still sad about it."
Greta sat up, swinging her feet to the ground, and put her shoes back on. She pulled her phone out of the front pocket of her jeans and checked the time. "Do you want to go to yoga with me tonight?"
Camila shot her a skeptical look.
"You're coming. Really."
"I don't have the right clothes," Camila said. "And I told James I'd coach him on how to flirt with Innerva tonight."
"You can do that after. Come back to the apartment with me, and I'll loan you some clothes."
"I don't know . . . Okay, I'll go. But I'm staying with my old neighbor, Charlie. I'll change there and meet you."
"I thought you said you didn't have clothes."
"That may have been an excuse to avoid moving my body in a manner that raises my heart rate."
Greta smiled. "Okay, I'll text you the address, it's in an old church. Meet me there at seven."
55
Dancing Bliss Yoga Workshop, Washington Heights
Denver Bice sat alone in a black Lincoln outside the Greater Union Church in Washington Heights, eyes fixed on the subway exit, looking within himself for one fond memory of his mother.
Nothing came.
He scanned the wide stone steps of the old church, then up and down the block. She'd be here any minute.
After releasing James and Alex, he'd flown back to New York on a private plane without a manifest, and had been hiding out in New Jersey. For a few days, he'd tried to convince himself that he'd go back to business, that everything could go back to normal. But the part of himself wanting that had been nearly silenced by the voice.
Bad-bad-bad-bad-bad.
And now, he'd ended up here, on West 171st Street, his father's gun in his lap, staring in the direction of the subway exit from which he knew Greta would emerge.
He turned the keys of the Lincoln halfway, in order to power on the clock and interior lights. 6:57 p.m. He turned them back, and the interior went dark.
He understood that different pieces of himself had been at war for years. He was seeing that more clearly every day. In college, he'd had a brief infatuation with German philosophy, an infatuation he'd shared with Martha Morelli.
They'd had a favorite passage from Nietzsche, which, in the rush of the first weeks of their relationship, they'd read to each other while eating boiled crawfish from a paper bag on the bank of the Mississippi River, just south of Tulane.
But the worst enemy you can meet will always be yourself; you lie in wait for yourself in caverns and forests. Lonely one, you are going the way to yourself! And your way goes past yourself, and past your seven devils! You will be a heretic to yourself and witch and soothsayer and fool and doubter and unholy one and villain. You must be ready to burn yourself in your own flame: how could you become new, if you had not first become ashes?
They'd argued about it, too. He hadn't wanted to believe that the pieces of him he'd buried would ever surface. Martha had assured him that they would, and encouraged him to look into his past.
But they had surfaced. Surfaced when she'd left him, when he'd seen her in New York. Surfaced when he'd killed her.
He'd spent decades running from it. After Martha Morelli, it had been corporate executives he needed to climb past. Then it had been other companies. But each victory only lifted him temporarily, leaving the gnawing emptiness when it wore off. The voice had grown louder when he'd been named CEO of Standard Media. Louder still when he'd killed Macintosh Hollinger.
He realized now that Nietzsche had been right, and so had Martha Morelli. When there are no more external battles to fight, the internal battles rise up and demand to be fought.
And now they'd taken over completely. He saw it happening, knew it was happening, but there was nothing he could do about it.
His eyes were still fixed on the subway exit, and he studied each passerby carefully. He knew what he was looking for; Bhootbhai had sent him plenty of photos from Greta's Myspace page.
She'd be wearing yoga pants, probably black. A loose top, most likely covered by a light jacket. Black hair, tied back in some way. She was skinny and most likely not showing yet.
He took a cheap plastic phone out his glove compartment and entered Alex's number from memory in a new text message: Alex, Remember when I said I'd find another way to make you suffer? I think I have. You shouldn't have let her come to yoga class tonight. Love, DB
He placed the phone on his lap without sending the text.
A minute later, he saw her. She was emerging from the subway and walking toward his car in black yoga pants and a blue jacket with the hood up.
He tightened his grip on the gun and put his hand on the door handle when she was a few yards from the steps that led up to the giant church. He glanced down at the phone, pressed "Send," and opened the car door.
She stopped at the base of the steps and rotated in a full circle, her eyes stopping on every passing stranger. He was about to get out of the car when he saw that it wasn't Greta.
It was Camila Gray.
As she rotated again, her face half-illuminated by a street light, he cursed himself and closed the car door gently.
He shifted to the side, away from the street, so she wouldn't see him, then glanced back as she pulled a phone out of her purse. She stared at it for a moment, then sat on the steps, facing his car.
His head began to spin. She was going to ruin it for him. She was typing something into the phone. She'd seen him. She was telling Greta not to come. She was texting the police.
The conflict in him was exploding into a full-fledged war. The voice was intensifying—bad-bad-bad-bad-bad—but was butting up against his desire to win, his desire to see his plan come to fruition, his desire to inflict suffering on Alex.
Bice positioned the gun between his belt and his pants, then sucked in his belly and buttoned the jacket of his suit. He peered out the window, watching Camila with one eye while watching the passersby in the periphery for an opening. An old couple walked by slowly, hand in hand. When they were about a yard past Camila, he opened the door, walked around to the sidewalk quickly, and sat down next to her.
"Get in the car," he said, wrapping his fingers around her bicep.
Camila flinched and leaned away, but didn't try to stand. "You . . . What are you . . ."
Bice jerked her closer, scanning the street. He pressed the gun into her side. "Now," he said, standing and yanking her up by the arm.
She stood and stepped with him toward the car.
Bice said, "I know Greta is on her way. If you run, she'll die. If you scream, you'll die." He opened the passenger-side door and shoved her in, then walked slowly around to the driver-side door, eyes trained on Camila th
rough the windshield.
As he got in, Camila said, "I know you think this will help, but it won't. What is it you want? I mean, really want?"
Bice was quiet for a few seconds, his eyes flashing from anger to confusion. Finally, he lowered the gun and said, "I can't remember my mother."
56
7:01 p.m.
Greta was trying to hurry, but she couldn't help stopping every few minutes to look into store windows. Dark clouds had gathered over the city in the last hour, but the night was warm, so, even though it was going to make her a few minutes later than usual, she didn't regret her decision to walk.
As she crossed 162nd , her phone dinged with a text from Camila: Where are you?
She texted back: B there in 10. Just go in. They expect me 2 B late.
7:03 p.m.
Alex was sprawled out on the couch, legs hanging over the armrest.
James had confirmed that Innerva wasn't the one who had sent the documents to The Times, and a friend of Lance's at The Times had confirmed that Denver Bice himself was the primary source on the story. Bice had also emailed them all the documents Bhootbhai had uncovered, which The Times had no intention of running.
But they'd given up on trying to track down whether Cooper had bugged their offices or hacked their e-mails, half out of frustration and half out of sheer exhaustion.
James's voice called from the office in the back. "Alex, your phone is buzzing."
He looked around for a moment, then realized he'd left it in the kitchen. "Is it Greta?" he called weakly.
"I'm busy. Go see for yourself."
Alex wandered into the kitchen and checked the counters through blurry eyes. He found his phone next to the fridge, the screen still bright with the text from Bice: Alex, Remember when I said I'd find another way to make you suffer? I think I have. You shouldn't have let her come to yoga class tonight. Love, DB
"Who was it?" James hollered. "Please tell me it was Cooper or someone from The Times."
Alex was already dialing Greta.