by Chris Jordan
Good old Mom. Still in there swinging. In the end, all she’ll accomplish is digging herself deeper and deeper into his trap, until the authorities have no choice but to charge her, even if some of the planted evidence looks, well, planted. By then it will be too late—his mission will have been accomplished. Still, you have to admire her nerve. First thing she does when she gets out of the clink is hire a freelance heavy to put the screws on witnesses. Tall, rangy-looking dude with a cool, confident way of moving that gives Cutter pause, but not so much that he’s prepared to alter his plan. No need at the moment. If they get close, ice picks are available at any hardware store. Not that he’ll need to make an additional purchase, since he already has another just like it in his possession.
Always be prepared—he learned that in Boy Scouts. Except he wasn’t prepared to silence Mrs. Bickford, not yet. Not while she’s useful. Tells himself there’s no sentimentality involved, it just makes sense to keep her front and center as a suspect. And yet, to be truthful, there’s something admirable about the woman. She’s braver than she thinks she is, frightened but still able to function, which is the battlefield definition of courage. Also, he’s grateful that she’s done such a fine job of keeping her adopted son in good health. Sickly boy would have been no use to him. Tomas will need his strength for what comes next.
We’ll all need our strength, Cutter thinks. Me, Lyla, the boy. Very soon the next phase of the operation will be put into motion, and that’s when things are likely to get a little dicey, a little edgy. No way to predict exactly what will happen next. He does know the ultimate goal—it burns in his brain like a hot gold disk—but how exactly he’ll get there has yet to be determined. At this stage it’s crucial that he remain flexible, not get locked into any particular scenarios or details.
All of his training has taught him the importance of flexibility, of being able to think rationally in irrational, unthinkable situations. What he has in mind is not so far removed from war, after all. In a battle the only thing certain is uncertainty. You have to accept that—accept that things will change, that events may spiral out of control—and go with the flow, always keeping your goal in mind.
Cutter’s goal is simple enough. He wants his family back.
Considering what has transpired, the tragic events that have clouded poor Lyla’s already delicate mind, the task of reassembling his little family is more than merely daunting. Some might conclude it impossible. Not Cutter, though. He doesn’t know the meaning of impossible. He’s incapable of accepting defeat. He’ll win at all cost.
Hooah and all that clichéd, chest-pounding shit. The point is, he’ll never give up.
That’s what Cutter learned in the Boy Scouts, and later in service to his country. No matter what crap the world heaps on you, never, ever give up.
That’s what he keeps telling himself now, in this desperate hour. And at the core, in the animal parts of his brain, in the marrow of his bones, in the muscles of his heart, he believes it.
24
in the white room
Tomas has a plan. He has no idea how long he’s been here, in the white room. At least a day. Maybe longer. He’s tried to figure out what time it is from the TV, but the tuner doesn’t seem to have a timer, at least not one he can find. And there’s no cable or satellite access, just a stack of DVDs and a player. Mostly lame-o family-rated fare like Finding Nemo and Agent Cody Banks, and a dumb but fun movie called Faster that Mom would never let him see because of the R rating. Hot cars and girls with big butts. He’d seen it three times so far and it still doesn’t suck, although he thinks it’s really stupid how the guys keep doing stupid things to impress the girls. Making cars leap over cliffs and stuff, this one guy actually paragliding from his flaming car just before it smoked into the ground like a guided missile. Wicked good explosion though.
It was a scene in Faster that gave him the idea for his plan. It wasn’t the same because there were no heavy glass vases in the white room, but he’d come up with his own variation. Tomas has no real confidence that his plan will work—these are big strong adults and he’s a kid—but it gives him something to do, something to think about other than how his mom must be worried, and what the man in the mask will do to him once he stops pretending to be nice.
Tomas concentrates on imagining his escape. Picturing himself outside the white room. Getting away and being celebrated as a hero. Standing up on a podium with all the cameras strobing and the big-butt girls hugging him and stuff. “The Boy Who Got Away.” “Star Short-stop Defeats Kidnappers.” He’ll have a scrapbook, other kids will want his autograph.
What will it look like, outside the room? Is this a regular house? The white room has no windows, so it must be in the center of the building, right? Or it could be in a warehouse, like in Faster where the gang is cutting up stolen Ferraris and turning them into super-cars that can run on train tracks down in the subway tunnels.
Tomas likes the warehouse idea because warehouses are big and there will be someplace to hide even if he can’t escape all the way. The problem with the white room, aside from no windows, is not having a place to hide. There’s no under-the-bed because the bed is just a mattress on the floor. No closets, no alcoves. No bathroom or toilet, even—just a stinky plastic potty-chair thing like old people use when they can’t make it to the bathroom.
Tomas hates to use the potty-chair, but he doesn’t have any choice. It’s that or wet the bed. Or worse. But he doesn’t have to go now, so he doesn’t have to think about anything but the escape plan. Making it happen.
Except for the mattress and the TV, there’s nothing in the white room but a small dresser with two drawers, and the drawers are too small for a boy his size. He knows because yesterday—was it yesterday?—he tried to squeeze himself into one of the drawers. Thinking he can hide in the dresser drawer and then wait until they look and think he’s gone—where’s the kid!—then he’ll escape through the open door. Except he can’t fit in the drawer, no matter how hard he tries.
It’s the only time he’s ever wished he was small for his age. Not just small. If only he could shrink himself up to the size of an insect, like in that old movie he used to like when he was little, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. Or even better, a cloak that made you invisible, like Harry Potter had.
But there were no invisible cloaks and no shrinking ray guns in the white room. Nothing but the mattress, the stinky potty-chair and the cheesy dresser. Just enough for a plan.
Tomas works the drawer out of the dresser. Carefully and silently. For the first time since his abduction—since he got the hit that won the game—he feels exhilarated.
For the moment he truly believes that his escape plan will work, just like in the movies.
Cutter has a plan, too. He’s not quite ready to put it into action because with this particular part of the plan, everything depends on timing. Not split-second, detonate-the-bomb timing. More like waiting for a piece of fruit to ripen and then biting into it at exactly the right moment.
Piece of very expensive fruit named Stanley Munk. Who is, at this very moment, pausing to look in a store window on West Fifty-first Street, in good old Manhattan. Trying to look like a casual shopper. Pathetic, really. Big important man, but when Stanley attempts to practice deception he reverts to adolescent behavior. Gets all cold and clammy, eyes darting around, palms sweating. Cutter doesn’t know about the sweaty palms for sure, never having shaken the man’s hands, but he was willing to bet they were sweating right now. Especially the hand that clutches the briefcase handle.
Cutter knows what Stanley has in the briefcase and how much it means to him. Thinks it’s a personal matter, his secret life, but he’s mistaken. Cutter knows what lurks in that briefcase, knows the sickness Munk has been hiding for years. Just as he knows where the Munkster is headed on this fine day. Disguised, or so he thinks, in jeans, Nikes, dark glasses and a Yankees baseball cap. For Stanley Munk, who favors designer Italian suits and handmade shoes, dressing down is a form
of disguise. Not that it would fool anyone who was paying attention, who recognized Stanley’s cocky master-of-the-universe strut, or the ever-so-slight sneer of preening confidence that is his default expression.
Very important man, our Stanley. Holds the fate of hundreds, possibly thousands, in his clever, capable hands. Hasn’t a clue that he’s been selected to play an important role in Cutter’s master plan. No idea he’s a target of opportunity because of who he is and what he can do. His particular skills.
Rather than follow the target, which might get him noticed, Cutter heads up the street, double-parks a hundred feet or so beyond the entrance to the Clarion, a hotel whose entrance is scarcely wider than its set of bronze double doors. The Clarion has eight narrow floors and fifty-six narrow rooms. Not exactly a hot-sheet hotel, not on this particular block, but the management tends to be discreet, and unlike most midtown establishments, will accept cash without the security of a credit card.
Cutter has been inside the Clarion, checked the joint out, although not at one of the times when Stanley is present. He doubts the Munkster would have any reason to recognize him, but it never hurts to be careful. He and Stan are going to get reacquainted real soon, but not today. Not until the situation ripens.
When the time comes, he wants Stanley Munk so off balance, so drenched with fear and anxiety, that he can’t think straight.
Cutter adjusts the passenger-side mirror until he has the narrow hotel entrance in view. And there he is, clutching his precious briefcase, darting through the bronze doors. Where Cutter knows he will take a room under an assumed name, paying cash.
Thinks he’s being clever and careful, does Stanley. Living his secret life. Less than a dozen blocks from the penthouse where he plays the big shot, entertaining all his influential friends, living the good life, less than a dozen blocks to the dark side of his world. If only they knew what distinguished, successful Stanley was up to, what really squeezed his juice, they’d recoil in disgust.
Dark side is going to cost him, big-time.
Cutter slips the stolen Explorer into gear, glides to the intersection and waits patiently for the light as about a thousand pedestrians churn across. People complain about driving in the city but he doesn’t mind. All you have to do, take it one block at a time. Same deal with his master plan. Taken as a whole, it’s overwhelming, perhaps impossible. But take it one step at a time, it’s doable.
First secure the boy. Done.
Then the money for operating capital. Done.
Then silence Vargas. Done.
Then take over Stanley Munk’s life, make sure he’s totally under control, behaving predictably. Do that, cross all the t’s, dot all the i’s, it will all work out. The plan of action will all come together on the big day in Scarsdale. Has to. So long as he remains focused on the next step in the sequence, and doesn’t get distracted by the sheer audacity of what he’s attempting.
In ten minutes, fifteen at the most, he’ll be out of the city and heading north. Heading back to the white room. Ready for the next move.
25
the blur called bruce
“I doubt they’ll have anyone at the train station, but you never know,” says Maria Savalo. “Just be ready to duck down.”
At the wheel of her sleek new BMW 545i, my diminutive attorney has the confidence of Sally Ride piloting the space shuttle. She carefully removes her high heels and slips them into a special Manolo carry bag before starting the engine.
We’re going to pick up Shane, who has been released from his lengthy interview with homicide detectives. Ms. Savalo knows all about what happened in Queens, the body in the bathroom, my encounter with the man in the parking garage. On the latter, she has expressed some doubts.
“You say all he did was point his finger at you?”
“You had to be there,” I tell her. “It was him, I’m sure of it.”
“I’m sure you’re sure. But I’m a defense attorney, so I doubt everything, especially eyewitnesses.”
“Why would he do that if it wasn’t him?”
“In Queens? Are you serious? Guys point fingers at women all the time, whether they know them or not. There’s a perfectly plausible alternative theory. Woman shouts at a man in a parking garage. Thinks he’s someone she knows. Guy can’t really see who it is, so he roars up in his big bad car, takes a look and blows her a kiss.”
“He didn’t blow me a kiss.”
“It’s the equivalent. That cute little move with the finger gun? I see it in pick-up bars all the time.”
“Oh,” I say.
“Not that I’m in pick-up bars all the time,” she adds hastily. “You know what I mean.”
My attorney is an expert driver. Keeps both hands on the wheel, ten and two o’clock, just like they taught us in drivers’ ed back in the day. Must be different now that so few people use or even recognize analog clocks. I recall Fred Corso talking to the team about how ball players run the bases counterclockwise because most batters hit right-handed. The kids looked at him like he had two heads—counterclockwise? What was the old dude talking about?
Poor Fred. His death weighs on me. For whatever reason my son was taken, one thing seems certain: if Fred Corso didn’t know us he’d be alive right now.
“They must be checking out this Teresa Alonzo person, right?” I ask Savalo. “She claims to be his birth mother, so she’d have as much reason to kidnap Tommy as me.”
Ms. Savalo keeps her eyes focused on the road. “Who’s ‘they’? The locals, the state police, the FBI?”
“Any of them,” I say, feeling indignant. “All of them.”
“Maybe the FBI. Somebody might actually push a button there, and pull up a file on Rico Vargas and his clients. But unless they’re actively involved, meaning that they believe your son’s abduction was by a third party, it’s doubtful.”
“That seems crazy.”
“No argument from me,” Savalo responds cheerfully. “The ways of the bureau remain mysterious to us mere mortals. I assumed they’d be all over it, but they’re not. As for the local cops, they don’t have the resources for a wide-ranging investigation. So they concentrate on the target of opportunity—that’s you. As for the state cops, they work with the prosecutor’s office and they’ve got some very experienced investigators. So if Jared Nichols decides to check out this mysterious birth mother, he has the personnel to do it.”
“Has he? Checked it out?”
“No idea. Sorry. He’s a friend, but he’s also a prosecutor and I’m a defense attorney. So there’s a lot he can’t tell me without putting himself in legal jeopardy. And Jared never puts himself in legal jeopardy. He wants to run for Senate.”
“Great. Just my luck.”
Savalo shoots me a look. “Not entirely a bad thing, Jared’s political ambitions. It means he’s very careful about who he charges. Suburban moms aren’t high on his list for targets of opportunity. He prefers mobsters, corrupt union bosses, kiddy-porn rings—basically what your average suburban mom finds offensive.”
The casual reference to kiddy porn makes me squirm in my seat. It’s one possibility that I haven’t allowed myself to consider: that my handsome boy has been taken by sexual predators. Even though I know it’s the most common motivation for abduction by strangers. Sexual predators don’t ask for ransom. Or do they?
I can’t summon up the courage to raise the subject with Ms. Savalo. Not now. If the subject must be discussed, I’d rather do so with Randall Shane. He’s the expert. And he made a point of telling me that it was a child molester abduction that got him into the business of looking for lost children. As if to warn me that the possibility was out there.
It’s well past the commuter rush, and the station itself isn’t busy at the moment. Of the half-dozen passengers who disembark the northbound train, only one is tall enough to be Shane.
As he comes loping down the stairs from the platform, I start to weep convulsively. Great heaving sobs.
“What’s wrong?” as
ks Savalo with real concern.
“I d-don’t know.” And it’s true, I don’t. Certainly I didn’t expect to start sobbing. It just suddenly came over me and couldn’t be resisted, like the impulse to sneeze. And once I’ve started, it’s hard to stop.
It’s difficult to hug a passenger when you’re the driver of a bucket-seated Beemer, but Ms. Savalo finds a way to lean across the console and embrace me, patting my back. “Tension,” she says, her breath warm on my neck. “You’re under incredible tension, Kate. Go on and cry, maybe it will help.”
My nose is running and neither of us can find a tissue, despite rummaging through our purses. I’m a blubbering fool, but it’s like a case of the hiccups, I can’t seem to stop. Try holding my breath, but I’m still sobbing when Shane gently opens the rear door and slips into the seat behind me.
“What have we here?” he asks softly. “Mrs. Bickford? What’s wrong?”
Silly questions. Everything is wrong, and that makes me bawl even harder. Crying so convulsively I can’t draw a breath. Why did seeing Shane trigger uncontrollable tears? Was it because the last time I saw him he was keeping company with a dead man? Because my whole world, Planet Kate, had tipped on its axis and started spinning out of control?