He had to learn the new rules. Also he had to talk to Nicole. He got dressed and went out the door.
28
Nicole was a little surprised to see Parminter so early in the day. He had driven over immediately after he had spoken on the phone to Robin. It was still mid-morning and the traffic had just died down so he was able to get downtown fairly easily. Ironically, if he had left thirty minutes earlier, it he would have gotten there at the same time. Such were the traffic patterns.
After he got there, he parked his car and went in. He didn’t see the Mercedes this time. He had gotten in the habit of checking for it every time he went out, but it had been strangely scarce since he had seen the guy speaking to Morris Fox. Perhaps he had found out what he wanted to and had gone back to New Jersey? He didn’t know or didn’t care at this point. All he wanted to do was to warn and protect Nicole from Howie.
“John, I didn’t think we were supposed to see each other until tomorrow,” Nicole said as he walked into her condo. “I was just getting ready for a meeting with Abercrombie. He’s after me to get the lot cleaned up. I suspect he’s going to try to buy it as soon as I get the work done so I’ve been putting it off. Now, he’s threatening to sue. Can you believe that?”
Parminter nodded, remembering what Howie had said at the bar, but didn’t say anything. He had more pressing business at hand. He was a little out of breath and limping just a bit from the effort. He had almost run from his car. “I needed to warn you about Howie. He said he might kill you and Morris Fox.” Parminter then detailed everything that Howie had said to him and Ratledge the night before. He tried not to embellish even though it was tempting.
Nicole looked serious for a second. “I can’t say I’m surprised because I’m not. He’s been threatening us since he came to town.”
Parminter was a little surprised. “Really?”
She lit a cigarette. “Oh, yes. He’s crazy. Before that, he would routinely call and threaten Raoul. He was always drunk when he did it, so we weren’t really sure if he even remembered doing it the next morning.”
That sounded like Howie, all right, Parminter thought.
“I’m not really worried though,” she added. “He’s a blowhard.”
“I don’t know. He’s pretty upset. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him this unhinged,” Parminter said.
“Well, you haven’t been around him in a long time.”
“I guess you’re right.”
Nicole thought for a minute. “You’re probably being overly concerned, but you never know. What do you propose I do?”
Parminter took a deep breath and told her what he had heard from the police. He left out the part that the police he was referring to consisted of his ex-wife.
She shook her head. “No. I’m not hiring private security. I do not want anyone hanging around here watching me. If that’s the only option I have, I’ll just have to take my chances.”
He didn’t really like what she was saying, but she did have a point. Would he want someone at his house all the time watching his every move? He might be protected, but he would feel like a prisoner.
They were silent for a minute.
“John, I know we haven’t really spoken about it, but I wanted to talk about Clement. I was going to talk about him tonight, but I really want to get this off my chest.”
He smiled and shook his head. “You don’t have to explain anything. I understand. It was the only thing to do.”
She breathed a sigh of relief. “Good, I didn’t want you to think that I’m some sort of cold-hearted person. It really upset me what he did but I couldn’t allow it to ruin my life. Also, can you imagine how much more his family would have suffered over it? The story would have never died down.”
“I know,” Parminter said. “It has the stuff of a TV movie. If we hadn’t left like we did, we would be watching it on Lifetime.”
She laughed. “You’re right.”
He laughed too and walked towards the door, feeling greatly relieved. “Well, I’ve got to go. I’ve got to get back. The market is in the tank. I’ve got to snap up some bargains.”
“Great,” she said, not really knowing understanding but playing off his enthusiasm. She walked him to the door. “I’ll see you tomorrow then?”
“I’ll be over at seven o’clock sharp.”
They kissed and he walked into the elevator.
As he left the building, he was still a little uneasy about Howie, but felt better that at least she knew what he had been saying. As he walked to his car, he did not see the man in the silver Lexus watching him. He was so caught up in thinking about Howie and Nicole that he was completely not paying attention to his surroundings. Or the fact that Morris Fox was carefully taking down his license plate number.
29
The next day was a Saturday and even though Parminter wasn’t technically supposed to have the kids, he took them to the mall and Chuck E. Cheese. He and Robin had a rather loose custodial arrangement and didn’t really stick with the court appointed visitation times. In the beginning of the divorce, after he had moved to California, they had adhered to them fairly rigidly but this was due more to the problem of distance than anything else. Now, whenever Robin and Freddy needed to do something or run some errands, he was always glad to help out. He knew that they took advantage of his willingness to be around his children, but he really didn’t care.
He took them back over around mid-afternoon and then ran some errands and got ready for his date with Nicole that night. Of course, they were going to have to go somewhere out of the way and this part of their relationship was really beginning to grate on him. Why drive all over the country when they were a five minute walk to some great restaurants? It was ridiculous, but then again so was the world that Nicole lived in. Everything had to be a certain way and certain people could not be offended. Everything was for appearances and you had to be absolutely nice to everybody—at least everybody who was somebody—because you never knew if you might need them for a business deal in the future. It was no wonder that so many people were happy that Raoul Goldman was dead. He may have been an asshole, but he also knew how to piss these people off. But then again, he controlled their money. He set the allowances and the spending of all the leeches and freeloaders of all the old money families. They may have hated him to his back, but they kissed his ass to his face.
At about six o’clock Parminter left his house and headed over to Nicole’s place. Naturally, after he parked, he looked for signs of the Mercedes, but it wasn’t there. He also looked around for Howie, but he wasn’t there either. He breathed a sigh of relief even though he hadn’t really thought anyone would be there.
He entered the building. He noted that there were a few people over in the lounge and continued walking. He pressed the button for the elevator. But before it could arrive, he felt a tremendous blow to his head and subsequently the warmth of blood on his scalp and then he hit the floor.
30
When Parminter came to, he had no idea where he was. He looked around and was immediately greeted by the round face of Ratledge.
“Ken? Where am I?”
Ratledge smiled uneasily. “You’re in the hospital, John. You got hit in the head.”
Parminter looked around his surroundings. He was indeed in a hospital. Then he looked at Ratledge again. What the hell was Ratledge doing here?
“But why...?”
Sensing his confusion, Ratledge went ahead and explained. “I had closed up the office and was walking to the parking lot when I saw them wheeling someone out of Nicole’s building. I thought I would go over and look and see what was going on. And to my surprise, it was you. People thought you were a homeless person because you didn’t have any ID. Anyway, I identified you and volunteered to ride with you to the hospital.”
“What? What did you say about my ID?” Parminter asked, more than a little confused.
“You didn’t have one. You really need to start carrying one,” Ratledge joke
d nervously. He was sweating profusely. Parminter couldn’t tell if it was from nervousness or the fact that it was very hot in the room.
All of sudden, what had happened came rushing back to Parminter. He had been attacked. He almost panicked at the realization, but his head hurt too badly and he was too medicated to get that excited at the moment.
“It must have been stolen. Did they catch who hit me?”
Ratledge looked nervously around the hospital before answering. “No. There was closed circuit camera footage but they didn’t really get a good look at him. His face was hidden.”
“So are they going to show it on the news or anything to see if anybody recognizes it?” Parminter asked, remembering his writing days. Most of the time, whenever someone committed a crime like this and it was caught on camera, the news outlets couldn’t wait to start showing the footage. Inevitably, someone would recognize the perpetrator and then turn them in for whatever minimal cash reward that was offered or purely for spite. Regardless of the motive, justice was usually served.
Ratledge fidgeted nervously. “No, John, they’re not going to show it.”
“Why not?”
Ratledge looked around nervously again. “The homeowners association isn’t going to allow it. If that footage is made known then no one will want to live there. You want to look at it from their perspective, John. Would you want to spend a million dollars on a condo if you thought that you could be attacked in the lobby?”
Parminter shook his aching head. “I suppose there’s not going to be a police report either?”
Ratledge looked away for a second. “That’s up to you, but I think that it would be in your best interest not to file one.”
Parminter was silent for a second. Then he remembered something. What if he hadn’t been the target? “What about Nicole? Is she safe?”
“She’s fine,” Ratledge said reassuredly. “She wasn’t even home. Why? Were you going to see her?”
“Good, I’m glad that she wasn’t,” Parminter said relieved. He then realized that he had almost let the cat out of the bag regarding their relationship by asking about her. “No, I just thought that since she lived there, she might have been around.”
“So, why were you in the building?”
Parminter then thought of Garrity. “Joan Garrity had said there were some properties for sale in the building and since I was in the area, I thought I would go in and look around the place…”
“Oh,” Ratledge said.
They sat in silence for a second.
“That looks like it hurts,” Ratledge said for lack of anything better to add to the conversation.
Parminter felt his head. It felt like he was wearing a turban. “Yes, it does.”
“You’re lucky,” Ratledge said. “Or as lucky as someone who just got hit on the head could be. It’s just a surface wound. They checked you out and you should be okay. I think the doctor is going to come back and ask you some questions and then release you. You’ll have to come back for a checkup but it appears that everything is okay.”
“That’s something at least,” Parminter said. Then he thought for a second. “So, he stole my wallet?”
Ratledge pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket. “No, your wallet was still there.”
“So he just took everything out of it and left it?”
Ratledge fidgeted again. “No, he just took the driver’s license. He left the money and the billfold.”
Parminter was stumped. “So he attacked me for my driver’s license?”
“Yes, that’s the way it appears.”
Parminter thought about it for a second. “Why would someone do that?”
Ratledge exhaled. “It appears that someone wants to know more about you.”
“Why would someone want to do that?” he said, more to himself than Ratledge.
“I don’t know. You would probably know more about that than anyone.”
Parminter quickly ran thought the various scenarios in his mind. There could be any number of things, but he didn’t want to tell Ratledge any of them. “Maybe I should get the police involved. I could call Robin.”
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, John.”
Parminter didn’t answer, but he remembered what Robin had said about these people and he knew that Ratledge was right. Ratledge was warning him. There was a lot of money tied up in those condos and anything at this point could jeopardize this money. This wasn’t a place like New York City where a story like this would disappear overnight. A story like this would linger for months. He could really piss off the wrong people by saying anything. Also, he would have to go more in depth with his explanation of why he was in the building.
“Okay, I won’t,” he said.
They chitchatted for a while later. Ratledge then called Robin who agreed to pick him up. He just told her that Parminter had just hurt his head. He then left.
As Parminter sat there waiting for the doctor to come in and release him or at least check on him, he remembered something. Why wasn’t Nicole at home? Wasn’t he supposed to be picking her up? He couldn’t think about it right then though. His head hurt too badly.
31
The next day, Parminter’s head was still hurting. Robin and Freddy had picked him up and taken him over to their place because he had to have someone watch after him all night and wake him up periodically because of his head wound. He could tell that they were really inconvenienced and this secretly made a part of him happy. Regardless, he would still rather have been at his place.
“That’s some hit you took,” Freddy said the next morning as he made coffee.
Parminter was sitting at the kitchen table. While the head was throbbing, it wasn’t unbearable. “You’re right about that.”
Freddy nervously tried to make small talk and Parminter sat staring, half in a fog from the head wound and lack of sleep the previous night. He never really felt like talking to Freddy even when he was feeling at this best. At least now he had a good excuse to not say anything.
Soon, Robin and the girls came in. The girls gave him a hug and asked him if he was all right. They were very sweet and tried their best to pamper him. He was touched. It could have been Parminter’s head wound but he could have sworn that Robin and Freddy were looking at him in a way that suggested that he was getting involved in something that he shouldn’t have and that he deserved it. He also knew that if the circumstances had been reversed, he probably would have been thinking the same thing.
“I guess you aren’t going to report this to the police,” Robin asked after the girls had stopped fawning over him.
“What makes you say that?” Parminter asked.
“Because those people will never let you.”
Parminter sighed and took a sip of coffee. “Ratledge suggested something to that effect.”
“Ratledge!” Robin said and shook her head. “What does he have to do with any of this?”
“Apparently, a lot. He’s involved with Morris Fox.”
“From the way you’ve always talked about him, that does sound about right.”
Freddy laughed uncomfortably.
“I don’t really know but I’ve seen him going to his house and acting all secretive about it.
“So who do you think did it?” Robin said.
“Probably some random guy. Some homeless guy person who...” he trailed off.
“John, are you all right?” Robin asked suddenly because of the way he had stopped talking.
“I’m okay. I was going to say a homeless guy who wanted my money but then I realized that he didn’t take any of my money. He only took my identification.”
Freddy whistled. “That’s pretty screwed up, John.”
“Well, I only had about five dollars in my wallet so it might not have been enough to worry about.”
Robin and Freddy gave each other a look.
The girls continued to eat their breakfast silently. Robin took a sip of coffee and shook her head again. “Morris F
ox is some really big shit. I don’t know if it’s a good idea for you to stay involved with this. I mean, Raoul Goldman was as crooked as they come and everybody knew it. Morris Fox is something else entirely. He’s old money. He can get away with a lot in this town.”
“I know you’re right. But if it weren’t for Nicole, I wouldn’t even be involved in any of this.”
“I know you don’t really want to hear this, but I think you need to rethink this thing.”
Parminter knew she was right but couldn’t think of an appropriate response.
“I remember her from college, John,” she continued. I don’t know why she’s even with you. You’re like polar opposites. It just doesn’t make sense.”
Parminter thought about it for a few seconds, letting what she said sink in. He began to get offended at the implication she was making. Was she saying that he wasn’t good enough for someone like Nicole? However, then his injury began to kick in and all of sudden he was very sleepy.
“Just think about it for a second,” Freddy finally said. “If you weren’t seeing her, you wouldn’t have this knot on your head.”
Parminter looked at him for a second. “So you’re saying that it’s because of her that this happened to me?”
Robin nodded. “Or more likely because of someone who’s involved in her life.”
“Why do you say that? Just because it happened in the building where she lives doesn’t necessarily mean anything. There is a park nearby and there’s always homeless people and drug addicts sleeping there.”
“Yes, I know that,” Robin said. “The giveaway is that they didn’t take your money. The person who did this to you didn’t need your money. He only wanted your ID. He wanted to send you a message and...”
There Will Be Fire Page 12