Lexington Connection

by M. E. Logan

  When she walked in to where Tompson was holed up, waiting, the sight was not unexpected. Never one to express emotion, Margaret made small talk with several of the men before she walked over to the woman tied in the chair. She noticed the table in front of the woman with the badge, the ID, the gun resting on it, like a taunt. Waldo had a streak of cruelty in him.

  Without emotion, Margaret lifted the woman’s chin. Her eyes were blackened, her cheeks cut and swollen. She was cuffed and tied to the chair. Her clothing was torn, she was bruised. She looked like she had been sick. Her hair was matted. Without much interest, Margaret picked up the ID, read it and put it down. She wasn’t sympathetic but she was concerned. She took out her cell phone.

  “Princess,” she said when Diana answered. “You need to get down here.”

  “Is there a problem? I really don’t want to deal with him.”

  “There is a problem.”

  “He’s changed his mind, doesn’t want to go?”

  “We should be so lucky. No. You need to come.”

  “Margaret,” Diana started.

  “You need to come,” Margaret said quietly, firmly. “And pick up a paper to read before you get here.”

  There was a moment’s silence. “If he’s screwed this up,” Diana said in a low voice.

  “We’ve got big problems,” Margaret reiterated. She broke the connection, looking down at the bowed head. She sincerely hoped she was wrong, but she was afraid she wasn’t. This was going to be ugly.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Diana came in the door in what Margaret called her kick-ass, take-names-later mood. She glared at Waldo, who was sitting at the table, his chair tipped back on two legs leaning against the wall. Several of his faction were around the table playing cards, killing time. Two of them had jumped to their feet when the door hit the back wall. She looked around the room until her gaze fell on the woman tied to the chair. Margaret was standing to one side and she nodded slightly.

  Diana stalked over, flipped open the paper she had carried in under her arm, and with her other hand pulled the woman’s face up by the hair of her head. The woman gasped and Diana held the newspaper beside the woman’s face as if comparing her to the picture. “Detective Galbreath, I presume?”

  Jessie swallowed and Diana’s grip tightened. “Yes,” Jessie gasped. Diana tapped the paper under Jessie’s chin in a warning not to say more. Jessie’s eyes widened, as much as they could as swollen as they were, and she clenched her mouth shut. Diana glanced behind her at the badge, gun and ID on the table and turned back to the woman.

  “Well, well, well.” Diana bent down so they were face to face. “Imagine seeing you here.” Jessie’s eyes were wide with surprise, with fear and if possible, she went even paler than she had been. Diana impersonally searched her face, although her adrenaline had shot up sharply when she realized it really was Jessie.

  Diana released Jessie with a movement that looked much harsher than it really was. She whirled on Waldo with every bit of her papa’s temper she could muster. She’d always thought he looked like a rat, so skinny as to be anorexic, with thin, slicked back hair, pointed features.

  “You son of a bitch,” she said in a voice so harsh he brought the chair down solidly on all four legs. “Where the hell was your brain? Or should I even bother asking? You get this close to getting out of here and you pull some goddamn stupid stunt like this?” She threw the newspaper at him, a picture of Jessie on the front page. “Bad enough to nab a cop, you have to nab a female cop? Her picture’s been all over the paper for the past week! And you expect me to ghost you out of the country?”

  “No one knows it’s me that’s got her!”

  “I do. Now. And you know it’s been in my rules all along. No cops. None here. No friends. No sightings. Never mind dragging them along for the ride.”

  “Then I’ll get rid of her!”

  “Fuck that idea! You think of taking her out and wasting her, I’ll cut you lose so fast you’ll break the sound barrier. The only thing worse than nabbing one is killing one, and I will not be a party to that!”

  “You don’t have to be involved!”

  “I already am!” Diana shouted as she pounded the table in front of him. “I’m here! She’s here! Eye to eye!” She made violent gestures pointing to Jessie, pointing to herself, tapping her temple. “What part of that can’t you understand, you imbecile?”

  “You weren’t supposed to show up.”

  “Well, son of a bitch, I did!” Diana glanced around the room.

  Waldo’s errand boys were lined up against the wall trying to look invisible. She still wasn’t sure what she was going to do. The most pressing problem was to get Jessie out of there alive. Damn, she should have moved faster on getting Waldo out of the country. She shook her head as she walked back over to pick up Jessie’s badge, her identification as well as her revolver in her shoulder holster. “Son of a bitch,” Diana repeated, glancing at Waldo as if she wanted to vaporize him.

  Diana finally turned back to Waldo’s table, even as she stuffed Jessie’s badge and ID into her hip pocket. She slung the holster over her shoulder. “I’d love to be able to cancel this whole operation, let you hang by your heels, but unfortunately we’re too far along the pipeline. It would be noticed if things got changed. But that’s the only reason, you bastard. And you’ll still pay for all this, this, this mess I’ve got to clean up because of your actions. I swear to God, you can screw up a wet dream!”

  Waldo only reacted to her words about canceling. He came out of his chair and around the table. “You cancel this and you’ll live to regret it!”

  She laughed at him. “From who? From you? Hell, I cancel this and you’ll be doing eighty years in an eight-by-eight isolation cell, a walk in the yard for an hour a day, maybe what? Ten-by-twenty? High walls, solid, can’t see through them. Only thing to see is sky, overhead. Little boxes of bricky brick,” she taunted, her hands up, her fingers wiggling at him.

  Waldo broke out in a cold sweat before her eyes. Diana had heard rumors he’d developed a bad case of claustrophobia when he had been in prison before. Now he was due for sentencing, was likely to get a long stretch, and he was sweating like a stevedore. She guessed the rumors were true.

  She contemptuously turned her back on him, glancing at Margaret. She was reasonably sure his need to escape the country would keep him from doing anything to her but it was still nice to have someone at your back. She returned to Jessie, standing over her a moment as if deciding what to do with her. She hated that she had to play this part, but now it wasn’t just Jessie’s life at risk. It was her own and Margaret’s.

  “Untie her,” she ordered finally.

  No one moved. Diana slowly turned her head to Waldo. “I said,” she started, and he gave a quick look at one of his men. Two of them jumped to untie Jessie from the chair.

  “Keys to her handcuffs,” she demanded next. The keys to Jessie’s handcuffs were immediately handed over.

  As soon as Jessie was untied, Margaret came forward. Between the two of them, they half-dragged, half-walked the still cuffed Jessie to the bedroom in the back. As Diana took Jessie to the foot of the bed, Margaret shut the door.

  Jessie barely made it to the bed. Diana turned her around and got her set down before she fell. Dropping her angry attitude, Diana half-knelt before her, lifting Jessie’s face to look at her. Jessie’s gaze slid over her.

  “Let me see,” Diana muttered as she gently felt along Jessie’s jaw. She noted the dilated eyes and wondered if there was a head injury, or if she had been drugged, or it was just plain fear. “Did they rape you?” she asked as soothingly as she could with no idea what she would do to Waldo if the answer was yes.

  Jessie shook her head. “No,” she answered in a croak of her former voice. She moved away from Diana’s touch. “Please, don’t touch me.” She looked down into her lap.

  “Why? Because you don’t want to be touched? Or because you don’t want me to touch you?” She g
ently turned Jessie’s face so she could see the cuts across the high cheekbones, the dark bruises, some already turning an ugly shade of yellow. Jessie lifted her chin off Diana’s fingers and turned away without answering. “You didn’t mind the last time I touched you, Jessie,” Diana said softly.

  “That was different. We were lovers then.”

  “Ohhh.” So she really doesn’t remember, Diana thought. “And now I’m on the other side and that’s hard to deal with?” Jessie made no response. “Sorry, sweetheart. I am going to touch you. For various reasons, but I won’t presume on our past relationship.” She turned Jessie’s face to her, wondering if there were any broken bones. No, he wouldn’t have done that yet but she really looked bad. “Do you need something to drink?”

  Jessie made no response, but Diana brushed a finger over Jessie’s dry lips. She got up and went over to the small fridge in the corner, opened it to find an assortment of drinks, pulled out spring water. She retrieved a straw from the drawer and opened the bottle.

  “Drink,” she ordered.

  Jessie turned away again. Diana pivoted around to find Margaret. “I’ve got my suitcase in the car. Go get it. We need to get her out of these filthy clothes.”

  Margaret went out the back door and Diana turned back to Jessie. “Drink.”

  This time Jessie tried but she couldn’t get the suction up the straw. Diana took the drink back and started the drink up the straw.

  “What are you doing here?” Jessie asked in a disbelieving whisper.

  Diana shook her head and tilted the bottle back to Jessie. “Doesn’t matter. I’m just here, and I’m going to get you out of here.” When Jessie took what she could swallow, Diana put the bottle aside and began to examine her. She carefully felt down Jessie’s arms, her ribs, noting the flinches that Jessie couldn’t control. She hated to ask but she had to know. “They worked you over pretty good. When did they grab you? The paper was rather vague.”

  “Three days ago.”

  “They threaten you?” The legs felt all right too. The weakness she displayed had to be simply from being tied for so long, the limited circulation.

  Jessie shuddered. “Elaborately.” She turned her face away.

  “Let me guess, some future point but soon?”

  Jessie nodded. She closed her eyes as she shuddered again and looked like she might be sick.

  “Yeah, I heard rumors,” Diana went on. She rested her hands on Jessie’s thighs. “What the hell did you ever do to him?”

  “Busted him. My first big one, totally by accident.” Jessie clenched her jaw. “He got a short sentence. Out early on good behavior.” She bent over.

  “He’s not on good behavior now. Gonna give us a few problems.”

  As if on cue, Margaret came in the door with the announcement, “We’ve got problems.” She closed the door and set the suitcase down by the bathroom door.

  Diana pivoted and stood. “Margaret, if you don’t stop telling me that every time I turn around…” She trailed off at the sign of Margaret’s cocked eyebrow. “All right, what now? As if there isn’t enough?”

  “There’s another woman here. I could hear her crying when I went around the house.”

  “Another woman?” She turned back to Jessie, a question unspoken. Jessie shook her head, but there was scared apprehension on her face. “Go check it out.”

  Margaret left the room and Diana put a steadying hand on Jessie’s shoulder. “We don’t know. The paper didn’t say anything. Don’t panic yet. Margaret will let us know.”

  As they waited, Diana checked out the room. It looked like it had been added on to the house at some time, had its own bath, small kitchenette, a door to the outside, the hallway to the house proper. Maybe a maid’s room, a mother-in-law suite. Not a bad little efficiency. She strained with listening and was finally rewarded with steps down the hallway.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Margaret pushed the other woman in, hands tied behind her, gagged, face swollen and tear-stained, who blanched when she saw Jessie.

  “Over there,” Diana directed, pointing to a settee in the corner across the room. As Margaret settled the woman, Diana turned back to Jessie. The answer was on Jessie’s face but she had to ask anyway. “Julie?”

  Jessie unsteadily nodded.

  “It’s okay,” Diana assured her even as some part of her railed that even here she couldn’t have Jessie to herself. She bent down to eye level with Jessie. “Look at me,” she demanded. Jessie dragged her gaze from Julie back to Diana.

  “I didn’t know she was here,” Diana said evenly. “And now we know. She doesn’t look like she’s been terribly hurt. Now don’t be going and doing anything foolish.” She touched Jessie’s cheek. “I’ll take care of her.”

  “Please.” There was bargaining in Jessie’s voice. “I don’t care what happens to me. Don’t let anything happen to her.”

  “Jessie. It’s a package deal.”

  She met Margaret in the middle of the room, between the two women. “Wasn’t difficult. She’s been hysterical, noisy, hence the gag.” She shook her head. “Waldo wasn’t happy. Guess she was his back up plan.”

  Diana frowned at the thought.

  “What are you going to do?”

  “A little hell-raising, maybe throw another temper tantrum. I’m getting real good at them.”

  “You’re going out on a limb.”

  “I’m already so far out there that this isn’t going to do anything more.”

  “He won’t like it.”

  “Tough shit.”

  “I wasn’t talking about Waldo out there.”

  Comprehension dawned on Diana. “Oh.” She sighed. “Well, I’ll just have to cross that bridge when I get to it.” She looked from Jessie to Julie back to Margaret. “I guess it’s about time.”

  “Perhaps so, sweet pea. You ready for it?”

  Diana nodded. “I think so.” She glanced over at Julie. “Let’s see if I can get her calmed down. Got enough problems without hysteria. Think I’ll have enough time?”

  “It’ll take a while for him to get his nerve up. You should be able to do it.”

  Diana nodded. “Likely make the detective nervous. Better stand ready.”

  As Margaret went over by Jessie, whose gaze shifted from one woman to the other, Diana went over and sat down beside Julie. Julie immediately pushed back from her, her eyes dilating, as Diana made herself comfortable. She sat on one leg, laid her arm across the back of the settee, reaching for but not touching Julie. She just watched her, her face neutral. Auburn hair, fair complexion, probably had freckles as a kid, nice build from what Diana could see. Nice eyes, even as scared as she was. She’d trip over into panic easily and then she’d be a handful. Yet, Diana didn’t get the feeling she was flighty, just strongly emotional.

  “Scary, isn’t it?” she said finally in a quiet voice.

  Julie swallowed hard, glancing at Jessie.

  “Look at me,” Diana ordered quietly. “Jessie can’t help you right now.”

  Julie’s gaze shifted back and her eyes filled with tears.

  “Don’t cry, it makes breathing hard when you’re gagged.” She kept her voice soft, gentle, reassuring. “And I’d like to remove the gag, but I need to know you’ve got your self-control back.” She slowly bent her arm, leaned on her elbow, a studied casual pose. “You’re Julie, aren’t you?”

  Julie responded with a short jerky nod.

  “And you’re a doctor, aren’t you?” There was another nod. The tears were controlled, that was a good sign. “Did they hurt you?”

  Julie started shaking again, her glance going back to Jessie, but she shook her head. She looked back at Diana.

  “Yes, they hurt Jessie. In the scheme of things, it could have been worse.”

  Julie’s eyes widened in horror.

  “I know. It doesn’t seem like it could be worse, does it?” Diana spoke quietly, even as she was saying frightening things, conjuring up terrifying images for Julie.
“That’s why I’m so glad I got here in time.” She saw the question, the sudden hope. She shook her head. “No, I’m sorry to say, I’m not the calvary coming to rescue. Let’s just say right now, I’m the lesser of two evils.” She saw the letdown. “Now, did they hurt you?”

  Julie uncertainly shook her head.

  “Scared you?”

  That produced an emphatic nod. Diana nodded. “Okay,” she said. “That’s good. Being scared is a lot better than being hurt. Jessie’s got enough to deal with without being afraid for you.” There was the question, the wariness in Julie’s gaze. “Yes, I know you’re Jessie’s lover. They know it too. That’s why they grabbed you.”

  Julie almost lost it then. Diana leaned forward, laying her hand on Julie’s thigh.

  “I’m not using you as a weapon against Jessie,” she said quickly. She added pressure until Julie looked at her, saw her again. “Relax, I’m not going to hurt you. Got a grip now?”

  Uncertainly, Julie nodded. Diana took her hand away.

  Diana took a deep breath, unsure how she was going to reach this woman. If she didn’t reach her, her panic would be as much a problem as Waldo. Then she got an idea. “Did you ever work the Emergency Room?” She had the faint idea it was a necessary part of physician training so it seemed likely.

  Julie nodded, frowning.

  Good. Make her focus. Make it her setting. “So you know what it’s like when you’ve got lots going on, it seems truly like a madhouse, everyone going every which way, organized chaos.”

  Apprehensively, Julie nodded.

  “But at the same time, everyone knows what their job is, what they have to do to accomplish it and they just have to ignore the chaos and at the same time work with everyone else. Right?” Julie nodded, still puzzled looking but with greater confidence. “Of course, the patient—now he’s just lying there, maybe conscious or unconscious, probably scared out of his mind, trying to answer questions, not understanding a damn thing that’s going on around him, hoping they’re going to help him with the pain or the sickness or whatever has happened to him, and trust they’re going to do their job and he’s going to survive and get better. Right?”