Payback

by Fern Michaels

  An hour later, Jack Emery was back in his apartment, hunched over his computer. The small television he kept on the kitchen counter was turned on to CNN, his favorite news channel. He felt lower than a snake’s belly as he mapped out his itinerary for the next thirty days. He’d used up all his favors with his friends so he was on his own. He knew in his gut if he made one misstep, his ass would go in a sling and he’d be out of a job. If he wasn’t careful, he could be living on the street.

  The headache pounding inside his skull was louder than a bongo drum. Where the hell should he start? With those women of course. He hadn’t been lying to Nikki when he said he’d run profiles on every one of them. They were as complete as Lexis Nexis could make them. He turned when he heard the name Webster on the television. The doctor’s husband, Senator Webster, was going to be Governor Crawford’s running mate in the presidential election. Whoa!

  Jack sat back in his swivel chair, his mind racing. If it was true, and CNN rarely got it wrong, why was Dr. Webster hanging out at Pinewood? Shouldn’t she be at her husband’s side, being interviewed over and over again? He put a large red question mark on Julia’s folder. Then he added a second one for emphasis. She’d consulted Nikki Quinn’s law firm but whatever went down there was considered privileged.

  He moved on to Isabelle Flanders. He studied the report. At the height of her career she’d been involved in a terrible car accident killing an entire family. He remembered the case well. Her defense had been beyond weak, blaming her assistant for the accident. Till the end of the trial she’d professed her innocence. She’d lost everything, her home, her business, her reputation. She’d floundered for a while, working in a dress shop, a convenience store and other menial jobs. She’d consulted with Nikki’s firm but again it was privileged.

  Alexis Thorne wasn’t really Alexis Thorne at all. She’d been convicted of securities fraud and sent to prison. She’d served her time, gotten out, and changed her name, presumably with Nikki’s help since she, too, had consulted with Nikki’s legal firm. Now she worked as a personal shopper to the rich and famous. Again, everything was privileged.

  Kathryn Lucas. He flinched when he remembered how he’d had her and her eighteen-wheeler hauled into the compound. He’d grilled her, with Nikki representing her, but he’d gotten nothing from the woman. Dead husband. She worked with a ferocious dog, the same dog who’d held him at bay last night in the woods. He had no clue as to why a truck driver would consult Nikki’s high-end law firm.

  Yoko Akia had consulted Nikki, too, possibly for incorporation of her garden nursery. Nothing out of the ordinary had surfaced on his various searches for her or her husband. For all intents and purposes, both husband and wife were who and what they said they were.

  Jack chewed on his lower lip. The one thing they all had in common was Nikki. There was no way that group of women would have found Myra Rutledge on their own. None of them had anything in common with Myra. It all came back to Nikki.

  Jack got up to take some aspirin and to make coffee. One of these days, he thought, I really have to get some sleep. I can’t keep going on pure adrenaline. He stared out his kitchen window as he tried to make sense of everything.

  Nikki knew all the women, probably represented them all or, at the very least, counseled them. Myra had the money. Maybe she was helping the women on Nikki’s advice. Myra was known for her philanthropy. But this time she was all over the map. Odd for Myra.

  One thing he was certain of, the women didn’t meet up at Pinewood to play cards. They met up to…to…do what? Jack had to admit he didn’t have a clue. Then there was the business with the pack of Dobermans. Myra never felt the need to have guard dogs in the past. Why now all of a sudden? Why was everyone so bent out of shape because he was spying on them? What were they afraid he would see? He wrote the word SECRET in big red letters on top of Nikki’s folder. All he had to do was find out what the secret was.

  Jack slouched up against the kitchen counter while he waited for the coffee to finish dripping into the pot. He’d purposely made the coffee strong, so strong it looked like tar. For sure his eyeballs would pop to attention.

  The secret! What the hell was the secret? Think, Emery. How in the hell was he going to find out what it was since Nikki chopped him off at the knees?

  Jack carried his coffee back to his desk, shifted his mental gears to what he called his neutral zone, and let his mind take off. Everything went haywire with Nikki when Myra’s daughter was killed. Good, good, Emery, great jumping-off spot. Nikki changed then and so did their relationship. Then came Marie Llewellyn’s trial. He’d prosecuted her because that was his job. It didn’t mean he didn’t feel the woman’s pain. He wasn’t heartless. Hell, if someone raped my daughter who knows what I would do. I was doing my goddamn job was what I was doing. He scribbled furiously. The rape killer had gotten off scot-free thanks to a creative defense team. Then when the killer walked down the court steps, Marie Llewellyn pulled out a gun and shot him. Right in front of the whole world to see on their television sets.

  Llewellyn had been arrested. Nik got pissed off. Myra posted a million dollars bail to get the woman placed under house arrest. There had been a rumor going around that Myra had called her old friend the governor to intercede on the bail, a rumor that Nik refused to confirm or deny. Nik asked him not to prosecute because she was going to defend Llewellyn. He’d refused. They had one fight after the other. Nik sided with Myra. Oh yeah, Nik sided with Myra. Myra again. Filthy rich Myra. Jack continued to scribble.

  Ooops. Back up, Emery. According to Nik, Myra was the next thing to catatonic over the death of her daughter. Then, all of a sudden, Myra is full of piss and vinegar and wants Nik to defend Marie Llewellyn. Myra posts the outrageous bail. What’s wrong with this picture, he wondered. He scribbled some more.

  Then just before trial, Marie Llewellyn and her family disappear. For all intents and purposes, they simply walked out of the house, leaving everything behind. On one of the stormiest nights of the year. The children’s toys, their bank books, food, their cars — everything was left behind. They weren’t rich. In fact their savings account held a meager $751. Their checking account held $81.25. The family walked away with whatever they had in their pockets.

  Because…because…They had help. He’d gone so far as to accuse Nik and Myra of spiriting the family away. Of course they’d denied any and all involvement. That’s when things had really soured between himself and Nik.

  Myra had flourished, though, while Nik just got more hateful. Then Nik moved back to the farm and the card games started. “Card games my ass,” Jack muttered.

  Jack spent the next ten minutes taping together sheets of paper that he then taped to his living room wall. With a red marker he proceeded to draw a map, enter notes and draw arrows all over the place. He mumbled as he swirled and twirled his marker until he was satisfied. He stared at the names on the right hand side of his map. Okayyyyy. The red marker scrawled across the page. More arrows followed.

  Nikki and Myra. Myra and Nikki. The brains and the money. The money and the brains. What the hell were they into? Something serious, that’s for sure. But what?

  The red marker moved again. Doctor, florist, architect, securities broker turned personal shopper, truck driver, lawyer, rich woman. Then there was Charles. Just who the hell was he?

  Truck. Medicine. Architect. Flowers. Legal. Money. Truck. Jack drew a big red circle around the word truck. An eighteen-wheeler. You could put two cars in one of those babies. Webster was a plastic surgeon. Maybe she gave the Llewellyn family a whole new look. How far-fetched was that? The red marker moved again and again. The truck could have been used to spirit the family away. Now that was not far-fetched.

  Myra’s money could have been used to give the family a new identity. Not far-fetched at all. Nikki was part of it. The brains.

  But…That was all months and months ago. Why were the women still meeting at Pinewood? The same women. Why did Nikki take a leave of absence
from her job and her teaching position?

  It was a club. A goddamn fucking club of some kind where those seven women did…what did they do? Something outside the law? Something they needed Nikki to orchestrate while Myra paid the bills.

  Jack went back to the kitchen to pour more coffee into his cup. It was still hot, still black, and it tasted like crap. He drank it anyway.

  He was closing in, getting a handle on things. He could feel it. Nikki used to tease him about his gut instincts while he teased her about her woman’s intuition. What a match they were. And now it was all gone.

  Maybe he needed some expert help. Someone with clearer vision, someone who could be objective. Maybe his old friend Mark Lane in the J. Edgar Hoover Building. He thought about it for all of ten seconds before he reached for the phone but suddenly, he couldn’t remember the number. That had to mean he hadn’t called his buddy in a long time. He fumbled for his address book and dialed Mark’s cell phone. The FBI agent picked up on the third ring. Jack identified himself and they talked pleasantries until Mark said, “I hope to hell you aren’t calling me because you want me to get you some information from the FBI database.”

  “Nah. I want you to meet me for a drink. I have a story to tell you and I need your analytical input. Yeah, I’m paying. I invited you, didn’t I? No, Nikki and I are on the outs. Actually, she dumped me. Yeah, yeah, I couldn’t believe it either. She’ll never find anyone half as good as me. Yeah, I’m saying that with a straight face. Seven o’clock at Mc Guire’s. See ya, buddy.”

  Jack spent the next few hours going over his finances. If he sold his skis, his snowboard, his snorkeling gear, took cash advances on his credit cards that were almost to the max, plus what he could wrangle out of his 401K, he should be able to get through the month, pay his rent, his car payment, the minimum on his plastic and eat macaroni and cheese, and peanut butter and jelly, he might squeak by. But, just in case, he went online and applied for a new credit card and then filled out the forms to increase his credit line on his existing cards.

  His mind going full blast, he headed for the shower. He emerged feeling almost like his old self. It was always this way when he was closing in on the tail end of a case.

  With nothing else to occupy his time, Jack went back on the computer to do more searches on the women who played cards at Pinewood.

  Two hours later, Jack walked back to the kitchen, this time for a beer. Alexis Thorne’s case bothered him. Nothing in her background even alluded to the fact that she was dishonest. On the contrary. She’d protested her innocence, said she was set up, but she was convicted anyway. She was from a poor black family but she’d worked her way through college. She belonged to the drama club because she wanted to be an actress but didn’t have the talent, so she’d gone into costume and makeup and learned all the tricks of the trade.

  When she graduated from college she’d gone to work in a small brokerage firm where she was able make use of her education while still pursuing her drama hopes by volunteering her services for Little Theater. Her mentor, a guy named Cyril Therman, had bequeathed his “bag of tricks” to Alexis on his death bed. Or so said the only interview Alexis had ever given after being convicted of securities fraud. Some smart-ass lawyer must have told her a good human interest story would go a long way at her sentencing. It hadn’t.

  Jack went back to his map on the wall and wrote the words makeup, costumes, disguise. It sort of went with Dr. Webster’s specialty, plastic surgery. Underneath he wrote the word “innocent” with a large question mark. His heart started to thump in his chest when he moved down to Isabelle Flanders’s name. She, too, said she was innocent. Said one of her trusted employees was driving the car that killed a family.

  Two women who claimed to be innocent of the crimes they were convicted of.

  Well, what have we here? A lot of loose ends. Maybe Mark would see something he wasn’t seeing. Maybe.

  Seven o’clock couldn’t come soon enough for him.

  It was like every other bar in D.C. All mahogany, brass, and sawdust on the floor. A local watering hole for the young hipsters and government workers. The only problem was you couldn’t hear yourself think, much less carry on a conversation. However, it was a good place to ogle the sleek young female lawyers with their tight suits and roving eyes. With no interest in ogling anyone, Jack had chosen seven o’clock to meet up with Mark because the five o’clock crowd was starting to leave and the evening customers hadn’t arrived yet. He figured he had a forty-five minute window to tell Mark his story and get his feedback.

  Like old buddies, they clapped each other on the back before they bellied up to the mahogany bar for their Buds and waited for a table to clear in the back of the bar. While they waited they dissected every female within eye range, a temporary distraction to pass the time. When a table cleared they beelined to it and yelled their order to a cute waitress who grinned at them. Her skimpy shorts, long legs and tight spandex top did not go unnoticed.

  Jack blurted out his story as he played with the long-neck in his hands. When he finally wound down he said, “I need you to tell me if I’m nuts or if I’ve got something going on here.”

  Mark removed his glasses, pinched the bridge of his nose and then settled the wire rims more firmly before he spoke. “Man, you got something going on here. You took a fucking month off just to work on this! What if you can’t nail it by the end of the month?”

  Jack eyed the pudgy man sitting across from him. His dark brown eyes behind his wire rimmed glasses were starting to steam up with his excitement. It looked to Jack like Mark was losing his hair, too. Better not to mention something so personal. Damn, it had been a while since they’d seen each other. “I don’t know, Mark. I just know I gotta do it. What’s your spin on this?”

  “Off the top of my head, and it’s a wild guess on my part, I think you’re looking at a bunch of female vigilantes. What’s with that Charles character?”

  Jack shrugged.

  “Maybe he’s the brains of the outfit. Excuse me but I think you’re giving Nikki too much credit here and, besides, you want it to be her so you can get even with her. How’m I doing so far?”

  “To what end? Who? What? Where?”

  “How the hell do I know? You just told me the damn story. The only player I know is Nikki. Maybe that Llewellyn babe was their first shot. Hey, it worked, smart ass. She’s gone and it was on your watch. Maybe they’re gearing up for something else. The only thing of interest going on in this town right now is Senator Webster being picked to be Crawford’s running mate. Both parties are sniping at each other. Nothing new there. No big time stuff out of the ordinary is going on at the Bureau. The world is a crazy place these days, Jack.”

  Their double burgers and sides of fries arrived along with two more long-necks. The friends wolfed down the burgers and ordered seconds. While they waited, Jack said, “What would you do if you were me?”

  “Go home and get under the covers and don’t come out till the end of the month. How the hell should I know what you should do? You’re not going to leave it alone, are you?”

  Jack shook his head.

  “That’s what I thought.” Mark sighed. “OK, what do you want me to do?”

  “You’re pretty much a nine-to-five guy. Help me out at night. See what you can come up with on Charles Martin and Senator Webster. In the morning I’ll drop off the files I’ve accumulated unless you want to go home with me and get them tonight. By the way, how’s your love life?”

  “In the dumps like yours. Don’t go there, Jack. You’re gonna owe me for this.”

  “Yeah, I know. Good burgers, eh?” Jack said, chomping down on his.

  Between mouthfuls of food, Mark asked, “Just how rich is Myra Rutledge?”

  “Fortune 500 company. Did I say she’s personal friends of the governor? She called him last night to get me off the property. Don’t you think that’s a stretch?”

  Mark belched, then apologized. “Depends on what she’s involved i
n and what she’s trying to hide. Everyone needs a big gun to call on when their ass is about to be nailed to the wall. It doesn’t get any better than being on a first name basis with the governor of this fine state.”

  Jack leaned back in his chair. “You’re my big gun, Mark.”

  “God help us both, Jack, if I’m the best you can do.”

  Six

  “Are you ready, girls?” Myra all but squealed, her face alight with excitement.

  “We’re ready, we’re ready. Show us! Myra, stop torturing us,” Isabelle shouted to be heard over the din of the others.

  “All right, all right! Our outfits arrived just minutes ago. I couldn’t wait to show them to you and Charles is slightly miffed that I pulled you all out of the command center. Fashions first! Who wants to go first?”

  “Me! Please let it be me,” Yoko said.

  Myra smiled as she rummaged among the tissue paper in the huge white box that had arrived by courier. She withdrew an electric blue gown with a stand up collar and a generous slit that was thigh high. The gown was so severe it shrieked dollar signs. Yoko rolled her eyes in ecstasy. “I’ve never had anything so grand. Thank you, Myra.”

  “Kiddo, you are going to look like the empress of China. Was she beautiful?”

  Yoko giggled. “No, but that is all right. I will accept the compliment.”

  Myra rummaged again among the tissue paper. “This is for you, Julia,” she said, handing over a slim, gold leaf dress with a high neck and long sleeves.

  “Oh, this is too gorgeous for words,” Julia said. “I love the way the dress flares at the ankle. Matching shoes. I hope I don’t have to do much walking.”

  “Not to worry, dear. We’ll take your rubber soled shoes in the limousine when we have to…ah…burn rubber.” She held out a scarlet dress to Kathryn who blinked.