The man turned away almost immediately but had memorized her face.
The door shut.
The elevator ascended.
She looked down to see what was wrong with her hands and found them trembling.
Back in the lobby, Venta said, “Well?”
“They got off on floor thirty-nine.”
The building directory reported three tenants on the thirty-ninth floor, including one law firm—Thung, Manap & Deringer, Ltd. Venta wrote down the name and said, “If they have a Bangkok office, we’ve found our connection.”
London nodded.
Maybe.
Venta pulled a $20.00 bill out of her wallet and handed it to London. “Do you want to see if you can find us some coffee while I finish up with my list?”
JUST OUTSIDE THE BUILDING, on the 16th Street Mall, London found a Starbucks and got at the end of a line ten long. The man in front of her looked like a 28-year-old rock star in a business suit—extremely attractive. He twisted his wrist every ten seconds to look at a black designer watch. He wore his hair straight, blond, parted in the middle and halfway down his back.
Something about him oozed sex.
He ordered an espresso, took a sip and then went to pay.
His wallet wasn’t in his left jacket pocket, or his right, or his pants.
“This is really embarrassing,” he said. “I think I left my wallet in the car.” He paused a beat and added, “I don’t suppose you take IOUs.”
The man behind the counter wasn’t amused.
London surprised herself and said, “I got it.”
The rock star looked at her.
He had the bluest eyes she’d ever seen.
“Thanks, I’ll pay you back.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
He looked at his watch and headed for the door. “Thanks again,” he said.
Then he was gone.
Walking back to the Republic Plaza Building, London spotted him again, talking intently into a cell phone and pacing back and forth near the fountain. He noticed her, walked over and said into the phone, “Hold on a minute.” Then to London, “You need to let me say thank you. I’m thinking lunch.”
No.
That wasn’t necessary.
“Thanks anyway.”
“Wait a minute,” he said. “What’s your name?”
“London.”
“Michael Montana,” he said. “I’ll tell you what. I’m going to be standing right here at noon. If you show up, we’ll do lunch. If you don’t, then my loss.”
FROM THE REPUBLIC PLAZA BUILDING, London and Venta went straight back to London’s apartment to drink more coffee and run Thung, Manap & Deringer, Ltd. through Google.
“Bingo!”
The law firm maintained offices in three Thailand cities—Bangkok, Chiang Mai and Krung Thep—as well as satellite branches in Hong Kong, Paris and Denver.
According to the Denver office website, the man in the elevator who looked at London was an attorney by the name of Virote Pattaya, Esq., a specialist in intellectual property law.
They printed page after page from the Internet and roughly organized things in manila file folders, absorbed.
London looked at her watch.
It was 11:40.
She hadn’t planned on meeting the rock star for lunch but suddenly had to.
“Can you run me downtown?”
Venta must have sensed urgency in her voice because she said, “Sure, when?”
“Right now.”
THEY WERE ALMOST OUT THE DOOR when London ran back, grabbed a pair of fresh khaki pants and a crisp white blouse, and then fell back into step. She waited until they were on the 6th Avenue freeway and then changed in the car. A trucker spotted the show and honked with approval.
Then he tried to keep up but couldn’t.
“He’d run someone over just to see your panties,” Venta said.
“Men.”
“They’re animals,” Venta added.
London laughed.
“What?” Venta asked.
“Here’s a secret. Right now, so am I.”
London looked at her watch: 11:50 and they hadn’t even reached Sheridan yet. “Step on it.” Venta checked for cops, saw none and brought the vehicle up to 78. Suddenly Venta’s cell phone rang and she answered it. London hardly paid any attention to the conversation as she frantically brushed her hair and painted her lips.
Venta hung up and said, “That was my assistant, Hannah. I’ve had her doing research to see if she could find any other female investigators who have gone to Bangkok and disappeared.”
London looked at her and said, “And?”
“And she found one.”
London stopped fussing with her hair and looked over.
“Are you serious?”
“Dead.”
“Who?”
“Someone named Susan Wagner from Cleveland.”
“Does she fit the profile?”
“Meaning tall and blond?”
“Right, and hot.”
“I forgot to ask,” Venta said. “But I’m guessing yes, otherwise Hannah wouldn’t have been so excited. I think I better call her and see if I can get her out here to Denver.”
“Her meaning Hannah?”
“Right.”
“Good idea.”
“I’ll call her while you’re screwing Mr. Rock Star,” Venta said.
London laughed.
Then she got serious.
“He’s someone important,” she said. “He’s not going to be interested in a waitress.”
“You’re not a waitress, sweetie. You’re a lawyer. Stop forgetting that.”
45
Day Six—June 16
Saturday Noon
THE WOODEN TABLE in the conference room had enough scratches on it to stretch from Denver to Aspen. Teffinger set his coffee cup down and slipped into a seat. Dick Zucker—the Channel 8 weatherman—took a seat on the opposite side, looking older than he did on TV. Ten seconds later Sergeant Kate Baxter walked in, sat down and said, “Morning.”
“Morning back to you.”
She had a pleasant face, an easy smile, and short wash-and-go hair.
As usual, Teffinger did his best to not drop his eyes to her world-class chest, currently encased in a T-shirt with a yellow smiley-face.
He checked his watch and found he forgot to put it on this morning, then twisted Kate’s wrist to see hers.
11:43 a.m.
Damn.
Where had the morning gone?
Teffinger looked at Zucker and said, “I’m going to be honest with you, we’re up to our asses in alligators around here. If it wasn’t Jena Vernon who called, we wouldn’t be talking right now. That doesn’t mean we don’t understand your situation and your concern as a father. And it doesn’t mean we don’t sympathize. It just means that you need to understand our time constraints and the fact that this really isn’t even in our jurisdiction. But if we can grease some skids for you we will. Actually, Kate will, which is why she’s sitting in. With that, tell us what’s going on.”
Zucker told them the story.
Brandy, age 20, still lived at home.
She left the house yesterday to go for a hike.
She never came back.
“Go for a hike where?”
“We don’t know for sure,” Zucker said. “She was talking about somewhere around Morrison or up Bear Creek Canyon. Last night we called everyone she knows and no one knows anything. We got up at the crack of dawn this morning and drove up and down Highway 74 but couldn’t find her car anywhere.”
“She’s probably just lost,” Teffinger said.
“No,” Zucker said. “She always took her cell phone with her. Everyone in our family has the same plan. The reception is good in that whole area. If she got lost she would have called.”
They talked for another ten minutes.
At the end Teffinger said, “Here’s what we’ll do. We’ll open a missing per
son’s file right now and get a BOLO out for her vehicle.”
A BOLO?
Be On Look Out.
Oh.
“Kate will help you coordinate with the parks department and the forest service. Is that good enough?”
Yes.
“Thank you. Thank you so much.”
Teffinger cocked his head.
“Does she have a credit card?”
“Several.”
“Get us the numbers,” he said. “We’ll see if any of them have been used.” He looked at Kate and added, “Also check with her cell phone company, find out who she talked to in the last 24 hours, and see if they know where she is.”
Kate nodded.
Teffinger looked at Zucker and said, “In exchange, we expect good weather from now on.”
AFTERWARDS AT THE COFFEE POT, Teffinger told Kate, “Sorry to stick you with this.”
“I have to admit, I’m not too motivated,” she said. “We both know she’ll wander home sometime this afternoon either hung over or with rug burns on her ass.”
“Maybe,” Teffinger said. “But Channel 8 has helped us out a lot over the years. This is called payback. I just wish it had come at a better time.”
“So you want me to really follow through?”
Yes, he did.
TWO HOURS LATER DR. LEANNE SANDERS CALLED. “I thought I’d let you know I’m loosing my target.”
“You mean the Frenchman?”
“No, his target, the lawyer.”
“Why? What’s going on?”
“The lawyer is getting on a plane to Bangkok.”
“Bangkok?”
“Right.”
“Why? What’s in Bangkok?”
“I don’t have a clue,” she said. “We’re monitoring all flights at this point. If the Frenchman follows him, I’m going to be in tow.”
“Do you think that’s smart? He’s already attacked you once and you’ll stick out like a sore thumb over there.”
“I don’t think he ever really got a good look at me,” she said.
“Yeah, well I don’t think you’re giving him enough credit.”
“Maybe not,” she said.
The line went dead.
Bangkok.
That’s where the pilot, Alan English, had been just before he got butchered in his bedroom.
Teffinger called Leanne back.
“Be careful,” he said.
“Always.”
“I mean it.”
46
Day Six—June 16
Saturday Morning
AS SOON AS THE BULLET RICOCHETED, even before Jekker dropped to the ground, he knew he’d been set up for a hit. At the backside of the railroad car, he got low to the earth and stuck his head out just far enough past a wheel to where he could see the mountainside.
No one was running down towards him.
He saw trees, boulders and fallen logs, but nothing human.
The air stood deathly quiet.
What to do?
In the middle boxcar he had a gun, plus his bow. But they might as well be on the moon. He was lucky enough that his hunter missed once. It wouldn’t happen again. Was the man coming for him to finish the job or was he getting the hell out of there?
He was coming.
Jekker saw nothing to indicate that but could feel it.
That’s what he would do.
Think.
Think!
HE BACKED AWAY FROM THE BOXCAR and, still hidden from view behind it, got to the base of a forty-foot lodge pole pine. On the backside, he shoved four or five good throwing stones in his pants pocket and then climbed up the trunk until he was thirty feet off the ground. Then he got his breathing as shallow and quiet as he could and waited.
Nothing happened.
Ten minutes passed.
Then another ten.
And another.
Then what happened took him totally off guard. A man with a rifle came down the mountain, behind him. All this time he must have been circling around.
Jekker was in plain view.
He held his breath.
The man wasn’t going to pass under him. Jekker couldn’t jump down on him, even if there weren’t twenty branches in the way. The man passed, stopped ten feet short of the boxcars, and bent down to see if Jekker was hiding underneath.
Jekker swallowed hard and then started to climb down.
47
Day Six—June 16
Saturday Noon
THE ROCK STAR WAS STILL WAITING at the designated spot when London trotted up, out of breath, fifteen minutes late. He looked at his watch and said, “I was only going to give you one more hour.”
“Thanks for waiting,” she said.
“Two at the most,” he added.
She smiled.
“Then I’ll consider myself two hours early. I’m starved.”
“What are you in the mood for?”
“What are my options?”
“Anything you want, and I even remembered my wallet.”
“Anything?”
“Yes.”
“Okay, but remember, you said it.”
She grabbed his hand, led him over to a street vendor and ordered a $1.00 hotdog and diet coke. He grinned and said, “Two.” They ate as they walked down the 16th Street Mall.
“True confessions,” she said. “I got dressed up for you.”
“You look nice.”
“Liar,” she said. “This is as good as it gets. I don’t own a dress.”
He smiled.
“Full disclosure,” he said. “I like that.”
“Nor do I want to.” She took a bite, chewed and said, “So disclose something about you.”
“Like what?”
“Are you married?”
He laughed. “No.”
“Girlfriend?”
“No.”
“No?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’ve been waiting for someone to come along who likes hotdogs better than lobster,” he said.
“That’s not necessarily me,” London said.
“No?”
“Well, it may be or it may not be,” she said. “I’ve never had lobster, so I can’t tell you with any honesty one way or the other.”
“You’ve never had lobster?”
She shook her head.
“Never ever?”
“No.”
“In that case, we need to make a stop at Fisherman’s Wharf one of these days.”
“Where’s that?”
“San Francisco,” he said.
She laughed.
“I usually don’t go that far to eat.”
“Me either.”
“You’d be hungry again by the time you got back,” she added.
He agreed.
“That’s the downside.”
They were approaching a homeless woman sitting on the sidewalk in the shade. The rock star pulled a $10.00 bill out of his wallet, put it in her hand and closed her fingers around it. She looked up, took a moment to focus and then smiled. “Thank you, Michael.”
“You’re welcome.”
“She knows you?” London asked.
He nodded.
“How?”
“That’s not important,” he said. “What is important is that I want to see you again. I already know that so I’m just going to get it out in the open. You don’t have to say yes, but don’t say no.”
She studied him and found the words sincere.
“Yes,” she said.
VENTA PICKED HER UP AT 2:30 and must have seen something on her face because she said, “Someone’s in lust.” London’s first thought was to deny it, but she didn’t.
“Possible lust,” she said.
“Lust,” Venta repeated.
London grinned.
“Okay, lust.”
“Details.”
London gave them and added, “There’s only one downside.”
; “What’s that?”
“He’s a lawyer.”
Venta chuckled.
“FYI girlfriend, that goes in the plus column.”
London felt herself get serious.
“Usually, yes,” she said. “But he’s not your ordinary lawyer.”
“So what is he?”
“He’s a lawyer with Vesper & Bennett.”
“Vesper & Bennett?”
“Right.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“I wish I was.”
“Well that’s a pretty big coincidence.”
London nodded.
She already knew that.
“Let me ask you something,” Venta said. “When you met this guy this morning, was he already in line or did he sort of hop in there right in front of you?”
London didn’t know.
She hadn’t been paying attention.
Venta retreated in thought.
Then she looked at London and said, “I’m not saying it’s a setup, but I’m not saying it’s not a setup either.”
London understood.
“You’ve been to Fisherman’s Wharf, right?”
Venta had, hundreds of times.
“Do they have good lobster there?”
“Good is an understatement. Why?”
London shrugged.
“Just curious.”
THEY DROVE IN SILENCE. Two blocks before London’s apartment, Venta said, “Assume it’s not a setup. Are you going to be able to do this?”
“Do what?”
“You know.”
“You mean go for blood against V&B at the same time that I’m all hot and bothered over one of their attorneys?”
“Right, that.”
London looked at her.
“Maybe V&B isn’t our target,” she said. “Maybe it’s Thung, Manap & Deringer. Either way, I won’t let you down. I promise.”
Venta studied her and apparently didn’t see the need to press.
But she added, “It’s not just me at this point. In fact, I’m all safe and sound back here in the U.S. I’m more concerned about the other women who will disappear down the road if we don’t do something.”
London nodded.
She understood all too well.
48
Day Six—June 16
Attorney's Run (A Nick Teffinger Thriller / Read in Any Order) Page 13