Running Scared

by Linda Ladd

  “Bad news, right?"

  Booker nodded, then looked down at Joey who was sucking again. It must be very bad. He was definitely not wanting to meet her gaze.

  “Tell me then."

  Heaving out a sigh, Booker took the nipple out of Joey's mouth and shifted the baby to a more comfortable position, as if he was used to holding and feeding babies every morning of the world. Joey sure didn't seem to mind being cradled in his muscular arms. “Mac's got some friends in St. Louis. Guys who work homicide at St. Louis PD. One of them filled him in on the investigation."

  “Yeah? And?"

  “Joey was kidnapped, Kate. From Barnes Hospital, just like the news said. Somebody took him out of the mother's room while she was sleeping. The police think Reed did it. So do the baby's parents."

  Kate shook her head. “No, that can't be true. I'm telling you the adoption papers were legal.” She spoke slowly, searching Booker's face, then turning her entreaty to Mac Sharp.

  “There wasn't any adoption. Your husband must've faked it.” Booker met her eyes, pausing momentarily before he went on. “Joey's family wants him back. They said the mother's close to a nervous breakdown since he's been gone, blaming herself for not waking up when he was taken. Apparently they've got her under sedation some of the time because she's so distraught. And that's not even the worst part."

  It was for Kate. She began to shake her head, not wanting to hear more, not wanting to believe any of it. “Michael said he got Joey off the black market just before they killed him. He wouldn't've lied to me then, he had no reason to, Dmitri and his men were already after us. He said he was supposed to pay them and didn't have the money. That's why they're chasing me. They think I'm in on it, Dmitri told me they did."

  “No. That's not the way it went down.” Mac looked as though he was really sorry about it, but his eyes were intense, his voice firm. “I'm sorry, Kate, I really am, to have to be the one to tell you this, but it's worse than you think, a lot worse."

  Kate couldn't speak, just waited, staring at one man, then the other, wanting one of them to give her some sign of hope. Inside she rebelled about where all this was leading. She wouldn't give Joey up, not now, not after all they'd been through together. He was hers, her son, her baby, nobody else's.

  “Mac found out that Joey's father is Vince Saracino,” said Booker at length. “Have you heard of him, Kate?"

  “No."

  “He's real bad news, the head of the crime family in St. Louis. He's put a contract out on your head, Kate, you and Reed both. They got him but they want you, too. This Dmitri guy is a hired assassin, and he's not going to stop until you're dead and Joey's in his hands. Saracino wants you six feet under, no matter how long it takes. As an example, if nothing else, to anyone who might wanna screw around with his family."

  For a moment Kate couldn't believe her ears, couldn't fathom that she was the target of that kind of man. A criminal, a Mafioso. It had been Michael, of course, Michael who had been involved with those people. He ran with criminals, defended them, but even he knew better than doing something so self-destructive. “Michael isn't that stupid,” she said, remembering then that he was dead and that she should've used the past tense. She couldn't bring herself to do it yet. “He wouldn't have the guts to take the baby of a Mafia boss. Why would he do it? It would be sheer suicide. It doesn't make sense. None of this makes sense."

  Booker hiked a shoulder. “Who knows why he did it? Maybe he didn't know who Joey was. Maybe whoever kidnapped the kid told Michael it was a black-market baby like he told you. Whatever the hell happened, it doesn't matter now. They think you did it, and they won't stop until they get you and make you pay."

  “It doesn't matter. I can turn myself in. If I have to, I'll find a place to hide Joey until the real truth comes out..."

  “You don't understand how the mob works,” Mac told her, locking his gaze on hers. “I know Saracino personally, went to school with his cousin Dave for awhile, played football with him. He told me some stories about his Uncle Vince that curled my hair, and I found out the rest when I was on the force up there. Vince came out of the New York branch of the family, and he's one cold mother. He's got people in his pocket just about everywhere in the state, cops, judges, prison guards. If you turn yourself in, Kate, here or anywhere else, trust me, you'll be one dead lady before the sun goes down. And if you don't give yourself up, if you keep running the way you have been, they'll track you to the ends of the earth and cut you down, I don't care how far they have to go or how long it takes."

  Kate looked back at Booker. His blue eyes looked calm but she knew what they were telling her, both he and Mac. She didn't want to listen to it. She stared down at Joey, who slept so peacefully in the crook of Booker's arm, and her heart twisted until she actually felt it might stop beating.

  “My friend at police headquarters said the mother's due to give a public plea for her baby's return. It should be on any minute now.” He gestured at the small television in the corner. The screen was on but the sound had been turned off. “If you don't believe what we're saying, maybe you ought to listen to it out of her own mouth."

  Kate watched him walk over and turn up the volume. Two commentators were talking about the case, a guy named Beeson and a woman with short blond hair. Both worked for KY3, a channel out of Springfield.

  "Although the family has wished to remain anonymous up until now, the child's mother has decided to make a plea to the kidnapper, who is purported to be Kate Reed, a woman reknown for winning an Olympic bronze medal a few years ago. At the family's request we will not reveal their name, but they have now offered a five hundred thousand dollar reward for the baby's safe return, no questions asked...."

  Kate sat frozen with dismay when the station suddenly cut to a film clip. She watched herself crawling over the finish line in the downpour, red-faced, exhausted, the cameras pushed in her face. Then the television cut again to a postevent interview where she was smiling and talking excitedly, her knee in a cast, holding up the medal beside her face as the photographers snapped their pictures.

  "You are watching a film of the primary suspect, Kate Reed, taken three years ago. We have been informed that she may have darkened her hair color and disguised her appearance. The public is being warned that she is armed and dangerous, perhaps traveling with a male accomplice. Kate Reed is also suspected in the shooting death of her husband, Michael Reed. If you have any information about this woman call your local authorities or contact the St. Louis Police Department...."

  Kate turned horrified eyes to Booker.

  “I'm sorry, Kate. This is bad for you, I know that, I wish things were different."

  Kate thought that he couldn't possibly know how it felt to have your heart ripped out. She couldn't speak, but she quickly returned all her attention to the television set when the blonde announced that the mother was about to speak. Every muscle bunched in hard knots, Kate waited for them to show Joey's mother.

  It was a remote shot, on what looked to be a private driveway. She could see a barred gate, open now but usually a formidable barrier into the grounds. A magnificent Tudor mansion could be glimpsed in the background behind some trees. The woman was sitting at a small wrought-iron table, alone, and the rowdy group of cameramen had been cordoned off some distance away, well outside the gates away from her. She looked extremely young and vulnerable, and the purple rings underneath her eyes revealed her exhaustion. She got a terrified look on her face as the camera zoomed in for the first close-up. She was very beautiful, with long, straight black hair and striking light blue eyes, a lot like Booker's. Hers were swollen and red from weeping. About fifty microphones were clustered in front of her, and she kept darting glances to one side of the driveway, where Kate supposed her husband was standing. He was not in the picture. The woman had been left alone to face the wolves.

  "Please, please, whoever take my baby, please give him home to me."

  Her voice was heavily accented with Russian, the broken
English a pitiable quaver, and Kate saw that she had a wad of tissues in her hand. She dabbed her eyes amid a thunderous amount of clicking and whirring of cameras as anxious photographers got their still shots.

  "I beg you bring son back to us. He is little and helpless, he much frail and we miss him much...."

  The mother wept again, openly, tears running down her cheeks, and the news people zeroed in with glee. Just like them, Kate knew there could be no faking such genuine distress.

  "Please, please, give back our baby, do not hurt, I beg you not hurt him, please, please..."

  When she covered her face with her open hands and sobbed into her palms, a voice came from outside the picture, one heavy with a Brooklyn accent, ordering the interview to stop. As the gate swung shut, slowly blocking off the sight of the crying woman, Kate could see a stocky, deeply tanned man with silver-blond hair stride across the driveway and take the weeping woman into his arms. The picture returned to the studio and the two suitably sober commentators with sprayed-stiff coiffures.

  "I think we can all appreciate that poor woman's anguish, so please, please, if you have any information about the suspected kidnapper, Kate Reed, immediately get in touch with the authorities. The number to call will be repeated until this ordeal is at an end. Please call day or night and operators will be on hand to take down any information you might have concerning this terrible crime."

  The television duo eventually moved on to other, less dramatic news. Kate continued to stare numbly at the screen, stunned by a churning conflict of emotions. The two men sat unmoving behind her, saying nothing. Her breast began to ache, so much so that she couldn't stand it, couldn't stand knowing the things she'd just been told. She stood up so hard she nearly knocked her chair backward, then turned and stared at Booker. He looked up at her, and she couldn't bear the pity she saw on his face.

  “Give him to me, Booker, give him to me!” she cried, snatching Joey up from Booker's arms, blanket and all. She clutched the baby tight for a fraction of a second, tears filling up her eyes so fast she couldn't stop them from falling. She turned blindly for the door, only wanting to get him outside, get him away from the truth that would take him far from her forever.

  Booker watched Kate flee out the door, leaving it standing open behind her. He began to feel a little sick inside. He looked at Mac, who said, simply, “Well, shit."

  “Guess I better go talk to her,” Booker said. Which was the last thing he wanted to do. What could he say that would make her feel any better? Nothing. She was about to lose her boy, the son she had gone through hell on earth for already. God help him, Booker sure as hell didn't have any words that would comfort her. There weren't any.

  Picking up his .45 and tucking it in his belt at the small of his back, he left Mac sitting at the table. He stepped outside into the sun and looked around. Kate had run down to the dock to the picnic table where Mac had first given him the bad news last night. He hadn't gotten much sleep after that, maybe a couple of hours, dreading the moment they'd have to lay it all out in front of Kate. She'd taken it just about the way he'd expected her to.

  He glanced around, up the road behind Mac's trailer in both directions, but he found no suspicious-looking parked cars or people loitering around. It was unlikely Dmitri had found them yet, but if the hit team was as good as Mac intimated, it was only a matter of time before they picked them up again. He walked down the path to the lake.

  Kate was sitting at the end of the bench, facing the calm, dark green water of the lake, clutching Joey up against her chest as if she'd never let go of him again. He sat down directly across from her, not quite sure what to say. He finally repeated what he'd said earlier, but it was heartfelt. “I'm sorry, Kate. Wish I could do something to make this turn out different."

  Kate was crying, silently, but it was the first time he'd seen her shed many tears, despite all they'd been through together. He set his jaw, hating to see her suffer, wanting to touch her but not wanting to touch her. He didn't know what to do.

  “Oh, God, oh, God, Booker, what am I going to do? What am I going to do? I can't give him up, I can't, I can't...."

  Sobs ended her words, and she lifted Joey up and buried her face against his dark curls. Joey felt her anguish and started to cry uncertainly himself, unsure what was wrong with his mommy. Kate pulled herself together a little, but not much, and tried to soothe him, rocking him in her arms. She couldn't seem to stop crying, though.

  “It's a bad situation, Kate, that's for damn sure. I don't know what to tell you.” He paused but he knew she didn't have any choice, and so would she, after she got over the initial shock.

  “Tell me I can keep him,” she whispered, turning to look at him, her brown eyes swimming with tears. “Tell me that, Booker, please."

  “They'll kill you if you try to keep him. Mac says Vince's opened up the contract. Anyone who gets you gets the money, but only if you're dead and the baby's left unharmed."

  “We can hide him! We could go back and stay in your cave, couldn't we? Nobody can find us there! You've lived there for years without any trouble, haven't you?"

  Booker knew she didn't believe that so he didn't answer.

  “Or we could leave the country, go far away, to Hong Kong or South America, Paraguay or somewhere, anywhere."

  “They'd find you, Kate. Five hundred thousand dollars is a lot of money. The Mafia has a long memory. Vince wants blood and he won't rest until he gets it. They say he's crazy about his young wife, and you saw the way she looked just now. She's a basket case."

  “I can't hand him over to them, to a monster like Dmitri,” Kate whispered hoarsely. She shivered. “They're nothing but murderers, criminals, all of them. How can I send Joey back into that kind of life? I can't do it, I'm telling you I can't, Booker!"

  Booker let his gaze wander out over the water. A fisherman sat in a small jon boat about fifty yards away. He'd hooked a crappie and was slowly reeling it out of the sun-spangled lake. Booker watched him put the catch on a stringer and rebait his line. Kate was still crying, but not as hard. She was thinking now, trying to think how to save Joey, using her cleverness to overcome this turn of events as she'd evaded everything else they'd thrown at her. But she was fenced in this time. There was only one way out.

  “Whether you like it or not, Kate, that is Joey's kind of life. Those two people are his real parents. The luck of the draw, I guess. It seems like his mother loves him. That's pretty hard to ignore."

  Kate lowered Joey and looked down at him. Her tears dropped onto his chest. When he gave that little grin he was always giving, the one with the dimples showing, Kate burst into tears again. Booker shifted uncomfortably, feeling he should take her in his arms and try to comfort her but not sure she'd want him to. He blew out air, angry that everything had come down to this.

  “But he's mine, Booker, I've held him and nursed him, I've changed his diapers and rocked him. How can I bear it if they take him back, if someone else raises him?"

  “I reckon that's how his mother feels, too, since Reed, or whoever it was, stole him out of her hospital room. You saw her face, how she's suffering, just like you are. She gave birth to him. She loves him, too."

  Kate turned her face toward him. Booker knew then that she knew every bit of that, that the knowledge of the mother's agony was what was killing her the most. The Saracino woman was Joey's real mother and she wanted him, needed him, just as much as Kate did. He'd been snatched away from her. She was as much a victim as Kate was. Kate was the kind of woman who would feel the other woman's pain, no matter how worse off it made things for her.

  They sat in silence until Kate finally got up and walked around the table to where he sat. Booker stood up, too, and she came into his arms. She pressed herself in close against his chest, still holding Joey. Booker put his arms around her and held them both tightly, his eyes fixed on the glittering water. They said nothing. There was nothing to say.

  Twenty-Eight

  DMITRI WAS ASTONISHED b
y the bright lights and bustling tourist atmosphere of Branson, Missouri. Good God, the tiny town was out in the middle of nowhere, carved from high stony hills but filled with theaters, hotels, restaurants and souvenir shops. It reminded him of Atlantic City in miniature, countrified with a lake view rather than an ocean vista.

  He sat in the backseat of the new white Suburban they'd rented in the city of Springfield, one chosen for dark-tinted windows that gave him privacy to watch the throngs on the street. Yuri found a map of Branson at a petrol station in a tiny hamlet called Ozark some miles down the road, one with the names and locations of all the shows and motels. The Shoji Tabuchi show was the one they were interested in and shouldn't be hard to find. How many Japanese shows could there be in the Ozark Mountains?

  “Look there, uncle. Yakov Smirnov.” Misha spoke in their own language, pointing a finger toward the left side of the street. “You will appreciate his humor, I think."

  A large marquee encircled with lights identified a giant theater down the sloped parking lot as Yakov's American Pavilion. Another billboard said From Red to Redneck, and Yakov had commissioned twin pictures of himself—one wearing a huge white cowboy hat that made him look like a simpleton, the other a traditional Russian fur hat. His telephone number was 33-NO-KGB.

  “Yeah, real fucking funny,” he muttered sourly, but Misha and Yuri thought it was humorous and laughed together at his expense.

  “America—the land of opportunity,” Yuri said, turning back and grinning at Dmitri. “You have only to look at us. Do we not make a good living killing off unwary Americans?"

  “Just find this guy Shoji's theater before Kate gets away again. I'm tired of chasing her. I want her. Do you hear me? And I want her taken alive. Nobody touches her but me. Not a single hair on her head."

  His companions nodded, well aware that the contract hit had gradually turned into Dmitri's own personal vendetta. Yes, he was anxious to get his hands on Kate again. She needed to be punished, to suffer a little, a good deal, in fact, for the things she'd done to him. He found himself craning his neck to spot the theater, his eagerness to capture the woman growing rapidly into an obsession that stunned even him. Only moments after they'd turned at a red light onto the Shepherd of the Hills Expressway, the Shoji show turned up on the left. Yuri pulled into the parking lot and was directed by a man in uniform to parking places facing the street. There was a restaurant next door called Contrary Mary's Garden Restaurant. Dmitri thought that a stupid name to call an eating establishment.