by Davis Bunn
“Shut the door, will you?” Don’s attention was focused on Jack Budrow. The CEO had his head in his hands.
When the three of them were alone, Don walked to the front of the boardroom table and bent over. “Think, Jack.”
“It’s all I can do.”
Don held his fingers a fraction apart and said, “We are this close to being rich for the rest of our lives. And we are this close to losing everything. Including our freedom.”
Jack straightened. “Yes. All right. I see.”
“You sure, Jack?”
“Yes. Yes, I understand.”
“Good.” Don straightened slowly, watching the CEO very carefully. “You’ve got to pull your weight from now on. Terrance and I are looking at dance cards that are full to the brim.”
Jack nodded once, his pallor easing. “So what should I do?”
“You have contacts at the Wall Street Journal, right?”
“Of course. I partnered with the vice-chairman at last year’s Bermuda golf tournament.”
“Swell. Call the guy. Give it to him just like we’ve done with the SEC.” Don’s gaze was jury-taut. “Can you remember your lines, Jack?”
“Certainly.”
“He’ll most likely hear you out, then have a reporter join him and tape a second round. They’ll listen to that tape about a hundred thousand times. If you leave a thread dangling, they’ll pull it and they’ll unravel it and they’ll hang us with it.” Don inspected their chairman. “Maybe we better let Terrance make the call.”
“No.” Jack Budrow rose to his feet. “I’ll do it.”
“Do it right, then.”
Jack was at the door leading from the boardroom to the trophy hall and his office when he quietly observed, “I see the torch has already passed from my hands.”
VAL HAINES ATE AT A NEARBY DINER. THE SUNSET WAS SHROUDED by city shadows and the diner’s grimy front window. He sat on a stool at the counter, one of a dozen faces staring at nothing. He kept his gaze aimed at the Times laid out on the counter beside his plate. He forked the food into his mouth and tasted nothing. His actions were a calm lie. His mind remained as frenetic as the traffic racing beyond the diner’s window.
Another memory had assaulted him just as his meal had arrived. In this one, he held a sleeping infant. The most beautiful baby girl in all the universe rested on his shoulder. Her breath came in tiny puffs he could feel on the nape of his neck. One hand grasped his finger. Val pulled out the hand far enough to look at the perfectly formed little fingers and even tinier nails. Her beauty was so complete he wanted to weep. Like all the other memory pulses, this one arrived with a ton of baggage.
It was the only time Val had ever held his child.
“You need anything else there, hon?”
“What?” Val jerked up. The waitress stood with one hand cocked upon her hip, the other holding a smoldering pot. “Oh. No, thank you. Just the check.”
“Sure, hon.” She set down her pot and scribbled on her pad. “Everything all right?”
Val pushed away the paper he had not really seen. The waitress observed him with the dull concern of one not able to offer anything to anybody. He dropped bills he could not see onto the counter and said, “Memories are a terrible thing.”
The soft edges of another dusk gradually vanished, joining all the other pasts lost to him. He walked a street of New York nighttime energy. People hurried past and refused to meet his eye. Traffic shoved and blared. Vendors shouted back. Val turned away from his hotel, not headed anywhere in particular. Just walking. Caught up in the pressure of other people’s lives.
Val was no longer certain how much he wanted to know. Uncertainty over what might strike next made his past feel very distant. He stopped before a shopfront window and stared at the stranger captured by the night. Maybe this was why he had gone into that bar in the first place. Just looking for a little distance.
Then he realized what he was looking at.
Val pushed through the door and entered the cyber café. It was empty save for the woman behind the counter. The woman had pink hair, two nose rings, and a wary gaze. The two side walls were segmented into semiprivate spaces, with scarred desks holding keyboards and flat-screen monitors. Hip-hop blared. Val approached her. “Can I use a terminal?”
“Why we’re here. You want anything to drink?”
“Coffee. Black.”
“I need a deposit. You got some plastic?”
“No. I left it . . .” He waved away the lie. “How about a twenty?”
“Works for me.” She rang it up and pointed him midway up the left-hand wall. “Take number three.”
The chair wobbled. The keyboard was filmed with other people’s stress. But that was not why Val sat and stared at the monitor. He knew the computer was part of his former life. He based that on no specific memory, just an awareness that here before him was something vital. The question was, how much more did he want to discover? How much more could he take?
The woman called over, “That thing not working again?”
“No. No, it’s fine.” He sat and sipped his coffee. Passing headlights etched his silhouette into the monitor’s surface.
The woman said loud enough to be heard over the hip-hop, “I got to charge you long as you’re tying up the computer, whether you’re using it or not.”
Val waved without looking over. He sipped his coffee. He set down his cup and pulled out the two wads of cash, one from either pocket. Using the desk as cover, he counted it out. The money clip held eight hundred and sixty dollars. The roll bound by rubber bands was tight as a fist and held another fifty-four hundred-dollar bills. Six thousand two hundred and eighty dollars. What kind of person carried that much cash around with him for a night on the town?
He slipped the money back into his pockets. Everything he knew about himself suggested that he was not happy. A happy man did not go into the sort of bar where he would be drugged and arrested. A happy man did not rely on a false ID to mask whatever it was Val had been doing two nights back. So far his returning memories had been hazardous as grenades.
The young woman left her security behind the bar and walked over. “More coffee?”
He looked up. If he could ignore hair the color of cotton candy and the nose jewelry, she was actually very attractive, in a knowing New York sort of way. “No thanks. I’m good.”
She stared at the blank screen. “Everything okay here?”
“Yes.” He could tell she was making herself available. The smile was there in her eyes, just waiting for an excuse to break out. Was this part of what he didn’t remember, a way with strange ladies? “I’m just trying to work up the nerve.”
She wanted to ask more, but something in his face kept her silent. She picked up his cup and retreated.
Val pulled the keyboard closer. He had to know. He drew up the Google search engine and typed in two words: Valentine Haines. He put his name in quotes, so the engine would treat it as a single concept and not flood him with offers for romantic getaways. Then he hit Search.
The retrieval didn’t take long.
Recovery from the shock, however, did.
Val realized the young woman had returned and spoken to him. He stared up at her. “Excuse me?”
“I was just wondering . . .” She seemed uncertain whether to stay or flee. “You went all white there.”
He turned back to the screen. The blue headline across the top of the screen screamed so loudly at him he could no longer even hear the music.
“Right. Sure. Whatever.” She went back to the counter.
Val clenched and unclenched his hand. He gripped the mouse and slid the pointer over to rest upon the first blue line. The arrow became stuck on the headline’s last word.
Dead.
TERRANCE HAD PURPOSEFULLY KEPT THE AFTERNOON AND evening clear, a rarity. He normally liked to surround himself with chattering faces. He found wry pleasure in observing the human zoo at feeding time. Terrance considered himself a spec
ies apart. All proper Brits did, in his opinion, whether they admitted it or not. Attitude and power went hand in glove. The British Empire had not been lost to armies but rather to a generation lacking the will to rule. His own father was the perfect example of modern British spinelessness.
Though the sky was fiery with a patented Florida sunset, Terrance kept the top up. He wanted neither to see nor be seen. His Lexus sportster bored a hole through the violet dusk like a polished bullet, seeking only the target ahead.
His home was a palace of creamy brick set on the ninth tee at Isleworth. It had originally been built for an Orlando Magic star forward, who had been traded to Los Angeles just as the contractor was polishing the granite master bath. The property was actually two houses connected by an ornate indoor-outdoor pool. Apparently the Magic player had wanted his entourage close at hand, but not actually sharing his home. Terrance parked the Lexus beside his weekend toy, a classic Mercedes gull wing he had bought at auction after winning his latest promotion. He entered his house and listened to his footsteps echo off the atrium’s forty-foot ceiling. Daily maid service left the place gleaming with a sterile air.
He lived alone, yet today he felt as though he were being observed by a thousand eyes. Terrance stripped off his jacket and tie, then opened the sliding doors leading to the pool. Steel girders supported a screened cathedral over the poolside veranda. A covered atrium contained an outdoor kitchen with built-in gas range and party-sized refrigerator. Ten imperial palms in giant wooden tubs marched down the pool’s other side. A waterfall timed to come on at sunset poured musically into the Jacuzzi. Beyond the pool and the screen and his border of oleanders, a final trio of golfers raced the twilight.
As hoped, Terrance spotted lights gleaming in the guesthouse parlor. He crossed the mock Venetian bridge and knocked on the door. He heard a voice call from within and entered. “Mother?”
“Hello, darling. You’re just in time.” She appeared in a sweeping flow of silk and jewelry. “The hook on this bracelet is just impossible.”
“Let me.”
“You’re a dear. How was your day?”
He pushed the catch into place. “Actually, it was rather horrid.”
“Do I want to hear?”
“I’m not sure.”
She turned and walked back to the second bedroom, now serving as her dressing room. “I suppose you’d best tell me.”
Eleanor d’Arcy was a woman born to reign. She deserved castles and private jets and servants offering the bended knee. She should have hosted monarchs for tea. She seated herself at the Louis XIV dressing table and used the silver-backed brush to bring her hair to perfection. Terrance said, “You look lovely.”
“Don’t vacillate, dear. The news won’t improve with age.”
“No, perhaps not. You remember Val Haines?”
“That dreadful man. I had hoped never to hear his name again.”
“He’s dead.”
“What?” She stared at him in the mirror. “How?”
“Rather odd, that. It appears he was blown up.”
“Don’t joke.”
“That is the farthest thing from my mind, I assure you.” Swiftly he related the day’s events.
“Do you mean to tell me he was in the bank when the terrorists attacked?”
“They don’t know that it was terrorists. And his location has not yet been confirmed. All we can say with any certainty is that neither he nor his colleague have been heard from since.”
She mulled that over. “I can’t say I’ll be sorry to see the back of that man. No doubt you feel the same.”
Terrance was too aware of the thousand eyes to respond.
“Your sister was sweet on him, I suppose you know that.”
“Yes.” Which added a very special flavor to the moment.
She misunderstood the gleam to his eyes. “I would prefer that you maintain proper civility with your sister.”
“Of course.”
But she was not fooled. “Why do you despise her so?”
“I suppose there is too much of Father in her for my taste.”
His mother started to respond, then let it slide. “I am hosting a charity dinner tonight at the club.”
He accepted his dismissal and turned to go. His mother had been in Orlando for only seven years. Yet already she ruled the upper tiers of what passed for the social hierarchy. She was lithe and very fit and professionally slender. Her face and neck were miracles of modern surgery. Some people took pride in aging well. Eleanor d’Arcy had no intention of giving time’s passage an inch.
Returning across the bridge, Terrance was halted by a sudden realization. He had mentioned his father. He never did that. Terrance could not remember the last time he had spoken about his father. Years. To bring him up now was a serious breach. To not even notice it at the time was far worse.
Despite the evening’s closeness, a chill sweat pressed from his forehead. He could afford no such slipups. He must control everything. Right down to the smallest detail. Eyes would soon be holding them under constant scrutiny.
He entered the house via the kitchen and began warming up the meal prepared by his maid. He was not the least bit hungry. He had felt no craving for food since this critical phase of their plan had begun. He ate his meal standing at the granite-topped center console. He turned the pages of the Journal as he forked the food into his mouth. Nothing registered, neither the food nor the news. The television in the recessed alcove above the oven was tuned to MSNBC. Twice while he ate, the bank’s charred image flashed on screen. The first time he used the remote to turn up the volume. The other time he left the image silent. The television was merely background activity for the theater he was shaping. The newscasters had nothing new to report.
He finished his meal and moved to the apartment he had fashioned from the house’s far end. The first room opened both to the house and the apartment’s private rooms. Terrance did not turn on any lights. The rooms were horribly bare. In the dim light that followed him from the living room, Terrance was able to reshape the rooms in his mind.
Terrance had always been alone. Even as a child, Terrance had known he inhabited a solitary universe. The tight core of seclusion never altered. Nothing could reach him. Terrance could stand in the middle of a dense pack of people and remain trapped within his interior void. Only one person had ever managed to pierce his shields and enter the hidden spaces. This room had been meant for her daughter. The next was a studio apartment for the nanny. After Terrance had secretly torn her former husband apart bit by mangled bit, Val’s wife had finally agreed to enter Terrance’s world. Then, at the last moment and without warning, she had fled to Miami. Terrance had gone wild with rage, smashing the handcrafted nursery furniture with a ball-peen hammer.
That night, after the fury had subsided, Terrance had confessed to his mother. How the core of his being was filled with a void. How he felt born to solitude.
Eleanor had patted his cheek, a rare show of affection. “My dear darling boy,” she said. “Has it taken you this long to realize?”
“Realize what?”
“Kings are not merely born to rule,” his mother told him gently. “They are born to eternal isolation. It is their destiny.”
Terrance made himself a drink, switched on the digital radio to a random channel, and pretended to read a book. Everything was merely theatrical moves for the hidden audience. Two hours later, his mother returned from the club. Eleanor tapped on the glass and waved him a goodnight. She did not ask if he was going to bed. Terrance had never needed much sleep.
When the guesthouse went dark, he turned off the downstairs lights and proceeded up the central stairs. He padded down the hall to his study. Across from his desk was a narrow cupboard for storing his personal tax records. The rear of the bottom shelf now contained a set of all-black running gear. He dressed in the dark. He hefted a waist kit containing a black knit cap, a penlight, a screwdriver, two keys in a manila envelope, and three sets of su
rgical gloves still in their sterile packs. Silently he went back downstairs and let himself out the back.
He left the house by the kitchen door. He stood by the property boundary and searched the night. When he was certain he was alone, he jogged across the golf course.
He exited the gated community by way of the golf course’s maintenance entrance, which he knew from earlier reconnaissance was locked and empty after nine. The workmen’s gate was easily scaled.
Don Winslow’s Escalade was parked just down the highway. Don greeted him with, “Look at this traffic. You sit here long enough, the whole world goes by.” Don wore a black sweatshirt with the sleeves cut off, black track pants, and black high-tops. A black headband held the graying hair out of his face. He looked like a killer ready for the night’s rampage. As soon as Terrance shut his door, Don slapped the Escalade into gear. “Where are we headed?”
“Val’s.” Terrance did not need to think that one through. “We hit Val’s first.”
VAL LEFT THE INTERNET CAFÉ AND RETURNED TO THE HOTEL because he had nowhere else to go. He needed to retreat and work things out. But as he pushed through the outer doors and entered the lobby, memories buzzed about him like vultures over carrion. Retreating to his lonely room would only give them the chance to pick his bones.
The lobby was empty save for the dark-suited desk clerk. “If it ain’t Mr. Smith. How we doing today?”
The lobby’s only sofa was a brown as toneless as the clerk’s gaze. The clock behind the clerk’s head read a few minutes after midnight. Val could find no sense to the numbers. The hotel and the night had been divorced from life’s natural cadence. Val took a seat and replied, “Not so good.”
“Yeah? Sorry to hear that.”
Val studied the ancient tiles at his feet. The hotel’s name was inscribed in a mottled design almost lost to the years. The air smelled of cleanser and time distilled to a futile blend. Val sighed his way deeper into the sofa’s lumpy embrace. What he needed was a way to shoot the mental vultures out of the sky before they could attack him again.
