Tag Man

by Archer Mayor

  Joe mixed the cream and tea together before taking a sip through his straw. He used the time to think for a moment.

  “Lisbeth,” he asked, licking his lips, “did you tell him you found the note, or that you suspect him of cheating on you?”

  “No.”

  He nodded. “Good. If it’s okay, I’d like you to keep it that way. Can I keep the note, incidentally?”

  “That’s why I brought it.”

  “Do you have access to the phone bills in the house?” he then asked.

  “Cells or house?”

  “Whatever.”

  “I pay my own cell bills; he does everything else.”

  “And he keeps the bills to himself?”

  “Yes. Sorry. I bet those would be interesting, wouldn’t they?”

  “They often are. You wouldn’t be able to get to them?”

  She laughed bitterly. “Not likely. My guess is he’s attached a grenade to his office door by now.”

  Joe took another sip and slid the note into his breast pocket. The phone bills weren’t a big issue, assuming he could persuade a judge to issue a search warrant for them. “That reminds me,” he said to her. “I think you should know about something that we discovered at your house. It’s a safety issue, really.”

  “What?”

  “Your husband has a very sophisticated camera system throughout the house, which he monitors from his office. I tell you this so you won’t try to do anything at home that you don’t want him to know about.”

  Her brow furrowed and she looked stunned. “Where are they?”

  “Pretty much everywhere.”

  He left it at that, and his brevity gave her what she needed to know.

  “Oh my God,” she murmured. “That bastard. That means the bedroom, too, doesn’t it?”

  “Among other places.”

  She reflected on that for a moment before saying, “I knew it. I just had a feeling. The things he had me do—like there was a mirror. Only there wasn’t one.”

  She slipped her fingers up under her dark glasses and rubbed her eyes briefly. “Jesus, I wish this would end.”

  He thought about reaching out and patting her arm, or extending some other sign of sympathy, but he didn’t. As solidly as he was in his professional mode at the moment, he couldn’t ignore his nearly perpetual grieving. While Lisbeth Jordan in no way resembled Lyn Silva, she was roughly the same age, and of similar build. To see her distressed brought Joe back to those intimate moments he’d had with Lyn, including ones where she, too, had expressed pain or confusion, and he’d been able to render some solace.

  The mere thought of that sharpened his sense of loss.

  “It will,” he said blandly instead, and moved on. “Was there anything else you thought might be helpful?”

  She straightened slightly at his change of tone, dropped her hands back to the tabletop, and looked at him. “What?”

  “I was just wondering if you had anything else?”

  She appeared momentarily confused. “I, ah … No. Will the note be helpful?”

  “Maybe.” He forced himself back onto even keel. “It might give us something to work on. If you could keep your eyes open for anything else, without endangering yourself, that would be very handy.”

  “I doubt that’ll happen,” she said. “He’s left.”

  Joe’s eyes widened slightly. “Where to?”

  “You think he told me? Ever since he found out about you people, he’s been tearing around the house like his feet were on fire, either locked in his office or making whispered phone calls on his cell. Then all of a sudden, it was a fat duffel bag and out the door with tires squealing. I have no idea where he went or when he’ll be back. He didn’t say one word to me.”

  “What’s he driving and what’s the license plate number?” Joe asked.

  She told him the registration. “It’s his stupid Hummer. Like driving a battleship. Wherever he’s going, it’s not the city.”

  Joe looked up from writing in his pad. “He considered that his country car?”

  “I guess,” she said dismissively. “Although he’s so paranoid about every nick and scratch, I don’t see him actually leaving the pavement in it.”

  “That’s interesting, though,” Joe continued. “The implication being that he’s headed somewhere rural. What’s he use for his trips to Boston?”

  “The Bimmer.”

  “And it’s still here?”

  “Sure.”

  “You have the keys?”

  “Sure.”

  Joe smiled slightly. It was a good bet that Lloyd’s office was now as clean as the proverbial pin, and that his computer was safely tucked into the Hummer beside him. But Joe knew from experience that when you were under pressure to head out the door, you didn’t often think of those surrogate homes away from home that too often got filled with the trash and details of everyday life.

  “Lisbeth,” he asked, “when Lloyd was preparing to leave, did he go to the Bimmer at all, maybe to get anything like a GPS or a map?”

  “Not that I know of, and the GPS is built in anyhow. The only time I was aware of his using the garage was when he left. He might have grabbed something then, of course…” She hesitated before correcting herself. “No, then the BMW keys wouldn’t have been in the kitchen, and I saw them there before coming here. Why?”

  “Specifically?” he answered. “I have no reason whatsoever. But to help figure out what Lloyd’s been up to and where he’s been, I’d like to get into that car, if you’ll allow it. Most GPS units keep a record of past trips.”

  “Of course.”

  * * *

  The bartender at the Emerald Isle in Lowell looked balefully at Willy, who this time was accompanied by Big Al Davis instead of Lester. Typically, counter to official protocol, Willy had traveled south alone.

  “What do you want? I already gave him my phone records.” He pointed at Al, who merely smiled.

  Willy pulled a photograph from his pocket. “Don’t get cranky now. I came all the way down here just because you were such a sweetheart last time.”

  “Fuck you.”

  “See? It’s all about attitude.” Willy looked at Big Al with a bright expression. “Just what we were talking about, wasn’t it? People who help people are the happiest people in the world.” He looked back at the barkeep, adding in a far darker tone, “Because they don’t fuck with the people who can make their lives a living nightmare. Especially over nothin’ at all.” He laid the picture on the bar. “Like this. Ever see him?”

  The bartender stared at Willy, ignoring the snapshot. “This gonna get you outta my hair?”

  “In fact, it is.”

  The other man smiled bitterly and picked up the photo. “Then I’ll give you everything I got.”

  He squinted at a face shot of Lloyd Jordan in the dim light, holding it close, as if he were trying to discern a counterfeit twenty.

  “Yeah.”

  “Yeah, what?” Willy asked him.

  “Yeah, he was here. That’s what you wanted, wasn’t it?”

  “Cute. So you have no clue.”

  The barkeep rolled his eyes. “Fuck. Can’t win for losin’. He came in here with Leo, all right? Made a big fucking deal about my not having Glen-something-or-other for a single-malt scotch. La-di-fuckin’-da.”

  “You remember when this was?”

  The man simply stared at him.

  “How ’bout the circumstances?” Willy persisted. “Any details.”

  “Middle of the day. Slow time—’nother reason he stuck out.” The bartender pointed to a far booth. “They sat there, talked quiet. Shut up whenever I got near, like they were planning a bank heist.”

  “You overhear anything at all?”

  He shook his head.

  Willy tapped the picture with his fingertip, content that what the bartender had told him matched what they’d extracted from the GPS unit in Lloyd’s BMW. “He ever here before or since?”

  “Nop
e.”

  “They look like they knew each other well?”

  “How the fuck would I know?”

  “When they met; when they walked in. Body language. You know.”

  He actually did know, and nodded. “They knew each other. The snotty guy was here first, sat at the booth, did his bullshit with the scotch. Leo came in after and they greeted like they went back a while—casuallike. No big deal.”

  “You said you didn’t hear anything,” Willy stated. “You see anything happen between them?”

  “An envelope,” the bartender answered without hesitation. “Rich guy slid it over to Leo, who just put it in his pocket. Not the first time I’ve seen that here.”

  “In general or with Leo?”

  “Leo. You already know he used this place like an office. What did he do, anyhow?”

  Willy was surprised. “What did Leo do? I thought that was against some bartender code of ethics, asking questions like that.”

  The man shrugged. “He’s dead, right?”

  “Right,” Willy agreed. “Which means I’d have to kill you, too, if I told you. What a shame, huh?”

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Julie Johnson unlocked her office, removed her damp raincoat, and hung it on the clothes tree by the door, spreading it out slightly so that it might dry more quickly. She was a careful, fastidious woman, which helped explain her success as the school’s comptroller, and the happiness of her well-tended, if unambitious, husband at home.

  She frowned slightly at the scene outside her second-floor window. She wasn’t fond of rainy days. She appreciated what it did for the grounds—and nature in general—but remained unhappy at the untidiness of it all.

  That having been said, she saw no irony in her next gesture, which was to check on the moisture of the rubber plant adorning her desk. It was, of course, perfect.

  Wiping her fingertip carefully on a tissue, she circled the desk, deposited the tissue in the trash can, settled into her chair, and turned on the computer before her, content in the sense of order so compulsively mirrored in the entire room’s layout. It was one of the school’s prized humorous tidbits, how the custodians never had to dust and vacuum the comptroller’s office, since she did the job herself with the care of a cleaning crew.

  She listened with satisfaction to the computer waking up, enjoying the orderly rhythm of all its components getting ready to observe her commands.

  In the process, however, she failed to hear the slight sound of the small bathroom’s door opening just out of her line of sight.

  She did, however, feel the sharp sting of a knife being held against her throat.

  “Mrs. Johnson, do not move. Do you understand me?”

  The voice was male, adult, and bone-chilling in its calmness. Despite her normal readiness to criticize or at least question, Julie knew enough now simply to pay attention.

  “Yes. What do you want?”

  She could just make out the shape of a man wearing a hood over his head in the thin reflection on the polished computer screen.

  “We’ll get to that. Are you expecting any visitors?”

  “No.”

  “Does your secretary have a habit of walking in without knocking at this time of the morning, maybe to offer you coffee or deliver the mail?”

  Julie frowned. What in Lord’s name? She struggled to stay focused. This was absurd. It was eight o’clock in the morning, for heaven’s sake.

  “She will come in sometimes. I don’t drink coffee, and I pick up my own mail.” She moved slightly and complained, “What is going on here? What do you want?”

  The response made her squirm in her chair. The knife bore down harder and she could feel a trickle of warmth course down past the collar of her blouse.

  She began to shiver.

  “Page the outside office,” the man’s voice said, “and tell them that you’re about to place a very important phone call and that it’s crucial that you are not to be disturbed—that it’ll only be about a quarter of an hour.”

  “That’s crazy,” she protested. “I never do anything like that.”

  The knife moved painfully. “Then you better make it believable.”

  “Right now?”

  The voice showed its first impatience. “Are you that stupid?”

  “Okay, okay,” she protested, and reached for the phone.

  She did as she’d been told, wrestling to maintain a normal tone, her brain beginning to fill with increasingly wild notions of what was about to happen. She was actually grateful when her secretary simply acknowledged her comment and hung up, so she didn’t have to worry about her rising panic giving her away.

  Nevertheless, she’d started trembling, and she could feel sweat breaking out all over her.

  “What do you want?” she whispered plaintively.

  He ignored her. “Pick up the phone and open a line. No need to dial. We just want the button to light up.”

  She followed instructions again and placed the receiver on the desk.

  “Are you paying close attention?” the man asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Good. This is what I want. You get on that computer and you get me the mailing address, phone number, and anything else related to getting in touch with Sally Kravitz’s father.”

  Julie couldn’t stop herself. She tried to twist around. “What…”

  He pulled her head back by the hair and moved the point of the blade from her throat to her cheek, right in line with her right eye. She gasped in pain and surprise.

  “Have I not made myself clear?” the man asked.

  “Yes,” she managed to get out.

  “Is there a problem, then?”

  “No.”

  He returned her to her previous position. “Then get to it. Sally Kravitz. Father’s name is Daniel.”

  Her fingers jittery on the keys, Julie tried several times to enter the information before succeeding.

  “It’s a post office box in Vermont.”

  He leaned over her slightly, trying to decipher the abbreviations and general format of the screen before them. “Is there a phone number?”

  “It says it’s an answering service. We get that sometimes. Our parents can be very self-protective.”

  “You ever had any problems with Kravitz paying his bills?”

  She nervously scrolled down the screen. “No. She’s a scholarship student, so most of the tuition has been waived, but he’s always met the deadlines on incidentals. There’s a note here from the academic dean that Sally will be doing some makeup exams later in the summer, due to a family emergency.”

  “How does Kravitz pay his bills?”

  She checked before saying, “By money order.” Her voice betrayed her surprise.

  “Show me the address,” he ordered.

  Reluctantly, she reached out and touched the screen—something she hated to see other people do. She generally gloried in the pristine shininess of flat glass before her.

  She could sense the man memorizing both the address and the phone number.

  “What else do you have on how to reach Kravitz?” he demanded. “Bank accounts, references, next of kin—anything at all?”

  She tried shaking her head and then froze, feeling the knife, and answered instead, “Nothing. It all gets entered here.”

  “How about in a medical emergency?”

  “That’s a different database. There are confidential restrictions.”

  “Don’t bullshit me, lady. Money makes the world go around. If the infirmary has better contact information on the parent than you do, it’ll be the first time in history.”

  Julie had to concede. “There would be an indicator on our screen. There isn’t one.”

  He laughed. “I knew it. You financial people are always the end-all, be-all. Regular sharks.”

  Julie didn’t understand his meaning. She merely sat there, frozen, her hands flat out before her, waiting for what might come next.

  “How ’bout an e-mail addres
s?” he asked.

  She scrutinized the form. “Yes.” She recited it aloud.

  “Good. Send him this note. Ready?”

  She went to the appropriate page. “Okay.”

  “Dear Mr. Kravitz,” he dictated. “We’ve hit a problem in arranging for your daughter’s makeup exams and have mailed the appropriate paperwork to your post office box by express mail. Unfortunately, due to circumstances beyond our control, if we have not heard from you in the next three days, your daughter’s standing at this school will be compromised. We deeply regret any anxiety and inconvenience this unavoidable imposition may cause.”

  Julie proofread what she’d written, struck by its sophisticated wording. She heard all sorts of language used on campus, from the maintenance crew to the richest of parents. If she were to receive such an e-mail herself, she thought, she’d be inclined to believe its contents utterly.

  It only further drove home the most confounding of her many questions: Who was this man?

  The knife left her neck with the warning, “You move, you die.”

  She barely breathed. There was a rapid movement behind her, a frightening ripping sound, and then a flash of duct tape passing before her eyes. She felt a broad band being applied to her chest, just under her breasts, pinning her arms and body to the chair. Instinctively, she struggled. He smacked the back of her head hard, making her eyes tear.

  “Stupid bitch. I told you not to move.”

  A second swath of tape was slapped across her mouth, then a third cut off her vision. Finally, she felt her swivel chair being turned away from the desk, followed by her lower legs being bound to the base of the chair. Instinctively, she clamped her knees together as she sensed him crouching before her to do this.

  “Don’t worry, lady,” she heard him say. “I couldn’t care less about that.”

  She felt an abrupt emptiness then, and realized that his body heat had disappeared, like a radiator being shoved out of the way. She heard a sound by the door, heard it open quietly, and then could only imagine as he turned left and walked down the short hallway, away from the secretary’s open area, toward the private entrance that Julie used when she wanted a little discretion.

  She sat there for a moment, assessing the truth of being truly alone. And alive. Even if disheveled and bleeding and taped to her chair.