Dawn Stewardson

by Five Is Enough

  Sully shook his head. “This Blackstone is sounding weirder all the time. But if Fax Depot’s been receiving his messages, then they’ve got to know how to get hold of him. So all we have to do is head over there and get our information, right? It must be open on Saturdays.”

  “It’s open 24/7. But as Chester put it, companies don’t merrily hand out information about their customers.”

  “No, I guess they generally don’t. So we’ll have to convince someone to make an exception.”

  KNOWING THEY’D NEVER FIND a place to park near Fax Depot, Lauren had convinced Sully they should take a taxi rather than his van. If he’d driven, they’d have ended up with a long walk down Forty-Second Street—not something she’d relish on a day that was sweltering.

  “Do you have much cash with you?” she asked Sully as the taxi crawled down Fifth Avenue.

  “You mean enough to pay for the cab?” Sully said. “Sure, I can handle it.”

  “No, I mean enough to get us the information.”

  Sully shook his head. “It’s been a long time since I lived in the city. You forget that people here don’t do favors unless there’s something in it for them.”

  “Well, they don’t. And Chester figured this something would be a minimum of two hundred dollars.”

  Sully looked distinctly annoyed. “We’d better find a bank machine, then,” he muttered.

  “No, it’s okay. I didn’t think you were likely to come armed with a stack of fifties, so I got some.” She took the bills out of her purse and handed them to him.

  “All right,” he said slowly. “After we’ve seen how many of these it takes, I’ll write a check.”

  “Oh, don’t be silly. The money doesn’t matter.”

  “It matters to me.”

  She hesitated, something in his tone telling her not to argue. “Fine,” she said at last. “Fine, you can write me a check later.”

  “And what about Chester?”

  “What about him?”

  “I mean, you told him to send his bill to me, didn’t you?”

  “There’s not going to be one. He said he owed Elliot a couple of favors.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Of course I’m sure.”

  Sully eyed her suspiciously, which she found rather insulting. “I’m positive,” she said firmly. “But I don’t know what you’re so concerned about. It’s only money.”

  “It’s only your money,” he said slowly, making her wish she hadn’t let her remark slip out. It obviously didn’t take much to hurt his pride.

  “Look,” he went on, “We’d better get something straight here. I really like you. I wouldn’t be with you today if I didn’t. But I’m still having trouble with the fact that you’re so incredibly rich.”

  “I was hoping we were past that,” she said uneasily.

  “I’m doing my best, Lauren, I really am. I’ve been telling myself I’m just not going to think about your money, but it’s hard not to when you give me a wad of fifty-dollar bills.”

  “I was only trying to help.”

  “I know you were.” He shot her a wry smile, then took her hand. “Look, I know it wouldn’t bother a lot of men but it bothers me. So all I can do is keep trying not to let it, and I’ll probably be okay with it after a while.”

  Or maybe he wouldn’t be. With that thought, a tiny chill wrapped itself around her heart. She looked away from him and glanced out of the taxi.

  They’d turned onto Forty-Second Street, but were still barely moving in the traffic, and she could suddenly imagine Sully opening his door, getting out of the taxi and walking straight out of her life. That wasn’t something she wanted to even imagine, let alone see happen.

  When she’d left Eagles Roost on Wednesday, she hadn’t been certain whether she was on the brink of falling in love with him or already beyond it. When she’d opened her door today and seen him standing in the hall, she’d felt so overjoyed it had left no doubt in her mind.

  So as much as she wouldn’t want a man to love her only for her money, she didn’t want Jack Sullivan not to love her because of it. Not now that she was sure she was in love with him.

  SULLY PULLED THE THIRD fifty out of his pocket and slipped it to the manager—a sweaty guy with beady eyes, a pointy nose and a two-day growth of beard. The three features combined to make him resemble a weasel.

  Even as he was slipping the bill into his own pocket, he was saying, “Like I told ya, my friend, my job would be on the line if anyone found out.”

  When Sully looked at Lauren, she gave him an encouraging smile that said she figured he was almost there, so he temporarily dismissed the idea of grabbing the weasel by the shirtfront and explaining a few facts of life to him.

  Instead, he glanced around the nearly empty store and said, “It doesn’t look to me as if anybody’s paying the slightest attention to us.”

  “Well, I guess a couple more fifties would make it worth the risk.”

  Trying to ignore the way the pulse in his temple was throbbing, Sully dug out two more bills. They disappeared into the weasel’s pocket faster than the eye could see, as if he knew he’d been pressing his luck.

  “I’ll be back in a sec,” he promised, starting for his office.

  “If there are many guys like him wandering around this city,” Sully muttered to Lauren, “it’s no wonder the murder rate’s so high.”

  “At least we’re getting what we want,” she pointed out.

  A minute or two later, when the weasel popped back out of his office, he was clutching a sheet of paper.

  “See?” she murmured. “He’s got our information right in his hot little hand.”

  Sully hoped she was right, but the guy seemed to be sweating even harder than he’d been before, which was hardly a promising sign.

  He reached them and cleared his throat. “This here’s a printout of Blackstone’s account for the month,” he said, handing over the sheet. “It’s the least I can do for ya, my friend.”

  “What’s this?” Sully muttered, staring at it. The phone number space was blank. And all that was printed on the address line was Deposit account balance: $216.45.

  He passed the page to Lauren, then focused on the weasel again. “Okay, my friend, what’s your game? Where’s the information I paid for?”

  The man took a step backward, saying, “Hey, I ain’t’ playin’ no game. See, I forgot that Blackstone never filled out our forms.”

  “What do you mean?” Lauren said.

  “I mean the guy said he didn’t like leavin’ personal information for just anyone to see. So we got no way of reachin’ him. He just calls every couple of days and checks if anythin’s come for him. If somethin’ has, he stops by.”

  Sully’s patience had run out, so he grabbed the front of the weasel’s shirt, pulling him closer. “Look,” he said into his face, “don’t try to sell me a load of junk. I don’t know what you’re playing at, but if you don’t have an address for him, how do you bill him?”

  The weasel swallowed hard. “That’s what the deposit account’s all about. He paid five hundred bucks up front. And every so often he bumps up the balance. So, long as we got more of his money than he’s got fax charges, we can live without an address or phone number.”

  “Why, you little—”

  “Sully?” Lauren said, resting her hand on his arm. “Sully, if he doesn’t have them he doesn’t have them.”

  “Right. Well if he doesn’t have them he doesn’t have our two hundred and fifty bucks, either. Hand it over,” he ordered, letting go of the weasel’s shirt.

  “Wait a sec.” He quickly stepped back again—far enough that he was completely out of reach this time. “How ’bout we work somethin’ else out?”

  “Like what?”

  “Like next time somethin’ comes in for him, I let you know he’ll be comin’ by?”

  “No good,” Sully snapped. He couldn’t be two places at once, and he had to head back to Eagles Roost tomorrow.

/>   “Could you at least describe him for us?” Lauren asked.

  The weasel looked at her, then gave her a sly smile. “Sure I can, lady. Tell you what. I describe him and I only give your boyfriend back half his money. Okay?”

  “Okay,” she said before Sully could open his mouth.

  “Great,” Sully muttered under his breath. He hadn’t wanted to leave this creep with a dime of his money, never mind a hundred and twenty-five bucks. And unless Blackstone had two heads or something, what good was a description when there were eight million people in New York City?

  The weasel reluctantly dug $125 from his pocket and handed it over, saying, “Okay, Blackstone’s a white guy. About forty. Average height. Average weight. Good-lookin’ guy, I guess. Yeah, I’d have to say he’s a good-lookin’ guy.”

  “Good-looking,” Lauren said. “You mean movie star calibre?”

  “Nah…well, I dunno. I mean, Danny DeVito’s a movie star, right? But by good-lookin’ I meant like a straight nose, a tan, all his teeth, that kinda thing. And neat. Clothes always pressed. Short hair. Never needs a shave.”

  “What color hair?” Lauren asked.

  “Brown.”

  “And his eyes?”

  “Two of ’em. He’s got two of ’em. Two ears, too.” The weasel started to laugh at his joke, then turned it into a cough when Sully glared at him.

  “I dunno,” he muttered. “Who looks at a guy’s eyes?”

  “What else?” Sully demanded. So far, he hadn’t heard anything that would distinguish Blackstone from half the fortyish-year-old men in the country.

  “What else,” the weasel repeated. “I dunno. He dresses good, I guess. A suit if it’s day. Sometimes casual stuff at night. But never jeans and sneakers or nothin’ like that. It’s always expensive stuff.”

  “What else?” Sully said again.

  “That’s about it, my friend. There’s nothin’ real special about him. But, hey, most of the customers I couldn’t describe at all. I only know him ’cuz of the fuss he put up about not fillin’ out our forms. And ’cuz he smacked a five hundred buck deposit down on the counter like it was milk money.”

  “Well, thank you,” Lauren said. “Perhaps we’ll want to do business with you again.”

  “Anytime. Anytime.” He smiled at her, then gave a sidelong glance in Sully’s direction. Clearly, if there was an again, he’d be far happier dealing with Lauren alone.

  Sully took her arm and they started for the door. “We might,” he muttered, “want to do business with that lowlife again?”

  “You never know, Sully. At the moment, he’s the only link we have to Blackstone.” As they walked out onto the street, she glanced at her watch.

  “When do we have to be at the gallery?” he asked, knowing why she was checking the time.

  “Well, if it’s all right with you, I’d like to get there early. The man Marisa lives with had to be in Europe this month, and she likes moral support at this sort of thing.”

  “The man Marisa lives with?” he said curiously. From what little he knew about Lauren’s parents, he couldn’t imagine them approving of that arrangement.

  She shrugged. “I know what you’re thinking, and no, my parents weren’t happy about it at first. But they finally rationalized it as a function of Marias’s artistic temperament. At any rate, is it okay if we get to the gallery early?”

  “Sure, it doesn’t matter to me. But with that guy who threatened your brother wandering around, is it a good idea for so many members of your family to be in the same place at the same time?”

  “Well, Elliot thinks if the man was actually going to try anything he’d have tried it by now. And I know he’s asked a couple of criminologists their opinions, so we’re probably all in the clear.”

  “Sully?” she went on after a moment. “You’re awfully disappointed we didn’t get much about Blackstone, aren’t you?”

  “Kind of.”

  “Only kind of?” she said softly.

  “All right, more than kind of. I keep thinking that if he still wants to get his hands on Eagles Roost as badly as ever, how do I know he won’t come up with some other bizarre scheme? As far as that goes, how do I know he hasn’t got one in the works already?”

  “Yes, I see what you mean. If he’d plan a bank robbery, who knows what else he’d do. But we’ve got about an hour before we should be getting ready for the reception. So when we get back to my apartment, why don’t we sit down and try to figure out some other way of finding an address for him?”

  “Sure. Good idea.” He doubted, though, they’d come up with any brilliant plan.

  “If we go to the reception early,” he said, “can we leave early, too?”

  Lauren smiled. “We’re there at six-thirty, we’re gone by seven-thirty. Then we’ve got the rest of the evening to ourselves. Does that sound all right?”

  Sully smiled back at her. It sounded just great.

  THE CHALMERS GALLERY, which handled Marisa’s work, was down in SoHo. As their taxi sailed along Broadway, Lauren glanced across the backseat at Sully and smiled, thinking how absolutely gorgeous he looked. He was wearing good pants and a chocolate-brown shirt—which he’d said had been a birthday gift from Grace and Otis.

  It made his eyes look so deliciously dark she practically melted every time her gaze met his. If this reception had been for anyone but her sister, she’d have skipped it in a minute. Then the two of them could have been alone together the entire evening.

  As they crossed Houston Street, leaving the village behind and entering SoHo, she rested her hand on his and said, “Have you decided about what we were discussing in the apartment? About hiring a private detective?”

  “I’ve been thinking it over,” he said slowly. “But with Fax Depot being open twenty-four hours a day, we’d need more than one person. It would probably take three people to keep it under surveillance. And they’d probably want to try tracking him down other ways as well, which would mean even more manpower.

  “So I’m just not sure. As much as I’d like to know what Blackstone’s story is, until I get some funding firmed up I really don’t want to spend any money I don’t have to.”

  It almost killed her not to say she’d pay for a dozen detectives, if that’s how many it would take, but she kept quiet. Until Sully got over this thing he had about her money, she intended to be very careful.

  Glancing out of the taxi, she saw they’d almost reached their destination—which started her worrying about how things would go once they got there.

  Over the past week, she’d grown awfully concerned that inviting Sully to this opening had been one of her infamous little errors in judgment. And at the moment, the butterflies in her stomach were multiplying at an alarming rate.

  Her father was bound to recognize Sully’s name when she introduced them, so maybe she should have forewarned him, should have given both him and her mother time to adjust to the idea. It was too late to think about that now, though.

  As the taxi jerked to a stop in front of the gallery, she told herself that no matter how upset her father turned out to be he was far too well mannered to say anything really rude.

  Once they were out of the taxi she watched Sully paying the driver, thinking he looked as uneasy as she felt. Then he straightened his shoulders, shot her a quick smile and suddenly looked up to taking on the world.

  She only hoped he was. Her little corner of it, at least. With a deep breath, she took his arm and they started for the door.

  A woman she didn’t recognize was standing just inside, checking invitations. Beyond her, in the long, narrow gallery, two dozen or so other early arrivals were sipping champagne—some looking at the paintings, some standing talking.

  Her heart hammering nervously, she scanned the room. She spotted Marisa, then her parents, then Elliot. They were all busy talking; none of them had noticed her yet.

  “Those are my parents, ahead on the right,” she murmured to Sully, hoping her voice wasn’t betrayi
ng her anxiety.

  Sully nodded.

  “And that’s Elliot standing over beside the bar. I don’t see his wife, Ursula, but she’ll be here someplace. And Marisa’s the one in the black dress, over there who—”

  “Who looks a lot like you only not quite so beautiful,” Sully said.

  “You’re impossible,” she told him, but he was doing a lot to lower her anxiety level. It was still far too high for comfort, though, and then it jumped even higher because she suddenly sensed something was wrong.

  Not far behind them a woman had raised her voice. “Sir?” she was saying as Lauren turned and saw it was the woman checking invitations.

  “Sir, this is a private reception,” she said while Lauren’s gaze found the man she was talking to.

  “Look, you can’t just barge in here and… Oh, my God! He’s got a gun!”

  “Nobody move!” he yelled.

  The entire room froze.

  “Don’t move a muscle,”

  Sully whispered.

  Lauren doubted she could if she tried. She simply stared, numb with fear, at the man holding the gun.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Sully meets the family

  ADRENALINE PUMPING like crazy, Sully sized up the situation.

  The pistol was a .380 semiautomatic. Not especially powerful. Nor accurate. But potentially deadly at close range. The guy brandishing it was about thirty—nervous but not strung out. And the way his eyes were roaming the room said he was here with a purpose.

  All at once, he found who he was looking for. He pointed the gun at Elliot Van Slyke and shouted, “You! Lawyer man! I told you I’d get you and here I am.”

  Elliot’s face went white. Lauren made a strangled little noise in her throat. Sully’s mind began working flat out. The guy wasn’t using both hands to aim. That was good. But probably not good enough.

  Just as Sully made his move, the shooting started.

  The gallery exploded with the shots. People were ducking and screaming. The smell of gunpowder seared the air. And Sully tackled the shooter from behind.