by Harlan Coben
Cissy Lockwood winced. Her eyes closed.
“Ms. Lockwood?”
She shook her head. The eyes slowly opened. “I am getting off track,” she said, catching her breath. “I apologize. I’m not here to tell you my life story. Just one incident in it. So let me just state it plainly.”
A deep breath. Then another.
“Jack Coldren told me that he was taking Win out for a golf lesson. But it never happened. Or perhaps they had finished far earlier than expected. Either way, Jack was not with Win. His father was. Somehow Win and his father ended up going into the stables. I was there when they entered. I was not alone. More specifically, I was with Win’s riding instructor.”
She stopped. Myron waited.
“Do I need to spell this out for you?”
Myron shook his head.
“No child should see what Win saw that day,” she said. “And worse, no child should ever see his father’s face under those circumstances.”
Myron felt tears sting his eyes.
“There is more to it, of course. I won’t go into it now. But Win has never spoken to me since that moment. He also never forgave his father. Yes, his father. You think he hates only me and loves Windsor the Second. But it is not so. He blames his father, too. He thinks that his father is weak. That he allowed it to happen. Utter nonsense, but that is the way it is.”
Myron shook his head. He didn’t want to hear any more. He wanted to run and find Win. He wanted to hug his friend and shake him and somehow make him forget. He thought of the lost expression on Win’s face as he watched the horse stables yesterday morning.
My God. Win.
When Myron spoke, his voice was sharper than he’d expected. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because I am dying,” she replied.
Myron slumped against a car. His heart ripped anew.
“Again, let me put this simply,” she said in too calm a voice. “It has reached the liver. It is eleven centimeters long. My abdomen is swelling from liver and kidney failure.” That explained the wardrobe—the untucked, oversize shirt and the stretch pants. “We are not talking months. We are talking perhaps weeks. Probably less.”
“There are treatments,” Myron tried lamely. “Procedures.”
She simply dismissed this with a shake of her head. “I am not a foolish woman. I do not have delusions of engaging in a moving reunion with my son. I know Win. That will not happen. But there is still unfinished business here. Once I am dead, there will be no chance for him to disentangle himself again. It will be over. I do not know what he will do with this opportunity. Probably nothing. But I want him to know. So that he can decide. It is his last chance, Myron. I do not believe he will take it. But he should.”
With that, she turned away and left. Myron watched her walk away. When she was out of sight, Myron hailed a taxi. He got in the back.
“Where to, bud?”
He gave the man the address where Esme Fong was staying. Then he settled back in the seat. His eyes stared blankly out the window. The city passed by in a misty, silent blur.
30
When he thought that his voice would not betray him, Myron called Win on the cell phone.
After a quick hello, Win said, “Bummer about Jack.”
“From what I hear, he used to be your friend.”
Win cleared his throat. “Myron?”
“What?”
“You know nothing. Remember that.”
True enough. “Can we have dinner tonight?”
Win hesitated. “Of course.”
“At the cottage. Six-thirty.”
“Fine.”
Win hung up. Myron tried to put it out of his mind. He had other things to worry about.
Esme Fong paced the sidewalk outside the entrance to the Omni Hotel on the corner of Chestnut Street and Fourth. She wore a white suit and white stockings. Killer legs. She kept wringing her hands.
Myron got out of the taxi. “Why are you waiting out here?” he asked.
“You insisted on talking privately,” Esme answered. “Norm is upstairs.”
“You two live in the same room?”
“No, we have adjoining suites.”
Myron nodded. The no-tell motel was making more sense now. “Not much privacy, huh?”
“No, not really.” She gave him a tentative smile. “But it’s okay. I like Norm.”
“I’m sure you do.”
“What’s this about, Myron?”
“You heard about Jack Coldren?”
“Of course. Norm and I were shocked. Absolutely shocked.”
Myron nodded. “Come on,” he said. “Let’s walk.”
They headed up Fourth Street. Myron was tempted to stay on Chestnut Street, but that would have meant strolling past Independence Hall and that would have been a tad too cliché for his liking. Still, Fourth Street was in the colonial section. Lots of brick. Brick sidewalk, brick walls and fence, brick buildings of tremendous historical significance that all looked the same. White ash trees lined the walk. They turned right into a park that held the Second Bank of the United States. There was a plaque with a portrait of the bank’s first president. One of Win’s ancestors. Myron looked for a resemblance but could not find one.
“I’ve tried to reach Linda,” Esme said. “But the phone is busy.”
“Did you try Chad’s line?”
Something hit her face, then fled. “Chad’s line?”
“He has his own phone in the house,” he said. “You must have known that.”
“Why would I know that?”
Myron shrugged. “I thought you knew Chad.”
“I do,” she said, but her voice was slow, careful. “I mean, I’ve been over to the house a number of times.”
“Uh-huh. And when was the last time you saw Chad?”
She put her hand to her chin. “I don’t think he was there when I went over Friday night,” she said, the voice still slow. “I don’t really know. I guess a few weeks ago.”
Myron made a buzzing noise. “Incorrect answer.”
“Excuse me?”
“I don’t get it, Esme.”
“What?”
Myron continued walking, Esme stayed in step. “You’re what,” he said, “twenty-four years old?”
“Twenty-five.”
“You’re smart. You’re successful. You’re attractive. But a teenage boy—what’s up with that?”
She stopped. “What are you talking about?”
“You really don’t know?”
“I don’t have the slightest idea.”
His eyes bore into hers. “You. Chad Coldren. The Court Manor Inn. That help?”
“No.”
Myron gave her skeptical. “Please.”
“Did Chad tell you that?”
“Esme …”
“He’s lying, Myron. My God, you know how teenage boys are. How could you believe something like that?”
“Pictures, Esme.”
Her face went slack. “What?”
“You two stopped at an ATM machine next door to the motel, remember? They have cameras. Your face was clear as day.” It was a bluff. But it was a damn good one. She caved a little piece at a time. She looked around and then collapsed on a bench. She turned and faced a colonial building with a lot of scaffolding. Scaffolding, Myron thought, ruined the effect—like armpit hair on a beautiful woman. It shouldn’t really matter, but it did.
“Please don’t tell Norm,” she said in a faraway voice. “Please don’t.”
Myron said nothing.
“It was dumb. I know that. But it shouldn’t cost me my job.”
Myron sat next to her. “Tell me what happened.”
She looked back at him. “Why? What business is this of yours?”
“There are reasons.”
“What reasons?” Her voice was a little sharper now. “Look, I’m not proud of myself. But who appointed you my conscience?”
“Fine. I’ll go ask Norm then. Maybe he
can help me.”
Her mouth dropped. “Help you with what? I don’t understand. Why are you doing this to me?”
“I need some answers. I don’t have time to explain.”
“What do you want me to say? That I was dumb? I was. I could tell you that I was lonely being in a nice place. That he seemed like a sweet, handsome kid and that at his age, I figured there’d be no fear of disease or attachments. But at the end of the day, that does not change much. I was wrong. I’m sorry, okay?”
“When was the last time you saw Chad?”
“Why do you keep asking me that?” Esme insisted.
“Just answer my questions or I’ll go to Norm, I swear it.”
She studied his face. He put on his most impermeable face, the one he’d learned from really tough cops and toll collectors on the New Jersey Turnpike. After a few seconds she said, “At that motel.”
“The Court Manor Inn?”
“Whatever it was called. I don’t remember the name.”
“What day was that?” Myron asked.
She thought a moment. “Friday morning. Chad was still sleeping.”
“You haven’t seen or spoken to him since?”
“No.”
“You didn’t have any plans to rendezvous for another tryst?”
She made an unhappy face. “No, not really. I thought he was just out for some fun, but once we were there, I could see he was developing a crush. I didn’t count on that. Frankly I was worried.”
“Of what exactly?”
“That he’d tell his mother. Chad swore he wouldn’t, but who knew what he’d do if I hurt him? When I didn’t hear from him again, I was relieved.”
Myron searched her face and her story for lies. He couldn’t find one. Didn’t mean they weren’t there.
Esme shifted on the bench, crossing her legs. “I still don’t understand why you’re asking me all this.” She thought about it a moment and then something seemed to spark in her eyes. She squared her shoulders toward Myron. “Does this have something to do with Jack’s murder?”
Myron said nothing.
“My God.” Her voice quaked. “You can’t possibly think that Chad has something to do with it.”
Myron waited a beat. All-or-nothing time. “No,” he said. “But I’m not so sure about you.”
Confusion set camp on her face. “What?”
“I think you kidnapped Chad.”
She raised both hands. “Are you out of your mind? Kidnapped? It was completely consensual. Chad was more than willing, believe me. Okay, he was young. But do you think I took him to that motel at gunpoint?”
“That’s not what I mean,” Myron said.
Confusion again. “Then what the hell do you mean?”
“After you left the motel on Friday. Where did you go?”
“To Merion. I met you there that night, remember?”
“How about last night? Where were you?”
“Here.”
“In your suite?”
“Yes.”
“What time?”
“From eight o’clock on.”
“Anybody who can verify that?”
“Why would I need someone to verify that?” she snapped. Myron put on the impermeable face again—not even gases could get through. Esme sighed. “I was with Norm until midnight. We were working.”
“And after that?”
“I went to bed.”
“Would the hotel’s nightman be able to verify that you never left your suite after midnight?”
“I think so, yes. His name is Miguel. He’s very nice.”
Miguel. He’d have Esperanza track down that one. If her alibi stuck, his neat little scenario went down the toilet. “Who else knew about you and Chad Coldren?”
“No one,” she said. “At least, I told no one.”
“How about Chad? Did he tell anyone?”
“It sounds to me like he told you,” she said pointedly. “He might have told someone else, I don’t know.”
Myron thought about it. The black-clad man crawling out Chad’s bedroom window. Matthew Squires. Myron remembered his own teenage years. If he had somehow managed to bed an older woman who looked like Esme Fong, he would have been busting to tell someone—especially if he’d been staying at his best friend’s house the night before.
Once again, things circled back to the Squires kid.
Myron asked, “Where will you be if I need to reach you?”
She reached into her pocket and pulled out a card. “My cell phone number is on the bottom.”
“Good-bye, Esme.”
“Myron?”
He turned to her.
“Are you going to tell Norm?”
She seemed only worried about her reputation and her job, not a murder rap. Or was this just a clever diversion? No way of knowing for sure.
“No,” he said. “I won’t tell.”
At least, not yet.
31
Episcopal Academy. Win’s high school alma mater.
Esperanza had picked him up in front of Esme Fong’s and driven him here. She parked across the street. She turned off the ignition and faced him.
“Now what?” she asked.
“I don’t know. Matthew Squires is in there. We can wait for a lunch break. Try to get in then.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Esperanza said with a nod. “A really bad one.”
“You have a better idea?”
“We can go in now. Pretend we’re touring parents.”
Myron thought about it. “You think that’ll work?”
“Better than hanging out here doing nothing.”
“Oh, before I forget. I want you to check out Esme’s alibi. The hotel nightman named Miguel.”
“Miguel,” she repeated. “It’s because I’m Hispanic, right?”
“Pretty much, yeah.”
She had no problem with that. “I put a call in to Peru this morning.”
“And?”
“I spoke to some local sheriff. He says Lloyd Rennart committed suicide.”
“What about the body?”
“The cliff is called El Garganta del Diablo—in English, Throat of the Devil. No bodies are ever located. It’s actually a fairly common suicide plunge.”
“Great. Think you can do a little more background stuff on Rennart?”
“Like what?”
“How did he buy the bar in Neptune? How did he buy the house in Spring Lake Heights? Stuff like that.”
“Why would you want to know that?”
“Lloyd Rennart was a caddie for a rookie golfer. That isn’t exactly loads of dough.”
“So?”
“So maybe he had a windfall after Jack blew the U.S. Open.”
Esperanza saw where he was going. “You think somebody paid Rennart off to throw the Open?”
“No,” Myron said. “But I think it’s a possibility.”
“It’s going to be hard to trace after all this time.”
“Just give it a shot. Also, Rennart got into a serious car accident twenty years ago in Narberth. It’s a small town right around here. His first wife was killed in the crash. See what you can find out about it.”
Esperanza frowned. “Like what?”
“Like was he drunk. Was he charged with anything. Were there other fatalities.”
“Why?”
“Maybe he pissed off someone. Maybe his first wife’s family wants vengeance.”
Esperanza kept the frown. “So they—what?—waited twenty years, followed Lloyd Rennart to Peru, pushed him off a cliff, came back, kidnapped Chad Coldren, killed Jack Coldren.… Are you getting my point?”
Myron nodded. “And you’re right. But I still want you to run down everything you can on Lloyd Rennart. I think there’s a connection somewhere. We just have to find what it is.”
“I don’t see it,” Esperanza said. She tucked a curl of black hair behind her ear. “Seems to me that Esme Fong is still a much better suspect.”
“Agre
ed. But I’d still like you to look into it. Find out what you can. There’s also a son. Larry Rennart. Seventeen years old. See if we can find out what he’s been up to.”
She shrugged. “A waste of time, but okay.” She gestured toward the school. “You want to go in now?”
“Sure.”
Before they moved, a giant set of knuckles gently tapped on Myron’s window. The sound startled him. Myron looked out his window. The large black man with the Nat King Cole hair—the one from the Court Manor Inn—was smiling at him. “Nat” made a cranking motion with his hand, signaling Myron to lower the window. Myron complied.
“Hey, I’m glad we ran into you,” Myron said. “I never got the number of your barber.”
The black man chuckled. He made a frame with his large hands—thumbs touching, arms outstretched—and tilted it back and forth the way a movie director does. “You with my doo,” he said with a shake of his head. “Somehow I just don’t see it.”
He leaned into the car and stuck his hand across Myron toward Esperanza. “My name is Carl.”
“Esperanza.” She shook his hand.
“Yes, I know.”
Esperanza squinted at him. “I know you.”
“Indeed you do.”
She snapped her fingers. “Mosambo, the Kenyan Killer, the Safari Slasher.”
Carl smiled. “Nice to see Little Pocahontas remembers.”
Myron said, “The Safari Slasher?”
“Carl used to be a professional wrestler,” Esperanza explained. “We were in the ring together once. In Boston, right?”
Carl climbed into the backseat of the car. He leaned forward so his head was between Esperanza’s right shoulder and Myron’s left. “Hartford,” he said. “At the Civic Center.”
“Mixed tag-team,” Esperanza said.
“That’s right,” Carl said with his easy smile. “Be a sweetheart, Esperanza, and start up the car. Head straight until the third traffic light.”
Myron said, “You mind telling us what’s going on?”
“Sure thing. See that car behind you?”
Myron used the passenger-side mirror. “The one with the two goons?”
