by Cate Holahan
“Sophia, no skipping. It’s a busy sidewalk and the pavement is uneven.” I didn’t add, We may not have health insurance since Mommy lost her job. My tone conveyed the sentiment. She slowed to a walk, still sucking the lollipop.
I searched the sidewalk for a payphone. Few places outside of America’s poorest inner cities possessed such relics. Cell phones had eradicated the demand for a box that charged a quarter a minute to place a call while standing on a corner.
I knew that Newark still had stalls. I was accustomed to passing one on the way to the bodega where I wired my parents money at a fraction of the cost of Western Union. The booth was a corroded metal relic covered in peeling stickers advertising unknown bands and taped-up fliers for long-passed street sales. I hoped it still worked. I couldn’t risk calling the coyotes on my cell. Tom would kill me.
Sophia spotted it first. Her distance vision could have qualified her as a fighter pilot. Mom, look at that plane. What? That speck by the skyscraper a mile away?
We sped walked the remaining block to the metal case. Wadded gum, blackened by dirt, stuck to the inside of the walls. I’d discovered the one place more diseased than a subway public restroom. Sophia’s hand gripped mine. I instructed her to keep a tight hold and stand outside.
I slipped in sideways, pulling in my shoulders to avoid touching anything other than the phone. I held the mouthpiece away from my face while pressing the top circle to my ear. There was a dial tone. Four quarters jangled into the machine. I flipped my free arm over to see the number copied from the website. The smugglers had a local area code.
A man answered on the third ring. “Return Trips Travel.”
“Hi. I’m calling because I need to get to the U.S. from the Bahamas.”
“Do you have the down payment?”
“Mostly.” I swallowed. My unpaid salary was less than half the required amount. “Can I work off a larger amount?”
“No. You’ll need the entire five before booking your trip.”
I looked longingly through the open payphone door. Sophia stood outside, twisting the lollipop in her mouth. When she caught me looking, her nose wrinkled. She grinned.
“I’ll get it.” I promised Sophia as I spoke. “I have to come home.”
23
November 28
Ryan was on his way to Tom’s when a call from Vivienne made him turn around and head back over the bridge. The prior night, a prosecutor had given the Financial Crimes Unit authority to sift through Michael’s personnel accounts for evidence that he’d been blackmailed or, more precisely, taken action to stop being blackmailed. Vivienne had already found something.
He picked her up outside the precinct. His old stomping ground was a squat gray box on the corner of Fifty-First and Third Avenue. Windows, each coated with gray film to block out prying eyes, covered the facade. The precinct recalled the Bauhaus building, save for the smart-car-sized American flag waving from above the bulletproof glass entrance. Police cars lined the street out front, parked beneath signs that threatened high fines for standing.
Vivienne hovered by a squad car in her long, black coat with a laptop bag slung over her shoulder. A lanky cop with wire-frame glasses hung behind her. She introduced him as David Parish, her new partner.
Ryan tried not to resent his replacement’s presence as the guy climbed into the dodge’s backseat. Vivienne slid into the navigator’s spot and directed him to drive out to the island. He headed to the FDR, trusting that wherever Vivienne wanted him to go was where the investigation needed to take them.
As he drove, she brought him up to speed on the progress of the FCU’s Friday night. There’d been two eye-popping expenditures in Michael’s records: a fourteen-thousand-dollar check, made out to cash, withdrawn four days before Ana’s death, and a twenty-thousand-dollar wire to the Bahamian bank account of a Charles Pinder, made two days after Ana’s fall. A web search hadn’t revealed any businesses associated with Pinder’s name, but a man with the same moniker had served ten years for human smuggling. “Maybe Pinder was more careful with his other crimes,” Vivienne said.
Ryan struggled to process the new information and keep his eyes on the road. “So where am I driving to?”
“Michael’s house,” she said. “He knows we’re coming. State attorney thought he deserved the courtesy given his financial clout.”
“Course he did,” Ryan grumbled.
“Thought you should do the honors, as you’d interviewed him before,” Vivienne said.
Twenty-five minutes later, Ryan stood at the gated entrance to a massive Long Island estate. This mansion didn’t require a qualifying prefix. A colonial home, it was every bit as large as the Bacons’ house but also sat on acres of green. Three dozen blue pines lined the property. A snow-speckled tennis court was just visible behind the gray gables of the attached four-car garage.
Ryan hung back as David rang the guard bell. An accented female voice invited them in through the speaker attached to the automatic gate. Iron bars buzzed open and vanished in a stone wall surrounding the home.
As they ascended the cobblestone driveway, the front door peeled back. A middle-aged man stood in the opening wearing a trust-me gray suit. He identified himself as “Mr. Smith’s personal attorney.”
Business cards were exchanged. Afterward, Michael’s lawyer led them through a grand foyer to a den of sorts: an oak paneled room with a billiard table and a large fireplace, over which hung massive antlers. The room smelled of tanned hide, though there weren’t any visible animal skins. Michael lounged just to the right of the hearth in a leather club chair. He glowered at them, a spoiled brat in the principal’s office waiting for his parents to speak to the headmaster.
Ryan heard a door close behind him. The lawyer gestured for the group to join Michael in the four additional leather seats, arranged facing their host. As they sat, the lawyer stood between his and Michael’s chairs and set the terms of their “voluntary interview.” Mr. Smith wanted to be helpful but would refrain from answering unfounded accusations and addressing rumors. Mr. Smith also reserved the right not to discuss any sensitive personal matters—whatever that meant.
During the drive, Ryan had considered starting with a few softball questions about Ana’s flirtatiousness intended to lower Michael’s defenses. But the attorney ruined any chance of that. He threw his hardest pitch.
“Did you sexually assault Ana Bacon when she worked for you?”
Michael’s jaw dropped. His lawyer patted his shoulder, silencing him before words could emerge.
Vivienne withdrew the laptop from her bag and turned the screen to face the accused. She’d set the video to the most damning part: Michael pinning Ana to the bench.
Michael’s tan grayed. “You can’t use that. I was at—” Again, the attorney pressed a hand on his shoulder.
“Where did you get that?” The lawyer asked.
“It’s the restaurant’s security tape.”
“It’s illegal to record a private dinner.”
“The bar has a CCTV monitoring notice,” Ryan said. “And your client hasn’t answered.”
The attorney stepped forward. “Ana Bacon surely isn’t making any allegations about my client. This interview is ov—”
“Is that the way you want to play it?” Vivienne stood. “Because sexual assault is the least of the considered charges.”
Michael patted the air for his lawyer to sit. When the man settled into his chair, he whispered into his ear. After a beat, the attorney began parroting Michael’s defense. “My client didn’t assault anyone. His secretary courted his advances, apparently to manipulate him into giving her money, and then viciously turned on him, as evidenced by her behavior on the video.”
“Blame the victim,” Vivienne muttered, resuming her seat.
“You did give her money, didn’t you?” Ryan asked.
Michael again conferred with his lawyer, keeping his hand over his mouth. The attorney gave Michael some signal: a head nod or blink of an
eye. Michael answered the question with a single word: “Yes.”
“And you gave her this money because she threatened to tell police about you trying to rape her?”
A sly smile parted Michael’s lips. He adjusted in his chair. “Nothing like that. It was charity. She was hard up. Depressed. Confused. I felt bad for her.”
Vivienne’s hands clenched beside Ryan. She must have wanted to pop the guy.
“How much?” Ryan asked.
Michael shrugged and rolled his eyes. “I don’t remember. Not much for me.”
Ryan was tempted to reveal the fourteen-thousand-dollar check, but he kept his mouth shut. He couldn’t alert Michael to the fact that FCU had been digging through his personal accounts—at least not yet.
Vivienne leaned forward, her full mouth pursed. “You expect us to believe that you gave money out of the goodness of your heart to a woman who kneed you in the balls?”
Michael smirked. “I’m a forgiving guy.”
“So Ana was hard up. Yet she went to the Bahamas on that money,” Ryan said. “Did that make you angry?”
Michael brushed his lawyer’s hand off his shoulder. “If I’d suffered financial ruin like the Bacons, I wouldn’t go on a cruise.” He shrugged. “But the Bahamas is a great place.”
“You go often then?”
“Yes. And before you ask, I visited the Bahamas the same weekend Ana disappeared. But I wasn’t on the same boat. I was on the Emerald.” He crossed his khaki-clad legs and folded his hands over his knee. “Gorgeous vessel.”
“But you both went ashore at the same time?”
“I have no idea. My wife and I got off briefly to go shopping somewhere. Our main destination was Paradise Island.”
“So you never saw Ana?”
The lawyer cleared his throat. “He’s made that clear. Ask another question or we’re done.”
Ryan exchanged a glance with Vivienne. It was time to go for the jugular. “Who is Charles Pinder?”
Michael’s smile vanished. He sat forward in the chair and leaned over to his attorney. Ryan couldn’t make out what was said, but the whispers were more vehement. The lawyer nodded along, his expression growing increasingly grave with each bob.
“You searched his financial records,” the attorney said.
“We have a subpoena,” Vivienne responded.
“Personal and corporate?”
“Just personal.”
“My client wasn’t notified.”
“It’s in the mail.” Vivienne’s new partner piped up. Ryan guessed he was being earnest, but it came out sarcastic, as though the NYPD had never intended to let Michael know that they’d scanned his recent expenditures. By law, they had to. But they had a few days’ grace.
Michael stood and walked to the door.
Ryan pressed his hand into the chair arm, helping himself stand quickly on his bad leg. “Who is Charles Pinder?”
Michael flung open the door and stormed out of the room, faster than Ryan would be able to follow.
“This interview is finished,” the attorney said.
“Who is he?” Ryan called after Michael. “Is he the man you paid to kill the woman blackmailing you?”
“It’s time for you to go.” The attorney moved toward the exit. He gestured like a butler for them to head through before him. “All future contact with my client should go through me. He won’t answer your calls.”
Ryan followed the lawyer to the front entrance. Vivienne and David trailed behind, taking advantage of Ryan’s slow gate to survey Michael’s home, showing his attorney that they weren’t intimidated by his client’s money. Once at the entrance, the lawyer again warned them all not to contact Michael directly before shutting the door behind them.
They walked to the car without speaking, aware that Michael might have cameras monitoring the driveway. Vivienne broke the silence after the Dodge had peeled away from the curb. “The mention of Pinder set him off.”
“Did it ever,” David chimed in from the backseat. Ryan caught him grinning in the rearview, a happy puppy that had caught a scent.
“Where to now?” Vivienne asked.
Ryan shifted to a faster gear. “I think you should meet Ana’s husband.”
24
August 24
My doppelganger, only younger with pockmarks beneath her makeup, sat at the desk in front of Michael’s office. A black cap-sleeve dress, fashioned out of a fabric akin to Ace bandages, wrapped around her slim figure. The neckline cut in a deep V to show slivers of cleavage. In no world did that dress qualify as business attire.
I strode past her. She hopped up just as my hand hit Michael’s closed glass door. My ex-boss appeared to focus on his monitor, no doubt scanning my notes on the California Public Employment Retirees Fund. They were his ten thirty meeting. He wasn’t expecting me, but I hadn’t needed to be on his schedule, thanks to his apparent failure to deactivate my work badge and alert security to my termination.
“Excuse me. If you’re the ten thirty, you’re going to have to wait. You can’t just go in there.” The girl was chewing gum. A glance over her shoulder revealed an open Facebook page on her computer screen. Did she even know who CalPERS was? The managers of a $230 billion fund could do whatever they wanted, including show up thirty minutes early for a meeting.
“I’m sure Michael will want to see me.”
She stepped to the side. My familiarity indicated that I knew her new boss far better than she did. I deliberately left the door open behind me. The presence of another person in the room stopped Michael from scanning the document in front of him. He shot up from the chair. Flinty blue eyes met mine. Once again, I owned his attention. “What do you want?”
I thought of Sophia at home with her daddy, missing me as I ran an “important errand.” I steeled myself. “What does everyone want? Money.”
He dismissed me with a wave. “You’re not getting any. As I already—”
“You explained why the police might not believe me.” I deliberately spoke too loud. I wanted the whole office to hear: Rick in marketing. Fadi in accounting. Jeremy in legal. All the administrative assistants. I wanted Michael’s entire fifty-person office to know that I’d been fired for my integrity, not for insubordination or mistakes or whatever lies he’d spread in my absence. “I’m here to explain why your wife definitely will believe that, as I screamed, you pulled up my—”
He rounded the desk and slammed the door shut behind me. My heart raced, but I planted my legs, refusing to allow my flight instinct takeover. I’d come here for a fight. Michael was going to pay to keep me from singing to his spouse, something to the tune of fifteen thousand dollars, the amount my parents had thrice paid coyotes to smuggle them into the country. The amount was, undoubtedly, less than he spent on a weekend away. It was certainly a bargain compared to the millions he’d lose in a divorce.
He resumed his seat behind the desk and then motioned to the opposite chair with a sweep of his arm, a welcoming gesture performed for anyone peering through the glass walls. I glanced behind me before accepting a seat. My replacement made guilty eye contact. No one else stood in the hallway.
“You really think you can blackmail me?” Michael smiled a wide Jack Nicholson grin that bared his upper teeth all the way to the fangs. “My wife isn’t possessive in that way. We have an understanding.”
I knew all about the understandings that guys like Michael thought they had: keep the wife in a lavish house with fancy clothing and a generous staff, fund her lunches, support her pet projects and charities, and then go do whatever, and whomever, you want. Undoubtedly, some men did have such arrangements. But I highly doubted that my boss had a half-open marriage. Jessica and Michael had married at age twenty-five, before Michael had made it. Rich women did not understand.
“You forget that I know your wife. We’ve talked on the phone often while you avoided her calls.” I stared him down, reclaiming the power I’d lost the prior week. “She won’t simply accept you trying t
o bed your secretary, not when she could take half your money in a divorce, maybe even half your firm.”
The mirth faded from his expression. “She won’t believe you.”
“I think she will. I spoke to my husband. You have something of a reputation.”
Michael’s smirk finally vanished. His arms folded across his chest. “I won’t be blackmailed, you little bitch.”
The curse brought me back to that night. If I closed my eyes, I would be trapped in that private bar again. I forced myself not to blink. “Then don’t think of it as blackmail. Think of it as the settlement of an unlawful termination suit. I worked hard for you: more than ten hours a day, five days a week, some weekends. I never missed a day. I didn’t deserve to be fired.”
“You had family emergencies.”
Was that his official excuse for letting me go? “I left early once, with your permission. And I worked late the following week to make up for it.”
Michael mumbled, “Not late enough.”
“I think your wife will agree that it was plenty late.”
Michael drummed his fingers against his desk. He sighed. “Well, I can’t justify not compensating you for services rendered. Pick up your last check from Linda on your way out. She’ll make sure it includes earned vacation.”
I had a week of unused leave. That added to my days worked would equal just about three thousand. “That’s not nearly enough.”
Anger darkened Michael’s pale skin to a reddish tan. “You listen to me. You’ll take what an axed employee gets and not a cent more. You think you’ll have a chance to share your allegations with my wife? My attorneys will gag and bind you like a BDSM hooker. And if you think your husband is unemployable now, wait till I get through with him. Believe me.”
The threat to Tom erased my fear. Michael had tried to rape me and now he was going after my family.
“No.” My voice didn’t sound like my own. “You wait till I get through with you. Jessica and I will be having lunch with her half of your money. Your kids will hate you. Believe me.”
