Obsessed

by Ted Dekker

  He walked toward the sound of voices in the kitchen.

  “The carrots and onions do the trick, I’m telling you,” Chaim was saying.

  “Smells delicious.” Sylvia’s soft voice. “You really didn’t have to go to so much trouble for—”

  “Nonsense. Besides, Stephen insisted.”

  She chuckled. “I hate to break it to you, dear Rabbi, but Stephen is only a friend. And I think the feeling is mutual.”

  Stephen pulled up short.

  “Are you accusing me of meddling?” Chaim objected. “How does an old man like me propose to meddle in the lives of two young pups?”

  A pot boiled gently on the stove.

  “Two lovely, beautiful young pups, I might add.” Chaim said. “A lonely man and a lonely woman, searching for love, practically ordained for each other.”

  “Please! I don’t know where you get the idea that I might be interested in Stephen. As a friend, sure. But trust me, he’s not my type.”

  “Oh? And what is your type? You’re both Jewish.”

  “There’s more to a relationship than religion.”

  “You don’t find him physically attractive? And he’s ambitious, smart, strong willed—you could never go wrong with a man like him.”

  “Don’t get me wrong, I like him, I really do. I just can’t imagine him as any more than a brother.”

  There was a pause. Long enough for Stephen to realize that he’d started to sweat.

  “I think you’re wrong about him,” Chaim said.

  “Please, what’s wrong with a brother?”

  Stephen backed up a few paces then walked forward, hoping they could hear him. He rounded the corner, saw Sylvia kiss Chaim on the forehead. Brown hair fell to her shoulders. She had a small nose, dwarfed next to the rabbi’s. Chaim was no beast, but Stephen couldn’t help but think that Sylvia was indeed the beauty kissing the beast.

  “And you’re like a father to me,” Sylvia said.

  “What is that incredible smell?” Stephen asked, stepping into their view.

  Chaim and Sylvia both started.

  He winked at them. “Is this the talk of love that I smell? Or is it veal parmesan?”

  “Hello, Stephen.” Sylvia exchanged a quick glance with Chaim. “It seems that God has informed the rabbi that you and I should fall madly in love and raise a dozen children in marital bliss.”

  “Oy, I said no such thing!”

  Stephen stepped to Sylvia and kissed her on the cheek. “Thank you for coming.”

  “My pleasure.”

  Stephen withdrew a box from under his arm and handed it to Sylvia. “In case the rocks still taste like dirt.”

  “Chocolates.” Chaim arched an eyebrow.

  “Rocks?” Sylvia asked.

  “Chaim was telling me this morning how even the rocks taste like chocolates when you fall madly in love. From his own vast experience, of course.”

  Sylvia took the box. “Thank you. These look wonderful.”

  Chaim eyed him. “Are you okay?”

  “Fine? Why wouldn’t I be? Today I found my mother. Her name was Rachel Spritzer. She was a very wealthy woman. A few days ago she died and left me nothing.” He shrugged. “So what has changed? Nothing.”

  “She was your mother,” Sylvia said.

  “Was she? And what is a mother?”

  They both looked at him.

  “How is the district attorney today?” Stephen said. “Keeping our streets safe from thugs?” He made no secret of his skepticism when it came to her boss, Ralph Ferguson, the bald, potbellied DA who’d come to Los Angeles from the East Coast seven months earlier. Sylvia still hadn’t committed to liking or not liking the man, even after going on four months as one of his attorneys fresh out of law school.

  “That would be the police chief ’s department,” she said. “We only lock them up.”

  “Lock ’em up . . . take ’em off the street . . . same thing. People don’t give you enough credit. That whole department would fall apart without you.”

  She laughed. “Last I checked, I was still chained to the research desk, but thanks for the vote of confidence.”

  They avoided the subject of Rachel Spritzer for the next twenty minutes. They were all thinking about it, Stephen knew. It was in their eyes and on the tips of their tongues. But they were giving him the space he demanded.

  The veal smelled wonderful, but Stephen hardly tasted a bite. They made small talk about the church Chaim attended, about Sylvia’s research, about the deal Stephen was working with Dan Stiller.

  “I visited the Holocaust museum,” Stephen finally said after a stretch of silence.

  Chaim set down his fork. “You did?”

  “Yes. And the will makes no provision for any other party.”

  “You told them who you were?” Sylvia asked.

  “I told them I was Stephen Friedman.”

  “But they knew you’re related?”

  “Of course not. How am I supposed to prove that? ‘Hi, my name is David Spritzer, son of Rachel Spritzer; hand over the goods’?”

  “There has to be a way.”

  “I don’t even know if I am her son.”

  “You must be,” Chaim said. “How could she ever know about the scar? No, there is no doubt.”

  “Legally there could be,” Stephen said.

  “Hire an attorney,” Sylvia said.

  “I don’t want to hire an attorney. I want closure. And I think I have it now. She was my mother; I can probably accept that. End of story.”

  “It can’t be the end of the story,” Chaim said. “She alluded to some danger. Sylvia, can’t you talk to the police about this?”

  “Please, no,” Stephen objected. “Really, whatever was in her past is in the past. Finished. I just want to get on with my life.”

  Stephen pushed a piece of meat into his mouth. “I’m not the only one she abandoned. Her dog’s on the street as well.” He immediately regretted the remark.

  Chaim raised his eyebrows. “That was her dog?”

  “I think it might live in the basement.”

  “The building has a basement?”

  “Not so uncommon for a building that size. Nothing but an old boiler and utilities down there.”

  “How old is the place?”

  “Built in 1947. The boiler isn’t in use, of course. Maybe she stashed all her gold in the sewer.” He couldn’t seem to stop this flood of spiteful comments.

  Sylvia looked up from the meat she was cutting. “What sewer?”

  “There was a manhole in the boiler room. I assume it leads to an old drainage sewer of some kind.”

  Chaim glanced at Sylvia and then back. “A manhole? How big?”

  Stephen set down his empty fork and indicated with his hands. “About so.” It was absurd to think that Rachel Spritzer would put anything in a sewer. Besides, the cover hadn’t been touched in years.

  “Since when do they put entrances to public sewers in private buildings?” Chaim asked. “In Russia maybe, but not here.”

  “They don’t,” Stephen said. “But if the sewer predated the building, it’s possible. I’ve seen it. These days, they would simply collapse the sewer and reroute it, but not in the forties.”

  “Could be submerged utility valves,” Sylvia said.

  The rabbi began to eat again. “Could be a bomb shelter.”

  “It could be a secret entrance to Fort Knox,” Stephen said. “Please. It was in the utility room.”

  “How big did you say?” Chaim asked.

  “Eighteen inches?”

  “I would think that was a floor safe,” Chaim said.

  “No, it was a manhole cover of some kind,” Stephen insisted.

  “How do you know this?”

  “Well, I don’t.”

  “There you go, then. A floor safe.”

  “Makes sense to me.” Sylvia winked. “You walked away from a fortune without knowing it.”

  “The cover was caked with an inch of gr
ime,” Stephen said. “No keyhole either.”

  “Still, I like the idea of a safe. A woman who owned one of the Stones of David would like the idea too.”

  Stephen rolled his eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous. Nobody has touched it for years—does that sound like a safe to you? I can’t believe we’re even talking this way.”

  Chaim nodded. “You’re right. It was a drain.” He sliced into a potato. “I’m very sorry about all of this, Stephen. Maybe Sylvia is right. You should hire an attorney.”

  “I don’t need an attorney. I have Sylvia. Honestly, I don’t have a case, do I?”

  “No telling without digging deeper,” Sylvia said.

  “But from what you know.”

  “No, probably not. But you never know until you dig deeper.”

  The image of that manhole cover, or whatever hid behind the potbellied boiler, fixed itself in Stephen’s mind.

  “I don’t think I could handle digging deeper. I’ll just . . . things will be fine. I’m working on a very good deal with Dan; I have a wonderful home. Wonderful friends.” He attempted his best smile. “This will all pass, and things will be fine. You’ll see.”

  SYLVIA LEFT at nine, and Stephen retired to his room at ten.

  He climbed under the sheets and turned off the lamp, but he could not sleep. What if Chaim was right about the safe? Absurd. Eighteen inches—about right for a safe. A big safe, anyway. Too small for a manhole, really. Floor safes weren’t that uncommon, although a safe behind a boiler was odd. Maybe he should return with a few tools and clean off the lid. Settle the matter. A safe would have a lock of some kind.

  He tossed and turned. The hour hand on the white-faced alarm clock by his bed crept past midnight.

  Say, for the sake of argument, that there was a safe behind the boiler. And say that there was more to Rachel’s estate than what her will revealed. Wasn’t it possible she would have left it in a safe? Maybe for her real son to find? He considered the note.

  I had hoped he would come . . .

  Even if the circle behind the boiler did belong to a safe, there might be no way to open it. Short of owning the building, breaking into the compartment was out of the question. Had she hidden a key in the basement? Or in her apartment?

  Stephen crawled out of bed at one, went to the bathroom and returned, careful not to slough off what little grogginess had set in after three hours in the dark. Sleep. Please, let me sleep. He plopped into bed and shut his eyes.

  What would she hide in a safe anyway?

  The Stones of David.

  No, she’d donated the one Stone in her possession to the museum. If she would have had two or three or all five, she would have donated the entire collection.

  She’d had a month to settle her estate before dying—surely she would have itemized her estate. Rachel hardly seemed the kind who would lock up a treasure in a floor safe and then forget to list it among her assets. Especially something so valuable as the Stones of David.

  Unless she wanted her son to find them without tipping off whomever she was afraid of. There was a thought. A silly, stupid thought. But a thought that kept him awake.

  ROTH BRAUN sat in the black sedan and peered into the night. It was now well past midnight, and the long journey from Germany had worn him thin. If not for his anticipation of the satisfaction that lay ahead, he would have collapsed long ago.

  But Roth wasn’t fueled by regular flesh and blood and muscle and sinew. He drew his power from the blackest part of night.

  He picked up the penlight with his gloved hand and snapped it on. A round circle of light lit the book that lay on his lap.

  A telephone directory of greater Los Angeles. A monstrous thing that he would have preferred to leave back at the hotel. But he needed options in the event that the Jew he’d selected was unavailable or hard to reach.

  There was always the possibility that he might select the wrong woman. Name alone couldn’t confirm heritage. For all he knew an American Indian married a Jewish man and now bore the name Goldberg. But that didn’t really matter. The selection of a Jew as opposed to an Indian or a German wasn’t critical, though certainly more rewarding.

  It did have to be a woman. His father had selected women. A woman had been his father’s undoing. Yes, it had to be a woman.

  His penlight illuminated the first name he’d chosen. Hannah Goldberg. Sounded like a Jew. Certainly a woman. Hopefully living alone.

  According to the phone book, she lived across the street from where he was parked now. The number on her mailbox read 123423. Such a big number for an address. The Americans were far too many.

  By night’s end they would be at least one fewer.

  Roth snapped the light off and set the book on the passenger seat. His fingers were trembling, but he knew he could subdue this visible anticipation with a single squeeze. He had this power. For the moment he would indulge the slight physical response.

  Roth picked up a red scarf, ran the silk under his nostrils, inhaled slowly, then tucked the long scarf into his pocket.

  He opened the car door, stood in the night, glanced up and down the vacant street, pushed the door closed. He rounded the hood and headed across the street. A single porch light lit the entryway. Otherwise the house was dark.

  It was going to be a good night.

  8

  Los Angeles

  July 19, 1973

  Thursday Morning

  BLINDING RAYS STREAMED THROUGH THE WINDOWS WHEN Stephen pulled himself from sleep the next morning. He swung his legs to the floor. Nine o’clock. When had he fallen asleep?

  He hurried to the shower. First stop, Rachel Spritzer’s apartment. He considered running the comps he’d promised Daniel first but decided that could wait. He had to get this other business out of his blood.

  He’d go, find nothing, and be done with his mother’s apartment. End of story.

  He couldn’t remember ever feeling so knotted up. The obscure hope that had kept him awake last night now demanded that he get into the apartment complex and down to the safe.

  What if?

  No, Stephen, not what if. Impossible, crazy, stupid.

  But what if ?

  From his clock radio, Diana Ross was belting out “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough.”

  THE REALTOR’S sign was missing from Rachel Spritzer’s yard when Stephen pulled up an hour later. Huh. Even if the Germans had made an acceptable offer, the sign usually remained until closing.

  A single brown car Stephen recognized as Mike Ryder’s waited along the curb. No pedestrians. And no cocker spaniel. Probably off licking someone else’s hand.

  Stephen got out of the Vega, grabbed a hefty screwdriver and a hammer from the floor behind the driver’s seat, shoved the first in his slacks’ front pocket, and slid the hammer into the inside pocket of his blazer. The folds of his pants easily concealed the screwdriver; the hammer wanted to lean out. He tried to flip the hammer around so the head would sit in his pocket. No luck. He would have to hold it in place with his left forearm.

  He patted his left breast pocket and headed toward the front door. If he was lucky, he would miss Mike. A quick trip down to the basement, and he would be gone. He was a Realtor with legal access—he wasn’t exactly breaking and entering. Still, sweat glistened on his brow. Hot day.

  Stephen stopped at the door. No lock box. No sign; no lock box. For a brief moment, he actually panicked. How could . . .

  The door swung open and Mike stood in the frame. “Stephen!” He clearly hadn’t expected anyone. “Whoa, too strange. I was just going to call you.” He stepped out and shut the door behind him, then donned a pair of mirrored aviator shades. “Sorry, man. It’s off the market.”

  “What do you mean, ‘off ’? Pulled?”

  “Sold.”

  “Sold?”

  “Closes tomorrow morning. Impossible, I know, but true. What can I say? Sometimes they go your way; sometimes they don’t.” A slight smile curved his mouth.

  “H
ow can it close tomorrow?” Stephen asked, seeking a new angle. He still wanted in, to satisfy his curiosity if nothing else. “Paperwork takes longer than that.”

  “Not necessarily. Clean title, cash deal.”

  “The German?”

  “Roth Braun. Asking price. Paid for the furnishings too. Signed the papers yesterday.”

  “He’s here?”

  “Not at the moment, but I’m sure he will be. Sounds like he intends to live out of the top floor for a few days while he finishes his business here in the States.” Mike locked the door and walked down the steps.

  “Any chance you could let me in?” Stephen asked.

  “In? Why? It’s sold.”

  “Not technically. It’ll be sold tomorrow morning. If they make closing. Either way, I think I left my wallet somewhere inside.”

  “As far as I’m concerned, it is closed,” Mike said. “They put half down in earnest money. Two hundred fifty thousand smackaroos, my friend. That sound anything but done to you? I’m not sure I’d want to be caught inside the property when Braun shows up. Considering the size of the deposit, we’re giving him access. I’m surprised he’s not here already.”

  Stephen almost walked away then—he really had nothing to gain at this point.

  Except maybe an inheritance that was rightfully his. Except maybe four more Stones of David.

  “I’ll be sure to hurry. Just let me in. I’ll lock up. I’m a Realtor, for heaven’s sake. This is what I do. Five minutes max. For my wallet.” The hammer felt heavy in his jacket, and he turned slightly away.

  “If he shows up—”

  “My wallet, Mike! He won’t.”

  Mike looked around and shrugged his shoulders. He pulled out a key, jogged up the stairs, and unlocked the door. “Locks from the inside. Make it quick. Trust me, you don’t want to run into Braun. The dude gives me the creeps.”

  “If it becomes an issue, I’ll tell him I entered the building while you were still inside. You left without knowing I’d come in, and I left shortly after.”

  “Yeah. Okay. You have a hammer in your pocket?”

  Stephen froze briefly. Recovered. “Oh, yeah. I forgot it was still there.” He pulled it out, thinking it was impossible to forget such a bulky object. “Pounded in a sign just a bit ago.”