As Rabbi left, Gulliver took a closer look around the Club Room. He stared at the coats of arms and the foxhunting scenes. A year from now no one would even remember that Black and Blue had been here, Gulliver thought. Some yahoo in a salvage yard in Pissville would be selling the Club Room panels. The coats of arms would end up in flea markets in Indiana. The foxhunting scenes would find new homes in interstate motel rooms.
In Manhattan everything was about what was hot. Tomorrow didn’t matter. You could never be sure of tomorrow.
Then someone standing behind Gulliver’s chair spoke. The world stopped turning. “Hello, Gullie.”
The woman’s voice cut a hole through Gulliver’s chest and into his heart. He froze with panic. It couldn’t be Nina. Not Nina, not after all this time. Nina, who seventeen years ago had given him love and hope for two months. It was the only love, the only hope, he had ever known. Then she had robbed him of both things as quickly as she had given them.
He could not bring himself to turn around. Because it might be her, or because it might not be? Not even he knew the answer. He had to look. He gathered up every ounce of strength he had and turned his head.
CHAPTER THREE
Nina Morton was even more beautiful now than she was as a teenager. She stood only two feet away from him. But it felt like seventeen years away. He was time traveling. It was again graduation day at Sachem North High School on Long Island. That was the last time he had seen her. All the anger and bitterness of that day welled up in him again. The tears too. He pushed them down. He would not let her see him cry. Not again.
He willed his hands not to shake. Nina had tried to speak to him on graduation day, after she had broken up with him. He would not listen then. He did not want to listen now. It was hard to listen with a broken heart. Seventeen years ago he had hobbled away from her as fast as he could. He had tripped over the hem of his graduation gown and fallen into a puddle. The other kids laughed at the mud on his face. One said, “Hey, Gulliver, now you look just like Keisha.”
The cruel things the kids said that day didn’t matter. He was bulletproof. No one could hurt him more than Nina had. Gulliver remembered something else about that day. It was Nina’s old boyfriend Eddie who had helped him out of the mud. He remembered the sad look in Eddie’s eyes. They had looked almost as sad as Gulliver felt.
“Leave him alone, Nina,” Eddie had said, stepping between her and Gulliver. “You’ve already done enough damage.”
His last memory of Nina was of her black graduation gown disappearing in the crowd.
He wanted to tell her how stupid in love with her he had been. Instead, he said, “You look vaguely familiar. So who are you again?”
“Nice try, Gullie. You still can’t lie to me.”
“You lost the right to call me Gullie seventeen years ago.”
“Sorry, Gulliver. May I sit down?”
“Sit. What do I care? You own the place, right?”
“I do, yeah,” she said.
Gulliver held down his anger. He watched Nina as she took Rabbi’s seat. Much about her had changed. She was just a girl when he’d known her. She had remained unaged and unchanged in his heart. Now she was thirty-five. Woman-hood agreed with her. Her bobbed black hair, coppery eyes, perfect nose and full lips still tugged at him. Her lush curves had deepened. Gulliver had run his hands over those curves thousands of times in his painful daydreams. The outlines of her legs had been further defined and sculpted by time. Nina knew how to make up. She knew how to dress. She wore a simple gray cocktail dress that fit her body the way white fits rice. Her light black stockings had a sexy seam that ran down the back of her legs and into killer black heels. Yet there was a sadness in her smile that he didn’t recognize.
They sat silently across from one another. Each one was studying the other. Then she said, “I was very, very sorry to hear about Keisha.”
“I guess your sympathy card got lost in the mail. Damned post office.”
She bowed her head. “I didn’t think you would want to hear from me.”
“I didn’t…I still don’t,” he lied.
Nina ignored that. “Besides, when did you ever want anybody’s sympathy?”
She had a point. Like Rabbi, Nina had been able to look directly into Gulliver’s teenage heart. He could hide nothing from her back then. And he guessed he wasn’t doing it very well now. But Nina’s gift was different than Rabbi’s. Rabbi was kind of blind to Gulliver’s looks. Nina wasn’t blind to Gulliver at all. She had seen Gulliver for what he was. And for two months, seventeen years ago, Nina Morton had ignored his height and deformities. She ignored the whispers from her friends. She ignored the taunting of her rivals. She had walked the halls of Sachem North High School holding Gulliver Dowd’s hand.
“Well, I was sorry to hear about Keisha. Whether you believe me or not. I liked her. You must have been very proud of her when she joined the police force.”
Gulliver was being torn in half. He was twisted inside out. He wanted both to beg her for another chance and to spit in her face. He wanted to hold her. He wanted to run his hands over her curves. He wanted to gimp away and never look back. But he couldn’t stand the pain of her bringing his dead sister into it.
“What’s this about, Nina? You didn’t arrange this meeting just to tell me you were sorry about Keisha. After all this time, what could you want from me? Did you want to kick me around a little more to feel important?”
“I need your help,” she said. A lone tear slid down her left cheek.
Gulliver hissed, “Fuck you!”
“I guess I deserved that.”
“You deserve a lot more than that. Did Rabbi have anything to do with this setup?”
“No. I worked through one of his clients. He’s a man I…” She cleared her throat. “Let’s just say I know him very well.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” he asked.
She ignored him. “I need your help.”
“Why, are you starting a freak show to compete with the one in Coney Island?”
“My daughter is missing.”
“I don’t do runaways,” he lied again. Runaways were a big part of his business. Parents of missing children didn’t care about his looks. Parents of missing children only cared about one thing—finding their children. “Just call the cops.”
“I can’t.”
“Then find somebody else,” he said.
“Her name’s Anka.”
Gulliver wouldn’t budge. “Beautiful name. So what?”
“It’s Polish for Hannah, your mother’s name.”
“My mother thanks you. If you want, I can recommend some—”
“She’s sixteen, Gulliver.” Nina’s voice was sharp, brittle. “Do the math, you idiot. She’s yours.”
After a moment someone said, “Is she…normal?” It was Gulliver.
Nina handed him a photo. “She’s perfect.”
CHAPTER FOUR
The Wilton Academy was perched on a bluff above the Hudson River. It was about fifty miles north of New York City. The trees in the city were still lush and green. But the trees near Wilton had begun to change into their fall wardrobe. The view from the car window was a leafy rainbow. Bright yellows, deep reds, pale browns and a hundred shades of green. The blue skies with pillowy white clouds could make you believe that all was right with the world. But you would be wrong.
Gulliver’s van was fitted with special equipment, so he was able to drive. But his head was still spinning from the news that he had a daughter. A beautiful, five-foot-seven-inch, blond-haired, blue-eyed daughter. One named after his own mother. His head was spinning because that new and perfect daughter was gone.
So instead of driving himself to the school that Anka attended, Gulliver went to Wilton with Ahmed Foster. Ahmed was the ex-Navy Seal who had taught him knife-fighting skills. He and Gulliver weren’t friends, exactly. But they had known each other since high school. Ahmed had even dated Keisha for a time back then. Gulliver
and Ahmed had met again at Keisha’s funeral and formed a kind of team. Whenever Gulliver needed someone to help on a case, he hired Ahmed. He was built like a linebacker. He had a face that was as rough as the side of a cliff. He also had a cold stare that scared the hell out of folks. With Ahmed around, people paid less attention to Gulliver than usual.
The Wilton Academy did not accept everyone. Not even if their families were rich and powerful. So Gulliver’s newfound daughter was not only even prettier than her mother, she was also really smart. She was a very gifted artist too. After Nina had told him about Anka the night before, she’d taken Gulliver to her office. She’d shown him all of their daughter’s report cards. She’d shown him photo albums. All the pictures were of Anka. The first ones were of Anka as a baby. The newest ones were taken at her last birthday party. The walls of Nina’s office were decorated with Anka’s artwork. There were paintings, photographs and figure drawings.
“These are incredible,” Gulliver had said, staring at his daughter’s artwork. “Amazing!”
But not everything had gone so smoothly.
“Why didn’t you tell me the truth until now?” Gulliver had asked, his voice full of anger.
“I didn’t tell anyone the truth. After a while I began to believe the lies myself. I wanted the baby, Gulliver. But if my parents had known you were the father…”
Nina didn’t need to say another word. Gulliver understood. Her parents would not have let her have a child that could turn out looking like a garden gnome. It hurt to think that. But it was the truth. And he never turned away from the truth.
Nina went on, “It was hard enough to convince them to let me keep the baby. No matter who the father was.”
“Funny you should mention that. Who did you tell them the father was? Eddie?”
Nina looked sick. “No. I had broken up with Eddie by then. You knew that. They knew that. I told them I’d faked my way into a bar in Smithtown. I said I got really drunk and slept with some guy I met there. I said I didn’t know his name. That he was visiting from out of state. They believed it because they wanted to believe it.”
“You mean, as long as it wasn’t me,” Gulliver said.
She couldn’t look him in the eye. “Yes…as long as it wasn’t you.”
“But after you moved out of the house and had the baby…why didn’t you tell me then?”
“Because she was mine, Gulliver. I raised her. I managed to get through college and everything. Just Anka and me, with a little help from my aunt in Boulder. I went to school out there. No one else was a part of our lives. And like I said, I began to believe my own lies. It was easier to pretend her father was some nameless guy I screwed in a bar parking lot. It was less painful that way. Sure, I thought of telling you over the years. But I thought you hated me for breaking up with you on graduation day.”
“You were right. I did hate you. I do.”
“I had to do it. To hide the pregnancy from you. After that the timing never seemed right. There isn’t a right time to tell someone that kind of secret.”
“But you’re telling me now,” he said.
“Only because I have to. I’m scared. I will do anything, Gulliver…anything to get her back.”
He shook his head. “Anything but go to the police.”
“I can’t,” Nina said. “I own this steakhouse. But I borrowed the money for it. And not from a bank.”
“You idiot,” Gulliver screamed at her. “You borrowed it from loan sharks!”
“Not exactly. I borrowed it directly from Joey Vespucci.”
“Joey ‘Dollar Menu’ Vespucci! The guy who runs what’s left of the mob in New York?” Vespucci was nicknamed Dollar Menu because he loved fast food.
“I’ve known Joey for many years,” she said. “We did other business together. He loaned me the money at very low interest. I just had to front some other businesses of his.”
“What other businesses?”
Nina turned away. “Clubs.”
“Clubs?”
“Do I have to spell it out for you, Gulliver?”
“Gentlemen’s clubs, sex clubs,” he said. “But what does any of this have to do with Anka going missing?”
“This place is doing great. And I got a legitimate loan to pay off the note and to pay Joey back all the money he loaned me.”
“Let me guess, Nina. When you paid him back, you asked if he would let you get off the paperwork from the other places. That you didn’t want to front for him anymore. He told you to take a hike. You acted all tough. You told him you would go to the cops if you had to. Then he threatened you. He probably had a file with Anka’s picture in it. He knew where she went to school and everything. Am I close?”
“It was exactly like that,” she said. “It’s like you were there. Do you see why I can’t go to the cops? If Joey’s got her, he’ll kill her.”
“How could you let yourself get into business with a wiseguy? Once they have you, they never let you go.”
“I knew him from before. I trusted him. I couldn’t let the opportunity to buy this place get away. It would mean I could finally get out from under. I could send Anka to school anywhere she wanted. She could live a life that I never could. She could be free in a way I never was.”
Gulliver sneered. “Yeah, look where that kind of freedom’s gotten her.”
“Find her,” Nina said. Her voice was soft.
Then she unzipped her gray dress. She dropped it to reveal a silken black bra, a matching thong and garter belt. She undid her bra. It fell at her feet. Her breasts were fuller than he remembered. Her nipples, dark and erect. She moved close to Gulliver. She reached for his jacket.
“Find her, Gullie. Like I said, I’ll do anything. Let me show you.”
He stepped back, slapping her hands away.
“For almost twenty years, Nina, I’ve dreamed of us being together again. In spite of how you broke my heart. I imagined a million scenes of us in bed together. Sometimes, after Keisha died, the only thing that made life worth living was thinking about us back together. Now you just make me sick.”
He grabbed a small leather case from his jacket pocket. He took out a business card and put it on her desk.
“Email or fax me about her school and who I should talk to. I will deal with Joey Dollar Menu at the proper time. But first get me that stuff.”
As he walked past her, Nina said, “I’m sorry, Gullie. I’m desperate. I just don’t know what else to do.”
He said nothing, just kept walking to the door.
“Where are you going?” Nina called after him.
“To forget my past and think about my future,” Gulliver said. He’d slammed the office door shut behind him.
Now Gulliver could not get the image of Nina’s half-naked body out of his head. No matter how furious he was with her, he was still in love with her. It hadn’t been easy to turn his back on what she had offered. Maybe when he found his daughter, he would see if they could try again. Maybe then Gulliver would see if there was anything left between Nina and him. Maybe then he would let Nina show her gratitude.
Ahmed turned off the country lane. Gulliver knew he had to stop daydreaming about Nina. Only one thing mattered now. Anka. Ahmed drove through the gated archway. He drove past the tall stone walls that surrounded the campus of the Wilton Academy. He came to a stop on the gravel driveway in front of the main building. It was a massive red-brick manor house that had been turned into a school building. Tall columns supported an arch of concrete and stone. Ivy crawled over the walls. It was hard to see the red brick beneath.
Before they had even gotten out of Ahmed’s pearly-white Escalade, a frumpy elderly woman was heading down the steps toward them.
“That’s one unhappy-lookin’ lady,” Ahmed said.
“Missing girls are bad for business. Come on, let’s go see what there is to see. When I’m inside with Miss Sunshine, you go have a chat with security.”
“I know the drill, little man. You do your thin
g. I’ll do mine. The brothers’ll talk to me.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Gulliver had never believed people really had names like Muffy and Jocasta. But he would have to change his mind about that now.
Miss Sunshine held her hand out and down to Gulliver. She said, “A pleasure, Mr. Dowd. I am Dr. Cissy Fenn Chatsworth, headmistress of the Wilton Academy.”
“A pleasure,” he repeated. He gave her papery hand a soft shake.
She looked as if she wanted to wash her hand after Gulliver had shaken it. Gulliver noticed. He had the urge to tell her not to worry. That what he had wasn’t catching. He kept his mouth shut because he needed this woman’s help. He couldn’t risk angering her. Not yet.
Dr. Chatsworth showed him into her office. She forced him to have some tea with her. Then she gave him Anka’s file. “She was a wonderful student, a true star of her class.”
She went on about how bright Anka was. What a talented artist she was. She showed him Anka’s test results from the previous year. She gave him all of the instructors’ glowing student evaluations. But there was a strange tone in her voice. It sounded a lot like pity. He knew the sound of pity better than any man alive. There was something else that didn’t escape Gulliver’s notice.
“Dr. Chatsworth. I notice you keep referring to Anka in the past tense. You are perfectly happy to discuss last year. But you haven’t said a word about what’s been going on this year.”
“I’m afraid it is a very old story, Mr. Dowd,” Dr. Chatsworth sighed. “Girls come to us bright and full of promise. Then they make the wrong sorts of friends or discover boys and…This year Anka returned from her summer vacation a different girl. She was angry and uncooperative. She did only C work. She didn’t seem at all interested in any of her clubs. Yes, as I say, a very old story. You are not the first person to come here looking for a missing girl, Mr. Dowd. Nor will you be the last.”
“I’m not worried about them right now. I’m worried about Anka.”
Dirty Work (Rapid Reads) Page 2
