"Do not bother. I'll get there on my own," he said and hung up.
Karina felt the pain of the thought that he belonged to someone else, that he, for sure, would go to meet the girl she saw hugging him a year ago.
Daniel enjoyed preparing himself to meet with Neta. He knew he would surprise her with his visit and he might also meet her boyfriend in her apartment, but he decided nothing could stop him. He wanted Neta at all cost. In his last conversation with her three months ago, he told her he would come back to the country and take her with him to Romania as soon as the bungalow project was done. She cried instead of answering him, which caused him to be more determined in his decision.
He arrived in Neta’s neighborhood. It was old and not well-manicured. He was shocked by the appearance of the neighborhood and thought how easy it was to forget the place you came from. He got out of the taxi, gave the driver a handsome paper bill and asked him to wait. He went up to the third floor and knocked at the door.
"Just a moment!" he heard someone shouting inside. He thought it was Neta’s mother. 'She really knew how to yell', he remembered what Neta had told him about her parents fighting and shouting all the time. The key was turning inside the lock. It took a long time, but Daniel remembered they were a bit disabled and understood this was probably the reason. He heard the mother cursing while attempting to open the door. When it was finally opened, a thin woman without teeth and with a hat on her head stood in the doorway. "What do you want?" she appeared not to be expecting a visitor like Daniel. She looked a little embarrassed about the way she yelled before and tried to sound nice, but the direct question was daunting.
"I came to see Neta."
"Neta doesn’t live here!" She replied, trying to sound polite and quiet.
"Who is he?!" He heard someone yelling inside the house.
"Why are you shouting?" the mother shouted back.
A short man with a big Kipa on his head came to the doorway.
Daniel looked at the interior of the house and saw the cracked walls. From the entrance, the broken upper center above the door of the old kitchen was visible. The walls never seemed to have been painted since it was built. The floor was black, though it was clean, which left a gloomy atmosphere. Ten years ago, he could certainly be jealous of Neta for these conditions, but now his life was much better, he could not help thinking about the difficult life Neta had with – her parents who never gave her the chance to talk to them about a thing, and who never understood anything, and a house where it was impossible to host anyone. Now he understood her desire to escape from this reality, even if it was meant for her to marry someone she didn’t love.
"Where is Neta?" the question was now intended for the father standing near the door.
"Neta got married. She doesn’t live here anymore. She lives in Bat Yam."
Daniel felt his legs were abandoning him. Suffocating heat filled his lungs. Dizziness threatened to knock him down. He leaned against the door frame and continued to listen to Neta’s father who seemed to be talking to himself, "She's not here... she's married... she does not live here..." He repeated again and again like a scratched record, but for Daniel, he felt he was being whipped again and again.
"What happened to him?" he heard the mother asking in surprise. But her husband continued, "She's married… she does not live here ..."
He realized no one seemed to invite him to sit. It was not because they were not polite, but because they had no idea that his world just fell apart. He sat on the stairs facing the door and started to think. A year ago she said she had a serious boyfriend but would wait for him. Now he understood what Mikhail said that his revenge toward his grandfather would eventually cost him a lot. Why did he ever think she would wait for him, especially if she was living in these harsh conditions, with parents like these and a house like this? Who wouldn’t want to run away from this reality?
If he had showed up at her house the Friday he was forced to leave, he would have been familiar with the difficult situation, but her conditions had always been better than his. She had been receiving gifts and money from her aunt, gifts that he never dreamed to have for himself during those days. If he only knew she had lived in this condition… He noticed her parents were about to shut the door and only then did he recover a little. "Do you have her phone number?"
Neta's mother did not answer, but went inside. A moment later she came back with a small phonebook. "Here, look for Neta’s name. She wrote down her phone number."
Daniel memorized the number. He promised himself he’d call her from the hotel. But when he arrived at the hotel, he laid back and tortured himself with disturbing thoughts. The phone in his room rang again and again, and then his mobile phone. He knew it was Karina. He was angry with her because she never left him alone. He dialed Neta’s number and felt an intensifying excitement to hear the sound of her voice.
"Hi Neta, this is Daniel. I’m at Acadia hotel in Hertzelia. I need to talk to you," She was silent and he continued. "I know you are already married, but I need to see you. I came for a visit just for you, so don’t disappoint me." Neta was still silent. "I will close the phone, but I will be waiting for you." He closed the phone and consoled himself in the hope she would come. But the anticipation was worse than he thought. After an hour, she didn’t arrive or call. Daniel sank helplessly until the point he wanted to go to her house and take her with him by force, even against the will of her husband.
He didn’t feel himself fall asleep. He had a busy day, the flight, the whole thing about chasing Neta, and the disappointment. At eleven o’clock at night, he was awakened by knocks at the door. 'It’s not Neta. There’s no way she would come at this hour,’ he thought. But there was a glimmer of hope.
He opened the door and she stood there, so beautiful. "My husband went for a three day ‘just for men’ trip to Eilat."
He smiled, pleased she was willing to risk her marriage just to meet him. He looked at the buttons of her shirt, which were open.
"Well, that makes everything easier. You're coming with me to Romania."
"It’s a little late Daniel, I'm married," she said as she showed the ring around her finger.
He took her hand and pressed it to his lips but she pulled her hand away. "I'm married, did you hear what I said?"
"It's just a ring around your finger, but your heart belongs to me, you know it. You will do everyone a favor if you come with me to Romania. What kind of life will your husband have if your heart is with me? What kind of life will you have? How much time can you hang on? This needs to end. You can’t let yourself live with someone just because of gratitude."
He saw her in tears. "You see what I mean?" He pulled her body towards his to comfort her, feeling a strong desire to sleep with her.
"I love you, Neta."
Her cell phone rang sharp and jumpy. "It is Danny, my husband," she was frightened.
"Do not answer," Daniel urged.
"I need to."
"No, you don’t have to." He grabbed her hand, which prevented her from answering.
"Oh, you're hurting me."
"Please, Neta, leave this moment for me."
Neta looked at him with a loving gaze. "I must answer."
Daniel stepped away from her, but he could hear the voice of her husband.
"Where are you?"
"At home, sleeping. How’s Eilat?"
Danny was silent for a while. "Great, I hope I did not disturb you from your sleep."
"No, it’s okay."
Danny released a sigh. "Tell me, where exactly are you roaming around at this hour?"
"What do you mean?"
"I'm home." Danny hung up the phone.
Neta looked at Daniel. She was horrified. "He's home. He came back from Eilat, how could that be?" She got up quickly but Daniel pulled her into his arms.
"Stop it. Try to help me get out of it!"
"What do you want, to find you a cover for tonight, some excuse for you? You don’t need it. Come w
ith me to Romania."
"It doesn’t work that way. I am married to a man who is pretty good to me. I can’t just leave him." She continued to defend her marriage.
"I talked to you three months ago, and I told you I was coming. You didn’t object; you deceived me. You let me feel that you wanted me. Then suddenly I came and you are more or less married. It’s not fair.”
"Oh really? I was ready to give up everything for you. I was even ready to leave my parents here and come to Romania with you, up to the moment I read some rumors about you and Karina Lavi." Neta was crying. This news obviously hurt her, at least at the time.
She took out a paper from the rumor’s page where it was written that Karina was dating a Romanian businessman named Daniel Montaigne.
Daniel looked at the page she handed him, "This is not true. She is my business partner. There’s nothing between us. This is a mistake." He tried to bring her close to him, but she moved away.
"It's too late to fix the mistakes," she took her bag and walked towards the door. On the doorway she stopped for a moment. "Daniel, it's over. Go and live your life. Just forget about me."
"Why did you come here in the first place?"
She looked at him. The tears in her eyes were dried. "To see you for the last time."
The door closed behind her.
Daniel ordered vodka to his room. It was the only way, he thought, he could get through the night, drinking himself into mental blankness, no bitter thoughts and no heart bleeding from disappointment. He did not hear the phone in the late morning and not even the knocks at the door until he heard Karina’s angry voice to the bell boy, "Open the door now!"
She took a glass of water and emptied it in his face. Daniel rubbed his eyes and saw the blurred image of Karina. She opened the curtains, staring at the vodka on the table.
He scratched his head and still couldn’t understand what had happened to him. He glanced at the clock on the wall and was reminded of the meeting that was set with the investigation office.
"I tried to call you all morning, sitting like an idiot with no idea what was going on. I was worried something happened to you, and you're here with vodka." He got up and walked towards the shower. She heard the water running, and after ten minutes he came out with a towel around his waist.
"What's wrong with you?" she yelled at him.
"Enough, get over it." He sat on the couch trying to recover from the brief remarks that he was caught up in.
“Do not patronize me. You're not doing me a favor. I tried to do you a favor, but you are one piece of egocentric man who doesn’t know how to appreciate anything."
He laid his head on the back of the sofa and closed his eyes. He didn’t have any strength, not for the yelling and not for the favors. Everything became futile after yesterday’s loss, including the mother who decided to leave her son for the sake of America.
He heard the sounds of her heels slowly going away. The door opened and shut. He went back to sleep.
19
Karina was sitting in the waiting room in Granot Gideon's office. She arrived for the meeting just out of discomfort, after having been compelled to cancel the previous meeting when Daniel didn’t show up. Now she planned to talk to Gideon for a little while and let him convince her there was nothing to investigate and get out from there. After the indifference Daniel showed, she didn’t have any intention of helping him anymore.
Gideon’s name had been given to her by Gilad, who recommended she go to him and clarify the details about Daniel, as they believed Daniel was some type of crook. He told her about Gideon's dramatic exposure, which brought his name to the headlines and led him up to the position of provincial officer in the police investigations division. A story which unfolded over two pages was hung on the walls of the waiting room. It was about the body of a man that was found in Shomron, which led to the arrest of an Arab from Kfar Bara. It was a police story that turned out to be complicated. Gideon Granot revealed a sad and creepy story. The guy who was killed was a married man who had a passionate love affair with a married woman. When the husband learned about the affair, he murdered the married lover. The victim’s wife knew who the killer was, but the pain and betrayal made her satisfied with the murder and she even covered up for the killer. The conspiracy of silence could have continued for years if Gideon Granot hadn’t dug deeper.
Following the investigation, Gideon was greatly appreciated. When he retired from the police, he found himself depressed. He was unable to accept the fact that he was too old to serve the country, and so the idea to open an investigation agency was born.
Amos, a journalist and a friend from the army, wrote a nice article about Gideon’s new endeavors as a private investigator, as he emphasized stories that left a mark in the police force. Karina also looked on all other articles that were framed. It was focused on Gideon’s glorious past in the police force.
As she sat opposite him at the office, she couldn’t recognize the guy who was pictured in the lobby. There was no resemblance between the man in a police uniform and the man that was sitting in front of her, a man with a slender and young build.
He looked at her eyes, invited a conversation, and despite her great anger towards Daniel, she found herself telling, with emotion, the story of a boy who grew up in a boarding school, who was left at the age of five with the nasty social worker Deborah after his mother left for America, leaving him under the care of his grandfather, Moshe Kowalski. She also talked about Kowalski’s attitude, Daniel’s deportation from Israel and the transition to Romania. When she finished, she was quiet and waited for a response from Gideon.
"What do you actually want to know?" Gideon asked slowly, in a deep voice.
"Two things: first, is his mother really in America? Maybe you could find her and hear from her about Daniel's father. Second, I want to know if Julia's words were correct - if Moshe Kowalski really is Daniel’s grandfather, or maybe Moshe was right and she just accusing him of things that are not true."
Gideon scratched his forehead. "Finding the mother would not be difficult, I suppose. To prove Daniel is the grandson of Mr. Kowalski would be very difficult, I think. If you came to me when Daniel was still a little boy, we could have forced the father to do a paternity test but now, it’s already impossible, at least until we acquire incriminating evidence. But let’s start by locating the mother."
Karina was a little bit disappointed. She didn’t expect a detective with Gideon’s profile would tell her only Julia could testify Moshe Kowalski was his grandfather. She was hoping to get some support from him on her claim, but he was not even thrilled by the name ‘Moshe Kowalski’. "Well, let’s begin the investigation and see how it goes." She said.
"You know, Karina", Gideon turned to her to the purpose of preparing her for her obligation that she would pay him even if he didn’t find anything, "I must be honest with you. You are trying to find proof to your story, that’s why you are here, but you should know you can also be surprised. There is a possibility you can’t find what you are looking for or you can find other things beyond what you expect."
Karina was annoyed not to be taken seriously – to insinuate that the story was heading to different directions just because Kowalski was involved here? She noticed she was taking things personally, as if they touched her and not Daniel. "Moshe’s behavior verifies the story, it’s suspicious. He threw Daniel off of the yacht. If Daniel is not his grandson, what was he so afraid of? Why was he so angry with Daniel? But drop it, like you said, start your quest with Julia. Maybe after you find her, you will start to believe me more."
Gideon noticed her agitated reaction to what he said. He wanted to say the guy was a living legend, that this case seems to be refuted. But he kept it to himself. "Okay, I’m ready to do a preliminary investigation on the subject. For now, I need a nominal amount for the initial expenses. When I have more information, I can give a more accurate estimate of the cost of the investigation."
Karina signed a check
for Gideon. Her fingers were delicate and beautiful. The fingernails were coated with a colorless nail polish. The ring on her finger marked her attribution. Gideon did not have enough money to buy such a ring, but he recognized the quality. He was very fond of jewelry. He often looked at the beautiful Cartier jewelry in showcases and dreamt that one day he could buy himself a diamond ring or a luxurious watch like Cartier, Breitling or Rolex. Her ring was a Cartier, he had no doubt. But what was jewelry compared to the real thing? The woman sitting opposite him was a piece of jewelry from head to toe. When she talks, she reveals rows of diamonds. When she shakes hands, she reveals amazing nails. Her eyes would shame emerald stones. She was perfect. Karina gave him the check and he put it in the drawer without looking at it.
A week later, Karina was surprised to receive a phone call from Gideon. "Well, it turns out that I was right - this story has a lot of inaccuracies which intensify my feelings that your guy was not telling the whole truth." He was careful in his words, not to reveal what he really felt about this tale. "I did not find any trace of a woman named Julia entering Israel, and certainly not an exit to America. And the worst of all, I did not find any documentation in Romania. She just doesn’t exist. I suggest you check the details closely and get back to me. There are some inaccurate things in the story. It’s a waste of your money.”
"What do you mean you can’t find her? This is an Intelligence agency isn’t it? If you cannot find her, then who will?" Karina said, angry at how easily Gideon solved a very difficult task. "Did you try to meet with the social worker?"
"Why is it any good?" Gideon asked.
"If you don’t check, we will not know."
Gideon hung up. He felt he got a slap in the face. He called Alon who was sitting in the other room. "Come to my office."
Alon took a chair and sat down in front of him.
"We have a case and I'm not sure if it is an interesting investigation we should put our heads into or if we should just shake it off." Gideon told Alon the details of Daniel's story based on what Karina had told him. "I made some calls, but I didn’t find any Julia. It’s some sort of a weird story, but the woman who wanted this investigation is quite interesting, and she has the means. I want you to check at the welfare office if there is a woman named Deborah who is familiar with this story. We'll try to find something. If not, we'll let Karina know the investigation is over.”
Vanished Without A Trace Page 10
