by G. M. Ford
The Feds were playing it close to the vest. Victims remained anonymous. They’d released only the names of those in jail and those in pieces. Other than that, all they’d say was that the investigation was ongoing and that they anticipated further arrests.
Corso took his time. Worked through the world news, the metro section and finally the sports before trashing the paper and making his way into the American Airlines waiting area. A quick scan of the area revealed Andriatta wedged into a seat near the center. Corso ambled over and stood in front of her.
She took her time looking up.
“Long as we’ve got some time on our hands, why don’t we get you a ticket back to Newark,” he said.
She shrugged and got to her feet. Together, they made their way over to the counter, where they stood in silence as a family of four tried in vain to arrange seats next to one another. “We’re on our way to Edgewater, Pennsylvania, by way of Pittsburgh,” Corso told the woman behind the counter. “How quickly can we turn it around and get back to Newark?” Corso watched as her long, square fingernails tapped the keys. “A 10:07 A.M. to Pittsburgh. A forty-minute layover, then an 11:59 to Newark.”
“Nothing later today?” he inquired.
She shook her head. “Once a day to Newark.”
“What about to Seattle?” Andriatta asked.
Before the woman could ask the computer, Corso waved her off. “Never mind,” he said. “I’m not headed home just yet.”
“Oh?” Andriatta said.
“I’ve got a few loose ends I want to look into.”
“Such as?”
“How many to Newark?” the woman wanted to know.
“One,” Corso said.
“None,” Andriatta said.
The woman put her hands on her substantial hips and scowled from one to the other. “What’s it gonna be?” she asked.
“One.”
“None.”
She looked at them sideways and smiled. “You’re putting me on, right?”
“I thought you couldn’t wait to get back home,” Corso growled at Andriatta.
“I changed my mind,” she said.
“I’m lost here.”
“What else is new?”
Corso opened his mouth to speak but couldn’t find the words. He ran a hand through his hair and looked at the ceiling. “You want to give me a hint?”
She stepped in close. The top of her head barely reached his chin. “It’s like you said before. I signed on for this thing.”
Corso shook his head in disbelief. The gate on the right was calling for first-class passengers to board. “That’s us,” Corso said.
Andriatta let her feet do the talking. Corso turned to the woman behind the counter. “Sorry,” he said.
She was amused. “Maybe you ought to tell her that,” she said.
36
T he Hertz kid turned bright red. “There’s a…a bit of a problem, I’m afraid.”
“What kind of problem is that?” Corso asked.
“The balance on your Number One Club account.”
“How much?”
“Forty-three thousand six hundred seven dollars and twelve cents.”
Corso pulled his head back in awe. “Is this a joke?”
“No, sir.”
“What for?”
“A Chevy Suburban.” He traced the invoice with the tip of his finger. “Serial number…”
Corso cut him off. “The one that ended up in the lake?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I took out the extra insurance.”
“Yes, sir. I can see that?”
“Then how can I owe Hertz for the car?”
“It says here that the police are listing the incident as a suicide attempt. Our insurance doesn’t cover anything like that, so the liability falls back on you.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Yes, sir.”
Corso leaned on the counter and pondered the situation. “Tell you what…” he said after a moment. “…What say we let the lawyers sort that one out for themselves.”
The kid’s eyes rolled in his head like a spooked horse. “Yes, sir,” he said tentatively. “The lawyers.”
“In the meantime you rent me something with four-wheel drive…”
The kid strove to speak, but Corso kept talking. “…Ms. Andriatta and I will drive it into town for the night. First thing in the morning, she’ll be back with the car.”
“I can’t do that, sir.”
“Look,” Corso began. “This isn’t the kind of thing that’s going to get settled between you and me, here and now.”
“No, sir.”
“So…with that in mind…what say we let Hertz’s attorneys and my attorneys do what they already get paid way too much for doing.”
“I can’t do that, sir.”
Corso turned to Andriatta. “Rent us a car. I’ll pay you later.”
The kid managed a waxy grin. “All I need is a credit card and a valid driver’s license,” he said.
Andriatta shook her head. “Every piece of ID I own is back at the hotel,” she said.
“Gotta have the plastic,” said the kid.
Corso looked around the terminal. The Dollar and Enterprise desks were dark and empty. “You’re the only rental car company open,” Corso said.
“Yes, sir,” the kid agreed. “Nasty night like this, folks tend to go home early.”
“Walking is pretty much out of the question,” Corso said.
“Yes, sir.”
Outside, it seemed to be snowing in circles. Windblown flakes passed through the realm of the overhead lights, cascading out of the blustery darkness, swirling into view for just long enough to make a sense impression before falling to the earth like icy darts from the great beyond. The twenty-four-seater from Pittsburgh was already collecting snow on the wings. The tracks made by the baggage carts, only minutes old, were nearly obliterated.
Corso paced a quick lap around the area in front of the desk. He pulled his wallet out of his pocket, dug around inside for a moment and came out with a platinum VISA card. He threw it onto the desk with a flourish.
“Charge the balance to my card.”
The kid’s eyes opened wide. “You mean like the whole…”
Andriatta stepped up to the counter. “Stop it,” she said to Corso.
Corso kept his gaze glued on the kid. “I’ll buy the damn car,” he said.
Andriatta picked the card off of the desk and handed it back to Corso. “Stop throwing your money around,” she admonished. “Your mother wouldn’t approve.”
A tense moment passed. Corso snatched the card from her fingers and was about to return it to his wallet when something inside caught his eye. He slid the credit card back inside and then pulled out a business card. He looked over at the kid.
“Can I use your phone?”
“If it’s local.”
Corso held out his hand. The kid surrendered the receiver. The cord didn’t reach over the desk, so Corso had to read him the number. The kid dialed. One ring. Two rings, then three, before a voice came on the line.
“Carl,” Corso said. “This is Frank Corso. Yeah. Yeah. Hey…yeah, L.A. on the TV. Yeah. I’ll tell you all about it. Yeah sure. Hey…I was wondering if maybe you could help me out with a problem. I’m at the airport. I need a ride into town.” He briefly listened. “It’s a long story, man. I’d really appreciate it. Yeah. Ms. Andriatta…my associate…yeah…no…no luggage. Thanks. Really…thanks. See you then.”
Corso gave back the receiver and turned to Andriatta. “Twenty minutes,” he said.
She nodded and crossed to the middle of the terminal and took a seat. Corso followed along like a stubborn puppy. He left a seat between them when he sat down.
They sat looking out at the gathering gloom. Another small jet sent plumes of windblown snow into the air as it taxied away from the terminal, out onto the runway, then disappeared out of sight. “Thanks,” Corso said.
�
��For what?” Andriatta asked, looking straight ahead.
“For keeping me from making a fool of myself over there.”
“I promised. Remember?”
“I’d have regretted it later.”
“Your mother’s voice.”
“Big time.”
Another silence ensued. “I’m sorry,” Andriatta said.
“For what?”
“For being such a bitch back in L.A.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“No really…I mean it.”
“Consider it forgotten.”
“I’m amazed you put up with me for as long as you did.”
Corso looked puzzled. “Put up with what?”
She reached across the empty seat and punched him in the arm. “Stop it.”
“I’m the same way,” Corso said. “There’s something about somebody pulling rank on me that brings out the idiot in my soul.”
“Especially when it’s the government,” she said. “When the people who are supposed to be on our side, when the people who are supposed to be helping us out turn out to have an agenda of their own.”
“Everybody has an agenda.”
“That’s always been hard for me to accept.” Corso watched as she went through some inner dialogue with herself. “I guess I’ve always been a bit naive,” she said. “Maybe even a romantic.”
“That’s the same thing Short said.”
She looked surprised. “What?”
“That he’d been a fool for believing people and institutions were better than they turned out to be.”
“World needs more people like that.”
Corso shot her a quick look. “Maybe.”
By the time Carl Letzo arrived, they were out of small talk. Corso was stretched out, fingers laced behind his head, feet halfway over to the next row of seats. Andriatta, had tried the opposite approach, pulling her feet up into the seat with her, scrunching up, and was trying to use the armrest as a pillow.
Corso closed his eyes and began to dream. He could see the shipwreck. Just south of Mukilteo. Lying half-up on the beach like some dead animal washed ashore by winter’s weather. And then the noise of shoes. Somebody cleared a throat.
Carl wore a long, tweed overcoat. The roughness of the fabric and the length of the sleeves made it look like it might have once belonged to his father. Corso gathered his feet beneath him and pushed himself upright. “Really appreciate you coming down here on a night like this,” he said.
“No big deal,” Carl assured him.
“How you doing?” Corso asked.
“Hargrove hasn’t fired me yet,” said Carl with a crooked grin.
“Let’s see if we can’t fix that,” Corso said.
37
C lad in a white courtesy hotel robe, Andriatta stepped through the adjoining door and looked around Corso’s room. She rubbed a towel around her head and neck. “Seems like weeks since we were here last.”
“Yeah,” Corso said. “Like some other life or something.”
“Seems like weeks since I had a shower.”
“First time I was ever glad to see my old clothes.”
She used the flat of her hands to press her hair between the folds of the towel, then shook her head to get everything more or less in the right place.
“How come you insisted on the same rooms we had the last time?”
“I was hoping something would come to me.” He waved a hand in the air. “Something…you know…something that was right in front of my face when I was here the last time…something I failed to see.”
“I don’t for the life of me understand what you’re looking for.”
“I’m looking for a link. Something that connects what happened in L.A. to what happened here.”
“It’s over,” she said. “The people responsible are either locked up or in the graveyard.”
“Not all of them.”
“Who appointed you the minister of justice?”
“I like things neat and tidy.”
“In case you haven’t noticed, the world’s a mess.”
“There’s a connection.”
“What if there’s not?”
“Fernando Reyes was one of the guys who jumped me in my room.”
“Because he had a bad knee?”
“Because his credit card history shows he bought an airline ticket from L.A. to Pittsburgh, then on to Edgewater. He flew in the day I arrived and flew back home the day after the attack.”
“It could be…” she stammered. “I don’t know…maybe…”
“There’s no maybe,” Corso said.
A knock sounded at the door. Corso tensed but didn’t move. The banging came again, louder this time. Corso eased over in his stocking feet and peeked through the lens in the door. Satisfied, he pulled open the door. A hotel maid stepped into the room carrying a bundle in both hands. “Jour oder stoof,” she said, offering the makeshift package to Corso, who took it, thanked her with a five-dollar bill from his pants pocket and quickly shepherded her back into the hall.
Andriatta followed along as Corso carried the bundle over to the desk. The package was a bedsheet, pulled tight in all directions and tied crosswise. Corso tugged at the knots until he got one to budge, then shook some of it out onto the desk.
Mostly it was paper. All the stuff they’d collected before being hijacked to L.A. by the government. Corso’s research notes from Nathan Marino’s parents and brother. The research from the newspaper archives. Andriatta’s interviews with his schoolmates. Nathan’s high school yearbook. The stuff they’d been going through when they’d answered the proverbial knock on the door.
Corso picked through it with his fingertips and folded the sheet back over the top like a diaper. “I’ll go back through it in the morning,” he announced.
“You hungry?” Andriatta asked.
Corso nodded and checked the clock. Seven-twenty in the evening.
“Where the hell did the day go?” he asked.
“We got a late start out of L.A. and lost three hours to time zones,” Andriatta offered. She smiled. “Not to mention turning out to be the curse of Hertz Rent-A-Car.” She snapped her fingers. “There goes the day.”
Corso crossed back to the desk, slid the bundle of paperwork down onto the chair and found the room service menu. He handed the little leatherette binder to Andriatta.
Half an hour later they were stretched out, eating on the bed, finishing up a pair of mediocre steaks and mounds of garlic mashed potatoes. Corso reached over and poured the last of the wine into her glass. The first bottle had disappeared in a heartbeat. The second had taken a little longer. He stuffed the bottle neck down into the wine bucket.
“Sure you don’t want to change your mind about dessert?” Corso asked. “We could always call room service again.”
“No…no…” She waved him off. “I’m getting fat as a cow.”
“You sure?”
“Positive.”
Corso rolled off the bed onto his stocking feet. He bent and picked up his tray.
“Get the door will ya?” he asked.
Andriatta scrambled to her feet. She stood at the edge of the bed for a moment and brought a hand to her forehead. “Whooo,” she said. “Had a little too much wine methinks.”
“No such thing,” Corso said. “You can’t be too thin, too rich or drink too much good wine.”
Corso followed her across the carpet. Her first try at opening the door was thwarted by the safety lock. Bang. “Oops,” she giggled and tried again.
Corso placed his tray on the floor in the hall, then returned to the room and retrieved the other. “Nothing worse than old food in the room while I’m trying to sleep,” he commented as he crossed the room. “I always feel like it’s looking at me in the dark.”
“Are you serious?”
“Swear to God,” Corso said, stepping back inside, taking the door from her hands and securely locking it.
“Must be your rural backgroun
d,” she said. “Putting it outside must be the urban equivalent of hanging it up in a tree so’s the bears don’t get it.”
“Something like that,” Corso agreed.
Andriatta stifled a yawn with the back of her hand.
“We gotta stay up,” Corso said.
“Why’s that?” she asked around another yawn.
“Because…for us…it’s only five-thirty at night, remember? We go to sleep now, we’ll be up in the middle of the night.”
“I feel like I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in a week.”
“Why doncha see what’s on the tube?” Corso suggested.
Chris Andriatta crossed to the bed stand, picked up the remote and snapped on the television. She propped a pair of pillows against the headboard and lay down.
“Here it is,” she said.
Corso crossed the room to see what she was talking about. Sure enough, there was Morales mouthing silent words into a microphone. Corso watched as she tried to find the volume control. The picture switched to the debacle on Santa Monica Boulevard. Then to one of ambulances arriving at emergency rooms. Then back to Morales. “Something else. Anything else,” Corso pleaded.
“Don’t you want to hear what they’re saying?” she teased
“I’d rather watch a spleen being removed,” Corso said.
“Oh come on.”
“My own.”
Morales’ voice suddenly filled the room. “We believe the group has effectively been put out of business,” he was saying. “As of this morning…”
“Please,” Corso begged. “Anything but…”
He moved to the side of the bed and tried to snatch the remote from her hand, but she saw it coming and rolled away laughing. Corso put one knee on the bed and tried to pry the remote from her grip. When it seemed for a moment that his superior strength would prevail, she used her free hand to reach up and grab him by the shirt, to pull him off-balance, sending him sprawling headfirst across the bed.
“Oops,” she said.
Their bodies lay crosswise. Corso could feel her beneath him, her belly heaving, straining for breath under his weight.
“Off, brute. I’m suffocating here.” She shoved him, not hard.
Corso rotated his body. Still on top of her, only now his face was in her feet and his feet were in her face.
