A Matter of Choice (22 page)

"I guess Jessica told you about this morning." As the coffee heated on the stove, David reached for cups.

Slade lifted a brow. What was this, he wondered. "Shouldn't she have?"

he countered.

"Look, I don't have anything against you--I don't even know you." David turned, tossing back the hair that fell over his brow. "But Jessie's important to me. When I saw her come out of your room this morning, I didn't like it." He measured the man across the room and knew he was outmatched. "I still don't like it."

Slade watched the eyes behind the lenses. So this was her private disagreement. Jessica had the loyalty she expected here, he mused. "I'd say you don't have to like it," Slade said slowly, "but Jess wouldn't feel that way."

Uncomfortable under the direct stare, David shifted a bit. "I don't want her to get hurt."

"Neither do I."

David frowned. Something about the way Slade said it made him believe it. "She's a soft touch."

Temper leaped into the gray eyes so quickly, David nearly backed away.

When Slade spoke, the words were soft and deadly controlled. "I'm not interested in her money."

"Okay. Sorry." Relaxing a bit, David shrugged. "It's just that she's gotten stung before. She trusts everybody. She's really smart, you know--for a scatterbrain who forgets what she's doing because she's doing twenty things at once. But with people, Jessica wears blinders."

The coffee began to boil over behind him. David spun around and turned off the burner. "Look, forget I said anything. She told me this morning it was none of my business, and it isn't. Except that... well, I love her, you know," he mumbled. "How's she feeling?"

"She'll be better soon."

"Boy, I hope so," he said fervently as he brought the coffee to the table. "I wouldn't want her to hear me say it, but I could use her at the shop. Between getting the new stock checked in and Michael's moodiness..." David grimaced and dumped milk into his coffee.

"Michael?" Slade prompted casually.

"Yeah, well, I guess everybody's entitled to a few temper tantrums.

Michael just never seems to have a temper at all." He flashed Slade a grin. "Jessica would call it breeding."

"Maybe he has something on his mind."

David moved his shoulders absently before he drank. "Still, I haven't seen him this unraveled since the mix-up on the Chippendale cabinet last year."

"Oh?" Some wells, Slade mused, took no priming at all.

"It was my fault," David went on, "but I didn't know he'd bought it for a specific customer. We do that sometimes, but he always lets Jessie or me know. It was a beauty," David remembered. "Dark kingwood, great marquetry decoration. Mrs. Leeman bought it the minute it was uncarted.

She was standing in the shop when the shipment came in, took one look, and wrote out a check. Michael got back from Europe the day we were packing it for delivery and had a fit. He said it had already been sold, that he'd had a cash advance." David took a quick sip of his coffee, discovered it was bitter, and drank again resignedly.

"The paperwork had been mislaid, I guess," he went on. "That was odd because Jessie's a fiend for keeping the invoices in order. Mrs. Leeman wasn't too pleased about the mix-up either," he recalled with a grin.

"Jessie sold her a side table at cost to soothe her feathers."

"Who bought it?" Slade demanded.

"What, the cabinet?" David adjusted his glasses. "Lord, I don't know. I don't think Michael ever told me, and with the mood he was in, I didn't like to ask."

"You have the receipt?"

"Yeah, sure." Puzzled, David focused on him again. "At the shop. Why?"

"I have to go out." Slade rose swiftly and headed for the rear stairs.

"Don't go anywhere until I get back."

"What are you--" David broke off as Slade disappeared upstairs. Maybe he was a nut after all, David mused as he frowned at Slade's empty chair.

You're having a casual conversation with a guy and all of a sudden he's...

"Make sure Jess stays put," Slade ordered as he came down again. His jacket was already zipped over his revolver.

"Stays put?"

"Don't let anyone in the house." Slade paused long enough to aim hard, direct eyes at David. "No one comes in, got it?"

Something in the eyes had David nodding without question.

Slade grabbed a napkin and scrawled a number on it. "If I'm not back in an hour, call this number. Tell the man who answers the story about the cabinet. He'll understand."

"The cabinet?" David stared dumbly at the napkin Slade thrust into his hand. "I don't understand."

"You don't have to, just do it." The back door slammed behind him.

"Yeah, sure," David grumbled. "Why should I understand anything?" A loony tune, he decided as he stuffed the napkin into his pocket. Maybe writers were supposed to be loony tunes. Jessica sure knew how to pick them. With a glance at his watch, he decided to check on her. Maybe the writer was a little loose upstairs, maybe not, but he'd managed to unsettle him. When David was halfway down the hall, the parlor doors opened.

"David!" Jessica closed the distance between them at a run, then launched herself into his arms.

"Hey, what gives!" He managed to struggle out of her hold and take her by the shoulders. "Is there a different strain of flu running around that affects the brain?"

"I love you, David." Close to tears, Jessica framed his face with her hands.

He flushed and shifted his weight. "Yeah, I love you too. Look, I'm sorry about this morning--"

"We'll talk about that later. There's a lot I have to tell you, but I need to see Slade first."

"He went out."

"Out?" Her fingers dug into David's thin arms. "Where?"

"I don't know." Intently, he studied her face. "Jessie, you're really sick. Let me take you upstairs."

"No, David, it's important." Her voice changed from frantic to stern--the one he always responded to. "You must have some idea where he went."

"I don't," he returned a bit indignantly. "We were sitting there talking one minute, and he was up and heading out the next."

"About what?" Impatient, Jessica gave him a quick shake. "What were you talking about?"

"Just this and that. I mentioned that Michael'd been moody--like he'd been when we'd had that mix-up on the Chippendale cabinet last year."

"The Chippendale..." Jessica pressed her hands to her cheeks. "Oh God, yes, of course!"

"Slade gave me some business about not letting anyone in the house and calling some number if he didn't get back in an hour. Hey, where are you going?"

Jessica had swung her purse from the newel post and was rummaging through it. "He's gone to the shop. To the shop and it's nearly ten!

Where are my keys! Call--call the shop, see if he answers." In a quick move, she dumped the contents of her purse on the floor. "Call!" she repeated when David gaped at her.

"Okay, take it easy."

While Jessica made a frantic search through the items on the floor, David dialed the phone. "I can't find them. I can't--they're in my coat!" she remembered and dashed for the hall closet.

"He doesn't answer," David told her. "Probably hasn't had time to get there yet if that's where he was going in the first place. Which doesn't make any sense because it's closed and... Jessie, where are you going?

He said you weren't to go out. Damn it, you forgot your coat. Will you wait a minute!"

But she was already racing down the front steps toward her car.

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Chapter 11

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It took Slade only a few moments to pick the lock on the front door of the shop. If there was one thing he was going to see to before he left, he decided, it would be to get Jessica to a decent locksmith. A miracle she hasn't been cleaned out, he mused as he moved through the main shop into the back room. Blind luck, Slade concluded, then tossed his jacket over a chair. Moving in the dark, he passed through the kitchen into what served as an office.

There was a large mahogany desk with neat stacks of papers, a blotter with names and numbers scribbled on it, and a Tiffany lamp. Slade switched it on. He caught the boldly printed ULYSSES NEEDS FOOD on the blotter right beneath the scrawled "New mop hndl--Betsy annoyed." With a half grin, Slade shook his head. Jessica's idea of organization was beyond him. Turning away, he walked to the file cabinet set in the rear corner.

The top drawer seemed to be her personal items. He found a receipt for a blouse she had bought two years before in a file marked INSURANCE

POLICIES--SHOP. Between two file folders was a wrinkled grocery list. On a sound of annoyance, he pulled out the second drawer.

It was the other side of the coin. The files were neat, legible, and in perfect order. A quick flip through them showed Slade they were receipts for the current year, arranged chronologically, delivery bills, also current and chronological, and business correspondence. Each section was a study in organized filing. He thought of the top drawer and shook his head.

In the third drawer he found what he was looking for--receipts from the previous year. Slade drew out the first file folder and took it to the desk. Methodically, he scanned each one, beginning in January. He learned nothing else, when he had completed the first quarter's receipts, other than the fact that Jessica did a thriving business.

Slade replaced the first folder and drew out the second. Time ticked away as he examined each paper. He drew out a cigarette and worked patiently from month to month. He found it in June. One Chippendale cabinet--kingwood with marquetry decoration. His brow rose slightly at the price.

"Not a bad deal, I imagine," he murmured. Noting the name of the purchaser, he smiled. "Everyone makes a tidy little profit." After pocketing the receipt, Slade reached for the phone. Brewster might find David's little story very interesting. Before he had punched two numbers, Slade heard the sound of a car pulling up outside. Swiftly he turned out the light. As he moved from the desk he drew out his gun.

Jessica sped along the winding back road that led to her shop. If she'd had an ounce of sense, she berated herself, she would have told David to call the number Slade had given him. Why hadn't she at least told him to keep calling the shop until he reached Slade?

Nervously, she glanced at her watch. Ten o'clock. Oh God, if only the man coming to meet Michael were late! Slade would be in the back room, she concluded, searching through the old receipts. What would the man do when he got to the shop and found Slade there instead of Michael?

Jessica pressed down harder on the gas and flew around a turn.

The beams of approaching headlights blinded her. Overreacting, she swerved, skidding the left rear wheel on the shoulder of the road. Heart in her throat, she fishtailed, spun on gravel, then righted the car.

That's right, she thought with her heart pumping, wreck the car. That'll do everybody a lot of good. Cursing herself, Jessica wiped a damp palm on her slacks. Don't think, she ordered herself. Just drive--it's less than a mile now. Even as she said it, the car sputtered, then bucked.

Frustrated, Jessica pressed down hard on the accelerator only to have the Audi stall, then die.

"No!" Infuriated, she slammed both hands against the steering wheel. The needle on the gas gauge stayed stubbornly on empty. How many times! she demanded. How many times had she told herself to stop and fill up?

Knowing it wasn't the time for self-lectures, she slammed out of the car, leaving it in the middle of the road, lights beaming. She started to run.

Slade stood pressed behind the doorway that led to the back room. He heard the quiet click of the doorknob, then the cheery jingle of bells.

He waited, listening to the soft footsteps and gentle breathing. Then there was a coldly patient sigh.

"Don't be childish, Michael. It hardly pays to hide when you leave a car out front in plain view. And you should know," he added softly, "there's no place you can hide from me."

Slade hit the overhead lights as he turned into the room. "Chambers, isn't it?" he said mildly. "With the fetish for snuffboxes." He leveled the gun. "We're closed."

With no change of expression, Chambers removed his hat. "You're the stockboy, aren't you?" He gave a wheezy chuckle. "How foolish of Michael to send you. But then, he hasn't the stomach for violence."

"I don't have that problem. Rippeon's in the morgue." When Chambers gave him a pleasantly blank look, Slade continued, "Or don't you catch the names of the pros you hire?"

"Death is an occupational hazard," Chambers said with an elegant shrug.

He never bothered to glance at the gun leveled at his chest. He knew a man was the real weapon, so he watched Slade's eyes. "What has Michael promised you, Mr..."

"Sergeant," Slade corrected, "Sladerman, NYPD, temporarily attached to the FBI." Slade caught the faint flicker in Chambers' eyes. "The only deal I have with Adams is a quiet... talk in the near future involving Jessica Winslow." The thought gave Slade a moment's grim pleasure.

"Game's up, Chambers. We've had Adams under surveillance for some time, along with a few other members of your team. You were all that was missing."

"A slight miscalculation on my part," Chambers murmured as he glanced around the shop. "Normally I don't involve myself directly with any of the transports. But then, Miss Winslow has such a charming shop, I couldn't resist. A pity." He looked back at Slade again. "You don't look to be the type who'll take a bribe... even a lucrative one."

"You seem to be a good judge of character." Keeping the gun steady, Slade reached for the phone on the counter.

With the breath tearing in her lungs, Jessica dashed the last yards toward the shop. She could see the lights glowing behind the drawn shades. Her thoughts centered solely on Slade, she hit the door at a full run.

At a speed unexpected in a man of his bulk, Chambers grabbed her the moment she stumbled inside. His arms slid around her throat. Before fear could register, Jessica felt cold steel against her temple. Slade's forward motion stopped with a jerk.