Cut and Run (13 page)

“Look,” he said, “I'm not interested in hurting you. A buddy of mine is in some trouble. To help him, I need your cooperation.”

“Or you'll do the story—or just give it to someone else on the
Gazette
who'd do it?”

She gave him an I-dare-you-fucker look, but this time she was the one bluffing. He had her scared. She didn't want her secret to get out.

He sighed. “No, I won't do the story, and I won't give it to anyone who would. I've never been one for blackmail. And I frankly don't care if you can play piano with one hand and one foot tied behind your back. My editor doesn't care, my readers don't care, and probably ninety-nine percent of the people in the world don't care. Ninety-nine percent of the people in your world may care, but they don't read the
Washington Gazette.
”

Her mouth drew in in a straight line, and she looked away. This time he didn't care if she felt bad. If she couldn't stand the truth, then she'd better get the hell out while she was still young enough to do something else with her life.

“Talk to me, Juliana,” he said.

The softness of his voice surprised him, and her, he would have guessed, but before he could find out for certain, a giant hand clamped down on his shoulder and lifted him up off the stool. Matthew looked up into the deep brown eyes of Len Wetherall. It wasn't only Wetherall's size his colleagues had respected, but also his tenacity and his intelligence—not to mention his temper.

“The lady doesn't want to talk,” the former basketball superstar said, his tone misleadingly mild.

Juliana sipped her water and didn't bother even glancing around. Matthew considered hinting he'd tell Wetherall what she'd been up to at Lincoln Center on Saturday night if she didn't help him out, but he doubted that would do any good. First, he'd just told her he'd been bluffing. Second, if he did tell, Wetherall would just toss them both. Third, no matter what he did, he assumed he was out the door anyway.

“You finish your beer?” Wetherall asked.

“All set. I'll need the check—”

“It's on the house.”

“Thanks, but I pay my way.”

Matthew pulled out his wallet and dropped a ten on the bar. Len let go, and Stark tried to give Juliana a look that told her what he thought of her chickenshit attitude, but she wouldn't meet his eye. He gave up and headed for the door.

On his way out, he glanced back and saw that Juliana had swung around on her bar stool and was watching him leave. He expected a look of apology for getting him thrown out, even an indication that she appreciated his not telling her boss how she'd wowed the Lincoln Center crowd on Saturday night without once banging out any notes with her feet and now was willing to talk.

But all she gave him was a cocky little smirk. Even with Len Wetherall hovering over her. Matthew was hard-pressed not to march back in there and haul her ass off the stool.

The little pissant was enjoying herself.

Juliana's feeling of victory didn't last. Len leaned back against the bar next to her and said idly, “Dude called you Juliana.”

“Yes, I know.”

“Is one of the
J
s in J.J. short for Juliana?”

“No. J.J.'s not short for anything.”

“Right.”

She'd finished her water and was anxious to get back to the piano. It would feel good to drop back into another world. Sometimes it felt as if she
were
parachuting into a new world, just floating, seeing everything around her, never really landing. Other times it felt as if she were freefalling and wouldn't be able to get her chute open in time, that even if she did, it would be too late. She'd tried a few times to explain this feeling to Shuji, but he couldn't understand it. His approach was much more matter-of-fact and controlled. He said he never left this world and neither did she, so quit talking nonsense. Maybe that was one reason she liked jazz. It required precision and technique, but not that same level of predictable control.

“Thank you for intervening,” she said. She hated lying to Len. He'd offered her friendship, trust—his stage, for God's sake. And what had she given him in return? A purple-haired pianist he couldn't understand. A potential bombshell.

“Anytime. But that's one mean-looking gentleman, J.J. I'd prefer not to have to mess with him again, myself.”

“I couldn't agree with you more.”

She left it at that, unsure herself exactly what she meant. She didn't know what to make of Matthew Stark. Undeniably he had a menacing look about him—the scars contributed, certainly—but she didn't think he was in fact mean or dangerous. Or was she just being naive? He was sarcastic, yes, but he had a smile that intrigued her, and even if he'd been less than sympathetic toward her dual identities, he hadn't given her away.

“You want to talk?” Len asked gently.

Reluctantly, she shook her head. But that too was a lie. She did want to talk. About who she was, about who Matthew Stark was, what he wanted. About the Minstrel's Rough. She remembered the soft, heavily accented words of her uncle as she'd prepared for the second half of her concert in the little Delftshaven church.

“The existence of the Minstrel has never been confirmed. It's best that way, Juliana. It's a very, very valuable stone. Once cut, it would be worth many millions of dollars for its size and beauty alone. But its mystery, its status as a diamond legend, adds to that value. People will do terrible things for such riches. I know.”

She hadn't thought then to ask him how he'd known. It was all a joke to her—an adventure. How many concert pianists had crazy uncles passing them uncut diamonds backstage? But now she wondered if she should get in touch with her uncle and tell him about Matthew Stark, ask him about Rachel Stein, Hendrik de Geer. Uncle Johannes might talk where her mother clearly wouldn't.

“Len, does the name Matthew Stark mean anything to you?”

“LZ,”
Len said, without hesitation.

She looked up at him, blank.

“Hell, babe, where you been?” Len laughed. “You telling me you've never heard of
LZ?
Don't you ever go to the movies?”

“Rarely,” she said. It was the truth. “
LZ
's a movie?”

“Yeah, and a book—author's Matt Stark. Book came out six or seven years ago, the movie a year or two later. It got best picture and best director, as I recall. The book was a bestseller.”

“What's it about?”

“Jesus, I don't believe you. It's about Vietnam chopper pilots. LZ stands for landing zone.” He looked at her. “You know, where helicopters land.”

She hadn't known. “I see.”

Unfortunately, now she did see. She'd made a fool of herself. Stark must think she was a hopeless dingbat. How could she explain? When his book had been a best-seller and his movie a hit, she hadn't had time to read books or go to movies. She had played piano. She had studied music history, music theory, music composition. Her friends were musicians and her enemies were musicians. Her world was music, and it consumed her. Lately, that had begun to change. She had the
New York Times
delivered, even if she didn't always read it, and she was trying harder to keep track of what was going on in the world. But she had some catching up to do. She still had to find out who the Matthew Starks were. If he'd written LZ recently, she might have recognized his name. But seven years ago? Not a chance.

“That the guy I just tossed?” Len asked. “Matt Stark?” He laughed. “Well, I'll be damned, don't you pick 'em. Go on and get your butt back to the piano, babe. Play.”

She nodded, thanking him, and did.

U
nited States Senator Samuel Ryder, Jr., was backpedaling as fast as he could.

Plausible deniability. That was what was required now.

He stared into the flames of the fire he'd built in the cozy study of his Georgetown townhouse and tried to think of ways he could distance himself from Phillip Bloch and Hendrik de Geer.

“Jesus,” one of his aides had said, handing him a copy of the Monday morning paper, “can you believe you luck? Talk about your providential accidents. You get to look like a nice guy on the front page of the
Times
and get her off your back at the same time. This lady was a no-win situation.”

Yes, indeed. What luck.

Which one had done it, he wondered. Bloch? De Geer? Each had so much to lose. Each was capable of giving a tiny old woman a little shove. Or having someone else do it.

Each had learned of her threat from him.

It's not your fault!
Rachel Stein had known the risks before she came to him.

Her death might have been accidental. Indeed, as his aide had said, providential.

He wished he'd hear from de Geer. There'd been nothing since their meeting outside Lincoln Center,
while Rachel Stein was dying—or before? After, perhaps? Could he kill a woman and then smoke a cigar?
The man was a lowlife. He could do anything. But if he came up with the Minstrel, then—at last—Sam Ryder could put an end to his relationship with Phillip Bloch, be free of him once and for all.

And if not?

Plausible deniability. That was what would be needed. It wasn't his fault. He didn't know.
I didn't do anything!
Yes, those were the words he needed to be able to say, with credibility. Just in case.

His telephone rang. He tried to ignore it, but the damn ringing persisted. He was alone in the house, mercifully so. Cursing, he snatched up the receiver. “Yes?”

“Lieutenant.”

Bloch. “What is it? I asked you not to call here—”

“Cut the bullshit, Sam. How're you coming with the diamond?”

Ryder stiffened, remembering the Dutchman's warning reiterated in the car on Saturday. De Geer would cooperate, he said, on one condition: Ryder was not to mention the Minstrel, Rachel Stein, or the Peperkamps to Bloch. “If you do,” he'd said, “I will kill you.”

“Sergeant,” Ryder said carefully, “I've made careful plans, and I cannot have you interfering. You could ruin everything. Please, just let me handle things on my end. Look—look, I'm taking a chance, all right? Guessing. This stone might not even exist, and if I can't come up with it, I don't want you to blame me. I've told you as much as I have out of courtesy.”
And if de Geer finds out…
He refused to consider the possibilities. He was a U.S. senator. De Geer couldn't touch him.

“Bullshit, Lieutenant,” Bloch said, laughing at him. “You told me because you knew if you didn't I'd come up there and wring your fucking neck. But did I say I wanted to interfere? Just want to ask you a couple of questions, that's all. Tell me some more about Stein's connection to de Geer.”

“What more is there to tell? He betrayed her family and the people who were hiding her.”

“Those're the ones I'm interested in. You say Stein told you de Geer pretended to be helping them while they were in hiding, bribing the Germans with diamonds. Where'd he get the diamonds?”

“From a stash the Peperkamps had, I believe. They were careful to keep diamonds that would be used for war purposes out of Nazi hands and offered them only to Germans who wanted them for their personal use, and—” A cold shiver ran up his spine and he stopped, hearing the dead silence on the other end of the receiver.

“What's that name again, Sammy? Peperkamp?”

Damn. Oh, dammit to hell, Ryder thought. Well, it wasn't his fault. Bloch had manipulated him into talking, into dropping the name Peperkamp. In any case, there was nothing the sergeant could do with this knowledge. So what if he knew their name?

“Don't tell de Geer I told you,” he said.

“Sure, Sammy. No problem. You think they've got this diamond?”

Ryder said nothing, wishing only that he could be warm and safe and away, far away, from the fear that had gripped him since Phillip Bloch had called three months ago and said he was setting up a temporary camp at Ryder's isolated fishing camp in northwest Florida. There had been nothing Ryder could do about it then or now. Bloch would do as he pleased. The only way to get rid of him—
my only chance!
—was through the Minstrel. It would provide Bloch the means to get a permanent camp, out of Ryder's life. But first he had to get the Minstrel, and to do that, he had to deal with Hendrik de Geer.

“It's about all that makes sense,” Bloch said.

Of course it was. The Minstrel's Rough had to be in Peperkamp hands—if it existed. Rachel Stein decidedly did not believe it did. “It's said Hendrik used the Minstrel as collateral to help us,” she'd told him in her desperate attempt to get the senator's backing to go after the Dutchman. “But that's nonsense. Where would he get his hands on such a stone? The Minstrel's a myth. Hendrik de Geer has always been out for himself, and he'd promise anyone anything to save himself.”

In his own desperation, Ryder had seized on the Minstrel and decided it
had
to exist. It had to. And that the Dutchman could get it for him—could be
made
to get it for him. It was a gamble—an insane gamble, perhaps. But it had to work.

If only he knew where de Geer was now.

“I will come with the stone,” the Dutchman had said. “Wait. Do nothing and talk to no one. Otherwise you will answer to me.”

The cold shiver had developed into a cold sweat, and Ryder leaned in toward the fire. Who frightened him more? Block? De Geer? Lowlifes! His only chance was to play them off against each other.

“I want their names, Lieutenant,” Bloch said. “I want to know who they are, where they live, everything.”

“I can't!”

“In case you fuck up, Sammy, I want to be able to go after the stone myself. So talk.”

“My God.” Ryder breathed deeply, sweat pouring down his back even though he was so cold. “Will you promise not to interfere—dammit, Sergeant, will you give me a chance?”

“Sure, Sammy.”

Bloch might have just laughed in his face; it would have been no less convincing than this empty promise. But what choice did Ryder have? He knew when he was beaten. If he didn't talk, Bloch would come to Washington. And then what would Ryder do?

“All right,” he said stiffly, trying not to sound defeated. “According to Miss Stein, there are four Peperkamps. Johannes Peperkamp, a diamond cutter in Antwerp, is in my opinion the most likely candidate to have or know where to find the Minstrel.”

“Johannes Peperkamp, diamond cutter, Antwerp. Sounds good. Go on.”

“But he's the main one—”

“And if he doesn't know diddly? Then what? You said there were four. I want the other names.”

Ryder shut his eyes, tasting the salt of his sweat on his upper lip. The fire crackled at his feet. “There's a Wilhelmina Peperkamp. She resides in Rotterdam and is a retired civil servant of modest means. I don't believe—”

“That's two. Next.”

“She has a sister, Catharina Fall, who lives in New York and runs a bakery. She apparently was willing to corroborate Miss Stein's accusations against de Geer, but now with her—umm—death…” His voice trailed off.
Why
had he brought that up?

“Handy, wasn't it? A loose end we don't have to worry about.”

Sinking deeper into the couch, Ryder recalled how Master Sergeant Bloch had never been able to tolerate anything he deemed a loose end. In combat, that compulsion had saved lives. But this was civilian life. Ryder bit down hard on his lower lip, nearly drawing blood, but he told himself it made no sense for Bloch to have killed Rachel Stein or to have had her killed.
It was an accident. You saw how old and frail she was.

Until now, frail had not been a word he had associated with the tough, cynical, and somehow warm-hearted old Hollywood agent.

“That's three then,” Bloch said. “Who's number four?”

Ryder didn't move. He opened his eyes, and in the redorange flames he saw the pale silken hair of Juliana Fall, the dark green eyes, the curve of her breasts. Bloch wouldn't dare touch her. She was too famous, too beautiful. “A young woman,” he said hoarsely. “She couldn't possibly know anything about any of this. She's not—”

“For chrissake, her
name.
”

“No!”

“Goddamnit, then, I'll find out myself.”

“Don't—no, don't. Fall.” He put a shaking hand to his mouth, as if somehow it might catch the words as they came out and keep them from Bloch. “Her name is Juliana Fall. She's Catharina Fall's daughter.”

“Lives in New York too?”

“Yes,” Ryder hissed.

“Then that's all four.”

He could hear Bloch's yawn. “Sergeant, I've been more than fair to you. At least tell me what you plan to do—”

“Sammy, Sammy. I'm going to make sure you don't screw up. Isn't that what I always do?”