First Class Killing (15 page)

“By blackmailing him.” Now he was barely getting the words out. His voice had a strangled quality, as if he had a tourniquet around his throat.

“Harvey, all I need…”
I sat back and tried hard not to get pulled into his hysteria. “All I need him to do is call whoever he’s supposed to call and tell them I did the deed. What I need you to do is find me some leverage so I can convince him that would be a good idea.”

“Like what?”

“The names of his wife and kids.” I stared down at my hands on my knees, then looked up in time to see the withering look before he turned his back. “Harvey, the man will be in a hotel room expecting to have sex with a hooker. He will not be entirely blameless.”

“My objection has less to do with his integrity than mine. And yours. I find this tactic despicable.”

“Me, too. But this is the business we’re in. We deal with despicable people, Angel Velesco chief among them. Besides, what else do we have? Do we have top swappers?”

“Not as of yet.”

I tried to think of the other avenues we’d been pursuing. “I just gave Felix the information yesterday. It’s too soon for anything there. What about that detective from Omaha? That woman’s murder. Did he ever call you?”

“Yes.”

“You didn’t tell me?”

“He said nothing, only that the case was solved, there were no loose ends, and he had no real interest in resurrecting a murder that was difficult enough the first time around.”

“Difficult how?”

“To have a young flight attendant beaten to death on a layover in Omaha was quite the civic black eye, as you can well imagine.”

“Is it worth pursuing?”

“Doubtful.”

“Then what do we have if I don’t find a way to get close to Angel?”

He continued to move around, albeit more slowly and in a more confined area. “I do not like this. Not one bit. Why did you keep me in the dark about going to meet her?”

“Did you check your messages? Because I left one on your home phone.”

“I must have been on the computer.”

“And your cell phone wasn’t on, as usual. I am reporting to you now, minutes after having left the woman. She’s still on the massage table.”

He fumed around a little more. I checked my watch. I was due to meet Tristan at the range within the hour. He had not appreciated my last late arrival. “Do you want to quit now when we’re so close?”

He did an abrupt change in course and ended up in front of my chair. “That is the same argument you have been using on me for the past week. It is a specious argument at best.”

“What is specious about it?”

“Every time we get close, the line moves. You keep moving it.”

“Harvey, the case is not finished. I don’t want to quit when there is still work to be done and we have the time.”

“If we use the time Mr. Wolff gave us and we come back with nothing, it could be disastrous.”

“On the other hand, imagine walking into the briefing on Monday with a full list of all the hookers, a detailed description of how the scheduling works, and proof that these women are being paid for sex. We’d blow them away. That’s what we get if we get the Web master. If I pass this test, it puts me one step closer.”

“You are sure she has one of those?”

“A Web master? Positive. She told me she hates computers. They make her eyes glaze over. Machines aren’t her thing. People are her thing.”

He made his way over to his bookcase, where he began touching each book on one of the shelves, running his index finger along the spine, top to bottom. Checking for dust? He held his free arm awkwardly at his side.

“I can’t do this without you, Harvey.”

“How will we know which flight you will be on?”

“The call comes in advance.” I considered it a positive that he was beginning to think specifically about the plan.

“How far in advance?”

“A day. They’ll arrange the date and set up the swaps to put me on the right flight. Then they’ll call me with the flight number and the code names for the client and me.”

“Code names.” That elicited a humorless chuckle. “Like spies.”

“Once I know the flight, we can pretty much narrow the options to men booked in first class. The date will be one of them.”

He continued doggedly swiping spines until he had finished one row and begun the next. “I do not like it.”

“You said that. What else, specifically?”

“We are not prepared for an operation of this nature. It is too dangerous.”

“I can appreciate your concern, but supposedly these clients are well vetted. I’ll be fine.”

“You cannot know that.”

“I also don’t know if the next plane I board will crash, but I get on it anyway.”

“That is not a valid comparison.” He turned toward me and was suddenly fully engaged. “There is an infinitesimal risk that your airplane will crash, a conclusion based on millions upon millions of hours of data analyzed over—”

“All right, then.” He did have the ability to drive me crazy. “Let’s make a decision based on the data. Depending on what you find out, we can decide at the time whether I go in or back off. That’s the ultimate out, right? I can be a no-show.”

“It won’t work.”

“Why not?”

“Because no matter what I find, you won’t back off.”

I twisted my watch around my wrist but managed not to look at it. “If you get me good information about this man that suggests I shouldn’t proceed, then I won’t. But you have to promise you’ll do the best you can to find the dirt, that you won’t rig the outcome. I have to be able to trust you.”

“We will have to trust each other.”

Chapter

18

“W
HAT IS
WRONG
WITH YOU
?” T
RISTAN HELD
up the paper target so I could see. Except for a crescent-shaped nick on the right side of the upper border of the page, it was completely intact. I had taken fourteen shots at it. “Are you still hung over from the party?”

“That party was two days ago.”

“You were pretty wasted.”

I wasn’t hung over. I was frazzled by the high-speed dash in late-afternoon traffic to get out to the range, and I was distracted by the details of the case. It might have been a mistake to turn down that massage. I could have used an hour of deep-tissue relaxation.

“Not my day, Tristan. I’m sorry. I can’t concentrate.”

“That excuse will not fly when you take your test. What if that day is a bad day, too? You have to learn to push through it. I’ll help you. Come on.”

“Can we take a break, please?” I didn’t leave him much choice. I set the weapon down and went to the picnic table to grab a seat. Eventually, he came and slipped onto the bench across from me.

He gave me his stern face, which could be comical. But then he lightened up, pulled a piece of paper out of his pocket, and unfolded it. “Maybe this will cheer you up.” He began to quote from the page.

“ ‘Subject was alert and observant and treated each passenger as if he or she were the only one onboard. Highest rating.’ ”

“What is that?”

“This, my dear, is your sparkling report from yesterday’s ghost rider.”

“Alert and observant?” I had to smile at that. “Imagine what I could have done if I hadn’t still been half in the bag. How do you have access to a report like that? I thought results were top secret.”

“It pays not to burn your bridges. Here’s something else I know. If you had missed that trip, you’d be on the street right now.”

“Did I tell you how much I appreciated all your help yesterday?”

“Yes, you did, but it’s always good to hear it again. You need to pace yourself. Take it from me; the lifestyle gets really old really fast, and it’s not good for your skin.”

Again with the skin.

“Drinking too much and going on two hours of sleep. And then getting on a six-hour flight with all that recycled cabin air. Although I give you special dispensation because of what happened with your brother. I suppose that could drive anyone into a tequila embrace. Speaking of which, what have you done about him?”

“Nothing.”

“Why not?”

“I lost his number.” He gave me the look that lame excuse deserved. “I did. I had it in the pocket of my uniform out in LA. I was moving it from pocket to pocket, and then it was just gone. I don’t know what happened to it.”

“You need to straighten this out, dear. I know it’s why you’re so spacey.”

“No. Jamie and I have been fighting for a long time.”

“But you saw him. That had to do something.”

“We’ve had fights before, and we’ve always made up. If this were about anything but my father…this feels different.”

“Because it is. It’s big. I’m sure the idea of Jamie reaching out to him like that really hurts.”

“I’m not hurt. I’m angry.”

“You’re lying, sweetie. I’m sorry, but you just are.”

He looked one way. I looked the other.

“You know what?” He turned sideways on the bench, pulled one of his long legs up, and folded it like a coat hanger. “I don’t usually talk about nine-eleven, but I’ll make an exception for you.” He inhaled deeply and, as he let go of the breath, seemed to age ten years in front of my eyes.

“On the morning of September 11, 2001, I was in Fort Myers at the airport getting ready to work a flight home. We heard something had happened, something bad. We all went up and crowded into this bar to watch TV. It was one of those rare moments in life when you feel completely accepted, totally on equal footing with everyone around you. There were passengers there, first class and coach. Pilots. Ramp rats. CEOs. Janitors. We all had our arms around each other, and anyone who wasn’t completely struck dumb by what we were seeing was crying or trying to get through to someone on a cell phone. I was one of the ones crying.

“The next day, I picked up the phone and called Barry, and I told him yes, I would move in with him. He’d been asking me for months. Then I rented a car with a couple of the gals from the crew, and we drove back to Boston, and two weeks later, Barry and I were cohabitating like an old married couple, and now here I am participating in a ‘committed relationship,’ something I said I would never do because even the term itself makes me retch, and I’ve never been happier. Next thing you know, we’ll be having babies, God help us, and in case my point is not obvious enough for you—”

“It is.”

“I’ll say it anyway, because I love hearing myself give sage advice. You could get up to go to work tomorrow, Alexandra, board your flight, and never come back.”

“I’m aware of that.”

“One minute, you’re serving up orange juice and seltzer on a tray, and the next, you’ve become part of some dreadful historical event, and you disappear from the face of the earth. Poof! You’re gone. I mean
gone
gone. Vanished. Not even so much as a molar left—”

“Tristan, I get it.”

He tipped his head and looked at me. “Think about it this way. If you had to make that last call on your cell phone, who would you call? If it’s your brother, don’t you think you should know his phone number?”

Chapter

19

O
N MY WAY BACK INTO THE CITY
, I
CALLED
information on my cell phone and asked for the number of Jamie’s firm in Manhattan. Then I paid the outrageous fee to have them connect me, because I was afraid if I did it myself, I would crash my car.

After one ring, a woman with a soft voice and a prim tone answered.

“Mr. Shanahan’s office. Can I help you?”

Mr. Shanahan. How could that kid who used to leave his coat on the floor be Mr. Shanahan? I wondered if he still did that, if he waltzed into his office, walked out of his cashmere overcoat, and left it lying in a heap where it fell. Did his assistant come in behind him and hang it up for him?

“Is he in, please?”

“May I say who’s calling?”

“I’m his sister.”

I saw him through the window, and it stopped me. Jamie sat on a stool at the street-facing counter, bathed in that mellow, hip-and-happening-but-not-adequate-for-reading Starbucks lighting. It was dark out, so he couldn’t see me. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I had made room for the possibility that he wouldn’t show, that he would leave me waiting for him, watching the clock with a sick feeling in my stomach. But here he was, and he was waiting for me.

I walked through the door behind a large man who took up a lot of space. Jamie didn’t see me, so I surprised him when I put my hand on his shoulder.

“Hi, Jamie.”

He did a pirouette on the stool and stood up, all in one graceful motion. “How did you…I didn’t see you come in.”

Unlike when we’d met on the plane, I felt like hugging him, so I did. He was only a little taller, so neither one of us had to bend down. It felt comfortable, the way it used to, but when he started to pull away, so did I, making the parting seem as mutual as the embrace.

I started but not well. “Um, I wanted to apologize for—”

“Watch out.” He took my arm and guided me away from the door. It kept opening and closing with each new latte-starved customer. He reached up and scratched the back of his head. “Can I get you something? Do you want tea?”

“I’ll get it. Do you need a refill?”

“No, thanks. I’ll just…” He reached around for his wallet. “But let me get this.”

“Don’t be silly. Tea costs all of a dollar here. I’ll be right back.”

I didn’t have to go far to join an ordering line that snaked almost to the back of the store, and it didn’t take long to figure out that waiting for a cup of hot tea behind the venti caramel soy macchiattos and grande decaf nonfat with whip white chocolate mochas was a bad idea. Given the sound level, it also occurred to me that I had not picked the best place for a reconciliation discussion, not if we actually wanted to hear each other.

I bailed out of the line and walked back. “Do you want to get out of here? Maybe go for a walk?”

“Let’s go.” He was off his stool before I had even finished the question, which reminded me of how much Jamie liked being in motion. Not in the hypercompulsive way Dan did but because he had always thought he was better at doing than thinking.