Green Kills (7 page)

“There’s no point in my going to California. I don’t really know
Christian. I’ve only met him twice, once briefly, here in our offices about a
year ago, and a second time during my meeting with him yesterday. If there’s
anyone who knew him well enough and could testify to his personality and the
situation of the company, as well as quash any rumors before they spread, it’s
you.”

“I’m swamped with raising money for our next fund. David and
I’ve discussed this and decided you’re the one most suitable for the job. We’re
counting on you.”

David didn’t raise his eyes from the table. “We’ve considered
all the options,” he mumbled. “I agree this is a compromise, perhaps not a very
good compromise, but a necessary one. Please go and do the best you can.” His
voice died out at once.

Henry stood, indicating that the meeting had come to an end.
“Evelyn will give you the tickets and your hotel details. It’s the same hotel
Christian was found in. That way, you’ll be able to speak with the appropriate
people and perhaps understand a little better what happened there.” He nodded
to David and went out of the room without saying another word.

Ronnie felt like a child who’d received an undeserved
punishment. David looked at him pleadingly, trying to stifle a sob stuck in his
throat. If Henry had seemed unaffected by the tragedy, David appeared
completely destroyed, although, to the best of Ronnie’s knowledge, he didn’t
know Christian personally.

Ronnie left the room silently, closed the door behind him, and
went to Evelyn to collect his airline tickets and hotel reservation
confirmation.

“Sorry,” her lips whispered. Her shining eyes betrayed what was
in her heart. She handed him an envelope with a limp movement.

Ronnie headed toward the exit.
On the way, he
speed-dialed Gadi.

“Yes, sir,” Gadi answered after a single ring.

“Change of plans. The CEO I told you about was found dead in his
room at the Sheraton Sunnyvale.” He opened the envelope and took a peek at its
contents, “I’m flying from Newark tonight, United flight 1051 taking off at ten
thirty-four and landing in San Francisco at one thirty-six. I have a room
booked at the Sheraton. I’d be pleased if you could join me.”

“Done.”

“I’ll explain the situation once we meet in Sunnyvale, but at
this stage, I want you to act as if you don’t know me. Check if I’m being
followed or if there’s any other suspicious activity you can identify.”

“OK. Bye.”

Ronnie hung up and called Liah. Just this morning he would have
sworn he would never do what he was now about to do. 

Newark, October
17, 2013, 10:00 PM

“Ronnie, for the hundredth time,
explain
to me what’s going on.”

Ronnie
lay
a comforting hand on Liah’s
arm and turned his eyes to the front of the plane, examining the faces of the
passengers who continued to pour through the entry door. “I’ll tell you all
about it after we take off.” Earlier that evening, he’d called her, told her
about Lumner’s death, and apologized for having to leave her to go to the West
Coast.

“Buy me a ticket as well,” she demanded decisively. “There’s no
way I’m spending the first week of our engagement without you. Should I pack
for you, too?”

“Thanks, this is a wonderful idea,” he answered. “Just take out
the green trolley suitcase from the closet. It’s always ready for a short
business trip.” Next, he called Evelyn and asked her help in buying an
additional business class ticket. Fifteen minutes later, he received a text
message
: I’ve made
reservations for Liah. I saw to it that you’re sitting together. You can go
straight to the boarding gate. I’m sending the electronic tickets to your
phones.

Thanks
,
he texted back a concise message, and a few seconds later typed an additional
one:
You’re the best. Well
done, it’s great to know I can always count on you.
He signed it
“Ray”
and pressed the send
button.

“We are about to close the doors and will be ready for takeoff
soon. Please take your seats, bring your seat backs to the upright position,
and fasten your seatbelts,” the laconic message was heard on the plane’s PA
system.

“And?”
Liah asked again, “You thought I
wouldn’t notice Gadi boarding the plane and you two ignoring each other? Your
best friend in the world is on the plane and suddenly you two don’t know each
other? What are you, little children?”

“Gadi’s on the plane?” he whispered, an amused expression on his
face.
“Where?”
He turned to look down the aisle with
theatrical exaggeration. When he turned his head back to Liah, he smiled at her
fondly and whispered, “Well done, I thought you were occupied with your reading
and wouldn’t notice.”

“Why are you whispering, you idiot?
Look around you; you think any of these tailored business class types speak
Hebrew? By the way, do you plan on taking Gadi on our honeymoon as well?”

“Aren’t you tired of being right all the time?” He stroked her
cheek, taking pleasure in the silky feel of her smooth skin against the back of
his fingers. “It’s so much fun you’ve decided to join us. I can’t tell you how
happy I was when you insisted on coming. You gave me the perfect excuse I
needed not to sleep with Gadi without him feeling rejected.”

“If you plan on continuing to avoid giving me an answer, prepare
to suffer,” whispered Liah with mock severity and pinched his arm fondly.

The sound of the engines intensified. The plane began to
accelerate on the runway and within seconds took off and began to ascend to
cruising altitude.

Ronnie pushed his seat back a bit, and as he saw Liah leaning
hers back as well, keeping eye contact, he realized the sooner he let her in on
the secret, the better.

“When I got back from Boston, I tried to tell you about my
meeting with Christian. I don’t know if you fell asleep on the first or second
sentence, so perhaps I’d better start over.”

“I fell asleep on the first. You’re not as interesting as you
think you are.” Liah wrinkled her nose.

For the next hour, Ronnie described to Liah everything he’d gone
through since Tuesday, his first day as a full partner in the fund. He did not
skip dry descriptions about the financial situation of TDO and found himself
analyzing at length the advantages of the medicine the company had developed
and the successful trials it had thus far performed. Liah, whose professional
curiosity was aroused by the idea of the innovative medicine, asked many
difficult questions, until Ronnie was finally forced to mutter humbly, “I’m
sorry, Dr. Sheinbaum, I don’t have all the answers. Can I continue to describe
the financial situation?”

“I beg your pardon, Sherlock, but the scientific part is much
more interesting than all your dusty financial and progress reports.”

Ronnie continued and told her about his meeting with Lumner in
Boston and the strange direction it had taken and did not skip the description
of the person they’d encountered while walking in the orchard.

“So that’s the reason you brought Gadi all the way from Israel?
To watch your back?”
Her voice was tense with concern.

“I didn’t bring him. He decided to come as soon as he heard we
were getting married. He insists on giving the bride his seal of approval
before I lead her to the altar.”

“And if he doesn’t approve?” An unexplained cloud of anxiety
settled on Liah’s face.

Ronnie felt ill at ease. What was she afraid of? “Gadi’s smart.
He’ll approve.” He returned to describing the morning following his appointment
with Christian. “Henry and David were waiting for me in David’s office. What
surprised me the most was that neither of them was interested in hearing, even
briefly, about my conversation with
Christian.
If I
were Henry, I’d have been dying of curiosity to know whether his demand to
embellish the company reports had been exposed. He must be very sure of himself
and perhaps also holding a few aces that could overshadow my discoveries.”

The stewardesses began the meal service. They both attacked the
food and hungrily devoured everything they were served. “When one is hungry,
even airplane food tastes good,” Liah mumbled, but it seemed her thoughts
drifted elsewhere. The monotonous sound of the engines and their full stomachs
lulled them into a drowsy comfort. As soon as they’d finished eating, they both
pushed back their seats, impervious to the noise of the clearing of the trays.

Two hours later, they found themselves standing next to a
luggage carousel, tiredly gazing at its gaping maw, waiting for it to spit out
their first suitcase.

“Excuse me, sir, is this yours?” Ronnie heard Gadi’s voice,
addressing him in English.

Ronnie turned around and saw Gadi holding a small bundle with
two keys hanging from it. Ronnie demonstrably fumbled in his trouser pockets,
gave Gadi an
embarrassed
smile, and said, “Thank you.
I must have dropped them when I took my cell phone out of my pocket. Thank you,
sir.” He took the bundle and stashed it in his pocket without giving it another
glance.

Ronnie’s and Liah’s suitcases arrived in the first batch. “First
time in my life I’ve been lucky,” Liah muttered. Gadi had vanished, but Ronnie
wasn’t worried. He knew his best friend was somewhere within reach, and guessed
the key chain he’d received contained a GPS transmitter that allowed Gadi to
know his location at any given moment.

The digital clock above the reception desk showed the hour to be
three thirty-four AM when they stepped into the hotel lobby. A drowsy desk
clerk greeted them. “Welcome to the Sheraton,” he said. “Name please?”

“Ronnie Saar.
Two people.”

“Yes, I see.” The desk clerk raised his head and gave Ronnie a
curious look, “No checkout date?”

“Please put it down as Monday morning. I’ll update you if it
changes,” answered Ronnie. The desk clerk’s curiosity-filled eyes gave him an
idea. “I understand there was an unexpected death here yesterday.”

“Yes, terrible.” The desk clerk was now fully awake, torn
between his duty to be discreet, and his desire to speak about the subject that
had shaken and horrified the hotel staff.

“Did you know the man who died?” asked Liah.

“Of course.”
The desk clerk was drawn
into the conversation. “I’ve known Mr. Lumner ever since I started working
here. He always used to check in to the hotel in the middle of the night.
‘That’s how you gain an additional workday.’ That’s what he always used to say.
He always had time for small talk, even when he was very tired.
A charming man.”
Genuine pain clouded his face.

“I always wondered if things like this can be predicted,” Ronnie
remarked. “Was there anything unusual about his behavior?”

“Not at first. He arrived around one thirty AM, as usual. He took
the last
United
flight from Boston.” His voice rose
with pride, “He gave me a Boston Celtics hat as a present and made it clear he
expected me to wear it the next time he came to the hotel.”

“You said, ‘not at first.’ What did you mean? What happened later?”
As usual, it was Liah who directed the conversation to the desired direction.

“Eh…While we were speaking, his phone rang. I remember thinking
it was a strange time to be getting calls, even from the West Coast, and
certainly from the East Coast. Mr. Lumner answered the call, listened for a
moment, then walked away and spoke in whispers. Two, three minutes later, it
looked like he was losing his patience. I heard him raise his voice, saying
something like, ‘There’s no way I’ll give you…’ and then he went back to
whispering. He was very upset. He took his key and went up to his room without
wishing me a good night. It was very strange.”

“Did you tell that to the police?” asked Ronnie.

The desk clerk shrugged. “No one ever came to talk to me.”

“I suggest you do,” said Ronnie in an authoritative voice. “It’s
your civic duty.”

“Thanks for the advice,” the desk clerk’s voice turned cold.
“Here are your room keys. Breakfast is served from six to eleven. I’m afraid
the meal is not included. I’ll call the bellboy to help you with your
suitcases.”

“No need, we’ll manage on our own. Good night,” said Ronnie. He
took the key cards and turned toward the elevators with Liah. Suddenly, an idea
came to him and he headed back, pulling Liah after him.

“Did Mr. Lumner receive any other calls or visitors during the
night?”

The desk clerk hesitated and shifted his gaze to Liah’s face.
She answered him with a warm smile. “About half an hour after he had gone up to
his room, I transferred a call to him.” He yielded to Liah’s smile. “Five
minutes later, Mr. Lumner called down and asked me not to put any more calls
through. He sounded upset or tired. I guess he was tired. By the way, the call
was from China. I know that because I was curious about the area code and found
out what country it was from.”

“Do you have any record of outgoing calls as well?” asked
Ronnie.

“Wait a minute. Let me check the copy of his bill,” answered the
desk clerk, his eyes nervously shifting from side to side. “No, no charges for
outgoing calls. But that’s not unusual. Nowadays, most people use only their
cell phones.”

“Thanks.
And good night again.”
Ronnie
left a twenty-dollar bill on the counter, grabbed Liah’s arm, and turned to the
polished steel doors of the elevators. While waiting for the elevator, he saw
Gadi out of the corner of his eye, entering the hotel and going toward the
reception desk.

Sunnyvale,
October 18, 2013, 8:15 AM

The guest in room 1022 lingered next to the door, carefully
examining his reflection in the entryway mirror. He found the image to be
pleasing. Five feet eight inches of muscles, oriental features he inherited
from his Taiwanese mother, and hair that refused to turn gray, completely
blurred the truth he was in his late forties and concealed the many injuries
his body had suffered during his long career as a martial artist. He wore a
pair of plain jeans and a black, slightly oversized t-shirt with a Nike symbol
spread across it. On his feet he wore a pair of blue sneakers, and his watery,
cobra eyes were concealed behind dark sunglasses. He moistened his index finger
with his tongue and fixed an imaginary errant hair on his right eyebrow, took a
last glance in the mirror, and left the room.

The corridor leading to the elevators was deserted.
As
always, luck is on my side
, he thought, as the door of the empty elevator
opened with a faint whistle. He stepped in and pressed the “Lobby” button,
maintaining an emotionless expression as the metal cell began its descent.

He ran the usual list of activities in his mind: telephonic
checkout — done, the falsified details were already in the hotel’s computer;
he’d left nothing behind in the room; and all fingerprints were erased. He knew
from experience only careful planning and an almost paranoid caution had kept
him alive thus far.

The elevator stopped on the eighth floor. A man and a woman in
their thirties stepped inside, nodding a good morning greeting to him. The
guest answered with an offhand nod of his own and returned his gaze to the
floor indicator screen above the door. There wasn’t any need. The man was
focused on the woman’s face, and it was doubtful he would be able to identify
him from their meeting in the Waltham orchard.

“Lobby,” the mechanical voice announced as the elevator stopped
and the door slid silently into the wall. Ronnie gestured with his hand
politely, inviting the guest to be the first to exit, smiling back at the thank
you nod the stranger sent him.

The guest crossed the lobby without stopping and went out the
revolving door into the hotel’s private access road, where his rental car was
waiting. His hand slid a ten-dollar bill into the palm of the valet, as the
latter gave him the car keys.

“You like him more than you like me?” Liah caressed Ronnie’s
cheek.

“Did you notice he was wearing a Phi Beta Kappa ring? For the
life of me, I can’t really see him belonging to that elitist honor society.”

“At least he’s not a sloppy dresser like you. I still want to
die every time I see you show up to the fanciest events dressed like a dairy
farmer.” She kissed his smiling mouth, and her hands lovingly brushed his
unruly hair as they walked hand in hand toward the dining room.