Puppet (24 page)

So now you’re forging your mother’s signature and breaking into safety-deposit boxes
, she hears Ben whisper disapprovingly.
You know you could get disbarred for this.

Amanda pulls off her new black leather gloves, noting the nervous trembling in her fingers, as she walks past the row of tellers along the bank’s mauve west wall. “I need to get into my safety-desposit box,” she says to a woman rifling through a stack of checks on the other side of the counter.

“Be with you in half a second,” the woman answers without looking up.

Good, Amanda thinks. I like your attitude. Don’t smile or ask how I am. Don’t tell me to have a good day. Just saunter over here as if you’re doing me a great big favor by letting me do business with you, and let me inside the goddamn vault.

The woman sighs with obvious frustration, runs an impatient hand through short-cropped brown hair. “Why can’t I figure this out?” she mutters to herself.

I know how you feel, Amanda sympathizes, shifting her weight from one foot to the other, and feeling snug and warm inside her new parka. She hears an angry voice beside her and looks toward the sound.

“What do you mean you have to put a hold on my check?” an indignant customer is demanding.

“It’s an out-of-town check, Mrs. Newton,” the teller explains. “I’m afraid it’s bank policy.”

“I’ve been a customer at this bank for more than thirty years. Since before you were born.”

“Yes, and I’m so sorry, but—”

“I’d like to talk to the manager.”

Amanda stares at the intersecting trails of wet footprints that crisscross the dark slate floor. My mother’s been a customer at this bank for the same amount of time, she is thinking, fighting the urge to flee. I might be able to forge her signature, but there’s no way I’m going to convince anyone that I’m Gwen Price. Suppose one of these tellers knows my mother beyond a casual hello. Suppose she’s been following the newspaper accounts of the shooting and, at the very least, recognizes her name. She’ll know I’m an impostor. And then what will she do? Throw me out? Call the police? Ben will be furious when he finds out, that’s for damn sure.

The exasperated teller drops the stack of checks to the counter and looks up with a weary smile. “You want to get into the vault?” she acknowledges, pushing a card across the counter for Amanda’s signature.

Something else that’s for damn sure: it’s too late to turn back now.

Amanda signs her mother’s name to the card, holds her breath while the teller compares it to the one she has on file. “This way,” she says, offering not even a flicker of recognition and ushering Amanda around the counter toward the imposing steel vault at the back of the room. Then she stops abruptly, turns, stares hard at Amanda. “Oh,” she says.

Amanda feels her breath stop in her throat, as if the woman’s hands are around her neck. Tell the woman it’s all a big mistake, that you haven’t been yourself lately. She thinks of John Mallins, or the man calling himself John Mallins. Haven’t been yourself lately, she thinks again, and almost laughs. Must be contagious.

“Your coat,” the teller is saying.

“My coat?”

“Yes. It’s gorgeous. I love it. Where’d you get it?”

“Uh. A little store in the Eaton Center.”

“It’s fabulous. I absolutely love the color.” She opens the vault, stands back to let Amanda enter first.

“Thank you.”

“I can’t wear red. Wish I could. But it washes me right out.” She uses her key, and then Amanda’s, to release the safety-deposit box. “You can take it in there.” She points to a small, curtained-off area. “Well, you know the routine.”

The long, rectangular steel box feels heavy in Amanda’s hands. “Thank you. I shouldn’t be long.”

“No problem.”

That’s what you think, Amanda says silently, watching the woman leave before pulling back the mauve velvet curtain and stepping inside the womblike space. She stares for several long seconds at the dull gray box, as if the force of her gaze will be enough for her to make out its contents. “Come on. What are you waiting for?”

I’m waiting for the cops to come bursting in here to arrest me.

Then you might as well give them something to arrest you for, she decides, pulling open the box and staring inside.

Whatever she was expecting to see, it wasn’t this.

Amanda gasps and falls back against the curtain, feeling hot and cold, light-headed and lead-footed, all at the same time. “Dear God,” she says, reaching into the long box and running her fingers along the neat stacks of $100 bills. “What the hell is going on here?” What is her mother doing with all this money? At least $100,000, Amanda calculates quickly. In cash. As compared to the $7.75 in her account. “What the hell is going on?”

Amanda stares at the money until she hears a shuffling of feet, followed by a discreet cough, on the other side of the curtain. “Excuse me, but is everything okay?” a voice asks.

Amanda slams the safety-deposit box closed, then takes several seconds to compose herself before pulling back the curtain and forcing a stiff smile onto her lips.

“I’m sorry,” the teller apologizes. “Normally we don’t like to interrupt our customers, but you’ve been in there a long time, and …”

Amanda checks her watch, is startled to see that more than twenty minutes have passed. “I’m sorry. I had no idea it was so late.”

“It’s just that we’re trying to close up.”

“I understand.” She hands the heavy box back to the teller and watches as the woman slides it carefully back into its slot, thinking, Please don’t let me faint until I’m out of here.

“Will there be anything else we can do for you today?” the teller asks, leading Amanda back into the main area, all of Amanda’s concentration going to putting one foot in front of the other.

“No. I think that’s quite enough for one afternoon.”

The young woman with the keys is waiting to accompany Amanda to the front of the bank. “Great coat,” she says, unlocking the door.

Amanda waits until she hears the door lock again behind her before lowering herself to the curb and covering her face with her hands.

“What do you mean, I have to check out tomorrow?” Amanda demands of the clerk at the reception desk at the Four Seasons hotel.

The young man smiles patiently. “Well, technically, you were supposed to check out this morning.”

“But I’ve decided to stay until the weekend.”

“And I wish we could help you. I really do. But our records show that you only reserved until last night. Now we can accommodate you for tonight, but I’m afraid that, as of tomorrow at noon, we’re fully booked.”

“You don’t have
anything
available?”

“I’m afraid not. I can call some of the other hotels in the area …”

“No, that’s okay. Thank you.” Amanda backs away from the reception desk.

Some of the things Amanda is thinking as she steps into a waiting elevator: her mother has $100,000 in $100 bills sitting in a safety-deposit box in a bank on the other side of town; she should call Ben, tell him of her discovery; her mother has $100,000 in $100 bills sitting in a safety-deposit box in a bank on the other side of town; she should call her office, tell them she won’t be back in town until next week; her mother has $100,000 in $100 bills sitting in a safety-deposit box in a bank on the other side of town; she needs to find a new hotel room; her new
coat is toasty warm; red is definitely her new favorite color; her mother has $100,000 in $100 bills sitting in a safety-deposit box in a bank on the other side of town.

A
MANDA
arrives back at the new courthouse at precisely eight forty-five the next morning. Already the corridors are crowded with visitors: harassed-looking lawyer-types in dull, ill-fitting suits scurrying purposefully back and forth from one end of the hall to the other, stopping to chat briefly with colleagues or confer with clients; uniformed police officers gathered in small blue clusters, suspiciously eyeing the young men who slouch past them clothed in baggy jeans and attitude; nervous parents sitting on uncomfortable-looking wooden benches propped against the high walls, holding back tears and trying to reassure each other that everything will be all right.

Amanda feels all eyes on her as she walks up and down the corridor, looking for Ben. I stand out like a sore thumb, she is thinking as she unzips her bright red parka and adjusts the overnight bag that weighs heavily on her shoulder. Make that a ripe tomato, she amends, succumbing to the lure of an empty bench and sitting down, lowering her overnight bag to the floor, and closing her eyes. She didn’t sleep well last night, which isn’t
surprising. Her head was a war zone of conflicting ideas. One minute, she was trying to convince herself that there was nothing unreasonable about her mother having all that money stashed away in a safety-deposit box in a bank halfway out of town because, after all, her mother was nothing if not eccentric, and the next minute, she was reminding herself that crazy was several huge degrees away from eccentric, and it was definitely crazy for her mother to have all this money hidden away, and besides, what was she doing with $100,000 in $100 bills, and what, if anything, was her connection to John Mallins, if John Mallins really
was
John Mallins, and if not, then who the hell was he, and did it really matter, when what really mattered was where she was going to stay for the next several days? “What the hell am I still doing here?” she whispers into the hood of her new parka, thinking of the plane reservation she canceled first thing this morning, and hearing the almost audible shiver of delight in her secretary’s voice when she phoned to tell her she wouldn’t be back in the office until next week.

“So what was it like seeing him again?” Kelly asked, her voice a conspiratorial whisper.

“What was it like seeing
whom
again?” Amanda replied flatly, hoping her imperious tone would be enough to silence the curious young woman.

“Ben Myers,” Kelly said, stubbornly refusing to take the hint.

“It was strange.” But even as Amanda spoke the word, she knew it was the wrong one. While the situation in which she and Ben found themselves might rightly be deemed strange, seeing Ben again, actually spending time
with him, was anything but. Their initial awkwardness had dissolved into an easy comfort born of familiarity and a mutual, if reluctant, respect. Simply put, it felt good to be around Ben, she realized. It felt like home. “I’ll be home this weekend,” Amanda told her secretary, brushing the distinctly uncomfortable feeling aside with a swat of her hand.

What’s the matter with me? Amanda wonders now, opening her eyes when she hears footsteps approaching, then closing them again when she realizes the man about to plop down on the far end of the bench isn’t Ben. What am I doing obsessing over a man I walked out on eight years ago? she berates herself. You can be damn sure he isn’t wasting his time thinking about me. No, sir. He has his office and his caseload and his Jennifer.
Can’t tonight
, he’d responded to her dinner invitation, without even bothering to offer an explanation. And yet, there was something about the way he looked at her … “Oh, no. You are not going there.”

“Sorry?” the man asks from the other side of the bench. “Are you talking to me?”

“What? Oh, no. No. Sorry.”

The man nods, his head continuing to bob up and down nervously even after he turns away. Seconds later, they are joined on the bench by a woman in a heavy down jacket, who squeezes in between them, glancing over at Amanda. “Nice coat,” she says.

Amanda smiles her thanks, then checks her watch. It’s already five minutes to nine, and Ben still isn’t here. She should have called him when she got back to the hotel last night, told him of her trip to the bank, and her shocking discovery. Why didn’t she? Because she knew
he’d be angry? Because she’d neglected to tell him about finding the key to the safety-deposit box in the first place? Beause she’d gone to the bank without him? Because she’d forged her mother’s signature and opened her safety-deposit box under false pretenses? Because of the disapproval she knew she’d hear in his voice?

Or because she was afraid she wouldn’t hear his voice at all?

Because he already had plans for last night, she reminds herself again. Plans that didn’t involve her.

Is that why she didn’t call?

“What’s with the suitcase?” a voice is asking from somewhere above her, and Amanda opens her eyes to see Ben, wearing a charcoal gray overcoat over a dark blue suit, his own eyes directed at the overnight bag at her feet. “I thought you’d decided to stay till the end of the week.”

Instantly Amanda clambers to her feet. “Got kicked out of my hotel. You’re late.”

“Sorry,” he says without explanation. “New coat?”

“You like it?”

“Great color.” He grabs her overnight bag, takes her elbow, and starts leading her down the hall. “Your mother’s in a holding cell downstairs.” He points toward a set of doors at the far end of the corridor. “They should be bringing her up those stairs in a few minutes.”

“There’s something I need to tell you before we see her,” Amanda begins as a middle-aged man with thinning gray hair and a worried scowl brushes past.

“Sam,” Ben calls after him. “Everything all right?”

The man shakes his head, continues walking backward as he speaks. “Seems my esteemed client went berserk last
night and almost killed the poor sucker sharing his holding cell. The usual crap. You?”

“The usual crap,” Ben agrees, before turning his attention back to Amanda.

“Well, that was flattering.”

He smiles, his eyes crinkling. “You were saying?”

Amanda hesitates. “Where do you think I should stay for the next few days? I’ve already called a few hotels. Seems they’re all filled up.”

“I don’t see a problem.”

“You don’t?”

“I would think the solution’s pretty obvious.”

“Tell me.” I’ve never been very good with the obvious, she thinks, hearing the silent invitation to stay at his place, and immediately wondering if this would really be such a good idea. She doesn’t want to start something she has no intention of finishing. A casual fling is one thing, but Ben has proved himself less than adept at casual.