Whistleblower and Never Say Die (35 page)

He focused on her face, on the look of worry in her eyes.
“Every other Sunday I’ll put an ad in the Personals.
Los Angeles Times.
It’ll be addressed to, let’s say, Cora. Anything I need to tell you will be there.”

“Cora.” She nodded. “I’ll remember.”

They looked at each other, a silent acknowledgment that this parting had to be. He cupped her face and pressed a kiss to her mouth. She barely responded; already, it seemed, she had said her goodbyes.

He rose from the bed and started for the door. There he couldn’t resist asking, one more time: “You’ll be all right?”

She nodded, but it was too automatic. The sort of nod one gave to dismiss an unimportant question. “I’ll be fine. After all, I’ll have Jack to watch over me.”

He didn’t miss the faint note of irony in her reply. Jack, it seemed, didn’t inspire confidence in either of them.
What’s my alternative? Drag her along with me as a moving target?

He gripped the doorknob. No, it was better this way. He’d already ripped her life apart; he wasn’t going to scatter the pieces as well.

As he was leaving, he took one last backward glance. She was still huddled on the bed, her knees drawn up to her chest. The oversized shirt had slid off one bare shoulder. For a moment he thought she was crying. Then she raised her head and met his gaze. What he saw in her eyes wasn’t tears. It was something far more moving, something pure and bright and beautiful.

Courage.

In the pale light of dawn, Savitch stood outside Jack Zuckerman’s house. Through the fingers of morning mist, Savitch studied the curtained windows, trying to picture the
inhabitants within. He wondered who they were, in which room they slept, and whether Catherine Weaver was among them.

He’d find out soon.

He pocketed the black address book he’d taken from the woman’s apartment. The name C. Zuckerman and this Pacific Heights address had been written on the inside front cover. Then the Zuckerman had been crossed out and replaced with Weaver. She was a divorcée, he concluded. Under
Z,
he’d found a prominent listing for a man named Jack, with various phone numbers and addresses, both foreign and domestic. Her ex-husband, he’d confirmed, after a brief chat with another name listed in the book. Pumping strangers for information was a simple matter. All it took was an air of authority and a cop’s ID. The same ID he was planning to use now.

He gave the house one final perusal, taking in the manicured lawns and shrubbery, the trellis with its vines of winter-dormant wisteria. A successful man, this Jack Zuckerman. Savitch had always admired men of wealth. He gave his jacket a final tug to assure himself that the shoulder holster was concealed. Then he crossed the street to the front porch and rang the doorbell.

A
t first light, Cathy awakened. It wasn’t a gentle return but a startling jerk back to consciousness. She was instantly aware that she was not in her own bed and that something was terribly wrong. It took her a few seconds to remember exactly what it was. And when she did remember, the sense of urgency was so compelling she rose at once from bed and began to dress in the semidarkness.
Have to be ready to run…

The creak of floorboards in the next room told her that Victor was awake as well, probably planning his moves for the day. She rummaged through the closet, searching for things he might need in his flight. All she came up with was a zippered nylon bag and a raincoat. She searched the dresser next and found a few men’s socks. She also found a collection of women’s underwear.
Damn Jack and all his women,
she thought with sudden irritation and slammed the drawer shut. The thud was still resonating in the room when another sound echoed through the house.

The doorbell was ringing.

It was only seven o’clock, too early for visitors or deliverymen. Suddenly her door swung open. She turned to see Victor, his face etched with tension.

“What should we do?” she asked.

“Get ready to leave. Fast.”

“There’s a back door—”

“Let’s go.”

They hurried along the hall and had almost reached the top of the stairs when they heard Jack’s sleepy voice below, grumbling: “I’m coming, dammit! Stop that racket, I’m coming!”

The doorbell rang again.

“Don’t answer it!” hissed Cathy. “Not yet—”

Jack had already opened the door. Instantly Victor snatched Cathy back up the hall, out of sight. They froze with their backs against the wall, listening to the voices below.

“Yeah,” they heard Jack say. “I’m Jack Zuckerman. And who are you?”

The visitor’s voice was soft. They could tell only that it was a man.

“Is that so?” said Jack, his voice suddenly edged with panic. “You’re with the
FBI,
you say? And what on earth would the
FBI
want with my
ex-wife?
”

Cathy’s gaze flew to Victor. She read the frantic message in his eyes:
Which way out?

She pointed toward the bedroom at the end of the hall. He nodded. Together they tiptoed along the carpet, all the time aware that one misstep, one loud creak, might be enough to alert the agent downstairs.

“Where’s your warrant?” they heard Jack demand of the visitor. “Hey, wait a minute! You can’t just barge in here without a court order or something!”

No time left!
thought Cathy in panic as she slipped into the last room. They closed the door behind them.

“The window!” she whispered.

“You mean jump?”

“No.” She hurried across the room and gingerly eased the window open. “There’s a trellis!”

He glanced down dubiously at the tangled vines of wisteria. “Are you sure it’ll hold us?”

“I know it will,” she said, swinging her leg over the sill. “I caught one of Jack’s blondes hanging off it one night. And believe me, she was a
big
girl.” She glanced down at the ground far below and felt a sudden wave of nausea as the old fear of heights washed through her. “God,” she muttered. “Why do we always seem to be hanging out of windows?”

From somewhere in the house came Jack’s outraged shout: “You can’t go up there! You haven’t shown me your warrant!”

“Move!”
snapped Victor.

Cathy lowered herself onto the trellis. Branches clawed her face as she scrambled down the vine. An instant after she landed on the dew-soaked grass, Victor dropped beside her.

At once they were on their feet and sprinting for the cover of shrubbery. Just as they rolled behind the azalea bushes, they heard a second-floor window slide open, and then Jack’s voice complaining loudly: “I know my rights! This is an illegal search! I’m going to call my lawyer!”

Don’t let him see us!
prayed Cathy, burrowing frantically into the bush. She felt Victor’s body curl around her back, his arms pulling her tightly to him, his breath hot and ragged against her neck. For an eternity they lay shivering in the grass as mist swirled around them.

“You see?” they heard Jack say. “There’s no one here but me. Or would you like to check the garage?”

The window slid shut.

Victor gave Cathy a little push. “Go,” he whispered. “The end of the hedge. We’ll run from there.”

On hands and knees she crawled along the row of azalea bushes. Her soaked jeans were icy and her palms scratched and bleeding, but she was too numbed by terror to feel any pain. All her attention was focused on moving forward. Victor was crawling close behind her. When she felt him bump up against her hip, it occurred to her what a ridiculous view he had, her rump swaying practically under his nose.

She reached the last bush and stopped to shove a handful of tangled hair off her face. “That house next?” she asked.

“Go for it!”

They both took off like scared rabbits, dashing across the twenty yards of lawn between houses. Once they reached the cover of the next house, they didn’t stop. They kept running, past parked cars and early-morning pedestrians. Five blocks later, they ducked into a coffee shop. Through the front window, they glanced out at the street, watching for signs of pursuit. All they saw was the typical Monday morning bustle: the stop-and-go traffic, the passersby bundled up in scarves and overcoats.

From the grill behind them came the hiss and sizzle of bacon. The smell of freshly brewed coffee wafted from the counter burner. The aromas were almost painful; they reminded Cathy that she and Victor probably had a total of forty dollars between them. Damn it, why hadn’t she begged, borrowed or stolen some cash from Jack?

“What now?” she asked, half hoping he’d suggest blowing the rest of their cash on breakfast.

He scanned the street. “Let’s go on.”

“Where?”

“Hickey’s studio.”

“Oh.” She sighed. Another long walk, and all on an empty stomach.

Outside, a car passed by bearing the bumper sticker: Today is the First Day of the Rest of Your Life.

Lord, I hope it gets better than this,
she thought. Then she followed Victor out the door and into the morning chill.

Field Supervisor Larry Dafoe was sitting at his desk, pumping away at his executive power chair. Upper body strength, he always said, was the key to success as a man. Bulk out those muscles
pull!,
fill out that size forty-four jacket
pull!,
and what you got was a pair of shoulders that’d impress any woman, intimidate any rival. And with this snazzy 700-buck model, you didn’t even have to get out of your chair.

Sam Polowski watched his superior strain at the system of wires and pulleys and thought the device looked more like an exotic instrument of torture.

“What you gotta understand,” gasped Dafoe, “is that there are other
pull!
issues at work here. Things you know nothing about.”

“Like what?” asked Polowski.

Dafoe released the handles and looked up, his face sheened with a healthy sweat. “If I was at liberty to tell you, don’t you think I already would’ve?”

Polowski looked at the gleaming black exercise handles,
wondering whether he’d benefit from an executive power chair. Maybe a souped-up set of biceps was what he needed to get a little respect around this office.

“I still don’t see what the point is,” he said. “Putting Victor Holland in the hot seat.”

“The point,” said Dafoe, “is that you don’t call the shots.”

“I gave Holland my word he’d be left out of this mess.”

“He’s
part
of the mess! First he claims he has evidence, then he pulls a vanishing act.”

“That’s partly my fault. I never made it to the rendezvous.”

“Why hasn’t he tried to contact you?”

“I don’t know.” Polowski sighed and shook his head. “Maybe he’s dead.”

“Maybe we just need to find him.” Dafoe reached for the exercise handles. “Maybe you need to get to work on the Lanzano file. Or maybe you should just go home. You look terrible.”

“Yeah. Sure.” Polowski turned. As he left the office, he could hear Dafoe once again huffing and puffing. He went to his desk, sat down and contemplated his collection of cold capsules, aspirin and cough syrup. He took a double dose of each. Then he reached in his briefcase and pulled out the Viratek file.

It was his own private collection of scrambled notes and phone numbers and news clippings. He sifted through them, stopping to ponder once again the link between Holland and the woman Catherine Weaver. He’d first seen her name on the hospital admission sheet, and had later been startled to hear of her connection to the murdered Garberville woman.
Too many coincidences, too many twists and turns. Was there something obvious here he was missing? Might the woman have an answer or two?

He reached for the telephone and dialed the Garberville police department. They would know how to reach their witness. And maybe she would know how to find Victor Holland. It was a long shot but Sam Polowski was an inveterate horseplayer. He had a penchant for long shots.

The man ringing his doorbell looked like a tree stump dressed in a brown polyester suit. Jack opened the door and said, “Sorry, I’m not buying today.”

“I’m not selling anything, Mr. Zuckerman,” said the man. “I’m with the FBI.”

Jack sighed. “Not again.”

“I’m Special Agent Sam Polowski. I’m trying to locate a woman named Catherine Weaver, formerly Zuckerman. I believe she—”

“Don’t you guys ever know when to quit?”

“Quit what?”

“One of your agents was here this morning. Talk to him!”

The man frowned. “One of
our
agents?”

“Yeah. And I just might register a complaint against him. Barged right in here without a warrant and started tramping all over my house.”

“What did he look like?”

“Oh, I don’t know! Dark hair, terrific build. But he could’ve used a course in charm school.”

“Was he about my height?”

“Taller. Skinnier. Lots more hair.”

“Did he give you his name? It wasn’t Mac Braden, was it?”

“Naw, he didn’t give me any name.”

Polowski pulled out his badge. Jack squinted at the words: Federal Bureau of Investigation. “Did he show you one of these?” asked Polowski.

“No. He just asked about Cathy and some guy named Victor Holland. Whether I knew how to find them.”

“Did you tell him?”

“That jerk?” Jack laughed. “I wouldn’t bother to give him the time of day. I sure as hell wasn’t going to tell him about—” Jack paused and cleared his throat. “I wasn’t going to tell him anything. Even if I knew. Which I don’t.”

Polowski slipped his badge into his pocket, all the time gazing steadily at Jack. “I think we should talk, Mr. Zuckerman.”

“What about?”

“About your ex-wife. About the fact she’s in big trouble.”

“That,” sighed Jack, “I already know.”

“She’s going to get hurt. I can’t fill you in on all the details because I’m still in the dark myself. But I do know one woman’s already been hit. Your wife—”

“My ex-wife.”

“Your ex-wife could be next.”

Jack, unconvinced, merely looked at him.

“It’s your duty as a citizen to tell me what you know,” Polowski reminded him.

“My duty. Right.”

“Look, cooperate, and you and me, we’ll get along just fine. Give me grief, and I’ll give
you
grief.” Polowski smiled. Jack didn’t. “Now, Mr. Zuckerman. Hey, can I call you Jack? Jack, why don’t you tell me where she is? Before it’s too late. For both of you.”

Jack scowled at him. He drummed his fingers against the door frame. He debated. At last he stepped aside. “As a law-abiding citizen, I suppose it is my duty.” Grudgingly, he waved the man in. “Oh, just come in, Polowski. I’ll tell you what I know.”

The window shattered, raining slivers into the gloomy space beyond.

Cathy winced at the sound. “Sorry, Hickey,” she said under her breath.

“We’ll make it up to him,” said Victor, knocking off the remaining shards. “We’ll send him a nice fat check. You see anyone?”

She glanced up and down the alley. Except for a crumpled newspaper tumbling past the trash cans, nothing moved. A few blocks away, car horns blared, the sounds of another Union Street traffic jam.

“All clear,” she whispered.

“Okay.” Victor draped his windbreaker over the sill. “Up you go.”

He gave her a lift to the window. She clambered through and landed among the glass shards. Seconds later, Victor dropped down beside her.