A Note From an Old Acquaintance (31 page)

He arrived home just after 9:00, relieved to see Joanna’s car in the garage. He’d known it was going to be there, as Mosley had reported her departure from the Stuart Street garage moments after she’d driven off.

Inside the house, he saw that Joanna had already gone upstairs, the light from their bedroom spilling out into the upper hallway. Ruby walked to the back of the house, finding his son typing away at his computer.

“Hi,” he said.

The boy turned and smiled. “Hi, Dad. Long day.”

“You’re not kidding,” he said, moving into the room. He sat on the boy’s bed, moving the guitar out of the way, frowning at the Green Day flag. Kids never changed, always the rebels.

“So, tomorrow’s the big day, eh, Chief?”

“Yeah,” the boy said, resuming his typing.

“Wait, hold up on that for a minute.”

Zack turned and regarded his father, a questioning look on his face.

“How would you like to check out the building with me tomorrow? I know you’ve been wanting to see it, so how ’bout it?”

Ruby could see a battle going on behind the boy’s eyes.

“What is it?”

“Well, Mom and I are going into town tomorrow to a book signing. She’s introducing me to Brian Weller. He’s taking us to lunch afterward.”

Ruby felt his entire body grow cold.

“How nice of him,” he said. “Maybe I should go talk to your mother.”

“I think she’s meditating.”

Ruby stood and went to the door. “Oh, I think she’ll want to talk about this.”

He marched through the house, his anger mounting. The door to her meditation room was closed. He hesitated for only the briefest of moments then threw open the door. It banged against the wall, putting a dent in the sheetrock.

Joanna sat on the floor in the lotus position, the glow of a candle the only light in the room. She opened her eyes, studying her husband with a calm gaze. Her serenity only angered him more.

“What is this? Going to a book signing tomorrow? You knew I wanted to take Zack to the building.”

“And you know how much he wants to be a writer, Erik. He can see the building anytime. This is a great opportunity for him.”

“Opportunity for what? To get his hopes up, just so someone can rub his face in the dirt someday because he’s not good enough?”

“He
is
good. And you’d know that if you bothered to read any of what he’s written.”

“I’m sure he’s got talent, but it’s a waste of time, Joanna. People like Weller are a rare commodity.”

“I’m glad you see it that way,” she replied, the hint of a smile on her face.

Ruby glowered. “That’s not what I meant.”

“I know what you meant.”

“Then why encourage him to think he can make any kind of decent living from it?”

Joanna rose to her feet in a fluid move and met her husband’s glare with one of her own. “Money isn’t everything.” She started to leave the room and Ruby barred the door with his arm.

“Money isn’t everything, eh?”

“Let me by, please.”

“Where would you be without everything I’ve given you? Living off your precious art?”

Joanna’s eyes narrowed. “I make good money off my commissions.”

Ruby snorted. “Enough to live like this?”

“The trouble is you think I wanted all this. You wanted it, Erik, not me! You spent the days and nights holed up in your office sweating over your deals because you wanted it! Now, let me by.”

She pushed his arm away from the doorframe and stalked out. Ruby’s slow burn turned white-hot. He followed her into the bedroom, his eyes scanning the thousand square feet of rare antiques, including the mahogany four-poster bed on its riser at the far end. The room, as usual, was neat as a pin, marred only by the sight of Joanna’s street clothes tossed casually onto the bed. He found her in the bathroom seated in front of her vanity.

“Maybe you didn’t want all this, Dear, but you’re certainly used to it, aren’t you? Or would you rather still be living in that illegal loft I found you in when you were a student?”

Joanna closed her eyes, sighing. She opened them and stared back at her husband’s reflection. “Do you really want me to answer that question?”

He hated it when she backed him into a corner like this. Well, this time he wasn’t backing down.

He leaned forward, grasping her shoulders. “Maybe you’d better,” he said. “Because I’m reaching the end of my rope.”

“You’re hurting me!”

Ruby let go of her. “Well?”

“I’m tired, Erik. It’s been a long day and I want Zack’s birthday to be the one he wants.”

Ruby ground his teeth. “Sure, why shouldn’t it be? Lord knows he’d rather spend it with you than me.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Isn’t it? You think anyone’s going to give a damn about your precious Brian Weller in fifty years? I’m making a mark on this city.”

Joanna slapped her hand on the vanity. “You leave him out of this.”

“Oh? I’ve struck a nerve, have I?”

She stood and wheeled on him. “He’s a caring, sensitive man, which is more than I can say for you. Your son needs your understanding, not a guided tour of your accomplishments!”

“I’m doing the best I can. And what’s wrong with what I’ve accomplished?”

“Nothing and everything! They’re glass and steel, Erik! You’ve got a flesh and blood boy down there who’s been trying to reach you for years! All he wants is his father to love him and know that his needs and desires are important.”

“I DO LOVE HIM!”

“THEN SHOW IT!”

God help him, he wanted to hit her, just reach back and slam his fist into that face—the face he’d adored all these years—and which now gazed back at him with such loathing and contempt. His hands balled into fists and his entire body shook. Then, all at once, the anger fled, leaving him feeling drained and hollow.

“I’m going downstairs to the office. There are some things I still need to do.”

He walked out of the bedroom with Joanna at his heels.

She remained at the top of the stairs, watching him descend.

“That’s fine, Erik, go and escape like you always do! Go play with your blueprints and whatever it is you keep in that locked file cabinet of yours and ignore what’s really important!”

She kept yelling, but Ruby tuned it out, finally cutting her off with the slam of his office door. He sat in the dark, trying to sort everything out in his mind. A part of him knew she was right, the part of him that felt panic every time he tried to talk to his son. He was so much like his mother, yet there was a deeper part of the boy that frightened Ruby, an extraordinary intuition, as if Zack could see right through to the core of him. It was so simple when he was five years old, so easy to bring a smile to that tiny face. Now, he just didn’t know what to do or say.

Now there was true irony for you.

Here he was, a man who could and did deal with titans, men who could break him if he wasn’t on his toes at all times, brought to his knees by the knowing look from a pair of young limpid green eyes.

Ruby shook his head. Joanna was wrong. He
did
love the boy. How could he not?

Weller was poisoning her heart and mind once more; and except for one brief blip all those years ago, they’d been happy since he’d left town...hadn’t they? Now, it was all turning sour.

Now, Weller was taking the boy from him, too!

Ruby slammed his fist onto his desk, his entire body trembling with rage. What was he going to do?

Zack’s fingers flew over the keys, the words poring out onto the screen. The new story promised to be even better than the one he’d sent to Mr. Weller. The faster he typed, the faster the words came, almost fast enough to drown out the sound of his parents screaming at each other....

Almost....

The words kept coming...along with the tears.

28

THE
PHONE
RANG
,
AND
Brian grabbed for it on the nightstand, almost knocking it to the floor.

“Hello,” he said in a voice thick with sleep.

“Good morning, Mr. Weller, this is your wake-up call.”

“Thank you.”

Brian replaced the phone onto its cradle and sat up, groaning. He’d finally dropped off sometime after midnight. His body was still on California time and felt as if a tribe of pygmies had trampled it. A glance at the clock told him it was just after 9:00. At least the call had come on time.

Climbing out of the bed, Brian went through his stretching routine. The problem was the older he got the longer it took to work out the kinks. After finishing with the stretching, he went through his isometrics, his muscles fairly singing by the time he finished ten minutes later. He then turned on his cell phone and checked his messages. There was one from Kevin, telling him about a talk show appearance he wanted to book for him back in New York.

The other was from Joanna.

“Hi, Brian. Just wanted to tell you I had a wonderful time at dinner last night. Can’t wait to see you in your element. Zack is all excited, too. See you soon. Bye.”

Brian smiled. He couldn’t wait, either. It was strange, though. She’d sounded cheerful, but there’d been an undercurrent to the sound of her voice that bothered him. That, coupled with the remnants of the dream he’d been awakened from, made for an unexplainable disquietude.

The dream was the oddest thing. He was having dinner with Joanna at the HUNGRY I, just as they had the prior evening, but this time they weren’t alone. Penny was at the table, too, looking as beautiful as he remembered her. The two women were chattering away, the best of friends, and he was sitting there feeling left out. But the strangest, and most ironic thing was the dream didn’t seem all that odd. Knowing each woman as well as he did, he was sure they would have been fast friends, were it not for the nature of his relationship with the both of them. Perhaps it was because they were similar in lots of ways.

Brian shook his head, filing that thought away. It would be good fodder for a book, at some point. He took a quick shower, dressed in a pair of khaki slacks, a chambray shirt and his boots, then grabbed his flight jacket and the laptop and left the room.

Downstairs, Brian went to the front desk. The woman working behind it, a strawberry blonde in her early twenties, looked up and gave him a perky smile. “Good morning, may I help you?”

“I was wondering if I could ask you a favor.”

The young woman nodded. “Sure.”

“Would it be possible for me to print out a short document of mine?”

The woman frowned. “We don’t normally do something like that.”

Someone from the back room called out to her. “Uh, Judy?”

Brian looked over her shoulder, spotting an older man beckoning her. “Excuse me,” she said, going over to him. Brian watched the man whisper something to her. Her body language immediately changed. Brian knew what was coming.

The young woman hurried back to the desk. “I’m so sorry, Mr. Weller, I—I didn’t recognize you.”

Brian held up his hand. “It’s quite all right, believe me,” he said, feeling embarrassed for the girl. “I really don’t expect special treatment.”

The young woman shook her head. “No, no, it’s not that. It’s just we’re always worried about viruses. My manager said you can plug into our printer, if you wish.”

“I appreciate that, but I know what you mean about viruses. Tell you what. If you have a spare CD I’ll burn my document onto it and your manager can check it. I know it’ll be fine.”

The woman looked relieved. “I’m sure it will. Would you like us to hold the printout for you?”

“Well, I have a signing I’m going to in about an hour. Could you have someone bring it to me in the restaurant?”

She nodded. “I’ll bring it myself.”

Brian smiled. “Thanks. And tell your manager I appreciate it very much.”

While the young woman went in search of a burnable CD, Brian turned on the laptop and reopened Zack’s story. Then resaved it on the desktop. The woman returned a moment later and Brian proceeded to copy the story, handing the burned disk back to the woman. Thanking her again, he shut off the computer and headed to the restaurant.

To his disappointment, he discovered it was a buffet. He took a moment to scope out the food, feeling a little queasy when he spied the mound of bacon swimming in pools of partially coagulated grease. Maybe Joanna had something with her vegetarian diet, after all. It certainly sounded more appetizing than this looked. Instead of his usual large breakfast, he opted for a bagel with cream cheese, along with some much-needed coffee, and took a seat in a booth toward the back of the restaurant. In spite of getting nearly nine hours sleep, he still felt disoriented.

He was also nervous.

He’d been through hundreds of signings over the years and had always handled them with reasonable aplomb, enjoying them. Now, he found he could barely choke down his bagel, his stomach doing flip-flops like a kid about to take his driver’s test. Of course, most of this was because he knew Joanna was coming. But the lion’s share of his nerves was because he wasn’t sure how he would handle meeting her son. A thought kept nagging at the back of his mind, one he didn’t want to acknowledge, but which refused to be ignored. Hopefully, it would all come clear when he and the boy had a chance to talk. And then he would need to speak to Joanna.

He looked up to see the strawberry blonde from the front desk crossing the floor toward him. She smiled and handed the pages to him.

“Sorry, again, Mr. Weller,” she said.

“No problem.”

She turned and left, and Brian took the opportunity to reread the hard copy, making some mental notes about the boy’s style. It was every bit as powerful and moving as it had been the night before, perhaps even more so in the cold light of day. And while he now noticed a few very minor errors, the kind of errors beginning writers made, the boy had a huge talent. So many would-be writers turned out perfect prose that left one cold. This kid wielded words like weapons.

His cell phone rang.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Captain, how’s tricks?”

Brian smiled. “I’m just fine, Kevin. How’re things with you?”

“Good, good. Just wanted to see how my boy, Gerald’s treating you. You all ready for this morning?”

“Gerald’s a good kid. Seems to be on top of things. And, yes, I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.”

“Glad to hear it. Anyway, just wanted to run something by you. Since we’re thinking about doing that talk show, how would you like to do a couple of additional signings in the Big Apple? Some of the stores there have been hearing about your little Boston jaunt—”

“Oh? I wonder how that rumor got started?”

Kevin Romano laughed. “Guilty as charged. So, anyway, Brentano’s, the big one in Manhattan, wants to host you early next week. It’s about two days after your last one there in Boston, so it makes no sense for you to fly back to L.A., only to turn right around and come back here. What do you think?”

Brian sighed. “Well of course I’m flattered. That particular Brentano’s was always one of my favorites, but can we wait a day, or two? See how things go?”

“Sure...sure thing. They’ll kick and scream a bit ’cause they want to start blasting this all over the radio and newspapers, but I’ll tell them you’re considering it. You take care of yourself and have some fun.”

“Thanks, Kev.”

He closed the phone and put it back into his shirt pocket, feeling guilty. The truth was Brian didn’t know if he even wanted to go through with any of the signings beyond that day’s. Joanna was so close, yet so far, and he didn’t know if he could endure being so near to her for the rest of the week, not with his feelings for her blossoming anew. Maybe what he should do was call Kevin back and tell him that he needed to get back to L.A., that his agent called about an urgent meeting at Universal and to please cancel everything.

He almost did it—almost....

But the forces that made him want to run were the same ones compelling him to stay, because there was a part of him that never wanted to leave. There was nothing left for him in L.A. He hated all the schmoozy lunches and phoney-baloney friendships that faded into oblivion the moment you were no longer the “flavor-of-the-month.” Aside from Joanna, there were lots of things about New England that stirred his blood. Still a Yankee at heart, and that’s all there was to it.

His cell phone rang again and he looked at the number, frowning. Who was this? He flipped open the phone and brought it his ear.

“Mr. Weller? It’s Gerald—Gerald Pomeroy.”

“Hi, Gerald. What can I do for you?”

“I’m outside, sir, it’s time to go.”

Brian looked at his watch and rolled his eyes.

“Sorry, Gerald, got caught up in reminiscing. I’ll be right out.”

He put the phone away, paid his bill, and grabbed his jacket and computer. At the front desk he asked the strawberry blonde to hold the laptop for him then headed outside.

Gerald’s Ford Explorer sat rumbling at the curb, plumes of exhaust wafting upward in the chilly air. The young man waved and Brian went round to the passenger side and climbed in. The car smelled of cinnamon.

“Kevin wants to get a few pictures before things get started. The photographer should be set up and waiting.”

“No problem,” Brian said. “I’m ready for anything.”

The ride to the Prudential Center was short and sweet. Gerald pulled his Explorer down into the garage off Huntington, parking near a service elevator. A stocky balding man in a green jacket with a Barnes & Noble badge pinned to his lapel stood next to the elevator doors. He raised a Motorola radiophone to his mouth and spoke into it. It squawked back a moment later, followed by a squall of static.

Brian and Gerald exited the car and the man approached.

“Hi, Mr. Weller, I’m Jim. Everyone’s waiting upstairs. It looks like we’re going to have quite a crowd.”

Brian nodded. “I have a friend of mine, who’s bringing her son. Could you have them escorted in when they arrive?”

“Absolutely, just give me their names.”

Brian told him and the man wrote it all down on a small pad he’d produced from inside his jacket. When they took the elevator up to the store level he realized how different the Prudential Center was from what he remembered. Everything had changed, plus it had mushroomed into a complex that stretched from Boylston Street to the north to Huntington Avenue on the south.

Jim led Brian and Gerald through a series of service entrances that felt like an endless labyrinth, finally reaching the store through its loading dock.

The store itself was impressive, almost intimidating. Two floors of shelves packed with books of every variety, and both floors several thousand square feet in size. A group of employees met them on the second floor near the front entrance. Through the plate-glass windows Brian saw a line of about twenty-five people. Behind them, a nervous-looking employee guarded the escalators leading down to the arcade. That meant there were more people waiting below. A lot more.

The manager, a harried man in his thirties, stepped forward and introduced himself and the half-dozen others. Brian did his best to remember their names, but gave up trying, thankful they wore their badges.

Next came the pictures, one with all the employees together and then ones with each of them individually. Brian played the good sport, hugging the women and shaking hands with the men.

Afterward, the manager led him to a table in the back. Brian’s eyes widened. Next to the table was a pallet’s worth of books.

“I hope this is okay, Mr. Weller,” the manager said, noticing Brian’s reaction.

“Everything’s fine. I just hope we sell them all.”

“You kidding? I hope we have enough.”

Brian laughed and took his place at the table.

Eat your heart out Stephen King.

His cell phone rang again. He was going to have to remember to shut it off once things got going.

“Hello?”

“So we meet again.”

Brian’s stomach lurched. It was Ruby.

“How did you get my number?”

“You should know by now that I have my sources.”

“So, you’re Mr. Big, so what? What do you want?”

“I want you to do your business, Mr. Weller, and go back to L.A., where you belong. I want you to leave Joanna alone, and I especially don’t want you filling my son’s head with any pie-in-the-sky dreams.”

Brian felt a rush of anger for Joanna, and particularly for Zack.

“You have a problem with your wife? Take it up with her. As for your son, I would think you’d want to encourage his talent. He could be great someday.”

The man was silent for a moment.

“Don’t push me, Weller. You may be a hotshot writer, but you’re still a punk to me. Leave my family alone.”

Ruby hung up and Brian fought the urge to call the man back. But that was pointless. What would he do, challenge Ruby to a duel with black powder pistols at twenty paces? Brian laughed at the absurdity of that image, which served to take the edge off his anger. But there was also an undercurrent of fear he couldn’t dislodge. Ruby sounded desperate. Had to be if he was calling out of the blue like this. And because of that Brian wondered to what lengths the man would now go to protect what he thought was in danger. The implications weren’t pretty.