Authors: Suzanne Brockmann
“I’m at the car,” Jenn reported, unlocking Ford with an electronic
whoop
and sliding behind the wheel. She put her handbag on the passenger seat, locked the door behind her, fastened her seatbelt and put the key in the ignition. Dang, it smelled funky in here, as if someone had left a sandwich or a piece of fruit under the seat and it was turning into a distant cousin of gin, with a little middle-school gym locker thrown in. No doubt about it, it was time to hose this puppy down. “I have to hang up.”
“We’ll be waiting down in front,” Maria promised, and cut the connection.
Jenn tossed her cell phone into her bag, put the car into reverse and looked into the rearview mirror.
And screamed at the top of her lungs.
There was a hulking shape of a man in the back seat—his eyes glistening in the dimness. She slammed it back to park and fumbled for the interior lights, for the door lock, for her belt release—getting everything on and opened at once.
She flung herself out of the car and into the street, with every darkly pointed comment her mother had ever made about living among all of the muggers and gangbangers and serial killers in New York City replaying loudly in her head. But she wasn’t completely reduced to a terrified eleven-year-old—part of her brain was functioning clearly and calmly, assessing the situation, thank God. And thank her squad of boisterous older brothers who’d taught her self-defense by forcing her to defend herself against their teasing and taunts.
Her phone was in her bag, which was still on the front seat. Her keys were in the ignition. She could run, but she wouldn’t be able to get back into her building or her apartment.
There was a twenty-four-hour convenience store two long and one short block away, but she wasn’t much of a runner. Still, running—
while continuing to scream loudly—was probably her best option. But before she took off, as she filled her lungs with air to scream again, she realized that the man, too, was scrambling out of the car. But he was going out the far door, on the sidewalk side—moving not toward her, but away from her.
And then she recognized him in the glow from the street light. He was the ancient-seeming homeless man that she’d seen in the neighborhood over the past few months. She’d spotted him many times, going through the dumpster in the back alley behind the office or napping in the waning sunshine in the little park down the street.
Everything about him was grayish-brown—his clothes, his long, scraggly hair and beard, his hands and face, his teeth.
“Sorry,” he mumbled, slamming the car door and backing away, his hands outstretched, as if he were attempting to calm a wild animal. Or to show he was unarmed, which was good. “So sorry. Saw you park it earlier, figured you wouldn’t be back until mornin’. You done scared me half to death.”
She’d
scared
him?
“You were trespassing,” she told him, her voice too loud to her own ears, her heart still pounding. She was still not completely convinced that he was harmless and that she was safe, so it was stupid to take such an accusing tone, but her fear was rapidly morphing into heat—into anger and indignation. “This car was
locked.”
He shrugged as he shuffled away. “Lock’s not a lock to everyone, missy. Jus’ wanted to be outa the rain. Stormy weather’s comin’.”
It
was
starting to rain, Jenn realized. It was coming down lightly in a mist that she wouldn’t have noticed unless she was walking more than a few blocks—or sleeping on the street.
He faded into the shadows as Jenn exhaled hard, and—peering into the back of the car first, to make sure he hadn’t left behind a companion—she climbed back in and locked all of the doors.
Her hands were shaking, but she put them on the steering
wheel and forced herself to drive. Traffic was nonexistent, and in just a few minutes she made it to the building where Maria and Savannah both had condos.
Van’s place was just a pied-à-terre—a home base for when she was in town—yet it still managed to be bigger and nicer than Jenn’s miniscule studio apartment, and yeah, she
so
wasn’t going to complain or even be envious. Nuh-uh. Not her. At least she
had
a place to live, unlike a lot of people these days, including Strong Aroma Man, who hadn’t been even remotely stymied by Ford’s security system. True, it wasn’t close to state of the art, but still. … Note to self: get one of those steering-wheel locks, ASAP.
As she pulled to the curb, there came Maria and Van out of a door held respectfully open by the always-on-duty doorman. Maria came around to the driver’s side—that’s right, she wanted to drive.
But that was Maria—always wanting to drive.
Jenn grabbed her bag and slid out, climbing into the back seat as Savannah and Maria took over the front. They were both traveling light and they passed their bags back so that Jenn could stow them on the seat next to her.
“Van,” she started to say, “I can’t imagine—”
“He’s going to be all right.” Savannah spoke with total conviction.
“Oh, thank God,” Jenn said with a rush of relief. She looked from Van to Maria, who glanced back at her in the rearview mirror as she pulled into the street, doing a hair-raising youie that pointed them downtown. “You spoke to the doctor?”
But Maria’s dark eyes were filled with warning as she looked into the mirror again and shook her head no.
“Not yet,” Van admitted. “But I spoke to Meg. She’s at the hospital, and she knows the surgeon. KatiAnn Watson. Meg said she’s the best—Ken’s in good hands.”
“That’s good to know,” Jenn said, looking to Maria again for more information.
“Meg is the wife of one of the officers in Ken’s SEAL team,” Maria explained, driving as she always did—like a NASCAR champion.
“Is she the FBI agent?” Jenn asked, sitting back so she could fasten her seat belt. There was something hard back there, and she reached beneath her to pull free an old sock, its toe filled with God knows what—coins or marbles or maybe even gravel.
Ew. It obviously belonged to the homeless man, and she didn’t want to look inside. She didn’t want to touch the thing more than she had to. She dropped it on the floor, on the other side of the center bump.
“No, that’s Alyssa,” Maria was saying. “She’s former FBI. She works for Troubleshooters now.”
“She wasn’t hurt, too, was she?” Jenn asked, as she saw that the sock wasn’t the only thing the homeless man had left in the car. He’d stuck a ragged photograph of a dark-haired woman into the pocket in the back of the driver’s seat. It must’ve slipped down during the drive, because only the woman’s eyes and the top of her head protruded, as if she were peeking out at Jenn.
Van shook her head as Jenn pulled the photo free. “I don’t think she was there.”
The woman in the picture was African American, with short hair that framed her exceptionally beautiful face. It was hard to see in the dim light, but her eyes looked to be light-colored, and they seemed to sparkle as she looked into the camera’s lens—her smile warm for the photographer.
She was young enough to be Aroma Man’s granddaughter. Jenn flipped the photo over, but there was nothing written on the back-no date, no
Happy Birthday, Grandpa
. She reached over and tucked it into the top of the sock—then checked the pocket to see if he’d left anything else there when he’d moved in. But it was empty.
“Meg’s married to John Nilsson,” Maria explained as they sped south on the island, green traffic lights stretching out in front of
them on the nearly deserted avenue, “who just got promoted. He’s the new executive officer of Team …” She looked at Savannah. “Ten?”
“Twelve,” she corrected.
“But Ken’s still with Team Sixteen?” Jenn asked, and Savannah nodded.
Just last week, Van had showed her what looked like a class picture of the men in SEAL Team Sixteen—although it was unlike any class picture Jenn had ever seen before. In it the group of men were wearing swim trunks that looked as if they’d last had a design update back in 1943. Which was a good thing. The trunks—small by today’s baggy standards—fit snugly and highlighted the men’s amazingly sculpted bodies. Van had gone through the rows of men, name by name, teasingly picking out her choice for a potential hookup for Jenn—some junior grade lieutenant who bore the nickname Grunge.
Yes, Grunge. Thanks a million, Van.
Many of them—particularly the youngest, fresh from SEAL school, which Van had said was called BUD/S training, which stood for Basic Underwater Demolition slash SEAL—had ridiculous nicknames that made poor pathetic Scooter’s self-proclaimed handle seem ordinary and lame.
Cosmo, Jazz, Gilligan, the Duke, Chickie, Hobomofo—who had a one syllable sub-nickname, Fo, for his nickname, and yes, there was no doubt a good story behind all four syllables of
that
one—Wiley, WetDream, and, of course, the esteemed Grunge. Ken’s nickname was WildCard, which, okay, was kind of cool, but Jenn had never, ever heard Van call him that.
“Ken’s going to be really angry,” Van said now from the front seat, the streetlights that flashed across her face illuminating her anxiety. “Meg told me that the man he was guarding got taken. I want to be there before they tell him, because he’s going to try to climb out of his hospital bed to be part of the team that goes and
gets him back.” She laughed, but her eyes filled with tears. “He’s going to be all right,” she said again, more to herself than to them. “He has to be.”
“I’m
sure
he will,” Jenn murmured.
“My laptop is in the office,” Van turned back to tell her. “I didn’t want to take the time to stop and pick it up.”
“I’ll send it to you,” Jenn promised. “First thing in the morning.”
But Van shook her head. “Let me get to California,” she said, “and figure out where you should send it. I’m going to be at the hospital with Ken, and—”
“Wait to send it,” Maria instructed, “until you hear from us.”
“Absolutely,” Jenn said. “And just let me know if there’s anything else you need.”
“We’ll be in touch,” Maria said.
“I made a list of all the meetings both Maria and I had scheduled for the next two days.” Van handed Jenn a legal pad. “Maria should be back after that.”
“But if I’m not—” Maria interjected.
Jenn didn’t let her finish. “I’ll take care of everything,” she promised again, flipping through the pad. Savannah had filled five pages with notes and lists.
“Page three and four are the interns’ schedules,” Van instructed. “Keep them going with the voter registration drive—these next few weeks are vital. Oh, and Douglas was helping me organize both a literature drop and weekend canvassing—again, focusing on getting out the vote. He can be a little defensive and I’ve found he’s easiest to deal with if you give him plenty of time to talk. You don’t have to do it his way, you just have to hear him out, okay?”
“Got it,” Jenn said.
“Gene and Wendy are working with him to create a list of block captains,” Savannah continued, “and … You have my number. If you have any questions—”
“Call
me,”
Maria interrupted, as she pulled to the curb in front of… Zachary Towers?
No way. The “friend” that Savannah’s Uncle Alex knew was Robert Zachary?
But yes, as they all clambered out of Ford, as Jenn humped her friends’ bags out of the back seat, she saw that it was, indeed, the real-estate mogul emerging gracefully from his trademark stretch limo, dressed down in jeans and a sweatshirt. His eyes widened, as most men’s eyes did, when he caught sight of Maria and Savannah. But then Savannah’s uncle was there, too, pulling up in a cab, introducing them all.
Well, almost all.
Jenn wasn’t affronted by the oversight, just resigned. The good news was that she would never need a cloak of invisibility when her gorgeous friends were around.
“Thank you,” Van said, giving Jenn a hug.
“If you need
anything,”
Jenn said again, but then they were gone, swept away into the building as the night guard leapt to unlock the door for his rich and famous boss.
Jenn climbed back into Ford and headed for home.
It was going to be a long night.
Savannah was gone.
She’d flown back to California before the sun had come up, long before he’d realized she’d escaped him and that his plan was ruined.
He’d wanted to scream when he found out. Scream, and wail, and tear at his clothes and hair.
He wanted to kill her—Jenn, the one who’d told him the news—right there and then. He hated her in that moment more than he’d ever hated anyone, as she promised all who were standing
there in that pathetic little office that she’d keep them posted as to the husband’s condition.
He was glad that he’d decided, back when he’d first worked out the details of his plan, not to make her his girlfriend. He’d done that before—played at normal with his victim, sometimes for weeks, before making her more permanently one of his own.
But Jenn wasn’t his target and the thought of having to talk to her, to sit with her, to share her bed and make love to her…
He couldn’t do it, couldn’t settle for her mundaneness, couldn’t betray his powerful emotions.
And although he wanted to, he didn’t now slash Jenn into a hundred bleeding pieces—because doing so would not get him that which he wanted most.
Alyssssa …
He knew he was going to have to be patient again, he was going to have to wait longer. Maybe the husband would die, or maybe he’d live—either way Savannah would eventually return and he’d proceed as he’d long planned. He’d kill Savannah, and Alyssa would come.
Still, his chest was so tight and the roaring in his ears so loud, he knew he needed to find relief.
But it couldn’t be now, and it absolutely couldn’t be here. It had to be far enough away, and it had to be different—no long, lingering terror, no teeth.
Somehow he walked home.
Maybe … one tooth, broken as if accidentally, perhaps from a tire iron to the face.
Somehow he changed his clothes, changed his appearance, changed his very identity.
He knew how to not get caught, how to not get noticed, and he rented a car using a credit card he kept on hand for emergencies like this one. The camera behind the counter recorded the transaction,
but its grainy images wouldn’t help them find him, even if they got as far as connecting his rental to that which was to come.