Repairman Jack [08]-Crisscross (18 page)

Russ grinned. "That's it. That's why you pay me the big bucks. Speaking of which…"

Jack dug into his pocket, saying, "But how will I know if it worked?"

"If you don't see him tossing his rig out a window, you'll see him down at his computer guy's place the next day asking what the fuck's going on."

Jack nodded. He planned to be watching.

But before all that he had to track down a take-out pu pu platter.

12

"Your cousin called," Sister Agnes said.

Maggie froze. She had just entered the convent's central hallway and now she felt unable to breathe.

So it begins.

Had she done the right thing in hiring Jack? She'd know soon enough. She'd either be free of this human leech or her life's work would be shattered by shame and humiliation. Either way, it had to be better than this awful in-between state of constant fear and dread.

"Maggie?" Agnes said, her brow knitting with concern. "Are you all right? You're white as a sheet."

Maggie nodded. Her words rasped over a dusty tongue. "What did he say?"

"He said to tell you your Uncle Mike has taken a turn for the worse and he'll call you back around four. I didn't know you had an Uncle Mike."

"Distant relative."

She went to her room and waited for Agnes to leave the hallway, then she darted out to a public phone two blocks west. The convent didn't allow sisters their own phones, and she couldn't discuss this on the common line in the hall, so she hurried to the one the blackmailer had sent her to the first time he'd contacted her.

It was already ringing when she arrived. She grabbed the receiver.

"Yes?"

"I thought you was going to stand me up," said that nasty, grating voice. God help her, she hated this faceless monster. "I wouldn't have been too surprised, considering how you shorted me on the latest payment."

"I don't have any more!"

Jack had told her to say that, but it was true. Her meager savings were almost gone. She'd told Mike and he'd helped her as much as he could without raising his wife's suspicions. He was being blackmailed too. But although he'd be damaged if those pictures got out, he'd survive—his marriage might not, but he'd still have his career. Maggie would be left with nothing.

"Yes, you do," the voice cooed.

"No, I swear! There's nothing left."

Now a snarl. "But we both know where you can get more!"

"No! I told you before—"

"It won't be hard." Back to the cajoling tone. "You've got all that cash coming in to the building fund. I'll bet a lot of the poor suckers in your parish don't ask for no receipts. All you gotta do is siphon off a little every time some comes through. No one will know."

I'll
know! Maggie wanted to shout.

But Jack had told her to string him along, let him think she was giving in—but not too easily.

"But I can't! That's not my money. It's for the church. They need every penny."

The snarl again. "And how many pennies do you think they'll get when start tacking up photos of you and Mr. Capital Campaign Consultant all over the parish? Huh? How many then?"

Maggie sobbed. She didn't have to fake it. "All right. I'll see if I can. But there's not much coming in during the week. What little we do get comes in on Sundays."

"I ain't waitin' till next week! Get me something before that! Forty-eight hours, or else!"

The phone went dead.

Maggie leaned against the edge of the phone booth and sobbed.

How in the world had she come to this? Never, not once, not for an instant since the day she'd joined the order had she ever even dreamed of becoming involved with a man.

If not for Serafina Martinez, none of this would have happened.

Not that she blamed the child in any way. But knowing that Fina and her sisters and brother would be forced to leave St. Joe's had compelled her to search for a benefactor.

And about that time she'd been getting to know Michael Metcalf. Bright, handsome, charming, and he was working to make St. Joe's a better place. Their positions in the fund-raising campaign put them together time and again. They became friends.

One day, out of desperation, she mentioned the Martinez children after one of the fund-raising meetings and asked if he might help. His immediate agreement had stunned Maggie, and as they continued seeing each other at the meetings, and at increasingly frequent tête-à-têtes about Fina and her siblings, she felt herself longing to touch him and be touched by him.

Then one night, when they were alone in the church basement—in the deserted soup kitchen—he'd kissed her and it felt wonderful, so wonderful that something broke free inside her, demanding more… and they made love right there, beneath the floor and aisles and pews of St. Joseph's Church. Beneath God's house.

Maggie had awakened the next morning ashamed and utterly miserable. Bad enough she had broken her vow of chastity, but Michael wasn't just a man, he was a man with a wife and children.

That had not been enough to stop her though. Being with Michael had lit a fire in her that she could not extinguish. A whole new world had opened for her and she thirsted constantly for him.

Seven times… she'd sinned seven times with him. And there would have been more if the arrival of that envelope hadn't shocked her back to sanity. Black-and-white photos, grainy and underlit, but her ecstatic face was clearly identifiable as she writhed under Michael. She'd vomited when she saw them, and nearly passed out when she read the note with its threats.

She'd called Michael who told her he'd been sent the same photos with a similar demand for payment.

Maggie closed her eyes, remembering those photos. To see herself in the act, doing what she'd been doing…

It still shocked her that she'd been capable of such a thing. She'd turned it over and over in her mind, trying to understand it, trying to understand herself.

Maybe because she'd joined the convent directly out of high school. She'd been a virgin then—no experience with men, certainly not with men interested in her as a woman—and had remained so until Michael Metcalf came along. She'd found herself mesmerized by this kind, generous man. He'd awakened yearnings she'd never realized she had.

And God forgive her, she'd surrendered to them.

But never again.

Now she and Michael saw each other only at fund-raisers, and occasionally at Mass where he'd pass Maggie some cash to help her with the payments. But he could give her only so much.

She prayed that even that would end soon.

She turned and walked back toward the convent, speaking softly to God.

"Lord—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost—deliver me from this trial, I beg you. Not just for my own sake, but for St. Joseph's as well. I have strayed, I know, and I am ashamed. I've repented, I've confessed my sin. I've done penance. Please forgive my one deviation from the Path of Your Love. I will never stray again. Never. Absolve me of this and let me go on serving you with love and devotion. But if I must be punished, let it be in a manner that does not reflect ill on St. Joseph's.

"I beg You to guide Jack so that he may end this threat to the parish and to myself without causing harm or sinning on my behalf."

Self-loathing choked her into silence. It was all her fault. No one else to blame. Yes, Michael was complicit, weak, and she perhaps was not his first dalliance, but she should have been strong enough for both of them. She had the Calling, not Michael.

If a few weeks from now she was still a member of the convent and the good name of St. Joseph's remained unsullied, she would know that God had heard and forgiven her.

If not…

13

A hand touched Jamie Grant's shoulder and she started. A quick glance in the streaked mirror behind the Parthenon's bar showed it was only Timmy Ryan.

"Hey, jumpy tonight."

Jamie shrugged.

Timmy leaned in closer, elbows on the bar, and spoke in a low tone. "Listen, Schwartz's got his kid brother along tonight. In from Duluth. We figured we'd have the usual fun with him if you're up to it."

Jamie didn't move her head. Instead she fixed her eyes on Ryan's reflection in the mirror. He had a Jay Leno situation going with his chin; he wore a dark suit, wrinkled, a striped tie, loosened, and a toothy grin, capped. He spent his days as a copywriter and his nights as a Parthenon regular, like Jamie and Schwartz, and Cassie and Frank, and about half a dozen others.

She took a sip of her Dewar's and soda. "I don't know if I'm up to it, Timmy."

She was feeling edgy. She could have sworn she'd been followed here. This comfy little bar in the West Sixties had been a nightly refuge for years. Had it been invaded? Had some Dementedists infiltrated the irregulars?

She hated to think so. A good neighborhood tavern like the Parthenon was a place to be nurtured and cherished. She liked the feel of the bar's mahogany under her elbows, the give of the leather on the chairs and stools and booths, the drama and pageant of foam rising in a draft pint of lager or stout, the smell of what's been spilled, the rattle of the cocktail shaker, the murmur of conversation, the green glow of a football game on the TV screen.

Where everybody knows your name
… more than a theme song, it was the foundation of what made a tavern work. But Jamie didn't need everybody knowing her name to feel at home here, just a nod or a wave from a few of the regulars as she stepped through the door sufficed. And few things were better than Louie timing the preparation of her Dewar's and soda—her "usual"—so that it was homing in for a three-point landing on the bar as she slid onto her usual stool.

Maybe she liked the place too much, maybe she spent too much time here. She definitely knew she drank too much.

Which always reminded her of an old Scottish proverb:
They talk of my drinking but never my thirst
.

And that pretty much nailed the situation. A thirst for something more than ethanol in all its various and wondrous permutations drew her to the Parthenon. If getting a load on were the sole objective, she could do it quicker and far cheaper by staying home with a bottle. She came for the embrace of kindred souls—who also just happened to like to consume ethanol in all its various and wondrous permutations—and for the camaraderie… a potion far more potent and alluring than distilled spirits.

Timmy draped an arm over her shoulders. It felt good, a spot of warmth on this chilly night. She and Timmy had had a fling a few years ago—Jamie had flung with a number of regulars at the Parthenon—but nothing serious, just someone to be with now and then. Some nights the thought of going home alone to an empty apartment was simply too much to bear.

"Come on, Jamie. Been a while since we heard a pinkie story. They're
always
good for a laugh."

"Tell you what," Jamie said, putting on a smile. "Pay my bar tab tonight and you've got a deal."

"You're on. After Frank finishes yakking about that new Lexus of his, I'll bring the kid over. So put on your thinking cap."

He gave her shoulder a squeeze and moved off, leaving her alone.

Alone…

She didn't want to be alone tonight, but not for the usual reasons. Those Dementedist threats—of course, they never said they were Dementedists, but who were they kidding—and now this feeling of being shadowed were getting to her. Maybe she and Timmy could hook up for the night… just for old time's sake.

She'd never liked the emptiness of her apartment—that was one of the reasons she spent so much time at the office—but she'd never feared being there. Maybe she'd just spend the night here at the Parthenon… entertaining the troops.

Always good for a laugh…

Yeah, that's me all right. Jamie the Joke Machine. Quick with the quip, the bon mot, the laugh-aloud girl, the—

Christ, I hate my life.

The Dementedism stories had been the first thing in years to fire her up, but now she sensed it turning on her. How could she enjoy writing pieces that kept her looking over her shoulder? She'd expected
some
negative fallout, but figured she could handle it.

Well, you're sure doing a bang-up job handling it tonight, Jamie.

She signaled Louie for another hit of Dewar's, then stared at the stub of her right pinkie. What tall tale could she come up with tonight? Yesterday she'd given that PI—what was his name? Robinson? Robertson? Something like that—the outboard motor story. But she'd already used that here at the Parthenon. Had to come up with something new.

Only Jamie knew the real story… how she'd lost most of that finger to the love of her life.

Never should have married Eddie Harrison. Her mother had known her college sweetheart was bad news and had warned her, but did she listen? No way. So right after she got her journalism degree she married him. It looked like a good situation at first, but it took him only a few years to morph from sweetheart to lushheart. And one night during year five he almost killed her.