Authors: Renee Simons
"Quit playing games." The man chuckled. "You know me."
"Okay, Conlon. Why are you calling?"
"Unfinished business. Something to improve your position. And you still want your story, don’t you?"
She let her incredulity come through in her tone. "Over the phone?"
"No. Face to face."
"I'm not free to come and go as I wish."
"You got out once. You can do it again."
A chill shivered through her. Had they been followed?
"Just leave
Caldwell
behind." The answer came like a body blow. "And forget the phony name and the glasses. They won't work a second time."
"We have to meet in a public place," she insisted.
"You name it."
"Faneuil Hall Marketplace."
"I'll be there. One hour."
In the kitchen, she searched the pantry shelves for the emergency flashlight, then took the steps two at a time to her room for comfortable clothes and hiking boots. She checked her bag for cab fare and tied a scarf around her hair. Although she wanted the surveillance team to know about the call, she meant to avoid running into anyone who could keep her from leaving the house. In eight minutes she entered the library.
"Let's see if we can get this thing to work." She felt under the shelves, finding the latch that released the book case. As the unit swung away from the wall, she held it, giving herself just enough room to squeeze behind and open the hidden door. Another press of the button allowed the shelves to slide back into place.
At the bottom of the stairs, she lowered the flashlight and swept the beam along the ground. Nothing stirred, giving her the courage to take the first step, and then another. Finally, she moved into the depths of the tunnel. The light, dim as it was, let her see that nothing frightening dogged her and made the walk easier. The air smelled stale and a little moldy but the place held no danger. The threat waited on the outside. She could only hope that the officer in the basement would direct the surveillance team to keep an eye on her.
She swept aside a cobweb. Mr. C. must still think I'm Augusta Maxwell. Wonder what he wants? Another web blocked her way. She used the flashlight to cut through its delicate tracings, sending weird patterns of light dancing along the ceiling and walls. One long streamer trailed across her face. She batted it away with a muted curse that echoed harshly in the emptiness. Her feet found the depression in the ground that had created a puddle the last time. Today the ground was dry.
She knew the end of the passageway was just ahead. She didn't know what to say or do once she and Conlon met. What would he ask for now in return for the story he would give her?
"Damn it,
Jordan
. You should be thinking about what you can get out of him." The sessions with the task force had taught her a lot about Conlon’s comings and goings. She would try to use what she knew.
The door stood outlined in the beam of light. She unlocked it and stepped into the vestibule, then passed her hand over the wall in imitation of Ethan's movements. The outer door opened.
The afternoon sun shone bright and warm. No one watched the wall so she stepped through the opening. The door hissed closed. Two blocks away, she hailed a cab. Despite heavy midday traffic, she arrived at her destination with time to spare. She paid the driver and joined the crowd strolling through the area.
As she waited to cross the street, a limo pulled up to the curb and Conlon stepped out. "I didn't think you'd come."
"Why not?"
"You're suspicious of me."
"Yes."
"But that didn't stop you." She didn't bother answering. "You must want this story very badly," he said.
She looked around, casually assessing the crowd, looking for a familiar face or a van that might represent her protection. "Ambition can overrule a lot of fear and even more common sense."
"There is no doubt that ambition can be dangerous, but no one ever got anywhere without it." He took her arm. "Shall we walk a bit?"
"I’d rather sit." Maybe a stationary position would make it easier for the team to track her.
He nodded at a bench under a shade tree. "That's as good a place as any."
"Want to tell me why you went to the trouble of tracking me down?"
"I expected you to call for the interview. When you didn't I got curious."
"This project must be as important to you as it is to me."
"You convinced me that getting out our story could be helpful.”
"I hope you mean that because I have a lot of questions whose answers can only come from you. You’re a difficult person to research."
"How so?"
Careful, she thought. "Well, for one thing, I keep running into dead ends. Records reach back only so far and then stop. People say only so much...and then stop." His features hardened. "Money appears suddenly and disappears just as quickly without any record of where it came from or where it goes. And then there’s your silent partner, whose existence nobody can prove."
His cordial expression faded. She feared she'd said too much. Clearly, he hadn't expected her to know as much as she did. Would that drive him away or elicit something they could use against him?
"Raising these questions in print could cause problems, embarrassment being the least of them. If you give me answers, I'll offer facts and not innuendoes."
"Somehow, I imagined you to be above publishing unsubstantiated theories."
Don't lose him now, her guiding voice cautioned. "I'd like to think so, but this story is important to me. I'd rather not speculate in print, but if you don't supply the facts, what are my options?"
He shook his head. "I certainly can't fault your candor."
"If you give me my story, what do you expect in return?"
He looked directly at her, his dark eyes devoid of deception. "I want to know that you will write what I tell you, accurately and without equivocation. I want to know you’ll never reveal anything but what I give you permission to. Ever." His expression turned deadly. "To anyone."
Her heart thumped violently in her chest and her stomach turned over. What is he planning to tell me? "All right."
"I'll give you information, some of which you'll keep to yourself until you submit your story. Some you'll pass on to those people you're involved with."
"Why?"
"So you can help me destroy this partner no one can identify."
She slumped against the back of the bench as her mind struggled to accept several facts simultaneously. If she agreed, this deception was nowhere near being over. What he told her could make the state's case against both men. Hardest of all, she would have to trust a man who'd years ago proven he was unworthy of that trust.
Finally, after what seemed too long a time, she felt enough in control to turn and look at him. "Why would you want to betray your partner?"
His lips tightened into a thin white line and his eyes smoldered with hatred. "The man's a bastard. He's destroyed everything I ever cared about. Now you're going to help me do the same to him."
"Anything that results will affect you also. Why would you want to do that to yourself?"
He looked at her with pity. "You're such an innocent, my dear. There are ways to avoid destruction, as long as you see it coming. Besides, I'm not looking for absolution, just a fair chance - and a way to bring him down permanently and thoroughly so he'll never hurt anyone else."
"Then go to the police. They want him as badly as you do and they have the means. The system will give you what you want. Better than I can."
He gave a short, bitter laugh. "The system put him where he is today. You and I will crush him so that all the money and lawyers can't put Humpty Dumpty together again."
Her doubts felt as real as the pounding of her heart. "I've never done anything like this. What if I can't pull it off?"
"Let me give you something to stiffen your backbone." She stared at him. "Would you like to see justice done to the man responsible for the death of your parents?"
"What are you saying?"
"I know what happened to them, Jordy. My partner, as you call him, was responsible."
"No," she whispered. She hadn't heard that name in years and it hurt. The fact that he used it meant he’d recognized her. "My father killed himself out of shame. Over what happened to me. My mother died of...a broken heart."
"Well, you're right about the second part, but not the first." He looked around at the crowd moving through the square, then turned back to her. "I suspect by now your task force is itching to ID this man?"
"It isn't my task force, but you're right."
He reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a pen and a piece of paper on which he wrote a date and an address.
"Give that to the surveillance team. I'll arrange for him to be there on that day. After you've seen him, you'll understand a great deal more than you do now. You'll have twenty-four hours to decide. Please forgive the presumption, but I can guess your answer."
Her curiosity overruled her judgment - again. "How did you find out who I am?"
"How could I not recognize my best friend's daughter? Even after fourteen years and her attempt at a disguise."
He climbed into the front seat of his limo and closed the door. Mesmerized, she stared at the spot the vehicle had occupied even after it pulled away.
As her mind struggled to absorb the conversation, she realized that the emotions warring inside her would have to dissipate before she could think clearly and logically. An urge to move picked her up and sent her walking aimlessly through the crowds.
A fleeting but sharp sense of danger signaled her to look up. Fifty feet ahead, two large men watched her. Their height and bulk identified them as the resident nemeses. She meant to avoid falling into their clutches and changed direction, hoping she hadn't outdistanced a possible tail.
Sure enough, a voice called out from her right. When she turned, Ethan motioned to her. Relieved to find him at her side, she followed him away from the two men and deeper into the crowd strolling the marketplace. Skirting push carts filling an area inexplicably called the "bull market," they wove their way among the tables of an outdoor café.
Equally grateful he’d found
Jordan
, Ethan ducked behind a huge sign that functioned as a directory to the mall and to Quincy Market. He pulled her along and shoved her back into a corner, then leaned forward until he could see without exposing himself to view. As the men came closer he spotted them towering above the crowd.
Jordan
peered out through a narrow opening where the sign joined the uprights. With a gentle hand, he kept her from leaning too far out and revealing their position. The men cleared the mass of people and stood almost abreast of the sign, then veered left and entered the building.
He glanced at her, expecting to find fear in her eyes. Instead, he saw anger, not the vital snap and sizzle that flared during one of their lively discussions, but something deep and steady and old. The intensity of emotion chilled him.
"C'mon, then, let's find the car," he said softly. She nodded her assent.
They crossed the street as vehicles thundered along the elevated highway. Near the Aquarium, Ethan spotted the surveillance car. He raised an arm, then followed her into the back seat when it stopped.
He waited with a mixture of concern and anger churning in his gut. When he started to speak, she gave him a warning look.
"Not now," she said through clenched teeth, then turned to stare out of the car window. "Please don't say anything right now."
They made the trip back to
Beacon Hill
in silence, but she seemed to welcome his touch when he took her hand.
Inside the house the inquisitors were furious. Lieutenant Torres ushered
Jordan
into the library. Captain Mahan, A.D.A. Dominique Santorelli and the lawyer waited in their usual places at the table. Ethan followed her in and took his seat.
Barely in control of his anger, the captain spoke first.
"You'd better have a damned good explanation for what just happened, although I can't imagine what would satisfy me."