Resisting the urge to confront her right away, Will left his seat in the busy café, paid his bill at the cash and stepped out into the sunny morning. An ice cream vendor happened by and Will bought a couple of Nutty Buddies, the twins’ favorite. Then he crossed the street and entered the air-conditioned building, all dark marble and gleaming brass.
He’d been camped out in front of the lawyers’ building since early Monday afternoon, working on the almost certain assumption Nina would turn up here eventually. It made more sense than running from pillar to post, being lied to by whoever was holing her up. He’d hung around until after seven the first night, long past business hours, drinking coffee fortified with scotch, and had been about to pack it in when Blumstein pulled out of the underground lot in his Jag. On a hunch Will had followed him to his yuppie ranch in the Glebe. The bitch was probably paying his fees with blowjobs and Will wanted to be there when she made her next installment. It hadn’t panned out that way—he’d sat down the block until dawn in the Suburban, drinking scotch and grinding his teeth, repeating the whole maddening process again last night. But the payoff was coming now, just as if he’d written the script. He knew how her mind worked, that was the thing. He knew she’d want to keep the boys with her around the clock—it was the only way she could do what she had to and still be sure he hadn’t found them—and he was counting on her reluctance to expose them prematurely to the messiness of an impending separation. It was a sure bet she’d avoid bringing them into Blumstein’s office to hear what was being said.
He rode the elevator to the fourth floor, stepped out behind a guy in a FedEx uniform and entered Blumstein’s outer office, just like he belonged there. Blumstein’s secretary was on the phone, the twins seated together on a leather couch, hunched over their Game Boys. The reception area was otherwise abandoned.
Jeffrey spotted him first and nearly knocked his brother off the couch trying to get to his dad.
“Daddy.”
The secretary’s head came up. “Where have you
been
?”
Then Jerry was on his feet, the Game Boy forgotten, and the secretary was scowling at Will, reaching for a switch on her intercom.
Will took three brisk strides to the desk and broke the switch off. He said, “You tell her if she wants her family back, we’re at home, where she ought to be.”
He dropped the broken switch onto the desk, hunkered down and gave the twins their treats.
“Thanks, Dad.”
Will snugged an arm around each of them and lifted them up. “Now,” he said, planting kisses on their cheeks. “We’re gonna go have some fun while your mom does her business.”
“Cool,” Jerry said. He threw an arm around his father’s neck. “Can we go to the wave pool? Mom took us there the other day and it was
awe
some.”
“No,” Jeffrey said, “Wal-Mart.”
Will started out the door. “Whatever you want.”
Standing, the secretary said, “Doctor Armstrong, I don’t think you should—”
The office door closed on her words. Will thumbed the elevator call button. He glanced back and saw Blumstein’s secretary darting around her desk, heading for the inner office.
The boys got the wrappers off their treats and started in. The elevator arrived and Will stepped aboard. As the doors slid shut he saw Nina come charging through the office door, her face as white as a sheet.
He rode the elevator to the parking level, belted the boys into the Suburban and backed out of his spot without looking. An old woman in a gray Lincoln leaned on her horn and Will buzzed down his window and cursed her furiously. The woman drove off and the twins fell silent. They’d lost interest in their ice cream.
Will paid the kid at the exit booth and saw Nina standing at the top of the steep ramp, scanning the street in frantic glances. When she spotted the truck, she started down the ramp at a run.
The barricade came up and Will punched the accelerator.
“Dad,” Jeffrey said. The uneaten portion of his treat plopped into his lap. “Look out for Mom.”
The truck surged up the ramp, and for a moment it looked as if Nina was going to call his bluff and hold her ground.
But Will wasn’t bluffing.
At the last instant she leaped aside, hugging the curved cement wall, and the Suburban jounced into the street, scattering pedestrians and narrowly missing a city bus. Nina ran up the ramp after them, screaming Will’s name. She stopped at the curb and hung her head.
The Suburban had vanished with her babies.
* * *
Nina said, “Mark, I’ve got to get my boys back. Your secretary said she could smell liquor on him. Will would never hurt the kids; but a couple of weeks ago I’d’ve said the same thing about myself. He almost ran me over out there.”
Blumstein, though outwardly calm, was livid. He was a compact man of forty-three with soft brown eyes and a close-cropped beard flecked with gray. He said, “Oh, I’ll get your boys back for you, Nina. That’s a given. You’ll have your boys, and with a little luck you’ll have a non-harassment order. That should get his attention.” He sat at his desk and checked his watch. “We’ll put an affidavit together right now, then grab a judge and apply for an emergency interim motion.” He looked firmly at Nina. “Are you up for this? It could get ugly.”
“Whatever it takes.”
They spent the next two hours preparing an affidavit outlining the events leading up to the present time, then drew up a notice of motion—a summary of what they hoped the judge would grant them. When they were done, they took a cab to the courthouse on Elgin Street. The court coordinator told Blumstein he could see Judge Henley immediately.
Blumstein hedged. “Is there anyone else?”
“Not today,” the coordinator said. “Full slates all around.”
Blumstein nodded and the coordinator called in the appointment with Henley.
“Henley’s a hardass,” he told Nina as they followed the corridor to the judge’s chambers, “but he’s fair.”
“Can I come inside?”
“Afraid not,” Blumstein said. They’d reached Henley’s office. “Just sit tight out here. I shouldn’t be long.” He took Nina’s hand. “Look, I made you a promise. This is a rotten situation, but I’ve seen it a hundred times. It’s going to work out.” He led her to a slatted bench. “You’ll be back with your boys by tonight, okay?”
Nina nodded bravely, but tears stood in her eyes.
Armed with the affidavit, Blumstein knocked and went inside.
Alone in the dim hallway, forced into sudden inaction, the unreality of the whole situation crashed in on Nina full blown. It was as if some malign prankster had booby-trapped the very landscape of her existence, undermining her trust in its most fundamental elements. Nothing seemed solid anymore. If the man she’d loved for almost half her life could kidnap her babies and try to run her down like an animal in the road, then the floor beneath her feet could sheer away or the building could collapse around her. She felt herself cowering inside.
But there was another emotion stirring and Nina reached for it now, the way a soldier will reach for a trusted weapon. She’d felt it when she ran for those elevator doors, sliding shut on her children’s stupefied faces, and again a few minutes later, with her own face pressed to the damp concrete of the parking ramp wall.
That emotion was rage, and when she touched it she felt it surge.
“All right, you son of a bitch,” she whispered through clenched teeth. “This time you’ve gone too far.” She began to rock on the bench. “This time you’ve gone too far.”
* * *
Blumstein came out twenty minutes later, looking dispirited. “I can’t believe that bastard,” he said.
Nina felt the defeat rise up in her again, smothering the flames of her rage.
“I made the situation ultra clear, but Henley feels the children are in no immediate danger. He spouted some naive bullshit about not wanting to prejudice a professional man without hearing both sides of the story.”
“You did your best,” Nina said.
Blumstein grinned slyly. “Oh, we’re not done yet. I have another idea. It’s a bit slippery...”
He laid it out for her in detail. And as he spoke, Nina’s defeated posture grew erect, her downcast eyes widening with possibility.
“Let’s do it,” she said when he was done.
“Good,” Blumstein said. He took out his cell phone. “Just let me make a few calls.”
* * *
The twins were scratchy and sullen. They wanted their mom. Their Kraft dinner was too watery and Will burnt their bacon bunnies—a melted cheese and bacon treat their mom sometimes made for them when they’d been especially good. He couldn’t find their matching Hulk pjs and he refused to sit through a second viewing of
Corky Romano
on the VCR. His temper finally snapped when Jerry spilled his pop on the coffee table.
“That’s it. Bed. Both of you. Right this minute.”
“But it’s only seven-
thirty
,” Jeffrey said, his voice a live wire in Will’s skull. “
He
spilled it, not me. Why doesn’t
he
go to bed?”
Will made a grab for Jeffrey and the kid slithered away.
“I’m not going to bed. I want mommy.”
Will rose up like a grizzly.
“Jeffrey. Jerry. Come here to Mommy.”
Will turned and saw Nina standing at the base of the rec-room stairs, her eyes fierce and clear. She seemed both strange and achingly familiar.
He said, “Nina, I knew you’d come home.” He took a step toward her, arms raised in greeting. “I knew we could work this out.”
“Come here, boys,” Nina said. She wasn’t even looking at Will, who stood between her and the twins, huddled together beside the rec-room fridge. “Come to Mommy.”
“Nina, honey, we need to...” Will noticed the manila envelope in her hand, its official looking red seal. He said, “What’s that?”
“It’s why I’m here.” She waved the twins over. “Come on, boys. We’re leaving.”
The boys started to move and Will blocked their way.
“In a pig’s ass you’re leaving.”
There was a heavy creak of footfalls in the staircase then and Blumstein appeared, flanked by two burly cops. The men stood in a loose arc around Nina, radiating menace. A dispatcher’s voice chirped cryptically from the receiver on the taller cop’s lapel.
“This is a court order,” Nina said, holding the envelope out to Will. The twins scurried past him and huddled behind their mother. “Take it.”
Will accepted the envelope.
“It entitles me to the immediate custody of the boys, until such time as we meet officially in a court of law.”
“Nina—”
“Let me
finish
.”
Will flinched and closed his fists, his eyes flashing to the cops. Their hands had shifted to their nightsticks.
“It also forbids you from coming anywhere near myself or the children. You’ll be arrested if you do. Do you understand?”
Will only glared at her.
“I suggest you secure counsel,” Blumstein said, giving Nina time to back away with the boys. “We’ll be in touch.”
Then they were in the stairwell, Nina and the twins followed by Blumstein and the silent cops, and Will was alone in the rec-room, clutching the sealed document. He heard the door close upstairs and he wanted a drink. He’d never wanted anything so badly in his life. He made his way to the wet bar on legs that had lost their purchase on the earth. His hand closed around a bottle of Jack Daniel’s; he uncapped it and took a long, scalding draw.
Then he sat at the bar and opened the envelope, squinting at its contents through prisms of tears. What he found took a moment to register. Instead of the legal tome he’d expected, he found a thick yellow pad, blank except for a few words on the facing page, scrawled in Nina’s hand.
It said: “Two can play a dirty game.”
Will sprang to his feet and roared. The bottle of Jack Daniel’s left his hand and whistled through the air, slurrying sour mash whiskey before exploding against the paneled wall.
“I’m gonna kill you,” he bellowed. “You hear me, bitch? I’m gonna fucking
kill
you.”
* * *
Nina said, “They’re finally asleep.” She poured herself a coffee and joined Blumstein at the table in her sister’s kitchen. She looked haggard, done in. “Claudia’s up there now. She’ll listen out for them.”
“How’d it go?”
“Not so well. They love their dad so much. It’s difficult for them to understand.”
“Kids are adaptable,” Blumstein said. “Give them time.”
Nina nodded, but the platitude irritated her. She was exhausted. She just wanted to go to bed.
Blumstein chuckled. “I told you we could pull it off.”
“I hope your policeman friends don’t get into trouble over this.”
“Not to worry. They didn’t say anything or involve themselves in any active way. They just stood there. Besides, if anyone asks, they’ll swear it never happened. What are poker buddies for? Now, we should go over our strategy for—”
“Mark, I don’t mean to be rude, but I’m burnt out. Could we...?”
“Of course,” Blumstein said, getting to his feet. “We can discuss it tomorrow. But listen, I’m in a meeting all day, and besides, I wouldn’t want to risk Will showing up at the office again. Why don’t you drop by the house tomorrow evening? Say, eight o’clock?”
“That’d be fine,” Nina said. She stood and hugged him. “Thank you, Mark. That was the bravest thing anyone’s ever done for me.”
Mark laughed. “Hey, you did all the work. I was just along for the ride.” Nina walked him to the door. Facing her, Mark said, “I’ll let you in on a little secret: I’m glad you’re not a lawyer. I’d hate to have to face you in a court of law.”
Nina smiled. “Tomorrow, then.”
“Tomorrow,” Blumstein said, and went out to his car.
WHILE JENNY SPENT THE DAY on Thursday sitting next to Kim’s comatose body, Will sat in the window of the café across from Blumstein’s office building. He knew his family was holed up at Claudia’s, but that crazy cow would be ready for him. Fucking around with her, he was apt to get himself shot. Besides, he was reasonably certain now that Blumstein was the one. If Nina didn’t show up here, she’d show up at his house. It was just a matter of time.