Chapter Nineteen
All too frequently these days, Barry felt like the epitome of evil. He wished he could get into a time machine and go back five years and not get on the freeway that night. Because if he did, he would never have killed that man, and Johnson would never have seen it, and he would never have been able to set up this blackmail.
Instead, on Wednesday night Barry had found himself loitering on the fifth floor of a luxury apartment building, hoping not to be seen by anybody, least of all Brenner. As usual, he had a dirty job to do, and if he didn’t do it, Johnson told him that their deal would be off.
Barry had argued that the job didn’t need to be done until Brenner didn’t show up to the meeting on Monday. But Johnson was sure the man wouldn’t. And Johnson was nothing but efficient. He wanted to make sure that the threat he’d given Brenner would not prove futile.
But Wednesday night, Barry witnessed some drama that made him hesitate. And gave him another, better strategy. He hadn’t told Johnson about it, because he had wanted it done by Friday.
Barry couldn’t do it by Friday. The next day, his car broke down and he didn’t get it back until Saturday morning. That was time enough to put a note in the mailbox of that young, sexy, half-drunk thing he’d seen accost Brenner on Wednesday.
“If you want to make an easy $1,000, meet me at the art museum admission desk Sunday at one. I’ll be wearing a cowboy hat. I know what you look like.”
Now it was Sunday, and as he opened the door to the museum his hand shook. He’d never done anything like this before – bribed someone into doing a criminal act – and he was afraid of messing it up.
Then again, how much worse could he mess his life up? He hadn’t counted on number one, a child dying, and number two, Johnson targeting a specific individual to persecute. The original plan was to take down Delico, not ruin the reputation of any one person. He supposed he should be happy Johnson wasn’t planning on killing Brenner.
Barry took a deep breath, went into the museum, and sat down on a cushioned bench near the door. The gray-haired admissions clerk looked at him with narrowed eyes through small-framed spectacles.
“I’m waiting on a friend,” he said before she could speak. The clerk smiled, adjusted her glasses, and focused her attention on a couple who were just coming in the door.
A few minutes later, the girl came in. She was dressed in tight jeans and a jacket that accentuated every curve on her body. As she glanced around nervously, no doubt looking for him, he allowed himself a long moment to enjoy the sight of her. While she was considerably more covered up than she had been Wednesday night, she was still almost unbearably alluring.
He wondered that Brenner had been able to turn her down.
Finally, he stood and walked toward her. She met his gaze at the same time, but didn’t move. Instead, her eyes darted from him to the door, as if she was thinking about leaving. But then her gaze settled on him, though her eyes were narrowed into mere slits and her full lips turned downward into a frown. No, make that a pout.
He shook hands with her. “My name is Darryl Klein.”
Her grip, if you could call it that, was limp and ultra-feminine. “I’m not going to tell you my name. If you try to make me, I’m outta here.”
So, she suspected that his offer was going to be not quite legal. Good enough. At least she was that smart.
“You don’t have to tell me your name.” He spoke in a low tone, then pointed to the desk. “I’m going to pay the admission for both of us, then as we browse the art we will search for a vacant room. When we find one, I will tell you what I would like for you to do.”
He made a move toward the desk, but she crossed her arms and stood as if rooted to the spot. “First, give me a clue to what this is about.”
Barry gave her the most charming smile he could muster. “Would you like to get revenge on a certain Preston Brenner for making you look like a fool?”
Her eyes widened, and she stared at him. After a long pause, she nodded, then followed him to the admissions desk.
***********
Monday night, Preston was staring at his cell phone, wondering if he should call either his sister or his mother. His mother always seemed to have the right words of wisdom whenever he was in trouble, or had a decision to make, all through his childhood and well into his twenties.
His sister seemed to have inherited this tendency to keen insight into problems. However, she would have more than a little bias about the sticky situation Preston found himself in. No matter what, she would counsel him to do what she had been nagging him to do for the past few years: quit his job.
But he wanted to tell somebody about the strange e-mail he’d received a week ago. He hadn’t received a follow-up, and had stayed home tonight. As much as he wanted to believe that it was a hoax, he’d had a bad feeling about it ever since this morning.
If he told his mother, she would worry. If he told Carly, she would nag. If only he could talk to Cynthia.
As the thought went through his brain, somebody began pounding on his door. He started up. Was it the police? Had the anonymous e-mailer set him up as having perpetrated some crime or other?
“Preston, please let me in. We have to talk!”
Karen. Preston clenched his fists by his side and huffed out a breath. When would that girl ever learn?
As quietly as he could, he walked into his bedroom and shut the door. The pounding and yelling continued, although in muffled tones.
“Preston! This is important. I promise, I’m not trying to come onto you this time.”
Yeah, right. And the President was from Jupiter.
A long pause followed, and then he heard his name shouted, angrily this time, then a loud “harumph!”
Then, quiet.
Preston wanted to believe that she was lying, that she was just saying that so he would open his door and succumb to her seductive dress and mannerisms and words. But Karen was a rich, sexy, beautiful girl. She could have any number of good-looking upper-class men. There was no reason for her to desperately cling to her fantasies about Preston.
Was there?
He went out of his bedroom, shaking his head in confusion. He needed to call his sister, Carly, and tell her about the e-mail. She would tell him to call the police, to quit his job, to get a revelation about healthy eating. But what would she say about what Karen had just done? What would his mother say?
He picked up the cell phone, put it down, ran his hand through his hair. He couldn’t be sure about Carly, but he knew what his mother would say.
His mother would tell him to work it out.
With a sigh, Preston snatched his keys off the table and walked out of his apartment, locking the door behind him. A glance around the hall revealed no Karen. He assumed she had returned to her apartment. Which suddenly seemed a mile away.
His feet were like bricks as he spanned the distance, and at her door he almost turned around and ran back. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he was a chicken walking into a fox’s den.
His hand felt like it weighed a ton when he raised it to push her doorbell. The task accomplished, he took a couple steps back and waited.
The door swung open a few seconds later. “Why, it’s Preston. Imagine that.” Karen’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “So nice of you to condescend to visit me.” She could have lowered her voice. As it was, he glanced around to make sure none of her neighbors were opening their doors to find out what the disturbance was. At least she neither smelled nor appeared drunk.
When his gaze settled back on her face, she was giving him a steely glare. “Why didn’t you answer your door?”
“I – I was busy.” He really needed to get out of the habit of lying. Of course, he had in a sense been busy – busy trying to ignore her, busy trying to decide what her motives were if not to “come onto” him.
Karen let out an exasperated sigh, then stepped aside. “Come on in, then.”
Preston went in, but
went no further than the door.
Karen followed him, closing the door behind her and dropping into a high-end dining room chair that went with the glass-topped high-end dining room table. “I suppose you don’t want to sit down.”
The girl was smarter than he thought. “No, thank you.”
Karen sighed heavily. “Fine. I suppose you wanna know why I wanted to talk to you.”
“Yes.” Preston tried not to let his impatience show. She knew why he had come over.
“You know a guy named Darryl Keith?”
Preston searched his memory for a few seconds, then shook his head. “No.”
Karen frowned. “He seemed to know you.”
Preston narrowed his eyes. “What are you talking about?”
“You know a guy who’s fat, red-faced, and a little bald?”
He was sure he knew several.
“And talks down to you like a college professor trying to show off his vocabulary?
An image of Dr. Barry Munger floated into his head. He stared at her. “I…might.” He felt the artery in his neck begin to throb. “Why?”
Karen broke eye contact, seeming to study a crumb on the table for a long time. Preston was on the verge of stepping toward her to demand an answer when she spoke again. “He wanted to pay me money to get you into trouble.” She cleared her throat, looking at the abstract painting adorning the opposite wall. “Okay, he did pay me money.”
That lowlife slimeball. Preston should have known Munger was up to no good the last time they met. Was it he who had sent the threatening e-mail?
“Go on.” He spoke between clenched teeth, but for once his anger was not directed toward Karen.
“I was supposed to go to your apartment tonight or tomorrow, and distract you and plant a packet that has some kind of evidence that would get you fired.” She turned and looked at him then. “He suggested I drug you and get you into bed.” Her lips quirked upward, but her smile did not reach her eyes.
Preston’s mouth went dry. “You took the money. Why didn’t you do it?” The fact that she had taken the money astonished him. She surely didn’t need it. Unless it was a huge amount, or she was in some kind of financial trouble.
Her smile faded, and she gazed at him with a seriousness in her eyes he’d never seen before. Not that he’d seen them all that often. “I was pretty torqued with you after Wednesday night. But not that torqued.” She lifted one shoulder slightly. “I like you, Preston. You know that. I don’t think I could live with myself if I made you lose your job.”
So, the girl had some scruples after all. Preston would never have guessed it by the shameless way she chased after him.
But he couldn’t relax. Not just yet. Not until he asked her –
“You’re not attaching any strings to this magnanimous decision of yours?”
Karen shook her head. “Whatever that ‘magma’ word means, no.” She got up, walked over to her kitchen, and opened a drawer. After withdrawing a large envelope from it, she went over to Preston and handed it to him. “This is what I was supposed to hide somewhere in your apartment.”
He took it, his shoulders and jaw finally beginning to relax. “Thank you, Karen. Very much.”
Their gazes held for a long moment. Preston was relieved to find that he felt no spark between them. Any affection he harbored toward her at the moment went no further than that of a big brother for his little sister.
He hoped Karen felt the same. She finally tore her gaze away and stepped backward, which he took as a good sign. “I – I’ll leave you alone after this, if you want me to.”
Preston held up the packet. “I owe you big for this. But,” he gave her a small smile, “not in the way you probably want.”
Karen continued her study of the floor. “I know.”
“There’s a handsome, smart guy out there for you, I’m sure of it.” Although Preston hoped Karen grew up a little before she found him. “I’m just not him.”
She looked up at him, a resigned smile on her face. “Well, you can’t blame a girl for trying.” She took a step toward him, hand outstretched. “Friends?”
Preston gently held her hand for a brief moment, waving the envelope slightly with his other hand. “I guess only a friend would do something…like this.” He released her hand, turned to go, turned back as a thought rammed into his head like an eighteen-wheeler against a concrete wall. “Karen, you took the money.”
She nodded.
“And you’re not going through with your side of the bargain.”
She stared at him blankly.
What should he say? He didn’t want to scare her, certainly had never thought Barry Munger to be capable of a Mafia-type crime. But he may have been partnered with somebody who was. And Karen needed a heads-up. It was the least he could do.
“If they find out that you didn’t keep your end of the bargain, you might be in danger.”
The sassy twinkle returned to her eyes, and she shrugged. “So I’ll give him back the lousy thousand bucks. Like I need it, anyway.”
Preston let out a heavy breath. “I hope it’s that simple. Karen, promise me you’ll tell me if you feel like anything strange is going on. Like, somebody’s stalking you or anything.”
She laughed her carefree laugh, and tonight, it grated on his nerves more than ever. Despite her assumed sexual prowess, she was quite innocent and naïve. And her innocence might get her killed.
He leaned forward, speaking sternly. “Promise me.”
Another laugh. “Okay, okay, I’ll promise, you old worrywart.”
Preston returned to his apartment, the invisible weight that had begun to press on him a few days ago now tripling to a crushing degree. Cynthia hated him, Munger was – for some inexplicable reason – trying to get him fired from his job, and now Karen’s life might be in danger. The first two issues he could probably struggle his way through, but over the last he had no control.
He was helpless. Eighteen years old all over again.
Chapter Twenty
Why had she been so hasty? She couldn’t even blame “that time of the month” on how she had treated Preston a week ago. Cynthia glanced at the calendar on the wall. Yes, a week ago today. Last Wednesday.
It wasn’t like her not to give people second chances, not to hear out their side of the story. Which just proved how deeply she had come to feel for Preston. If she hadn’t, one little lie – a lie he most certainly told because he knew she wouldn’t have given him the time of day if he had told her the truth at the outset – would not have made her throw a potentially good relationship away.
She should call him, she had frequently thought over the past couple of days. But every time she did, another thought trailed right after it: he had lied. Deceived her.
Justin never had. She could not, especially since she had a child to think of, continue on in a relationship founded on a lie. Even if he wasn’t trying to use her, which she still couldn’t be sure of. His smile was too charming, his words too smooth, for her to be easily convinced that he hadn’t been trying to get under her skin so she would lay off her persecution of the food industry.
“Mom, are you okay?” Melissa’s voice brought a welcome relief to her mental self-torment. “You’ve hardly touched your dinner.”
Despite herself, Cynthia had to smile at her daughter throwing her own motherly words back at her. Then she sighed, dropping the fork she’d been moving her green beans around with. “I was thinking about Preston.”
Melissa scrunched her brow. “Why? You’re only going to make it worse.” She shoveled a forkful of dinner into her mouth.
Cynthia lifted her brow. “Make what worse?”
“Your moodiness. I got over him pretty fast, Mom. But you’ve hardly smiled since we last saw him, and half the time you look like you’re going to burst into tears.”
That’s what she felt like half the time. “You’re right. I need to forget about him.”
But Preston’s face loomed larger
than ever in her mind when she gathered with a group of forty or so other parents the next day in front of yet another St. Peter school, Wainwright Elementary. She had already e-mailed and called both Dr. Munger and several of the district cafeteria managers, but as of yet had heard nothing back from the Special Services department and only polite, vague e-mails from the managers, telling her they had no power to change the menu.
It looked like she would keep on demonstrating until she could garner enough parental interest to create a protest group that nobody could ignore. Say, two or five hundred people.
But that seemed a long way off. The only thing that kept her from giving up was hearing Preston’s words that first time they meant, the affirmation that she was taking action and trying to make a difference. Had he really been sincere?
The demonstration began around ten-thirty, and soon after they had to regroup in another location a few yards away when a school bus drove up, coughing out several dozen children. They filed into the building behind two teachers, one of whom Cynthia recognized. It was Erin Halley, the teacher at Franklin who had gotten into trouble for letting Cynthia use her classroom after school.
Erin glanced at the parents as she walked by, and gave them a thumbs-up. Cynthia didn’t think the teacher had seen her, but appreciated her encouragement all the same. She was on their side. Probably would have been part of the demonstrations if she hadn’t had a day job.
Cynthia hoped to see her again before they left, but by the time their hour-long demonstration ended the children from Franklin still had not come back to the bus. After thanking the parents for coming, and reminding them of the Saturday meeting at the library and to bring as many other parents they could persuade to come, Cynthia turned away from the school building and began to cross the street.
A silver Lexus careened around the corner as she did so, and she jumped back onto the curb just in time. Her heart thudded violently and her mind spun with confusion. She thought she had recognized the driver.
Dr. Munger, from Special Services.
But an employee of the school district wouldn’t be driving like that, would he? She must have been mistaken.
“Cynthia, honey, are you all right?” Faith was by her side, an arm around her shoulder, a few seconds after the car sped by.