He squinted when he came out onto bright Lexington Avenue. He looked up and down the block, across the wide street clogged with delivery trucks and buses and yellow taxis. He looked up at the Chrysler Building, right in front of him now.
There was no white jacket in either direction. Audrey Hepburn had left the d.a.m.n building. Nothing. He"d taken his eyes off her for five seconds.
That was the problem with this rat race city! he thought, infuriated. Too many d.a.m.n holes for the rats to hide in! She must have seen him.
Jeanine had disappeared.
Chapter 69.
THAT DIDN"T JUST HAPPEN.
Inside the wall-to-wall-crowded Grand Central Starbucks, I stood at the milk and sugar stand by the window.
Bathed in sweat, I tried to keep myself from hyperventilating.
Peter? Here? Now? How was that possible?
I didn"t know. I was having trouble breathing, let alone thinking.
When I wasn"t looking out over Lexington Avenue, I had my head craned around at the shop"s side window and side door, which opened onto the train station"s corridor. If Peter came in, my plan was to run screaming through the door back into the train station"s main concourse and try to flag down one of the many ant.i.terror cops. I shivered like a cornered rabbit.
I hadn"t even gotten down to Key West, and already I was playing a game of hide-and-seek, with my life as the prize.
Maybe I was just being paranoid, I thought, scanning the pa.s.sing faces beyond the plategla.s.s window. Couldn"t it have been somebody who just looked like Peter? I was heading down to Key West now, after all. Peter was certainly at the forefront of my mind, not to mention embedded in my subconscious. Maybe my overstressed brain had jumped to the wrong conclusion.
Then again, maybe not!
I needed to act. I looked across Lexington. I could actually see my town car, idling outside my office building. I quickly fumbled open my bag. I took out the card that the driver, a very pleasant West Indian man who called himself Mr. Ken, had given me.
"Hi, um, Mr. Ken?" I said. "This is Nina Bloom. Were you able to get my package from my office?"
"It"s right here in the front seat beside me," he said.
"Great. Do you see the Starbucks on the west side of Lex in front of you? I"m right here by the window. Would you come over and get me?"
"On my way," he said.
"Thanks, Mr. Ken," I said to him in person when I bolted across the sidewalk and dove into the car ten seconds later. And thank G.o.d for cell phones, I thought.
I locked the door before I scrunched down low in the seat.
Mr. Ken raised an eyebrow at me in the rearview mirror.
"Did you forget your coffee, Ms. Bloom?" he said in his lilting accent.
"Oh, I already drank it, thanks," I lied, glancing out the window, panicked. "If we could head out to JFK now, Mr. Ken, that would be really great."
I scrunched down even farther in the seat. I didn"t breathe again until Mr. Ken hit the gas.
Chapter 70.
ON THE CORNER of 42nd Street and Lexington, Peter stood scanning faces. He looked frantically up the unbelievably crowded street in front of Grand Central. Nothing. No ivory jacket. Not across the street or anywhere. He"d screwed up. His rat had found her hole.
What a bust! He"d had her, and then he"d lost her again.
As he stood there fuming, a memory bubbled up. It was of his first and only bow hunting trip with his dad in New Hampshire when he was seven. He was in the forest taking a leak when an enormous black bear appeared ten feet in front of him. Before he could yell out, there was a thwap from his dad"s compound bow, and the shaft of an arrow popped out of one of the bear"s eyes. The animal dropped like a tipped-over piece of furniture.
His father climbed down from the blind and knelt over the fallen monster, inhaling loudly as he wafted the blood aroma into his face like a chef over a pot. Peter had almost wet himself when his dad suddenly grabbed him and shoved his face down toward the blood-splattered bear until they were nose to black-and-b.l.o.o.d.y nose.
"This life, you either get the bear," the crazy drunken b.a.s.t.a.r.d had said in his French Canadian accent, "or the bear gets you. Your choice, yes?"
Exactly, Peter thought.
At least he knew Jeanine lived in New York City, knew that she worked somewhere around here. h.e.l.l, knowing that she was still alive was enough. Catching up with her wasn"t an if anymore, it was a when.
His phone rang. He glanced at the screen. His wife, Vicki.
Horns honked as he stared up at the endless windows, his rage cooling now, replaced by his hunter"s natural, cold patience.
"Don"t worry, I"m going to get that bear somehow, Pop," Peter said as he lifted his phone. "Always have. Always will."
Book Four.
THE PRODIGAL WIFE RETURNS.
Chapter 71.
I DIDN"T KNOW what time it was when I woke with a start, spilling Justin Harris"s court transcripts.
The plane that I was now on was a tiny fifty-seater. I"d had an hour layover in Atlanta before getting on the disconcertingly small aircraft.
After I put Harris"s folder away, I looked out the tiny window, wondering how close we were. There was nothing but water underneath us now, as silver and bright as tinfoil under the harsh Southern sunlight.
As I was staring at the light, the b.u.t.terflies in my stomach woke up and got right back to work.
It was Florida light. Key West light.
Was I safe now? Hadn"t I left Peter back in New York? I didn"t know.
I looked up as the cabin speaker tolled out a musical bong, and the stewardess announced that we were about fifteen minutes out. Across the aisle, a decent-looking, fair-skinned man of about fifty smiled at me. He wore Bermuda shorts and a gray NYU gym shirt and had wavy strawberry blond hair.
He was Australian and quite drunk. I knew these things because he"d tried to hit on me by the gate in Atlanta. Under other circ.u.mstances, I probably would have let him. I certainly could have used a drink.
"To paradise," Crocodile Dundee said with a goofy theatrical flourish as he raised his plastic cup to me. I smiled politely before looking away.
More like Paradise Lost for me, I thought, staring back out the window. I made out the line of a large structure beneath us.
I closed my eyes, my stomach suddenly seizing up, my teeth and ears aching with tension. Clammy sweat stuck my shirt to my back as the coffin wall of the fifty-seater plane suddenly felt like it was bearing down on me, burying me alive.
The structure I"d spotted was the Overseas Highway. The same Overseas Highway where the Jump Killer had almost murdered me nearly two decades before. As if that weren"t heart attackinducing enough, as the plane descended, the white hot Florida light began sparking off fishing boat after fishing boat, each one a carbon copy of the Stingray Peter sailed.
I shouldn"t have come here, I thought, instantly overcome with terror. This was stupid. I was stupid. I"d escaped from h.e.l.l. Why was I going back?
"Oh, I"m so sorry, honey," a Southern voice cooed in my ear. It was the stewardess, a short, st.u.r.dy blond woman in her early fifties. She held my hand. "I can see it in your face. Don"t worry. Everybody gets airsick sometimes. Even me. Is there anything I can do for you?"
Turn the plane around, I felt like telling her. But was that even safe? Did I have anywhere to hide now?
As she snapped open a vomit bag, I heard the landing gear hum down. I felt its jolt beneath my feet as it locked into place.
Then black stars lit across the inside of my closed eyelids as I threw up. With an embarra.s.singly loud and drawn-out retching sound, I returned the airline"s complimentary honey-roasted peanuts and Diet c.o.ke. When I glanced across the aisle again, my Aussie buddy was intently studying his in-flight magazine.
Terrific, I thought, wiping my mouth with a napkin.
Way to hit the ground running.
Chapter 72.
HAVING SPLASHED SOME WATER on my face, I felt slightly better as I came down the rolling stairs of the tiny jet onto the airport tarmac. The small Key West airport looked the same as it always had: namely, as laid-back and weathered as its baggage handlers. You could actually see the crystal blue water sparkling beyond the runway"s chain-link fence, lulling and beautiful and beckoning.
I tore my eyes off it as I followed the line of smiling, ready-to-party young businesspeople. This wasn"t a vacation for me. It was more like a suicide mission. Get in and get the heck out, I told myself.
"Miss?" said an NBA-sized black guy in aviator shades and a green tennis visor, tapping me on the elbow on the airport"s sidewalk.
Christ, did he recognize me? I thought. "What?" I snapped at him.
"Do you need a taxi to your hotel?" he said warily as he pointed at the car behind him.
We stopped at the Hyatt five minutes later. After I paid and tipped the driver, I hurried into the lobby as if the parking lot were a sniper zone.
The large black female concierge gave me an easy smile when I came in. "Nina Bloom?" she said when I showed her my credit card. "Oh, yes. I just got off the phone with someone about you."
What?!
"Your firm just upgraded your room," she said. "They must like you. You"ve been transferred to one of our penthouse suites."
The first time I felt that I"d breathed all day was after I"d tipped the bellboy and had the door securely locked behind me. It really was a beautiful suite. South Beach chic. White leather furniture, black quartz countertops, neon bright modern art. Outside the sliding gla.s.s doors, a queen-sized white chaise with my name on it lay on a private, Mexican-tiled roof deck.
There was also a huge gift basket on the countertop. Tropical flowers, G.o.diva boxes. Even an orange and green magnum of Veuve Clicquot champagne.
"Thanks for doing the right thing, kid. Go get "em!" my boss had written in the message.
Well, at least I was making someone happy.
I read in one of the hotel magazines about the upcoming Conch Republic (as Key West jokingly called itself) Independence Celebration. There was a bed race down Duval Street and, of course, lots of drinking. Maybe that was a good thing. Hopefully, the whole police department, including Peter, would be more than busy with the greater influx of tourists than normal.
I plopped down on a low, white leather couch and called Emma.
"I made it," I said. "I"m so tired."
"Sure you are, Mom," Emma said. "I feel for you. Enjoy your business trip to Key West. Try not to throw your back out limbo-ing the night away."
I shook my head. She didn"t understand. She had no idea how much I wanted out of this place, how much I wanted to go straight to the airport and head home.
"You better not do any partying with that Gabby, either, Miss Wiseacre. I love you, Wilson. I"ll call you tomorrow."
After I hung up, I put in a call to Harris"s attorney, Charles Baylor, whose office I would be visiting tomorrow. No answer. What else was new? I was going to take a shower, but then I saw the sky. The sun was going down, and the sky was turning a ridiculously intense electric blue.
I shook my head again as I remembered partying in Mallory Square that last sunset on spring break. Dancing and singing to Bob Marley, I"d actually thought I could be happy and carefree forever.
I"d thought wrong.
Despite the memory, and my usual policy of not mixing business with pleasure, I decided to bring the bubbly bottle out onto the roof deck with a water gla.s.s. Because if anyone on earth needed a drink at that moment, it was me.
On second thought, I left the water gla.s.s inside and headed for the white chaise, the champagne bottle"s foil trailing behind me.
Chapter 73.