Better Read Than Dead (28 page)

There was a moment when the world moved in slow motion. I looked at Dutch, he looked at me, and our eyes locked. I watched as his beautiful blues widened slightly, then in an instant narrowed with anger. His hands appeared to be bound behind him, but that didn’t stop him from struggling with his captors.

Joe, on the other hand, gave nothing away. She glanced at me as if I were something distasteful, then focused on Andros. “Who’s the whore?” she asked, motioning her head my way.

My back was still to Andros. I couldn’t risk him noticing the surprise on my face, so I continued to stare at Dutch and Joe. I didn’t know why they were here, or what Andros knew about whom they worked for. I figured I’d keep quiet until someone let me know what was going on, and until then I was going to try to blank up my expression.

“Who she is would not matter to you, Sylvia. It’s what she can do that is of interest. Miss Cooper is a psychic,” Andros explained with a small chuckle. “Tell me, Miss Cooper, what does your gift say about these two people?”

So this was my test. One wrong answer and Dutch and Joe would be taken out behind the woodshed.

Dutch had stopped looking at me and was focused now on Andros. “This is bullshit, Andros. What’s she going to do, pull out a crystal ball and levitate a table?”

Andros laughed heartily. “Mr. Wilson, this is why you find yourself in the predicament you’re in. It is your temper that has led to my suspicion and tells me you have something to hide.”

My brain was working furiously to put the clues from their conversation together. Dutch and Joe obviously weren’t using their real names. They were aliases. Also, they both looked different. Dutch’s hair, typically neatly combed, had a more gelled look; he’d also grown a goatee that gave him a sinister cast. Joe was dressed for a night of clubbing. Much of her outfit consisted of leather and buckles, and I figured that she had a lot of nerve calling me a whore.

My guess was that Dutch and Joe were undercover, and Andros suspected foul play. Obviously Andros didn’t know about our connection to one another, or I would have been accompanying Dutch and Joe out to the woodshed about now. That meant that if I was
very
careful I could confirm their story and buy them some time. It would be tricky, because I didn’t know what Andros suspected, so I’d have to be cautious. “There’s some sort of business deal these two want to make with you,” I said abruptly.

Dutch’s eyes pivoted back to me. The sneer on his face let me know exactly what he thought of my input.

“Go on,” Andros encouraged from behind me.

“The feeling I get is that there’s some sort of trust issue at work here. I’m getting that there’s another party involved in this whom you don’t necessarily trust. . . .”

“Yes, indeed,” Andros confirmed.

I was now alternately looking from Dutch and Joe back to Andros, feeling my way carefully along. I had to be extra cautious to filter the messages coming to me and put them in a way that wouldn’t incriminate Dutch or Joe. I closed my eyes, sifting through the assortment of messages. There was something about Florida, or a connection to Florida, and I didn’t know if I could mention that or not. There was also a connection to a brother, or someone like a brother, and something about betrayal. A memory flickered in my head and I blurted out, “Oh! These guys are from your cousin!” The moment I said it I wanted to retrieve it. I hadn’t followed the line of information long enough to weigh whether that was something I should say out loud or not. I prayed I hadn’t just revealed something that would jeopardize Dutch, and breathed a huge sigh of relief as I saw a hint of relief in Joe’s expression.

“Very good, Miss Cooper. What else do you see?” Andros prodded.

I shut my eyes again and sorted. I was getting the image of a badge, and lots of focus on a betrayal, but this had more to do with the present than the past. That part I definitely wasn’t going to mention. And then in my mind’s eye I saw a pyramid made out of rifles. I opened my eyes and said, “Guns. This is a business arrangement about guns.”

Andros clapped his hands together and barked out a laugh. “You are exceptionally gifted, even better than Madame Jarosolov. Now, here is my concern. I had a dream last night that my cousin had sent me a gift, only this gift was a horse carved out of wood. I opened the gift and it exploded. Can you see where I’m going with this?”

“You’re afraid your cousin has sent you a Trojan horse,” I replied easily.

“Exactly. The thing I remember most from the dream, other than the bomb, is that I opened the present with a letter opener in the shape of a police badge. I think these two are not who they say they are. I think they are Feds.”

My heart was beating fast and furious. I looked back at Dutch, who refused to meet my gaze. He wasn’t going to give me anything to go on, and I understood that I now held his life in my hands. My mind whirred, and I pretended to close my eyes and concentrate, but what I was really looking for was an explanation that would fly with Andros. A memory drifted up to me. It was the day Dutch had taken me out for lunch, and the memory was of him holding the ticket he’d gotten for parking illegally in front of my building. I snapped my eyes open and looked quickly at him. He was wearing the same suede coat he’d worn that day. My eyes drifted to his pocket, and I sent up a silent prayer as I took a huge chance. “Yeah, you’re right, Andros. This one over here,” I said, waving a finger at Dutch, “he’s the one with the badge in his energy.”

Dutch’s eyes returned to me, and if looks could kill I’d’a been toast. I swallowed hard and continued, begging with my eyes for him to trust me. “Now, the weird thing is that I’m not picking up the badge in connection to what he does, ’cause they’re showing me a no-parking sign, and then the badge . . . like, I don’t know, like he’s gotten a parking ticket recently or something like that.”

Dutch’s eyes relaxed a fraction, and he said, “Your whore’s got talent, Andros. I’ve got the ticket in my jacket pocket.”

I knew we were just putting on a good show, but the fact that Dutch had just called me a whore made me want to pop him one. I held my cool, however, while one of the thugs reached into Dutch’s coat and pulled out the parking ticket, handing it over to Andros.

Andros took the ticket and inspected it carefully. “You should be more careful where you park your car, Mr. Wilson,” he said, and tossed the ticket onto his desk. Turning back to me he said, “Now what about the dream, Miss Cooper? Do you think I can trust my cousin after such a dream?”

I had to step carefully here. “Well, the feeling that I get is that this is an opportunity for you to make some good coin. This gun deal . . . it’s pretty lucrative, right?”

“Possibly,” Andros said.

“My sense is that there’s going to be a big payoff here, and you’re going to have to trust your cousin a little bit to get the payoff. The dream, I think, represents more of your fears than your reality. Dreams can often be a reflection of what we fear, rather than a prophetic vision. You say you suspected your cousin of betraying you in the past, correct?”

Andros nodded slowly. “Yes. Yes, I believe he did.”

“Then there you have it. The dream is just your subconscious working out your fear of being betrayed again. It simply means you’ll need to keep your eyes open. My feeling is that these two are who they say they are.” For effect I turned to Dutch and asked, “Wilson, right?”

Dutch nodded curtly at me, the scowl on his face deepening.

“You deal in heavy artillery, right?”

Another curt nod.
Liar, liar . . . pants on fire . . .

I turned back to Andros and explained: “I’m good at knowing when people are lying, and this guy’s not flagging my radar. So my advice to you is that you can trust them. Make your deal with your cousin and enjoy the profits.”

Andros had reclaimed his seat in the chair, his elbows on the desk with his hands coming up into a steeple, which he rested against his lips, deep in thought. He was weighing everything I said, and I was praying he’d buy into it. Finally he waved to his thugs and said, “Untie them, and have them wait outside for me while I finish with Miss Cooper.”

Dutch and Joe were untied and led outside. Joe’s lip curled slightly at me, and she reached out to grab Dutch’s arm as the two were escorted out of the room. I didn’t care. For now Dutch was safe, and that was all that mattered to me.

“So have I passed your ‘test’?” I asked smugly.

“For now,” he answered, then reached into a drawer and pulled out a large manila folder bound by rubber bands and chock-full of paper. He looked at it thoughtfully for a moment, then pushed it toward me. “Here,” he said.

I took the folder and looked at it curiously. It appeared to be old and weathered, and I didn’t really know what to do with it. “What’s this?” I asked.

“It is my wife, Dora’s, missing-persons police file, or a copy of her file, plus a few of the leads Madame Jarosolov was able to produce. Over the years I’ve hired many private detectives, hoping to find her, and all of them met dead ends. Madame Jarosolov produced some of the best leads, but still nothing concrete. I want to know what happened to my wife, Miss Cooper. This is your project. Find her, or find out what happened to her, and we will see about your sister’s attacker.”

My heart sank. I picked up the folder and I realized the “bargain” I’d struck with Andros was no bargain at all. “You’ve got to be kidding!” I said as I dropped the heavy folder with a thud.

“You think I am trying to amuse you?” Andros said in a dangerous tone. “I assure you, there is no joke in my request. I want to find my wife, or find out what happened to her, and I’m a man with limited time left to wait for such things. You want information about your sister’s attacker? You will find Dora.”

I ground my teeth for a minute, wondering what I’d gotten myself into, when my intuition began buzzing. Distractedly I picked up the message, which basically said,
Take the file. . . .
I questioned this message, but got it again more urgently, so, shrugging my shoulders, I stood up and carried the folder with me. “Fine. I’ll work on this, but I can’t guarantee anything. . . .”

“Yes, that was Madame Jarosolov’s excuse as well,” he said so ominously that I got a chill all the way up my spine. Andros picked up his phone again and barked something Greek into it, and a moment later my driver reappeared. As I turned to leave Andros gave me a parting warning: “I trust your discretion about what you’ve seen here tonight, all right, Miss Cooper?”

I turned back to him and copped an attitude. “Yeah, I’ve gone this long without reporting any of the bullshit you’ve done to me over the last week, but this is going to push me right over the edge!” Andros’s brow darkened, and I knew that I was playing with fire. “Listen,” I said more calmly, “you Mafia boys want to kill each other? Fine by me. The last thing I want to do is get mixed up in it, so trust me, I’m not going to dial nine-one-one anytime soon.”

“It would be a grave mistake,” Andros threatened, his eyes forming small slits and his mouth in a hard, frightening frown. “I also know you have been helping the police in your town with their rapist investigation, and I will not tolerate any mention of me in connection to that case. Do you understand?”

“Perfectly,” I said, and turned toward the door.

As the driver and I headed back through the house we walked right past Dutch and Joe, who were sulking in two wing chairs, surrounded by brutes and waiting to be summoned. I wanted to catch Dutch’s eye, but figured I wouldn’t be doing him any favors by visually checking in with him in front of so many witnesses. It was better to pretend I didn’t care, so I only stole a glance his way out of the corner of my eye. He looked ready to kill me, but I assumed it was all part of the act.

In a moment we’d left them behind, and I privately crossed my fingers that he’d be safe tonight.

 

Thirty minutes later I was back home, where I warmed up in a hot bath, complete with bubbles. I needed a little pampering tonight. Cat called while I was in the tub, and we talked briefly about her trip to Aruba.

“So how was the flight?”

“It was long, but totally worth it. We checked into the most gorgeous hotel, and Tommy has been so sweet to me. He’s been having the staff here wait on me hand and foot.”

“I’ll bet,” I said, smirking. It was so good to hear my sister talking like her old self again.

“Hey, has that client of yours given you any clues about the guy who jumped me?”

“Uh . . . no . . . not yet. Actually, he’s had to keep a really low profile lately, but we’re supposed to meet in the next couple of days, and I’m sure he’ll give me something to go on.”

Cat sighed audibly and said, “I’m just worried for the next poor girl who might not be as lucky as me.”

My face pinched in guilt. I hated lying to my sister. “Yeah, I know. I promise you I’ll do my best to get what I can out of my client, okay?”

“Will you please be careful while you’re doing that? This Russian Mafia thing has me really worried about you.”

“Oh, Cat,
please
,” I scoffed. “I’m perfectly fine. Geez, you and the drama of it all . . .”

“I’m serious,” she insisted. “What if this man pointed these guys in your direction? I mean, what if someone without the best of intentions wanted to take advantage of your abilities? It could be very dangerous, you know.”

I gulped at how close she was to the truth and said with a forced laugh, “My God, Catherine, have you been watching too much Court TV lately, or what?”

“I’m just saying. . . .”

“Well, don’t worry about it, sweetie. I’m fine, and I will remain fine. Listen, you guys get back to your vacation and I’ll talk to you in a couple of days, okay?”

“Okay. Give Milo our number here for me, won’t you? I promised I’d call him when I got in, but if you could pass it along it would save me another phone call.”