Collar Robber (20 page)

His skull might as well have been transparent. I could see the metaphorical wheels turning.
Was she really that dumb? Buying the generic bad-guy line?

“You're right,” he said at last. “I'll wait for them. You'll stay with Szulz?”

No, you moron, I'll just pop down to PNC Park for this afternoon's ball game
.

“Yes, I'll stick with Willy.”

He backed up about three feet, then turned to his left. Trying to make it look good, I suppose. That gave me all the room I needed. Quick arch backward, stretched my left arm out and back until it hurt, caught the edge of the door and slammed it shut. And punched the little button that locked it.

I sensed Tally wheeling back in indecision, but I couldn't really see him anymore. Did he think about banging on the door, trying to force his way in? Good luck with that one. Ever hear about the seal of the confessional? Whatever, he ended up not doing it. He probably figured that he'd give me maybe three minutes and then come hustling back, yelling that the EMTs were here.

I called nine-one-one, because Tally sure as hell hadn't done it.

“What is your emergency?”

“Attempted strangulation at St. Benedict the Moor Catholic Church.” I rattled off the address. “Victim is near death and needs immediate attention. Pulse weak, respiration shallow, eyeballs distended.”

“What is your—”

“Cynthia Jakubek. Victim is in immediate danger of death, repeat,
immediate
danger of death.”

“Dispatching.”

I gave her thirty seconds, then spoke up again.

“Now listen carefully. The front doors of the church are locked. Call Father Larry in the rectory and tell him what's happened. Have him meet the EMTs outside with the key when they arrive.”

“Is the perpetrator still in the vicinity?”

“Don't know.”

“Are you with the victim?”

“Yes.”

“Are you in immediate danger?”

“No.”

“Stay where you are.”

“Count on it.”

Seemed like two hours later when I finally heard sirens in the distance, but it couldn't have been more than three or four minutes. It gave me time to fish the much-folded von Leuthen letter out of a pouch in a money belt that Willy had concealed under his shirt and waistband. Right on cue, maybe thirty seconds after the first audible klaxon, Tally appeared in the window, rapping on it and mouthing
They're here! They're here!

Sure they are, Tally. Pulling my phone up, I punched dad's number.

“Jakubek residence, this is Vince.”

“Cindy, dad. I'm gonna be running late. Don't hold dinner.”

Chapter Forty-six

Cynthia Jakubek

Did I actually bring this off? Really?

Those questions ran through my head as the EMTs wheeled Willy away and the cops snapped their notebooks shut over my story and Tally's. Had Tally bought my little act, my pretending to believe that a bad guy matching Halkani's description was running around Pittsburgh, and thank God Tally had shown up like a white knight?

A pleasant hope but, as my dad taught me, “Cheer from the heart, bet from the head.” Three-to-two I hadn't fooled Tally. Maybe longer odds than that. So I needed a Plan B.

Tally and I followed the others out toward the central door and the brilliant sunlight beyond it. Father Larry stood in the vestibule, jingling the keys the cops had returned to him. I shot him a glance over my shoulder.

“I'll get the doors, Father.”

A puzzled look splashed for a second across his face. He knew that the church's doors locked automatically when they swung closed unless you push an obscure button on the bottom of the brass case that houses the latch-end of the inside push-bar on each door. He's a savvy guy, though. After one look at my face he wiped his baffled expression away and nodded, as if my comment made sense.

I held the door for him and Tally. As they exited, I surreptitiously found the button with the middle fingers of my left hand and pushed. The
click!
sounded to me like it could have been heard in Ohio, but Tally didn't seem to notice. I joined him on the sidewalk, watching the others move away toward their different destinations.

I did a quick run through alternative options, which in my view basically sucked. No way the EMTs would let a non-relative ride along with Willy in the back of the rescue squad truck. I had nothing concrete to tell the cops, and they heard donuts calling them. If I started spinning theories they'd tune me out and tell me a detective would be in touch. Pushing eighty, Father Larry didn't strike me as promising human shield material, so improvising a spiritual crisis to talk to him about didn't make much sense.

Zero for three, leaving Tally and me
mano a mano
with a surreptitiously unlocked church door as my only plan. Under the circumstances a banality seemed to be in order. I turned toward Tally and came up with one.

“Quite an adventure.”

“Certainly was. May I accompany you back to your car—you know, just in case?”

“Actually, I'm gonna head around back and see if they need any help at the café in the church basement. Plus, I have to check the church doors like I promised Father Larry.”

He responded to that by giving me a long, shrewd look. A little unnerving. Okay, a lot unnerving. When he spoke his tone seemed matter-of-fact, almost jovial.

“You know, don't you?”

So much for my thespian skills
.

“Yeah, Tally, I know.” I sighed at the sheer tawdriness of the whole thing. “I know that you were a Catholic seminarian who slipped the traces after you had a fling with a charismatic lover and turned her into a collar-robber.”

“Lost my vocation.” A rich whiff of irony wafted from his words.

“God be praised for
that
. You have about as much business in ministry as I do in air-traffic control. I know that you formally apostasized because you thought that would impress your lover. No one formally defects from the Church unless he's already part of it. You filed the paperwork after your marriage to Abbey Northanger, so that nuptial is invalid on its face. Catholics can't get married by an Elvis impersonator in an ersatz ‘chapel' on the Las Vegas strip.”

“They can't get married by the Archbishop of Canterbury in Westminster Abbey without a dispensation—and we sure didn't have one of those.”

“That shoots your plan to shake down Sean and Abbey all to hell. All that trouble—having some thug-hacker destroy seminary computer records in New Mexico and Austria so that your enrollments in those places couldn't be documented, all the gratuitous ‘free-thinker' comments to throw people who thought about your background off the scent, the clever idea of having Sean bribe you with a share of his next deal instead of hundred-dollar bills in an attaché case—all wasted. Of course, you still have the
Eros Rising
scam. Maybe you can bring that one across the finish line. Unless Halkani wakes up one morning and decides that it's kill-a-redundant-gentile day.”

“I think we have some things to talk about—in a less public venue.”

So he thought he could bribe me, and through me, Willy. I wonder if he could have—if I had a price for something this important. I don't think so, but to tell you the truth I can't be certain. I guess we'll never know for sure.

I was exhausted. Physically, mentally, emotionally, and morally. Hungry. Thirsty. And at the moment disgusted with life. I couldn't imagine digging down into my soul for another chase at the best-actress Oscar. I wanted to just spell it out for him, scream it at him.

It's over, Tally. You strangled a guy in Vienna, using a knot that would be second-nature to an ex-seminarian. You tried to strangle Willy the same way, and you failed. Even if you got him from behind he'll know it was you. The Halkani story won't hold up for fifteen minutes once the cops start talking to Willy. You engineered a scam putting the Museum at risk because you knew that if the deficits kept piling up, sooner or later they'd have to cut staff—and inside counsel always seem dispensable. Halkani couldn't have gotten on top of that elevator car unnoticed without your help, or known when to be there without your telling him. You're done. Finished. It's over.

But I didn't. I plunged into my guts again. Felt a little like dumpster-diving.

“You're right, Tally. We should have a talk. How about my office?”

His eyes lit up. He swallowed my gullible/greedy chick act hook, line, and sinker. To him, my office would be absolutely perfect. Total privacy. He could do anything there that he wanted to.
Buy her if you can; kill her if you have to
.

“We can take my car.”

“Sure. I'll double-check the church door and we'll be on our way.”

I started moving before he could get an objection out. I knew I hadn't sold this one. Not completely. I'd only put eight feet between me and him, with a good ten feet before I'd reach the door, when I heard his voice.

“Here, let me help you.”

That did it. A whisper of scraping pant-legs, meaning he was coming after me.
Hammer down, Cindy
. I broke into a sprint. Reached the church door in three loping strides and a stutter step. Lost a precious second swinging the heavy door open but still made it inside before he could grab me. Couldn't count on the door closing fast enough to lock before he reached it, so I didn't bother to fumble with the button.

With his longer legs, Tally figured to be faster than I was. Bigger and stronger, too. I do my ten miles a week at eight-plus minutes a mile, but we weren't going to be running a mile. Best case, we might run a thousand feet. I had one advantage, though. I knew the inside of the dark church and he didn't. Built for an era when people would be crowding the aisles at each of three Sunday Masses, the church featured a main body of pews separated by a wide center aisle, with a set of mini-pews across narrower aisles on the outsides of the main pews.

I sprinted through the vestibule and up the main aisle. Tally had apparently worn soft-soled shoes, but I could still hear faint
slaps
against the floor—and not all that far behind.
Assume he has a gun. Running in a straight line makes you an easy target unless he can't see you in the dimness—and the longer we're in here, the more his eyes will adjust
.

Time for a calculated risk. Halfway down the main aisle I pivoted at close to full speed and dove headlong to my right, onto one of the pews. Slid almost half its length on the lovingly waxed oak, worn smooth by a century of poor and working class fannies. Rolled to the floor, scrambled to my feet, took two cramped strides, levered myself on a kneeler some worshipper had forgotten to put up, and vaulted over the back of the next pew, gaining a couple of yards toward the far side.

The maneuver had gained me a few seconds. Tally had lost sight of me. I'd made plenty of noise, but with the sounds echoing off stone vaults and stained glass, the racket wouldn't help him much. I clambered on all fours across the pew's seat. A lacerated shin and a banged hip provoked some fiercely whispered blasphemy, but I made it to the end and scooted onto the floor.

Back to my feet and running straight ahead again. Breathing shallower. Diaphragm felt hollow. Tally sounded like he was roughly abreast of me, but separated by the entire length of the main body of pews on our side of the church. Only about twelve feet from the stairs leading down to the basement now. I tried to remember if I'd heard the door at the bottom of those stairs re-lock when it closed behind me on my way in. Couldn't be sure, so I had to assume that it had. Anyway, with only about thirty feet between me and Tally, betting the other way was too big a risk.

With a slanting right pivot I headed for the side door to the parking lot. Five churning strides and I slammed through it. Not an instant too soon, either, because Tally had already made up some serious distance. Suddenly awash in dazzling sunshine, I raced for the rear corner of the church building, maybe sixty feet away. If I could get around the corner I'd be within sight of the Open Door Café entrance, and anything Tally tried then would happen in front of a dozen eyewitnesses.

His footfalls seemed to slam in my ears. I felt like I could feel his hot breath on the back of my neck. Panicky fear.
Not gonna make it
. Managed a small scream, but I didn't have much breath to give it and, anyway, screams don't qualify as anything special in this neighborhood.
Don't look back!
Ten feet from the corner. His left arm grabbed my left bicep, but with the help of the streaming sweat that had soaked through my blouse and suit jacket I managed to snatch my arm from his grasp.

But that felt like my last bullet. One decent stride from rounding the corner, his right hand grabbed my collar at the nape of my neck and jerked me backward. Spinning me around to face him, he grabbed a fistful of the front of my blouse. I saw a fetid combination of pure hatred and raw fear in his reptilian eyes, and thought I could actually smell their stench. His left hand administered an ear-ringing slap to my right cheek, followed by a backhand to my left cheek. Okay, fine. I've been slapped before. Hurts like hell, but I can handle it. I was opening my mouth for a lustier scream than my last effort when his left hand darted toward his belt and I suddenly saw his fist filled with a gun.

No. Not a gun. A Taser. Through some irrational impulse, it scared me more than a gun would have. The thought of however many volts zapping me, of smashing to the pavement and twitching spastically, seemed even worse than dying quickly of lead poisoning.

“Now listen—carefully.” His menacing whisper suggested complete control. “We have to talk. We can walk to my car together, or I can zap you with this thing and carry you to my car as if I were rescuing a damsel in distress.”

Tempting. God, how tempting it was. Fought the good fight, run the race, all that stuff. Now stop banging your head against a wall. Growing up with two older brothers I'd thrown punches and taken punches, but I didn't have an ounce of technique. Not ten seconds of hand-to-hand combat training in my life. All I had was eight years on parochial school playgrounds, and I'd only learned two things there: never quit, and kick 'em between the legs.

That's what I did. Got him pretty good. Not dead center, but close enough to bring that telltale green tinge to his jowls and slacken the grip he had on the front of my blouse. That let me back a little toward the corner. He had to come with me a few steps to keep from losing me altogether.

We'd made it past the corner when I screamed. I don't remember exactly what I called him, but I should probably mention it at my next confession. I tried everything—thrashing, twisting, bucking, weaving—but I couldn't pull free of that damned right hand of his.
All right, you didn't quit. That's something
. I figured that would be my last coherent thought for awhile. Then, off to my right, I heard a voice and the
smack-smack-smack
of feet running in what sounded like slow motion on the pavement.

“Hey! Whachu doin', man? That my moufpiece!”

As he glanced to his left I thought Tally couldn't have looked more astonished if he'd seen ET peddling toward the sky on his bicycle. Couldn't blame him. Clarence Washington, in all of his tiny wispiness, five-feet-nothing and a hundred-twenty pounds soaking wet, was charging forward like a chihuahua with designs on raping a St. Bernard.

Tally raised his left arm to level the Taser at Washington. I took advantage of the distraction to bang my head into Tally's sternum, in the wild hope of spoiling his aim. Washington, of course, took off his right shoe. I mean, that's what anyone would do, right? Just slow up for a second and slip your right shoe off.

Not sure if I spoiled his aim, but Tally had apparently figured out that he didn't need any Taser to send Washington to the emergency room. He turned the weapon back toward me. Didn't see much I could do about that, so I held my breath and braced for the zap. Then, instead of a thousand strobe lights exploding behind my eyeballs, I saw a flash of black as Washington whizzed his shoe at us..

Tally screamed. Tortures of the damned kind of thing, with a tinge of astonishment coloring the pain that echoed from his screech. The Taser clattered against the pavement, falling next to the shoe that had dropped there after smashing Tally's wrist. Tally's face turned white. Releasing my blouse, he grabbed his left arm with his right hand.