Death Glitch (8 page)

“
We did that,” Alicia said, “but don’t blame Amy. I was driving. We were afraid, because you, or rather an older version of you, was screaming out that someone was trying to kill her. I know I should’ve stopped, but I saw someone on the sidewalk and I knew they’d call 911. There wasn’t anything we could do, except stop and maybe get Amy killed.”

“
And where did you get that car, young lady?” If Amy would have had any doubts that this was her grandmother, that tone of voice would have taken them away.

“
Tucker bought it for me.” Amy winced when she said his name.

“
Tucker!”

“
Don’t worry, Dr. Eisenhower.” Alicia said. “They’re not seeing each other any more.”

“
I’ve got a lot more on my mind right now than Tucker Wayne,” Nana said.

“
Wow,” Alicia said. “I was a little clairvoyant with that Dylan quote, wasn’t I, Amy?”

“
Yeah, I guess you were,” Amy said.

“
You’re really finished with Tucker?” Nana said.

“
She really is,” Alicia said.

“
I thought he was going to let me go,” Amy said. “We had it worked out.”

“
That was before his hit woman Lila Booth saw a tape of you copying files from his computer.”

“
There was a camera?”

“
How could you be so stupid?”

“
I wanted to leave him and I thought I needed insurance. It turned out I didn’t.” She was scared now. In the last few months she’d heard stories about what could happen to you if you crossed Tucker Wayne. “I’ll call him up. I’ll give it back.”

“
He already has it. Lila broke into your apartment.”

“
That bastard,” Amy said.

“
He is a bastard,” Nana said, “but he’s the one who warned me that Lila was coming after you last night. If it wasn’t for him, you’d be dead now. Anyway, I’m glad you’re through with him. Now we have to go.”

“
Where?” Amy said.

“
Far away.”

“
Because that Lila Booth person is trying to kill Amy?” Alicia said.

“
I can probably fix that, eventually,” Nana said. “Mostly we’ve got to disappear because of what’s happened to me. Once it gets out, you can imagine what they’d do to me.”

“
Well yeah, the government alone, they’d be pretty interested,” Alicia said.

“
So we’ve got to get on the road,” Nana said. “The sooner we’re away from here, the better.”

“
Excuse me,” Alicia said, “but wouldn’t you be better off hiding, you know, someplace close by, where whoever might come after you would never look. Someplace safe, rather than drive away to who knows where, with spooks and spies and Lila Booth hot on your trail. I’ve seen that movie and somebody always gets killed.”

“
Who is this person?” Nana said. It was odd thinking of her as her grandmother, but despite the way she looked now, it was Nana, of that Amy was sure.

“
She’s my friend Alicia,” Amy said.

“
So, Alicia,” Nana said, “do you have anywhere specific in mind?”

“
Yeah, my place. You can hang till this Lila Booth person and whoever else is looking for you are convinced you’ve disappeared, then you can leave. Like, when it’s safe.”

“
It could be a long time.”

“
No worries. I’ve got lots of room, plus I make tons of money, so you all won’t be a problem.”

“
She does have a big house,” Amy said. “I think it’s a good idea.

* * *

Izzy followed Alicia out of the parking lot with the dog riding shotgun. When they’d decided that she and Amy would follow Alicia and Hunter to Alicia’s, the dog seemed to object. He went to Izzy’s car, parked himself by the passenger door and wouldn’t budge. He was her dog now. She knew it. The dog knew it.

So Amy got in the yellow VW with her friend, Hunter jumped into Izzy’s passenger seat when she opened the door, sat straight up, like it had been his place forever.

“
There is something very strange going on here, big guy.”

“
Woof,” the dog answered.

“
And I suspect you might know more than you’re letting on.”

Five minutes later, Izzy parked alongside the girls, who had pulled into a driveway of a two story yellow house three blocks from the university. She was about to shut the engine off when Alicia got out of the VW.

“
You should park in the garage.” Alicia pointed to the garage doors, a double and a single. She had a three car garage and Izzy wondered how many cars she had in it. “I’ll just be a minute.” Alicia pulled a set of keys from her pocket, went to the front door, keyed the lock, entered the house.

Seconds later the double door went up and Izzy’s unasked question was answered. One car, a flashy red BMW sports car. And a lot of stuff. Amy pulled her VW in, parked next to the Beemer as the single door went up. Izzy pulled in, parked next to a mound of cardboard boxes. She was barely able to squeeze her little Raider in.

“
What’s in the boxes?” Izzy said.

“
Everything, including the kitchen sink,” Alicia said. “I’m an eBay junkie.” She laughed. “Sadly, I’m a neat freak, too, so there’s no room for most of this crap in the house.”

“
Then why do you buy it?”

“
I don’t know,” Alicia said. “I can’t seem to help myself.” Alicia wasn’t poor, didn’t appear to be watching her money. She lowered the door and Izzy and the dog followed her into the house.

“
Nice,” Izzy said once inside. The furniture was expensive, from the love seat and sofa in the living room to the designer lamps and the paintings on the wall, which all looked like original art.

“
You’ll be safe here,” Alicia said as Amy came in the front door.

“
I don’t know if I’ll ever be safe again,” Izzy said.

* * *

Mansfield Wayne paced his living room, with a wooden ruler in his right hand and with every third or fourth step he smacked the open palm of his left. He needed to feel the pain, needed to feel alive. He was seventy-seven years old, the same age as Isadora Eisenhower and, like her, he had terminal cancer. Cigarettes were the cause of his, Eisenhower, it seemed, was the victim of bad luck. He probably deserved his fate. She probably didn’t deserve hers.

Still, if one of them were to be spared, it should’ve been him. He ran an empire which employed thousands. Who was she? A woman concerned only for herself, that was plain to see, because if she had an ounce of concern for others in her condition, she’d’ve shared her secret. Nobody should be allowed to keep something like that all for themselves. It wasn’t right.

“
Stop it, stop it, stop it!” He flung the ruler across the room. He was Mansfield Wayne. He didn’t have to justify his actions. Yet, here he was trying to justify what he was about to do. He didn’t do that. He was a man who took what he wanted and who fought like hell when somebody tried to take what was his. Eisenhower had something he wanted. No, something he needed, needed desperately. He was going to find her, learn her secret and take it.

He thought back on what Peeps Friday had told him. It was a fantastic story, an unbelievable story. Mansfield didn’t believe in the supernatural. Didn’t believe in ghosts. Didn’t believe in God either. If he couldn’t see it and touch it, it didn’t exist for him. But this did.

He could spot a liar at fifty paces. Peeps Friday was a lot of things, but he was no liar. Peeps may not believe in what he’d seen on that DVD, but he was telling the truth about how he got it. And from what he’d said, those doctors believed what they’d seen. Still, he wanted to make absolutely sure. He had to know if Lila had shot Isadora Eisenhower. He had to hear it from her own mouth.

The doorbell rang.

“
Finally.” He went to answer it.

“
I came as fast as I could,” Lila Booth said.

“
Not fast enough!”

“
Mansfield, I work for you, but I don’t have to. You don’t get to use that tone of voice with me.”

“
Yeah, yeah.” He waved a hand in front of himself, started for the kitchen. His martini had been interrupted, it was time to rectify the situation.

“
I’m serious. I am not one of your lackeys.”

“
Sorry,” he said. “You want one?” He held up the shaker.

“
You know I do.”

He made one for himself, one for her.

“
It’s good,” she said after taking a sip.

“
Glad you like it.” He went to the dining room, took a seat at the table. She did, too.

“
So what was so urgent that I had to drop everything and come right over?”

“
Tucker says you went rogue, that you’re going to take out Amy Eisenhower, without clearing it with him. Or more importantly, with me.”

“
I’m trying to keep my temper here.” She slid her hand into the backpack she always seemed to have with her. He hadn’t noticed it earlier, probably because he’d been too excited to pay attention. She had a gun in there, probably more than one. She was the only person in the world who could get close to him armed. His security had been warned to leave her be when she approached him. She was never searched, never would be. She was a coiled snake without a conscience, but she was his snake.

“
Hold your horses. I’m not upset.”

“
Then why am I here?”

“
I’ll get to that.” He took a sip of his martini, trying to slow the conversation down so he could get his bearings. “But first I want you to know how much Tucker and I appreciate all you’ve done for us.”

“
I don’t go rogue.” She eased her hand out of the backpack. “Amy Eisenhower copied Tucker’s files to a CD. I got it back and I decided to take care of her before she got a chance to go to the authorities. And I decided to do it gratis, something I never, ever do. I was willing to do this for you, because Tucker was out of the country. Because I couldn’t get through to you. And because of our long association. But I made a couple mistakes.”

“
Go on.”

“
One, I left a message on Tucker’s voice mail. That was stupid, because he still had feelings for the girl. He told her grandmother, who threw a spanner into my plans.”

“
And the other mistake?” This is what Mansfield had been waiting for, hoping for.

“
I let my temper get the better of me and I took out granny. Shot her through the heart.” She shook her head. “It was a stupid thing to do. A waste of a good weapon. A waste of my talent. And I put myself at risk for no reason.”

“
You shot her through the heart.”

“
Yes.”

“
So it’s true.” He sighed. For the first time in many months he felt hope. A great weight had been lifted from his shoulders.

“
Yes, she’s dead.”

“
I’d like to thank you for that.”

“
You wanted Granny dead.”

“
Yes. You’ll get your usual fee for that.” He gave her a smile, something he didn’t do often these days. “I would’ve wired the money as soon as I’d heard she’d been taken care of, but I had to hear it from you, that it was you who took care of it.”

“
I didn’t expect this.”

“
It’s okay, we appreciate everything you do for us and the last thing I’d want you to think is that we’d take advantage of you.”

“
That’s nice to hear,” Lila said.

“
Now about the granddaughter, Amy Eisenhower. I don’t want her dead.”

“
Don’t tell me you’re going soft because Tucker has feelings for her.”

“
Hardly.”

“
Then what?”

“
I want her alive.”

“
So you want me to leave her be.”

“
Not exactly. I’d like you find her and bring her to me. Alive. Double your usual fee.”

“
Go on.”

“
You get the extra money for two reasons. One, because you don’t get to kill her. I know how much you like to do that. And two, because this is between you and me, I don’t want Tucker to know.”

“
Why not?”

“
Because he has feelings for the girl, because she’s betrayed his trust and because now it’s personal. There was a time when I didn’t need you, because I took care of my own problems. I’m too old and too sick to go out and find her myself, so I need you for that, but I want to get my hands dirty with this one and I want to enjoy it. I want you to bring her here, drugged, with her hands cuffed behind her back.”

“
Why, Mansfield, I’m impressed.”

“
There’s more.”

“
Amy has a twin.”

“
No she doesn’t!”

“
Not a sister. A cousin, at least I think she’s a cousin. She’s also named Isadora. They’re identical, except for the eyes. Amy’s are blue, the cousin’s are brown. I want her, too, same way, drugged up and hands cuffed behind her back. I believe they’ll be together, so if you find one, you’ll find the other.”

“
Two of them,” Lila said. “That’s going be harder.”

“
And that’s why I’m paying you double your usual fee for the cousin as well.”

“
You’re being very generous, Mansfield.”

“
These women took something from me.” He met Lila’s eyes straight on. Like him, she could spot a liar. “Now I’m going to take something from them.” He wasn’t lying, he was going to take something from them, something precious. “Can you do this for me?”