Eye Candy (6 page)

PART TWO

11

It's a dumb joke,” I said. I still felt warm from my shower. I had on a long flannel nightshirt. My wet hair was wrapped in a towel. “Come on. The food is here. Let's eat.”

Ann-Marie chewed her bottom lip. “It's not a joke. It sounds serious to me.”

I tore open the Chinese food bag. “Someone's idea of a sick joke.”

Ann-Marie started to pace, arms crossed in front of her. “It's a threat, Lin. That raspy whisper. No way it's a joke.”

I'd played the message for her. She insisted on hearing it four times.

“
. . .
I'll mess you up!”

Ann-Marie shuddered. “Do you think it's one of the guys you just met?”

I pictured Jack, then Brad, then Colin. And Shelly? I'd just talked to Shelly. It couldn't have been Shelly. “None of them seemed like a psycho. They all seemed as normal as you and me.”

“Uh-oh. You're in deep shit.”

I laughed.

Should I be suspicious of Jack? Did he follow me this afternoon? I had no proof.

And Brad? I pictured that sudden, violent kiss. But he had apologized, saying he'd slipped.

“I'm just going to ignore it,” I said. “I'm going to erase it. It was probably a wrong number, anyway.”

“No, it wasn't. The guy said
Lindy
. He called you by name.”

I began pulling out white food cartons. “Listen, do you want mustard or duck sauce?”

Ann-Marie grabbed my arm. “Lindy, you have to call the police.”

“They'll tell me to ignore it.”

“They won't. It's a threat. You can't just sit down and eat
moo shu
pork. You have to report a threat, Lin.”

I opened the silverware drawer and pulled out chop-sticks. “Well . . . I still have a friend at the Eighty-second Street precinct, remember. Tommy Foster? Ben's partner?”

“Hey, yeah. I remember Tommy. I sorta had a crush on him. Then you said he was married.”

“Well, he's divorced now. I haven't really talked to him since a few weeks after Ben . . .” The words caught in my throat. Saying Tommy Foster's name was bringing back a rush of memories.

Ann-Marie picked up a rice container and began emptying it on our plates. “Think he'll be at work on a Sunday night?”

I shrugged. “Worth a try. If you insist, I'll call.”

“I insist.”

Ben had been such a hothead. He probably would have wanted me to start carrying a gun. Or he would have gone after all the guys I'd just met and confronted them. Tommy was older, more mature, calmer.

I'll never forget the way he sobbed at Ben's funeral. He turned away. He didn't want the other cops to see him bawl. But I saw it—and it made me cry even harder.

No one can stay dry-eyed during a police funeral. The bagpipes . . . “Danny Boy” . . . There was so much emotion in that chapel, I thought the roof would fly off.

I thought all that
feeling
might bring Ben back to life . . .

I still had the precinct phone number stored in my cell phone. I called, expecting to leave a message. But to my surprise, I was put right through to Tommy.

He sounded very surprised to hear from me. He hesitated for a long moment when I told him who it was. I guessed that my voice made him think of Ben, too.

“Working on a Sunday night?”

He snickered. “Always. I'm just taking off, actually. What can I do for you, Lindy?”

I said I had a frightening phone call I wanted to tell him about. He asked where I was living now. Practically around the corner. He said he'd stop by.

Fifteen minutes later, he showed up. Tommy is a tall, lumbering sort of guy, slump-shouldered and droopy. A Brooklyn Liam Neeson.

He was wearing a shiny, brown suit a little too big for him, a pale blue shirt and yellow tie loosened at the collar.

He looked older than I remembered, forehead creased under thinning hair, tired eyes, flecks of gray in his coppery mustache. I figured he was around forty. Why did he look so much older? Police work? Would Ben have aged so fast, too?

Would Ben have aged?

I'd have to nuke the Chinese food later. I pulled out some bottles of Corona from the fridge. The three of us chatted briefly. Ann-Marie flirted with Tommy a little. I couldn't hide my impatience. I was eager to play the phone message for Tommy and get this over.

He and I went into my bedroom. I apologized for the unmade bed. Tommy waved a hand, dismissing my apology. He stared at the answering machine as if studying it for clues.

“Let's hear it. Maybe it's a caller I recognize. There are some regulars that we get to know.”

“Regular perverts?”

He shrugged. “Regular phone creeps.”

I played the message for him. He shut his eyes as he listened.

“. . . I'll REALLY mess you up if you ever say no to
me!”

The words made me shiver this time. Ann-Marie was convincing me this was serious.

Tommy scratched the back of his neck. He tilted the bottle to his mouth and took a long sip of beer. “I don't recognize him. It's a new one. Pretty intense.”

I had goose bumps on my arms. I tried to rub them away. “Think it's a joke?”

He shook his head. “No. But I don't think you should be terrified, either. There's a lot of creeps out there. You've got to be careful.”

Tommy took another pull on the beer, draining the bottle, then turned his gaze back to the answering machine. “You have Caller ID?”

I shook my head. “No. You know. I was trying to save a little money.”

“Did you try star-six-nine? Sometimes you can trace a call back that way.”

“I was so freaked. I didn't think of it. And then someone else called. Right after I got home.”

“Someone else called?”

“A guy I met last night.”

He pushed the button and listened to the message again. He scratched the side of his face. “Can't place him.”

“I . . . I've been dating some guys from the Internet,” I stammered, feeling embarrassed. “You know. A personals Web site. They've all seemed really nice. I mean, okay. Not weird or anything.”

He narrowed those tired eyes at me. “Maybe you should tell me about them.”

He followed me back to the kitchen. I got him another Corona. I described my dates to him as best as I could. He listened, leaning on the kitchen counter, scribbling on a little notepad.

When I finished, he sighed. “These men might be okay. But I don't have to tell you there are a lot of geeks and freaks on the Internet.”

I nodded. “And you think one of the guys I met—”

“No, maybe not. Anyone could have stolen your info, you know. Once you register at a site like that, it would be easy for anyone to access all kinds of stuff about you. Did you put your phone number on the Web site?”

“No.”

“Doesn't matter, really. There are still ways they can get it. This guy doesn't even have to be in New York. He could be in Alaska or Hawaii or somewhere in Siberia.”

“So I shouldn't worry?”

“You should be
careful,
Lindy. But remember this: The guys who make these phone calls, they're not killers. They're not tough guys. They're usually little creeps who live alone. The guys who make these sicko calls are all too timid and fucked-up to be dangerous.”

I let out a sigh of relief. “I'll just try to forget about it then.”

He scratched his neck again, then adjusted his shirt collar. “Well, you should be careful with these guys you're seeing. But I don't think there's reason to be very afraid. Keep in touch, okay? If he calls again, let me know. We'll see what we can do.”

At the door, he thanked me for the beers, said it was great to see me again, told me for the tenth time not to be afraid. He hesitated for a moment. I had the feeling he wanted to say something more. But he turned abruptly, pulled the awful yellow tie tighter around his collar, and lumbered down the hall to the elevator.

“That's it!” I cried, closing and bolting the door.

Ann-Marie had just stepped into the room, carrying a copy of
In Style
magazine. “What's
it
?”

“I'm finished with these Internet dates.”

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me. I don't know if one of those guys left that message or not. I just won't go out with them anymore.”

She squinted at me. “Even Colin?”

I hesitated. “Well . . . I don't know. I have to think about Colin.”

Are you the guy, Colin? Are you?

“But I'm through with the others. When they call, the answer is no.”

In the bedroom, my phone rang.

My mouth dropped open. Ann-Marie and I stared at each other.

I strode stiffly into my room and hesitated in front of the phone. Finally, I picked it up and clicked it on. “Hello?”

“Please don't say no,” a voice said.

12

Dad? Is that you? You sound funny.”

“I'm on my cell. Do you believe it? I'm walking down Twelfth Street.” He was shouting. He cleared his throat.

“You got a cell? Dad, you never go anywhere. Why do you need a cell?”

“Everyone has them now.”

“But what are you going to do with it?”

“Talk to you, of course. I wanted to ask—”

“How's the gallbladder thing? You better?”

“It only hurts when I laugh. Ha ha. I'm fine. It's eight o'clock at night and I'm out walking around like a human.”

“I can't hear you too well. You keep going in and out. What kind of phone did you get?”

“It doesn't flip. They tried to sell me one that flips. But why should a phone flip?”

“You got the cheapest one, huh? Well, why did you call?”

“Don't hang up on me. Please don't say no. I want to take you out for your birthday on Monday.”

Monday?

“Dad, I completely forgot. Do you believe I completely forgot my birthday?”

Silence on his end. And I understood it.

My birthday hasn't been a happy date since I was ten. That's because it's also a horrible anniversary. The day my mother died.

And the truth is, she died
because
of my birthday.

When I turned ten, we still had the big town house duplex apartment in the Village. I don't remember that day too well. My mind is jumbled with pictures—like bright color snapshots—of red and white balloons and streamers, party hats and a pile of wrapped presents, and then . . . the crowd in the street and the cake box, the white cardboard cake box smashed, the yellow icing oozing out.

Most of what I know about that day comes from what my dad told me later, not from memory. Twelve kids were invited to the party, and my grandparents, and a magician. The Great Amazo. Why do I remember his stupid name?

Mom picked up the cake at Greenberg's bakery and was rushing home. She started across Christopher Street and didn't see the taxi. She was hit and killed half a block from the apartment. Crushed like the cake.

So you can see why I might forget my birthday. You can see why birthdays were not exactly occasions I remembered with great fondness. Dad tried to make them nice when I was a kid. He tried to be brave. And of course I had a Sweet Sixteen, all girls and giggles and loud singing and doing and redoing our hair, with the memories pushed to the background like sad music in another room.

But I could still hear it.

Dad was so busy running his chain of camera stores. I really needed a mom. Aunt Rebecca tried to step in. But it was such a chore for her, such hard work to help me with my French homework or take me shopping for summer clothes. I knew she was only doing a favor for her brother.

When the boys started coming around, I didn't know how to handle it. They told me I was beautiful. I stared at the faces of models in
Vogue
and other magazines. Was I beautiful like them?

One friend insisted I was a perfect double for Heather Graham. I looked in the mirror and couldn't see anyone but me.

In high school, I just felt too tall and gangly. My arms and legs looked so skinny to me, like broomsticks. But I was aware of people looking at me, boys watching me in the halls.

What was I supposed to do about looking the way I did?

I needed a mom to explain, to guide me through it all. I couldn't talk about it with Dad. And it was hard to talk about it with my friends.

I know, I know. I should feel lucky to be tall and blond. Ann-Marie tells me how lucky I am nearly every day.

But sometimes I just feel so awkward. Like people are judging me because . . . because I stand out.

Boo hoo, right?

Ann-Marie never lets me get away with feeling sorry for myself. And she's right.

But I feel sorry for myself on my birthday, and I have good reason. It's been fourteen years. I still dream about that smashed birthday cake oozing yellow icing onto the street. And I still miss Mom.

“Sure, I'll go out to dinner with you Monday night, Dad.”

“You will?” Such surprise in his voice.

“Yeah, why not? As long as we don't talk about birthdays.”

“I can't believe my little girl is twenty-four. Hear me sighing. Sigh, sigh.”

“You're still young, Dad. You've got your whole life behind you.”

“Oh, now you're using
my
jokes?”

“Yeah. Pretty sad, huh?”

“Well . . . I think if you . . .”

“I'm losing you, Dad. You're breaking up. You shouldn't have bought the cheap phone. Dad? Hey, Dad?”

“Oh, did
you
want coffee, too?” Rita Belson pulled the cardboard coffee container from a paper bag and set it on her desk. “Sorry. I should have asked.”

“It's okay,” I muttered.

We'd been working together for over a year, and I think maybe in all that time she'd brought me coffee once or twice—both times, not what I'd ordered.

Hostile?

Yes, Rita was hostile. And she didn't make much effort to cover it up.

It was three o'clock in the afternoon, and I could have used a cup of coffee. I'd spent most of the day writing letters to authors and publishers and printers, boring stuff about contracts and payments and publishing schedules.

Children's publishing is not all bunny rabbits and FurryBears, believe me.

Rita made a big deal of sifting through her stack of phone messages before sitting down at her desk to drink her coffee. She gets a lot of calls, most of them personal. She seems to have a lot of guys calling her, and she talks to them all every day.

We share a room with four gray-walled cubicles. Across from us sit Edith, a little gray-haired woman who answers the phone, and Brill, Saralynn's lanky, blond, efficient, and always fashionably dressed assistant. That means Rita and I are side by side, so I can hear every word she says on the phone.

And a lot of it is about the “great sex” she had the night before.

Whew.

Of course, when Saralynn enters the room, Rita suddenly becomes all business on the phone. She usually pretends she's discussing a manuscript with an author. I guess her many admirers understand what she's doing.

Saralynn never catches on. Rita has Saralynn totally snowed.

Rita isn't bad-looking. I can see why guys find her attractive. For one thing, she has a great body, and she shows it off well, mostly in designer stuff—TSE cashmere sweaters and scoop-necked T's; short, pleated skirts over dark stockings; a gray pinstriped Armani suit that's to die for.

She has straight, black hair down to her collar around an oval face, big blue-gray eyes, a sexy smile with one dimple in her right cheek, and a little nip of a nose, cute as a button, obviously not her original.

“Good job on this
Pioneer Girl
manuscript, Rita.” Saralynn walked quickly into the room and set the stack of pages on Rita's desk. “The ending really works now.”

Rita glanced at me before she turned to Saralynn. “Oh, thanks. It didn't work at all when Charlene sent it in. And the middle was a mess. I had to rewrite the whole thing. I didn't want to send it back to her again for a
third
revision, so I just stayed up all night and rewrote it myself.”

“Well, it's excellent now,” Saralynn said.

I had a tremendous urge to jump up and scream at her: “Don't you realize Rita says that about
every
manuscript she works on? How can it be that every single manuscript is a mess that Rita has to completely rewrite herself? She stays up all night
every time
and saves the author's work single-handedly?”

It's total bullshit, but Saralynn eats it up.

Saralynn turned to me, her smile fading. “Lindy, I need to speak to you about
Pioneer Girl II
. I read it last night. It still isn't there. You've got a great beginning and a pretty good ending—but there's no middle. Nothing happens for pages and pages. The covered wagon is stuck in a ditch and the whole story just stops.”

“I know,” I said lamely. “I want to talk to Charlene about it, but she doesn't answer her phone.”

Charlene Nola Watson is the series author. She hates to revise. I'm sure she screens her calls and doesn't pick up when she hears it's me.

“Well, email her then,” Saralynn suggested, like I'm a two-year-old who wouldn't think of email without being told. “Both of these manuscripts are supposed to go over to Random House on Friday, and only one is ready.”

Rita's, of course.

Saralynn turned and swept back to her office down the hall.

Rita had a huge grin on her face. She made no attempt to hide her delight. I wanted to grab that little nub of a nose and pull it out to its original length.

“Lindy, if you'd like me to take a look at the manuscript . . . ,” she sang.

Luckily, my phone rang before I could tell her what I'd like her to do with the manuscript. “FurryBear Press. This is Lindy.”

“Lindy, hi. It's me.”

At first I didn't recognize the voice. Was it one of the guys from the Internet?

“Just wanted to see if you've gotten any more threatening calls.”

Oh. Tommy Foster.

“Tommy, I . . . didn't know you had my number at work.”

“Well, I added a lot of Ben's contacts to my file. You know. In case I needed to contact some of his people. I'm just following up on last night, Lindy. If you're busy . . .”

“No. It's okay. Thanks, Tommy. I'm fine. I mean, no other calls.”

“Good. I thought it might be a one-time thing. You see any of the guys you met on that Web site?”

“Well . . . I'm going out with a guy Saturday. But I didn't meet him online. And, to be honest, there's another guy . . . well . . . I kind of like him.”

Tommy didn't reply. I heard someone say something to him. A police radio blared in the background. “I'd better go. You've got my number, right, Lindy?”

“Thanks, Tommy.” He clicked off before I could say goodbye.

In the next cubicle, Rita was talking to one of her guys. “What are you going to wear? No, not that. No, don't wear that. Listen to me. They won't let us in if you wear that.”

Where does she find all these men?

I set the phone back in its base. Nice of Tommy Foster to call. I probably shouldn't have bothered him in the first place.

I took a deep breath and let it out. It had to be someone playing a stupid joke—right?