The Dark Tide Free for a Limited Time (8 page)

It was the second day of field-hockey practice, near the end of February. Sam Friedman tossed her stick into the bottom of her locker.

She played right forward for the girls’ team. They’d lost a couple of their best attackers from last year, so this season it was going to be tough. Sam grabbed her parka off the hook and scanned over a few books. She had an English quiz tomorrow on a story by Tobias Wolfe, a chapter to skim on Vietnam. Since she’d gotten into Tufts, Early Decision 2 in January, she’d pretty much been coasting. Tonight a bunch of them were meeting in town at Thataways for wings and maybe sneak a beer.

Senior slump was in full throttle.

Outside, Sam ran over to her blue Acura SUV, which she’d parked in the west lot after lunch. She jumped in and tossed her bag onto the seat, and started up the engine. Then she plugged her iPod into the port and scrolled to her favorite tune.

“And I am telling you I’m not going…,”
she sang, belting it
out as closely as she could to Jennifer Hudson in
Dreamgirls.
She went to slip the Acura into drive.

That’s when the hand wrapped around her mouth and jerked her head back to the headrest.

Samantha’s eyes peeled back and she tried to let out a muffled scream.

“Don’t make a sound, Samantha,” a voice from behind her said.

Oh my God!
That scared her even more, that the person knew her name. She felt a bolt of fear race down her spine, her eyes darting around, straining to glance at him in the rearview mirror.

“Uh-uh, Samantha.” The assailant redirected her face forward. “Don’t try to look at me. It’ll be better for you that way.”

How did he know her name?

This was bad.
She ratcheted through a million things she had always heard in case something like this occurred.
Don’t fight back. Let him do what he wants. Give him your money, jewelry, even if it’s something important. Let him have his way.

Anything.

“You’re scared, Samantha, aren’t you?” the man asked in a subdued voice. He had his hand wrapped tightly over her mouth, her eyes stretched wide.

She nodded.

“I don’t blame you. I’d be scared, too.”

She glanced outside, praying someone might come by. But it was late, and dark. The lot was empty. She felt his breath, hot on the back of her neck. She closed her eyes.
Oh, God, he’s going to rape me. Or worse…

“But it’s your lucky day. I’m not going to hurt you, Samantha. I just want you to deliver a message to someone. Will you do that for me?”

Yes, Samantha nodded, yes.
Stay together, stay together,
she begged herself.
He’s going to let you go.

“To your mom.”

My mom…
What did her mom have to do with this?

“I want you to tell her, Sam, that the investigation is going to start very soon. And that it’s going to get very personal. She’ll understand. And that we’re not the types to wait around patiently—forever. I think you can see that, can’t you? Do you understand that, Sam?”

She shut her eyes. Shaking. Nodded.

“Good. Be sure and tell her that the clock’s ticking. And she doesn’t want it to run out, I can promise that. Do you hear me, Sam?” He loosened his hand just slightly from her mouth.

“Yes,”
Sam whispered, her voice quaking.

“Now, don’t look around,” he said. “I’m going to slip out the back.” The man had a hooded sweatshirt pulled over his face. “Trust me, the less you see, the better for you.”

Samantha sat rigid. Her head moved up and down. “I understand.”

“Good.” The door opened. The man slipped out. She didn’t look. Or turn to follow. She just sat there staring. Exactly as she was told.

“You are your father’s little girl, aren’t you, Sam?”

Her eyes shot wide.

“Remember about the sum. Two hundred and fifty million dollars. You tell your mom we won’t wait long.”

Karen clung to her daughter on the living-room couch. Samantha was sobbing, her head buried against her mother’s shoulder, barely able to speak. She’d called Karen after the man had left, then driven home in a panic. Karen immediately called the police. Outside, the quiet street was ablaze in flashing lights.

Karen went through it with the first officers who’d arrived. “How could there be no protection at the school? How could they just let anyone in there?” Then to Sam, in total frustration, “Baby, how could you not have locked the car?”

“I don’t know, Mom.”

But inside she knew—her daughter’s fingers tight and trembling, her face smeared with tears—that this wasn’t about Samantha. Or more protection at school. Or locking the car door.

It was about Charlie.

This was about something he had done. Something she was growing more and more afraid that he had withheld from her.

They would have found Samantha at the mall, or at some
one’s house, or at the club where she worked. But they weren’t trying to get to Samantha, she knew.

They were trying to get to her.

And the scariest part was, Karen had no idea what these people wanted from her.

When she spotted Lieutenant Hauck come through the front door, her body almost gave out all at once. She leaped up and ran over to him. She had to hold herself back from hugging him.

He placed a hand on her shoulder. “Is she all right?”

“Yes.” Karen nodded in relief. “I think so.”

“I know she’s already been through it a couple of times, but I need to talk with her, too.”

Karen took him over to her daughter. “Okay.”

Hauck sat down on the coffee table directly across from Samantha. “Sam, my name’s Lieutenant Hauck. I’m the head of detectives with the Greenwich police here in town. I know your mom a little from when your dad died. I want you to tell me exactly what took place.”

Karen nodded to her, sitting next to her on the couch and taking her hand.

Sniffling back tears, Sam went through it all again. Coming out of the gym after practice, stepping into her car, putting on her iPod. The man in the backseat, completely surprising her from behind. Cupping her mouth so she couldn’t scream, his voice so chilling and close to her ear that his words seemed to tingle down her spine.

“It was so scary, Mom.”

Karen squeezed. “I know, baby, I know….”

She told Hauck that she’d never gotten a good look at him. “He told me not to.” She was certain she was about to be raped or killed.

“You did right, honey,” Hauck said.

“He said that the investigation was going to start soon. And that it was going to get very personal. He said something about
two hundred and fifty million dollars.” Samantha looked up at Karen.
“What the hell did he mean by that, Mom?”

Karen fitfully shook her head. “I don’t know.”

When they’d finished, Karen eased herself away from her daughter. She asked Hauck if he would come outside with her. The awning on the patio wasn’t up yet. Still too cold. In the darkness there were lights flashing out on the sound.

“Do you have any idea what she’s talking about?” he asked.

Karen drew a sharp breath and nodded. “Yes.”

And no…

She took him through the visit she’d received. The two men from Archer and Bey, who had pressured her about all that missing money. “Two hundred and fifty million dollars,” she admitted.

Now this.

“I don’t know what the hell is going on.” She shook her head, eyes glistening. “Charlie’s trustee—he’s a friend—he promises that everything in the partnership was one hundred percent by the book. And I’m sure it was. These people…” Karen looked at Hauck, flustered. “Charlie was a good man. He didn’t handle that kind of money. It’s like they’ve targeted the wrong person, Lieutenant. My husband had a handful of clients. Morgan Stanley, a few well-to-do families he’d known a long time.”

“You understand I have to look into this,” Hauck said.

Karen nodded.

“But I need to tell you that without a physical description from your daughter, it’s going to be very tough. There are cameras at the school entrances. Maybe someone around spotted a car. But it was dark and pretty much deserted at that time. And whoever these people are, they’re clearly professional.”

Karen nodded again. “I know.”

She leaned toward him, suddenly so full of questions she felt light-headed, her knees on the verge of buckling.

The lieutenant placed his hand on her shoulder. She didn’t pull away.

She’d handled Charlie’s death, the long months of uncertainty and loneliness, the breakup of his business. But this was too much. Tears rushed in her eyes—burning. Tears of mounting fear and confusion. The fear that her children had suddenly become involved. The fear of what she did not know. More tears started to flow. She hated this feeling. This doubt that had so abruptly sprung up about her husband. She hated these people who had invaded their lives.

“I’ll make sure you have some protection,” the lieutenant said, squeezing Karen’s shoulder. “I’ll station someone outside the house. We’ll see that someone follows the kids to school for a while.”

She looked at him, sucking in a tense breath. “I have this feeling that my husband might have done something, Lieutenant. In his business. Charlie always took risks, and now one of them has come back to haunt us. But he’s dead. He can’t untangle this for us.” She wiped her eyes with the heel of her hand. “He’s gone, and we’re still here.”

“I’ll need a list of his clients,” Hauck said, his hand still perched upon her shoulder.

“Okay.”

“And I’ll need to talk to Lennick, your husband’s trustee.”

“I understand.” Karen pulled back, taking in a breath, trying to compose herself. Her mascara had run. She dabbed her eyes.

“I’ll find something. I promise you. I’ll do my best to make sure you’re safe.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant.” She leaned against him. “For everything.”

Static from her sweater rippled against his hand as he took it away.

“Listen.” He smiled. “I’m not exactly a Wall Street guy. But somehow I don’t think this is how Morgan Stanley goes about collecting its debts.”

The call came in at eleven-thirty that night. The limo had just dropped Saul Lennick at his Park Avenue apartment, home from the opera. His wife, Mimi, was in the bathroom removing her makeup.

“Can you get that, Saul?”

Lennick had just pulled off his shoes and removed his tie. Calls this late, he knew what they were usually about. He picked up the phone in frustration.
Couldn’t it wait for the morning?
“Hello.”

“Saul?”

It was Karen Friedman. Her voice was cracking and upset. He knew that something was wrong. “What’s happened, Karen?”

Exasperated, she told him what had happened to Samantha leaving school.

Lennick stood up. Sam was like a grandniece to him. He had been at her bat mitzvah. He had set up accounts for her, and for Alex, at his firm. Every bone in his tired body became rigid.

“Jesus, Karen, is she all right?”

“She’s okay….” Karen sniffed back a sob in frustration. “But…” She told him what the man who had accosted her had said, about wanting their money. The same two hundred and fifty million dollars as before. The part about how she was her father’s little girl.

“What the hell did they mean by that Saul? Was that some kind of threat?”

In his underwear and socks, Lennick sank down on the bed. His mind ran back to Charles. The avalanche he had unleashed.

You stupid son of a bitch.
He shook his head and sighed.

“Something’s going on, Saul. You were about to tell me something a couple of weeks back. You said it wasn’t the right time…. Well I just put my daughter in my own bed,” Karen said, her voice stiffening. “She was scared within an inch of her life. What do you think, Saul—
is it the right time now?”

Archer and Bey turned out to be phony.

Just a name on a business card. A call to an old contact at Interpol and a quick scan over the Internet for companies registered in South Africa determined that. Even the address and telephone number in Johannesburg were bogus.

Someone was trying to extort her, Hauck knew. Someone familiar with her husband’s dealings. Even his trustee, Lennick, whom Hauck had spoken with earlier and who appeared like a stand-up guy, agreed.

“
Incoming,
Lieutenant!”

The call rang out from the outside squad room, followed by the low, pretend
whoosh
of a mortar round exploding.

“Incoming” was how they referred to it when Hauck’s ex-wife was on the line.

Hauck paused a second, phone in hand, before picking up. “Hey, Beth, how’s it going?”

“I’m okay, Ty, fine. You?”

“How’s Rick?”

“He’s good. He just got an increase in territory. Now he’s got Pennsylvania and Maryland, too.” Beth’s new husband was a district manager in a mortgage firm.

“That’s real good. Congratulations. Jess mentioned something like that.”

“It’s sort of why I’m calling. We thought we’d take this long-overdue trip. You know how we’ve been promising Jessie we’d take her down to Orlando? The theme-park thing.”

Hauck straightened. “You know I was sort of hoping she and
I
could do that together, Beth.”

“Yeah, I know how you’ve always been saying that, Ty. But, um…this trip’s for real.”

The dig cut sharply into his ribs. But she was probably right. “So when are you planning on doing this, Beth?”

Another pause. “We were thinking about Thanksgiving, Ty.”

“Thanksgiving?”
This time the cut dug all the way through his intestines. “I thought we agreed Thanksgiving’s mine this year, Beth. I was going to take Jess up to Boston to my sister’s. To see her cousins. She hasn’t been up there in a while.”

“I’m sure she’d like that, Ty. But this came up. And it’s Disney World.”

He sniffed, annoyed. “What, does Rick have a sales conference down there then or something?”

Beth didn’t answer. “It’s Disney World, Ty. You can take her Christmas.”

“No.”
He tossed his pen on his desk. “I can’t take her Christmas, Beth. We discussed this. We had this planned. I’m going away Christmas.” He’d made these plans to go bonefishing with a group of school buddies off the Bahamas, the first time he’d been away in a long time. “We went over this, Beth.”

“Oh, yeah.” She sighed as if it had somehow slipped her mind. “You’re right. I remember now.”

“Why not ask Jess?”

“Ask Jess what, Ty?”

“Ask her where
she’d
like to go.”

“I don’t have to ask her, Ty. I’m her mother.”

He was about to snap back,
Goddamn it, Beth, I’m her father,
but he knew where that would lead.

“We actually sort of already booked the tickets, Ty. I’m sorry. I really didn’t call you to fight.”

He let out a long, frustrated exhale. “You know she likes it up there, Beth. With her cousins. They’re expecting us. It’s good for her now—for her to see them once or twice a year.”

“I know, Ty. You’re right. Next time, I promise, she will.” Another pause. “Listen, I’m glad you understand.”

They hung up. He swiveled around in his chair, his eyes settling on the picture of Jessie and Norah he kept on the credenza. Five and three. A year before the accident. All smiles.

It was hard to remember they had once been in love.

There was a knock against Hauck’s office door, startling him.
“Hey, Loo!”

It was Steve Christofel, who handled bunko and fraud.

“
What,
Steve?”

The detective shrugged, apologetic, notepad in hand. “You want me to come back, boss? Maybe this isn’t a good time.”

“No, it’s fine. Come on in.” Hauck swiveled back around, mad at himself. “Sorry. You know the routine.”

“Always something, right? But, hey, Lieutenant, you mind if I see that case file you always keep in here?”

“Case file?”

“You know, the one you always keep hidden on your desk over there.” The detective grinned. “That old hit-and-run thing.
Raymond.
”

“Oh, that.” Hauck shrugged as if exposed. He always kept it buried under a stack of open cases. Not forgotten, not for a second. Just not solved. He lifted the stack and fished out the yellow case file from the bottom. “What’s going on?”

“My memory’s a little fuzzy, Lieutenant, but wasn’t there a name that was connected to it somewhere? Marty something?”

Hauck nodded.

The person who had called up AJ Raymond at the shop, just before he’d left to cross the street.
Something like Marty,
his boss had said. It had just never led anywhere.

“Why?”

“This wire just came in.” Christofel came around and placed his notepad on Hauck’s desk. “Some credit-card-fraud division has been trying to chase it down after all this time. An Amex card belonging to a Thomas
Mardy
—that’s M-A-R-
D-
Y—was used to pay for a limo ride up to Greenwich. Dropped him off at the Fairfield Diner at a little before noon, Lieutenant. April ninth.”

Hauck looked up, his blood starting to course.

April 9.
That was the morning of the hit-and-run.
Mardy,
not Marty—
that fit!
A Thomas Mardy had been dropped off across the street from where AJ Raymond was killed.

Now every cell in Hauck’s body sprang alive.

“There’s just one catch, Lieutenant.” The detective scratched his head. “Get this…. The Thomas Mardy the Amex card belonged to was actually
killed
on April ninth. In the Grand Central bombing. On the tracks…”

Hauck stared.

“And that was three full hours,” the detective said, “before the Greenwich hit-and-run.”