The Trophy Wife (9 page)

“So what do you think? He's legit?”

She shrugged her shoulders while the waiter was pouring the deep red wine from a basket-wrapped bottle. Then she resumed thinking out loud. “Is he legit? Yeah, I think so. He looks too flustered to be in charge of a scheme like this.”

“So then someone really was waiting to see if he went to the restaurant?”

Helen had been asking herself the same question. “Maybe. But if it is an inside job, then maybe no one had to follow him to lunch. I mean, his secretary would know that he had left for lunch at Casper's. Probably the other swells in the executive suites would know. An insider probably wouldn't have to follow him or see him sitting in the window. Maybe the instructions were just supposed to get him thinking that it was an outsider.”

Hogan took over. “The crime scene looked like some sort of circus act. They could have grabbed the lady the second she pulled into the garage. No fuss! They'd have been gone in a half a minute. Instead, they wait for her to get into the shower. Then they have to knock her out, roll her in the shower curtain, and carry her down the back steps. Minimum, ten minutes in the house.”

“Which suggests … ?” Helen wanted to know.

“Our perps were late getting there. My guess is that they never cased the house. That they played the whole thing pretty much off the cuff. I'm beginning to believe that someone has hired a group of unrelated amateurs …”

He paused as the food arrived and waited impatiently while
the waiter topped off his still full wineglass. Then he leaned back close to Helen.

“Walter Childs said that the messenger didn't seem like someone who could be involved in a kidnapping. Just some guy moonlighting to pick up some extra money. That's about where I'd put the people who took Mrs. Childs. Average Joes trying to do something that they have no experience with. The lady even bloodied one of them up. The blood around the drain wasn't hers, and it wasn't Walter's.”

“You think they killed her?”

Hogan shook his head. “No. Not right away, at any rate. Your forensic guys found a used Demerol ampoule in the shrubs outside the kitchen door. Someone had filled a syringe. Looks like they knocked her cold. Or, at least, that's what they were trying to do.”

“That's not completely amateur,” Restivo mused.

Hogan shrugged. “No shortage of people who need money and know how to use a hypodermic. Could be any druggie from any street.”

“You know,” Helen said, “that's one thing that's bothering me. How do you recruit average Joes for a kidnapping? I mean, you can't just pick people out of the telephone book and say, ‘Hey, how would you like to make a couple of hundred by kidnapping someone?' It seems to me that you'd have to have a pretty wide inventory of down-and-out lowlifes at your disposal. We think that this is an inside job. But whoever did it must have some connections with crooks and junkies. So who in a bank knows how to deal with street scum?”

“Me, for one,” he said. Helen's eyes snapped up. “And I suppose some of the people on my staff. I've hired a couple of guys off the parole rolls. You know, ‘to catch a thief.' And there's no doubt that they resent some of the suits who pick up million-dollar bonuses at Christmas.”

Helen wanted to drop the delicate subject, but she could see that her friend was still tossing it in his mind. “Some of my guys have learned a lot about the bank's systems and procedures,” Andrew said. “It's stuff they need to know when they try to break in.”

They started their meal in silence, neither wanting to pursue the idea that Hogan and his staff should become important suspects in the investigation but, at the same time, both unwilling to move on to another topic. Helen found her priorities shifting. She had figured Walter as the most likely perpetrator. But where would the senior vice president of a world-class money center make the acquaintance of subculture types who knew how to administer drugs and who would moonlight as kidnappers? Probably not among the members of his country club. Andrew Hogan, on the other hand, could put together a team in an hour. Hogan was squirming under the continuing insult of his treatment by the InterBank executives. What a delicious way to bring them to heel and pocket the biggest bonus in the banking industry.

But she knew Andrew to be squeaky clean and honorable enough to marry her even though he didn't really love her. Robbing a bank wasn't in his makeup, unless he got bored protecting it. When she glanced over at him, she found him staring vacantly around the room. “Are you bored, Andrew?”

“No, just thinking.”

“But not about the case?” She knew him well enough to discern when his investigator's brain was turned on and when he had shut it off.

“No. I was just thinking about these other couples.” A tilt of his head indicated the couples at the surrounding tables. “How many of them are talking about bodies wrapped in shower curtains or blood in a bathtub drain?”

Helen laughed. “We do have some disgusting conversations. So what else would you like to talk about?”

“I don't know anything else. This is what I've been doing my whole life. I'm beginning to think that maybe it's time for a change.”

She was startled by the thought of Andrew Hogan doing anything but upholding the law. Maybe it would be a good idea, she thought, to take a good look at some of his people.

“Oh,” said Andrew, suddenly clicking back into focus. “I've got another new name that you should be following closely.”

Helen took out her pad and pencil, ready to write.

“Guess who Walter Childs telephoned the second that his courier was out of sight?”

She decided not to guess.

“One of his associates at InterBank. A lovely young thing named Angela Hilliard.”

Helen set down the pencil. “You're kidding. A secretary? You're going to tell me the guy is doing the girl from the mailroom?” And then she bit her tongue. Andrew's sheepish grin told her that he, too, was remembering when he was doing the girl from the mailroom. He was an officer and she had been a rookie cop. “Sorry,” she said. “Let me try to rephrase that.”

His hand reached out and covered hers. “No, that
was
our problem. Neither of us were comfortable with it. But this young lady is hardly from the mailroom. Miss Hilliard is a fast-track executive. She runs a few of the bank's biggest accounts. Odds are that she'll be the first person to use the women's facilities at the senior executives' health spa. And when she does, you're going to find the whole executive row dressed in bath towels, because Angela is a perfect 10, even in a business suit. Put her in running shorts, and she's probably a 12.”

Rita Lipton yelped with pain, dropped the small tray of fried chicken onto the table, and jammed her fingertips into her mouth. “Damn platter is hot as hell!” Angrily, she slammed the door of the microwave oven where she had just heated the frozen chicken. “I thought only the food got hot!”

Mike laughed without looking up from the tabloid he was reading. “Good thing you know what to do in bed, because you don't have a clue in the kitchen.”

“Good thing I have more than a clue in the courtroom,” Rita countered, “or you'd be lining up for your meals with other cons.”

“I'd of gotten off,” Mike said.

She pushed some of the chicken onto his plate and set the plate next to an open bottle of beer. “Sure you would have.
Especially when they found the guy's shoe in your car. How did you figure on explaining that one?”

He put down the paper and picked up a chicken breast. “Christ!” he said, dropping it as if it were a ticking bomb. “It's hotter than hell!”

Rita shook her head. “Isn't that what I just told you?” She wondered whether she should have just let them put Mike away for two to ten. He was beginning to wear on her.

She made her money by her wits, convincing people that she could help them double or triple whatever they gave her. For horseplayers, she always had a sure thing. She was putting up two grand that the player would match. Then they'd place their bet. Only there was no horse and no bet. She'd left with the player's two thousand.

For the greedy, she had a sure-fire insurance scam. The insurance company had agreed to pay her twenty thousand to settle her slip and fall claim. All they needed were the doctor's records. And she needed three thousand to pay the doctor for a set of phony X rays and a matching medical report. She'd pay six thousand for the three thousand loan when the check came in. Of course, there was no insurance company, nor any doctor. Rita would vanish with the three thousand sure-thing investment.

Most of the scams required a third party to play the bookie who would take the bet or the insurance representative who was promising payment. They were never big roles. The starring part was always Rita's. All she needed was someone who would show up and say a few lines. Mike could manage a few lines. He needed a bit of help to grasp that the loud shirt went with the bookie role and the striped necktie was for the insurance representative. But if she dressed him and rehearsed him, he could be quite convincing. He looked and sounded like much more than he actually was. And if things went awry, then Mike's real professional skills as a street thug would come in handy. He had been a leg breaker for one of the New Jersey dons and he could punch his way through anyone who decided to hold them for the police.

Rita put a breast and thigh on a plate with the potato salad
she had spooned out of a delicatessen container. “I'll bring this down to our houseguest,” she mentioned, turning toward the basement door.

Mike jumped to his feet. “I'll bring it down.”

She eyed him suspiciously. “No way! Last thing we need is you getting the hots for her. I'd stab you in your sleep.”

“Hey, don't worry.” He grabbed for the plate. “If she goes for me I'll call you. We can make it a threesome.”

She held the plate away from him. “I'll watch the lady, all you have to do is watch the street.”

Emily heard the lock click. She jumped up from the bed and moved quietly toward the table and chair. If it were him, the farther she was from the bed the safer she would be. She nearly sighed with relief when the woman appeared at the bottom of the stairs.

“Time for dinner.” Rita put the plate on the folding table and set a spoon beside it. “And there's a surprise.” She slowly lifted a bottle of beer from her pocket and displayed it proudly. “It's a good thing he can't count, because he wouldn't like me giving away his stuff.”

Emily tried to look thrilled. “That's very kind.”

Rita shrugged. “Nobody said this had to be awful for you. Remember, I want to get you out of here as much as you do.”

“How long will I be here?” Emily asked, the forced smile still painted on her face.

“Not long. They told me Monday. Tuesday at the latest.”

Rita was moving away, back toward the stairs, but Emily didn't want to let her go. “What happens then? On Monday?” she asked.

“I don't know. All they said was ‘make her comfortable for a couple of days.' They'll be telling us where to turn you lose.”

“Who are ‘they'?” Emily tried.

“Who knows? It's one of those computerized voices so you can't tell anything. But they've already sent the first payment, so they're for real. I'm not asking any questions.”

Emily took a deep breath. “I could pay you much more.
If you let me out of here, you could name your price. My husband is very wealthy.”

Rita scowled. “Yeah, I bet you could. I've seen you someplace before. Probably in the society columns. I always look at the society pages. It's like a mailing list of suckers waiting to be taken.”

“I suppose I've been in the papers,” Emily answered.

“Yeah, well, they said you'd try to up the ante. But they said I could end up in a place where money wouldn't matter. So just try to relax. You'll be out of here soon enough.”

Rita turned to the stairs.

“Do you suppose I could have a book,” Emily called after her. “It's a lot of time to spend by yourself with nothing to do but worry.”

“Sure, I'll bring you the paper as soon as he's done with it. And don't worry. It's only going to be a couple of days.”

Emily was still staring toward the stairs long after she had heard the door slam shut.

Mike was hunched over the table, already half-finished with his meal. He had opened another bottle of beer and he was tipping up to his lips while he chewed. His fingers left greasy smudges on the bottle.

“Thanks for waiting for me,” Rita said sarcastically. “Where did you learn your manners?”

“I could starve to death waitin' for you. What the fuck were you two talkin' about?

“About her,” Rita said as she fixed her plate. “I know her. She's in the society columns. Mrs. ‘The Donald' or something like it. She told me her husband would double whatever they're paying me.”

“Payin' us,” he reminded her. “I'm the one who's sittin' on her.”

She bowed profusely. “A thousand pardons.” That was the trouble with Mike. He thought like a thug. His ambition was to take more hits than Dillinger did in a bloody shootout with the police. The subtleties of avoiding shootouts with the police seemed beyond his grasp. Rita knew that he was dangerous to keep around. Sooner or later, Mike would get
confused by someone they were conning, think he was in trouble, and turn a misdemeanor scam into a capital offense. But, so far, she had been able to control him. He was even showing signs of learning. And she had to admit that the guy was an Adonis. It was hard to face the end of the day without him and she always started each new day with a smile.

That was what had brought them together. She was doing a telephone scam in Trenton, making random calls for a nonexistent charity, collecting credit card numbers and then hitting ATM machines. No more than a hundred on each card so that the mark might not even notice when he got his statement. It promised to be good for a thousand a day, for about two weeks. Then she would have to move on.