The Oxenburg Woman, page 32
“I think you must have very bad taste in women.”
“I think we could start a club. I remember some pretty rough things I said to you the first time I woke up in that stadium bed of yours. I can’t think of any reason you’d want me in it.”
“We went for a drive and talked about this last night.”
“Last night, we talked about what happened a month ago. Circumstances are different now.”
“You’re still you, and I’m still me. I want you to stay. You can sleep in the guest room if you prefer.”
“I’m clear on my preferences,” he said. “I’m looking for your reason.”
“Does there have to be a reason?”
“If you don’t need a reason, what’s been holding you back? Don’t you know any nice guys?”
She smiled. “Actually I do. Men from my office, the tennis club, everybody within a hundred miles who owns a horse. It’s possible I do this kind of thing all the time.”
“No,” he said, “you don’t.”
She stepped back. “This can wait. Right now, you should go and talk to Lily. The poor girl thought you’d already left when she got up. She has something to tell you, and whatever it is, she’s scared to death, either of it or of you.”
He was at the door when she added, “And stop snarling at her. She’s frightened enough.”
* * * *
Lewis spotted Lily waiting for him in the row of junipers where the gravel path to the barn disappeared. He bounded down the stairs and caught up with her at the barn door. They stepped inside to talk.
“I may have found what you’re looking for.” Lily’s face was white and strained in the sunlight. She pulled something out of her pocket and held it out to him. “Look at it,” she said sharply. “You’ll never believe it if I just tell you.”
It looked like a cafeteria sugar packet that had been torn open and discarded. A print of blue flowers decorated one side; the other side was plain. He turned it over twice but could see nothing significant.
“It’s not mine,” she said quickly. “I got it in the center. Not recently, last year, when I first came for my interview with Gerald.”
“So what is it?”
“Cocaine.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure. Before I came to Gerald I was with Arnold’s team, doing drug buys in Florida. Believe me, I knew what it was the minute I poured it under the tap last night. I knew right away it wasn’t bath salts. It’s powdery, and it went glumpy when it hit the water. It was familiar, made me suspicious.
“Here.” She handed him two identical packets, one still sealed, and a second that had been opened and reclosed with accordion folds. He unraveled the folds to squint critically at the contents.
“Go ahead,” she invited. “Taste it. I did. There’s no doubt what it is.”
“Let’s have the story. Where exactly did you get this? Did you buy it or did someone give it to you?”
“Nobody gave it to me. I took it from the little bathroom upstairs across from Gerald’s office. There was a basket of these little packets on the vanity. I thought they were bath salts. I didn’t think Gerald would mind, so I just took a couple and put them in my purse after my interview. Gerald hired me the same day, and I went straight up to the trailer. There was no bathtub up there so I forgot all about them until last night. I wanted to take a long, hot bath, and that’s when I remembered I still had these in my purse.”
Lewis refolded the top of the opened pouch. If she’d wasted one in the bathtub and opened this one to test it, the third, still sealed, held the only proof of the story.
He had tasted cocaine once, in a training program years ago. He distrusted drugs of any sort, found the concept of recreational drugs incomprehensible. He’d just recovered from his first — and definitely his last — experience with a mind-altering substance. He was reluctant to ingest whatever this was and doubted he’d recognize it even if he did.
“Last night was the first you knew about this? Why didn’t you tell me right away?”
“I tried to but the lights were off and I couldn’t find you. I didn’t think you’d appreciate me prowling around or yelling for you.”
“Right.” He decided there wasn’t much point in pursuing that any further. “How sure are you about this?” He worked the top seam open on the still-sealed packet while he questioned her.
She watched his hands. “It’s coke,” she said, without raising her eyes. “Almost pure, expensive.”
He examined the well of white powder with distaste before forcing himself to coat a finger and lick it off. It was bitter, both the taste and numbing impact on his tongue immediately recognizable. He held the packet out and Lily obediently sampled it, too. “Well?” he said, studying her reaction.
“Same stuff,” she said with conviction.
“You have any more of these? At your trailer or anywhere at all?”
“No. This is it. Just these two and the one I took a bath in last night.”
Lewis carefully folded the torn edges of the packet together, pressed the three into a flat group and slid them into the front pocket of his jeans.
“I swear I don’t know who’s using it, Lewis.” Lily’s voice was worried and earnest. “I thought about it all last night. I just can’t come up with anything. I’ve had some experience with dealers and to a certain extent, most of them are users but I can’t ID any users here. I was hardly ever in the center until a few weeks ago. The only person I saw regularly was Mac.”
“Don’t worry about it, Lily. I’ll take it from here. I’m going to do some looking but I’ll be very surprised if I find anything. I have a feeling these three are the last of their kind. Somebody’s done a very thorough job of cleaning up. And I think we both know who it was. The cleanup man is lying under your trailer right now. He cleaned up the evidence and then somebody cleaned up the loose ends.”
“Oh no, not Mac, I just can’t believe it.”
“Believe it. He took orders, Lily. That’s what he was good at, and somebody needed a man who took orders. Don’t try to work it out. You’ve done your part.”
Lily’s face showed her relief.
Watching her, he meshed the details of her file with the evidence. She looked scarcely older than a high school kid, but for three years she’d been in constant demand as a contractor. She had not qualified for the level of investment required to train and develop an agent but on short-term projects she’d proven herself both quick and capable. She’d done whatever she was directed to do, some of it decidedly unpleasant.
In an instant he saw what Arnold had seen, the innocence and vulnerability that had surely drawn Gerald, too. She was the perfect foil for drug dealers, targeted by every police force and agency, hounded and harried by their competition, their life expectancy dependent on their paranoia. And for Gerald, an earnest and engaging biologist to substantiate a non-existent commitment to wildlife.
“You’re okay, Lily,” he said “You can keep your weapon. In fact, start keeping it on you. It’s your official assignment to secure this location. Stay close, keep Suzanna in sight at all times, be alert, and remember, this is work. Quit running off at the mouth with her, she doesn’t need to know anything.”
“I like her. Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve had anybody to talk to?” Lily’s expression was animated now. She looked at him accusingly, no longer as a subordinate. “Besides, what are you doing with her? She’s too nice for people like us. You’ll hurt her, or somebody else will.”
“Not me. And not anybody else. Not as long as I’m around.”
“You think that’s how it works? You’re only responsible as long as you’re around? Out of sight, out of mind?”
“Look, Lily, if you want something to worry about, worry about Bliss. I need something from him, and I intend to get it, one way or another. Does he want you enough to work for me?”
“Leave him alone. Please Lewis, whatever you need done, let me do it. I don’t want him to even know who you are.”
“It’s too late for that. I’ve already had one meeting with him, enough to get an angle on him.”
“Why? When did you see him?”
Lewis raised an eyebrow. “I saw him when I wanted to, and I’ll see him again when I’m ready. I’ll use you to influence him, but I’ll deal with the man directly. Between the two of you, I’m owed some things and I intend to collect.”
“But why are you doing this? What do you want?”
“I want those horses off the property and I want the perimeter secured. I want to impress on him what a really bad idea it would be for him to ever look in that direction again. I have something he wants, and he has something I want; your job is to put it in perspective for him. Convince him he can’t win this one no matter how tough he thinks he is.”
“And what happens afterwards? If I get him to do it, can I resign and will you leave us alone?”
He smiled at her coolly. “I can live the rest of my life without setting eyes on either of you again. And I can speak for the Group on this. You work with me until this is cleaned up, and you’re out, no strings.”
She frowned. “I can’t commit Henry to anything, you have to know that. I don’t know how he feels. I know how I feel, but that doesn’t prove anything. Don’t you see? I’ll have to tell him about my work. How do you think he’ll feel about me then? Henry’s straight. I’m afraid he won’t want anything to do with me.”
“Is that what you were talking about just now with Suzanna?”
“Yeah.”
“And? What’d she have to say?”
“She says all I’ll ever know is how I feel. She says I have to believe in my intuition.”
“Sounds right to me.”
“Oh God, what would you know about it?”
“Not one damn thing. I don’t care how you play it. Do what you want to do, just be sure of him before you give him too much information.”
He frowned at her expression of distaste.
“You’ve been working the mean streets for a while, Lily. I can understand you wanting something else. But Gerald got you transferred, brought you out here for this wildlife project. A couple more months, maybe two assignments and your contract’s up anyway. You can walk away with money in the bank. There’s a review in progress because of what happened to me out here, but if you perform for me, I can get you clear of that unless you haven’t been straight about your actions.
“You didn’t have to give me this.” He tapped his pocket. “I appreciate it. I’m just giving you some free advice, something somebody told me once, a long time ago, when I was ready to quit. You can’t make history go away. The things you’ve done and seen, nothing can change them now. Getting paid for your work doesn’t make history better or worse, but money makes the future a hell of a lot easier. Do you really want to be flat broke and mixed up with some simple-minded farmer out here in the middle of nowhere?”
“Yes, I really do.”
“All right then, let’s get on with it.”
Chapter 25
Lewis stood with his back to the corner windows in Gerald’s office. “What’s the first thing you heard after my name when you were told about the audit?” he asked, facing them across the desk. The three were seated; Robin closest to the desk, Deece on the leather couch, long legs outstretched, Dave, tense and sullen, in the wing chair beyond the coffee table. “Come on,” Lewis crossed his arms, “it was probably the first word you heard after my name.”
“Brazil,” Dave supplied.
“Brazil.” Lewis turned his back to their faces and swept his eyes along the horizon. Careful now, don’t lose them, don’t push them. “I’ve been a lot of places since Brazil, done a few other things, but Brazil sticks to me like my name. Why do you think that is?”
This time Dave was not going to volunteer. He met Lewis’s gaze with stubborn silence. Deece’s expression was mild, waiting. Robin looked concerned and sympathetic. Trust the woman to get it.
He’d exchanged the blood-smeared jeans for a clean pair but hadn’t shaved or changed the well-used black T-shirt. The effect said he’d worked all night. Throw in a little irritated impatience for good measure and he should have just enough leverage except possibly for Dave, the unknown quality. Lewis had met him only briefly when he’d arrived but had not yet interviewed him or reviewed his file.
It was eight a.m. He’d summoned them to this meeting with fifteen minutes’ notice, Robin from the control room downstairs, Deece and Dave from their beds. They watched him expectantly, not looking at each other.
Lewis paced the section of parquet behind the desk. “Well?” he demanded. “You heard I was coming, you all talked about me. Not one of you wants to deny that Brazil came up, but nobody wants to put a name on it?”
“Morbid curiosity,” Robin said.
“Ah, yes. Why was I the only one who got out in one piece? Why did the review take so long? Oh yeah, and the fine, let’s not forget that.”
“If that’s why you got us all up here, I reckon we’d all like to know and you might as well throw in Angel.” Deece leaned forward, “What happened to her anyway?”
“I didn’t get you up here to talk about Brazil but I’ll set you straight on one thing.” He raised his left arm slowly and rotated the rows of white interlocking scars toward them. “I didn’t exactly get out clean, I picked up a couple of scratches and enough nightmares to keep me awake the rest of my life if I let them. And I got a monkey on my back; a word, a name I hear whispered every place I go.”
“Gerald told me you saved his life there,” Robin protested. “And as far as the review goes, they always take a long time when agents are killed. People talk, especially when it’s somebody important. When we heard you were coming, people rehashed everything they’ve heard about all your jobs. Yeah, I heard Brazil first,” she shrugged, “but then London and Bahrain, Nigeria before the coup, Manila — and a lot of places I can’t remember right now. It’s probably mostly rumors and lies, anyway.”
Lewis scowled at her and shook his head impatiently. “We’re off the topic. I brought up Brazil to remind you what happens to a man’s reputation when it’s tied into a big, messy fiasco, the kind where we lose assets and find out our security is seriously inadequate.”
“And here?” Deece asked. “Is that what you’re saying? You think we’re that bad?”
“What?” Dave jerked erect. “There’s nothing wrong here, we’re clean. You can audit us forever. You’ll never find anything to hang us for. Gerald killed himself, that’s nothing like what happened in Brazil.”
“Gerald died here.” Lewis let the words hang momentarily. “Do you think it’ll do you a goddam bit of good to call it suicide when people whisper ‘Arizona’ every time your name comes up?” He studied Dave coldly. “Think again. The Brazil review was closed and I moved on to the next project, but stories never dry up after something goes to hell, do they? I’ll never live down Brazil. Just like this site is going to hound the three of you forever if they close this center.”
Dave’s mouth opened but no sound came out.
“Are you serious?” Deece’s fingers pinched the sides of his mustache fiercely. “They can’t shut this place down. It’s already cost ten years and some odd million. We’ve just come on-line.” His face twisted. “Why?” he demanded. In the drawn-out cadence of his speech the word was almost a bleat.
“MacIntyre,” Robin supplied. Her green eyes bored into Lewis. “Where is he? He should be in this meeting, and I shouldn’t. You need three to make a quorum, that’s why I’m here.”
“Right.” Lewis positioned Gerald’s chair and sat. “MacIntyre wants out. I say let him go, but I’m putting it to you three.”
“You’re the auditor,” Robin said.
“That’s right. But you’re his peers. I don’t want anything coming up after the fact to damage this place. If it’s a clean ship my audit will reflect that. You three are all that remains of the management team so by protocol, MacIntyre’s resignation needs your sign-offs. If I terminate him, the director will be inclined to think I railroaded him out because of Gerald.”
“So you want us to get on her list instead,” Dave said. “And what if we won’t? You threatening us with a bad audit?”
“As of right now,” Lewis said, with elaborate patience, “my audit is incomplete. I have less than twenty-four hours. I won’t sign an audit unless I finish it. Do I have to explain to you how much pressure the director is under, given the investment here? Why do you think she sent me? I have a job in progress right now. My team is running it without me because I am out here in the middle of bloody nowhere to look hard at everything on this site.”
Lewis allowed his voice to drop to a tired growl. “I have been up all night trying to convince your boss,” he glared at Dave, “to come in here and resign like a professional.” When Dave’s focus swiveled past him, he continued: “He won’t. He can’t face you. I’m tired and frustrated with him, but he’s determined to retire immediately. It’s not terribly unusual in the circumstances. My priority is completing the audit. The last thing I need is another mishandled situation with my name attached to it.”
He stood up. “I need a shower and some coffee.” Two steps took him to the side door into Gerald’s apartment. “I’ll be back in half an hour for your decision. Whatever you decide, make it unanimous. I’m not going to do your thinking for you. It’ll go to the director in my report but with your signatures. Understood?”
He directed the question to Robin. Though he had been mainly concerned with overwhelming Dave’s resistance, he’d been watching Deece and Robin as well. Deece was plainly shocked by the threat to the center; the man loved the place. Robin was watchful and thinking strategically.
“I don’t see,” she said pertly, “why you think we need half an hour. It’s a five-minute decision. We sign off on Mac’s retirement, and that frees you up to get on with the audit. Dragging this out is a one- way ticket to nowhere. We’ll end up working the backup vault at HQ for the foreseeable future.”
He pushed the retirement packet, clipped open at the signature page to their side of the desk. “Use the pens in the rack,” he said.
