A Small Fortune (13 page)

I lock the bolt on hotel room door behind me and spend the next half hour fingering my passport, fixating on the arrows clutched in the eagle’s claws, feeling as if each one pierces my heart. I pace the balcony, deciding what to do next. I need to get inside Jonathon. Think like he thinks. What’s he trying to accomplish? I sense he wants me on the run. He wants me out in the open where someone will see me. This is why he tried to scare me into thinking someone could find me in a hotel room. What will he do if I call his bluff and sit tight? There’s no way for him to know how this past week has changed me. What will he do if I do nothing at all?

Story. I have to think of this in terms of story. I’ve read thousands of books in my lifetime, not to mention the ones I’ve edited. If there’s one thing I understand about the way something works, it’s story. How is this one going to unfold? How will it end? More importantly, what needs to happen for my own ending to find its way into Jonathon’s twisted plot?

A tiny thread begins to reveal itself. If I can just follow it through, allow it to map a path through the maze, then I can find my way out to the other side. I check the time. Oliver is at school, and there’s no way he’d leave the house without his phone.

I pull out the prepaid cell phone and block the number the way the storeowner showed me. I dial Oliver’s number and his voice mail immediately picks up. Does he turn his phone off during class?

I’m having second thoughts. Maybe Jonathon did something to his phone after we talked, convincing Oliver it no longer works.

I dial the number one more time, and suddenly my boy is on the phone. I can hear the bustle of a high school hallway in the background.

“Oliver!”

“Mom! What’s wrong?” he asks.

“Are you at school?”

“Yeah, but I was just about to leave. Dad just called and said there was an emergency and I had to come home.”

This is why the voice mail picked up. He was on the phone with Jonathon.

“Oh God, Oliver. You need to trust me, sweetheart. Something terrible is happening.”

“That’s exactly what Dad said.”

“What else did he say?”

“For one thing, he said if you called to please not listen to you.”

My heart flips. My free hands wrings through the air. I have to think quickly, but all I want to do is reach through the phone and snatch him to safety.

“Are you really calling from Switzerland?” he asks.

“Switzerland?” I’m sweating in the hot sun of the balcony. “Jesus Christ, no, honey, I’m not in Switzerland!”

“Dad said you were.”

“I’m sure your dad said a lot of things, Oliver, and they’re all lies.”

He pauses and I know he’s deciding whom to believe. The next seconds are crucial.

“Where are you?” he asks.

“I’m still in Mexico. I can’t come home just yet—”

“Why not?”

“Oliver. I was never at a spa. I was kidnapped.”

“What?”

“It’s a very long story. I got away. I’m all right now. All I can say is that your father had something to do with it. Money has something to do with it.”

“This is messed up. You said that you were at a spa when I talked to you this morning. Somebody’s lying to me.”

“I was trying to protect you. I didn’t know, I mean,
really know
, how much your father was involved until I got him on the phone. You just have to trust me. I wanted to make sure you were all right, Oliver. Please, please believe me.”

I can hear the chatter of young voices and slamming lockers in the background.

“Oliver?”

Nothing.

“Oliver!”

“He’s here, Mom. I can see him through the door. He’s parked at the curb waiting for me.”

“Shit. Can he see you?”

“I don’t think so.”

My mind spins faster than my words can keep up. “Listen to me. I’m begging you, Oliver. Go to the opposite side of the building and out the back doors. I want you to run to the Lebanese restaurant we always go to. There’s that small alleyway alongside with the hair salon and those other shops in the courtyard. It shouldn’t take you more than ten minutes to reach it. Wait there and I will call you right back.”

I can hear him moving through the halls. The background noise fades in and out. Then the thud of a large door being released. He’s outside.

“This is crazy, Mom. Dad said we had to go to Switzerland to bring you back.”

“He lied to you, Oliver. He lied to me and probably everyone he knows about everything. There is no business trip. This was his plan all along.”

“Where are you then? I mean, where in Mexico?”

I stop short. I don’t trust my own son. “I’m some place safe. Don’t worry about me. Just get yourself to that courtyard. Now!”

The next ten minutes are the longest of my life. I imagine Oliver running through the streets of Portland while Jonathon wanders the halls of the high school, smiling at the kids, stopping to ask if anyone has seen Oliver. He might start to get frantic, check in at the office. All of which will give Oliver plenty of time to get away.

Then I imagine Jonathon spotting Oliver across the street. Picking him up in the car, playing the picture of calm, the voice of reason, convincing Oliver that I’ve lost my mind.

Switzerland. What the hell is in Switzerland? He must have hidden money there. What is it about Swiss bank accounts? I can’t remember, except that people open them for nefarious reasons. Anonymous. Wasn’t that it? Accounts that can’t be traced?

He’s planning to take Oliver with him. Is it because he has no choice? Is he planning on leaving him there? Why didn’t he go straight there from Mexico? Why did he bring those warm clothes to Mexico and then turn around and go back home? My escape must have thrown everything off. Had he planned to take Isabel and Benny with him? Was that another reason why Isabel was so angry with me?

Nine minutes have passed when I dial Oliver’s number again. He answers by breathing heavily into the phone.

“Are you in the courtyard?”

“I just got here.”

I still can’t allow myself to trust him, and it hurts like hell. Jonathon could have brainwashed him. He could be sitting in the car with him this very moment for all I know.

“Walk into the salon and tell the receptionist I want to make an appointment,” I say. “Hand her the phone.”

“What? Why?”

“Just do it!”

“This is really messed up.”

“You have to trust me, Oliver.”

After a moment of rustling a woman comes on the line asking what day will work best for me.

“You know what,” I say. “I just realized my schedule is really crazy right now. Let me call you right back.”

“Hello?” Oliver says, back on the phone and clearly annoyed.

“How much money do you have?” I ask.

“On me?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t know. Thirty bucks, maybe. Why?”

“How much do you have in your savings account?”

It crosses my mind that maybe Jonathon has taken that, too.

“Last time I looked at the statement it said about eight hundred. Why?”

Thank God, at least in this respect, that he takes after his father and actually pays attention to his statements.

I struggle to think fast. Where can he go? Who will take him in? There’s only one person, only one place I can think of. And it’s absolutely absurd.

“Listen to me very closely, Oliver. You cannot tell anyone where you’re going. Not Maggie, not anyone. Least of all your father.”

He’s quiet. Too quiet.

“Oliver. Promise me! You have no idea what I’ve been through.” I’m pleading now, trying not to cry.

“But why can’t I tell Maggie? She’s not going to tell—”

“I had a chunk taken out of my leg by a bullet that was shot by someone who works for your dad.”

“What?”

I picture Roberto on the ground covered in blood. Tears lodge in my throat. “I wish to God this wasn’t the truth.”

“Are you all right?”

“Yes, sweetheart. I
will
be. So long as you do what I’m asking.”

“Jesus,” he says, suddenly sounding like the scared child he is. “What am I supposed to do?” Fear is now palpable in his voice.

“First of all, I want you to stay calm. Take as much cash out of the ATM as you can. Then get on the Max train and take it to Union Station. Buy a ticket with confidence. Don’t draw attention to yourself. Don’t let anyone see a nervous teenager fumbling at the counter. They might call the police and send you home.”

“But where am I going? I don’t even have any clothes.”

The image of him as a toddler flashes before my eyes. He’s waving good-bye from the babysitter’s arms. I wave back over my head as if dismissing him, and in truth some part of me was as I rushed away, the taste of toothpaste fresh in my mouth, my pulse pounding, pounding, pounding all the way to Reilly’s Books.

“Mom? Can’t I go home and get some things first?”

“There’s no time.”

“The Max is coming right now. I can hop on it and make it there and leave before he gets home.”

“Oliver, no! Whatever you need I’ll buy new for you.”

“At least tell me where I’m going!”

“You’re going to Minneapolis, sweetheart. Just hang tight. I’m going to meet you there.”

I crack the door and scope the stairway. Empty and quiet, the only sound is birds calling to one another in a two-part chorus. A couple of tabby cats dash across the courtyard then duck behind a hibiscus bursting with bloodred blossoms. It’s ten o’clock in the morning.

I slip out and head down the stairs. Small wheels creak on the landing above me. I glance up. A cleaning cart is parked outside the penthouse door. A maid appears. A Mexican woman in her twenties. She instantly locks eyes with me.

“
Hola
,” she says.

“
Hola
,” I answer, dropping my gaze.

“You need towels today?” she asks.

I’ve kept the
Do Not Disturb
sign on my door since arriving. “Yes. Thank you. Some sheets, too, if you don’t mind.” I think I might never get rid of the stench I’ve brought into the room. “You can just leave everything outside my door.”

“OK,
señora
.”

When I glance up again she’s entering the penthouse.

I find Willow behind her desk in the office speaking Spanish on the phone. Her eyes narrow when she sees me. She holds a finger to her lips. She looks away and nods at something the caller is saying.

I study the shelves behind the desk. An assortment of DVDs and books, several copies of
Night of the Iguana
.

Willow speaks a minute longer, and then spins back around and hangs up the phone.

“You won’t believe who that was,” she says, getting up from the desk and twisting the blinds closed on the glass doors.

I’m prepared for the worst. “My husband?”

“The local police, if you even want to call them that. More like
minders
, really.”

“What did they want?”

“You, as a matter of fact.”

“Shit.”

“Actually, they already sent a guy round this morning asking a few questions.”

My stomach turns into a fist.

“What did you tell him?”

“I said I never heard of you.”

I lower myself into a chair.

“Didn’t he ask to see the registration forms for the guests?”

“As a matter of fact, he did. But after our little talk this morning I decided to throw yours away. Well, I actually just hid it in a drawer.”

“And he believed you?”

“He didn’t even look around upstairs. If he had he would have seen the
Do Not Disturb
sign on your door, a room that’s supposed to be vacant. These guys just go through the motions more than anything, make it look as if they’re working. Frankly I don’t blame them. They don’t get paid enough to actually do much.”

“Somehow that doesn’t make me feel any better.”

“I have to say, though, this one seems to be doing a bit of a job anyway. That was him on the phone just now. Something new had come in.”

“What?”

“He asked if a man had checked in by the name of Benicio Martin.”

I must look like I’m about to collapse.
Martin
is his last name.

Willow studies me. “Someone you know?”

“Yes. Maybe. I don’t know.” I push away the image of his body being dragged across the sand. The sound of his voice screaming my name. I want to cover my ears right there in the office.

“The cop wants me to call him if this guy shows up.”

How did he get away? “Why? What does he want with him?”

“I was just trying to get him to tell me. He wouldn’t say. Just someone of interest in the case of a wanted woman.”

My head jerks up.

Willow eyes me. “Apparently you’re wanted for something.”

I drop my head into my hands. I can’t stay much longer without getting caught.

I look her in the eye. “I didn’t lie to you, Willow. My husband set this up. It’s his way of finding me. Please. You have to believe me.” I imagine Oliver shaking at the counter in the train station. If he doesn’t get away, if anything happens to me, he’ll be returned to Jonathon.

“I believe you,” Willow says, almost too easily.

“You do?”

“Yes. Why shouldn’t I?”

“Why should you?”

“The other thing my hippie parents gave me besides my hippie name was a sharp instinct for bullshit.”

“Who’s in the penthouse?”

“No one, why?”

“I just saw the maid cleaning it.”

“She only comes three times a week. Someone checked out two days ago. It’s not as if there’s a mad rush of people checking in here. You’re getting a little paranoid.”

“I could have used some hippie parents myself.”

“Then I’d be calling you Sparrow instead of Celia.”

“You wouldn’t be calling me anything because I wouldn’t be here. I never would have married a sociopath. Sparrow would’ve seen through his lies.”

She smiles and gives a knowing nod.

“I have another favor to ask. Two, actually.”

“All right.”

“You’re awfully eager to help me.”

“Is that a question?”

“No. My question is how long have you worked here?”

“I bought the place about five months ago. Why?”

This might explain why she doesn’t recognize Benicio’s name. He made it sound like he knew the owners.

“Never mind. It doesn’t matter. Listen. If this Benicio guy comes looking for me, I need you to stall him.”

“How?”

“I have no idea. Tell him you’re short staffed and he’ll have to come back or something. Lock the office and pretend to go somewhere for a minute or two. Just let me know he’s here and I’ll figure out what to do next.”

“What’s he look like?”

“Very handsome. Mexican. Broken nose.”

Willow’s eyebrows lift. “Is he your boyfriend?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. And my husband didn’t break his nose, if that’s what you’re thinking. His own cousin did.”

“This is making my head spin.”

“Imagine what it’s done to mine.”

“OK. What’s the other favor?”

“Do you have a laptop I could borrow?”

“I only have the one I use here for the office.”

There’s no way I’m going back to the Internet café.

Willow taps her finger on her closed mouth. “I go to lunch at noon and close the office for two hours. I suppose you could use it then.”

“You don’t mind?”

“Not at all.”

“Is the Internet wireless? Will it work in my room?”

Willow nods. “I’ll give you the password.”

“Thank you. Do you mind if I check one thing really quick right now?”

Willow gestures for me to have at it.

I check the train schedule. Oliver should have already boarded the train to Minneapolis/St. Paul. He won’t arrive there, though, for thirty-six hours. Why would anyone take a train these days if it takes that long to get somewhere?

I search for the address and telephone number in Minneapolis. Clicking on the picture of the storefront gives my fingers a strange tingling sensation. I write the information down on a sticky note from the desk and stuff it in my pocket.

“That it?” Willow asks.

At the last second I glance at the DVDs behind the counter. “You wouldn’t happen to have a copy of
In the Company of Harold’s Daughter,
would you?

“The movie?” Willow looks confused.

“Yes. Long story.”

“Well, if the story is anything like the one you’ve already told me then you more than deserve to have a laugh.” She steps behind the desk and runs her finger along the spines of the DVDs. She pulls one out. “I love this movie. It’s a classic,” she says. “People actually steal it.”

“I promise to bring it back.”

“You have a pretty honest face, according to my hippie senses.”

“Thank you,” I say, but as I race back to my room I can’t stop thinking of all the lies I’ve been telling myself for years.