F Paul Wilson - Novel 04 (27 page)

Simply
put, if your pal makes it to the drug summit, you’ll never see the rest
of your kid again.

Snake smiled. He especially liked
the part that went, the rest of your kid. That was driving the nail home.

He uploaded it through the Eric
Garter account to the remailer, then logged off. He unplugged and dialed up
Salinas.

“Hello.” Gold’s
voice.

Snake didn’t feel like
speaking to Salinas, so why not let Gold play messenger boy.

“Tell your boss the deed is
done as of ten this morning. Now we wait.” He hung up and smiled.

That felt good. He wanted to keep
reminding Salinas that he wasn’t in complete control. Snake was not a
hireling at his beck and call. Snake was an independent contractor.

He felt the slim rectangle of the
audio cassette in his jacket pocket that he’d made a point of keeping on
him at all times. That little baby was what was going to help him remain
independent—and on the right side of the grass.

He walked out to the front of the
hotel and watched the midday traffic on Connecticut Avenue. Light for a sunny
Saturday. All the good suburbanites were probably home tending their gardens
and fertilizing their lawns.

So what do I do with the rest of
the day? he wondered.

Maybe take a cruise over to Falls
Church, ostensibly to check on the package, but mainly to lean on Paulie a
little. Because Paulie was a hireling… and he’d begun acting like
an independent contractor. Snake was still pissed about yesterday. The goddamn
nerve—telling him there’d be no more persuaders from this package.
Who the hell did he think he was?

Well… Snake had his pistol
locked away in the Jeep. This might be a good time to wave it under
Paulie’s nose. No shooting, no overt threats, just let them see it stuck
in his belt, let them know it was there, loaded and ready.

Time to reestablish the pecking
order.

Not that it would have any
practical value in the long run—seeing as how Paulie and his babe
didn’t have a long run—but simply as a matter of principle.

Mamie sat in her rented car and
watched John’s house through the windshield. Yes, she was stiff and
uncomfortable from the long vigil, but it would all be worth it to see her
Katie again.

Where is my daughter, John?

She was puzzled. She’d
watched the house all yesterday afternoon and hadn’t seen Katie come home
from school. John must have sneaked her inside somehow.

And no doubt Katie had been a
willing participant in that sneaking. Always plotting, those two, always
keeping secrets and not letting her in on them.

You don’t deserve her, John.
I have more right to her than you. You didn’t carry her inside you
through nine months of sickness and bulging discomfort. You didn’t go
through hours of screaming agony to deliver her into this world. You
weren’t left with extra pounds and ugly red stretch marks. You
didn’t have to stay home with her day after day and listen to her
incessant crying.

She’s mine. I earned her.
You’ve no right to keep her from me. And if it weren’t for your
crackpot “medical expert” cronies and that pet judge, Katie would
be with me. Where she should be.

You aren’t good for her,
John. Always too easy on her. You can destroy a child with leniency. She needs
me, John—now more than ever. I know you’ve probably turned Katie
completely against me, but I can change that. All I need is—

She ducked as she saw John’s
car coming down the street. This was his second trip out today. Where had he
gone? To see Katie? To bring her home?

Cautiously she raised her head and
watched him pull into the driveway.

John spotted the car as he was
heading into the house. A brand new white Taurus. He thought he’d seen it
parked near the corner when he left to bring Katie’s toe down to Bob
Decker at the White House—a surreal trip, riding through downtown D.C.
traffic with his daughter’s little toe packed in ice in the six-pack
cooler next to him on the front seat. But he was almost beyond reacting at this
point.

Now he thought he saw the same
white Taurus parked across the street. And at least one person in it. Maybe
two. FBI? Secret Service? Or one of the kidnappers?

Better not to know.

Nana was waiting for him when he
stepped inside. She stood in the hall in a tartan robe—Dad’s old
robe— looking older and more disheveled than he’d ever seen her,
with her fingertips pulling at her throat… pulling at her throat…

“Has there been any
word?” she said.

John had debated whether or not to
let her in on the fact that federal agencies were getting involved. He’d
finally decided that she’d only worry more about the kidnappers’
threats against Katie if the feds were brought in. So, for the time being,
he’d stick to the ransom story.

“None yet, but I think I can
have the money together by late this afternoon.”

“Oh, thank God! And then
Katie will be coming home?”

“Soon after I deliver it. Or
so I hope. I’ve been following their instructions to the letter, but they
haven’t told me yet what to do with the money once I get it.”

“So much money,” she
said, her fingers digging deeper. “How will you ever pay it back?”

He shrugged and said what he would
have said if the kidnappers really had wanted only money. “I’m not
going to worry about that right now. I’ll have plenty of time to figure
that out after we get Katie back.”

“Yes, yes,” she said.
“Getting Katie back. That is what we must worry about.”

“Why don’t you try some
of your yoga,” he said. “Maybe it will relax you.”

She shook her head.
“No… no yoga. I can’t do yoga with Katie gone.” As she
turned and shuffled toward the kitchen, John stepped into the living room and
sneaked a peek through one of the front windows.

The white Taurus still sat across
the street.

And suddenly he had to see who was
in it. Not to speak to them, not to confront them or get their names; just to
look.

He hurried through the kitchen,
past his mother with her cup of coffee, and out the rear door. He cut through a
neighboring backyard, then dashed into the front and across the tree-lined
street.

There… he now was on the same
side as the Taurus. He began walking toward it, approaching from the rear. As
he neared he saw the National sticker on the bumper. A rental.

Closer now… coming abreast of
the rear door… the front door—passenger seat’s
empty—now by the hood a quick glance over the shoulder to see—

“Mamie!” Fury took him
then. She could ruin everything! He ran around to the driver’s door and yanked
it open. It took all his control to keep from dragging her out of the car and
throttling her.

“What the hell are you doing
here?”

She cowered back, her hand to her
mouth. “John! I—”

“What? Tell me! What do you
think you’re going to accomplish sitting out here?”

“John… you’re out
of control.”

He wanted to say, You should
know—you wrote the book on out of control, but he bit it back. She was
right. His whole life was out of control. He stepped back, took a deep breath.

“Go away.”

“I want to see my daughter.
You won’t let me talk to her, so I thought if I waited here I might at
least get a glimpse of her.”

“She’s not your
daughter anymore.”

“She’ll always be my
daughter! And I want to know what you’ve done with her?”

“Done with her? What are
you—?”

“She didn’t come home
from school yesterday. I was watching.”

“Oh, no!” What was he
going to do with this woman?

She was going to ruin everything.

“Oh, yes! Where are you
hiding her? What have you done with my daughter?” John couldn’t answer
that, couldn’t come up with another lie to cover everything. He stared at
her for a few heartbeats, then went on the offensive.

“You’re stalking her,
aren’t you,” he said.

Mamie’s eyes widened.
“What?”

“I should have guessed
you’d do something like this. You’re going to try to kidnap
her.” He pulled a pen and a slip of note paper from his breast pocket.
“Well, you won’t get away with it.” He walked to the rear of
the car and began writing.

Mamie leaned out the open door and
stared at him. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“I’m going to call the
FBI and give them this license plate number. I’m going to tell them that
not only have you violated a standing court order to stay away from your
daughter, but you’ve crossed state lines to stalk her and kidnap her.
That makes it a federal matter.”

“You’re
bluffing.”

“Why should I bluff? The
court order is real; I’ve got witnesses that you’ve been lurking
out here. And then all the Dr. Schuylers in the world won’t be able to
keep you out of the slammer.”

Her mouth twisted into a snarl.
“You son of a bitch!” She slammed the door, started the car, and
roared off.

John looked down at his note paper.
Why not do as he’d threatened? Give the number to Decker and maybe let
him get the FBI on her. Scare her away. The situation was at a delicate
juncture. The last thing they needed was a loose cannon like Mamie blundering
into the middle of everything and maybe getting Katie killed. She’d
already damn near killed Katie once. She wasn’t going to get a second chance.

But even if Katie were safely
inside with Nana, Mamie would still be a menace. What the hell was she doing
roaming around D.C. in the first place?

John jammed the paper into his
pocket and hurried inside. He knew just the man to answer that question. Dr.
William Schuyler of Marietta, Georgia. It might be Saturday, and Schuyler might
have the weekend off, but John had his home phone number.

He crept up to his study, closed
the door, found the number, and dialed.

Schuyler’s wife answered.
John mumbled his name as Dr. So-and-so and said he had to speak to
“Bill” right away. He sat there, seething, grinding his teeth:
William Schuyler, M.D., Ph.D., a pompous ass who thought he had the magic touch.
No one was so deranged that he or she would not respond to Dr. Schuyler’s
unique ministrations.

“Hello?”

“This is John
Vanduyne.”

“Oh.”

“Yes. ‘Oh.’ Want
to know who’s been skulking around my neighborhood?”

“Oh, come now, John.
‘Skulking’ is such a loaded term.” The mellifluous tone, the
precise diction, the haughty demeanor. It all came back to John in a flash, the
sight of him sitting in the witness chair, bald head gleaming in the overhead
lights, pudgy hands resting on his ample abdomen as he spewed his inexhaustible
stream of psychobabble until the courtroom was awash in empty, selfserving
opinions that sounded for all the world like facts.

“You think
‘skulking’ is loaded? How about stalking That’s right.
She’s stalking Katie. And she says you said it was all right.”

“That is absurd, John, and
you know it. I did tell her, however, that I think she’s recovered to the
point where supervised visits might be equally beneficial to both mother and
child. Now, if she’s misinterpreted that to mean—”

“Always have your ass covered,
don’t you. But this time you’re out on a limb. You had no right to
say that to a deranged patient. You—”

“ ‘Deranged’ is
such a—”

“Keep quiet and
listen‘. You know the terms of the deal. No criminal prosecution if I got
sole custody of Katie and Mamie stayed in intense psychotherapy for ten years.
That was the deal. There were no maybes. She doesn’t get near Katie for
ten years.”

“But that’s so
unreasonable.”

“And damn near killing her
daughter isn’t? You know her history almost as well as I do. She damn
near stove in Katie’s skull with that fireplace poker. She’s hated
Katie since the day she was born. I—”

“ ‘Hate’ is such
a vague—”

“Shut up, dammit! I
don’t know why she hates her and neither do you. We may never know. I
don’t care to know. All I care about is Katie. And if anything happens to
my little girl because of your negligence, you will pay, Schuyler.”

“If you think you can sue
me—”

“Sue?” John heard
himself laugh and it was an awful sound. “Oh, no, Schuyler. You
won’t pay with your money, or even your license. You’ll pay the way
Katie pays. Because anything—anything—that happens to her will
happen to you. Double. Got that? Got that?”

Amazing. William Schuyler, M.D.,
Ph.D., was speechless.

John hung up and stared out the
window at the tree branches. He’d meant every word he’d just said.
Somehow, sometime, somewhere in the past twenty-four hours he’d decided
to devote the rest of his life to finding the people who had amputated
Katie’s toe. He had fantasies of the feds being baffled but the relentless
John Vanduyne somehow tracking them down… and cornering them… and
then wading in with a chainsaw.

And now he’d add the esteemed
Dr. Schuyler to the list. If Katie came to more harm because of Mamie,
he’d see to it that Schuyler experienced it all first hand.

John folded his arms on his desk
and rested his head atop them. He made a sound halfway between a laugh and a
sob.

Mamie’s not the only one who
needs a psychiatrist.

“What I want to know is why
this lunatic is still running around loose?”

Bob Decker looked up from his
notes. Dan Keane of DEA was doing the asking; trim, silver haired, in his
midfifties, his usually florid complexion had grown progressively paler since
Bob began explaining why they were here. He sat between blond, handsome Gerry Canney
of the FBI and balding, red-headed Jim Lewis from CIA.