Remaindered (4 page)

She laughed. “No way. I'm starstruck by how you guys operate.”

Reassured, he reached for the Bourbon and topped up his glass. “Sexy, huh?”

“It's a turn-on. I'll say that.”

“You're a turn-on without saying a word.”

“Flatterer.” She was still on her first glass of wine, picking her questions judiciously. The process required care, even with a half-cut would-be seducer like this one. The query about the undercover cop was a warning. Edward couldn't have been more wrong, but it would be a mistake to underestimate him. “What is it with the Friends of England? Is that the only way you can meet in private?”

“We could meet anywhere. It's a free country.”

“Be mysterious, then,” she said, smiling.

He grinned back. “You bet I will. There's gotta be mystery in a relationship.”

“Who said anything about …” She didn't get any further. His hand was on her thigh.

She'd got him just as she wanted.

He needed support as he tottered back to Precious Finds and Tanya supplied it, allowing him to put his arm around her shoulder.

“Why don't we close the shop for the afternoon?” he said.

“What a good idea,” she said. “I was thinking the same thing.” She'd already closed for lunch and didn't have to reopen. She let them inside, fastened the bolts and left the closed notice hanging on the door.

Inside, she said, “After all that wine, some coffee might be a good plan.”

“I can think of a better one,” Edward said, reaching for her breasts.

She swayed out of range. “Coffee first. I only have instant, but I'm not sending you to Starbucks again. Tell you what. I'll make it here and we'll carry it through to the back room, so we can both have a chair.”

“And if I spill it, I can't do so much damage,” he said with a grin.

She carried both mugs through the shop after the coffee was made, insisting he went ahead. She didn't want him behind her.

Edward managed to lift two chairs from the stack in the back room and sank into one of them. “Never thought I'd get to be alone with you.”

And so drunk you can't do anything about it, Tanya thought, but she said, “Yes, it's great to relax. And in the company of a famous New York mobster.”

He looked stupidly flattered.

“I'd love to hear about the last big job you did—the security van,” she said. “I thought they were so well protected no robber would even think about a hold-up.”

“Takes brains,” he said.

“Was it your idea, then?”

“The part that worked, yeah.” He ogled her. “You wanna hear about it? I'll tell you. In a job like this you go for the weak spot. You know what that is?”

“The tires?”

“The people. You surprise the guard in his own home, before he reports for work. You tell him his mother has been kidnapped and he has to cooperate. You tape dummy explosives to his chest and tell him you can detonate them by remote whenever you want.”

“Brilliant,” Tanya said. “Was that you, doing all that?”

“Most of it. From there on, he's so scared he'll do anything. He drives you to where the vans are kept. You're wearing a uniform just like his. He drives the security van to the depot where the bank stores the money. He does the talking and you help load the van.”

“How much? Squillions?” She was wide-eyed, playing the innocent.

“They don't deal in peanuts,” Edward said. “And when you're outta there and on the street, your buddies follow in the transit van.”

“George?”

“He was one of the bunch, yeah. Some were Butch's people and some worked for Gritty Bologna. Gritty had a line into the security outfit, which was how we got the uniform and the guard's address. You drive to the warehouse where you transfer the loot and that's it.”

“What about the guard?”

“Tied up and locked in his van. No violence.”

“How much did you get?”

“Just under a million pounds.”

“Pounds?”

Edward looked sheepish. “Yeah. We screwed up. We thought this van was delivering to the major banks like all the others. Too bad we picked the one supplying British money to currency exchanges at all the major airports in New York.”

“You had a vanload of useless money.”

“Uh huh. Crisp, new banknotes for tourists to take on their vacations.”

“What a letdown.”

“Tell me about it. Gritty went bananas. He blamed Butch. There was a shootout and Butch was the loser. Some of us figured Gritty wouldn't stop at one killing, so we left town.”

“You and George and Myrtle?” She'd been incredibly patient waiting for the pay-off.

“Myrtle remembered Robert here in Poketown, and this is where we came.”

“With the pounds?”

“With the pounds. I figured we might think of a way to use them. It took a while, but with Robert's help we worked it.”

“All those trips to England? That's neat.”

“Twenty, thirty grand at a time. Some notes we exchange and bring dollars back. Some we spent over there. It's small scale. Has to be, with new, numbered bank-notes.”

“And this is why you call it the Friends of England? I love it!” She clapped her hands. “Edward, you're a genius. Is there any left, or is it all spent?”

“More than half is left.”

“Who's got it?”

“It's right here in the safe. That's why we can't let the place close.”

He was losing her now.

“I haven't found the safe,” she said as casually as if she was talking about the one copy of Jane Austen the shop didn't stock. “I don't know what you're talking about.”

He just smiled.

“When you say ‘right here' do you mean the back room?”

He wagged his finger like a parent with a fractious infant. “Secret.”

Infuriating. To her best knowledge there wasn't a safe on the premises. Robert had always left the takings in the till. There wasn't enough to justify using a safe. She gathered herself and gave Edward a smoldering look.“If that's how you want to play this, I won't be showing you my secret either.”

“Whassat?” he asked, gripping the chair-arms.

“Wouldn't you like to know, naughty boy.”

She watched the struggle taking place in front of her, rampant desire taking over from reality. “You gotta do better than that,” he said.

“Okay. To show you my secret we have to go upstairs, to the bedroom.”

“Hell,” he said, shifting in the chair as if he was suddenly uncomfortable.“Is that an offer?”

She hesitated, then gave a nod.

He groomed his moustache with finger and thumb and took a deep, tremulous breath. “The safe is right where you are. You could touch it with your knee.”

She looked down. “Get away.”

“The Encyclopedia Brit … Brit …” He couldn't complete the word.

“Britannica?”

“Middle five volumes. False front.”

She stooped and studied the spines of the large books that took up the whole of the bottom shelf. With their faded lettering and scuffed cloth bindings they looked no different from the others.

“1911 edition,” Edward said. “Green. Press that showy gold bit on volume twelve and see what happens.”

She pressed her thumb against the royal coat of arms and felt it respond. Just as Edward had said, the five spines were only a façade attached to a small, hinged door that sprang open and revealed the gray metal front of a safe with a circular combination lock.

Eureka.

“That's amazing.”

“If I could see straight, I'd open it for you,” he said, “but there's only stacks of notes in there.”

“You have to know the combination.”

“Zero-four-two-three-one-nine-six-four, but I didn't tell you that, okay?”

“Smart. How do you remember?”

“It's Myrtle's birthday. April twenty-three, sixty-four. Shut it now and we'll go upstairs.”

In his inebriated state, he couldn't have stopped her if she'd walked out and left him there. But, hell, she wanted the satisfaction of showing him her secret, as she'd put it.

“Will you make it?”

He chuckled. “You bet I will, baby.” And he did, even though he took the last few stairs on all fours. “So which one is the bedroom?” he asked between deep breaths.

“That's another adventure, loverboy. Next floor.”

“Stuff that. There must be a sofa right here.”

Tanya shook her head and pointed her finger at the ceiling.

After some hesitation Edward seemed to accept that this had to be on Tanya's terms. “Which way, then?”

“The spiral staircase at the end of the corridor.”

Gamely, he stepped towards it and hauled himself to the top. “Makes you kind of dizzy.”

“That's not the fault of the staircase.” She pushed open a door. “In here, buster.”

Robert's bedroom matched the size of the back room downstairs. It overlooked the yard at the rear of the property so it was built over the same foundations. The king-size bed was constructed of oak, with headboard and footboard graciously curved and upholstered in a French empire style. All the furniture matched and there was plenty of it, dressing table, ward-robes, chests of drawers and easy chairs, but no sense of crowding. More books lined the facing wall and there was a fifty-inch plasma TV as well as a sound system with chest-high speakers. There was an open door to an
en suite
shower room. A second door connected to a fire escape.

“This'll do,” Edward said, stepping towards Tanya.

She moved aside. “Not so fast.”

“C'mon, I showed you
my
secret.” He patted the bed.

“Fair enough. Here's mine.” She crossed to the dressing-table, swung the mirror right over and revealed a manila envelope fastened to the back. “It's ridiculous. I checked the mirror a week ago, and nothing was there. This morning I found this. Robert's will.”

“Yeah?” he said, his thoughts elsewhere.

“You'd better listen up, because it names you.” She slipped the document from the envelope and started to read.“‘This is the last will and testament of Robert Ripple, of Precious Finds Bookshop, Main Street, Poketown, Pennsylvania, being of sound mind and revoking all other wills and codicils. I wish to appoint as co-executors my good friends George Digby-Smith and Edward Myers.' That's you. Unfortunately as an executor you're not allowed to profit from the estate.”

“No problem,” Edward said. “Now why don't you put that down so we can give this bed a workout?”

“Listen to this part: ‘I leave my house and shop in trust to become the sole property of my devoted assistant manager, Tanya Tripp, on condition that she continues to trade as a bookseller on the premises for ten years from the date of my decease.' Nice try.”

“Don't ya like it?” Edward said, frowning.

“It stinks. This wasn't drafted by Robert. It's a fake. I know why you wanted his credit cards the other day and why in the end you walked off with that old receipt book. So you could fake his signature. Well, it's a passable signature, I'll give you that, but you forgot something. A will needs to be witnessed. There are no witnesses here.”

“No witnesses, huh?” He raised his right hand in a semi-official pose and intoned in a more-or-less coherent manner, “The state of Pennsylvania doesn't require witnesses to a will. You're in the clear, sweetheart. It's all yours, the house and the shop. Just be grateful someone thought of you.”

“Thought of
me
? You were only thinking of yourselves, keeping up the old arrangement, taking your stolen pounds from the safe and spending them in England. I'm supposed to give up ten years of my life to keep this smelly old heap of wood and plaster going just to make life dandy for you guys. Well, forget it. I don't buy it.” She held the will high and ripped it apart.

The force of the action somehow penetrated the alcohol in Edward's brain. Suddenly he seemed to realize that there was much more at stake than getting this young woman into bed. “I've got your number. You figure you can do better for yourself with those Agatha Christies you have in the office. Worth a fucking fortune, you said. Few spots of coffee didn't harm them much. You're aiming to take them with you when the shop closes down and cash in big time.”

Tanya felt the blood drain from her face. She'd been hoping her agitated words the other day had passed unnoticed. This was dangerous, desperately dangerous. It wasn't quite true because the best books weren't stained. They were safe in her apartment. Even so, this stupid, drink-crazed man could put a stop to everything.

She still had ammunition and her reaction was to use it. “You don't know who I am. I can bring down you and your thieving friends. I'm Gritty Bologna's daughter, Teresa. That money in the safe isn't yours to spend. We spent years tracking you to this place. I took the job with Robert to find out where the banknotes are and now I know.”

“You're Teresa Bologna?” he said in amazement. “You were in school at the time of the heist.”

“I'm family, and family doesn't give up.”

He moved fast for a drunk. Fear and rage mingled in his face. He came at her like a bull.

He was blocking her route to the door and the
en suite
would be a trap. Her only option was to use the fire escape. She turned and hit the panic bar and the door swung open. She grabbed the rail and swung left just as Edward charged through.

No one's movements are reliable after heavy drinking. Edward pitched forward, failed to stop, hit the rail hard with his hips and couldn't stop his torso from tipping him over. He may have screamed. Tanya (or Teresa) didn't remember. But the sickening thud of the body hitting the concrete forty feet below would stay in her memory forever.

The autopsy revealed substantial alcohol in Edward's blood. No one could say what he had been doing above the bookshop in the dead owner's bedroom. Those who might have thrown some light had all left Poketown overnight and were not heard of again. So an open verdict was returned at the inquest.