Better Read Than Dead (24 page)

“No!” I shouted. I couldn’t risk Andros’s goons knowing about my sister. I knew the man was ruthless enough not to think twice about leveraging her safety against me.

“There was a pause before Cat spoke again. I pictured her rubbing her ear after my outburst. “What do you mean, ‘no’?”

“Well, I don’t want you to catch what I’ve got, Cat. I mean, I have a fever and the chills, and I’m sick. Sick, sick, sick!”
Liar, liar, pants on fire . . .

“Oh, you poor thing! All the more reason you will need me to take care of you. I’ll have the cabbie stop off at the drugstore and pick you up some—”

“Cat! Do
not
come over here!” I shouted into the phone.

There was a very pregnant pause; then in her most offended voice she said, “Well,
fine,
Abby, be that way. I’m just trying to spend a little time with you this week, but if you’re too busy being sick and hiding away inside your house then I guess I’ll just see you at Thanksgiving!” And she hung up the phone.

I put the receiver back in its cradle and walked over to the wall, where I pounded my head three times, producing the headache I’d complained to Cat about. Then I went around the house, checking all the windows and doors and making sure the alarm was set. I went upstairs to my bedroom and crawled under the sheets fully clothed. Sometimes pretending to be sick can make you feel like going to bed.

 

At three a.m. I bolted upright, my heart racing and panic coursing through my veins. My burglar alarm was blaring a noise so obnoxious I had to shove my fingers halfway to my eardrums. On tiptoe I stepped out into my upstairs hallway and peered down the stairwell at the darkened living room. If someone was inside, I wouldn’t be able to hear them above the noise, but by turning off the alarm I’d give the intruder free rein to hang out for a while.

I looked around for a weapon, but nothing upstairs came to mind. Feeling all the hairs stand up along my arms and the back of my neck, I gave up being brave and headed back into my bedroom, shutting the door and locking it. Quickly I grabbed the phone and carried it into my walk-in closet, and shut that door too.

I dialed 911 and shouted above the blaring from downstairs that my home alarm was going off, and I suspected that someone might be in my house. Five minutes later I heard a pounding on my front door, and someone called out, “Royal Oak Police!”

Nearly crying with relief I ran as fast as I could down the stairs and threw open the door, then quickly turned to the control panel of the still-blaring alarm and shut it off. Turning back to the officer at the door I sucked in a breath of surprise in recognition, “Good evening, Officer,” I said to Shawn Bennington.

“I hear you got an intruder,” Bennington answered, not seeming to recognize me.

“Uh, yeah. My alarm just started going off, and I don’t know why.”

Bennington looked at the control panel on the wall. “What kind of an alarm system you call that?” he asked me. Apparently he was used to the kind that cost tons of money and came equipped with whole teams of people devoted to ensuring you never took a dangerous breath.

“It’s the cheap kind,” I answered, put off by his casual demeanor.

“Well, there you go then. The thing’s probably unreliable. Probably had a short circuit or something.”

“Still . . .” I insisted, extending my arm out in a welcoming arc. “As long as you’re here I’m sure it wouldn’t hurt to take a look for me, now, would it?”

Bennington sighed audibly, then clasped his hands onto his belt buckle and pulled upward, securing his pants over his extended belly. “Yeah, okay,” he said, and came into my living room. I shut the door and turned to guide him through my house, but he was already in my kitchen with the fridge open. “Say, would you mind if I had one of these sodas?” he asked.

Of course I minded! “Help yourself,” I called while thinking,
Asshole . . .

“Thanks,” Bennington said, taking a soda. As he opened the top he pivoted in a three-sixty, looking around my kitchen, and nodding his head. “Nice place,” he commented.

“Thanks. Now about looking around?” I said, my hands finding their way to an impatient stance on my hips.

“Okay, okay,” he replied, and came out of my kitchen, walking through the living room and around to my study. He flipped on the light, blinked, and turned it off again. Then he came back around the corner and lifted his chin up the stairs. “You want me to look up there too?”

My face contorted itself into a deep scowl. “Yes,” I said through gritted teeth, “I would like you to look in
every
room, if it’s not too much trouble.” In about three seconds I’d be going to jail for whomping a police officer on the head.

Bennington sighed audibly again, then climbed the staircase, his footfalls heavy on my carpet. He was up there for quite a while, so finally I called up to him, and he came out of my bedroom.

“Everything looks fine,” he said, and hurried down the stairs. “No sign of forced entry, and no bogeymen in your closet.”

“You were up there awhile; did you check everything?”

Bennington looked at me with a sly smile that turned my stomach. “Oh, yeah, I checked everything.” He gave a small chuckle as he opened my front door, pausing to say, “My advice is to spend some cash on a better alarm system, ma’am; the one you’ve got’s a piece of crap.” And with that he was gone.

I stood in the living room with every light in the house blazing, feeling extremely vulnerable. I reset the alarm and left all the lights on as I trudged up the stairs.

Something about how quickly Bennington left bothered me, the same way it bothered me how long he’d been in my bedroom. When I got to the top of the stairs and looked into my room, I knew why. The top drawer of my dresser was pulled slightly open, and my underwear had been tossed around like a salad. Outrage coursed through my veins as I stomped forward and pulled the drawer open further, sorting my undergarments and swearing under my breath, “Sick son of a bitch!”

A few minutes later I’d discovered that Bennington had absconded with two pairs of lace panties, and the violation of that brought tears to my eyes. Milo and Dutch were definitely going to hear about this.

Shivering now because my room was very cold, I headed back over to my bedroom door, shutting and locking it. I left the light on and crawled back under the covers, but never made it back to sleep.

 

The next morning the silver sedan was nowhere to be found. I breathed a huge sigh of relief and quickly got ready for work. I noticed my reflection looked haggard, but through the magic of concealer I was able to hide most of the dark circles lining my eyes.

I got to work early and quickly began calling the day’s clients. Luckily I got through to most of them; the others I simply left detailed instructions for. I told everyone to come in the side door around the back of the building, and to use the back elevator, and under no circumstances should they assume I wasn’t here, even if they found notifications in the building suggesting otherwise.

The ruse worked brilliantly, as all three of my morning appointments appeared without incident. I ate lunch at my desk, and called the rest of my missed appointments from the day before. Luckily they understood, and I re-booked every one.

I was feeling pretty good around mid-afternoon, just as I was showing my fifth appointment into my reading room, when an earsplitting noise pierced the quiet office building.

“Oh, my God, what
is
that?” shouted Sarah, my two-o’clock.

“The fire alarm!” I shouted back. Already we could see people moving into the hallway as offices began to empty out. “Come on; we’d better go outside just in case it’s not a drill.”

Sarah and I, along with about a hundred other of the building’s occupants, descended onto the street via the back stairwell. I’d had sense enough to grab my coat, as the day had turned bitterly cold. We all stood around, periodically looking up at the building for any signs of smoke, and within moments the fire department showed up.

I watched as several firemen raced into the building, and Yvonne talked to someone in charge holding a walkie-talkie. I worried about my office suite, and thought anxiously about all my belongings left behind that might be consumed by a fire. For some reason this sent a disturbing chill up my spine, and I shivered violently.

Just then I noticed something out of place, and I turned slightly to look to my left. There in the back of the crowd stood Goon, his eyes pinned on me and a sly smile on his face. I now understood why the fire alarm had been pulled, and frustration welled up inside me and gave me courage. Excusing myself from Sarah’s company I marched over to Goon and lifted my chin as I snarled, “Listen, pal, this stunt you’ve pulled? It’s not going to work. There are a dozen ways around your little intimidation tactics, and I for one will not be bullied, cajoled, pushed, or
persuaded
into working for a slime-ball like Kapordelis!”

Goon was hardly swayed by my no-bullshit attitude. “Mr. Kapordelis has a message for you. He says you have until the end of the day to make up your mind, or else . . .” He let the sentence trail off ominously, but I was way beyond reason at this point.

“You can tell that ugly, cancerous tumor to go
fuck
himself!” And I stomped away.

“Abby?” Sarah said when I got back. “You look pale as a ghost; are you all right?”

My mouth had suddenly gone dry, and I’d begun to shake slightly. “Yes, I’m fine,” I reassured her, “just a little cold.”

At that moment we were given the all-clear to head back to our offices, and I shuffled along with the rest of the crowd. When Sarah and I got back to my suite we had only a half hour left, so I did what I could and charged her half price. Kindly she tipped me some extra and left.

My next appointment was a no-show. I waited with my office door open until three fifteen, but Kelly, one of my regulars, never came. I walked around to my desk and put my head in my hands, tears of frustration and exhaustion welling in the corners of my eyes, when the phone rang. I picked it up reflexively. “Hello?”

“Abby?”

“Speaking.”

“Hey, there, it’s Kelly Holms. Listen, I just wanted to tell you that there’s this really scary guy standing at the end of your hallway who wouldn’t let me through to your door.”

“What?” How far was this going to go?

“I even think he’s still there. You should call security on him—the guy really freaked me out.”

“Kelly, I’m so sorry. I’ve been having some trouble with a former client lately, and I think he’s probably the one causing the problem. Would you like to reschedule your appointment?”

“Well, how about a phone reading; do you have time now?”

I breathed a huge sigh of relief. I’d been so tired and anxious lately that I’d completely forgotten about offering phone readings. It was the perfect solution, and I mentally vowed to call all my appointments for the next day and let them know that their readings would be over the phone. I’d have to make up a plausible excuse about why I couldn’t have them in my office—maybe that there were electrical problems in the building or something—but at least this way I could still keep my business afloat.

I did Kelly’s reading over the phone and hung up forty minutes later feeling like a balloon after all the air had been let out. I just sat at my desk for a long moment, my mind numb and my body exhausted.

It was growing dark, so I switched on a light and began to shuffle some paperwork around, preparing to leave for the day, when I heard a scuffle outside in the hallway. Quickly I went to my door and pulled it open, and as I looked down the corridor my jaw dropped.

My sister Cat was shoving her five-foot-nothing frame against Goon’s seven-foot-plus body as she struggled with her luggage and a large shopping bag to get past him. “Get out of my way, you big, dumb ox!” she shouted.

“I told you,” he said, standing in front of her and blocking her progress, “Miss Cooper don’t want no clients today.”

“I am not her client, asshole; I’m her sister. Now move or I’ll call the police!” And with that my sister pulled her cell phone open and let her finger hover over the buttons.

“Hey!” I yelled, and came running down the hallway to Cat’s rescue. “Leave her alone!”

Upon hearing my voice Goon turned and looked back at me, allowing Cat to push her way past him. She reached me and latched onto my arm, her eyes large and a little frightened. “Abby, who the hell is this guy?”

Goon stood there glaring at us as I pulled my sister into my office and slammed the door. “What are you doing here?” I demanded, not answering her question. I was furious at her for coming uninvited and unwittingly putting herself in danger. Now Kapordelis knew I had a sister, and that made both her and me very vulnerable.

“I
came
here because I didn’t like how we left things last night, and I
thought
we could talk about it on the way to the airport!” she snapped back, irked, no doubt, by the tone I’d taken with her.

“Oh, okay,” I said, backing down. I was only going to make a tense situation worse by sniping at her. “I’m sorry. It’s just that that jerk has been causing real problems for me lately, and I was afraid he might get pushy with you.”

“
Who,
exactly, is he?” she demanded.

I shrugged lightly and said, “Just some client I had earlier who wasn’t happy with his reading, so now he’s trying to cause trouble.”

“Have you called security?” she said, tapping her toe as she grilled me.

“I was thinking about it, but I hate to bring it to Yvonne’s attention. My lease is up in December, and I don’t want them to think that maybe I’m too much trouble as a tenant—especially after last summer,” I explained, thinking back to the time I’d been viciously attacked in my office.

“Well, you have to do
something;
that guy could be dangerous!”