No Footprints (18 page)

Adamé wasn't pleased about going with me, much less having to follow me to the mouse hole to drop off my car for Mac, but like any successful businessman he knew how to make deals and act nice. Declan Serrano notwithstanding, nothing about Adamé suggested he was a big-time financial criminal. But then there's a reason confidence men are called
confidence
men.

But, behind the wheel, he transformed. It was as if all the energy he'd restrained waiting for his wife exploded there. He was on my tail, blinking the lights and motioning when there was a space in the other lane, shooting over without me and slamming brakes to crawl back in behind me. The guy was so close to nudging my bumper it was almost an insult. I kept having to remind myself he was desperate to find out about his wife.

We hit a red. I was grateful. What I needed was to figure out what the hell was going on.

Behind me he tapped the horn. When I turned he gave a little ‟I'm here” wave. The light changed and I moved behind a truck and settled a car length back.

Varine Adamé in the hotel? Using her own credit card?
Duh!
Could
Tessa Jurovik
be an alias of Varine Adamé? Varine who had a studio in the Mission, like Tessa. Varine who craved a life of her own!

Was Tessa Jurovik merely a long-time alter ego? Was that even possible in a city this size?

I couldn't adopt an alter ego; I'd be spotted before the day was through. I'd grown up here. But a woman like Varine who'd only been here five or six years, whose public identity was in the shadow of her husband's—

I got out my cell and called the authority. Luckily, he picked up right away. ‟Mike, if you were less strikingly handsome and had fewer siblings prowling around the city, could you have created an alter ego here?”

‟Me, sure! A lesser man, or woman maybe but . . . You mean the woman on the bridge?”

‟How'd you—”

‟Who else?”

‟Yeah. I think she's really Varine Adamé, wife of Aaron. The red jacket, Mike, it's hers. I just saw her in it in a photo.”

‟One of a kind?”

‟Point taken. But—”

‟Are you sure she's the woman on the bridge?”

‟Same hair, same clothes. But it was a studio portrait, the kind you put in a Christmas card. She's relaxed and smiling. Her husband's arm is around her shoulder. She's not frightened, angry, cold, and snarling at me. So, yeah.”

‟From last Christmas?”

‟Dunno.” I knew I needed to look for flaws in this match. ‟I found
Tessa Jurovik
from her pay stub.”

‟Just means some woman earned a salary.”

‟But she was a bike messenger.”

‟Just means some woman rode two wheels. Darce, you ride through the streets and disappear. No one checks the rolls of every messenger service in town.”

Despite everything I was smiling. This was like the old days, the two of us running a single thought—usually
his
thoughts that he was willing to share with his kid sister. I'd just about killed myself to make my mark on them. Even now, driving, I could feel the tension from pressing my back against his bedroom wall, my teenaged arms around my knees, me plucking ‟takes” and rejecting them as too childish, worrying that I was letting the silence settle like a stain on the fabric of my acceptance.

There'd been safe but obvious comments; I'd disdained them. Maybe I'd learned early on or maybe I just knew that the only route was the most audacious, the one that would bring the supreme reward of a surprised look that said: You're not a kid anymore. Back then, like now, he'd start talking mid-idea, or I would. Now it was me: ‟If Varine Adamé created an alter ego in the Mission—Tessa Jurovik—and used it for a quiet life there, low-key, no one from her life as Aaron's wife would catch on. Possible?”

‟Possible.”

‟But?”

‟For her, it's not going to be so hard. It's playacting.”

‟But—”

‟Hang on, Darce, 'cause this is the clincher. Taking another identity's only a problem when people are looking for you. Her, she's just playing at this other life, right?”

‟Yeah, maybe.”

‟Yeah—definitely. You figure she's got this hideaway life in the Mission, to get free of the pressures of her other life. When nobody's after you, then, look, you screw up and something doesn't compute, people figure you're flaky or you've got some trouble with a guy, right?”

Toss in the night at the Mark, with Marc, the sexy bellman, and it made a pretty complete package. ‟Yeah, a guy. That was Kristi's first guess for pretty much anything. She liked Tessa—”

‟Because?”

‟Because Tessa was nice to her.” There was a swishing sound on the phone, him, I was sure, nodding knowingly. ‟And her roommate, Byron, sheesh, she could have carried a grenade launcher on her shoulder and he'd never have noticed. He had no idea whether she was there or not. The landlord—the landlord, Mike, he's an amateur bagpiper!”

‟Say no more! Arrangement like that,
I
could have lived there and never been caught.”

‟Caught” was an odd word for a brother we'd been desperate to find because we loved him. Or maybe he didn't mean us. In which case—

‟What's hard,” he said as if continuing a thought he'd neglected to speak out loud, ‟is when the people who are looking for you for the best of reasons get close enough to blow your cover. Then you've got to scramble, watch your ass, and make sure you don't get them caught in the middle.”

Middle of what? ‟You talking ‛me'?”

‟You once.”

‟You know I would never, ever have done anything to endanger—”

‟Hey, you don't have any idea what agony it was to know one of you was a breath away and all I could do before I split was make damned sure there wasn't a trace you—especially you—would connect to me.”

I couldn't deal with that at all. Certainly not now. I said, ‟But you're back now.”

Behind me, Adamé flicked his headlights.

I'd slowed without realizing it. ‟Mike, I'm almost at the mouse hole to drop the stunt car. Varine's registered at the Mark Hopkins. Adamé's taking me—”

‟The husband?”

‟Yeah. He's not happy about it, but it'll be okay. Hey, wait, we're so busy trying to figure out whether or not Varine had a second life, whether
it was she who checked into the hotel, I almost forgot about the bridge. All this would mean it's Varine Adamé who tried to jump.”

‟Yeah,” he said in a what-else-is-new tone.

Why was it such a shock? There was something else, something deeper gnawing at me. ‟To me, Tessa's life began on the bridge. It's always central to who she is. But Varine Adamé's got a whole entire other life. For her, Tessa's like an extra cocktail dress in the back of the closet.”

Mike, of course, hadn't seen her on the bridge looking longingly when a horn beeped. He hadn't been the one pulling her back over the railing. Now, to accept that Tessa had never existed except as an alias . . . it was like she had jumped! ‟To me, it was Tessa, not Varine, who was real.” I had to swallow before I could trust myself to speak. ‟But why give away all of her clothes?”

‟Clothes for her Tessa persona. Why not? She was going to jump.”

‟I guess.”

‟Darce?”

‟Yeah?”

‟What are you expecting to find at the hotel?”

‟She didn't check out. So, with luck, her.”

Outside the mouse hole, Adamé flung open the passenger door of his BMW X6 and I slid in.

There was a lot he might have asked me about his wife's last couple days, but he hadn't. Not so far. Now he jumped lights before they turned green—not so unusual in this city—and ignored yellows. He ran one red entirely, and on the couple that turned half a block away, he hung rights and made sure he got through at the next intersection. The car never stopped until it jolted still by the doors of the Mark.

The first thing I noticed inside was the Security guy. Would he recognize me without my flashy cocktail dress and spike heels? I hoped—

But it was his job not to be fooled this easily. Before he could utter an accusing word, I said, ‟Mr. Adamé's here to see his wife, in the Presidential Suite. Can you let him in or—”

‟Scatto, Security,” he announced to Adamé, after shooting me a puzzled look. He had little choice but to play along. ‟Perhaps you'd like me to call ahead, sir.”

Adamé nodded. ‟As you wish.” He was striding to the elevator. Scatto and I followed.

‟I'm afraid I owe the hotel for some breakage. Can I get a bill from you, or should I take it up with the concierge?” I said as Scatto watched his
phone ring. The man had more important things than me to worry about. I'd have to pay, but now my behavior no longer counted as hooliganism, but rather the exuberance of the well-connected.

In the elevator, Scatto clicked off and then tried again. At the door he knocked, announced ‟Security,” and then opened it.

Adamé burst in. ‟Varine? Are you here? Varine?” He was in and out of both bedrooms before the elevator door shut. ‟Not here. Empty. Are you sure this is the right room?”

The place had been restored to order. Housekeeping had been and gone. Clearly, there was no stopping the gears of a first-class hotel like the Mark. I checked the closets: no clothes, no bicycle. ‟Mr. Scatto, have her belongings been removed?”

‟Not by our staff.”

‟You sure?”

‟Of course. When you are a guest at the Mark Hopkins, your room is your home. We do not invade your privacy.”

I walked into the president's bathroom, and leaned against the newly cleaned counter. ‟Why would your wife come here and rent this suite?” I asked Adamé.

He eyed Scatto and lowered his voice. ‟She does what she does. I don't question her.”

‟But—”

‟Mr. Scatto, my wife and I share the credit account. So, in truth, this is my room.”

Scatto took the hint.

When the door shut after him, I followed Adamé to the living room.

He was standing in front of the window, not looking out, but leaning against the glass, as if fear of the glass breaking and the resulting endless fall into the dark had no hold on his subconscious. And yet, he was clearly
uneasy. Maybe keeping his back to the dark unknown was his way of handling it.

‟So, why?” I prodded.
Your version, at least.

‟Varine has always had moods. She's charming when she has to be. But she needs her privacy. It's just her way. I love her. I accept that.” He paused so long I thought that was it. But then he added, ‟I've seen her sit staring out at the fog for . . . quite a long period. Sometimes she goes from room to room and when I ask her what she's looking for she says, ‛Nothing.'”

‟Sounds like she has something troubling her. Did that ever occur to you?”

‟She wouldn't have wanted me poking . . . .”

‟So you didn't try to find out what was going on? You were honoring her need for privacy?”

‟If she'd said she was depressed, of course we would have talked it out. If she'd needed medication, of course . . . but she didn't. She just . . . lived as she did.” He was turning his head slowly, almost hypnotically, from side to side, as if his body itself was admitting he couldn't deal with this.

‟Are you sure?”
As little thought as you've given to her!
‟What about if she was desperate?”

‟Why should she be?”

‟Why should she be poised to take a leap off the Golden Gate Bridge? I've been trying to get a lead to the woman I pulled back from there and it's beginning to look like it's your wife.”

‟That makes no sense.”

‟Sense! We're not talking theory! I hauled her back! She said she'd try again. Maybe that's what she's doing right now.” I wanted to grab him by the shoulders and shake him. ‟You can't just deny . . .”

He closed his eyes, then opened them. In a low voice he said, ‟I don't know. Maybe. Maybe she really is depressed. Maybe more lately. She
says she's fine, just needs space. I guess it's been easier for me to believe her, to let her do her own thing. And there's always the excuse,
my
excuse, that I was trying to protect her, not expose her to all the constant pressure of my life. Letting her alone's been my way of respecting her. She's not fragile—I don't mean that—just fed up with crap demands. I understand that.”

‟Crap demands?”

‟All those outstretched hands. She said it was like walking down Market Street being ‛
spare change
'd with each new person. Just subtler. Everyone needs donations, all good causes, like Jessica Silverman with her endless parade of pitiable little girls. Varine'd be a wreck when she got home. How could she say no, with my money there endlessly replenishing itself? That's what she told me. No way to say no, and no gift ever enough.”

‟Couldn't she—”

‟Don't you get it? She feels trapped! Whether she actually is or not, that's how she feels! The pressure's driving her crazy!”

I remembered the tale of her diverting the food from the luncheon to the hungry people outside. And as a result, what she'd ended up with was a load of bad press. ‟So,” I said, ‟was that the contract she felt trapped by?”

He looked blank.

‟Aaron, there was some contract she couldn't get out of. She told—she was extremely upset about it. Upset to the point of suicide.”