The Trophy Wife (27 page)

Overhead, there was a steady flow of conversation, very different from the moping silence of other mornings. She tried to eavesdrop, but was able to catch only random, meaningless words. “It will work,” she had heard Mike say once in an angry tone that suggested Rita had doubted something he planned. “It's too risky,” Rita had shouted a few moments later. At another point, her voice had risen above the murmur to demand, “Why are you taking a gun? Stop thinking like a hood and start using your brains. You don't need that.” And most recently, “No way I'm going with you. If they get the both of us, who's going to spring you?”

She could feel her heart racing, keeping pace with her rising anxiety. Just the fact that the routine had changed was frightening. Her captivity was probably coming to an end and at this moment the only end she could envision was at the hands of the madman upstairs. In her imagination, the cargo that he was loading into his car consisted of a saw, ax, and shovel.

Get hold of yourself, she thought, trying to rally her courage. There were reasons to be hopeful. By now, Walter should
have paid her ransom. If everything were going according to reason, then Rita and her husband should have been ordered to release her. Emily couldn't remember hearing the telephone ring, but it was possible that all the preparations she was hearing had to do with her release.

Then there was the money that Mike had demanded as part of the threats he made her record. Maybe Walter had paid him off. And maybe Rita and Mike, with their newly found fortune, were planning their own escape. It that case, they might decide to just leave her locked in the basement, planning to phone from some place on the road and tell Walter where she could be found.

Another consoling thought was that the rumble of the garage door had come from the other side of the wall, in the direction where she had seen the daylight between the ceiling rafters. That most likely meant that she would be escaping into a garage where she could easily open a door to the outside.

“Goddammit!” It was his voice, shouting his displeasure at something that had happened above. And then, “Where the fuck is it?” Just the sound of his voice blotted out all reasons for hope. Emily could clearly visualize the egotistical sneer and the depraved eyes that enjoyed the thought of her rape and mutilation. Setting her free would be a disappointment for him. He would much prefer to commit his ghastly crimes and then bury the evidence behind the garage.

Her worst fears returned when she heard footsteps shuffling toward the top of the stairs. The dead bolt flew open and then the footsteps started down.

“Your breakfast!”

Emily sighed with relief at the sight of the tray. “Thank you, I'm hungry.”

Rita set a bowl of dry cereal, already awash with milk, on the folding table. Next to it, she put down a gas station mug of coffee. Wordlessly, she crossed to the bed and unlocked the shackles, not even glancing at the sprung fittings of the headboard.

“I'll come back in a few minutes,” she said and went toward
the stairs. Emily went into the bathroom.

But Rita was still there when she came out, standing at the foot of the steps, a pained expression on her face.

“Is something wrong?” Emily's antennae immediately picked up danger signals.

“No! Have your breakfast.”

Emily crossed cautiously to the table and sat down at the bowl of cereal. But her eyes kept track of Rita, who wandered back into the room and sat on the edge of the bed. The frame creaked and the bed wobbled. It seemed impossible that she wouldn't notice the weakened headboard. But her mind was elsewhere.

“Did he really come on to you?”

Emily's eyes widened at the suddenness of the question.

“You know what I mean. Was he really under your nightgown?”

Her lips moved, but she couldn't make a sound. If she repeated what he had done, then Rita could explode into rage just as she had the first time that Emily accused Mike of fondling her. But if she denied it, then the woman would think she had made it all up. That would be another reason for her anger to flash.

“Mike sometimes acts like a punk,” Rita went on. “He can be pretty physical with people that give him a hard time. Or even with people that try something with me. At a bar once, some jerk grabbed my ass as I was coming out of the ladies room. Mike threw the guy right through the plate glass window and out into the street.” She smiled at the happy thought of how much he cared for her. “But he'd never attack a woman.” Rita stiffened to show her indignation at even the thought of him being less than chivalrous. “Well, he did slap me around once when I pushed him too hard about being a punk. But a hour later he was crying on my knee, telling me how sorry he was. So I wouldn't expect him to give you a hard time. Especially when you're tied up and helpless.”

“Maybe he was just trying to frighten me,” Emily offered. “Just to get my voice on the ransom tape.”

“I'll bet that's what it was,” Rita said with feigned enthusiasm,
as if she were trying to save face with Emily. “He's not sure how he should handle all this. Kidnapping isn't what we bargained for. We were just supposed to mind you. It was easy money and we weren't going to be hurting anyone.”

“Then let me go,” Emily said. “You could have twice as much money. And I'd be grateful to you. I'd never describe you to the police, or point you out, or testify. You'd have nothing to worry about.”

Rita nodded. “That's the way I'd play it. Take the money and run. But Mike wants to see this through. I think he feels that this is the kind of thing that he can do better than me. So far we've made our way playing my game. Sophisticated scams where people pay for being greedy. This is his kind of game. He likes to feel that he's in charge.”

“Please,” Emily begged. “Help me.”

Rita jumped up and started for the stairs. “You'll be all right,' she promised. “I won't let anything happen to you. And you don't have to worry about Mike. He's a real pussycat.”

She was interrupted by the sound of a car engine grinding and then catching Emily's face snapped in the direction of the garage. “He's going out. He's going to meet your husband and collect the money. Then you'll have nothing to worry about,” Rita explained. She ran up the steps and bolted the door behind her.

Emily stood slowly. She was alone and she was unchained. How far could she get before Rita came back down. Probably not even into the ceiling. And if she waited until after she came down for the breakfast tray, could she move quickly and silently enough to make her escape before the woman's next visit? She had to do something more than wait for the sick thug to return. And, yet, if she angered Rita, she would forfeit the only protection she had.

Should she make her move now? Or should she wait until night as she had been planning? Both choices were dangerous. The wrong choice would get her killed.

* * *

Alex watched silently as his father lifted the leather briefcase and laid it conspicuously across the backseat of his car. Then he pushed the tightly wrapped package of cash into the space on the floor behind the driver's seat.

“I'd like to make sure of the car phone,” he mumbled as he slid in behind the wheel.

“I don't think you should be doing this,” Alex repeated for the third time since they had sat together, toying with their breakfast.

Walter turned the phone on. “Would you dial it for me?” he asked as if he had never heard his son speak.

Alex went back into the kitchen where he lifted the telephone and keyed in the car phone's number. He listened to the ringing and then heard the beeping sound coming from the garage. His father's voice came on the phone. “Thanks. Thanks very much.”

He looked at Amanda, who was still sitting at the breakfast table. “Don't leave it like this. He's putting his life on the line for her. He might get himself killed.” Amanda turned her face away. Alex marched back into the garage.

“Dad, please don't do this. It could be very dangerous. You ought to turn the whole thing over to the police.”

“They want the money,” Walter answered. “They certainly don't want me.” He started the engine and then pushed the button for the garage door.

Amanda came out from the kitchen. “Please, don't go. You've never done anything like this before.”

He showed a wry smile. “I guess I never had to. But don't worry. Everything will be all right.”

She put her hands on top of the open window as if she could keep the car from moving. “Dad … last night … I said some terrible things.”

Walter patted his daughter's hands. “Let me do this now. We'll have plenty of time to talk everything out once your mother gets home.”

They backed away from the car and watched it ease out of the garage and into the turning circle.

Walter drove slowly, taking meticulous care to observe
every traffic regulation he could think of. He had worried all night about the things that might go wrong, and one of them was that he would be pulled over for passing a stop sign and that the policeman would find the money. In his grim scenario, he was sitting at the police station arguing with a desk sergeant while a madman was slitting Emily's throat.

He pulled onto the interstate that ran west to east, toward Manhattan, and fitted into the light, weekend traffic. Cars eased up on either side of his and he found himself shrinking into his seat as if to escape identification. It was absurd, of course. He had been much more conspicuous driving this route every morning as the lone passenger in the back of a gleaming limousine. But now it seemed that his mission was obvious. It seemed that everyone who passed him would know instantly that he was a man on his way to pay off a ransom.

Walter wasn't really afraid. Apprehensive, certainly, because he was dealing with a terrible unknown, and careful because the money on the floor behind him seemed like a bomb that could go off at the slightest jar. But it wasn't concern for his own safety that made him shrink low in the window. It was more that he felt like a criminal about to engage in a despicable act.

He had lived his whole life within the womb of the establishment. Always, it had been us and them. The “us” were the people that the country was truly intended for. Hardworking, dedicated, and fiscally responsible, they created wealth to the benefit of the entire community. They dressed properly, visited the dentist regularly, tried to understand the political issues, and voted in even the off-year elections. You met them at Sunday church services and Ivy League parents' weekends, at charity functions to benefit the downtrodden and at Republican Party luncheons. The “them” were the takers rather than the givers. Shiftless and unambitious, they counted on tenure, civil service rights, and labor unions to keep them in salaries far higher than their worth. They filled welfare rolls and jammed the lobbies of public clinics. When they gathered, it was generally to protest reductions in their civil rights
and they inevitably littered the area. They were often darker in complexion, probably unshaven, and most likely Democrats. The best of them were pain-in-the-ass do-gooders. The worst were cutthroats and purse snatchers.

Walter rarely dealt with “them.” He had, early in his career, developed a distaste for the consumer side of the business that provided home mortgages, auto loans, and other needs of the common people. He had embraced the investment side of the business, which was inevitably run and staffed by “us.” Then he had moved up a class when he entered international monetary movements and found himself dealing with the deities of the business world. They were even more “us” because they had noble titles that proved they had always been “us.”

Now he was moving downward to the level of the criminal class. He was acting like a common burglar, avoiding the police, averting his eyes as though he were standing in a lineup, driving stealthily to a clandestine rendezvous with an unsavory psychopath. He was handling the crudest form of money—cash. The televised murder and mayhem that always seemed so far off would be close enough to touch. During the next few hours, he would clearly be one of “them.” Walter wasn't so much afraid as degraded. His self-esteem was in greater danger than his physical person.

He swung off the interstate onto the toll parkway and headed north. After a few miles, the road dissected a giant complex of stores that rambled through a mind-boggling panorama of color-coded parking lots. Every day, people got lost in the endless avenues of shops and found themselves searching for the
YOU ARE HERE
arrows on the backlighted maps. There were dozens of phone calls to security each night from people who couldn't find their cars and felt certain they had been stolen. At its heart, the mall was a labyrinth, the confusion intended to slow down the progress of shoppers and force them to pass more display windows. For the kidnapper's purpose, it was the perfect place to pick up a ransom. There were endless avenues of escape.

The car phone chirped and Walter switched it on instantly.

“Yes?”

The smooth voice demanded. “Where are you?”

“Heading north on the parkway.”

“Okay. Get off at the first mall exit. Take a left under the parkway and then drive in from the first entrance off the access road.”

“All right. Then what?”

“Then park as close to the side doors as you can get and stay in your car. I'll call you when I'm ready.”

“I want to talk to my wife …” Walter started, but the phone went quiet. Then the connection was broken. “Christ!” He moved to the exit lane. He could see the skyline of the mall ahead and he wanted to be ready for the exit.

The parking lot wasn't crowded. The marked rows closest to the building were full and there was a steady rush of shoppers around the entrance doors. But there were acres of empty blacktop around the periphery, marked into neatly stenciled parking places. Walter slowed well short of the densely crowded cars and pulled to a stop between two marker lines. He felt conspicuously alone in the center of so much empty space. Hopefully, the exchange would take place in an alley or in the shadow of a building where his crime wouldn't be so apparent.