Desperate Measures (19 page)

Peter Sorenson stormed through the lobby of his apart
ment building. He felt like a wounded bulldog. He had jet lag, was hungry, tired, and needed sleep. He dumped his bags in the foyer of his apartment, ripped at his tie and suit jacket as he made his way through the dining room, living room, hall, and into the bedroom. His clothes, as he shed them, went into a pile in the middle of the floor. Seconds later he was in the shower, lathering up.

Jesus, he was tired, more tired than he'd ever been in his life. On top of that, he was sick with worry and fear. He was supposed to get married tomorrow. As he shaved he wondered if Maddie had called the minister to cancel the wedding. He'd have to check that out.

Ten minutes later he was dressed in a cotton Perry Ellis sweater, worn, comfortable jeans, and Dock-Siders. He raged about the apartment for another five minutes before he gathered up his keys, wallet, and headed for the door. His hand was on the phone to call the garage to send up his car when the phone rang, the sound vibrating through his hand. He picked it up on the third ring, hoping it would be Maddie, knowing it was his uncle Leo..

“When did you get in, Peter?” Leo asked, skipping the amenities.

“About fifteen minutes ago, and I'm on my way out. You should have the paperwork first thing in the morning. We'll talk later, Leo. There are no problems.” He replaced the receiver, waited for the dial tone before he called the garage. Leo was probably having an anxiety attack, he thought.

He was lucky to find a parking spot directly in front of Maddie's apartment building. His own set of keys in hand, he walked down two steps that led to the building's entrance. The doorman recognized him and held up his hand. He eyed the keys dangling from Pete's fingers. “Sir, Miss Stern is gone.”

“I know. I want to look around the apartment. The rent is paid till the first of the month, a month after that if the security deposit wasn't refunded. I have a key,” Pete said briskly.

“I guess I can't stop you, then,” the doorman said quietly.

“No, I guess you can't. Did Miss Stern take her cat?”

“The cat is gone, sir,” the doorman said. He was remembering the instructions he'd been given by the police. Do not volunteer anything. He liked Miss Stern, liked this man standing in front of him because he was responsible for putting the smile in Miss Stern's eyes.

“Did she say where she was going?”

“No, sir, she didn't. People are giving their notice right and left,” he blurted.

“Oh, why is that?”

“I'm not supposed to talk about this, sir. The management company doesn't want me to talk about it either.”

“Talk about what?” Peter grated.

“The double murder, sir.”

“Well you just talked about it, so you might as well tell me the rest. I promise not to tell anyone you spoke with me.”

“Mr. and Mrs. Ky were murdered in their apartment. They own the little store around the corner. Most of the tenants in the building shop in their store. It happened on the sixteenth, I believe. Ten or eleven days ago,” the doorman said, wrinkling his brows as he tried to recall the exact date.

“Do you think that's why Miss Stern moved? Did she move or did she go away?”

“Her phone's disconnected. Her furniture is still in the apartment. I'm not sure, sir. I haven't seen her in quite a while.”

“What about her mail?”

“I wouldn't know anything about that, sir.”

“Has anyone been around here asking questions about Miss Stern?”

The doorman thought about the police warning, thought about Miss Stern and her possible involvement with the police. He wanted to tell the nice man with the worried eyes that too
many
people had been around asking questions, but his tongue wouldn't work. He shook his head, refusing to make eye contact with the attorney.

Pete waved airily as he headed for the elevator. When he reached Maddie's apartment, he looked for the note Annie spoke of. It was gone. He let himself into the apartment. It was cool and dim, musty-smelling. It looked the same, just empty. He recognized a dead basket of flowers as the ones he'd sent the day before he left. There was hard candy—butterscotch, his favorite—in the candy dish. A flat bowl of little colored stones they'd both been picking up these past months sat on the coffee table. Maddie liked odd things, and the colored stones proved to be a conversation gimmick on many occasions.

The cushions on the sofa had indentations in them. Maddie usually fluffed them up before she went to bed. She must have left in a hurry. Maddie was meticulous about housekeeping. She wasn't much of a cook, but she was the next best thing to a neat freak. At least compared to his own sloppy habits.

The kitchen was tidy. The red coffeepot was filled and waiting, and the canisters were filled with sugar, coffee and flour. She must plan on coming back at some point, Pete thought. If she were going away for good, she'd empty out all the food. He opened the refrigerator and grinned. It was almost as empty as his own. Chinese food containers were closed tightly, Italian foil dishes with cardboard tops, cheese, cold cuts, and bread were tied in Baggies. A bag of bagels and three apples completed the contents. The cabinets held staples and dishes. He picked up the receiver on the wall phone, held it to his ear. Nothing. He replaced it. It would cost more to have the phone reconnected than it would to keep the phone on. What was she thinking of, to disconnect it? He flicked the light switch and was rewarded with yellow light. Why disconnect the phone and not the electricity?

The bedroom was neat and tidy, the bed made, no stray clothing anywhere. The dresser was bare, with a light coating of dust, possibly powder. He yanked at the closet doors and saw clothing and shoes, a shelf with handbags and boxes of scarfs, winter hats, and sweaters. Two of the three suitcases were missing.

The bathroom was bare, nothing on the small vanity. No toothbrush. He opened the drawer to see if his was there. It was gone too. So was his shaving cream and the razor he kept in the drawer. Two towels hung neatly on the rack.

To Pete's inexperienced eye, it didn't seem like Maddie left in a hurry or was harried in any way. He walked over to the little rosewood desk to check it. He'd gotten the antique for her on her birthday. She loved it, would never have left it behind if she didn't plan on coming back. She kept her bills in it, her checkbook, and all her notes for Fairy Tales. There were pens and pencils, but no papers. He started to grieve for his loss.

Maddie loved him. He knew it, believed it. She would never go away and not tell him. Somehow, some way, she would have gotten word to him. Unless . . . she wasn't able to do so. They were supposed to get married tomorrow. He felt an ache start to build within him.

Pete took one last look around. Maddie would never have left the Red Skelton clown picture behind either. It and the rosewood desk were two of her most prized possessions.

Pete sat down. He felt drained, like a rag doll, limp spaghetti, Jell-O. All of the above. Because he had nothing else to do, he picked up the remote control to the television and turned it on. It pleased him. She must be coming back. Goddamn it, she had to come back. They had plans, places to go, things to do. They were getting married, for Christ's sake.

He was about to bang on the end of the table when he remembered the pain he felt when he'd done the same thing in Hong Kong. He picked up a brocade pillow from the couch and sent it flying across the room. Dead flowers flew in every direction, three of the petals sailing downward, ever so gracefully, to land on his knees. He felt like crying. And why in the goddamn hell shouldn't he cry? He was human, had feelings just like everyone else. He was supposed to be macho, tough as rawhide, able to weather anything. It was all fucking bullshit. He hurt. He ached. He felt pain unlike anything he'd ever felt before. No, once before . . .

Pete wiped at his eyes. He wondered what Barney would do in this situation. He was crying. That was good.
Fuck you, magazine writers who say men shouldn't present a weak image.

Pete closed his eyes, willing his closed lids to conjure up the surfboard in his closet. It was the last present his parents had given him. On his sixth birthday, the year they died. He'd dragged that surfboard with him everywhere. Sometimes he stared at it for hours.

Leo didn't understand about the surfboard, and Pete had never tried to explain. Well, maybe he tried once when his room at the estate was being redone, and Leo wanted to toss it out. “Redone, my ass,” Pete grated. “I was never fucking there, so how could it be
my
room?” He'd gone at Leo with all the gusto of a nineteen-year-old, kicking and shoving, gouging and bellowing his head off. He'd used words even Leo hadn't heard before. He didn't get to come home that summer. Instead, Leo sent him on a backpacking trip in Wyoming that was so arduous, grown men buckled and had to be taken back to the camp. He'd made it, though, by plotting Leo's death in a thousand different ways. He'd returned to Leo's palatial estate in New Jersey two days before it was time to return to Harvard to find a Jaguar convertible. Had he been properly grateful? Hell no, he hadn't. He'd told Leo to shove his Jaguar convertible. He'd never taken a second look at it.

He was twenty before he figured out why he didn't like his uncle Leo. To this day he still didn't know if the dream he'd had was real, something buried in his subconscious or just a plain old dream. In the dream he was four, maybe five, and he'd been playing checkers on the back porch with Barney Sims when he heard his parents talking in the kitchen. He'd heard his father say, “I'd rather pick shit with the chickens than ask Leo for a loan.” At the time he thought it was the funniest thing he'd ever heard. Barney Sims thought it was funny too. Both of them had clapped their hands over their mouths to keep from laughing aloud. Then it wasn't funny anymore when he heard his father say, “I don't care if we lose this house and the car. I'll get another job. Marie, I love you with all my heart, but I will not ask Leo for money. I might not be able to buy you diamonds and furs, but I'll always make sure I take care of you and Pete. Just say you're with me, and no matter where we are it won't matter because we're together.” Pete's eyes almost bugged out of his head when he heard his mother's voice, the voice he loved that had such a warm chuckle in it, say, “I'm with you, Albert, and so is Pete. But right now what's important is, where are we going to get the money for Pete's surfboard? We agreed we'd never promise our boy anything if we couldn't keep that promise.” His father said, “I have some ideas on that. For starters, we'll redeem all those pop bottles in the cellar. You can bake and sell your strudels, and I'll do some lawn work for the people on the other side of town. Who knows, I might get a job in the meantime, and we can keep the pop bottles.” His mother laughed over that.

In the end, none of that worked out. They got the money for the surfboard when his mother pawned a piece of jewelry, a gold locket crafted to look like a book. There was space for four pictures that turned like pictures of a book. His baby picture was in the locket, his parents' wedding picture, his picture when he went off to kindergarten, and a picture of the three of them. In the little box of mementos Miss Wardlaw gave him after the funeral, he saw the pawn slip for the locket with four tiny little pictures. He'd bawled for days and days. Miss Wardlaw thought it was because of the funeral, which was partly true. Every time he looked at the surfboard, he bawled his eyes out. Even now, to this day, when he opened the closet door and saw the board, his eyes misted over.

“Shit!” Pete said succinctly. A moment later he was on his feet. He didn't have time for trips down Memory Lane.

In the small foyer he caught a glimpse of himself in an ornate mirror. Jesus! He looked like something spawned from black, mucky water. He finger-combed his dark hair. It didn't help. He rubbed at the stubble on his cheeks and chin. He muttered another expletive. He wished he'd brought his shell-rimmed glasses with the tinted lenses. At least they'd cover the dark circles and bags under his eyes. “I look,” he muttered, “like an undertaker's client who can't make up his mind.”

Minutes later he was in his Range Rover, heading for Janny Hobart's apartment. Christ, where were they? Maddie wouldn't take off on him like this. She just damn well fucking wouldn't do it. There was something wrong. He could sense it, feel it. Jesus Christ, he could
smell
it. He thought about the small packet of wedding invitations Maddie had made up for the few friends they were inviting to their wedding. He had one folded in his wallet. He knew the words by heart:
This day I will marry my friend. The one I laugh with, live for, dream with. Love.

At Janny's apartment building he didn't get past the doorman. “She moved out,” was all he was going to get from the bulldog countenance.