Hope House (23 page)

Compared to his inner jitters, Gloria seemed fine. Maybe she was in shock, or there was more than pot in Joe’s brownies and the effects lingered. He’d expected to have a hysterical female on his hands, but he’d gotten nothing of the sort. She held it together and reviewed the files with such nonchalance that Kurt thought she may as well be checking a grocery receipt to ensure she hadn’t been overcharged.

This gorgeous woman with the hot body and a surprising sexual appetite could really hold her own when the going got tough.

After she read all the address from the files, Kurt said, “Hold up. Where do you live again?”

“Bradfield, Massachusetts. It’s near New Hampshire. Way up Route 495.”

“Okay, let’s fly to Portland and rent a car. We’ll meet with those folks then go back to your place. About how far is it from Portland?”

“A hour and fifteen minutes. Maybe an hour and twenty depending on traffic.”

He laughed. Quite a precise approximation. He would have said an hour or so and left it at that. “Good, so we’ll go back to your place after that. You can pack some clothes and dig out that ultrasound picture. We’ll need that for proof later. Then we’ll go to New York. All the others are too far.”

“What about the weather?”

He’d been living in Miami so long he’d forgotten that in mid-February getting a flight out to or from anywhere in New England was a crap shoot. “Let’s take our chances leaving Madame Fruitcake back there. We’ll pick up Joe and he can take us to the Key West airport.”

“You needn’t call her names, Kurt.” 

“She tried to kill us, Gloria.”

“No, she held a gun on us and begged us to leave. She was terrified. More than we were. Whoever did that to her face most likely still threatens her with more of the same if she slips up. When we appeared on her doorstep like that it set her off is all.  You can see she’s a mess. Cowering in that house, afraid even to use her own name.”

“I’ll bet you’re the type who won’t step on spiders or kill mice, eh?”

She blushed. “What do you mean?”

“You know, catches insects, takes them out of the house rather than
murder
them.” His tone was joking.

“
I’m no pushover!” she protested.

“So could you take out the man who followed you in the airport and then the hotel parking lot? And the ones in your hotel room? Or the two dopes at the agency who shot at us?”

“I think I could kill them if it came down to it.”

“I don’t think you could. You don’t have it in you.”

Gloria scrunched her face. “I do too.”

“Listen, it’s not an insult. It’s a compliment. You have to have a kind of  moral vagueness, a flexible glitch in your resolve that allows you to end someone’s life and then go on about your business as it if doesn’t matter.”

“And you have that—glitch?”

“Let’s say it was thrust upon me. Believe me, it doesn’t make me stronger and it sure as hell doesn’t make me a better person.”

“So killing someone, it doesn’t matter to you—no qualms?”

“It matters, sure. Does something to a man. But if someone is attacking you, if you take the time to worry about qualms, you’re a dead man. And Gloria, no one I kill is innocent. It’s always in self-defense.” He tapped her nose with his fingertip to attempt some levity. “Or defense of others.”

“Were you in the military or something? Is that where you learned this moral vagueness?”

He gave her a lopsided smile. “I was a Conscientious Objector.”

She rolled her eyes. “How ironic.”

“Oh come on. I
would never hurt you or anyone who wasn’t trying to hurt someone else. My past is my past. It doesn’t matter.”

“Speaking of pasts, you’ve done a complete background check on me, know more about my history than anyone, and I don’t know
anything
about you except your name and that you don’t stock your refrigerator very well.”

Kurt sighed. She didn’t know his name. Not his real one. If he told her the truth now, she’d want out of the car in a hurry. Out of his life. She’d go to the nearest police station and report him; and even if he managed to escape, she’d be in the spotlight for the Puglisis. Surely she’d heard of Tim Perconi, the “Pizza Man who Delivered Death.” The media had it so slanted he didn’t stand a chance of innocence in anyone’s eyes.

And on the off chance she took his side on that one, gave him the benefit of the doubt, forgave he was merely there to
blackmail
the senator…Kurt shook his head just thinking of it.

Even if she accepted him because they had been together in the Biblical sense, and she felt some kind of bond, what about the rest of his life? The years before he was known as the nefarious Timothy Perconi. What were the chances she’d listen to the grit, grime, and violence that were the building blocks of his life
, and still want him around?

“I can’t talk about my past.”

“Why?”

“I just can’t.”

She stroked his arm. “Too painful?”

It would be so easy to fool her. To continue lying so he could keep her in his life. The one he’d worked so hard to construct.

“If I tell you I’ll have to kill you.”

“Oh really?” She laughed lightly.

“Well, no not really. But if I told you about my past, people might kill you to find out what you know. Might kill you to get to me. Can we leave it at that?”

She recoiled. 

He knew what she was thinking.
What the hell did I get myself into with this guy and how can I run away?

“I’m sorry, Gloria. I really like you but my past has to stay a secret and no one can know who or where I am.”

“Couldn’t anyone just look up your name in the phonebook? Tommy found you. I mean, come on, you’ve got an apartment and you rent office space. Not very deep cover for a—skip tracer.”

When he didn’t answer, but just looked away from the road into her eyes, he knew she understood.
Smart girl.

“Kurt Malone isn’t really your name is it?”

“No.”

She stared out the window for a very uncomfortable few minutes while Kurt drove, trying to lose himself in an Allman Brothers CD.

She opened her mouth and he held his breath, prepared to be asked to pull over.

“Well, Kurt Malone is the man I hired to help me find out the truth about Alison Gander, and he seems trustworthy. He’s doing what I paid him for.”

He breathed out.
Thank God.

“You killed two men for me and have kept me safe when no one else would. You were the first person to ever believe me about my faked miscarriage.”

He looked to her. “I do believe you.”

“Well, that’s all that matters then. I’m not paying you to divulge your past. I’m sure my accountant and my hairdresser have dark secrets and I don’t ask them for full disclosure before I agree to their services.”

He looked over his right shoulder then pulled into the emergency lane. “Listen,” he said once he had the truck in neutral and the parking brake engaged. “I can take being fired or shouted at. I can certainly take being abandoned if you don’t want to be with the likes of some hired killer or whatever you think I am. But don’t demote me to the same level as your accountant for God’s sake.”

“I don’t know anything about you and I slept with you. That meant something to me. As impulsive and boneheaded as it was, and as much as I initiated it, I was giving myself to you. First I find out that I didn’t even hire you but that my ex did and you just pretended to work for me. That was bad enough! But now to know Kurt isn’t even your name? How do you except me to react? I really liked you.”

She started crying.
Damn. This is exactly what I didn’t want to happen.

He leaned his head on the steering wheel then turned to look at her.

“I really like you too. I haven’t slept with anyone in a long time or let myself care about a woman. No close friends either. I’ve had to sever ties with relatives. You were just supposed to be a client but you threw a wrench into it. From the first time I saw you I knew I was going to have a hard time keeping this professional. He reached out and placed a tender hand on her cheek before continuing. “Last night, this morning whatever, I knew what I was getting into. I knew it wasn’t going to just be sex. I knew that at some point you’d start asking questions I couldn’t answer, but just once I wanted to let myself get close to someone.” He reached over again and now wiped tears from her eyes. “I wanted to get close to you, even if it meant I’d get hurt later. I thought what the hell, maybe I  can just go on with this identity. I’ll just let her think I’m Kurt and maybe we can have something long term.”

She looked up, fresh tears in her eyes.

“But then when I was faced with it, I couldn’t lie to you. Damn it, Gloria. I like you more than is good for both of us. And I am the only one who can help you out of this Puglisi baby mess.”

“Okay,” she said through a tight strangled throat, reigning in crying as much as she could. Always trying to be strong, that one.

“Are you married?” she asked.

“No.”

“Any kids?”

“No.”
So far so good
, he thought.

“You’re not a child molester are you?”

“Gloria!” Did she honestly think he was that kind of monster?

“I had to ask.”

“I’m none of those things. My past is in the past and won’t affect us if we leave it there.”

“Will you ever tell me?”

“I don’t know.”

She turned again toward the window, and he put his arm on her shoulder. “But I can tell you other things about me. About my childhood, my personality, my values. Stuff like that matters doesn’t it?”

She nodded.

He added, “I mean, what does it really matter what someone was doing when they were twenty years old? Even thirty years old. I’m here now and will tell you everything I can.”

She turned back toward him. “You do this for a living right? Give people new identities and help them hide, help them create new lives?”

“Most times people keep their own names; I just take them off the radar.”

“But sometimes you get them a whole new name and history. Clean slate. That’s what you got.”

“Yes.” He wondered where this was going.

“Then I suppose you’re pretty good at it. No one ever figures it out?”

“No one ever finds the trail unless the person messes up. If they get homesick and contact someone they once knew, or happen to run into an old acquaintance. But if they just hold fast to the new life they remain undetectable, yes.”

“Think the identity of Kurt Malone could withstand dating a publisher?” She half-smiled.

His heart pumped hard. She was letting him in, accepting him with all his baggage. “We could sure as hell try.”

She splayed her hands out on her lap. “Okay, I pretend you never told me any of this and that Kurt is your real name. For now. When things settle down, I’m going to want some answers. Not everything but enough so I at least know why you’re the Invisible Man.”

“I can’t believe you’re saying this.” He smiled and his cheeks started to hurt. The muscles were out of practice.

“I’ve got a few secrets of my own. I wouldn’t want you to toss me aside because of them. And I don’t want to talk about what they are any more than you do.”

He took her hand. “Truce. We’re a couple and we’re going to figure out where these babies are coming from, and exactly how Alison is related to you. And yes, eventually I’ll tell you everything you need to know.”

She smirked. “And I’ll tell you everything you need to know.” She squeezed his hand.

Now she had him wondering. What could she possibly have done? What dark secrets did she have? None he had uncovered in his search. Probably something minor that her ethics were blowing out of proportion.
This mystery just made her more interesting. A pretty woman who took care of herself, fought for what she wanted, and accepted him, could have any past she wanted. She was here now, and nothing else mattered.

7.

Mick Puglisi’s home, Miami, afternoon

Mick
smiled as he opened the FedEx package from El Salvador.  Dr. Lopez had signed a birth certificate for Donovon, listing Boni Angeline as the birth mother. That way Boni would be honored and Angela would feel like she was connected somehow too, to make up for her baby.  Mick neither knew nor cared what Boni’s real surname was. Didn’t matter a hill of beans.

In an hour he’d see Judge Stein and have him sign off on the adoption.

Mick felt bad for anyone who had to adopt the conventional way. All his clients and those who got their children through other agencies or opted for a second-hand kid from the Department of Social Services had to jump through more hoops than a circus poodle. It was much more of a hassle if you did it legally. Those social services referral reports took forever and those red tape freaks stuck their noses way too much into your business.  Yeah, it was great they checked the backgrounds of the prospective parents but Mick couldn’t be bothered with the waiting. He certainly couldn’t have anyone check into his past. Maybe on paper, to certify he was fine, but no social worker was going to get her hungry little hands into his books and records and personal life.