Love Beyond Words (City Lights: San Francisco Book 1) (34 page)

“Well, that would be hunky-fucking-dory, now wouldn’t it? You got some magic beans to sell me, Dave?”

Garrett sniggered like a bull. Jesse did not.

David closed his eyes. Once spoken, there’d be no going back. The plan was a good one, though, and David thought it would work. It
had
to work. The ordeal would be over and he and Julian would be free of Natalie and Cliff both.

“Julian’s latest book…Rafael Melendez Mendón’s book, I mean. He wrote another one. No one has seen it yet; it’s rough and hand-written. He says it’s his best one yet.”

“And?”

“I can get it.”

“Yeah? So?”

David blinked. “Then you…you’ll have it. I’ll give it to you.”
              “The fuck am I going to do with a book?”

“Sell it,” David said, confused, “on the…uh, black market.”

Cliff stared at him a moment more, and then burst out laughing.

David’s ears grew hot. “It’ll be worth millions! You’ll be set for life!”

“Dave, you crack me up. But you’re also one stupid motherfucker, you know that?” Cliff leaned over his desk. “First off, how the hell we going to authenticate something like that? We’ll use the tried and true ‘Because Dave Thompson said so’ method? Secondly, that shit has to be fenced. Only I happen to be fresh out of fences at the moment, so that book would be about as useful to me as a pile of dog turd.”

David felt his sliver of hope melt away. “But…”

“But…that’s not to say your plan doesn’t have its merits. No sir.” Cliff laced his fingers over his protruding belly. “In fact I think it has potential.”

David looked up. “It does?”

“This is what we’re going to do: you’re going to give us this book and we’re going to ransom it
back
to Mendón for our millions.”

“What? No,” David said. “He might not pay. And even if he did, I’d have to tell him…No, he can’t know what we’ve been doing. Please, Cliff.”

“This is a bad idea,” Jesse put in. “We’re getting in too deep.”

Cliff ignored him. “Relax, Dave. Mendón doesn’t have to know shit. Tell him the place was robbed and the book was stolen.”

David wiped his nose, thinking. “He won’t know I was involved.”

“Right-o.”

“Then I tell him that the robbers have contacted me because they recognize what they have.”

Jesse snorted. “You think he’ll believe that? That a bunch of crooks out looking to steal the TV and grandma’s pearls
also
know who Mendón is? Ridiculous.”

David squared his jaw. “Cliff did.”

Cliff bellowed more laughter. “That’s right. Us seedy bottom-feeders know good literature when we see it, don’t we Dave?”

David wasn’t listening, his thoughts ran ahead a mile a minute. “Then I tell Julian that the robbers want one million dollars for the book’s safe return. I help negotiate the exchange, you get your money, and you leave us alone forever.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, snowflake,” Cliff said. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
One
million dollars? What do you take me for?”

“Two, then.”

“Three,” said Garrett from his post in the corner. “One million for each of us. Unless Jesse’s too chickenshit, in which case, I’ll take his share.”

David shook his head. “He won’t pay that much, Cliff.”

“Jesus, Dave, do I have to think of everything? If he won’t pay it, you will. With his money. You have access, right? Tell him you couldn’t bear the thought of his precious book in our dirty little mitts and you impulsively—and out of
love
—” he sneered, “took it upon yourself to rescue his book.”

David thought this over. It could work. Julian would be mad but not for long, not when David’s intentions were so benevolent. He looked at Cliff. “And then that’s it? You won’t bother us again?”

“Scouts’ honor.”

What do you know of honor?
David thought, but he was more relieved than anything. “Okay just give me a few days to plan it out. Make it look real. Okay? Deal?” He held out his hand for Cliff to shake, but the big man stared at it as if David had offered him a rotting fish.

“Get the fuck out of here, Dave. I’m tired of looking at your goddamn face. Come back in a few days with the book or I’ll see you next month with…
forty
grand.” He leaned back and laced his hands behind his head. “You know. For my troubles.”

Julian woke up the next morning the same as he had the day before, and the day before that—three days since that awful night at Natalie’s place: with a pain in his heart that slugged him like a mallet. The clock on the side table showed that it was after noon. Always an early riser, this new habit felt alien to him. But then his entire world was different now. His pillows beckoned him to retreat into sleep and he almost succumbed. But the conversation with Natalie replayed in his mind, like a terrible song stuck on repeat. Only this time, at the end, he recalled a different conversation.

Go to Rijeka. Make your peace.

Will you come with me?

Of course I will.

Julian squeezed his eyes shut for he could remember the way she’d held him and how soft her hair was against his cheek. He thought he would have given anything to hold her again.

“I could go,” he said aloud, countering his thoughts. “I could go and when I come back I could tell her…” He didn’t know what would happen in his father’s homeland. But he’d have tried. He’d have done something that might change everything.

Julian threw off his blankets and took a much-needed shower. The headache of a mild hangover thudded dully between his eyes but washed away under the hot water. Yes, this was something he could
do.
Something he could show her and maybe, just maybe it would be enough.

After the shower, he dressed in a pair of jeans, t-shirt, and a blue sweater that Natalie loved because she said it was the exact color of his eyes. The mallet slugged him again, and he laid his hand on his chest.
Keep going. Just keep going.

He packed enough for two weeks, hoping whatever it was he needed to do there wouldn’t take so long, and trundled the small luggage bag into the kitchen. He searched around for his cell phone to call the car service. He hadn’t seen his phone, he realized, in several days. He turned to the wall phone and then realized he had no idea how to get to Croatia. It would surely take more than two flights, lots of connections…

David could help him. He’d planned all his travel to Uruguay when Julian had been researching
Coronation
and had done a fantastic job
.
He thought to call David but remembered he was staying right here. Something about his mother being ill and his own apartment was being fumigated for…rats? No, termites.

Julian went to the office and heard nothing from inside. It was late for David to still be sleeping, but Julian didn’t want to barge in and startle him. He opened the door quietly to find it empty and a mess. Two bottles of Jack Daniels, a liter of Pepsi, and a cocktail glass half-filled with both sat on the coffee table beside the couch. The air smelled of sweetly tinged alcohol, and the remnants of fast food meals were strewn about. David’s sport coat hung over the end of the couch like a flaccid tongue.

Julian frowned at the mess then remembered David had told him once that he had always needed to be careful about his alcohol intake; Julian wondered what prompted this binge.

Everything’s all turned around,
he thought, leaving the office. He had almost closed the door when he saw his cell phone on the floor near the couch.
Odd. I must have dropped it.
He took it and left, closing the door behind him.

In the kitchen, he turned the phone on and looked for missed calls from Natalie, messages that said she’d had a change of heart and wanted to talk. There were none. There was nothing, as a matter of fact. His call history had been erased. That was odd too.

He used his cell phone to go online and scrolled through a list of airlines that would take him to Croatia. Lufthansa had a flight from SFO to Zagreb with one layover in Frankfurt. And it left in three and a half hours.

Julian hesitated. He felt unprepared, rushed, unwilling to venture into his father’s territory, afraid of what he’d find or that he’d find nothing. Then he thought of living the rest of his life without Natalie and called the airline.

#

David raced back to Julian’s place, panic streaking through him and making his hands tremble. He’d stepped out to replenish his liquor supplies that had dwindled faster than was safe. But it couldn’t be helped; a mild buzz was the only thing that kept his nerves from feeling like they’d explode at any moment.

In the parking lot of the convenience store he discovered Julian’s cell phone wasn’t in his coat; it must have fallen out.
He could be calling Natalie right now…
That problem joined the other, constant worry that gnawed on his nerves.
How on earth am I going to stage a break-in when Julian’s here all the time?

The plan to steal the latest book was a good one, if only he could leap frog over the actual doing of it and get right to the part where he and Julian lived happily ever after. He snorted a laugh. Nothing was ever that easy for him. Nothing.

At the front door, David heard the sounds of Julian moving about the kitchen. His chest constricted and his ulcer flared in a perfect harmony of dread. He opened the door and tried not to run inside.

“Oh, hello. Good to see you up and about,” he said, injecting false cheer into his tone. Julian was not only up, he was showered, dressed, and tucking his cell phone into his back pocket.
Oh my god, he knows he knows he knows…
“Who were you talking to?” David asked, forcing his voice into a normal range.

“The car service. I’m going to the airport,” Julian answered, and David watched him stuff his passport into his leather shoulder bag.

“Oh. Where…uh, where are you going?”

“Croatia,” Julian said, and checked his watch. “If I make the flight.” He looked at David with concern. “And how are you, David? You don’t look well, to tell you the truth.”

David ran a hand through his greasy hair and hugged the little brown bag of whiskey against him more tightly. “Uh, yeah. Worried about my mother is all. You know how that is. But uh…why Croatia? I mean, right now? For how long?”

“Two weeks, I think. Maybe more. I’m not sure yet. This situation with Natalie has me in turmoil. I…I have to get away. To think some things through.”

David nodded. Was this good or bad? Certainly good that he wouldn’t have to monitor Julian’s whereabouts at all times, but all it would take was one phone call to Natalie and David would be destroyed.

“I think that’s a good idea,” he said. “Check out for awhile. Get some rest and uh…not think about…stuff here.”

Stuff?
David mentally kicked himself. But Julian seemed not to have heard. He moved to stand before the windows, arms crossed, like some majestic lord surveying his domain. David went to stand beside him.

“I mean, I’m sure a vacation is just what you need right now.”

“It’s not a vacation,” Julian said. “I used to think I’d go for myself. But it’s apparent to me that the idea of Natalie and myself are tightly bound. So I’ll go for her too in the hopes that when I get back…” He stared straight ahead, his voice hard. “Maybe we can start again.”

David thoughts raced.
At long last, a break.
He didn’t like all this talk about starting over with Natalie but he’d deal with that later. With Julian gone, he could design a beautiful robbery in which a few minor treasures and Julian’s book could be spirited away. No mess, no fuss…He glanced at the library desk where the stack of notebooks had sat for the last few weeks.

No book.

Oh dear god, now what?

Julian had his leather shoulder bag with him. Was it there? Was he going to work on it while in Croatia? David swallowed hard.

“So will this be a working vacation or are you going to leave the book alone until you get back? Maybe give it a breather…?”

“I don’t have the book.”

“Oh?” David forced his voice to sound as casual at as possible. “Where is it?”

“Gone.”

“What does that mean…exactly?
”

“I gave it to her.”