Razor Sharp (6 page)

Harry unbuckled his seat belt and leaned forward. “Are you telling us this woman’s disappearance is tied in to our visit to the mountain and your visits to the White House? Lizzie is not going to like Cricket’s name coming up on this coast, especially at the White House. Jesus, you aren’t telling us Cricket was that woman’s attorney, are you?”

Bert’s silence was all the confirmation Harry and Jack needed.

“Buckle up, Harry,” Jack told him. For once, Harry didn’t argue. He leaned back, buckled up, and closed his eyes as he tried to make sense out of what Bert had just said.

Keeping his eyes on the road, Jack chewed on his lower lip. Ten minutes later he finally had his thoughts in some kind of order. “Did you warn Lizzie or Cricket?”

“Not yet. But I have to go to Vegas tomorrow. Don’t worry, you two don’t have to leave with me. You have the whole weekend. Lucky stiffs. I already made arrangements for a car to be left at the Shell station down the road from our drop-off point. In fact, it should be in place when we get there. I’m going to want to check that out before I go up the mountain.”

“Can you keep a lid on the Vegas part, Bert?” Jack asked.

“I can try, but you know I can’t really interfere. It’s all got to look on the up-and-up. My guys out there are sharp. I mean like
razor-sharp.
They’re all seasoned pros.”

“C’mon, Bert, Vegas is buttoned-up, FBI or not. Cricket’s got the inside track, and those people out there are not going to open up to anyone, not even the FBI.”

“Yeah, I know,” Bert growled. “That guy Cricket is something else.”

Harry chirped up from the backseat. “Put him together with Lizzie, and you have a stick of dynamite with a lit fuse. As you well know, they are now
as one.”

“You just
had
to say that, didn’t you, Harry?” Bert growled again.

“Forewarned is forearmed,” Harry said smugly.

Jack took his eyes off the road for a second to look at Harry via the rearview mirror. His stomach crunched into a knot at his friend’s serene expression. Harry was up to something, but Jack knew he’d never know what that something was until Harry wanted him to know.

“Maybe we need to get off all this serious shit and have a little sing-along,” Jack said. “When we were kids, my mother made us sing so we’d shut up and not fight in the backseat. It never worked, though.”

“Then why did you bring it up?” Harry murmured.

“To have something to say because you are scaring the shit out of me, that’s why,” Jack said. “What are you thinking?”

“Nothing. My mind is a total blank. I’m traveling cosmically to other parts of the universe, and the universe has no place for bullshit. Now, shut the hell up and drive.”

“Yes, sir,” Jack said, saluting smartly.

Bert hunkered down in his seat and clamped his lips shut.

For the next three hours no one said a word. When he couldn’t take the silence any longer, Jack slipped an Eric Clapton CD into the player and, like Harry, transported himself someplace else until they arrived at their destination at the Shell gas station.

Jack watched from the car as Bert checked out the dull gray Ford sitting at the far end of the station. He watched as Bert reached up under the left rear fender and withdrew a key in a metal magnetic box. He shoved it in the pocket of his jacket, then loped back to Jack’s car.

“Aren’t you going to park this buggy?” Bert asked. “I thought the plan was to park here and make our way to the base of the mountain.”

“No. We’re driving to the base. I know where to…stash this buggy. It’s too damn cold to hike from here to there. Get in. Harry, call Yoko and tell her to send the cable car down. By the time we get there all we have to do is step in and, voilà, we’re among friends.”

Harry was speaking into his cell before Jack could finish what he was saying.

A satisfied look could be seen on Harry’s face. “Yoko said they have a ton of snow on the mountain. She said they are looking for three strong backs to man the shovels.” He cackled at the expressions on Jack’s and Bert’s faces.

After they hid the car, Bert started grousing about how much he hated the cable car. “I don’t like dangling thousands of feet in midair. In daylight, you feel like you have a fighting chance should something go wrong, but at times like this, you’re at the night’s mercy. Hell, we won’t even know if something is wrong till it’s all over. That’s if we don’t plummet down and aren’t dead.”

“Shut up, Bert. Nothing is going to happen. Don’t jinx us,” Jack said as he flapped his arms for warmth. “C’mon, let’s go,” he said, jogging in place.

Fifteen minutes later the three friends stepped from the cable car to a rousing welcome. Flashlights skittered about as the women waved them for additional illumination. A light snow was starting to fall.

Laughs, kisses, and hugs were the order of the day, with Isabelle announcing the late-dinner menu as they all trooped through the knee-high snow. They all stomped their feet on the wide plank porch, then removed their shoes and boots. All three men sniffed appreciatively as Annie held open the door.

Two hours later, when dinner was over, Myra and Annie offered to do the cleanup so the “young people” could go off and do whatever they were going to do.

“Think of it as a free night,” Myra said. “We’ll meet here for breakfast at six sharp since Bert has to leave.”

“The youngsters,” as Annie called the little group, bundled up, and, with a lot of laughing and shouting, ran outdoors into the new-falling snow.

Left alone, Annie and Myra looked at one another. “I think, Myra, the two of us should have a…little snort. I’m not saying we should get schnockered or anything like that. I’m just saying we should have a little libation. What say you?”

“I say
yes,”
Myra replied, getting out two squat cut-crystal glasses that felt like they weighed a pound each. “Let’s get right to it, Annie. Skip the ice, the club soda, or whatever you were going to dilute this fine liquor with. Fine whiskey should be consumed the way it comes out of the bottle.”

Myra looked so adamant, Annie could feel her eyebrows shoot upward.

“This…uh, very fine whiskey is 100 proof. Are you sure, Myra? One glass of this very fine whiskey could very well land us on our very fine respective asses.”

“And this concerns you, Annie?” Myra asked as she poured generously into the crystal tumblers.

Annie looked hard at the amber liquid that threatened to spill over the top of the tumbler. “Maybe we should clean up before we start to…uh…party.”

“I’m thinking maybe we shouldn’t. I hate cleaning up. You don’t like it either, Annie. It’s a messy job and a few hours later you have to do it all over again. I think we should requisition those hard plastic plates and throwaway utensils. Why aren’t you sampling this fine liquor, Annie?” Myra asked as she took a long gulp from her glass.

Annie pretended not to see the tears rolling down Myra’s cheeks.

“This is quite smooth,” Annie gasped as she took a robust drink. “Do we have any cigarettes?”

“We don’t smoke, Annie. Charles smokes once in a while, so there might be some in one of these drawers. I suppose we could smoke one if we didn’t inhale. Smoking is not good for you. The surgeon general says so. Ah, here are some,” Myra said as she triumphantly held up a crumpled package of cigarettes from one of the kitchen drawers. “Since we don’t smoke, we won’t know if they’re stale or not. Fire up, Annie.”

Annie marched into the dining room and returned with a lighter that was used to fire up the kindling in the fireplace. She clicked it on and almost set Myra’s nose on fire.

“Whoa! The cigarette, Annie, not my nose.”

Annie puffed furiously on the cigarette in her mouth. She wiggled it from side to side. “Did ya see that, Myra? I saw Clark Gable do that in a movie once. See if you can do it.”

“First, fill ’er up,” Myra said as she struggled to talk around the cigarette in her mouth. The cigarette fell on the floor. Myra bent down to pick it up. She looked at the glowing tip and stuck the other end back in her mouth. “I don’t want to learn that trick. You know what else, Annie, I don’t want to look at that messy dining room table.” Gingerly, she lowered herself to the floor and stretched out her legs. “Now we don’t have to look at the mess. And if we pass out from all this fine liquor, we won’t have far to fall.”

“That really makes a lot of sense, Myra. Sometimes you hit it just right. I wish you weren’t so sad. Charles will come back at some point. You know that,” Annie said as she waved the whiskey bottle back and forth.

“I don’t care to discuss Charles. Now or ever. Are we clear on that, Annie?”

“Crystal, my dear friend, absolutely crystal.”

Myra burst into tears.

Annie’s solution was to refill her glass. “Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do,” she muttered to herself. A good drunk never hurt anyone as long as it didn’t become a habit.

L
izzie Fox looked down at her watch when her cell phone rang. She frowned until she realized she hadn’t set her watch back to Vegas time. Cosmo looked at her, his eyes full of unasked questions. “There’s only one person who calls me at three o’clock in the morning. I have to take this call, Cosmo.”

The big man walked away to allow Lizzie to speak privately with her caller. He wasn’t sure, but he rather thought Lizzie would confide in him unless it was a client’s privileged conversation. He jammed his hands in his pockets as he paced around his living room, then into the den, which was lined with books and a huge 106-inch television set mounted on the wall. His enormous custom-crafted rocking chair, which matched the one in his office, beckoned him. He tried to remember how many times he’d slept the night through in that very chair. He finally gave up when he realized that more often than not it was where he slept. His day lady was forever chiding him for not sleeping in his bed.

Cosmo watched the digital numbers change on his watch. Whoever Lizzie was talking to was either very verbose, or he or she was trying to convince Lizzie of something. He wondered whether, if they ever got married, Lizzie would still answer calls in the middle of the night.
If they ever got married.
Why hadn’t his thought been,
when we get married?

Cosmo closed his eyes. First he had to ask Elizabeth to marry him. He admitted to himself that he was afraid to pop the question for fear Elizabeth had had second thoughts and would say
no,
she just wanted to keep the relationship the way it was. Fear was such a terrible thing.

In the next room, Lizzie paced, too, as she listened. “No, Martine. I can’t give up my life to help you. No. Why would you even think I would consider much less accept your offer to be your White House counsel? You can’t buy me; you could pay me my weight in diamonds, and I would still tell you
no.
Do I have to remind you that you made the decision to live in that fishbowl? I just helped you achieve your goal because I believed in you, and you’re my friend. I owe you nothing more.” Lizzie listened, her eyes growing wide with shock. “No, Martine, you can’t do that! I know you’re desperate, but you cannot infringe on my life. I will not allow you to do that.” She listened again. This time her jaw set into hard lines and her blue eyes sparked with anger. “Don’t ever threaten me, Martine. If you do, you’ll regret it. I don’t give a good goddamn about your Secret Service or the FBI or the CIA or the IRS or any of those other stupid alphabet-soup organizations. I know people who will chop those people up and spit them out. I’m going to hang up now, Martine, before either one of us says something even stupider than what has already been said.” Lizzie snapped the phone shut and ran into the living room, where Cosmo was waiting for her.

“If your phone rings, do not answer it! The president of the United States is going to be calling you to ask if you want to be White House counsel. Oh, my God, Cosmo, you don’t want that job, do you?”

“Whoa! Whoa!” Cosmo said as he struggled out of the rocker. “Were you just talking to the president of the United States? Why in the world would I want a job like that?”

“Yes, that’s who I was talking to, and she’s going to call you. The only time she can call is the middle of the night.”

The words were no sooner out of Lizzie’s mouth than Cosmo’s phone rang. He pulled it out of his shirt pocket and looked at the unknown name and unknown number that showed on the screen.

“She’ll leave a message if you don’t answer,” Lizzie hissed.

“Elizabeth, I do not have to return her call. I do not have to answer this phone either. It’s that simple.”

“She damn well threatened me. I won’t tolerate that, Cosmo. Did you hear me? The president of these United States threatened me! Me! We’re friends. I helped her get into office. I cannot believe she threatened me. She did. With the Secret Service, the IRS, and all those other crazy ABC organizations. I hung up on her! I did, Cosmo, I hung up on the president of the United States! I can’t believe I did that.” All the while she babbled on, Cosmo’s phone kept ringing. It finally stopped.

Cosmo laughed. “Do you want me to throw away the phone? I will.” Without waiting for Lizzie to respond, he walked over to the fireplace and tossed the cell phone into the flames. He was grinning from ear to ear at Lizzie’s horrified expression. “Just for the record, I did not vote for Martine Connor.”

Lizzie burst out laughing as she threw herself into Cosmo’s arms. “I love you, do you know that? When are we going to get married?”

Stunned beyond belief, Cosmo blinked. Then he laughed until the house shook. “How about right now? I know a twenty-four-hour chapel.” He held his breath waiting for Lizzie’s response.

Lizzie’s smile lit the room. “Hey, I’m ready. Put your shoes on, and let’s go.”

Cosmo blinked. “This isn’t very romantic, Elizabeth. I wanted to ask you myself. I rehearsed, in front of the mirror, for hours, and I had it down pat. And then I chickened out because I convinced myself you would say
no.”

“I know.” Lizzie giggled. “That’s why I asked you. So, are we doing it or not?”

Cosmo held out first one foot, then the other. “See! I have my shoes on. Should we stop for some flowers? I have the ring. You said a plain gold band. I got a plain gold band. Do ya want to see it?”

“Well, yeah, Cosmo. On second thought, no, not until you slip it on my finger. Will that work for you?”

“It absolutely works for me, Elizabeth. It absolutely does.”

“Then what are we waiting for?” Lizzie asked, linking her arm with his. “I can’t wait to become Mrs. Cosmo Cricket.”

Cosmo thought he was going to black out. In the whole of his life, he’d never been this happy. “They give you a video,” he said.

“No kidding! Can you order extras? I want to send one to everyone I know so all my friends can see how happy I am.”

Cosmo walked straight into the front door.

Lizzie laughed so hard she doubled over. “Come along, my darling. I don’t want you killing yourself before I get to say ‘I do.’”

Cosmo walked out to his car in a daze. He didn’t say a word when Lizzie said she would drive.

“Last chance to back out,” Lizzie said as she slid behind the wheel.

“You must be kidding!”

Lizzie laughed all the way back to town.

Annie woke with a start. Groggy and hungover, she groaned loud enough to wake Myra, who had been sleeping propped up against the refrigerator. “Oh, my God!” she wailed.

“Myra, it’s five thirty! Quick, we have to clean up this mess and get breakfast ready. I knew we should have cleaned it up last night. My head is killing me. And, we smell to high heaven.
You
drank all that whiskey?”

Myra pushed her glasses higher on her nose to peer at the empty bottle lying on the floor. “I think I had a little help. All right, all right! I have an idea. Just wrap the tablecloth around everything and dump it all outside the door. Load the dishwasher with the pots and pans, splash some water on your face and we’re good to go. It will work, Annie, if you move your ass like right now. I’ll make breakfast!”

“You can’t cook, Myra. I’ll do the cooking, you do the cleanup. Hurry!”

Between the two women, they soon had the dining room back to normal, the dishwasher humming, bacon on the grill, and toast ready to pop. Also, a bowl of frothy yellow foam was standing ready, the sideboard held a pitcher of juice, and the coffee urn was working at full capacity.

“What did we resolve last night?” Myra shouted.

“Not a damn thing,” Annie shouted back. “I don’t think we should do that again for a long time. My head feels like it’s going to fly right off my shoulders. How do you feel, Myra?”

“Sick and sorry I listened to you, that’s how I feel. It snowed again during the night. Looks like maybe another six inches,” Myra said, peering out the dining room window. “We’re snowed in again. Did anyone call us during the night? I can guarantee the girls didn’t have their phones turned on. We really should check the phones,” Myra said fretfully.

“Forget that
we
business, Myra. As you can see, I’m rather busy here.” Spatula in hand, Annie slid the pile of bacon from the grill onto a serving platter. She waited another minute, then added the sausage patties Bert Navarro loved.

Myra made her way back to the kitchen, the encrypted phones in her hand. “Oh, oh! Maggie called five times. Lizzie called three times. I’m leaving them turned off until breakfast is over, and we have our heads on straight. God, Annie, how do people drink like that day after day? I hope we didn’t rot out our livers.”

“Myra, shut up! Look, we got drunk, we’re paying for it this morning. We are never going to do it again, so just shut up. Whatever Maggie and Lizzie were calling about can wait. It’s now five minutes to six. Try to look alive even if you don’t feel like it. And, remember this, we are of an age where we do not have to explain ourselves to
anyone.”

Myra fingered her pearls with one hand as she tried to smooth down her wiry curls with the other. She shrugged. Sometimes Annie made perfect sense. Other times she was halfway to the moon.

“My dear, you are absolutely right,” Myra said, placing a hand on Annie’s shoulder.

“If I hurt your feelings, I’m sorry. This just hasn’t been a good time for me lately. I promise to do better. It is what it is. I’m going to build up the fire unless there’s something else you need me to do.”

“I got it covered. Tend to the fire while I carry all this over to the sideboard. I think I hear the girls! We pulled it off, my dear. Age and determination wins out every time.”

Myra smiled to herself as she tossed a huge log onto the dying embers. Flames shot up the chimney as the log caught and blazed to life. She returned to the kitchen to wash her hands before she joined Annie in the dining room.

The early dawn chased away the dark, velvety shadows of the night as the girls crossed the compound, the men behind them, to the main dining room for the early breakfast they’d all been ordered to attend.

The mountain was quiet with a blanket of over five new inches of snow that had fallen during the night. They grumbled among themselves but only because they’d all wanted to sleep in that morning.

On the porch they stomped the snow off their boots, then slid out of them and set them aside once they were indoors.

The blazing fire along with the aromas of fresh-brewed coffee and fried bacon put them all in a good mood as they lined up at the sideboard to fill their plates. No one made a comment about Myra and Annie looking less than fresh or that they were wearing the same clothes they’d worn the night before.

The conversation was light, bantering, as they talked of the snow and the spring that was slow in arriving.

Myra nibbled on dry toast and sipped at her coffee. She murmured something vague about going on a diet. Annie, on the other hand, gobbled down her own breakfast and went back for seconds. She kept up a running dialogue about planting marigolds that were guaranteed to give triple the amount of blooms if sulfur was added to the potting soil. No one was interested enough to comment.

Yoko and Isabelle cleared the table the moment everyone placed their napkins on it, the signal that the social aspect of the gathering was at an end per Charles’s previous instructions. Old habits were hard to break.

“I only have forty minutes before I have to head down the mountain,” Bert said as he inched his chair closer to the table. “Having said that, let me bring you up-to-date on what I know personally. I was called to the White House seven times in as many days. The new administration at the moment is in total chaos. I had two closed-door meetings with the president, and may I say she serves a good cup of coffee. She’s haggard, she’s a nervous wreck and admitted it to me. Half of her appointees are probably going to be resigning, and if they haven’t done so yet, their resignations are ready to be handed in. That old devil sex has reared its ugly head once again. Martine Connor wants the FBI, me in particular, to find the woman who enticed her people—that’s how she put it to me, ‘the woman who enticed my people’—and arrest her. She wants this all done quietly. The only problem is that the other side of the aisle has already gotten wind of it. If that is the case, I have no idea why they aren’t exploiting it. The president gave me a list half a mile long of the men in her administration who participated in, as she put it, ‘nefarious doings.’ She really thinks we can keep it quiet and cover it up. I told her it was impossible but that I would do my best. Personally, I couldn’t believe how naïve she is.

“When I was leaving, I stopped for a moment to speak with her secretary, and she jokingly said it would be nice if the Vigilantes showed up to pull some magic rabbits out of a few hats. The chief of staff, who was on the list, turned a little green but pretended to agree. It’s not good. I’m on my way to Vegas and will check in with you sometime this evening after I get briefed by the Vegas office.”

“Lizzie is in Las Vegas. Her trip is purely personal,” Annie said. “But I’m sure if you need her for anything, she’ll be glad to help out. She volunteered to meet with us via webcam, but we postponed that because of your late arrival.”

“So what is this meeting all about?” Nikki asked.

The women seated around the table looked at one another. As one, they shrugged.

“I think we’re waiting to hear from Maggie,” Myra said. “She’s going to be faxing us a list of names. Until we get that, there’s nothing any of us can do. Exxxccceeppt,” she said, drawing out the word as long as she could, “figuring out what and how we’re going to deal with those names. And, I do not think we should concern ourselves with Martine’s promise of a pardon or allow that to influence whatever decisions we make. We can always deal with Martine Connor on our own terms when the time is right.”

“Myra’s right,” Jack said as he repeated everything Maggie and Lizzie had said at their early-morning meeting the previous day.

“Yah, Myra!” Kathryn said. “That means I agree.”