The Fifth Avenue Series Boxed Set (58 page)

Eric’s shoulder was drooping.
 
The pain was unbearable.
 
He was about to shout when one of De Cicco’s men came behind him and covered his mouth with a hand.

“You can live or you can die,” Mario said.
 
“Your choice.
 
To live, you need to tell me who you called to put the contract on Leana.”

Without hesitation, Eric jerked his head away to free his mouth and blurted out the person’s name.

Without hesitation, Mario De Cicco grabbed Eric again and lifted him to the top of the staircase.
 
And right there, on Eric’s face, was the shock of what was about to happen to him.
 
He tried to struggle, tried to get this man off him, but it was useless.
 
De Cicco leaned close to Eric’s ear.
 
“You fucked with the wrong person.
 
Nobody touches Leana Redman.
 
When they do, just look at what happens.”
 

*
 
 
*
  
*

The cab swung in front of Redman Place.
 
Eric and Diana rushed out.
 
She tossed another hundred through the passenger’s side window, thanked the driver and ran with Eric to the revolving doors.
 

Across the lobby was the bank of elevators.
 
They hurried toward them, pressed the button and waited for one of the doors to open.

*
  
*
  
*

“You told me you’d let me live!” Eric shouted.

“I lied,” De Cicco said.
 
“Ain’t that a bitch?”

“Here’s your bitch,” Eric said.
 
“It’s Leana Fucking Redman.
 
Tell her for me that she can burn in hell.
 
Tell her for me that she can—”
 

But before Eric could finish speaking, De Cicco pushed him down the winding staircase.
 

Mario and his men moved forward to watch him fall.
 
They watched his body twist and bend in unnatural angles as he toppled down the staircase, they watched his cast catch on a rung and snap it in half, and they watched what happened when he suddenly flipped over and his neck came down hard on the banister.
 

It wasn’t the wood that cracked—the banister could sustain the impact.
 
Instead, it was the bones in Eric’s neck that cracked and the sound they made was like wood splintering in the room.
 
As Eric Parker continued to fall, the men noted the difference in how he fell.
 
He now was a rag doll.
 
As he fell to the bottom of the steps, there was no life in him—just momentum behind him.
 
He was dead and lying in a growing pool of his own blood by the time he hit the floor.

“Let’s move,” De Cicco said.
 

The men hurried down the stairs, Mario placed a gloved finger on Eric Parker’s neck, felt no pulse and joined his men as they checked the room to make certain no trace of themselves was there.
 
They were backing out of the room and looking for any signs of a struggle when Mario brushed against a side table.
 
He looked down and saw Parker’s watch and wallet, and what looked to be a check.
 

He lifted the check, read the amount, looked at the name of the corporation listed on it and then looked back in surprise at Parker.
 
What was World Enterprises?
 
Who was behind it?
 
Why had they paid Parker $90 million?
 
What had he done to earn it?

Mario pocketed the check.
 
Since there was no asking Eric Parker now, they left the room, found the stairs and began rushing down them just as an elevator door whisked open.
 
De Cicco and his men were three floors down when they heard a woman, her voice high and shrill, call out Eric’s name.

They hesitated.

And then they fled down the stairs when she began screaming.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

Carving a path in the evening sky, the plane soared over the Atlantic, hurtling towards New York and JFK.

Michael unbuckled his safety belt, reached for Leana’s hand and squeezed it gently.
 
She had been silent ever since they left Heathrow and he could sense her slowly withdrawing into that part of herself that no one could hurt.
 
“I’ll be right back,” he said.

As he left his seat and walked towards the rear of the plane, the quiet rage that had been building within him since they left Monte Carlo finally struck.
 
He knew his father was behind this, knew that it was he who had Celina Redman murdered.
 
He probably used Spocatti,
he thought.
Probably got that son of a bitch to do it for him…

The stewardess smiled as he approached.

“Where are the phones?” Michael asked.

The woman motioned toward an area just outside the restrooms.
 
“They’re there, Mr. Archer.”

He thanked the woman, moved in their direction and swayed slightly when the plane hit a pocket of turbulence.
 
An older woman with a shock of blonde hair grabbed his arm as he passed her seat.
 
“You’re Michael Archer,” she said.

Michael released his arm, aware that other passengers were now looking at him.
 
Recognizing him.
 
“No,” he said. “I’m not.
 
But it happens all the time.
 
I’m flattered.”
 
And he moved on, ignoring the woman even as she said to the man seated beside her:
 
“I could have sworn….”

He picked up one of the telephones, swiped his credit card and dialed.
 
While he waited for the connection to go through, he thought back to earlier that evening:
 
Leana picking up the phone, hearing the conversation with his father, and how he quickly severed the connection when Louis took a breath.
 
Leana stepping into the bathroom, watching him while he showered.

At the time, Michael thought that if he ignored her, that if he just washed himself and acted as if nothing was out of the ordinary, she would doubt what she heard on the phone and think perhaps the lines somehow got crossed in the storm.
 
But what if she didn’t think she heard someone else’s conversation, not his?
 
What if she recognized his father’s voice and was just staying with him until she could safely escape?
 
Since his life was at stake, the implications unnerved him.

Finally, the line was answered by a woman. “Manhattan Enterprises.”

“Judy, it’s Michael.
 
Is my father in?”

“He’s in a conference, Michael.”

“Please tell him I’m on the line.
 
I’m calling from a plane.
 
It’s urgent.”

There was a sigh, a click and the abrupt sound of Muzak.
 
Michael closed his eyes and felt the familiar knot tightening in his stomach.
 
His life was out of control.
 
Yesterday morning he shot and killed a man in his apartment after the man burned his manuscript.
 
The police obviously were looking into that now, asking questions, following leads.

His father told him earlier that they found the charred bodies in his apartment and the Iranian cab driver dumped in an alley one block away.
 
Although Michael rented the apartment under an assumed name, he knew that sooner or later the police would learn it was his apartment the bodies were found in.

He was famous.
 
Although his apartment was surrounded by people whose reality was altered by drugs, certainly somebody had recognized him during the three weeks he’d lived there.

But I can help you
, Louis said.
 
Kill Redman and the police will never know that apartment was yours.

Although his father never said this, Michael knew the opposite also was true:
 
If you don’t kill Redman, every cop in the world will be after your ass.
 
As will Santiago.

It was an endless cycle that offered no escape.
 
Michael wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep going, how much longer he could keep up with the facade.

His father answered the line.
 
“What is it, Michael?”

“We need to talk.”

“That isn’t possible right now.”

“Not good enough,” Michael said.
 
“We need to talk.
 
Now.”

“And I said it isn’t possible.”

“Who are you with?”

“That’s none of your business.”

“Fine,” Michael said. “Then answer this for me and you can get back to your meeting—why did you have to kill her sister?”

“I’m not discussing this with you now.
 
Call me when you arrive in New York.”

Michael’s hand tightened around the receiver.
 
“Don’t hang up on me.”

The silence stretched.

“What is it?”

“I need to know if it’s safe for me to come back.”

“It’s safe,” Louis said.

“Are you sure?”

“I told you—it’s safe.”

But Michael could sense his father wasn’t telling him something.
 
He could sense that something was wrong.
 
“If you’re lying to me, Dad—”

“I’m not lying to you, Michael.
 
You’re going to have to trust me on this.”

 
While Michael knew he had no choice but to trust his father, he couldn’t help feeling that he was being pushed nearer to the edge of a cliff.
 
“Where do you expect Leana and me to stay when we get back?” he asked.

“That’s been taken care of.”

“Taken care of?” Michael said.
 
“When were you planning on telling me—next week?
 
We’ll be landing in another two hours. You’ve told me nothing—”

The line went dead.

*
  
*
  
*

Leana watched the night pass by, only dimly aware of the jet’s engines, the conversation of the couple seated in front of her, the diet-slim flight attendants as they whisked up and down the aisle.

She was still trying to understand and accept that her sister was dead and had been murdered only that morning.
 
And she could still hear Harold’s voice echoing like a cold whisper:
 
“Celina did love you, Leana.
 
I can’t tell you how many times she told me that she missed you.”