Gia had come out to paint. She was taking a break now, sitting at the white enameled table in the shade, nibbling delicate slivers of a bright green Granny Smith as she whittled them off with a paring knife. Her latest painting—the top of the Fifty-ninth Street Bridge glinting in the afternoon sun as it peeked over the townhouse roof—sat half finished on an easel by the playhouse. Jack liked it a hell of a lot better than any of Melanie Ehler's work, especially that one in her study. Gia, on the other hand, might go for Melanie's stuff. Her appreciation of art was so much wider than Jack's. Vicky picked up the baseball and threw it—wild.
She throws like a girl, Jack thought as he raced to intercept it before it hit her mother. But then, what else did he expect?
Jack caught the ball a few feet away from a cringing Gia.
"Many athletes in your family?" he said in a low voice.
"Not that I know of."
"Didn't think so."
"Looks like you've got your work cut out for you," she said, batting her blues as she smiled up at him.
"But I'm up to it." Then, raising his voice. "Before I'm through with her, the Vickster will be the best ballplayer in the whole damn city!"
"Yay!" Vicky cried, pumping her fist in the air.
They tossed the ball back and forth a few more times, and then Vicky wanted a break.
"I'm hungry," she said.
Gia held up her Granny Smith. "Want some apple?"
"Wait," Jack said. "I've got just the thing."
He trotted over tothe shopping bag he'd brought with him and produced a red paper box. He tossed it to Vicky.
"Animal crackers!" she cried, and tore open the top.
Jack watched Vicky munch and pick through the crackers to find her favorite animals. So easy to make her happy. She took such a disproportionate amount of pleasure from little things, and he took an equally disproportionate amount of pleasure from hers.
He looked around and knew he loved it here. So far from mutilated bodies and names stolen from dead children. At times like these he didn't want to leave. Ever.
Vicky turned to her mother. "Want a lion, Mommy?"
"Vicky!" Jack said in a shocked tone. "How can you say that? You know your mother doesn't eat meat!"
Gia winged her partially eaten apple at him.
It sailed wide. Jack reached out and snagged it, then took a sloppy bite and gave them both a big juicy grin. Vicky laughed. Gia smiled and shook her head as she bit into her lion cracker.
Life could be so good.
16
After a quick stop at his apartment to drop off the letter and pick up some extra clothes—and delay his return—Jack finally reached the hotel. As he walked up to the front entrance, he was struck by the absence of officialdom. He'd expected at least one blue-and-white unit to be hanging around.
The lobby looked pretty quiet too, although he could feel that strange tension again, coiling and building in the air. Most of the excitement should have subsided by now, but he'd expected to see at least one or two knots of people whispering and glancing over their shoulders.
He spotted Evelyn heading for the stairs on her Little Lotta feet. He hurried to catch up with her.
"I just got back," he said, slowing to match her pace. "Did Olive show up yet?"
She shook her head. "No one's seen her? And she hasn't contacted anyone?"
Jack repressed a groan. Don't tell me they haven't opened her room yet.
"What about her room?"
"She wasn't there? I had the managers—"
Jack froze. "What?"
"Her room was empty? I—" She stopped and looked at him with motherly concern. "Are you all right?"
Jack was mentally reeling. He knew if his face reflected half of the shock he was feeling, he must look terrible. He tried to compose himself.
"She wasn't in her room?"
She shook her head. "I can't tell you how relieved I am? I was so afraid? Like maybe we'd find her dead of a heart attack or a stroke or something?"
His mind raced, stumbling along as it tried to decide which way to go. Not there? Impossible. He'd seen her…dead…mutilated…her head twisted around…
"You're sure you had the right room?"
"Of course? Eight-twelve? I was there? I searched the room myself? Olive's suitcase? And her clothes? They're all there in the drawers? But no Olive? Isn't that strange?"
"Yeah," Jack said. "Real strange."
"It makes you wonder? You know, about the End Days? When the faithful are taken away in the Rapture? Could this be the start? And Olive is one of the first to be taken?"
How do I—how does anyone—answer that? Jack wondered.
Evelyn smiled and patted his arm. "Rapture or not, the show goes on? I have to run? I'm introducing Professor Mazuko's panel on Japanese UFOs? See you later?"
"Sure," Jack said, still feeling dazed. "Later."
He wandered up to the common area and dropped into a chair. Olive's corpse…gone. How had it been spirited out through a hotel full of people?
Spirited out…swell choice of words.
And without leaving a trace of the murder.
This left him and the killers as the only ones who knew that Olive Farina was dead.
Or was she dead? Did he know that?
Jack was having a SESOUP moment here—he'd witnessed something but didn't have a shred of physical evidence to prove it.
Had to stop that kind of thinking. Olive was dead. No question about that. But who sliced her up? The two men in black he'd run into? Or someone else?
All of which made Jack intensely uneasy. This was supposed to be a quiet job, a safe job. No rough stuff.
But the condition of Olive's corpse had said loud and clear that someone was playing very rough.
Of course there was always the possibility that Olive's murder had nothing to do with Melanie's disappearance.
Yeah, right. I should be so lucky.
Olive gone without a trace…just like Melanie. Did that mean Melanie was hidden away somewhere with no lips, no eyes, and a broken neck?
A logical conclusion, seeing as Jack, like everybody else except the killers, would be thinking of Olive as simply missing—or taken by the Rapture, if you were into that—if he hadn't broken into her room. He was glad he hadn't told Lew about Olive. He'd jump to the same conclusion, and that might just kill the poor guy.
He looked around at the SESOUP folk streaming into one of the conference rooms. Maybe these people weren't as crazy as they seemed. And maybe he could learn something useful at one of these panels.
As he followed the crowd he spied a flyer taped to the wall. He stepped closer to read it.
CALL FOR RESEARCH PARTICIPANTS
If one of your parents is an alien
OR
If one of your siblings or one of your children is the
product of an alien sexual encounter
PLEASE CALL IMMEDIATELY!
Then again, he thought, maybe SESOUPers are even crazier than they seem.
Even though Jack had been sure at times during his childhood that his older brother was part alien, he resisted copying down the phone number.
He filed inside and found a seat near the rear of the room. He fought an urge to shout out: "All those who believe in telekinesis, raise my hand!" Instead, he listened to Evelyn introduce Professor Hideki Mazuko of the University of Tokyo—what department, she didn't say—and was startled to learn that the man didn't speak any English. He did, however, speak French. So did Evelyn, and she would provide a running translation of Dr. Mazuko's address.
As a lantern-jawed middle-aged Asian in a gray suit, white shirt, red- and blue-striped tie advanced to the dais amid polite applause, Jack groaned and looked around for a way out. He realized he couldn't make it without stumbling over a lot of SESOUPers, so he grudgingly settled in and promised himself a trip to the bar immediately afterward.