Poppy caught his eye and glared at him through the mask. He shrugged, like. What else am I supposed to say?
Better say nothing, Paulie. Mac finds out you almost messed up his little package and he’ll be like all over you.
She was still pissed at Paulie. Really, how could one man be so stupid? He had the pills in his goddamn pocket. All he had to do was— She cut off the train. She got crazy every time she thought about it. Better to leave it alone.
But she was still royally pissed.
“What?” Paulie was saying. “Aw, come on! You gotta be shitting me, man!” Uh-oh. What else had gone wrong?
She saw Paulie glance at her but his gaze skittered away. He turned his back and lowered his voice, but she could see his shoulder muscles bunching up and knew he was arguing. He stole a second gun-shy look her way, then took the phone into the bedroom.
Obviously, Paulie and Mac weren’t seeing eye to eye about something. She wondered what it was. No matter. She’d find out soon enough. She closed the door and returned to Katie.
Took a long time, maybe fifteen minutes, before Paulie knocked on the door.
“You wanna come out here a minute?”
She slipped out the door, closed it behind her, and immediately pulled off the mask. Cool air felt great on her face. Hot and humid inside that plastic. She blotted the moisture off her face with her sleeve, then looked at Paulie. Jesus, he looked totally spooked. His eyes were darting all around the room, anywhere but at her.
“What’s wrong?” she said.
“That was Mac.”
“Who else would it be. What’d he want?”
“He says the package’s father ain’t cooperating.”
“Ain’t cooperating? You mean he don’t want her back?”
“I don’t know exactly. Mac says he’s giving him a hard time.”
Poppy looked at the bedroom door. Jesus! Somebody steals your little girl and you haggle over the price? Like what kind of father does that?
“The son of a bitch.”
“Yeah. So…” Paulie was staring real hard at the floor. “So Mac wants us to send the guy a persuader.” Poppy froze, staring at Paulie, who was still looking at the floor. She’d been gut punched once, and that was how she felt right now. She thought she was going to puke. But she controlled it. And she controlled the urge to launch herself at Paulie and start screaming like a banshee. She controlled everything.
And slowly she turned to ice.
Then steel.
No one was going to hurt that little girl.
“Uh-uh,” she said softly. She kept her voice low, even. “Not a chance.”
Paulie’s head jerked up like he’d been slapped. He stared at her like she was a stranger. Obviously he’d expected a different reaction.
“Hey, Poppy, we gotta do it.”
“Really? Says who?”
“Mac. I told you—”
“Mac says, ‘Jump,’ and you say, ‘How high?’ That how it goes?”
“You think I want to do this? You think I want to hurt a kid? Christ, gimme a break! But this is Mac’s gig.”
“I don’t care if this is God’s gig—no one’s touching that kid.” She started to turn away but he grabbed her arm.
“Look. Mac wanted us to send the guy one of her fingers. I talked him down to a toe. A toe. Poppy! A freaking little toe! She’ll never miss it!”
Poppy wrenched her arm free. “Not a fingernail, Paulie! Not a hair! You got that?”
“It’s got to be done. Poppy!”
She went to the guest room door, turned, and faced him.
“Over my dead body.”
She could see that Paulie didn’t really believe her. How was she going to convince him? How could she stop him?
He took a step toward her. “With or without you, it’s gotta be done.”
“Through me first, Paulie. You’re gonna have to beat me to a total pulp before you get to her. I know you can do it. But will you do it? I hope not. I don’t think it’s in you. But if you do, you better kill me. That’s all I can say, Paulie—you better kill me. ‘Cause if you don’t, and you hurt that little girl, I’ll kill you. Some night when you’re sleeping, I’ll put a knife through your heart. That’s my promise: You hurt that kid and some morning real soon you’re gonna wake up dead.”
He stood and stared at her, his hands opening and closing at his sides.
“Christ! You’re really serious!”
She nodded. Yeah, she was. And that amazed her. She barely knew this little Katie and yet she was ready to die for her. What the hell was going on?
“You’re forgetting Mac, aren’t you?” he said. “We don’t do what he wants, we could all wake up dead. And then he can take any damn part of her he feels like.”
That shook her. Paulie was right. Mac wanted what he wanted. He was paying you, he expected you to take orders. Who knew what he’d do if they told him to shove his persuader.
Paulie ran both hands through his hair. “This is just great! I do what Mac wants, you’ll kill me. I do what you want, Mac kills me. How the fuck did I get into this?”
Poppy felt sorry for him. She was putting him in a real jam. She didn’t want to see Katie or Paulie hurt.
“There’s got to be like some way out of this,” she said.
“Yeah?” Paulie said. “Like how? Mac wants a piece of her to send to her father. He’s not going to settle for anything less.”
Poppy didn’t know where the idea came from—she just blurted it out: “All right. Send one of my toes.”
Paulie gaped at her. “Are you nuts? That’s not only crazy, that’s stupid. Like her father ain’t gonna know the difference. What’s happened to you. Poppy? What is it with you and this kid? I thought you hated kids.”
“I… I do,” she said. “But not this one.” Poppy leaned back against the door. Suddenly she felt miserable. Her ice and steel were melting away. She was all shaky inside.
“Can we call a truce?” she said.
“Sure.” Paulie had his hands on his hips and was walking around in circles. “But that’s not gonna help us when Mac calls back with the address of where I’m supposed to deliver his persuader. What do I tell him then?”
“We’ll think of something.”
He stopped and stared at her. He looked worried— real worried. “Don’t be so sure.”
“I think I need a hug,” she said, taking a small step toward him.
He continued to stare at her, then shook his head and opened his arms. He wasn’t smiling—she could tell he was a long way from that—but she really did need a hug.
She fell against him and clutched him to her.
“Don’t let’s fight, Paulie. We’re in this together, and together we’re bigger and better than Mac.”
“I ain’t so sure of that. One thing’s for sure, we ain’t meaner. And that’s gonna get us in trouble.”
“We’ll think of something.”
“We’d better.” He kissed the top of her head. “You make me crazy, you know that? You’ll be the death of me yet.”
Poppy clutched him tighter. Dear God, she hoped not.
8
Daniel Keane watched his grandson swing from rung to rung on the jungle gym and felt a little sick. Not because he feared he might fall. No, in this upscale Mclean, Virginia, playground, the ground under the slides and swings and jungle gym was padded. Danny had already fallen twice and bounced right back up again.
Little Danny—five years old, named after his grandpa, and full of boundless energy. A regular little monkey on those bars. But thinking of Danny and how precious he was to everyone who knew him led to thoughts of John Vanduyne’s little girl. And thus the nausea.
Dan knew her name… Katie… knew everything about her and her father. And he’d fed all that information to Carlos Salinas. Who used it to kidnap her.
Dan didn’t know for sure that it had been done, but he’d checked on Vanduyne yesterday and learned that he’d left his office almost immediately after arriving, and hadn’t been heard from since. Dan had a pretty good— and pretty sickening—idea what that meant.