Out in the hall, just a few steps away, stood the security guard.
The woman set the tray on the top of the dresser and left without saying a word. The door closed, and locked.
“Dinner is served,” Nicky said. She took off one lid and said, “Ooh, Italian.”
Chloe approached and lifted the lid off the second plate, slowly, as though there were a rat underneath it.
“Linguine with chicken in a garlic and wine sauce, I think,” Nicky said. “The food’s so good here, I keep thinking every meal must be my last one, you know? They serve you something nice before they strap you into the chair.” She rolled her eyes. “Actually, I don’t think that’s how they’ll do it.”
Chloe tucked into the food. She hadn’t realized, until the meal had arrived, how hungry she was. She ate standing by the dresser, and inhaled the pasta in less than three minutes.
“You in a rush to get somewhere?” Nicky asked.
Moments after finishing, the door was unlocked and opened. Standing there was the woman Chloe saw, very briefly, in the back of the limo.
“This is Roberta,” Nicky said. And then, to Roberta, she said, “I’d introduce you but I figure you already know who she is.”
Roberta ignored Nicky’s snide comment. She turned to Chloe and said, “Your host would like a word. Come with me.”
Chloe looked worriedly at Nicky. Was this it? Had she just had her last meal?
“Don’t be afraid,” Roberta said. “He’s really looking forward to meeting you.”
Roberta stepped into the hall and motioned for Chloe to follow. They walked a short way to the broad landing, then up to the third floor, through a set of open doors and down a hallway that was lined with windows on the street side, and black-and-white erotic photography on the other. Chloe paused in front of a four-foot-square photo of female genitalia.
Chloe asked, “Is this you? Because you seem like a really big cunt to me.”
At the end of the hall was a set of double doors. Roberta opened them outward and motioned for Chloe to walk in first.
Holy shit, Chloe thought.
She figured this was supposed to be an office, or a library, judging by all the shelved books and the big desk in the center of the room, but there was more square footage here than in her entire home. On top of that, a goddamn RV was parked on the far wall. How the hell did that get up here?
But her focus quickly turned to the man sitting behind the desk. Midfifties, sixty maybe, with a full head of gray hair, neatly trimmed. Slim, tanned, handsome. Long face, chiseled jaw. Sitting behind the desk, all she could see was his shirt. Powder blue, button-down collar.
But then he stood and came around the desk. Jeans, faded, but shit, were they pressed?
“Let me look at you,” he said.
Oh no, Chloe thought. Maybe she really had been brought here to be part of some sex thing.
“Please, sit,” the man said, motioning to the leather chairs on this side of the desk.
Chloe sat.
Roberta said, “Would you like me to stay, Jeremy?”
“If you wouldn’t mind waiting in the hall,” he said.
With that, Roberta slipped away, closing the double doors behind her.
“I’m Jeremy Pritkin,” he said, sitting in the chair next to hers.
“Figured,” Chloe said.
“How are you enjoying your stay, Chloe?”
“I thought the pasta had a titch too much garlic in it.”
He nodded. “If there’s something else you’d like, we could fix it up for you.”
“I’d like a ticket out of here.”
Jeremy smiled. “Tell me something about yourself.”
“Like what?”
“What do you do?”
“I’m a waitress. At a diner in Providence.”
“I see. You’ve been at that for a while, haven’t you?”
Chloe’s eyes narrowed. “Why do I get the feeling you already know the answers to the questions you’re asking?”
“It’s true, most of them I do,” Jeremy Pritkin said. “I know your history. About your mom, and her partner. That she passed a few years ago. I would get occasional reports.”
What the fuck? Chloe thought.
“They were... disappointing,” he said. “You weren’t exactly a straight-A student, were you?”
“I don’t understand,” Chloe said.
“Have you never aspired to anything more? You’re content to be a waitress for the rest of your life?”
“No,” she said.
“What then? Please, indulge me.”
“Film,” she said. “Documentaries, stuff like that. I would like to make them.”
Jeremy brightened. “That I did not know. You have a talent in that regard?”
“I have no idea,” she said. “But I’d like to do that.”
Jeremy nodded thoughtfully. “Well, that’s something, I suppose.”
“I still don’t... what is the point of this?”
Jeremy looked down into his lap. A sadness seemed to have come over him. “This is very difficult for me, Chloe. I don’t expect you to understand, but believe me when I say that it is. Very difficult. To see you, sitting here.”
Jeremy sighed. And then, before her eyes, he appeared to transform. His forlorn expression turned into something harder, like warm water suddenly turning to ice.
“There are some things I need to know,” he said.
“Right back atya,” she snapped.
“I need you to tell me everything that you and Miles Cookson have learned.”
“Why do you care? What’s it to you?”
“Don’t make this any more difficult than necessary,” Jeremy said. “For your own sake.”
“Fuck that,” Chloe said. “You want to know something, then you go first. Tell me what this is all about.”
Jeremy sighed. He raised his head and called out, “Roberta!”
The woman reappeared. This time, she had something in her hand. It was hanging at her side.
A belt.
Jeremy stood and then, with great solemnity, placed his hand gently on Chloe’s head, felt the texture of her hair on his palm.
He closed his eyes.
Chloe froze, so taken aback by the gesture that she did not know what to do.
After several seconds, Jeremy opened his eyes and took his hand away. Chloe watched him walk to the door, nod to Roberta, and leave.
Once in the hallway, he closed the doors behind him. The first time he heard Roberta lash Chloe with the belt, and the young woman’s simultaneous scream, he flinched, ever so slightly.
But when the second strike came, and then the third, and the fourth, it was like he wasn’t hearing anything at all.
Fifty-Four
Somewhere over Pennsylvania
Miles and Samantha had left poor Travis pretty much in a state of bewilderment. Miles hardly knew what to tell him. He was as shocked to find Samantha was his “girlfriend” as Travis was to learn that Sandy was not really Sandy.
But Miles did take time to offer the young man some advice.
“Get out of town. Go away for a few days and don’t tell anyone where you’re going. Don’t take this van. They know what it looks like. Take a bus or a train and pay cash. Ditch your phone and get a burner or something.”
Travis had been shell-shocked.
“Do you understand me?” Miles had asked.
Finally, he’d nodded. “What’ll I tell my parents?”
Miles had paused. “You might want to consider taking them with you.”
Miles had given him a number to call in a week’s time. By then, Miles hoped he’d be able to tell him whether it was safe to come in from the cold.
Then Miles took Samantha to the airport. On the way back to Connecticut, in the private jet he’d chartered, Miles got the full story from Samantha.