She wasn’t going to be glad to see him. He didn’t have any illusions about that. She’d hit the skids, turning sadistic tricks and stealing from her johns for a living, and he’d become one of the most elite and highly skilled soldiers in the world. It was the only reason he’d been tagged for SDF, not because he’d grown up in Denver and knew the guys. The personal association was a bonus, not a prerequisite. Johnny knew who and what he was, and so did Dylan Hart. Dylan knew how he’d been trained, where he’d been, what he’d done, and how he’d survived. It was more than enough to earn him a slot on the team-and Dylan knew that, too.
Methamphetamines, Johnny guessed, crossing Sixteenth at Wynkoop. Maybe crack cocaine, maybe heroin. Whatever had derailed Esme Alden’s life was probably something she was popping, putting up her nose, or shooting into her veins. He’d seen enough drug-induced destruction to know the score, and nothing else could have sunk her so low.
At least that was his best guess until he reached the alcove.
Two glass doors with transoms were set back from the sidewalk, with the words FABER BUILDING and a date, 1937, chiseled in stone on the lintel above them. Flanked by an Oriental rug store on one side, and a pizza place called The Joint on the other, the doors each opened onto a long set of stairs leading up to the building’s upper floors-two doors, but there wasn’t any guesswork involved in which one she’d taken. B & B INVESTIGATIONS, ROBERT BAINBRIDGE, PROP. was painted in gold letters on the north door, along with three other businesses.
Yeah, Johnny remembered her old man had been a private investigator working for Bainbridge, and he remembered one day back in high school when Christian Hawkins, the SDF operative known as Cristo on the streets of Denver and Superman everywhere else, had let him know some gumshoe from B & B was snooping around, asking questions about him. Her old man’s instincts had been good. Johnny had definitely had designs on the PI’s daughter. He never had known, though, what Mr. Alden could have come up with, other than the same facts everybody already knew about Juan Ramos-that he’d spent time in juvie, dropped out of school twice before he’d decided to stick it out, and that he’d been with his older brother the night Domingo had been killed in City Park, capped by a Parkside Blood in a turf war.
Old news.
But Esme Alden dressing up like a hooker to do some work for her father-well, that was good news, in a bad sort of way, if that’s what had been going on at the Oxford. And if that was what had been going on, what the hell was her old man thinking? Sending her to deal with guys like that German? For that matter, what the hell was Bainbridge thinking? Of course, Robert Bainbridge had to be in his eighties by now, maybe even his nineties. He’d been older than dirt since forever, so maybe he wasn’t thinking too clearly about anything anymore.
Johnny stepped back onto the sidewalk and looked up. Of the eight windows stretching across the second floor above the rug store, two were lit. He stepped back into the alcove and pressed all the intercom buttons next to the north door.
“Carlson Services,” a man answered one of the intercoms.
“Delivery,” Johnny said, giving it his best shot, and a couple of seconds later, the door buzzed.
Esme closed the door of B & B Investigations behind her and immediately pulled the heart-and-sequin shirt off over the top of her head. The gloves came next. She didn’t bother to turn on the lights. The streetlamps on Wynkoop gave off enough light for her to see the main office, not that there was much to see beyond a bunch of old filing cabinets, a couple of beat-up desks, and a couple of mismatched, overstuffed chairs she knew were tucked in the corners somewhere. A door flanked by two bookcases led into another, smaller office, Robert Bainbridge’s private office, otherwise known as her father’s storage room. There was no Robert Bainbridge at B & B Investigations anymore. Failing health had landed him in a nursing home a few years back, and his business had been hanging by a financial thread ever since, a situation that had taken an even sharper downhill turn since her father’s ill-fated involvement with the Mountaineer Dog Track, a badass bookie in town named Franklin Bleak, and the truly hapless Otto Von Lindberg.
She had the painting now, though, and that was a start toward sorting this mess out. Once she made her delivery of the painting to Isaac Nachman, Otto wouldn’t have any choice but to hightail his deviant butt back to San Francisco to deal with his boss as best he may. Esme didn’t envy him the job. Erich Warner didn’t suffer fools gladly, and he suffered losers even less well.
Tossing the shirt and gloves onto a chair, she checked her watch.
Eight-thirty. The night was still young, and she was on schedule-a ridiculously tight schedule. Getting all her players in place in time to meet Franklin Bleak’s deadline had left her with a very small window of opportunity.
The sudden buzzing of the intercom on the security system brought her to a standstill, all her senses on alert. Then the intercom in the office next door buzzed. When she heard Pete Carlson buzz back, she relaxed.
Pizza delivery, she thought. Pete liked his Friday night pizza, The Joint’s version of Chicago-style. She’d gone over and shared it with him more than once as a kid, when her dad had been working late and her mom had been pulling the night shift at the hospital. Nothing had changed there either. Her mom still worked the night shift at Denver General.
Bending over, she released the straps on her platform heels and kicked them off her feet. Timing was everything tonight. As long as she kept moving, she could pull this deal off. On her way across the office, she lowered the zipper on her skirt and let it fall to the floor.
It hadn’t been Otto on the intercom. She knew that for damn sure, and if by some chance, for whatever reason, somebody had been tailing her tonight, they were hell and gone out of luck if they thought they were going to find a shopworn hooker with a limp in the Faber Building. That girl was disappearing fast.
As she passed her desk, she leaned over and hit the play button on the phone, then continued on to the bathroom, where she did turn on a light. She set the white vinyl tote on the floor, keeping it close, and left the door open, so she could hear the messages come off the machine.
The first one was dearly predictable.
“Esme, you’re not answering your cell, honey, and I need you to stop at the Sooper’s to pick up your father’s prescription and a watermelon. Aunt Nanna forgot to get a watermelon for the twins’ birthday tomorrow. Everyone is just thrilled that you were able to get home for the party. And that’s the Sooper’s just off Federal, not the new one. Oh, just a second…”
The line went quiet for a moment, then her mom came back on. “Okay, honey, I just pulled into the hospital, and I’ve got to get to work. Don’t forget the watermelon. Thanks, baby.”
Geezus, her mother was so clueless, so sweet and clueless, and that was for the best. Burt Alden worked hard to keep her in the dark, with varying degrees of success, and far be it from Esme to shine a klieg light on her father’s less-than-kosher activities. She loved her mother too much for that-but a watermelon? Honest to God, there was a helluva lot more at stake tonight than a damn watermelon, and she sure as hell hadn’t come all the way from Seattle for Danny and Deb’s seventeenth birthday party. Not that she didn’t love them, but geez.
The answering machine beeped for the second message.