“No, nothing. I usually come in through the front door, not the back, so I hadn’t even been in that hallway.”
“You didn’t hear anything?”
“Like?”
“An argument? A shot? Footsteps in the hall?”
The woman shook her head hopelessly. “Nothing. It must have happened before I got here.”
Wedmore figured that was the case.
Sylvia said, “We’ve had trouble here before, but never anything like this.”
“What kind of trouble?”
“A few years ago we had a break-in. Someone made off with nearly a hundred thousand dollars’ worth of wedding gowns. Who steals wedding gowns? Insurance only covered a fraction of it. I thought, when Mr. Duggan set up his office there, that maybe we’d be safer. It was like having a security guard here, you know? Because he used to be a cop. Did you know that?”
“I did,” Rona Wedmore said.
“It never occurred to me that him being here was just going to attract trouble. Look at my hand. It’s shaking.”
“You never had any more break-ins?”
Sylvia shook her head. “Never. Spent a fortune on cameras for nothing.”
“Excuse me?”
“The surveillance cameras we put up out back.” Monroe looked at Wedmore as if she’d just remembered where she left her car keys. “Should I have mentioned those to you?”
Fifty
Terry
Vince went down to his knees, then threw out both his hands to brace himself. I thought he was going to pass out, but he spent a moment on the floor there, on hands and knees, panting and catching his breath.
“Call 911,” Cynthia said to me.
“No!” Vince bellowed.
She struck off for the kitchen.
“Don’t call!” he yelled, looking down.
She returned with a glass of water. “Drink this,” she said, holding it in front of his face. He took one palm off the floor so he could do as he was told. Grace was perched halfway up the steps to the second floor, taking it all in, her eyes fixed on Vince.
He took a couple of sips and handed the glass back to Cynthia. I was next to her now, extending a hand.
“Here,” I said. He grasped it, hard, and with great effort got back up on two feet. “Over here,” I said, moving him to the closest living room chair.
“No time,” Vince said, his voice breaking.
“Just for a minute,” Cynthia said. “Till you have your strength back.”
“I have to... have to start making the rounds.”
“Damn it, sit for a minute,” Cynthia said. “Do you have chest pains?”
“No.”
“You’re sure?”
“Just... I’m just tired. A wave kind of came over me...”
“Drink some more of this.”
“Something stronger...”
“Drink the water.”
He took two more gulps, handed the glass back again.
“Fill us in,” I said.
“Some guy. Using Jane’s phone. He said they’ve got her. They want everything.”
“Did you talk to her?”
“She got one — two words out. Mine, and then she said, ‘Don’t,’ and then they wouldn’t let her say anything else. But it was her.” He made fists with both hands, opened them, closed them again. “I’ll kill them,” he said quietly. “All of them.”
Cynthia glanced at me, then said to Vince, “No one doubts you for a second about that, but right now you have to figure out how to get her back.”
“You think I don’t know that? But after I do, I swear to God...”
He looked at both of us, and for a moment I thought I saw a flicker of self-pity in them.
I asked, “What did you mean when you said they want everything?”
“Everything!” he said, as if it should be obvious. “Everything I’ve got! Everything I’ve put away for people. The money, anything else. They want it all.” Vince shook his head. “If that’s what it takes to get Jane, fine, they’ll get it. But after that, I’m a dead man. And if I’m a dead man, I’m taking them with me.”
I had an idea what he was getting at, but he must have seen confusion on our faces, so he spelled it out more clearly.
“I’m paying a ransom with other people’s money and property. One day, they’re gonna want it back, and they’re not gonna be happy when I tell them I gave it all away. These are not forgiving people. I’m talking bikers. I’m talking bank robbers. I’m talking drug dealers. I’m a dead man walking, in more ways than one. So these fuckers who took Jane, I don’t care how many I take down, or what happens to me after.”
“It’ll matter to Jane,” Cynthia said.
Vince shrugged. Defiantly, he stood bolt upright out of the chair. But his top half swayed slightly and he had to put his arms out for balance.
“Shit,” he said.
“You can’t do this,” Cynthia said. “You’re not well. You’ve got to let somebody else handle this. You have to call the police, Vince.”
“No!” he shouted. Weak as he was, he could still make his words echo off the walls. He pointed a meaty index finger at both of us. “No police.”
“Vince, for God’s sake,” Cynthia said, keeping her voice calm. “They’ve got experience with this kind of thing.”
“They got no experience with handling this kind of thing the way I intend to handle it,” Vince said. “Christ, can you imagine if I called the cops? They’d love that. They’d put the cuffs on me and spend a week busting my balls before they got around to looking for Jane.”
I thought he was probably right about that.
“No, no way. I’ll handle this.”
“Do you know who has her?” I asked.
His head went side to side slowly. “But I got an idea. I think I recognize the voice. A woman. Someone who brought some cash for me to hide a few days ago. Now I think maybe she was sizing me up, seeing how the operation works. I was wondering that about those two guys who came to see me last night, too. Maybe they’re in this together.”
“What two guys?”
“Logan, and his asshole brother, Joseph. The donut eater.”
I had no idea what he was talking about.
“There was something about them didn’t smell right. But the woman, she must have an idea how much money and stuff there is. She said bring it all. Said if I didn’t, she’d know. Son of a bitch. If she really knows, then I’m gonna be coming up short.”
“The Cummings house,” I said. “You got ripped off last night.”
“Two hundred grand, and incidentals,” Vince said, his jaw tightening. “I gotta go.”
He took a couple of unsteady steps toward the door.
“What about your guys?” I asked. “You said you’ve got nobody.”
Another shrug. “Eldon’s dead. Gordie’s dead. And Bert, he’s bailed. Abandoned me. Disloyal fuck.”
Cynthia gasped. “Two of your men are dead? These people who have Jane, did they kill them?”
A shake of the head. “No. Eldon... had a problem. And Bert said Gordie was in an accident. Minutes ago. Hit by a truck.”
“You mentioned Nathaniel,” Cynthia said. “You said dog walker.”
“They thought he might have ripped off the stash last night. Picked him up for a chat. Things didn’t go right.”
“Is Nate — what happened to Nate?” Cynthia asked.
“Got away.”
Cynthia looked relieved. “What are you going to do?” she asked.
“Pull together what I can, in the time I’ve got. Bert, Gordie got to a few places where we tucked stuff away. But not all. They were running out of time — some people were home; they couldn’t get in without causing a scene. Had to find out if we’d been hit anywhere else. They pulled together a few hundred thou, some other stuff. I can raise maybe another couple hundred, buy myself some time.”