Hank had been down with a zillion Taser volts in him and not noticing a whole lot of what was going on in his immediate vicinity. The guy had been wearing a beard so it was hard to sync up memories of Tyleski with Drexler’s description of the Taser guy. No point in getting sidetracked into the possibility that Tyleski could have grown a beard and been right under Hank’s nose for who the hell knew how long.
“According to Drexler, the Taser guy had brown hair and brown eyes, just like Tyleski, and he also knew all sorts of stuff no one outside the Order should know. So, couldn’t he and Tyleski be the same person?”
Szeto looked a little more interested. “Possible.”
“But still not probable?”
“I do not know.”
“Can we agree on still improbable, but less so?”
Szeto shrugged. “If you wish.”
“Good. Then, as I recall, last summer you were looking for a woman who knew lots more than she should.”
Szeto’s eyes flashed. “Louise Myers, yes. We know where is bitch but the One does not wish her touched.”
“But what if we-?”
“The One has spoken.”
Hank sighed. The One, the One, the One.
“Okay. Be that as it may, I recall that she had a protector who killed just about every man you sent against her. A man you never saw and could never find. And the Myers gal comes from that same town as the man Drexler knew as a boy, the one who vanished without a trace.”
Szeto dropped his feet from the desk and leaned forward. “You really think…?”
“All I’m saying is we’ve got three guys messing with us-‘Tyleski,’ the Taser guy, and the killer-and no one knows who they are or where they are. They’re untraceable.”
“But you mention boy.”
“Yeah. The boy-a fourth guy we can’t find. A circle is a perfect shape, and I see things circling back to a certain boy in that small town in Jersey. Could all four mystery men turn out to be just one guy?”
Szeto pounded his fist on the desk. “But we do not know where he is!”
“The boy’s got to have family-”
“All dead or disappeared.”
“Then we’re left with Louise Myers, who you’re afraid to touch.”
Szeto smiled like a snake. “You are free to approach her. Do not let me stop you.”
Going against the One… uh-uh.
“Well then, looks like we’re stuck, amigo.”
“No. Not stuck. He has been to high school and to university. We can get picture-”
“Right-right-right. Yearbooks.” Hank hadn’t thought of that.
“And you can see if face is same as Tyleski.”
“Well, that’ll answer some questions about who he is, but we won’t be any closer to knowing where. Let’s just hope that if the One changes his mind about the Myers babe, he lets your people know. Because she can point us to him, and I sorely want to get my hands on that fucker.”
Szeto rose to his feet and puffed up behind the desk. “The One speaks to me. He will tell me first.”
Hank stared at Szeto as the implications of that remark sank in.
First?
“I thought he spoke to your boss-”
“No. Speaks to me. He comes to me for solution to problems. If he does not wish Myers woman disturbed, okay. I am in her hometown many times. I can find other way perhaps.”
“In Jersey? What for?”
“Is not your concern. The One gives me many things to do and I am taking care of them all.”
Many things to do?
“Like what?”
That smirk again. “If the One wishes you to know, I am sure he will tell you.”
Had Drexler been taken out of the loop? Hank didn’t like that. Not one bit. Because if Drexler had been booted aside, Hank might be next.
… You might be the most surprised of all…
Hell, he might have been given the boot already and didn’t even know it.
8
Dawn followed Dr. Heinze through the Midtown Tunnel onto the Long Island Expressway. Her stomach totally knotted when he turned off on Woodhaven Boulevard and headed south into Rego Park. She’d grown up in this area. He continued on to Forest Hills where he eventually parked his car in the driveway of a two-story brick house with a manicured lawn and shrubbery that probably looked beautiful in season.
Home again, home again, jiggety-jig.
Now where had that come from? Oh, yeah. Her mother used to recite that nursery rhyme line every time they pulled into their driveway.
Dawn’s throat tightened. God, how she missed her.
She shook it off and stared at the house. Well, Dr. Heinze, I now know where you live.
What she was going to do with that information, Dawn hadn’t a clue, but she tucked the address away, just in case…
She wound her way back to Queens Boulevard and Rego Park, and slowed as she passed the Tower Diner where she used to wait tables… where she first met Jerry Bethlehem or whatever his real name was… where he started spinning the lies that led her into his bed and got her pregnant with the child she was now chasing.
Full circle.
Her hands seemed to have a life of their own as they turned the wheel, taking her off Queens Boulevard into the confusing local residential streets. She headed for 68th Drive, which paralleled 68th Road and 68th Avenue. She slowed before an older, stucco-walled house with high-peaked gables and an attached two-car garage. On impulse she pulled into the driveway.
Home again, home again, jiggety-jig.
Mom’s house. The house Dawn had left to move in with Jerry. She remembered it being better kept, then realized it had been almost a year since her mother had died in there, leaving a huge hole in her life.
A sob burst from her as she saw the foreclosure sign. Mom had loved that place, had worked so hard to earn it, and now…
She stared at the darkened windows.
What would you do, Mom? Would you tell me to find my baby or let him go?
Dawn realized her mother might very well tell her to let him go. She’d warned her against Jerry from the get-go, but Dawn wouldn’t listen. And Dawn was totally sure she’d tell her now that nothing good could ever come from something that came from Jerry.
And maybe she was right.
But I can’t let it go, Mom. I can’t.
A car pulled out of a driveway two doors down-the Schanz house. It turned this way and slowed as it approached, the driver probably wondering about a car parked outside the deserted Pickering place. Dawn’s pulse picked up as she recognized Mrs. Schanz behind the wheel. Couldn’t be seen here by that old busybody-not when she was a “person of interest” in her mother’s death.
She turned her head, praying the biddy wouldn’t recognize her in the failing light.
After Mrs. Schanz moved on, Dawn backed out and gunned away. She headed back to Manhattan, but she’d be back in the morning to trail Dr. Heinze from his house to the foundation-just to make sure he didn’t make any stops between.
She shook her head, realizing how this had totally become a sickness. But she couldn’t let go. She couldn’t.
9
A voice had invaded Hank’s head. A cut from his conversation with Szeto kept playing and replaying as he walked up from the Lodge toward Allen Street.
“The One speaks to me. He will tell me first.”
“I thought he spoke to your boss-”
“No. Speaks to me.”
Couple that with how distracted Drexler had seemed the last time he’d seen him No, more than distracted-upset. Drexler was pretty damn near the most together, focused guy he’d ever met. But not yesterday. Yesterday he looked like he was being held together by spit and baling wire.
Had something gone wrong at the Order? Their High Council had an inside track on everything connected to the Change, and Drexler was Hank’s connection to those bozos. Hank was counting on riding with them to Mover-Shaker status after the Change.
But then Drexler had made that “the most surprised of all” remark.