Chains whirred and locks thunked. As the door opened, Beth stuck her head out. “Didn’t Oliver already take his Series-7?”
“This is for the renewal, Miss Manning,” Joey said matter-of-factly. “But we still like to check the references.” She motioned back to the notepad and offered a perfectly pleasant smile. “I promise, it’s just a few simple questions – painless as can be.”
Shrugging at no one in particular, Beth moved back from the door. “You’ll just have to excuse the mess…”
“Don’t worry,” Joey laughed as she stepped inside and waved a hand against Beth’s forearm. “My place is fifty times worse.”
Francis Quincy wasn’t a pacer. Or even a worrier. In fact, when the lid on the pressure cooker clamped down, while everyone else was anxiously roving back and forth across the carpet, Quincy was the one stuck to his seat, quietly calculating the odds. Even when his fourth daughter was born three months premature, Quincy stepped back and took silent solace in the fact that eighty percent of similarly aged babies turn out just fine. Back then, the numbers were in his favor. Today, they were out of his control. He still didn’t pace.
“Did he say anything else?” Quincy asked dryly.
“Nothing… less than nothing,” Lapidus said, rapping his middle knuckle over and over against the desk. “They just want us to keep a tight lip.”
Quincy nodded, standing alone by the window in the corner. Staring out at the electric skyline, he reached up and gripped the top of the butterfly-covered shoji screen for support. “Maybe we should wait a day before telling the partners.”
“Are you crazy? If they found out we were holding back… Quincy, they’d drink our blood for breakfast.”
“Well, I hate to break it to you, Henry, but they’ll be screaming for blood no matter what – and until we find Oliver and that money, there’s nothing we can do.”
Lapidus’s knuckle rapped even harder. “I already called twice. Gallo hasn’t called back.”
“If it’ll make it easier, Henry, I’m happy to take a stab at it.”
“I don’t understand…”
“Maybe Gallo needs to hear it in both ears,” Quincy suggested. “Just to tip the scales a little.”
Lapidus paused, studying his partner. “Yeah… no… that’d be great.”
Almost immediately, Quincy headed for the door.
“Just don’t forget whose side Gallo and DeSanctis are on,” Lapidus called out. “When it comes right down to it, law enforcement is just like any other client – out for their own peanut.”
“You don’t have to tell me,” Quincy said as he left the room. “I know all about it.”
“So how’re we looking?” DeSanctis asked, cradling the phone with his chin.
“Hard to say. Obviously, we hit a few speedbumps, but I think it’s all about to smooth out,” his associate explained. “What about there? How’s Gallo doing with the mom?”
Peering through the one-way glass, DeSanctis watched as Gallo helped Mrs. Caruso thread her arms into her coat. “We’ve got it covered,” DeSanctis said dryly.
“You don’t sound too confident…”
“I’ll be confident when we have them,” he insisted. Charlie and Oliver may’ve gotten away once, but it wasn’t going to happen again. Not with stakes like this.
“Have you thought about calling in other agents?”
“No – no way,” DeSanctis shot back. “Believe me, we don’t want that headache.”
“So you really think you and Gallo can keep it quiet?”
“Personally, I don’t see much of a choice – for any of us.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing,” DeSanctis said coldly. Through the glass, Gallo led Mrs. Caruso out of the interrogation room. “You just do your job, and we’ll do ours. As long as that’s taken care of, they don’t have a chance.”
27
“Here you go,” Oz says, slapping a blue-and-white Continental Airlines envelope against Charlie’s chest. I rip mine open; Charlie does the same. Flight 201 – 9:50 tonight, nonstop to Miami.
“You didn’t put us next to each other, did you?” I ask.
Oz stings me with the same do-I-look-like-a-schmuck look I usually get from Charlie. Still, this is no time to take chances. “ 25C,” I tell my brother.
He studies his ticket. “7B.” Turning to Oz, Charlie adds, “You stuck me in a middle seat, didn’t you?”
Oz rolls his eyes. It’s always been Charlie’s best magic trick. Keep ’ em talking. Reaching down to the laminating machine that’s balanced on a stack of boxes, Oz picks up the iron-on wrapper and peels it open. “Remember that crappy fake ID that helped you buy beer in high school?” he brags. “Well, say hello to the real thing…” Like a cop flashing his badge, Oz shoves the laminated card straight at us. Without question, it’s a perfect New Jersey license, complete with my picture and brand-new black hair.
“Spiffy,” Charlie adds.
Oz told us to pick easy-to-remember names. Charlie’s says Sonny Rollins, jazz master and legend. Mine says Walter Harvey, dad’s first and middle names. Physically and in name, we’re no longer brothers.
Charlie kisses the picture of himself. “Mmmmm, mmmm – this baby’s gold…”
“But it ain’t foolproof,” Oz warns in full Hoboken accent. “Like I tell everyone, don’t put all your eggs on the ID. It may get you on the plane… and maybe into a motel… but it only gets you so far…”
“What do you mean?” I interrupt.
“It’s just the way the world spins,” Oz explains. “No matter how fast you think you are, three things always pull the rug out: ego, greed, and sex.” Knowing he has our attention, his high voice gets quicker. “Ego – you mouth off to your waiter; you’re a jerk to the maître d’ – that’s how the guy at the restaurant remembers you and picks you out for the cops. Greed – you buy a big watch; you bite off five lobster dinners in a row – that’s how the bartender recognizes your photo. And sex – baby, that’s why all the clichés are true. Ain’t nothing like a woman scorned.”
“Do you see this streaky blond hair?” Charlie asks, pointing to himself. “And his nasty black bird’s nest?” he adds, pointing to me. “From here on in, women are the least of our worries.”
“So when you add in the travel and everything else,” I interrupt, “how long you think we have before people realize we’re gone?”
Oz turns to his computer and studies Charlie’s fake driver’s license, which is still staring back at us from the screen. “Hard to say,” Oz replies as his voice gets shaky. “Depends who you’re running from.”
28
“Whattya mean, Wonder Bread?” Noreen asked through the cell phone.
“Wonder Bread,” Joey repeated as she drove back through Brooklyn. “As in yawn… as in boring… as in whiter than white. I’m telling you, whatever Oliver sees in her – this girl’s as exciting as a speedbump. I knew the moment I walked in: flower-patterned sofa, with matching throw pillows, with matching carpet, with matching coasters, and a matching Monet poster on the wall…”
“Hey, don’t bust on Monet-”
“It was Water Lilies,” Joey interrupted.
There was a pause. “Well then, you should’ve killed her right there.”
“You’re missing the point,” Joey insisted. “It’s not like there’s anything wrong with her – she’s nice, and she smiles, and she’s pretty… but, that’s it. Every once in a while, she blinks. There’s nothing else.”
“Maybe she’s just an introvert.”
“I asked her for a funny story about Oliver, and all she could come up with was ‘He’s nice’ and ‘He’s sweet.’ That’s as excited as she gets.”