The Morning Show Murders (1) (29 page)

Marvin raised both hands, palms up, indicating two plates of a
scale. "Money or people's lives?" he said, moving his hands up and down. "You can always get more money."

"If the kidnapper is as dangerous as everyone seems to think," Whitman pointed out glumly, "there's no reason to believe that money will make any difference to him."

"We
are
wiring the money, Ralph," the commander said with a finality that shut the CFO up like a clam.

"Did anyone hear the background noises?" I asked. "Not just the traffic, I mean."

"The church bells," Gretchen said.

"Dogs barking," Marv said. "Sounded like a whole pack."

"What was that music?" asked the commander.

"I can't begin to count the times I ran behind the source of that music waving a quarter," I said. "The Mister Softee soft-serve icecream truck."

"I'll get someone to find out the morning routes," Lee said, "as well as the addresses of kennels and dog parks. Perhaps we will discover an intersection."

The commander stood up. "Thanks to each of you for your cooperation. And thank you, daughter, for the presentation."

As everyone headed for the door, I stopped Trina. "Could you ask someone to put the footage Gabe Farris took at the superhero exhibit on a disk for me?"

She gave me a half-smile. "Working on your talent reel, Billy?"

"Never know when you're going to need one," I said.

Lee was standing with Bettina at the door, both of them watching me approach.

"What was that about?" Lee asked, pointing her lovely chin at the departing Trina.

"Shop talk," I said.

"We should have some of that right now," she said. "I'm sure Bettina will excuse us."

"Of course," Bettina said, and left us alone in the room with Gretchen. We waited while she powered down her computer, snapped its lid shut, and, giving us a curt nod, departed.

"I have a long list of things to do regarding Mr. Aharon's arrival," Lee said, "but if you so desire, I will tell A.W. to expect to spend the night in his own bed."

"I so desire," I said.

"At about ten?"

"Or even earlier," I said. "I've got to be on the set at the crack of dawn tomorrow."

"I'll make it nine," she said. "I wouldn't want you to feel hurried."

Then, in a sudden display of compartmental dexterity, she lost her sexy smile and it was back to business. "You are prepared to go through with the plan on Tuesday?"

"Sure. But I'm a little curious why Felix wants me to come alone."

"You won't be alone," she said. "I'll make sure of that."

"There's something else I'd like you to do. Treat Trina Lomax to one of your famous InterTec background checks."

"Why?"

"Earlier today, when you asked who'd be interviewing Aharon if Gin weren't available, she didn't even have to think twice," I said. "Lance was the obvious second choice, but Trina didn't even give him a moment's consideration. She had the answer on the tip of her tongue, almost as if she'd known for some time Gin wouldn't be free."

"As fond as I am of your devious mind, chef dear, I think Ms. Lomax was simply establishing a backup plan. From what I've seen of Lance, I can understand her decision to do the job herself."

"Maybe. But why are they holding Gin until Tuesday afternoon? It'd be much more efficient and less risky to close the deal today or tomorrow. Why wait, if not to keep Gin off the show? What's scheduled for the show? Let's see.
Hmmmm
. Isn't there an appearance by a controversial guy some people would like to see dead?"

"I'll get that background done at once," Lee said.

"Make sure it includes the INN assignments she's had over the past couple of years. I know that she was in the same locations as some of Felix's kills. It would help to know if she was nearby for all of them."

"You're saying Trina could be Felix?"

"Why not?"

"Felix--a woman? You are a wonder. Whatever gave you that idea?"

As much as I would have liked to tell Lee about Joe and Rita Margolis both claiming the figure in the Cheetah outfit was feminine, I
didn't want to drop any names on Lee. I didn't want her or her minions bothering Rita or Joe, or dragging them into this mess.

"Everybody knows you females are deadlier than us males," I replied.

"Don't you forget it, Mister Softee," she said, giving my face a none-too-gentle pat.

"Pull up over there," I said to Bettina, pointing to a section of empty curb on Central Park South.

"Why?"

"Why not?"

"I thought you wanted to get back to the Bistro," she said, maneuvering the hybrid into the parking space.

"Cassandra's on duty," I said. "Could you use that phone gadget of yours to Google dog parks and kennels in the city?"

Instead of replying, she took out her phone and began tapping at it.

I looked past her to a couple of horse-drawn carriages clopping along to the park. It was a nice sunny Sunday. Great day for a carriage ride. Or jogging in the park. Or strolling along. Or thinking about absent kidnapped friends.

"Google says there are over four thousand kennels in New York City."

"That may be more than we can handle today," I said. "Let's limit our search to Manhattan. The sections of the city near water."

"Why water?" Bettina asked.

"Gin mentioned champagne. I assume she was telling us she's in a
wine cellar. An old wine cellar, judging by the wall behind her, and one that's permanently cold and damp. A lot of the city's old mansions that were constructed near water had wine cellars dug deep to take advantage of the natural cooling."

The limitations left us with eightysomething dog hostels.

We spent a little under an hour driving to the first twenty locations. Then we stopped for food, or what they pretended was food at a Bettina choice, Cafe Carrot on the Upper West Side. Another hour to cruise the second twenty canine conclaves, and for my stomach to digest roasted seitan, grilled onions, and soy cheese. We were in the beginning of the third group of listings when I asked her to park the car again.

To our right was the Dawn of the Dog Hotel and Spa, where a collection of overpampered pups was resting quietly in a gated pen where once a lovely lawn and garden grew.

"Well?" Bettina said. "We have dogs, but they make no noise. So?"

I looked at my watch. "Let's wait a bit."

"Is there something special about these dogs?"

"To paraphrase the great Sherlock Holmes," I said, "the thing that makes them special is that they are not special."

"I don't understand," she said.

"Wait for it ... wait ... right ... about ... now."

Church bells began to ring in the hour. Could have been St. Bartholomew's or St. Peter's Lutheran over on Lex. The dogs were now singing along at full bark.

"Two out of three on our city-sounds list," I said.

"But I still don't know why you thought--"

"At the end of the block," I said. "The abandoned stone-and-brick monstrosity we drove past."

She looked back. "Chain fence," she said. "Three-story with boarded windows. Totally overgrown with bushes and vines. What about it?"

"It's the Vosburgh mansion," I said. "A classic city eyesore. Built back at the tail end of the nineteenth century by an old crook named Joe Vosburgh, who still holds the record for the number of times he sold the Brooklyn Bridge. The mansion cost nearly half a million dollars, which was a whole lot of ill-gotten loot back in those days."

"I appreciate the history lesson," Bettina said. "Is there a point to it?"

"You tell me. A year ago, Gin and I did a segment covering more than a dozen of the city's old mansions that are so tied up in legal red tape they just sit there gathering greenery gone wild and dust and rodents. The Vosburgh was on our list. The thing that added to its uniqueness is that the old con artist spent a hunk of that half-million digging a double cellar so deep in the ground that because of the proximity of the East River, the temperature was a natural forty-five degrees. That's where he kept a gazillion bottles of French champagne that he bought when he saw that Prohibition was soon to become the law of the land. While everybody else was swilling bathtub rotgut, Vosburgh's friends and clients were enjoying
vin extraordinaire
".

Bettina frowned. "So you think that when Ms. McCauley was talking about freezing champagne, she was telling you she was being held at the Vosburgh mansion?"

"I'm jus' sayin'."

Bettina nodded. "Logical. We should see."

She reached for the door handle.

"Whoa," I said. "That's not smart. Could be a dozen guys inside. With Uzis."

"You watch too much television," she said. "Besides, I have a gun."

"One thing I learned from TV, the cop who goes in without calling for backup ends up in trouble. You have a phone. Use it to call the troops."

"Your friends could be in there at great risk," she said. "Waiting for more agents may be the proper procedure. But this is a situation that demands ... flexibility." She handed me her cellular. "I will enter the building and you call A.W. Press button three."

"Let's go in together," I said. "I've been in there before."

"No. You are under my protection."

"Wait ..." I began. But I was talking to myself.

She moved down the block at a swift pace. I fired up the phone, and A.W. answered on the second ring.

While giving him the situation, including our location, I watched Bettina find a loose section of the chain-link fence that surrounded the Vosburgh. She pulled it back and squeezed past it onto the property.

"Sit tight," A.W. instructed me. "I'll be there with backup in ten minutes."

Ten minutes
, I thought, as I put the phone away. Too much could
happen in ten minutes. I felt like a jerk just sitting there. But Bettina was a trained professional. She was armed. I was a guy who ran a restaurant and talked to people on TV.

Then I heard popping noises coming from the mansion. Two, then silence.

With great reluctance, I got out of the car.

Another pop.

I did not take my time getting to the weak link in the fence. It wasn't as easy for me to squeeze through as it had been for Bettina. My jacket pocket ripped and a pant leg caught, tumbling me onto my knees in a jungle garden of overgrown shrubs and bushes, some of them with thorns.

Our crew had cut a path through the jungle a year ago. Somebody--the kidnappers probably--had removed whatever growth there had been since then. I had no problem moving past the branches and brambles.

At the rear of the mansion, the greenery had really taken over.

I suddenly froze, staring at a pale hand poking through the shrubbery. There were people hiding among the weeds and vines and plants. No, not people, I remembered with relief. Ivy-covered statues of Greek gods and goddesses that the old con man had imported to give his estate a "classic look."

A broken brick path led me to a slightly ajar basement door.

I'm not a particularly brave man, and I really didn't want to go through the door. Not empty-handed. I looked around for something that even remotely resembled a weapon. A hoe, a rusted hammer. Even a big rock. Nothing.

With pounding heart, I entered the building.

To my right was a short stairwell that, as I recalled, headed up to a dayroom in the main house. To my left was a much longer set of creaking, partially dry-rotted stairs leading to the deep basement.

With a sinking feeling, I turned to the basement stairs. I had no weapon. I had no flashlight. And I had even less courage.

I closed my eyes and concentrated on sounds from down below. All I heard was my own panicked breathing.

There was enough reflective light from the open back door for me to see the first several stairs. A dim glow down below indicated that I'd be able to see the bottom steps. But in between ... darkness.

Well, hell. I'd come this far.

I descended cautiously. The wooden stairs were old and weak. And very noisy. I probably sounded like a golem stomping down. Halfway, the temperature dropped and there was a dampness to the air that couldn't quite mask the unmistakable firecracker-plus odor of gun-smoke. There was another aroma, too, almost as pungent. Gasoline. Not good.

I could see that the faint illumination came from a round, battery-powered Stick 'em light lying on the ground just past the bottom step. Somebody had probably tried to adhere it to the moist wall and it had fallen and rolled downstairs. Instead of concentrating on it, I should have noticed the sponginess of the stair under my left foot.

The rotted wood gave way and I tumbled forward, banging my left elbow against the wall, hitting the stairs on my right shoulder, and sliding to the cement floor on my back, totally disoriented.

A jolt of pain from my elbow helped to clear my head. As I reached to comfort that aching joint, my shoulder reminded me that it, too, had taken a hit. I lay there on the cold cement, feeling very sorry for myself, until I heard someone moving around in the basement.

The Stick 'em light was only a foot away from my face. I reached out to press the little button that turned it off. My elbow stopped me halfway. It wasn't broken, I didn't think, but it definitely didn't like sudden movement. Breathing heavily, I eased the arm out and turned off the light.

With just the faint glow from the top of the stairs, I was in nearly total darkness. I rolled over and crawled painfully into the pitch-black basement.

Another rustle.

I had to assume that whoever was moving around had gotten a good look at me when I stumbled into the Stick 'em spotlight. That they hadn't shot me was a good sign. But if it was Bettina scurrying around in the darkness, she probably would have identified herself. So the best I could do was stay quiet and still and wait for A.W. to arrive with the cavalry.

My left ankle was hurting now, too. What fun. I lay on my back and tried to mentally catalog my injuries. I got as far as the elbow that wasn't broken and the shoulder that was definitely bruised.