But Jack wasn’t even all the way across 106th Street when the tantalizing mystery of his floater began troubling him again. As he climbed his refuse-strewn stairs, he wondered if there was a chance that Ted had made a mistake with the DNA analysis. As far as Jack was concerned the victim had had a transplant.
Jack was rounding the third-floor landing when he heard the telltale sound of his phone. He knew it was his because Denise, the single mother of two who lived on his floor, didn’t have a phone.
With some effort, Jack encouraged his tired quadriceps to propel him up the final flight. Clumsily, he fumbled with his keys at his door. The moment he got it open, he heard his answering machine pick up with a voice that Jack refused to believe was his own.
He got to the phone and snatched it up, cutting himself off in mid-sentence.
“Hello,” he gasped. After an hour and a half of full-court, all-out basketball, the dash up the final flight of stairs had put him close to collapse.
“Don’t tell me you’re just coming in from your basketball,” Laurie said. “It’s going on nine o’clock. That’s way off your schedule.”
“I didn’t get home until after seven-thirty,” Jack explained between breaths. He wiped his face to keep his perspiration from dripping on the floor.
“That means you haven’t eaten yet,” Laurie said.
“You got that right,” Jack said.
“Lou is over here, and we were going to have salad and spaghetti,” Laurie said. “Why don’t you join us?”
“I wouldn’t want to break up the party,” Jack said jokingly. At the same time he felt a mild stab of jealousy. He knew about Laurie’s and Lou’s brief romantic involvement and half wondered if the two friends were starting something up.
Jack knew he had no right to such feelings, considering the ambivalence he had about becoming involved with any woman. After the loss of his family, he’d been unsure if he ever wanted to make himself vulnerable to such pain again. At the same time, he’d come to admit both his loneliness and how much he enjoyed Laurie’s company.
“You won’t be breaking up any party,” Laurie assured him. “It’s going to be a very, very casual dinner. But we have something we want to show you. Something that is going to surprise you and maybe even make you want to give yourself a boot in the rear end. As you can probably tell, we’re pretty excited.”
“Oh?” Jack questioned. His mouth had gone dry. Hearing Lou laughing in the background, and putting two and two together, Jack knew what they wanted to show him; it had to be a ring! Lou must have proposed!
“Are you coming?” Laurie asked.
“It’s kind of late,” Jack said. “I’ve got to shower.”
“Hey, you old sawbones,” Lou said. He’d snatched the phone from Laurie. “Get your ass over here. Laurie and I are dying to share this with you.”
“Okay,” Jack said with resignation. “I’ll jump in the shower and be there in forty minutes.”
“See ya, dude,” Lou said.
Jack hung up the phone. “Dude?” he mumbled. That didn’t sound like Lou. Jack mused that the detective must be on cloud nine.
“I wish I knew what I could do to cheer you up,” Darlene said. She’d made the effort to put on a slinky silk teddy from Victoria’s Secret, but Raymond hadn’t even noticed.
Raymond was stretched out on the sofa with an ice pack on his head and his eyes closed.
“Are you sure you don’t want anything to eat?” Darlene asked. She was a tall woman over five feet ten, with bleached blond hair and a curvaceous body. She was twenty-six years old, and as she and Raymond joked, halfway to his fifty-two. She’d been a fashion model before Raymond had met her in a cosy East Side bar called the Auction House.
Raymond slowly took his ice pack off and glared at Darlene. Her bubbly vivaciousness was only an irritation.
“My stomach is in a knot,” he said deliberately. “I’m not hungry. Is that so difficult to understand?”
“Well, I don’t know why you are so upset,” Darlene persisted. “You just got a call from the doctor in Los Angeles, and she’s decided to come on board. That means we’ll soon have some movie stars as clients. I think we should celebrate.”
Raymond replaced the ice pack and closed his eyes. “The problems haven’t been about the business side. That’s all been going like clockwork. It’s these unexpected snafus, like Franconi and now Kevin Marshall.” Raymond was loath to explain about Cindy Carlson. In fact, he’d been trying to avoid even thinking about the girl himself.
“Why are you still worried about Franconi?” Darlene asked. “That problem has been taken care of.”
“Listen,” Raymond said, trying to be patient, “maybe it would be best if you go watch some TV and let me suffer in peace.”
“How about some toast or a little cereal?” Darlene asked.
“Leave me alone!” Raymond shouted. He’d sat up suddenly and was clutching his ice pack in his hand. His eyes were bulging and his face was flushed.
“Okay, I can tell when I’m not wanted,” Darlene pouted. As she was leaving the room, the phone rang. She looked back at Raymond. “Want me to get it?” she asked.
Raymond nodded and told her to take the call in the study. He also said that if the call was for him, she should be vague about where he was, since he wasn’t up to talking with anyone.
Darlene reversed her direction and disappeared into the study. Raymond breathed a sigh of relief and put the ice pack back on his head. Lying back, he tried to relax. He was just getting comfortable when Darlene returned.
“It’s the intercom, not the phone,” she said. “There’s a man downstairs who wants to see you. His name is Franco Ponti, and he said it was important. I told him that I’d see if you were here. What do you want me to say?”
Raymond sat back up with a new jolt of anxiety. For a moment, he couldn’t place the name, but he didn’t like the sound of it. Then it hit him. It was one of Vinnie Dominick’s men who’d accompanied the mobster to the apartment the previous morning.
“Well?” Darlene questioned.
Raymond swallowed loudly. “I’ll talk to him.” Raymond reached behind the couch and picked up the telephone extension. He tried to sound authoritative when he said hello.
“Howdy, Doc,” Franco said. “I was going to be disappointed if you hadn’t been at home.”
“I’m about to go to bed,” Raymond said. “It’s rather late for you to be calling.”
“My apologies for the hour,” Franco said. “But Angelo Facciolo and I have something we’d like to show you.”
“Why don’t we do this tomorrow?” Raymond said. “Say between nine and ten.”
“It can’t wait,” Franco said. “Come on, Doc! Don’t give us a hard time. It’s Vinnie Dominick’s express wish that you become intimately acquainted with our services.”
Raymond struggled to come up with an excuse to avoid going downstairs. But given his headache, nothing came to mind.
“Two minutes,” Franco said. “That’s all I’m asking.”
“I’m awfully tired,” Raymond said. “I’m afraid…”
“Hold on, Doc,” Franco said. “Listen, I have to insist you come down here or you’re going to be very sorry. I hope I’m making myself clear.”
“All right,” Raymond said, recognizing the inevitable. He was not naive enough to believe that Vinnie Dominick and his people made idle threats. “I’ll be right down.”
Raymond went to the hall closet and got his coat.
Darlene was amazed. “You’re going out?”
“It appears that I don’t have a lot of choice,” Raymond said. “I suppose I should be happy they’re not demanding to come inside.”
As Raymond descended in the elevator, he tried to calm himself, but it was difficult since his headache had only gotten worse. This unexpected, unwanted visit was just the kind of turn that was making his life miserable. He had no idea what these people wanted to show him, although he guessed it had something to do with how they were going to deal with Cindy Carlson.