American Express, MasterCard, debit card, frequent flyer cards, AAA card, an emergency contact number card.
His muscles tensed but I dropped his belt, punched him irritably over the right kidney, and had hold of the leather again before he could translate thought to action. He went limp and the rhythm of his breathing broke. No concealed weapons permit for this or any other state. No private investigator license.
“I know your name, address, and social security number.” I glanced at the emergency contact card: the name Nicki Taormino, the designation fiancée, and a phone number in the person-to-be-contacted slot. “And I have your girlfriend’s number. Do exactly as I tell you and I won’t ever have to use any of that information. Upset me and I’ll shoot you in the gut. Walk two paces to your left and kneel down.”
I let go of his belt and he did as he was told.
I made sure he could see the gun trained on him. “Do you have a handkerchief? Good. Throw it to me.” He tossed me a clean, folded square, still warm from his pocket. “And your tie.” He obeyed silently. I put the tie and hankie on the truck bed with his wallet. “Now take off your belt.” He took off the belt. “Make a big loop.” It took him a moment to understand that I wanted him to thread the tongue through the buckle. The brain does not work well when the system is adrenaline-charged. “Hold it in your left hand, put that hand behind you.” His reaction time was getting slower as his system began to shut down. In three or four minutes it would rev back up, but by then he’d be helpless. “Now the right hand. Wrists together.”
I stepped behind him and yanked the loop tight.
“Lean back, as though you’re reaching for your heels.”
Good thing his waist was so big; there was enough leather to wrap around his ankles, tuck under the loop, pull tight, then knot.
“I’m going to tip you over.” I gave him a second to brace himself, then pushed one shoulder with my foot. I stepped over him to the truck bed, retrieved the hankie and tie. “Open your mouth.” He knew what was coming and began to thrash. I racked the slide on the Glock, pointed the muzzle at his stomach. “Gag or gun.” He opened his mouth. I stuffed the hankie in, then pulled the tie over his mouth to keep the gag in place and knotted it behind his head. He’d probably be able to work it loose in an hour or so, but I wouldn’t take nearly that long. I went back to the truck, fished the driver’s license and insurance card from the pile, and slipped them in my pocket. I needed a minute to stop, to think, but I didn’t have a minute.
I slid the safety back on, tucked the gun in the back of my waistband, and stepped into view of the Maxima. When the woman saw me I waved, opened my mouth to speak, then shut it again with an apologetic smile, as though remembering it wasn’t ladylike to shout.
The woman watched me calmly as I approached, though her shoulders and back looked tight. Her window slid down, but instead of speaking to her I leaned in the driver’s side and took the keys. That bothered her. I smiled at Luz and shook my head slightly, hoping she would understand. She didn’t smile back, just watched me the way you’d watch a rabid dog.
“Step out of the car please, ma’am,” I said to the woman, and the tension in her spine eased a little: law enforcement generally pay attention to well-paid lawyers. Hijackers and thugs don’t. She got out of the car.
I closed her door and window, then used the master control on the driver’s side to lock the car up. I didn’t want Luz running off.
“Well, officer,” she said, “or is it agent? I’d say prior knowledge of my travel plans means some kind of wiretap, which rules out local involvement.” She didn’t look worried. “FBI or INS? Not that it matters. I’ve been through this before. It’s a waste of my time and yours. You have nothing in the way of documentation.”
My eyes felt hot and a little too big for their sockets. This was all her fault. “I don’t need proof.”
She raised her eyebrows. “Since when—” Then she got it. She took a step back. “Where’s my driver? What do you want?”
“Your purse.”
Like Mike Turner, she immediately assumed I wanted to rob her and turned to the car with relief, but unlike him, she realized within a second or two that no one would go to such trouble for a few bucks and a handful of credit cards, and her hand dropped before it touched the handle. “Who are you?”
I got out the gun and pointed it at her. “Someone who is getting more irritated every second.” There was no one here to stop me. Aud rhymes with allowed. I used the key remote and her door lock thunked open. I nodded at the car. “Your purse.”
Luz suddenly wriggled out of her seat belt and lunged to the front of the car, reaching for the horn. She managed to hit it once, just enough for a light pap that no one would hear, before I got the door open and yanked her out with one arm.
I stood her up on the pavement. “Don’t.” I switched to Spanish. “Estoy salvando te de esta mujer. En unos minutos, te devolvere a… a Aba.” And in the middle of explaining to her I was rescuing her, that I would take her back to Adeline, she gave me that bird-eyed look again, and I understood, then, why I recognized it. I had looked at my own mother the same way all those times she had said, Yes, Aud, this time I will be there for the school sports day, or, Of course I don’t have to work on your birthday.
The woman was edging towards the car. I pointed the gun again until she stopped, then turned back to Luz. “I will explain very soon, but I need you to be very quiet and very still, just for five minutes. No one will hurt you. Do you understand?” She nodded, amenable but uncommitted. “Get back in the car.”
She shook her head.
There was no time to argue. “Then stand right here, next to me, and don’t move.”
She crept to my side.
I turned back to the woman. “Su bolso.”
“Ella no comprende,” Luz said.
“Your purse,” I said again, in English.
“I could get it,” Luz said. If you please Mummy, she might do as she promised. And I wanted to pistol-whip this smug woman, this panderer of children, until her blood seeped into the Arkansas dirt.
Luz climbed into the backseat, felt around the floor, and emerged with the purse. “It’s heavy,” she said, and held it out to me.
I made myself breathe. In and out. “Find her wallet,” I said. I locked the car again and put the key in my pocket.
Luz rooted around and came up with a slim, calfskin billfold.
“Open it. I want her driver’s license and insurance card. Read them to me.”
Luz did. Jean Goulay, an address in upstate New York.
“Any business cards in there?”
“What’s a business card?”
I didn’t take my eyes off Goulay. Any minute now she was going to realize she was in even deeper trouble than she thought. People don’t avoid leaving their fingerprints if they mean you well. “Tip the purse out onto the road.” Luz did, and looked at me nervously. I forced what I hoped was an encouraging smile. “There, those pieces of cardboard with phone numbers and e-mail addresses.” Maybe she didn’t know what an e-mail address was, either. “Lift one up so I can read it.” I read it aloud. “Goulay Adoption Agency: specializing in difficult cases. Discreet. Established in 1987.” Nineteen eighty-seven. Fifteen years of processing children like imported grain. Some of them would be old enough to already be married.
“This will stop,” I said to Goulay. Terrible heat was building in my bones and it was hard to get the words out; the hinges of my jaw felt dry and swollen. I put the gun back in my waistband.
“Nothing I’ve done is illegal.” Perhaps it was seeing me put the gun away, but Goulay had relaxed again, on surer ground. She looked almost smug.