Patricia’s voice rang out calm and commanding as she read the names on the list. She paused for the perfect interval between names to let each family savor its moment of glory. When the last family had been acknowledged, she held up her hand with dramatic effect.
“Now the big moment has arrived, although with an unexpected twist. I ask Roger and Enid Van Allen to please come to the podium.”
The Van Allens rose from their seats of honor in the front row and proceeded to the stage amid thunderous applause. Roger, bent, frail, and in his late seventies, was helped up the stairs by Enid, forty-five and glamorous, a fourth wife. Patricia embraced each of them, then turned back to the microphone.
“As I know you are all aware, Roger and Enid Van Allen have pledged the astonishing sum of ten million dollars to the endowment campaign for the purpose of constructing a new building to house our Upper School.”
The audience rose en masse for a standing ovation. Patricia looked out over the crowd, knowing that this was her last chance to turn back. But she wouldn’t. She’d made her decision.
“Thank you, thank you,” she said, indicating with a downward motion of her palms that they should resume their seats. “Now I would ask our audiovisual coordinator, Mr. Greenblatt, to please open the line to our bankers.”
After a bit of earsplitting feedback, a man’s voice came over the loudspeaker. “Hello? Can you hear me?”
“Yes, this is Mrs. Andover. You’re on air at the Holbrooke gala. Can you please identify yourself for the audience.”
“Kyle Chin with the Private Banking Group.”
“Mr. Chin, you’re aware that ten million dollars is slated to be transferred from the Van Allens’ account into the Holbrooke endowment campaign account.”
“Yes, ma’am. Say the word, and I’ll make the transfer.”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that.”
A collective gasp ripped through the crowd.
“What?” Roger Van Allen exclaimed.
Patricia cast her eyes all the way to the back of the auditorium, to the spot where James stood watching her. He’d guessed what she was about to do. He must have, because he immediately turned on his heel and fled. So much for their so-called love affair. Neither one of them had gotten what they bargained for, which made them even.
Patricia resumed her speech without missing a beat.
“I can’t transfer the money tonight as planned for a very good reason. Every Holbrooke family should rest assured that when misfortune threatens our school, I am here to combat it. I stand vigilant to keep the school’s resources, and your daughters’ futures, safe from every foe. Tonight it has come to my attention that an important safeguard put in place to protect Holbrooke’s endowment account may have been compromised. Mr. Chin, I am therefore instructing you to immediately shut down the account so that nobody-repeat, nobody-can access it.”
63
WHAT WAS THAT? What just happened?” Hogan demanded, his words carrying loud and clear through the development office’s door.
“I don’t know. I never got an error message like that before,” came Carmen’s voice, small and tremulous.
“Try again!”
Melanie heard the keyboard clicking.
“Nothing,” Carmen said. “I had it. You saw. But then it like just blipped away.”
“You’re trying to trick me, bitch!”
“No, I swear!”
“Do it right or you’ll be sorry.”
“Let me try again.”
There was menace in Hogan’s tone, pure terror in Carmen’s. Melanie put her hand on the doorknob and glanced back over her shoulder at the empty hall. Where the fuck was Detective Leary?
“I don’t understand. The account’s offline for some reason,” Carmen was saying. Then came a muffled cry, followed by the sounds of a struggle. Time had run out.
Melanie twisted the doorknob, but it refused to give. It must’ve locked automatically again. She flipped the safety latch on the Beretta so she didn’t shoot herself by accident and, grasping the gun by its barrel, smashed it hard against the frosted window. Glass shattered, flying everywhere. She reached in to unlock the door, crying out as a knifelike shard sliced into the palm of her right hand.
When she stepped over the broken glass and flipped on the light in the office, the scene that greeted her was bizarrely calm. Carmen sat at the desk in front of the computer. Carmen didn’t know Melanie and so gazed at her uncomprehendingly, neither moving nor calling out. Hogan stood behind Carmen’s chair, acting as if nothing unusual were happening. But his hands were held oddly down and in front of him, concealed by the chair. Either he was hurt somehow or else he had a gun.
“Hey, Melanie, that was some entrance. Are you okay?” And Hogan smiled at her reassuringly.
“Get away from her! Now,” Melanie said, raising her gun. Mierda! The safety was still on. But Hogan didn’t know that.
“I don’t really see where you’re coming from with this,” Hogan said reasonably. “There must be some misunderstanding. Carmen uncovered a scheme by Patricia Andover to steal money from the school endowment fund. She reported it to me because I’m somebody she trusts, right, Carmen?” And he moved his arm jerkily behind the chair. It was Door Number Two, the gun, for sure.
“Right,” Carmen echoed hollowly.
“I only came here tonight to prevent a crime from occurring,” he said.
Hogan looked Melanie steadily in the eye. He was an attractive man, with his lean face, longish dark hair, and lanky frame, and he had the gift of gab. She definitely got how he’d been able to brainwash Whitney Seward. Hell, she was almost tempted to believe him herself. But then she looked into his gray eyes, and they were cold and lifeless as the ocean in winter.
She raised her gun higher so it pointed directly at his head. “I know you’re lying. You were there the night Whitney and Brianna died. You murdered Whitney Seward.”
“That’s not true. I don’t believe in judging others, but those girls had drug problems. They did it to themselves.” He was still standing there with a long-suffering expression on his face, ignoring the gun pointed at his head as if Melanie were some tiresome child. It was a good act, but she wasn’t buying it.
“I have witnesses! Charlotte Seward will testify you stole her Oxy-Contin. And the M.E. will say you mixed it into a nice little heroin cocktail and shot Whitney up between the toes.”
For the first time, anxiety flickered in Hogan’s eyes, and his smooth facade began to splinter. “That’s a crock of shit. Charlotte Seward is a junkie.”
Blood was oozing from the cut on Melanie’s hand, and she was well aware that the gun she struggled to hold steady wouldn’t fire if she pulled the trigger. Yet she couldn’t resist confronting this smug killer, who’d obviously bargained on being smarter than everyone else, on being too smart to get caught. Well, he’d bargained wrong.
“You can’t fool me, because I know too much about you, Bud,” Melanie said. Hogan flinched visibly at her use of that name. “That’s right! I know you recruited your students to mule for your pal Jay Esposito. How much did he pay you for that, huh? To ruin those girls’ lives? To kill Brianna Meyers? Did you watch her die, Bud, with heroin leaking into her stomach?”
In a flash, Hogan grabbed Carmen by the hair and yanked her to her feet, putting a gun to her head. The girl yelped in pain. In the same instant, Melanie lowered the Beretta and tried vainly to flip the safety with her blood-slicked fingers. Shit! She couldn’t manage. She raised her gun again instantly, praying Hogan hadn’t noticed. At this point, if he didn’t believe she could fire, he’d surely kill her. Then who would rescue Carmen?