Aphrodite Part 28

"I can't talk to you! This crazy cop's gonna shoot me if I so much as look at you!"

"What cop?" the white-haired man said.

"The cop right there! The guy in jeans. The off-duty cop goin' through my car!"

"What car?" the white-haired man said.

That was when the boy pulled his hands off the fence and turned his head. He looked at the white-haired man, then back at the empty street. He stared at the spot by the stop sign where his car had been. "G.o.dd.a.m.n son of a b.i.t.c.h!" the kid screamed. "My father's gonna kill me!"

It turned out to be a Toyota. While Justin drove, Deena went over the notes he'd made on the yellow pad, reading them aloud. Together they began to organize things and get a clearer picture of KranMar and its various subsidiaries.

"Let's keep running through it," he said. "I want to be able to picture this perfectly in my mind."

"KranMar's at the top," she said. "That's the parent corporation. Pharmaceuticals. Everything from toothpaste and mouthwash to pills that help erectile dysfunction."

"You love saying that, don't you?"

"Yeah, kind of." She grinned. "KranMar's the granddaddy of the whole shebang. Underneath they seem to own twelve research companies in America. Two in the Northeast-Ellis, in New York, and Aker, in Boston. They both specialize in DNA and cellular research. I sound like I know what I'm talking about, don't I?"

"The other ten companies are in the South, Midwest, and West Coast, right?" he continued. "And they're mostly concerned with the less adventurous products."

"Right. They're working on stuff for athlete's foot. The European labs are a little harder to figure out. It looks like he's got one in Switzerland, one in London, one somewhere in southern England. And there's one in Germany and one in southern France."

"Those are their research arms. How many other companies are there?"

"Eighty-four."

"We don't know what all of those do, do we?"

"It's incredibly complicated. I don't even know if Roger could figure all this out."

"It could be like the Enron scam," Justin said. "A lot of them could be sh.e.l.ls, set up to hide money or even purpose." He thought for a few moments. "How many list their officers and executives?"

"All the ones that are owned by KranMar, because it's a publicly traded company. But Kransten seems to have a lot of privately held companies, too. There's nothing but addresses listed for those."

"Is there anyone named Newberg listed?"

"No. I've gone over it a million times. No Newberg."

"Read the names of the companies aloud again."

There were eighty-four spin-off companies. She named each one, and when she was done with the list he threw up his hands.

"Out of all of those, we've only run across two. Alexis Development, they own the mall that houses Growth Industries. Kransten's definitely constructed a maze that's supposed to hide his various activities. He built the mall and had his own subsidiary be the first renter. Nice financial arrangement, but I don't think it ties in to all this."

"What about the Lobster Corporation?" Deena said. "They got the bills that came from some of the old-age homes, right?"

"That's what Gary said. My guess is that Kransten uses it only for accounting purposes, to siphon checks through. Is it public or private?"

"Private. It doesn't have any names listed with it."

"Let's run through this whole thing one more time. There have to be connections we're missing."

"I'm listening."

"Susanna Morgan found out how old Bill Miller was," Justin started. "She called Marion. Marion worked for Kransten and he called someone, maybe Kransten himself, maybe whoever Newberg is. One of those two ordered Susanna killed."

"Why?"

"Hold on a second. I want to follow this through. Ed Marion was afraid that Kransten was going to kill him because he screwed up. I call Rollins to come protect Marion. Instead, Rollins kills him. Why would the FBI want to help Kransten?"

"Maybe Rollins is on the take. Maybe he's working for Kransten."

"It's too much of a coincidence. If he's on the take so are his superiors, and I don't believe Kransten's got that much muscle. Rollins couldn't have gotten himself sent to East End-he got a.s.signed there, to the Maura Greer case, and it has to be for a reason. It's got to be connected to all this. There's a connection between her and Manwaring, that we know. And-wait a second-there's definitely a connection to Manwaring and Kransten. In that article I read, the one about Maura Greer, it said that Manwaring had done battle with the big drug companies. It was over some fake-fat-substance thing. I can't remember exactly what it was. But Manwaring wanted it banned. And the drug companies were p.i.s.sed off about it."

"But how does the FBI come in?" Deena asked. "Why do they care if Kransten's happy and protected?"

"Maybe they're not trying to protect him," he said. "Maybe they want what he has." Justin saw it now, the vague outline of the puzzle, one little piece beginning to fall into place. "All right, let's think the unthinkable," he went on. "Kransten's researchers have come up with something that can extend people's lives. A pill, injections, some kind of formula for treatments. Whatever it is. Looking through the products that have been developed and are being developed, it actually doesn't seem that crazy. According to Roger's notes, they're really on the verge of major breakthroughs in oncology, inflammation, the ability to decrease strokes and heart attacks. So let's say he's got it. For some reason, he's keeping it a secret. But the FBI knows about it because Helen Roag, who worked for Kransten, was telling them. But why why? Why was she telling them? And what good is it to the FBI?"

"Helen Roag'll know." Deena frowned. "Except she's gone."

"Yeah. But whoever she's been calling in Was.h.i.+ngton might know, too. So let's hope that my old pal Wanda's as smart as I'm giving her credit for being."

Deena looked at her watch. "We only have about twenty minutes to wait." As Justin pulled into a restaurant parking lot, she said, "Why are we stopping here?"

Justin just smiled and Deena shook her head in amazement.

"Your mother ... the mother I met ... she used to like to go to the House of Pancakes?"

"It was her secret shame," Justin said. "She loved the chocolate-chip pancakes and she'd sneak out here and have them. She could never tell my father. I was the only one who knew. And that was only because I was in here with some friends-this was one of our stoning hangouts- and I saw her one day." He pulled the key out of the ignition. "Give me five minutes. I've got one more thing to do."

It took him under five minutes, using the miniSwiss army knife that served as a key chain for the new car key, to remove the Toyota's license plates and swap them for a set on another car in the lot. "That should buy us a little time," he said. "There's nothing distinctive about our car, and now the license plates don't match the description. That's about as invisible as we're going to get."

"If we ever get out of this mess," Deena said, "I'm giving up yoga and becoming a crook. This is very educational."

He took her arm and they walked together into the IHOP, headed toward an inner booth away from the window. They ordered coffee, said they were waiting for someone else, and after another ten minutes a second waitress came up to them.

"This might sound kind of crazy," the waitress said, "but are you expecting a message from your mother?"

Justin nodded and the waitress handed over an envelope. There was handwriting on the outside of the envelope and Justin read it, shook his head in admiration, then pushed it across the table so Deena could read it too. His mother's scrawl said: I think someone's following me. So, since they heard you say that I had to kill time, I'm going to sit and have some coffee inside. And maybe have some chocolate-chip pancakes. I'm writing this in the car-don't worry, no one can see anything. I'll slip it to the waitress when I pay my check. Then I'll drive around town for the rest of the day and make someone crazy, I hope. She signed it: She signed it: Lizbeth. Lizbeth. Crossed that out and put: Crossed that out and put: Mother. Mother.

Justin ripped open the envelope. Inside was a faxed note from Wanda c.h.i.n.kle. This note was also handwritten. It read: You're one smart son of a b.i.t.c.h. Helen Roag was calling Frank Man-waring.

But you knew that, didn't you?My career's f.u.c.ked. Get these guys for me, will you?-Wanda Deena put her head between her hands and sighed. A long, deep, hopeless sigh. "Great," she said. "Now all we have to do is figure out where Frank Manwaring is and how we can talk to him. Why don't we just try to go meet Prince Charles-it'll be about the same thing."

"Maybe not," Justin said. "What's today's date?" When she told him, he said, "I know where Manwaring is. I don't know how the h.e.l.l we get to him, but I know where he is."

"Where?"

When he told her, she looked at him in amazement. "Well, I know how we can get in to see him," Deena said. And when she told him how, he not only gave her the same amazed look, he leaned over and kissed her. A long, celebratory kiss.

When the kiss finally broke up, Deena asked, "Am I the first girl you ever kissed in the House of Pancakes?"

He thought for a minute, then shook his head. "The third," he told her. "But this one was by far the best."

30.

Gordon and Wendell Touay were in the small gym in their house, the narrow rectangular s.p.a.ce that had originally been built as a laundry room off the garage. Gordon was spotting Wendell's bench press. He was up to his eighth rep at three hundred and twenty-five pounds when the cell phone rang. The special cell phone. Gordon looked down at his brother, helped him ease the bar into a resting position. Then Gordon picked up the phone, flicked it open, and said, "Yeah."

"They're alive," Alfred Newberg said.

Gordon didn't say anything. The muscle in his right cheek began to twitch. It pulsed in and out. Did it again. In and out ...

"You're fired," Newberg said. "You no longer work for this company."

Gordon slapped at his cheek with his right hand. "I don't think you want to do that," he said.

"It's already done. You are no longer employed by this firm. Your weekly payments have been terminated."

"We'll finish the job," Gordon said.

"You're free to do whatever you want. But whatever you do now you're on your own. You don't work here anymore and you will never work here again."

Gordon Touay's right hand closed into a fist now. He kept it clenched so tightly that his entire hand turned red, then white as the blood supply was cut off.

"Whichever one of you idiot freaks I'm talking to," Newberg said, "I'm a.s.suming you are about to fly into a psychopathic rage. So let me explain something to you. It is not an accident that you have never been allowed to contact me or know where we are. If, by some slim chance, you have been clever enough to learn anything at all, understand that we've done video surveillance on you over the years. If anything happens to me, those tapes will be delivered, along with your names, phone number, and address, to the proper authorities. Your activities have been chronicled in great detail. And, believe me, there is no possibility of connecting those activities to this office. If you so much as try to contact me, you will be arrested immediately and spend a very long time in jail." When Gordon didn't respond, Newberg added, "This conversation is now over," and hung up.

Gordon closed up his phone, slowly turned to his brother, who was still lying on his back on the bench, his feet planted firmly on the ground. Gordon repeated Newberg's words. Then he went back to the bench, added twenty more pounds of weight to the bar, stood over his brother, and began to spot him for his next set of repet.i.tions.

"We're going to find them," Wendell Touay said slowly, as he forced his first rep upward. "That's what you want to do, isn't it?"

Gordon nodded. "We're going to find them and we're going to kill them."

Wendell finished his tenth rep, laid the bar to resting position. He grabbed a small towel, wiped the sweat from his forehead and then his bare chest. He smiled. "I can't wait," he said to his brother.

Then they were both smiling.

Justin drove the Toyota along Highway 27, past the town of Water Mill, and they both saw the road sign pointing to a turn on the left and reading: east end harbor east end harbor 7 7 miles. miles. He drove past without turning. He drove past without turning.

"It's a little creepy to be back here," Deena said. "I used to think of this place as so normal. A nice, all-American town. Now I think of it as someplace to be running away from. It feels sinister to me. It doesn't feel like my home anymore."

"It's like everyplace else," Justin said. "Nothing's ever as normal as it pretends to be."

"Jay, I don't want to have that kind of dark view of life. I don't want Kenny to have it, either. It scares me."

He didn't say anything to rea.s.sure her. He didn't have anything rea.s.suring to say.

Deena understood the reason for his lack of response, and she gave an involuntary shudder. "What's creepier," she said, breaking the silence, "is Manwaring coming back here."

"It's a conference. Media, business, and politics. Thrown by Herb Borbidge, the Wall Street guy. They've had it here the last four or five years. Manwaring was signed up to come months before any of this happened."

"I know. But if he killed that girl, if he killed Maura Greer, to come back so close to the spot ..." She shuddered again. "The paper said the Greers are leading a protest against him."

"It's going to be a media circus. Security's always tight for this thing-all the local forces are called in. I was on call for it the last few years. But this year it's going to be brutal. It's why I hope you know what you're doing."

They drove until they drew near the town of Montauk, at the very tip of Long Island. Houses became fewer and fewer. The beach terrain turned more rugged. They pa.s.sed by the popular local sandwich place, Lunch, then Justin slowed the car down as they pa.s.sed the Havens Hotel & Resort, the ultraluxurious beach and spa complex where Borbidge held his annual conference. The Wall Street mogul had a house- a compound, really-nearby, in East Hampton. He was one of the wealthiest and most dominant figures of the Hamptons social scene. He hosted charity events and presidential campaigners and sometimes threw huge parties just for the h.e.l.l of it. When he asked someone to partic.i.p.ate in his conference, that person didn't just agree, he or she came running.

Justin had seen Borbidge once, a couple of years ago, at the local breakfast joint in East End Harbor, Art's Deco Diner. He was in his early fifties, nearly completely bald, and had ears that looked like, with just a little bit of flapping, they could lift off, fly him around the town, and make a nice, comfortable landing at the local airport. He had been having breakfast with a gorgeous actress at least twenty years younger than he was. She had made a name for herself by doing several nude love scenes in successful movies. She was looking adoringly at Borbidge as he paid the breakfast check. He paid no attention to her. He was too busy studying the check for errors.

The conference had started earlier that morning, and security was out in full force. There were four police cars on the highway near the entrance to the grounds of the resort. Justin knew from experience that in addition to the eight uniforms guarding the exterior, there had to be at least that many in plainclothes inside. Depending on who was attending this year, there might also be Secret Service. Two years ago, Clinton had shown up at this thing. Heads of Wall Street, senators, cabinet members, presidents of media conglomerates, opinion makers, even leaders of foreign countries appeared to listen and lecture. This year Giuliani was one of the keynote speakers.

But the person who was clearly causing the biggest ruckus at this year's event was ex-secretary of Health and Human Services Frank Man-waring.

The protesters were already out in force. There were probably a hundred of them, men and women, holding signs, parading back and forth outside the entrance to the Havens. Several had bullhorns and were periodically screaming out words and phrases such as "Murderer!" and "Tell the truth!" and "What kind of human service is murder?" Justin thought he recognized Maura Greer's parents from their newspaper and magazine photos. The father looked placid and out of place. The mother was one of the ones with a bullhorn.

Justin cruised by, followed Deena's instructions as she directed him to go half a mile past the resort, then up to the left, into the oddly barren hills near the ocean. Soon they came to a small house, a shack clearly meant for summer living only. She asked Justin to wait in the car, then she knocked on the door of the shack, opened it herself, and disappeared inside.

Five minutes later, she came out, followed by a small, thin, muscular man-lithe is the word that came to Justin's mind-with short-cropped brown hair. He wore loose-fitting sweat pants and a tank-top T-s.h.i.+rt. Deena had a grin that spread across her entire face. is the word that came to Justin's mind-with short-cropped brown hair. He wore loose-fitting sweat pants and a tank-top T-s.h.i.+rt. Deena had a grin that spread across her entire face.

"This is Curtis," she told Justin. "He's the one I used to work for sometimes, when I was a ma.s.seuse."

"Nice to meet you," Curtis said and shook Justin's hand.

Deena's grin seemed to grow even wider. "I told you. If there's one thing wealthy people always want at a conference, it's a ma.s.sage."

"And you're doing the ma.s.sages for this conference?" Justin asked Deena's friend.

"I'm providing all the outside work," Curtis explained. "They don't have enough regulars to keep up with the demand. I've done it since this thing came to the Havens."

"So you can get us in?" Justin said.

"I can do better than that," Curtis told him.

And when Justin gave him a look that said, I give-what could be better? I give-what could be better? Deena jumped in, her words tumbling out. "Guess who has a ma.s.sage appointment for tomorrow morning? At eleven o'clock." Deena jumped in, her words tumbling out. "Guess who has a ma.s.sage appointment for tomorrow morning? At eleven o'clock."

That's when Justin smiled. And his smile was almost as wide as Deena's.

"And it gets even better," Deena said. "How can it get any better than that?"

"He wants a ma.s.sage for two people," Curtis said. "He asked for two ma.s.seuses."

"Is his wife with him?" Justin asked.