Page 32

Two hours later, when they landed in New York and went straight to Gus’s brownstone in Brooklyn, they discovered that he was not at home. And his wife wasn’t there either. They went to the news station where he worked. He was “working” in the field. And even the editor used air quotes when she told them what he was supposedly doing, as if what working meant to a crack journalist like Gus wasn’t ordinary work. It included sitting around thinking about angles to stories, calling his sources, hiding their methods. But he was good, their best reporter, so they tolerated it.

But as they left the station and got back into their SUV, Roni said she knew where he spent a lot of his time. “It’s not far from here,” she said as Brax buckled her onto the front passenger seat. “Just go to that second corner and hook a left.”

Brax looked at her after he buckled her in. Whenever they were that close, he had a tendency, she noticed, to look from her left eye to her right eye as if he was looking for something deep inside of her. As if he was just waiting for her to reveal a side of herself that would make her just like all the other women he’d known before. She never understood why he would still be suspicious of her.

But he was. And he proved it, in her mind, when he got in behind the wheel and looked at her again. “How would you know where this guy hangs out?”

“I told you we were friends.”

“But I thought you just meant a working relationship. You talk as if you guys were close.”

“We were. We are. At least I thought so.”

“Just get to the point. Have you ever slept with this guy before?”

“Oh my goodness. No you are not doing this. Stop, Brax. Just stop.”

“What do you mean stop?”

“Stop acting as if your ass didn’t get out of a woman’s bed to come see about me last night. Stop acting as if you can do anything you’re big enough to do, but I’m not supposed to do shit. Stop acting as if we have a different relationship than we both know we have. Just stop. And I mean it.”

But Brax was as stubborn as she was. “Did you sleep with him?”

“None of your damn business! Now are we going to find out why he followed me to that apartment building, and why he was taking a video of our activities there? Or did we come all this way just to argue?”

Brax pressed the Start button. “Next time we’re about to be in the same room with one of your former lovers, you’d better let me know that he’s a former lover. Or is he former ?”

“Oh for crying out loud, Brax!” Roni couldn’t believe that was what he was worried about. “Can we just go?”

Brax knew he was being irrational too, given his history and current behaviors, but it still did something to him every time he thought of another man touching Roni. He couldn’t help it: It did something to him. But he drove off anyway. He had no exclusive digs on her and probably never would. He picked up speed.

When they arrived at a storefront bar, Brax was surprised as they got out and walked across the sidewalk. “Who hangs in bars this time of day? It’s not even noon yet. Who would be at a bar?”

“Lonely people. Alcoholics. Gus comes here to call his contacts or talk with some of his sources. He sometimes submit articles to The New Yorker and Vanity Fair, and he says he gets ideas for those articles by sitting in this bar.”

Brax shook his head. “He sounds like a piece of work.”

“He’s a good guy,” said Roni. “And an award winning investigative journalist.” But then she scrunched up her face. “At least I thought he was a good guy.”

Brax could see on her face the cognitive dissonance she was going through after discovering that her friend and probably lover wasn’t who she thought he was. He placed his hand around her waist. “Sorry about earlier,” he said. “I was out of line.”

Roni stopped walking and looked at him. He told her to let him know, and she was going to let him know. “I met Gus when I was a rookie. We dated for a while and yes, slept together a few times. But I moved on and he got married and that was that.”

Brax appreciated her honesty. “You’re right. It wasn’t my business. But thanks for telling me anyway.”

She gave him a smile that didn’t shield her anxiety, he squeezed her waist, and then they entered the bar.

It had far more people inside than even Roni expected, but it didn’t take long for them to spot Gus. He was seated on the opposite side of the bar, near the restrooms, and he was smoking a cigarette and taking another swig of his drink. “So that’s how great journalists work, eh?” asked Brax. “I’d go bankrupt working like this.”

But Roni’s anger was kindled toward her friend and she began heading in his direction with a determination that made clear she was getting answers today. Brax hurried behind her.

They were still on the opposite side of the room when Gus looked up and saw Roni. And as soon as their eyes met, she could tell he was guilty as sin. And he did what any rat would do: he took off running.

Roni began giving chase and Brax was running behind Roni.

Gus ran to the back of the bar, through the kitchen, and then out of the backdoor. Roni was right on his tail.

But when he jumped down the steps and began running through the backyards of brownstones, Roni was losing ground. She ran track and field in high school, but she was never a star. She rarely won a race. But Gus was smoking her. He was easily outrunning her. And they both, much younger, were easily outrunning Brax.

With dogs barking and children running out of the way of the Speedy Gonzales’ coming their way, Gus was on pace to get lost within seconds. Roni and Brax didn’t seem to stand a chance.

But when Gus ran into a dead end in the form of a ten-foot brick wall, they saw their opportunity and Roni seized upon it. She was able to get a second wind.

That was why, when Gus began scaling that wall, Roni began scaling it too. But she kept slipping down. It was Brax who had to scale the wall, too, but not to catch Gus. He was there to make sure Roni didn’t fall. He was there to keep hoisting her up by her heels when she slipped, to keep her on the wall.

And it worked. Because as soon as Gus had scaled his way to the top and was trying to climb over, Roni grabbed him by the shoe just hard enough that he fell off the wall, and Roni and Brax fell with him. They all hit the ground together.

Gus tried to get up and run again, but Brax pulled him back down and Roni the cop pulled her weapon, straddled him, and put that gun in his face. “Try it,” she decried more out of hurt than anger. “I dare you to try it!”

Gus, knowing Roni was not the one to trifle with, immediately put his hands in the air.

“I’m dead as a journalist if this ever gets out,” was the first thing that came out of his mouth.

Roni was floored. “That’s what your ass worried about? Your career ? Are you serious?”

But Brax, who was now crouched down beside them, wanted answers. And he began with the proposition that somehow Gus was involved with his accident too. “How did you get that old guy to crash, head-on, into my limousine?” he asked him.

“I had nothing to do with that. She knew the daughter, and the daughter was talking about how her father was suicidal because of his cancer diagnosis. He only had weeks to live. So she agreed to pay the daughter millions and her father agreed to do it. She made like you were this horrible person for what you did to her family, and the old guy fell for it. I had nothing to do with that. My job was to tail Roni and get whatever incriminating evidence I could get on her. I took that video. That’s all I did.”

“What about the ransom note?” Roni asked. “You knew about that?”

“Yeah I knew about it. It was the only way I was gonna get paid. Because of my addictions, and I’m not going into what they are, but because of my addictions I owe some very nasty loan sharks a lot of money. I need that cash.”

“How much did she agree to pay you?”

“Five million if I came up with something big. And I did.”

Roni frowned. “You actually believed that somebody was going to give you that much money? Come on now, Gus!”

“I believed it because it wasn’t about the money for her. That’s why she tried to kill your boyfriend in that limo crash. That was her main plan. When that didn’t work, she decided she would go after the two things he loved most, at least according to her: and that was you and his money. She found me after you gave me that recording of your partner killing that Bridges kid. She knew you probably trusted me if you gave me that video. She also knew I owed big league money all around town. So we made a deal. But I had nothing on you until I followed you and your partner to that apartment building. When I saw what I saw at that apartment building, and filmed it, she knew then she could get you and his money, and thereby hurt him, with one fell swoop. It was about revenge for her.”

Now the question they both wanted to ask. Brax asked it. “Who is this person? Who is she?”

“Her name is Jessica Hampton. I never heard of her before she approached me.”

Brax looked at Roni, but Roni was shaking her head. “I never heard of her.” Then she remembered. “Wait a minute.”

Brax looked at her. “What?”

“The name Jessica came up on your phone.”

“She said she was your plaything before,” Gus said to Brax.

Brax didn’t remember that name at all. But that wasn’t unusual for him. He was in contact with so many females.

He stood up, pulled out his phone, and looked up names. There were strolls and strolls of names in his contacts. “There it is,” he said, surprised. “Jessica Hampton. I met her the night I was in town to take you to dinner.”

“And I was a no-show,” said Roni.

“Right.” Then Brax looked at Roni. “And I have her address.”

Roni was surprised. “Here in town?”

Brax nodded. “She put it in my phone.”

Roni stood up, pulled Gus up with her, and then frisked him. “Let’s go,” she said, grabbing him by his shirt. “You’re going with us. And you better pray your story checks out.”

Roni kept her gun to her side as she pulled Gus along, Brax followed behind them, and they made their way back to the SUV.