Deep as the Marrow

  Poppy had to get hold of some.

  But where? How?

  She pulled out the phone book and began flipping through the yellow pages.

  19

  Carlos listened to the distorted voice barking from the receiver.

  “What kind of half-assed operation are you running there, Salinas? I just learned that a bottle of pills belonging to the little girl was found in a house in Falls Church where someone was murdered. What the hell is going on?” Carlos stared at the ceiling. Please, God, if you will ever do anything for me, do this for me now.

  “One dead man?” Carlos said. “Has he been identified?”

  “Yes. They got a tip as to his name and confirmed his prints. A smalltime hood named Paul Dicastro.” Thank you. God, Carlos thought. I will make a large offering to the church.

  “No one else? No woman? No child?”

  “No sign of anyone else, but they’re looking. Looking hard, because this death is now linked to the other matter. Better clean house, Salinas. And fast.” The line went dead and Salinas hung up. He turned to Gold who was stuffing a valise with papers from a filing cabinet.

  “I believe we can relax for a while, Alien.”

  “Relax?” Alien said. His face was unusually pale, even for him. “How can I relax?”

  “Well, you insisted on knowing about my dealings with MacLaglen, and now you know.” He smiled. “Don’t you feel better?”

  When Carlos had thought he would have to flee the country, he’d filled Gold in on the plan to remove Winston. After all. Gold had to know why they were running for the airport.

  He did not return Carlos’s smile. “You want to say, ‘I told you so,’ go ahead. But right now, if we don’t get out of here—”

  “Be calm. MacLaglen is not dead. He is still alive and free.”

  Alien stared at him. “You’re sure of that?”

  “My source.” Alien staggered to the nearest chair and dropped into it.

  “What a relief! But why doesn’t he call back?”

  “That I do not know. Something happened. An argument, perhaps. He may be busy trying to find a new hiding place for the child. Or, even better, a place to dispose of her. Keep trying to reach him. Sooner or later he will call in.” Carlos agreed with the voice on the phone: Time to clean house.

  20

  “See, I got like this problem with my nephew,” Poppy said to the pharmacist, keeping her voice so low that he had to lean forward to catch every word. “He’s visiting and I found these pills in his room. Not that I don’t trust him or nothing, but I’m like, ‘What are these?’ you know?” The overhead fluorescents gleamed off the black of the pharmacist’s balding scalp as he nodded and stared at her over the top of his reading glasses. The old dude couldn’t seem to take his eyes off her eyebrow ring. Did he like live in a cave or something? Hadn’t he ever seen one before?

  For more than an hour she’d driven around with the yellow pages on her lap, checking out one drugstore after another. Finally she’d settled on Doc’s Pharmacy in what looked like a black neighborhood. Kinda small but with a good-sized front window, and off the main drag in a building that looked like it had been built when dirt was new.

  “I’ll be happy to identify them for you,” said the pharmacist, like he got asked this all the time. He might have been “Doc,” but more than likely he was the original Doc’s grandson. Kind of grumpy, but then, closing time was near and he looked like he wanted to go home. “Give me one and I’ll look it up.”

  “That’s just it. I ain’t got any. He only had one in the bottle and I’m like, I can’t take his last pill. But I saw the name on the bottle. It was Tegretol 1oo mg. Is that bad stuff? You know, like drugs?”

  “Does your nephew have a seizure disorder?”

  “You mean fits?”

  “Yes, I suppose you could call them that. Tegretol is used for er, fits.”

  “I don’t know. My sister never told me about that, and she’s on a trip and I can’t get hold of her to ask. If you could just let me see one…”

  He sighed. “Sure. Wait right here.” Poppy watched him go to the rear shelves and return to the counter with a white plastic bottle. He shook a few pills into a plastic tray and handed her one.

  “Is that it?”

  Poppy held up the precious little pill to the light, but her eyes were on the bottle sitting a foot away on the counter. So close. So tempting. All she had to do was reach out, grab it, and run.

  And maybe get caught.

  Too many people around, too much traffic on the street outside. She couldn’t risk it.

  “Yeah,” she said. “That’s it. You think you could like sell me some of those?”

  “Not without a prescription.”

  “But he’s only got one left.” Poppy slipped a twenty on the counter. “Just a couple to hold him until I can get in touch with my sister?”

  The pharmacist shook his head. “I’d like to help, but it would be against the law.”

  They went ‘round and’round, but this old dude wasn’t going to budge. He gave her all sorts of suggestions that would have worked out fine if her little story was true, but they didn’t help Poppy one bit.

  Just when she was getting desperate enough to make a grab for the bottle, he screwed the cap back on and held it in his hand.

  “You can have that one,” he said. “Maybe it’ll give you a little extra time.”

  “Thanks,” she said. “What do I owe you?”

  “Forget it. I can’t sell it once it’s been touched anyway.”

  Poppy stood on tiptoe and watched where he went, mentally marking the section of the rear shelves where he placed it. Then she looked at the single pill in her hand. At least Katie wouldn’t have to go through the night without her medicine.

  Nice of the old grump to give it to her. Made her almost regret what she was going to have to do.

  21

  John pulled off 95 and coasted into the Maryland House parking lot. He found a space under a light and looked up at the big colonial-style brick building squatting on a rise about fifty yards away. Raindrops flickered through the light from its windows. With its wide brick chimneys and many-paned windows, it looked like a mansion that had fallen on hard times and was now tolerating tours to cover expenses—until you spotted the Bob’s Big Boy, Roy Rogers, Sbarro, and TCBY signs.

  He checked his watch: 8:35. He was early, but didn’t see how he could be too early for this.

  John sat and shivered. Not from the drizzle outside, because he was warm and dry here in the car. The cold came from within.

  Something had gone terribly wrong in the Falls Church house where they’d been keeping Katie… wrong enough that a man had been stabbed to death.

  What if something else goes wrong tonight and Katie winds up getting hurt?

  John had identified her clothing at the police station. e’d have been sick with worry that someone had sexually molested her if he hadn’t heard her voice an hour earlier. She’d sounded so normal, almost happy. He was glad of that, but for the life of him he couldn’t understand it. She’d been kidnapped, her toe amputated—she should have sounded lost, shocked, disassociated; yet she’d been perky, bouncy, her old self. As Katie herself ad said: “Fine.” Like she’d been out on an overnight with her favorite aunt instead of her captor.

  God, who was that woman who’d called?

  He’d sensed something in her voice… genuine regard for Katie. He prayed he was right.

  And he prayed he’d done the right thing by not telling Decker about Katie’s call.

  “I guess I’ll know soon enough, won’t I,” he said aloud as he stepped out into the wet air and went looking for the phones.

  22

  “There he goes,” Gerry Canney said.

  Bob Decker had parked in the south lot. He squinted through the dripping windshield and watched Vanduyne trot through the rain toward the Maryland House. Plenty of light from the mercury bulbs overhead and the fluorescent backwash
from the Exxon station behind them.

  He yawned. A long, hard day, but he felt wired instead of tired. Excitement and apprehension burned inside him.

  “Your people set up?” Canny started to answer, then held a hand up as his walkie-talkie earpiece buzzed. He pulled out his handset.

  “Good work, Trevor,” he said. “Keep an eye on her.”

  Bob stiffened. “We’ve spotted her?”

  “It’s Vanduyne’s wife. She followed him from his place. When I heard that, I put an agent named Trevor Hendricks on her. Used to be a stunt driver. As they got within a few miles of here, he boxed her in behind some slow-moving cars until Vanduyne was out of sight. She’s still on Ninety-five, somewhere north of here, racing along, trying to catch up to him.”

  Bob smiled. “Smooth. I love it.”

  Earlier Vanduyne had told Canney about his wife and how she was asking all sorts of troublesome questions about Katie’s whereabouts. Vanduyne’s lawyer had faxed him selected sections of the court file on Mamie Vanduyne… one very messed-up lady. Bob had told Canney to put someone on her. Good thing too.

  He glanced up at the glowing windows of the Maryland House. A busy place, with travelers of all ages, shapes, sizes, colors streaming in and out, tour buses disgorging hordes, even at his hour.

  “Pretty amazing inside,” Canney said. “The phones are up on the second floor, along with a bank, a copy machine, fax services. More like a business office than a rest stop.”

  “What’d you tell your people?” Canney shrugged. “As much as they need to know and no more. They’ve all got pictures of Katie and Vanduyne. They know it’s a kidnap situation and possibly— hopefully—a victim transfer.”

  “Right. Hopefully.” Canney turned to him. “You thinking what I’m thinking?”

  Bob’s turn to nod. “That this is some sort of trap? Yeah. Makes sense, especially after that corpse in Falls Church. Dicastro had to be involved. I mean, the kid’s prints are all over the bedroom, bathroom, and living room. She was there. What I don’t get is, we’ve been so sure this was a cartel operation, yet this Dicastro’s got no drug connection.”

  “That we know of,” Canney said.

  “Right. But he’s still not the sort I expected to run into. Maybe the cartel isn’t involved. But with the President checking into Bethesda today, whoever’s behind it must figure Vanduyne’s done their dirty work. That makes him and his kid expendable.”

  “More than expendable,” Canney said. “They’re loose ends. Dicastro was probably a loose end, and look what they did to him.”

  “Yeah,” Bob said, wishing Vanduyne didn’t know him. He’d love to be up there, loitering around the Maryland House himself. “That’s what I’m worried about.”

  23

  Poppy drove past Doc’s Pharmacy three times before she was satisfied that the streets were empty. She didn’t even know the name of the town, but, hell, it was only 11:30 and it looked like everyone was asleep.

  She parked the panel truck in the shadows around the corner from the store and gathered the “tools” she’d picked up earlier from a hardware store: a flashlight, two bricks, and a baseball bat. She left the sack of spray paint cans on the floor. Twisting in the seat, she shrugged into Mac’s Orioles jacket and stuffed a brick in one pocket, the flashlight in the other. She pulled the leg she’d cut from a pair of pantyhose over her head, slipped into a pair of striped work gloves, then clutched the remaining brick in one hand and the bat in the other.

  Ready.

  But she couldn’t move. Her heart was racing so fast it made her whole body feel like it was vibrating. She wished she was smarter; then she might be able to figure out a better way to do this. But hey, like what could she do? You make do with what you got.

  Can’t turn back now, she thought. Got to get in, get out, and back to Katie.

  Poor Katie. Poppy had found her a Yoo-Hoo and crushed up a Valium in it.

  The little thing was sound asleep back at the motel. She hated leaving her alone like that, but she was locked in and safe… if anywhere was safe with Mac hunting them.

  Katie would wake up dopey in the morning, and Poppy would have to lie and say she’d slept through the time she was supposed to go back to her daddy, but that was okay because soon they’d arrange another time.

  Right. Soon. Poppy just wouldn’t say like how soon.

  At least she’d have Tegretol for her. She hoped.

  Do it now, she told herself.

  Leaving the car running, she jumped out and ran around to the front of Doc’s Pharmacy. Speed was everything.

  She hurled the first brick at the lower half of the display window, putting everything she had behind the toss. The glass shattered, leaving a gaping hole and setting off a deafening alarm bell. She had to fight the urge to run. Instead she pulled out the second brick. The first hole was big enough to crouch through, but just her luck, the rest of that glass would fall on her as she was going through. Probably cut her head off. So she tossed the next brick higher, and that brought down most of the center of the pane. She used the bat to knock off a couple of daggerlike pieces, then leaped through the opening.

  Flashlight glowing ahead of her, she jumped to the floor, ran to the back, vaulted the counter, and fond the bottle of Tegretol right where “Doc” had left it. Just to confuse things, she knocked everything she could reach off the drug shelves, then dashed back toward the window.

  She hit the sidewalk running, jumped into the truck and glided away with her lights out.

  She was breathing hard, sweating, shaking with fear and excitement as she kept watch ahead and behind, looking for flashing red lights.

  None.

  So far, so good. Just give me a couple of minutes more before— Red-and-blue flashing lights appeared way down the road ahead. She swung to the curb and ducked out of sight, trembling as she waited.

  She began a mantra: He didn’t see me… he didn’t see me…

  Seconds later a squad car roared by, no siren. As soon as it passed, she popped up and waited till it screeched around the corner to Doc’s. Then Poppy started moving again, lights still out, accelerating slowly so as not to attract any attention. Cruising.

  Soon she was a mile, then two miles from the store. She put her headlights on.

  How long had the whole thing took—from first brick to driving away? Like ninety seconds?

  Paulie would of done it better, smoother, but what really mattered sat beside her on the seat: a whole stock bottle of Tegretol.

  “Wasn’t pretty,” she said aloud, “but it worked.” She pounded on the dashboard and laughed. “It worked!” We’re in business, Katie, she thought as she picked up speed back to the motel. We can stay together as long as we want now.

  24

  “Here he comes,” Canney said.

  Bob Decker looked at his watch: 1:28. He shifted in his seat to relieve the stiffness in his joints and watched Vanduyne shuffle down the ramp from the Maryland House. A different man from the one who’d trotted past them five hours ago.

  “Poor bastard,” Bob said.

  “Yeah. I tell you, I’m glad I wasn’t up there. Don’t know if I could stand watching him wait all those hours for a call that’s not coming. Rips your heart out.”

  Bob stared at him. “Identifying with him, Gerry?”

  “How can I help it? If that was me and it was Martha I was waiting to hear about…” He shook his head. “And you know what’s worse? We may be the reason he didn’t get his daughter back.”

  Bob nodded. He’d already thought of that. “You think we were made?”

  “Possible. Maybe whoever was returning the kid saw something and got spooked.”

  “Or maybe the hit team got spooked.” Canney didn’t answer right away.

  They both watched Vanduyne’s car pull out of the lot and head for 95 south.

  “That’s a good thought,” Canney said. “I’ll keep telling myself that.

  Over and over. Soon I may actually believe it.??
? Bob knew the feeling.

  For the past hour he’d been telling himself that they might have saved Vanduyne’s life tonight.

  So why did he still feel like a bum?

  Sunday

  1

  “Another hidden cost of the war on drugs has been the accelerated spread of AIDS. Because we don’t allow IV drug users to buy clean needles legally, they reuse old needles. That’s why forty-four percent of newly reported AIDS cases last year were drug related. ‘Serves ’em right,‘ some might say, but these people pass the virus on to their sexual contacts, who then spread H IV further into the heterosexual community, and on to any children resulting from these contacts. AIDS babies are the civilian casualties of the War on Drugs.”

  Look at us, John thought. We’re a Hopper painting.

  He imagined himself a stranger standing in the kitchen doorway, taking in the scene. Nana sat at one end of the rectangular table, half turned away from him, her eyes fixed on the TV. Meet the Press was on but he doubted she saw Tim Russert or heard a word Heather Brent was saying.

  John sat at the other end, staring out at the backyard as the morning sun poured through the windows, enveloping him without warming him. Two people in the same room, connected by ties of blood and nothing else.

  Bright light and estrangement. Edward Hopper would have jumped on the scene.

  But that was only the surface.

  In truth, he and his mother had commiserated for so long into the night, shared so much pain, that sheer emotional and physical exhaustion demanded they withdraw into themselves for a while.

  Down time.

  What had been the purpose of making him go to the Maryland House last night? A cruel joke? This whole nightmare had started out seeming purely political—get Tom out of the White House—but now it had taken on an almost personal tone. What had they accomplished besides torturing him?