Live Wire
“Big-time.”
Four days after the biggest victory of her career—after appearing on the Today show, Late Show with David Letterman, and a bunch of other high-profile venues—Myron found Suzze crying, still in bed at two in the afternoon. They say that there is nothing worse than having a dream come true. Suzze had thought the US Open trophy would bring her instant happiness. She thought her breakfast would taste better in the morning, the sun would feel better on her skin, that she’d look in the mirror and see someone more attractive, smarter, more worthy of love.
She thought that winning would change her.
“Just when things were at their best for her,” Esperanza said, “she started using again.”
“And you think that’s what happened here?”
Esperanza raised one weighing hand, then the other. “Happiness, crash. Happiness, crash.”
“And her visit to Karl Snow after all the years? Do you think that’s a coincidence?”
“Nope. But I think he brought up a lot of emotion. That plays for her using, not against. Meanwhile I checked the addresses you gave me from Suzze’s GPS. The first, well, you figured that one out—Karl Snow’s ice cream parlor. The rest are all easy to explain, except I don’t have a clue about that second one.”
“The intersection in Edison, New Jersey?” Then: “Wait. Didn’t you say Kitty’s disposable phone was purchased at T-Mobile in Edison?”
“Right.” Esperanza brought something up on the computer. “Here’s the Google Earth satellite picture.”
Myron looked. A ShopRite. A Best Buy. A bunch of stores. A gas station.
“No T-Mobile,” Esperanza said.
But, Myron thought, worth a drive anyway.
23
Myron’s car Bluetooth picked up his cell phone. He spent the first half hour on the phone with clients. Life doesn’t stop for death. If you ever need proof of that, head back to work.
A few minutes before arriving, Win called.
“Are you armed?” Win asked.
“I assume you upset Herman Ache.”
“I did.”
“So he’s involved with Gabriel Wire?”
“It would seem so, yes, except for one thing.”
“What’s that?” Myron asked.
“I presented him with our theory about them controlling Wire via blackmail and gambling debts.”
“Right.”
“After several minutes,” Win said, “Mr. Ache finally admitted that our theory was correct.”
“Which means?”
“Herman Ache would lie about what he ate for lunch,” Win said.
“So we’re missing something.”
“Yes. In the meantime, arm yourself.”
“I’ll pick up a gun when I get back,” Myron said.
“No need to wait. There is a thirty-eight under your seat.”
Terrific. Myron reached under his seat, felt the bump. “Anything else I need to know?”
“I birdied the last hole. Shot two under par for the round.”
“Talk about burying the lead.”
“I was trying to be modest.”
“I think,” Myron said, “that at some point, we will need to talk to Gabriel Wire face-to-face.”
“That might mean storming the castle,” Win said. “Or at least his estate on Adiona Island.”
“Think we can get through his security?”
“I’ll pretend you didn’t ask that.”
When Myron arrived at the intersection in Edison, he parked in the lot of yet another strip mall. He looked to see whether there was an ice cream parlor in this one—he’d start there this time if that was the case—but no, this one was somewhat more generic, Strip Mall USA, featuring a Best Buy, a Staples, and a shoe store called DSW that had the approximate square footage of a small European principality.
So why here?
He worked out yesterday’s timeline in his head. First Suzze received a phone call from her husband Lex Ryder. The call lasted forty-seven minutes. Thirty minutes after hanging up, Suzze placed a call to Kitty’s disposable cell phone. That call was shorter—four minutes. Okay, fine, what next? There was a time gap now, but four hours later, Suzze confronted Karl Snow at his ice cream parlor about the death of his daughter Alista Snow.
So he needed to try to fill in the four hours.
Following the logic of the GPS, sometime between Suzze’s four-minute phone call with Kitty and Suzze’s visit to Karl Snow, she had driven down here, to this intersection in Edison, New Jersey. Suzze hadn’t put an actual address into the GPS, like she did with Karl Snow’s mall. She had just put this intersection. There was a strip mall on one corner. A gas station on another. An Audi dealer on the third. Nothing but woods on the fourth.
So why? Why not put a real address?
Clue One: Suzze had come here right after calling Kitty. Considering their rather long and complicated relationship, a four-minute call seemed awfully brief. Possible conclusion: Suzze and Kitty had talked just long enough to set up a meet. Second possible conclusion: They’d agreed to meet here, at this intersection.
Myron looked for a restaurant or coffee shop, but there were none. It seemed highly unlikely that the two former tennis greats had decided to buy shoes or office supplies or electronics, so that ruled out the rest of one corner. He glanced down the road on the left and then the right. And there, past the Audi dealer, Myron spotted an ornate sign that caught his attention. The lettering was done in an Old English font and read: LENDALE MOBILE ESTATES.
It was, Myron saw after crossing the road, a trailer park. Even trailer parks had gone the way of Madison Avenue and spin doctors, what with the fancy sign and use of the word “estates” as though it were a beloved stop on an elite house tour in Newport, Rhode Island. The trailers were laid out along a grid of roads with names like Garden Mews and Old Oak Drive, though there seemed to be no indication of either a garden or an oak, old or not, and Myron was not sure what a mews was.
Even from his spot on the road, Myron could see several For Rent signs. New conclusion: Kitty and Mickey were staying here. Maybe Suzze didn’t know the exact address. Maybe a GPS wouldn’t recognize Garden Mews or Old Oaks Drive, so she’d given Suzze the closest intersection.
He didn’t have a photograph of Kitty to show around, and even if he did, that would just be too suspicious. He couldn’t stop and knock on trailer doors either. In the end, Myron opted for a good old-fashioned stakeout. He got back in his car and parked near the manager’s office, giving him a pretty good view of most of the trailers. So how long could he park here and wait? An hour, maybe two. He called his old friend Zorra, a former Mossad agent who was always game for a stakeout. Zorra would head down and take over in two hours.