“You just missed her,” one of the associates said, waving a brief. “But don’t use her, she’s terrible. She’s been trying to go home all morning, but I needed her to type something for me. Look at it! She types worse than I do.”
But Judy was already hustling for the elevator. The steel doors were sealed closed but she heard the cab
“Where’d that woman go, with the braid?” she called to the alarmed security guard, who pointed to the service entrance of the building.
“Out the back. Said she wanted to avoid the press. Is there a problem?”
Judy was off and running, down a short corridor, past a green time clock with white cards in slots underneath, and out the back exit, which dumped her into an alley. She looked down the street just in time to see the receptionist’s dark braid flying around the corner.
Judy darted up the alley after her and found herself on a hot sidewalk crowded with businesspeople coming back from lunch. She looked left. The dark braid wasn’t in sight. She looked right. Up ahead, running now against the current of the crowd, sprinted the woman with the dark braid. She was tall enough that her head bobbed above the crowd.
Judy barreled through the crowd, keeping a bead on her. The temp had on running shoes, but they were no match for clogs. Judy could do anything in clogs. She could leap tall buildings. Running down a fake temp was a no-brainer.
Her heart beat faster. She sweated through her days-old suit. Questions flew through her brain. How had they known about the tapes? Had they been watching her? Who had sent this woman? Judy kept her eye on the dark braid, who swerved around a corner toward Chestnut Street, heading into the heart of the business district, clearly hoping to lose Judy in the crowd.
Judy put on the afterburners, becoming breathless, and the dark braid picked up her pace, too, tearing down the street. Startled passersby jumped out of the way and looked on curiously. The distance between Judy and the woman was widening. The crowd thickened. Judy was losing her. Clogs were stupid. Then Judy got an idea. If the dark braid could use the crowd, so could she.
“Stop that woman, she took my purse!” Judy called out, dimly aware that Bennie had tried that trick once, with success. But nobody stopped. They just let the woman run by. Damn. Judy charged ahead and got another idea.
“Stop that woman, she took my baby!” Judy shouted, louder, but nobody stopped the woman with the dark braid, who tore down the street, slipped through traffic and made it to the next curb, and took off. So much for the City of Brotherly Love. Judy got another idea.
“Stop that woman—it’s
In no time a small crowd was running after the tall woman with the dark braid, and Judy trailed them by a furlong. They chased the woman into an alley, where they cornered her and had her backed against the brick wall, panting like a dog. Judy peered over their heads, blocked the alley, and waited for the inevitable.
“That’s not Cher!” “She’s not Cher!” “You don’t even look like Cher!” “Wannabe!” “Poser!” called the crowd, and after some commotion they dispersed, filing disappointed out of the alley, leaving Judy and the temp alone.
Judy went to the back of the alley and faced the woman, who didn’t even try to run past her but looked plainly exhausted, her head to one side, as if she were nodding out. She didn’t even move as Judy approached, and up close Judy could see that the woman was just a girl, with heavy black eyeliner, greasy from exertion, and her hair dyed black as midnight. She couldn’t have been more than nineteen or weighed more than a hundred pounds in tight Guess jeans and a thin white sweater. Her skin was pale, her cheekbones too prominent to be healthy, and her pupils pinpoints. It wasn’t because of the sun.
Judy grabbed the girl’s skinny arm and pinned her against the wall with ease. “Where are my tapes?”
“Don’t hurt me. I put them in the incinerator, in the basement. They’re gone.” The girl’s eyelids fluttered and her green eyes filled with tears of fear, which disarmed Judy. She had never acted this way before. Nobody was afraid of her. She could barely housebreak a golden. Nevertheless she tightened her grip. Her tapes, gone.
“Why’d you burn the tapes?”
“Because they made me. They said they’d beat me up if I didn’t. Please don’t turn me in. Please lemme go.”
“Who said they’d beat you up? One of the Coluzzis?”
The girl pursed her lips, as if to resist Judy’s prying out the answer, so Judy tried hardball.
“You destroyed critical evidence in a murder case. That’s obstruction of justice. If I call the cops to arrest you right now, that’s federal time. Who made you do it? Was it Coluzzi? Jimmy Bello?”
“I can’t say.” The girl shook her head, jittery against the rough brick. “I’d rather do the time than end up dead.”
“You think they’d kill you?”
“I know they would.”
Judy shuddered, thinking about Marshall. “Did they hurt our receptionist?”
“No, they said they’d
“Did they hurt Marlene Bello?”
“Nobody hurts Marlene.” The girl grinned crookedly. “Lemme go, please. I didn’t have a choice.”
Judy considered it. There weren’t a lot of alternatives. She felt too sorry for the girl to turn her in. If the girl told the police who’d sent her, she’d be in danger herself. Judy flashed on Theresa McRea, who had to flee the country in fear. Judy was suddenly tired of causing so much pain, even in the name of justice. She was becoming her enemy and that she couldn’t stand. Let the bad guys do the bad things from now on. If Judy was a good guy, she had to do the good things. Her karma reserves were already in the red zone, from the scrapyard.
Judy released the girl’s arm. “Go. Run. Get clean. Learn to type. But do me one favor. Tell them you think I copied the tapes.”
The girl’s eyes narrowed with street savvy. “You didn’t make copies.”
“You’re not Cher, but those people thought you were. And look what happened.”
The girl giggled, and then the laughter disappeared as quickly as it had come. “They’re trying to kill you, whoever you are. Lawyer with a dog.”
“I know, the car bomb gave them away,” Judy said, forcing a smile she didn’t feel. The threat by the Coluzzis was a constant now, gnawing at her stomach. “But why didn’t they send you to do it? You could have killed me as easily as burned my tapes.”
“Me?” The girl put up her palms. “Oh no, I don’t go
Even Judy’s fraudulent smile vanished. “Better go now. Before I change my mind.”
The girl broke free and ran off, without looking back.
“Hey, kids,” Judy said, rushing into the reception area at the office, worrying about Marshall and Marlene Bello. Murphy and the secretaries were standing around the front desk talking. Judy gauged the scene instantly and relaxed. They wouldn’t have been loafing if the receptionist were in trouble. “I gather Marshall is okay?”
Murphy nodded. “She got stuck in an elevator. It broke, they think. She’s on her way in.”
“Great.” Judy smiled with relief. The Coluzzis were killing only when necessary. They must have been off their game. “I gotta go make some calls. Thanks for your help.”
“You didn’t catch the temp?” Murphy asked, surprised, but Judy shook her head.
“Bennie woulda caught her, but I couldn’t.”
“Damn!” Murphy turned to Letisha, one of the secretaries. “I owe you a tenner.”
Judy laughed, on her way to her office. She was liking Murphy more and more. She reached her office, shut the door, and punched in Marlene Bello’s number, holding her breath while the phone rang one, two, three, and
