back.
What was up with all the car tails today? In the old days, a suitor would send flowers or candy. Myron pined for a brief moment, but now was hardly the time. The car had been on him since he left Riker Hill. That meant it was probably one of Dominick Rochester’s goons again. He thought about that. If Rochester had sent a man to follow Myron, he’d probably at the very least known or seen that Myron was with his wife. Myron debated calling Joan Rochester, letting her know, but decided against it. As Joan had pointed out, she’d been with him a long time. She’d know how to handle it.
He was on Northfield Avenue heading to New York City. He didn’t have time for this, but he needed to get rid of this tail as quickly as possible. In the movies, this would call for a car chase or a swift U-turn of some sort. That didn’t really play in real life, especially when you need to get to a place in a hurry and don’t want to attract the cops.
Still, there were ways.
The music store teacher, Drew Van Dyne, lived in West Orange, not far from here. Zorra should be in place now. Myron picked up his cell phone and called. Zorra picked up on the first ring.
“Hello, dreamboat,” Zorra said.
“I assume there’s been no activity at the Van Dyne house.”
“You assume correctly, dreamboat. Zorra just sits and sits. So boring this, for Zorra.”
Zorra always referred to herself in the third person. She had a deep voice, a thick accent, and lots of mouth phlegm. It was not a pleasant sound.
“I have a car following me,” Myron said.
“And Zorra can help?”
“Oh yes,” Myron said. “Zorra can definitely help.”
Myron explained his plan — his frighteningly simple plan. Zorra laughed and started coughing.
“So Zorra like?” Myron asked, falling, as he often did when speaking to her, into Zorra-talk.
“Zorra like. Zorra like very much.”
Since it would take a few minutes to set up, Myron took some unnecessary turns. Two minutes later, Myron took the right on Pleasant Valley Way. Up ahead, he saw Zorra standing by the pizzeria. She wore her ’30s blond wig and smoked a cigarette in a holder and looked just like Veronica Lake after a real bad bender, if Veronica Lake was six feet tall and had a Homer Simpson five o’clock shadow and was really, really ugly.
Zorra winked as Myron passed and raised her foot just a little bit. Myron knew what was in that heel. The first time they met, she had sliced his chest with the hidden “stiletto” blade. In the end, Win had spared Zorra’s life — something that surprised the heck out of Myron. Now they were all buddies. Esperanza compared it to her days in the ring when a famed bad-guy wrestler would all of a sudden turn good.
Myron used the left-turn signal and pulled to the side of the road, two blocks ahead of Zorra. He rolled down his window so he could hear. Zorra stood near an open parking spot. It was natural. The car following Myron’s pulled into the spot to see where Myron was headed. Of course, he could have stopped anywhere on the street. Zorra had been ready for that.
The rest was, as already noted, frighteningly simple. Zorra strolled over to the back of the car. She had been wearing high heels for the past fifteen years, but she still walked like a newborn colt on bad acid.
Myron watched the scene in his rearview mirror.
Zorra unsheathed the dagger in her stiletto heel. She raised her leg and stomped on the tire. Myron heard the whoosh of air. She quickly circled to the other back tire and did the same thing. Then Zorra did something that was not part of the plan.
She waited to see if the driver would get out and accost her.
“No,” Myron whispered to himself. “Just go.”
He had been clear. Stomp the tires and run. Don’t get into a fight. Zorra was deadly. If the guy got out of his car — probably some macho goon who was used to breaking heads — Zorra would slice him into pizza topping. Forget the morals for a moment. They didn’t need that kind of police attention.
The goon driving the car yelled, “Hey! What the—?” and started getting out of the car.
Myron turned around and stuck his head out the window. Zorra had the smile. She bent her knees a little. Myron called out. Zorra looked up and met Myron’s eye. Myron could see the anticipation, the itch to strike. He shook his head as firmly as he knew how.
Another second passed. The goon slammed his car door shut. “You dumb bitch!”
Myron kept shaking his head, more urgently now. The goon took a step. Myron held Zorra’s gaze. Zorra reluctantly nodded.
And then she ran away.
“Hey!” The goon gave chase. “Stop!”
Myron started up his car. The goon looked back now, unsure what to do, and then he made a decision that probably saved his life.
He ran back to his car.
But with slashed back tires, he wouldn’t go anywhere.
Myron pulled back onto the road, on his way to his encounter with the missing Katie Rochester.
CHAPTER 41
Drew Van Dyne sat in Big Jake Wolf’s family room and tried to plan his next move.
Jake had given him a Corona Light. Drew frowned. A real Corona, okay, but light Mexican beer? Why not just pass out piss water? Drew sipped it anyway.
This room reeked of Big Jake. There was a deer head hanging above the fireplace. Golf and tennis trophies lined the mantel. The rug was some sort of bear skin. The TV was huge, at least seventy inches. There were tiny expensive speakers everywhere. Something classical drifted out from the digital player. A carnival popcorn machine with flashing lights sat in the corner. There were ugly gold statues and ferns. Everything had been selected not based on fashion or function, but by what would appear most ostentatious and overpriced.
On the side table was a picture of Jake Wolf’s hot wife. Drew picked it up and shook his head. In the photograph, Lorraine Wolf wore a bikini. Another of Jake’s trophies, he guessed. A picture of your own wife in a bikini on a side table in the family room — who the hell does that?
“I spoke to Harry Davis,” Wolf said. He had a Corona Light too. There was a wedge of lime jammed into the top. Van Dyne rule of alcohol consumption: If a beer needs a fruit topping, choose another beer. “He’s not going to talk.”
Drew said nothing.
“You don’t believe it?”
Drew shrugged, drank his beer.
“He has the most to lose here.”
“You think?”
“You don’t?”
“I reminded Harry of that. You know what he said?”
Jake shrugged.
“He told me that maybe Aimee Biel had the most to lose.” Drew put down his beer, intentionally missing the coaster. “What do you think?”
Big Jake pointed his beefy finger at Drew. “Who the hell’s fault would that be?”
Silence.
Jake walked over to the window. He gestured with his chin at the house next door. “You see that place over there?”
“What about it?”
“It’s a friggin’ castle.”
“You’re not doing too badly here, Jake.”
A small smile played on his lip. “Not like that.”
