<<< Chapter Three >>>
Perry strode into his office nearly two hours early. He was missing the services of his two best young reporters for the next few days while the police and the District Attorney’s office got through with them. Most of the rest of his staff was out for the Memorial Day holiday weekend and either weren’t answering their phones or were out of town. Alice hadn’t liked it, but she’d understood, especially when her boss at the DA’s office had called her to come in to her office as Perry was tying his shoes.
He’d wisely refrained from laughing with sardonic pleasure, but he almost regretted his restraint. It would probably be the last laugh he’d get for days. The Daily Planet would not fumble this story. It was too big to assign to some thumb-fingered rookie or an incompetent like Ralph, so the job landed on his shoulders.
“Hey, boss man, what’s shaking?”
He turned with a start and saw Paula Young at her desk, an unlit cigarette hanging from her lip. “Paula! You’re still on medical leave from your heart attack! What are you doing here this early?”
“Same as you, I think. Big story coming down the pike, and you got almost no one here to write it for you.” She leaned back and lifted her lighter, then held it close to her cigarette without flicking it. “How’s about we work together on it?”
Perry suppressed a smile. “You know Alice won’t let me smoke any more. She hates the smell of tobacco on my clothes.”
She shrugged. “So I’ll irritate your wife a little. But you’ll get a good story written.”
He let the smile free. “Sounds like a plan to me.”
She finally flicked the lighter and lit up. “Good. I already talked to the harbor cops and got their statements for publication. And I have a friend at the hospital where the Connors girl is staying. They think she has a good chance to pull through. Think you can get a statement from the DA’s office?”
“If I can’t you can buy me one of those Cuban cigars you used to slip me.”
She gave out with a hoarse bray that Perry recognized as her laugh. “Done. It’ll be just like old times, Perry, you and me against the deadline.”
“You think we’ll beat it this time?”
“We always have before, boss man. Let’s get cracking and find out.”
Perry would always appreciate the memory of that day. It was Paula Young’s final byline for the Daily Planet. He was glad she got to see the story in print.
Paula went to bed two nights later and never woke up, her abused heart having finally given up the fight. Despite her fear that she wouldn’t be missed, there were representatives from every major daily paper within a hundred miles at her funeral. Perry’s eulogy brought tears to the eyes of everyone attending, including Alice. And Paula would have laughed at the cloud of cigar smoke and the number of empty liquor bottles left behind at the wake following her cremation.
*****
Rebecca Connors slowly floated back to awareness.
Nothing made sense. She tried to call out, but her voice wouldn’t work. It was as if there was something in her mouth keeping her from speaking. She tried to look around her, but even though she managed to flutter her eyelids and change the level of light she could perceive, no details resolved themselves before her eyes.
The effort exhausted her and she slipped back into the blissful darkness.
When she awoke again, she felt pain. Her stomach hurt and her throat was raw. Her eyes were still unable to focus, but at least they didn’t seem to be glued shut.
She could hear hissing noises in the background and a voice over a PA speaking softly. Once she heard several people run past her, but not close to her. She tried to call out again, but whatever was in her mouth still kept her from speaking.
Exhausted, she closed her eyes and slept once more.
*****
When she opened her eyes again, there was someone beside her bed. “Oh, good,” came a woman’s gentle voice. “You’re awake, and right on time, too! Let me get the doctor.”
Rebecca tried to turn her head to follow the woman’s progress, but the tube in her throat shifted slightly and it felt like sandpaper on a sunburn. She tried to speak again, but the tube apparently went all the way down her throat past her vocal cords and she couldn’t even moan. She closed her eyes against the pain and tried to remember why she seemed to be in a hospital.
She heard footsteps approaching and she opened her eyes again. A short, thin, young Asian man smiled down at her and said in a surprisingly deep voice, “Welcome back to the land of the living, Miss Connors. Please don’t try to talk. You have a breathing tube in your throat, but if you can stay awake for a few minutes, we’ll take it out.”
She tried to snap her head up and down with enthusiasm, but her head only shifted slightly on the pillow. “Very well,” said the doctor. “This will hurt for a minute or so, but you’ll be able to talk once you get your mouth and throat hydrated again.” He turned to the nurse beside him and said, “Let’s get ready to extubate her.”
The nurse turned and opened a drawer. She pulled on a pair of latex gloves and helped the doctor don a pair of his own. “You’ll need to lie still, Miss Connors. I don’t want to hurt you any more than is necessary.”
He smiled as Rebecca’s eyes widened. “Don’t worry, it isn’t that bad. I’m told that the actual discomfort is fairly mild.”
Oh, good, thought Rebecca, we’ve already gone from pain to discomfort. Can’t wait for it to turn into real fun.
“Your friends will be happy to know you’re awake,” the nurse said. “That good-looking young man hasn’t left the waiting room since he got here. We practically had to tie him up to get him to stay there.”
Young man – that had to be Clark.
It was a good thing the doctor chose that moment to slide the tube out of her throat, or she might have blurted out that Clark Kent was Superman’s other name. Not a good idea, especially since she’d just confessed her love to him.
Like that was a big secret to anyone, she complained to herself.
For the next few moments, though, she focused on not coughing her lungs out onto the pillow.
She heard the doctor and nurse talking but none of their words made any sense. There was something about staples and somebody’s stomach and blood seeping – who was bleeding? Maybe there was another patient in the room –
No. She was the one who was bleeding.
But why?
Oh, right. She’d been shot.
The shock of returning memory made her inhale deeply and she gagged and coughed again. The nurse held her shoulders and helped her turn to one side. Nothing came up from her stomach, but the effort of coughing made her entire middle hurt. It wasn’t a strong hurt, almost as if the invisible pain was over in the near corner of the room and barely reaching out to touch her belly when she moved or tried to breathe too deeply.
“Feeling better, dear?” the nurse crooned. “We just gave you some morphine for the pain. You can’t eat or drink anything yet, but I can give you some ice chips if you want them.”
Rebecca nodded wearily, determined to stay awake. The nurse turned and picked up a Styrofoam cup from the cabinet and fished out several chips of ice with a spoon from a small cooler beside the cup, then gently laid them on her tongue one at a time. Rebecca sucked at the first one, then opened her mouth for the second as soon as she swallowed the tiny droplets of water it gave. It made her think of a baby bird begging food from its mother.
After the fourth chip, the nurse put the cup back on the cabinet. “Feeling a little better, are we? You just lie still while I check your output.”
Nice lady, thought Rebecca, just a little mixed up on who was the patient. It wasn’t like they were conjoined twins or anything –
It was the closest thing to a coherent thought she would have for several hours.
*****
Rebecca’s eyes fluttered open. The room was darkened and all she could see was the vague outline of someone sitting beside the window. She blinked, and the image resolved itself.
Clark was sitting in the chair, staring out at the night sky. His left arm was folded across his chest and his right arm was braced on it while his right hand cupped his chin. There was a fading bruise on the side of his face and a piece of gauze taped to his forehead just above his eye. He looked smaller and weaker to her than he ever had before.
She tried to speak to him, but no sound escaped her lips beyond a strangled whisper. But he reacted immediately and strode to her bedside.
He smiled down at her and stroked her hair away from her face. “Hey, Becca. How do you feel?”
She tried to smile but shuddered in sudden pain instead. “Hurts,” she whispered.
“Your stomach?” She nodded. “I’ll call the night nurse.”
Her hand fluttered aimlessly as he stepped away, her attempt to touch him thwarted by his quick reaction. “Clark?” she groaned.
He was back in an instant to take her hand. “What is it?”
His touch made the pain easier to bear for the moment. “Don’t forget – what I told you. On the boat, I mean.”
That warm smile enveloped her again. “I won’t. Now let me get the nurse for you, okay?”
She nodded. He eased her hand down to the bed beside her hip and slipped away. The nurse would come and give her something for the pain and she could go back to sleep.
And when she woke up again, Clark would be there with her. It was better than any dream.
*****
Lois sat next to Lex in the hospital’s waiting room. She’d been there for six hours, he for almost four, and they had exchanged only fairly impersonal greetings and vacuous comments about the shows the waiting room TV displayed. They hadn’t shared anything serious or personal since he’d arrived. They hadn’t even discussed their respective experiences with the police interviews, and Lois was worried, both about their legal situation and about their personal relationship.
The station switched from the network soap opera feed to a local broadcast of Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint in “North By Northwest,” one of Lois’ lesser favorites because of the fake romance between Cary and Eva. Cary’s character had been caught in a near-fatal case of mistaken identity, and Eva’s character had more secrets in her life than a James Bond movie had beautiful and murderous women. The parallels between the movie and Lois’ relationship with Lex made her uncomfortable.
Just as Cary was being forced to drink massive amounts of liquor prior to the bad guys’ first attempt to kill him, Lex’ cell phone rang. He looked at the display and said, “Sorry, this is private,” and walked to the window away from the other couple in the waiting room. “Zeus here. Area not secure.”
She knew what it was about from the first words. It was the report on the raid on Arianna Carlin’s compound. Lois listened with growing horror as the report came in: two dead, three hospitalized, two of Arianna’s guardians dead and one captured, her house destroyed, and worst of all, Arianna had escaped.
Her first thought was to let Clark know what had happened. But then concern for Lex overcame that thought. He’d slumped further and further down as the bad news hammered him and his face had grown more ashen with every word until Lois feared he might actually collapse.
She stood and walked to his side. As he shut off the phone and slipped it back into his pocket, Lois took his free hand in hers. He started, then sighed. “You heard, I take it?”
“Yes.” She rubbed his hand for a moment, then said, “Come and sit down before you fall down.”
He allowed her to guide him to a small couch away from the nurses’ desk. He flopped down on it and put his head in his hands. “I am such a fool,” he muttered. “An arrogant fool. I never imagined that Arianna would fight back against such a well-armed force.”
Lois slipped down beside him. “What are you going to do?”
He leaned back without looking at her. “What can I do? The police department in the town nearest Arianna’s estate will surely investigate, and they will call in the state police, who will determine that automatic weapons and explosives were used, which will automatically involve the Federal authorities, who will quickly determine who was involved in the incident, and it is probable that I shall spend the rest of my life in court trying to resolve this debacle to no one’s satisfaction.”
She leaned back beside him and took his hand again. “I’m sorry it happened this way, Lex.”
He sighed again and rubbed his face with both hands. “Aren’t you going to tell me that you told me it was a bad idea?”
She didn’t respond to his feeble attempt at humor. “I’ve already said it. And you know what I would’ve said had you asked me before setting this in motion.”
He nodded. “And you were correct.” He crossed his arms over his chest as if warding off a chill. “My only defense is that I feared that Arianna would disappear when she learned that Nigel had failed to kill me.”
Lois nodded back. “You’re probably right about that, anyway. Any idea where she might be?”
“Not really. My intelligence network has identified two separate properties she has purchased within the past three years, either of which might be her new hideout. Or she might simply choose to disappear overseas. She has sufficient funds to slip away and assume another identity, one which would afford her total anonymity.”
“Ick. I don’t like that idea one bit.”
“Neither do I. But it may be preferable to another choice for her.”
Lois’ eyes widened. “I haven’t heard it yet and I don’t like it.”
Lex closed his eyes. “She could vanish into New Troy’s population and reappear to wreak vengeance upon me at a time of her choosing.”
“Yeah.” Lois shook her head. “You’re assuming that she’ll find out you were the one who sicced those gunmen on her.”
He waved a hand at the TV on the wall. “I have to assume that such information will become public knowledge before very many days have passed.”
*****
Arianna’s fury was boundless. It was blatantly obvious to her that Nigel had failed to kill Lex, and that the assault on her home had been Lex’ revenge for that affront. That assault had cost her two valuable employees, and the two who had come to the safe house with her wouldn’t stay with her. The third one, the woman from the garage, had never arrived, and Arianna was certain that the woman was already headed as far from New Troy as she could get.
The only one who might stay with her was the older man, the gardener, and Arianna couldn’t remember his name at the moment. Besides, he couldn’t shoot or drive, and without an estate to groom, he was all but useless. No, her best option would be to slip into hiding alone and wait for the proper moment to reappear.
And she still had the two hackers to deal with, the ones who had broken into her offshore accounts and copied her transaction records. She was sure that they had already given the information to whoever – almost certainly Lex – had attacked her refuge. She would keep her ear to the ground and find them also, and anyone else connected to them.
The older man looked frightened. He leaned close to her and said, “Dr. Carlin, what’re we gonna do? It ain’t safe for you out there.”
The man’s obvious concern for her touched her for a moment, but then her mind regained control. “There isn’t much we can do.” She opened the satchel she’d carried from the house and pulled on two latex gloves, then reached deeper and pulled out two wrapped stacks of hundred-dollar bills. “Your best option is to get away from me and stay away. I want you to take this and head to Florida, try to get work there. And use your other name. You can’t do anything else for me now.”
He glanced at the money in her gloved hand, then looked up at her. “What’s with the gloves, Doc?”
“My fingerprints aren’t on this money, and I don’t want them to be. If the police do stop you, they won’t be able to connect this money to me, or you to me, by checking it for prints. It will be one less reason for them to suspect you of any wrongdoing.”
His face relaxed into a slight smile. “Okay, Doc, I gotcha. Thanks.” He took the bills and peeled off the wrapper. “Just how much is here?”
“Twenty thousand dollars.”
His eyes bulged. “Twenty thou- are you kidding?”
“No. You’ve more than earned it. Now take this and get going. The others can drop you at a bus station, if that’s where you want to go.”
He looked at her with sadness and compassion. “Yes, ma’am. I’ll just get my bag and head on out.”
Arianna watched him trudge away, then turned to the other two. “Roger, Yvette, we’ve got to split up.” She reached into the satchel again and brought out four bundles of cash. “Here’s twenty-five thousand each. The two of you need to disappear.”
Roger took two of the stacks of bills and slid them into his pants pocket without a second look. Yvette, though, frowned at the money offered her. Unobtrusively, she slid a small pistol into her hand and hung it down beside her leg. “You’re not usually this generous with your operating capital, Dr. Carlin. You want to level with us?”
Arianna ignored the pistol and exhaled sharply. “I want the two of you away from me, that’s all. If I give you enough money to get started again somewhere else, you’re a lot less likely to go to the police because you’re broke and hungry.”
Yvette licked her lips, then twisted her mouth, and finally nodded. “Makes sense.” She reached out to take the other two stacks of bills from Arianna. “I take it you want us to be invisible for a while?”
“I don’t care if you put your faces on billboards and advertise your services so long as you don’t do it around here.”
Yvette nodded again and slipped the little pistol into her pants pocket. “That makes sense to me too. You ready to head out, Roger?”
The gardener’s name finally popped into Arianna’s mind. “If you’ll drop Mr. Carson off at the bus station or train station or wherever he wants to go, I’ll give you the keys to the old Buick. It’s the car the police are least likely to be looking for, and since it’s registered to Janet Smith they won’t be looking for it.”
Roger nodded. “Good idea. Sure, we’ll drop him off. Bye, Doc.”
Arianna hated the diminutive of her title. She’d earned her doctorate, and even though it had been a means to an end and not an end in itself, she was proud of it. Lex had insisted on calling her ‘Doc Ari’ when she’d first been admitted into the PhD program at Yale, and she’d always hated it when he’d called her that.
Receiving her degree the same month as her divorce was finalized had been most gratifying.
She forced herself not to snap at the man. “You two get moving. I don’t want to be caught, and I doubt that either of you want it. Good luck.”
Roger gave her a jaunty two-finger salute. Yvette backed away holding her cash, then picked up a purse she’d found at the safe house and slid the money in it. Carson smiled wearily at her. “Good luck to you too, Dr. Carlin. It’s been interesting workin’ for you.”
“Thank you. It has been an interesting experience for me also.”
Carson turned and followed the other two. Arianna heard the old Buick start up, cough a couple of times, then catch and run smoothly. As the car slipped away, she closed the satchel and carefully stripped off the gloves.
The neurotoxins embedded in the fibers of the counterfeit bills wouldn’t take full effect for three to six hours, depending on how much the bills were handled. She figured that Carson would be the first to succumb, since he probably wouldn’t be able to stop playing with the money. She wondered if either Roger or Yvette would realize what was happening to them before it was too late, but she doubted it. The symptoms were hardly noticeable prior to lethal exposure, and with any luck they’d lose consciousness while on the road and destroy the car in the ensuing wreck. Unless a very curious and highly skilled coroner examined the bodies, their deaths would then be discounted as exposure to carbon monoxide or injuries sustained in the crash. All she needed to do now was to locate Karen and neutralize her as well.
Arianna hated loose ends.
After that, she had to find out what had happened to Nigel. If Lex had killed him, she’d kill Lex.
Actually, she planned to kill Lex no matter what had happened. The only questions were how and when.
*****
Rebecca sighed to herself.
Clark was gone for the morning, talking to the police or some of Mr. Luthor’s lawyers or something. Lois had come by for a short visit and left with a promise to come back later that evening. The nurses kept dropping by to take her vitals or check her IV to make sure it was running properly or ask about her pain level and if she needed more drugs, but there was no one to talk to. She’d told the doctor that she was getting bored. He’d grinned – the meanie – and told her that it was a good sign and that she was feeling better. And daytime television was worse than bad. She had no idea that people treated each other that way in public on those awful talk shows. At least her parents, as bad as they’d been, had kept it in the family and away from the public.
So she was bored out of her skull and planning a breakout when a familiar face leaned into the room. “Hey, Lady Galadriel! How do you feel?”
Rebecca smiled. “Come on in, Morgana. It’s good to see you.”
“Good to see you too, girlfriend. Harry and Gandalf send their best wishes. We drew straws to see which one of us would come to see you and I won.”
“I’m glad you’re here. Actually I’m just glad anyone’s here. I’m getting bored like you wouldn’t believe.”
Morgana pulled a chair close to the bed and flopped down in it. “Jimmy told me he’d be here some time tonight for a little while. He’s doing some kind of in-depth research for the paper on Dr. Carlin.”
Rebecca sighed. “That’s not surprising. He’s a hard worker, and he’s pretty smart, too.”
Morgana smiled and tilted her head. “You playing matchmaker or something, Becca?”
“What?”
“Come on! ‘He’s a hard worker and he’s pretty smart.’ You gonna add ‘shadchen’ to your list of titles?”
“What’s a shadchen?”
The tall woman laughed. “It’s a Yiddish term for a paid matchmaker. She arranges meetings that are supposed to turn into marriages.”
“I thought that was a yenta.”
“Nah. Yenta’s just a gossipy old biddy. Speaking of gossip, I got a piece of news for you.”
“Please, yes! Tell me something that Maury and Oprah don’t know!”
Morgana laughed, then dropped her eyes for a moment before looking at Rebecca again. “The Dangerous Boys are breaking up.”
Rebecca’s eyes widened. “What?”
“Yeah. See, that thing last year with us helping the FBI catch those dudes who were robbing the Russian bankers didn’t scare anyone, even when they almost tracked us down and we had to go dark for almost a month. This time, though – “ she gestured at the bed “ – I’m really scared. Raoul and Philip both graduate at the end of the semester, and they’re already looking for permanent jobs. Jimmy’s the only one willing to go on, but he’s got some protection from the Daily Planet. We don’t.”
Rebecca nodded slowly and thought hard. They’d dodged several bullets in the past three years and had lots of fun. They’d also helped each other and pushed each other in their school careers, and she knew that the doctorate she was working toward would be much farther away if not for the help the group had given her.
At the same time, it wasn’t fair to ask them to continue to put themselves in danger. Dr. Carlin surely had enough resources to find them if they started hunting for her, and none of them wanted to end up in a hospital bed recovering from a near-fatal bullet wound – or buried because of a fatal one. So she was surprised to find that she wasn’t surprised that the members of the group were headed in different directions.
“So what are your plans now?” Rebecca asked.
Morgana bit her lip, then said, “I have a good offer from the Chicago Symphony. I start rehearsals in four weeks.”
“Hey, that’s great! You’re a terrific musician. I know you’ll do a great job.”
“Don’t get too excited. It’s only third chair and I’ll be on six months’ probation. They want to be certain that I ‘maintain the traditions of the orchestra’ while sawing away on an oversized violin stuck between my legs.”
Rebecca laughed and tried not to let Morgana see the pain, but it didn’t work.
“Hey, Becca, I’m sorry! You need me to call a nurse for you?”
“No, that’s – okay. Just let me relax – there. All better now.”
“Good. I’m glad you’re doing as well as you are. Um, you gonna have any, um, problems in the future?”
Rebecca narrowed her eyes. “What kind of problems are you talking about?”
“Oh, like, you won’t be able to eat certain food, or you’ll have a no-bikini scar, or you won’t be able to dance the horizontal mambo with Clark, or you – “
“Morg!” she squealed. “That was nasty, girl!”
“Hey, us civilians gotta get our jollies out somehow.”
Rebecca knew it would hurt, but she let the laughter ring anyway.
*****
“Recorder on. This is Homicide Detective William Henderson, in the thirty-third precinct of the Metropolis Police Department, conducting an interview with Karen Vollmer, who was taken into custody this morning at a shootout in the Metropolis suburb of East Brinkers. Are you ready to begin, Ms. Vollmer?”
“Sure. Let’s get this dog and pony show off the ground.”
“We’re recording this interview for this investigation. Do you understand?”
“Yeah.”
“Have you been read your rights and have they been explained to you?”
“Yes to both questions.”
“Do you want to call your attorney?”
“I just want this to end so I can get some sleep.”
“Please say directly whether you do or do not want your lawyer.”
“Fine! I don’t want a lawyer! Happy now?”
“Thank you. Please state your full name for the record.”
“My name is Karen Denise Vollmer.”
“Where do you live?”
“Metropolis, New Troy.”
“Address?”
“I get my mail at Riverside Hotel, Ninth and Bermuda. Up until today, though, I was spending my nights at Dr. Arianna Carlin’s estate in East Brinkers.”
“What is that address?”
“I never knew the address. But you can’t miss it. The house has a shell crater in the middle of the roof and for all I know it’s still burning.”
“Actually, it isn’t. The automatic sprinkler system put out the fire before we got there. You didn’t know that?”
“No. Those wannabe Green Berets cuffed me, blindfolded me, and hustled me into a windowless van before you could say Bob’s your uncle.”
“’Bob’s your uncle?’ Are you English, Ms. Vollmer?”
“No, I was born in Florida, but I spent a lot of my teen years across the pond. Nice people over there. I should have stayed.”
“Is that where you met Nigel St. John?”
“Yes. He recruited me my final year in university. Sold me a bill of goods, he did.”
“I suppose he must have. Can you tell us what happened today?”
“All I know is I got an alert call from Beth-Ann to – “
“I’m sorry, who is Beth-Ann?”
“Beth-Ann Reynolds. She’s our team leader. She was in the machine gun nest on the roof. Hey, where is she, anyway? You got her locked up somewhere else?”
“Let’s stay on track, Ms. Vollmer. Please continue.”
“Lemme see – right, we all got into position to watch the front for intruders. I thought I saw some people sneaking backwards when Paul – that’s Paul Snider – fired from upstairs. A bunch of people from the outside shot at the window he was shooting from, and Roger whose-last-name-I-don’t-know went up to check on him and found him dead. Then Dr. Carlin ordered Beth-Ann to get to the machine gun and cover our escape. A ricochet got her in the leg and she said she was okay and I waited for her in the kitchen but she never came. I guess the mercenaries caught her too. By the time I broke for the escape hatch it was closed and locked and a whole lot of people were pointing rifles at me so I gave up.”
“Let me check something. You’ve mentioned Dr. Carlin, Beth-Ann, Roger, and Paul. Was there anyone else in the house?”
“Just Yvette Jones. I assume she got out but I don’t know for sure. Oh, and there was the groundskeeper. I don’t think I ever heard anybody call him by his name.”
“Thank you, Ms. Vollmer. That’s all for now.”
“Great. Can I get a sandwich or something and then get some sleep? I’m wiped out.”
“Of course. I hope you like turkey and cheese on rye.”
“Right now I’d take sawdust and shoe leather and sleep on concrete.”
“We’ll see if we can do a little better than that.”
“Quicker would be better if you can do it.”
“Of course. You’ll have your meal faster than you can say Jack’s a doughnut.”
