Talk (The Alexandra Chronicles Book 4) Read online

  Unfortunately the bracelet clanked when it fell and then rolled over the concrete, and her abductor saw it. Urging her on, he said, "I suppose it will make you feel better that you tried."

  "Don't make me want to punch you," she told him automatically, thinking in the next moment, This is not a friend, Jessica! Well, he better be your friend, she thought in the next instant. You better make him your friend and keep him as your friend or you'll end up like Bea.

  What amazed her was that her kidnapper was such a pleasant-looking fellow. Dressed in a blue blazer and Dockers and loafers, no less, as though he had just hurried over from his Princeton reunion-committee meeting to kidnap her.

  "Please hurry," he said, nodding to the next door.

  The next door took them to a long corridor. Then they took a right, another right, and when they reached a dank little room, he stopped and told her to take off her cowboy boots and put on a pair of black rubber boots. They fit. Then she had to put on a big orange slicker, and finally he plopped a white hard hat on her head that was so big it nearly sat on her nose. He put on a Con Edison jacket and hardhat too and then said, "When we go out, you're going to turn right and head straight out to the street where the Con Ed truck is parked. Get directly into the passenger's side seat."

  He blinked and extracted a device from his pocket that looked like some sort of electronic remote control. "Remember—"

  "You won't have to set that off," Jessica told him. "Really. You've got me—just leave my friends alone."

  It was strange how calm she felt, how clear her mind was. She was carefully making mental notes. Her kidnapper was approximately six foot one, about one hundred eighty pounds. Dark brown hair. Brown eyes. Dark mustache. Horn-rimmed glasses. Thin lips. White teeth, a bit crowded on the bottom. A chicken-pock mark or acne scar high on his left cheek. Large hands, thick wrists.

  They came out a door to find themselves crossing a marble lobby. But before she could do anything to attract attention, she was guided through a brass revolving door onto what Jessica figured must be Avenue of the Americas. Just as she spotted the Con Edison truck, she managed to drop an earring, then headed straight toward the vehicle and, looking neither right nor left, opened the passenger's-side door and got in.

  "You dropped this," her kidnapper said as he got in next to her, placing her diamond earring into her hand.

  "Thanks," she said, reaching up to take her hard hat off.

  "Leave it on," he told her. "And put on your seat belt."

  She complied. Then she looked out her window, hoping to catch the look of a passerby. There were lots of them, only no one seemed terribly interested in peering inside a Con Ed truck. "Look straight ahead, please," he said. She did.

  He drove across Forty-Ninth Street to the West Side Highway extension and turned south. They went about twenty blocks and he turned into some sort of city parking facility on the Hudson River. No one appeared to be around. "Okay, we get out here," he said. She got out. "Over there."

  They walked toward a small, square brick utility building. He unlocked the door and held it open for her. It was a shack with a lot of tools and junk in it. He took the hard hat from Jessica, helped her off with the poncho and pointed to a battered wooden door. "You may want to use the bathroom before we make the next leg of our trip."

  Wordlessly she went to the door and opened it. It was a bathroom that her kidnapper must have prepared for her, because while the john was clean and there was a roll of toilet paper, a bar of soap and a new roll of paper towels, it was the filthiest rat hole of a bathroom she had ever seen. But she used it. Heaven only knew what was next. But she also stuck the earring he had returned to her inside the toilet-paper roll. Since it was a diamond, she was pretty sure someone would pay attention. Try to pawn it, at least.

  And then suddenly panic gripped her. He wasn't going to put her in a storage locker like those people did to that Exxon executive, was he? Or put her in a box like those guys who had buried that man alongside the West Side Highway? Dear God, he wouldn't bury her in something, would he?

  As long as his fantasy remains intact, she had been told, he probably won't hurt you.

  "Please, God," she thought, closing her eyes, "help me to remain calm. Help me to do your will. Please help me, God." And then she opened the door and found her kidnapper standing there, holding a bottle of water and a tissue with three pills on it.

  "You need to take these, Jessica," he said quietly. "They will make you sleep. They won't hurt you, they won't threaten your sobriety."

  "I'd rather not," she told him.

  "It will be easier on you," he told her.

  "You're not going to bury me in a box, are you?" she blurted out. "Because if you are, you might as well kill me right here and now because I'm claustrophobic and I will kill myself before getting into a box underground."

  He looked pained. And then he smiled, almost tenderly. "I would never do something like that to you. I simply wish for you to rest for the next few hours until we get to where we're going. And you'll be quite comfortable there, where we're going, I promise you." He held out the bottle. "Please, Jessica."

  She acquiesced, took the medication and the water from him, and swallowed the pills. Sam would fire her as his sponsee for taking unknown drugs, but surely there were exceptions for kidnappings.

  She wished she could get over the urge to try to smash this guy in the nose and get away, because she knew if she did try something like that, no doubt he'd blow up Rockefeller Center. Some security measures. She would string that jackass Dirk up herself when she got out of this.

  "Thank you," he told her, taking the bottle from her. He led her outside and to the Con Ed truck. He opened the back doors. Inside was a stretcher, lashed to the side, with a pillow and blanket on it. "I think you might want to stretch out there."

  It was true, the pills were already starting to take effect. She just felt tired, suddenly, sleepy, and the stretcher looked inviting. So she climbed up into the van and stretched out on it, big black rubber boots and all. "There's a monitor in the cab," he told her. "So if you need anything, just say the word and I'll hear you."

  "Okay," she said, yawning. "So you're not going to hurt my friends, are you?"

  "No."

  "Or hurt anybody else—if I cooperate, I mean."

  "I won't hurt anybody," her kidnapper promised. He took the remote-control thing out of his pocket and tossed it with a clatter on the floor of the truck. "That wasn't really a bomb back there. I'm sorry I tricked you, Jessica, but I needed your help."

  "Oh," she said. Great, she had cooperated for nothing. Well, maybe for her life.

  He closed the truck doors and locked them. There was a night-light so she could see. The engine started up and Jessica vowed to remember the stuff they always did in the movies, like listening for trains and boat whistles and other sounds to figure out where they were going. But all she could hear was the hum of the engine and an occasional squeak of a spring, and feel the gentle rocking of the van as it started to move.

  He was trying to wake her and she did come to. Barely. He helped her off the stretcher—she stumbled on something on the floor—and half carried her out of the truck. It was very dark and they were in the country somewhere, on a dirt road. She saw the outline of a darkened house, but he led her away from it, over the grass. Into the woods?

  She saw the stars and heard crickets and tried to keep her eyes open. "I'm so tired," she said, but he made her go on. He let her sit down finally and she curled up on her side in the damp grass. She heard him say something and then felt him pull her up to a sitting position. She felt something wet on her forehead.

  "You are clean and protected," he whispered.

  "Oh," she said, wanting to curl up on the ground again.

  He pulled her to her feet and very nearly carried her. She saw stars, the night sky and the silhouette of trees. "It's pretty here," she said, vaguely remembering that she was somewhere strange and with someone she couldn't re
member. "I need to take a whiz."

  He paused, and then moved her in another direction.

  There was the crash of a door and the smell of an outhouse or something. "Can you do it yourself?"

  "Sure," she said and went through the routine, her eyes closed. Then he was shaking her and pushing something in her hand. Kleenex? She used it and he helped her up and she pulled up her underclothes. Then she stumbled forward and he kept her from falling.

  "You are very susceptible to medication, my darling," he said softly, putting her arm around his shoulders and leading her along. "Okay, up." He helped her back into the truck where she tripped on something again and he caught her, gently lowering her to the stretcher.

  "Nightie night," she said gratefully, curling up on her side and pulling the blanket over her shoulder.

  "Nightie night," he said, closing the truck doors and locking them.

  Part IV

  Nightmare

  14

  Jessica's eyes opened. And then her eyes really flew open and she sat up. Where the hell was she?

  It was like a scene out of an old Hammer gothic horror movie. She was sitting in a massive mahogany bed with a pink silk canopy and a red velvet bedspread, which smelled vaguely of mothballs. Next to the bed was a round table with red fabric draped over it, and on it was placed an electric hurricane lamp and a glass of water. To the left there was a fireplace with an ornate stone mantel. There was an elaborately carved Victorian sofa across the way, made of mahogany and covered in red velvet. On the floor was a faded Oriental rug.

  There were three doors—to the left, the right and straight ahead—all made of cypress, stained dark, with large brass plates and door handles. There were carved plaster moldings on the walls, a swirl of carved plaster on the ceiling and a short brass chandelier. The windows on either side of the bed were recessed in brownstone, but Jessica could not look out because behind the red velvet floor-to-ceiling drapes the windows were bricked in.

  Bricked in.

  She thought of Edgar Allan Poe and tried not to panic. She had been kidnapped by her stalker, a nutcase for sure, and he had brought her to a bedroom with velvet drapes and bricked-in windows. Where was she? Transylvania?

  Only then did Jessica realize she was dressed in just her bra and panties.

  So he had undressed her.

  And she remembered something about this, vaguely, something far away about being undressed, and then she became aware of a pain in her arm. She looked down and saw a bandage taped to the inside of her left arm. She pulled the bandage back. The creep. He had shot her up with medication while she was asleep in the truck.

  So that's what another vague memory had been about, of an intravenous bag hanging above the stretcher, of being wheeled out somewhere, thinking she was having her wisdom teeth out again. I had them out when I was fifteen! she remembered trying to explain. I better tell them, she had reasoned, but when she tried to, she had been shushed and she had gone away again, somewhere into the darkness.

  The son of a bitch had drugged her on top of the pills. How long had she been out? What day was it? Was it day? How the heck was she supposed to know if it was day or night when the windows were bricked in?

  Bricked in.

  She closed her eyes and did what every good AA member first felt ridiculous doing but always did anyway when in trouble. God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Help!

  God only knew how far they had traveled. They could have taken a plane, a boat, for all she remembered. Of course, she didn't know how long she had been out, either, so maybe they had not gone far at all. They could still be in New York somewhere.

  No. She remembered that outhouse thing, the country darkness, the stars in the sky.

  She spotted a letter, folded and taped to the bedpost. Jessica it said. She scooted down to pull it off the bedpost. Then she reached for the glass of water, sniffed it and proceeded to drink it all for she was very thirsty. And then she read the letter.

  Dear Jessica,

  (So what had happened to "Darling Jessica"? Or "Dearest Jessica"? Now that he had her, she was just "Jessica"?)

  Dear Jessica,

  Do not fear. You are safe and nothing will hurt you. I think you will find everything you need for your stay. I cannot say how sorry I am for having had to medicate you, but you will have to trust I have your best interests in mind.

  No more medication from now on. I promise. The water is pure and clean and the food in the kitchen is fresh. The microwave is a little temperamental, but if you cook everything on HIGH it should be fine. There are clean clothes in the closet and dresser, clean towels and toiletries in the closet in the bathroom. Everything here is for you to use.

  Please, please, PLEASE do not try to leave your apartment, because there are electric fields to keep you safe.

  I know you must be wondering what all this is about. All shall be revealed in time. In the meantime, do not fear, for all is well and you are safe.

  I love you, Leopold

  "We are doing everything humanly possible to locate her," Alexandra said to Jessica's parents, Dr. and Mrs. Wright. Cassy had asked Alexandra to swing out to Essex Fells to see the Wrights herself, partly out of courtesy but mostly because the police had gotten nowhere with them.

  Will had taken one of the DBS cars and driven them out to the New Jersey suburb, and now they were sitting with the Wrights in their living room. The house was one of those lovely 1920s colonials with a big wide porch, Dutch roof, splendid windows and expanses of woodwork and wood shingle. The inside was very nice, too. Dr. Wright had been retired for some time, but had enjoyed an enormous practice. Mrs. Wright's family was distant relatives of the Duponts or somebody, and so she had come to the marriage with money, too.

  "I also want to assure you," Alexandra continued, "that the police and FBI are certain the man who kidnapped her will not harm her."

  Mrs. Wright looked to her husband and said, "I'm not sure so many people should be so upset over Jessica's disappearance. I'm sure she'll turn up. She always does."

  "I'm afraid this is not like the old days, Mrs. Wright," Alexandra said gently. "I'm afraid there's no doubt that Jessica has been taken against her will."

  Mrs. Wright's eyebrows arched slightly. "If that's true, then it must be Eric." She turned to her husband. "Don't you think, Mal? That if someone has kidnapped Jessica, it must be Eric."

  Eric was Jessica's ex-husband of almost nine years.

  Dr. Wright made an indecipherable sound deep inside his throat that was apparently an assent of some kind.

  "If there's money involved," Mrs. Wright continued, "Eric's involved, you can bet your life on it." Her eyes narrowed slightly. "Received a ransom note, have you?"

  "No, no ransom note," Alexandra said. "Not yet. But do you really think Eric's capable of doing something like this?"

  "Oh, sure," Mrs. Wright said expansively, just for a split second resembling her daughter. "Those drug people all work together, don't they? He's too unstable to do it by himself. He's too stupid, frankly. And surely he knows you'd pay a lot to get Jessica back, seeing as she is the jewel in the crown of the network."

  Alexandra and Will smiled slightly. They couldn't help it. They knew Jessica must have described herself that way to her parents as a joke, paraphrasing the annual report. But clearly Mrs. Wright had absorbed it as a perfectly legitimate illustration of her daughter's position.

  Dr. Wright seemed to suddenly wake up, eyes growing large. "Sarah's been kidnapped, you say?"

  "Yes," Mrs. Wright said loudly. "Eric's kidnapped her."

  Dr. Wright gave an exaggerated shrug, holding his hands out the way a child might. "She's gone back with him before. Don't know why, but she has."

  "But that hasn't been for a very long time," Will said.

  "Oh, I don't know," Mrs. Wright said vaguely. She touched her cheek with her left hand, showing an older but stil
l elegant hand encrusted with diamonds.

  "Not since she stopped drinking," Will added.

  "Listen to me, young man, Jessica was into mischief and mayhem long before she ever started drinking. And given the current situation, she's obviously going to remain in trouble for far longer than she ever drank."

  Alexandra's mouth parted in astonishment. After a moment, she said, "I'm not sure you understand, Mrs. Wright. Someone has taken your daughter against her will. I was there, I saw it happen. Jessica's in very real trouble and it's not her fault."

  Mrs. Wright was silent for several moments. And then she said, "I'd like to think so."

  Jessica found slacks and blouses hanging in an orderly fashion in the closet behind the door on the left. On the floor there was a pair of cowgirl boots from the line she endorsed and also a pair of cross trainers. In the dresser she found several pairs of underpants and brassieres, and she stopped herself from wondering how he could know the right size and brand names to purchase for her.

  How could he know this much about her?

  The thought made her sick.

  Jessica opened one of the other doors and pulled a chain dangling from the ceiling. An overhead light came on. She was standing in a dressing-room vestibule that, in turn, led into a bathroom with a sink, a bathtub, and through another door, a water closet. Literally, a water closet from some time past. All that was in it was a john, with a long pipe going up into a big square tank up high, from which a chain with a wooden handle dangled. Back in the bathroom she surveyed the open shelves and found weeks and weeks of supplies, everything from mascara to tampons to deodorant to shampoo and conditioner

  "Hey!" she said out loud. "What's this?" In her hand was a bottle of conditioner that said it was for color-treated hair. "Try again, buddy, you haven't stalked me good enough!" And she threw it into the wastebasket under the sink.