Lynne Heitman - The Pandora Key aka The Hostage Room

Talk about karmic retribution.

ROGER FRATELLO’S OLD ADDRESS WAS A LARGE WHITE Victorian down a shady street in the affluent suburb of West Newton. It had a vast front lawn and a wraparound covered patio with a wooden porch swing. Susan Fratello answered the door. It was the same woman I had seen in those tuxedo-and-gown photos with her once-respectable husband, plus twenty years and a blue velour housecoat zipped up the front.

“Mrs. Fratello?”

A small terrier with wisps of brown hair in its eyes yapped from behind her leg as she scanned the street. “Have they found him?”

“Excuse me?”

“Aren’t you a reporter?” Her voice conveyed nothing but calm curiosity, a direct contrast to her nearly hysterical pooch.

“I’m a private investigator. I’m looking for information about your husband.”

“Read the papers.”

She started to close the door, but I put my hand on it, a gesture that made the tiny canine go nuts. He was a smart dog. He could spring and yap at the same time. Mrs. Fratello stared at me until I took my hand off her door.

“I’m sorry, but I have read the papers. I’ve done lots of research.” I held up my backpack. “It’s all in here. But it doesn’t give me what I need to solve my case.”

“What kind of case?”

“Someone I’m close to was abducted. My partner. I’m trying to find him.”

“What does my husband have to do with it?”

“That’s why I’m here. I need to figure that out.”

She pushed her head out again and looked up and down the quiet street. “Have you seen the FBI? They’ve been here. And they watch. They’re always watching. Did you see them out there?”

“I was questioned by the FBI a few hours ago.”

“About what?”

“About your husband. They have some new information about him.”

“Down, Trudy. Quiet.” The dog went silent. It was miraculous. “What did they say?”

“Perhaps if I came in, I could answer some questions for you as well.”

Susan Fratello lived what appeared to be a modest existence in a large house. While she went to change, I perused the photos lined up across the mantel. Her children were handsome and healthy, tan in the summer, red-cheeked in the winter, and always affectionate and close in their poses. It looked as if it had been a comfortable life, easy to be in, and without ever a thought in the world that it could all go away. There were no pictures of Roger.

Susan came in with a tall glass of water. Trudy, the tiny terrier, was right on her heels, and I wondered if she ever got stepped on or lost in Susan’s longer gowns and robes.

I took the glass from her. “Thank you.”

She had put on a pair of white slacks, a dark blue, long-sleeved, scoop-necked top, and a string of white beads with matching earrings. She was also wearing lipstick. I sensed that she didn’t get many visitors. She sat on her couch and patted her thighs. The springy dog had no problem leaping up there. Then the two of them sat and looked at me. Susan’s smile gave her the appearance of one of her photos-posed and two-dimensional.

“I’m sorry,” I said, “to bring all this up for you-”

“It never really went away. Besides, you’re not the only one. That awful Agent Southern was here. He brought a new one this time. He was completely bald.”

“Special Agent Ling,” I said. “That’s the team that interviewed me this morning.”

“That Southern is a sour man. I wonder what makes him so sour. Do you know?”

“I don’t.” But I had to agree with her. “Why did they come to see you?”

“Apparently, my husband has popped up somewhere in Europe.”

“He has?” If true, that put a big dent in the Fratelloas-Hoffmeyer theory. Hoffmeyer was dead.

“They have no proof. They only told me they had found something of his.”

“I think I know what that is,” I said. “They told me about all this cash in a safety deposit box in Brussels. Stacks of it with your husband’s and my partner’s fingerprints.”

That got her complete attention. “How much money?”

“They didn’t say.”

“Was it my husband’s?”

“We didn’t really talk about the money.”

Just as quickly, she turned a little glassy-eyed. “How strange this all is,” she said, “after so much time has passed. They showed me his wallet. Don’t you find that odd? From four years ago. They think he might contact me. That’s why they were here.”

“Would he?”

“Heavens, no. I would be the last person he contacted. I would turn him in, and he knows that.” She offered that same fixed expression. It was strange. At times, she seemed to be completely present behind it. At other moments, she was just gone.

“Who is your partner?”

“His name is Harvey Baltimore.”

“How unusual. Is that his real name?”

I nodded, thinking of how Harvey always had to explain his name. “His people came over from Poland. The agents who processed them couldn’t say the family name, and they were going to Baltimore, so-”

“They were rechristened at America’s doorstep. Yes, I understand.” This time, her smile was not forced. Her maiden name was probably something like Kasprzycki. “I don’t know a Mr. Baltimore,” she said. “I would remember. Is he also an investigator?”

“A forensic accountant.”

She sighed. “Unfortunately, I know what that is. After Roger left, I was interviewed by investigators of every stripe. Agents from the Treasury, the IRS, the state’s attorney’s office, the attorney general’s people-”

“But not Harvey?”

“No.”

I hadn’t considered that Harvey might have been part of a team investigating the fraud. Ling hadn’t mentioned it, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t so. I pulled out a picture of Harvey and showed it to her. “Maybe you know his face.”

She looked at it. “He has a nice face. He looks kind.” She offered it back to me. “Did you say he’s also missing?”

“He’s…I’m not sure where he is. I’m looking for him.”

I put the picture back and came out with the one I had slipped from the frame on Harvey’s desk. “His ex-wife showed up this morning. I think she might have something to do with it. Maybe you know her. She worked with your husband.” I offered her the picture of Rachel.

Susan looked as if I had just offered her a plate of botulism. Her neck bowed. Trudy, holding otherwise perfectly still, turned her head and looked back at Susan’s face. “Of course I know her. She was the ruin of this family. She deserves the hottest corner of hell for what she did to us.” Trudy whined. Susan lifted her up to her face and nuzzled her. “Isn’t that right, pookie?”

“I’m sorry.” I pulled the picture back. “I didn’t realize…were she and Roger-”

“Sleeping together?” She shrugged it off. “Who didn’t he sleep with? It wasn’t that.” She leaned forward and pointed with a long fingernail at the image of Rachel in my lap. “She brought the Russians.”

“Excuse me?”

“Russian investors.” She did the air quotes. “The Russian mob, the Russian mafiya, the red menace. Whatever you want to call them, just don’t call them people, because they’re not human, they’re animals. Those animals made our lives a living hell, and she’s the bitch responsible for bringing them in.”

“Into Betelco?”

“I’m sure you know all about my husband’s company.” She still puffed up a little when she described it that way. “Actually, my husband’s father’s business-and the source of our income-that my husband ran straight into the ground. We didn’t know what we were going to do. We couldn’t find any more investors. We couldn’t get a loan. We were desperate when, out of the blue, we found a buyer for the business.”