James Patterson - Run For Your Life

As I sat there on my beat-up sectional, sipping my too-sweet coffee, something brightened in my chest. Though Maeve was gone, she had accomplished a miracle. She’d taken the best of herself – her sense of humor, her love of life, her ability to do for others – and somehow injected it into my silly kids. That part of her would never die, I realized. That could never be taken away.

“Dad, stop! This is supposed to be making you happy,” Julia said.

“What are you talking about? I’m thrilled,” I said, wiping my wet face. “It’s just the Pine-Sol. It always irritates my eyes.”

It was coming on eight P.M. when I got back to the Blanchettes’ building on Fifth. I parked at a hydrant on the Central Park side, and before crossing the street I rapped a hello on the party rental van where the Emergency Service Unit guys were staked out.

My buddy Petie, the doorman, waved to me as I stepped under the awning. He had a new partner with him now. I grinned when I saw the face underneath the ridiculous green hat. It was ESU Lieutenant Steve Reno.

“Good evening, sir. May I get you a psycho?” he said, touching the hat brim with a white glove.

“I wish somebody could,” I said. “No sign, huh?”

“Not yet, but I did make ten bucks in tips. Mike, did you know these Blanchette people are holding a charity fund-raiser tonight? How does that make sense when our guy’s only joy in life is offing filthy rich New York types?”

I was stunned. “Are you kidding? A fund-raiser? Is that right, Petie?”

He nodded. “It’s been scheduled for months. Too late to cancel.”

I shook my head. I still couldn’t believe it.

“Which part of ‘your psychopathic son-in-law is coming to gun you down’ aren’t they getting, do you think?” I said as I headed for the elevator. Not to mention that they just learned that their daughter and granddaughters had been brutally murdered.

When the butler opened the penthouse door, I spotted Mrs. Blanchette out by the pool. A maid was standing beside her, and an elderly Latino man in maintenance clothes was sitting at the pool’s edge, apparently about to slide into the water.

“What’s going on out there?” I said.

“Mrs. Blanchette dropped an earring in the deep end,” the butler explained as the maintenance guy submerged himself.

“Why don’t they just drain it?” I said.

“It wouldn’t be refilled by the time the first guests arrive at nine, sir. Mrs. Blanchette insists on tea lights during the cocktail hour.”

“Of course,” I said. “The tea lights. What was I thinking?”

The butler’s face had a peculiar, pained expression. “Detective, perhaps you should have a word with Mr. B.,” he said. “I’ll fetch him, shall I?”

I nodded, wondering what that was about. As he hurried off, I walked out to the pool to try to talk sense to Mrs. Blanchette.

“Ma’am?” I said.

She whirled around like a sequined cobra. The contents of the big martini glass she was holding sloshed onto the maid’s dress. I could tell from her eyes and her breath that she’d already downed several of them. Maybe drinking and staying busy were her ways of working through her grief.

“Get me another one,” Mrs. Blanchette said impatiently, thrusting the glass at the cowed maid. Then she turned her attention to me.

“You again. What is it now?” she said.

“I must not have been clear about the danger you and your husband are in,” I said. “Your son-in – I mean, Thomas Gladstone – is targeting you, without question, as we speak. It’s not a good time to have people over. I’m going to have to ask you to postpone.”

“Postpone?” she said furiously. “This is the Friends of the Congo AIDS Benefit – in planning for the last year. Steven is flying in from the coast just for tonight. Sumner actually cut his vacation short. Do I have to supply last names? There’ll be no postponing anything.”

“Mrs. Blanchette, people’s lives are at stake here,” I said.

Instead of responding to me, she ripped a cell phone from her bag and flipped it open.

“Diandra? Hi, it’s Cynthia,” she said. “Could you put Morty on?”

Morty? Oh, Lord, I hoped it wasn’t the Morty I thought it was. I didn’t need that name dropped on me. Not even an ounce of it.

She stalked away, talking. The maintenance guy, up for a breath of air, stared at her back and muttered a Spanish word that was not used in polite company.

“You said it, amigo,” I told him.

When she came back a moment later, she shoved the phone at me, with a look of triumph on her face.

“Who is this?” came a harsh male voice.

“Detective Michael Bennett.”

“Listen up, Bennett. This is Mayor Carlson. There’ll be no more crazy talk of canceling this event. We can’t cave in to terrorism.”

“It’s not exactly caving in to terrorism, sir.”

“That’s how it will look. Besides, my wife and I are attending, so that’s an end to it. You call the commissioner and tell him to beef up security. Do I make myself clear?”

Right, I felt like telling him. A highly visible police presence will really be great for our trap. What did another bunch of dead citizens matter, compared to twisting by the pool with the A-list?

But those were the kinds of thoughts I grudgingly had to keep to myself.

“Whatever you say, your honor,” I said.

As I walked back inside, I met the butler returning with Henry Blanchette. I’d never seen a more unhappy-looking man.

“I’m sure you’re finding my wife’s behavior somewhat odd, Detective,” he said.

“That’s not my job to judge.”

“She has a very hard time dealing with stress,” he said with a sigh. “There’ve been times in the past when much slighter things than this have pushed her over the edge. She goes into denial, drinks, and takes pills, and she’s impossible to deal with. But soon she’ll break down, and then I’ll take her to a discreet clinic, where they know her well. So if you’ll just bear with us for a little while longer.”

“I’ll do my best,” I said, actually feeling sorry for Henry. On top of his own grief and the danger of the situation, he had a crazy woman on his hands.

For the next half hour, I followed the mayor’s orders. I called Chief McGinnis, and within minutes a dozen plainclothes cops and detectives arrived on the back elevator along with the caterer.

I finagled the guest list from the butler and stationed two cops at the penthouse door with it, although it wasn’t like they’d really need to match names to faces, what with all the Hollywood, Washington, and Wall Street celebs due to arrive. I got several more men to pose as waiters, and even posted a couple of detectives outside by the roof pool. With this maniac, who knew? He might try to scale the building like Spider-Man, or maybe paraglide onto the roof.

Then I made a security check, going upstairs and wandering through the cavernous duplex apartment. This place could have fit even my family comfortably, and would still have a few rooms left over. I passed by his-and-her master bedrooms, marble bathrooms that ancient Roman emperors would have found plush, a white-on-white French château-inspired library with an ornate, coffered ceiling. Any minute, I expected to turn a corner and find gold and gems just dumped out onto the oriental rugs like pirate treasure.

I was passing by yet another bedroom when I heard human sounds. It was probably just one of the platoon of maids, but better safe than sorry. I drew my Glock and held it down beside my thigh.

But instead of a maid, it was Mrs. Blanchette that I glimpsed through the doorway. She was sitting on a small canopy bed, crying. Her husband arrived at her back and embraced her, his cheeks wet. She rocked back and forth, keening, her fists squeezing and pulling at the bedspread as he whispered in her ear.