Джеймс Паттерсон - NYPD Red 6

“Pay attention.”

“To what?” she said.

“Everything.”

He didn’t take her to the mall. Five minutes into the drive he pulled over and said, “Being aware of your surroundings can save your life. And if you are released or manage to escape, you want to help law enforcement with as many details as you can remember.”

He then asked her five questions about things they’d seen, heard, even smelled on their brief trip. She didn’t get a single one right.

“Your brain was already at the mall,” he said. “You have to learn to live in the present.”

He was so incredibly sexy—jet-black hair, steel-gray eyes, and full lips, and the jacket he wore did little to hide the chiseled body underneath. Erin leaned in to kiss him.

“No,” he said, grabbing her wrist. “Not now. Not ever.”

“Why? Are you married?”

“No. I am only here to protect you from the insanity of others and your own stupidity. If you don’t want to learn, I will look for a job teaching someone who does.”

“I’m sorry,” Erin said. “Let’s start over.”

They did, and the next thing Ari told her was never to let her enemy know how well trained she was. He taught her how to stay mentally and physically active. How to capitalize on even the smallest mistake an abductor might make. But most important, he taught her how to deal with a captor: Keep your dignity. It’s harder to kill or harm someone who can remain human in his eyes. Establish rapport. Don’t antagonize and don’t try to convince him that his delusions are unfounded. Above all, comply. You may have to do things you don’t want to—including sex. Just do it, because sometimes that’s the only way to stay alive.

“Give in,” Ari told her over and over and over again during the four years they were together. “But never give up.”

CHAPTER 18

IT WAS TWO in the morning when Kylie and I sat down to debrief the bosses. Not just Captain Cates, but all the way up the food chain. Even the mayor showed up for this one.

They asked a lot of questions, some of which we couldn’t answer because they were the same questions Kylie and I were still asking ourselves.

“You want to know the difference between the two of us and most of them?” Kylie told me when the session was over. “We’re trying to figure out how to solve this, and they’re trying to figure out what to do if we don’t solve it.”

We went back to our desks to crank out paperwork—DD-5s. On a normal case we’d document everything we’d learned to date, and it would go into a file that could be accessed across the department. But this case was a hot potato, and the powers that be were afraid of press leaks, so our reports were restricted to a very short list of people.

It was too late to go home, so at three thirty both of us crashed at the station. I slept till six thirty, showered, and wondered how the hell Veronica Gibbs could exist on so little sleep every day of her life. Kylie was still asleep, so I decided to walk around the corner to Gerri’s Diner and bring us back some breakfast.

And that’s when my day took a turn for the better.

Cheryl Robinson, the love of my life, was sitting in a booth talking with Gerri Gomperts, the diner owner who will happily unscramble your personal life while she scrambles your eggs.

As soon as I walked through the door, both women stood up. Cheryl ran over and gave me a much-needed hug. Gerri grabbed a coffeepot, poured me a cup, and told me I looked like crap.

I ordered two breakfast burritos and coffee to go, then sat down with Cheryl.

“What’s going on with Erin Easton?” she said.

I put an imaginary key to my lips and turned the lock. “Sorry, babe. They’re keeping a tight lid on it. Let’s talk about something else.”

She shrugged. “What did Kylie say about my cousin?”

I knew exactly what she was asking, but I gave her a puzzled look to buy myself some time to come up with an answer.

“My cousin Shane,” she said. “You were supposed to ask her about him.”

My first impulse was to say, We were a little busy with this kidnapping thing . But that was a half-assed excuse, and Cheryl would see right through it. I’d spent the entire night with Kylie. We’d had plenty of downtime in the car. I could easily have told her about the tall, good-looking, ginger-haired, soon-to-be-celebrity chef who’d be perfect for her.

Then it hit me. “You’re jumping the gun,” I said. “I know you think I was supposed to tell Kylie about him, but that’s not how guys work. I can’t pimp Shane without clearing it with him first. We’re going to the restaurant next month to meet your aunt Janet, and I’ll ask him then. If he opts in, I’ll take the next step.”

“We don’t have to wait a month,” she said. “I was just telling Gerri that after you left, Shane came back to the table, and I told him all about Kylie. He doesn’t like fix-ups, but I did such a great presell that he was definitely intrigued.”

“Did you tell him she was my partner?”

“And your ex-girlfriend. Full disclosure. At first he thought that might be awkward, but I told him it was your idea to introduce them.”

Cheryl’s phone chirped. She checked her incoming text and stood up. “Duty calls,” she said. “I’ve got to run. I know you’re crazy-busy. So am I. I’ll call you later. Let me know what Kylie thinks about Shane.”

She leaned over, gave me a quick kiss, and left me sitting there. I drained the coffee in my cup, and Gerri appeared instantly and topped it off.

“Your breakfast is almost ready,” she said, “but while we’re waiting, I have a question. How much wine did you drink last night to come up with the bright idea of fixing your ex-girlfriend up with your current girlfriend’s blood relative?”

“I swear to God, it was a total misunderstanding. I said something, Cheryl heard something else, and now …”

I couldn’t finish the sentence, so Gerri finished it for me. “And now you’re afraid that if you tell Cheryl that the last thing you want to do is fix Kylie up with a good-looking, successful man who can cook, you will wind up, as the French say, in the château de bowwow .”

I nodded. “That pretty much sums it up.”

Gerri put the coffeepot back on a burner and sat down across from me. I was about to get breakfast with a side order of therapy—whether I wanted it or not.

CHAPTER 19

GARY BANTA WAS a pro. He weaved the ambulance, siren wailing, through the morning traffic on Fifth Avenue with Indy Speedway proficiency. Most vehicles, willingly or grudgingly, pulled over quickly and gave him a wide berth. In a big city like New York, people know that response time to a 911 call can mean the difference between life and death. They also know there’s a fat fine if they fail to yield.

The traffic signals are timed so that if a driver maintains the speed limit, the lights in front of him will turn green before he gets to them. But an ambulance clipping along at breakneck speed gets ahead of the sequence, so Gary had to whoop-whoop at every corner to run the red lights and avoid barreling into the crosstown traffic.

At Seventy-Fourth and Fifth, he pulled up to the canopy of a stately nineteen-story prewar building.

“Such gross injustice,” his partner, Julio, said. “The most beautiful apartment houses in New York, and they’re always filled with rich old white ladies.”

Gary shook his head. He’d heard Julio on the subject before. He left the lights flashing as they got out.

A uniformed doorman came rushing to the curb. “What’s going on?” he said.

Gary checked his iPad. “We got a call for an elderly woman, difficulty breathing. Apartment eight C. The name is Ogden.”