F. Paul Wilson - Haunted Air

Jack rarely watched talk shows. "She's big time?"

"Pretty much. Upper East Side. I hear she's been hot the past few years. Her name's popped up quite a bit from my sitters-a lot of them used to be Pomerol regulars."

"There you go," Jack said. "You know who, and now you know why."

"They Upper East Side?" Charlie said. "How come they got such a hooptie ride?"

Jack was about to explain that it was a city thing, but Lyle cut him off.

"The bitch!" he muttered, still staring at Madame Pomerol's business card. "She tried to kill me!"

"The husband was driving the car that just missed you, don't forget," Jack told him. "Looks like a joint effort to me."

"Yeah, but I bet she's been running the show."

Charlie said, "Yeah, well, don't really matter who was the shot calla. The right-now real is that our garage is holdin' two butt-naked honkies tied up like calves ready for slaughter. What we gonna do with them?"

"Not sure yet," Jack said. He was winging it here; usually he went into a job with at least half a plan, but events tonight had moved too swiftly. "The more immediate question is, What are we gonna do to them?"

Charlie was watching Jack. "What you mean, 'to'? I know they tried to hurt us-"

"They tried to kill us, Charlie," Lyle said. "Not hurt us, kill us! Don't you forget that!"

"A'ight. So they tried to off us. But that don't give us no right to off them." He was fingering his WWJD button again. "We gotta turn the other cheek and hand them over to the police."

Jack didn't like the way this was going. "Do that and you leave yourself open for charges like assault and battery, kidnapping, unlawful confinement, and who knows what else," he said. "You want that?"

"No way," Charlie said.

"And who said anything about killing them?"

"Well, the way Lyle talkin'-"

Lyle said, "I didn't mean we should kill them, Charlie. For Christ sake, you know me better than that! It's just that I don't know what we've accomplished here besides figuring out who they are. We let them go and they're right back on our asses tomorrow, trying to off us or run us out of town. I don't want to keep looking over my shoulder, man. I want this done with!"

"That's where I come in," Jack said. He felt the adrenaline start to flow, singing along his nerves as the beginnings of a plan took shape. He took one of the Madame Pomerol business cards from Lyle and waved it in the air. "We've got their address. We've got a set of their keys. Let's see if we can rig some surprises for them."

Charlie nodded. "I'm down with that. What you got in mind?"

"Still working on it, but I think I can find a few ways to keep Madame Pomerol too distracted to worry about bothering you. At least in the short run. We can worry about the long run later. But if I'm gonna make a move it's got to be tonight, and that means I'll need some help." He turned to Charlie. "Where's your key cutter?"

Charlie blinked and looked at Lyle. "Key cutter?"

"I know you've got one. Take me to it. We're wasting time."

"Do it," Lyle said.

Charlie shrugged. "Okay. We doin' copies of their crib keys?"

"You got it. And while we're at it, what do you keep in the way of spare parts for your magic tricks?"

Charlie grinned. "Got boxes and boxes."

"Swell. Show me your stock and let's see if you've got anything we can put to use."

Jack didn't know how the night would turn out, but he knew he'd be a lot later getting to Gia's than he'd planned. Had to give her a call soon. But not now. His blood was tingling and he felt more alive than he had in months.

11

Lyle ground his teeth as he wandered into the garage for another check on Madame Pomerol and her husband. Jack and Charlie had raced off to the city almost two hours ago, leaving him in charge of the... what? Prisoners? Hostages? Human garbage?

Whatever they were they were back in their car-the husband on the rear floor, Madame Pomerol on the back seat, both face down. Lyle had taken the tattered remnants of the clothes they'd cut off them earlier and tossed them over their naked bodies. But that hadn't been enough, so he'd found an old blanket to cover them. He didn't want to have to see their puckered, hairy asses every time he checked on them.

His fury frightened him.

Mainly because the windows and doors had started opening themselves again. Taking a shot at him, trying to run him down, he could handle that. Where he came from, you understood that. But sneaking into his house, changing it, wiring it to do strange things...

His house, goddammit! The first home he'd ever truly been able to call his own, and these pathetic lowlifes had invaded it, defiled it, made parts of it theirs instead of his.

It made him crazy, made him look long and hard at the carving knives in the kitchen, made him open their car trunk and stare at the nickel-plated pistol they'd fired at him.

But as much as he could think of murder, he knew he couldn't do it. No killer in his heart.

Yet God, how he'd love to scare the shit out of these two. Grab them by their scrawny necks and drag them through the rooms, holding their own piece to their heads, threatening to start busting caps on them if they didn't tell him what they'd done to his house, then stand over them and make them undo it, jab and poke them with the barrel when they didn't move as fast as he wanted.

But Jack had said the Fosters mustn't know where they were, mustn't connect their abduction to Lyle and Charlie Kenton. Lyle had never been one to take orders blindly, but this Jack guy... Lyle had to make an exception for him. You pay a man that kind of bread, you'd better listen to him. Besides, the man got things done.

The phone rang. Lyle checked the caller ID and picked up when he recognized Charlie's cell number.

"We through, bro," Charlie said. "We done our business and we headin' home."

"What'd you do?"

"Tell you when I get there, but lemme tell you, dawg, it fine! This Jack is righteous! Now, we took care of our end, you take care of yours. See ya."

Lyle hung up and took a deep breath. My end... Jack had laid it out before leaving with Charlie. Sounded easy then, but seemed risky now.

He took a deep breath and headed for the garage.

12

Lyle stopped the Fosters' car in the shadow of a construction Dumpster. With all the rebuilding still going on in the financial district, these things were on every other block; this one seemed particularly large and isolated. He killed the lights and checked the street: nothing moving. This part of Manhattan was just about the quietest spot in town on a Saturday night.

He checked his watch. He'd made good time. The BQE had been light so he'd followed it all the way down to the Brooklyn Bridge and across into lower Manhattan. He'd driven like a timid Sunday school teacher, sticking to the speed limit all the way, signaling every lane change, spending as much time looking in his rearview mirror as through the windshield. The last thing he needed was to get stopped for some minor violation and have to explain what was under the blanket in the rear.

Lyle picked up the carving knife from the seat beside him and thumbed the edge. He noticed the blade quivering in the faint light.

I've got the shakes, he thought. He cast an angry glance over his shoulder. They should have the shakes.

But he'd never done anything like this before.

Let's get this over with.

He pulled the blanket off Madame Pomerol's flabby body, turned her over, gripped her under the arms, and started dragging her from the car. She struggled and he could hear whimpers of fear through her gag, her breath whistling in and out her nose. She'd just spent hours stripped naked, bound, gagged, and blindfolded. Both of them had to be terrified beyond anything they ever could have imagined.