The Finishing School

61

THE FOOTSTEPS HAD STOPPED outside the office door. For a moment nothing happened, and chill silence prevailed. Melanie slipped her hand into her evening bag and grasped the Beretta, getting ready to defend herself. The door squeaked open on noisy hinges. She heard the sound of ragged breathing and thought it was her own, that it would give her away. But it came from her pursuer.

“Carmen? He-hello? Are you here?” a frightened voice called out.

Dizzy with relief, Melanie pushed the swivel chair out and rose to her feet. “It’s me, Melanie.”

Lulu was in the act of reaching for the light switch.

“Don’t!” Melanie covered the distance to Lulu’s side in two rapid steps, knocking the girl’s hand away in the nick of time. “No lights,” she whispered urgently. “Hogan could show up any minute. He could already be in the hall. You have to leave.”

“Carmen’s my sister. I’m staying.”

“What you’re doing won’t help her. If I have to worry about you, too, I’ll get distracted. Go. Now.”

“I want to help.”

“Fine. There’s something important you can do for me. I have a detective who’s supposed to show up to make the arrest, but I haven’t heard from him in the last half hour. I need you to call him. Take my phone, go outside, tell him where I am and to get here fast. Just hit redial. His number is the last one I called.”

Lulu looked at her in confusion. “I…I don’t know. I-”

“Do it!” Melanie commanded. “Trust me, it’s the only way. Come on, I’ll take you to the front staircase. Hogan will use the back, and I don’t want you running into him by accident.”

Grabbing Lulu firmly by the wrist, Melanie leaned out the office door and stole a furtive glance down the hallway. “It’s clear. Let’s go.”

They hurried along the dark hall in the opposite direction from the way Melanie had come. When they reached the main staircase, Melanie gave Lulu her cell phone and physically turned the girl so she was pointing downstairs. “Go. And don’t you dare come back.”

Lulu started down but then turned, throwing a pleading look over her shoulder. “You’ll protect her? Promise?”

“Yes. Now, get out of here. And be quiet about it.”

Melanie watched Lulu creep down the stairs until the girl’s slender form disappeared from sight, and then she turned resolutely back. But what she saw froze her in her tracks. A flashlight beam, bouncing wildly off the walls, kicking up strange shadows. Two figures struggling. Melanie drew her gun and advanced stealthily. Clinging to the darkness along the walls, she moved forward until she could see them clearly. They were standing in front of the door to the development office.

“Want me to fucking kill you?” Hogan said. In the crazed violence of the sound, Melanie just barely recognized the psychologist’s laid-back voice. He had Carmen by both arms.

“No.”

“Then don’t try that again, stupid bitch. Nobody can hear you with what’s going on downstairs anyway.”

Hogan pushed Carmen away roughly and fished in his coat pocket. Melanie tensed, thinking he might pull a gun, but he brought out a set of keys and inserted one into the lock. In a second they were inside. Melanie crept right up to the door, listening. Hogan didn’t turn on the light. Instead the beeps and groans of a computer sounded, and a blue glow emanated from the frosted-glass window. Hogan had booted up the computer. Melanie looked at her watch-7:29. In just one minute, ten million dollars would flow into Holbrooke’s account, Hogan would force Carmen to execute the commands transferring it out, and then he would have no further use for her.

“Hurry up,” she heard Hogan tell Carmen. “Pull up the account. I need to be in it when the money comes.”

Melanie realized that giving her phone to Lulu had been a big mistake. Now was the moment to call 911. But in the time it would take Melanie to search out another telephone, Carmen could die. She looked down at the gun in her hand and back up at the office door. At least she could stop that from happening, even if she had to do it by herself.