Need You Now

22

T he black limousine passed a second time. Or was it a different one? Lilly wasn’t sure. They all looked alike. On any given workday, thousands of limos must have cruised down broadway in the financial district. That call from her source was making her paranoid. Or maybe she was just more alert. No, this was definitely paranoia.

Damn you, Patrick.

She shook off that thought. She didn’t want to jump to conclusions. Not everything her source had told her could be true. Not all the blame could be laid on Patrick Lloyd. Even though his name was really Peter Mandretti. And his father was in jail for murdering Gerry Collins. And he went to see Manu Robledo without any help from her.

“You’ve been played , ” her source had told her. “First by Gerry Collins, then, even worse, by Patrick Lloyd.”

A pigeon waddled past her on the sidewalk. Lilly thought of its cousin in Singapore-the seagull that had swooped down from the sky and dropped a direct hit on Patrick’s head. Allegedly swooped down. The timing of it-right in the middle of her breakup speech-had been rather unbelievable. Sunscreen. What kind of jerk would slap himself on the head with fake bird shit to make it even harder for his girlfriend to dump him?

“Patrick played you from beginning to end ,” he’d told her, “ on every level.”

Loser. That’s what you are, Patrick: a lying loser.

A black limo with dark-tinted windows passed. Lilly stopped as it turned at the next block. Very similar to the last one that had turned off Broadway at the same cross street. It was hard to say if it was the same one she had seen before, but the mere possibility was making her so nervous that it felt like she had broken glass in her stomach.

This is all your fault, Patrick, Peter-whatever your name is.

She jaywalked across Broadway, avoided the piles of slush at the curb, and cut down the narrow side street at St. Paul’s Chapel. Changing course made for a little longer walk, but she could get the subway at the World Trade Center. She thought about grabbing one of the cabs outside the Hilton, but her cash was running low, and the station was only two minutes away. She stopped at the crosswalk for the red light, glancing again at the chapel. She hadn’t attended services in years, but she was suddenly back in elementary school and reciting the Golden Rule, guilting herself into being the bigger person and doing the right thing.

You have to call Patrick.

His lies were hurtful, no doubt about it. But that bizarre phone conversation had, in the end, come down to the question of whether Patrick should live or die: “That’s entirely up to us , ” the caller had told her. Whatever lies Patrick had told her didn’t change that fact. She had to tell him.

The traffic light changed at Church Street as she reached for her cell, and she was stepping off the curb when the limo cut her off in the crosswalk. Lilly jumped back onto the sidewalk as the rear door opened. It startled her, but she recognized the man in the backseat. Even though she no longer worked at BOS, photographs of the new head of private wealth management at BOS/America had been all over the news lately.

“Get in,” said Joe Barber. He was alone on the bench seat, directly behind the driver.

Lilly was more confused than afraid-but fear was definitely part of the equation. For a moment she couldn’t move, her mind and body trapped between the eerie, urban silence of old St. Paul’s Churchyard behind her and the incessant buzz of construction at the World Trade Center site across the street.

“Get in the car,” said Barber.

Lilly froze, her eyes locking with Barber’s. To say that she didn’t know who to trust anymore was a gross understatement; she trusted no one. She certainly didn’t know Barber, except for what she’d read about him. But the newest addition to BOS/America’s top management-a former Treasury official who wasn’t even working for BOS when Cushman had come crashing down-seemed low risk. And worth a listen.

But how did he know how to find me?

“Lilly, get in the car, or the next sound you hear will be FBI handcuffs closing around your wrists.”

The broken glass was churning, clawing away at the inside of her stomach. Lilly’s war was being fought on too many fronts. Her legs didn’t have another run in them. She climbed inside and closed the door.

Barber signaled to the driver, and the limo pulled away.