In a Heartbeat - Elizabeth Adler [85]
In no time at all a bottle of wine was opened, food was being cooked, and they were all talking at once. Mel was bringing them up to date on the investigation; Harriet was bringing her up to date on Moving On business; and Riley was interrupting at every possible opportunity with her own important stories of school, and especially of Jason Mason, who was, she said scornfully, still shadowing her “like some two-bit private eye.”
Mel’s astonished eyes met Harriet’s, then they both looked at Riley. “Wherever did you learn that expression?” Mel demanded.
“On the Internet. You wouldn’t believe some of the stuff on there.”
“I’ll bet,” Mel said grimly. “Okay, so it’s supervision time again, little girl.”
“I’m no little girl, I’m the tallest in my class.”
Mel sighed with feeling. “I know it, hon. It’s known as the Jack and the Beanstalk syndrome.”
Riley giggled as she took a seat at the old pine table. Then Lola jumped into her lap, and for once Mel didn’t tell her to get down. Tonight was special, and of course Lola was counted in too.
Happiness, Mel thought, looking around at her home and her small family, was where the heart was. Except that chunk of her heart that was still back in Manhattan. In that hospital. With Ed.
46
A hundred miles south of LA, Gus Aramanov was still in his office at the San Diego marina.
He was a yacht broker, and his wife thought he was surely good at his job because his family lacked for nothing. But then again, Lila wasn’t certain exactly how much Gus earned, because he never talked finances with her. Just told her to get whatever she and the two kids needed and to quit worrying.
They had been married for seven years and owned a nice four-bedroom, three-and-a-half-bath home on a pretty suburban street in San Diego, with white wall-to-wall carpet, a big-screen TV in the den, and her Lincoln Navigator and his Mercedes E350 in the three-car garage next to the kids’ bikes. Her closet was crammed with Nordstrom’s and Macy’s best; she had help in the house; her kids attended expensive preschools. Lila was not asking any questions.
Gus Aramanov was more than twenty years older than his fluffy blonde wife. Whenever they were alone together in bed—without one of the children tucked up with them, that is—he would whisper in her ear that she was his “little toy girl.” And Lila called him her “big teddy bear.” Gus was six-six and power built like a construction worker—thick neck, muscular shoulders, and long arms. He had dark hair and a jowly face and habitually wore dark glasses that hid the fact that his brown eyes had a kindly expression. A “teddy” was exactly what he was.
Still in the office, Gus switched on the voice mail and retrieved the single message. It was short and to the point. And he knew only too well who was calling.
“You fucked up twice now,” Mario de Soto said. “Either he’s dead by next week or you are.”
Gus felt a sudden stab in his chest. His eyes bugged. He struggled to his feet, clutching the back of his chair, thumping his chest with his fist. He was a man in acute pain.
It had been late in the evening a few months ago when Gus Aramanov, a.k.a. George Artenski, received the first telephone call about the Ed Vincent job. He could have lived without it. The weekend was coming up and he had promised to take the kids to Sea World. But business was business. He’d told Lila to pack a bag, he would be leaving first thing in the morning.
“Oh, but you promised” was on the tip of Lila’s tongue, but she had clamped her mouth tight shut. She knew better than to grumble.
The next morning, early, he had kissed Lila good-bye, driven his Merc to the airport, and caught the first flight out to New York. From there, using a different name and identification, he had taken a flight to Charleston. He carried only the small overnight case packed by Lila, and a briefcase.
In Charleston, he rented a Ford Taurus and checked in to the Marriott, using the name Edgar Forrest and giving his home address as Key Biscayne, Florida.
“I’m expecting a package,” he told