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She dialed from memory and sat back. As the ringing commenced, she pulled the fleece she had on closer and turned her face into the top of the collar. The cologne or aftershave or soap Gus always used was fading, but she could still smell him.
Or maybe she was imagining things. Either way, it worked… she saw Gus as clearly as if he were standing in front of her, his presence summoned—
“Catherine, what a pleasant surprise.”
The way Gunnar Rhobes rolled hisr’s made her want to slam the receiver down four or five times, right in his supercilious ear.
“What did you do to Gus,” she demanded.
“I beg your pardon?”
“Spare me the pseudo-polite bullshit.” She swiveled around to face the floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out into the back field. “Where is he.”
“If you recall,Iwas the one who notified you that he could not be located—”
“What better way to divert attention away from yourself? And donotpretend you don’t think like that. You’re capable of anything, Rhobes.”
“Why, thank you,” the man said dryly. “I am complimented in the midst of your insults—”
“You lied, Gunnar.”
“About what.”
“His car was in the garage.” She shook her head. “When you called me an hour ago, you told me that it was in the driveway. That’s a pretty big discrepancy, dontcha think.”
There was a moment of silence that could have been interpreted in a variety of ways. Then her chief business rival said: “You’re accusing me of having no honor, over a detail like that?”
“In. The. Garage.” At the edge of the forest, a doe soft-walked into view, nearly invisible against the pale brown rushes that had died back in October. “Youexpect me to believe that a man who runs an empire like yours is going to forget something like that?”
“I did not go to his abode. One of my associates did.”
“Associates. Is that what you call them?”
“Do you refer to your hired mercenaries as something else? And are we really arguing about this, considering the single most significant brain in medical science today has gone missing?”
The doe proceeded forward, seeming to place each hoof down at a precisely chosen spot, so careful, so hyperaware. And then there was a sound that brought the animal’s head up, her radar-cup ears sweeping as her tail twitched, her haunches vibrating as if she were ready to bolt.
Funny how survival of the fittest dictated that the paranoid tended to live long enough to reproduce—and keep their offspring alive. So anxious genes prevailed.
“I don’t get it,” she said tightly. “He works for you now. You won. Why do you have to pretend—”
“I called you in good faith,” Rhobes snapped. “I do not like you, you do not like me. We are not just competitors, we are enemies—and you are correct. I did win and he does work for me now—which is why I wish to discern hisgoddamnlocation.”
The deer bolted back into the trees, as if the vitriol was what had spooked her, and C.P. pivoted back around to her desk. With an objectiveeye, she regarded the restrained decor she had chosen, the furniture modern and monochromatic, the art on the walls abstract and worth a fortune, the bound rug a vanilla lawn cropped close as the green around a golf hole.
Eyeing the Rothko across the way, she did some quick math on all her debts and wondered what kind of seller’s cut Sotheby’s down in NYC would take if she sold the thing. Then she remembered she didn’t have to think like that. Her time was running out way faster than her cash position.
“I’ve never heard you swear before,” she commented absently.
Rhobes exhaled like he was exhausted. “There are plenty of other words to choose from. Especially when one speaks five languages.”
“Aren’t you a good little student.” She closed her eyes and pictured the man in one of his European-cut suits with the slim slacks and the double-vented, double-breasted jacket. “Where do you keep all those merit badges.”
“In my downstairs bathroom so the guests can admire them, of course.” There was a silence. “You could have just sold me Vita-12b, Catherine. It would have avoided much unpleasantness.”
“I told you to make an offer. Instead, you raided my scientist.”
“You would have done the same in my position. Gus St. Claire is worth more than that oneparticular cancer drug. He’s a pipeline in and of himself, so you can keep your drug, Catherine. I hope it replenishes your dwindling accounts.”
