Upside Down Read online

  “Espinosa’s right. Nikki said she doesn’t even take a lunch and sometimes inhales a yogurt if she has time. She’s lost seventeen pounds. She looks anorexic, and the last time I saw Alexis, she didn’t look any better,” Jack growled.

  “Alexis has lost thirteen pounds,” Espinosa volunteered unhappily.

  “Listen, guys,” Harry said, “I have to go. Yoko asked me to pick up Lily today. She said she had something to do. Guess we know what that was now, don’t we. By the way, guys, I think I had a tail coming here. I also think I lost him but can’t be sure. I’ll let you know if he or she picks me up when I leave here. See you at seven. Don’t be late because if you are late, you’re going to work an extra hour.”

  Cyrus let loose with a howl that made everyone in the room shiver. He calmed down and walked Harry to the door, got his treat, and waited until the door closed behind Harry to trot back to the conference room, where he nudged Jack’s leg to let him know everything was okay before he dropped down to chew on his treat.

  “Guess we need to be a little more alert,” Ted said. “If Maggie, and I’m sure it’s Maggie, has a tail on us, she’s doing it with Annie’s approval. And that, gentlemen, is the reason for this lunch meeting today. I’d bet my Pulitzer on it. Any takers?”

  There were none.

  “To what end?” Dennis asked. “I don’t like the idea of someone shadowing me. Why?”

  “To find out what we’re doing. What else? Use your head, kid,” Ted barked. “Women need to know everything . I know this because Mr. Jack Emery, who is an authority on all things woman, told me so a long time ago. When women don’t know everything, they become very unhappy. So they then take steps to find out what it is they think they need to know. That’s why they hire private detectives. I bet we all have tails and none of us has picked up on it.”

  “Cyrus would have picked up on it, don’t you think?” Jack said, the frown still in place.

  At the mention of his name, Cyrus rose to his magnificent height and looked around the room as much as to say, I did not detect anything. So there. His point made, at least to Jack, he flopped back down and resumed chewing on his treat.

  “I have to assume this just took place in the last day or so. Maybe all the operatives aren’t in place yet. If that’s the case, stay alert and stay in touch,” Jack said. “Private dicks, at least the good ones, charge outrageous fees. To tail all of us has to cost a bundle, and the only persons I know who could afford something like that are Myra and Annie.”

  Jack’s cell phone pinged. He looked down, and said, “It’s Bert.”

  “Hey, buddy, how’s it going out there in fantasy land? The guys are here except for Harry. What’s up? I’m going to put you on speaker, okay?”

  “Yeah, sure. Sparrow is here, too. Look, I don’t know if this means anything or not, but Kathryn just called about fifteen minutes ago and said she’s going to stay on in DC for a few days after she drops off a load of Christmas trees in Delaware. She’s going to be staying at her house there in the District. For whatever this is worth, she sounded . . . I don’t know . . . off somehow. We had plans for when she got back for the weekend. Now that’s been scuttled. As a rule, Kathryn never does anything at the last minute. She’s a planner, and the good thing is that she sticks to the plan. Is anything going on there Sparrow and I need to know about?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Jack drawled. He quickly filled Bert and Sparrow in on what had just transpired.

  “You’re right, those girls are up to something. Looks like my employer is up to her eyeballs in this. Okay, keep us in the loop. Gotta go, time is money.”

  Jack returned the cell phone to his pocket and looked around at the guys. “Any thoughts here?”

  “Just one. Why didn’t Isabelle stay and attend the luncheon? Those women are tight. She might shove me under the bus, but not her sisters,” Abner observed unhappily.

  “How do you know she didn’t? You said Annie was holding the door for Maggie, which means Myra was already inside. If Isabelle went to the farm, like we think she did, then it’s a good chance she was inside with Myra. At least, we can’t rule it out,” Ted observed.

  “She said she was leaving this morning to return to England.”

  “And you believed her!” Ted glared in disbelief at the computer hacker like he’d sprouted a second head. “Haven’t you learned anything hanging around us? Those women stick together, no matter what.”

  Abner hung his head the way Cyrus did when Jack chastised him for something or other. “She is my wife. Husbands tend to believe their wives, at least this husband does. I’ll make sure I don’t make that mistake again, Ted.”

  “Now what?” Dennis demanded.

  Jack shrugged. “What do you mean, now what?”

  “I had an idea, and I wanted to run it by everyone.”

  “Spit it out, kid. We can always call Harry and tell him your idea. And Bert, too. Why waste time?”

  “I was thinking last night because I couldn’t sleep. This case with the lieutenant governor is important. Children died, and he has to be held accountable, but where does it say we can’t work on two cases? Nowhere, right? So, Jack, why don’t we take on those people your wife’s law firm is going after in the class-action suits? You did say one suit was about a drug given to children for leukemia that ended up killing hundreds of little kids. Hundreds. That is just not acceptable to me. And the case Alexis is heading up, the one you said was the biggest dog-food-processing plant, where all those poor animals died. If we went after them, then Nikki and Alexis would have more free time and could just be normal lawyers again, and you and Espinosa will get them back in your arms. To me, that makes sense.”

  When no one said anything, Dennis flushed. “Stop looking at me like I’m an idiot. It makes sense. Call Bert and Harry and ask them what they think. I’m not backing down, either,” the young reporter said, defiance ringing in his voice.

  Ted banged his fist on the shiny conference table before he leaped across it to land in Dennis’s lap. “Kid, you make me proud to know you! I mean that. You are so on the money, you scare me.”

  “Yeah, me, too,” Jack said, his expression filled with awe.

  “And if we play our cards right, no one has to know it’s us making life easy for Nikki and Alexis and taking care of the greedy badass guys at the same time. You have my vote, Dennis. Now, get that agile brain of yours working on Isabelle for me, will you?” Abner begged.

  “Oh, you bet I will. I really will. So are we going to . . . you know . . . plot this out? I can’t wait for my assignment. Boy, this is a great day, guys,” Dennis shouted exuberantly as he smacked his hands together.

  “Then let’s get to it, boys. Once we make some inroads, I’ll call Harry.” Jack looked at his watch. “He’s probably on his way back home after picking up Lily as we speak. By the way, kid, I like that you think outside the box.” Cyrus wiggled under the table and nipped at Dennis’s ankle, his show of approval, too. Dennis laughed out loud, a sound of pure joy. His reporter’s gut instinct told him he really did belong to this group. He really did.

  Chapter 10

  Harry watched the cars behind him as he listened to his daughter, Lily, babble nonstop about her exciting morning at play school. He grunted from time to time to show that he was listening to her delicious, little-girl chatter. He was right: he had a tail, and it didn’t have four legs. This tail was the same black Honda Civic that had followed him to the BOLO Building and again when he’d driven home to switch vehicles to pick up Lily. The guy was good, he had to give him that. He wound in and out of traffic, pulled ahead, then pulled back, all the while following Harry, no easy feat when Harry had been riding the Ducati. Even now, he was showing his expertise, which surprised Harry. A pro, that was for sure. He realized there was nothing he could do while he had Lily in the car with him. But the moment he dropped her off at home with the nanny, it was going to be a whole new ball game.

  “Sing it, Daddy. I have to know all the wo
rds by tomorrow. It’s my homework,” Lily squealed from the backseat. “Sing it, Daddy! Sing loud!”

  Harry racked his brain, but all he could come up with was, The itsy bitsy spider . . .

  Lily sighed. “Does Mommy know the words?”

  “Yeah, yeah, Mommy knows the words,” Harry said, believing he was off the hook.

  “Okay, Daddy, I’ll tell Miss Charles you didn’t know the words. Miss Charles said that all mommies and daddies know the words. How come you don’t know the words? You have to write me a note saying you don’t know the words.”

  “Because I’m Chinese, that’s why,” Harry barked, and was instantly sorry at his tone. “Mommy will write the note, okay?”

  One eye on the road in front of him, the other eye on his side mirror, Harry mumbled something under his breath that sounded like, “Oh, shit!”

  “Oh goodie, we’re home. I can hear Cooper,” Lily said, unbuckling her safety harness and hopping down out of her seat. “Are you coming in, Daddy?”

  “For a minute. I have to switch up and go back to work. Maybe Cassie knows the words to the song. Did your teacher give you a paper?”

  “Two papers. You have to sign one.”

  “Okay, let’s go! First one in wins a marshmallow!” Harry lagged behind, so his daughter could win. Flushed from the cold air, her cheeks rosy pink, Lily screamed her victory just as the nanny opened the door. Cooper barreled out, all but knocking Lily to the ground, where he proceeded to try to lick her to death. He loved the sound of his daughter’s infectious laughter and Cooper’s excitement at being reunited with his playmate. He knew in that instant that he wouldn’t trade one second of his wonderful life for anything in the world. He made a mental note to learn the words to the spider song. If there was one thing he never wanted to do, it was to disappoint his beloved little daughter.

  Ten minutes later, assured that Cassie did indeed know the words to the itsy bitsy spider song, Harry started up his Ducati. He knew that the black Honda would pick him up once he rounded the corner to the next street. The jerk probably thought he was going back to the dojo, but instead he was going to head for the park where Lily and Cooper romped in nice weather. There wouldn’t be anyone there today, he was almost sure of it. He would set a trap, and the spider would fall right into it. Harry shook his head to clear his thoughts. He must have spiders on the brain. But if it worked, it worked. He knew he had the advantage with his two-wheeled vehicle.

  Sure enough, the black Honda picked him up just as he hit the long, narrow street. Harry goosed the Ducati and roared his way to the park, where he had open road all around him. He lucked out when he didn’t see any other vehicles, with the exception of the black Honda, anywhere near the park. And it was far enough back that the tail didn’t pose an immediate threat. He knew he had the advantage since he visited the park on a regular basis and knew every road and footpath. He checked his side mirror to see what his tail was doing, which was nothing but following him. “Fool!”

  Harry rounded a dogleg and came up on a side road that was little more than a path but still wide enough for one car. In the blink of an eye, he went off road, whizzed past a lush grouping of thick, hedgelike boxwood, and disappeared from the road’s view. He waited until he saw the black Honda slow, then speed up. From his position behind the boxwood, Harry waited, counting slowly under his breath until he got to the number ten. He roared out of his cover, raced alongside the Honda, then skidded to a stop with inches to spare. The Honda’s brakes screeched, and Harry sniffed at the scent of burning rubber. He was off the Ducati, his hand on the door in a nanosecond. He reached in and literally pulled the driver out of the door and onto the ground, where he stomped on his neck. “Move, and I’ll break your neck. You know I will. Do we understand each other?”

  The driver tried to nod but thought better of the idea. “Yeah,” he mumbled.

  “Here’s the deal. I’m going to remove my foot from your neck, and you are going to get up nice and slow. Then you are going to lean against the car and spread your legs and arms. We good so far?”

  “Yeah.”

  Harry sized up the driver. Six feet, looked to be in good shape, probably in his midthirties.

  “You married?”

  “What the hell! Who are you? What business is it of yours if I’m married or not? I’m calling the police! I don’t have much money on me, sixty bucks or so. Take it, and I’ll forget about this.”

  Harry laughed. It was an evil sound. “My name is Harry. The reason I asked if you were married is because I’ll need to notify your next of kin after I kill you. Let’s cut to the chase here right now. You’ve been following me all day. And you followed me when I had my child in the car. That’s something you never do, put my child in jeopardy. So we’re clear on that point. I know you’re some kind of private dick, so spit it out right now. Who hired you? Who do you report to? You go all shy on me, then I’m going to have to get creative and shove your dick up your ass; and then I’m going to pull your ears off your head and stuff them down your throat. You’ll probably choke to death, but if you don’t, then I’m going to shove your tongue up your nose to cut off your air supply. Talk to me.”

  “You need to get a life, mister. You watch too many kung fu movies. I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

  “Well, I did ask nicely,” Harry singsonged as he advanced on the driver, reached out with both hands, lifted the giant off the ground, and heaved him over the top of the black Honda, and he landed on the ground with a thump. Harry ran around the car and stepped on the driver’s chest.

  The driver groaned in pain, knowing he had cracked ribs. He wished now he hadn’t been so verbal, not to mention stupid, especially since Spritzer had warned him about his subject. He also wished he had believed Maggie Spritzer when she extolled the martial virtues of one Harry Wong.

  “If you move, you could push those broken ribs up into your lungs. Where’s your ID?”

  “In the car,” the driver groaned. “Aren’t you going to call an ambulance?”

  “Why would I do a stupid thing like that?” Harry called over his shoulder as he rifled through the Honda. He helped himself to all the equipment, including the man’s cell phone, which was ringing as he picked it up. He carried it over to the driver and smiled the same evil smile. “Answer this, and if I hear one word I don’t like, you will be eating your ears.”

  “Suliman here,” the driver said. He listened, and said, “I’m following Wong. He just dropped off his kid. I don’t know where he’s going, maybe back to his dojo. He was at the BOLO Building but didn’t stay long. Yeah, yeah, they were all there.” He listened again, thought about choking on his ears, and said, “I said I’d call if there was something to report. There is nothing to report, Miss Spritzer. Listen, I have to pay attention to the road.” He broke the connection but held on to the phone.

  Harry reached down and snatched it. “I like a man who follows orders. Who hired you?”

  Mike Suliman thought about his dick, his ears, and his tongue. He wanted to keep them all intact on his body. “I think, and I say I think, some woman at the Post but not the Spritzer chick. You think my boss tells me? This is a job, a tail job. I get paid by the hour to tail and surveil you. That’s the beginning and end of it.”

  “How many of you are assigned to my little group of friends?”

  “Hey, man, I’m dying here. It’s cold as hell. Call an ambulance, okay?”

  “I never ask a question twice,” Harry said.

  Mike Suliman bit down on his lip. “All you guys have a tail, and they’re twenty-four/seven. That translates to big bucks for my boss. That’s all I know. He warned us not to screw up and said this was an important case. And he promised bonuses. Now, are you going to call an ambulance for me or not? I could die out here, it’s freezing.”

  “Yeah, I know,” Harry said thoughtfully. “So Maggie Spritzer is your contact?”

  “Yeah, the one with that wild bush of red hair. Damn, she�
��s almost as scary as you are. She warned us not to mess up. She said you guys are slick. Especially you and Jack Emery.”

  “Guess you’ll be getting into another line of work, huh?” Harry said, pleased that his and Jack’s expertise did not go unrecognized.

  “If I don’t die first.” Suliman groaned. “C’mon, man, help me out here. You don’t want me on your conscience, do you?”

  Harry shrugged as he looked around to make sure they were still alone in the park. Seeing nothing to alarm him, he dropped to his haunches and stared into the private investigator’s eyes. Then he smiled. Mike Suliman wanted to cry.

  “I’m going to ask you a few questions, and depending on your answers, I will know whether or not I should call nine-one-one for you. Okay?”

  “I told you everything I know. You can peel off my skin, and I can’t tell you anything else.”

  “So you say. How well do you know the other dicks assigned to this case?”

  Suliman tried to rear up, but the pain in his side was so intense, he fell back to the ground. He clenched his teeth. “I’m a licensed private investigator, not a dick. It’s a job. An honest job. So do whatever the hell you’re going to do or leave me here to die.”

  Harry was not moved. “I didn’t ask you for a dissertation. I also told you I wouldn’t ask you twice. Talk.”

  “I know them, that’s it. They do their job, I do mine. ‘Hey, how are you?’ That kind of thing. Will you call nine-one-one already?”

  “You want to make a deal?”

  “I’ll do whatever you want if you call nine-one-one. Anything.”

  “Stay right here. I have to make a phone call.”

  Harry moved off, called Jack, and explained what was going on. “I’m thinking, Jack, we can turn this guy. How much money can I offer him to spy for us while in the employ of the Post?”

  “You’re the man, Harry. As much as it takes. Can you trust him?”