he say why?” Annja found a cab that belonged to the same company that two of the men had taken. She shoved two twenty-dollar bills up against the window, fanning them so the driver could see them both.
He was young enough that her looks probably captured more of his attention than the money. He waved her in.
“No.”
That, Annja thought as she opened the rear passenger door and slid across the seat, is probably a lie.
The driver peered at her through the security glass and smiled. “Where to?”
“Why didn’t Mario try to call me?” Annja asked.
“He left the country suddenly. He didn’t want anyone to know where he’d gone.”
What country? Annja wanted to ask.
“Hold on,” Annja told the woman. She covered the cell phone’s mouthpiece and looked at the driver. “Another one of your cabs just picked up a fare on this street. Just a couple minutes ago. I got the number of the cab. I missed a meeting and I’m trying to catch up to a client. If I don’t at least try to close this deal, I’m going to be looking for a new job.” She tried to look desperate.
Some of the smile left the driver’s face and he didn’t look so friendly. “Hey, lady—”
Oh, great! Now I’m “Hey, lady,” Annja thought. So long sex appeal.
“I got this thing about hauling around psychotic ex-girlfriends,” the driver said. “No offense.”
“If I was a psychotic girlfriend,” Annja said evenly, “I’d wait for him at his apartment.” She took another sixty dollars from her jeans with her free hand and held the full hundred against the safety glass. “Now the question is, do you want a big tip or should I find another cab?”
The driver eyed the money and shrugged. “You know, psychotic or not, it’s really none of my business. What was the number of the cab?”
Annja gave it and they got under way. The driver called for dispatch and asked about the other cab’s fare destination.
“Okay,” Annja said into the phone, “I’m back.”
The woman was gone.
Thinking the signal had been dropped, Annja called the number back and listened to the double ring tones.
No one answered.
Annja closed her phone, wondering what Mario Fellini could possibly have gotten into that would have involved men with guns and no hesitation about killing. And why would he have brought that to her?
She sat back quietly in the seat and watched the congested traffic around her. They rolled through the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel and into Manhattan without stopping because the cab was equipped with an E-ZPass that automatically paid the toll.
“I gotta charge you for the toll,” the driver said, shrugging.
A hundred-dollar tip and you want to be chintzy? Annja bit back the retort and said, “Fine.”
The radio DJ interrupted the music to relay the news about the shooting in Brooklyn at a local theater. The driver eyed Annja suspiciously in the rearview mirror.
Don’t look psychotic, Annja told herself.
“So what kind of business are you in?” the driver asked.
Annja put her smile and conversation on autopilot. The driver wanted reassurance that he wasn’t making a mistake. “What kind of business would you expect?”
The driver eyed her a little more deliberately. “You’re fit. Young. Obviously aggressive or you wouldn’t have me chasing after your client right now. But you’re not dressed like a stockbroker.”
“I’m not a stockbroker. That’s close, though.”
“How close?”
“I work for a guy who’s in business putting talent together.”
“Like rock bands?”
“Not that kind of talent. He’s a corporate headhunter. Raids other companies of their employees. If they’re good enough.”
“So the guy you’re after…”
“Wrote some kind of computer application my boss thinks is mind-blowing. Now he’s not going to rest until I manage to put the two of them together in the same room and he has a chance to pitch him.” The story sounded good to Annja. She’d watched something like it on the Discovery Channel while she’d been in Florida. “If we land him, I get a vacation.”
“Cool.” The driver smiled and nodded.
By the time they’d finished the discussion, the cab rolled to a stop in front of the Sentry Continental Hotel.
“This is it,” the driver said.
Annja peered up at the eight-story structure as a uniformed bellman advanced on the cab.
“You’re sure?” Annja asked.
“Yeah.”
Annja paid him and allowed the bellman to help her out. Settling her backpack straps onto her shoulders, she walked into the hotel, wondering how she was going to find the two men she’d come there looking for. While her mind was occupied with that, her phone rang.
Caller ID showed a number that she was all too familiar with. The number belonged to Doug Morrell.
Annja chose to ignore the call as she entered the hotel’s lobby. The decor was marble the color of old bone and had brass ornamentation. Brass planters held arboricola trees, triangle palms and philodendron plants.
The guest registry was tucked away to the right, quietly blending into the wall. A young woman stood at the desk and watched the action at the bar area a little farther back into the hotel.
Annja’s phone rang again, but this time it was a text message.
Hey Annja.
Some guy named Marty Fenelli keeps calling. If you ask me, the guy sounds desperate. Maybe he’s just a rabid fan?
Anyway, give me a call when you get this.
Doug
4
Crossing over to the hotel bar, Annja slid the backpack off and sat at a table obscured by a palm tree. The bartender’s attention was focused more on the television in the corner than on his clientele. It was almost spring and baseball was starting up again.
Annja gazed at the screen wistfully and wished she was home instead of in a hotel she had no business being in. A cup of hot chocolate, made from real chocolate and scalded in a pan, sounded like heaven.
Her stomach rumbled at the thought. Some kind of lunch wouldn’t be a bad idea, either. Breakfast had been consumed on the run, a biscuit in the Miami airport that she hadn’t bothered to finish.
She read the text message again, then settled back behind the big plant and called Doug Morrell.
“Annja!” Morrell greeted on the first ring. “What a pleasant surprise!”
Annja shook her head. Morrell was in his early-twenties, working at the first job he’d gotten after graduating college. He’d told her on several occasions that all he’d ever dreamed of was working in television. Annja had asked him once how he felt about producing a syndicated show devoted to legends and lore that were often misrepresented. He’d claimed it was the greatest job in the world, and she hadn’t been able to doubt his sincerity.
The false representation wasn’t done by Annja. She kept her stories concrete, rooted in the bedrock of history and the facts as she found them. Thankfully, the audience for Chasing History’s Monsters seemed devoted as much to real archaeological work as they were to the fantastic.
The