Coffee with Bradley
“Sarah!” said her neighbor. “You actually leave the building. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you outside the stairwell.”
“Okay, cards on the table,” she said, trying to look into his eyes even though they were well above her head.
“I just ran into my creepy ex and I’m afraid he might be following me, and I don’t want him to see where I live or, you know, think that I’m available.
If he sees me having coffee with someone like you, I think it would discourage him. ”
“Someone like me?”
“I’ve never been in a fight in my life,” said Bradley.
“He doesn’t know that.”
“I suppose I can spare twenty minutes for a damsel in distress,” said Bradley.
He allowed Valentine 6 to slip her arm into his and they headed down the block.
Valentine 6 didn’t like being called a damsel in distress, nor did she care for Bradley implicitly styling himself a knight in shining armor, but she planned to use him for her own ends, so she let the casual sexism slide this time.
Five minutes later they were ensconced in the back booth of the local diner, sipping black coffee. Bradley had made a show of waving down the waiter, as if only a man could undertake such a daunting task.
“Can I borrow your phone for a second?” asked Valentine 6. She saw no reason not to get straight to the point.
“My phone?” said Bradley.
“Mine’s home charging. I just need to send a text.”
“You left home without your phone?”
“Can I borrow it or not?” said Valentine 6, trying to tamp down the exasperation in her voice.
“Fine,” said Bradley, handing her his phone.
She tapped in the president’s number, then the message. V6, two minutes, followed by the phone number of Tony’s West Side Diner, which she copied off the menu. As soon as the message had been marked as delivered, she deleted the whole thread and handed the phone back to Bradley.
“You seem pretty normal in the stairwell,” said Bradley. “Now I’m not so sure.”
She wanted to reply, You seem like less of an asshole in the stairwell, but only mumbled a terse “Thanks for the phone.”
Valentine 6 had eaten at Tony’s at least a hundred times.
It was the first establishment she had staked out for its usefulness in avoiding trouble.
She knew every inch of its layout and she knew that the phone—yes, Tony’s still had a landline for delivery orders—hung on the wall just around the corner from the restrooms. She watched the second hand on the wall clock behind the counter swing through one and a half revolutions, then excused herself, arriving in front of the ladies’ room, and thus out of sight of anyone in the restaurant, just as the phone rang.
With a wink at Tony, she picked up the receiver.
“Trouble?” said Richard.
“Lots of it,” said Valentine 6.
“I could use you here,” said Richard. “I’m in Wisconsin tailing a car that I think is headed your way, but I’m not sure I can stay awake to drive all the way to New York.”
“Who are you tailing?”
“Before you come here, though,” said Richard, ignoring her question, “I have to ask you to do one thing first, and it won’t be easy.”
“What is it?”
“You need to go back to the club.”
“I can’t,” said Valentine 6, panic edging into her voice. “I barely made it out of there the last time.”
“I need Gatsby the Great,” said Richard, “or at least I need Pilgrim 3 not to have it.”
“I have it!” said Valentine 6. “I snuck it off Pilgrim 3’s desk before I left.”
“You’re an absolute dream,” said Richard. “I want you to fly out of there as soon as you can. Right now, we’re south of Madison, headed toward Chicago. Best if you fly to Detroit, that way you might be able to intercept us.”
“Who’s us?” asked Valentine 6.
“Never mind about that. Have you got a phone and credit card?”
“A credit card, yes, but I don’t have a safe phone.”
“Buy a burner at the airport and call me when you land. Don’t waste a minute.” With that admonition, the line went dead.
Valentine 6 stepped into the ladies’ room to assess her situation.
Should she risk going home for a change of clothes and a toothbrush, or go straight to the airport?
She dumped the contents of her purse onto the tiny counter to evaluate her assets—a phone she dared not and probably could not use; a small blank notebook and two pens; a wallet with three hundred dollars cash, government-issue photo ID, and two credit cards; a toiletry bag with two tampons, her anxiety medication, and some lip balm; the copy of Gatsby the Great she had stolen from the club; a packet of tissues and…
a round black plastic object about the size of a quarter.
She knew instantly it was a tracking device, and a smile crept across her lips as she imagined Lidenbrock 2 and Pilgrim 3 following her movements.
Pilgrim 3 must not have noticed the missing book, or she’d have sent Lidenbrock 2 after it by now. Still, she had to hurry.
She shoved the wallet and the meds into the pocket of her jeans, tucked the book under her arm, and put everything else back in the purse.
Leaving Bradley to pay for the coffee—a deception about which she felt no regret whatsoever—she slipped out the back door and walked out of the alley and two blocks uptown toward her apartment before hailing a cab.
“My sister went to Newark Airport and forgot her purse,” she told the driver. “A hundred dollars cash if you’ll drive it out to her. She’s waiting in front of American Airlines departures wearing a red dress.”
“I’m not really supposed to,” began the cabbie.
“One fifty,” said Valentine 6, shoving three fifty-dollar bills through the window. “There’s nothing dangerous in it, I promise. Look for yourself, if you want.”
The cabbie peered into the purse and, perhaps because he didn’t see anything that looked like a ticking time bomb, grabbed it and the cash and peeled away before Valentine 6 could change her mind. A block away she hailed another cab and headed to LaGuardia.