The Plan Page 15

  Chapter 27

  RECOVERY AND BETRAYAL

  While Ryan was still in recovery at Dr. Jazz's house, Kaz had rented a small room in a hooker hotel in Trenton called the Blue Rainbow. He had learned long ag o t hat hooker hotels made great hideouts because the des k c lerks and the staffs had no inclination to talk to the cop s o r anybody else, for that matter. Money was the only language anybody spoke. He had prepared the dingy, threadbare room, bringing the medication that Dr. Jazz ha d p rescribed, along with clean sheets and blankets he'd b ought that afternoon in a department store. He als o b ought an ice chest and four six-packs of Gatorade to restore Ryan's fluids and electrolytes. He bought two six — packs of Coke for himself. He put all the provisions in th e r oom.

  He picked up Ryan from Dr. Jazz at twelve-thirty A. M. Ryan was still out of it, mumbling incoherencies as Kenetta and Dr. Jazz helped get him into the Nova rental that Kaz had picked up that afternoon.

  "Ain't gonna be much fun for a while," Dr. Jazz said. "He lost half of his adductor longus and I hadda rebuild his iliotibial tract. . I sewed what's left of the adductor to his vastus lateralis. He gonna be gimpin'."

  "I'm gonna have to put this on my account," Kaz said, "but I'll get it to you."

  "I don't work for cash," the old man said, the handball bouncing up and down in his stringy neck. "You watch for infection and give him dem antibiotics till they all gone."

  He watched with old eyes as Kaz kissed Kenetta goodbye, then got behind the wheel and drove Ryan away into the moonless night.

  They arrived at the Blue Rainbow Hotel and Kaz pulled around to the alley in the back and parked. He had already unlocked the fire door. He got Ryan out of the seat and supported him so that he wouldn't have to walk on his damaged leg. Kaz struggled to get Ryan up to the second floor and down the hall. He passed a heroin-ravaged hooker with striped orange hair, who smiled at Ryan through broken teeth.

  "Lookin' fo' some good times, baby? I buff yo' pink helmet, make yo' Johnny feel so thce. . "

  "Why don't we wait till he stops bleeding, sugar?" Kaz said pleasantly, wondering if she was blind or just brain-dead. Kaz got Ryan into the room and onto the bed. He locked the door and put a blanket over him.

  "Z0000 nooth. Luvvvv wingggg," Ryan said.

  "You're very welcome," Kaz responded and he went to the cooler and popped open a cold soda, sat down, and looked at Ryan, who had already drifted back to sleep.

  The Alos had put Ryan Bolt up on waivers and Kaz had claimed him. He still didn't know why or how he fit the puzzle.

  While Ryan was lying in the hooker hotel unconscious, Lucinda had dressed and waited for New York Tony to come back. At eleven o'clock, it was certain something was very wrong. Her brother had been stomping around downstairs and had started using the phone. She had tried to call Ryan at the Cape May Inn on her private line, but there was no answer. She had gone downstairs and move d q uietly into the living room so that she could overhear her brother in the kitchen.

  "Where the fuck is he?" Mickey was saying into the phone. "Look, not on the phone, okay? I think we gotta figure it didn't happen. I'll talk to you in an hour." He hung up and spun around and caught his sister standing in the living room ten feet behind him, listening.

  "Whatta you doing?" His eyes had that same shiny, glazed-over look she remembered from the park, twenty years ago.

  "I just came down to get something to eat."

  Mickey moved quickly, covering the short distance between them in less than a second. She tried to turn and run, but he grabbed her arm, spun her, and held her in a vise grip by both wrists.

  "Where's Ryan? I tried to call him at the Cape May Inn," she said.

  "Ryan doesn't exist anymore."

  "Mickey, don't," she said weakly. "You're hurting me."

  Finally, Mickey shoved her back. She stumbled and fell on the beach house carpet.

  He moved to her and stood looking down. There was something absolutely soulless in the stare. "I told you not to see him. You chose to ignore me. . You went to Iowa anyway. If I can't trust you, Lucinda, I can't leave you in my life. Pack your stuff and get out." Then he turned and walked out of the room.

  She packed and, half an hour later, left the beach house in the old Mercedes station wagon that was there for the servants.

  She knew as long as Mickey was there, she would never return.

  Chapter 28

  BONDING

  Bud Rennickissued the invitation on Brenton Spencer's six o'clock news. It was a TV remote from the union headquarters on East Fifty-seventh Street. Bud was standing on the steps of the Teamsters headquarters dressed in a black suit. "We welcome any help in this negotiation that we can get. If Governor Richards thinks he has a solution, we'd be more than happy to hear it."

  Ryan had been asleep for hours and the newscast woke him up. He was now watching the TV propped up in bed, his leg on fire, while Kaz sat in a straight-backed chair, drinking Coke out of a long-necked bottle.

  "This has A. L's fingerprints all over it," Ryan finally said under his breath.

  "Who's A. J.?" Kaz asked nonchalantly, hoping he would open up.

  "Better question is, who are you?"

  "We'll get around to that. First I wanna know what you're doing with Mickey Alo."

  "Why?" Ryan answered, feeling dizzy.

  "If you keep answering questions with questions, we're not gonna get far."

  "Why should we get anywhere?"

  "Am I remembering this correctly? Weren'tyou about to get dumdummed off the fucking planet when I showed up?"

  Ryan felt tooweak to answer. He wished somebody would get a chain saw and cut his leg off.

  "So, who's A. J.?" Kaz asked again, as if no time had passed.

  "Teagarden. He's Haze Richards's campaign chairman."

  "You feel strong enough to answer my other questions?"

  Ryan studied the man who had saved his life and decided he owed him something.

  "You're Ryan Bolt, right?"

  "Right."

  "What's your connection to the Alos?"

  "I was Mickey's roommate in prep school," Ryan said as Kaz's expression went flat.

  "Don't shit me, Bolt. I'm looking for comedy, I'll go watch pigeons fuck."

  "He and I went to Choate School in Connecticut twenty years ago. We were roommates. I didn't pick the room assignments." The two traded empty stares.

  "So why are you hanging with him now?"

  "When you get through with this interrogation, are you gonna let me know who you are?" Ryan's leg was getting worse. He looked down at the bandage, still seeping blood. "Depends on whether I like what I hear."

  "When my son died a year ago, Mickey came out for the funeral. I hadn't seen much of him since college, but he helped me get through it. And then. . I hit a roug h p atch, careerwise, this year, and he said he'd help me out."

  "What career? Whatta you do?" Kaz asked, but he already had a pretty good idea. He'd been shopping in Ryan's wallet and found his Writers Guild card and his T. V. and Motion Picture Academy memberships. Unfortunately, there were no picture IDs. "I'm a writer-producer in television."

  "So, Mickey calls you up, asks you to come out here. Why?"

  To make a documentary film on the candidate." "Must a' been a pretty shifty film."

  Ryan looked at him blankly.

  "Mob guys don't like a movie, they generally just walk out. They don't take the filmmaker into a field and try and blow his head off," Kaz explained.

  "Yeah, it was a bad movie, especially if you want to put Haze Richards in the White House. It showed Haze to be a coward. Mickey wanted it back."

  "It's a wonder you only got one hole in ya. You been stomping around in a mine field wearin' snowshoes." He set down the empty beer bottle. "My name is Solomon Kazorowski. I used to head the Vegas Organized Crime Unit of the FBI. I lost my job and my tin for trying too hard to put the Alos out of circulation. They got to my bosses, but Mrs. K. didn't raise no quitter, so I'm still in the
hunt."

  "FBI?" Ryan said, not really believing that this unkempt, sagging monster had ever been a member of the Bureau.

  "Been off the job for ten years."

  "You know Alex Tingredies?"

  "The Tin Man? Yeah. Alex is good people. He's still wearing his asshole behind him. One of a dying breed down there."

  "Mind if I call him and ask him about you?" Ryan asked, trying to forget the rising agony that was now consuming his whole left side.

  "Don't trust me?"

  "Just trying to get the snowshoes off."

  "Last I heard, Tingredies was in Atlanta."

  "He's back in D. C. I called him a couple a' days ago. I got his home number in my wallet."

  Kaz found the number. He sat in the chair next to the bed and dialed. On the third ring, Alex Tingredies answered.

  "Hello," the agent said.

  "Is this Rin Tin Tingredies?" Kaz said, a smile forming on his face.

  "Who's this?"

  "It's fucking J. Edgar Hoover, calling collect from Dead Fed Heaven."

  "Gotta be Kaz. Don't tell me you're still vertical. I figured somebody would a' put a 'nine' through you by now."

  "Gonna take more than nine millimeters to put me outta service." They both laughed, then: "Listen, you know a guy named Ryan Bolt?"

  "Why?"

  "He says he knows ya. I'm trying to find out who he belongs to. New York Tony put a round through his leg." "Is he okay?"

  "Yeah, but Tony's gotta bad headache. I sent him to harp class."

  "Nobody's gonna miss that piece of shit."

  "This guy Bolt. . can you describe him?" Kaz said, looking at Ryan, who was trying hard not to move his throbbing leg.

  "If he's six-two, 'bout one-eighty, pretty-boy goodlookin', California blond, it's probably him. He used t' be an all-conference wide receiver at Stanford. He's got some edge."

  Kaz looked down at Bolt and nodded. "I'm gonna put him on. Tell me if this is the guy." He handed the receiver to Ryan, who took it and looked at Kaz.

  "I thought I was checking you out."

  "Hey, we're checking each other out, we're not getting married, so relax."

  Ryan put the receiver to his ear. "Alex?" he said, weakly.

  "Yeah. You okay?"

  "Sorta. Who is this guy?"

  "You know I don't throw compliments around, but Solomon Kazorowski was the best agent I ever worked with.

  I don't know what trouble you're in, but if it's got anything to do with Mickey Alo or any of that stuff we talked about yesterday, you better listen to him, Ryan. Anybody gets you outta the tunnel, it's Kaz. . "

  "Thanks," Ryan said. "I'll put him back on." He handed the phone to Kazorowski, who put it up to his ear. "He sounds trashed."

  "He is, but he'll come back."

  "Anything I can do for you?" Alex asked, worried.

  "Yeah, send me a Hawaiian shirt. I'm walkin' around looking like Paul Bunyon. And if you got a wire on your phone, burn the tape. It wouldn't do either of us any good."

  Chapter 29

  PRAIRIE FIRE

  "These tracking polls are unbelievable," A. J. was saying. He was in Haze's hotel room in the Savoy. A. J. wanted Haze to stay with the Caulfields, but Haze wa s a damant, and in the long run, A. J. figured, it wasn't wort h t he effort. So they'd moved him into a suite on the sevent h f loor.

  It was ten A. M., the morning of the Iowa Caucus. The campaign staff was gathered in Haze's room. . Besides Haze, Carol Wakano, the Rouchards, Ven and Van, Malcolm and Susan Winter were scattered around the suite in blue jeans and T-shirts, while A. J. moved back and forth in front of the window that framed a gray Iowa morning.

  "Over all, we're tracking at twenty-one percent. We've knocked Skatina down to forty. He's not even gonna get a majority if this is accurate. The rest of these clucks are out of it. Gulliford is at ten, Savage at seven, Dehaviland. . Get this-he's tracking at four percent after spending a whole two months kissing blue-ribbon pigs and getting tractor-seat hemorrhoids. Undecideds are down to twelve percent and leaning our way."

  "How are the internals?" Malcolm asked.

  "We've got a net plus of nine percentage points. On values, we're plus seven. Economy, we're plus fifteen-and we haven't said one thing about how to fix it, change it, or deal with it. Fucking amazing." A. J. was bouncing around the room. "I'm telling you, the message is a winner, a major pony. We're gonna come in second tonight, just like we planned. Then we're gonna get on that commuter train and ride down to New York and we're gonna fix what ails the Teamsters and the Truckers Association."

  "How 'm I gonna do that?" Haze asked. "I don't even know what those guys are arguing about."

  "I got it worked out, babe. Don't I always have it worked out?" He moved over and patted Haze on the cheek like an adoring parent.

  Haze slapped his hand away. "Cut the shit, A. J. I need to talk to you."

  "Okay, boys and girls, everybody go get brunch."

  They all trooped out except Susan Winter, who was lounging in short-shorts and a halter top on the chair next to Haze. She made no move to leave, and Haze didn't shoo her out as the others left. Once they were gone, Haze got to his feet.

  "How 'm I gonna solve the Teamsters strike? I walk in there with those guys, with the whole world watching. I look like a fool if I don't pull it off."

  "Would you mind leaving us alone, Susan?" A. J. said to the twenty-five-year-old body woman, who was flexing her naked thighs seductively as she wiggled her toes in white, beaded moccasins.

  "She can stay."

  "I'm not gonna discuss this unless we're alone." "You must of forgot, I'm the candidate for President of the United States."

  "Shit," A. J. said, spit-spraying across the room. Some of it landed on Susan Winter's bare legs and she wiped it off with a grimace. "You actually think this is about you?"

  "Of course it's about me. It's not your face, not your reputation that they're talking about."

  "But they're my ideas, Haze. I'm the guy who comes up with the bullshit."

  The argument arose so fast, it startled both of them.

  "You wanna know how you're gonna solve the Teamster strike? I'll tell you, but get her out of here!"

  The tension in the room multiplied again before Haze finally moved to the door and opened it. "Give us a minute, Sue."

  She got up and moved out, taking her time, showing how she felt about it. When the door closed, Haze spun on A. J.

  "I've had it with this shit! I won't be treated like some dumb asshole. I don't need you to tell me what I think."

  "Hey Haze, if I wasn't here, you'd be selling twenty-year life policies for Aetna, and if you don't think I'm right, give me the gate and see how far this campaign goes"

  "You're pissed off because I took Susan and you wanted her."

  "No, I'm pissed off because every good idea, every piece of worthwhile strategy that ever happened for you came outta my head. And now we're sitting here, ready to make the biggest play of our lives, and you start sounding like you're actually responsible. I put Mickey Alo in the picture. I set up the debate. I came up with the defining event. Me! Not you! Me! And if you start to read the newspaper and think this is about you, then you're the stupidest son of a bitch on the planet!"

  They glowered at each other across a threadbare carpet. Finally, Haze took a deep breath.

  "How does this Teamster thing work?"

  "I don't know. Mickey is working it out. He told me it's a done deal; all you gotta do is go down there, walk in that room with those two guys, spend an hour, walk out and announce that you made it happen. You brought management and labor together. You made America work again."

  "I wanna know the terms of the agreement first."

  "You wanna ratify the fucking contract?" A. J. was stunned. "All you know about trucks is they're hard to get around on the turnpike."

  "Trucking wages and mileage fees affect the cost of goods. It's an expense that's passed on to the consumers. It directly affect
s the economic viability of our products in the world marketplace."

  "Haze, stay out of it. You don't know shit about it. Let Mickey do the thinking. All you gotta do is take the credit."

  Haze reached out and poked A. J. in the chest.

  "Don't you ever humiliate me in front of my staff again.

  Don't ever treat me like that again." 'or…?"

  "Or you're gone. I'll replace you."

  "And who will do your thinking for you?"

  "I will."

  "I've known you since you thought it was funny to blow up Coke cans with firecrackers. Lemme tell you something, bubba. . You'd have trouble thinking your way out of a parked taxi. If it wasn't for me, you'd be nothing. If you wanna throw me out of the campaign just so that piece of ass outside thinks you're hot shit, then go ahead, but you won't be going to the White House."

  A. J. turned and walked out of the room.

  The Iowa Caucus results came in slowly that night because of a problem with the counting machines, but it was clear by nine o'clock that Haze Richards had done extremely well. . and he'd done so at the expense of the

  Democratic front-runner, Leo Skatina. The headline in the next morning's Register-Guard was: RICHARDS ON THE MOVE IOWA VOTERS GIVE RHODE ISLAND GOVERNOR 25 PERCENT

  It was a huge showing. He had gone from nowhere to second in just twenty days, a seemingly impossible task. The networks were already beginning to call it 'The Iowa Miracle."

  "Who is this political phenomenon and why did he strike such a chord in Iowa?" the NBC newscast said.

  UBC declared Haze Richards the candidate to watch. Steve Israel included man-on-the-street interviews from Des Moines and Cedar Rapids, choosing only the ones that gave Haze the best boost. A UBC exit poll estimated, without any hard data to back it up, that had the Iowa Caucus taken place a week later, Haze would have actually won. In the last two days, Haze had acquired a press contingent of almost a hundred pod people and blow-dries. They were now following him around in two Greyhound StratoCruisers.