Free FACETS (JAKE SCARNE THRILLERS Book 6) by Lawrence de Maria Page B

much to ask for, or what form the ransom should take. He simply did not have enough time to think everything through. 
    And then there was the girl. She could identify him. He had thought that one through. But now he was having second thoughts.

CHAPTER 9 – DUDLEY MACK
     
    At approximately the same time Luke Willet was arguing with the annoying Mary Mulgready outside Dr. Schwartzberg’s office at Columbia, Jake Scarne was waiting for Emmanuel Moliere to remove the tarp from Scarne’s silver Ford Fusion hybrid. He planned to drive Noah Sealth to Newark International for his Alaska Air flight to Seattle.
    Moliere was one of the attendants in the garage next to Scarne’s Greenwich Village apartment at Fifth Avenue and 8th Street. He treated Scarne’s car as if it were his own, washing and occasionally polishing it when he had free time. Moliere was Haitian and, despite Scarne’s repeated insistence that the man owed him nothing, never forgot that Scarne helped some of Moliere’s family escape the horrors of the earthquake that devastated Haiti years earlier.
    As Scarne got in the Fusion, Moliere handed him a magazine. Scarne noted that it was the most recent issue of Car and Driver .
    “Page 22 might interest you, Mr. Scarne,” Moliere said slyly.
    Scarne sat behind the wheel, turned to the page and laughed. It was a review of Mazda’s new MX-5 Miata convertible, entitled, “Another Home Run: The Best Roadster Money Can Buy”. Scarne immediately fell in love with the pictures. He looked up at the grinning Moliere.
    “You never give up, do you Manny?”
    “You too young to be old, Mr. Scarne. Fusion is a nice ride, but you want something sexy, no?”
    It was the same friendly debate they always had. Moliere said he missed Scarne’s old cars, the classic 1974 MGB Roadster, and before that, a 2009 Mazda MX-5 Grand Touring hardtop, both convertibles.
    “I think it was time to grow up,” Scarne said. He looked at the magazine. “Probably has some good articles. Do you mind if I keep this for a day or so?”
    “Thought you might,” Moliere said, happily.
    ***
    Sealth and Juliette no longer lived in a fourth-floor walk-up on 79th Street near the Museum of Natural History. They’d found a small two-bedroom in a more modern building on Second Avenue and 61st Street. While they were now on the seventh floor, the building had an elevator, an important consideration for a woman soon to have a baby.
    Sealth was waiting outside the building when Scarne pulled up. He threw his bag in the back seat and picked up the Car and Driver . As Scarne pulled into traffic, he started thumbing through the magazine.
    “You see this article on the new Mazda,” Sealth said. “Hot-looking car.”
    Must be a conspiracy, Scarne thought.
    Forty minutes later they approached the American Airlines terminal at Newark International. Sealth was singing softly.
     
    “All my bags are packed, I'm ready to go.
    I'm standin' here outside your door. I hate to wake you up to say goodbye.
    But the dawn is breakin', it's early morn.
    The taxi's waitin', he's blowin' his horn.
    Already I'm so lonesome, I could die.”
     
    “Good Lord, Noah, Leaving on a Jet Plane ?”
    “So?
    “Peter, Paul and Mary? You're a Suquamish Indian and a homicide cop for crissakes.”
    “Loved them. Mary was hot.”
    “Did you see what she looked like in her later years?”
    “Who looks good in their later years? She was hot when she sang it.”
    Scarne shook his head.
    “It’s a John Denver song by the way,” Sealth said. “Love him, too.”
    They reached the terminal.
    “I spoke to my old partner in Homicide,” Sealth said. “He said he’ll reach out to the O.C. guys to see if they’ve heard of anyone who might have it out for the Dallassios.”
    “Won’t he be curious as to why you are interested?”
    “Sure. But he was my partner. If I tell him not to be too curious, he’ll go along with it. And he’ll make sure the O.C. guys aren’t too curious,