One by One (Роберт Хантер 5 Поодиночке) - Carter Chris (2) - Страница 49

The hurt look softened.

‘But Robert is just—’ Anna’s eyes wandered, searching for the right words ‘—unique, and a complete enigma. He’s a loner by choice, not because he’s a difficult person to get along with, far from it. He’s probably the easiest-going person I know. But he shies away from relationships as if they were a curse.’

‘Bad past experience?’ Patricia asked.

‘No one knows.’ Anna shrugged. ‘I’m telling you, he’s an enigma. He’ll talk to you about anything but his job or his personal life. I do think he had someone important in his life once, years ago, but he just won’t talk about it.’

‘So he doesn’t date?’

‘I never said that. I said that he doesn’t do relationships. He dates plenty.’

Patricia smiled. ‘There you go, then.’ A hip-hop swagger found its way onto her words. ‘Hook me up, sista.’ She smiled, but it didn’t sound like she was joking.

‘You want me to try to hook you up for a one-night stand with my husband’s work partner?’

‘Are you kidding? With that man I’ll take meaningless sex any day of the week, and twice on Sundays, thank you very much.’

Anna knew that Patricia was serious.

‘You are incorrigible.’

‘I know, but that’s what makes life fun.’

As Anna heard the ringtone of her cellphone come from inside her handbag, Patricia started eyeing a skimpy black dress with white details in the window of the trendy shop to their right.

Anna riffled through the contents of her bag. She found the phone and brought it to her ear.

The man standing just a few feet behind Anna and Patricia smiled.

Sixty-Three

‘Hey, hun!’ Anna said into her cellphone. ‘This is a surprise.’

Garcia kept his voice as calm as he could manage. ‘Anna, listen. Where in town are you right now?’

‘What?’

‘I know you’re out shopping with your friend, but where exactly are you now?’

Anna looked at Patricia and pulled a face. ‘How do you know I’m out shopping with a friend?’

‘Anna, please . . . I don’t have time to explain everything. What I need is for you to tell me exactly where you are, OK?’

‘Um . . . I’m in Tujunga Village . . . Carlos, what’s going on?’

Located near bustling Ventura Boulevard, in Studio City, but seemingly a world away from everything, Tujunga Village was nestled between the Colfax Meadows neighborhood and Woodbridge Park. The heart of the Village was the block-long stretch of Tujunga Avenue, between Moorpark and Woodbridge, where boutiques, restaurants, cafes and miscellaneous stores catered for even the most discerning of visitors.

‘Baby, I told you, I don’t have a lot of time to explain,’ Garcia said. ‘But I need you to trust me right now, OK?’

Anna nervously tucked a loose strand of her short black hair behind her left ear. ‘Carlos, you’re scaring me.’

‘I’m sorry. There’s no need for you to be scared. I just need you to trust me right now. Can you do that?’

‘Yes, of course.’

‘OK. Who’s with you?’

‘Um . . . Pat, my friend from yoga. You remember her, right?’

‘Yeah. She came to your birthday drinks, right?’

‘That’s right.’

‘OK. Listen, I need you to find a busy place – like a cafe, or a pizzeria, or a burger joint, whatever, and go sit in there with Pat and wait for me. I’m on my way to you now. Do not engage in a conversation with anyone. No one at all. And do not leave the place, under any circumstances, until I get to you. Do you understand that, baby?’

‘Yeah . . . but . . .’

‘Call me as soon as you find a place, OK?’

Anna knew Garcia too well to be fooled by his calm tone. He’d never questioned her about her whereabouts, or who she was out with, or anything else for that matter. They had always trusted each other, pure and simple. That was the foundation their relationship was built on. And he had never before told her what to do, unless she had asked for his advice first. Something was definitely off.

‘Carlos, what’s this about?’ Anna’s voice weakened a notch. ‘Did something happen? Are my parents OK?’

Patricia was standing next to Anna with a concerned look on her face.

‘No, baby,’ Garcia replied. ‘Nothing has happened to anyone, I promise you. Look, I’ll be there in twenty-five minutes, half an hour tops. I’ll explain everything then. Just trust me. Find a place and sit tight.’

Anna took a deep breath. ‘OK. Look, I already know where we’re going to go. We’ll be inside Aroma Cafe. It’s halfway up Tujunga Village. We’re just coming up to it now.’

‘Great, baby. Get in there, grab a coffee and I’ll be with you in a few minutes.’

Garcia disconnected.

Sixty-Four

Garcia saw Anna even before Hunter finished parking right in front of the Aroma Cafe. She and Patricia were sitting at a small table toward the front of the glass-fronted store.

Anna had sat there deliberately, her nervous eyes wandering up and down Tujunga Avenue, as if following a tense, invisible tennis match. As she saw Garcia and Hunter step out of the car, she got up and dashed outside. Patricia followed her.

Garcia met her by the door, and instinctively threw his arms around her as if he hadn’t seen her for years, kissing her hair as she buried her face into his chest.

‘You OK?’ he asked, relief taking over him.

Anna looked up at her husband, and the tension of the moment filled her eyes with tears. ‘I’m OK. What’s going on, Carlos?’

‘I’ll explain in a moment. Did you drive here?’

Anna shook her head.

‘We took the bus,’ Patricia said. She was standing next to Hunter, wide-eyed and confused, watching the scene between Anna and Garcia.

Hunter’s eyes were scanning the street, searching for anyone who looked to have taken any sort of interest in their group. No one seemed to care. People on both sides of Tujunga Avenue were just getting on with their lives. Some window-shopping, some entering or exiting one of the many cafes or restaurants on the busy road, and others just enjoying a leisurely walk at the end of a nice Californian autumn day. No one inside the cafe seemed interested in them either.

Hunter had also already surveyed the street for CCTV cameras. There weren’t any. Unlike many cities in Europe, some with as many as one camera for every fourteen people, Los Angeles wasn’t a surveillance-crazy city. There wasn’t a single government or law-enforcement CCTV camera in the entire Tujunga Village stretch.

‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ Anna said. ‘Robert, this is my friend Patricia.’

Hunter shook her hand. ‘Pleasure to meet you.’

Patricia was a little over five foot five, though black high-heeled boots added a couple of inches to her height.

‘The pleasure is mine,’ she replied, sending him a sincere smile.

Hunter handed the car keys back to Garcia. ‘Carlos, you take the car and take Anna and Patricia home,’ he said. ‘I can make my way back to the PAB from here. Though I might stay and look around for a little while.’

‘Look around for what?’ Anna asked. Her eyes settled on Hunter, as she knew her husband wouldn’t offer an explanation.

Hunter’s gaze rested on his partner for only a split second before moving to his wife. ‘Nothing in particular, Anna.’

Anna’s stare remained hard. ‘That’s bullshit.’

‘Look,’ Hunter said. ‘Trust us on this. Carlos will explain everything to you later.’

‘I promise I will,’ Garcia said, squeezing her hand. ‘But right now, we need to go.’