Cross Roads. Fern Michaels

      “I’m going to register us. You two head for the Blue Duck Tavern and keep your eyes peeled. Order me a Slamming Sally. Do I have to be cost-conscious on the room rates?” Maggie asked.

      “Not if you’re booking a room for me. Of course not, Maggie. Just put it on the Post account. We have one here, don’t we?”

      “Actually, we don’t, Annie.”

      “Well, then, open one.”

      “What do you think a Slamming Sally is, Annie?” Myra asked as they entered the dim Blue Duck Tavern, which even smelled like a tavern.

      “Probably something that would knock us on our asses after the first drink. We need to dry out after last night, so we’ll drink ginger ale. We’ll ask for fancy glasses, and ginger ale looks enough like champagne to pass for it. We got it covered, Myra.”

      “I wasn’t exactly planning on spending the night here, Annie. I have to call Charles and tell him where I am. Don’t worry, I won’t share any of the details. I wonder if he has any inkling of what Maggie is talking about,” Myra whispered.

      “Men stick together, you know that, Myra, just the way women stick together. I don’t think you should say anything to him until we have something a little more concrete. I’m finding all of this…very perplexing. I didn’t pick up a thing from Fish during our time together. But now when I think back…it explains an awful lot of things. Pillow talk was always uninformative, but I do know this—he thinks the sun rises and sets on Hank Jellicoe.”

      “Funny you should say that, Annie. Charles thinks the same way. Is this one of those ‘birds of a feather stick together’ kind of things? Or keep your friends close, your enemies closer?”

      “Well, Ted and Joseph Espinosa subscribe to the latter theory. And they were in the trenches, so to speak. I just hate it when I don’t know what’s going on, Myra.”

      “I know, dear. I don’t like it myself.”

      Maggie walked into the Blue Duck just as the waitress was setting down their drinks. She slid room keycards across the table. “We’re all on the same floor in adjoining rooms.”

      The minute the waitress walked back to her station, Maggie said, “I made another reservation on my BlackBerry. A friend will be picking up the key any minute now. He’ll slip it in an envelope and tell the concierge to hold it for me. No one will be the wiser. Did you see anything? Were all these people here when you got here? What are you drinking?” Maggie asked in a rush as she gulped at her Slamming Sally.

      “Champagne,” Myra said.

      “Fibber. That’s ginger ale.”

      Maggie nonchalantly looked around the bar as she sipped at her colorful drink. It was still early in the afternoon, too early for the cocktail crowd; businessmen were still in their meetings while their wives, if they’d been considerate enough to bring them along, were either shopping or sightseeing, while the guests with children were sitting by the pool. “So, no one has come in since you arrived, right?”

      “Six customers. The man at the bar looks like he’s had one too many. If I were the bartender, I would have cut him off two drinks ago. The couple against the wall had a full-course luncheon and are about finished. The two girls opposite the bar could be hookers. I say could be, I’m no authority. The businesswoman in the blue suit has been on her laptop and hasn’t looked up once. I think we’re okay so far,” Annie said.

      “What do we hope to do in here?” Myra asked.

      “Not much but drink. I want to see if anyone followed us. I know the two of you think I’m being paranoid, and I want to prove to you that I am not. Paranoid, that is. Unless someone planted a GPS tracker on your car while you were at the Post or when it was parked in the lot at the park, we should be in the clear. Now, if someone shows up who we think is questionable, we can be assured there is a GPS on the car,” Maggie said, as she kept her eyes fixed on the door leading into the Blue Duck.

      “What is our plan if someone does show up?” Annie asked, her eyes sparkling with excitement. “Do we…ah…take him out? What?”

      Maggie sucked the last of her Slamming Sally and held it up so the waitress could see she wanted a refill. “We play it by ear. We should ask for some munchies, peanuts, or some trail mix. I think better when I’m eating.” Her drink arrived, and, without missing a beat, she continued to talk and suck through her straw at the same time.

      Myra’s stubbornness rose to the fore again when she said, “I’m sorry, girls, but I am just not getting any of this. It’s been so long since our pardons, and so much time has passed, that I’m having trouble believing any kind of…tomfoolery is afoot.”

      Annie’s eyebrows shot upward as her eyes widened. “Did you really say tomfoolery is afoot? My God, Myra, do you realize how that dates you? That sounds like everyone is going to go dancing in the park in their undies. You need to get with the program here and try to look alive and stop fingering those damn pearls. And who might that person be who just entered our domain here?”

      Maggie raised her eyes from her drink to look at the man who walked over to the bar and ordered a beer. “Harmless. Not what we are looking for,” she said around the straw that was still clutched between her teeth.

      “What are we looking for, exactly?” Myra whispered.

      “You’ll know him or her when you see them. If you don’t spot them, then you do not belong in this business,” Maggie said, her gaze going to the door, where a tall man was standing. He removed his aviator glasses, rolled his neck like he was a tired businessman in want of something cool to drink.

      “Bingo!” Annie chortled. “Mr. Cool himself. He’s going to belly up to the bar and order a frosty one. Right, Maggie?”

      “I knew that,” Myra said, just as Maggie nodded in agreement.

      Seven minutes later, a pert redhead in a dove gray pantsuit ambled in, stopped, looked around, then headed for the bar, where she sat down, two stools away from the guy with the aviator glasses.

      “Part of the team,” Myra said, before anyone could say anything. Maggie nodded again as she slurped the last of her drink. She held her glass aloft for the waitress to see that she needed another refill.

      “Start jabbering, ladies. Babies are always a good topic of conversation. I have pictures of Little Jack I don’t think you’ve seen. I think Lizzie has her camera on twenty-four seven, so she doesn’t miss a thing. Little Jack is a cutie for sure.” Maggie’s voice dropped several octaves. “All we need is one more, and my suspicions become fact. The next one will be so ordinary most people wouldn’t give him or her a second thought.” Maggie’s drink arrived as Myra and Annie managed to coo and giggle over the pictures of Little Jack, which wasn’t all that hard to do even though they, too, were watching the doorway out of the corners of their eyes.

      Seventeen minutes later, Maggie’s fourth Slamming Sally arrived just as Myra and Annie finished speculating about Little Jack’s bright blue eyes. The room darkened momentarily as a pudgy woman with three rolls of belly fat, wearing a tank top and carrying two shopping bags, huffed and puffed her way to a table near the far end of the bar. The three women smiled as one.

      “Tissue paper in the shopping bags. She’s just a watcher. She won’t interact at all, unlike those two at the bar.”

      “How do you know this?” Myra asked in a jittery-sounding voice. “What in the world is in those drinks you’re guzzling?”

      “I’m a reporter. I have instincts. I’ve seen it all, Myra. It’s what I used to do and what I miss most in my life. I’ve seen this same stakeout scenario, in one form or another, at least a hundred times. We’re three for three. They don’t know if we’re going to split up or not. Whatever, they have us covered. Outside in the lobby, there are three more just like them. You can count on it. Here’s something else you can count on. None of them belong to any of the famous alphabet-soup